Fridge Logic: Colony Ships and Genocide

[pteroid]

One time I warped my fleet into the home system of a species I was at war with just as they were about to send a colony ship out. My fleet engaged and blew it up before I even realized what was going on. Eventually I won the war and got their home planet in the bargain, I kinda RP'd my species being protective of them and treating them better than most conquered species because they'd ended up annihilating an entire civilian population by mistake.

 

[Rock Lord]

Yeah I have to admit, I kinda wish targeting Colony Ships was something covered in empires' policies somewhere and that there were repercussions for blowing them up. I remember blowing one up because it just so happened to be orbiting the world of the empire I was attacking. It didn't flee like I was hoping it would, so it was destroyed.

Making them a separate type of target might help with immersion, at least in cases like that.

 

[Crissa]

Yeah I have to admit, I kinda wish targeting Colony Ships was something covered in empires' policies somewhere and that there were repercussions for blowing them up. I remember blowing one up because it just so happened to be orbiting the world of the empire I was attacking. It didn't flee like I was hoping, so it was destroyed.

Making the a separate type of target might help with immersion, at least in cases like that.

Yeah, you could have diplomatic repercussions for targeting a colony ships... Then middling ones for hitting civilian ships, then an extreme honor one for militaristic societies (or pacifists) to not even shoot troop transports until they hit the ground. There's some cool story possibilities here.

 

[Sinister2202]

some rules of engagement policy would be nice along with the OP, like the bombardment policy.

 

[Mouthwash]

I don't understand why colony ships don't make you sacrifice anything besides minerals and energy. You can settle a new world in a year, build a spaceport in another year, and let your new planet start colonizing before it even has a second pop. That's kind of immersion-breaking, no?

 

[macd21]

I don't understand why colony ships don't make you sacrifice anything besides minerals and energy. You can settle a new world in a year, build a spaceport in another year, and let your new planet start colonizing before it even has a second pop. That's kind of immersion-breaking, no?

Not really, no. I've always assumed that the colony ship only has a few thousand people on it. They spend the first year establishing the colony, which mostly consists of setting up the infrastructure for the millions of colonists who arrive over that time. Those colonists don't necessarily come from the same planet as the ship originated from.

 

[extrapancake]

Adding a way to capture ships with infantry would solve the problem. It would also be a good start for a pirate framework.