So I guess the two pieces I hadn’t noticed were the ability to directly impact other players’ production, and the idea that you would actually be supplying these resources to a global economy. That all sounds great! Thanks for the reply.
So much of this game is different from other RTS games that the standard tactical triangle is not really applicable (although, I suppose, their are riskier strategies - like skipping water in hopes that the price will stay low - that might be thought of as a bit of a “rush” gamble…)
I’m not sure if there is a “rush” strategy. We want to avoid that “walking dead” issue in RTS games where you know the game is over but are going to have to go through the motions for another 15 minutes. (EMP some of their power plants while stealing another while also causing an energy shortage, for example.) However, it should be said that - like many board games - there is a certain point that gets passed where the game should not really allow comebacks and should hopefully allow the top players to take out the bottom players as quickly as possible.
That’s a good situation to use the Espionage building to trigger an artificial shortage to drive up the price.Īs for comebacks, if you combine some black market items effectively, you could cripple another play and overtake them. (“Oxygen Shortage!”) Third, a slow but steady demand affects all of the resources but especially the more finished products (chemicals, glass, goods) which can be thought of almost as “cash crops” although they have their other uses as well (especially chemicals).Ģ-player games are quite interesting because it is likely that you might be the only player producing a specific resource. (The drone is an AI-controlled ship that launches from the colony as soon as you decided to claim a tile.) The market is determined by three things. There is a randomly-generated map of hexes, with discrete amounts of resources on each hex (low water, high iron, etc.) After founding a colony, players can claim these hexes, and whichever drone gets their first gets the claim. Maybe you can develop claims that become insolvent if you’ve overreached?Īnyway, I’m sure all these questions will get answered at some point along the way. I see how the control side could work, but I’m unclear on how something akin to a rush could be implemented. How do you make a comeback mechanism in a game like this? I suppose resource discovery and depletion could be one way, but it seems like there should also be some agency to it - some way for one side to play “control” while the other plays “rush”. Is the market purely between the players, or is there an intermediary? In other words, can you corner the market on a certain resource, and if so how does that work in a 2-player game? Are market interactions purely one-shot resource dumps, or can you have a contract for a portion of production over a longer term? Are there supply lines? What determines who gets to develop a specific resource location? Can resources be discovered or depleted? Apparently there are maps that contain the raw resources everyone is competing for, so the refineries and such must also be placed on the maps somewhere. Personally, I’m excited about the idea to the extent that I understand it, but I’m having trouble envisioning how the market and the development of claims play out in real time. What are the worries? Seems like this would be a good place to discuss them. I want to see a couple of potential worries addressed before getting interested- premise sounds promising, but want to hear more before committing.