Stock A2 game play idea

[Rifraf]

I had an idea for game play and thought I'd share. Some one may have already thought of this, but here goes. Instead of mining resources there would be strategically placed neutral trading stations scattered around the map that can't be destroyed our captured.

You have to send out convoys from your station to theirs to trade then buy metal/dilithium or whatever with the credits/latinum to build your fleet. I know it does sound kind of boring as that is about all there is to it, but maybe someone can turn it into a mod?

You have basic cargo ships and basic war ships for protection then research larger cargo carriers, and ways to arm them, and then add cargo holds to war ships etc.

Maybe a twist on this idea would be that you have to trade with each other to get your needed resources. Do you attack their supply chain at the risk of hurting your own? I know the engine is much to simplistic to support that type of play, but there it is.

 

[CABAL]

I know the engine is much to simplistic to support that type of play, but there it is.

The AI may have trouble, but the engine should work fine.

Rather than actual trade stations, which would confuse the AI, try infinite moons that look like stations. Freighters would 'mine' the 'station' and bring resources back to base. Your own trade station/refinery would be irreplaceable and located at your base as a starting unit. Protecting resource points would be important, as usual, but with the added problems of trying to defend supply lines to and from your base. It would probably make cloaking ships more interesting.

The reason I suggested pseudo-moons is to make it easier to code the AI.

 

[Aad Moerman]

I like it, but at scriptwriting I really sucks..

 

[SonicJordan]

I like it also.

 

[Rifraf]

I'm thinking about another game play mod idea and would like some more opinions if you have a moment.

Would you play a mod where you could only build say 50 ships instead of huge fleets of 100's?

The Klingons only ever showed the BoP, K'Tinga, Vor'cha and Negh'var. Would you have fun only being able to use 4 ship types?

I realize artistic license needs to be used sometimes as the Romulans only ever showed the D'Deridex and the scout ship until the Norexan was introduced. Is 3 ships too limiting?

With only so few ship types for the Klingons and Romulans would getting rid of cloak detection altogether make it more fun for you? Lot's of sneaking around, but not too far from home that you don't have enough ships to protect your base.

The Feds would get lots of ship types like the Miranda and Excelsior. Slightly more Nebula's. Only a handful of Galaxies, just a couple Sovereigns. Some Saber's, Akira's and Defiant's, but only the USS Defiant can cloak. One Prometheus later on with faster regenerating shields. No MVAM though as I don't see the point.

Only Galor's, Keldon's and Hideki's for the Cardassians until they alliance with the Dominion.

Probably set from around approximately 2260's to current so Motion Picture era and on.

See where I'm going? More like the shows and balanced in such a way that hopes to keep it slightly more realistic. No gigantic starting base, just a lightly armed outpost so you are forced to protect it more. Lot's of ship upgrades for weapons and such to slightly increase the power of systems as the game goes on. Does this type of set up have any appeal to anyone at all?

 

[CABAL]

If you're going to make a faction that only has a few ships, it can work, but they need to complement each other. The ships would need to be designed with particular roles in mind and be set up in such a way that they work well together.

As for cloaks, I like the idea of them being much harder to detect than A1, A2, or even FO had them. I'm not sure about complete undetectability, though. Maybe something that requires more player intervention, like a depth charge?

Anyway, the idea sounds interesting. Are you going for a sort of Age of Empires type of gameplay?

 

[Rifraf]

Forgot about this thread, but had a couple more ideas for anyone who likes them.

One comes from an idea that I think I mentioned for the Yesteryears mod, but basically get rid of the dilithium mining station and have your Starbase process it. Give the freighters low warp capability so they have to warp to the nearest moon, fill their holds then warp back to your base to unload. Kind of a different take on supply lines. You can't afford to build bases everywhere so better protect your freighters. I may have to test that out. Not sure if the AI would have the freighters use warp?

Next idea is for research. I realize this would be better for multiplayer, but no one really plays that anymore. Anyway, give each player a set amount of latinum to start, but no means to collect it. So now you have only this pool of latinum to spend on research. Better choose which items you research carefully.

In furtherance of this you could in essence have research paths that let you build up a tree, but if you choose to spend a little in another path then you can't go all the way to the top of the other tree. Make the next item in a tree require the one before so you have to research things in order. Maybe put a weapon upgrade or shields upgrade at the end of each path or something.

Anyway, I'll add more as I think of them. Anyone else have fun ideas to contribute or are you saving them for your mods?

 

[CABAL]

Anyway, I'll add more as I think of them. Anyone else have fun ideas to contribute or are you saving them for your mods?

I've been considering an alternate officer system where a resource, like biomatter, is repurposed as officers and you gain it per second, like crew. Basically, it would be more of a soft cap than the hard cap that the standard A2 system is.

I've also tried (in A1) to have different weapon types inflict different RPG-style status effects. Phasers reduce the target's energy reserve, disruptors burn over time, etc. It was a nightmare in A1, but it might be easier in A2 or FO.

 

[Rifraf]

I thought of another one that I had partially done in a personal mod. It was a lot of odf's, but was kind of fun as the Borg. After researching X,Y,Z or something you can then build any Borg ship that "adapts" to enemy weapons and these new ships take say 25% less damage from all other races.

The other races compensate by using the weapon upgrade special through research. Then the Borg "adapt" through research to take a bit less damage from all other races that upgraded their weapons. So it's always one upping each other. It would be easier with FO to use replace weapons to "adapt" on the fly instead of having to build complete new ships each level in stock A2.

If you go the FO route you could even use replace weapons on the stations since after the Borg adapt it really would effect every ship/station they have.

 

[CABAL]

The sheer number of ODFs seems like the only problem with that adaptation system. If only we had the tools that the FO team uses for that kind of thing.