Fwurg

[Chriz]

I have been thinking about an alternative for piracy patrol on outposts for a while now and have been thinking about giving the outpost defences to fend of pirates on its own. Since building a planetary defence grid around the outpost sounds rather boring I have created this proposal to station an army on the outpost that defends the outpost from pirates as long as it receives the necessary weapons.

Distributed Outpost Defense Technologies

Traditionally outposts have no defense and rely on military fleets that patrol for them. An army could be stationed on an outpost and perform the same task for the outpost with the right materials.

This technology allows you to detach an army onto your outpost and unlocks the Distributed Army Outpost special project.

Cost: 1500 / 4
Prerequisites: Compacted Defence Facilities

Distributed Army Outpost

This special project makes it possible for the outpost to protect itself from pirates. The outpost has an efficient distributed army base that can house an army to protect the outpost from pirates as long as it receives the necessary weapons.

This special project can be applied to an outpost to create a distributed army outpost.

When an army is stationed in this distributed army base on the outpost that receives 20 / , next to the regular upkeep of the outpost, the outpost no longer requires piracy patrol.

Cost: 100 + 500
Prerequisites: Distributed Outpost Defense Technologies

Calculations:

period: 2 years = 104
piracy patrol: 150 /
sectors scanned: 7

total cost = 15600
cost per sector = 2228


My proposal:

Technology share : 1500 / 2 = 750
Special Project Army Base: 100 + 500 = 1000
Army construction: 2000 = 2000
Army upkeep: 2 years * 25 = 2600
Weapons requirement: 20 / for 0,75 / in 2 years = 1560

total = 7910

This is about half of the scanning cost that would normally provide 7 sectors. If you don't count the construction of the army since we don't count the military fleet required either it is still 1/3 of the total scanning cost.

[Stuiter]

This sounds as a good idea. As fleets cover a big area and and outposts only need protection in one hex.
Maybe we could made it more general so you can also use this on space habits.

[Brend]

As I already discussed with Chris I have a big problem with the proposal as it is now. I like the idea, but the current mechanics should not make it into the game in my opinion. They will remove the use of fleets, making them rather boring money-sinks once again. Without these mechanics, it is desirable for people to cooperate for the piracy patrol of their assets. With these mechanics, they won't.

(Warning: real 'Brend' post incoming! If you don't like figures or examples, skip to the TL;DR marker.)

For example, let's suppose players Alice and Bob play Alicistan (with colour red) and Bobworld (with color green) respectively. Figure 1 shows the space we are interested in.

Without technology

Figure 1: Colonizable space / Figure 2: Alicistan Outpost / Figure 3: Bobland Outpost

So, let's say Alicistan has grown enough to establishes an Outpost in sector B. This means she will have to build the outpost itself, and send in a fleet to patrol the area. This can be seen in Figure 2. Alice now has to pay 150 upkeep for the piracy patrolling fleet.

Upkeep for Alicistan: 150 .

Now, when Bobland has grown enough, they can establish an outpost in sector F, and share the upkeep of the Piracy patrol fleet with Alicistan. So, instead of paying 150 by themselves, both Alicistan and Bobland now only pay 75 upkeep to keep their outposts safe from pirates. Of course, any further outpost in the same 7-sector area makes this even cheaper, for example if Carolstan joins, the upkeep would be 50 .

Upkeep for Alicistion: 75 .
Upkeep for Bobland: 75 .

Total: 150

So, cooperating is a good thing. It allows you to share the burden and pay less per world.

With technology

Figure 4: Colonizable space / Figure 5: Alicistan Outpost / Figure 6: Bobland Outpost

With the technology things will be a little different. Let's say once again that Alicistan has grown enough to establish an outpost in sector B. Let's also say that they invest in the propose technology, and for a lot of they remove the need for a fleet. Instead they send regular 20 shipments to help the Army keep pirates at bay. For them, 20 is not that much, as any world capable of supporting an outpost is in tax bracket 3 or 4 anyway, so let's say the are worth 10 in total. (See Figure 4)

Upkeep for Alicistan: 10 .

Now, Bobland joins the club of Outpost-builders. they establish an outpost in sector F (see Figure 6). To help protect their outpost, they send in a fleet for piracy patrol, with te associated upkeep of 150 . They ask Alicistan to share upkeep, but their reply is: No thanks, we only pay 10 . So in the end we have:

Upkeep for Alicistan: 10 .
Upkeep for Bobland: 150 .

Total: 160

Cooperation is not desirable. Bobland is better off also getting their army in there, if they think they'll be having their outpost for more than two years.

Conclusion

Ok, I went a little overboard with the images there, but I think it helps to explain the problem: even with costs balanced neatly against a 2-year period of scanning this technology will deter player cooperation.

TL;DR: The problem isn't the cost calculation, it is inherent in the mechanic. As soon as you have done the investment to make an outpost defendable by army, your upkeep is drastically reduced. This situation won't be undone, the investment is there, so you'll always have the option of doing the piracy defence cheaply.

I think that the theme of this proposal is great. I like seeing options for expansion, especially if they somehow allow players to work together smartly. However, the current Piracy Patrol option promotes working together and promotes roleplay as well because the required assets (Military Fleets) are available through the Union as well.

Alternative mechanics

Instead of upgrading the Outpost, we could look into one or more of these other mechanics:

• Upgrading the Army and Fleet. As these are movable later on, you can start out with those, and later switch to a shared outpost defence when it becomes interesting. So, the fleet would not some kind of upgrade to allow a special manoeuvre akin to Piracy Patrol but with less cost, the manoeuvre would require an army though.
• Hook this mechanic into the special trade line running from and to the Outpost. Since there is already a special trade line, it would be interesting to have an upgrade that allows you to deploy an army supported in your system on any Outpost that has a special trade line to your system. This would combine with a higher upkeep to again make the option of cooperating more feasible.
• We could look into allowing Piracy Patrol cost reductions in combination with an Hyperspace Monitoring Grid upgrade? That way the economic value of a sector as a colonization location would increase, allowing people to cooperation in creating colonies of several Union world outposts...

(Of course, any of these things can be done in combination, making cooperation more useful if the cost can be reduced while at the same time making a specific sector more desirable for multiple people.)

In all cases we should find a good economical breaking point between doing it yourself and cooperating.

[Chriz]

I believe we kinda agreed upon being equal with fleet patrolling for 3 outposts which would mean the new method would have a cost equivalent of 50 / * 104 = 5200 for 1 outpost.

I don't really see a military fleet + army + upgrades + upkeep work since the balance will be pushed too much towards investment.

I think we should choose for an army + upgrade just instead in this case. Since the army can be moved. I also like the idea of giving the army an extra dot that is used to justify a higher cost and can be explained by the fact that the army requires air transports and possibly a few capital ships to defend the outpost that they are stationed on. Which could increase the cost to around 7000 .

I agree that the special trade line is a good explanation for projecting the army on the outpost and similarly on a space habitat.

Something like a space defence forces technology that unlocks the upgrade for the army and allows it to perform the piracy patrol manoeuvre on the outpost / space habitat it is stationed on.

Technology share : 2000 / 2 = 1000
Special project / upgrade on army: 1000
Extra upkeep for the army during the piracy patrol manoeuvre 50 / * 104 = 5200

The army would get a permanent additional base upkeep of 5 in return for the additional dot and unlocking of the piracy patrol manoeuvre .

[Brend]

After some more thinking I don't really like any alternative where the fleet is no longer needed. This is due to a few reasons:

1. We decided that fleets were going to be 'the thing' with regards to piracy patrol. And making them unnecessary this soon seems a bit weak: we effectively make them useless again.
   
2. The moment you no longer need the fleet, you need to calculate in the fact that you're saving an additional 7800 (= 75 per * 104 ) of fleet upkeep for even a 1/1/1 fleet.
   
3. You propose giving the army an additional dot. This should cost at least 12.5 per turn extra, as an additional dot is half of a fleet upgrade in fire-power when the army is attached to a fleet. Maybe a little more because it lets you break the upgrade barriers.
   
4. The fact that the army only piracy patrols a single outpost/space habitat takes away all options for cooperation.

I will calculate and post an alternative proposal before the end of the week (which ends on sunday evening).

[Elmer]

I like the idea of requiring a fleet to patrol. Using an army to take over the job sounds weak to me. It kinda feels like that some police men are stationed at a village to stop the guerilla warriors from taking control of the highway. I believe the idea of the pirates is that they attack the tradeships in space. So you can station an army at the colony to protect the colony, but the space freighters will still be attacked by space pirates.

I also second the cooperation argument Brend Rose.

Concerning the tech costs, I think you actually need to include the fleet costs and the army costs in your calculation, as a fleet costs: 5500 (fleet cost) + 2000 zone cost. An army costs 2000 . (Upkeep not included). With the proposed tech, you no longer need a fleet and thus safes you 5500 . And then I am not even including the tradefleet cost you have as well.

Maybe we can think of something along the way of a small specialized anti-piracy only fleet. Which can patrol only a few sectors (or just 1), can not participate in actual fleet battles since it is too weak, but can be upgraded to an actual fleet?

[Chriz]

If the piracy patrol can not be done without a military fleet I believe adding an army into the equation is not an option anymore, since this only pushes everything into investement.

We could also add a small upgrade to a military fleet that allows it to do a focused patrol on 1 sector only for 50 / .

This scanning could even be shared with multiple outposts in the same sector if players cooperate. However if players do this near each other in different sectors it would only hold for a maximum of 2 sectors since it requires a upgraded fleet per sector and the 50 / . Which would mean that for scanning 3 sectors a normal piracy patrol is always better since it only requires 1 normal military fleet and 150 per .

[Brend]

While I don't necessarily agree with Chriz' belief that an army and a fleet would lead to too much investment, I do like the mechanic he proposes. It leads to nice cooperation options for those with and those without the patrolling improvement at the same time.

I will have to do some calculations to see what the different investment options are. I hope to get to those this evening (barring any IC roleplay that crops up).

[Chriz]

I believe it also works for focused patrolling on one or multiple adjacent sectors with a price of 50 / / sector. This makes it possible to share with two sectors as well.

[Brend]

That would indeed be an interesting upgrade to allow further cooperation. Will take that in consideration during calculations ^_^

[Brend]

I don't really see a military fleet + army + upgrades + upkeep work since the balance will be pushed too much towards investment.

If the piracy patrol can not be done without a military fleet I believe adding an army into the equation is not an option anymore, since this only pushes everything into investement.

At first I did not see how you could have ever reached those conclusions. After some calculations I found that your original proposal not only shifts piracy patrol costs into investment, but actually halves the piracy patrol costs as well. (Which you state as well: "This is about half of the scanning cost that would normally provide 7 sectors.") I feel that that is a serious error in the calculations, as we specifically decided to calculate upkeep over a longer period than 1 year. You use 2 years and than immediately halve the costs again, effectively calculating them over 1 year.

Either way, on to my proposal.

Proposal

Active Hyperspace Signature Tracking (technology)

Technical improvements to a military fleet's sensor and communications arrays, together with the addition of dedicated scanning and monitoring vessels allows the military fleet to track and monitor thousands of individual hyperspace events and transponder replies.

This technology unlocks the Hyperspace Tracking Vessels military fleet upgrade.

Cost: 6000 / 4
Prerequisites: High-Level Sensor Fusion

Hyperspace Tracking Vessels (fleet upgrade)

Specialised transponder recognition droids, highly trained hyperspace trajectory analysts and a bank of data fusion processors allow detailed real-time starmap and data-stream integration and holographic visualisation. A team of military operators dispatches anti-piracy patrols whenever transponder and hyperspace event data suggests pirate activity.

This upgrade enhances a military fleet in two ways. The military fleet gains the Informed Piracy Patrol strategic fleet operation:

Informed Piracy Patrol
Available in all levels of activity

Informed Piracy Patrol keeps the pirates at bay by targeted deployment of anti-piracy patrols.

• Reduces Piracy in the sector that the fleet is in. Optionally, a single adjacent sector can be patrolled as well.
• Keeps the patrolled sectors free of Piracy for the next turn
• The upkeep of the fleet is increased by +50 per if patrolling a single , or +80 per when patrolling 2 , while executing the operation

Secondly, during battles the military fleet can use its highly specialised sensor vessels to form a real-time model of the battle. This gives the fleet a +1 bonus to all Direct Combat Actions that take advantage of knowing the positions and flight paths of all friendlies in the battle.

Cost: 2000 , 200 , 200 , 300
Prerequisites: Active Hyperspace Signature Tracking

Cost & Discussion

I base my cost justification on the following numbers:

• Upkeep calculation period: 104
• Piracy Patrol Upkeep: 150 per
• Total Upkeep over period: 15600 (= Calculation Period * Piracy Patrol Upkeep )

• Target Upkeep: 50 per

• Saved Taxes if you patrol 1 : 10400 (= Calculation Period * (Piracy Patrol Upkeep - Target Upkeep) )
• Saved Taxes if you patrol 2 : 5200 (= Calculation Period * (Piracy Patrol Upkeep - Target Upkeep * 2) )

At the start, no one is going to scan 2 . But basing the total cost on this and then requiring additional upkeep for the second sector is not fair. Therefore, I have opted to use the average saved taxes as the basis for my calculation.

• Average Saved Taxes (as if you patrol 1.5 : 7800 )

As this is a bit of an advanced technology, I have placed the one-faction technology share at 3000 .

• Technology cost: 6000 (= Technology Share * Amortization Factor)

This leaves us with 4800 that should be spent on investments; after writing the fluff for the upgrade, I checked out the costs of Passive Hyperspace Scanning Array and Hyperspace Monitoring Grid to see which products and special goods are fitting. I also checked out the Military Fleet upgrade costs.

I ended up with two special goods and some totalling a -equivalent value of 4225 . This is calculated at the pessimistic rates of 5.0 per special good, and 0.75 per product, so it might turn out a little cheaper still.


Overall, if one person is doing all this, they are paying 15425 (=6000 tech + 4225 upgrade + 104 * 50 upkeep), which is slightly less than the 15600 that would've been spent. So, after 2 years, you start to turn a profit. If two people want in on this, things get much better. If they scan 1 , they will have a total cost of 7712 (= [6000 tech + 4225 upgrade + 104 * 50] / 2 ) over 2 years.

If you want to scan 2 the you pay slightly more than without the research and the technology: 1 person would pay 18545 instead of 15600 . The benefit here is the lowered upkeep, whichs means you can bulk-spend and then keep more spendable. The other benefit is the easier cooperation: 2 persons half that cost to 9272 per person over 2 years, which is less than the patrolling cost of doing it yourself.

If still not as cheap as starting out from the start with two worlds paying for a single fleet of patrolling goodness, but it allows gradual joining of worlds. Of course, it is even better to cooperate from the start, which is the cheapest solution; and cooperation with three others from the start beats everything. I like this balance.

[Elmer]

I like Brend's proposal. This gives you the option to start for yourself, while always having the option to cooperate, this is win win for everybody. Even when 3 people want to work together, this tech is not a hinder to do so.

If I read it correctly, the upkeep is 50 for 1 sector, 100 for 2 sectors, and 150 for 3-7 sectors (standard patrol). Making the upkeep 50 per person for 1, 2 and 3 players. When the 4th joins the upkeep will become less.

And there is a new combat manoeuvre this way, which is also nice :).

I haven't checked the entire calculation, but the totals seemed decent and I trust that Brend has the right numbers.

[Brend]

After some discussion with Chriz, we have agreed that the tech is in need of a cooperation-bonus.

Several calculations later, we found that we can do this nicely by allowing the scanning of two sectors at a price of 40 per per . So, patrolling 1 will cost 50 per (:turn, patrolling 2 will cost 80 per .

I will update the above post.

I have also moved the 100 into the to reduce the 'confetti' effect of the upgrade cost. Now it is a more consolidated cost.

I think I'm done tweaking now.

[Chriz]

I think it fits now since it allows you to focus on one sector and allows cooperation with another player as well.

I have no more comments on the technology and will implement the technology on the wiki in the weekend of 16 august if there are no objections.

[Brend]

Awesome! Don't forget to link back to this topic with a Forum [forum]: 2199 field in both data blocks.

[Elmer]

I have no objections :)

[Gerben]

I have no objections ;)

[Dragonmaster352]

While I like the idea and the proposal, I have to voice a small objection.

You are already trying to research the tech IC while this topic is still being discussed. It hasn't even been added to the wiki yet.

Forgive me if this seems a bit nitpicky, but I believe it should at the very least be on the wiki with the discussion completely ended before it is allowed to be researched.

[Brend]

You might have noticed that the research has not yet been started yet: in fact, it will only start in 168. Chriz clearly announced his intent to put the technology on the wiki in the weekend of 16 august, which is 167. So, if the tech is actually put on the wiki at that moment, it will be in effect before the research starts.

Besides, characters can talk IC about anything they want. Even technological developments that won't be designed for another 2 years. The OOC thing here is only necessary to get approval to get an actual effect within the framework of the rules. Of course, can only be invested if the tech is approved. So if there is an objection to the proposed technologies, the IC spending of can not commence.

Does that clarify things?

[Dragonmaster352]

Yeah that's fine.

[Brend]

@Chriz: Have you found any images yet?

[Chriz]

Not really :(

Hyperspace scanning is kind of an odd subject for find fitting pictures.

[Brend]

Hmmmz. I tried going in the holographic map direction.

I think the best way would be to go the 'project in use' route. That way you get to just crop any picture with a starmap and some spaceship room around it. Maybe one of the following could be sufficiently cropped or merged with another image (for your convenience, I place some comments with them :P):

• http://theshootening.files.wordpress.co ... eus48.jpeg (This is the best one)
• http://martinweigel.files.wordpress.com ... 5lrxws.jpg (Yes, well. Crop it?)
• http://i.imgur.com/P7QRufL.jpg (This one is so simple it is awesome. Maybe not for hyperspace scanning.)

[Chriz]

I finished adding the technology: Active Hyperspace Signature Tracking and the special project: Hyperspace Tracking Vessels to the wiki.

[Brend]

I've added the Forum field to the project, and tweaked some of the layout of the project page with arcane wiki magic so it looks a little better.

I think that's it. I'll close this thread!