Alpha Centauri 2

Community => Chiron News Network => Topic started by: BlaneckW on June 04, 2013, 11:20:37 am

Title: pandora update
Post by: BlaneckW on June 04, 2013, 11:20:37 am
I wasn't sure if you guys are following Pandora (I'm not, I was just looking for something to do before going to bed). 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZdaoLKHxJDo#ws (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZdaoLKHxJDo#ws)
https://www.facebook.com/notes/slitherine-ltd/through-the-keyhole-may-31st-2013/531954540198608 (https://www.facebook.com/notes/slitherine-ltd/through-the-keyhole-may-31st-2013/531954540198608)

I find it unfortunate that they don't have a more open forum/registration process. I'm still not likely to buy it with the information given. The video and article are on the tech tree. Or, at least the article sort of is, the video just shows that a tech tree exists.

Keeping the tech tree unknown (other than something on combat levels) really isn't selling the game to me, but then, that will eventually be reported on some gameFAQ. Alpha Centauri had an interesting tech tree; the tech tree itself made for good stategy. Telling "how the tech tree works", does not mean that the tech tree interesting. I understand that things are in flux before the release, but unless they can one-up it in other areas than the unit workshop or even combat, I'm not bothering.

By itself, I already have enough wargames, and I'm sorry to say I've played enough Alpha Centauri (they compare it to Civ 5, which I didn't even bother buying). Not that I wouldn't buy a new-and-improved AC. but I doubt that they can give the game any flavour without a Brian Reynolds (does a game without flavour manage to have an interesting tech tree?). Frankly I'd be more interested if they started babbling philosophy. AC may not have quoted a library worth of books, but it did turn me on to Han Fei.  As for Kant, well....
Title: Re: pandora update
Post by: Green1 on June 04, 2013, 06:43:33 pm
I agree with you. For me, this is a wait and see type thing. I also have a bit of wargames that have taken up space on my hard drive, so it has got to appeal to me.

But then again, beta is beta. Depending on how early it is in beta, they themselves probably do not know what is going to be left in.

And, no.... I am not going to be volunteer QA for any game. I think people should get PAID to do betas, not the other way around in some cases.
Title: Re: pandora update
Post by: BlaneckW on June 04, 2013, 08:48:07 pm
I don't get the impression that they have the money for that sort of thing.  I'd rather they pay people who know books to come in and make their game interesting.  If they have any kind of government feature at all, it ought to be based on ideas, and this is something that can be improved from AC without making it too complicated for simple-minded people.  AC had real-world philosophy in the character of Yang, and knew what it was doing with the other factions too; Zakarov had drones because it's focus on labs was done at the expense of utilizing the majority of it's citizenry. 

Other designers would not have been able to make as intelligent factions.  The expansion cybernetics faction is a failure; the negative growth makes it a bunk faction.  The expansion also tried to include an industrialistic democratic socialist faction, but mostly it just ends up spamming synthemetals unless it gets a lucky position.  Angels is pointless, it's function easily replaceable by believers and morganites (and what kind of idiot plays RPGs while mind worms crawl at the door?).

Take the "imperium" faction in the screenshot.  Does this have any philosophy behind it that was applied in real-world governments, or is it just a generalized category?  There's lots of games out there I can tickle my brain with bull[poop]fights between red and blue (the SUCH and SUCH, the BLAH BLAH), I see it in ads for online games all the time (which never have any information on their game on the home page!  I'm just supposed hand out my information, which slitherine also wants a bit too much of).

But then, if they want to sell me a wargame AC look-alike, I will buy it for 20$.  I appreciate pittance effort with "sci-fi atmosphere!"  But then, I might just play HOI2 and EU3 for my wargame fix.  I also have some sci-fi novels with concepts that might be less concocted.  Good authors.   So you have four weapon types; how about... [fuddle-duddle] you?  I have battle island waiting for me on GOG, haven't played it yet.
Title: Re: pandora update
Post by: Buster's Uncle on June 04, 2013, 09:01:41 pm
This doesn't sound promising...
Title: Re: pandora update
Post by: BlaneckW on June 04, 2013, 09:32:18 pm
I don't mind if they make verbatim clones of AC factions (some of them are obvious), but let them one-up the gaians by finding an interesting real-life agronomy quote.  For that matter, put agronomy somewhere in the tech tree.

But to tell you the truth, If I was to make AC2, I'd get rid of the factions feature.  Select ideologies or aspects of ideologies over the course of the game.

But currently, there isn't evidence that this one even has "social engineering".
Title: Re: pandora update
Post by: Buster's Uncle on June 04, 2013, 09:47:55 pm
It sounds like they've gotten enough basic structure working to start adding the kind of grace notes (story and personality) that made SMAC(X) great.  I'm not holding my breath, but not abandoning all hope yet, either.  [shrugs]  Maybe they'll get it right before they release.

I don't believe it either...
Title: Re: pandora update
Post by: BlaneckW on June 05, 2013, 01:10:50 am
I don't get the impression they have the team or the money.

But something I hadn't considered, if they make the game modable enough, maybe we can make an AC2 out of it, in terms of it not just being a war game (I'd be able to help with ancient Chinese ideology :p).  I'd find it ridiculous to pay 50$ for a graphical chasis with an updated combat system, but the price would go down after awhile.

So maybe you guys could be discussing AC2 after all, unless they're asses and make it unmoddable.
Title: Re: pandora update
Post by: Buster's Uncle on June 05, 2013, 01:17:51 am
We certainly have a deep bench of modders who know what they're doing...
Title: Re: pandora update
Post by: BlaneckW on June 05, 2013, 01:20:58 am
Maybe shiny new graphics and combat gimmick is the hit Alpha Centauri needs.
Title: Re: pandora update
Post by: Buster's Uncle on June 05, 2013, 01:22:35 am
[shrugs] Could be.
Title: Re: pandora update
Post by: Geo on June 05, 2013, 06:38:19 pm
For sure!  ;lol
(At least if you want to attract a larger part of the newcoming gamer base)
Title: Re: pandora update
Post by: Buster's Uncle on June 05, 2013, 08:24:23 pm
IF they're cool, sure.
Title: Re: pandora update
Post by: Green1 on June 06, 2013, 02:26:46 am
Well, the selling point for many games nowadays IS the mods available for them, if it is moddable at all.

I personally think they should at some point instead of Civ X, Fallen Enchantress, Total War, Warlock, Age of Empires, Age of Wonders, etc just come out with a badass vanilla wargame construction set that is complex but can do anything. Forget about this flavor or that flavor. You know folks would eat that stuff up.

...but no one has done anything close to that to my knowledge since Roger Damon's Wargame Construction Set. And, those tools were lackluster even on an ancient system like the Commodore 64.
Title: Re: pandora update
Post by: BlaneckW on June 06, 2013, 07:47:47 am
\
...but no one has done anything close to that to my knowledge since Roger Damon's Wargame Construction Set. And, those tools were lackluster even on an ancient system like the Commodore 64.
That was excellent, disproving your own point.
Title: Re: pandora update
Post by: Green1 on June 06, 2013, 09:36:54 am
Not disproving... just a honest assessment of the last real attempt (as far as I know) of what I think would be great for the 4x community as a whole.
Title: Re: pandora update
Post by: Unorthodox on June 06, 2013, 01:58:24 pm
But to tell you the truth, If I was to make AC2, I'd get rid of the factions feature.  Select ideologies or aspects of ideologies over the course of the game.

If you were talking Civilization, I'd actually agree with you, but I think the factions, and the personalities therein is one of the best things of AC.
Title: Re: pandora update
Post by: Green1 on June 06, 2013, 08:33:21 pm
But to tell you the truth, If I was to make AC2, I'd get rid of the factions feature.  Select ideologies or aspects of ideologies over the course of the game.

If you were talking Civilization, I'd actually agree with you, but I think the factions, and the personalities therein is one of the best things of AC.

Not just that, but the way they interact in diplomacy. I would put AC/X's diplomacy up against even modern efforts. IPlus, when you compare the diplomacy of games of that era, there is no comparison.

I remember a thread on another board where a writer for Triumph games (Age of Wonders series) was asking the community about characters. I said that the different leaders of AoW felt like they were not real folks. The only difference between, say, Merlin or Nekron was a different spell list and race. But AC, each leader feels alive like a real person with real agendas and totally different playstyle. The dialogue and backstory matches. Plus, unlike some 4xs, AC does not need a "campaign" mode with scripted events to tell backstories. You crank up a random map and like characters out of Shakesphere a play begins.

In order to capture and be the spiritual successor to AC, a game must do that or else it is just another 4x.
Title: Re: pandora update
Post by: Buster's Uncle on June 06, 2013, 08:38:46 pm
You articulate the point extremely well, sir.
Title: Re: pandora update
Post by: Zoid on June 07, 2013, 09:50:12 am
I´m not ready to write off this just yet, but then I´m not a die hard AC-puritan...  :P
Title: Re: pandora update
Post by: BlaneckW on June 08, 2013, 06:06:38 am
If you were talking Civilization, I'd actually agree with you, but I think the factions, and the personalities therein is one of the best things of AC.
Also the least likely thing to be made decently.  Imperium!  Bet you that has a whole lot of thought behind it!
Title: Re: pandora update
Post by: JarlWolf on July 03, 2013, 05:13:57 am
Someone mention Imperium?

(http://media.desura.com/images/members/1/374/373140/ImperialGuardSacrifice-1.jpg)
Title: Re: pandora update
Post by: Green1 on July 04, 2013, 08:49:18 pm
A lot of this is going to be how easy it is for modders to get a hold of it and tweak it.

Almost all the great 4x games, past and present, have survived in good part because of modders.

It would be interesting, too. A modern and scaled 3D Civ 5 style Alpha Centauri?
Title: Re: pandora update
Post by: JarlWolf on July 04, 2013, 11:14:58 pm
This game will reach success if it can allow you to create your own custom factions, like you select bonuses in some sort of editor, change colour and select an appearance from amongst the one's available, and some superficial things like names etc.

And if the game is easy to mod, the two combined will be easy to re-create Alpha Centauri with.
Title: Re: pandora update
Post by: BlaneckW on July 09, 2013, 11:00:56 pm
My gripe was with the scope of tech tree.
Title: Re: pandora update
Post by: Earthmichael on July 14, 2013, 05:28:17 pm
Pandora is far less complex that SMAC.

On the positive side:

I like the hex grid. 
I like the graphics. 
I like the resources pools. 
I like the complete wrap around maps.

It would have been much better if they had just taken SMAX and adapted it to resources pools, a hex grid, and updated the graphics.



On the negative side:

I have made a ton of suggestions.  Only a couple have been implemented to date.  Some that seem very easy to implement and very important as well, such as defining hot keys for movement, have not been done, and I have no visibility as to whether the feature is even being considered.  I do know moving each unit with the mouse is pretty tedious in late game.

The tech tree gets randomized each game.  This could be a good thing to vary strategies a bit.  I would rather have the option of a standard (sensible) tech tree and only get the randomized tech tree if the option is selected.  Forced randomization is what makes me list this on the negative side.  I would rather have the option.

The AI is very bad at fighting.  AI diplomacy is total nonsense.

Multiplayer does not work yet, so I cannot give any assessment of networking.

The game has no governments or social factors.  No secret projects or equivalents.

You can only get a single kind resource from a square, no matter how many different resources the square produces, so forests are a waste.  Instead of allocating workers to squares, you have to decide how many workers are allocated to farming, how many to mining, and how many to science.

Frankly, the game is much less complex and much less strategic that SMAC.  That may appeal to some people, but I was attracted to SMAC by the strategic options and complexity.

What would be great is a version of SMAX that uses the Pandora graphics, hex grid, and global resource pools.  To me, Pandora does not satisfy by desire for a SMAX 2.

Right now, I find the game pretty boring with just the AIs.  Hopefully, when they get multiplayer working, the game will be more interesting, due to the variety of strategy that human players can bring to the game.
Title: Re: pandora update
Post by: BlaneckW on July 15, 2013, 05:45:41 am
Hopefully, when they get multiplayer working, the game will be more interesting, due to the variety of strategy that human players can bring to the game.
I appreciate your report, but I don't really believe that multiplayer by itself would make it purchasable.  Without a sociological aspect, preferably more developed than AC, it's just a weak (and at the moment, ai-less) civ-styled wargame, unlike, say, the AOW series, which is a good civ(master of magic...)-like wargame.  One can do the whole rock-paper-scissors thing better elsewhere, and if you want flavor, AOW campaign, at least, has more RPG aspects and story-depth than many CRPGs.  Alpha Centauri is notable for it's sociological aspects.  I hope that you forum-goers can convince them to make their priority the improvement of AI, or at least it's modability, and ensure modability overall so that someone else can make their game.
Title: Re: pandora update
Post by: Vishniac on August 05, 2013, 10:42:54 pm
Though they are listed as dating from May 31 and June 13 there are updates on the Pandora home page (http://www.matrixgames.com/products/435/details/Pandora:.First.Contact (http://www.matrixgames.com/products/435/details/Pandora:.First.Contact)) that I didn't see last week.
- a developper explanation for the tech tree mechanism
- two videos.

I won't watch these videos just as I don't watch trailers for movies I am eagerly awaiting. Feel free to comment though!
Anything else on the beta-tester front?
Title: Re: pandora update
Post by: Buster's Uncle on August 05, 2013, 10:53:07 pm
We've got three people in the beta, and a secret Pandora forum with no action.  That's all I know.
Title: Re: pandora update
Post by: BlaneckW on August 06, 2013, 01:39:00 am
They probably realized they aren't sci-fi buffs.
Title: Re: pandora update
Post by: Geo on August 06, 2013, 03:40:04 pm
They probably realized they aren't sci-fi buffs.

The three testers, or the game developers? ;)
Title: Re: pandora update
Post by: BlaneckW on August 07, 2013, 01:37:58 am
The game developers.
Title: Re: pandora update
Post by: Geo on August 07, 2013, 04:03:10 pm
Then they're stupid to have even started it!  ;lol
Title: Re: pandora update
Post by: BlaneckW on August 07, 2013, 09:08:57 pm
They didn't, they're programmers paid by a company that makes generically named wargames. 
Title: Re: pandora update
Post by: BlaneckW on August 07, 2013, 09:23:40 pm
I hope that they will begin marketing it as a moddable shell rather than try to sell a loreless AI-less Civ with no governmental aspect.
Title: Re: pandora update
Post by: Geo on August 07, 2013, 09:26:16 pm
They didn't, they're programmers paid by a company that makes generically named wargames.

Okay. Have to tone down my response then. Thank for clarifying.
Title: Re: pandora update
Post by: Petek on October 31, 2013, 11:10:17 am
Pandora beta tester Gfurst has posted a preview on Youtube:

Pandora: First Contact Beta Preview (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nlrllbOLqQk#ws)
Title: Re: pandora update
Post by: Yitzi on November 03, 2013, 04:51:55 am
Other designers would not have been able to make as intelligent factions.  The expansion cybernetics faction is a failure; the negative growth makes it a bunk faction.  The expansion also tried to include an industrialistic democratic socialist faction, but mostly it just ends up spamming synthemetals unless it gets a lucky position.

That's strange; Drones and Cyborgs are two of the top contenders for "strongest faction", from what I've heard.

Quote
Angels is pointless, it's function easily replaceable by believers and morganites

I'm not so sure...techshare could be fairly powerful in a 7-player game if exploited to its fullest...
Title: Re: pandora update
Post by: Mart on January 21, 2014, 08:20:03 pm
I think, weakness of Cybernetic C. and Drones is here presented due to AI playing style. What I think, was meant here...

Human players can make quite a use of these factions.

And this gives me an idea of a competition. Whether a faction is strong or weak depends on what map/terrain is used, game settings, AI capability to handle it, or who is playing it, what skills a player have, or maybe playstyle fitting a given faction.
Competition would be multiple human players, AI player and in various setting.
Title: Re: pandora update
Post by: Yitzi on January 22, 2014, 07:36:30 am
You mean have a lot of games with people and AI playing different factions on a wide scale of maps, and see how the various factions do on each sort of map with various players?  That would work, but would take a lot of playing to get a decent sample size if we don't make use of already-existing data...

And even there, you forgot to list a few other important factors that affect faction strength, such as difficulty level, and the features (faction, player skill, player playstyle, and difficulty level) of the other factions in the game.
Title: Re: pandora update
Post by: Mart on January 22, 2014, 09:47:18 am
You mean have a lot of games with people and AI playing different factions on a wide scale of maps, and see how the various factions do on each sort of map with various players?  That would work, but would take a lot of playing to get a decent sample size if we don't make use of already-existing data...
Yes, exactly that. :) I think the process of playing and making the ranking will be very interesting. And it can be sort of continuous process.
Quote
And even there, you forgot to list a few other important factors that affect faction strength, such as difficulty level, and the features (faction, player skill, player playstyle, and difficulty level) of the other factions in the game.
Yes, these factors too. Difficulty level would be stressed on transcend. I have impression most people quickly migrates to the highest level, if they are going to play SMACX longer.
Title: Re: pandora update
Post by: Geo on January 22, 2014, 11:31:14 am
Don't think I ever won a game at Transcend. ;)
Title: Re: pandora update
Post by: Mart on January 22, 2014, 04:26:20 pm
Don't think I ever won a game at Transcend. ;)
You mean, you always win on transcend?
Title: Re: pandora update
Post by: Yitzi on January 22, 2014, 04:47:21 pm
Don't think I ever won a game at Transcend. ;)

I don't think I ever played a game on Transcend (other than one of the GotMs just to see what it was like, but not for long).
Title: Re: pandora update
Post by: Geo on January 22, 2014, 04:50:50 pm
Don't think I ever won a game at Transcend. ;)
You mean, you always win on transcend?

IIRC, I have never won a game at Transcend.
Title: Re: pandora update
Post by: Mart on January 22, 2014, 05:02:12 pm
Ok, so on which level you usually play and win?
We have:

1. citizen
2. specialist
3. talent
4. librarian
5. thinker
6. transcend
Title: Re: pandora update
Post by: Yitzi on January 22, 2014, 06:10:46 pm
For me, probably librarian, though I have been slowly moving my way up.  At the moment, though, I'm more interested in making ways to make each difficulty harder by tweaking the mechanics to remove (or at least add a substantial cost to) the tricks that people often use to handle high difficulties, and then maybe Transcend will be a difficulty level that only the best players can win reliably on.
Title: Re: pandora update
Post by: Geo on January 22, 2014, 06:24:58 pm

4. librarian
5. thinker

A bit of switching between those two. I remember winning games on Thinker.
But its been a long time since I finished a game. :-[
Title: Re: pandora update
Post by: Mart on January 31, 2014, 11:22:58 pm
In this thread (http://alphacentauri2.info/index.php?topic=6800.0) there is transcend scenario, for Faction Ranking.
I haven't completed it yet, but I believe, it is possible to win it with basic skills.
Title: Re: pandora update
Post by: gwillybj on February 01, 2014, 04:34:42 pm
I played Citizen, Specialist, and Talent once each, then went to Librarian for a long time during which I tried Thinker a few times, Transcend once. I've deicided I'll always be a Librarian. That's okay; I'm always playing new factions or maps or some rules adjustment somewhere.
Title: Re: pandora update
Post by: Yitzi on February 01, 2014, 11:58:03 pm
I played Citizen, Specialist, and Talent once each, then went to Librarian for a long time during which I tried Thinker a few times, Transcend once. I've deicided I'll always be a Librarian. That's okay; I'm always playing new factions or maps or some rules adjustment somewhere.

Librarian really is "standard" difficulty; the only reason people tend to play on Transcend is because people have found exploits (not in the "abusable bug" sense but just as rules that allow strategies to be far more powerful than is balanced) that the AI doesn't know how to use, so playing on the hardest difficulty is the only way to rebalance it.  So with good rules adjustments, Librarian could probably actually be reasonably difficult.
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