hivemind seems quite weak

[teri]

i'm having a long war versus another race next to me. fights were going well but invading wasn't. nearly all colonies rebelled against my rule and converted back to their old empire(is there some way to prevent this except setting taxes to 0? other games use propaganda to absorb new cultures.).

anyway i exchanged all troopcompartments with bombardweapons. ongoing enspionage kept him weak. after the new ships were build i just started bombing his colonies away. but after some destroyed colonies something odd happend: my empire split in two, claiming it was too tyrannical. how can there be rebellion, war weariness or corruption in a hivemind? they should even sacrifice their own life gladly for the whole, so killing in a war shouldn't be a real decision. even if they had feelings, i didn't start the war, it went on for quite a while because of the afore mentioned problems, but when there could finally be a lasting solution to it, the price is to high?!? why should all races ecspecially a hiveminded one with a high reproduction rate value life (of others) so dearly?! the act of bombing also destroyed all small agreements with all the other races i had, which alone, is a very high price. so it appears to be: once u start bombing u have to bomb the whole galaxy.

[jscott991]

A major issue with this game right now is that all races are pretty much the same, with changes only on the periphery.

You can't be a race like the Borg or the Arachnids (from Starfire/David Weber novels) that has no regard for life.

Heck, you can't even be a race like the Romans from Earth.

There is an assumption that all races follow Judeo-Christian values in terms of life and that any bombing or disregard for that will result in major internal upheaval.

It must be based on balancing issues, but it is somewhat disappointing and bland.

[Erik Rutins]

It's not quite that simple - there are a lot of differences between the different race and government types, but planetary bombardment is one area right now that is probably too simple rules-wise, it was also the last thing added to the game before release.

If you choose to bombard, you should make sure you are bombarding an enemy that is generally considered (reputation-wise) to be quite evil, otherwise this will be considered a major atrocity by the rest of the galaxy, for whom the extermination of planetary populations is akin to what today would be indiscriminate use of atomic weapons.

[jscott991]

All races also use the same war-weariness model. Even though a race might have a bonus to determine when its population becomes too tired for it to continue a war, it still eventually will run out of will to fight.

I can't imagine this actually happening to a belligerent hive mind like the aforementioned sci-fi examples.

The idea that a xenophobic race (which is not modeled in this game at all) would be outraged by its government bombardment of an enemy's planets is rather hard to accept.

Heck, the idea that a xenophobic race of any type would be outraged by war against outsiders is hard to accept, but there you have it.

[HsojVvad]

ORIGINAL: Erik Rutins

It's not quite that simple - there are a lot of differences between the different race and government types,

Maybe I am playing humans too much, but when I tried to play a different race, the Dayhut (sorry spelling is wrong I know) but I have to disagree with Erik and agree with jscott. When I was playing Dayhut as a hive mind, there was no difference than humans under democracy. It just felt the same, even though they were a different race and goverment. I didn't see no difference money wise, I saw no difference, culture wise, I saw no difference happiness wise.

Hopefully this can be fixed in a patch, but if not, there should be a difference in an expansion pack. I know DW is not other games, but at least when I change goverments in other games, like Call 2 Power, or Civ Revolutions, I know and see a difference in goverment types when I change in those games.

I can see the difference in income I make, or my tech is researched faster, or I have more or less happier citizens, or can control more cities, (wich dosn't apply to DW, but you get the idea) I see and feel a difference.

The only difference, so far when I play another race, is if I can colonize a different type of world, like volcanic worlds or oceans. Other than that, I don't feel that there is much difference in playing. When I tried to play the Dayhut, I wanted to be an evil race, but I couldn't really do it since I had to play the same way as humans would to make my population happy. Instead of being one mind bugs who like to have warfare as described in their fluff, they acted as if they were humans.

So I am hoping something can be done about this. Hey I will put this in the wish list thread.

[Erik Rutins]

ORIGINAL: jscott991
All races also use the same war-weariness model. Even though a race might have a bonus to determine when its population becomes too tired for it to continue a war, it still eventually will run out of will to fight.
I can't imagine this actually happening to a belligerent hive mind like the aforementioned sci-fi examples.

Again, this is not entirely accurate. They do use the same _basic_ model, but it's heavily modified by their racial characteristics and their government choice. You can absolutely choose a race/government combo that will be able to stay perpetually at war.

The idea that a xenophobic race (which is not modeled in this game at all) would be outraged by its government bombardment of an enemy's planets is rather hard to accept.

Agreed on that, but that's unique to how bombardment is currently handled, not war in general.

Heck, the idea that a xenophobic race of any type would be outraged by war against outsiders is hard to accept, but there you have it.

You're reading too much into it here. War weariness can mean many things and the fact is that right now in DW the very Aggressive races with war-oriented government types can maintain wars, while peaceful democratic societies have a lot of trouble doing that. The current model does handle this. Bombardments are the exception.

[Bartje]

It does go against the idea of a Hive mind though. A typhical Hive is anti-individualistic so howcome the bugs suddenly start thinking about their own well being rather than the Hive's? Perhaps the Hive mind trait should be limited to insectoid races and have a creativity / research penality with the added bonus of complete and utter devotion above and beyond the call of duty, the wet dream of any totalitarian dictator?


I'm making a few too many associations here but I really like this idea. It certainly adds some dark and anti-human identity to the insectoid races. It would be like Individualism and Freedom VS Extreme Collective Darwinism


Come to think of it, this would really tie in well with the story line, giving it a much deeper philosophical background.


A clash of two existensial ideologies: Individial Life & Liberty VS Collective Survivalism

-Life and Liberty promotes Individualism and thus Individual development. SCIENCE BONUS! The state is an extension of the individual and serves as such. The Individual is a voluntary and as living being, invaluable member of the group.
------> TYPHICAL MODERN WESTERN (DEMOCRATIC) PERSPECTIVE


-Collective Survivalism promotes Total societal mobilization towards a single goal. COMPLETE AND UTTER STATE controlled society (perhaps the private sector is merely another part of the government, independent yet alike) The survival & strenght of the species is supercedes all other individual considerations. The Individual does not exist or is heavily subservient to the group.
----> CLASSICAL DICTATORIAL COMMUNISM!


This would really hit a snare with the general public. Everybody's been bombarded with anti communist and pro Liberty media since childhood!

I think this would be better then the unrealistic concept of good vs evil .
There is no inherently good or evil action or intention but these are two radically opposed ideologies!


We could even introduce a struggle for Humanoid Rights! Humans in favor, Bugs opposed!

There's an intergalactic war for you!

I love this idea! This would work!

[YvesDelecroix]

That does sound pretty interesting, Bartje, but I think at this point it's squarely beyond the scope of the devs. Right now a lot of the issues that *need* to be handled are unbalanced game mechanics, GUI problems, bugs, etc. Not to say that your ideas couldn't be used later, but pressing for such a change now is hardly fair.

And in any case, I think that the war weariness model can work for hiveminds. What I'm thinking is that just because an individual is subjected to the will of an absolute authority doesn't mean that individual necessarily can't think for themselves in situations. This would be even more apparent the farther an individual was from the physical location of the authority.

[toryn]

To be frank, it is not generally accepted that good and evil are unrealistic concepts.  Simply being told that 'everything is relative' in a class doesn't actually make everything relative.  As it stands, your proposed alteration is actually already modeled in the game through some types of governments not likely other types.

[teri]

ORIGINAL: Erik Rutins
If you choose to bombard, you should make sure you are bombarding an enemy that is generally considered (reputation-wise) to be quite evil

the other "evil" warmongers are the factions i get along the best. no war, some free trades.
i bombed the democratic securans. but they aren't innocent... they started the war and kicked me when is was down: as a hiveminded gizurean i had a big fleet early on and was on my way to dominate the galaxy. but somehow a fuelcrisis broke out(too much realism ;-P), which hit me really hard with my enormous fleet. paying 300k fuel for 230ships drove me down to 2million dept. i tried to sit it out but my dept just got bigger. so i scrapped ALL my ships. then those pesky securans crawled out of their holes to attack me... so thats what "good" guys do?! they still had problems tearing down my star bases. but without the huge fleet sucking up my rescources i recovered pretty quickly. used the newly invented hydrogen drive in all my new designs to get away from the insane caslon prices. that's where i also included the bombardment weapons. then i took revenge with bombarding their securan homes... they attack me when i'm down i bomb their colonies and i'm the bad guy?

ORIGINAL: Davor
When I was playing Dayhut as a hive mind, there was no difference than humans under democracy. It just felt the same, even though they were a different race and goverment. I didn't see no difference money wise, I saw no difference, culture wise, I saw no difference happiness wise.

i felt a difference. i wasn't always gizurean hive mind. at first i was kiadian republic/democratic(don't know which one it was), playing the diplomatic researcher. i got along with the other races quite well, except one warmonger i couldn't please. so it came to war and i though my technology >> his so i'll kick his butt... my tech was quite better but he had gigantic fleets which just overwelmed me. my problems were:
- too high maintenance cost and thus just a small fleet
- war weariness shrinking my income, further reducing my fleet
- technological advantage not big enough to turn the tide
- diplomacy was still quite tough, didn't get an ally to help me fight

being afraid of a slowly demise against the warmonger i restarted and picked gizurean hive mind to try the war-side.

and at once waging war became easy:
- producing and maintaining a huge fleet became cheap
- they reproduce like cockroaches so colonies prosper quickly and they easily win population races on mixed colonies
- war weariness bearable, being continuously at war with one or another race
- research impaired, but salvaging ships and stealing research takes care of that so ur not that far behind
- getting allies is really hard, even before bombing. after bombing it's just total war

so i'm quite confident with my new pick even that hive mind seems quite weak compared to other games and movies.

[jscott991]

Every race plays like humans as it stands now. Despite what Erik says, I believe there is no significant difference between the parameters that govern an "evil" race and a "good" race. If you wage war, some part of your people will become unhappy. If you bombard enemies, your people will become very unhappy.

This forces every race to behave within a very narrow set of parameters.

We are modeling a very small subset of science fiction if we accept that. It feels like a utopian future where every race accepts the exactly same set of morals, just their tolerance for immorality differs.

[Joram]

It seems like evil should like evil and good good.

[YvesDelecroix]

@jscott991:

I would disagree with that, especially with the new update. The economic changes make waging war with a lot of race/government combos very unfeasible. However, even with these changes, if you approach every race the same way, you're going to think they're the same. If you change your strategies, though, the differences become apparent fairly quickly.

Even so, I do agree that bombarding should be tweaked.

[jscott991]

The economic changes have very little to do with the war weariness/reputation-based morality system the game imposes on all races.

[Fishman]

All races pretty much play the game, it is just a matter of differing degrees. Having Warlike bonuses makes your empire slightly more tolerant of you being warlike, but ultimately it is simply a matter of degree rather than an actual difference. You don't actually get to the point where your people can be genocidal, planet-crushing maniacs and LIKE it, not even if you're Boskarans with Way of Darkness and therefore have a combined better than -100% war weariness.

[teri]

ORIGINAL:  Erik Rutins
for whom the extermination of planetary populations is akin to what today would be indiscriminate use of atomic weapons.

getting killed instantly or being a slave for the archenemy... so the torture one is not evil?

ORIGINAL:  Davor
So I am hoping something can be done about this. Hey I will put this in the wish list thread.

fixing the crashes and making the ui more userfriendly would be my first picks.

ORIGINAL:  YvesDelecroix
I think that the war weariness model can work for hiveminds.

yes but it should be just all yes or all no. u don't act on what's best for u, u act on what's be for all of u, so there is just one solution.
perhaps they should have the possibility to veto ur decisions, boykotting them completly.

ORIGINAL:  toryn
To be frank, it is not generally accepted that good and evil are unrealistic concepts.  Simply being told that 'everything is relative' in a class doesn't actually make everything relative.  As it stands, your proposed alteration is actually already modeled in the game through some types of governments not likely other types.

maybe, but i still haven't seen a good one. they spy, sabotage and revolt my colonies just like i do with theirs. never played warhammer: "there is no innocence just degrees of guilt."

ORIGINAL:  jscott991
This forces every race to behave within a very narrow set of parameters.

that sucks:
i chose a fighter race, but invading is not really effective and bombarding neither.
if i invade they just revolt back. if i bombard i declare war on the whole galaxy my own empire included.
so how to play a warmonger?!

ORIGINAL:  YvesDelecroix
I would disagree with that, especially with the new update. The economic changes make waging war with a lot of race/government combos very unfeasible.

those securans never had a chance despite their huge empire. they started the war but after losing some skirmishes and the war weariness taking it's toll they tried to revert to peace again(they knew they could't win), which i didn't accept. but because of my invading and bombarding problems i can't win either...

[mllange]

ORIGINAL: Erik Rutins

ORIGINAL: jscott991
All races also use the same war-weariness model. Even though a race might have a bonus to determine when its population becomes too tired for it to continue a war, it still eventually will run out of will to fight.
I can't imagine this actually happening to a belligerent hive mind like the aforementioned sci-fi examples.

Again, this is not entirely accurate. They do use the same _basic_ model, but it's heavily modified by their racial characteristics and their government choice. You can absolutely choose a race/government combo that will be able to stay perpetually at war.

The idea that a xenophobic race (which is not modeled in this game at all) would be outraged by its government bombardment of an enemy's planets is rather hard to accept.

Agreed on that, but that's unique to how bombardment is currently handled, not war in general.

Heck, the idea that a xenophobic race of any type would be outraged by war against outsiders is hard to accept, but there you have it.

You're reading too much into it here. War weariness can mean many things and the fact is that right now in DW the very Aggressive races with war-oriented government types can maintain wars, while peaceful democratic societies have a lot of trouble doing that. The current model does handle this. Bombardments are the exception.

quote:

ORIGINAL: jscott991
All races also use the same war-weariness model. Even though a race might have a bonus to determine when its population becomes too tired for it to continue a war, it still eventually will run out of will to fight.
I can't imagine this actually happening to a belligerent hive mind like the aforementioned sci-fi examples.

Again, this is not entirely accurate. They do use the same _basic_ model, but it's heavily modified by their racial characteristics and their government choice. You can absolutely choose a race/government combo that will be able to stay perpetually at war.

Erik,
I appreciate the stated efforts to make improvements in the game and look forward to improved gameplay in the months ahead with additional enhancements.

That said, the fact remains that everything feels the same when you're playing one race to another; it doesn't really matter what is going on under the hood and whether jscott991 is entirely accurate or simplifying things... what matters to the player is that the gameplay feels the same for each race. Rather blah.

Who care's if the developer is completing overhauling the codebase with each new race - if gameplay still feels the same it makes no difference to the player. In general we don't care what the justification may be, we want results. You seem to be spending an awful lot of time simply providing justifications, which are completely unnecessary. If the nuts and bolts under the hood are different but the engine still not working, the results are all that matter. There's nothing wrong with simply listening to constructive criticism and using them to improve the game.

[Krippakrull]

I'll reserve my judgement about the feel of the races and government combos until I can play through a full game, though I can say that my Teekan Merchant Republic felt a lot different from my Mortalen Despotism for the extent I got to play them. Big changes to races to make them more unique are hard to make and balance though, and IMO couldn't and shouldn't be made in haste. Making races and maybe governments more unique would be nice, but should be made after the game is stable and people actually figured out how the game plays with the tweaked economy, and maybe whatever other tweaks we'll get. Better to make one or a few tweaks and changes at once, rather than make big sweeping changes to the mechanics all at once.

[Gertjan]

It would be nice to have some Klingon type of race in the game, or is there one already?

[Bartje]

ORIGINAL: toryn

To be frank, it is not generally accepted that good and evil are unrealistic concepts.  Simply being told that 'everything is relative' in a class doesn't actually make everything relative.  As it stands, your proposed alteration is actually already modeled in the game through some types of governments not likely other types.

This is true, but I can point out that something that is not generally accepted, such as Nazi's murdering Jews does not make it false.

In fact, in order to prove my thesis I would ask anyone to come up with an existing / existed example of evil within our Universe / Nature.

This task is quite impossible because evil is unnatural. Being evil for sake of being evil has no place within the natural world.

What does exist in our Universe are "good" and "bad".

I wonder though how any space faring race could possibly survive while constantly doing things that are "bad" for it.


An Example here:

-Insects wantonly murdering men, women and children without any regard for human life does not make them evil. In fact, war does not even imply "good" or "evil", it implies "good" or "bad".
The reason to start a war is obviously because the insects think it will be good for the Hive.
If starting a war would be the end of their existence then no concious entity would pursue this course of action, unless it is driven into despair, desperation and wishes to end its existence through collective suicide.


The point i'm trying to make is:

Instead of the classical and quite frankly wrong perspective of "good" versus "evil" it makes much more sense, especially in a single player game to provide a realistic setting and thorough immersion.
Immersion quite simply is achieved by presenting the player with a "realistic / believable" environment in which creatures act according to their nature .

In this context it makes far more sense for the insectoid races to be "evil" or "bad" for other humanoid life because quite simply they see it as a matter of survival .

The insectoids would thus justify their ceaseless expansion and war mongering nature, perhaps rightly so, by pointing out that in their perspective the whole point of existence is the struggle to survive.

If your survival is threatened by some humanoid primates your only realistic option is to remove them.

Unless ofcourse you can be persuaded that the humanoids are not a threat but a potential ally and survivalist boon.



How would this work in the game:

The government labels "path of evil" and path of the ancients could quite simply be renamed to:

-Path of Universal Survival (or something like it)
This ideoligy provides a perspective on existence that heavily emphasizes the struggle to survive (Life = Survival)

Hence the path of universal survival inherently justifies using slaves and mass genocide. As long as it is for the survival of the species.


-Path of Universal Existence (or something like it)
This ideoligy provides a perspective on existence that is more encompassing of Life and not just the struggle to survive. (Life = Love, Growth, Survival, Pain, Suffering, Discipline, Nature, Religion etc...)

The path of universal existence would imply a much more caring attitude towards all life, even bugs. Slavery is wrong, murder is wrong etc.. but survial is a part of nature, yes, just not the only one.