THIS IS EDIT#41: This post will include idea by writing them in a brief format.
There have been numerous good ideas for this game that have been read. Sadly because we are human, some may have been forgotten or discarded. I am sure Stardock has a great creative process to remember them, but this list is a courtesy as there are currently 14 pages with about fifty posts on each one.
Alpha game ideas are welcome, not bug reports or what's absent (duh). Features already in game or planned to be will be removed from the list as they are added to the alpha/beta.
Here is a easy to read list of all the sane ideas I have found.
UNITS, COMBAT, AND RELATED FACTORS:
1. A enhanced ship leveling system.
2. Ship promotions: a system that gives more than HP as a reward.
3. A way to easily upgrade multiple ships at once.
4. Star base docking and joint tile defense with fleets.
5. Total planetary bombardment. (or the ability to modd it.)
6. Some kind of late game super weapon.
7. Heros/admirals/commanders/crews.
8. Logistics influencing ship range.
9. Logistics impacts planetary defense and invasion.
10. Capturing ships/star bases.
MODULES AND THE EPIC SHIP DESIGNER:
1. Science vessels. A module that adds a set amount of research.
2. Starbase population modules.
3. Different laser beam colors.
4. Over clocking components. To increase the size of a component for increased effects. The same for under clocking applies.
5. Old galciv2 design imports.
6. Starbase designer.
CIVICS, CIVS, AND IDEOLOGY:
1. Civics and ideology that influence the probably of rebellion.
2. More ways to make and prevent planetary rebellion.
3. More playable civilizations.
4. Multiple leaders per civilization.
IMPROVEMENTS:
1. "Dyson Ring" orbital Power Stations.
2. Improvement modules that increase output and efficiency, like; larger living quarters in factories=more output.
3. On/off switchs for improvements to reduce maintenance in hard economic times.
COLONIZATION, FEATURES, AND GALAXY SETUP:
1. Custom planets for custom races; a way to customize your home system at the game setup.
2. Partly random race selections in game setup.
3. Blind tech advancement.
4. Pocket universes; a area that is accessible from one tile. (Also a large. Area initially out of reach of colonization was wanted to. Like a mirror universe.)
5. Chosen completed tech branches.
6. Optional tech branch speeds;
7. Different race life forms; be like the Yor as robots, or organic, or something in between.
8. Partly Randomized tech tree cost.
9. Partly Randomized improvement cost.
10. Custom civ traits that can define your play style. Example: +% in laser damage, or +% armor.
11. Rainbow worlds: full of resources but weird stuff tends to happen if you colonize them.
12. A minimum threshold of habitability like in Galciv1. (what does that mean?)
13. A way to have homeless players in games, including the player.
DIPLOMACY AND TRADE:
1. Special dialogue between allies, and specific tasks.
2. More relation factors.
3. More treaties to give.
4. Defensive pacts.
5. Add Morgan Freemen's voice as a valuable diplomatic resource for the game.
6. Closed/open borders agreements.
7. Ships can get range a increases in allied territory. (for a fee possibly)
8. Civ credit ratings.
9. Request allies to research techs. And joint tech research.
10. Trade routes can yield production, research, or minor morale boosts.
11. Ultimatums and time dead lines for demands.
12. Planet liberation. (return the planet to the original owner, and you get all surviving troops and transport.)
13. The ability to loan/rent starports, or other things.
14. The use of collateral for trades.
15. Third party deals; have someone make a deal for you or with someone.
16. The ability to surrender to a faction becoming a vassal state; Doing so may result in losing your super ability or other bonuses.
18. Option to give credits per turn in diplomacy.
19. Population trading.
INFLUENCE:
1. Improve the way influence is calculated; economy, and morale can be factors.
2. Grant visibility within friendly borders.
3. Influence can help go to grow population.
4. Options when someone violates your closed borders agreement; destroying the single ship instead of a automatic conflict.
5. Planet influence tile limits; so a super planet can't go over a sector or a entire small map.
6. civs cannot colonize planets in your influence.
R.E.P AND POPULATION:
1. Asteroids that give research or economics if chosen.
2. Two populations; one civilian and one military.
TECHNOLOGY:
1. Researching multiple techs at once. (you may have to research this ability. Lol )
2. Research points can be dispersed and spent if you have multiple techs at the same time.
3. Unending technology research. tech branches become more potent the second time being researched.
4. Enable race research bonuses in specific tech areas. Example: Drengin get double the research points when researching Warfare tech.
5. Let Research Treaties allow techs either civs couldn't do alone.
6. Object based requirements for techs. (ships, starbases, and treaties)
VICTORY:
1. Allow Vassal states in conquest victories. (So everyone doesn't have to die.)
2. Capital victory. (conquer all enemy home worlds.)
3. Espionage victory. (Advanced intelligence on all civs, and spies on X% worlds for X turns.)
4. Economic victory. (be the richest and or most influential civ.)
5. Domination victory. (like the influence victory but with population)
6. Super technology victory. research all techs to win, (possibly twice or more) and build the winning super project.
7. No victory conditions selected. (for when you just want to play forever.)
AI, UI, PROGRAMMING, AND MODDING:
1. AI can declare war on first encounter with you in real games.
2. Applying to ALL game aspects, may there ALWAYS be a defense or a way to lessen negative effects via strategy.
3. In game editors. (like in civ)
4. Smarter automated scouting and way points.
5. Computer generated opponents.
6. A disable tag on events for easy modding or in game selection of controversial events.
8. Support for scripting languages that could allow players to add new game play mechanics.
9. Fully adjustable AI; Have one slider decide how much help you or the AI gets with production, research, and economy. And the old AI intelligence/algorithm slider to make a game with a more customizable difficultly.
10. Animated leader reactions/movement when given proposed deals.
EVENTS:
1. Civil wars. A group of planets rebelling at the same time for independence.
2. Auto trigger events button that isn't a cheat code. like the disaster button in SimCity.
3. Race specific random events. Like drengin declaring war if your Torian or machines Rebelling if your the Iconian.
4. An event were special abilities can stop working when they are needed. i.e Altarians not getting help in wars.
5. Random event missions for ships and your empire. (explore X sector or improve relations with X empire or be first to complete X tech for a reward.
6. Planetary events don't always have to be ideological.
ESPIONAGE:
1. Make spies easier to train; a flat rate to create.
2. Spy costs scale with the amount active; when a spy is lost the cost scales with the amount active, so the price isn't exponential if you loose spies. (if 1. is ignored.)
3. Spy interrogation; find out what civ sent the spy.
4. If you place a spy in a research lab, instead of nullifying the lab you can steal research points from the lab each turn. Or steal a tech easier.
5. Missions against planets that can increase the probability of revolt and loss of assets.
6. Spies are not detected the first turn of infiltration, unless your espionage score is high enough.
If you have a idea write it in a similar format and in as short as possible in a post and I'll add it. Keep it simple though, don't give me a headache with long paragraphs and riddled words.
Thanks you and remember, its easier for a dev to look at this every now and then vs every forum made. So double post a abbreviated version of your posted idea here.
DARCA
Wow, really cool. Are you going to publish the story somewhere, like fanfic or a real publisher?
Randomly generated enemy races. They'd have a randomly selected ship style (possibly pulled from the internet, a random portrait (also possible pulled from images submitted to a stardock database) and random traits. You'll never know what to expect when you explore the galaxy.
Nice!
It's been updated. Some idea were similar to existing ones, so I expanded on the descriptions.
when the time comes it will be a e-book. (I have just started writing on the series a year ago. DARCA is just one of four main characters though all three acts, FYI.)
you can start a opposite of this forum. I would advise against it because people will defend their ideas, and the more you name the more opposition you will face and little progress will have been made. Always do what you feel is right, just make sure your ears are open.
Also some of the ideas here even the "good ones" probably won't make the initial release, but will be in expansions and future DLC's, because of the amount of stuff here.
Thank you, for expressing your ideas.
DARCA, do you really have any authority to get any, let alone all, of these ideas included as you say? I am sure StarDock will consider all of them, but it seems they, not you, are who will be making the decisions. Or have you been in direct contact with StarDock about this list of ideas?
WOW jack. Sorry I didn't phrase it properly. I should have put "probably" in the sentence. Again I have no power to implement anything or make ANY decisions. I just thought it would be hard/nearly impossible to get all this stuff in one initial release. Sorry, I'll edit the post.
That's OK, DARCA. I have seen it happen too many times that a fan's statements were taken as a dev's commitment, so I just wanted to protect some poor unwitting fan from disappointment.
Other ideas
-Spies cost (if using the actual system) determined by the number of actual spies you have waiting and doing other stuffs (if you use them to neutralize other spies or conquer a planet with a spy in there the cost should be reduced since they are no longer available).
-Spy interrogation: if your spy “neutralize” an enemy spy and manage to capture it alive you can obtain one of the most basic information: “who sent you” (a chance controlled by spy techs or points, like in diplomacy). You can assign more than one spy to increase the chance to capture the enemy spy alive.
-If you place a spy in a research lab, instead of nullifying the lab you can “steal” half or all research points from the lab each turn (there’s no point in doing something similar with factories since you cannot build anything in that planet).
-Using spies as a method of conquering an enemy world. After placing an agent in every building you can attempt to assassinate the leader of the planet. The happiness of the people of the world conquered by this method influence the probability of an internal revolt (unhappy people won’t bat an eye for the change of government). It can be done while in peace but, beware, you can easily trigger a war against you in more than one way...
By the way, DARCA, did you considered my other idea of a weapon designer? I asked this because I could not find it in the update or, at least, the idea goes far beyond just changing some laser colors.
Edited: to clarify about the cost and to make it different from the other spy cost idea.
Okay chepelink I have added the weapons designer idea under #24 PROGRAMMING and the others under ESPIONAGE.
speaking of spies
1) spies shouldn't be identified immediately in gc2 as soon as someone placed a spy on your world you were notified this should require some research or a cost to detect or something
i think you could a spy could steal components and sell them on the side (black market) this money could be funneled back to your empire or to fund that spies operation. further this spy could leak plans from ships or planetary buildings being built giving you a combat or invasion bonus
or introduce flaws in the manufacturing process therefore making ships and buildings weaker
Done.
I have noticed a pattern people speaking their imaginations without thinking about how to the ideas are phrased, or implemented. It makes putting ideas in five lines or less very difficult. FYI to those who may apply.
Good point. Would not be better if we agree in a format? Like: "Your idea in five lines or less here in quotation marks",Your explanation of the idea outside of quotation.
Using one of my ideas that DARCA rephrased and part of the original idea as an example:
"Using spies as a method of conquering. (missions against planets that increase the probability of revolt and loss of assets)", after placing an agent in every building you can attempt to assassinate the leader of the planet. The happiness of the people of the world conquered by this method influence the probability of an internal revolt (unhappy people won’t bat an eye for the change of government). It can be done while in peace but, beware, you can easily trigger a war against you in more than one way...
So, it become easier for DARCA to read the idea and work on the rephrased (if needed) and the explanation is there in order to guide him or expand the idea to make it more clear. You might want to propose a format if mine is to simplistic or want something different, DARCA.
"Optionally continue playing after victory (just like in Sins)."
Any similar format that you've seem here is acceptable. Writing in short descriptive paragraphs of about five lines makes the ideas easier to comprehend. it also helps save me time editing and making hard choices.
As for the above idea, it wouldn't be one idea with a long description, it would be written in segments. Each act is a game feature and the description given should be clear on how it will be used. For future reference.
I am learning as this list evolves, and becomes easier to manage. So in the future (and I think this will see more activity when the alpha comes out.) be sure to think about the idea and make it into ONE sentence. Then add a description. Thanks.
I want to explain my trade ideas in more detail because I think they would make the economic side of the game a lot more fun. Having trade routes with other civs could give you a lot of options. You could, of course, trade in a mutually beneficial way and compete with the other civilizations. However you could also sacrifice revenue to flood another civ's market with cheap goods, damaging their manufacturing industries and morale. Trade routes could be used to plant spies (you could also sell electronics with security vulnerabilities but if you are caught it would lead to a trade embargo). As I mentioned before, if you were to build proprietary goods, you could sell defective versions that would lead to harmful random events for the other faction (aphrodisiac that causes mass heart attacks, micro repair bots that "accidentally" damage/immobilized the occasional ship, diplomatic translators that cause incidents. etc) but this would also lead to embargos when discovered. These defective goods could be used to manipulate the outcome of wars between CPU opponents, especially if someone's dreadnaught gets crippled by repair bots you sold. Finally, civilizations could protect themselves against economic sabotage with tariffs/immigration restrictions, but the United Planets might overrule them.
Someone else suggested a black market but they admitted that they were not sure how it would work. I suggest that black markets would appear on individual planets and starbases, either via random event (chance increased by distance from capital and civilization traits) or by by placing spies in economic centers (you could place them in your own economic centers if you want to enjoy the benefits of black markets.) A black market makes your planet vulnerable to infiltration and may lower tax revenue (especially if you have tariffs on alien goods) but would help you steal technologies, ship designs, and proprietary trade goods from other civilizations with black markets. The races with the super spy trait could host black markets without any intel leaks, although they would still skim off your tax revenue. Evil civilizations would be able to use black markets to arm terrorists on enemy planets. Good civilizations could use them to nullify enemy agents for free and provide healthcare through unofficial channels (increasing population growth.) Neutral factions would use black markets to create unblockade-able trade routes and circumvent tariffs.
22. In the TRADE section. 10. ESPIONAGE
The black market idea is everywhere of the list and it is similar to yours. How it may be implemented is a mystery.
Also read my post directly above yours it explains the proposed format and how to write a idea that can fit on the list.
Another also. I am going to make a new version of this list for the alpha.
DARCA.
Could we expand upon the crew idea to include pilots, gunners and engineers with a basic number of attributes and/or perks. Perhaps even being able to hire/replace crew from certain locations? Maybe even inter-racial crews (having a Drengin gunner on one of my Terran Capital ships would be sweet!)
9. and 16. in the COMBAT section.
Cool.
Thanks!
-Automatic ship designer should be able to use every type of ship module and be able to design a wider variety of ships
-Q-ships: freighters with concealed weapons that patrol your trade routes and lure enemy ships into attacking them.
Good idea but, would not be better if you can, instead, assign escorts to freighters (based on your logistic)? A single ship, unless it is big enough, is very susceptible to fleets and doesn't work too well as a trap (My fleets destroy enemy freighters as secondary targets after cleaning the imminent threat and, who send a single ship in a war state in a galaxy surrounded by enemy fleets? Unless it is big enough to defend by itself, I don't).
Diplomacy, and Programming.
I'd like a more obvious indicator which ship or planet or starbase I have selected. Right now I can't tell other than guessing it's the one near the center of my screen.
That's a alpha bug, that has been mentioned. The devs take care of that stuff, in fact this list needs a overhaul anyway. (or a alpha version) which I will make...now.
I posted this over on the founder's forum, so maybe that was the wrong place.
Just a couple of thoughts I'm putting out here while I'm thinking of it. #2/3/4 in particular might have serious AI reprogramming ramifications (not my area of expertise) so design may be already too far along to implement that. If so, put it on the shelf for an expansion.1. Galaxies/Maps with spiral arms. The arms themselves provide galactic boundaries, so hyperdrive (which apparently doesn't work outside the galactic boundaries) cannot drive ships from arm to arm - you have to go to the "armpit" to cross over.2. I've seen elsewhere folks refer to the stargates (linked to space stations) as providing "highway" concepts for trading vessels. This could be expanded or recast as "wormhole technology" to allow fast or instantaneous travel for ships, perhaps with tonnage limits (maybe also researchable). These may allow passage through the "intergalactic" space between spiral arms, but in any case would introduce the capability of establishing "beachheads" in the rear of opponent space. Using them to provide interior lines of communication within your empire (or to empire outposts) is another use. Whether the wormhole established would be a permanent fixture or tied to some structure that could be destroyed (or scuttled) would affect the strategic and tactical effectiveness immensely.3. The position on the tech tree for basic stargates should be early, since they do predate hyperdrive, but easily/cheaply built ones and the capability of handling massive ships (or fleets) should be quite a bit further out, and use of these (outside of invasion, but in someone else's space) might also require serious diplomatic skills, too. (Thanks, Lord Kona!)4. A nerf for balance might require weapons &/or shields to be powered off for transit.5. Tied into this would be the concepts of stealth &/or cloaking in order to sneak into enemy territory to use these on the offense.
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