| "Ownership" - what does it mean in Stars! Realpolitik? |
Mon, 07 April 2003 16:38  |
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Following a game forum where apparently a race has dropped and the neighbors are bickering about how his territory will be carved up. Claims and counter-claims over who will own what. Well, what does "own" really mean here?
[Aside: And Stars! really doesn't have a supra-legal entity to enforce "laws" defining ownership. We're at a basic dog-eat-dog level here in my opinion.]
How 'bout an example then...
Race A: 20 planet empire and currently not submitting
Race B: 15 planet empire and currently ramping quickly in resources and tech.
Race C: 30 planets - a slower growing empire
For simplicity they all shall have common "borders". I quote borders as well since the concept of borders in essense is part and parcel with defining ownership as a concept. If you're not recognizing property/ownership rights than a recognized border doesn't really exist either.
So, what exactly is "owned" by each empire?
Theory 1: Simple Physical Possession
Race A owns 20 planets
Race B owns 15 planets
Race C owns 30 planets
Complication A: What about unsettled planets? like that one with nasty Rad value 5ly from Race C's homeworld? 
Complication B: Race A is not submitting. Do you expect that all other powers will simply recognize first claim by settlement and pass these juicy planets by? 
So, I think Theory 1 fails any sort of realpolitik test.
[Aside: yes, that was a straw-man argument.]
Theory 2: Ability to Defend an object/area of space
Some progress here. Ownership seems to include some ability to 'prove' a claim via defense. On the other hand, we seem to be in a nebulous position that you only own what your fleet is currently orbiting. This might be accurate from a realpolitik view, but it's not really that useful when looking at claims and counter-claims for territory. By this theory, ownership just changes as the opposing fleets arrive and depart to enforce their claim. Race A owns something until a Race B or Race C fleet arrives to bomb them out.
This sounds more like disputing ownership than actually having it. However, it seems that Stars! 'ownership' is also dependent on how the other races view/react to a race's claims.
Theory 3: A Race's Willingness to Defend an object/area is recognized as viable by another race.
The theory now encompasses relationships betweeen races. Ownership is a consensus - a race recognizes that taking something away/challenging a claim from the other race is not worth the cost at this time and therefore gives the claim validity. "Cost" is a very wide thing - could be a reference to economic, military, or diplomatic efforts and consequences necessary to dispute the claim, or simply deciding that there are better fish to fry elsewhere, for now.
So, back to our example.
Race A (dead) owns their 20 planets until Race B or Race C decide to muster sufficient force to start taking them away. This may involve negotiations between B and C on how to carve this up, and disputing the split depending on capabilities and the other potential costs; i.e. fighting for a planet now might be more costly when a dispute arises in another sector of shared space.
Just food for thought guys. Further comments and elaborations welcome. And this post also somewhat echoes some old Newsgroup posts on a similar subject.
- Kurt
Time flies like an arrow.
Fruit flies like a banana.
- Groucho MarxReport message to a moderator
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| Re: "Ownership" - what does it mean in Stars! Realpolitik? |
Fri, 11 April 2003 08:48  |
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| mazda wrote on Fri, 11 April 2003 07:56 |
I remember reading a newsgroup article from Jason about this
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Drawing from that article to a certain degree surely as I alluded to it as well.
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Take my homeworld for example. Now I say I that I own my homeworld and I don't really care what the concensus of other players in the game is.
Even if I lose my homeworld in the game, it will still be referred to as "my homeworld", even by all the other players.
In the absence of explicit agreements by other players, I think it boils down to the feeling that there is some almost intangible, emotional attachment to certain systems, and it is these systems that you state that you own.
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Well, part of that I suspect is that you'd never fully concede to the other race's hold on that planet; i.e. if (when?) the means came to wrestle control of it back you would do so. Whether said efforts are feasible and good operational strategy might well depend on which side of your brain is being used. Or you might see role-playing concerns creeping into the decision.
I think one of my main reasons for starting this thread is to make players think about this a little bit if possible. There are no real "laws" in a Stars! game beyond those conventions agreed to by the players and specific rules set up (and enforced) by the host. I don't mean cheats and other meta-game concerns -- I mean more along the concepts of territory/property and interactions with other races on the playing field itself.
Even with space lawyers I doubt one can successfully sue another race to get control of a few planets back; or an indemnity for the destruction of a few ships. More effective would probably be convincing a few other races of the justice of your cause and showing up with a large fleet of BBs. The stuff of diplomacy.
- Kurt "speak softly and have a lot of Nubians"
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