FreeOrion

I have been stewing over some of the various ideas that have been discussed and I think I may have a nice idea for merging them all together in a nice coherent way.

Ok first off a planet will have X number of Regions each with a environmental type (Swamp, Radiated, Ocean, Desert ect ect). Only one race can ocupy each region. Depending on a races Environmental Preference the number of cities that each region can support will vary, 10 for the sweetspot down to 2 or 3 for very poor environments. Thus the overall size and Environmental type will determine the overall population capacity of a planet.

Each City represents 1 unit of population and it can be a variety of cities. The City represents a combination of both population and specialized infastructure (or lack of). A city can become "abaondoned" when it lacks population and will begin to decay to nothingness. Conversly a "Refugee" city can be created when population exceeds Infastructure. These Reffugees can be instructed to convert them selves to some specialized and more usefull type. When a city is changing from one type to another it has a number layed over it to express how many turns it will take. In the mean time the City producess nothing.

Rather then using a planet wide Focus we change the type of each city. The player can discover and designate more advanced City types, in most cases the older city types recive upgrades. Their might also be limit on the number of types of Cities each planet can have, their are basicaly "slots" for City types and the Cities can be draged and droped into the slots to varry how much of each type is being used. The interface would work just like Moo2 with the Draging and droping of Population.

All Cities consume 10 food per turn (I think using base 10 or atleast something higher then 1 will give us more flexiblity). It might also consume other things that we designate.

Each city produces things basesed on its Meter positions. Their will be a Food, Industry, Growth and Science metter and possibly more. Output in each of these areas is dependent on the meter rating. For example the food output is determined by a meter which is effected by your race, goverment, the Environment the City is in and lastly by the City type. If the City is a "farm" type then it will recive a considerable bost on that meter and be producing a considerable excess of food. All the output from the Cities is totaled together for the planets total productivity in each area.

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Fear is the Mind Killer - Frank Herbert -Dune

beside the fact that i like the idea of region, i don't think we should go for multi races planets (at least if they belong to different empires). Maybe after you conquered some foreign planets it's population might migrate to regions in your empire in which they fit better. replacing foci by defineing city types increase micro.

Aq's Focus system was meant to eliminate fine-grain decisions dealing with individual population units. As it passed through public review, we probably shouldn't rehash it.

I believe multiple races per planet was also nixed for v1.0 during the same public review, but my memory might be rusty.

Your idea would work out fine, great even, if there were far far less planets. A game with a dozen worlds at max I think.

Oh I wasn't realy saying we SHOULD have multiple races per Planet but IF we do a 1 race per region would be a good way of doing it as it makes it very clear cut who is ware and how large their population can grow.

I see your point that the design is a lot more fine grained them the Focus system. Admitedly it is a bit of a pain to be moving around the pop units in Moo2. The upside is their are now no "buildings" what so ever. Everything is managed by creating "focused" cities of a particular type and tecnologies simple upgrade their effectivness. Any particular thing a player wishes to DO at a planet is done with a focused City, including any and all defences. So it a bit of a trade off here as we make one part a bit more complex but alow it to swallow up something that would otherwise be another burden on the player and try to get these focused cities to make game play more strait forward in the long run.

I also realize that is probly too late to do any change this radical, unless the idea catches on like wild fire I dont expect it to be adopted, perhaps though it can prove inspirational to someone else.

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Fear is the Mind Killer - Frank Herbert -Dune

Why do you say your idea is 'radical'?

The idea of having cities combining pop and basic infra appeals to me. Hower I think we should not drop the focus - it would ease the management (i.e. agricultural focus '80%' would make each 4 cities in 5 to be agricultural, unless players directly intervenes). I am quite sure that in the late game I'll want to deal as little as possible with most of my cities.

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