The time is 2000 years in the future, mankind has spread across the stars, terraforming planets as it expands. The Human empire has crumbled, and fractured into many independent stellar kingdoms. However, four of these star kingdoms have arisen, Antares, Regulus, Algol and Pavus, to unite the human race once again, and rule. You are the supreme admiral of the Fleet, and it is your job, via diplomacy, subterfuge and strategy, to conquer the quadrant.
This is an adaption of the Boardgame 4000AD, each turn you will command the ships in your fleet to expand across the board, win combats and eventually take the enemy home stars. To travel from Star to Star, a ship must create a warp bubble and enter Hyper Space. Hyper Space is an alternate dimension, where a fleet of ships moves in a non-deterministic line at a constant velocity, completely undetectable from this dimension. In this way they travel across the starmap to different locations.
A fleet in hyperspace only has three statistics associated with it, The number of ships in the fleet, the origin, and the number of turns in hyperspace. Conveniently one turn is the exact unit of time needed to travel one sector (Pair of stars on the starmap). But Kashyyk, there are 4 stars per sector! Indeed there is, but space is three dimensional, which is hard to represent with a two dimensional medium. Imagine two layers of stars, all the yellow ones on the top layer and the red ones beneath. The Distance between the two layers is also, conveniently, one turn. Thus we now have our pairs of stars in each sector, designated by it's Coordinate and it's colour, for example B3 Red would be either Algenib, or Fomalhaut.
In order to work out the travel time between two stars, you have to count the sectors between the origin and the destination, including the one you start in. You must count along the shortest route and not count diagonally. Therefore, to get from Polaris (C3 Red) to Markab (B3 Yellow) would take three turns. One in C3 Red, the second in B3 Red and the third in B3 Yellow. To get from Sol (B2 Red) to Alpha Centauri (B2 Red) would therefore take one turn. However, the turn a fleet goes into transit is included in the count, therefore a fleet leaving Sol effectively arrives at Alpha Centauri instantly, or would arrive at Sirius (C2 Red) next turn.
Therefore, to get from one corner of the starmap (say A1 Red) to the opposite corner (D3 Yellow) would take 7 turns. However, if a fleet were to be in hyperspace for longer than seven turns, or less if you are in the center of the quadrant, it's destination would be beyond known space and would be lost forever.
Arrival and departure to a star happens effectively simultaneously, thus it is possible for a warp bubble to dissipate, release it's ships and for that fleet to instantly create another one and leave again. If however, an enemy fleet is present in the system, the interference generated will prevent either fleet from leaving until one side is destroyed. If one fleet arrives at a star as an opposing fleet leaves however, both sides are unhindered by the other, and plans proceed as normal.
Due to the complex nature of phasing out of this dimension and into hyperspace, only one warp bubble can be created each turn. However, once there, it is a simple matter to maintain and sustain the bubble, and to bring the fleet back into this dimension. Therefore, multiple bubbles can be sustained or dissipated a turn. It is also a simple matter of logarithm's to scale the size of a bubble thus one ship can just as easily travel as one hundred can.
The hull of a ship is made from easily gathered materials, but the rare elements needed for the combat field and the warp bubble projector are only present in a few systems. These systems are represented with a O on them. No matter how many fully functional ships you can build they will be useless without crew. There are only a few systems with the spare population available to fully crew an interstellar battleship, these systems are represented with a + on them.
For every set of Resources you have, a ship can be built. Ships are built at the beginning of every turn, at any system which has both resources on it. A single system may build more than one ship a turn, so long as the resources are available elsewhere. Resources are transported instantaneously across your empire thanks to the Molecular Transport System. Unfortunately, Whole ships are too large to travel though the MTS.
A system is available to claim resources from if you have a ship present in the system. The only way to seize a system and it's resources from an opponent is to destroy the ships present and substitute your own.
If at any time your Home Star is taken by an opponent, You will be unable to create more ships, even if you have a system resourceful enough to do so. It is however possible to seize another Home Star and claim it as your own, and recommence construction.
Each Battleship is equipped with a Combat Field Generator. This essentially creates a large force field, which presses upon it's target and crushes it. Combat Field Generators are easily capable of combining their fields to create a united and more powerful front. When two Combat Fields oppose one another, each fleet will ramp up the power to try and overcome their opponents field. This will cause the smaller of the two fleets to either be crushed under the larger field, or have their Field Generators burn out, dooming the ship to internal explosions and an unopposed aggressive Combat field.
This style of combat always results in the largest fleet winning with no casualties, and the losing being utterly destroyed. Combat always takes a turn to do, thus preventing a fleet from departing mid battle. Whenever two or more opposing fleets are at the same star system they will always engage in combat unless both fleets are specifically ordered not to.
In the case of a draw between the two largest fleets in the combat, every single ship is destroyed and the star reverts back to it's independence.
It is entirely possible, and encouraged, to create secret alliances between players. My only requirement is that I'm CC'd.
The Win condition is either total annihilation of all opponents by destroying every single opposing fleet, or to securely hold all four Home Stars, preventing enemy construction and making annihilation inevitable.
So, after that wonderful wall of text, I'm looking for two to four players. Each player starts with fifteen ships at their home star. A turn consists of a PM to me containing your commands regarding each warp bubble. Claiming a spot involves choosing one of the four Home Stars I mentioned in the Opening Text and a color from Orange, Blue, Pink and Green.
Feel free to point out any confusing/grammar/other mistakes in this, It's currently 1am for me
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Topic: Re: 4000AD - Interstellar Warfare Game - Turn 2! 1 new player needed (Read 2175 times)