This week's design discussion is going to discuss strategic resources. We talked about this feature a little bit last week and wanted to conclude our discussion on it this week. Our hope with strategic resources is that they will provide more depth to the strategic map, research, fleet design, and diplomacy. So let's start our discussion on these various areas and the effects that Lord of Rigel's strategic system will have on each.
Strategic resources will enable players to research and construct advanced technology. Strategic resources will be on the only way to research certain advanced techs that will allow for the Research Victory. Additionally, players can use them to research planet killer technology and build mega structures such as Dyson Sphere and Doomstars. The idea behind tying resources to research and construction is to make the player think about the galaxy map beyond just size. We want players to have to defend key systems that provide critical resources and to incentivize targeted invasions of other territory to acquire planets with key resources. And yes you read it correctly - we are tying Doomstars to strategic resources. Many strategy games become a demonstration of bigger is better and by the end game players ignore the basics of fleet design because there is nothing to stop them from making massive ships in a short period of time.
Lets also not forget planet killer technology and other advanced weapons. Just like the real world, advanced resources should be needed to produce advanced weapons technology. Planet killers should not be difficult to produce or something that can be equipped on every ship. Having strategic resources being a requirement of researching and building advanced weapons will keep them from becoming too common and further assist in fleet mechanics. It will be difficult for a player to have a fleet of planet killers - and if they do it will hurt the player even more to potentially lose them in combat.
There will be a time when strategic resources may not be reachable for a player and players will be forced to trade. Often players become strong enough in a game that they can choose to ignore trade, but we want players to interact with the galactic community even if it is just for trade. It will help players become more vested in the affairs of other empires, especially in terms of defense as to now allow the species providing them with strategic resources to be conquered by another hostile species.
As you can see we are hoping that strategic resources makes players approach a variety of systems, the galaxy map and fleet design in a different way. There will be numerous strategic resources for players to look out for and they won't always be on nice worlds. There maybe a Toxic Ultra-Poor world that has that special resource that you need.
Join us next week!
