AltHistoria Plays Stellaris - An interactive AAR

[Krall]

Alright, it's time to choose what our aliens look like! Here's the poll, as before you have three days to decide.

[Krall]

The poll is closed, and the people have spoken! The portrait we shall use for our species is:



Avian Massive #17!

So, we've got all the big things done - ethos, government type, genetic traits, and appearance - but there are still a number of smaller details we need to work out. There are three that affect gameplay, and a number of others that are just details/roleplaying. This is going to be a lot to take in all at once, so feel free to skip to my comments right at the end of this post if you're okay with me choosing the order we do stuff in. Here are all the choices we have yet to make:



Gameplay Affecting Things


Starting Weapons - We have to choose whether our race will start off with the basic Missile, Laser, or Kinetic weapon technology. All three will be available to us through research, but choosing one as your starting weapon gives you a pretty good headstart on that weapon tech line. The difference between the three weapon types are roughly as follows:

Missiles: Long range and never miss, low fire rate. Relatively easy to counter with point defence systems.

Lasers: Decent range, decent fire rate. Has bonuses to ignoring enemy armour (armour removes a % of all damage to a ship's hull).

Kinetic: Short range, high fire rate. Has large bonuses to damage against enemy shields (shields are essentially extra health that can recharge, and isn't protected by armour).

There are a lot more nuances to how the weapons system works and what counters what, but generally it doesn't matter too much and it's more a question of what you think would look coolest.

Which of the three weapon types do you want? I'd rather not do many more polls, so I'll just see what the response is in the thread and roll a dice if there's no clear favourite.


FTL Method - We have to choose what technology our ships will use to move faster than the speed of light. Unlike starting weapons, we're basically locked into this decision for the whole game. There are three different methods, each with their own advantages and disadvantages:

Warp: Warp travel allows ships to move between the system they're in and any system within range, thus offering the most freedom of movement. However it is the slowest of the three methods, and has a considerable cooldown which prevents ships from moving immediately after a warp jump.

Hyperspace: Hyperspace offers a wide range of advantages and one BIG disadvantage. It's fast, there's no cooldown and only a short wind-up time, plus it allows ships to make an FTL jump regardless of where they are in a star system, whereas Warp and Wormhole travel require that ships move to the edge of the system first. However ships can only move along existing hyperlanes which are generated between planets at the start of the game. Hyperlanes cannot be built, and there's no guarantee the Hyperlane network will make much sense (e.g. just because two star systems are close to one another there's no guarantee that they'll have a Hyperlane). If we play in a spiral galaxy then there will only be a few hyperlanes joining each spiral arm to the others, greatly limiting movement on a galactic scale.

Wormhole: Instead of being mounted on ships, Wormhole generators have to be built as small space stations at the edge of a star system. Ships within the station's system can then approach it and warp to any other system within its range. Ships in other systems within the station's range can warp to the station itself. The advantage of this system is that travel between systems is instant - there's a significant wind-up and cooldown period for the wormhole station, but it's not affected by how far you're sending the ship. This effectively means that all star systems with a station's range might as well be right next to each other. However, ships can't enter FTL without being in a station's range, which means that you have to build up infrastructure as you grow and explore the galaxy. This also means that the wormhole stations act as a bottleneck, since two fleets can't use the same station at the same time.

The game recommends Warp for new players and Wormholes for advanced players, but generally they're all balanced - you just have to put more thought into what you're doing for Wormholes and much less for Warp. So, which one do you all like the look of? Again I'd rather not do another poll, so I'll just see what people in the thread like.


Homeworld Class - There are seven basic types of inhabitable world in the game. They're all essentially identical gameplay-wise, but this does technically influence gameplay as our species can initially only colonise worlds of the same type, and will find planets more similar to their homeworld more inhabitable than others. The planet classes are arranged in a ring, so each class has two adjacent classes that are very similar, and thus planets of that type will be secondary targets for colonisation. The class names make it pretty obvious what each one looks like (though I should point out that "continental" means "Earth-like"), and they are arranged in the following order:

Continental - Ocean - Arctic - Tundra - Arid - Desert - Jungle - Continental

This essentially boils down to what type of environment you think our species would evolve in. Which ones do you all like the sound of?


Cosmetic/Roleplay Things


Species Name - Our alien species itself needs a name, as well as a plural and an adjective (e.g. "Zoblox, Zobloxes, Zobloxian"). Usually I make this up after choosing a name list, so that planet and leader names are similar in how they sound to our species' names. Any ideas, or would people rather choose a name list first?

Additionally there's space for us to write a short description of our species and its history. If you guys want to figure out a backstory/concept behind our aliens now, then we can put it in here. It might be a good idea to do the backstory stuff now, just so we have an idea of what our alien empire is/what its ideals are when deciding other cosmetic factors.


Name List - There are roughly 20 name lists in the game, each one providing a list of names for our species' leaders, ships, fleets, planets, army units, and sometimes space stations. It's hard to give a complete overview of all of them just because there's so much detail and variation, but if people want to choose this now then I can post the previews the game gives you when you select each one. I can also edit name lists and make a customised one, if people want. Do be aware that we can rename just about anything in the game - fleets, ships, individual leaders, planets - so we don't have to abide by the names our name list gives us.


Ruler - Every empire has a ruler, and we can customise our first one's appearance before we start playing. We can choose their name, sex/gender (which, for the most part, does nothing), and - in the case of the portrait we've chosen - their colour variation. More importantly we can customise our ruler's title and the title of their heir (Despotic Hegemonies function like monarchies, though the game doesn't count them as one). The default titles for Despotic Hegemonies are "Overlord" and "Deputy Overlord", and the advanced form of Despotic Hegemony - Neural Network Administration - uses "High Technician" and "Senior Technician". Do people want to stick with the defaults, or come up with some new titles?


Homeworld and Home Star Name - Our homeworld and the star it orbits need names. Not much more to say about that.


City Appearance - The six overarching species types each have a city appearance associated with them - Mammalian, Reptilian, Avian, Molluscoid, Fungoid, and Arthropoid. If you want to do this one I can post pictures of each and see which one people like the most.


Empire Name - Our empire itself needs a name, as well as an adjective (E.g United States of America, American). The game can generate these itself based on our government type and the name of our species/homeworld, but I prefer to bust out the thesaurus and come up with something weird (e.g. "The Sublime Faculty of Yii", "The Volitional Co-Operative of Gon", "The Undivided Ministry of Ryyn and Beyond", "The Wawo Cosmic Directory", "The Qre Sagacious Administration", etc. etc.). This is probably best left until after we decide on our empire's backstory, unless anyone has any cool ideas right now?


Flag - Our flag consists of four elements: a primary colour, a secondary colour, a pattern, and an emblem. There's no way we'd be able to vote on all the possible options, especially since I've got mods that let you choose from over a thousand colours instead of the 16 the base game gives you, but if people tell me roughly what they want the flag to look like/what colours they'd like to see used I can put something together and propose it in the thread for your approval/criticism.


Ship Appearance - As with city appearance there's one set of ships for each species category. I can post a picture of the previews it gives you so people can decide on this, when we get around to it.



Aaaand I think that's everything! That's a lot to take in all at once, so I'd suggest coming up with a backstory first then working through all the naming (species, empire, ruler). For a species/empire background I generally try to cover how the species evolved its genetic traits, how early governments/societies were structured, and how they came to have their current government. If anyone has any ideas or suggestions, please feel free to post them!

[Krall]

Any ideas? If no one's willing to start us off I can throw out some basic background concepts for people to work off of.

[whiteshore]

Maybe we could have our Empire get a pseudo-Soviet vibe with Collective Union of Galactic Republics as their name and their leader being styled the "Great Comrade"?

[Rhand]

I say we start on an Arid world. Just because I like the sound of it.

[ToixStory]

Lasers, warp, arid, and then avian appearance for the rest. As for names, I'm really not good at coming up with them, I'm afraid. Also flag I imagine something brown and orange?

[Krall]

Jul 3, 2016 8:47:32 GMT whiteshore said:

Maybe we could have our Empire get a pseudo-Soviet vibe with Collective Union of Galactic Republics as their name and their leader being styled the "Great Comrade"?

Not a bad idea, but I think we need some basic background, like how such a government system developed and what our founding ideology is. Also remember that we're starting off as an alien race that's only just figured out FTL travel, so it's not really a union of Galactic Republics if all the Republics are on the same planet. We can change our empire's name later, when appropriate, though.

So, any ideas for our empire's background?

[MinnesotaNationalist]

Here's my thoughts (took a while to collect)

We developed in Arid environment as a scavenger species, close relatives of vultures. Over time, the species developed so that scavenging, and society itself, was more organized. They developed technologies to better search for food, domesticate it, and later preserve it. As each of these happened, great shifts in society happened: First, going from a loose union of _species_, to organized under a "Chief Scavenger," to regular "Chief," and finally "Premier Organizer" (as in, organizes militarizes and organizes who gets food when). In 1998, they were finally united under a single Premier Organizer, and while life was generally good at home, all citizens still looked up into the skies for their future.

Environment: Arid
Weapons: Missile
FTL method: Warp
Ruler: Premier Organizer
Heir: Second Organizer/ Sub-Organizer
City Appearance: Arthopoid (a bit more mechanical and materialist, I'd say)
Ship Appearance: Arthopoid
Flag: Borwn-orange triangle-split, Zoological top-right/ Zoological 14 www.stellariswiki.com/Flag_modding#/media/File:Reference_-_backgrounds.png
Name list:
Name list: Avian 3 (if you want it to keep it easy to interact with), Avian 2/ Arthopoid 1 (if you want immersion, I like these 2 more)
-Example names from each
Avian 3: Leaders: Claws of Bronze, Wings of Indigo, Eyes of Orange| Planets: Whoo'tar, Trobbi, Craw't| Ships: Sweep, Fly, Glide (all sorts of flying terms)| Armada names: 1st Murder and so on.
(honestly, I don't want to write down Avian 2 and Arthopoid 1. Avian 3 really is the best if you want easy interaction, besides the Human names of course)

[Krall]

Jul 4, 2016 19:46:18 GMT MinnesotaNationalist said:

Here's my thoughts (took a while to collect)

We developed in Arid environment as a scavenger species, close relatives of vultures. Over time, the species developed so that scavenging, and society itself, was more organized. They developed technologies to better search for food, domesticate it, and later preserve it. As each of these happened, great shifts in society happened: First, going from a loose union of _species_, to organized under a "Chief Scavenger," to regular "Chief," and finally "Premier Organizer" (as in, organizes militarizes and organizes who gets food when). In 1998, they were finally united under a single Premier Organizer, and while life was generally good at home, all citizens still looked up into the skies for their future.

Environment: Arid
Weapons: Missile
FTL method: Warp
Ruler: Premier Organizer
Heir: Second Organizer/ Sub-Organizer
City Appearance: Arthopoid (a bit more mechanical and materialist, I'd say)
Ship Appearance: Arthopoid
Flag: Borwn-orange triangle-split, Zoological top-right/ Zoological 14 www.stellariswiki.com/Flag_modding#/media/File:Reference_-_backgrounds.png
Name list:
Name list: Avian 3 (if you want it to keep it easy to interact with), Avian 2/ Arthopoid 1 (if you want immersion, I like these 2 more)
-Example names from each
Avian 3: Leaders: Claws of Bronze, Wings of Indigo, Eyes of Orange| Planets: Whoo'tar, Trobbi, Craw't| Ships: Sweep, Fly, Glide (all sorts of flying terms)| Armada names: 1st Murder and so on.
(honestly, I don't want to write down Avian 2 and Arthopoid 1. Avian 3 really is the best if you want easy interaction, besides the Human names of course)

Nice! I like the vulture angle - I hadn't realised our portrait looked reminiscent of vultures before. I agree that the Arthropoid ships and cities look more pragmatic and industrial than the others (especially the Avian ones, even if I do love the look of Avian ships).

I like the idea for government essentially evolving out of a scavenger meritocracy, where the most efficient and able scavenger is the natural leader and all others must abide by their orders in order to avoid inefficiency and thus threatening the survival of the tribe, with the same basic logic applying throughout all technological ages. "Premier Organizer" is a bit of a dry title, though I like the basic idea behind it. Generally for coming up with titles I use this thesaurus website, as it sometimes gives you archaic and obscure terms. Using it I've come up with the titles of "Intendant Superior" for the ruler and "Intendant Inferior" for the heir. As an intendant is someone with power over the management of some business, these two are basically the only ones permitted to make real decisions in government, with the Intendant Inferior acting under the auspices and tutelage of the Intendant Superior. Thoughts?

In terms of name lists I'd argue Avian 3 is actually less interaction-friendly than others - I don't know about you, but when playing with that name list I would constantly confuse my leaders for one another, as their names were so similar (it essentially generates names using a first name like "Wings of", "Claws of", etc. and a surname which is a colour, so you will get numerous leaders who are all "Claws of X" or similar, which gets very confusing). Arthropoid 1 by comparison has names like "Vi-Ka", "Uk-Ma", and "Ek-Ir", whilst Avian 2 has names like "Bhunakh", "Loketral", and "Dalurkot", which are a lot easier to remember and recognise as different people.

As I said though it's easy to create custom name lists, so if people want to take the idea of a society that abhors individual agency and identity to its extreme I could come up with a name list that simply gives all our leaders an identification number or code. Maybe something where the first name is the word of a letter (the alien equivalent of "Alpha", "Beta", etc.) and the surname is a sequence of numbers? Leader names are editable during the game as well, so if we want we can give them nicknames based on their ID numbers to make them more unique, if necessary.

Regarding the flag, it's important to note that I'm playing with a couple of mods that give you more background patterns and colours, specifically this one for background patterns and this one which lets you choose from over a thousand different colours. As such we're not restricted to the default, and it might be easier for you guys to give me general ideas, as well as colours and specific symbols, so I can make a few designs and propose them to the thread.

[MinnesotaNationalist]

Jul 5, 2016 2:42:02 GMT Krall said:

Jul 4, 2016 19:46:18 GMT MinnesotaNationalist said:

Here's my thoughts (took a while to collect)

We developed in Arid environment as a scavenger species, close relatives of vultures. Over time, the species developed so that scavenging, and society itself, was more organized. They developed technologies to better search for food, domesticate it, and later preserve it. As each of these happened, great shifts in society happened: First, going from a loose union of _species_, to organized under a "Chief Scavenger," to regular "Chief," and finally "Premier Organizer" (as in, organizes militarizes and organizes who gets food when). In 1998, they were finally united under a single Premier Organizer, and while life was generally good at home, all citizens still looked up into the skies for their future.

Environment: Arid
Weapons: Missile
FTL method: Warp
Ruler: Premier Organizer
Heir: Second Organizer/ Sub-Organizer
City Appearance: Arthopoid (a bit more mechanical and materialist, I'd say)
Ship Appearance: Arthopoid
Flag: Borwn-orange triangle-split, Zoological top-right/ Zoological 14 www.stellariswiki.com/Flag_modding#/media/File:Reference_-_backgrounds.png
Name list:
Name list: Avian 3 (if you want it to keep it easy to interact with), Avian 2/ Arthopoid 1 (if you want immersion, I like these 2 more)
-Example names from each
Avian 3: Leaders: Claws of Bronze, Wings of Indigo, Eyes of Orange| Planets: Whoo'tar, Trobbi, Craw't| Ships: Sweep, Fly, Glide (all sorts of flying terms)| Armada names: 1st Murder and so on.
(honestly, I don't want to write down Avian 2 and Arthopoid 1. Avian 3 really is the best if you want easy interaction, besides the Human names of course)

In terms of name lists I'd argue Avian 3 is actually less interaction-friendly than others - I don't know about you, but when playing with that name list I would constantly confuse my leaders for one another, as their names were so similar (it essentially generates names using a first name like "Wings of", "Claws of", etc. and a surname which is a colour, so you will get numerous leaders who are all "Claws of X" or similar, which gets very confusing). Arthropoid 1 by comparison has names like "Vi-Ka", "Uk-Ma", and "Ek-Ir", whilst Avian 2 has names like "Bhunakh", "Loketral", and "Dalurkot", which are a lot easier to remember and recognise as different people.

Well, the reason I think Avian 3 is better than the others is this: Which is easier to remember, Scientist "Wing of Bronze" or Scientist "Bhunakh," whose name appears more like just an inpronounceable jumble of letters, and I also feel like we can get more invested in characters we can actually know the names of. The Planet names and everything else is easier to remember for Avian 3 also. Arthopoid 1 has somewhat easy to remember leader names, being made up of only 4 letters, but everything else is, again, what appears just a jumble of letters. Besides, I feel like the AAR is likely only going to focus on abut 5 characters at a time: The Leader, the Heir, the Exploration Scientist, and maybe a couple of Admirals and Governors, with the names of any other governor only coming up when they die, get a new trait, or a new one gets appointed, so having leaders with similar names shouldn't be that big of deal.

I have played with this name set, it's the only game (of 2) that I got invested in. While some of the names can get a bit too similar to each other, I also distinctly remember the names of the characters that did matter (For me, it was Claws of Bronze, the first Scientist, Beak of Khaki, the first Leader, and Wings of Indigo, the current Leader), and I did feel almost sad seeing these characters depart.

That being said, modded names is also a fair possibility. Your idea seems quite interesting for a society as strict as this.

[whiteshore]

Here is my take on the History:
We developed in a bountiful and prosperous world as flightless apex predators and our ancient history saw many divided nations fight for power but the competing nations of the world were united in the Unification Wars, where the People's Collective, under the first Great Comrade, defeated the Allied Nations in a series of wars which ended with the People's Collective uniting the planet under Rational Collectivism (Basically pseudo-Communism, albeit with a technocratic lean). After a few generations have grown up knowing only a world under Rational Collectivism, the People's Collective looks to the stars now as the Party slowly lapses into stagnation
Environment: Continental
Weapons: Kinetic
FTL: Hyperspace
Ruler: Great Comrade
Number 2: First Worker
City and Ship: Avian
Name List: Avian 3

[Krall]

Jul 5, 2016 4:13:28 GMT MinnesotaNationalist said:

Jul 5, 2016 2:42:02 GMT Krall said:

In terms of name lists I'd argue Avian 3 is actually less interaction-friendly than others - I don't know about you, but when playing with that name list I would constantly confuse my leaders for one another, as their names were so similar (it essentially generates names using a first name like "Wings of", "Claws of", etc. and a surname which is a colour, so you will get numerous leaders who are all "Claws of X" or similar, which gets very confusing). Arthropoid 1 by comparison has names like "Vi-Ka", "Uk-Ma", and "Ek-Ir", whilst Avian 2 has names like "Bhunakh", "Loketral", and "Dalurkot", which are a lot easier to remember and recognise as different people.

Well, the reason I think Avian 3 is better than the others is this: Which is easier to remember, Scientist "Wing of Bronze" or Scientist "Bhunakh," whose name appears more like just an inpronounceable jumble of letters, and I also feel like we can get more invested in characters we can actually know the names of. The Planet names and everything else is easier to remember for Avian 3 also. Arthopoid 1 has somewhat easy to remember leader names, being made up of only 4 letters, but everything else is, again, what appears just a jumble of letters. Besides, I feel like the AAR is likely only going to focus on abut 5 characters at a time: The Leader, the Heir, the Exploration Scientist, and maybe a couple of Admirals and Governors, with the names of any other governor only coming up when they die, get a new trait, or a new one gets appointed, so having leaders with similar names shouldn't be that big of deal.

I have played with this name set, it's the only game (of 2) that I got invested in. While some of the names can get a bit too similar to each other, I also distinctly remember the names of the characters that did matter (For me, it was Claws of Bronze, the first Scientist, Beak of Khaki, the first Leader, and Wings of Indigo, the current Leader), and I did feel almost sad seeing these characters depart.

That being said, modded names is also a fair possibility. Your idea seems quite interesting for a society as strict as this.

I seem to have the exact opposite opinion and experience with that name list than you. The only Avian 3 name I can remember is Beak of Gold, because they were a scientist with Spark of Genius that I accidentally got elected leader and thus lost the 10% research speed bonus that Spark of Genius gives you. Some of the name lists are hard to wrap your head/tongue around, but "Bhunakh" is really easy to say and remember for me. Arthropoid 3 is definitely too "jumble of random letters" for my liking, with names like "Crumklac Inaxinirkis", but names like "Bhunakh", "Loketral", or even "Qotryyk" are simple enough for me to parse, pronounce, and remember.

If your history idea proves popular I'll have a go at making an appropriate name list and proposing it to the thread as an option alongside the default name lists.

What did you think about the alternate leader titles I proposed (Intendant Superior and Intendant Inferior)?

Jul 5, 2016 9:21:18 GMT whiteshore said:

Here is my take on the History:
We developed in a bountiful and prosperous world as flightless apex predators and our ancient history saw many divided nations fight for power but the competing nations of the world were united in the Unification Wars, where the People's Collective, under the first Great Comrade, defeated the Allied Nations in a series of wars which ended with the People's Collective uniting the planet under Rational Collectivism (Basically pseudo-Communism, albeit with a technocratic lean). After a few generations have grown up knowing only a world under Rational Collectivism, the People's Collective looks to the stars now as the Party slowly lapses into stagnation
Environment: Continental
Weapons: Kinetic
FTL: Hyperspace
Ruler: Great Comrade
Number 2: First Worker
City and Ship: Avian
Name List: Avian 3

Hmm, the idea four our history seems a little uninspired - it seems to amount to "Everything was fine and then the Soviet Union took over", at least in my assessment. What do other people think about these background ideas?

[MinnesotaNationalist]

Jul 5, 2016 14:10:05 GMT Krall said:

Jul 5, 2016 4:13:28 GMT MinnesotaNationalist said:

Well, the reason I think Avian 3 is better than the others is this: Which is easier to remember, Scientist "Wing of Bronze" or Scientist "Bhunakh," whose name appears more like just an inpronounceable jumble of letters, and I also feel like we can get more invested in characters we can actually know the names of. The Planet names and everything else is easier to remember for Avian 3 also. Arthopoid 1 has somewhat easy to remember leader names, being made up of only 4 letters, but everything else is, again, what appears just a jumble of letters. Besides, I feel like the AAR is likely only going to focus on abut 5 characters at a time: The Leader, the Heir, the Exploration Scientist, and maybe a couple of Admirals and Governors, with the names of any other governor only coming up when they die, get a new trait, or a new one gets appointed, so having leaders with similar names shouldn't be that big of deal.

I have played with this name set, it's the only game (of 2) that I got invested in. While some of the names can get a bit too similar to each other, I also distinctly remember the names of the characters that did matter (For me, it was Claws of Bronze, the first Scientist, Beak of Khaki, the first Leader, and Wings of Indigo, the current Leader), and I did feel almost sad seeing these characters depart.

That being said, modded names is also a fair possibility. Your idea seems quite interesting for a society as strict as this.

I seem to have the exact opposite opinion and experience with that name list than you. The only Avian 3 name I can remember is Beak of Gold, because they were a scientist with Spark of Genius that I accidentally got elected leader and thus lost the 10% research speed bonus that Spark of Genius gives you. Some of the name lists are hard to wrap your head/tongue around, but "Bhunakh" is really easy to say and remember for me. Arthropoid 3 is definitely too "jumble of random letters" for my liking, with names like "Crumklac Inaxinirkis", but names like "Bhunakh", "Loketral", or even "Qotryyk" are simple enough for me to parse, pronounce, and remember.

If your history idea proves popular I'll have a go at making an appropriate name list and proposing it to the thread as an option alongside the default name lists.

What did you think about the alternate leader titles I proposed (Intendant Superior and Intendant Inferior)?

I do like the names Intendendant Superior and Intendant Inferior (I think the incarnation of Intendant Superior is actually called a Superintendant No mind, Intendant Superior sounds a lot cooler)

[Krall]

I've done some work on a unique name list for our empire, at least if we go with the hyper-efficient meritocracy idea. I spent some time trying to come up with a ID number system that made sense and would actually provide a unique ID to each member of a race that could potentially number in the trillions, but ultimately decided that was too complicated and made a simpler set of names which are - supposedly - the final couple of segments of an individual's full ID, which are the ones used when referring to them casually. They consist of a 5 digit code and a "letter name" (basically the alien equivalent of Alpha, Beta, Gamma, Upsilon, etc.). In the file I've put in a number of 5 digit codes as first names and alien letter names as last names, so they'll be matched up randomly. Here's an example of the kind of names this produces:



What do you think? Is the number code part of the name too long?

I also had a go at making a flag, based on suggestions in this thread:



I also made an alternative that I personally like more, but the choice is up to you guys:



Which do you prefer? Or would you like a different flag design?

[AnachronistRocketeer]

I actually quite like the history idea from MinnestoaNationalist, as well as your second flag (Even if I would replace the green with orange or some other more arid color myself.)I'm of two minds on the namelist, I like the Letter portion of it, and as much as I'm not fond of the random ID's I'm... not really sure how to replace them without just replacing them with more specific titles in the case of Leaders.

[Krall]

Jul 6, 2016 23:17:21 GMT AnachronistRocketeer said:

I actually quite like the history idea from MinnestoaNationalist, as well as your second flag (Even if I would replace the green with orange or some other more arid color myself.)

Thanks! I went with green partially because I like that colour combination, but also because I try to avoid making a race too monochromatic - a lot of the stuff we've got so far (portrait, planet class, background (derived from our dominant ethic)) is brown/orange. This version with a dark orange/red doesn't look too bad, though:

Jul 6, 2016 23:17:21 GMT AnachronistRocketeer said:

I'm of two minds on the namelist, I like the Letter portion of it, and as much as I'm not fond of the random ID's I'm... not really sure how to replace them without just replacing them with more specific titles in the case of Leaders.

There should be enough "letter names" (over 40) that we can ignore the number code most of the time and still have unique names for every leader, but I understand if people want to go with something else. Do people want me to post previews of each name list so they can get a basic idea of what each one looks like?


On a side note, one of the best and least important/visible bits of name lists is the names they give for different types of armies. I've tried to come up with a few for our empire - even if we don't go with my name ideas I can still edit it into whichever name list we choose if people like them (note that these are sequential names, and "%R%" is a stand-in for a Roman numeral, so the first army of that type will have "I" there, the second will have "II", and so forth):

Defence army: "Section %R% Garrison"
Assault army: "Section %R% Mobile"
Slave army: "Section %R% Sub-Citizenry"
Clone army: "Duplicate Contingent %R%"
Robotic army: "Drone Contingent %R%"
Android army: "Synthetic Cadre %R%"
Psionic army: "Transmundane Cadre %R%"
Xenomorph army: "Pseudofauna Contingent %R%"
Gene warrior army: "Augment Cadre %R%"

So yeah. I just wanted to post those, mainly because I spent a good half hour coming up with "Pseudofauna". If people like them, or have any suggestions themselves (for army names or for anything else we can name - ships, ship classes, leaders, ruler and heir titles, space fleets, and planets), please do let me know!

[MinnesotaNationalist]

Jul 7, 2016 0:15:14 GMT Krall said:

Jul 6, 2016 23:17:21 GMT AnachronistRocketeer said:

I actually quite like the history idea from MinnestoaNationalist, as well as your second flag (Even if I would replace the green with orange or some other more arid color myself.)

Thanks! I went with green partially because I like that colour combination, but also because I try to avoid making a race too monochromatic - a lot of the stuff we've got so far (portrait, planet class, background (derived from our dominant ethic)) is brown/orange. This version with a dark orange/red doesn't look too bad, though:

Jul 6, 2016 23:17:21 GMT AnachronistRocketeer said:

I'm of two minds on the namelist, I like the Letter portion of it, and as much as I'm not fond of the random ID's I'm... not really sure how to replace them without just replacing them with more specific titles in the case of Leaders.

There should be enough "letter names" (over 40) that we can ignore the number code most of the time and still have unique names for every leader, but I understand if people want to go with something else. Do people want me to post previews of each name list so they can get a basic idea of what each one looks like?


On a side note, one of the best and least important/visible bits of name lists is the names they give for different types of armies. I've tried to come up with a few for our empire - even if we don't go with my name ideas I can still edit it into whichever name list we choose if people like them (note that these are sequential names, and "%R%" is a stand-in for a Roman numeral, so the first army of that type will have "I" there, the second will have "II", and so forth):

Defence army: "Section %R% Garrison"
Assault army: "Section %R% Mobile"
Slave army: "Section %R% Sub-Citizenry"
Clone army: "Duplicate Contingent %R%"
Robotic army: "Drone Contingent %R%"
Android army: "Synthetic Cadre %R%"
Psionic army: "Transmundane Cadre %R%"
Xenomorph army: "Pseudofauna Contingent %R%"
Gene warrior army: "Augment Cadre %R%"

So yeah. I just wanted to post those, mainly because I spent a good half hour coming up with "Pseudofauna". If people like them, or have any suggestions themselves (for army names or for anything else we can name - ships, ship classes, leaders, ruler and heir titles, space fleets, and planets), please do let me know!

I do like the flag with that color attached. The reason I'm more inclined to those browns, oranges and golds is because, well, we're in an arid environment and it'd make sense to have a flag reflecting that.

On the army names, *shrugs* I don't really care that much. Sub-Citizenry is a nice touch, since I doubt 'Slaves' would be true slaves in our nation (as in they're owned and worked to death), just people with less rights then an average citizen.

"And thus Krall-o gave the contingent a cruel name, a name that means half-animal: Pseudofauna. _{now here is a riddle, to guess if you can, sing the bells of notre dame, whom are the monsters and who is the man?}"

[Krall]

Jul 7, 2016 1:58:37 GMT MinnesotaNationalist said:

I do like the flag with that color attached. The reason I'm more inclined to those browns, oranges and golds is because, well, we're in an arid environment and it'd make sense to have a flag reflecting that.

I'm not sure how much sense that argument makes, since humans don't often colour their flags after their environment, but they're aliens so who knows how they view and understand colour culturally? In any case, I'm fine with whatever people want to go with when it comes to flags, but that red flag with a black circle would be my suggestion.

Jul 7, 2016 1:58:37 GMT MinnesotaNationalist said:

On the army names, *shrugs* I don't really care that much. Sub-Citizenry is a nice touch, since I doubt 'Slaves' would be true slaves in our nation (as in they're owned and worked to death), just people with less rights then an average citizen.

That's exactly why I went with that name! Going on the background we've got, it doesn't seem like we'd enslave people and use them as property - just withdraw rights and privileges from them where this increases our economic efficiency.

Jul 7, 2016 1:58:37 GMT MinnesotaNationalist said:

"And thus Krall-o gave the contingent a cruel name, a name that means half-animal: Pseudofauna. _{now here is a riddle, to guess if you can, sing the bells of notre dame, whom are the monsters and who is the man?}"

Still one of the best Disney songs.

[whiteshore]

What about we call Slave Armies "Penal Armies"?

[Krall]

Jul 8, 2016 2:31:58 GMT whiteshore said:

What about we call Slave Armies "Penal Armies"?

That could work. I've been looking over the other name lists and - whilst I do like the army names I came up with - I think I'll reconsider the number code names, mainly because I'd rather use number codes for ships or planets and using number codes for everything would get confusing.


If you don't want to go with a custom name list, I've made previews of all the default name lists (excluding the human ones) which you can see here. Note that the fleet names section shows set names, but the game actually uses sequential names - so instead of "Iniika-Pa Navy Cluster" or "Murder of Barraw" we'd have "1st Navy Cluster" and "5th Murder". There are a couple of name lists where the set fleet names bare no relation to the sequential names, so I've added notes below those noting what fleet names will actually be generated.

If you like the look of any of these, or you'd like me to make a custom name list based on one of them, please let me know!