Posted by: Steve Walmsley
« on: May 15, 2009, 07:18:21 PM »Quote from: "sloanjh"
I've picked up life pods from 4 ships now. The log message says they've been interrogated, but I'm yet to get any info. Am I doing something wrong, or is the chance of gleaning info just small?Picking up life pods will add espionage points, just like from Espionage teams. When you have enough you will get some information, although it may not always be tech-related.
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2) Really like the idea of the Xenophobia acting as a "current" that degrades relationships, and is offset by diplomacy. Should there be an offset though (e.g. 20-Xenophobia instead of -Xenopobia), so that low Xenophobia races want to be friends with everyone?Interesting idea. if I did this though I would probably reduce the effect of diplomacy teams to avoid it being too easy to make friends, so it may be a case of swings and roundabouts.
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3) Do I have a way to modify my Empire's opinion of others, or can I be forced by the voters/subjects into an unwise war that I don't really want.You can pick any treaty within the range supported by the political modifier. At the moment, you aren't forced to change the treaties if the modifier drops (although NPRs will change) but bear in mind all of the treaties you can grant (except probably trade) benefit the other race more than you. The main concern will be to avoid other Empires attacking because their opinion of you has dropped too low.
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4) Have you considered generalizing this to represent internal strife within an empire, either between races or even between "rim" and "core" worlds of the same race? Political state could have an effect, and if relations get bad enough it could trigger a civil war. A governor's diplomacy rating could make relations better.A good idea, although it isn't something I will add to the next version as I want to make sure the whole concept works first
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5) Have you thought about putting an offset into the Xenophobia that's specific for dealing with a particular race? In other words, my base Xenophobia might be 57, but it might be modified by a +20 for Race A (because their slimy skin is just sooooooo icky) to 77 and by -68 for Race B (because they look just like fuzzy bunnies!!!) to -11, which moves things in the direction of friendship if left alone. If this idea went in, then the offset idea in #2 probably wouldn't be needed.I amn considering a random element of some sort that could cause a shift in relations. This could be a fixed amount as you described which is set at first contact, or it could be a small random amount during each increment that would average over time but could produce short-term fluctuations.
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6) It occurs to me that there should be a way to indicate to another race (with whome you don't yet have communications) that a particular system is already claimed and they should go away. Locking up with fire control seems to be a pretty pointed message. Of course the other race might interpret this in several ways - this could be modeled by variable point penalties for this act.Something else I have added to v4.1 is Strategic Intelligence. This is on the same window as diplomacy and tactical intelligence and it provides a list of systems for each alien race in which have detected ships/pop of that race and a list of technology you have learned that they possess (through various means). I could expand this a little to include claimed systems. Two races with full communications could then see which systems each other was claiming. This could be set manually by players and automatically generated for NPRs. Just an idea at the moment though - I would have to give some thought as to how to implement it.
Steve