"Once upon a time, there was an empire of 100 quadrillion beings... Ah, but that time is past..." The monster infested universe I''m making is a post-apocalyptic interstellar empire that''s rebuilding. People are surrounded by tech that they don''t know how to make but use everyday, and tech they''re rediscovering. As the player, I see you being able to change the game world by adding or interfering with this process. There are various (semi-randomly generated) empires, and each has a certain number of factions. Almost all of them want tech (except the Returnists, who want to destroy it). You can take missions to get items for one side, but if you do, it gives them power over their rivals. Tech Types There''s Old Tech and New Tech (bah, I''ll come up with a better name eventually ). Old Tech is magick. It''s indestructable unless you dump it in a sun, and it''s scattered throughout space filled with sleeping monsters. New Tech, OTOH, is everything else the survivors are discovering. Old Tech quickly changes the universe but can''t be copied because it''s attached to a device. New Tech only changes the universe slowly and gradually (like adding 3 or 4 points to armor), but can be stolen from computers or advanced by taking science missions into dangerous areas. You can find either an intact Old Tech item (rare and valuable), or components, all in various states of functionality. Some of the components are interchangable, but there is always at least one unique to each tech device. Scales There''s five size affecting classes of tech:

• Type I: Buildings and up to medium sized ships
• Type II: Small Stations and capital ships
• Type III: Space and ground cities
• Type IV: Planets (rare)
• Type V: Star System (very rare)

Old Tech Categories The tech covers:

• Quantum Powerplants - Clean, unlimited, unfueled power
• Shields - Defense against psi, radiation, concussion, etc., depending on type
• Producers - Generate food and water
• Fabricators - Produce everything from clothes to guns to starships, depending on special fuel (strangematter) and a data template
• Citadels - Nearly indestructable habitats
• Gates - FTL travel to any connecting gate of equal size

Core Gameplay You can raid the tech for yourself and improve your own ship and other assets, or help a empire or faction you like. If you keep tech for yourself, then you must deal with continuous random events of agents and or fleets trying to buy or steal it. You can hide tech by never exposing anyone below a certain level of loyalty to it. This means you must either keep it in secure safes, or travel to it incognito without being tracked. If agents know that you have it but don''t know where it is, there''s gameplay in using stealth to lose them. Suggestions? Problems you see? -------------------- Just waiting for the mothership...

I''ve read quite a few of your recent posts and was just wondering on what game you''re working on exactly, is there any demos or anything? Sounds interesting...

Just a short question: If people know you have technology, but don''t know what it is, can you blackmail ships into joining your fleet, saying that you can obliterate them with your tech if they don''t?

Also, I can imagine rumors of a certain artifact going around, and people will form a cult about it. Then, grabbing it could get the cult to follow you...

quote: Original post by wardekar
I''ve read quite a few of your recent posts and was just wondering on what game you''re working on exactly, is there any demos or anything? Sounds interesting...

Thanks for asking! I''m working on an open-ended science fiction RPG with both space and ground based gameplay. It''s set in a semi-randomly generated universe with no fixed storyline but has "storylets" and a game world you can change. You control a single character in detail but can hit the TAB key and command up to 15 additional ships / characters, who can (abstractly) command any number of characters. The core gameplay is combat, stealth, trade and (if you choose) management of crew with diverse personalities; there''s also a psionics / magic-tech system, a few simple mini-games and some Sims style needs management.

Development-wise, it''s still early, early alpha yet, unfortunately. My focus has been locking the design, which I feel will finally happen by the end of this summer.

I''ve just spent the last year and a half teaching myself 3D modeling, animation and texturing, and now have about 150+ reasonably decent models, which are meant to be combined like legos to form a huge number of starship configurations. Ground art lags, mostly because it''s been darn difficult to model people, but I''m getting there.


Codewise I have some work done in terrain and a few proof-of-concepts, but nothing cohesive. I''m holding out hope to use the Destiny3D engine to save myself alot of work, but that project is very shakey right now. I''m right now putting together a game-engine API and something to demo the lego-ships idea.

I should probably think about putting together a website at some point so that you can get the big picture, but I''ve been lazy on that front. I''ve been preparing to transfer to a UC, which should happen next year, and unfortunatley this stuff takes a backseat to schoolwork.

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Just waiting for the mothership...

quote: Original post by Dakar
Just a short question: If people know you have technology, but don''t know what it is, can you blackmail ships into joining your fleet, saying that you can obliterate them with your tech if they don''t?

I''ve got to think about this one. Maybe there''s a simple, foolproof way of proving that you have it, so that this doesn''t become a big production (like you having to blow up a planet or something to prove you''ve got a deathstar... whatever).

I''ve got a variable called Threat Value which has a Current and Total rating. If there was an ironclad way of proving you had a tech, it would raise your Total Threat Value, but not your Current unless you carried it around.

If you tried to blackmail ships into joining you that could squash you like a bug, they''d do so I''d think. It would probably only work if you had the power with you that you could threaten.

It''s sort of like telling a mobster that you have a bomb... but it''s back at home.

This should probably be based on some notion of reputation, too. If you have a high current threat value and a horrible rep, people know you mean business, and they''ll either fight or comply (or maybe even pretend to comply).

quote:
Also, I can imagine rumors of a certain artifact going around, and people will form a cult about it. Then, grabbing it could get the cult to follow you...

Hey, I like that idea. So it''s yet another angle of tech, say Religious Artifacts that cause people to behave a certain way. If you destroy it, you could raise their ire; if you were able to blame destruction on someone else, you could start a war.

It doesn''t necessarily follow, though, that just grabbing it makes them follow you, anymore than if I grabbed the Pope''s clothes. So maybe you have to be both a member of the cult (which would be a faction) and grab the symbol of power?


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Just waiting for the mothership...

quote: Original post by Wavinator
Scales

There''s five size affecting classes of tech:

• Type I: Buildings and up to medium sized ships
  
• Type II: Small Stations and capital ships
  
• Type III: Space and ground cities
  
• Type IV: Planets (rare)
  
• Type V: Star System (very rare)
  

Nothing smaller? Where is the all the smaller pieces of old tech? partily function personal phase shields, that let you walkthrough walls, or Zero mass engines salavaged from a derlict vessel?


[qoute]
Old Tech Categories
The tech covers:

• Quantum Powerplants - Clean, unlimited, unfueled power
  
• Shields - Defense against psi, radiation, concussion, etc., depending on type
  
• Producers - Generate food and water
  
• Fabricators - Produce everything from clothes to guns to starships, depending on special fuel (strangematter) and a data template
  
• Citadels - Nearly indestructable habitats
  
• Gates - FTL travel to any connecting gate of equal size
  

Core Gameplay
You can raid the tech for yourself and improve your own ship and other assets, or help a empire or faction you like. If you keep tech for yourself, then you must deal with continuous random events of agents and or fleets trying to buy or steal it.

You can hide tech by never exposing anyone below a certain level of loyalty to it. This means you must either keep it in secure safes, or travel to it incognito without being tracked.


How do you hide something the size of a star system?

I have to say this idea seems to be rather lacking, Perhaps it would be easier to understand if you fleshed it out more?

Lets say I''m out exploring and come across a vast star system sized device ancient beyond belif, then what? After all that is an astronomically massive device. It would a FTL transport system just to move people around it. How many millions of people do I need to operate it? Or can it all be done for a single command center?

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"Fate and Destiny only give you the opportunity the rest you have to do on your own."
Current Design project: Ambitions Slave

quote: Original post by TechnoGoth

quote: Original post by Wavinator
Scales

There's five size affecting classes of tech:

• Type I: Buildings and up to medium sized ships
  
• Type II: Small Stations and capital ships
  
• Type III: Space and ground cities
  
• Type IV: Planets (rare)
  
• Type V: Star System (very rare)
  

Nothing smaller? Where is the all the smaller pieces of old tech? partily function personal phase shields, that let you walkthrough walls, or Zero mass engines salavaged from a derlict vessel?

I left those out intentionally because I wanted to isolate the discussion to only those things that would affect the game world at large. Those items are bonuses for you to use and trade, they can't defend an entire population.

quote:
How do you hide something the size of a star system?

No, no, no, haha. The tech device itself isn't the size of the star system. The size affecting class is the area that the tech affects. So you can have a truck sized piece of technology that affects an entire star system, that's how advanced the tech is.

quote:
Lets say I'm out exploring and come across a vast star system sized device ancient beyond belif, then what?

Then you're not playing my game. I'd have to model something like this and it would be the volume of a million worlds, like a Dyson sphere. I'm not going there!

quote:
Or can it all be done for a single command center?

That's the core of how all this is supposed to work. You find a device and you can tow it via tractor, or take it into your cargo bay. If it has the right components (microscopic atomic motors, nanocomputer, etc.) then you can use it.

Let's say that it's a rare planetary shield that wasn't activated. You can haul it from one planet to another. You could sell it to the highest bidder. You could lend it to a besieged society, changing their defense against raiders. Or you could turtle up on a planet (maybe even blackmail people if it's a civilized planet-- "Gimme 10 million credits or I'll ruin your economy")





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Just waiting for the mothership...

[edited by - Wavinator on May 24, 2004 11:52:48 PM]

If this game was multiplayer I would spread rumor about someone I don''t like having an artifact, hoping some headhunters go and chase them.

Or I have an artifact everyone wants to have, and I spread word it is just a rumor to keep headhunters from following me.

Adding some kind of "rumor" would be beneficial to the gameplay, but it will be hard to implement it so NPCs can handle it...

I can''t think of anything to add yet, but I like the sound of this a lot...keep up the good work, Wav! We should have another one of our NPC talks sometime


Need help? Well, go FAQ yourself.


"Just don''t look at the hole." -- Unspoken_Magi

quote: Original post by Wavinator
No, no, no, haha. The tech device itself isn''t the size of the star system. The size affecting class is the area that the tech affects. So you can have a truck sized piece of technology that affects an entire star system, that''s how advanced the tech is.

Ahhhhh, I see, I thought the size where the sizes of the items.

quote:
Then you''re not playing my game. I''d have to model something like this and it would be the volume of a million worlds, like a Dyson sphere. I''m not going there!

If anyone here was going to try and tackle a Dyson sphere I would have thought it would have been you.

quote:
That''s the core of how all this is supposed to work. You find a device and you can tow it via tractor, or take it into your cargo bay. If it has the right components (microscopic atomic motors, nanocomputer, etc.) then you can use it.

Let''s say that it''s a rare planetary shield that wasn''t activated. You can haul it from one planet to another. You could sell it to the highest bidder. You could lend it to a besieged society, changing their defense against raiders. Or you could turtle up on a planet (maybe even blackmail people if it''s a civilized planet-- "Gimme 10 million credits or I''ll ruin your economy")

Are they all move able? Or are there some that are part of the enviroment? For example an cgi show that came out a few years ago had planet mover engines hidden in planets, and the people living on the planets discovered them and used them to flee from their enemy the beast.

I think it would make things more interesting if they can''t all be moved. For instance you find a giant crumbling citadel on seiger world. Do you take the risky endevour of trying to restore an setting it up has your HQ or do cannabilize it and take what you can find?

I would personally like to see, a situation where you discover an old tech spacestation, similar to Gateway. Most of the systems are non functional, but it would possible to rebuild and repair should you aquire enough old tech.


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"Fate and Destiny only give you the opportunity the rest you have to do on your own."
Current Design project: Ambitions Slave