I know in supremacy it will be possible for minor races to colonize other star systems, but will it be possible for them to conquer the systems of other races, minor or major?

Welcome to the forums and a hearty congratulations on your first post. Every question is a good question. I'm pretty sure the answer to that is no. Captain B

How do you know that Bashir?

AI limitations would probably lean towards no for this. But we won't know for sure until the AI is actually in development.

As for how Bashir knows, Zeleni, Mike recently posted about some of the likely problems the AI will have to overcome somewhere in the workshop, which is also why I'm leaning towards no on this. But again, we won't know for sure until the AI is actually in development.

Anyways, welcome to the forums, twiggy!

In last talk with Mike he assured me that "minor's confined to one system" is last option, maybe something is changed I don't know

Yes I was thinking of the same post as Matress. It wasn't too long ago. See 0069twiggy? A good question! Bashir

Can you post me link to that thread?

Minors will (hopefully) be able to expand through colonization, and they'll be able to go to war (and assault systems). Minor race conquest through invasion is on the table, but I wouldn't get your hopes up. Minors aren't competing for victory in the game, so they don't have as much motivation to conquer. Removing conquest from the list of goals for minor races would also help prevent situations where aggressive minor races overpower empires.

Well that's good news. But...

...Why would we want to prevent this? I for one would like to go up against the Breen or another minor race. Each game would be different afterall, and you never know how the races are going to react to each other.

Of course, we'll need to think about what happens with liberated systems. There was a horrible bug in BOTF where if a minor had been conquered before you met them, you lost the ability to ever contact the minor race, even after it was liberated, whether by yourself or someone else. Hopefully Supremacy will be a bit more flexible.

Well the option of aggressive minor races overpowering a major empire isn't a minus, it adds to the realism and makes the game more interesting. But as .Iceman pointed out, that chanced of that happening are small. Still it would be fun if you had to worry about strong minor races. I see them attacking an empire after some sort of major battle against either the Borg or some other major race.

In any case, it's your call.

thanks for the welcome everyone,

I would love to see minors able to conquer because I think it would add to the challenge of the game. Instead of just having the 4 other empires to worry about you would have to be on your guard against the Gorn or the Breen as well.

I think it is. If a minor race attacks another empire, you're basically getting "free" help.

Look at it this way: when a foreign empire conquers another foreign empire, you effectively have a transfer of power between two of your competitors: one is weakened while another is strengthened. However, when a minor race conquers a foreign empire, one of your competitors is weakened (or even eliminated), but that strength isn't "transferred" to another competitor--it's transferred to a minor race. This is a very important difference: minor races do not compete with you for victory. They cannot win the game themselves, and you don't need to conquer them in order to win. If minors can conquer, then you could potentially "win" the game simply by sitting back while minor races conquer all of the other empires. Mind you, that's not a scenario that's likely to pan out very often, but my point is that minor race conquest would have an adverse effect on gameplay.

Beside minors conquering CPU Empires they should try to conquer Human player too. It's game over for player and there is no difference are you beaten by Klingons or Breen, Kazon.... Actually there is only few minor races which could be able to fight effectively against majors (devore, gorn, kazon, andorians, breen maybe few more)

Well, minor races would attack human players and CPU players without distinction. That wasn't my point. Regardless of which empire a minor race conquers, it amounts to free aid to the other empires because it wears down one of their competitors without strengthening another. A minor race conquering an empire would have a more significant impact on the direction of the game than the conquest of one empire by another.

I may not be doing a very good job of explaining this. .Iceman, get your ass over here and help me .

Ok, but the same could be said about the Borg.




No, I understand your point, but imagine that you are able to bribe some developed minor race into attacking your opponent, it could be of great strategic value.

Mike we understand you perfectly, i know what you mean by transfer of power and it's actually question about winning conditions. And yes, if victory condition is galaxy domination and if we say that means that player must eliminate 3 empires to achieve victory then Breen crushing Cardassians, Klingons and Romulans will win game for player (player sitting back and doing nothing). You are right about that but I was referring on something else and I didn't explain myself properly. I think minors should be divided on two groups. Lest say on Mini-Empires and Rest .

Rest, in this group would be races like Acamarians, Chalnoth, Vidiians, Antedeans, Ferengi, Vulcans (almost all minor races). They move around on galaxy map without motivation of global conquest and domination. They can fight for one system or two but their behaviour is focused locally, only on surrounding space of their system(s). In other words they can start war with player or other empire but their focus is maybe to grab one system or two and they will be satisfied. So basicly they can't do any real transfer of power from one empire to other and they can't win game for player.

Mini-Empires, in this group would be limited number of minor races. Let's say most powerful races from star trek for which is known that they have aspiration for global conquest and domination and they are big enough to be relevant factor.

Alpha and Beta Quadrant: Tholians, Breen and Gorn
Delta Quadrant: Kazon and Devore
Gamma Quadrant: Drai (for sake of balance)

As I see this races I see no difference in relation with Cardassians or Klingons. Actually they are empires, they behave like empires, they wage wars and try to kick player and other empires from game, in other words they try to win the game. The only distiction between Empires and Mini- Empires is playability, Empires are playable by human player and Mini-Empires not. (we have all limited time here and we can't do 50 images and ships for each race in the game). All this leads to victory condition, victory condition for player easily can be set to crush not only empires but also mini empires. I think this will bring to game tremendous reality and replay value. There is one thing which is different and can only apply for Mini-Empires, the thing is they can be membered , but only in special circumstances, for example, when they are weak, when player empire is considerably larger or when mini-empire is threatened to be completely annihilated.

One note: Mini-empires already have good amount of special structures with great bonuses and numerous ship classes.

This is only of course my idea and I'm aware that coding all of this is different story. This is only my view of game which I would like to play.

Cheers

Oh, so _now_ you want my help Just kidding.

Besides the fact that there aren't really many transport ships for minors (and yes, that could be "fixed") - being that the vast majority of the 19 races that actually have them are mere traders, and those ships are freighters rather than "transports", which the game doesn't distinguish - like Mike said, it could present a whole slew of "problems". A minor attacking an empire basically weakens _both_ the minor and the empire. Another empire can easily take advantage of that, especially one ran by a human player. Humans are adept at exploiting situations. The same could be said about 2 AI empires, sure, but empires by definition have more "staying power" in the game. I'm also imagining paying minors to devastate one empire at a time; or just cripple them enough. Using their fleets as proxies, or as a slow attrition machine.
I think too much importance is being given to minors. Their actions will be _mostly_ transparent to the player, so devoting resources to them has to be carefully thought out. Not everything that sounds cool is actually going to be as expected in the game.

The Borg are an event. Plus, they're a braindead "race". Their specific purpose in the game is precisely this.



War by proxy is all well and good, but it's a _diplomacy_ option. I think the discussion is about standard minor behavior.

Even more divisions in minors?!



Why? Either they're a warring race, or they're not.



Well, if the 50 minor limit sticks, they may not even be in the game. Any of them. If a couple of them are, they may unbalance a single quadrant. Etc.



Their special structures are Home System structures, and their ships are mostly upgrades. A couple of different classes, and at moderate to high tech levels.

The scenario you described would be incredibly 'in character' for anyone playing as either the Dominion or the Federation. When I'm playing as the Federation I won't be sending fleets in to conquer other empires unless they are so aggressive and dangerous there is simply no choice, and anyone playing as the Dominion will be actively trying to weaken all other empires without getting involved... it's the Dominion way. As such I can't see much wrong with this scenario. There really needs to be a win condition that doesn't involve conquest and subjugation for the Feds.

Also, a war between 2 empires will always weaken both empires. Yes, territory will transfer from one to another if they are actively conquering, but I understand it won't be possible this time to build fleets of ships quickly, therefore an empire that has just conqueswred it's neighbour should be ripe for attack. Diminished fleet and more territory to control.

Well, all that effects that minor empires would have are positive in my point of view.

Do you remember the DS9 episode "The Adversary", where the Dominion wanted to start a war between the Federation and the Tzenkethi? Why the Tzenkethi, why not the Romulans, or the Cardassians? It obvious that in Star Trek universe there are races outside our five major empires that are strong enough to shift the balance of power within a quadrant.

As Zeleni said, those would be the Breen Confederacy, the Gorn Hegemony, the Tzenkethi Autocracy, the Tholian Assembly, the Devore Imperium, the Kazon Collective, the Drai, the Trogorans and perhaps one or two more.

I'm not saying that they should be strong enough to compete in galactic domination, but they should pose the biggest threat to the major empires out of the other minor races. They should expand, build more ships, subjugate weaker races and from time to time try to take a major race planet. Also making them allies in the war against other major races could mean the difference between victory and defeat.

It could depend on the game difficulty. In the most difficult setting, they would attack and be a danger. In the medium setting they should only attack minor races and in the easiest setting they should only rarely attack some weak minor race.

Actually there are non divisions regarding minor races. If you think on key, secondary, tertiary... that isn't real division it only gives rough information about minor race special structure bonuses and nothing more...



They are minor race afterall and would be happy with one additional system with max pop 20 and I think Gorn wouldn't be pleased whith such booty. Sense behind this is to annoy human player who is in war with major empire but still has to pay attention to the mosquito on his neck who only takes advantage of situation.



How many minors will be in the game we don't know so we can't debate. Unbalance why? Game will randomize each time position of race on galactic map regardless of their canon destination so if game loads 4 key races each of them will be positioned in different quadrant (Vulcans in Gamma quadrant)




I already stated that minors ship database needs changes, it depends how will be solved Ai.

1. Minor starts game with tech 3 level (like in Botf)
2. Or all races start with tech 0 and they advance according their own tech modifier, in this situation Tholians are going to have destroyer, cruiser, battlecruiser on each tech level like major empires.

What do you mean by special structure is set to native system? How this can be relevant for player? My thinking was that mini-empires already posses structures with great bonuses so they should hard to obtain for human player (membered).



Two years ago I said that all minors ships with other function then fight should be kicked out. All of them will get their generic ship for transport and colonizing, there is no need for special ships.

I have SOME concern about this idea only in that the processing time for each turn in the game could become astronomical. I guess Mike is the best to speak to this although I am not sure that he has ever programmed an AI like this before. I would at least assume that major race players won't have to wait while we visually watch every battle (in the combat engine) between two minors (there are other problems with this like potentially giving major races clues as to WHO is near WHO on the galactic map long before that area of space is explored).

Of course in the old game, we only saw ship to ship combat between two human players.

The reason the major empires would have risen (in the Star Trek Universe) is because for some reason they had a developmental jump or lead on technology, conquest and/or diplomacy. Some races were more primitive, some passive, some xenophobic / isolationist and perhaps some simply too isolated. There were more aggressive races too. This was handled in the old game in that a major race could have a ship to ship battle with a minor race.

I guess the conquest wars between minor races would have to be number crunched wars that we don't see or know about until the system is discovered. I'm not sure we would like the game if this was given as much capability as a major empire (i.e. all aggressive or highly advanced races are major races). This latter would have to be considered a possibility since everyone starts with unexplored space and just their system. It was the "Birth" of the Federation. Why would we believe that at this early level the Chalnoth couldn't do as well as the Klingons unless their technology wasn't up to it (the Chalnoth not as bright or science minded)? Hence the processing time. So many factors to account for, for so many minor races (I guess you would also have to add that there were some races so advanced that their philosophy did not allow for conquest).

But if it is quick (at each turn) and doable. I'm in.

This is a core aspect of the game, so it's probably best to think of it in terms of gameplay and not in terms of 'Star Trek'. Minor races exist to enrich the experience and provide strategic bonuses to empires who bring them in as members. They were never meant to fill the role of primary opponents--that's what empires are for.

Let me phrase this another way: if minor races can conquer, then in terms of capabilities, they have virtual parity with empires. They'll be able to do pretty much everything empires do, except win the game. That seems like a pretty silly difference on its own, so why bother with the difference at all?

Pro Tip: Unlike BotF and BotE, there is no significant limit to the number of empires you can have in Supremacy. If you want to go up against the Breen, all you have to do is open up the editor and switch 'Civilization Type' to 'Empire'. We could easy ship a Supremacy: Empirepalooza mod/expansion that promotes some of the minor races to empires. Hell, we could ship that mod with the game for all I care. Would that be good enough?

I like that idea, so we will be able to change the minor races we want to fully equal opponents? Ok, lets call it a compromise and make this feature a part of an expansion/mod/sequel

Achievement Unlocked: Compromise

From which only the T'Rogoran have Transport ships.



Well, when they join an empire, they will make that empire stronger than if it was another, les powerful minor. That's the whole point of minors and their levels. And membering them.



There are no diff settings currently. I was thinking about that the other day, with the "braindead" minors thingy. With levels set from the onset, diff level could modify minor allocation in the game, with higher diff levels producing more high level minors.

I was thinking the same thing. The only question is, will the difficulty settings be implemented, or will there be only one setting?

And Expanding, Developed, Minor (can't recall the right names). That's another division. And Warlike, Partisan, etc.



They would provoke a full out war with an empire, just to take _one_ additonal system?! Are you sure you understand the concept of war? And its repercussions?



Hmm?! Minors are locked to quadrants too, just like empires.



Changes of the magnitude you are implying?! Also, again, minors will be mosly transparent to the player, so a bigger footprint in the game will accomplish little.



Why? They're minors.



Not sure how this differs from what's planned (I guess).



Minors structures can only be built on _their_ home system. _When_ they join an empire. This is one of the basic concepts of the game regarding minors.

The difficulty of the game will basically depend on what values are loaded into certain tables. In terms of implementation, supporting multiple difficulty levels would be as simple as loading different sets of values into those tables. In terms of development, testing and balancing those value sets will be very time consuming. The good news is that those efforts can be mostly decoupled from the rest of the game development. People like .Iceman and dafedz could volunteer to spend countless hours of their time tweaking the difficulty levels so that I don't have to .