Welcome to The Kushana Initiative, a play-by-council game. As I play, I'll be posting regular reports and leaving the direction of the game up to those who have chosen to join the council. The planning topic for all discussion leading up to this game and continuing out-of-character discussion can be found here: Play by committee? (Kushana Initiative Planning and Discussion)
Of particular interest is the post detailing the back story for the whole game: Back Story
A summary of gameplay:
- Regular council sessions to take place every game quarter. I'll be posting each quarterly report and any pertinent information, including the UP vote every year, at which time the council will decide the course of action. Essentially, I'll be playing in 12 turn blocks and coming back for direction.
- Between sessions councilors are free to request additional info and entertain any discussion. This includes calling votes and modifying directions.
- The council is comprised of those who took part in the planning discussion. Others may request to join the council, but please read the background material and post a request before joining in. Requests to join should be posted in the planning and discussion thread linked above.
- This topic is for quarterly reports and in-character discussion only. Off topic and out-of-character discussion should be posted in the planning and discussion thread.
The Current Council:
- qrtxian
- NikolaiOmega
- noctilucus
- Talonschild
Inactive Councilors
- LordCarlos
- TMS2224
- -__- (May be addressed as SarcFa)
- Mambaman
Rules of Voting:
1) The ballot should list the issues and have a place for councilors to sign either FOR or AGAINST a measure. (the council or balloteer can decide the exact terms)
2) Councilors should copy the ballot from the last person who voted and add their signatures. No need to rewrite the ballot and no chance for it to be changed in transcription.
3) Make your arguments in a separate space. Don't break up the ballot with comments after each item.
4) Once a vote is cast, it is cast. No changing votes or editing the ballot. Listen to arguments before voting and consider your decisions wisely.
5) To get an issue on the ballot, it should be proposed and seconded. The exact wording/nature of the issue should then be established.
6) Amendments/Addenda - I see these as separate sub-issues. Maybe list them under the main issue and vote separately?
Galaxy Conditions:
Our Competition:
A good mix of opponents. I purposely left out the Terrans and Altarians. Not only am I kinda sick of them, but they would mess up the story. I see the Tolmekians as more neutral, so theres 3 good, 3 evil, and 2 other neutrals. Also note the difficulty - the AI has a 20% economics bonus. Not only that, but I customized each opponent and made sensible ability and politics choices rather than let the computer randomize it. I expect some stiff competition.
Custom Race - The Kushana Initiative:
You'll see that I swapped the PQ bonus for 20% morale. Given the conditions, I want our people happy and making us money! I also did my best to spice up the ships, but that's pretty much it.
That should be it for the start. Now to get into it!
***INCOMING TRANSMISSION - SECURITY LEVEL ALPHA***
Greetings councilors, I'm Commander Percival Mekoides (Meh-COY-dees). Some of you may already know me and some may not. I will, however, soon become familiar to all of you. I have been appointed Adjutant General of the Initiative and as such will be your primary contact throughout our ongoing operations in the recently accessible portion of the galaxy now titled 2227-RADS.
Our fleet has made planetfall and established an initial base of operations on the southern edge of the unexplored zone. Unfortunately, our initial scans were thrown off by residual dark energy fluctuation and we've found this planet to be less promising than thought. I'll leave the presentation of those details to our science team. For now, please turn your attention to the galactic map.
Cmdr Mekoides
As you can see, we've established ourselves on the central-southern edge of 2227-RADS. A number of other forces have been detected spread out in the sector. Having arrived before us, they may enjoy a slight advantage in their utilization of local resources. We've also detected signals indicating that several advanced races already inhabit this sector. Though prevented from interstellar travel by the dark energy storms, they seem to be capable of space travel and making preparations to expand their reach. Additional information on these races will be provided as we encounter them and establish contact.
Our first course of action is to explore the surrounding systems and expand our claims. Regular updates on our progress will be posted for your consideration. With that, I'll yield to Dr. Markus Malar, Lead Investigator of our science team.
Thank you, uh, as the Commander said, our base of operations is unremarkable, except in that it sits in an apparently uncontested region of space. Initial tests show that residual dark energy is having very interesting effects on our equipment. Many of our existing technologies may require . . . significant reengineering to restore full functionality. The upside of this is that we may eventually be able to exploit these local conditions to develop entirely new technologies. Our success in that regard may well provide the edge we need to prevail. I recommend a robust research and development program be given priority. We have already established laboratory facilities, with more slated for construction pending approval.
You can see our current paths of research on the viewscreen.
Dr. Markus Malar
My team has started work on improvements to our existing technologies that will allow for greater productivity. I will update the council we progress.
Cmdr Mekoides: That's all for now, councilors. We await your reply.
***END TRANSMISSION***
Greetings Commander I'm Councilor Carlos, pleased to meet you. I have read your report, and although i see we are in a very good position to colonize worlds, i have a concern regarding our closest neighbors.
Do you have any information on them?
Have you determined if they are hostile?
Will we have to develop war technologies early on or can we expect peace in our borders?
This are my main concerns at the moment.
In regards Dr. Malar, if our current construction, terraforming and colonizing technologies are not working, it is my opinion that those should be the first to be re-engineered. I can see by Dr. Malaar's plan that he agrees with me.
I Expect to hear from the other council members soon, as i expect them to have the same comitment to the cause as i do.
Crippling difficulty? AAARGH! I still find "Tough" AIs enough of a challenge, although I've dabbled with including one or two Painful races. Also, is there any way you can shrink those 'character images' a little? They seem somewhat oversized compared to the text and screenshots.
In character:
Dr. Malar, I'd like a full report on the status of our planet, with particular note to any areas of high resource value.
Also, your projections indicate a 26-week research time for our planetary improvements. While I agree with your rationale for focusing on this area, I hope you've considered the lack of development in other research branches that we'll have to deal with.
Finally, in addition to our more significant rivals, what information is available on any minor races in this region of space? In other words I'd like some information on the details of your modded minors.
Commander, as my fellow councilor Carlos already seemed to inquire, I would like to discuss our early expansion strategy, more importantly whether our initial stance would be peaceful or whether our nearby neighbours will likely force us into battle early on.
As to Dr. Malar, I too would like to get better visibility on what this planet which will be our homeworld for the time to come, has to offer us.
You spoke of more laboratories pending approval - to which I fully agree as the current estimate is that we would only complete our very first research project in half a year from now. However we should not forego additional production capacity either as this will ensure that we can lay claim to a sufficient number of planets early on, thereby securing our foothold in this corner of the galaxy, so-to-speak.
Building on qrtxian's comment on the Crippling difficulty, what's everyone's experience so far regarding difficulty levels? While I've ventured into Crippling games in the past year, those were usually in medium-to-large galaxies with 2-3 opponents and often I had to rush towards a Technology victory as I failed to keep up in military strength with 1 AI. That being said, my playing style is usually quite defensive so I'm hoping some of you will bring some counterbalance to that with some aggressive decisions early in the game...
Hello, my name is TMS2224. I would like to formally petition the council for my entry. In other words, can I join? Please send your decision soon as I eagerly await your reply. TMS2224 Out.
Commander, it may be helpful to show a map of the space immediately surrounding our new planet, preferably after more has been explored by our ships. I would like to be aware of our surroundings, especially of habitable planets nearby. Also, I believe we should wait before becoming aggressive against our neighbours. We need to be strong before we can go to war.
I hope your research will prove successful, Doctor. Our natural creativity may make the time to completion shorter.
Like Noctiliucus, I am quite defensive. I typically would just expand peacefully and let others start wars, unless war is necessary for making me more powerful. The difficulty is probably okay for me, I think I've played one level below that before with success. I agree with the research choice, as I implied above. That's all for now.
Got things ready for the next update, but it's too late to make an actual post tonight. I'll just address peoples concerns for now.
- Character portraits shrunk. At first I thought they may lose detail, but I like the smaller ones better. On a related note, as this is shaping up to be very pic intensive, I'm going to see what I can do about using thumbs for anything that won't show up nicely in the main forum anyway.
- Crippling difficulty. I considered putting the question of difficulty out, but just went for broke. I agonized a bit about it, but I have quite a bit of experience playing on tough. I usually clean house, with the game being decided before it gets really fun. It does occur to me now that by upping the difficulty I may be forcing myself to play a certain way, thus limiting your options. Though a restart would be a drag, I am open to the prospect of starting again on a lower difficulty. I leave that to the council, though I welcome the challenge.
- I have no problem at all with TMS2224 joining. I always intended for things to be pretty open. I assume you've read the back story, TMS2224?
No, stay with cripling, if you enemy does not put a challenge it won't be fun.
I gree, he can go in as soon as he is ready.
Crippling is fine for me, as long as my fellow council members feel comfortable with it. For me it's still a stretch compared to the difficulty level below (painful) where I nearly always win.
Yes, I've read all the backstory including the planning thread. It sounds great!
Commander Mekoides and Doctor Malar, I have some concerns about our research plans. I belive, and I'm sure others agree, that we should look at our neighbors as potential enemies instead of potential friends. In other words, guilty until proven innocent. And, because I am in this state of mind, I belive that we should concentrate on weapons,defenses, and industrial improvement research. In other words, we should build up militarily before concetrating on trivial resecrch such as planetary improvements. I also think that we should grab as many planets as we can as fast as we can. I belive that the path I am proposing is one that will lead us to dominance. Please debate my comments Counsilors.
Could you give us a notice when you colonize a planet?
I read the backstory and it was very interesting and I would like to join the council. Please reply soon.
Master123wr
p.s. I may not post things as often as others.
Hello Councilor TMS, i'm sure you have this projects interests at heart when you talk about this subject, yet it is sill hard to belive for me that we should follow your advice.
The develpment of a good manufacturing and economic infrastructure is a necessity. Yes, we need information on our neiborghs plans but before we decide to attack or not we need to be able to risk a long battle.
I'm thinking you belive conquering will be an easy task, but remember it might not , and without a healthy economy it would be impossible for us to deal with any surprises they might have, or in the worst case scenario a second war against another race.
In conclusion i believe we should develop technologies to improve our infrastructure while keeping an eye in our borders, and gathering as much information on our neiborghs. It would be a shame id they end up being hostile, yet if they are not , think of the possibilities, we could start a very healthy trade business with them and maybe even an alliance at the end of the road.
I think you are misreading my intent, LordCarlos, I simply wish to have a healthy defensive force in case of an attack. Also, the industrial machine is a huge part of our economy and military. If we have the most advanced one then we will be on top, however if we go with the Doctor's recomendations for research this would put us behind in that critical sector of our economy. My "guilty until proven inoccent" comment was engineered to keep us safe. There is a limit to how much we should trust. I however agree with your trade comments, if a race has shown itself to be trustworthy, then we should open trade routes. But, only if they have proven themselves to be friendly.
Im fine with Master123wr joining.
I still disagree councilor, it is necesary that before we start developing our army we need to give our colonies the tools to build those ships efficently.
Platenar improvments will increase not only our social production and research but also out military production. I think it is a great compromise, you get your military production while we get our social and research production.
Any other councilor has an opinion on the matter?
Yes, but my point is that there is a great unknown out there and we need to be ready for anything, Including armed conflict! Also, you will notice that the Doctor's choice for research will take over 7 months, in that time we could have researched three military technologies. I would be fine with his research choice if it didn't take so long. For all we know our technological advancement could be the only thing keeping us alive in the future, that is why we cannot WASTE 7 MONTHS on a project that will only be a marginal help.
Are there any other opinions?
Did you see, a new person wants to join. I said yes.
My opinion tends more towards Councilor Carlos' view; let's not forget that the 7 months are not fixed: as soon as we have additional labs built (a decision which is still pending approval if I recall correctly) this time will decrease through concurrent research efforts.
I'm glad to see that you seem to agree that we should expand first, if I read your messages correctly. At this point we are surrounded by unclaimed planets and seeing the distance between us and our closest neighbours, I would suggest to first colonize the better amongst those planets before weighing down our economy by building a military force.
We can keep an eye out for any imports or other large movements of goods associated with military production. In addition whenever we meet representatives from the other civilizations we should try and see if they offer any military technologies for trade - not because we're interested in buying but to see how advanced they are.
(I'm referring to the military graph here that we can watch as soon as we've made contact with any other races)
Commander, seeing that probably other council members will be joining, going forward you might want to move ahead without all votes having been cast on less important decisions. At least personally speaking I would have no issue whatsoever with the council taking decisions and advancing if at some point I am not available, rather than being a blocking factor in the decision process.
Welcome Master123wr, at least assuming that Tolmekian accepts but I think that's a safe assumption
I am propsing a compromise. If we at least get laser one then I will be content for a time.
The Compromise:
We research 1-2 rudimentary planetary improvement techs and then get 1-2 missile techs. After this we will have enough defense capability to please me. Then, we build 1 defender M1 for each planet. After that we concentrate on Planetary Improvement techs and insert one or two military ones every now and then.
Please improve upon/ comment about this compromise.
I vote that we accept this compromise.
I would like to suggest that my fellow councilors reserve this discussion for our next formal meeting, when we can be provided with more information about our spatial neighbors. I move that the vote on the compromise proposal be deferred until then.
For what it's worth, I personally agree with LordCarlos's recommendations. Thanks to the dark energy storms no other power is likely to pose a military threat at this moment and it would be foolhardy to delay improvements to our infrastructure over possible dangers in the distant future.
In other words, we should wait for Tolmekian's game update before making any decisions like this. I mean, it's only turn 1. Remember, this isn't just a roleplaying session, we are giving actual advice on the game. No AI is going to invade in the first three months!
Further note: While I like the back and forth discussion, I really do feel that we should wait for updates on the game before getting into the military vs social debate and its corollaries. 27 weeks is not a fatal length of time especially when the creativity ability could lead to it being researched much sooner.
Fine, but I will still be proposing my compromise at the formal meeting.
Well, this sure is getting lively. I do agree with qrtxian that the discussion can get quite ahead of the game if we aren't careful. Actually playing 12 turns isn't much right now - in fact, I went ahead and played the 1st 12 figuring it couldn't hurt - but in the future it could take me quite some time given the size of the game. Posting updates takes quite a bit of time itself, with screenshots and multiple characters and storytelling and all. I don't want to curtail the discussion or politics in any way, but we may need to check ourselves as gameplay goes on. The more information and discussion that goes on between updates, the harder it will be for me to keep track of things.
That being said, let me say that I'm liking what I see so far. Some good spirited disagreement is healthy, I think.
I'm going to start working on my report and should have it posted tonight. You may even see the work-in-progress post pop up as I experiment with thumbs and other things. Let's see what the Commander has for us tonight . . .
- Master123wr, I'm fine with you joining the council. I see you're a supporter of TMS2224. You'll have your own little War Party going before you know it!
Edit to add - Actually, qrtxian's motion to table the issue until the next session is an excellent example of such a check. Did I mention that I like the way this is turning out?
This was my work in progress 1st quarter update. I reposted it when finished, so it would be after all the posts that came in while I was working on it.
Read on, my friends.
Argh, I guess this matter will have to wait until the first official meeting.
Of Character: Since we are doing this let me jsut state i'm part of the federalist party, even when i'm advocating for manufacturing.
I am also in agreement with Councilor Carlos; our efforts should be firmly placed on infrastructure for the time being. Military development will come when we have solid economic, manufacturing, and research foundations. For now, we should be friendly to the other races. I do not accept Councilor TMS2224's compromise.
Anyone who asks should be allowed in. I don't see why not.
Dammit, a War Party is forming! We need to form an opposition party to hold back those sword-waving Advocates for Imperialism! How about the Coalition of Prosperity? Also, I think I'm part of the Research Party, but I definitely support economic and industrial development.
We can form a part for prosperity, kind of like an union of parties. With the research party, universalists, industrialist, traders and federalists.
As a matter of fact ill do that, just give me a couple of minutes.
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