Achillus, remember that you are referring to things that have happened on a world scale. It's easy to pick out a single person who has been influential during a particular time, in a particular place in the world. However, you need to take one more step back. Sure, George Washington helped shape the future of the U.S., and ultimately this planet. However, how much influence did he have on the planet circling Proxima Centauri? As I mentioned, even the George Washingtons, Da Vincis, Mozarts get abstracted when you look at things at a galactic scale. When you're talking about invading a planet using a million soldiers, one person just doesn't count.

Personally, I'd prefer the game use the limited resources of my computer to figure out how I'm going to stomp my AI opponent into the ground in the next 10 turns because I have set up a pincer with two large fleets stationed on planets adjacent to his homeworld rather than worry about keeping track of the statistics of a single "special" unit.

This game isn't in beta, file this crap under suggestions for somehting else.

The first expansion will be in beta before long... In fact, there may be as many as 2 expansions for GC 2. Heroes will probably be in GalCiv eventually. If you have a problem with that, then that's your problem.

Personally, I'd prefer the game use the limited resources of my computer to figure out how I'm going to stomp my AI opponent into the ground in the next 10 turns because I have set up a pincer with two large fleets stationed on planets adjacent to his homeworld rather than worry about keeping track of the statistics of a single "special" unit.

Don't worry. If my P90 could keep track of those statistics in 1995 I'm pretty sure your rig can handle it.

As I mentioned, even the George Washingtons, Da Vincis, Mozarts get abstracted when you look at things at a galactic scale. When you're talking about invading a planet using a million soldiers, one person just doesn't count.

Not true. No matter how large the fleet or army gets, somebody is in charge of it.

Silly realism arguements aside, heroes (and artifacts also) add variety. And they're just... cool. How interesting would Star Wars be without Darth Vader?

All the children say
We don't need another hero
We don't need to know the way home
All we want is life beyond
Thunderdome

And yet the HERO Mad Max saved them all in the end.

I think Heroes could be achieved through Mods to some limited extent. If Stardock added in event trees into the game, it would absolutely be doable. It wouldn't be a ship or a person on the game board, but it would be very similar to one-time event bonuses or penalties.

Here's how it could work with the game as it stands...

Add in a new random event, tweak the values to determine bonus and rarity. Basically it would be something like "Admiral Yarg has opened a special training school, ships gain +10 armor" or whatever. One-time bonuses and the like.

It could be broadened if there was a way to have random events work on time frames like UP issues do. Rock star tours empire for 1yr, gives 10% morale boost for that year.

Here's how it could work if the events system was retooled to allow for event trees.

1. Have a main event that potentially brings in a character. For example we'll use Admiral Yarg. The character has a base bonus of some form that persists empire-wide so long as they're "in play"
2. Character has a string of random events under it in the tree. If character is "in-play" those events have a chance of triggering. Admiral Yarg personally pilots a fleet, gains +X skills
3. Character has a chance to die/retire/defect as an additional event in the tree. This may incur a penalty, but it removes the character from play and closes the tree.

Add in time limits from the UP code, and you could even define the length of time a character lives in the game.

So right now, you can have events that mention names and say those are the characters... SD can in an expansion or sequel put in event trees (which would have cool possibilities aside from this) and be able to do it that way without ever having a unit.

Or finally, you could have a random event that gives you a named ship with some above normal combat bonuses... or maybe a custom trade good or whatever. It's all about being creative in editing the XML files.
3.

No heroes please. Heroes promote micromanagement and playing Diablo 2. If I'm playing a strategy game, I don't want to be mooking around with General Salazar and his premier fleet of Space Rangers.

Too much of the strategy genre has recently put effort into making heroes and experience units and baby sitting. Instead of furthering the strategic elements of the genre, they're spitting out hybrids. I don't want an RPG in my RTS. Heroes introduce an element of flavor that throws off balance, requires additional playtesting and coding, and has a rather dubious value in the game. It changes the theme from 'manage your space empire' to 'build up the strength of your heroes so they can help steam roller everything'.

That's what WC3 did. It worked for WC3, but that was a different game. What Stardock should be doing is furthering strategic possibilities, like what Rise of Nations did with civilization borders and cities, and eliminating peon management. Did you hear that right? The strategy genre is furthered by the refinement of player management and control - NOT the introduction of factors that allow a strategically inferior player to triumph through the use of superior reflexes and fine tactics. A game about space empires should be about managing a space empire- not managing individual units.

What happened to the good old days when you found pride in smashing the opponent with faceless hordes at your own command? When I'm playing a TBS, I don't want an action game. I don't want a simulation of an action game. I should be making big decisions. Not deciding whether Admiral Nimitz should go here, or go there. I could care less. I hated Warcraft 3 because it was too twitch and hyperactive. It was more important where and when you fired off the special abilities and how proficient you were at firing off the hotkey, than when you attacked, whether you bluffed your opponent, or setup traps and ambushes. A p[layer that had the reflexes to manage 3 heroes won over the player who used his troops properly, and that really ticked me off.
In Age of Empires it was whether you could micro your villagers to do the maximum effect. Even now they've got the retarded settler hero that lets you run around the map. In my opinion in a -strategy game- people shouldn't be rewarded for micromanaging when someone plays a better strategic game. A better strategic game should always triumph over someone with better twitch skills.

You want heroes and special abilities and to base your decisions on when to click how, you go play Empire at War, or maybe Warcraft 3. I would rather play a game that plays down twitch play and micro. You want to show off? Do it somewhere else.

No heroes please. Heroes promote micromanagement and playing Diablo 2. If I'm playing a strategy game, I don't want to be mooking around with General Salazar and his premier fleet of Space Rangers.

Too much of the strategy genre has recently put effort into making heroes and experience units and baby sitting. Instead of furthering the strategic elements of the genre, they're spitting out hybrids. I don't want an RPG in my RTS. Heroes introduce an element of flavor that throws off balance, requires additional playtesting and coding, and has a rather dubious value in the game. It changes the theme from 'manage your space empire' to 'build up the strength of your heroes so they can help steam roller everything'.

That's what WC3 did. It worked for WC3, but that was a different game. What Stardock should be doing is furthering strategic possibilities, like what Rise of Nations did with civilization borders and cities, and eliminating peon management. Did you hear that right? The strategy genre is furthered by the refinement of player management and control - NOT the introduction of factors that allow a strategically inferior player to triumph through the use of superior reflexes and fine tactics. A game about space empires should be about managing a space empire- not managing individual units.

What happened to the good old days when you found pride in smashing the opponent with faceless hordes at your own command? When I'm playing a TBS, I don't want an action game. I don't want a simulation of an action game. I should be making big decisions. Not deciding whether Admiral Nimitz should go here, or go there. I could care less. I hated Warcraft 3 because it was too twitch and hyperactive. It was more important where and when you fired off the special abilities and how proficient you were at firing off the hotkey, than when you attacked, whether you bluffed your opponent, or setup traps and ambushes. A p[layer that had the reflexes to manage 3 heroes won over the player who used his troops properly, and that really ticked me off.
In Age of Empires it was whether you could micro your villagers to do the maximum effect. Even now they've got the retarded settler hero that lets you run around the map. In my opinion in a -strategy game- people shouldn't be rewarded for micromanaging when someone plays a better strategic game. A better strategic game should always triumph over someone with better twitch skills.

You want heroes and special abilities and to base your decisions on when to click how, you go play Empire at War, or maybe Warcraft 3. I would rather play a game that plays down twitch play and micro. You want to show off? Do it somewhere else.

Citizen TarlSS - perhaps I missed the part where introducing Heroes neccesitated turning GalCiv2 into a 'twitch-based' RTS micromanagement 'action game'. If you read through the posts above you will see that most people advocating heroes want them to be a MINOR part of gameplay, NOT capable of turning a lame fleet into galactic wupp-ass, and certainly not harbingers of a bold move to real time gameplay (which you seem to imply).

Heroes introduce an element of flavor that throws off balance, requires additional playtesting and coding

Surely anything added to the game leads to this, not jsut Heroes? That is why developers playtest, patch, and release expansions.

No heroes for me either. I like the game as it is. If I want to play MOO2 I will load it up.

I bet you "no heroes" guys don't like the ship expirience feature either. Or at least you shouldn't if you were consistant, sinse ships can essentially become hero units already. And yet the game is not ruined... I haven't seen an arguement yet against heroes that makes any sense.

My only argument, and perhaps it might not make sense, is that I just do not like it. I did not really like MOO2, I got annoyed with the leader aspect. It is just not a feature I like. I want to run my colonies. I never used ministers in Space Empires either.

I guess the other part of it, is I am tired of hearing everyone want to mold every new space 4x into MOO2. It just got worse after the fiasco of MOO3 (Yes, I wasted $ on that). That was not what the fans wanted so some try and turn all other space 4x's into MOO2.

But, if the feature were added and was an optional enhancement, sure, go ahead...

Oh, and no, ship experience is not the same. Lots of strategy games allow units to gain experience through the course of battles.

How bout this idea. Instead of Having Heroes, have only one and that would be your leader. Then have a bunch of captains ready to be placed. Or we can also forgo the Heroes until Expansion and hopefully have Captains instead. Now here's the big difference about heroes and captains proposal. Heroes can affect the game with bonus and penalties. Captains on the other hands does not, its a superficial addition that adds tremendous depths.

The game mechanics already allows each ship to gain level. Now all that is needed is a superficial change to ships.

I propose a Captains list where there would be a list of Captains with their own background story and statistics. Each of this captain can be assigned to a Ship to command. These captains do not have bonus on them nor do they effect gameplay. All they do is (mechanically wise) is to gather data of how many battles that ship has won. If the ship is destroyed, the captain will "escape" and return to HeadQuarters (captain's list) where he can be assigned to a new ship. He will NOT add any experience to the new ship he's assigned to, but will continue to keep track of how many times he won or lose a battle, seperated by the different ships he's been assigned to.

Here's the thing, if the Captain is on the ship and that ship is destroyed, most of the time, he'll return to HQ. But there is a small chance (random) that he can die instead of escaping. If he dies, he will be sent into HQ memorial or Hall of Fame where he would be placed and unassignable.

The captains should be editable so we can all make our own Captains. I would love to assign one of these captains to my Shakara Class Battleship. It gives more immersive values to an already immersive game. And best of all, there is no balancing issues since the Captains don't give bonus or change stats.. it just keeps a record and adds a personal touch.

As Great God and Overlord of my Empire, I would wish to know who is behind the wheel of my Great and Powerful ship that is tearing through my enemies like a chain saw through veal. It would be a good feature also if they enemies have captains so if one of my ship is destroyed, I'd know the Enemy Captain responsible so i can plot my revenge of conquering his homeworld and enslaving its inhabitants hoping to get that particular Captain's love ones. But that's just me.

I agree.. MOO3 was a waste of $$ here as well.

But just because having hero units would not make the game into MOO2. Similarly like Rise of Nations having Heroes did not make it into Warcraft 3. Still a totally different area. My proposal of Heroes and especially the Captains idea would not effect the gameplay much and even that. With the hero ideas, it would be similar in effect to finding an anomoly. With the Captain ideas, it will have no effect at all besides a little more immersion.

In the end, I and I think most gamers, just wants another persona in the game that is actually on our side. Even if its superficial, there should be others below them.

Take any presidents or leaders, do you think they run the country on their own. Even the unknown leaders, they have people under them they know fairly well. Take Bill Clinton even. He has Albright and Janet Reno to order around. I can't see Bill saying, "Hey Fat Old chick, go to Samolia NATO and tell them so and so." Or Bill telling Reno, "He Mrs. Dude-Looking-Lady, go deport that Cuban kid back."

Now take our prediciment, we're galactic leaders and emperors. I should be able to know who's under me. Not everyone, just those that have proven themselves. When I play and I'm about to launch an attack on those stinking Torian (I really hate those buggers), I would send my fleet in lead by my ships that has the most HP. Now, having a Captain to match would just add to that immersion. Now besides sending the USS Enkle Thomas, I would be sending my legendary Captain who fought againts the Torians before.

Rise of Nations left my hard drive a while ago. For me, I still love Civ 2

Anyway, I am not opposed to any new ideas. I guess my real opposition is in trying to make the game conform to what folks liked in MOO2. This is how these subjects tend to be brought up and many times the suggestions starts with "Remember in MOO2...." Stardock has an absolutely amazing game here as they did with GalCiv1. I played GalCiv1 until 2 came out and still play it on and off.

Brad has his vision for the game and I have been pleased with it immensely. I do not foresee these games leaving my hard drive for a long time. From what I have seen he does not seem inclined to make the game like MOO2. He made mention of it in interviews that he did not want MOO2 pushed on him.

Now, as I recall heroes added some bonuses to a colony. So do our anomalies and other items we can produce. So, in essence we want to add a "person" with a name to perform the same function. I do not see a purpose in it. I really do not. I do not need it for immersion. GalCiv 2 has remained true to the "universe" created in the first and I am quite happy with it. As for the idea of the captains... As you describe it, it is nothing but "color" and "flavor" to an already rich game environment. As I said, I am content...

I can hardly wait to get home too.... make some Yor ashtrays

Teri, I see your point. But for me and maybe for those that are for the Hero/Captain addition, I feel like it would be a great addition. And I don't know why people still insist that just because I mention Heroes, people start assuming its because we want the game to become another MOO2.

Say your playing Halo and they didn't have an assault rifle. Then someone mentions, man, "i wish they had an assault rifle." (and to help clarify it) "they add, like the assault rifle in ghost recon but better fitted for Halo universe." Now, by adding the assault rifle, are they making Halo a bite-off of Ghost Recon?

Or when Civ4 added the "hero." Would you then accuse the makers of Civ4 of trying to make the game like MOO2? They are both turn based strategy. They both have heroes.

Of course not since they do different functions.

Now the same goes for Galciv. Just because another game had that feature that we want in this game does not mean we want to make this game the same as that last one.

So people, FOR GOD SAKES, lets take the Hero/Captain for Galciv on its own merits. Forget about MOO2. Stop talking about Moo2. This is not Master of Orion, this is a discussion of Heroes for Galactic Civilization.

I would actually prefer a hero system to the current exp system.
Personally I would rip out the current Exp system, it's far too overpowered, There's unlimited scope for mega-units.
I'd impliment a 3-5 tier experience system for basic non-hero ships, but then include the ability to hire a limited amount of "Hero" fleet commanders. Maybe in thier own pre-designed ships, and unmovable to custom created ones.
Have them infer bonuses to the fleet they are assigned to, such as increased movement, extra HPs, First strike, Increased sensor range, faster Exp gain etc, a comprehensive list wouldn't be difficult to obtain from player feedback.

A system such as this would be far less overpowered than the current endless Exp system. Under the present rule, if you take your fleet inside enemy territory and simply destroy undefended small ships you gain an amazing amount of experience for ALL ships in that fleet. At one point when I had about 180hps per ship I was gaining a further 3 max hp every time I blew up a freighter or constructor.
With a limited, scaled and tiered exp system backed by powerful "Heroes" or generals it would be a much more tactical affair, with co-ordinating your best. You'd also have the AI hiring/finding heroes who would be primary targets in times of war, or direct targets for assasination using an improved espionage system which has already been bought up.

You would of course also have the potential top have plantery govenors with specific increases and skills, who could be tactically assigned to specific planets, or tactically assisinated pending an invasion, or co-erced into becoming a reverse hero, double-agent, and actually reduce the planets abilities instead of increase.

These are just examples of how a hero/general system could be implimented in order to add greater tactical choices to the game on all levels. To downright dismiss it is niave, there is a system currently in place to help personalize your ships and fleets, they gain experience and improve making the player feel more attached, but the current system is severly flawed, replacing it with a much more intuitive and involving system such as this would be nothing but an improvment.

The concept of having to micromanage the location and bonuses of heroes in order to counter the (likely) appearance of AI heroes in the exact place I don't want to see them makes my head hurt. Don't forget, the AI has the time luxury / computing power to do a better continuing job of optimization than we poor organics do.

That said, being able to transfer experience between two ships (of different hull types - within a hull type is handled via the upgrade ship function) with a significant penalty to account for the crew's learning curve (maybe penalty increased or not allowed if the transfer is not to the adjacent hull size) is an interesting idea to be able to jumpstart some of your new design's effectiveness. Of course, you then may be facing an AI capital ship of a brand new design that will seriously kick YOUR a**.

Don't wish for stuff you don't want to face......

Given that this thread is now pretty big, it would be interesting to read an actual response from the developers on this. Just a 'No, we don't like the idea of Heroes' or 'We may consider it in an expansion'.
Personally I think they would add a great deal of 'colour' and 'flavour' (this is a GOOD thing btw), and I'm not sure where this fixation on micromanagement is coming from. If you have a hero who adds 5 to ships weapons for instance, how is the decision on where to put him any more complex than deciding on what weapons or armour to put on a regular ship?

That said, if I knew for a FACT that Heroes were simply not a feature the Galciv2 team would consider, I'd shut up about it, however as far as I know there is no official position in this regard as yet.

Achillus: Please do not take offence.... I was generalizing about the "we want it like MOO2" and did not mean it to seem as if that were the essence of your argument...I did not think that.

I see it much as SrGalen does, as another thing to manage. I do well enough keeping track of what I have. I don't want to worry about where my leader is on top of what I already have. Sometimes the more that is added to a game, the less fun the game becomes--not to all, but to some. I am part of the "some", I guess, in that I find the game fun and challenging as it is.

I certainly would not mind the addition of leaders via an expansion, but, also, I would prefer their use remain optional. Just an IMHO thing...

HEROES!?
We don't need no steenkin' HEROES!

(no I'm not contibuting to the discussion, I'm kibitzing)

Hmmm...not sure if I like heroes. Soon we will be running around scouting debris for the "Ray gun of Death" for our heroes so they can do more damage. Works on smaller scale battles, but this is planetary!

After saying that, I wouldn't mind some kind of "flagship" or special designator I could move around (for a price) between ships. Having the flagship add bonuses to your tactical for that fleet would be helpful. With techs being generally equal in the game do to all the trading, I'd love something that could give my fleet a special kick.

Teri, no offense taken and I understood that you were Generalizing. That part of the post was intended toward the people who had no contribution to this discussion except to say, "I hate the idea. Stop making it into a MOO ripoff."

I like Noxins idea of implementing heroes, and he's right about the limitless exp gain on ships now. That needs to be fixed.

But as far as the captain idea. The captains Would NOT cary over the experience when transferred to another ship since that ship is a new crew.

And where is the dev team or anyone from Stardock. I would love to here what they think of our ideas. This thread is getting larger and larger. And I will personally keep talking about it till they say it will happen or not. I'm really excited at the possibility if it is adopted. As long as we keep talking about it, then there is a chance that it can be implemented since Stardock is the type of company that listens to its consumers/gamers if the demand is there.

Maybe they can post a poll in the website to see how much in demand is this feature. And we can start a petition drive.