How would you patch MOO2?

Sollos · October 21, 2002, 23:21

How would you have patched MOO2?

This thread is for fun---distraction until MOO3. The question is, If there was a major new patch for MOO2, what would it have done?

First I'd start with the race picks. I added 7 new ones off the top of my head at the bottom.

1. DEMOCRACY: I would have added the fact that Declaring War would lower morale empire-wide by 10%. Democracies fight great when they are attacked or declared war on, but they truly experience uprest when they start wars.

2. UNIFICATION: Way too many people used this pick because it was just so good. Such a government should arouse suspicion with Democracies and Feudals (-25% diplomacy with these governments).

3. LOW-G WORLD: This was an absolute bargain pick. Change cost to -4. Also, a Low-G race should experience x2 penalties on High-G worlds.

4. HIGH-G WORLD: Cost way too much. I'd change to 4 picks.

5. AQUATIC: Desert, Arid, Barren, Radiated, and Toxic worlds should offer more negative modifiers to an Aquatic race. Change to 4 picks.

6. SUBTERRANEAN: I always thought having x2 population size was too much simply because you lived underground. I would have made the pop max 66% better, instead of 100% better, and made the pick worth 5.

7. CYBERNETIC: This pick was messed up. The drain on industrial production was too much. I would have totally revamped Cybernetic and turned the Meklars back into a revised of what they were in MOO1.

8. LITHOVORE: Turn Lithovore sort of into MOO2's Cybernetic in that Lithovores eat a small amount of their industrial output. Just a bit mind you. Pick falls to 8.

10. REPULSIVE: This was a very irritating pick. No diplomacy at all?! Totally change this by giving Repulsives -50 or -60 rolls on all normal diplomatic actions. Maybe they can only conduct diplomacy once every 6 turns with each respective race.

11. CREATIVE: I had the original solution for this stupid pick, but SImtex ignored me years ago! Hehe. Instead of getting all 3 techs in a group, the Creative should get 2 of the 3. Then the pick should go back to 6 in cost.

12. TELEPATHIC: Another unrealistic pick. A cruiser of Telepaths could instantly take over a planet? Dumb. Instead, the Telepaths could cause rebels on a planet, like a conquered planet in revolt. Every cumulative ship size (1 for frigate, 2 for destroyer) orbiting the planet would be added together and exert telepathic disruption causing loss of morale and potentially rebellion. Maybe the attack could turn loyal colonists into captured ones (those yellow handcuffed guys that you have to assimilate all over again).

13. OMNISCIENT: Knowing everything for 3 picks? Kinda takes the fun out of things. I would have made the range of omniscience to 10 parsecs, and called the pick PRESCIENCE.

14. TRANSDIMENSIONAL: What a lame ability for 5 picks! I would have added that TRANSers would be immune to various random events like the Hyperspace Beast and Space-Time Anomaly. Plus they'd be immune to techs like Phasors, Warp Dissipaters, and Warp Interdictors.

15. WARLORD: Seeing that the race is totally focused when fighting, I'd give them +5% morale while at war, and -5% when not. Just a minor detail, but cool.

16. FEUDAL: I disliked Feudal because of the steep research penalty, even though it's not a bad penalty pick. I'd tone down the penalty from -50% to -33%. To compensate, I'd make a Feudal empire more turbulent. For every hull size of ship that is lost in combat (meaning nobles have been killed), there is 1% that a colony is hit by insurrection. For instance, a fleet of 18 hull sizes is destroyed; there is an 18% chance a planet will riot, fight its marines and, if it wins, declare independence or amalgamate with another empire.

Okay, now what other picks would you have added? How about:

17. DEVELOPED SYSTEM (3 picks). Player starts with 2 of his solar system's planets freshly colonized.

18. RECOVERING HOMEWORLD (-2 picks). Player begins the game after a brutal war on his homeworld. Starts with 1/2 of the normal colonists, which would be 4, I believe.

19. ADVANCED (3 picks). Player starts the game with one free tech from every group from the bottom of the techtree. Choose away. Your research starts on the 2nd tier.

20. POLLUTED HOMEWORLD (-2 picks). Industrial accidents and mismanagement have spiralled out of control and the player's homeworld is either Tundra or Desert, 10 max in size. Mutally Exclusive with Tolerance and maybe others.

21. PERIPHERY HOMEWORLD (1 pick). Player starts at the edge or corner of the starmap, slightly increasing chances for unimpeded expansion.

22. CENTER HOMEWORLD (-1 picks). Player starts somewhere in the middle of the starmap. This slightly limits the chances for large-scale expansion since he will butt up with so many other races, thus possibly being ending up in a compromising strategic position.

23. PACIFIST (-3 picks). A new government type. The race's government is completely designed to minimize conflict. Taxes can never be raised beyond 10%. They cannot declare war. While defending themselves in war, no matter what, their morale is reduced by 20% until peace is declared. They cannot bomb a planet, nor commit genocide. Mutally exclusive with Warlord and Repulsive.

- Sollos

I'll add more later. SO many things could have been done to improve this game!

vmxa1 · October 22, 2002, 00:20

I like it for the most part. Low-G, I think people would not use it if it changed that much. OMNI - make it so you can't choose it until mutation and leave it as it is.

Garth Vader · October 25, 2002, 12:53

Quote:

Originally posted by Sollos
How would you have patched MOO2?

This thread is for fun---distraction until MOO3. The question is, If there was a major new patch for MOO2, what would it have done?

First I'd start with the race picks. I added 7 new ones off the top of my head at the bottom.

6. SUBTERRANEAN: I always thought having x2 population size was too much simply because you lived underground. I would have made the pop max 66% better, instead of 100% better, and made the pick worth 5.

True having x2 pop is too much that's why subterranen is already only +50% pop. A large HW goes from size 16 to 24.

Interesting picks. I liked most of them! Most of my thoughts on changing Moo2 revolve around combat and ship movement.

I think you should be able to fight in deep space, and intercept ships. Warp dissipator would be useful here. You should also be able to set ships on a defensive intercept so one fleet could defend a number of your home systems.

I'd like to be able to split a fleet up and assault multiple planets in a system in one turn.

Ship defences should increase in line with weapons advances. In the early game a one on one ship battle would often take a number of rounds, in late game one cruiser could take out multiple titans. Although a real time or semi real time ship combat fixes this too.

moomin · October 25, 2002, 19:39

Patches? Oh, I dunno. Here's a couple I've been feelin irritated about occasionally:

1. The Elerians are utterly useless. Could they please use thier telephatic ability instead of building troop transports like everybody else? It's not like a cruiser is expensive for a feudal race...

2. AIs should learn how to use outpost ships (although that may make impossible live up to it's name).

3. Could I please equip my starbases myself? Pretty please?

4. No beams should be effective for more than, say, five grid boxes. Beams are not long range weapons.

5. Forward mount should mean a 10 degree gun mount, not a 90 degree one... 5 for heavy.

6. No space weapon should scratch planetary surface. Bring along all those bombs. (OK, the stellar converter may.)

7. Require at least two successful frames to go from allied to war. Really.

8. Teach the AI to pursue the Antares option.

9. Auto-build warp interdictors like star gates.

10. Default build queues. Nuff' said.

11. Give the Antareans battle ships, titans and doom stars.

12. Hit the leader. Especially - but certainly not exclusively - if it's the human player.

13. Could we please have a terraforming tech for toxic planets that doesn't involve stellar converters?

Hmm. That'll have to do for now.

vmxa1 · October 25, 2002, 20:36

Nice list.

Urban Ranger · October 27, 2002, 04:42

Quote:

Originally posted by moomin
13. Could we please have a terraforming tech for toxic planets that doesn't involve stellar converters?

You could do that in MoO.

Urban Ranger · October 27, 2002, 04:46

Quote:

Originally posted by Sollos
23. PACIFIST (-3 picks). A new government type. The race's government is completely designed to minimize conflict. Taxes can never be raised beyond 10%. They cannot declare war. While defending themselves in war, no matter what, their morale is reduced by 20% until peace is declared. They cannot bomb a planet, nor commit genocide. Mutally exclusive with Warlord and Repulsive.

I would add the following:

- Bonuses with diplomacy, because other races trust them.
- Reduced cost with defensive deployments and civilian improvements.
- If one of their worlds is bombed, all restictions regarding war against the offender are permanently lifted.
- Bonuses with scientific research and production.

Cost: +5

Sollos · October 27, 2002, 05:58

The MOO2 patch wishlist is getting fat over at this thread:

http://www.ina-community.com/forums/...hreadid=226006

No offense or anything, but I just envisioned the Pacifist pick as being more problematic than advantageous. Instead of a government, maybe it's just genetic hardwiring (due to lack of Darwinian pressures) and millenia of cultural conditioning.

1. Bonuses with diplomacy? Maybe, but not a lot. Perhaps they could have bonuses when asking for a peace treaty, or brokering peace between 2 empires. Otherwise, a general diplomacy boost takes away from the uniquessness of the CHARISMATIC pick. Races with the Warlord and/or Feudal picks would probably look down upon a Pacifist race as weak and unworthy. Maybe even a Unified government too.

2. Reduced cost to defenses? They don't like violence of any kind. Maybe their ships and defenses should cost 10% more.

3. Enemy bombing negates pacificism? They shouldn't get away with eye-for-an-eye without feeling tension. It's just the way they are.

4. Bonuses to production and research? This kind of steals from other picks. Again, just my opinion, I envisioned excessive pacifist tendencies as being passive and not exactly ambitious in any way.

I just made the Pacifist pick crappy because they're so few negative picks.

Skanky Burns · October 27, 2002, 07:28

I'd fix the bug where fully terraformed planets that were created out of asteroids or gas giants are not able to reach their maximum population.

vmxa1 · October 27, 2002, 12:50

If there are no serious positive traits for Pacifist, it will never be used. Negative picks have some means of over coming them with growth or tech. It may be possible to create it as valid form of government with the proper balance for players that do not want to use conquest. Some sort of discount on colony ships and outpost. They could start with that field already learned.

Urban Ranger · November 13, 2002, 01:52

Even Fedual has some positive points. Something at -3 picks with absolutely zero positive points is just a total waste of time.

nato · November 13, 2002, 14:47

Wow I really like some of the ideas here, they are very cool. Here are some of my patch level ideas:

1. An option to disable the senate vote. If you don't want to win that way its just a nuisance.

1. A chance to get another race to peacefully join you, if you've been nice long enough and you are closeby with no conflicts. Basically winning a harder senate vote with that one race, but not ending the game.

3. More room for specials on ships, like 10 or 12.

4. A chance to choose which ship tileset you get. Maybe I want to be blue with the red ship styles.

5. An in game ability to move your capitol.

6. An in game ability to rename colonies.

7. Weaken the telepathic colony takeover option somehow.

8. I also thought of making feudal research at 2/3, not 1/2. Like they traded 1/3 of their research for 1/3 more ships. Might make them not such a "deadly pick".

9. Various custom race pick price changes (like make high g cost less, subterranean cost more, etc.).

10. Make battlestations and star fortresses a little longer lasting.

11. Allow many more leaders, like 16 instead of 4.

Ack, this is hard to stop doing. I could keep going for a while I think, but I'll stop here.

vmxa1 · November 13, 2002, 19:27

Why stop if you are having fun?

moomin · November 13, 2002, 19:48

That's enough freeridin' vmxa! Fess up your own suggestions

vmxa1 · November 13, 2002, 22:57

This is where I have admit that I am very poor at concepts and have very little imagination. I guess I just do not give it much thought. The sad truth is I do not have any. I do like to see others idea, I just do not come up with many and I forget them if I do.