RE: Future of Distant Worlds

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RE: Future of Distant Worlds - 5/1/2013 11:37:33 PM

Numdydar

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But a Casus Belli only would apply to human races. Aliens being 'alien' would not have a clue and would not care.

Just the fact we can interact with then at all strains the boundries of reality already.

The entire universe should be kill on sight, especially if they would be more advanced. So asking for more diplomancy options given the context of the game, seems a little over the top imho anyway.

If humans travelled to anothe planet and found a primitave cluture of cockroaches (or some other revolting looking lifeform) and the planet was loaded with rare resources. Does anyone here think we would hesitate to ignore them and take what we wanted? As we did that with our own race, what chance would an alen one have that has nothing at all in common with our DNA.

Of course if they were cure panda type creatures (even if extremely deadly and cruel), then we would move heaven and earth to save them lol.

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Post #: 31

RE: Future of Distant Worlds - 5/1/2013 11:54:24 PM

Simulation01

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I don't like the Casus Beli system whereby during the war if you took planets that were not part of the grievance you have to give them back automatically. War goals are fine but, I wouldn't want to be constrained by them.

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Post #: 32

RE: Future of Distant Worlds - 5/2/2013 3:12:46 AM

Cauldyth

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quote:

ORIGINAL: Numdydar

But a Casus Belli only would apply to human races. Aliens being 'alien' would not have a clue and would not care. Just the fact we can interact with then at all strains the boundries of reality already.

The entire universe should be kill on sight, especially if they would be more advanced. So asking for more diplomancy options given the context of the game, seems a little over the top imho anyway.

Well, I personally have no interest in a 4X game that's kill on sight (though I realize that opinion is not universal among strategy gamers). Games like DW already throw believability out the window in favour of making a cool, fun game. If something makes the game cooler and more fun, I say add it. And I think complex diplomacy is both of those things!

Besides, if DW wanted to be realistic, then one of the races would get a 500 million year head start over the others.

As for casus belli being obsolete in the modern age, that's simply not true. The US had a casus belli to invade Afghanistan in 2002. Iraq tried to fake a casus belli for its 1990 invasion of Kuwait (they said that Kuwait was historically part of Iraq and had only been split off by the British in 1913 - in Paradox terms, Iraq claimed to have a core on Kuwait!). Casus belli was never some formalized system where you had to wave your "Certified by the Casus Belli Authority" certificate in the air before declaring war. It's simply a convenient concept for describing how you would be viewed by the international community if you went to war. Are you viewed as standing up for your rights, or are you seen as an aggressor? The US invasion of Afghanistan was generally viewed as justified, whereas the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait was not. That's the real world manifestation of casus belli.

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RE: Future of Distant Worlds - 5/2/2013 5:48:34 AM

Shark7

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Hmmm, I often find it humorous how people will play a science fiction game, yet try to argue how the laws of reality must be followed to the letter.

Very simply, its imagination, its make believe...it is not real. Just accept the game for what it is, a fun game from the Imagination of Code Force.

As far as Casus Belli in game, isn't it really just a system to help determine the diplomacy aspect of the game? I honestly could care less about what it means in real life, in fact you don't even have to call it casus belli in game, call it likability scale, or the 'reason we are furious at you' scale. Again, the reality of it has little bearing on the game, its simply a system to make the code work better.

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Post #: 34

RE: Future of Distant Worlds - 5/2/2013 6:29:36 AM

Antiscamp

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quote:

ORIGINAL: Numdydar

If humans travelled to anothe planet and found a primitave cluture of cockroaches (or some other revolting looking lifeform) and the planet was loaded with rare resources. Does anyone here think we would hesitate to ignore them and take what we wanted? As we did that with our own race, what chance would an alen one have that has nothing at all in common with our DNA.

Of course if they were cure panda type creatures (even if extremely deadly and cruel), then we would move heaven and earth to save them lol.

LOL! That's pretty much true. I call it the Disney effect.

As for a Casus Belli and Wargoals system, I think it would have its place in this game. We're comparing with the Paradox games here. In EUIII there are several hordes in Asia that can't be at peace just because they are, well, hordes, developed out of Genghis Khan's conquests in the 1200's. These hordes keep attacking everyone and everything and they truly pose a significant threat in the beginning phases of the game.

I think something similar could apply to different races in this game too. Maybe even for most races; and make it a technological or political decision to be able to communicate with other races better and for all sorts of treaties and decisions between the factions to form and be upheld. A truly political system would require a lot of techs to be added too anyway.

Each race could have a different and unique "exopolitical" stance to begin with, which can be changed during the course of the game by technology and adapting different political ideas.

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Post #: 35

RE: Future of Distant Worlds - 5/3/2013 2:58:10 AM

Deomrve

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I know this might be heresy, but I think Distant Worlds 1 has run its course and needs to be replaced/updated. I probably would never buy the modding expansion, but I would buy Distant Worlds 2 that off loaded the graphics to the GPU, made it multi-threaded, gave me more control of military supply thru the use of contracts, priority flags and/or military freighters. I can even accept making it more modder friendly for those of you who like to mod.

Distant Worlds, in my opinion, has reach its end of life. I still play it on occasion because its the only decent 4x space game out there, but when you can pretty much have the game won within a couple of hours and all you do for the next 8-10 hours is mop up the game becomes very tedious. I would actually like to Code Force and Matrix forgo the mod expansion and start working on DW2 which includes the ideas they were going to put into the mod expansion.

Just my $0.02.

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Post #: 36

RE: Future of Distant Worlds - 5/3/2013 10:51:30 PM

Plant

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Well Antiscamp, Shadows have new Pirate factions, so if you was looking for a horde style race, presumably that is reasonably similar. To be honest the horde mechanic is EU3 was realy strange, since in reality the timurids and golden horde behaved nothing like how they were depicted in EU3. The casus belli game mechanic is so out of place in a space game. In fact, halfway through EU3 if you are a European power you pretty much gain the freedom to declare war on anybody you wish and take any provinces you conquer, with a reputation hit, just like Distant Worlds!

As for a mod expansion, I wouldn't express any interest in it as I'm not a modder, I'll rather that AI systems and an economic system that made more sense were put into palce.

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Post #: 37

RE: Future of Distant Worlds - 5/7/2013 5:47:06 AM

CyclopsSlayer

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A Casus Belli does imply that there is an overriding political/religious structure common to all members.

On Earth, say renaissance France wants to attack Spain, while they have differing rulers, they are all inter-married and are both under the watch of the Papacy. So they have a need to explain and justify their wars since they are essentially attacking themselves.

When it comes to attacking some Bug-Eyed-Monsters there is little need to justify your war with them, or to say "We'll only go this far and no further", as if they would believe that... Nuke them 'til they glow, then shoot them in the dark.

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Post #: 38

RE: Future of Distant Worlds - 5/7/2013 7:11:08 PM

ASHBERY76

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quote:

ORIGINAL: CyclopsSlayer

A Casus Belli does imply that there is an overriding political/religious structure common to all members.

On Earth, say renaissance France wants to attack Spain, while they have differing rulers, they are all inter-married and are both under the watch of the Papacy. So they have a need to explain and justify their wars since they are essentially attacking themselves.

When it comes to attacking some Bug-Eyed-Monsters there is little need to justify your war with them, or to say "We'll only go this far and no further", as if they would believe that... Nuke them 'til they glow, then shoot them in the dark.

Space 4X game framework is more in line with space opera ala Babylon5,Startrek than Starship troopers.A balance of power in is effect.

Casus Belli in EU is just a gameplay mechanic that would suit DW.It could be called anything.The game needs a mechanic to make war an important event rather than primitive civ style politics.

Reputation is in but goes down very quickly.The war weariness mechanic (unless fixed in shadows) is solved with a get peace and then declare war again trick.

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RE: Future of Distant Worlds - 5/8/2013 7:24:02 PM

CyclopsSlayer

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quote:

ORIGINAL: ASHBERY76

quote:

ORIGINAL: CyclopsSlayer

A Casus Belli does imply that there is an overriding political/religious structure common to all members.

On Earth, say renaissance France wants to attack Spain, while they have differing rulers, they are all inter-married and are both under the watch of the Papacy. So they have a need to explain and justify their wars since they are essentially attacking themselves.

When it comes to attacking some Bug-Eyed-Monsters there is little need to justify your war with them, or to say "We'll only go this far and no further", as if they would believe that... Nuke them 'til they glow, then shoot them in the dark.

Space 4X game framework is more in line with space opera ala Babylon5,Startrek than Starship troopers.A balance of power in is effect.

Casus Belli in EU is just a gameplay mechanic that would suit DW.It could be called anything.The game needs a mechanic to make war an important event rather than primitive civ style politics.

Reputation is in but goes down very quickly.The war weariness mechanic (unless fixed in shadows) is solved with a get peace and then declare war again trick.

True. The weariness mechanic needs a lot of work if it is to really affect anything.

As well Wars, do indeed need to become a much more major thing, currently they are little more than skirmishes that you can enter into and exit quickly, without a penalty that killing a couple pirates wouldn't fix. Wars, Blockades, that last mere seconds are pointless and annoying.

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RE: Future of Distant Worlds - 5/9/2013 12:35:37 AM

Webbco

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At the same time, the game has to be fun when not at war. I've played plenty of games where I've tried to avoid war to so I can maintain high reputation with other empires...but then the enemy AI does something silly (thus justifying hostile response), or I simply run out of things to do and get bored.

Maybe a more significant differentiation between skirmishes and full blown war?

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Post #: 41

RE: Future of Distant Worlds - 5/9/2013 12:02:37 PM

Ranbir

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On the casus belli thing and other interactive diplomatic options. It would be interesting for something like this to develop over time in the game that demonstrates how politics between empires evolves in to something more intricate and advanced.

Like in Civilization games, you reach the United Nations near the end game to show how global politics has gone beyond simple war rararara.

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Post #: 42

RE: Future of Distant Worlds - 5/10/2013 1:25:46 AM

Simulation01

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One thing that could be fun is an additional layer of exploration beyond exploring the galaxy. What I have in mind is something similar to Warlock: Master of the Arcane. In that game you had the main map or world but, there were these portals that you could enter into another world or dimension filled with alternate landscapes, creatures, and challenges. Something like that would be cool in DW. So you could have these Wormholes that led to other galaxies or dimensions that contained different monster classes and types as well as different races and types. They could be further characterized by extreme space hazards like the bad lands in Star Trek Deep Space Nine. It could fit into the story as well....for example...suppose a race stumbled onto a wormhole that led to the place where the Shakturi returned from. These other galaxies or dimensions could also hold special techs found at planets, asteroids, or on abandoned ships that can not be researched.

This type of exploration could be a late game technology function unlocked by a tech.

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Post #: 43

RE: Future of Distant Worlds - 5/10/2013 9:09:33 AM

Mansen

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That reminds me of the Arilou from Star Control II. They fled into QuasiSpace to hide their planet from invaders. :)

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RE: Future of Distant Worlds - 5/10/2013 10:48:22 AM

Bleek

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Perhaps WAR should require certain triggers, whereas skirmishes and unruly behaviour 'tit for tat' are par for the course and not deemed war. More in line with how the world works... unless it's North Korea who are in a constant state of war without being at war.

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RE: Future of Distant Worlds - 5/10/2013 4:04:30 PM

Plant

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quote:

ORIGINAL: Ranbir

On the casus belli thing and other interactive diplomatic options. It would be interesting for something like this to develop over time in the game that demonstrates how politics between empires evolves in to something more intricate and advanced.

Like in Civilization games, you reach the United Nations near the end game to show how global politics has gone beyond simple war rararara.

Would you like to suggest this more intricate and advanced diplomatic system? All i can see are empty suggestions without going into any meat. To compare with Civilisation, Distant worlds pretty much have a better diplomatic system than Civilisation games, with their active trade system and blockades. As for the United Nations, in Civilisation, all it is, is a bland nonsensical victory condition.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Simulation01

One thing that could be fun is an additional layer of exploration beyond exploring the galaxy. What I have in mind is something similar to Warlock: Master of the Arcane. In that game you had the main map or world but, there were these portals that you could enter into another world or dimension filled with alternate landscapes, creatures, and challenges. Something like that would be cool in DW. So you could have these Wormholes that led to other galaxies or dimensions that contained different monster classes and types as well as different races and types. They could be further characterized by extreme space hazards like the bad lands in Star Trek Deep Space Nine. It could fit into the story as well....for example...suppose a race stumbled onto a wormhole that led to the place where the Shakturi returned from. These other galaxies or dimensions could also hold special techs found at planets, asteroids, or on abandoned ships that can not be researched.

This type of exploration could be a late game technology function unlocked by a tech.

Rather ironic in that in playing a space game, you have a sudden desire to be whisked away into an alternate universe full of strange landscapes, creature with monsters and different races and extreme space hazards. Why, that sounds like Distant Worlds! Also I dread to think how the AI will be scripted to react to those circumstances.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Bleek

Perhaps WAR should require certain triggers, whereas skirmishes and unruly behaviour 'tit for tat' are par for the course and not deemed war. More in line with how the world works... unless it's North Korea who are in a constant state of war without being at war.

They already are, hence why you can invade worlds without declaring war, and why the Gizurean are always shooting at my ships patrolling my mining stations within their territory, and then they have a reduced relationship from "our past dealings with you have been terrible". And in real life even minor skirmishes have huge chances of escalation into act of wars; in fact they are a symptom of being at an uneasy ceasefire, it is certainly not how the world works.

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RE: Future of Distant Worlds - 5/10/2013 11:06:47 PM

Bleek

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You're right, I retract my comment. The mechanics go way beyond that of other 4X games and they are solid.

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RE: Future of Distant Worlds - 5/11/2013 1:54:29 AM

Simulation01

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LOL I suppose it is Ironic.

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RE: Future of Distant Worlds - 5/11/2013 1:19:27 PM

Bleek

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I was talking more about the time scales of things happening i.e. going in and out of war at the drop of a hat.

Nothing is perfect, a lot of other 4X games have really poor diplomacy systems.

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RE: Future of Distant Worlds - 5/11/2013 4:22:20 PM

towerbooks3192

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Casus Belli System inappropriate for distant worlds. You are exploring space and facing space monsters and aliens and the last thing you would want to do is negotiate with aliens that are about to chew you and spit you back out.

Excited for DW Shadows!! I am going to finish my assessments tomorrow so I could play it once it comes out.

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RE: Future of Distant Worlds - 5/12/2013 9:24:13 PM

Arcatus

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quote:

ORIGINAL: Erik Rutins

Thank you for the compliments.

We're about to release Distant Worlds: Shadows, the next expansion. The current plan is to have a modder-focused expansion after that and then start work on Distant Worlds 2. This is subject to change though. If Shadows and the modder-focused expansion do very well we may look at extending DW 1 a bit further, but we'd really like to do a new engine to show what we can do.

Regards,

- Erik

Oooh, nice.

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RE: Future of Distant Worlds - 6/22/2013 2:59:06 PM

criticom41

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Wow that sounds like a good plan Eric, great to hear yer thinking of a new one!.....ya this is the best 4x game agreed.

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RE: Future of Distant Worlds - 6/29/2013 2:04:40 PM

Icemania

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Erik, now that Shadows is released, can anything more be said? As you can tell from other posts I'd vote AI, AI and AI.

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RE: Future of Distant Worlds - 7/2/2013 11:12:48 AM

feygan

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As far as the future of DW is concerned I'm against the idea of 3D, Sure it looks great I'm a long time player of both SEIV & SEV being both 2D & 3D, while I love the 3D aspect of SEV it wasn't until I did my last system upgrade to 16GB and SSD's that I was really able to play it properly (partly due to bad code). But still 4X games that go heavy on the pretty always end up being hogs on resources that leaves the essentials neglected. You only have to look back at the last 10-15 years of strategy games to see the really good timeless ones are those that offer real gameplay.

2D distant worlds gives great freedom to those with higher grade systems to have monstrously large games on the go if they choose, to make it 3D means you then have to get another system upgrade just for some pretty lights. I can get my pretty lights fulfillment from any number of first/third person shooters or ARPG's.

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RE: Future of Distant Worlds - 7/2/2013 3:38:22 PM

scotten_usa

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I agree with Feygan. Although 3D is more realistic, 2D is waaaay more playable.

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RE: Future of Distant Worlds - 7/2/2013 3:53:20 PM

Dotdotdot

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If the Distant Worlds is to be more fun during peace time, you need to have more ways to interact with your and other empires during peace time. Victoria 2 would be a good example, insofar as you have to juggle the needs of your population. The actions you can take along those lines are limited by your type of government, the parties that make up your legislative body, and the wants of your people.

It'd also be interesting to add cultural differences to races within the game: Humans and Boskarans from a Democracy are going to behave differently from their kin that were indoctrinated in a military dictatorship.

Or maybe even evolutionary off-shoots considering the reason for the Age of Shadows?

Also, we need to be able to build our own freighters and designate our own fuel stockpiles. Or allow our own civilian freighters to respond to resource contracts.

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RE: Future of Distant Worlds - 7/2/2013 11:04:19 PM

RockKahn

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I would vote for DW to stay 2D. I don't see, in this scale of game, where 3D gets you anything but frustration. If it were a tactical game, yes.

If you want "eye candy", put a picture of the wife or girlfriend on your computer desk. I wouldn't recommend both.

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RE: Future of Distant Worlds - 7/23/2013 2:33:42 AM

paShadoWn

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Casus belli in DW will be awkward. There is one reason that is enough: i want to effing conquer the galaxy. Period. There is also an option to destroy the galaxy but for some obscure reason i prefer domination over destruction. The legacy of vampiric pet lovers i suppose. I play Crusader Kings 2 sometimes and every time it ends the same: i conquer the half of map then it becomes pointless as there are no more doomstack-producing HRE's to challenge you. The casus belly serves only to prolong the inevitable.

New engine? An excellent idea, an engine with greatly reduced graphics will do well. In sense it wont make oom crash so often. Removing all the animations, replacing artwork with 32x32 icons and generally not trying to make "graphic enhancements" in wargame.

3d? Do a simple math: get a big number, square it then cube it. Then you will see how much 2d->3d increases the size of coordinate data arrays. In ten-twenty years maybe computers will get powerful enough to handle 3d Distant Worlds.
Sword of the Stars gets away with its 3d by cheating with turn-based global map and tactical map being semi-flat with limit on few scores of ships. And even then processing turns and loading tactic takes minutes. Sometimes many.

And also i would very like a multiplayer, with matchmaking server. The modern 100mbps networks are imo quite capable of handling it. If you dont live in a backward hole like Florida of course.

< Message edited by paShadoWn -- 7/23/2013 2:35:28 AM >

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