Game Explanations

[PhaseDragon]

I realize that everyone wants to know every little thing about everything in the game. I admit that I thirst for knowledge as well; but, when it comes down to it, the reason we play is for discovery. If Pete just tells us everything anytime we ask then we would be more likely to lose interest in the game....a game which I find most enjoyable.

 

Rules are something that I agree needs to be clarified. Also, rules exploits need to be addressed when they are discovered. Some rules were designed for one purpose but could actually used by exploitation to do something completely different and probably force the original rule out of existence....very sad. I am not up on a soapbox since I have exploited many a rule in the past without really seeing the damage that it caused to the game. I might have "Won" but it was hollow victory at best. Nothing to really brag about. When you play within the intended rules and abide by the rules in spirit then everyone can continue to have fun and winning really is winning.

 

Just a thought to try and calm some people down a little.

[System Lord Ra]

Because your God Emperor Ra commands it, slave!

 

[Ozboym]

I realize that everyone wants to know every little thing about everything in the game. I admit that I thirst for knowledge as well; but, when it comes down to it, the reason we play is for discovery. If Pete just tells us everything anytime we ask then we would be more likely to lose interest in the game....a game which I find most enjoyable.

A good game does not need to rely on rule "secrecy" to make it interesting.

 

Having rule secrets causes large numbers of problems:

 

1) Bugs in the game are less obvious. How can you complain that something isn't working correctly if RTG has never explained how it is supposed to work.

 

2) Every other week some player complains bitterly and threatens to drop because they have been "surprised" by a secret rule not working the way they thought it should

 

3) Secrecy is convincing me this game is far more incomplete than I was led to believe. Too much of it is "unimplemented" and this will ultimately lead to disappointed players. We've seen many examples on these boards already where players have wasted money performing actions that were actually pointless

 

4) A game that needs rule secrets to give it depth is an illusion. I think SuperNova has more than enough depth that it doesn't need secrets (but the secrets make it hard to tell )

 

And before anyone leaps to conclusions, I am not angry about this, I am just stating my opinion

[Shade]

I completely agree with Ozboym. I've been a serious "gamer" for over 20 years now. I've played and run PBMs, as well as countless boardgames, RPGs, etc. If a game is good and has sufficient depth, it does not need rule secrecy to hold interest or allow for players to experiment with different strategies. In fact, rule secrecy actually detracts from this. If players don't know how something works, there is no basis for experimentation, we may as well be throwing darts at a dartboard blindfolded and try to improve our game without ever taking the blindfold off. Now I'm not saying Supernova is necesarily in this situation. Many of the rules are well understood. Some rules are not in place as features of the game haven't been implemented yet. the game is really in a building phase still, not so incomplete as a playtest, but I think the guys at RTG have done a pretty good job phasing in rules and features. It is annoying if certain things are unknown that really shouldn't be, such as combat rules. One way I look at this is that if your government could perform "simulations" or "wargames" to test their combat capabilities (and why wouldn't they be able to?) they then should be able to know enough to understand the realities of combat and not need to find another alien race to try their designs out against them before they do. Things like that give the impression to players that the moderators want to keep things secret so that they can change the rules at a whim without explanation. This is dangerous if overdone, and can lead to player abandonment. With Supernova the combat rules could be a little more open I think. We have been given general ratings (poor, adequate, etc) for systems and a basic idea as to how offensive systems are countered by defensive systems and how formations play into things and so forth, but I think things could be better. I'd like to see orders that allow you to conduct "wargames" among your own fleets with combat reports that give a decent idea as to what systems are working well or not with certain design vs design matchups, without your ships actually getting destroyed. This could maybe be an expansion on the LFE order, giving training bonuses as well perhaps. In fact this could lead to more $ for RTG as players start spending all kinds of orders building ships and fleets and then pitting them against one another simply to see how things work so they are better prepared when they need to face off against a real enemy.

[Locklyn]

The capacity to run wargames or simulate combat between your own fleets was suggested to Pete some time ago but he said it was impossible as every combat is moderated/overseen by him manually as it is today that and he would not be able to cope with the hundreds of combats per turn that were likely to ensue.

 

/Locklyn

[Krelnett_of_Kraan]

[OoC] He's gonna be screwed when people start meeting up and going to war for real, then.

[iC] Not that we believe in war, anyway, but... *shrug*