How Many Factions Should There Be?

[MysticWind]

My original idea was based on this assertion by this review:

The Data Angels? The Cult of Planet? The PIRATES? I shuddered as I thought I was looking at Alpha Centauri 90210. The original factions of SMAC were believable, mature archetypes--groups you could actually envision emerging in a far-flung colony, at least if you've watched Planet of the Apes enough times. Merchants, librarians, religious fanatics. The factions of SMACX, on the other hand, seemed to have been drawn out of...well, let's just say I haven't seen a line up like that since I stopped watching movies on USA ("Okay, so there's this hacker, and her buddy sails the seven seas").

The review ultimately gives the factions a good review, since Alien Crossfire was made under the aegis of Firaxis and Sid Meier, after all.

Anyhow, are there any other mature archetypes one can imagine? Or have all of the big ideas for ideologies been used up?

By the way, I reject that University was in any way librarians, or rather, Librarians.

[WotanAnubis]

Originally posted by MysticWind
Anyhow, are there any other mature archetypes one can imagine? Or have all of the big ideas for ideologies been used up?

Well, the only one I can imagine right now (and since it's pretty late my thinking is currently all funky) are, shall we say, Primitives. The opposite of the University and the Consciousness - seeking to return mankind to its natural roots (whatever those are; presumably living in caves and eating raw meat), perhaps the only time in mankind's existence that humanity was truly pure (or so they'll have you believe).

Of course, the science hit they'll take would make the Believers look like a progressive thinktank.

[Brent]

Get rid of ideology based factions. Use continuations of Earth Civs. Have several choices for leader for each civ. Each is based on an ideology. The characters you didn't choose are your advisors. Advisors can leave your Civ. Then you won't be balanced.

I think there's a good case for ideologies being used up. Or you could just base each one on an actual political party from Earth: Fascists, Communists, Fundamentalists, Greens, there's at least dozens of choices you could use, but would they work for the game?

The Primitives would have to be nonplayer degenerate splitoffs. Can anyone think of any true advantages to give them? Maybe they could handle Planet's environment better than anyone else? Maybe Planet befriends them and helps them out supernaturally?

[Darsnan]

Originally posted by H.Humpel
Well, one of the reasons you can't find more of these "original" factions may be because of the parameters given to modify/build a faction.

I think another reason might be because everyone always thinks the game needs to be played on Planet, which then constricts gameplay because of the nature of Planet. If you were to place the Factions on a different planet (i.e. different ecosystem/ environment/ sociological context) why I think it would give rise to more diverse/ viable Faction ideologies. One example would be my Beta Lyrae mod where I replaced the 8th Faction with something significantly different. This became a viable approach because I created a believable storyline whereby the involved Factions were placed in this new environment.
Another really good idea is Ogie Oglethorpe's Ringworld idea. Here again your creating a whole new environment - so create viable Factions for that environment! An example of this in the Ringworld mod would be because the "Fall of the Cities" has occured on Ringworld (and if you don't understand the reference then read "The Ringworld Engineers" by Larry Niven) then the "Green" SE option should become the "Machine" SE option whereby Factions that are mechanically inclined have a greater chance of "capturing" the relics from the former rulers of the Ringworld (i.e. the 8th Faction units that are the leftover rogue machines from Pril's people).
There are many different options, if you simply think outside of the box....


D

[H.Humpel]

Originally posted by Darsnan
There are many different options, if you simply think outside of the box....

That's true... well, my point/approach is based on "staying inside the box" .
In this case there are hardly new ways or basic factions to find.
But when moving out of the box, you really need a lot of good thinking and ideas and try to stay some kind of realistic.
If it was too way-out SF I think ACAX wouldn't be that great (IMHO).
But I guess/believe this might be done some-how...

[MRT144]

more factions, more revolts, more units, more _____?

you guys fail to realize that more is not neccesarily better for a game

[Darsnan]

Originally posted by MRT144
more factions, more revolts, more units, more _____?

you guys fail to realize that more is not neccesarily better for a game

I agree with your statement that more is not necessarily better. However, from my experience in the PBEM world why I have witnessed the same Factions being played a myriad of ways, the only difference being the players who played the same Faction. So if you then expand the base number of Factions, you then increase exponentially the ways to play the game, which then increases again the ways/ methods to play the game! Therefore, if the Factional expansion is done correctly, the game benefits significantly. Its worth the effort/ risk, IMO.


D

[MRT144]

then it will have to be a whole new game. redesigning a game to accomidate more factions would be silly, and a minor technical point. I think the most id like to see is 14 because each of the 14 is different enough to exsist within the same game. i doubt that youd be able to create 20 more factions with different personalities.

[Brent]

A sequel should almost always have more of everything. A Civ sequel in particular should have more civs. What should be the focus of a SMAC sequel if not new Factions and still have it be a sequel to the original game? My best answer to that is expand to elsewhere in the Alpha Centauri system and maybe into interstellar space. Space stations you can play on may be required. Or maybe Earth got itself together, and sends a new colony ship after SMAC1 ends? Or you could have SMAC -1, a prequel about the progenitors.

[MRT144]

jesus, this is why sequels almost always suck. youre like the people that asked for episode 1

[H.Humpel]

Originally posted by Brent Or you could have SMAC -1, a prequel about the progenitors.

which is basically Civ 1... isn't it???
It is long ago that I played Civ 1 (or 2), but isn't the main goal to send a new colony to Alpha Centauri ???
There we are in SMAC... I always thought it was meant to be some kind of sequel to Civ.

[H.Humpel]

Originally posted by MRT144
more factions, more revolts, more units, more _____?
you guys fail to realize that more is not neccesarily better for a game

That's so true. It's never like more = better.
OK, I think there are two ways to talk about "more":

1. more faction etc. (as you "proposed" it)
well, I think there are some thing that would be nice to see in ACAX, like more KINDs of factions (like the ALIEN in ACAX, a new one might be AI) and some other of these "mores". But of course, you can easily go over the top with this and the game would lose its "magic". Balancing things like these are very hard to do!

2. more as a finer way of adjustments
with this "more" I mean a finer way to set things up, e.g.: PLANET just ranges from +3 to -3 and I think (for all the Social factors) a scale from -100 to 100 (or -255 to 256 for the computer freaks ) might be better. Sometimes the steps are too hard/high or easy/low.
Same for the things like "interested in power" etc. in the faction files. Just a yes/no isn't enough (IMHO).
Especially in term of diplomacy a finer structure would be nice, too!
This way, you get more choices and a more complex system without using more categories.

Just a quick thought which is hard to put in the right words for a non-native English speaker...

[waab]

@thread
Actuly I don't want any new big factions, I just want better diplomatics and even more politics. To remove the ideology based factions as Brent suggested make me shiver. The fundation of SMAC is the ideology based factions, and therefore I prefere a better political arena and a better trading bord.

This is the reason why I am suggesting that there only should be seven big factions. Then let the "great leaders" influense other to spring there own factions.

Subleaders could be good no more then 2 per faction is needed, IMHO they should only appear when a subfactions does.

@MRT144
let people dream

[Brent]

SMAC -1 would not be about humans on Earth, it would be about the alien progenitors introduced in SMACX.

[Commy]

More is not better...seven factions, seven idealogies...it works, its simple, you can get attached to seven people...you can understand, remember, and really play seven factions...adding more just ruins the point...

Furthermore, having factions that are "communists, fascists, socialists, libertarians, democratists..." would destroy one very good aspect of SMAC...having factions based on idealogy, while maybe not the most realistic, makes the game what it is...you can't get attached to some Russian dude and some American guy and some Chinese fro...but you can get attached to someone like Yang and Morgan...maybe you don't like them, but you really know them, you understand them, they are what makes the game really deep...SMAC is made to get us away from reality, to look into the future that we can shape and control...bringing in factions from our lifetime and our experiences just depresses the game and ruins all hopes of the game really being successful...

If you want real nations from earth, make a mod for it, but I don't think the game should be made that way...