Empire wide facilities

Instar · #1 February 5th, 2001, 11:05 PM

I just got an idea (hooray for me!)

Okay, here it is. As the subject suggests, their would be a couple facilities that would count for the entire empire, just like the system wide facilities. (Only one would work at a time, but instead of one for each system, one for each empire)
Examples:
Emperor's Palace: Would give small bonus to happiness, production, etc. Cost quite a bit of money to build.
Main Intel Center (for lack of a better term): The main facility for all intelligence ops. All operatives report to the main center.
Main Research Center: The research coordination center, a really really big computer maybe.
Also, we'd have to add a few for the special techs, I dont know what though.
Others?

dmm · #2 February 5th, 2001, 11:49 PM

Nice idea. I think they should all have to be on your homeworld. No fair putting the Emperor's Palace on some junky moon. And of course he's going to want to surround himself with the main Intel and Research compounds. Adds some extra "ouch! factor" if you have to use up space on one of your best planets.

I hope you don't mind a bit of criticism, though. Why should a palace make anyone but the emperor happier? Maybe more productive and/or less likely to rebel (because they are cowed by the emperor's wealth and power). On the other hand, a palace might make discontents even more likely to rebel. Hard to say. Maybe a palace should do nothing, except be a prerequisite for the other empire-wide facilities?

Some other suggestions:
Institute of Mining -- would increase mining output. Same for organics and radioactives.
Institute of Health -- would increase reproduction. (And maybe decrease industrial output?)
Institute of Arts -- would increase happiness levels.
Institute of War -- would increase offensive and defensive bonuses, or maybe physical strength.

Maybe not all should be available to all race demeanors, e.g., peaceful races couldn't build an Inst. of War., or warlike races couldn't build an Inst. of Arts.

Baron Munchausen · #3 February 6th, 2001, 01:05 AM

Like almost every other idea posted here, we've already thought of this in the beta forums.

I suggested a "Seat of Government" ability that would let you create a facility (or component! -- remember the Minbari 'Grey Council' staying on a ship is deep space at all times?) that represents the actual center of control for whatever form of government your races uses. It's the "Imperial Palace" for monarchic or dictatorial governments, but could also be the 'parliament' in more democratic systems. If this "Seat of Government' is destroyed there would be a huge hit to happiness on all of your worlds and you would lose the ability to control most of your ships and fleets in space for a few turns, at least, while your government reforms somehow.

There are also ideas for "trading post" and "embassy" facilities floating around. You could build an embassy for a given empire and you would NOT lose contact if the 'direct path' between your empires was broken, for example. And maybe relations should be stronger -- an AI empire would react less negatively to bad events and maybe not be fooled by tricks like a 'communications mimic' intel operation. It would be really interesting if the 'Seat of Government' could be transfered to an embassy somewhere in a friendly empire whenyour homeworld was conqueredor destroyed... government in exile?

You could build a "trading post" close to an empire you were trading with and get more trade benefits. Not hardly as interesting as embassies or seats of government, but useful.

[This message has been edited by Baron Munchausen (edited 05 February 2001).]

Instar · #4 February 6th, 2001, 02:03 AM

Well, I figure that the Palace could make people happy by having a center of government (it doesnt have to be a Palace for the emperor, more like a place for the government)
Id agree with the statement about only on Homeworlds, but thats really restrictive and the game doesnt let you specify that. (Also, you only get one homeworld)

HreDaak · #5 February 6th, 2001, 02:26 AM

quote:
Originally posted by Baron Munchausen:
Like almost every other idea posted here, we've already thought of this in the beta forums. I suggested a "Seat of Government" ability that would let you create a facility (or component! -- remember the Minbari 'Grey Council' staying on a ship is deep space at all times?) that represents the actual center of control for whatever form of government your races uses. It's the "Imperial Palace" for monarchic or dictatorial governments, but could also be the 'parliament' in more democratic systems. If this "Seat of Government' is destroyed there would be a huge hit to happiness on all of your worlds and you would lose the ability to control most of your ships and fleets in space for a few turns, at least, while your government reforms somehow.

There are also ideas for "trading post" and "embassy" facilities floating around. You could build an embassy for a given empire and you would NOT lose contact if the 'direct path' between your empires was broken, for example. And maybe relations should be stronger -- an AI empire would react less negatively to bad events and maybe not be fooled by tricks like a 'communications mimic' intel operation. It would be really interesting if the 'Seat of Government' could be transfered to an embassy somewhere in a friendly empire whenyour homeworld was conqueredor destroyed... government in exile?

You could build a "trading post" close to an empire you were trading with and get more trade benefits. Not hardly as interesting as embassies or seats of government, but useful.

[This message has been edited by Baron Munchausen (edited 05 February 2001).]

Excellent ideas! I too hope that MM will implement these when they have time.

Zanthis · #6 February 6th, 2001, 06:33 AM

When/if your "seat of government" is destroyed, you should "lose" a few turns. Just have the game End Turn you two or three times in a row.

Would have to be some serious penalty to not having a "seat of government" otherwise no one would build one for fear of it being destroyed, though.

Tomgs · #7 February 6th, 2001, 09:35 AM

What happens if you capture an enemy "seat ofgovernment"? Do they just lose bonuses or do you gain bonuses from having the facility?
It would be difficult to make the game know that it was a different races's seat of government building and not yours. Of course your morale (happiness) should go up a bit if you capture an enemies capitol.

Aq-s'ain · #8 February 6th, 2001, 10:02 PM

Hmm... Maybe this "Seat of Government" shouldn't be a component at all, but instead a condition of a ship/planet. So basically you simply select some ship or planet and click some button and that's it. However, you can only move the Seat from place to place if the places in question are in the same sector (i.e. to move Seat from one planet to another you would have to use some ship as a transport). What do you think?

[This message has been edited by Aq-s'ain (edited 06 February 2001).]

Baron Munchausen · #9 February 7th, 2001, 12:10 AM

quote:
Originally posted by Aq-s'ain:
Hmm... Maybe this "Seat of Government" shouldn't be a component at all, but instead a condition of a ship/planet. So basically you simply select some ship or planet and click some button and that's it. However, you can only move the Seat from place to place if the places in question are in the same sector (i.e. to move Seat from one planet to another you would have to use some ship as a transport). What do you think?

[This message has been edited by Aq-s'ain (edited 06 February 2001).]

That's basically the "Emperor location" method. It's just an abstraction. It might be easier to handle from a code standpoint, but realistically a government uses real estate and resources to do its business. It makes more sense to have a real facility or component that represents the government -- offices, records, communications equipment, etc...

As for a penalty for NOT having a Seat of Government:

1) A huge increase in susceptibility to intelligence operations of all sorts?

2) An increasing risk per turn of planets spontaneously rebelling regardless of any PPP operations? (5 percent++ per turn. 1 in 20, 2 in 20, 3 in 20... in a year there's a 50/50 chance that any given world will rebel and form its own empire... quite nasty, though it might be funny to see someone try to put a splintered empire back together.) The risk ought to decline only at the same rate, btw, not just stop cold when you get your seat of government rebuilt.

3) A loss of a certain percentage of all production to corruption? -25 percent of all resources is a pretty stiff penalty. Or this could be an increasing thing like the risk of rebellion. Same deal with the gradual decrease, too.

Do these sound like good reasons to maintain a seat of government?

There could be a special racial ability, "Anarchists" or something, that lets you do without a Seat of Government, too.

[This message has been edited by Baron Munchausen (edited 06 February 2001).]

Aq-s'ain · #10 February 7th, 2001, 12:35 AM

quote:
Originally posted by Baron Munchausen:
That's basically the "Emperor location" method.

Hmm... I guess you're right... But honestly: I just want super-important ships!! *Snif*! With current SE4 system, there really isn't anything comparable to... Executor, for example. Or even better, Colossus. Of course one doesn't usually build gigantic fleets of dreadnaughts or baseships, but still... It would be cool to have a ship which, when destroyed, would cause some *serious* happiness penalties for it's owner.. And if possible, some nice (happinese)bonus for the race responsible for the deed. ("...We have proven without a doubt our technological superiority over...")
Ps. this ship should, however, be really destructive, so that people would actually use it (and not hide it in some lil' plasma storm in some backwater system).

[This message has been edited by Aq-s'ain (edited 06 February 2001).]