Author Topic: What exactly is Spacemaster for?  (Read 2037 times)

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Offline Foolcow (OP)

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What exactly is Spacemaster for?
« on: March 16, 2012, 09:53:53 PM »
Based on what I've been able to glean from the forums, it is a tool which you can use to modify the universe to your liking to set up scenarios.  But I cannot figure out how it works.

Is it possible to play a normal game for ten years, for example, and then use spacemaster to look at the universe from the perspective of an NPR?  And is it possible to start playing the game as that NPR?
 

Offline Thiosk

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Re: What exactly is Spacemaster for?
« Reply #1 on: March 16, 2012, 10:47:48 PM »
No, what spacemaster lets you do is manipulate details of the empire.  For instance, need 100,000,000 duranium?  SM it in.  The real reason for it is that sometimes things happen that are not expected, liek you set up an order to move 2000 factories but only 300 show up at the destination and 1700 went *poof*.  Just use SM mode to move them around.  Move around bugged task groups, delete and re-add bugged ships, etcetera.

I use it because I don't research racial techs, i SM research all of them (i find ship design tedious when i have such a large delay between conceiving of the ship and actually designing it)

So really, its a tool to give us the player a little more scenario flexibility, built in cheat tools, but more importantly bug correction and convenience correction.
 

Offline xeryon

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Re: What exactly is Spacemaster for?
« Reply #2 on: March 16, 2012, 10:55:56 PM »
...And you can use it to tailor the universe to your liking as well.  A lot of people use it's tools to set up specific scenario games but it is also great for tweaking your game experience.  Not hard enough?  Add a few aggressive computer aliens.  All your surrounding systems barren of minerals and you like your current game and don't want to throw in the towel?  Use SM to make a resource rich system and create a previously "hidden" JP or just add a million minerals to yourself.
 

Offline Nathan_

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Re: What exactly is Spacemaster for?
« Reply #3 on: March 17, 2012, 01:47:36 AM »
SM is also used for hotseat/MP games, or managing and roleplaying multiple empires, and so on. Steve's fiction has examples of him doing this.
 

Offline sloanjh

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Re: What exactly is Spacemaster for?
« Reply #4 on: March 17, 2012, 11:10:58 AM »
Historical Perspective:  Aurora has its roots in an earlier game called Starfire, which was (is) a multi-player, refereed, interstellar war game.  The referee (or "spacemaster") was there to provide fog-of-war - the players gave him their orders, and he managed interaction between the players and the NPRs that they activated.  Think dungeon master in D&D.

Steve wrote a program called Starfire Assistant (SA) that helped SMs (and players) manage the (copious amounts of) book-keeping involved in a game of Starfire.  The players would pass the DB around, adding their orders for the upcoming turn (it was turn-based), then the SM would run the turn.  The SM was also the one responsible for placing the initial player empires.  SM mode was put in to allow the SM to adjust reality the way it needed to be, e.g. during setup or when the program didn't handle some book-keeping properly and required human intervention.  The Rigellian Diary is the campaign write-up of Steve's campaign that drove most of the development of SA.

Even during SA, a lot of people (e.g. Steve in the Rigellian Diary campaign) used it to play solo games, where they wore both the player and SM hats.  So the purpose of the SM password was two-fold: 1)  It kept players in multi-player campaigns from seeing/doing things they shouldn't and 2) in solo campaigns it helped the player to avoid doing things while wearing the player hat that should only be done under the SM hat.

When SA turned into Aurora, the multi-player aspect (mostly) went away.  SM mode stuck around, however, because players still need to act as their own SM and it's useful to have a distinct interface mode so that you can be aware when you're performing SM functions.

John

 

Offline Gabethebaldandbold

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Re: What exactly is Spacemaster for?
« Reply #5 on: April 18, 2017, 03:15:36 PM »
Also it lets you be the dungeon master in space D&D
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Offline MarcAFK

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Re: What exactly is Spacemaster for?
« Reply #6 on: April 18, 2017, 10:40:08 PM »
Most of us use SM mode for the initial setup phase. If you want specific tech already researched, systems designed, warships already available and stationed at a specific place, specific colonies etc.
Sm mode is used for creating new player controlled empire or NPR empires, and you need SM mode to switch between which player controlled empire is active.
And finally even if you don't intend on a complex multi empire scenario you have initial research or fleet build points available which require the use of space master mode to utilize.
Then there is designer mode which steve restricts giving out the password for, which lets you look at or modify every npr, civilian , etc.
You can easily break the game changing that stuff, but it's a valuable tool if you have a long running campaign that gets broken by a bug which could be fixed with a little detective work and creative pruning.
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