More Ideas about the game - Before Coding

[tiagocc0]

First part - Evolution

You will be able to choose the initial settings then the game will start on a planet with a number of gray tiles.
Your objective is to occupy all the tiles of the planet, at the beginning of each turn you will be given some tiles in which you will be able to place them on the gray tiles.
The first tile can be put anywhere, after that you will have to put all the other tiles adjacent to the tiles you've already put on the map.
Each tile will represent a kind of terrain of your planet, on a normal planet like earth you will have Grass, Forest, Water, Mountain, Snow, Swamp and Desert. Additionally to this they have a number which indicates it's quality, most of the tiles you receive at the beginning of the turn will have the worst quality.
Tiles that you have already put can have their quality enhanced by using tiles of the same type on them.
Some tiles may have a ? mark on them, this indicates that they hold an Event and the Event will start after you use the tile.
There are good and bad events, events can destroy or give you tiles or alter your bonuses that you have acquired so far.
You will have two types of experience points, Expansion Points that is related to the number of tiles you have put and Quality Points that is related to tiles which have it's quality above the worst.
You can spend those points in a number of perks, some of them are specific to a certain kind of terrain, others are generic.
One perk will be travel to space, acquiring this perk will end the first part of the game.
Each turn represents an amount of time, acquiring the travel to space perk earlier will give you a head start in the second part of the game but your race will probably have less perks to work with.


Initial Settings

Planet Type - Tiles
Normal - 2xGrass, 2xForest, 2xWater, 2xMountain, 1xSnow, 1xSwamp and 1xDesert
Warm - 2xArid, 3xDesert, 2XMountain, 1xWater
Cold - 3xSnow, 2xFrozen Water, 2xWater, 2XMountain
Ocean - 4xWater, 2xSwamp, 1xMountain
Lava - 3xArid, 3xLava, 1xVolcano
Acid - 3xArid, 3xAcid, 1xMountain
No Atmosphere - 3xArid, 2xMountain
Gas Giant - Gas

Gravity
Heavy Gravity - Close combat bonus, penalty living on other types of gravity
Normal Gravity - Small penalty living on other types of gravity
Low Gravity - Ship combat bonus, penalty living on other types of gravity

Galaxy Size - Number of stars in the game
Huge
Large
Medium
Small

Evolution Speed - The number of experience points required to acquire perks
Fast
Normal
Epic



Deity Entity

You are an active part of the evolution process of your race, some may call you a sentient being with far superior technology, others may call you a god but there are those who simply refer to you as The Player.

What kind of deity entity are you?

The Emperor - You live among your people, you do not die of age so if you are careful you will always be there for them, guiding them, bossing them around. You may be killed by other races if you lose the colony you are currently in. While you are alive you are constantly giving bonuses to your race but if you die you will lose those bonuses.

The Avatar - You live among your people but only for a period of time, you will eventually grow old and die, then you will reincarnate and restart the cycle, you may die if you lose the colony you are currently in.

The Shadow - You live among your people, but they don't know about it. Instead of being their emperor you can be a researcher, an artist or a businessman, each giving different bonuses, you will grow old and die and then reincarnate. Other races won't know your location but you can still die if you lose the colony you are currently in.

The Guide - You do not live among your people but you do communicate with them, your bonus will be smaller but you won't have to worry about being killed, you will need a temple though to communicate and they can be constructed on any colony you own.

The Divine - You do not live among your people and you don't communicate with them, but you are able to inspire them and in any area you want, they will feel more independent too and you won't have to worry about temples. The bonuses are smaller.

The Observer - You do not live with them, neither communicate nor inspire them, you only observe. You people will be more independent and will be more receptive to other alien races.

The Void - No bonus, you do not exist, or at least this is what everyone thinks.


Deity Entity - 10 Points to Spend

The Emperor
7 Points
Minus 30% War weariness
Plus 10% Faster Colony Building
Plus 10% Faster Ship Building


The Avatar
7 Points
Minus 15% War weariness
Plus 5% Faster Colony Building
Plus 5% Faster Ship Building


The Shadow - Researcher
5 Points
Plus 10% Research

The Shadow - Trader
5 Points
Plus 10% Economy

The Shadow - Worker
5 Points
Plus 10% Production


The Guide
4 Points
Minus 10% War weariness
Plus 5% Faster Colony Building


The Divine
4 Points
Plus 5% Research
Plus 5% Economy
Plus 5% Diplomacy


The Observer
4 Points
Plus 10% Diplomacy
Plus 5% Happiness


The Void
0 Points
No Bonus


Adaptability
1 - 0 Points - Get 3 Tiles per turn
2 - 2 Points - Get 4 Tiles per turn
3 - 5 Points - Get 5 Tiles per turn
4 - 10 Points - Get 7 Tiles per turn


Mutability
1 - Normal - 0 Points - 5% chance to get a higher quality tile
2 - 3 Points - 20% chance to get a higher quality tile
3 - 5 Points - 40% chance to get a higher quality tile
3 - 10 Points - 75% chance to get a higher quality tile


Fate
1 - 0 Points - Get 1 Fate card per turn
2 - 3 Points - Get 2 Fate cards per turn
3 - 6 Points - Get 3 Fate cards per turn
4 - 10 Points - Get 5 Fate cards per turn

 

[tiagocc0]

Initial Planet Size 26x20
Total Tiles that can be put 520

In the Perks tree of the Evolution part of the game you will have different types of way to achieve them:

Spending Experience Points
Reaching A Number of Tiles or Quality of Tiles
Have a group of perks that will unlock another
Go trough an Event

Since the max number of tiles is 520, 520 is the theoretical maximum experience points you can have.
Some events may destroy your tiles but they can't make you lose experience points so if you had 100 tiles and 100 experience points and an event destroy 10 tiles, you will have 90 tiles and still 100 experience points.
So after acquiring 10 more tiles you will end up with 100 tiles and 110 experience points.

The games abstracts from where you are exactly in the evolution process, so you could have a race that has a highly technological advanced military units but who still hunts for food.

Example of Perks

20 Experience Points
Hunting - Your species is carnivorous and hunt for a living, this does not only provides food for your people but also keep their close combat skills sharp
1 food unit per population per turn
Plus 5% Close Combat

10 Experience Points
Extractivism - Your species is herbivorous and gather food from the nature
1 food unit per population per turn

20 Experience Points + Extractivism
Farming - Your species is herbivorous and learned the way of the plants, you can now settle down and farm your land away, it provides a little more food than hunting but no special bonus
1.5 food unit per population per turn

Hunting + Extractivism
Omnivorous I - By using the two methods your race is able to gather more food in the same amount of time.
1.5 food unit per population per turn

Hunting + Farming
Omnivorous II - By using the two methods your race is able to gather more food in the same amount of time.
2.0 food unit per population per turn

30 Forest Experience Points + Hunting OR 60 Experience Points + Hunting
Advanced Hunting - By means of technology or better techniques you're able to hunt more and to take care better of your hunting grounds so the animals there won't go extinct
2 food unit per population per turn
Plus 10% Close Combat

60 Forest Experience Points + Advanced Hunting OR 120 Experience Points + Advanced Hunting
Master Hunting - Hunting is truly an art for your species and it also helps by providing vast amounts of food
3 food unit per population per turn
Plus 20% Close Combat

30 Grass Experience Points + Farming OR 60 Experience Points + Farming
Advanced Farming - This could mean that you have perfected the technique of farming without causing erosion on your lands or that you have enslaved a subspecies of your planet to do the farming for you
3 food unit per population per turn

80 Grass Experience Points + Farming OR 160 Experience Points + Farming
Master Farming - Ever wondered what a fully automatized robot farm would look like? And this is just pre-space technology!
4 food unit per population per turn

320 Tiles + 120 Highest quality Tiles
Space Era - You're now are to explore space, when you feel you are ready you can finish this game and start the next phase, just remember that every turn counts and delay too much it make other races explore space first than you!

 

[tiagocc0]

Reserved

 

[tiagocc0]

Reserved

 

[Destroid]

You could also add some RPG elements by allocating a few stats to such an entity.

 

[Grunker]

You could also add some RPG elements by allocating a few stats to such an entity.

 

[tiagocc0]

You could also add some RPG elements by allocating a few stats to such an entity.

Nice, what stats could we use?

 

[Destroid]

I suppose it depends on how involved you want to make the players character, but I'd start with stats to show how great an impact they have on the various spheres they influence, be it research, production etc. Probably would be best if the characters attributes were differentiated from racial attributes in some way so they didn't just stack up on top of each other. It's a bit hard to say much in detail at this point because we don't have details about how the races are put together.

 

[tiagocc0]

I suppose it depends on how involved you want to make the players character, but I'd start with stats to show how great an impact they have on the various spheres they influence, be it research, production etc. Probably would be best if the characters attributes were differentiated from racial attributes in some way so they didn't just stack up on top of each other. It's a bit hard to say much in detail at this point because we don't have details about how the races are put together.

Ok, I will definitely look into this, as soon as I have more information about this I will post on this thread.

 

[tiagocc0]

Updated the posts, I got what was my original idea, this would be like the race creation screen of MOO2, but you would create your Deity Entity so you can you it to create your race.
I'm still thinking about giving it stats, I have some things to think about.
If it does have stats, do they improve over time? Does it have level up?
If the stats do improve over time will you be able to carry it from one game to another or will you always start at level 1?

 

[Destroid]

You could do something like shift the societal bonuses onto the character (things like reserach, production, trade, military etc. bonuses) while only having innate characteristics for racial attributes - things like (to use MoO examples) aquatic, subterannean, high reproduction rates, high/low gravity, tolerant, etc. Personally I would steer away from levels and XP and favour discrete rewards and improvements.

Depending on how much RPG you want to put into your 4X game you could allow the attributes to improve with certain tech advances, or perhaps allow your character to go on 'quests' of a sort. A game that integrates characters into 4X is Star Wars: Rebellion, a very fun game despite it's flaws (balance, characters and their missions are overpowered), I highly recommend you play it.

 

[Awor Szurkrarz]

For some weird reason I thought it's going to be a Prosper thread.

 

[tiagocc0]

You could do something like shift the societal bonuses onto the character (things like reserach, production, trade, military etc. bonuses) while only having innate characteristics for racial attributes - things like (to use MoO examples) aquatic, subterannean, high reproduction rates, high/low gravity, tolerant, etc. Personally I would steer away from levels and XP and favour discrete rewards and improvements.

Depending on how much RPG you want to put into your 4X game you could allow the attributes to improve with certain tech advances, or perhaps allow your character to go on 'quests' of a sort. A game that integrates characters into 4X is Star Wars: Rebellion, a very fun game despite it's flaws (balance, characters and their missions are overpowered), I highly recommend you play it.

I will take a look into the game, I will write down what I can think of about the perk/tech tree of the evolution part of the game then I will come back to finish the deity skills.

For some weird reason I thought it's going to be a Prosper thread.

Should I take that as a compliment?

 

[tiagocc0]

Updated the first post, is it clear how I'm planning to make the first part of the game works? Does the hunting and farming skills makes sense?

 

[Destroid]

I'm not really sure how much fun pre-game mini-games are. I'm trying to think of a game I've played that had something like this to compare to, but all I can think of is Spore, which I didn't play.

It's not clear to me what the perks are intended to be.

 

[tiagocc0]

I'm not really sure how much fun pre-game mini-games are. I'm trying to think of a game I've played that had something like this to compare to, but all I can think of is Spore, which I didn't play.

It's not clear to me what the perks are intended to be.

Well, it will not only serve as a mini-game, you are going to set the tiles on the planet the way you want, so that's how your home planet will look like, my plan is to have all planets like that so it will work on how you build your colony later or how you explore a planet's resources.

It would be like in MOO2 where you can spend points to have a +1 to food production per unit, or you can spend more points and have a +2 to food production per unit. The difference is that you are going to get random tiles every turn, and you will build your home planet accordingly, the more tiles you use the more experience you get. But most perks will have requirements based on a type of tile, like advanced farming requires 30 Grass Experience Points, so you would have to lay 30 grass tiles to get this perk, or 60 Experience Points means any other 60 tiles would also do.
With this you will receive several random tiles but you may want to use just some of them, because you want to specialize into something. Like if you want production bonus you better save those mountains tiles because it will be a lot cheaper to buy those perks with them.

But just waiting for the right tile to appear may make you lose turns and you could have a race that for example completed the evolution part in 300 turns, so it will start colonizing other worlds, another player may be trying to get as much perks as possible so he completes in 500 turns, so the other race who has less perks have already started and the race with more perks will start later.

I still have lots of things to consider but that's the main idea. This is the main point, to have a game where different races will start the second part of the game at different times.
You will enjoy build your home planet, the way you built your home planet will tell which perks you will be able to choose. And there will be lots of events too, so will have a chance of getting some special perks.

Edit: The player will have the option to skip this part of the game.