Announcing! Aldebaran 1.beta.1 (prerelease notes)

[Kassiopeia]

I scribbled up some new name propositions for the Nauticons, though these aren't any better then the original one if not worse.

- Submariners
- Planet/Star/Space Marines
- Aquanauts
- Aquamarines
- Neospartans

Planetlovers:

- Planetfriends
- Deirdreans
- Servants (of Planetmind)
- Mindkeepers
- Planetkeepers

[Avenoct]

Blake,

I figured something like a new game must have happened . Ah, well, your feedback is still quite useful.

I think there is a grey-matter ceiling for the AI, and it's kinda in the basement.

I've now run 64 full-auto games with the AI, and played half-way through 4 myself, since starting this project. There's a big difference between the two. Three major stumbling blocks:

1. When the AI is passive, playing by itself, it does incredibly well, at least compared to Smac. As I've said, ecodamaging in 50 years in some cases, focusing well on tech (had labs at 650 labs/turn in 150 years from one faction), and generally having a ball. This falls apart when war starts however, as the involved AI's switch to wartime production, which crushes them. This happy state is also, as you've mentioned, too easy to abuse for the Veteran. Last night I turned the corner on a Transcend game vs. the AI. Because one of the AI had the jungle, the other factions were willing to continue a war against them that I manufactured by framing that faction. It's too easy to make treaties with the laid-back AI, then to use those treaties more effectively than the AI.

2. AI will never prioritize research as a human will, nor will it be able to upgrade, use the disband trick, rebuild eco-damage reducing facs (though it builds them well enough), or of course, use crawlers.

3. I've needed some sort of factory for the AI, and some sort of eco-damage reducing fac early, to help them get their minerals up to snuff around the time the human gets crawlers. While it works to some degree, the human can use these facs even better than the AI.

Your report r/e tree farms matches Vel's, and though I've not tried it (I usually wait on the buggers till I get my crawler-minerals going), I think we're going to have to solve it, as well as the Direct Control Unit. I propose either pushing the TF's back and/or banning the human use of the DCU factory. The AI will build Planetparks when it ecodamages, but that's ok. It tends to do fine with farms for food at this point. Do you think these restrictions would help?

This is the second time you've brought up the terraforming costs...I'm going to have to do something with that. It is different now, but apparently not enough so. I'm starting to like the 0-2-1 or 0-2-2 idea. The human exploits the forest better than the AI, still! Argh! At least the AI now terraforms pretty much the best that it possibly can...mixing forest with farms....ah the pastoral landscape...not unlike NZ eh Blake? Then of course it gets solar, and then mines which ruins the pretty picture, but ah well. I might also experiment with really cheap..like 1 turn terraforming. Since the human has the tendency to make more formers, perhaps this will limit that strategy? I've had games where 1/2 the AI's have more terraformers than bases though, and that was one of my goals, which succeeded...seems that when the AI isn't getting enough of something, it builds a terraformer, so on dry maps before Gastric Frontiers, it builds lots of terraformers. Mutter.

Soil Enrichers are already on Gastric Frontiers, or so they should be...

I think I'll also experiment a bit with more agressive factions vs. pacifist ones...see how I, as a human do in both environments.

Kassiopeia, my pick would be 'Aquanauts' (or the current Nauticons) and 'Servants of Planet' or 'Planetkeeprs' from that grouping. What does everyone else think? Anyone with a navy background? I need basenames for the Nauti's.

Some general notes:

1. It appears that I might just have to make two sets of factions. One for the player and one for the AI. This will largely solve the problems of the 'grey-matter ceiling'. Simply, at the start of a game, once you'd decided what faction you'd like to play, you'd reload the 'player version' faction, which would have the stats that the current factions now have (with some slight changes yet to come), and perhaps even be a little weaker (say make tech-rate slower, or rushbuild penalties as in the Syndicate). The AI factions would have major boosts to research, growth, industry. This is a pretty inelegant solution. When a player is playing vs. these AI super-factions, it's going to be sadly obvious how much the AI is cheating! Perhaps these AI factions could be bundled with tougher human factions for a Veteran's Edition? What do you think?

2. I'd really like to release the public beta soon. Cybergod, how soon do you think you can mock up some graphics? Also, if anyone cares to take a peek at the help-text situation...I just wish that were stable.

3. Have any of you noticed the increase in hills and rivers? Also, has anyone played with artillery yet? Together these make for fun warfare, IMO.

4. In light of Blake's and Vel's feedback, expect TF's to be moved back. Also, I'm thinking it should be ok to ban player use of the DCU factory and the 'disband' trick. The AI doesn't use the disband 'feature', so this seems fair. The DCU could be seen as an AI facility, that's what it's there for. Again, inelegant, damn.

Oh, by the way, I even tried making the drones it creates to '-2', but alas, I can't make it a drone-control factory.

5. Been experimenting with early and weakened cookie-cutter choppers, including a transport chopper, but can't get it to work properly...I'll let you know.

6. The kelp-enricher should work...but not sure why it doesn't...like a soil enricher, it has the same key-code as a farm, 'f'. Occasionally the AI sea-formers get stuck doing nothing, and I think it's b/c this doesn't work properly. Will try to fix this.

That's the news! Thanks for the feedback and work! Please let me know if my Beta-posting is annoying your email inbox.

-Smack

[Blake]

By "ban the use of..." DCU and Disband trick, do you mean just telling players not to use them?

On terraforming:
On the whole, other than the new tech tree it seems the exact same strategies from SMAC work in Aldebaran (forest n' forget..), if you want to make the game new experience then changing how the terraforming works would be one option... unfortunately it would require a new round of testing. If you decide to change the terraforming then it could be changed to favour the AI, the most important change being:

Forest:
1,2,1 -> 0,2,2
Do you eat trees? Well, in New Zealand nothing grows in forests that is terribly edible (other than birds), and I believe this is the case in most countries - food comes from farms and the sea, resources come from mines and forests. Indeed the fastest growing trees (conicals) tend to destroy any underlying plant life, making the land only usefull for the trees. Also only the hardiest trees would survive the alien landscape, and fruit trees usually aren't very hardy.

From a gameplay point of view the AI's tendency to build farms would heed it well, because farms become essintial for growth.

Farms: These would have to come early, maybe available from the start.
Mines: These would still come with mineral restriction lifting (altough the farm/mine combo isn't so bad when forests dont produce food).
Solars: Whenever, basically once you have farms you start wanting to put things on them, like solars.

Rec tanks: 2-1-1 or 2-0-2
I struggle to think of usfull things you can build from grandpas corpse, Rec tanks would probably produce fertilizer to improve food production. The decompisition process also generates usfull energy.


Treefarms: These could still come reasonably early.
With the advent of tree farms ways are found of introducing native Aldebaran edibles into the forests, making more effective use of the land.


With the advent of gastic frontiers native edibles can be re-introduced to farmland, improving productivity (prehaps earth plants dont fare too well in the aldebaran enviroment, but at time of landing they dont know how to process aldebaran plants, hence the nut restrictions).
Possible name for soil enricher: "Aldebaran Edibles", "Aldebaran Crops", "Native Edibles", "Subsurface Farm", "Underground cavern", "Fungal Farm". The order would be "Cultivate", "Construct" or "Plant".

(prehaps these native edibles actually grow underground, like earthly truffles, which is why they can be grown in the same land as earth plants)

Just some ideas...

[Avenoct]

So I went ahead and made a set of AI factions that are pretty powerful. They look like the human-player version, but have bonuses to techrate, industry, and in some cases economy or growth. So far, this looks good. Also, have slowed general research rate to 80 percent of normal. I'm going to now test 'freeforming' just really cheap terraforming, to see how the AI handles it, and then I'm going to try setting the AI factions to 'Erratic' and then 'Aggressive' and play against them.

Blake, I'm starting to like this 'Aldebaran Edibles' thing! You might get a terrform named after you: 'The Blake Xenophagi Improvement' or somesuch.

As to the practical applications...not sure...this will need testing, but I think I can do some of this with 'auto-games' and varying the terraform costs and availability. If it seems better than what we've got, we'll then have to player-test it.

I don't know why I'm so attached to the AI using Trees. It just seems there must be some way to have them make nice forests and then kick human butt! I suppose this will just take more experimenting.

I did mean simply a rule whereby players aren't allowed to use the DCU or the Disband strategy. I know one of the fun parts of beating an AI strat game is finding the weaknesses and exploiting them, but for lack of a better avenue....the only other thing to do would be to make the drones from the DCU something huge, like 4, and then give all AI factions 'TALENT, 2' or something.

Ramble ramble...need to get those auto-games underway. How do you feel about the separation of AI versions for factions, and Human versions? It's really not hard to do, its just the aesthetic is wrong.

Oh, I've got the choppers to work, so now there are several 'weak' choppers available earlier as cookie-cutter types. There's an air-defense chopper, a Transport chopper (very fun), and later, a weak assault chopper. They don't move very far, but add a new dimension to the battlefield, which is already better (I think).

That's all for now,

Smack

[Blake]

Whoa, be carefull how you use my name, I dont want it to imply I'm edible or something

On that note I forgot to mention I'd prefer the Mesa be called "Blakes Plateo" (sp?) or "Blakes Mesa", or "Blakes Highland". 'The Blake' implies that the mesa thingy is actually Blake, which is just wrong.

Just for my personal amusment (and others befuddlement) dont suppose the place names "Renwick", "Blenheim", "Marlborough" or "Canterbury" could be slipped into the huge map of Aldebaran or one of the scenerios, they are respectivly the two closest towns to where i live, and the two provinces in which I live.


More on names, altough they are really boring people some of my computer science lecturers have rather strange names.

Professor Tadao Takaoka
Dr Wolfgang Kreutzer
Dr Krzysztof Pawlikowski
Dr Antonija Mitrovic
Richard Pascoe
Carl Cerecke
Warwick Irwin

So if ever short of first/last names for people in factions / stories you might like to give my dull lecturers a thought .

Onto more serious business *ahem*
AI super-factions are a good idea, the SE bonuses AI benefit from most are support, economy, industry, I'd advise staying away from Growth, if only because it makes the AI's bigger bases more attractive targets for conquest, and big bases are a more obvious sign of cheating than smaller more powerfull bases. If you give the AI +2 or +3 support it should pretty much eliminate the mineral-eating support problems when they go into military mode.

The naming convention for AI factions should probably be have an X on the end for AI factions, so if for example the human faction was 'peace.txt' the AI would be 'peaceX.txt', in the veteran alpha.txt the 'X' factions are loaded by default, and the human reloads the non-X version, in the standard version the standard factions are loaded, and if the player wishes to fight tough enemies reloads the X versions (if a player doesn't copy the veteran alpha.txt they dont need to worry about super factions at all).



On pop-booming, I notice one SE has +4 growth, are you sure it's a good idea to have an SE used specifically for pop-booming? I would lean towards eliminating the possibilty of pop-boom altogether, or the pop-boom SE should have more servere penalites, maybe -3 effic , -5 police, making pop-booming a very painfull experience, in effect crippling the economy and military for the duration of the boom.
The lack of pop-boom would encourage steady growth, and would give the human one less tool for wrapping up the game.

[Avenoct]

Beta 2.1 sent.

Here's the Readme for 2.1, skip to the end for additional discussion.

Dear Beta Group,

Well, after a TON of testing, and taking recent testing by Blake esp. into consideration, I've made 'the split' as I call it. More on that in a second. I think I should step aside here and mention that one of the goals of Aldebaran is to make the AI play as darn near as well as it possibly can. This is for increased fun in general: When you see that AI aircraft carrier pull up, you'll know what I mean! But it's also because the very best Smac players need new challenges, while those of us in the middle (and I consider myself here) can simply play up or down a level, depending on what kind of game we desire. I don't know anyone who HAS to play on the easiest level, well except for my pet goldfish.

This is a 'full install' minus the graphics. Some faction names have changed slightly, so these might not overwrite all the old ones...as before, dump all these files into the place you keep Aldebaran.

That said, I'll explain 'the split'. It's not as elegant as the other improvements to the game, such as finally getting the AI to do some terraforming, etc., but it helps a lot....

The Split

Basically, there are now factions for the AI, and factions for the player. It's not as complex as it sounds. As a player, all you need do is load the appropriate 'version' of the faction you choose to play. Otherwise, it will default to the supercharged AI faction of the same name. The player versions of the factions remain normal, while the AI factions get the suffix 'ai'.

So, to load your player faction for say the Planetlovers:

1. Get your game set up as usual, then when you've selected the Planetlovers, click 'Load Faction'.

2. You'll get a prompt with the Planetlover-AI codename highlighted to show you this is the current faction: it'll say 'PLANETLOVERAI'.

3. Remove the 'AI' part, and say ok. That's it.

[4. You as the beta group will need to rename and duplicate the graphics for the factions. It would be silly to send them again. Basically, match up a graphics file with each faction file. Note: The names have been cleaned up a bit. None end in vowels, and none are plural, so change that accordingly.]

The nuts and bolts of the split: The factions are similar to their Human counterparts, but have various boosts to research, growth, industry, and/or economy. Some of their weaknesses have gone. Also, all the AI factions have faster techrates than the human versions. Obviously, you can open the files if you'd like to see the exact modifications.


Other New Features for Beta 2.0

Choppers! There are three new choppers: The Transport Chopper, The Air-Defense Chopper, and the Light Assault Chopper. They are available at different points in the game, and the AI actually uses them. So can you! If you know how to 'cheat' the design workshop and retroengineer the chassis, don't!

There is a super-aircraft carrier available at a certain point. It'll look funny in the design workshop (not sure why, but it appears as 'just' a silksteel gunboat), and looks hilarious in the field. It's a great ship.

Tree Farms are way back there now...hard to get to. The AI handles this fine.

I went through a lot of tests with terraforming...from making everything nearly free, to making forests 0-2-2, or 3-1-1, to changing the base square production, etc.

To make a long story short, I've returned to the normal 'forests'. Farms are better, Soil Enrichers are now 'Xenophagi' and use the letter 't' on land and in the sea (pretty sure it works now Blake). Monliths, Bonus squares are a little different.

Costs changed slightly for probe teams and terraformers, but more significantly, only the first 8 minerals are 'exempt' from retool penalties, players start with only 10 energy, not 100 as it was.

Ah, a few other things, but I'm too tired to remember right now. I'm really excited to see how the veterans handle the game now, and I think it'll still be just as fun for the rest of us!

If you have any questions, let me know. Remember to dupe and rename your graphics if you want them. And keep up the feedback! I'm really going to push to finish this in the next 10 days, at least the public beta. I hate seeing projects like this just fall to the neglected piles of 'good ideas that never happenned'. I'm determined that Aldebaran will be stable and playable, and a challenge for all. Also, I'll go into more detail about AI refinements on the Apolyton thread.

-Smack

P.S. If you want to just use the new Alpha with the old factions as AI's, that's fine, just reload them or change the alphatext to force it to do so for you (it's at the end). -Smack


Notes:

Well Blake, it appears we had the same idea for the AI superfaction names. Great minds, or something...

Er, I would post some notes on the tests I ran, but basically for now, know that I DID try to set forests at different levels, and I did run a test with 'freeforming' where everything took one turn to build. That was humorous. But, I ended up back where I started. If forests are 0-2-2 the AI never uses the square, even though it builds them! And variations. Changing the Base square production from 2-1-1 to 1-1-1 had major effects but they were too harsh...it's a good trick though. The AI can build Colony Pods with only 1 population, and the player can't. With only 1 nut from the base square, the worker completes the requirement for 1 citizen, or if they have a farm, grows one food. ouch! And many other things. I hope you have fun with the new super-factions and that my install directions (repeated above) make some kind of sense...when I return to coherence, I'll return here.

-Smack

[Avenoct]

Basil might have solved the 'retroengineer' bug in another thread...I'll test this tomorrow:

(1) Choppers. I personally like the solution of reducing their movement. But if you want to have standardized choppers that can't be retro-engineered, I think you can do it by assigning the standardized chopper a cost. I haven't tested this, but I notice that all the standard units with a fixed cost don't show up in your unit workshop and so can't be retro-engineered, while the ones with variable costs do.

But the Mesa is a Blake! I suppose it shouldn't be edible though

I think we can work some of those Kiwi/English names into the Huge map...

Those are odd Professor names...great for the new Syndicate or Universaility..let's see what our creative-types have to say.

You might have convince me about the pop-booming. But it's so fun! You're right though, it just helps the player wrap up a win..push an advantage....Hrm, what 'Production' SE should we make up in it's stead (instead of Citizens)?

G'night!

Smack

[Cybergod]

Smack, how big IS this new bate update? I am asking this since I believe that you have crashed my email account !!! I can't access it (mail.yahoo.com) and it says that there is a problem with my ac**** and that it should eb sorted shortly, if not contact system admin.!

Oh well, on the brighter note, finished graphics for the Universali, Planetlovers, Syndicate, Peaceniks (I like this name), I didn't get to edit the Nauticon yet and I am half-way through editing the Outlaws. The The G.A. is finished except that I am waiting to receive the beta group feedback as to whether we keep the Shodan face.

No Smack, I did not receive the plot and would really appreciate it if I could get it REALLY soon (send it on cybergod@localgenius.com).

Names:
Hey! Dr. Antonija Mitrovic has a very similar name to mine!

What about "New Gaia Foundation" for Planetlovers? Gaia's Children/Offspring(s)? And maybe for Nauticon - Neoaquatica?

The graphic files do not fit the maximum size that can be sent to this thread so I'll post new pics to Smack, when (and if) I get my email account back...

[Avenoct]

Cybergod, That Beta 2.1 is 53k zipped, so that's not the problem. I sent a long a 5k patch for a typo I made.

Sorry to hear that you can't access yahoo. my excitemail account has been shutting down a lot recently too. Major pain.

Can't wait to see the new graphics! I'll send the plot outline to you right now. I think you'll see why it might be good to save 'dat ugli face wid da cigar hangin out it's mouf' for another faction to appear halfway through the scenarios. I do like the face.

Happy Crawlering,

Smack

[Edit: Well, havn't field tested the kelp enricher, but the alphatext is right when it says that the keystroke-definitions aren't accessible. The ones listed in alphatext are only visual references, not the actualy keystroke. You'll notice when you go to make a farm or soil-enricher that you press 'f' but the letter 't' shows up. That's why!

Further, the new AI's seem tougher, stronger, better all around, but! I didn't mention that I did fool around with making them all 'erratic' or 'aggressive'; They simply can't handle it. I've kept them all passive for now. I'm thinking of making two versions then, one 'normal' Aldebaran, and then an Aldebaran.veteran edition. This way I can really max out the super-AI's for the vets, I can also leave out the extra factions for the regular edition, and, I think I can go back to a mix of personalities with both editions: what I mean is, have most passive factions (for the great infrastructure), but toss in an erratic and an agressive faction or two to stir things up a bit. Not sure about this last part though.

Just discussing this a bit further...I think that even though the player will be able to make treaties more easily, that at a certain point, ie, when the player becomes a real powerhouse, that the AI will gang up on the player pretty nastily. So, the first 50 or so years will be apple-pie, trading tech and whatnot, but as the borders encroach, as things get tighter, as the player gets stronger, the AI will turn nasty. That's been my experience. Oh, and at least for the first three scenarios, Transcendence isn't an option, so the player will have to get mighty to win. I reccomend turning off the transcend option for beta testing. The games are more fun anyways!

Also, how do you like the new +2 food for farms? I might have to change it back to 1, not sure yet.- Smack]

[Edit2: I've solved the DCU and Disband problem. The player can use any cheat they want and will still have a majorly hard time beating the AI on Transcend now. The AI factions are a powerhouse!
Blake, thanks for the pointer about not using 'growth' boosters for the AI factions..industry and/or econ are the keys. With one more round of player-testing I think the AI, alpha, and factions are mechanically done! I'm going to use names of old Greek towns for the Nauticons btw, unless I hear a better idea. I've pushed the soil-enricher back a bit, and tuned down the farms again..you'll see. Also, Scenario One is a Wrap...'Welcome to Aldebaran' is basically a normal game on the huge map of Aldebaran, with a few secret tricks. The huge map I sent the beta group has changed a wee bit. I'm now working on Scenarios 2 and 3, which require the creation of the second Galactic Faction and the Superrace. Very shortly I'll need a name for these guys.
Also, I'm going to put a 'Novice' version in cryogenic storage, for those just wanting to play at the easier levels, stoned people, or goldfish.
I'm biting my tongue trying not to say 'Betatest!' - G'night! ]

[Avenoct]

Recently Completed

Scenarios 1-4 are done (yes, that's all the scenarios for now). There's a hugemap version and standard map version for each one but #4.

New factions for the Galactic Colonists and the Xeti (superrace) done.

A few final tweaks to the AI, factions, terraforming, done.

Huge map of Aldebaran Done, Standard map also done.

Huge: developed, then PB'd, then fungused map of Chiron done for scenario 4.


To Do List:
Get Beta Feedback
Finish Techlongs
Complete Graphics
Add in the 'Interludes' for the scenarios and main game (waiting for storyclips)
Add nifty scifi quotes for the blurbs, etc. (being worked on)
Get Beta Feedback

I tend to ramble on, so I'm keepin' it short for now. I just have to tell you how much fun it was to PB Chiron and then re-tune it for Scenario 4. It was great fun.

-Smack

P.S. Check out the latest chapters of the story 'Aldebaran' by Kassiopeia, it's coming along!

[Avenoct]

News from Aldebaran

Kassiopeia and I (well, mostly Kass) have been working to finish up the blurbs and tech-longs, for those of us who read those things! We've got some really great ones that will add a bit of culture to the new techs.

I'm still tweaking the AI and player factions (and getting my butt kicked in SP games!) and don't know when the graphics will be finished, but I'm hopeful that we can release the beta in about a week.

-Smack

[Cybergod]

Smack, within around 20 mins I will finishe the last of the faction graphics as I was searching desperately around the net for a good head portrait for the Nauticon (or whatever you decide to call them). When I'm done, I'll email it to you since Apolyton doesn't support posting files larger than 200kb

[Cybergod]

Oh and by the way, I suggest adding a TALENT rating to Citizen and Utopian SE options (see thread associated with talents ).

[Cybergod]

Sorry for sending 3 posts in a row but it needs to be said:

THE GRAPHICS ARE DONE AND POSTED TO SMACK!!!

Thank you for your attention

[Avenoct]

The Daily News from Aldebaran

I think I scared off my beta testers with the last release!

(Note to Self: maybe you should make a new thread with a download and show how simple it is to work with the new superfactions)

Just recieved the new graphics, thanks to Cybergod!

Agreed on the TALENT idea Cybergod. the name 'Citizens' is remaining, but the growth factor is being reduced and +1 Talent being tacked on.

I'm going to need playtesters for the scenarios.

And away we go!

-Smack