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Founders discussion topic: Overview

Founders discussion topic: Overview

Greetings!

I'm creating this thread as a general reference thread because this is bound to come up.

The overall design of Galactic Civilizations III is pretty set in stone. We know what game we want to make and we think GalCiv fans are going to like it.

We generally subscribe to the Sid Meier design philosophy for new titles in a series:

  • 33% of the game should be the same as the previous
  • 33% of the game should be the features from the previous but enhanced
  • 33% of the game should be new features entirely

You've seen this with the previous Galactic Civilizations games and the same is true here.

However, there are pieces of the latter two categories that we are very interested in talking to players about because they aren't set in stone and part of the fun of making a game is talking to the fans who know the game well.  

What we want to get across is that discussing these features and soliciting feedback should not be construed that we're making a game designed by committee or that we don't have a very firm understanding of the game we're making.  

And now, here come the topics!

37,205 views 36 replies
Reply #26 Top

Hello and welcome to the Dawn of War Galactic Civilizations 3 tutorial. By listening to me and reading the text appearing in this box you will learn how to play a skirmish game.

Reply #27 Top

The things that I  would really like to see in GalCiv3 are:

1. The ability to create wormholes across the galaxy. You could do this by making it require starbases on each end of the wormhole with the proper modules and tech.

2. A variety of weapon and defense tech trees. Something like a specialized energy weapons, specialized mass drivers, specialized missiles, etc and a separate tech tree for defenses against each. Also, I would like to see race specific tech trees that have their own unique weapon types such as biological or time manipulating weapons.

3. Races that have vastly different ideal home planet conditions. This is so that terraforming for one race would make it worse for others. This could be explained by races breathing different gasses, living in different temperature extremes, etc.

4. The ability to destroy planets. This could be done easily enough utilizing any variety of higher tech weapons specifically designed for it and can be negated with the proper defenses (missiles vs. mass drivers, shields vs. energy weapons, etc). 

5. The ability to build planets. The building of the planets could be done by utilizing existing asteroid clusters or belts or ones created by blowing up planets to make similarly sized planets. This would require a higher level of tech. Eventually at very high tech levels, maybe allow the creating of planets without needing the asteroids, just a star base with the proper modules.

6. The ability to destroy stars. Requires very high tech levels in the weapon like on the planet destroying and can be negated using similar methods on a system level. The planets near the star would be destroyed as well leaving a nebula and a lot of asteroids. The extremely expensive ship that can destroy the star should be destroyed in the process.

7. The ability to create stars. Requires a very high tech level, a starbase with the proper module, and an existing nebula. A higher level of tech and other modules may make it so you don't need the nebula.

8. The ability to create and destroy black holes. Using the same method as the stars in 6 and 7.

9. The ability to create Ring Worlds and Dyson Spheres. Can be done at extremely high tech levels using MASSIVE amounts of resources and money. Basically build a ring of starbases around a star, give them the proper modules, and eventually be able to link them together. Any planets around the star would either be dismantled to make the mass required or take a huge terraforming hit unless the race building it prefers temperatures near absolute zero.

 

I know a lot of these ideas are taken from the Space Empires series, but i really enjoyed them and have never seen any other space strategy game go nearly as far with their major engineering projects.

Reply #28 Top

Quoting Hamshank, reply 6

[quote who="Eskaminagaga" reply="27" id="3438207"]


I would like you to check this post out this post on creating an avatar, and don't forget to leave a message. https://forums.galciv3.com/450709

 

Quoting TheMathKing, reply 22


1)etailed Unit Skil-trees (Crews?): The units are how we get to directly interact with the the rest of the world. By making units more customizable and specialized, they can do what we want better and they become more precious. Personally, I'd like the units to be as RPG-like as possible. Skill development, bonuses, crew training, millitary training (for planetary or even ship to ship invasions), etc. Maybe it is the crew that retains this skill-tree and can be placed into other ships, that way keeping the crew alive would be another thing we could invest in with the tech-tree.

Can you contrast with governors and heroes for me.

 

Quoting TheMathKing, reply 22


4):More World Types and Features: More of this, in every way you can imagine. Make the worlds so unique that even once you've colonized 40 worlds, you still get something new and refreshing each time you get another world to your federation.

Agree the only question is how if you could only be so specific.

Quoting TheMathKing, reply 22

Ways that worlds could be unique:
-Positive Features: Resource Rich, Filled with ruins of the ancients (random bonuses from "discoveries"), The usual (scientific, production and economic bonuses, food), Special building options (insert sci-fi reasoning for this)

Already have this on the game can you be more specific on how this could be improved. The users guide tells you what the planetary bonuses are I agree that this could be improved on. Some of the planetary bonuses are ruins of the ancients, ad when you first settle a planet there are ruins of the ancients. Giving you random bonuses you pick from depending what you do favoring evil options. I'm kind of torn from endless space method and galactic civilizations method. The reason why I can't remember where all those ruins are, so I like the galactic civilizations method where I only get the benifits when I colonize the planet. On distant worlds I think I get the bonus when I explore where I don't have tp colonize.

Quoting TheMathKing, reply 22


-Neutral Features: Moons which give random bonuses, proceedurally generated descriptions (lifeforms, history, etc), inhabitants that already live there (can specialize the population).

  This kind of makes it harder to colonize planets.

Quoting Eskaminagaga, reply 27


2. A variety of weapon and defense tech trees. Something like a specialized energy weapons, specialized mass drivers, specialized missiles, etc and a separate tech tree for defenses against each. Also, I would like to see race specific tech trees that have their own unique weapon type

 Already do this can you be more specific.
 
Quoting Eskaminagaga, reply 27

such as biological

Maybe other than just the Korath like spore ships.

Quoting Eskaminagaga, reply 27


3. Races that have vastly different ideal home planet conditions. This is so that terraforming for one race would make it worse for others.

This could be explained by races breathing different gasses, living in different temperature extremes, etc.

Never did like the fact everyone started out on a Terran world. There would also have to be Terran world coliniszeation and advanced Terran world colinization because this would mean that not everyone starts out with being able to colonize Terran worlds. The faction would start out with the random planet colinization and its advanced form. The types of planets would have to be on an even chance or at least the ones that were randomly picked. That is why this would rock as an option I would pick sometimes.

Quoting Eskaminagaga, reply 27



4. The ability to destroy planets. This could be done easily enough utilizing any variety of higher tech weapons specifically designed for it and can be negated with the proper defenses (missiles vs. mass drivers, shields vs. energy weapons, etc).

You want to bring back the terror stars.

Quoting Eskaminagaga, reply 27


5. The ability to build planets. The building of the planets could be done by utilizing existing asteroid clusters or belts

This wouldn't work with our inner astroid belt it only holds 1/4 the mass of mercury though there are two astroid belts just as big in Jupiter's orbit. If you don't mind a water world there is plenty of ice in the Kepler belt. I guess it would depend on how old the solar system is or you could gobble multiple solar system astroid belts. 

Quoting Eskaminagaga, reply 27

  maybe allow the creating of planets without needing the asteroids, just a star base with the proper modules.

Energy to matter convesion.

Quoting Eskaminagaga, reply 27


7. The ability to create stars. Requires a very high tech level, a starbase with the proper module, and an existing nebula. A higher level of tech and other modules may make it so you don't need the nebula.[/quote]

Should be easier than a Dyson sphere or maybe easier than a planet. All we need is some solid hydrogen or nitrogen and blast it from every angle this would require a big starbase depending on the size of star this you could choose or a lot of laser platforms. The solid hydrogen could be mined from class 0 planets.

Let's not forget the ability to turn stars into black holes by dumping enough ieon into them. This could be done by replicators using the power of the star to do this

Quoting Eskaminagaga, reply 27

9. The ability to create Ring Worlds and Dyson Spheres. Can be done at extremely high tech levels using MASSIVE amounts of resources and money. Basically build a ring of starbases around a star, give them the proper modules, and eventually be able to link them together.

There is always a replicator option using the energy of the star to power this, There are different kinds Dyson's spheres the most unrealistic. Dyson net, Dyson circle, and the Dyson swarm.

Quoting Eskaminagaga, reply 27

Any planets around the star would either be dismantled to make the mass required or take a huge terraforming hit unless the race building it prefers temperatures near absolute zero.

Other than the sun our whole solar system lies on a plane. This is hard to believe, but this is what the astronomers say. Meaning most of the sunlight don't hit the mass of the solar system anyways. If you use a little more fuel because the sun will try to force the satalites on the ecliptic plane and turn a Dyson sphere where it intersects not paralell the ecliptic plane then most of the sunlight hitting the planets would not be affected. This should be feezable for a Dyson swarm unless I was trying to make the planets uninhabitable. For a Dyson's swarm both options should be possible.

Actually if you combine options 7 and nine this is even more feasible because you control the size of the star otherwise I would recommend red dwarfs. You could do this with planets as long as they weren't dead. That means that they are still giving off heat and haven't cooled.

Quoting Eskaminagaga, reply 27

I know a lot of these ideas are taken from the Space Empires series, but i really enjoyed them and have never seen any other space strategy game go nearly as far with their major engineering projects.

That's Ok I;m sure Stardock no's how to modify this where they can't get sued.

 





Reply #29 Top

In response to admiralWillyWilber.

1): Definition of crews: This was inspired by a game I played called Startrek Armada 2. In that game you could fill your ship with crew and as the ship took on damage, etc, the crew would die. You could beam out the crew and put them on new ships.

They would basically represent a normal unit, except you can change the ship they are in. Instead of building "Ship X" and leveling it up till it is killed, you could move the crew out of that ship if it were damaged and put it into another ship later. The crew could also be something you need to replenish from your populations too (but this doesn't affect the skills the crew obtained through levels). The crew would obtain abilities, bonuses and an entire RPG-esque skill tree.

2): World Customization: 
The customization we've seen before are things that directly relate to bonuses on the tile you build on. What I was thinking is to have bonuses, neutral traits and penalties that can be listed for the planet and do not necessarily correspond to a tile improvement. The neutral traits could simply be flavour text and history that has no gameplay value but makes the world more unique. An example of a positive bonus would be something like "Diverse Fungi: Non mechanical civs get a 5% higher population cap", "Wormhole to another Brane: An ancient civilization opened up a tear in spacetime that leads to another dimension exclusively made of energy. The planetary weapons on this planet do 150% damage, and the shields are 120% more effective as you tap into the rift", etc etc.

They should also have...moons! 

Reply #31 Top

Brad:

I love your work. I am hoping the game is going to turn out great. I just want to keep one thing in your mind when your team is developing this game.

Masters of Orion 3 had too much complexity and too much to management. Whereas in Masters of Orion 2 was much simple in design. The lessons from those games is that complexity can be good and giving power to the user to micromanagement an empire seems like a great idea. If the player feels like all they're doing is managing versus playing, it would be less fun than its predecessor.

 

Reply #32 Top

I'm sure a lot of these things will have already been said, but here's some loose thoughts on what I'd like to see:

 

1. Claimable and useful Gas Giants. Perhaps like a research/other version of Asteroids?

2. A more interactive/developed U.P. system with some kind of resolution proposal mechanic using selectable parameters (drop down menus?)

3. All the diplomacy options we saw in GC2 and many more - 'Vote with me/against Lord Kona at the next UP Summit', 'lend me money/ships/research/other'. Mini objectives generated for and by the AI and human players (a la Rome/Medieval TW) could be implemented through diplomacy too. 'Kona, go do! Get big bag of goodies (automatic) upon completion.' If kept simple and rare enough (not every 5 turns), it could be fun.

4. Individual unique ship names that the AI will use too: i.e. USSC Discovery 1, ISA Excalibur, EAS Agamemnon, USS Defiant, Nostromo, Axiom,  etc instead of 'Drengin Cruiser M1 - 2372'  - Possibly only for medium and above size ships?

5. Modding tools that include an in-game map, empire and generally everything editor. I'd be happy to wait a few expansions for that. Think Twilight's tools, only better and more integrated. Easier modding means more modding which means a more lively game community.

6. Ability to customize and save starbase appearances without leaving the game.

7. As nice as it is to discover Xeno Ethics on your 10th turn, the creative ability bonus as was in GC2 could use a tweak/nerf. Even at half the chance of it happening, it would still happen too often and I would even say that it might be an idea to disable it completely for multiplayer for the sake of balance unless there is a total rework planned for it.

8. Planetary invasions should feel less like 'whack-a-mole' and more like a planetary invasion. We have invasion methods (propaganda, gas, etc), why not have a planetary 'defensive posture' mechanic? 'Guerrila Tactics', 'Hold the line', etc all having bonuses/penalties against the various types of assault. Dunno... just needs more depth I guess.

9. Stable/Unstable Wormholes. All temporary but duration random with some being one-way tickets and others having no exit (bye-bye ship)

10. AI that doesn't declare war on someone with 3 large enemy (at war) empires in between.  

11. Make space feel bigger. Even the small map needs to feel a bit more 'epic'. One of the reasons I've always played GC2 with each empire having a -400 modifier to their range ability is because even on the biggest map, it doesn't take you long to be able to go pretty much anywhere. New space terrain and mechanics or no, it still feels like there's a lot of clutter on the map. The nebulae penalties are a nice touch though.

12. Bring back Jenna Casey

Reply #33 Top

Quoting Dirtyface83, reply 32
2. A more interactive/developed U.P. system with some kind of resolution proposal mechanic using selectable parameters (drop down menus?)

From Frogboy:

Quoting Frogboy, reply 18
1. united Planets now involves proposing bills rather than voting on random items.

Quoting Dirtyface83, reply 32
the creative ability bonus as was in GC2 could use a tweak/nerf.

Creativity doesn't seem to be in GalCiv 3. At least, I couldn't find it while I was looking through the files yesterday.

Reply #34 Top

at least 50 new races pls :)

Reply #35 Top

Quoting Gaunathor, reply 33


Creativity doesn't seem to be in GalCiv 3. At least, I couldn't find it while I was looking through the files yesterday.

That's good news.

 

On the topic of there being lots of races, I'd like to see at least one or two new ones made by SD and/or the players as part of each DLC pack.

Reply #36 Top

Quoting TheMathKing, reply 29

In response to admiralWillyWilber.


2): World Customization: 
The customization we've seen before are things that directly relate to bonuses on the tile you build on. What I was thinking is to have bonuses, neutral traits and penalties that can be listed for the planet and do not necessarily correspond to a tile improvement. The neutral traits could simply be flavour text and history that has no gameplay value but makes the world more unique. An example of a positive bonus would be something like "Diverse Fungi: Non mechanical civs get a 5% higher population cap", "Wormhole to another Brane: An ancient civilization opened up a tear in spacetime that leads to another dimension exclusively made of energy. The planetary weapons on this planet do 150% damage, and the shields are 120% more effective as you tap into the rift", etc etc.

They should also have...moons! 

 

The planets (some) do have bonus's now, apart from what is on the hex in the build menu.  If you hover over the planet you can see, forex:  +25% research bonus, -25% pop, etc.

 

And, Earth has a moon, if you close in to see, it even revolves!  Can't colonize it, if that's what you mean.

 

pek