An SDNW Proposal

[Steve]

Yeah, I recall that conversation now. You and your esoteric military toys....

[Steve]

I do admit that I think the rules aversion by some of you is a tad overdone, and having absolutely none will inevitably lead to A) more work for the mods and B) game-drama down the road.

That said...

[12:47] RyanThunder0: Anyway, what do you think of just going by expenditure?
[12:48] sbbigsteve: "This is madness!"
"No. THIS. IS. STGODDDDDD!!!!!!!"
*gets kicked into pit*
[12:48] RyanThunder0: ah

[Coyote]

I like this proposal, although I won't go out on a limb and devote myself to it just yet. I have to say that, looking back, I enjoyed SDNW-2 the most. I did a lot of character development there and got fairly in-depth with my cast of characters. Part of me always regretted that it went flatline.

I really liked SDNW-3, really, but to me the nitpicking arguments and ever-evolving rules, retconning, and the numbers game wore me down badly. Plus, it is obvious I'm a role-player and not a wargamer, and it seemed to me that SDNW-3 became too focused on power contests. Losing Stas also hurt one of my developing story arcs (the Communists).

Also, I feel that a historical game has flaws built in, because you have some folks who can probably tell you how many rivets were on the port side of the SMS Baden and knew that a precise hit at 37-degrees of arc fire on a typical spring day with normal barometric pressure could sink it.

I think, in retrospect, the Star Wars game got bogged down in rules, and I was partly to blame for that because I wanted a numerical system that would be applied that could circumvent all the expected arguments about the uber-mega-gigaton-ultrawank fleets/shields/weapons/etc that I was certain were lurking around every corner.

So for a space game... it would be an interesting idea to pursue.

[Agent Sorchus]

Also, I feel that a historical game has flaws built in, because you have some folks who can probably tell you how many rivets were on the port side of the SMS Baden and knew that a precise hit at 37-degrees of arc fire on a typical spring day with normal barometric pressure could sink it.

A similar concern happens in Space if we try to make things constrained by anything but good judgment. My 50MW Quantum Extender destroys your destroyer. Nuh, uh. My destroyers armor is made such that the tensile strength is..(shows calculations) and you would need a 51MW Quantum Extender to do that.

I think, in retrospect, the Star Wars game got bogged down in rules, and I was partly to blame for that because I wanted a numerical system that would be applied that could circumvent all the expected arguments about the uber-mega-gigaton-ultrawank fleets/shields/weapons/etc that I was certain were lurking around every corner.

HEy it wasn't really your fault. The problems came after you had left, especially after Thanas started adjusting the rules and after alliance blocks had already formed that were the result of the setting and of the new requirement to have absolutely massive fleets to break planetary defenses. Really that was a problem because we had too few planets and too few players to build fleets that were sufficient to break defenses without creating only a small number of alliances.

Really that game suffered from using a predetermined setting and too rigid of expectation for what the universe is capable of. When an ISD is nothing to worry about, but individual nations cannot have more than a few, the game was broken.

The lesson to learn is to make the game more fluid and easier to sustain losses, so that we can have at least token border changes.

EDit: added a couple of lines and fixed a typo: by>but

[Thanas]

HEy it wasn't really your fault. The problems came after you had left, especially after Thanas started adjusting the rules and after alliance blocks had already formed that were the result of the setting and of the new requirement to have absolutely massive fleets to break planetary defenses. Really that was a problem because we had too few planets and too few players to build fleets that were sufficient to break defenses without creating only a small number of alliances.

Well, I'll take responsibility for that, considering that it was the wish of many people to have less battles and more RP. Turned out that only Serafina and me really put much input into it. As for the rules changes, they were necessary because the original rules just did not make sense (a 100m ship costing the same as a 400m cruiser? Eh?). I then tried to spice it up with pirates and well...look how many of you responded to that.

That said, for the shields the explanation was that we did not want the Imps - who were in the vast majority - to curbstomp everything. Without the shields, the game would have ended after the first few posts as the Imps would have just BDZed the Sith.

That said, I think I'll revisit the SDNWARS game in summer and at least write epilogues regarding my characters.

[Agent Sorchus]

Thanas the problem as I saw it with having rp be the focus in that game was the almost complete lack of players that were not imperial. While the game was winding down their were what 2 non imperial players? Maybe 3? Serafina, Siege, and myself. It was like the republic never really existed. And yeah the rules never were perfect, but the rule changes simply made it hard for people to remember what was up.

If you wish lets both put some time aside before Worlds starts to put a nice epilogue down.

[Thanas]

Thanas the problem as I saw it with having rp be the focus in that game was the almost complete lack of players that were not imperial. While the game was winding down their were what 2 non imperial players? Maybe 3? Serafina, Siege, and myself.

Well, I also recruited Norade and Vyrweath. But both simply disappeared soon. The problems there were already persistent when I took over, it is simply impossible to force people to play other factions as well, so what was I supposed to do?

It was like the republic never really existed. And yeah the rules never were perfect, but the rule changes simply made it hard for people to remember what was up.

I think the problem were more the massive budgets that had been dictated right from the start. There was simply too much minutiae, plus too few players knew what the technical terms meant. Problems one cannot fix if one just takes over in the middle of the game. The rules as they stand now however are pretty sensible, I think.

If you wish lets both put some time aside before Worlds starts to put a nice epilogue down.

After SDNWorld 3 is finished. Before I simply do not have the time.

[Agent Sorchus]

Thanas the problem as I saw it with having rp be the focus in that game was the almost complete lack of players that were not imperial. While the game was winding down their were what 2 non imperial players? Maybe 3? Serafina, Siege, and myself.

Well, I also recruited Norade and Vyrweath. But both simply disappeared soon. The problems there were already persistent when I took over, it is simply impossible to force people to play other factions as well, so what was I supposed to do?

Yeah I think I missed saying that none of the problems were really avoidable, and as such were not your fault either. That game suffered from too many little obstacles and changes over its short life. The survival of SDNW2 did not help either.

I think the problem were more the massive budgets that had been dictated right from the start. There was simply too much minutiae, plus too few players knew what the technical terms meant. Problems one cannot fix if one just takes over in the middle of the game. The rules as they stand now however are pretty sensible, I think.

Yes the rules as they are are quite workable. The problem was that they changed at all, even though it was for the better. Too much room for error to change the "rules" whle the game still moves.

If you wish lets both put some time aside before Worlds starts to put a nice epilogue down.

After SDNWorld 3 is finished. Before I simply do not have the time.

Right.

[Siege]

I do admit that I think the rules aversion by some of you is a tad overdone, and having absolutely none will inevitably lead to A) more work for the mods and B) game-drama down the road.

It's not that I insist on having "absolutely no" rules, it's that I know from experience how this sort of thing snowballs: one moment the only thing we have is a set number of IBPs and the next I'll need three spreadsheets to keep track of the number of spacedocks, the calibres of my turbolasers and the logistics train of my hegemonial overmatch fleets. I don't want to get mired in a who, why or how blame-game, but I've seen it happen in the Star Wars game and the 3rd SDN World game, and the lesson I've taken away from it is that someone needs to watch the brakes or before long I'll be required to calculate how much money I have to spend quarterly to keep the chicken soup dispensers filled at the military outpost at Beta Carinae.

As much as the 2nd SDN World game sparked a lot of "game-drama", as you choose to call it, it at least didn't die from lack of action after two months of play (or rather the lack thereof). I am convinced the primary reason for its success was its free-form nature, and conversely I believe the overbearing, unwieldy rulesets and the ceaseless, dreary bean-counting that came with them were the primary cause of death of both the 3rd and the Star Wars incarnation of the game. Now, feel free to call me crazy, but I prefer a bit of OOC squabbling at the side-lines of the game over no game at all. So yes, I will yell at you for every silly needless rule you propose to add, and as much as you might think I'm overdoing it I do believe the game will be better for it.

[Steve]

Despite what you might think, Siege, those of us favoring some rules framework aren't going to mindlessly add more rules just to clarify minute issues. All I was thinking of was that we customize the sizes and wealth of our nations, and thus the forces they start with. That's, well, it. I'm even willing to go with the whole "make up your own military units and assign a point value to count against your military point total" system instead of something slightly more rigid because, well, we're probably going to be doing a lot of freeform battles anyway and it's not hard to see the relative point totals of two combating sides.

Seriously, only thing we'd do under my proposal as of now is A) place home sectors, B) spend nation creation points to add more sectors of the three types to our nations, C) spend the same NCPs to add more hyperspace nodes and/or a wormhole gate, and D) use the resulting GDP figure to say what our starting military forces will amount to point wise and to give the mods an idea of how much someone should get to build in the space of a game year before remarks about how someone's overmilitarizing can be made.

Edit: Note, I wrote this before seeing your PM.

[RogueIce]

As much as the 2nd SDN World game sparked a lot of "game-drama", as you choose to call it, it at least didn't die from lack of action after two months of play (or rather the lack thereof). I am convinced the primary reason for its success was its free-form nature, and conversely I believe the overbearing, unwieldy rulesets and the ceaseless, dreary bean-counting that came with them were the primary cause of death of both the 3rd and the Star Wars incarnation of the game.

Actually, the primary reason for its success was the fact I created the SDN World wiki and people used it. But maybe I'm biased.

Depending on how things work out, I may or may not play. Although if I do, I'll go against type (for once)... *gazes down at the SEGNOR affiliation in his sig*

[Darkevilme]

So STGOD 2k10 is resurrected under a funny name. What the hey, its a while in the future and its been a while since the last STGOD died. Me and the kitties are in. Though with preferences.

There should be points to spend on stuff like in the last STGOD. Though no specializations and complicated grindness (STGOD before last had ships with multipart costs spread over base, offence, defence, sensors, ftl, sublight and etcetera....this was bad and documentedly scared off potential players). So 10 point cruiser, 100 point planet..both good. cruiser(deathrays 4, megapalozors 3, hull strength 2, troop capacity 3)= bad.

Still though an overral 'this is all the stuff i have and how it compares power level wise with yours' is needed even if its vague. See the last STGOD.

MAYBE, racial points...maybe. We can go perfectly well without racial points though and just have that stuff flavour.

Personally I like fairly small scale fleets like in the previous STGODs(around a hundred ships), makes a bit more sense to me with how many planets we're gonna get. Which is a dozen or so correct? i admit i kinda skimmed through the thread to get this far.

That being said. I'm definitely interested.

[Fingolfin_Noldor]

So STGOD 2k10 is resurrected under a funny name. What the hey, its a while in the future and its been a while since the last STGOD died. Me and the kitties are in. Though with preferences.

There should be points to spend on stuff like in the last STGOD. Though no specializations and complicated grindness (STGOD before last had ships with multipart costs spread over base, offence, defence, sensors, ftl, sublight and etcetera....this was bad and documentedly scared off potential players). So 10 point cruiser, 100 point planet..both good. cruiser(deathrays 4, megapalozors 3, hull strength 2, troop capacity 3)= bad.

Still though an overral 'this is all the stuff i have and how it compares power level wise with yours' is needed even if its vague. See the last STGOD.

MAYBE, racial points...maybe. We can go perfectly well without racial points though and just have that stuff flavour.

Personally I like fairly small scale fleets like in the previous STGODs(around a hundred ships), makes a bit more sense to me with how many planets we're gonna get. Which is a dozen or so correct? i admit i kinda skimmed through the thread to get this far.

That being said. I'm definitely interested.

Well, this game is driven by a different set of people from the last.

Same bunch who were looking a red button that would lead to the next nuclear holocaust that said.

[Setzer]

So it's basically "Place our nation. Buy territory. Calculate Points. Buy military forces" right? Seems simple enough.

[Steve]

STGOD 2k10? Never heard of it.

I was honestly looking to do "SDNW, but in space" with this proposal, since the SDNW STGOD series kind of has a character of its own.

And it's not necessary "race creation", people can be alien races if they want but I know a number of us will pick Humans.

And yeah, Setzer. That'd be the system conceptually. I was thinking that forces are generally free-form - you use points to determine rough capability. You can build a 50 point battleship or a 100 point battleship, your choice.

Though I was contemplating giving "base prices" of points for specific hull forms. For instance, the sheer act of building a 1kmx400mx140m ship should require more points consumed than building a 200mx100mx30m vessel.

[Dave]

Alright, for easy ship strength calculations, what if we had a power output rating as the base stat? You pay more industrial points for bigger powerplants (i.e. more tonnage) and that can go into offence, defense, sensors/ecm, or thrust. Maybe it's a little naive, but...

Completely made up scenario and numbers here:

Say I spend 10 Industrial Points to get a "light cruiser level" powerplant of 1000MW.

And I want an electronic warfare boat.
I chose to put that as
100 MW of offense (call it point defense)
100 MW of defense (call 'em SHip Integrity Tensors, or S.H.I.T -- but of course you can call it whatever you want: armor, shields, magical deflection fairies)
700 MW of sensors/ECM (Kickass computers for her power rating)
100 MW of thrusters (slow for her power rating)

By looking at these numbers for each side, you can get a feel for roughly how the battle will play out, and then write the roleplaying/battle scene off of that.

Would a system like this work?

[Steve]

A bit complex, and use of power rating, while realistic, is probably a bit further than we're looking for.

[Setzer]

Maybe ships could be rated in terms of offensive power, defensive power, carrying capacity, and speed. So you can have a battleship that has loads of the first two, but can't carry many troops or fighters, and is a tub in terms of speed. A carrier would devote everything to to carrying capacity, with the rest being dump stats, something like 0/200/700/100, for a one thousand point carrier.

For carrying capacity, the points could represent internal space. Fighters would take up 10 points, troops take up 1/10th, heavy vehicles take up 4 points and light vehicles take up 2. So our hypothetical carrier could field 70 fighters, 7,000 troops, 175 heavy vehicles (like tanks, IFVs, mechs, or artillery) or 350 light combat vehicles (jeeps, trucks, scout vehicles, AA guns, etc)

I'm not yet sure how speed would work into it.

[Dave]

Maybe ships could be rated in terms of offensive power, defensive power, carrying capacity, and speed. So you can have a battleship that has loads of the first two, but can't carry many troops or fighters, and is a tub in terms of speed. A carrier would devote everything to to carrying capacity, with the rest being dump stats, something like 0/200/700/100, for a one thousand point carrier.

For carrying capacity, the points could represent internal space. Fighters would take up 10 points, troops take up 1/10th, heavy vehicles take up 4 points and light vehicles take up 2. So our hypothetical carrier could field 70 fighters, 7,000 troops, 175 heavy vehicles (like tanks, IFVs, mechs, or artillery) or 350 light combat vehicles (jeeps, trucks, scout vehicles, AA guns, etc)

I'm not yet sure how speed would work into it.

That's making it even more complicated. How about we just have a generic transport class, that carries generic troops. We can RP what they're carrying later, but can we assume all ground forces are created equal to reduce complexity? The more you have in your invasion fleet, the bigger the invasion.

[Setzer]

I do like playing around with T/O&Es, but it may be best to make it generic.

[Coyote]

If I did --hypothetically speaking, of course -- do this, I suppose I could dust off the ol' Hegemony of New Israel...

[Dave]

A bit complex, and use of power rating, while realistic, is probably a bit further than we're looking for.

How would you suggest fleet combat be done?

[Setzer]

What about aliens? Anyone interested in forming a league dedicated to purging Xenos in the name of whatever deity we settle on worshipping?

[loomer]

I might have some aliens in my Outlander Commissions if we go that route - I got a lot of very unique ones that are just waiting for an opportunity to be used. Gas-giant blimps, deep-pressure sealife...

[Steve]

If I did --hypothetically speaking, of course -- do this, I suppose I could dust off the ol' Hegemony of New Israel...

Ha, porting them over from TGG eh?

I'll probably try to adapt one of my SDNW/LibArc STGOD states into the setting myself.

Also, I was considering having one of my Midrange Sectors actually represent the homeworld and nearby colonies of an alien race that was folded into my nation.