Open Source TC

Got Dropbox all set up and running.... looking at all the amazing stuff

I'm working on some story ideas and maybe some escort sounds or something.

Good. I really like the start we have. I am glad I have made a (sort of)contribution in the VA stuff. I like the police pirate merchants already implemented.

I have had an idea for a ship for a long time the "Assault Class Drake" its a kind of fast frigate with both missiles and laser type weapons. I will add a more in depth description later.

Holy crap my grammar sucks.

This post has been edited by of doom : 12 November 2008 - 07:44 PM

I haven't gotten the dropbox thing to work for me yet (I probably haven't spelled the pass corectly yet...) but I would like to add my idea which I actually think is pretty nice...

I will use inde to represent independent throughout this post...

THE PLAYER BEGINS:

Basically the player is thrown into the galaxy in an area completely independent from any gov (along with surrounding systems) and he gets introduced to the game through there... (trading and such) The 3 govs surround the inde area and fight a little bit in systems randomly throughout space (gov, independent and enemy)...

POSSIBLE STORYLINE 1:
After a certain amount of time a new weapon is developed on an inde planet and pirates then exist in and around inde space (a pirate place might be created... optional) as the weapon is very good for fast vessels that can attack, plunder and retreat... soon after, one of the ind systems (a resource rich one) is dominated by Gov A (for lack of a better name) but they don't continue past that point. No one thinks of it... The game continues normally but in the news you can hear about 2 stations that have been discovered near completion somewhere in the first gov's space. Nothing urgent comes out of this until a while after completion. One of gov B's scouting groups finds a growing military presence in systems behind gov A's main border systems (possible attack force). They quickly try to inform every system on the map of this force and to prepare. Seeing the fact that the fleet was discovered gov A quickly advances through some of inde systems (while landing troops to dispose of any uprising that might occur their take over) overnight and launches an attack on one of gov B's outer systems and captures the border station... At this point all the inde systems send representatives to the other gov's asking for help and they all unite to fight gov A. Unfortunately Gov B, C etc didn't want to merge and thus the rest of the independent systems are being fought over after the first wave of Gov A ships is fought back. After all the inde systems become loyal to their respective gov's, gov's A, B, C... tone down the war effort and try to find an advantage over the others (a reason to attack)...

I don't know how much of that will be understandable as I am pretty excited about this... If you want me to explain any of this you can just ask... Also, could someone pm me the pass to the dropbox? I don't know how to spell it =/
Hope I can be of SOME help for this at least... I really enjoy placing systems on maps and such but I bet you could do that... :rolleyes: Would the Mod Pirate Starbridge I made and never released be too Novaish? (probably)...

Yah, that's enough mindless rambling...

EDIT: I got the pass now. I forgot the comma...

This post has been edited by 1purevengeance1 : 14 November 2008 - 05:00 PM

I think, in addition to the Governments that were chosen by Vote, I think we need to discuss some major history. Namely, Earth. (Is Earth really important? We are rather ethnocentric...)
Some general possibilities: (this is beginning to look like a poll. Is that a good thing or not?)
1. Earth does not exist; the universe is completely original (as per the wording in the Guidelines)
2. Earth exists but has little or no general storyline value.
3. Earth has a significant place to one government, but not much to others except as an enemy government's capital or whatever.
4. Earth is the Palestine of the Universe.
5. Earth is hidden.

Also, when does this all take place?
1. In the far past.
2. In the near future.
3. In the far future.

Discuss.

If this is a vote, I would say 5 or 2 for the first one, and 2 for the second.

I think Earth should exist, but not be of major importance to all the governments. IE: That isn't why they are fighting. However, having side missions to discover Earth, perhaps even linking to a potential gov #4, could be exciting.

I also think that the near future is the most practical time to set this. If in the far future, then one loses site of what is possible. In the far past, there are a lot of assumptions that have to be made, and including Earth would be more difficult. However, in the near future, if done right, it can seem realistic.

My thoughts on time (somewhat linked with the first) are this:
The near future is the "normal" way of doing a story. Nova is like that, and many others. For some reason, I have a good "feel" like this because how did all these governments come to be in such a short time?
The far future (i.e. Foundation) allows more flexibility, and we have to do a lot of assumptions about technology anyways. As far as politics, those aren't assumptions, they are our conscious decisions about how we want our universe to be.
The far past is one that allows us to redefine the (pre-)history of Earth, as in HHG2G.

None of this applies if Earth does not exist.

I'm thinking 5 for Earth would be a bit more appropriate, as it would open up more storyline possibilities, and somewhere between 2 and 3 for the time period.. The universe doesn't have to be as old as the Novaverse, but it shouldn't be so young as to impede the pilot in traveling and day-to-day things such as cargo missions.

Perhaps Earth could be the main reason behind the Monarchy's existence?

For Earth, 5. For time period, I'm leaning to 3.

Quote

Perhaps Earth could be the main reason behind the Monarchy's existence?

That just gave me an idea for their back story. Perhaps their religion could revolve around Earth somehow, such as seeing it as a sort of eden or heaven. Their prophet could be someone from Earth or someone who claimed to be from Earth (and preferably dead for time now, perhaps martyred). Maybe they could even be called something like the Disciples of Earth, stemming from the name idea I've been using thus far, or something along those lines. But, regardless, finding Earth could be one of their goals.

What exactly constitutes near vs. far future? If it's the near future (I'm thinking anywhere before 3000 AD) then it'll be hard to explain how Earth was lost. But if near future means like, by the year 10000 AD and the far future would refer to something exceedingly far from now (50000 years or more) than I would say go for the near future.

I would suggest having some interesting scenarios with time disruption and whatnot worked into the story before FTL drives. Two cultures or groups could have begun together, but one could be significantly older than the other due to time lag from high-speed non-hyperspace space travel. My inspiration for this idea comes from the book "Hyperion" in which cryosleep and time lag could cause two people, a couple, for instance, to be separated for a time and separate their ages drastically - in the book one character began younger than the other, and thanks to space travel on her partner's part, ended up nearing death by old age when he had only grown a few years.

Of course, some parts of that section of the book creeped me out like nothing else, so maybe it's not such a good idea. Needless to say, it couldn't really be worked into the storyline very well, and the idea is that hyperspace and hypergates equalize time to some degree, so it could only really exist in the backstory.

I like near future SIFIish stuff but in this TC it wouldn't work. my near future being aprox 2500 AD with no hyperlinks only hypergates and wormholes.

See, that's what I think we shouldn't do; try to make something "unique" by eliminating hyperdrives and forcing the player to use hypergates and whatnot to get around. We should keep the scope of the game limited to something similar to, say, EVO, in my opinion.

And thats why I said it wouldn't work.

I would personally suggest using hyperspace and hypergates (although hyperspeed would be the primary thing) to get around, but my suggestion (or rather, idea; I didn't really suggest that it should be done in this particular case) earlier was simply to include periods of low-travel ability in the backstory.

Maybe do like AG and make hyperjumps take up many days, as incentive to use hypergates? Tangetnt: many-day hyperjumps+multijump outfit would be an ... interesting ... combination.

The general consensus appears to be that Earth is hidden, and thus the TC must be set in the semi-far or far future.
This leads to my next question: whence comes the pilot?
I've fancied the thought that he comes from Earth, giving opportunity to plot hooks for later. Some people spoke against that on the grounds that the introduction should not tie the player to a storyline. Well, maybe it would only be an opportunity For example, if you do the delivery to Earth, but never return to Earth and instead start another mission thread, then that Vell-os who looked at you will have absolutely no significance (well, not directly. I hope my point is taken). Note: if I have strong ideas, they're from my vaporware TC, which is not this TC, which exists.
Should we have multiple chars, one for each government (probably true during testing)? with the possibility of changing sides?

For testing purposes multiple chars are a good idea. For the release version of the game, we should probably stick with one default char.

@of-doom, on Nov 14 2008, 10:14 PM, said in Open Source TC:

And thats why I said it wouldn't work.

Oh, sorry... that's what I get for posting late.

I think we should stick to hyperjunping as the main way of getting around.

Agreed. If someone designed a new 'system' of travel it would be cool to add a fourth way to travel...

Magic! Teleportation missions on planets.

This post has been edited by of doom : 19 November 2008 - 05:06 PM

I know! After a week in a system it randomly teleports you to new a system where you must figure out what's going on and somehow solve the crisis in that system or group of systems.

Technically, the stock scenario already has four modes of travel; hyperspace, sub-light flight, hypergates/wormholes, and the last mission in every storyline where the player is moved into s7evyn. We don't want to scare the player away.

This post has been edited by JacaByte : 19 November 2008 - 07:43 PM