Rules Discussion / Suggestions

[GreyJaeger]

Well, rules are only open to abuse as long as there are players who seek to abuse them.

Personally, I think that the first time a players or players attempt something like that...



Upon their entire faction(s).

[Iron Mongoose]

In a sense, I don't disagree.  But, the problem with abuse is drawing the line.  The senerio I present is clearly outragious, but others might not be, and such a player could easily respond to such acusations of abuse "Its legal under the rules, is it not?"  If we can acomplish the same thing by means that don't invite abuse, should we not do it?  After all, show me which is the player who's a rules abuser, and which is the one who simply wants to gain benifits that are explicitly offered by the rules as writen?

[Daemonknight]

In the scenario you outline, if the FS sold x FP to the Lyrans for y RP, y would be the number subject to the 5% increase. Basiclly, when a faction pays RP to another faction, and you have one of those research paths finished, you get a little more RP than they actually gave you. But of course, if it becomes a problem, I'll simply remove the Economics path entirely, and everyone will lose out on that whole line of research and it's benefits. So I suggest nobody tests the GM's patience on the matter.

The 'but it's allowable within the rules' defense has some merit, but abuse is abuse, even if you believe yourself to be justified. I expect people to respect both the letter and spirit of the rules Dave and now I have created. If I see repeated complaints about loopholes and such, the first step is to attempt to close the rules loophole. If I find myself constantly fighting against players who continually try and find the loopholes in research, I'll start shutting down specific avenues of research, and if really gets bad, I'll just kill research entirely. I don't have a lot of patience with that sort of thing, so as before, I suggest people don't make a hobby of finding loopholes, which I am sure are there.

[Iron Mongoose]

Given that I did even offer a solution here, I don't see why there's so much resistance.  I'm trying to close what I see as a potental trouble spot, not exploit it.  If I were, I would have darn well kept quiet about it.

Again, the key problem is assuming that all players have the same set of ideas about what is 'fair play' and what is 'abuse.'  You Deamonknight should well know that differing oppinions of the game asthetic exist amoung players.  Using the rules at hand as an example, is it reasonable for a faction to create a big giant manufacturing hub, with all its factories within four hexes of a centeral factory on a multi FP world?  On the one hand, the rules strongly encourage it, by alowing such factors to pool their production.  On the other, it flys in the face of the game's traditional asthetic, where factories are inveriably spaced far appart.  Is it abuse, or it is just doing what the rules outright encourage you to do?

If the intent of trade rules is to make trade profitable, wouldn't two (or more) faction doing profitable trade deals simply be following the explicit intent of the rules?  If it were just one FP or a fractional FP, would that be ok?  Where's the line?

The idea that players may differ in oppinon about such things, and do so in genuinely good faith, shouldn't be casualy ignored.  Its not my intention to come back to the game and imediatly cause trouble, so I hope no one gets that idea.  But, it should be remembered that the reason that I'm comming back is that I left over precicely such a difrence of oppinion about what was fair and reasonable and what was abuse (I don't intend to draw any conclusions about that here, other than simply to state the very apperant truth that difrent people had difrent feelings about it). 

As your DK yourself freely admit, there are likely to be other little things in the rules that can be used in ways other than perhaps innitaly intended.  If abuse really "is abuse, even if you believe yourself to be justified," then would it not make sense in places where we can see the potental for it, to clarify where the line is, and to remove any justification?  That we acknolage the idea that I player might see themself as being in the right and yet still be in the wrong means we should take steps to make it evidant what is what, and not force players who may be new or not know the GMs well to try and guess at what spirit they had indended.

Maybe I'm just making trouble.  Probably so.  But, wouldn't it be best to make it, and to iron out what's what, and what spirit we intend this game to go foward in, before its underway and each faction has its chance to diverge in its understanding of the rules and of the philosophies that we hope to embody.

[Daemonknight]

Im not saying anything against you IM. I'm saying in general. I freely admit that there will be situations where theres loopholes. Hopefully I close them before they cause any trouble once we see them crop up.

In your manufacturing example, no, I don't see a problem with that. The downside to that scenario, is that all of your manufacturing is bunched together, making it easy for an enemy to cripple your ability to make new military forces. I'd hope the players would take full advantage of that little strategic oversight. But I wouldn't call it abuse. When I said that bit about the 'justified' part, I don't mean someone is automaticlly wrong every time. It depends on circumstance. In the case you outline originally, I'm not sure I follow what your point was. If the Lyrans are buying FP, it's upto the Fedsuns to determine how much money the Lyrans need to pay. Once they agree on a price, and it's paid, the FS would recieve a 5% bonus to the RP they get from the Lyrans, thanks to their tech bonus.

If players want to sit there and swap RP back and forth to generate huge bonus...that would be abusing the system. Obviously. Because they arn't trading anything, they're just generating profits. Perhaps it would be best to establish a player-controlled 'standard price', and anything thats widely outlandish, by the consensus of the player base, is what needs to be worried about. I don't know, I'm just throwing an idea out.

[Iron Mongoose]

Well, let's talk about the rule in question, rather than anything else.

I think its fair to say that the system is designed to encourage trade, and to give traders to reserch that advance a competitive edge.  So, if you've gotten to the point where you get 10% back (much costlier reserch, but easier math) you can sell at cost and cover your over head, or sell at what your buyer thinks is your cost (including terriffs) and make a proffit, or what ever.

The problem is, it is based on enhancing revenue.  In effect, it makes 'free' money appear.  Where does the extra 5-10% come from?  Naturaly, its based on exchange rates and maket demand and other things, IC, but game mechanicaly its a bit funny.  And anything that's a bit funny attracts people that, let's be honest, are like me (again, read into that what you will, and weigh that against the past decade I've been in this game). 

Would a simpler mechanism not be: reduce costs?  That is to say, as you reserch, your terriffs go down (streamlined bourder crossings, more efficant systems, knowing who to bribe and how much, etc) or transport costs go down (more efficant transport hubs, better invintory managment, less waste, etc).  So at even at the maximum point, you don't make any 'free' bonus money by trading, you just don't have to spend any of your own money to do it either. 

If we apply a bonus to transport costs, this actualy can have a domestic effect that goes back to that factory thing we discussed earlier, too, making factory spacing an even more nuanced proposition.  Though that is not essental for the fix to function, and could be left out if it was felt to be imballancing.

But, since you can't increese proffit, just reduce cost (and never below 0) I would offer that such a system achives the same thing (incentives to trade, and advantages in trade to the possessers) with fewer oppertunities for abuse; there is now no possible way that nations can colude to make magic free money.

[Daemonknight]

tell me what you think about this rewrite(had to increase the tarrifs for the research to actually be a useful proposition):

Any time a faction attempts to export production capacity, some money is lost due to tariffs and export duties. Each point of production capacity exported costs the exporting faction .25 RP. The actual cost of the deal is totally up to the players to decide, but this tariff is unavoidable.

Tier I – Economic Theory (15 SP): Reduce international trade tariffs by 10%(round up)
Tier III – Intermediate Economics (50 SP): Reduce international trade tariffs by 25%(round up)
Tier V – Advanced Economics (100 SP): Reduce international trade tarrifs by 50%(round up)

[Hugin]

I liiike

[Crunch]

I like that much better.

[Iron Mongoose]

While I think I do like it, to clairify, is the .25 terriff reduced by that percentage, or is the whole price reduced.  That is to say, at tier one is your savings .1 RP, or .025 RP?  Its definatly exactly what I had had in mind, however, in principle.

[Daemonknight]

I think reducing the total price will make our lives easier, atleast in my opinion.

[DisGruntled]

Prestigious Facilities
Cost to Purchase:    72
Construction Time:    3 turns
Activation Costs: Tier I - 4.5 RP/turn, Tier II - 9 RP/turn, Tier III - 13.5 RP/turn

Prestigous Facilities contribute to a faction's research, as well as serve as training grounds for the elite soldiers that make up Special Forces teams. There can be no more than 3 PFs in a hex, with each PF representing a level of sophistication, or a 'Tier'.

A faction can have any number of Tier I prestigious facilities.
For every Tier II prestigious facility, a nation must have two Tier I prestigious facilities.
For every Tier III prestigious facilty, a nation must have three Tier II prestigious facilities.

Does it really cost the same 72 RPs to construct  T1 PF, T2 PF, and a T3 PF?

[Daemonknight]

Yes

The additonal cost to the higher tiers, is the requirement to build more of the lower stuff. So the total investment required to build one Tier II PF is: 72x2(for the hex holding the tier II), and 72 in 2 other hexes that need to hold Tier Is, bringing our total to to 288 RP. Obviously someone might say: doesn't it just make sense to build a hole lot of Tier Is everywhere? Sure, you can, but getting to Tier IIIs is the economy of scale: eventually that savings in paying half the normal rate of RP/SP will pay off, if the game goes long enough(i assume everyone would like to see that happen).

[Daemonknight]

Also, it goes without saying that the more widespread your research base is, the easier it is for hostile factions to launch Disrupt Research missions against you. Because the blanket 'Counterintelligence Operations' mission doesn't apply against SF mission(the reason the Disrupt Research mission was made into an SF mission btw), the only counter to the mission is to physiclly station your own SF teams on your PFs, and have them running Protect Hex Element missions. Much easier to defend with a handful of upgraded Tier III and Tier II places, and having the extra 4 hexes with Tier Is for the same research production.

[DisGruntled]

So lets say that Faction Fuzzy Wombat has 3 Tier 1 PFs.

If they wanted to build a Tier 2 PF which option would be correct?
A)Spend 72 RP over 3 turns to build a brand new Tier 2 PF.
B)Spend 72 RP over the 3 turns to upgrade an existing Tier 1 PF into the new Tier 2 PF (ie  you swap out an existing Tier 1 PF for the new Tier 2)