Proteus Test Game

What if you could not control where you population went and they moved around on stars themselves where they will find somewhere to be more “content” like when one star is overcrowded some will look for a star you own that is not, the interface might show a really small and feint line connecting all your stars where the population is going and there tiny ships, should not be able to see ship numbers for pop unless you clicked on its carrier which would be smaller than looped carriers.

The population idea would need some serious thought through to work properly and make the game fun, it might not “suite” the game…

Also you would not evade the penalty like that because normal pop would not fight because they not ships, and carriers are very expensive I would not want to throw them away, because then your still taking an economic hit to your empire by sacrificing carriers.

What if Scanning also works to counteract other empire’s scanning ? Sort of like electronic countermeasures.

If an empire has scanning tech 4, then normally it can scan out to 6 LY = 2 + tech level.

If two empires have the same level of scanning tech, then there is no modification.

If empire A has Scanning 5, and empire B has Scanning 4, then empire A can scan “B” stars and “B” carriers normally out to 7 LY, but empire B will suffer a -1 LY penalty so it can scan “A” stars and “A” carriers out to 5 LY = 2 + 4 - 1 LY.

If empire A has Scanning 6, and empire B has Scanning 4, then empire A can scan “B” stars and “B” carriers normally out to 8 LY, but empire B will suffer a -2 LY penalty so it can scan “A” stars and “A” carriers out to 4 LY = 2 + 4 - 2 LY.

The empire with the lower Scanning tech will suffer a LY distance penalty equal to the difference between Scanning tech levels between the two empires.

This could motivate empires to keep up with Scanning research, stay competitive or else get left behind. :stuck_out_tongue:

This would not affect Formal Alliances. FA will not jam each others Scanning techs, so -0 LY modification.

@JayKyburz , I would like to see this Feature Request in NP2 also.

So you are suggesting a kind of like scanning territory?? where higher scanning gives you more of this territory over your neighbours?

I guess the game would just have to know that empire A and B are in scanning range of each other to apply the rules.

What would happen when your scanning level can reach over empires and find empires behind them? would the effects stack on the empire with the lower scanning?

I really like this idea btw.

You can have multiple neighbors, each with their own Scanning tech level. So each star and carrier is detected on a case by case basis, by comparing empires Scanning tech levels.

If empire A has Scanning 4, and empire B has Scanning 10 or higher, then empire A will see nothing of empire B, but still could see 6 LY into empire C stars and carriers, because empire C has Scanning 2.
In this case empire C could scan empire A out to 2 LY.

I like idea its like having scanning attrition, but how would the interface work because you would have different scanning range for different people, and atm we can only see just our basic scanning range.

If empire A has Scanning 4, then it has a dotted Scanning ring at 6 LY, and be able to normally see empire C which has Scanning 2.

As for empire A Scanning 4 not being able to see empire B Scanning 10, IDK ? maybe the stars just show NR ? but no carriers and no Infrastructure ? You just need to be a savvy player ? or maybe the star selection ring has less dots to indicate ECM jamming ? Empire A would not know an attack was coming until the final visitation.

There were other ideas on this thread from other players that might be able to blend in with this ECM concept. Or else just keep it simple.

Ok what about, if when you clicked your own empires stars you see your standard scanning range, that needs to be shown anyway…

But when you select an other empires star, it shows your scanning range relevant to that empire?, kind of like you selected all your stars but without doing that.

I guess the missing star infrastructure and ship counts and carriers would be the indication.

Oh just realized that Jay could still allow a 12 LY Scanning ring when selecting an empire B star. This is known information because it can be possible to trade tech, and tech levels are known data. IDK whether Jay would prevent empire A from seeing this about empire B. Empire C would suffer similar difficulties beyond 2 LY trying to scan empire A.

Empire A can still attack empire B stars, because the star is within Scanning tech 4 and HR 3 but it would be a blind attack since empire A can not see empire B inf & ship counts & carriers.

I suppose all carriers should be visible at 0 LY when the enemy carrier arrives for combat.

Yes, one of the things I want to add to Proteus before we start the next game is some randomness in the reseach system. I think discovering other people’s tech could be a part of this randomness.

Would anybody be too upset if I just removed star abandonment. I only added it when there were all kinds of issues with helping allies defend.

I was also think that formal alliances should be always on in Proteus.

2 Likes

My opinion on the whole trading thing is don’t fix what isn’t broke. Trade was fine in the first test game, scan being vital to doing anything is what made trade broken on the second game. Since we’re removing the cloaking (thank God!) I don’t think trade will be an issue. I suggest the trade scales more expensive. This game was a good start but it wasn’t enough, make it where it’s still good to invest in infra as well. I’m not sure how the numbers crunch.

Please take out abandoning stars. That will make it was harder for players to concede their empire to an ally when they are done with a game.

Not sure with formal alliances since it will make betrayals harder to pull off. I could go either way though.

Yes, drop abandonment. Why not have alliances as an option, what is your thinking?

Back on my Scanning ECM feature request.

If it is too overpowered, then it can be changed to penalty -1 LY scan distance for every 2 or 3 levels difference of Scanning tech.

Although the infrastructure & ship counts & carriers might not show, the color and shape symbol of the empire should still show. Trading within scan range should be unaffected.

Possible variations to try for Scanning ECM could be :

show ECON & SCI, but hide IND and ship counts and carriers

hide ship counts, but show carriers

Would like to see this in proteus, if diplomacy is a big part of the game then I believe formal alliances should be also.

I say leave alliances as an option. Maybe make it defaulted on so in standard and 64 players games it’s on. But I like having it off sometimes because it makes for much easier betrayal and you’re not telegraphing your plan to every ally.

I think the biggest problem is working out how the interface would show all your scanning ranges for all the empires that surround you because you might not be able to have a scanning ring for every empire.

I think you would have to have a scanning ring that goes all the way around your empire and not a circle around a star, so that you can see your scanning border expanding through empires that have less scanning than you but being compressed by empires that have more scanning than you.

Also, I think this might work with hyperspace as well?

I thought we had decided to ditch the cloaking mechanism. That was my understanding of Jay’s post at least.

I guess so, regarding the formal alliances… you could still betray by keeping your ships 1 day away then sending them in to hit stars 1 hour before the alliance breaks, you still would be more prepared than your victim?

I think this is what Russia is planning in real life when I watch the news lol