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Author Topic:   War penalties.......

Singularity posted 05-01-99 05:51 PM ET
This is a serious topic that must be discussed. Many people have voiced a need for war penalties. Some of these are severe. As I was finishing my list of stuff to send BR, I was trying to decide of whether or not to include them. These could totally cripple factions that rely on war as their main strength. Because I was not sure if they should be included, I thought I'd ask you. What do you think? If they should be included, how? By this I mean should they be an option on the customizable rules? Should they be standard? Either way, how bad should they be? Should they get worse as difficulty increases? Should they be included at all? For a complete list, look in my SMACX threads, they should be there somewhere. Or feel free to post your own versions. I need your help.
Q Cubed posted 05-01-99 11:36 PM ET
War penalties:
Nell and Kosovo sorta got me thinking on another thread, so here goes:
How about refugees?
When a war breaks out, have the city under attack, if not captured, lose population points gradually, and have those population points go to cities that are in neutral factions or their own nearby.
The catch is, they'd be drones for the next few turns.
Superconductor posted 05-02-99 01:13 AM ET
War penalties?
"Come one people now...
Smile on your brother...
Everybody get together..."
Must we?
Glak posted 05-02-99 01:30 AM ET
gee, why not ruin the game even more. Heck, lets just remove all ground units from the game so no one can hurt anyone for the first few months of the game. I don't even know why I come to this pacifist forum.
Look up game in the dictionary, do you see the word conflict anywere? If you don't then throw out your PC dictionary. If you do think about what types of conflict games can have. There is only one: battle (theoretically there are others but I have never heard of a game like that)
Also in real life war is the accepted means by which humanity weeds out inferior societies and governments. Without war we would be no where. Only recently has war been shunned and look how humans are turning soft. Heck I'm softer than I'd like to be.
Nell_Smith posted 05-02-99 01:36 AM ET
Singularity:
As Q has pointed out, my views on "refugees" in SMAC are already in another thread, so sorry for repeating myself!
I do feel that it's too easy to win by conquest (you wipe out the enemy's few main bases, you win the game, basically) , and that it would be more realistic, and perhaps help to balance the game, if refugees were introduced.
Say you manage to kill the last defending unit in a base. My idea would be that there would then be a random chance for 0%, 25% or 75% of the population to leave the base and appear as drones in neighbouring bases, whether those be friendly bases or neutral bases belonging to other factions. They could stay as drones for a certain number of turns, then settle down and become useful citizens.
I'm not knocking the warlike strategy, but rather thinking of a way in which it could be made slightly less easy to pursue. And it would add a bit of realism, too
Nell
Smeagol posted 05-02-99 01:36 AM ET
SMAC is already biased enough towards peaceful races-- unless you play with "spoils of war", of course. Spending time to create a military and research military applications obviously takes away from building a solid infrastructure, so this is penalty enough (and then some).
cousLee posted 05-02-99 01:39 AM ET
If you want war penalties, use a negative police rating (free eco) and send out mass troops.
I think the penalties are bad enough for the game. captured bases have increased drones. This is a planetary conquest game. If you choose to win by economics, or diplomacy, great, that is your choice. It does sound like that is your preferred method. I prefer conquest. The War penalty idea sounds like someone who hates being attacked, trying to get a game changed to make it harder for the "warmonger" player. And increased drones for a neutral faction? why? that would only promote coordinated battles to eliminate factions quickly. I prefer to see my enemies wage long wars against eachother. or, how bout increased drones each time YOU LOSE a base? It would make defense more important. I like the way the game allows several victory methods, and any changes IMHO would unbalance the game.
Glak posted 05-02-99 02:58 AM ET
wow other people here like battle too?
Oh and here's a bit of game theory that should apply to all games:
medium beats fast
fast beats slow
slow beats medium
By fast I mean a rush, slow I mean some sort of teching up (yeah SC terms I know)
Once you break this delicate balance the game immediately losed almost all of its strategy and simply becomes a game of skill (skill is not the same as strategy). For example rock paper scissors is a pretty fair game. You can use one of three strategies: rock paper or scissors. Each strategy has a reasonable chance of winning. However what if we introduced "scissor penalties" that made it so that the scissors were too dull to cut the paper? Now what strategy would be used in every game? Paper of course. At this point the winner is determined by who is most skilled at paper and substrategies associated with it. So by crippling scissors you have also effectively removed rock from the game.
The game should encourage wars because wars are conflicts. You should be playing against your opponent. The more important others are to the game experience the more fun the game is. Can you think of specific games where you had a lot of fun? For me those games were the ones where I was closely matched with my opponent and we had to struggle as hard as possible to win. Those situations won't occur if you punish those who try to initiate conflict.
ErikSigra posted 05-02-99 09:36 AM ET
Tell that BR that he removes or increases the Red Field Limit for faction design. It really sucks:-(! make it at least 16 instead of 8.
DilithiumDad posted 05-02-99 10:44 AM ET
I was one of the ones who posted on SMACX adding "peace dividends" NOT "war penalties".
1. Council motion: sanctions or fine.
2. Remove the suspension of loan payments during vendetta (this a war bonus). Faction eradicating a lender could assume loan payments, though.
3. Increase commerce income slighlty, and make AI faction leaders "care" about commerce income in making decisions to have treaties or pacts.
Jeje2 posted 05-02-99 10:50 AM ET
Q Cubed: LOL
Not to you, but in the very first SMAC forum (last summer)were we were able to suggest ideas to FIRAXIS for upcoming SMAC, I suggested wanderers, who would be similiar as refugies.
THX: Q Cubed, I'm
Urban Ranger posted 05-02-99 12:16 PM ET
Here's a suggestion.
The side that starts a war must pay an amount of energy credits. This is called the declaration of war and should be done on a percentage basis as not to favor Morgan.
Anybody that has miltary units in another country (neutral ground doesn't count) should also suffer a reduction in energy and minerals production to reflect the tremdeous effort required to sustain a war of aggression.
Newly captured bases should have a reduced production in (again) energy and minerals for n number of turns, representing resources diverted to intergrate the base into your faction. Re-capturing a base during this time doesn't carry this penalty.
Non-military units cannot enter enemy territory during peace time without escort, or they will be removed from the game, as they become detained by border patrols.
During peace time, any military units in enemy territory counts as double for support purposes.
Singularity posted 09-06-99 06:58 PM ET
I thought this was another good idea.
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Author	Topic: War penalties.......
Singularity	posted 05-01-99 05:51 PM ET This is a serious topic that must be discussed. Many people have voiced a need for war penalties. Some of these are severe. As I was finishing my list of stuff to send BR, I was trying to decide of whether or not to include them. These could totally cripple factions that rely on war as their main strength. Because I was not sure if they should be included, I thought I'd ask you. What do you think? If they should be included, how? By this I mean should they be an option on the customizable rules? Should they be standard? Either way, how bad should they be? Should they get worse as difficulty increases? Should they be included at all? For a complete list, look in my SMACX threads, they should be there somewhere. Or feel free to post your own versions. I need your help.
Q Cubed	posted 05-01-99 11:36 PM ET War penalties: Nell and Kosovo sorta got me thinking on another thread, so here goes: How about refugees? When a war breaks out, have the city under attack, if not captured, lose population points gradually, and have those population points go to cities that are in neutral factions or their own nearby. The catch is, they'd be drones for the next few turns.
Superconductor	posted 05-02-99 01:13 AM ET War penalties? "Come one people now... Smile on your brother... Everybody get together..." Must we?
Glak	posted 05-02-99 01:30 AM ET gee, why not ruin the game even more. Heck, lets just remove all ground units from the game so no one can hurt anyone for the first few months of the game. I don't even know why I come to this pacifist forum. Look up game in the dictionary, do you see the word conflict anywere? If you don't then throw out your PC dictionary. If you do think about what types of conflict games can have. There is only one: battle (theoretically there are others but I have never heard of a game like that) Also in real life war is the accepted means by which humanity weeds out inferior societies and governments. Without war we would be no where. Only recently has war been shunned and look how humans are turning soft. Heck I'm softer than I'd like to be.
Nell_Smith	posted 05-02-99 01:36 AM ET Singularity: As Q has pointed out, my views on "refugees" in SMAC are already in another thread, so sorry for repeating myself! I do feel that it's too easy to win by conquest (you wipe out the enemy's few main bases, you win the game, basically) , and that it would be more realistic, and perhaps help to balance the game, if refugees were introduced. Say you manage to kill the last defending unit in a base. My idea would be that there would then be a random chance for 0%, 25% or 75% of the population to leave the base and appear as drones in neighbouring bases, whether those be friendly bases or neutral bases belonging to other factions. They could stay as drones for a certain number of turns, then settle down and become useful citizens. I'm not knocking the warlike strategy, but rather thinking of a way in which it could be made slightly less easy to pursue. And it would add a bit of realism, too Nell
Smeagol	posted 05-02-99 01:36 AM ET SMAC is already biased enough towards peaceful races-- unless you play with "spoils of war", of course. Spending time to create a military and research military applications obviously takes away from building a solid infrastructure, so this is penalty enough (and then some).
cousLee	posted 05-02-99 01:39 AM ET If you want war penalties, use a negative police rating (free eco) and send out mass troops. I think the penalties are bad enough for the game. captured bases have increased drones. This is a planetary conquest game. If you choose to win by economics, or diplomacy, great, that is your choice. It does sound like that is your preferred method. I prefer conquest. The War penalty idea sounds like someone who hates being attacked, trying to get a game changed to make it harder for the "warmonger" player. And increased drones for a neutral faction? why? that would only promote coordinated battles to eliminate factions quickly. I prefer to see my enemies wage long wars against eachother. or, how bout increased drones each time YOU LOSE a base? It would make defense more important. I like the way the game allows several victory methods, and any changes IMHO would unbalance the game.
Glak	posted 05-02-99 02:58 AM ET wow other people here like battle too? Oh and here's a bit of game theory that should apply to all games: medium beats fast fast beats slow slow beats medium By fast I mean a rush, slow I mean some sort of teching up (yeah SC terms I know) Once you break this delicate balance the game immediately losed almost all of its strategy and simply becomes a game of skill (skill is not the same as strategy). For example rock paper scissors is a pretty fair game. You can use one of three strategies: rock paper or scissors. Each strategy has a reasonable chance of winning. However what if we introduced "scissor penalties" that made it so that the scissors were too dull to cut the paper? Now what strategy would be used in every game? Paper of course. At this point the winner is determined by who is most skilled at paper and substrategies associated with it. So by crippling scissors you have also effectively removed rock from the game. The game should encourage wars because wars are conflicts. You should be playing against your opponent. The more important others are to the game experience the more fun the game is. Can you think of specific games where you had a lot of fun? For me those games were the ones where I was closely matched with my opponent and we had to struggle as hard as possible to win. Those situations won't occur if you punish those who try to initiate conflict.
ErikSigra	posted 05-02-99 09:36 AM ET Tell that BR that he removes or increases the Red Field Limit for faction design. It really sucks:-(! make it at least 16 instead of 8.
DilithiumDad	posted 05-02-99 10:44 AM ET I was one of the ones who posted on SMACX adding "peace dividends" NOT "war penalties". 1. Council motion: sanctions or fine. 2. Remove the suspension of loan payments during vendetta (this a war bonus). Faction eradicating a lender could assume loan payments, though. 3. Increase commerce income slighlty, and make AI faction leaders "care" about commerce income in making decisions to have treaties or pacts.
Jeje2	posted 05-02-99 10:50 AM ET Q Cubed: LOL Not to you, but in the very first SMAC forum (last summer)were we were able to suggest ideas to FIRAXIS for upcoming SMAC, I suggested wanderers, who would be similiar as refugies. THX: Q Cubed, I'm
Urban Ranger	posted 05-02-99 12:16 PM ET Here's a suggestion. The side that starts a war must pay an amount of energy credits. This is called the declaration of war and should be done on a percentage basis as not to favor Morgan. Anybody that has miltary units in another country (neutral ground doesn't count) should also suffer a reduction in energy and minerals production to reflect the tremdeous effort required to sustain a war of aggression. Newly captured bases should have a reduced production in (again) energy and minerals for n number of turns, representing resources diverted to intergrate the base into your faction. Re-capturing a base during this time doesn't carry this penalty. Non-military units cannot enter enemy territory during peace time without escort, or they will be removed from the game, as they become detained by border patrols. During peace time, any military units in enemy territory counts as double for support purposes.
Singularity	posted 09-06-99 06:58 PM ET I thought this was another good idea.