XENOPHOBE - New Game |
Sun, 05 December 2004 14:04 |
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The_Crowd | | Petty Officer 2nd Class | Messages: 55
Registered: September 2003 Location: Vancouver, WA. USA | |
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They are all freaks and abbherations. Not a single race in your universe is 'normal'. Strange and disgusting beings covered in crystalline skin, coated in slime or a myriad other grotesque traits that only prove to you and your people that somehow the universe has become infested with the lowest forms of vermin. What's worse is that they are spreading. If something isn't done soon, there won't be a clean planet left in the galaxy for your beautiful race to live on. Ohh it's true that some of these THINGS dwell on planets which are too hot or large for you, but vermin always adapt. They won't stay on those inhospitable planets for long. And they send out their disgusting offspring in vessels that are themselves perverse in form. Just having to view them on your scanners is enough to twist up your stomach.
Something must be done.
Your people are going hunting. Your plan is to exterminate one disgusting race at a time so that they don't reinfest any of the galaxy. And when that one is finally wiped out and the solar winds are a little cleaner, then you will target another and purge it from the universe as well. Eventually the stars will be freed of the horrid creatures plaguing it and your people can rest knowing that all of the planets in the universe will be as beautiful as your own home world....
Game Objective
To eliminate all of the other races one at a time.
Game Parameters and Rules:
All PRTs except CA are allowed for race design.
The game will be played on a Medium - Normal map with Distant starting positions. If we get less than 12 players, then it will be Medium - Sparse instead. Accelerated BBS play will be enabled.
Chaff is allowed, but the Split Fleet defense is not.
There will be NO ALLIANCES OR NAPS allowed!
Your objective is to destroy one race at a time until all of the others are vanquished, however this must be done in a specific order. The first race you encounter will be your first target and all other races must be dealt with in the order in which they are discovered. You may not attack any other race until your current target is completely vanquished (No worlds left). To 'encounter' is to discover an occupied world or see an enemy vessel on your scanners. This order must be followed regardless of who may be attacking you. You may defend yourself of course, but you may not attack another races' worlds or fleets unless the world is assaulted accidently (for example, they just pop-dropped the world you were about to attack and you were unaware of it) or if the fleet is within 100 LY of one of your occupied worlds and OBVIOUSLY heading towards it.
Although it spoils the element of surprise, there will be an attack order list maintained in the Host Notes section on autohost. To keep it current, every time a player encounters another for the first time, they will send a Stars! message with the player number of the spotted race to everyone. The host will collect that information and update the Host Notes area as needed. Obviously this will change as races are eliminated as well as discovered.
Race files are due on or before christmas day and should be sent to the email address posted below. The first turn will process January first. After that, turns will be generated at 0400 GMT sunday through thursday for the first 30 years and then we will review. First come, first served but preference will be given to players currently playing in 'The Core'.
Any skill level will be accepted but novice players should consider this game to be a 'learning opportunity' only!
The game will be played using the J patch and run on AutoHost.
Questions should be directed to me here or else to my email address. jaysmith@xprt.net
Thanks all!
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Re: XENOPHOBE - New Game |
Sun, 05 December 2004 14:26 |
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Is any/all of the following allowed:
a) intentional tech trading
b) setting other race to friend
c) allowing other race to use ones stargates, get refueled
d) ship trading, mineral trading, etc.
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Re: XENOPHOBE - New Game |
Sun, 05 December 2004 18:15 |
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If I see 2 races at the same time, what happens?
(1) I can attack both?
(2) I get to choose my order or preference?
If 2 races see me first - Both of them can attack me?
If no race sees me first - No one is allowed to attack me?
I should set all players to enemy? and am I allowed to have a treaty with any of the other players - like exchanging info etc?
I'll have my race file to you in the next week. Sounds like fun.
Cheers,
Pratap
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Re: XENOPHOBE - New Game |
Sun, 05 December 2004 21:32 |
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Fun game idea, but - how are you going to enforce aggression? What if two players meet each other first, then start to tech trade by lightly 'attacking' or pop dropping?
Here's a potential solution you might like:
Victory condition:
5 points gained if you manage to conquer your current target's homeworld (and keep it for say, 5 turns.)
2 points gained if you manage to conquer your current attacker's homeworld (and keep it for say, 5 turns.)
1 point gained if you manage to conquer any other player's homeworld (and keep it for say, 5 turns.)
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Re: XENOPHOBE - New Game |
Sun, 05 December 2004 23:43 |
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Quote: |
I think that change the requirement of total destruction to requirement of capturing the HW and this game is quite playable.
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Some race designs can easily afford to lose their HW. I can see the diplomacy: 'Ok, you are beating me up but X is beating you up as well. How about I let you take my HW, in return quit attacks on the rest. Then you can take on X while I focus on my target'.
I agree with what you say on SS, and believe this game would see lots more SS than usual. Not sure how to handle situation.
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Re: XENOPHOBE - New Game |
Mon, 06 December 2004 01:14 |
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Easily fixed - I'd add a proviso that if your HW is under another's control for 5 turns then your race is considered dead, and stops submitting turns --- if you are going to play a brutal game like this, might as well make it extra lethal
[Updated on: Mon, 06 December 2004 01:18] Report message to a moderator
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Re: XENOPHOBE - New Game |
Tue, 07 December 2004 10:56 |
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The_Crowd | | Petty Officer 2nd Class | Messages: 55
Registered: September 2003 Location: Vancouver, WA. USA | |
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Okay, round two of response.
Regarding the changing of the the terms of the game to 'Take Homeworld'...Would you settle for killing just the cockroaches in your kitchen when your home is full of them? I don't think so.
Regarding scoring. I don't see a reason to do this. It's not going to speed up the game and it's not going to make bookkeeping any easier. In fact, it will do just the opposite. If you're thinking of wanting this to curb cheating, all I have to say is, How Is That Going To Help? Cheaters will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the...umm...AH law. I know that Ron is tough on cheaters and even tougher on repeat offenders.
Minefields are hardly an issue. They affect everyone regardless of whether they are exploding or not. However, the dropping of minefields around worlds occupied by someone other than yourself and your current target is unacceptable.
If you've lost a world to someone other than your primary target, then you've lost it. I suggest that you defend your worlds appropriately.
AR colonizers may not stay over an occupied world (other than their primary targets) for more than one year.
Regarding Mario's post concerning one's ability to grow without interferance...First off, the bigger your empire gets the greater the chances of being spotted. People are going to be scouting worlds and even SS can't avoid that. Secondly, yes it would suck to have two players working against you simultaniously. I hope it doesn't happen, but it's a brutal universe out there. ;c)
This is really simple, people.
1. You have one and ONLY one player you're allowed to be intentionally aggressive towards at any given point in the game. If it's not your primary target, you can't do it! If it's an 'accident' like when two fleets hit the same world simultaniously, then it's No Big Deal.
2. You can't get or provide assistance to any other player in any way.
3. You don't have to worry about bookkeeping because it's all going to be done for you - you just need to say to all using the Stars! messaging who it is when you see a race for the first time.
Could someone cheat? Of course, but think for a moment what that would entail. Trying to set something up pre-game would be tough at best considering the nature of the game. And are you REALLY going to ASK your neighbor whom you've just spotted to cheat with you and risk getting kicked out of the game or worse, have your cheating nature posted here and never get another AH match again?
The_Crowd
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Re: XENOPHOBE - New Game |
Tue, 07 December 2004 23:11 |
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I forsee issues.
What if my targer has 1 planet at the other end of the galaxy through a wormhole or whatever? Should I be forced to just defend myself trying to find that one planet of my current target?
Can we change the rule so that a player can move to his next target once his score is 100% more than his current target? or 150% and that player leaves the game at this stage.
Hunting down 1 planet means we are going to play this game for a loong time and people will start dropping out.
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Re: XENOPHOBE - New Game |
Wed, 08 December 2004 01:42 |
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MarioHebert | | Crewman 3rd Class | Messages: 8
Registered: March 2004 Location: Armpit of the Universe/Re... | |
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Minefields and other points are an issue to discuss before game because it could very well be an issue during game, however simple people might think the rules are because ambiguities are there; they can become obstacles on playing the game.
* If races are in close proximity to each other and minefields are put up, is minesweeping permissable? When is it not permissable (the question might seem absurd, but scouting with armed ships is done and race might not have pen scanner; frieghters and other ships will want to travel back and forth between planets and the neutral race is in the middle of a heavily travelled route, will sweeping to 1ly of the minefield to clear the route be okay)?
* An exploding minefield might be an issue if its used offensively in attacking a target planet/ships but other neutral planets/ships are nearby that might damage/destroy ships (i.e. you go after the target's last planet and its deep within a neutral players space).
Sprocket brings up a nice point: If your remote mining a planet, is it yours and not open for colonization from neutral players?
Regarding my post about growing your empire: everyone should be able to spot their first enemy within ten turns (if you choose not to scout, then I guess you just wait until you get a visitor). If you luck out on not being targetted first (being targetted second or after is not something to worry about initially)by the remaining races, you have a free reign of expanding up until a race dies (and I'm figuring that won't happen too quickly), and then you might or might not be the target for the recently victorious race. I, personally, have no problem with this. But it is something that can seriously offset the game.
I'm assuming there will be an outside observor who will monitor the game? This is not saying that people will cheat, but people can miss things (especially finding a new race's planet, ship, mineral packet, or minefield when their mind is occupied on something else like how to deal with their new found target, economy, etc.) or forget. A monitor would be able to notify everyone when they've been spotted (this would be a lot of work for someone to do - I would pity the guy who would want tod o that). However, I believe everyone has good intentions when entering these games and would try their best to keep to the rules. But a stupid mistake could offset the game (and people may [and rightly so] cry foul). Will there be no leeway on some (or all) rules which might result in people being suspended/banned from the game?
Is there anything wrong with the idea of setting everyone to Neutral (except for the target which turns to Enemy status) and changing battle plans to attack Enemy only to enforce nonengagement/bombing of neutral races? This would seem to be keeping to the heart of the game when your only allowed to attack your enemy, but allowed to defend when your the victim of anihilation?
Here's an interesting idea: what if your allowed to attack the person who has targetted you for destruction, but aren't allowed to bomb or mass packet his planets until he comes up on the list for genocidal mayhem? The problem is not defending well when being attacked. The problem is that its a war of attrition against the defender and all he can do is stay at his planets and hope he can last forever against attacks (which he probably won't, expecially when starbases are targetted and in the position of gang-ups). The offensive player is immune from having his worlds attacked from the defender (he won't have to worry about spending resources in building starbases to build his armada while the defender will more than surely will [and if the attacker is not targetted for extermination he has a VERY big bonus for him], decreasing his ability to build ships to defend). I think my idea is a very good compromise that gives some unfortunate players a chance at survival a bit longer and to counter those players who are not targetted for extermination at the beginning of the game. You know that old crappy saying "...
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He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages whose known rule of warfare is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.
A paragraph in the Declaration of Independence charging the King with inciting slave rebellion and Indian attacks
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Re: XENOPHOBE - New Game |
Wed, 08 December 2004 19:08 |
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This is why I was suggesting applying a scoring system based on homeworld kills, which could be heavily weighted towards killing your target. This means you can make the game behave in the intended way, without having to apply artificial and ambiguous rules to limit peoples behavior. If I can get an equal amout of points by killing my target as I could by killing 5 other players, then you can assume that I'm not going to waste much resources combating the 5.
If people think HW kills are not enough to count as a successfull player kill, then add a score condition to this as well:
Victory condition:
5 points for Player Kill of target
2 points for Player Kill of attacker
1 point for Player Kill of any other player
Player Kill = control player's HW for 5 consecutive turns AND have 100% higher score over that player. On a successful player kill then that player is banned from uploading further turns and is removed from everybodies' target lists.
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Re: XENOPHOBE - New Game |
Fri, 10 December 2004 03:20 |
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Sirak | | Crewman 2nd Class | Messages: 19
Registered: November 2004 | |
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In my opinion games which have such complicated game terms will either never start or never finish! What people really want are games like Plain Vanilla which were filled in no time and lot of players wanted to join.
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Re: XENOPHOBE - New Game |
Sun, 12 December 2004 16:09 |
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sprocket | | Chief Warrant Officer 1 | Messages: 138
Registered: November 2002 Location: Illinois US | |
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Can a remote mining planet be defended by warships with orders to attack everthing as a matter of DEFENSE, otherwise RM is worthless. Also, what if a scout slips thru an early wormhole gets spotted first by a player but they are too remote from each other to wage war? Maybe disallow wormhole travel until enemy is determined.
[Updated on: Sun, 12 December 2004 21:37]
Dieter of sprocketsReport message to a moderator
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Re: XENOPHOBE - New Game |
Wed, 15 December 2004 18:42 |
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The_Crowd | | Petty Officer 2nd Class | Messages: 55
Registered: September 2003 Location: Vancouver, WA. USA | |
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Yes, parking warfleets over a world to protect your remote miners is perfectly acceptable. This is PASSIVE, so not in voilation of the rules.
Hmm.. Good point about the wormholes. We will have to disallow wormhole travel until every player has acquired at least one target.
Thanks!
[Updated on: Wed, 15 December 2004 18:44] Report message to a moderator
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