Planetary Alignment : A Suggestion

So I had a few ideas about how to (hopefully) make the MUD a better and more interesting place.

Planetary Alignment

In order to make clans and wars a bit more about real strategy, I propose that we add a few things to planets AND clans.

Section I – Planets

Culture: A reflection of the planet’s traditional form of government (see Section III).
Major Amity: The planet’s like (or love, in some cases) of a particular species (homeworlds) or a subset of species (humanoid, non-humanoid, etc).
Minor Amity: The planet’s acceptance and approval of a number of species. This would be generally very small in comparison to a planet’s Major Amity.
Major Enmity: The planet’s fear or hatred of a species or subset.
Minor Enmity: The planet’s distrust of a number of species; again, a very small amount in comparison to Major Enmity.
Planetary Bonus: A boon attributed to the world and accessible by its controlling clan, under certain restrictions. Planets historically responsible for producing certain items, ships, or resources would do so in limited quantity as long as the conditions are met (see Section III).
DFC: Distance From Capital rating, specifically for entities which control multiple planets. (see Section III)

Section II – Clans

Structure: No, not buildstructure. Clan Structure would be a reflection of how the clan’s leadership and overall managerial process is setup. (see Section III)

Section III – Mechanics

Every planet should have its own independent government, basically a placeholder for when no clan controls it. When a clan takes control of a planet, their maximum popular support on that world would be determined by how closely the clan resembles the planet’s government. For example, the government of Naboo would be a Democratic Monarchy of Humanoids. If a clan with the structure ‘Despotic Monarchy’, such as the Empire, took control of the planet their maximum support would be partially diminished by the planet’s Culture. However, the planet would not be likely to rebel without player actions because it would still be under a Monarchy ruled by a Humanoid. However, the degree to which the planet’s Popular Support would be diminished by the ‘Despotic’ structure would also be amplified by the DFC rating. There would be a 10% bonus to support if a clan is identical to the planet’s government.

By the numbers:

Naboo: Maximum Support: 110% -> Empire is different (-10%) -> Empire is Despotic (-20% Max Support) -> Empire is Monarchy (No Change) -> Empire is Humanoid (No Change) -> Maximum Support: 80% -> DFC Reduction is 7% of Current Support -> Maximum Support (Real): 74%

Naboo: Maximum Support: 110% -> Republic is different (-10%) -> Republic is Democratic (No Change) -> Republic is Republic (-10%) -> Republic is Humanoid (No Change) -> Maximum Support: 90% -> DFC Reduction: 7% -> Maximum Support (Real): 83%

Naboo: Maximum Support 110% -> Queens of Naboo is same (No Change) -> QoN is Democratic (No Change) -> QoN is Monarchy (No Change) -> QoN is Humanoid (No Change) -> Maximum Support: 110% -> DFC Reduction is 0%, Capital is Naboo -> Maximum Support (Real): 110%

As you can see, this would be a more realistic system and involve a bit more on the part of the players than just "It’s my clan, if I win then I win." Since it is all IC, clans with a certain type would be required, of course, to model their actions around that particular alignment to prevent clans from, say, setting their type to Democratic Republic to have a bonus toward controlling other free planets and then still acting like the Sith Empire. The culture and structure alignments would function similary, then, to player alignments, but with regard to civilization and government.

Chaotic = Despotic
Neutral = Parliamentary
Lawful = Democratic

Evil = Dictatorship
Neutral = Empire
Good = Republic

To the last point, on planetary bonuses, each planet would have a certain quality accessible to varying degrees depending upon popular support. There would be three tiers of bonuses.

Examples:
Tier I – 110% Support
Coruscant – Galactic Senate; mitigate DFC effects by 30%.
Mon Calamari – Capital Ship Production; produces one MC80 for sale every 72 hours.

Tier II -90%-100% Support
Naboo – Starfighter Production; produces one Naboo Starfighter for sale every 24 hours.
Lorrd – Commerce Guilds; Lorrd produces significantly more credits and resources.

Tier III – 70%-80% Support
Every planet would have a generic bonus to credits and resources as long as their support is above 70%.

The catch to how the planetary bonuses would work is that if your support goes under the given value you slowly lose the bonus, it does not go away immediately. In the case of ship production, it would simply add time, and so long as your clan controls the planet you will still be able to purchase the ship that was built. However, if your clan loses control of a planet that is building a ship the ship will be destroyed and the new owners of the planet will have to establish popular support and wait the full time for a new one to be built.

At any rate, I’m tired now. Let me know what you guys think, and we can refine the idea as we go along. Who knows, maybe it’ll make it into the MUD.

V, for Valerian Root

I thought this was LotJ, not Spreadsheets Online – Space FarmVille.

For the record, Fish, if you don’t like the idea then feel free to either offer some constructive suggestions or stfu.

Thanks, and have a nice day. <!– s:) –><img src="{SMILIES_PATH}/icon_smile.gif" alt="" title="Smile" /><!– s:) –>

No need to criticize your critics.

Anyway, I don’t like it at all. It’s over-complicated gaming by the numbers for the numbers for lots of unbalanced min/max gaming that is going to be damned impossible to get players to understand, a nightmare to code, and absolutely impossible to balance.

RP &gt; MIN/MAX twinkery.

We’ve been working on an overhaul to the system for next timeline that is similar in concept to this but does not quite go so far. In essence besides the ‘popular support’ rating each clan has a different popularity rating with the populace that can be influenced, and it determines how quickly a clan can capture a planet.