Matrix Games Forums

A full world has up to 200 people. A cruiser has a crew of 45. That ratio seems awfully skewed. I'd assume a full world would be in the billions (unless each "person" on a world counted as 10 million or something). Not a big deal, but for me a lot of the allure of this type of game is in the finer points or realism.

It's more a question of reality vs game ratio...

I'm sure certain numbers and representations had to be changed for the game to be enjoyable and not too complicated.

Otherwise you'd be lost in a maelstrom of very confusing details, enough for an entire world to manage. In this case, that's you so everything had to be simplified.

Imagine playing it real, having to manage fleets of hundreds of ships, sending them to conquer the galaxy... <img src="wink.gif" border="0"> <img src="eek.gif" border="0">

I understand that from a game balance standpoint it makes sense to have the ratios that are there but it makes no sense from a reality/story standpoint. I don't think it would be hard to do something like indtroduce a multiplier into the code where 1 unit of planet population counted as 20 million people but it would make a lot more sense. I also don't think you'd need hundreds of starships, you could keep that aspect just as it is now.

No but let's say three of your ships are coming back from battle and need to be refitted (with crew) . Ex: You require 70 crew members total is nothing out of 200million while it's quite alot taken out of 200. It slows your planet production, your research, your defenses.

<img src="eek.gif" border="0">

I think of the planet population number as showing the "best and brightest" on your planet. Your finest become engineers (project leaders), scientists (research leaders), or naval personnel on HORRIBLY expensive starships. The world might have 20 billion people, but only 200 working at the highest levels of science, engineering, and military.

When you take population from the planet, you can't just replace your best people with the average shmoe. You have to wait years and sift through thousands or millions of children to get your very best to fill those positions.

The rest of your population is working for these people, or growing food or running the government.

Yeah, I think I agree with Fasani. Besides, to implement this from a programming standpoint should be trivial. One approach would be to use a multiplier, say 20 million. MadMax's starships needing 70 crew could draw from the planet's population divided by 20 million. Or, use the "Fasani method" whereby there are 4 billion people but only some tiny fraction are "starfleet material"... C'mon, throw me a bone here!

Heh, I have no method. I don't think anything needs to be changed. That was just my rationalization of numbers. The billions of people on the worlds don't matter in a game of starships...just a few people matter. So why worry about the rest?