Birth of the Federation

In the meantime I completed a game as Borg assimilating all major and minor races and I met no problems during the whole game!
Some small suggestions:
- there was no message about winning the game after the assimilation of all races
- the list of systems is meaningless for Borg, maybe a list of known system of other races would be more useful as Star System page at the Intelligence Screen

Cool!
The texts need major improvements though, they need to be made more Borg-ish to make the experience more satisfying.

- there was no message about winning the game after the assimilation of all races

IIRC, it's in the ToDo list. Might tackle that next, though it's low priority.

- as the list of systems is meaningless for Borg, maybe a list of known system of other races would be more useful as Star System page at the Intelligence Screen

Good point!

Thanks for the report(s), you're a big help!
Anything you find, as small as it might seem, please LMK.

- there was no message about winning the game after the assimilation of all races

Fixed the issue that you didn't get any message, and added a custom message for the Borg.
You only need to eliminate all major civs, not the minors.

Uploaded a new patch with the fix mentioned above. Geordie, if you have a savegame close to the end of that game and can check if you now get the SitRep, I'd appreciate it! Thanks.

Also the Star Systems tab for the Borg will now show only systems colonized by other species - it still needs to be tweaked though, namely showing the civ's name.

Thanks for the patch!
I confirm that the Borg corrections work. Perfection attained
I also confirm that the autosave transfers the diplomatic decisions, even in rather old saves.
BR
geordie

Hehe, cool.

I've added the Home System and Quadrant of the race to the Diplomacy Report text in the Race Info panel. Next I'll try to make clicking on the Home System name move you to the race's homesystem.

Do you think this will help?

Yes, it helps, but after two last patches I do not see a link to the proper system, only a quadrant description. In an advanced game it may last a while for example to find a race to establish a trade link.

BTW - an error after a really long time....

Haven't released it yet
Had just finished coding it, and wanted to make sure it was an acceptable solution before closing this issue.

That error, it's the IndexedCollection issue... at least it seems to be fixed for OBs, which is good.

I've made Cease-Fires and War Pacts also last only for 25 turns (like NAPs). What do you guys think?
Ofc, these need to be made to take more strategic considerations into account when accepting/rejecting.

What about Open Borders?
The question here lies in if we want these to only allow establishing trade routes, or if we should have a relations penalty for fleets in another civ's territory without an Open Borders Treaty.
If we want the OBT only for the former, then no strategic considerations are really needed, and setting a limit on it doesn't make much sense - it'll just force you to offer it again; then again, it might be useful in that if you want to change the target civ/system of the trade route, it'll save you the diplo fallout of cancelling the TR... (the downside being you having to re-establish the TR every 25 turns).

Iceman wrote: ↑Mon Nov 18, 2019 6:55 pm I've made Cease-Fires and War Pacts also last only for 25 turns (like NAPs). What do you guys think?
Ofc, these need to be made to take more strategic considerations into account when accepting/rejecting.

I like this change a lot. I always wish we could've had this in BOTF.

Iceman wrote: ↑Mon Nov 18, 2019 6:55 pm What about Open Borders?
The question here lies in if we want these to only allow establishing trade routes, or if we should have a relations penalty for fleets in another civ's territory without an Open Borders Treaty.
If we want the OBT only for the former, then no strategic considerations are really needed, and setting a limit on it doesn't make much sense - it'll just force you to offer it again; then again, it might be useful in that if you want to change the target civ/system of the trade route, it'll save you the diplo fallout of cancelling the TR... (the downside being you having to re-establish the TR every 25 turns).

Hmm, good question.

Would it be possible to allow only scout/science vessels to enter other empires' territory, whilst otherwise restricting access to combat vessels, colony ships, troop transports, etc.? That way, you could have open border agreements be indefinite, while avoiding obvious exploits.

Martok wrote: ↑Tue Nov 19, 2019 9:12 pm I like this change a lot. I always wish we could've had this in BOTF.

Cool.
I think it makes sense. In CFs, you have 25 turns to get your relations up to Neutral or risk being at war again. In WPs, it didn't make much sense to get an allied status indefinitely, when this is by definition a temporary agreement.

Hmm, good question.

Would it be possible to allow only scout/science vessels to enter other empires' territory, whilst otherwise restricting access to combat vessels, colony ships, troop transports, etc.? That way, you could have open border agreements be indefinite, while avoiding obvious exploits.

Do you mean this when having a NAP, or when having no agreement at all?

a) When you have a NAP, you cannot enter their territory at all, with any type of ships.
b) If you don't have any agreement, you can enter at will, with any type of ships; it should (not implemented yet) affect relations though (else it's no different from an Open Borders except for trade routes).
c) If you have an OB, you can enter at will, with any type of ships, and no penalty to relations.

The purpose of OBs having a time limit (and thus my question) was:
- to allow you to change the target colony of a trade route without taking a relations hit (after 25 turns) [which you can still do before those 25 turns, if you don't mind the hit]
- to allow you to cross that civ's territory with a war fleet to attack another civ, without committing indefinitely to such a safe passage status [which you can still do without an OB (but only if no NAP) but with a relations penalty, if you don't mind the hit]

Some UI enhancements in the diplomacy screen and the starmap.
- DS: added notification in the Race Info panel when an embargo with the civ is in effect (setting embargos not possible yet)
. DS: improved look of credits selection dialog
- SM: station indicator, will display "S" if owner not contacted yet, else will display OP/SB/SS/TH
- SM: shipyard indicator, will display "Y" if system not explored yet, else will display Yx where x is the number of docks ("level" of SY)

Will upload a new patch in a moment.

A remark about the Open Border Treaty or any limitation to enter the foreign space by a colony ship - a terraforming of somebody's system improves the relation status, sometimes remarkably. In fact I like it more than a pure bribing...
I suppose that establishing a trade root could add some small relation improvement as well

The OBT doesn't add any limitations; on the contrary, it removes any imposed or default limitations - as explained earlier.

Re colony ships roaming freely in another civ's territory, would you want another empire to have colony ships in your territory?
I understand the terraforming bonus argument, but shouldn't you need an OBT for that? You then would have 25 turns to do it. I can make it so that during the course of the terraforming mission, the "trespassing" penalty is cancelled and instead you get the terraforming bonus; but you're still there without permission... or is there something I'm missing?

Re the terraforming bonus, I plan to curb it some at some point. I think I mentioned already making homesystems start with terraformed planets according to a TechCurve vs PlanetEnvironment relation. Maybe also make the bonus be modified by the target civ's TechCurve - a higher tech civ should be less impressed with your gesture than a lower tech one.

Having a trade route with another civ does improve relations with them already

I agree with the OBs go first. My remark concerned only minor races. Of course some minor races (isolacionists) will be still hard to convince to sign any treaty. In fact I meant that for now there were few diplomatic tools or ways to be used, so I would prefer not to limit the terraforming effect.