Posted by: Randy
« on: March 31, 2009, 02:37:46 PM »I wasn't suggesting to change the database - I know its way too much work at this point. 
Posted by: Steve Walmsley
« on: March 30, 2009, 06:47:11 PM »Quote from: "cjblack"
The problem for me is that I wouldn't benefit from either of those and I can't see me selling the game so there is no real incentive for me to do either. I would rather spend the considerable amount of time it would take to add new features that I would be able to use.Quote from: "mavikfelna"Well, you could look at it as the opportunity to rebuild on a new platform and make it multiplayer friendly.And/or multi-platform so that those of us who use Macs could also play.
Steve
Posted by: cjblack
« on: March 30, 2009, 05:36:47 PM »Quote from: "mavikfelna"
Well, you could look at it as the opportunity to rebuild on a new platform and make it multiplayer friendly.
And/or multi-platform so that those of us who use Macs could also play.
Posted by: mavikfelna
« on: March 30, 2009, 04:03:06 PM »Quote
I don't think it will be a problem with regular compression. The Commonwealth campaign database is only about 40 MB and there is more scope for removing old records. I don't think I have much of a choice anyway. Changing the database would be a massive undertaking and would likely take several months and cause a lot of disruption to the program.
Steve
Well, you could look at it as the opportunity to rebuild on a new platform and make it multiplayer friendly.
--Mav
Posted by: Steve Walmsley
« on: March 30, 2009, 02:54:54 PM »Quote from: "Randy"
Sounds like a great idea, but for a game that size, you might not be all that happy using Access as the database.I don't think it will be a problem with regular compression. The Commonwealth campaign database is only about 40 MB and there is more scope for removing old records. I don't think I have much of a choice anyway. Changing the database would be a massive undertaking and would likely take several months and cause a lot of disruption to the program.
You might want to do some early estimates of size (based on any of your larger campaigns) to get an idea of how big the database will get.
You need to consider number of systems, colonies, ships, designs, events, etc. You have a limit of 2 GB for everything... and with all the new commercial stuff and NPR activity, things will grow at a fairly rapid pace.
It'd really suck to have a great storyline going and then slam into the 2 GB wall.
Steve
Posted by: Randy
« on: March 30, 2009, 11:16:19 AM »Sounds like a great idea, but for a game that size, you might not be all that happy using Access as the database.
You might want to do some early estimates of size (based on any of your larger campaigns) to get an idea of how big the database will get.
You need to consider number of systems, colonies, ships, designs, events, etc. You have a limit of 2 GB for everything... and with all the new commercial stuff and NPR activity, things will grow at a fairly rapid pace.
It'd really suck to have a great storyline going and then slam into the 2 GB wall.
You might want to do some early estimates of size (based on any of your larger campaigns) to get an idea of how big the database will get.
You need to consider number of systems, colonies, ships, designs, events, etc. You have a limit of 2 GB for everything... and with all the new commercial stuff and NPR activity, things will grow at a fairly rapid pace.
It'd really suck to have a great storyline going and then slam into the 2 GB wall.
Posted by: Erik L
« on: March 27, 2009, 04:57:24 PM »Quote from: "SteveAlt"
Quote from: "Erik Luken"There is also the outfit I use for Astra Imperia, Lulu.com. No upfront costs, they publish anything and you get 80% of the post-printing costs. Buy an ISBN for $99 US, and it will show up in amazon.com and the like.That sounds like a great idea. What is the quality like?
On a side note, I recently purchased an ISBN for Astra Imperia, so by this summer in addition to buying a PDF from my site, or hard copy from Lulu, you should be able to find it on Amazon.com and through special orders from a local brick & mortar outlet.
Steve
Quite excellent actually. The hardbound copy I'm holding has sturdy covers, the print quality is excellent (any errors are mine), the cover graphic is rich and vibrant in coloration. The perfect bound I gave away as a con prize, was of similar quality. They both look like something you'd see at a game store published by one of the "big names".
Posted by: SteveAlt
« on: March 27, 2009, 04:19:36 PM »Quote from: "simon"
I tend to interpret open ended stories such as the Rigellian papers as promise rather than loose ends because If you can pull of a campaign on the Rigellian scale and intensity with the techno-strategy blend of Gen Sir Hackette's work, then you should leave strong expansion capacity kind of like Weber's Harrington saga. Why garrote the Fabergé laying goose anyway ? If possible make it international rather than amero-western centric, there is a whole world out there. Hopefully we will see the campaign line branching out under some very talented writers on this forum.What I meant was that each book would have a definite start and end point. I wouldn't just leave it hanging in mid-air. Depending on the success of the undertaking, I hope I would be able to create additional books. In fact, even if it isn't very successful I probably would anyway
P.s Add that special pinch of madnesss that Napoleon Fuchida and Mushashi had, because the very best were always slightly mad.
. I am doing this as much for my own satisfaction as any potential monetary reward. I plan to make it more international in flavour. By having more but smaller starting countries, nations like Brazil, South Africa or Taiwan might play a significant role, depending on how the early game goes. I may well play out the first few years to get several countries into space and only start the book at a point where colonies have already been established. The first few years of any campaign are relatively uneventful, which wouldn't be the best way to get readers interested.
Steve
Posted by: SteveAlt
« on: March 27, 2009, 04:13:35 PM »Quote from: "Erik Luken"
There is also the outfit I use for Astra Imperia, Lulu.com. No upfront costs, they publish anything and you get 80% of the post-printing costs. Buy an ISBN for $99 US, and it will show up in amazon.com and the like.That sounds like a great idea. What is the quality like?
On a side note, I recently purchased an ISBN for Astra Imperia, so by this summer in addition to buying a PDF from my site, or hard copy from Lulu, you should be able to find it on Amazon.com and through special orders from a local brick & mortar outlet.
Steve
Posted by: SteveAlt
« on: March 27, 2009, 04:12:31 PM »Quote from: "rmcrowe"
On the question of finding a publisher, you might try the same one that published "the Last Centurion", to wit: Baen. they seem much more flexible than most traditional publishers. Access at baen.com, and I believe Toni Weiskopf is the who you need to "talk" to.Thanks for the tip and the name! I always thought if I ever wrote a sci-fi novel I would approach Baen. When I look on my bookshelves, its amazing how many titles are Baen. They just seem to pick the writers I like.
Steve
Posted by: SteveAlt
« on: March 27, 2009, 04:10:44 PM »Quote from: "ShadoCat"
Steve,LOL at the T-shirts
Another thought on turning this into a money making venture....
If you can work this into a multi player web server app, you can charge a membership fee for the web server (or have an ad supported web server). Note that in this scenario, playing it on a local DB would still be free.
My preference would be for an ad supported server that would take longer before showing a profit but it would make the game more accessible.
This would also give you a venue from which to sell your other products (books and, maybe, Aurora coffee mugs or t-shirts).
. I think the fiction would be appealing to a wider audience. They wouldn't have to be able to play the game to read it and reading it might actually bring them into the game.Steve
Posted by: SteveAlt
« on: March 27, 2009, 04:05:40 PM »Quote from: "ShadoCat"
Steve,I can get the figures for GDP, etc from Wiki or some other sources. The dilemma is whether to use the nominal GDP figures or the PPP figures. Nominal GDP is based on the US dollar equivalent of the national product whereas PPP is based on internal purchasing power for that GDP. In other words and assuming equal tech, while the Chinese nomimal GDP might buy a dozen US destroyers, it might buy 30 equivalent Chinese destroyers because in China they are cheaper to build due to lower manpower and raw material costs. So is the measure of economic power what you could buy from someone else in US dollars, or what you could build internally for the same cost.
I'm an economist by training but not by practice. My area is commercial funding.
I'm afraid that I don't spend enough time paying attention to with world scene to know the current GNPs, etc. of the nations. Though I could probably google it as fast as anyone.
Where I might help is in the brainstorming of how the economies and the business world will react to different changes.
I can also help with figuring out how the mass populations and political entities will react to changes but there are likely others on this list who are more qualified in this area.
For example, using the figures of the International Monetary Fund, the top twelve countries by nominal GDP are:
Code: [Select]
(European Union 16,905,620)
1 United States 13,840,000
2 Japan 4,381,576
3 Germany 3,320,913
4 China (PRC) 3,280,224
5 United Kingdom 2,804,437
6 France 2,593,779
7 Italy 2,104,666
8 Spain 1,439,983
9 Canada 1,436,086
10 Brazil 1,313,590
11 Russia 1,289,535
12 India 1,150,695Using the PPP Method they are as follow:Code: [Select]
(European Union 14,712,369)
1 United States 13,843,825
2 People's Republic of China 7,034,8381
3 Japan 4,292,198
4 India 2,996,588
5 Germany 2,812,255
6 United Kingdom 2,167,837
7 Russia 2,089,607
8 France 2,067,707
9 Brazil 1,837,149
10 Italy 1,787,897
11 Mexico 1,486,302
12 Spain 1,351,521As you can see, while it doesn't make much difference for the US or the UK, it makes a huge difference for countries like India, Russia or ChinaSteve
Posted by: simon
« on: March 27, 2009, 01:43:56 PM »I tend to interpret open ended stories such as the Rigellian papers as promise rather than loose ends because If you can pull of a campaign on the Rigellian scale and intensity with the techno-strategy blend of Gen Sir Hackette's work, then you should leave strong expansion capacity kind of like Weber's Harrington saga. Why garrote the Fabergé laying goose anyway ? If possible make it international rather than amero-western centric, there is a whole world out there. Hopefully we will see the campaign line branching out under some very talented writers on this forum.
P.s Add that special pinch of madnesss that Napoleon Fuchida and Mushashi had, because the very best were always slightly mad.
P.s Add that special pinch of madnesss that Napoleon Fuchida and Mushashi had, because the very best were always slightly mad.
Posted by: Charlie Beeler
« on: March 26, 2009, 07:10:40 AM »Quote from: "rmcrowe"
On the question of finding a publisher, you might try the same one that published "the Last Centurion", to wit: Baen. they seem much more flexible than most traditional publishers. Access at baen.com, and I believe Toni Weiskopf is the who you need to "talk" to.
robert
IIRC Baen's 'slush pile' is in the Bar (Baen's forum) these days. Complete with guidelines and a seperate section for comments.
Posted by: Erik L
« on: March 25, 2009, 06:54:43 PM »There is also the outfit I use for Astra Imperia, Lulu.com. No upfront costs, they publish anything and you get 80% of the post-printing costs. Buy an ISBN for $99 US, and it will show up in amazon.com and the like.
On a side note, I recently purchased an ISBN for Astra Imperia, so by this summer in addition to buying a PDF from my site, or hard copy from Lulu, you should be able to find it on Amazon.com and through special orders from a local brick & mortar outlet.
On a side note, I recently purchased an ISBN for Astra Imperia, so by this summer in addition to buying a PDF from my site, or hard copy from Lulu, you should be able to find it on Amazon.com and through special orders from a local brick & mortar outlet.
