You know if you want to bring this out for MP play, you are certainly going to annoy player's like me who may be intrested in playing your campaign. I'm kinda of surprised Duke that you would consider some of these idea's considering we both dislike any idea of being railroaded into a certain path.
Your first goal, any goal for the designer is to take into consideration the people who will be playing your campaign. Who they are, what demographic they belong to and quite frankly what kind of people they are. Are they aggressive, laid back, more modest in their approach to thing's.
The most important objective to any game is to give your playerbase more option's. More option's to achieve his goal's. and more option's to get the player to the endgame. We all know that there will always be a varying difference in the quality of player's. Those who play the game in a laid back manner and those that powertech and know the game inside and out. We know this, yet it frustrate's me that people still believe that artificial limit's should be imposed on player's because they know how to play well. Instead of rewarding player's for being innovative, we smack them down for reaching ahead of themselve's.
It has alway's been my belief that we should encourage player's to play how they want, not limit their option's. By bringing in these event's your belief that more war's and less hyperteching will be the end result.
Allow me to focus on the real issue here. Hyperteching has never been the root cause of any downfall of a game. Hyperteching is a byproduct of a player's desire to nation build and grow his nation economically. This desire is in all of us, saying that you don't hypertech is saying I don't sleep. It's beyond silly to say this.
Yet for some, or in this case, many people do blame hyperteching for the ill's of our game. They say, it turn's a game into a predicatable game where certain nation's isolate themselves and hypertech all game long without any involvment in continental politic's. Thereby hurting the dynamic's of the game.
Are people that misinformed that they would believe that this is the root of all our problem's? It's strange that for the most part, most of the playerbase of EU have for the most part supported the patch's that have come out. For a few minority, we do have some problem's with the patch's. Namely the end result of player's becoming more cautious in how they go about playing EU.
Has anyone noticed that over time steadily more and more people are now complaining about the lack of initiative from player's. And that more and more player's are avoiding conflict's so they can "hypertech?" Yet not many people have yet clued in that as we bring more patch's out to improve gameplay and promote initiative from our player's, we are doing the exact opposite? Instead of player's being more assertive, more and more player's are becoming cautious.
Could it be that this all could be inter-related? More importantly could it be possible that these patch's have forced player's to re-evaluate how they play and forced many of them to change their approach to gaming. I certainly have.
To be honest, I think to a large degree these patch's have forced player's to be cautious, cautious in that they now know the risk's of any action they take, and more importantly the consequence's. For many player's it's far more rewarding to hypertech for the first century or two, then involve themselves in the continental arena. These patch's has made teching more difficult by fiddling with the tech paradym, trading has become restricted to the trading nation's now. And learning how to nation build has become an art form. Player's aren't stupid, they already know what the number's are when it come's to calculating the most bang for their buck.
So can you honestly blame them for hyperteching to set themselve's up? It now become's even more apparent that player's need to be ready before they go into any large conflict. The risk's involved, if one should lose, can result in weakening a nation that he fall's behind in tech as a result of it. For player's this is a nobrainer that he should be well prepared for any conflict.
This won't change no matter how you jury rig the event file to limit this. Funny thing is, it will only force player's into hyperteching with these event's. As I said, our playerbase is so knowledgeable about the game mechanic's, that they know what tech they need to reach to then push onto the next level. Putting obstacle's in their way only emphasize's their need to hypertech because as individual's, they are not idiot's. They know as trade nation's they need to rush for their trade tech's, they know as land power's, that gaining that infra 5 as soon as possible will help them in the long run.
Your not going to change anything by putting event's to limit this. Your just going to force people to follow this route even more religiously thereby railroading their choice's. Which I oppose. Think on this, most player's rush for infra 3, it's a foregone conclusion on this. It happen's and if you don't do it yourself, your only shooting yourself in the foot. And of course the reason behind this is so player's can then start pumping out refineries. Some player's will then chose at this point to land tech or other's to infra tech. Other's who are aiming to be trade power's, then move to trade research. With the help of their refineries going to trade 3, then to trade 4 before 1492 come's up.
Of course to those that despise hyperteching and with this strategy you WILL be hyperteching. The fact remain's, this strategy will not change if you put random event's to slow this down. More to the fact it will force player's who chose the infra 3, land tech route, to railroad them into going all infra and avoiding war's until he can set up. For nation's that want infra 3, then rush to trade 4 route, they aren't going to change their plan's. Your just going to force them to research longer and put more effort into gaining these tech's. Why you ask? Because as player's we know the fundemental game mechanic's of EU, we know where the tech break down's are and how to take advantage of them. Putting these event's in, is not going stop these player's from following this plan. The reward for setting up your nation later on just is too great.
So instead of getting nation's to war earlier, you will in essense force many player's to hypertech even further, which in an ironic way is amusing, considering you are trying to limit it.
I don't see why people have so many problem's with other player's hyperteching. Everyone should have a choice on how to play their nation's and not be forced to play one way. The choice should alway's be mine on how I direct my nation's growth, certainly having outside event's dictating your strategy would in fact hamper a player's ability to have free choice. But if that is your intent, then why are we playing this game if this game is only going to turn out how you want us to play, not how I would like to play my game.
Duma
