Suggestion: Civilization borders.

I dont know if its possible but i like it.

I don't have a problem with not being able to block off space, that was clearly a design decision and makes a good bit of sense when you consider the difficulties in guarding a huge, vast, really really big empty space.

That said, the computer likes to threaten me when I start massing in their influence area - I'd like the same ability. I want to say to the AI, "Bugger off or we're going to war."

It would be nice not to have two Drengin fleets parked next to one of my planets.

Why not just make the influence border the official border that defines the territory?
Then have a 'neutral zone' of say 5 parcecs on either side of the border designated as safe travel zones, so at least if you are at war with a race in between you can get around.

Maybe instead of blocking ships from staying in your space you could force the AI to pay a weekly fine for parking a battleship above your home world. You could have an option to tax all combat ships of a certain civ in your territory. This would lower relations somewhat, but could also make civs less inclined to attack you.
A U.P. event could allow you to completely block ship access, or prevent you from taxing other ships.

On a side-note, I think that borders should be a solid line (with a "neutral zone") and cultural borders should be a dashed line.

I like the idea of borders, with cultural borders being a separate entity. I don't think it's a matter of guarding all the space, merely seeing the space. I like the idea of a certain amount of space being designated as part of your territory, but I think it should be on a first come first serve basis. If someone doesn't like it, then they declare war. And all UP members should have to abide by guidlines set on whether foreign ships can pass through your territory (of course, during a war all restrictions are off for the combatants). So, diplomatic negotiations would usually be needed before you sent your fleets warping across someone else's space. And, if you wanted to hurt someone economically, you could not allow trade by their ships through your space. However, I would think that this sort of feature might be GalCiv III, not an update.

Also, I don't like "neutral zones". Not much sense there. There's no "neutral zone" between the US and Canada, for instance. The only purpose would be to prevent either side in a conflict from grabbing certain territory, and perhaps an agreement could be made "you don't, and I won't", but it would be hard to make that stick.

The only proper 'borders' I want to see in the game are ones used in diplomacy. I want to be able to just draw a line and say 'don't cross this'. Sure, if you don't have a military nobody will take you seriously, and they'll just cross somewhere you can't see...

Simply adding a 'get your bloody ships away from my colonies' option would be good enough for me. Again, I want a *proper* diplomacy system, not just a trade system.

Wouldn't that make influence even more ridiculously powerful than it already is ?

I would just like the ability to threaten er.... em "inform" the AI about ships/starbases in my area. Diplomacy could also have an effect on this, If low diplomacy then it would come off as a harsh threat, and the other civ would drop relations or something.

the border should be like an influence sphere of starbases around planets that are owned by us....

I also would like to see the borders defined by our cultural borders actually mean something other than as an indicator to which way the influence is pushing. I really see no reason to add *another* superficial line.

More diplomacy options is definitely the way to go here, something which has been asked for before.

The current trade embargo button, which as far as I know just keeps that ai from creating trade routes with your worlds and removes any that are currently there is the basis of what I'd like to see.

In the Foreign relations sceen you have a new tab, Policies.

- The trade embargo button can be moved there, forbidding trade routes.

- Ban their war ships from entering your territory. (Foreign planets under your influence would be an exception, they control that planet, and ships built and docked there are not technically in your space yet)

- Ban their constructors from entering your territory. (Influence would then have to be pushed progressively, no more squatting influence starbases right outside your homeworld)

- Allow or deny right of passage (Applies to warships or constructors from the above two options. Right of passage being defined as auto-moving to a location that is outside your territory, much like moving back into your ship range when a wormhole teleports your flagship to the other side of the galaxy)

- Set a tax for entering and staying in your territory (this would apply to all ships or only unarmed ships without constructors if the above two options are set)

- Set a tax on starbases and planets they control that are within your territory (The higher the tax the more their relation with you goes down and the less your influence affects their people. ie the border there may change enough that they would no longer BE in your space, so some balance might have to be struck if you chose that option, even if you had a far superior military and they wouldn't go to war with you)

Of course all of the above options would only apply to a civilization that you are not at war with. Breaking these policies would create an instant message from you to them or vice versa stating they have 1 turn to remove their ships or they might as well declare war. War would be declared from the policy breaker the next turn if the ships aren't removed.
You would not be able to apply these to allies of course.

To give these options their full utility, there would be options in the diplomacy screen to ask for a change of policy from one of the civ's (ask for right of passage so you can attack a civ on the other side of their borders for instance).
Or telling a civ that he'd better let your contructors in "or else", much like demanding tribute.

Some would be set from the start of the game (the bans against constructors and warhips and deny right of passage). Others you can set later and will result in lower relations with that civ. Lifting bans would result in slightly better relations, though if you had a weak military and decided to allow their ships to move into your territory to improve relations so they wouldn't actually go to war with you quite yet might delay war a few turns, but would allow them to get into a better position to attack, so might not be advisable

Including all of that and adding more ai so they don't inadvertently go to war with you because they tried to move a constructor into your area, I don't expect to see anytime soon, but put it on my wish-list.

There's a neat space border thingie in the movie "The Fifth Element", but that's more or less just for Earth (although it's hard to tell, as the "science" in the movie is weak [although again, it does feature topless Milla more than once, something we just won't ever get to see in GalCiv]).

Physical space borders that extend into untold numbers of parsecs into space -considering that this game is supposed to only take place a couple of hundred of hears from now - seems like a waste of logistics to me.

Having said all of that, now I want to go freeze-framing through 5th Element... Mmmm, Auto-wash...

These 'bans' are silly. Simply having a dip system that allows you to declare things (like 'come anywhere near me and you're toast sucka) and AI that can determine risk/reward would work fine. Frankly, why should there be a big incident if they slip a ship over your 'magic borders' miles from anyone, totally unseen? That's why borders in space are a crazy concept. If you can't defend it, it's not yours. It's a shame you can't actually have a dialogue about this with the AI, negotiating over sector entrance/trade rights, etc. Adding another line is unneeded - just use sectors.

Now, i didn't read the whole Topic, but i don't think "Boarders" are a very practical thing in space....But what i WOULD like to see, that follows the same path, is the ability to tell the AI to Pack up or face some ass kicking...Nothing pisses me off more then seeing a "Close" AI building Influence Bases around my planets, or having Giant War fleets on my doorstep....and the only way to counter it is to declare war on them.

In short, i want the option to issue an ultimatum to get the hell away from my planets with those invasion fleets. So as to not hurt standing between us.

heres my 2bc

I see no reason why borders could not work. But, you must be able to tell if someone has crossed your border for the idea to make sense. In mid game you could very easily build a fleet of sensor ships and position them around your 'influence' border, therefore you would know when anyone enters and should be able to take appropriate diplomatic action.

In the early game this makes no sense - you would have no way to WATCH your border until you reach a certain level of technology/manufacturing capability, therefore a border of the sorts suggested would make no sense.

to take these points into account, maybe it could work as follows:

In early game, borders are the same as they are now - just nebulous influence borders.
Once you have researched some tech (on the sensors tree) to represent the technological knowhow needed to effectively watch a large border in space (needing a large network of sensor ships), AND you have build an (expensive) galactic acheivement to represent the manufacturing strength needed to produce such a network of ships, THEN the borders become more meaningful, you now know when anyone crosses your border and should have some appropriate options become available in the diplomacy screen to respond to this. (and only diplomatic options - as many posters have said, if you havent got the military to back it up, whos going to care if you know they've crossed your borders?)

anyone got any thoughts on this modification?

Here is an alternate way boarders could possibly be defined. A new type of module (automatic on planets, addable to starbases, installable on ships) that acts like a sensor, but has some diplomatic weight behind it. Conflicting boarders would be resolved by 'first come, first serve', i.e. building a boarder module on a starbase rigth next to someone's homeworld would probably get you a boarder around the square the base is in, but nothing else.

So in effect, your boarders become a subset of what you can 'see' via your sensor net.

I think the simplest solution would be to simply have an option to request someone leave if they enter sensor range while within your influence borders. If they accept, their ships will be considered out of range while in your territory and must set an auto-pilot course back to their borders, while if they refuse, war, or an embargo could be declared.

Maybe a United Planets resolution could be added to effect auto embargos on border violators, or something.

Some interesting ideas in here.

I don't necessarily want to see Influence borders == Imperial (political) borders. I think the two concepts should remain separate. Rather than just having lines that fluctuate from week to week like influence does, have the political borders decided in the Diplomacy arena, where it belongs. Perhaps a treaty designating that certain sectors are off-limits to treatied AIs (the taxation and other ideas above fit in well here, ie. treaty designates no access, limited access, transit fees), a treaty could designate certain sector(s) as a neutral zone between civs (maybe even down to the parsecs, as those are 'counted' as well in the map. These treaties do not necessarily affect other AIs, and they would have access as they do now anyway. Any limitations would require a treaty between the AIs you want to limit.

Since they are treaties, they can be "bought" in a manner similar to Tech or trade goods. New UP resolutions might create universal neutral zones, and violating them could cause UP to gang up on the violator.

In order to make any of this work, there needs to be some big changes made to the diplomacy screens including the addition of making UP voting agendas negotiable PRIOR to the actual meeting and vote. Both of these would really add value to the game.

Cheers,
Reaver

One way to create our own borders now, would be build a series of military starbases with overlapping AoE and build "Border Interdicter" ships to patrol the areas defined by the starbases. You could stop anyone that you wanted that tried to cross your border.

There are several problems with this solution however.
1) You would almost certainly always be in a perpetual state of war with someone, perhaps everyone because, as it stands now, you can't tell anyone WHY you are blasting their ships out of space. (requires Diplomacy enhancement)
2) If/when your borders expand, you have to build a new huge fleet of constructors to build more starbases along the new border. (Costly and wasteful, as the older starbases will be defending nothing and scrapping them will result in >97% loss of original expenditure).
3) Number of starbases is finite, limited by your logistics value (don't really know how many, haven't maxxed out yet), leaving you fewer starbases available for production/trade and Influence.
4) There is no way to simply tell a ship to patrol. (need a Patrol command in addition to Guard and Sentry, need to be able to create patrol Waypoints).
5) This is a tedious solution, the time and effort it would take a player to complete the border, would be exorbitant, to the point where a significant portion of a Large empire's production would go into creating the border (Tons of constructors and lots of interdictors), almost to the exclusion of all else (including fun. I have a job, don't need an after-hours construction gig. ).
5a) The border work would likely never be completed, since the player will likely be trying to win the game by expanding their empire, rendering previous construction moot.

So much more could be done with enhancements to the diplomacy aspects of this great game.

Cheers,
Reaver

I think the simplest solution would be to simply have an option to request someone leave if they enter sensor range while within your influence borders. If they accept, their ships will be considered out of range while in your territory and must set an auto-pilot course back to their borders, while if they refuse, war, or an embargo could be declared. Maybe a United Planets resolution could be added to effect auto embargos on border violators, or something.

Quoted 'cause I agree

I think the simplest solution would be to simply have an option to request someone leave if they enter sensor range while within your influence borders. If they accept, their ships will be considered out of range while in your territory and must set an auto-pilot course back to their borders, while if they refuse, war, or an embargo could be declared. Maybe a United Planets resolution could be added to effect auto embargos on border violators, or something.

I agree. This isn't civilisation, we don't need actual physical borders, because it's space. The logistics involved would be terrible. But perhaps a variation of the two: Make the planets your borders that overwrite influence, but if it's free space in between planets of two races then whoever has the most influence in that sector owns it.

You can only have border only if you are able to defend it.

Suggestion: Currently you can set your fleet into sentry or guard mode. How about an option to set your fleet to a patrol mode, which enables your fleet to control an area of a few parsecs radius (for example: square root of the fleet maximum speed). Neutral unarmed ships can pass thru the zone of control. Armed ships (and contructors) has fight the patrolling fleet if they want to enter the ZOC. Otherwise, they have to go around the ZOC if they don't want to risk war. Essentially, if you want border, then you have to garrison it and risk a chance of war if someone decide to challenge it.

BTW, you can use the patrol mode to defend your starbases and planets. Just station a fleet next to your starbase or planet and set it on patrol.

Yes, I must agree that this should change. I also hate when enemy ships are freely roaming through my space and I can not do anything about it. I like the idea of paying fees. It sounds good. You need a fleet moved through my space? Of course, but pay for it. Or have the possibility to say Of course, we are glad to help our neighbours, which would increase the realtionship. Only allied ships should be allowed to move freely through my space.

Which brings me to the alliance. Would it be possible to place my units to my allie's planets? The only game I have ever seen to allow this was Alpha Centauri, where you could send units to your allie's cities and theyc could (and they did it) send their units to your cities. So far, I have not seen much advantage in being in an alliance. I only need to go to fight their wars.

I'm partial to having an option in the diplomacy dialogue to demand that ships be withdrawn from your space, or demand tax on freighters that pass through your space. I'd also like the ability for ships to be able to patrol sectors, or even a designated path, like between two waypoints. It would be a good way to defend your borders.
And, that sort of stuff can make or break alliances as well. If you demand your allies remove their ships, or pay taxes on freighters that pass through your area, then they might dissolve the alliance because you aren't trusting enough.

I had the Altarians drop 4 influence star bases right outside of Earth once. We had a strong relationship, but I couldn't let such a thing go unnoticed, and I had to erradicate them. It was a shame, because we were working on some diplomacy to take over the Drengin.

i said this in a feed i started about patrol command. if you have a solid border you can order you ships to patrol. they would attack anyone in your territory if siad ship didn't belong in there. as far as more lines on the map get rid of the inflence borders inflence flows across borders don't believe me ask mexico, canada, england, your choice one that one. there shouldn't be anything that says you can't influence a planet on the other side of universe as long as they know your there ie have met you.

at start of game borders could be established by range of life support. until your border bumps into someone elses. as far as an ai having a planet inside your border the ai can build ships all they want just not launch them if the planet doesn't have a buffer zone around it