Kinda space battle thing

[Evil DIMwit]

So, it's the future, yeah? Way future. Like we're all in space time. And there's this little bitty desolate space rock, not even a planet really, but you better believe it's the most strategic desolate space rock in the damn galaxy. That's why these light blue pointy folks are serious about keeping it. That's also why the red chunky guys and the green space zoo are both into taking it for themselves (the orange guy doesn't really care about the planet, he's just a neutral merchant vessel looking to score major space cash off the war).

Gameplay

66 territories
Features:

• Semi-complex bonus system
  One-way paths
  Army decay territory

Latest gameplay:

Click image to enlarge.

http://www.freewebs.com/dimagic/Fleets_gplay.png


Gameplay to-do:
--] Community input
--] Rework bonus structure for red fleets?


Graphics (for later)

Spoiler

Latest graphics (dummy background):

Click image to enlarge.

http://www.freewebs.com/dimagic/Fleets_bg_2.png

Graphics to-do:
--) Nothing

Old versions
Gameplay v1:
http://www.freewebs.com/dimagic/DragonFleetPath.png


Actual first post

Spoiler

Rough sketch:

Click image to enlarge.

Now, I'm not really sure how the bonuses would go but the idea is that each fleet has a different way to get bonuses. Like maybe for the red fleet it' for holding each of their scary dreadthings, and for the blues it has something to do with the satellites, and for the green ships I don't even know.

Transportation would be something like:
- For the battle forts and planet, movement is to adjacent sections or structures
- Among ships (and buildings) of the same color, two-way connective lines of transportation between nearby ships
- For multi-segment ships, every part of the ship can move to every other part of the ship
- Between fleets, one-way transportation based on lines of weapon fire.

I'm not sure how the merchant works; I'm thinking each fleet has a connection to it (possibly one-way in) and then if you own it, the merchant's bonus is higher based on how many of the adjacent terrirories (prob. the tiny triangle, seahorse head, and nearest red spot). Is there something like that in any of the maps out there? I dunno.

Keys are in the upper left and lower right corner. What d'you think?

[sinctheassasin]

Yeah, I like it. Your wording would be hillarious to see on the actual map XD

[Risky_Stud]

great idea, keep up the work

[RedBaron0]

Get yourself a spiffy story and a spacey background, and you're looking good!

[Evil DIMwit]

I'm thinking something like this for paths:

Click image to enlarge.

http://www.freewebs.com/dimagic/DragonFleetPath.png

Where the darker lines are two-way intrafleet connections and the lighter lines are one-way connections from the fleet whose color they share. Spots within the same shaded circle/blob all border each other.

Current thought for bonuses:
Space zoo: Bonus is two less than the number of heads you own, minus two. The ship in the lower left has three heads so there's a total of nine heads, seven possible armies.
Dreadcogs: The big inner platform is worth two, the small inner platform is worth one. Controlling the whole big cog gives you five armies while the whole little cog is worth three.
Home team: Three armies for owning all three triangle satellites, two armies for owning both cross satellites. Four for the planet.

For the merchant, I'm thinking maybe his connections are all two-way but he charges an army or two per turn if anyone keeps more than one army on his ship.

[whitestazn88]

no. doodle _____ first. lol, jk. keep it up

[Evil DIMwit]

no. doodle _____ first. lol, jk. keep it up

I made a sequel to Doodle Earth, even smaller. It's called World Peace and it has zero territories. It's just in a development snag right now because the thread doesn't have any posts in it.

[ustus]

hahaha your description monologue from the first post makes this map. See if you can capture the vagueness of the backstory you gave us in the map (about the most strategic desolate space rock in the darn galaxy) it amuses me. I might play the map just for that alone.

As to the map itself, i like. I'm assuming you'll color in the lines on the light blue and green ships a bit more in the final version, the blobs of color annoy me. But i know this is just a sketch, i just need reassurance that you're planning on fixing that.

[Industrial Helix]

Make it happen!

Perhaps the big guns on the rock can bombard a certain area or something.

Lol... Green Space zoo

[Evil DIMwit]

Here's one with a bit more color. The background comes from Google image search for "space"; it does cut off at the top and I don't think this will be the final background but it is something dark and spacey that we can see the ships against.

Click image to enlarge.

No connecting lines yet, no labels, no instructions -- more gameplay-oriented map coming soon but if anyone has any comments on the graphical style forming I'd be interested to hear.

[whitestazn88]

Here's one with a bit more color. The background comes from Google image search for "space"; it does cut off at the top and I don't think this will be the final background but it is something dark and spacey that we can see the ships against.

Click image to enlarge.

No connecting lines yet, no labels, no instructions -- more gameplay-oriented map coming soon but if anyone has any comments on the graphical style forming I'd be interested to hear.

that looks awesome

[Industrial Helix]

I prefer the black lines to the white lines on the ships.

It also kind of looks like the cogships are just close to us and the rest is small via perspective. I guess it all depends on where you put the lasers gun thingies... if they shoot from the bottom and get smaller it will reinforce this idea. Just a thought.

[Danyael]

i love those merchants ships especially the duck looking f*cker
i bet the pilot has a Burt Reynolds mustache

[Evil DIMwit]

Here's the latest graphics picture; it's very far from the finished look but should give a decent idea of the final graphical style:

Click image to enlarge.

It also kind of looks like the cogships are just close to us and the rest is small via perspective. I guess it all depends on where you put the lasers gun thingies... if they shoot from the bottom and get smaller it will reinforce this idea. Just a thought.

Might also be because the cogships' lines are thicker. I'll have to play with all that at some point.


But first, it would be a good idea to focus on gameplay before graphics, since an easy change in the former could mean an annoying change in the latter. Hence this poorly-labeled purely-gameplay map:

Click image to enlarge.

The territory labels are totally provisional and ugly (and it looks like I'm going to make the planet larger to accommodate better labels) and are just there to ease discussion.

I'd like it if anyone has thoughts in the way of strategic analysis, how bonuses should work, and so forth. I'm also not entirely convinced that an army-draining connective territory is the best use for the merchant, so if anyone has a better idea I'm all ears.

Finally, I think I have enough here to qualify this as a draft rather than just an idea -- who do I talk to to get a thread moved around here?

[Danyael]

i'd pm mr benn, iancanton or nobodies but i'm pretty sure one of them or one of the FA's will move it for you if they read this and i'm sure they will the foundry has been good for that lately


some of the fa are killing .44 tacktix oaktown gimil

hope that helps

[neanderpaul14]

I would stick with "Kinda space battle thing" as the name of the map

[Evil DIMwit]

Oh! This is an irrelevant aside but check out this image I dug up from two years ago. I think this was a kind of prototypical version of the invasion battle idea:

Click image to enlarge.

Won't win awards any time soon but the two-level blur thing has potential, I think.

[iancanton]

Finally, I think I have enough here to qualify this as a draft rather than just an idea -- who do I talk to to get a thread moved around here?

i'll let thenobodies80 know!

ian.

[thenobodies80]

[Moved] to the Drafting Room

[Evil DIMwit]

Woo, yay!

I'm thinking of changing the red blobs' bonus to something involving auto-deploy:
The first thing that comes to mind is the core spaces, but (A) one army per turn seems too weak and two seems too strong, and (B) the whole red section would become very valuable with unlimited fortification and very useless with chained or adjacent forts.
My second line of thought was to give one army/turn on D9, D7, D6,C9, and C6. That would make the blobs into real fortresses; and since the armies get deployed to fairly useful territories, it's not so bad that there are only 5 per turn vs. 7 per turn for the green section and 9 per turn on the blue. The problem with this is that it makes the rears of the blobs useless except as bulk territories.
Finally, I could go for a combination, retaining the +2 and +1 bonuses for holding the cores, and replacing the +4 and +3 bonuses with 1-army auto-deploys on C6, C9, and D6-9. I don't want the bonus structure of any one section to get too complex, though.

Any thoughts?

[Danyael]

Finally, I could go for a combination, retaining the +2 and +1 bonuses for holding the cores, and replacing the +4 and +3 bonuses with 1-army auto-deploys on C6, C9, and D6-9. I don't want the bonus structure of any one section to get too complex, though.

i think this might work best and i agree you should keep bonus structure as simple as possible

[Teflon Kris]

Looking quickly at the plan - the bonus system wouldn't need any kind of major overhaul - maybe minor tinkerings which could come way later on.

There are plenty of features there - incl. build-your-own bonus, without the map being mega-complex. Something that you'd expect players to take a few games to get the hang of but not too many that they give up.

Would it be easy to get all those connections onto the map without detracting from the space graphics?

Great idea though - we need more space maps - or at least someone willing to persevere with them - a few fell by the wayside recently when they were coming along nicely. Spaceness and Space Escape which was a smaller conquest-style map.

[Evil DIMwit]

Hm. I haven't really been feeling this map for a while. Mods can go ahead and move this to recycling until I'm inspired for it again.

[iancanton]

as requested, moved to the recycling bin.

ian.

[owenshooter]

hmmm... i liked vace coopers space war map that had space shuttles, alien ships, space walkers and aliens with lazer guns!! where did that ever go?!-0

p.s.-and his vomit map is still the best idea ever in this forum. impassable chunks of corn?!! hilarious...