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Thoughts on gameplay

Posted: Fri Nov 15, 2013 12:16 pm
by Tafoid
There are many different ways to play a game, especially one like Stellar Emperor. Traditionally, the tactics of destroy and conquer is entertaining, compelling and generally draws you in. Each planet or ship in your ownership that is attacked or conquered can feel very much like a personal possession which entices retaliation and revenge. It is a natural response and it's healthy too for most people playing. What might not be healthy is letting it interfere or distract you other things you should be doing or other out of game responsibilities you might have which are being sacrificed for a game. Maybe we all know what that means to lessor or greater extents..

Styles of Play

Just as there is the standard "4X"- eXplore, eXpand, eXploit, and eXterminate" intent of the game, there are other ways to enjoy this game. Each "X" has a certain style of play which can be done exclusively and still allow a player to be successful in this game. Some come for discovery and finding that prefect planet on reset night, others expect to own those large planets later in the war. Some love the fun of politics, making (and breaking) of treaties, and even others enjoy as a primary focus ship to ship combat exclusively. This started out to be proposal or discussion on different ways to approach the game and has turned more into an essay. I'm sorry about that. Each person, in the end, can play the game however he or she chooses. It is up to them to defend through words or actions to prepare for any consequences which may befall them.

A different approach

My main idea comes from a way of playing that was tried back on Gamestorm, War #41 (A one week war (800:1)). In that war I ran a team consisting of very few players unfortunately I only remember 3 people from the roster (myself, Spook and Talon). As a team, we claimed sovereignty on a specific area of space. In this particular instance, we chose the upper right corner (3x3) or 9 provinces of the original 100 Province map as our land. With our ships we physically protected its borders and we busted anyone we found who might have established bases inside our zone. We flew.. a lot. The Spook and I devoted most of our waking days and Talon when he had the ability at the time to actively fly along our borders and ward off potential intruders. We had our share of planetary attacks as well as cleaning our sovereign land out daily but we rarely went beyond our land in space. Being vocal and assertive about it made it attractive to the enemy and a very fun time and there were not many times where there was absolutely nothing to do. It was a toil but at the same time.. very satisfying. We ended up winning that war as a team, myself getting President and Spook getting Warlord against the much larger 2nd place team - mostly due to the nearly constant combat and being able to retain our planets at all times throughout the war with the active patrols.

My question is - can it work in the current game? Maybe. There is a time issue (1 week vs. 4 weeks ) which would require a huge dedication and the galaxy is smaller which may make it tricky to claim an area for a full team which does not include an IMP - which I would consider a neutral area. You could use a province line outside of your claimed area as the same but with only 49 provinces you are limited as far as room for both.

Anyone have thoughts on this style or can suggest other interesting approaches to the game?

Re: Thoughts on gameplay

Posted: Sat Nov 16, 2013 2:02 pm
by Yoda
Greetings, Tafoid -
First of all, your posting is an excellent essay - absolutely no need to be sorry about posting it. It is interesting, insightful, and thought-provoking.

You astutely and accurately point out the tremendous attraction of Stellar Emperor(SE): that there are many ways to play and enjoy the game. As is well known, Planetary Management(PM) is and has been the passion which calls me (Yoda) to SE. PM itself within SE also has so many different paths - no one way to accomplish the varying goals of growth, hydro vs ag, combat readiness, defense and so on; perhaps there are as many ways as there are planets with varying habs and metal percentages.

Your proposal sounds like an idea that merits some sort of an invitational tournament. As you noted, the time constraint issues we all are faced with to one extent or another, could be detrimental to the approach you propose. I believe you might need to line up teams beforehand and have a dedicated galaxy for the event. Perhaps it is premature at this point with the still relatively small (albeit growing) SE player base. Of course, as in all things SE, Caleb's point of view and opinion are paramount.

I know I am excited for this BW3 as it stands - for the first time since last millennium when I participated a few times with Eagle Squadron, DEFF, OIS, THO, etc, before setting up PMA, I have joined the very appropriately named alliance Part Time Pilots. For some reason, even though completely retired (many thanks to those of you who work for a living for my Social Security payment which puts Cheerios on the table) time to play is hard to come by. I recall being concerned last century with Hetulik's time commitments to SE - thought I might need to attach a McDonalds application to his college diploma.

As far as other interesting approaches, varying war lengths and amount of available planets are always possible options. The old Gamestorm community with it's large player base permitted multiple alliances and changing loyalties throughout the war; probably growing the amount of players is the best thing to be done to improve SE. Perhaps 3 or 4 max alliance members...

Thanks again, Tafoid, for your thoughts. I enjoyed replying. Yoda

Re: Thoughts on gameplay

Posted: Sun Dec 08, 2013 2:10 pm
by Yoda
Greetings,

As this BW3 is coming to it's merciful end this Thursday, had some additional thoughts; thanks to Tafoid for starting this thread.

First, on a personal level, this is the first war since early 1999 where I have been even semi-active on an alliance at war. Back last century, time constraints kept my contribution pretty much limited to Planetary Management; the team (Eagle Squadron, for example) protected Yoda's planets, and if they were attacked, the perpetrator(s) suffered Hetulik's quick and certain retribution. This war, my combat skills have improved! They have risen from non-existent to the level of very, very poor. This can be attested to by a brief study of NF ship kill listings, where the number 139270 has a prominent place. But, I have learned a lot, thanks to my team, but, most importantly, I have enjoyed the comradeship of my teammates, old and new.

Next, on a general level, I am a bit sad about the level of acrimony that was evidenced in this war. It is just a game - there is no prize money involved - nobody dies (except in space, where no one can hear you scream).

Last, some odd further thoughts on approaches to gameplay. I have no idea as to the viability of any of these ramblings; I leave that to the expertise of Caleb, whose contribution to SE can not be calculated nor can gratitude for his efforts ever be properly acknowledged.

-2 or 3 member teams (until player base expands)
-Variable Imperial Attacks, instead of open attacks all war, or no attacks allowed at all. The times Imp's are open for attack could be posted. Think of the gun kills - and the A-channel cries of "Die Imperial Dogs". And teams jockeying for the opportunity to attack Imps and prevent others from attacking them.
-Limit provinces that can be settled in first 24/48 hours to 1 or 2, perhaps by assigning them, or claiming them on game entry. Then, after the initial period, teams/individuals would work to upgrade their weaker planets (at the expense of others) and defend their good ones. (the seed for this thought comes from Tafoid's original territory post)
-Permit settling of only 3 or 4 planets the first 24 hours. Then, the balance could be settled after that period. Think of the scramble at 9:30pm on Saturday, after a day of scouting.

Again, have no idea if any of these musings have any merit, just happy to be able to participate in the SE community. Yoda

Re: Thoughts on gameplay

Posted: Wed Dec 11, 2013 10:01 am
by Cossid
ltd100 wrote:2 or 3 member teams (until player base expands)
This won't happen because it causes a very very fast imbalance, as it is quite easy for one team to dominate flight time.
ltd100 wrote:Variable Imperial Attacks, instead of open attacks all war, or no attacks allowed at all. The times Imp's are open for attack could be posted. Think of the gun kills - and the A-channel cries of "Die Imperial Dogs". And teams jockeying for the opportunity to attack Imps and prevent others from attacking them.
There is no point for variance here as it's not even remotely viable to take an imp before the end of the second week. After that, it's only viable if the resources become lop-sided. I am making efforts to prevent that and keep wars more even when evenly matched.
ltd100 wrote:Limit provinces that can be settled in first 24/48 hours to 1 or 2, perhaps by assigning them, or claiming them on game entry. Then, after the initial period, teams/individuals would work to upgrade their weaker planets (at the expense of others) and defend their good ones. (the seed for this thought comes from Tafoid's original territory post)
This detracts from some of the freedoms of the game, which makes rules unnecessarily complex or confusing. I don't like the idea of restricting provinces.
ltd100 wrote:Permit settling of only 3 or 4 planets the first 24 hours. Then, the balance could be settled after that period. Think of the scramble at 9:30pm on Saturday, after a day of scouting.
I do like the concept of staggering establishment of planets, as it would give a better distribution of high stat planets. Unfortunately, this could seriously detract from early combat for players establishing quick bases to repair upon. But at the same time this could lead to other balance issues. I will ponder this thought further.



Thanks for the feedback, and feel free to counter anything I've said.

Re: Thoughts on gameplay

Posted: Fri Dec 13, 2013 10:44 am
by Yoda
Greetings, Caleb,
I, of course, bow to your SE wisdom - I am even honored you took the time to consider my babblings at all. I do appreciate your comments, and will not hesitate to put forth any other dumb ideas I might come up with, as I still enjoy all aspects of SE. Yoda

Re: Thoughts on gameplay

Posted: Fri Dec 13, 2013 12:24 pm
by Cossid
ltd100 wrote:Greetings, Caleb,
I, of course, bow to your SE wisdom - I am even honored you took the time to consider my babblings at all. I do appreciate your comments, and will not hesitate to put forth any other dumb ideas I might come up with, as I still enjoy all aspects do SE. Yoda
I love all ideas, but I always try to maintain a strong bias towards balance. No harm has every come from an idea being brought up and rejected, but loss can come when ideas are never presented in the first place.

Re: Thoughts on gameplay

Posted: Tue Dec 17, 2013 3:19 pm
by Yoda
Dear Caleb,
In the spirit of your previous remark:

"No harm has every come from an idea being brought up and rejected, but loss can come when ideas are never presented in the first place."

The following thoughts are tweaks to SE that might change certain dynamics of game play. I don't propose these as across the board every war alterations, but to add some variety to a war from time to time. I suspect they would be part of the parameters outlined in the Galaxy Information screen.

- This thought came to me as I watch for my Imperial Loan on various planets to be paid off, and make the adjustments to mining accordingly. Make the loan easier (or harder to pay off).

- Adjust starting planet population, with proportional labor capacities - for example - start with 10K population and 1K Shipyards and so on. (or even 50K - people would really be at each other's throats early!)

Appreciate your openness to input. Thanks, Yoda

Re: Thoughts on gameplay

Posted: Wed Dec 18, 2013 1:27 pm
by Cossid
Yoda wrote:This thought came to me as I watch for my Imperial Loan on various planets to be paid off, and make the adjustments to mining accordingly. Make the loan easier (or harder to pay off).
The loan currently is tied to very specific values, and I would prefer to keep them as a meaningful value, so changing them randomly would not work very well. It appears GS:SE did this in later versions, but there is not enough data to show how it was accomplished.
Yoda wrote:Adjust starting planet population, with proportional labor capacities - for example - start with 10K population and 1K Shipyards and so on. (or even 50K - people would really be at each other's throats early!)
This type of thing is certainly something that could happen in the future. Starting at 10/15/25/50k are all viable, depending on the war length. Part of the issue with things happening too soon though, is it changes things like the amount of time a team has to pull together and organize (many teams don't seem to forum until after opening night). Also scouting become much more of a pressure point. Personally, I like the delay at the beginning as it gives a bit more time for combat it be a worry-free venture, and early combat often leads to more intense wars, or changes the alliances intentions earlier on.

So, in the future, starting size and caps will be experimented with, but nothing in the near future.