Types of computer/tablet players

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UesugiKenshin
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Re: Types of computer/tablet players

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Ordinarily the world is populated by people rushing around, and it took a virus to slow people down. This means there's a gap in the activity allowing far more people to play BotE and create resources for BotE.

It's a missed golden opportunity if nothing constructive comes out of that process.

Players often don't have the time for hundreds of turns. So the most beautiful advanced elements like research, buildings, ships, troops, might never be seen if played from turn#1 to turn#400.

This means the way to get past this limit is loading scenarios, campaigns, and advanced saved games.90% of players may not get to turn# 700. If playing an hour a day, and it requires 16 hours a day times 30 days equals 480 hours to get to turn#700, then that is 16 months or 1 year and 3 months to get to that turn. They may move on to a new game by then.

This is why modders create preset empires as otherwise you may not have balanced empires to challenge players and not everyone enjoys building like "builders" and "turtlers" do. They are among the smallest subset of players.

The largest subset are people who have 30 to 50 hours they want to commit to a game. This means they require preset campaigns. They would rather play 10 shorter campaigns that they did not have to build,just redeploy troops and ships and fight battles and wage war and peace.
Minor Race Database http://birth-of-the-empires.de/wiki/ind ... r_(Minors)
Minor Race Ships http://birth-of-the-empires.de/wiki/ind ... nen_Völker
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Re: Types of computer/tablet players

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So the 5-7% who enjoy building an empire does not mean never building as that is an ordinary aspect of establishing new colonies.

93-95% want some base of empires where they have maybe 10 starting colonies with strong infrastructure and established stable treasuries. The risk of losing these is small. What they may lose are the new colonies as the ai expands.

Half the players want to wage war over 20-30 turns. That means they need 25-50 established colonies with strong military forces. They have to direct these with issuing orders and then altering orders based on ai responses. Suddenly plans change, as the ai attacks or makes an error, and they seize the moment and attack that weakness.

25% want a 100+ colonies with marvelous infrastructure and extremely strong diverse ships they can combine in fleets and have escorts for transports of hundreds of ground invasion forces. Those have huge treasuries and vast mined resources.

Yes, some want to establish something akin to the Founding of the Federation or the Klingon empire, but that would require 16 months. What every developer of turn based strategy game hopes for is years of play. Civ2 is still being played 24 years later. Rome 1 Total War is still being played 16 years later. Alpha Centauri is still being played 21 years later.

Birth of the Empires was released in 2004 and 16 years later is still being played even ported to the Android tablets.
Zuletzt geändert von UesugiKenshin am Dienstag 22. September 2020, 18:29, insgesamt 1-mal geändert.
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Re: Types of computer/tablet players

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Intelligent clever insightful players do not reinvent the wheel. They pick up tips from other players who are very similar in style to enhance their own or pick up tips from those who are their opposites as they lack certain abilities. They synthesize a new style of playing and get better.

Everyone was new to computer wargaming once. Few are naturally gifted. There are not many opportinities to wage war and in doing so, there is a heavy attrition rate.

Reinventing the wheel means maybe 16 months of a learning curve to gain all the skills need to routinely beat BotE adversaries.

When computer wargaming was a new idea, it was so popular and thrilling to have an ai opponent as otherwise one rarely played a tabletop wargame.

That created "computer widows" as mostly guys played computer games and spouses would call out at 1-2 am, "Honey are you coming to bed?", as the only way to play as a young husband was after work and after all the jobs around the house, and helping with the kids' homework, and paying bills, and fixing/repairing/constructing projects.

There are not an extra 450-900+ hours to learn all new ways to build a space empire. Not when there is an easier faster method.

And I bet if you are average players, some of you are taking classes and getting certifications and doing CEUs, and have other hobbies, so you can't spend 900 hours just playing BotE.
Minor Race Database http://birth-of-the-empires.de/wiki/ind ... r_(Minors)
Minor Race Ships http://birth-of-the-empires.de/wiki/ind ... nen_Völker
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Re: Types of computer/tablet players

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A superlative player can take a rotten way unbalanced advanced save game and though the situation is terrible as it's handicapped by mismanagement of resources so the wrong infrastructure was built, or the treasury is in a shambles, or there isn't enough of a military presence and the enemy is attacking terraforming colony ships, can still win. They enjoy so-called unwinnable save games and show ""Nope, I saved your disaster".
Minor Race Database http://birth-of-the-empires.de/wiki/ind ... r_(Minors)
Minor Race Ships http://birth-of-the-empires.de/wiki/ind ... nen_Völker
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Re: Types of computer/tablet players

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Players have very different motivations for playing.

Some are killing time between classes and assignments and during meals.

Some want something with quick resolution as they want a diversion.

Some want extremely long games where they entirely choose their fate.

Some want to play with their buddies in duels and that has been going on since Doom and null modems.

Some want to play campaigns in multiplayer with a friend across the country.

Some want to fight battles and wage war to stimulate their mind. They don't have time to build entire armies and fleets.

The standard BotE or a modded BotE, no matter how great, may require too long a time commitment, so advanced save games remedy that.
Minor Race Database http://birth-of-the-empires.de/wiki/ind ... r_(Minors)
Minor Race Ships http://birth-of-the-empires.de/wiki/ind ... nen_Völker
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Re: Types of computer/tablet players

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Some players are very analytical. They don't want to build, be entertained with stories, sabotage, or research. They want to wage war doggedly and play BotE as if it's chess.

"I'm building forces and deploying them, utilizing many tactics to crush that colony, and eliminate them and military forces. Then do the same to the next colony until victory is inevitable."

Others like exploring and war is okay, but it's the unique stars and planet types and stellar anomalies and minor alien species that intrigue them. They want to hear stories and do research as everything is compelling and there is no rush to attain a victory.

"Wow! Look at that!"

And that is why in the eighties some were called "space cadet"...they are dreamers and sometime visionaries and need adventure and stimulation.
Minor Race Database http://birth-of-the-empires.de/wiki/ind ... r_(Minors)
Minor Race Ships http://birth-of-the-empires.de/wiki/ind ... nen_Völker
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Re: Types of computer/tablet players

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Originally in the traditional martial arts of Japan, there were two belt rankings: white worn by beginners and black worn by those who had gained proficiency.

Japan was rather foolish as they had a warrior cuture, but after the battle of Sekigahara, Tokugawa won and established a dynasty. That meant samurai were not required and neither were they local lords over a fief, but living in urban centers with bureacratic responsibilities.

Then many were impoverished and there was seemingly no need for them, so the Emperor eliminated them. Then he had lied as he wanted common people to serve in a conscripted military at very little money and so reversing professional armies and navies.

Well, for awhile it worked until they were hopelessly defeated. So much so that many young men were dead...a whole generation or thereabouts.

So teachers of the martial arts started teaching Americans. American soldiers wanted to be measured regarding their progress and doing so regularly. It gave them positive feedback about how much (or little) ability and skills, they had attained. So colored belt ranking began and how proficient they were to teach and so have "dan" rating.

This same phenomena exists in achievements in BotE. Some are motivated by achievements so getting feedback like acquiring medals so they know how well they are doing and have a sense of accomplishment.
Minor Race Database http://birth-of-the-empires.de/wiki/ind ... r_(Minors)
Minor Race Ships http://birth-of-the-empires.de/wiki/ind ... nen_Völker
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Re: Types of computer/tablet players

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Some don't want to play a war game. Some want win in other ways like being victorious through research. The two players are not at all alike. And such victories are like achieving medals.
http://birth-of-the-empires.de/wiki/ind ... Conditions
Here Victory Conditions are activated.

These value are changed automatically by Game Settings.
Elimination
The game ends when any empire has eliminate all opponents.

Diplomacy
The game ends when any empire has signed x contracts (min. affiliation)

Conquest
The game ends when any empire has conquered x systems.

Research
The game ends when 10 achieved special techs are reached by any empire.

Combat
The game ends when combat victories are reached by any empire.

Sabotage
The game ends when x successful sabotage attempts are reached by any empire.
Minor Race Database http://birth-of-the-empires.de/wiki/ind ... r_(Minors)
Minor Race Ships http://birth-of-the-empires.de/wiki/ind ... nen_Völker
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Re: Types of computer/tablet players

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I don't think people realize how vast a galaxy is and how many people would love a sandbox space 4x game, but with 600 minor alien races.

You can set BotE to maximum so a 40x40 galaxy and turn off all major aliens but your own. And set minor aliens to 100%. This is a misnomer as the maximum is 150, I think. On such a galaxy, there are typically 1400 sectors (theoretically 1600), so only 150 would be inhabited. You could colonize the rest and establish diplomatic relations and so eventually attack if you want. They can't really grow, but some are very strong.

[Note: sectors may be empty or have stellar anomalies so never are fully populated]

Say the average number of planets is 5 though 9 is possible. That means there are 7,000 planets. In the late seventies, science fiction fans could only dream of such a galaxy in a computer simulation.

Many would love meeting 600 minor alien races and using diplomacy, probaby 50% will end up joining your empire.

Upon opening diplomatic relations, getting a trade deal, terraforming their possible planets, maybe establishing trade, and then getting friendlier, you would expect parsing a dialogue and so it having an effect. That could change all manner of elements...in a cascading manner...a butterfly flaps its wings in chaos theory and affects the hurricane.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Butterfly_effect

But if thousands of random events played were unique to these minor exraterrestrials, many would love just exploring. That was the Star Trek vision...only occassionally marred by war.

You really want at least one, maybe two major alien races too as a minimum. They will offer more challenges and absorb many minor aliens as well.
Minor Race Database http://birth-of-the-empires.de/wiki/ind ... r_(Minors)
Minor Race Ships http://birth-of-the-empires.de/wiki/ind ... nen_Völker
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Re: Types of computer/tablet players

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Why do you play BotE? See that seems straight forward, "too win, Goofy, but actually that is not true.

You could cheat and clobber all the major and minor races as there is at least one apk with infinite money. It would be a totally boring unsatisfying way though.

You play because human beings like challenges and rewards. You will find yourself helping extraterrestrials when it probably will make it tougher to win. In other words, you intentionally want a more difficult challenge.

You want to date the lovely lady who beckons you even though she is tougher to date...when the pretty girl next door keeps hoping you will notice her. On some subconscious level, we all like challenges more.

In some ways, excitement is an aspect of being potentially denied reward or induces fear and then it is overcome, so it affirms us. Human beings like risk. If there is no risk, we are bored.
Minor Race Database http://birth-of-the-empires.de/wiki/ind ... r_(Minors)
Minor Race Ships http://birth-of-the-empires.de/wiki/ind ... nen_Völker
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Re: Types of computer/tablet players

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Some players never play mods. They don't understand why anyone would play one as the game seems fine the way it is.

I remember the first time I found out about mods and loaded one. I figured there would be a few differences, but was shocked at all the new units and ai changes and new buildings. The game was remarkably different and more thrilling.

Some people only want to play mods as they like novelty. Maybe they played BotE for years so want a few changes and they don't want to mess the programming as it makes them nervous they "would mess it up".

There would be no mods if not for the foresight and selflessness of the developers as they shared valuable details so modding was possible. Otherwise programs are "black boxes" and no one know what is going on in the source code. Without the BotE wiki and the forum, who could keep track of all the details needed to mod?

People are fickle and many get bored easily and so some quit playing the original game in as little as 1-2 years.
Minor Race Database http://birth-of-the-empires.de/wiki/ind ... r_(Minors)
Minor Race Ships http://birth-of-the-empires.de/wiki/ind ... nen_Völker
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