What do YOU want in SMAC2

[Analyst]

Three more ideas (there goes my studying).

When upgrading a unit, improving the chassis should also be an option. I should be able to upgrade a silksteel shard infantry unit into a silksteel shard rover or chopper with energy credits. If special abilities don't convert, they should just disappear, maybe even saving money. Now, this is only an infrequent option while a unit is in production and you design a new one in which the only difference is the chassis. The chassis change could be expensive, but I shouldn't have to disband the unit in a base and lose so much production value relative to the gun and armor costs.

Any unit with more than one movement point should be able to attack up to their number of movement points, not just choppers. This goes for elite infantry, rovers, and especially gravships. I'd like them thought of as action points. Gravships hover like choppers and the infantry and rovers are on the ground anyway. Also, there's no reason why a bomber or interceptor can't make another pass, if it has fuel. All units with enough action points should be able to stick and move, not just move and stick. Maybe part of the answer is giving units a fixed amount of ammo that must be "recharged" as part of an improved military logistics system, or requiring an attack to use multiple action points.

Also, speaking of movement, one of the most annoying things is to have a gravship with lots of movement left end it's turn because you accidentally moved it the wrong way and it entered a friendly base. Only air units seem to fall victim to that, and no unit should. Airplanes don't automatically land on every runway they fly over.

[Blake]

I agree the combat system really does need to be revamped, while the civ system was fine for civ it really needs to be dropped for SMAC2.

Unit workshop is cool, instead of chassis, weapon, armour, special, special I think the options should be
Weapon: weapon strength compared in battle
Chassis: multipliers for combat strength according to terrain, ie rovers mobile in open bonus
Shield aka forcefield: This increases the hitpoints of a unit, the effect is much greater in bases because the unit can tap the base energy grid, thus defenders get a bonus
Special Abilities: Have a whole host of these, and not restricted to 2, but some could be mutually exclusive. Examples:
Anti-missile counter measures: Combat bonus vs units with missile based weapons.
Empathic: Improved police, still quell one drone even under negative police coditions. More difficult to bribe.

Units should be generally more expensive than facilities, an attacker should require a reasonably extensive combined arms attack to conquer a city, and a city should be more of an asset than in SMAC.

Also, facilties which act as immobile units. For example SAM battery instead of increasing the combat bonus vs aircraft actually defends against aircraft, so even if the base has no units an attacking fighter still engages in combat with the SAM battery (or has a chance to get shot down). These facilities are destroyed in battles, and automatically repair by about 25% every turn, or can be rush-repaired. Other inbase defenses could be coastal battery, laser battery. Also these defenses should auto-upgrade with tech, further reducing MM, and a newly built base should have "miltia" which can defend against a less-than-serious attack (for example a scout rover stumbling across an undfended base should not be allowed to just walk in).

The actual combat should be played out in CTP2/MOO2/HOMM style, as units would be grouped into armies. It would be really nice if you actually saw rovers flanking infantry and infantry digging in, but I would be happy with a simplified combat, and the option should be available.

Speaking of options, there should be options to allow low-spec users to play the game, or high-spec users to be able to play with hundreds of armies and bases on huge worlds without slowdown. By this I mean have options for simplified units & terrain, so instead of showing up as a nicely rendered animation a missile rover is just a square with a R6 (chassis, weapon). So for small worlds you can enjoy the eye candy, while vets who know every unit inside out have options to increase framerate at expense of understandability. With SMAC you could zoom out 4 times, and the units became coloured squares. Would have been great if they had a 'F' for former, and different coloured borders for different states. But No, instead every unit was an indentical square, and bases were a slightly larger square. Stupid.

I should be studying, too

[DilithiumDad]

The military model you are speaking of has been executed in Deadlock (1996)and Deadlock II (1998). The original Deadlock had a more playable demo, which you can download from this link:
http://gamespot.com/gamespot/filters...197068,00.html

Do yourselves a favor. Download the free demo and play the game. Now tell me if you think SMAC would be imporved if they grafted on the military model and resource management from this game series.

There are 7 species which correspond with eerie similarity to the original 7 SMAC factions. Here is a key for the SMAC player:

Green faction = Gaians = Uva Mosk
Insectoid faction = Hive = Ch'Chit
Research faction = University = Maug
Money and commerce faction = Morgan = Humans
Military faction = Spartans = Tarth
Mind control faction = Believers = Relu
High morale (easy drone control) faction easy for beginners = PK's = Cyth

There is an 8th faction (The Skirineen) that runs the Black Market, but you can't play as them.

[Fugi the Great]

After reading the previous posts, it sounds very much like all that is needed is a patch or a mod to make most people happy, and most what you are asking for will probably be in Civ3, which after reading an article about it sounds very much like a SMAC clone with a few tweaks here and there to fool us into thinking its a whole new game.

I on the otherhand want a whole bunch more for SMAC2. They started with 3D units, so now give us the ability to design our own units in 3D, there are lots of talented artists out there, give us the template. Also some way to make movement of units faster, even on an P3 800 those units are slow, especially the alien units. Maybe convert them to 2D at the touch of the spacebar and move them as in CIV2?. Make a true 3D planet, that is spherical, with polar icecaps that can melt and also refreeze - there should be no reason they can't do this. Different levels in altitude for different units to be in, so that now a plane can fly over an enemy unit without having to attack it, with satellites above those and other space units in near Planet orbit only, and submarines that can travel under enemy ships without attacking. You no longer can just park a bomber in the middle of road to halt enemy movement, or put an army of sea terraformers out in the way to block submarine movement. Public works AND terraformers, so I don't have to build a huge army of terraformers, and make the terraformers so that I can put them in Automatic and tell them "plant forest only" - something very much missing in SMAC or SMACX, if players don't like PW then they can set it to "0", if they don't like terraformers, they don't have to build any, both could/should be used because both have their good/bad points. Expandable city influences as in CTP2 to combat ICS, but with the border movements of SMAC, but this should be OPTIONAL, for those who don't like it. Better diplomacy to "haggle" over the fineprint of a treaty. An AI that doesn't pick a fight just because I'm ten times bigger than they are, and also knows when to quit after it gets its butt kicked. And more upbeat music, that music/noise (whatever you call it) got very annoying after awhile. Also it needs to be more open for mod designers, with a way to easily design your own mods and scenarios. Please add the ability to research multiple techs as in MOO1, and even there not really too directed since most discoveries are by accident, but somewhat directed if we know that someone else has already got that technology. And please, fix ALL of the bugs not just most of them.

To sum this up, try something different. People complain about how terrible CTP and CTP2 are, but the programmers at least tried something new, maybe it was too much too fast, but those two games are the two I keep going back to again and again. Those games are very modifiable, maybe not easily, but a lot better than SMAC. SMAC can be boring and depressing. I do not want another ICS terraforming game, I already have enough of those.
[This message has been edited by Fugi the Great (edited April 21, 2001).]

[Alinestra Covelia]

This is something I was wondering about, as I examined my world map. It probably has more resonance with Civ3 than with SMAC2, but it's an interesting idea all the same.

Call To Power tried to innovate with the poles, allowing you the option to make your world doughnut shaped. (ie if you walked off the top row you would appear on the bottom row) Whilst this owes more of a debt to pseudocartography than astronomical feasibility, it still highlights a distinct lack of purpose to the Civ2 and SMAC poles.

In any Civ2 Earth scenario, in order for the USSR to nuke America (or vice versa) the superpower in question must send a nuclear weapon across the Pacific or Atlantic. Frequently the range involved is too great for a single flight. In reality, the nations would most likely consider delivering the nuclear weapon across the Arctic circle. Most flights from London to Beijing or New York to Beijing do cross the Arctic circle, since the curve of the earth favors that more than an Atlantic/Pacific flight.

So - how about the possibility of moving a unit on the top row to any other square on that top row? This would reflect the fact that the poles are on the same latitude lines, and that moving from meridian to meridian is simpler at the poles.

[Cybergod]

Alinestra Covelia, I've been wondering about the poles ever since I landed next to them for the first time! I think that would be great but the shape of the "world map" would need to be changed to something else. Maybe eliptic?

I would also like different SE models. How do you know if Planned, FM or Green economies would survive up to 2100.? Or if there still would be some fundamentalists about? I also don't seem to see in the world that countries are 100% in one thing and 0% in other. Also the period of switching from one to the other should be longer and dependable from how big is your empire. I mean, yes the capital would make the switch quickly enouth but what about those cities on the edge? What if some of your cities are more influenced by your neighbours ways of living and decide to switch (or it happens vice versa)? I'd like to see "philosophies" of different faction, a bit like in "Stars! Supernova Genesis" (from the screenshots of it though, I don't particulary like it), where you have:
* Alternate Reality (energy-based life forms that only inhabit starbases, orbiting and mining the local star until it's depleted, then caravanning to the next empty system)
* Bio-Engineer (name says it all, masters of biotech)
* Synthetic (machines, robots & manufacture...)
* "Standard" (pick and mix of the three above)

Also there were some interesting philosophies in the above game so maybe go to http://crisium.com/sn/snprt.htm ?

Tech trees: do they have to be the same for everyone? Maybe one faction's personality is mainly 'synthetic' weapons (made with machines, and uses robots a lot) and another uses loads of bio-tech. For those with biotech, the sinthetic armament would be all in one technology possibly called Sinthetic Machinery (like Bio-Machinery for the synthetic faction).

Also I've been thinking about our storyline problem. Do we really have to more from Planet straight away? Can we wait a little later because there is so much we can exploit by staying on Planet. Maybe 'borrow' some bits from other Civ games? Maybe a tech called "Secrets of the Wormholes"? I think that my colonies idea should be used for colonisation of other planets in the Alpha Centauri system (if I remember one of them, it as Eurypton - Mercurian planet) or moons of Planet or even asteroids (asteroid mining, remember the Living Refinery video?). Maybe leave the "Return to Earth" scenario for later or maybe make it AS a scenario in the end game.

I've never played Deadlock and so don't know what it's like, so can some one link to the screenshots page of it? Please?

That is all from me for now folks .

[Sikander]

quote: Originally posted by RGE on 04-18-2001 12:25 PM One thing I would like to see in regards to combat is a different take on weapon and armor. If the weapon has lower power than armor, the attacker shouldn't be able to hurt the defender. If the weapon is as high, or higher than armor, the battle should be resolved by comparing weapon vs weapon. Because this seems to be the way everything is heading in modern warfare. Armor is good for protecting against shrapnel and small arms, but it's not used for actual defense when attacked by similar machines as the one you're using. Although, maybe accuracy and speed is more important once it's been established that you can't afford to let your armor take the hit, just as long as your own weapon is able to penetrate your opponent's armor. RGE

I don't think that a weak weapon should be completely useless against strong armor. For instance, a .50 caliber machine gun of WWI era design can shred a BMP (Soviet Armored Fighting Vehicle) designed 50 years later, even though the machine gun was not designed for that role. It takes a long time for armor tech to completely neutralize weapon tech. This is in large part due to the need for armor to cover a large area, while the projectiles / energy of an attackers weapon can concentrate on weak spots, or create them through multiple hits. This doesn't mean that there is no advantage to armor. In the example above it would be completely conceivable that the BMP could aquire the .50 cal machine gun and destroy it with cannon fire before the .50 cal could do enough damage to destroy the BMP. It might make the BMP think twice before engaging several machine guns at once however.

My problem with the Civ system of combat is it's reliance upon units of a single type. It is tactical combat on a strategic map at a strategic pace (1 year per turn!) . A much more realistic model would be the grouping of different types of weapons into combined arms armies (or divisions etc.) Add a leader pool where leaders of varying ability are kept. You could assign a leader to each of your armies (and certain factions and SE settings would excel in leadership or not) and the system becomes much more palatable. There is nothing I hate more than the Civ scenario where a Phalanx produced by a city of 10,000 blocks the movement of even a Panzer Korps produced by a city of 1,000,000 over a huge area until it is squashed by the Panzer Korps. Zones of Control should be based upon the ability of an army to project power into adjacent areas. It should be a product of mobility vs the distance involved and firepower of the reacting unit vs the fire power of the force which moves into the potential zone of influence.

Military movement and combat should be carried out simultaneously, based upon the orders given by the human (the high command) or AI, and the results should be dependent upon enemy moves as well as the quality of the respective leaders, and the difficulty of the desired movement. This would not only speed multiplayer by eliminating the wait for each player to make their moves sequentially, but also by reducing the number of moving entities involved. It should also help the AI, as the human cannot take as much advantage of the unrealistic total tactical control he now enjoys. Moving all of your units in whatever order you see fit is extremely powerful, and well beyond the ability of the AI to take advantage of. Instead both human and computer will issue simpler intstructions, and both must anticipate and react to the chaos and imperfection of the battlefield.

[Earwicker]

quote: Originally posted by sk8ordie on 04-12-2001 03:38 PM ok, if we're evolving constantly dont you think future humans would look different. play areound with that.

Similar thought: As bases grow, and the factions grow older, the base appearance should change. It's weird that bases with large population just look like proportionally larger versions of themselves at a younger age. Yes, there currently are minor variations, but it makes the later game a little boring. This is particularly true for factions like Angels, Hive, Pirates, whose bases are plain to begin with.

Other stuff:
1) Different factions should research specific techs more quickly -- maybe even research others less quickly. For instance, Gaians get 10% (or so) Labs bonus when researching "Centauri" techs, -10% while researching "Industrial" techs. Spartans +10% for "Doctrine" techs. Or assign different tech values for different research areas to impede the tendency for the game to become a wargame -- like increasing the costs of "conquer" techs.

2) How about more SP's whose effect is dependent upon SE (like Longevity Vaccine)? Or SP's that, in addition to their positive effects, come at a price -- by creating negative effects to certain SE choices. Sort of the anti-Network Backbone or Cloning Vats. That might mitigate the unbalancing effect of certain SP's

[johndmuller]

quote: Originally posted by Earwicker on 04-23-2001 10:33 AM 2) How about more SP's whose effect is dependent upon SE (like Longevity Vaccine)? Or SP's that, in addition to their positive effects, come at a price -- by creating negative effects to certain SE choices. Sort of the anti-Network Backbone or Cloning Vats. That might mitigate the unbalancing effect of certain SP's

How about some occasional really BAD unexpected SP Side Effects - the result of mad scientists, accidents in the lab, bad luck, whatever.

Examples:
--Space Elevator Collapses during Ribbon Cutting Ceremony -- A one plot wide ring around Planet is devastated by the impact of the falling cable; terraforming, units, bases all gone; must negotiate heavy compensation with all affected factions and/or engage in vendetta.
--Planetary Datalink Glitch -- Programming error causes All of YOUR Tech to be published on the Web (permanent or one-time only).
--Cloning Vats are Big Disappointment -- The extra population produced by the Vats are ALL DRONES.
--Weather Paradigm Backfires -- Incompetent scientists create environmentsl disaster at base where it is being researched; equivalent to earthquake/meteor/nuke - minus 2 Planet adjustment.
-- Have fun making up more.

[Sikander]

The Hermann Goerring Project -

A glitch in the HGP accidently infuses all citizens with a propensity toward obesity and delusions of grandeur. Every population point now requires 3 nuts to support, and diplomatic relations suffer a penalty.


Synthetic Virtues -

Every one seems real nice, but behind your back, watch out! Hab limits are relaxed by two, but those two are automatically drones that look like talents! Watch the fun as the drone riots begin!


The Planetary Gridlock System -

Government engineers radically underestimate the growth of motor traffic when designing roads. The result is miles of gridlocked traffic, well beyond the quadruple bypass, blocking every major artery into the city. All travel along a road is at double the normal cost of the terrain in the square. Every fourth worker becomes a drone.


The Planetary Energy Reneg -

Areas of your empire which support Green economics over Free Market suffer from rolling blackouts as they refuse to build sufficient energy production facilities. Your Energy Minister refuses to build solar panels or tidal harnesses and instead tells them to wait until the market forces a correction, or more energy can be crawled in from the north. Every fourth base produces -1 energy per square. The effect lasts until the discovery of Sympathetic Fossile Fuels.


The Maginot Defense Force -

Rather than impose an expensive and politically unpopular militia system upon your citizens, your defense minister Maginot hits upon an idea of extensive fortification. Every square surrounding each of your bases is converted to a bunker (using commandeered formers of course), regardless of the effect upon any terraforming. Brushing aside the complaints from the Chief of staff regarding the insufficient numbers of troops to hold the bunkers, and the possibility that the enemy might occupy them to invest bases, Maginot presses on.


The Hunter - Sucker Algorithm -

While it appears that you are immune to probe actions, in fact what has happened is that every faction has infiltrated your counter-espionage agency. -4 probe rating regardless of other settings.


[This message has been edited by Sikander (edited April 24, 2001).]
[This message has been edited by Sikander (edited April 24, 2001).]

[Aredhran]

NO BUGS

'nuff said.

[Cybergod]

quote: Originally posted by johndmuller on 04-23-2001 03:19 PM How about some occasional really BAD unexpected SP Side Effects - the result of mad scientists, accidents in the lab, bad luck, whatever. Examples: --Space Elevator Collapses during Ribbon Cutting Ceremony -- A one plot wide ring around Planet is devastated by the impact of the falling cable; terraforming, units, bases all gone; must negotiate heavy compensation with all affected factions and/or engage in vendetta. --Planetary Datalink Glitch -- Programming error causes All of YOUR Tech to be published on the Web (permanent or one-time only). --Cloning Vats are Big Disappointment -- The extra population produced by the Vats are ALL DRONES. --Weather Paradigm Backfires -- Incompetent scientists create environmentsl disaster at base where it is being researched; equivalent to earthquake/meteor/nuke - minus 2 Planet adjustment. -- Have fun making up more.

I love those ideas! Well, all except the Cloning Vat side effect.

BTW, this is the 101th post to this topic!!!!!

[sharpshooter]

Before I start suggesting new features, I'd like to know if there's ever going to be a SMAC2? Has Firaxis said anything on the question? Has anyone asked? And as you all probably know, Brian Reynolds who designed SMAC has left Firaxis.

[Vultur]

I've got a couple of idea for SMAC2:
Movies for all types of victory (Not only Trascend & Progenitor)
For Conquest Victory:
Immagine a lot of soldiers aligned, behind them speeders and hovertanks
and over squadroons of Neddlejets that fly to a big monumentum (like that you see when you descover a Secrect tech) and the a voice (maybe Santiago's) that read the text for the Conquest Victory.
For Economy Victory:
Immagine the Planet seen from space, with tons of bases' lights,
and one after one the lights turn off except a region and Morgan's voice that read the text for Economic Victory.
For Diplomatic Victory:
Immagne a big assembly, like a parliament and the votation for Planet Governor, with the voice of Lal that read Diplomacy Victory's text.

I've think that other type of victory could be enjoyable.
For example:
Satellite Victory
Someone has proposed as satellite facility a sort of "death beam", my idea is that you built, for example, 10 "death beam" for each non-pacted faction, you can activate the "Satellite Peace Platform" and win the game.
Any faction can do it.
Planet Buster Victory
If you build enough Planet Busters (20-30, maybe more) you can try to "Threaten the Planetary Council",(Council option, after the discovery of Will to Power ) that can vote for you for not to be busted off; obviusly they can risk and, joyn the forces, combat till the death (their...or yours!)
Any faction (also Progenitor) can do it.
Probe Victory-for Sinder's lovers-
New Probe Action "Steal Secrect Codes", performed at enemy's HQ:
Allow ANY probe action against the victim faction that act as -2 PROBE for 10 turns, disregarding for SE,facilities, SPs, etc.
If you steal all enemys' codes in 10 turns you can "Introduce Networks' Virus" and taking off the Planet, pushing the other factions on the Stone Era!!!

I have also an idea for robot factions:
Square don't produce nutrients (Robots don't need them)
Robot's "population" need 2 energy/turn
Robot bases don't growth (you can expand only building Colony Pod)
Robot's CP don't subtract "population" from the base"
Children's Creche,Cloning Vats can't be built
The Nano Factory SP work as Cloning Vats for robot factons.
The CPs' cost is determined by ASSEMBLY values on social engeneering (ASSEMBLY=GROWTH)
A robot faction has not Talent/Drones, Pop Boom, Golden Age etc.
Instead of drones the robot faction as "Upkeep problems"
Base begin to produce "out of order" population; the production is not stopped as in the case of drone riots, but this "robot drone" extract only the half of resources rounded down (do you remember polluted square in Civ2?). If "robot drones" are more then normal population the base stop to work (too many upkeep's problems) and only high UPKEEP values on social engeneering (UPKEEP=POLICE) or have Upkeepers(=Doctors, Empaths, Trascendent) or relocate energy to the Maintenance(=Psych). Obviusly the equivalent of Rec Commons, Holo Theaters etc. can be built to avoid "out of order" population. Talents don't exist so Garden of Eden, HGP etc. can't be built. Also Punishment Sphere & Nerve Stapling are impossible.
A robot faction has not positive/negative MORAL modifiers.
They can upgrade their moral only building Command Center etc.
They can also build units with "High Moral" named for them "War Algorithm"
They can build nerve and soporific gas units, but against them don't work.(Robots don't breath)
Instead enemy's faction can use Comm Jammer ability (+100% vs robots, they take this as an Atrocity)
An other "robot atrocity" is "Introduce Polymorphic Network Virus" that works as Gene Warefare.
MORALE in the SE is replace by BELLIC (Industry) that influence units' costs (act as INDUSTRY)
They can't capture or bree or own Mindworms, they haven't PLANET bonus/penalties in PSI combat against native planet life that "infiltrate through every crevice and chew through anything softer than plasmasteel."
(Can robots feel?an androids does dream eletric sheeps?) Other factions can't attack/defend using PSI units (simply don't work!), but robots can do it (with mechanical aid). PLANET rating influence the Maintenance costs of the facilities (recicling abilities).
For the part of conquering the bases there is the same "relocation" for the robots (as in SMACX, for the Progenitors)

I think a robot faction is not overpowered (you decide when a base growth, but population needs energy, humans can't use gas or nerve but Comm Jammer is enogh to stop them, the bases don't revolt, but there aren't talent to balance the balance the drone's effect etc.)
Maybe must be add robot's name for the SE choises (robot fundamentalism? "in Gear we trust?"), but I think SE with the adjustment seen above are quite good.

What are your ideas?

[This message has been edited by Vultur (edited April 25, 2001).]

[knowhow2]

quote: Originally posted by Vultur on 04-25-2001 03:34 PM I've got a couple of idea for SMAC2: Movies for all types of victory (Not only Trascend & Progenitor) For Conquest Victory: Immagine a lot of soldiers aligned, behind them speeders and hovertanks and over squadroons of Neddlejets that fly to a big monumentum (like that you see when you descover a Secrect tech) and the a voice (maybe Santiago's) that read the text for the Conquest Victory. For Economy Victory: Immagine the Planet seen from space, with tons of bases' lights, and one after one the lights turn off except a region and Morgan's voice that read the text for Economic Victory. For Diplomatic Victory: Immagne a big assembly, like a parliament and the votation for Planet Governor, with the voice of Lal that read Diplomacy Victory's text. I've think that other type of victory could be enjoyable. For example: Satellite Victory Someone has proposed as satellite facility a sort of "death beam", my idea is that you built, for example, 10 "death beam" for each non-pacted faction, you can activate the "Satellite Peace Platform" and win the game. Any faction can do it. Planet Buster Victory If you build enough Planet Busters (20-30, maybe more) you can try to "Threaten the Planetary Council",(Council option, after the discovery of Will to Power ) that can vote for you for not to be busted off; obviusly they can risk and, joyn the forces, combat till the death (their...or yours!) Any faction (also Progenitor) can do it. Probe Victory-for Sinder's lovers- New Probe Action "Steal Secrect Codes", performed at enemy's HQ: Allow ANY probe action against the victim faction that act as -2 PROBE for 10 turns, disregarding for SE,facilities, SPs, etc. If you steal all enemys' codes in 10 turns you can "Introduce Networks' Virus" and taking off the Planet, pushing the other factions on the Stone Era!!!>[This message has been edited by Vultur (edited April 25, 2001).]

This is really ideas! Not to much but definitely a improvemnet. Maybe this idea could be introduced in a expansion set prior to the sequal?

[gwillybj]

I would like to propose a minor adjustment in the unit graphics (references are to SMAC v4.0):

For unarmored infantry units, keep the current graphic of the person holding the weapon.

For armored infantry units, use a modification of the graphic used for the Former -- with its tracks and hull, but replace the terraforming tools with the weapon graphics, and the hull properly colored according to the armor type.

One way to do this would be so only certain types of armor use the "AFV/APC" graphic:
Synthmetal (blue)
Plasma Steel (red)
Silksteel (green)
Neutronium (brown)
Antimatter (dark grey)
(5 types).

The rest remain the "soldier" graphic:
No Armor (just the weapon with its usual graphic)
Photon Wall (yellow "wings" on the backpack)
Probability Sheath (gotta love that semi-transparent light grey raincoat )
Stasis Generator (red "wings" on the backpack)
Psi Defense (purple "wings" with brown antennae on the backpack)
(also 5 types).
Edit: darn formatting again .
[This message has been edited by gwillybj (edited April 26, 2001).]

[Blake]

SP's are just a hangover from Civ2 I feel, and are not really nessecary for SMAC2, instead there should be special facilities, which act simialler but more than one can be built under certain circumstances. These should have some possible negative effects, and also be allowed to be shut down. Some SP's do make sense, a second Merchant Exchange or Empath Guild would seem redundant, but if the first was destroyed.... For other SP's like the WP and space elevator every faction should be allowed one, the longlivity vaccine is borderline - surely the first faction could create a monopoly, but another faction may like to create it's own version to serve only it's own people and deprive the first LV of business...

One thing I would love to see in SMAC2 (and Civ3!!) is immigration between bases, so people move from overpopulated cities into frontier cities. If a large base feels threatened by it's proxmitity to an enemy border droves of people could start leaving it and moving to "safer" cities.

Immigration could even go between your faction and other factions, if your population is unhappy it moves! Ofcourse then that unhappy population could make the other faction unhappy and poorer too.

You should be able to control this with city orders, like to allow no immigrants from faction X, or order citywide evacuations. Ofcourse the result would depend on the population, it would be easier to order an evacuation if nearby cities are not overcrowded. Also a high probe rating and plentiful garrisons would help to prevent immigration.

The PTS SP should increase and regulate immigration, so you can quickly shuttle population around.

The growth model should have overcrowding, so unless your faction SE enforces birth control population can grow without limit, outstriping food and housing and resulting in a large, unhappy, unproductive population. On the other hand growth could be slowed by birth control, you have less population to throw around, but smaller family sizes and other factors would result in a richer, better educated population, from which you would get more technological advances and income (but less UN votes).

Earthly human factions would tend to have large, relativly unproductive populations which grow (and starve) quickly, while centurai human factions would have smaller populations, where people have a much higher standard of living and are more productive.

[Vultur]

quote: Originally posted by Blake on 04-27-2001 12:40 AM One thing I would love to see in SMAC2 (and Civ3!!) is immigration between bases, so people move from overpopulated cities into frontier cities. If a large base feels threatened by it's proxmitity to an enemy border droves of people could start leaving it and moving to "safer" cities. Immigration could even go between your faction and other factions, if your population is unhappy it moves! Ofcourse then that unhappy population could make the other faction unhappy and poorer too. You should be able to control this with city orders, like to allow no immigrants from faction X, or order citywide evacuations. Ofcourse the result would depend on the population, it would be easier to order an evacuation if nearby cities are not overcrowded. Also a high probe rating and plentiful garrisons would help to prevent immigration.

I've had a similar idea: when you lose population for hunger the game swow a window saying:"hungry workers leave the factories"
my idea is to materialize a CP in an adiacent square. The CP will be "colorless" and will move to an other faction's territory. The "reciving" faction can receive,reject,capture (use them as slaves?) or ...exterminate (truly two bad things...) the CP.An other good idea is the "City evacuation" but how to evacuate a city of more 2 citizen in few turn?(CP take time to be built...)
Maybe it will be enjoiable put an option that force your citizen to "escape" from a city. (like burned-earth strategy, you leave nothing to conquer to your enemy). Maybe the CP "created" with this methods should be different, for example with you can't use them to build new bases (they are escaped...) but you can only add to existing bases (creating refugees problemes). Maybe if you force a population to evacuate some of them will escape from your hands. (the percentage of lost CP could be based on ex-base's people happiness, so if is a conquered city very few of them will join to you)

[johndmuller]

quote: Originally posted by Blake on 04-27-2001 12:40 AM One thing I would love to see in SMAC2 (and Civ3!!) is immigration between bases, so people move from overpopulated cities into frontier cities. If a large base feels threatened by it's proxmitity to an enemy border droves of people could start leaving it and moving to "safer" cities. Immigration could even go between your faction and other factions, if your population is unhappy it moves! Of course then that unhappy population could make the other faction unhappy and poorer too.

I like the idea of Immigration too.

CIV & SMAC model conquest and colonization, but don't do real well in more subtle concepts like assimilation and cultural imperialism, not to mention the effects of religion, either spiritual or economic. Civ3 is supposed to have some elements of culture, as in conquered cities taking a while before they are really your citizens or some such, but I don't think they address as much as we could imagine.

The idea of cities or individual pop units leaving and/or joining factions sounds great; there could be some quantifiable effects from a propaganda war. Perhaps the Psych/Happiness levels could be juiced up to provide a value for comparison between nearby cities where "nearby" could be a function of the available Communications techs, whatever they were.

Probe/Diplomat units could be allowed to attempt to recruit a pop unit to switch factions where the strength of the unit and the relative Psyche/Happiness indicies were compared for resolution (maybe credits involved as well).

Emigrants could be the result of bad conditions at home either economic or military (if city conquered by another faction), and or immigration could be fostered by good conditions at the receiving faction, probe actions or just chance, maybe even ficticious good conditions via propaganda.

A "Wonder" - the Statue of Liberty could provide a bias towards acquiring and keeping pop units w/r other factions.

I think that "Guest Workers" are a viable possibility also. A guest worker would be a pop unit "loaned" between cities of different factions they would produce more and/or cost less to support than local workers, but they would have a negative effect on the Psych/Happiness of the host faction (cheap foreign labor taking our jobs). They would provide credits to the faction of origin (sending money home) as well as having a beneficial effect on the home country's Psych/Happiness (relieving social pressure). Presumably (but maybe not necessarily) this would be between a rich/advanced faction and a poor/low-tech faction. If desired, they could be represented by new icon(s) in the Drone/Worker/Specialist vein.

They could be created by negotiation between factions, by covert activity (probe/diplomat "recruiters") or automatically, by the game, between two bases whose relative technology/ecomomics/happiness-psych/whatever were conducive according to some algorithm.

Perhaps the guest workers would become citizens in a certain period of time and fully join the new faction and leave the original one.

I think that these would be really cool and add a convincing level of realism.

Something similar to guest workers could possibly be done with military units (mercenaries/soldiers of fortune), but they would have to be handled differently as the issues of support and benefit are handled differently. I think that there is some discussion of this in a Civ3 suggestions thread somewhere.

[Cybergod]

OffTpic for a second now, when am I supposed to be upgraded from a Chieftain to something lese? How many posts?

[Solver]

Cybergod,
You'll get a Warlord title when you have 100 posts.
And, the email address Aalogin@aol.com will not work, as we have the aol.com domain in our ban list. It's possible to get a free email address at aol.com, and we try to get people to use addresses provided by ISP, so that it's easier for us to hunt down those double logins.

------------------
Solver the "Running Beer" - http://www.aok.20m.com

[Cybergod]

I've just received an email from someone who calls himself (I persume it's a he) Aardom 723 Anyway, kinda off-topic to what you guys are posting but he asked me to post his letter here since he can't for some reason create an Apolyton account (administrators, why won't Aalogin@aol.com work ?). Here itis, exactly as I received it:

Part: 1

Greetings. My name is Aalogn, but I prefer to call myself Aardom 723. I've
been working on some very intertesting suggestions for Apolyton's What do you
want in SMAC2 forum, but because of my isolated e-mail address, I cannot
recieve a password from the administraotors to join the forum. Therefore, if
you don't mind, may I send my suggestions to you to post on the messageboard?
I think they are quite interesting and quite possibly good. If you accept my
proposition, please include my name as the original writter, if you don't
mind. Thank you.


Part: 2

How about this: Instead of the traditional landmaks, I have a better Idea.
What if, even after the nuclear holocaust, a few of the largest cities managed
to survive...or at least partially survive. Any base that is built on the
city square gets a super bonus as well as any base within 7 squares. (Note:
if the base's rating is zero for the particular bonus to start with, the
base receives +1)

Los Angles: In the early 21st century, this Californian metropolis became
it's capital. It was a bustling commercial center and a major entertainment
hub.
Unfortunately, a series of horrendous earthquakes and riots brought this
city to it's knees. Many of it's building were sheilded from radiation,
though, and survived most of the fallout. Any base on this square gets it's
Efficiancy doubled, but because of severe lack of mining stations, it's
Support rating is halved.

New York: A narrow vote just missed making this the capital of the U.S.
Following that, crime in the area began to rise untill in the year 2041,
when it's security systems where jacked up. Seriously. Any base on this
square has it's Probe rating doubled, but since there are very few military
instalations in the area,
Morale is halved.

Tokyo: This Japanese city was one of the first to suffer from global floodings.
In a matter of years, most of the city was underwater. The workers managed
to persevre, but by year 2055, Tokyo was submerged. An unkown benefit of
this is that most of the city was protected from the fallout by the water,
and a series of seismic unheavals brought Tokyo from it's watery grave.
Any seabase on this square has it's Research doubled, due to the tremendous
amounts of preserved computer data, but since many communications were cut
off, Efficiency is halved.

Moscow: In year 2038, Moscow was nearly destroyed by a barage of nuclear
weapons that set off the first waves of fallout. It was repaired for the
most part, but lacked several police centers. Crime sky-rocketed, but was
silenced by a rise of military bases. Despite it's continual decay from
profuse fallout, many of these bases survived. A base here gets double Support,
but halved Police.

Bejing: As the Earths population continued to rise, great pressure was put
on this Chinese capital. It swelled from an overflowing population, and
food supplies were scarce. However, with the rise of hybrid plants, it became
apparent that China was ideal for the growing of the engineered plants.
As the hungary were fed, the food problem was stabalized. But in 2041, the
Japanese bombed it to smithereens. Many of the underground food stores survived,
giving doubled Growth, but because of the decimated factories, Industry
is slashed.

Berlin: One of the major industrial centers of the 21st century, Berlin
survived wave after wave of nuclear assult. But global warming ended up
catching up to it,
and the temperatures in Germany soared to a sweltering 120 degrees average.
As if that wasn't enough, their continual polution lead to an infestation
of a polution sensitive weed that ended the industrial giant. A base here
gets double Industry, but halved Planet.

Rome: During Earth's final years, many people turned to religion for aid.
The tiny country of the Vatican located deep within Rome was a welcome sanctaury.
The Vatican became a heavily populated metropolis, nearly absorbing Rome.
But located so close to the shore, it succumed to global floods and was
absorbed by the sea. Many of the religious buildings werre preserved underwater,
and any seabase on this square gets double Morale, due to the evangelizing
tasks that can be preformed there can have a similar effect to Miriam's
brain washing, but the complete lack of technology there drops Research.

Bagdad: As you know, Iraq was one of the largest oil producers in the 20th
century. Unfortunately, Iraq eventually drained it's petroluem fields in
around 2009
sending the country into poverty. They lost much of their military potential
and mostly fell out of world events for about 15 years. But in 2030, a large
geological fault formed right under their noses. By tapping into that thermal
energy, they once again became rich. But the geothermal proved to much for
them, and the whole country went up in a ball of flame. Parts of Bagdad
still exist, as do the geothermal mining spires. Any base here will get
doubled Economy, but because of the tremendously unfavorable ecosystem,
Growth suffers.

Rio Di Janero: Global warming hit this city hard in 2045. By that time,
most of Brazil's forests had been either destroyed by an unfavorable enviorment
or by greedy moguls. When Rio once again became capital, the industrial
upsurge proved too much for the coastal city and ended up pushing it over
the edge. Litterally. It partially sank but was resurfaced in 2054. When
it was again active, crime had exploded, causing Rio to take drastic measures.
The once great leizure
city became a vurtual fortress from crime. Any base
here gets doubled Police, but lack of exports kills Economy.

Alexandria: Originally sunk mostly into the sea sometime in the 1 century
B.C., a special excavation team, sponsored by Prohkor Zakharov himself,
dragged the city from the bottom of the Egyptian sea in 2006. Restoration
work began immediately and in 2015, most of the city was restored, including
the lighthouse of Pharos. An enourmous university, also sposored in part
by Zakharov, was then built. Unfortunately, faced with the coming nuclear
holocaust, there was little chance of it surviving. In 2061, it was once
again sunk off the Egyptian coast. It is specualated, though, that the grand
University survived. Any seabase on this square gets doubled Talent rating,
but because of the archaic condition of it's buildings, and construction
there costs twice as much.

And a special city for any alien faction (Progenitor, Zo'or, the like):

N4: Located deep in the Nevada desert, this observation site was once known
as
Area 51. Details about it are sketchy, but what is known is that a strange
and very alien technology shielded it from most of the nuclear onslaught.
In around 2070, the inhabitants of the base mysteriously vanished. Any alien
base on this site gets
a plus 1 Research on the social engineering table,
+1 Morale, due to the abundance of military technology, but these benifits
are moot until you discover
the Secrets of Final Days technology(D10),
or if you build the Universal Translator project. This site also grants
a offensive and defensive bonus to any units built there.


You can contact at Aalogin@aol.com

[Cybergod]

THIS is my 101st post now and if I don't get upgraded I'm gona kill someone !

[Solver]

Not just me. I'll kill you then, instead. But you should now get Warlord, I don't see it?

------------------
Solver the "Running Beer" - http://www.aok.20m.com

[vogon_jeltz]

I like all of the ideas put forth (except for the SP negative effects; while funny, they've gotta be annoying as hell when they hit you), but there are a few that haven't been mentioned (or if so, not enough):

1) Air Bases

Air colony pods in SMAC look cool, and scare the living daylights out of your human opponents if they've never seen them before, but they plant the same old land / sea bases. Air bases would be a great addition.

2) Spacecraft Victory:

I liked the spaceship victory in Civ2 (especially the ridiculously fast "space darts" you could build), but I'd like to see it reincarnated in SMAC2 with a twist. You'd have to build 6 or 7 spacecraft loaded with your citizens, materials (and most importantly, big guns), send them all out, and at a certain time (maybe after planetfall in other star systems), lock them all on Chiron, and wipe the entire planet from existence -- conquest with a vengeance; give the other human players left on Chiron the ominous warning, "It seems to be getting quite a bit warmer," for a couple of years beforehand. Call it the "stellar converter" in homage to MOOII (which I still play). Great FMV sequence, no?

3) Multiple equipment:

Why did the designers of SMAC limit each unit to having one piece of equipment or weapon? I think that there should be a way to place two equipment modules on a unit (at some ridiculous price hike), as long as they're not both weapons. I need to have my formers/colony pods/probes have some sort of defense beyond armor -- also, imagine the sort of damage you could inflict with a Probability String Probe Deathsphere (30-8-8*inf Air Probe, if I remember correctly; ouch) or the kind of building power you could get from a Super Fungicidal Singularity Sea Former Colony Pod.

4) 3D model maker:

We (and by "we", I mean the mod-making community) need a 3D modeler built into SMAC2 to build new chassis, weapons, reactors, etc. *cough* And it needs to be out for Linux, too. *end cough*

5) Drop-in code:

It's impossible to add SPs and facilities, not to mention terraforms, to the current version of the game. It'd be nice for Firaxis to provide some way to code in the changes, perhaps in either C or some proprietary pseudocode format.

6) Better MP:

A metaserver (server with a list of all open games, akin to Q3A) capability would be much appreciated; it's hell setting up an MP game over Usenet, bulletin boards, or ICQ.

7) Sane timeframes:

Sometimes things are crunched at the end of a Transcend game; in addition, supercolliders don't take 50 years to build, and neither do nuclear weapons; just ask the U.S. gov't. I hate the Civ-style 1 year per turn timescale; I much prefer MOOII's .1 year per turn.

Just my $.14...

[Daniel Senz]

map improvements!

i hate running for years to surround the poles. the world is a cylinder...? no, it should be a shpere. turnable, rotatable and with the correct distances.

maybe further addons of north/south sphere or/and seasons, very more detailed ground (i.e. 9 times the size; terraforming for 9-square-sectors except roads) for detailes tactical improvements - therefore each trun split in 2-4 seasons

[C17GMaster]

Okay, my opinions on these ideas:


"We should have colony pods on the moon so that when we die, we can come back." Then, they proceeded to list all the stuff they wanted to take with them to the moon.

My response: You're dead, laddie! Get over it and restart. Why prolong your suffering? We're playing on Chiron, a.k.a. Planet. Don't get into stuff like Nessus, a.k.a. Moon. "Conversations with Moon, Lady Deidre Skye." Ugh!


"Why can only one faction build each secret project? That doesn't make sense."

My response: This was put in so you have to compete for the secret projects. What's the point of a secret project if everybody has one? You're thinking of what the rest of us call "base facilities."


"The armor system is completely messed up. Armor isn't what keeps troops alive; it's their weapons. The battle should be a weapon-weapon combat."

My response: The idea here is to promote combined arms. Don't think of it as "armor" if you don't want to. Think of it as "ability to dig a foxhole really quickly and jump into it before the battle begins." This is just a tactical element of the game. (Some units are optimized as garrisons; others are designed for front-line combat.) Do you really want Alpha Centauri to be a realistic game? Okay, if you don't get the 'clinical immortality' secret project before eighty game turns have passed, you die and the AI takes over your empire. Realistically, the "commander-in-chief" is too busy to coordinate every attack (except for Pres. Johnson, I believe), so the computer should co-ordinate your battles after you pick a target nation.


"The game allows too much micromanagement. I want pure strategy. Don't let people assign individual workers to individual squares."

My response: I have a size 1 city within range of a nutrient bonus with a farm and soil enricher, and a mineral bonus in a rocky, mined square. A mindworm sits two squares away, and I can't afford a rush-build. If the production is set to minerals, I can get a garrison in time. The computer will probably choose 'nutrient,' because growth is always important early in the game. I'm going to lose my city because of that? I believe that the ability to micromanage is crucial, though I would much prefer that we get an advanced AI that can micromange competently. (As it stands right now, I don't automate formers. With a new, customizable AI, this could change.) Now, if you want a 'pure strategy' game, bring out the chessboard. This is Alpha Centauri.


"We need a new robot faction."

My reponse: Ugh! I always thought that the "Alien Crossfire" thing was just asking for trouble, and it seems that I was right... We have plenty of factions. I actually prefer the seven human factions and the Planet units (red/barbarian). No "fungal tower" mess. No bizarre native races to compete with. Just pull out good ol' SMAC... I like SMAC' story line well enough. Your "Robot faction" can be created through customization of an existing faction. Pick someone that could rival you (probably Miriam, your expansionistic foe) and hack "Believer.txt" to make a robot faction. Ta da!


"I want a spherical planet. The cylinder is unrealistic."

My response: Yes, it is unrealistic. It also works. How, pray tell, should we go about making a spherical grid? It might become a little easier if we change the squares to hexes (which could be interesting), but the tesselation still wouldn't be perfect. If you want a spherical planet to work with, wait about thirty years. By then, we'll have some thoroughly bizarre setup that meets your needs.


"I want geothermal pipes that go down to the core, release lots of energy, and kill off the life nearby."

My response: They're called "boreholes." They give you 6 minerals and 6 energy, not to mention making the adjacent squares arid.


"I want the AI to improve. Not only do the enemy factions know how to fight, but my governors are idiots, creating mind worms when I set them to 'build."

My response: Now we're talking. The rules are fine for now; I can even tolerate a square grid. That doesn't mean that the automation can't be improved. I want an efficient, micromanaged empire, and I agree that the AI could use quite a bit of work. I do like the "Evolution" suggestion, and suggest that it be expanded to adapt to whomever is playing the game. When push comes to shove, are you rover-crazy? If so, the AI could put the Comm Jammer on its defensive units the next time it plays you. This is no worse than what happens when you play the same opponent in multiplayer games for long enough... This is also a trade-off, considering that for the next twenty years, the AI will not be as intuitive as a human when it comes to dealing with the hundreds of subtle variables in each game. I am, as always, in favor of improvements on automation, and support a large "control panel" on the headquarters menu that allows you to manipulate currently-existing functions en masse and with greater precision. "Upgrade as many synthmetal chaos squads to plasma shard squads as I can afford, and upgrade units near Chairman Yang's empire before upgrading the units inland. The algorithm shouldn't be too hard: Locate all the synthmetal chaos squads. Calculate their distance from the nearest city/unit owned by Yang. Arrange them in order from nearest to most distant, and then upgrade them, starting at the top, and working down the list. Ta da! No more "You can't afford it because you have one too many infantry" or having to go through and individually upgrade each individual infantry on the front (except, of course, for the one you can't afford). My twenty synthmetal chaos squads take time to upgrade individually on my 133 MHz machine...


I'm not a complete grouch, I just don't like some of the weird stuff I've seen. Some ideas sound good, like sonar buoys that act as sensor arrays in the ocean. The seas can be extremely difficult to keep track of, considering that there is very little out there, and I would appreciate an early warning system. It doesn't defy the "nature" of Alpha Centauri, either.

-C17GMaster out-

[The Mad Monk]

I would like to see a multi-map capability, as in ToT--the ordinary 'surface' map, an underground map (allowing true subterranean cities and maglev tunnels), an undrsea map (want to raise the seafloor? You gotta build a submersible former, first), and an 'orbital' map, with true space-based colonies (that would need food connections from ground colonies to have any chance at all).

[Cybergod]

Originally posted by C17GMaster

"We need a new robot faction."

My reponse: Ugh! I always thought that the "Alien Crossfire" thing was just asking for trouble, and it seems that I was right... We have plenty of factions. I actually prefer the seven human factions and the Planet units (red/barbarian). No "fungal tower" mess. No bizarre native races to compete with. Just pull out good ol' SMAC... I like SMAC' story line well enough. Your "Robot faction" can be created through customization of an existing faction. Pick someone that could rival you (probably Miriam, your expansionistic foe) and hack "Believer.txt" to make a robot faction. Ta da!

C17 if you don't want fungal towers and any other additional interesting challenges SMAX gives then go on just play SMAC, no one is forcing your to play the expansion. I actually find it interesting and enjoyable to "compete with" Planet and her little demons .

And no, you're missing the whole point I was making about the robot faction . It adds more depth to the story line, more challenges and a different style of play. No you CANNOT hack believe.txt or any other file to make the alterations and new stuff we've been talking about on this thread.

I do agree with you that a spherical map IS a bit too much. It would make it realistic but also much more complicated and frustrating.

Vogon_jeltz, I like your idea of drop-in codes. Maybe have SPs waiting at the Firaxis or SMAC2 website waiting to ba downloaded? (What about the SP movies, that would take a while to download though ). I'd really like to see the model-naker , maybe included on the SMAC2 disc. Also I do not think that Planet busters should take ages to build ( ) and also, how come the Planet Buster cannot engage in Psi combat? This was so frustrating when I tried doing "it" ( ) on the Gaians and attacked their mindworm and off the nuke went to Psi combat and won, and nothing happened , it wanished like a missile.

It's nice to see an old thread dug up from it's grave .

PS. I just had to try out all the NEW smileys!

[Sikander]

The spherical map should not be too much a problem. Keep in mind that the game is really a series of points, arbitrarily set as a grid even though the distance in game terms between two squares diagonally is the same as it is vertically or horizontally.