An SDNW Proposal

[Steve]

Early proposal.

All nations get 20+1d6 rolls for their Nation Creation Points (NCPs) and a Home Sector for their homeworld/capital.

One uses NCPs in the following fashions: Adding more sectors, improving a sector's population, or improving a Sector's GDP. 1 NCP can improve a sector's population by 5 Billion or the GDP by $1,000. There are three kinds of sectors.

Home Sectors are the heart of an interstellar state. They contain the capital and key industries to the maintenance of an interstellar state's existence. One natural Earth-like Planet and four planets of Near-Earth or Terraformed type, not counting numerous mining colonies, science outposts, and space habitats. Unlike a Core Sector, there is a slight capability for growth in the Home Sector, due to it being the site of many of a star empire's most prestigious universities, foundations, and businesses, as well as the seat of government and thus the heart of a nation's civil service - one cannot apply extra population or GDP to one's Home Sector however. Every Home Sector automatically comes with a Warp Gate and a Hyperspace Junction, both presumed to be in the system of one's Capital World.

Stats:
Sector Population: 60 Billion
Sector GDP: $12,000
NCP Cost: Free, Limit 1 Per Nation

Core Sectors are long-settled and inhabited areas of space. One natural Earth-like Planet and four planets of Near-Earth or Terraformed type, not counting numerous mining colonies, science outposts, and space habitats. Due to being so heavily populated and developed, their population growth tends to be reduced as Core dwellers leave for less developed sectors to seek better fortune; what immigrants they receive typically are only using them as a stopover point for wider spaces outside the Core. Unlike other Sector types, a Core sector's population or GDP cannot be improved in Nation Creation.

Stats:
Sector Population: 50 Billion
Sector GDP: $10,000
NCP Cost: 4 Points

Midrange Sectors have been settled for long periods of time but have not reached the population level of a Core Sector due to varying factors, including planets still in the midst of late phase Terraforming and being the homeworld sectors of minority races in a larger empire. Due to not being as developed, Midrange Sectors enjoy a superior growth rate to the Core Sectors and receive some immigration on top of natural population growth. A Midrange Sector's Population and GDP can be improved by up two NCPs apiece.

Stats:
Sector Base Population: 30 Billion
Sector Base GDP: $6,000
NCP Cost: 3 Points

Colony Sectors are sparsely populated, a network of unterraformed or early Terraformed planets and mining colonies centered around an Earth-like or Near-Earth planet in the sector. Despite the lack of extra fully Terraformed planets the capacity for population and economic growth in a Colony is higher than any other sector type. Land is cheap, resources are still abundant, and for daring and brave folk there are plenty of ways to make one's fortune in these Sectors. There are no mechanical limits to improving a Colony Sector.

Stats:
Sector Base Population: 10 Billion
Sector Base GDP: $1,000
NCP Cost: 1 Point


NCPs can also be spent upon adding a Warp Gate or a Hyperspace Junction to a sector.

A Warp Gate in a Sector permits it to receive high value trade and permit instantaneous point-to-point transit for key figures or officials, permitting the GDP of the relevant sector to rise by $500. A Warp Gate costs 1 NCP.

All Warp Gates will be assigned to one another upon completion of Nation Creation process.

A Hyperspace Junction is a system where major hyperspace lanes meet and cross one another. Such a system enjoys heightened incomes from the interstellar trade traffic that results, it also serves as a logical fleet base for one's space forces to ensure rapid deployment and enjoys increased defenses to deal with an incursion. The more Junctions a nation has, the more rapidly its ships can deploy around its space. A Junction increases GDP by $1,000 for the sector it is in. Each Junction costs 3 NCP.

This process would be the first step; once complete you'd use your GDP figure to determine how big your starting military is.

[Beowulf]

Something important is to make it not easy for a side that's losing to just jump away. Without specializations for ships, that will require a more nature based approach (Ye old hyperlimit, with most things of import in the hyperlimit of a star).

[Steve]

Hrm, if hyperspace had mass shadows of planets or stars within it, then hypering within a system is a desperation maneuver.

Either that or Hyperlimit would work.

[Ryan Thunder]

Something important is to make it not easy for a side that's losing to just jump away.

You seem to think this is self-evident...

Why?

[Steve]

Think he's wanting to avoid people saying "Well, I just run away!" when they're getting beaten upon.

[Agent Sorchus]

Think he's wanting to avoid people saying "Well, I just run away!" when they're getting beaten upon.

There already is a solution, namely that there is only so far a player can run before getting wiped out. If they retreat you just force them back to their homeworld or force them to stay in the battle over a territory, if they retreat you win.
I do not think that every battle should be a massacre. If their is no retreat then that is all you get, massacres. If someone starts abusing retreats, we slap them with the don't be a douche rule. Done.

[Steve]

Think he's wanting to avoid people saying "Well, I just run away!" when they're getting beaten upon.

There already is a solution, namely that there is only so far a player can run before getting wiped out. If they retreat you just force them back to their homeworld or force them to stay in the battle over a territory, if they retreat you win.
I do not think that every battle should be a massacre. If their is no retreat then that is all you get, massacres. If someone starts abusing retreats, we slap them with the don't be a douche rule. Done.

*nod*

I was pondering that retreat should be a viable option but not one without tradeoffs, beyond abandoning the field. When retreating, you must break off from the enemy fleet in some way. If you do so in order, you take extra time to actually jump to hyperspace, during which you take damage and aren't returning fire as heavily (As your ships are powering up their hyperdrives). OTOH, if you just have your fleet flee as capable, your forces become disorganized and are open to further disintegration from a successful enemy pursuit.

[Ryan Thunder]

Why the random number, by the way?

[Steve]

Why the random number, by the way?

You mean the extra bit of points from a dice roll? Allows some slight power variances so we're not all carbon copies by capability. 5 points isn't likely to be too major a potential differential, though a smaller number like 1d4 or 1d5 could be used.

And I give full credit to Slacker for that, he's doing it in Ad Astra 6 and seeing it made me want to kick myself for not thinking of it.

[Ryan Thunder]

Why the random number, by the way?

You mean the extra bit of points from a dice roll?

Yes, sorry, I'm not totally together in my head today.

Well, roll away. I'd like some time to think about what I have to work with.

[Steve]

As I told Setzer tonight, this is preliminary stuff. I'm not even sure the base point figure will be 20 and not 15 or 25 or 23 (what were you expecting from me, a round number? ). No point rolling yet when the game systems' not complete.

[Beowulf]

Think he's wanting to avoid people saying "Well, I just run away!" when they're getting beaten upon.

There already is a solution, namely that there is only so far a player can run before getting wiped out. If they retreat you just force them back to their homeworld or force them to stay in the battle over a territory, if they retreat you win.
I do not think that every battle should be a massacre. If their is no retreat then that is all you get, massacres. If someone starts abusing retreats, we slap them with the don't be a douche rule. Done.

Which works when they're on the defensive, but not when they're on the offensive. "Oh, you managed to sucker me into an adverse correlation of forces? I retreat back home. Where I have a bigger fleet laying in wait. Ha ha." And I don't mean no retreat at all, but rather, no way to instantly take your toys and go home undamaged.

[Steve]

Think he's wanting to avoid people saying "Well, I just run away!" when they're getting beaten upon.

There already is a solution, namely that there is only so far a player can run before getting wiped out. If they retreat you just force them back to their homeworld or force them to stay in the battle over a territory, if they retreat you win.
I do not think that every battle should be a massacre. If their is no retreat then that is all you get, massacres. If someone starts abusing retreats, we slap them with the don't be a douche rule. Done.

Which works when they're on the defensive, but not when they're on the offensive. "Oh, you managed to sucker me into an adverse correlation of forces? I retreat back home. Where I have a bigger fleet laying in wait. Ha ha." And I don't mean no retreat at all, but rather, no way to instantly take your toys and go home undamaged.

Hence my remark that escaping from battle cannot be done undamaged.

[Kuroji]

Well, the easiest way to avoid an instant retreat is by saying that FTL drives must be a given size, and any FTL requires that they need an amount of time to 'spool up', a la nBSG, or otherwise recharge. Long enough that there's no way to avoid some damage, but not so long that it means all engagements are fight-or-die.

Sue me, but I'm lurking this thread, this stuff seems interesting!

[Sea Skimmer]

I’m in favor of FTL drive spool up times too, but nothing too ridiculous

But if people want decisive battles... well one of the problems is the idea of classical battlelines of warships pounding away at each other barely worked out in real life once steam was introduced. People might notice that few battles between battleship fleets ever occurred, and most of them were indecisive. That was with merely a 2-D surface to with landmass obstructions all over to block retreats.

In wide open space a fleet has basically limitless options to keep open the range. Plus, ships in space can’t sink. Now you have to actually utterly destroy them, or else they can always be towed away.

The inability to close for decisive action is one of the many reasons why aircraft carriers took over, and with them a very raid oriented kind of warfare. A fleet is no longer such a rigid concept as a battleline, and rather then grand fleet battles you have a long series of attritional situations. The enemy fleet isn’t necessarily wiped out; but it is driven out of an island chain. Then the carriers move up and drive it out of the next time. Both sides can risk certain assets, mainly the carrier planes, and afford to expend them at a steady rate in pursuit of larger objective. But they don’t usually loose the fleet doing so. Carrier on carrier battles were also usually lacking in decisive results, Midway aside.

I’m not a fan of one and two man fighters in space, they are too small to make sense in space, but fleets comprised of relatively small fast ships, armed with weapons that are high on firepower but low on sustainability seems like the way to pursue regular warfare. Something like a Oscar II crossed with an AEGIS frigate. Battleships and cruisers might still exist and all, but they’d mainly exist to be a fleet in being, to secure objectives and escort invasion shipping which cannot move quickly.

[Fingolfin_Noldor]

I would imagine that some form of a battleship/carrier hybrid because there are advantages to direct and in-direct weaponry. Fighters might not be sufficient to hurt other battleships and then you need the heavy firepower of a battleship to break the other apart.

[Teleros]

No point rolling yet when the game systems' not complete.

Ten minutes of digging out my 40k stuff to find a dice, and woot, got 25pts to play with, so went with the following for the Altacar Empire:

Home Sector: 0
Core Sector 1: 4
Core Sector 2: 4
Midrange Sector: 3
3 Warp Gates: 2 (free Home - Core 1, Core 1 - Core 2, Core 2 - ???)
3 Junctions: 6 (Core 1, Core 2, free Home one)
£6,000 bonus income = Home +2, Core 1 +2, Core 2 +1, Midrange +1
Total GDP: 12+(10*2)+6+3+2.5+6 = £49.5k

Playing around with a little min/maxing as well, assuming a max of 26pts to play with:

Home Sector: 0
Core 1: 4
Core 2: 4
Core 3: 4
Core 4: 4
Core 5: 4
Core 6: 4
Junction: 0 (free Home one)
Bonus GDP: £2000 (Home)
Total GDP: 12+(6*10)+2+1+0.5 = £75.5k

Note that I'm assuming in both cases that the £500 bonus applies to both ends of a Warp Gate if both ends are within your nation. In addition, I assume that the Home Sector GDP does not include the figures for its hyperspace junction & warp gate.

[Akhlut]

Uh, Teleros, he said the system wasn't finalized yet.

[Teleros]

I know, I even quoted him saying as much . Got some free time though, and playing with the beta rules never hurt either.

[Steve]

No point rolling yet when the game systems' not complete.

Ten minutes of digging out my 40k stuff to find a dice, and woot, got 25pts to play with, so went with the following for the Altacar Empire:

There are things online like random.org that let you do dice rolls y'know. AIM chat also has them enabled.

And when the time comes I'll be handling the rolls.

Note that I'm assuming in both cases that the £500 bonus applies to both ends of a Warp Gate if both ends are within your nation. In addition, I assume that the Home Sector GDP does not include the figures for its hyperspace junction & warp gate.

A lot depends on whether we allow Warp Gates to behave like Stargates, and thus "dial" other Gates in the network, or if they're strictly point-to-point, at which time I will mandate your Warp Gates connect elsewhere.

And I actually didn't intend for the Home Sector GDP to count the free Hyperspace Junction and Warp Gate, just the extra population. Hrm... might just round out the Home Sector to $14K- in that case.

[Steve]

Oh, Teleros, might I poiint out your All Core Sector nation has almost no growth potential until you settle a Colony Sector? And that might be easier said than done depending on where you wind up on the map.

[Fingolfin_Noldor]

Oh, Teleros, might I poiint out your All Core Sector nation has almost no growth potential until you settle a Colony Sector? And that might be easier said than done depending on where you wind up on the map.

At least his industrial production is maxed out whereas it will take forever otherwise?

[Steve]

Well, he has a high GDP, but others will likely surpass him during the game because they have Midrange and Colony Sectors that can grow.

It is an issue to consider for balance. I was hoping to avoid the "may only have so many Core Sectors per country" thing but I may have to consider it if we can't find a way to balance it out and make such min-max builds have sufficiently painful tradeoffs.

[Steve]

23 NCPs

1 Home Sector w/ free Junction and Warp Gate
2 Core Sectors - 8 NCPs
3 Midrange Sectors - 9 NCPs, 1 Hyperspace Junction @ 2 NCP, improved Population and GDP @ 1 NCP/each
2 Colony Sectors - 2 NCPs

0

Home Sector
60 Billion/$14,000
HJ
WG

Core Sector 1
50 Billion/$10,000

Core Sector 2
50 Billion/$10,000

Midrange 1
30 + 5 Billion/$6,000 + $1,000 + $1,000
HJ

Midrange 2
30 Billion/$6,000

Midrange 3
30 Billion/$6,000

Colony 1
10 Billion/$1,000

Colony 2
10 Billion/$1,000

$56,000 GDP


Looking at Teleros' two proposals (also note I just rolled the HJ and WG bonuses into the Home sector's starting GDP, now $14,000) it seems just maxing out Core Sectors allows for a lot more cash. I am now leaning toward imposing a cap of no more than 3 per nation, if just to prevent such min-maxing, since I'm not sure any kind of counter-balancing issue can be put in without undermining the freeform system.

[Teleros]

A lot depends on whether we allow Warp Gates to behave like Stargates, and thus "dial" other Gates in the network, or if they're strictly point-to-point, at which time I will mandate your Warp Gates connect elsewhere.

Dunno, although if they can't be dialed I think the option to have some (one?) internal one would be nice. Helps knit nations together: part of the idea I have for the Altacar Empire is that it's a geographically fairly small but well-joined-up and developed nation - if SDNW 4 was in... let's say the mid-19th Century Earth, the Altacar Empire would be somewhere like the Netherlands or UK, as opposed to a big country with lots of potential internal growth like the USA.

And I actually didn't intend for the Home Sector GDP to count the free Hyperspace Junction and Warp Gate, just the extra population. Hrm... might just round out the Home Sector to $14K- in that case.

Would make sense.

Oh, Teleros, might I poiint out your All Core Sector nation has almost no growth potential until you settle a Colony Sector? And that might be easier said than done depending on where you wind up on the map.

Like F_N said, my that option is pretty maxed out to start with. I may have low population growth, but I can build a metric ton of ships, Interstellar Ballistic Missiles or what-have-you and expand by force. Or just send a heavily-protected long-range colony expedition to some distance unclaimed sector*, and then nuke the neighbours .

Anyway, that "all core sector" one was more of an exercise in powergaming as I'd be using (or hope to use) the first one I posted. The big thing it depends on is how population & GDP grow over time in Midrange & Colony sectors. On the other hand... too fast growth pop / GDP growth and you'll be seeing loads of Midrange- / Colony- dominated nations .

I am now leaning toward imposing a cap of no more than 3 per nation, if just to prevent such min-maxing

What about 1 Core Sector per non-Core Sector (inc Home Sector)?


*Regarding the possibility of acquiring unclaimed territory during the game... will it have to be adjacent to your existing sectors? Logically I don't think there's much reason why it would have to be, although there would of course be advantages in terms of defence, travel times, blockades and such.