Get your fill of sci-fi, science, and mockery of stupid ideas
http://stardestroyer.dyndns-home.com/
Indeed. It could be as simple as having a "reject call" button on your stargate.Darkevilme wrote:You know, when i first heard of these warp gate things. i kinda assumed that both ends had to be powered up for transit. if you don't want people showing up uninvited at the warp gate you just don't turn it on.
Simplest way: go by the ship's cost and tag a description on the end (ie "this cruiser design is very fast, but has weaker firepower than normal" will do. Given combat is determined more by storytelling than by dice rolls and all that, I don't see why it shouldn't work out okay.Siege wrote:Of course I do agree that there should be a certainly sensibility to what players are allowed to field... Investing your entire fleet allotment in a single thousand-point world-ending battlestation for example might be a bit too much, but why not let people come up with their own ideas in this here OOC thread and then judge whether they are or are not acceptable, or whether they need to adjust the point score per ship of the class? That way we can exploit our creativity to the fullest extent without getting hemmed in by hull types or sublight drives or whatnot.
The Bragulan Star Empire
Government: The BSE is ruled by the great and fair unquestionable will of the mighty Imperator Darvyl Sagatantron Byzon, ruler of all the countless suns and stars flying the flag of Bragule. The center of governance is the world-city of mighty Bragule itself, the seat of the Imperator’s nigh unlimited power, and the dictates made on that great world-throne radiate outwards to span the entire Empire. Subject to these dictates are the various agencies of Imperial governance created by the Imperator to aid him in his most humble and beneviolent rule, and these agencies and branches are innumerable as the moons that orbit the Bragulan worlds themselves. The authority the Imperator has bestowed upon these agencies range from the ceremonial and ineffectual, to so potent as to determine the fates of entire planets and peoples. In its current form, the Bragulan Star Empire has existed, as it always has, for some three hundred years now, constantly illuminated by the light of Imperator Byzon‘s noble rule.
Economy: Mighty Bragule commands vast resources befitting the scope and scale of a great Empire of its standing, and its economic apparatuses are likewise dedicated to the everyday working of the Empire - which every proud, patriotic Bragulan citizen contributes to with their noble and dedicated unending labor for the Imperator. Moons have been strip mined and laid bare in the industrialization of the Bragulan Stars, verdant jungle-worlds denuded for paper that now fills the cabinets and shelves of Imperial bureaucrats, entire agri-planets irrigated and crop-rotating to feed billions of mouths, all great feats that conservationists have protested before they were revealed to be intellectuals and subsequently sent to be de-educated.
Species: The Bragulan Star Empire is a multicultural, multiracial and multi-species nation tolerant of all forms of sentient sapient creatures. The great majority of Bragulans are, in fact, Bragulans, while other species constitute a minute minority. There exist in the Empire a microscopic populace of humans, confined mostly to the green zones of Wild Space or in the various ‘Bragule Hilton’ work camps for prisoners of war. Likewise, there are Zigonian colonists forcefully evicted from their jungle worlds when the trees were all chopped down and turned to paper. There are also a limited population of Apexai, trapped after the war and now kept in walled-in cities for their own safety as Bragulan settlements are built all over the post-Apexai planets. Other species in the Empire include insectoid Karlacks and Scrollian slug men, considered by the Bragulans to be their equals and brothers in arms for their contributions in ridding Bragule of the Apexai menace.
Military: The valiant militaries of the Bragulan Star Empire serve the Imperator, safeguard the Bragulan Stars’ untold billions of citizens, and stand vigilant against the depravities of insidious alien powers and perfidious factions that threaten the Empire’s rule from without and from within. To ensure the unending continuity of the Empire, the Imperial Star Army maintains millions of shock trooper forces to storm entire worlds and ensure that death comes swiftly to the Imperator‘s enemies, and countless of conscripts to occupy said worlds and maintain the ideological purity of its populace. Then there is the Imperial Star Navy, which scours the vast regions of Bragulan Space with armadas of warships, ranging from centuries-old derelict patrol ships to great cruisers festooned with massive devastating weaponry, to battle stations that lord over key Imperial worlds. The Bragulan Star Empire maintains a proud militaristic tradition, with vast numbers of citizens conscripted for patriotic military service, and a history of warfare culminating in the demolition of several Apexai worlds and a seemingly perpetual state of war with the United Solarian Sovereignty that simmers on to this day.
Sectors:
Bragule (Home Sector)
Vanagradheim (Core Sector)
Krygyzstovan (Core Sector)
Vegalyrsk (Core Sector)
Kravrochezwtola (Core Sector)
Drago (Midrange Sector)
Krannisk (Colony Sector)
Omicron (Colony Sector)
Kasanar (Colony Sector)
Population: 1.5 Trillion
Religion: None, the Bragulan Star Empire is an atheist regime and both prosecutes and persecutes religions that are deemed in need of ideological correct and de-education. There are some religions tolerated by the Imperial government, so long as these religions follow the guidelines set by the Imperial People’s Organization of Societal Correctness and the Ministry of Truth. There is also an encouraged, though unofficial, leadership cult dedicated to the evident greatness of the Imperator Darvyl Sagatantron Byzon, however any patriotic Bragulan will be quick to point out that religion is defined as an object of faith, while the Imperator is fact.
(The fringe worlds of the Empire often has troublesome human missionaries from the Sovereignty, often from the Christian denominations, come attempting to convert Bragulans to their faith. The Imperial Bureau of Galactic Vigilence takes care of this problem, however.)
Foreign Policy: The Bragulan Star Empire is a belligerent, isolationist power with few friends in the international interstellar community, where any cooperation or alliance the Bragulans have with other nations is not based on friendship but more on convenience. The Bragulan Star Empire is also in the process of waging an ongoing war with the United Solarian Sovereignty, a war that has lasted for several decades and punctuated with brief but violent outbursts of conflict followed by long simmering periods of tenuous ‘ceasefire’. The official stance of the Bragulan Star Empire, as dictated by the Imperator himself, is that the Sovereignty is a nation comprised primarily of degenerates and deviants, a lawless and perverted permissive people no different than the horrible Apexai before them - and, like the Apexai, in dire need of a good ideological correction, and a moon landing on one of their planets. Or all of them. The Empire and the Sovereignty have a ‘re-militarized’ zone between them known as Wild Space, populated by disowned renegade elements of both nations. Wild Space is considered a free-fire zone with everything in its confines considered a valid target for both Bragulan and Sovereign militaries.
Imperium of Man
Government
At the head of the Imperium of Man, is the God Emperor of Man, Heraclius XX Komnenos. Revered by many as a God, he is a superhuman who has lived for many hundreds of years, and is a power psyker by right. He rules an Imperium that is xenophobic to the extreme, and the Imperium has exterminated many an alien race that was unfortunate enough to blunder into the Imperium.
However, as theocratic a state as the Imperiunm of Man, it also pursues Science and reveres it; seeing it as a tool required to exterminate all alien races in the galaxy. The main pillars of the Imperium are: The Adeptus Mechanicus, The Adeptus Astartes, the Imperial Guard, the Imperial Navy, the Church of Man, the Imperial Curia, the Adeptus Urban Cohort and the Imperial Inquisition.
Education
All citizens are required to receive compulsory education, provided for by the Adeptus Mechanicus and the Imperial Curia. The scientifically adept are immediately inducted into the Adeptus Mechanicus and given thorough training before becoming an Technician, followed by Engineer. Some who excel in the fundamental Sciences, are given titles such as Academicians.
The remaining citizens are then allowed to join various parts of the Imperial Government, as well as military. Those who meet extremely stringent requirements such as genetics, are inducted into the Adeptus Astartes, the mailed fist of the Imperium. Some become traders, businessmen, while many join the Imperial Guard and Imperial Navy, and perhaps the more gifted join the Curia, or the Imperial Inquisition. The more religious become priests in the Church of Man, venerating the God Emperor.
Economy
The economy of the Imperium of Man is dominated by the Adeptus Mechanicus, though large private corporations exist. Many Engineers of the Adeptus Mechanicus leave to join private corporations or form their own. Much of the heavy industry and defence industry however, is in the purview of the Adeptus Mechanicus. The various forgeworlds are massive factory worlds that produce much of the equipment and weapons and warships for the Imperium's armies, though the forgeworlds do lease part of their land to private companies who work closely with the Adeptus Mechanicus for civilian and defence projects. Much innovation occurs within the Adeptus Mechanicus, as the vie for contracts from the Imperium.
As one would expect, a tax is levied on all the Imperium's citizens, though the Adeptus Mechanicus does receive tax rebates in return for their service and sacrifice to the Imperium, both in the form of technology, research, and their Titan Legions.
Military
Heavily Militarized, the military of the Imperium has 4 main branches: the Titan Legions, the Imperial Guard, the Imperial Navy, and the Adeptus Astartes. The Adeptus Astartes are feared and rightly so. Led by the Strategikons, who are sons of the Emperor, they are genetically modified Superhumans; the epitome of human perfection. Using powered armor, and heavy weapons, they are the mailed fist of the Imperium, and the Strategikons are often called upon to lead a Crusade against Xenos. The Astartes have their own warships to provide transport and firepower required to defeat enemy ships and defences.
The Imperial Navy is composed of carriers, battleships, and myriad cruisers, destroyers, frigates and corvettes. They patrol Imperial space, perform exterminatus, and lead attacks on enemy vessels.
The Imperial Guard is composed of conscripts and professional soldiers who fight and die for the God Emperor. Equiped with Tanks, Superheavy Tanks, armored fighting vehicles, artillery and superheavy artillery, they are the fist that holds the Imperium together.
The Titan legions are composed of Titans and Skitarii. Walking giants, the Titans bring heavy firepower to the battlefiled, and are escorted by the cyborg Skitarii. The firepower of the largest Titans, Warlord and Imperator, carry enough firepower to obliterate whole cities.
The Urban Cohort are not military per se, but they patrol the trade lanes and the cities and ensure that all follow the laws of the Imperium.
Foreign Policy
The Imperium is friend to any human empire, and hostile against xenos. It has recently entered a war with a race of insectoids, and a crusade has been called to exterminate them....
Systems
Constantinople system
Thessaloniki system
- Terra
Mars
SaturnSparta system
- Vostroya
Fortis Binary
- Cadia
Ryza
So let's say we don't quantify such. Let's say people can claim any transport capacity they want. Are you going to accept it when some guy proclaims he has a $100 value hull carrying half a billion troops? No? What if it has $1000 value? $2000, or at least a fleet worth that much? Where is the line between "munchkin" and "acceptable"? Because if it's not clarified at game start in the rules this is going to be an argument that will be hashed out whenever someone thinks someone else has too many troops in their ships.Dark Hellion wrote:It is primarily a philosophical difference. The thing is that you state that you have to clarify how troop transports and carriers act but these things are ultimately minutia in the grand scale of things. The only reason we need to know how these work in the long run reduces to fluff. Does it matter if troops are transported by landing craft, drop pods or by a platoon of men generating gestalt psychic powers by doing jumping jacks and teleporting to LOS of their aerobics sergeant as long as they all require the same level/type of investment from the player and have the same strengths and restrictions?
Invoking "Don't be a douche" sounds all nice and simple and summed up, but how will it work in practice? What quantifies "being a douche"? There are obvious examples, of course,, but what of a case where a player claims something a bit big but not overtly douchery? Is he being a douche or just imaginative? What if someone proclaims him being a douche but he's not intending to be, or proclaims his innocence?Same thing with planetary numbers and population numbers. Does it really matter if you have 10 billion people and I have 10 copies of superman if we both produce the same and it takes the same investment of troops to subdue? I don't think it does as long as we enforce rule #1) Don't be a douche.
Militaries with same general design philosophy? The system as written is crafted to permit multiple ideas. There are no "definite" things set up like specific types of battleships or infantry weapons, it's just a rough quality of kit, quality of troops, and hull size system. A Heavy hull could be a space battleship or it could be a carrier or it could be a heavy cruiser or a system defense ship or whatever someone wants it to be.Its actually more unbelievable that numerous civilizations of a variety of species will all utilize land area, resources and manpower at the same general levels of efficiency and build militaries with the same fundamental design philosophy than just a priori assuming egality and general equivalence of civilizations using the fluff to patch the holes.
Agreed.The rules should be there for situations were two players can't agree on an outcome and a mod has to go "ok, how many points do you each have? Let me roll some dice and see what I get", or a "wait a second, that ain't right" moment.
So you are arguing that a player should get to decide how many "fighters" or "gunboats" or what have you his carriers have.I mean, we don't have rules for intelligence gathering, counter-intelligence, espionage, assassination and economic sabotage even though all these things are tantamount military concerns far more important than the mechanical functioning of carriers. Why are we trusting players to run an aspect that is necessarily sneaky, duplicitous and obscured but not the general vagueries of combat which are either transparent or only important in retrospect?
(I do, OTOH, get a bit of a chuckle when I make him wail in horror at the sight of an actual ruleset I've derived that's not going the free-form route. 
)If anyone finds something here too complex, please explain what it is you feel is too complex, and I will find a way to simplify it or replace it with something more simple.Interstellar Transport Rules:
Having an army is nice and everything, but for interstellar war you need ships to move them in.
Any hull of Light size or greater can be used as a troop carrier while Gunboat and Shuttle spacecraft hulls are capable of being troop dropships.
For starship troop carriers, every $1 of hull value you may carry 1,000 troops with Elite kit, 1,500 with Regular kit, 2,000 with Baseline, or 3,000 with Old kit. A $75 Medium hull configured with $10 worth of troop carrying capacity can carry 10,000 troops with Elite kit, 15,000 with Regular, 20,000 with Baseline, or 30,000 with old. Naturally, a ship configured to carry troops will sacrifice some capacity in firepower or defenses, scaled to the hull value allocated for troop carrying..
For spacecraft troop dropships, a Shuttle Hull of either variety can carry 50 troops and a Gunboat Hull can carry 500.
Troop Transports are ships dedicated solely to carrying troops. They are generally Heavy hulls or larger that use dedicated sublight Yacht and Ultralight hull sized dropships as well as normal ones to ferry troops to a planetary surface. These ships ferry 2,000 troops for every $1 of hull value, as well as the necessary dropships to transport them to a planetary surface: a $125 Transport thus carries 250,000 troops with large quantities of troop landers. They have only minor defensive capability and no weaponry beyond anti-spacecraft weapons and planetary bombardment fire support guns.
All nations are presumed to start with a troop transport fleet sufficient to carry a quarter of their active troops at any given time.
Carrier Rules:
Any Starship Hull can be configured to carry Fighters and Gunboats. Superheavies can be configured to carry Ultralights and Ultraheavies can carry Ultralights and Lights.
A Hull size's carrying capacity is equivalent to half its cost. For example, a Medium Hull ship of $80 cost can carry $40 worth of craft (that's 200 basic Fighter hulls or 40 basic Gunboats as a max exclusive capacity).
The same rules for troop transports' combat capabilities apply to hulls made into carriers, though mostly in terms of anti-starship firepower; a carrier, unlike a troop transport, is presumed to have at least mediocre, if not moderate, defensive capability between armored hull and energy shielding.
Fighters and Gunboats are automatically considered to have a x2 to attack value; a base cost fighter unit of 20 fighters, $4 overall, can inflict damage and defeat a ship at $8 cost. This allows a carrier to be economically viable and practical, but due to their lower defensive value fighters and gunboats are easily destroyed and thus the effectiveness of a force of spacecraft is blunted as it takes losses in a space battle.
Isn't that what we'd have a moderator staff for? To make those hard decisions when people can't agree on what's acceptable and what isn't?Steve wrote:So let's say we don't quantify such. Let's say people can claim any transport capacity they want. Are you going to accept it when some guy proclaims he has a $100 value hull carrying half a billion troops? No? What if it has $1000 value? $2000, or at least a fleet worth that much? Where is the line between "munchkin" and "acceptable"? Because if it's not clarified at game start in the rules this is going to be an argument that will be hashed out whenever someone thinks someone else has too many troops in their ships.
Then faced with multiple players who think he's being a douche he ought to withdraw or adjust his claims. And if he doesn't he is, in fact, a douche--actions matter more than intentions, after al. And if there really is a gray area where we just can't agree at all... Hello, moderatorial prerogative!Invoking "Don't be a douche" sounds all nice and simple and summed up, but how will it work in practice? What quantifies "being a douche"? There are obvious examples, of course,, but what of a case where a player claims something a bit big but not overtly douchery? Is he being a douche or just imaginative? What if someone proclaims him being a douche but he's not intending to be, or proclaims his innocence?
Who cares? If he gets mad over a bloody game he shouldn't have been playing in the first place, and he's free to leave. You're making this far more complicated than it needs to be, based solely on the half-assed approach to game-modding we took in game #2. I think you're taking exactly the wrong lesson away from that game: if somewhere down the line people genuinely start to lawyer up with moderatorial precedents from five months ago, and this is seen somehow as a valid argument, then we might as well call it quits right then and there, because that obviously means we've taken a wrong turn somewhere.The same thing applies to player actions. Player A might do something that Player D proclaims douchery, but Player A doesn't see that, nor does C or F. The mods look at it and say "nope, not douchery". Is Player D simply going to accept that ruling, or is he going to get mad and assume the mods are being assholes or biased and continue to scream about Player A's douchery?
