Make troop/colony ships consume local troops/population

[Oberlus]

And make colony buildings also consume population from the appropriate source colonies.

This is related to making viable the Tall strategy, in which a empire grows few planets big.

This change would make gameplay considerably different, but I think the pros would outperform the cons:

Pros:
- We get more viable strategies (Tall vs Wide, colonize everything less of a no-brainer).
- We get more balanced starts thanks to the controlled growth rate, since empires that start with plenty of good/adequate planets around no longer grow population that faster than unlucky starts (still faster, but much less).
Cons:
- It requires AI changes.
- It requires player's adjustment to the new mechanics.

Some other pros or cons? Thoughts?

Edit: More cons:
- It requires a mechanic to take population from other planets for the colony buldings to consume population on outposts.
- It requires a mechanic to query the size of colony ship batches to avoid stuck colony production batches when population isn't enough to supply all ships.

Related https://github.com/freeorion/freeorion/issues/1406

[labgnome]

I may be mistaken, but I believe these ideas have floated around the forums here before. I personally think they make a lot of sense.

[Geoff the Medio]

see: https://github.com/freeorion/freeorion/issues/1419 and viewtopic.php?f=28&t=10329

[Oberlus]

Also, about troops:

Changelog for v0.4.6 states that troops were made to consume local troops.
https://freeorion.org/forum/viewtopic.p ... 385#p85385
If that is not a thing anymore, I assume someone wasn't happy with it and change was reverted. Need to find discussion about it.

[Geoff the Medio]

Also, about troops:

Relevant commit:
https://github.com/freeorion/freeorion/ ... 6095dfb210

[Ophiuchus]

Also, about troops:

Changelog for v0.4.6 states that troops were made to consume local troops.
https://freeorion.org/forum/viewtopic.p ... 385#p85385
If that is not a thing anymore, I assume someone wasn't happy with it and change was reverted. Need to find discussion about it.

Simple implementation is a micromanagement headache. Troop regeneration scales with the number of planets. You suddenly need to spread troop ship production, build shipyards everywhere. Troop ship generation needs to be delayed until there are enough troops. What do you do with batches? Split those? Pause production?

[Oberlus]

It seems that for both troop pods and colony buildings we need a way to drag from the whole empire?
Or, for troops, a special building that boost troop creation in that planet (dragging pop from other planets)?

[labgnome]

Simple implementation is a micromanagement headache. Troop regeneration scales with the number of planets. You suddenly need to spread troop ship production, build shipyards everywhere. Troop ship generation needs to be delayed until there are enough troops. What do you do with batches? Split those? Pause production?

I'd just pause production, that would be the simplest solution. Maybe also generate a sitrep that the colony has run out of troops?

It seems that for both troop pods and colony buildings we need a way to drag from the whole empire?

Have planetary population be reduced by the "growth" per turn of the colony building divided by the number of planets of that species in the supply group.

Or, for troops, a special building that boost troop creation in that planet (dragging pop from other planets)?

Maybe a one per species per supply-group shipyard upgrade, the Troop Recruitment Center, that draws from all planets of that species in the supply group in a similar way to what I outlined for the colony building.

[Oberlus]

Queued batches that won't be possible to finish (such as colony ships or troop ships) should not get any PP, as per one of the linked issues.

Even with distributed sources for troops/colonists, dragging from every available colony, one could queue a batch that won't be possible to finish.

@Geoff
Can we tie the progression of a colony (troop) ship batch to available colonists (troopers) in the empire? That is, if a colony ship batch takes t turns and p PP to produce, and it requires a total of c colonists (so c/t colonists per turn, and p/t PP per turn), can we make that if at a given turn only X% of the c/t are available in the empire, then only X% of the PPs are invested?

[Geoff the Medio]

...if a colony ship batch takes t turns and p PP to produce, and it requires a total of c colonists (so c/t colonists per turn, and p/t PP per turn), can we make that if at a given turn only X% of the c/t are available in the empire, then only X% of the PPs are invested?

Probably yes.

Consuming a fraction of the needed colonists (or any other consumable special resource something needs) per turn would probably be better than trying to take them all at the completion of production.

[LienRag]

I may be mistaken, but I believe these ideas have floated around the forums here before. I personally think they make a lot of sense.

Ditto.

I guess Evacuation System has a way of calculating where a population should go ? Colonizing an outpost is just the reverse of it...
It may not be very intuitive for new players, though. Using a sitrep to signal when a source planet sends Colonists could maybe help ?

This would mean that growth rate becomes much more important, any plans about that (growth focus, techs, buildings) ?


Troops are a different thing imho. Having to manage troops as a resource rather than just using Production Points would probably be interesting strategically if we can find a way to avoid making it micro-managy, but the game mechanisms we have now do not favor this. Just for exemple, how would you manage species which have different offensive and defensive troops ?
Or do you mean that troop ships would consume local population (which could be interesting, but is a very different thing) ?

[Oberlus]

Troop pods queued in a shipyard can drag troops from any supply-connected colony with troops of the same species. If you want many ugmor warriors, you need many ugmor worlds.

[LienRag]

Troop pods queued in a shipyard can drag troops from any supply-connected colony with troops of the same species. If you want many ugmor warriors, you need many ugmor worlds.

That could work.
And I like the game consequences of it, too : no more specialized planet providing all the needs of the Empire.

Doesn't take into account the difference between offensive and defensive troops, though.

[labgnome]

Doesn't take into account the difference between offensive and defensive troops, though.

It doesn't need to. Offensive and defensive troops aren't separate kinds of troops, they are different troop behaviors.

[LienRag]

Doesn't take into account the difference between offensive and defensive troops, though.

It doesn't need to. Offensive and defensive troops aren't separate kinds of troops, they are different troop behaviors.

Well it won't be KISS to beginners to understand taking one unit of troop will cost them more than one for species that have good defensive troops but not good offensive ones...