This is a very small wishlist of ideas I find easily implementable, being extracted from a larger list of things I am sure I will (alas!) never see.
1. Rehauling Alliances and AI Relationships
- Currently, once you have an alliance with a foreign nation X, I have found no way to weaken my relations with that ally X aside from failing to declare war on a nation which declares war on X. This, I feel, is greatly suboptimal. In fact, it is THE only reason I have to turn "Diplomatic Victory" off. It is both unchallenging and -- more importantly -- unfun. I believe this may be because "ally" seems to be a flag which can only be unchecked if condition (let's call it QW) is met: If Y declares war on X, X will ask for help then, and if you fail to declare on Y, your alliance ends. (This will not stop you from making peace with Y the next turn, and X will think none the less of you.)
I think "Ally" needs to be a COMPLETELY DIFFERENT CATEGORY than "Relationship". Relationships may go from Hostile to Friendly, but "At War" and "Ally" should not be in this list. "Ally" should be a flag that you can lose once the "Friendly" relations drop too low, for any number of reasons (you may be dropping too far behind militarily to be considered a decent ally, you may not be trading enough, you may not help out militarily enough, etc. etc.).
2. To create more valid strategies and more fun, there should be a few new types of Resources which do not add a % to a stat but rather allow the owner to do one of the following things:
a. Build a particular building.
b. Research a particular tech.
c. build on terrain squares of a certain type.
If (a) is built, this will give the owner the ability to produce a certain new type of element for her ships, IF she also researches Tech YY and AS LONG AS resource Q is still owned. These elements could be things ranging from bonuses to damage (let's call them Targeters) to small, one-use teleporterts.
If (
is researched, it might allow the owner of the resource to produce a unique type of premade unit, as long as Resource Q is owned.
(c.) is self-explanatory, but for balance purposes all buildings built on those squares (say, ocean squares) must be destroyed if ownership of the Resource Q fails.
3. More variety in military base modules and Damage rolls:
- Upgrades could be made much more interesting by adding new types of modules which yield bonuses to attack and/or defense ROLLS, e.g. instead of adding 5 points to beam attack power, there could be a module which adds a +2 to the beam ROLL (thus if a ship had an attack value of 12, it would normally roll a number between 1 and 12, but with Quarz Light Refinement II, it would roll a number between 3 and 12). This enhancement would never allow for damage to exceed a ship's maximum value, but it would increase its minimum value.
- There could be upgrades which leech or damage an enemy ship's defense rating when these come within radius (much like there is a module which leeches an enemy's speed rating).
3. Shipyard interface changes
- PLEASE let us be able to sort ship parts by various categories, at least by the category "size". (One should be able to choose between name, size, cost, and value (e.g. damage, speed, defense, etc.).)
- PLEASE let us be able to list ship designs by various categories, at least by the category "hull size". Currently, ships are listed alphabetically, which (when one has a large number of designs) is most bewildering at times.
- Whichever factor is chosen in the above-mentioned suggestion of ship listings in the shipyard should be used in the mini-list on the f2 screen when one clicks the "build ship" bar.
thank you very much
