Something that's always bugged me with Stellaris was how little empires seemed to care about their neighbors in terms of grand-scope of things. They never take into account galaxy-wide crisis events, or a local neighbor gaining power exponentially or anything that is a medium to long term threat. The closest thing in game that we get to this is border friction, but I think it needs to expand on the idea of localized problems a bit. A Coalition system would work well in this regard.
The basic idea has two real steps necessary for execution: a temporary Alliance either ensuring the independence or non-aggression of everyone apart of it, and additional things accounted for relations between empires.
1) The first is just a version of Alliances that only lasts until a specific goal is met or a threat ended. This could go from a bunch of neighboring empires forming a Coalition against the Preythoryn Scourge on thier borders or forming a grouped effort against an invading empire similar to how Greece would against effectively everyone that wasn't Greece. The goal could be similar to how one starts a War, although the terms would of course be different from planetary liberation, more like mutual Guarantee Independence against X Empire/Threat, win Coalition-members war, break apart X Empire into fragments, and so on. This would add more to the game rather than everyone building up as best they could until few remained, but also breaking down larger hosts. Also, I'm aware this is effectively just an Alliance, but it's the temporary bit that I think is enough of a difference to separate the two. Also, this would of course be easier to form with other Empires than a permanent Alliance due to it's necessity for mutual survival. Think of ME3 where the separate races formed a Coalition against the Reapers, as different as their ethos' were. Mutual protection against a mutual threat we could not hold off on our own is the core idea here.
2) The second is a bit harder to explain. Certain factors would have to be taken into account between nations for one to assess the other as a threat, rather than just "we share similar ethos" like the game currently does. This does include border friction, but expands on to their relative strength, number of ships, AI personality, history of war and takeover, etc etc. I know there are better words to use than this but I'm failing at finding them. There needs to be a better understand of empires between each other than is currently implemented is what I'm trying to say. The current model we have feels very basic and does not take into account nearly as many things as it should.
I feel like with a Coalition system this would allow smaller empires to form states (another potential idea of States maybe) and would expand middle-game quite a bit before it becomes 3 massive empires fighting for galactic conquest. Which, of course, is fun. But I think I prefer the smaller more localized conflicts over the 3 top empires vying for power. Hopefully you all can at least understand what I'm presenting, if not appreciate and agree with it.
Cheers,
Captain_Jin
The basic idea has two real steps necessary for execution: a temporary Alliance either ensuring the independence or non-aggression of everyone apart of it, and additional things accounted for relations between empires.
1) The first is just a version of Alliances that only lasts until a specific goal is met or a threat ended. This could go from a bunch of neighboring empires forming a Coalition against the Preythoryn Scourge on thier borders or forming a grouped effort against an invading empire similar to how Greece would against effectively everyone that wasn't Greece. The goal could be similar to how one starts a War, although the terms would of course be different from planetary liberation, more like mutual Guarantee Independence against X Empire/Threat, win Coalition-members war, break apart X Empire into fragments, and so on. This would add more to the game rather than everyone building up as best they could until few remained, but also breaking down larger hosts. Also, I'm aware this is effectively just an Alliance, but it's the temporary bit that I think is enough of a difference to separate the two. Also, this would of course be easier to form with other Empires than a permanent Alliance due to it's necessity for mutual survival. Think of ME3 where the separate races formed a Coalition against the Reapers, as different as their ethos' were. Mutual protection against a mutual threat we could not hold off on our own is the core idea here.
2) The second is a bit harder to explain. Certain factors would have to be taken into account between nations for one to assess the other as a threat, rather than just "we share similar ethos" like the game currently does. This does include border friction, but expands on to their relative strength, number of ships, AI personality, history of war and takeover, etc etc. I know there are better words to use than this but I'm failing at finding them. There needs to be a better understand of empires between each other than is currently implemented is what I'm trying to say. The current model we have feels very basic and does not take into account nearly as many things as it should.
I feel like with a Coalition system this would allow smaller empires to form states (another potential idea of States maybe) and would expand middle-game quite a bit before it becomes 3 massive empires fighting for galactic conquest. Which, of course, is fun. But I think I prefer the smaller more localized conflicts over the 3 top empires vying for power. Hopefully you all can at least understand what I'm presenting, if not appreciate and agree with it.
Cheers,
Captain_Jin
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