Brief Wishlist for some DA Basics

This is a very small wishlist of ideas I find easily implementable, being extracted from a larger list of things I am sure I will (alas!) never see.

1. Rehauling Alliances and AI Relationships
- Currently, once you have an alliance with a foreign nation X, I have found no way to weaken my relations with that ally X aside from failing to declare war on a nation which declares war on X. This, I feel, is greatly suboptimal. In fact, it is THE only reason I have to turn "Diplomatic Victory" off. It is both unchallenging and -- more importantly -- unfun. I believe this may be because "ally" seems to be a flag which can only be unchecked if condition (let's call it QW) is met: If Y declares war on X, X will ask for help then, and if you fail to declare on Y, your alliance ends. (This will not stop you from making peace with Y the next turn, and X will think none the less of you.)
I think "Ally" needs to be a COMPLETELY DIFFERENT CATEGORY than "Relationship". Relationships may go from Hostile to Friendly, but "At War" and "Ally" should not be in this list. "Ally" should be a flag that you can lose once the "Friendly" relations drop too low, for any number of reasons (you may be dropping too far behind militarily to be considered a decent ally, you may not be trading enough, you may not help out militarily enough, etc. etc.).

2. To create more valid strategies and more fun, there should be a few new types of Resources which do not add a % to a stat but rather allow the owner to do one of the following things:
a. Build a particular building.
b. Research a particular tech.
c. build on terrain squares of a certain type.
If (a) is built, this will give the owner the ability to produce a certain new type of element for her ships, IF she also researches Tech YY and AS LONG AS resource Q is still owned. These elements could be things ranging from bonuses to damage (let's call them Targeters) to small, one-use teleporterts.
If (b) is researched, it might allow the owner of the resource to produce a unique type of premade unit, as long as Resource Q is owned.
(c.) is self-explanatory, but for balance purposes all buildings built on those squares (say, ocean squares) must be destroyed if ownership of the Resource Q fails.

3. More variety in military base modules and Damage rolls:
- Upgrades could be made much more interesting by adding new types of modules which yield bonuses to attack and/or defense ROLLS, e.g. instead of adding 5 points to beam attack power, there could be a module which adds a +2 to the beam ROLL (thus if a ship had an attack value of 12, it would normally roll a number between 1 and 12, but with Quarz Light Refinement II, it would roll a number between 3 and 12). This enhancement would never allow for damage to exceed a ship's maximum value, but it would increase its minimum value.
- There could be upgrades which leech or damage an enemy ship's defense rating when these come within radius (much like there is a module which leeches an enemy's speed rating).

3. Shipyard interface changes
- PLEASE let us be able to sort ship parts by various categories, at least by the category "size". (One should be able to choose between name, size, cost, and value (e.g. damage, speed, defense, etc.).)
- PLEASE let us be able to list ship designs by various categories, at least by the category "hull size". Currently, ships are listed alphabetically, which (when one has a large number of designs) is most bewildering at times.
- Whichever factor is chosen in the above-mentioned suggestion of ship listings in the shipyard should be used in the mini-list on the f2 screen when one clicks the "build ship" bar.

thank you very much
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Reply #1 Top
Foolishly I see that I have eliminated a further point from my list that should have been included, and since I am unable to edit my post now, I shall include it here, although it fits very well to point 1, above:

4. Rehauling "Diplomatic Victory"
- Currently, it is too easy to cement alliances, and it would be nice if, in order to win a diplomatic victory, one had to form alliances with all existing nations and these nations had to elect you, in a vote, to be "Chairentity" (or something) "of the Galaxy" in a UP meeting. (Yes, I think that the Civ series did a good job with that.)
Reply #2 Top
4. Rehauling "Diplomatic Victory"
- Currently, it is too easy to cement alliances, and it would be nice if, in order to win a diplomatic victory, one had to form alliances with all existing nations and these nations had to elect you, in a vote, to be "Chairentity" (or something) "of the Galaxy" in a UP meeting. (Yes, I think that the Civ series did a good job with that.)


Master of Orioon did that, there wre periodic galactic votes to appoint one race to be the new masters of Orion and therefore uber. Orion was homeworld of a deceased master race and universally seen as the capital of the galaxy. You could conquer it without being elected if you could overpower the Guardian dreadnought, but usually by the time you pulled that off you were pretty much top dog anyway.
Reply #3 Top
tweek to the AI - placement of influence starbases (by AI) gives us a dialogue resembling a threat to remove with consequences and an ability to just threaten the AI if/when we chose to do so.

Tweek to DIplomacy - ability to break alliances for whatever reason we want.
- ability to enforve alliance when I am attacked.
Reply #4 Top

Some thoughts for the DA wish list  

1. Updating the visuals/graphics to reflect soldiering bonus and levels. When I research a new tech that creates better soldiering capabilities, it would be great if the appearances of the troops would change. Especially if you get a unique tech such as Tir Quan training it would be nice to have some visual (bling reflective of your alignment, maybe a cool banner carried by the troops) that shows that soldiers are getting tougher or if the enemy has it you can see that in the fights.
2. Is it possible to updating the visuals/graphics so that each race has a more distinctive race look for their soldiers?
3. At the beginning when you are in the set up, would it be possible to select your troops appearance, along the lines of when you choose your race colours for your ships. Maybe with several choices for troops…
4. The ability to mod your soldiers would be cool