Re: Galaxy Cargo, Corners & Diplomacy

From: mhall@netcom.com (Michael Hall)

Date: Wed, 24 Mar 1993 00:26:09 +0000

One reason Galaxy is not like Diplomacy is that the diplomacy in Galaxy,
while important, is very much hindered.  In my opinion, steps should be
taken to make diplomacy and cooperation easier in Galaxy.

The first failing in Galaxy is the inability to communicate with other
players prior to "first contact", coupled with the fact that "first
contact" is almost always an exchange of automated firing, since by
default everyone is "at war" (meaning automated firing upon contact)
with everyone else.

When I play Galaxy, I react to this problem by immediately launching
first strikes on all my neighbors' homeworlds.  The first turn I build
3-4 *fast* warships, the second turn I send all (save one for defense)
on their way to their targets, stopping at worlds in between to prevent
an "incoming group" notice, except that the final jump can take two
turns, as the victim's planet would be destroyed before his reactionary
production would appear. I might also produce some faster ships
(drones/probes) on the second turn for chaff, but even without this,
I have never failed to destroy all target homeworlds on the third or
fourth turns, as most players are not expecting a strike that soon.
It's sad that there really is no alternative to this strategy - the
way things are set up, one cannot communicate with the neighbors prior
to preemptively blowing their brains out before they blow your brains out.

One solution would be to permit communication directed at star systems,
rather than at player names, since initially you don't know who is where.
Another solution would be to get rid of the automated firing.  Either
have firing occur *before* movement (and only under orders or in reaction
to being attacked) or separate movement and firing totally, getting
two reports and requiring two sets of orders in succession (one for
movement, one for firing) per overall turn.

The second big diplomatic shortcoming of Galaxy is the inability to remove
population from planets by the owner.  During the initial scramble for
planets, colonists often get planted where they "do not belong".  The
owner might gladly relinquish control of the planet to an ally, if only
he could.  The only way to do this is to have the ally declare war
on that player, send a warship to that planet, and have the ship perform
some "ethnic cleansing" (and possibly inadvertantly bomb other planets
and fire at ships owned by that player.)

The obvious fix is to allow players to uproot population by converting
them to colonist popsicles.

The third diplomatic failing of Galaxy is the awkwardness of military
cooperation.  I don't wish to go into details, but if you have ever
tried to organize a "multinational" offensive or defensive force in
Galaxy, you may know what I mean.

The primary problem again is that damn automated firing and peace/war
declarations, so the main fix is to get rid of the automated
offensive firing.  Also, it would be nice to be able to dictate the
speed of fleets of ships, so that you could keep pace with your allies'
ships, and not wind up at the battle a turn too early or too late.

The fourth and final diplomatic shortcoming of Galaxy is the lack
of incentive for economic cooperation.  As it is, your neighbors
do you no good unless they are directed against your enemies.

If trading were part of the game, it would give you some reason to
let your neighbor live other than having a mutual enemy.  When designing
a trade system, keep in mind that the primary basis of trade is a
difference in quantities and utilities of stuff.  Trading would assist
the economies, and since building one's economy is the most important
thing in Galaxy, trade would make diplomacy become the most important
thing in Galaxy.

--
Michael Hall   \
personal account\                     Alamarain!
mhall@netcom.com \

References

Re: Galaxy Cargo, Corners & Diplomacy
sutin@helios.UCSC.EDU (Brian Sutin)
Tue, 23 Mar 1993 01:22:27 +0000
Re: Galaxy Cargo, Corners & Diplomacy
desj@ccr-p.ida.org (David desJardins)
Tue, 23 Mar 1993 03:40:58 +0000
Re: Galaxy Cargo, Corners & Diplomacy
gl8f@fermi.clas.Virginia.EDU (Greg Lindahl)
Tue, 23 Mar 1993 04:10:20 +0000
Re: Galaxy Cargo, Corners & Diplomacy
sutin@ra.UCSC.EDU (Brian Sutin)
Tue, 23 Mar 1993 20:11:30 +0000

Referenced By

Re: Galaxy Cargo, Corners & Diplomacy
sutin@helios.UCSC.EDU (Brian Sutin)
Tue, 23 Mar 1993 01:22:27 +0000
Re: Galaxy Cargo, Corners & Diplomacy
desj@ccr-p.ida.org (David desJardins)
Tue, 23 Mar 1993 03:40:58 +0000
Re: Galaxy Cargo, Corners & Diplomacy
gl8f@fermi.clas.Virginia.EDU (Greg Lindahl)
Tue, 23 Mar 1993 04:10:20 +0000
Re: Galaxy Cargo, Corners & Diplomacy
sutin@ra.UCSC.EDU (Brian Sutin)
Tue, 23 Mar 1993 20:11:30 +0000