Re: Even MORE galaxy suggestions...

From: rwallace@unix1.tcd.ie (russell wallace)

Date: Fri, 07 Aug 1992 11:39:51 +0000

In <1992Aug6.200325.22112@kronos.arc.nasa.gov> hall@kronos.arc.nasa.gov (Michael Hall) writes:

>In article <13153@chalmers.se> d8ilvja@dtek.chalmers.se (Jakob Ilves) writes:

>>5) Set ships on GUARD duty. A ship guardian will immediatedly jump to
>>any planet of the same race which is within one jump range if enemy
>>ships jumps to that planet this turn and reaches it in one jump.

>This sounds very similar to the already existing intercept ("I") command.
>I *hate* it.  If my race can detect the mass, speed, and destination of every
>enemy group in transit even to worlds I don't own (for the intercept command),
>then why can't I get this information on my print-out?!

For the simple reason that if this information was placed on your
printout, you'd be criticizing me for overfilling your mailbox with
every Galaxy turn report, and Greenpeace would be criticizing me for
making a huge contribution to global deforestation :-).

>And it changes the tactics of the game.  After both sides have adapted
>tactics, you *still* have the problem of the enemy sneaking into your
>weakly defended worlds.  The defensive player adapts by having a large,
>fast, balanced fleet that is ordered to intercept a potential attacking
>fleet that has been spied within strike range of the defender's planets.
>The offensive player adapts by breaking his attack into N pieces.  The
>largest mass (but low tech) force is sent *away* from the real targets,
>diverting the intercepting defensive forces.  Then the N-1 attack groups
>pound the defender's planets senseless just like there were no interception
>command at all.  The offensive player loses his decoy fleet, but the
>defender loses N-1 worlds.  (I wonder if Cybers realized that this is
>what Space Frogs was doing ;-)

I figured you were probably up to something like that, but it hardly
mattered, since the Cybers were outnumbered by about five to one at that
stage :-).

>Abolish the "I" command!

Well, you will agree that either the "I" command or a replacement is
definitely needed, right? For the moment, I think the "I" command works
reasonably well; though I might implement either an improved version, or
a Guard command, or something like that, eventually.

>In another article, someone else suggested that the war status be
>possibly different for each world with respect to each player.  The real
>problem is that the turn sequence is 1) move then 2) fire automatically.
>If instead the turn sequence were 1) fire under orders then 2) move,
>this would give the players more flexibility than any imaginable
>automatic firing orders.  Whenever possible, think about the fundamental
>game design/mechanics, rather than introducing new commands.

Hmmm... this is an interesting one; introduce a manual Fire command, to
be executed before any movement.

--
"To summarize the summary of the summary: people are a problem"
Russell Wallace, Trinity College, Dublin
rwallace@unix1.tcd.ie

References

Even MORE galaxy suggestions...
d8ilvja@dtek.chalmers.se (Jakob Ilves)
Wed, 05 Aug 1992 21:41:09 +0000
Re: Even MORE galaxy suggestions...
hall@kronos.arc.nasa.gov (Michael Hall)
Thu, 06 Aug 1992 20:03:25 +0000

Referenced By

Even MORE galaxy suggestions...
d8ilvja@dtek.chalmers.se (Jakob Ilves)
Wed, 05 Aug 1992 21:41:09 +0000
Re: Even MORE galaxy suggestions...
hall@kronos.arc.nasa.gov (Michael Hall)
Thu, 06 Aug 1992 20:03:25 +0000