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Saintrl

Lt. General
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Jul 9, 2013
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Mods, if this topic belongs somewhere please move it to the correct topic (too tired to remember where this goes). Thank you.

I posit a question: Could the Clausewitz Engine be used to create a 4x Space Strategy game?

To some people this question may sound silly. "Why would you ever want to play a Space Strategy game?" "X Paradox game is so much more fun!" "There's probably a Masters of Orion mod you can enjoy somewhere."

But I am bored, and I like to think. For the most part I don't think there should be much problem for the AI. After all, the computer already has a grand old time deciding when to backstab you, raise rebels, and in general make your life miserable interesting. Certain aspects of diplomacy, economy, and colonize seems possible to recreate within what the engine is capable of. Therefore I believe that many problems with the engine will be experienced by both the players and the AI.

What really got me speculating is how to take a engine that uses province based maps and turn it into something that is a 3-d space filled with star systems. Each of which can travel to all other star systems (many older games seem to revert to using starlanes for the sake of the AI and to keep things from getting too complicated). I of course, in my infinite boredom and speculation wondered what would happen if you used multiple maps instead of just one big flat map. Divvy up the known galaxy into 'Sectors' and pretend that every province has an adjacency to every other province on the map.

Of course, I half wonder if you could even still call the Clausewitz Engine the Clausewitz Engine if you gutted the existing system where you use one flat map filled with provinces and mostly just Earth.

Regardless I attempted to think of ways one could replicate a 3-d map using only flat 2-d maps. Even if you used 'Sectors' to divide up the map you would still be ignoring the fact that space has depth (unlike most flat maps without mountains and annoying mountain terrain bonuses). So then what if you used a stack of them?

Theorycrafting time.
If we have a maps layered on top of one another you could technically replicate 3-d space as long as you could have the game calculate how long it would take to travel from one layer to another. Of course this STRONGLY reminds me of a certain magically turning into boats mechanic since you'd effectively be teleporting from one map to another in terms of the how the engine would be seeing it. That's not to mention asking the engine to remember the travel times between any 2 star systems that can also travel to all other star systems as well.

Well, I think I should come to a stopping point and call it a night for now.

Is this possible? Do I even know what I'm talking about?

Hopefully the answer isn't no...

Sorry for the rant if you're offended somehow by this waste of electronic data storage space in the form of slightly meaningless text.

Here's the polandball cartoon if you were expecting one:
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Oh god, what did I write last night...

I wonder if paradox will ever make a 4x space strategy. I'd love to see them step outside their comfort zone and make something like that (considering how history stops in the modern day I'd like to convert my paleo-stone-magick-age save to classical era to medival era, to colonial era, to vicky era, to modern era, then to the future!).

Is anyone even reading this? >_>
 
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Oh god, what did I write last night...

I wonder if paradox will ever make a 4x space strategy. I'd love to see them step outside their comfort zone and make something like that (considering how history stops in the modern day I'd like to convert my paleo-stone-magick-age save to classical era to medival era, to colonial era, to vicky era, to modern era, then to the future!).

Is anyone even reading this? >_>
Yes, we are reading this. Have you been drunk at the time of your OP? :p
 
Oh God no. Please don't encourage them to make more games with that same old engine. We need a new engine from PI.
 
I actually thought about a star wars mod using a mixture of Europa Universalis and Vicky II elements.

Planets would be landmasses that could be upgraded and the rest would be "ocean" and your spaceships go around. For example alliance ships would move really fast and have some things while the empire would have many more ships but slower and with some other stuff.

Meanwhile the rebellion would strike key places where the empire produces stuff in an attempt to bankrupt the empire's production capabilities. If you strike starfighter facilities their ties will be harder to come by and a lot more expensive.

I don't know. I suppose it could be made.
 
Personally, I think a full globe would need to be done before space can even be conceived in the engine.
 
Oh God no. Please don't encourage them to make more games with that same old engine. We need a new engine from PI.

No we don't, current engine is absolutely fine for its purposes. No new engine required as PDS have been updating it constantly since its release and keeping new features up to date.
 
No we don't, current engine is absolutely fine for its purposes. No new engine required as PDS have been updating it constantly since its release and keeping new features up to date.

Uh, except for the numerous limitations and flaws, like only having one ocean on a map and having lakes always being at 0 height. And the amazing inefficiency of Paradox games in the lategame.

The Clausewitz 2 engine is really pretty garbage, actually. It's just "good enough" for most purposes.
 
Fair enough, I'm sure PDS will sure hire you to work on their Clausewitz 3.

Limitations are always self imposed on any piece of work you take on. There is no "perfect" engine, and if you think there is then you're pretty much living below a rock.
 
This is a ludicrous statement.

Have you ever actually made anything in your life? Have you ever had a job?

Are you out of your mind?

When you go out for a stroll you yourself say that you're going to get till X place before you go back.

Even the "I'll go where the wind takes me" is self imposing a restraint. You won't end up on the moon, you might end up in any continent.

And also, personal attack? Really now...
 
Oh God no. Please don't encourage them to make more games with that same old engine. We need a new engine from PI.

Same old engine? Each new game is an improvement to the Clausewitz engine that all of their games use. There is no "old engine" - Only way you're going to see a radically different engine is if they completely stopped developing new games and focused strictly on a new engine, or at the least a radically different engine.

PI doesn't make game engines, they're a publisher.

Uhm.... Yeah they do. It's their engine, they make their own games and they DO publish third party titles.