Rebellions!

[iamrobk]

You (or the computer) should also be able to help fund rebellions. Maybe if a rebellion occurs, you have the option of sending either a small transport with good guns, a larger one with some soldiers too, or maybe 2 or 3 small assault ships or whatever. Or maybe just money. If the rebellion takes a planet, maybe they become their own country. IMO a funded rebellion should be pretty hard to stop, but a non-funded one should be relatively easy to stop.

[Krikkitone]

I would say a non-funded one should be hard to stop (actually you should never be able to Stop a rebellion only control it, ie stop them from taking the planet) depending on your situation. If you have a large amount of your territory in low level revolt (say because you just conquered it), you should need a massive % of your money going to both supporting a massive military and 'happiness' if you want any hope of holding onto it.

A funded revolt should pretty much automatically suceed if it is locally driven. (unless you are capable of intercepting the support or annihilating the local populace)

[Impaler]

A little game by the Name of "Balance of Power" has some interesting if simple models for Rebelions. The game is avalible at the UnderDog and consists of a USA vs Soviet global domination contest through the proxy conflicts of the third world, with the threat of total nuclear anialation over every move.

Rebelions were in a one of 3 states, Terroism, Gurrillas and Civil War. Also the players recives a "trending" indicator like "rising rapidly" or "decling slowly" to help judge what will happen in the future (a very usefull bit of information). You can fund Insurgensts up to a level that is determined by how much of a military pressence you have in neiboring countires (no pressence = no ability to fund). If the Insurgency is strong enough it can result in a Rebelion and the Goverment and Insurgency switch place (and your Insurgency funding is now Goverment military aid).

Free Orion though will have two distinct type of Rebelion, internal (you vs your own people) and Conquest rebelions (you vs a Race of Alien slaves/masters). Their should be some very distinct differnces between the two. Aliens would be much harder to fund (perhaps they are fundable only by their parent empire) and harder to keep happy with "happyness" spending (you dont understand their culture well) and harder to supress with Secret Police and troops (you cant infiltrate them, they hate your troops a lot).

[Krikkitone]

Sounds good.

I figure the level of 'Rebel activity' should depend on a cost benefit analysis on the part of the rebelling populace.

1. Chance of success (population v. troops..also includes your ruthlessness and their access to weapons.. and the success of past rebel actions)

2. Benefit of success (how unhappy are the people now, how much would they gain if the rebels won?)


(Side note, one final thing that should affect rebellions is how well 'armed' the populace is.. I figure a good way to model this is by their access to advanced technology and the strictness of your laws... so you can decrease the chance of rebellion by

introducing more troops (although this leads to more troops being lost, and possibly collateral damage which advances the desire for rebellion)
having harsher laws (although this makes the people unhappy)
keeping them away from access to technology/positions to do damage (this decreases their productivity.. if all their factories are decades behind, they can't make effective weapons, but then they can't make good stuff either)

[RebelFaction]

This all sounds very good, but I wouldnt like a civ-style corruption model (or anything similar) that made your empire pretty much useless because all of its gold and production would be eaten up by corruption and waste. It really was annoying that I put all that effort into an invasion only to get a useless city that was costing me a fortune to support and even more to defend. I hope that FO dosent go that way.

[Krikkitone]

(double post)

[Krikkitone]

Well it does have to be balanced so that invasion isn't worthless compared to bombardment.

The way I see it, your options are

1. Bombard and recolonize...actually makes the colony the best in the LONG run, but it is Very long run

2. Invade... actually worse than bombard in the immediate term (you get almost nothing out of it and have to leave troops there to keep it) but gets back to productivity much more rapidly than recolonizing a barren rock. However, it will never be as productive as a 'native' colony..except maybe after a MINIMUM of several centuries of integration and assimilation would it be as productive as a colony of your own people.

[how well you treat the locals in the short run helps you actually assimilate them in the minimum of a few centuries instead of 'deassimilating them'...which is also ok, they can stay a 'conquered people' for the whole game and you will get stuff out of them, as long as you are willing to put down the unavoidable periodic rebellions.]

[iamrobk]

Maybe bombarding the planet would hurt it's ecosystem a lot which would lower farm production or whatever, but maybe could increase the change of finding rare minerals due to chemical reactions or whatever.

[luckless666]

I know this is an old post but...

This all sounds very good, but I wouldnt like a civ-style corruption model (or anything similar) that made your empire pretty much useless because all of its gold and production would be eaten up by corruption and waste. It really was annoying that I put all that effort into an invasion only to get a useless city that was costing me a fortune to support and even more to defend. I hope that FO dosent go that way.

The corruption model, although found annoying by some, proved that just by invading a city (or planet in the case of FO) you werent going to get any of the benefits unless you set about integrating them properly into your empire (look at americas attempt to try and establish a government in post-war iraq...and most of the citizens SUPPORT america). Maybe it shouldnt be as harsh as the Civ3 system, but should still be there...

Maybe bombarding the planet would hurt it's ecosystem a lot which would lower farm production or whatever, but maybe could increase the change of finding rare minerals due to chemical reactions or whatever.

Sounds like a good idea...

You (or the computer) should also be able to help fund rebellions. Maybe if a rebellion occurs, you have the option of sending either a small transport with good guns, a larger one with some soldiers too, or maybe 2 or 3 small assault ships or whatever. Or maybe just money. If the rebellion takes a planet, maybe they become their own country. IMO a funded rebellion should be pretty hard to stop, but a non-funded one should be relatively easy to stop.

This idea is also good. Maybe an option screen should crop up stating that a rebellion has started by your people on a planet now controlled by an enemy nation. It then gives you options saying (for example):

1. Send credits to fund rebellion - cost: 150 BC - Success: 15%
2. Send weapons to Rebel faction - cost: 200 BC - Success: 25%
3. Send exp. troops to train and aid Rebels - cost: 380 BC - Success: 40%
4. Send advanced weaponry and guerilla war experts with enough funding to support rebellion - cost: 650 BC - Success 85%

The percentage of success can be modified depending on the extent of enemy troop presence in the sector etc. You only get this option once per rebellion (and only at the beginning).

[iamrobk]

Well i think that you should be able to join in later on (but you would have to go through some screen or 2), and maybe help send troops to fight against the guerillas.

[Paul1980au]

Look at the system in SEIV (plantery loyalty - it hits rebellious and there is a 30% per turn chance of the planet defecting to another empire or forming its own independant empire) This might also flow on say a 10% chance of antoher planet in the same solar system defecting

[D-fense]

I played "Shadow President" an political simulator like "Balance of Powers" and I don´t think that success chances will be a good feature. I always saved the game and reload it when i failed.
"Hearts of Iron" use dissidents to lower the production. (3% dissidents, 97% production, ...)

[Marijn]

I think the rebelling thing in MOO2 should definitely be used - when you conquer a world the natives will liberate the world unless you put enough troops there, then in time you can assimilate the population.

Something like empire-splitting rebellions is fun too, but I agree it should make *a lot* of sense to the player, not be a kind of random event. I think if you behave normally your population should be reasonnably happy, and only when you take actions like jacking up tax rates beyond the default or causing famines should your citizens go riot or revolt.

[Paul1980au]

So unhappy planets are more likley to rebel - what about an intel project to stir rebellions in enemy empire planets. Tax levels should though have an aspect - it could also in addition be a random event - very rare but could happen.

[luckless666]

So unhappy planets are more likley to rebel - what about an intel project to stir rebellions in enemy empire planets. Tax levels should though have an aspect - it could also in addition be a random event - very rare but could happen.

Intel projects to incite rebellions take time, and the 'target' player (computer or player) would see the results of this intel project as a random event (such as 'An outbreak of The Plague has infested Praxis IV. Your government has been blamed for lack of sanitation. The population grows restless.') So the player will know somethings up.