Posted by: dsedrez
« on: November 17, 2021, 02:25:28 PM »Hi! I'm setting up a scenario, and reading about features I'm trying to address, and I've stumbled upon this thread. I'd like to add a couple of things to the discussion, that may help in improving the fun of mid-to-late game even in the current version.
First, Steve is going to fix it in the v. 1. 14 code, but currently, in 1. 13, any randomly-generated NPR in the middle of the game always use the default research rate to calculate its research points. That means that if you've reduced the rate (to 15% or even 10% as I'm going to try) that means the new NPR most likely will get a massive research advantage over the player races, even accounting for all the player advantages. Unless, of course, it's so late in the game that the player's advantage is already massive, regardless of the tech rate, and those other advantages (cloaking etc), that the NPR doesn't know how to use effectively, are now in the player's hands. The recommendation, therefore, is to set up a reduced research rate from the start, that will result in increased advantages to the random NPRs.
Second, I've found you can manually generate the NPR in a place of your choosing, without the problems resulting from taking over control of the NPR (BD editing etc). In the beginning, start with 0 NPRs, and be sure to set the chance of NPR generating other NPRs to 0. Create a race specifically to set up the game, but instead of exploring the whole universe with it, simply go to SM mode, and "Create System". If it's real stars, you can choose the system you want, at a given distance from Sol, number of stellar components etc. Note that this new system is *not* yet connected to Sol, therefore there'll still be an element of surprise to when and how the new NPR will meet you. Choose a planet, terraform it, give it all the minerals you want etc. Be sure to also put a gas giant in the system: the NPRs love to use harvesters for fuel.
Then you create the NPR, choosing any advantages to give it in terms of pop, facilities etc, but be sure to click the "Non-player race" checkbox. You can even choose whether it's xenophobic and other characteristics, or simply go with what was rolled. And you can give it the system already surveyed, thus accelerating its expansion. Maybe even adding more jump points, and exploring ahead to set up more minerals, gas planets, neutral colonies etc. . .
Your set-up race can always go back to the NPR system to check up on things, and I plan to use this to learn how the NPR evolves, and how I might be able to "help" it later on.
An added suggestion is that you can "seed" the new system with neutral "colonies" of the same race (it can be chosen from the pull-down menu) in the system, to be annexed by the new NPR. I don't know if this works as intended, but I'm going to try in my new scenario. By being neutral, they're unarmed, so they should be easy pickings. Though I'm not sure if the AI will try to conquer them. If you give these new colonies some facilities (no shipyards, but mines certainly), they'll end up being "inherited" by the race if/when it conquers them.
Another advantage is that you can do this at *any* point in the game, creating more NPRs to challenge yourself. You don't know how it'll be set up and where you'll meet them. I hope this will be enough to keep the game interesting much farther into the game.
I hope this helps. When my scenario is ready I intend to try writing an AAR for it, maybe. I have a whole background story for it :)
[edit] I forgot to add, but when creating the game, set both NPR generation chances to 0, so you don't accidentally create a NPR just by creating the system. . . Once the game is set up, you can choose to allow NPR random generation by the player races, if you wish.
First, Steve is going to fix it in the v. 1. 14 code, but currently, in 1. 13, any randomly-generated NPR in the middle of the game always use the default research rate to calculate its research points. That means that if you've reduced the rate (to 15% or even 10% as I'm going to try) that means the new NPR most likely will get a massive research advantage over the player races, even accounting for all the player advantages. Unless, of course, it's so late in the game that the player's advantage is already massive, regardless of the tech rate, and those other advantages (cloaking etc), that the NPR doesn't know how to use effectively, are now in the player's hands. The recommendation, therefore, is to set up a reduced research rate from the start, that will result in increased advantages to the random NPRs.
Second, I've found you can manually generate the NPR in a place of your choosing, without the problems resulting from taking over control of the NPR (BD editing etc). In the beginning, start with 0 NPRs, and be sure to set the chance of NPR generating other NPRs to 0. Create a race specifically to set up the game, but instead of exploring the whole universe with it, simply go to SM mode, and "Create System". If it's real stars, you can choose the system you want, at a given distance from Sol, number of stellar components etc. Note that this new system is *not* yet connected to Sol, therefore there'll still be an element of surprise to when and how the new NPR will meet you. Choose a planet, terraform it, give it all the minerals you want etc. Be sure to also put a gas giant in the system: the NPRs love to use harvesters for fuel.
Then you create the NPR, choosing any advantages to give it in terms of pop, facilities etc, but be sure to click the "Non-player race" checkbox. You can even choose whether it's xenophobic and other characteristics, or simply go with what was rolled. And you can give it the system already surveyed, thus accelerating its expansion. Maybe even adding more jump points, and exploring ahead to set up more minerals, gas planets, neutral colonies etc. . .
Your set-up race can always go back to the NPR system to check up on things, and I plan to use this to learn how the NPR evolves, and how I might be able to "help" it later on.
An added suggestion is that you can "seed" the new system with neutral "colonies" of the same race (it can be chosen from the pull-down menu) in the system, to be annexed by the new NPR. I don't know if this works as intended, but I'm going to try in my new scenario. By being neutral, they're unarmed, so they should be easy pickings. Though I'm not sure if the AI will try to conquer them. If you give these new colonies some facilities (no shipyards, but mines certainly), they'll end up being "inherited" by the race if/when it conquers them.
Another advantage is that you can do this at *any* point in the game, creating more NPRs to challenge yourself. You don't know how it'll be set up and where you'll meet them. I hope this will be enough to keep the game interesting much farther into the game.
I hope this helps. When my scenario is ready I intend to try writing an AAR for it, maybe. I have a whole background story for it :)
[edit] I forgot to add, but when creating the game, set both NPR generation chances to 0, so you don't accidentally create a NPR just by creating the system. . . Once the game is set up, you can choose to allow NPR random generation by the player races, if you wish.