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Terror stars?

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BlizzardGR
Lord_StarPilot
Join Date 03/2003
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Reply #51 January 27, 2006 3:27:12 PM
from GalCiv II ForumsGalCiv II Forums
Ah, but you use heavy shielding and don't let it through. If you can tap serious power, a planet could shield itself.

The Terror Star does not escape. It sits there and watches the results. I'm sure that GC2 Terror Stars will do the same thing. Otherwise, it would be too easy for a civ with a few Terror Stars to do an "Alpha Strike" and eliminate a well spread out race in one turn. That's something Brad seems to dislike, so its a safe bet that Terror Stars will be big and forever slow (ie, no running away, not even from the stars or planets it blows up).

Terror Stars are just lawsuit avoiding Death Stars. A star base the size of the Moon that goes around and blows up star systems in GC1. In GC2, they'll probably just blow up a planet. The tech is there in the GC2 tech tree, but so is the tech to make your worlds immune to Terror Staring (it would be a Tile construct that prevents the Terror Star from being able to blow up that one world). So the net result would be that those core/heavily built up wars of your enemies would be immune to being destroyed by the Terror Star, but their worlds that weren't heavily built up would be toast. Not a bad trade off. Of course, if you had a serious tech edge, they wouldn't have any defense other then intercepting and killing the Terror Star. You know, the classic GC1 defensive strategy.

Well, we will see how it works in the future in GC2.

A nova isn't a flood of fire. It's a light flash (if you can shield against lasers, gamma rays, and x-rays, then you can shield against that), and a massive coronal ejection (this just requires electromagnetic shielding). So it is quite possible to shield a world against a star going nova. It's just a matter of tech, shielding, and sufficent power. It's harder to dodge a bullet then a flood. You don't have much time to react to a bullet coming at you. But you have time to either move out of a floods way, or to build flood walls. Considering your worlds will have several months to several *years* to prepare for a Terror Star to arrive, then it is quite likely that an highly built world that starts off defenseless could build an Omega Shielding System and watch the pretty fireworks that the Terror Star makes.

In GC2, Terror Stars are something you use to beat down the minors and the frontier worlds. But Core worlds are going to laugh at its appearance as it will not be a real military threat. An inconvience, yes, but not a serious challenge to their continued existance.
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BlizzardGR
PJ_
Join Date 08/2003
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Reply #52 January 27, 2006 4:38:52 PM
from Stardock ForumsStardock Forums
The Terror Star does not escape. It sits there and watches the results.


From one parsec away. Any idea how big a parsec is? GalCiv2 physics redefines a parsec in terms of how much a HyperDrive can fold space considering the local mass density, but in real space a parsec is big. With the energy from the supernova traveling at the speed of light, a TS one parsec away has a few years before it needs to get out of the way. The planets, on the other hand, are right there. So close to the star that the game board had them all on the same square. They're not dodging that. And after it's over there's nothing left of the star or the planets.
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Lord_StarPilot
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Reply #53 January 28, 2006 3:49:08 PM
from Stardock ForumsStardock Forums
Not a parsec. Otherwise, the planets would be 2 real parsecs away. Check GC2. All planets from Mercury to Pluto are all 2 parsecs away from the Sun. That's 2 GC squares away. The Terror Star would be how many away? 1. Inside Mercury's orbit. The Terror Star is using its own shielding to remain untouched by the nova. If a piddling little starbase (with really big engines) can do it, then the worlds in GC2 can do it just as easily. And somewhere inside Mercury's orbit means the Terror Star is not getting a chance to dodge. That's just SECONDS from the star. Not years. not even the nine minutes that Earth would have. Or the hours Saturn would have.

Look at GC2. As it is, a Terror Star is not a threat to any core quality world. Terror Stars, as they were in GC1, are logically done in. It doesn't fit the new GC. However, I'm sure that Brad and his team will come up with a new world killer.

Not that most GC players used Terror Stars as system killers. We used them as mobile culture palaces. So they weren't Terror Stars, but rather, Pleasure Stars.
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IztokBitenc
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Reply #54 January 28, 2006 6:26:36 PM
from GalCiv II ForumsGalCiv II Forums
Hi!
Not that most GC players used Terror Stars as system killers. We used them as mobile culture palaces. So they weren't Terror Stars, but rather, Pleasure Stars.

Yeah, that was their use once or twice in games I played. And as a warship support (weapons +??, defenses +?, + ship movement... etc.) Was almost too easy to win once it started rolling. Haven't used them much thereafter.

Some nitpick about Terror Star:
Check GC2. All planets from Mercury to Pluto are all 2 parsecs away from the Sun. That's 2 GC squares away. The Terror Star would be how many away? 1

Would be... but it isn't, because it is not in that game. So PJ_ is right. In GC1 they are firing from next square -
one parsec away. OTOH all ships are also attacking from there , so I'd propose to close that case.
BR, Iztok
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charmedmeat
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Reply #55 January 29, 2006 8:00:21 PM
from Stardock ForumsStardock Forums
On the planet side discussion about removal of a star, has anyone here read Niven and Ringworld? fleet of planets
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PJ_
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Reply #56 January 30, 2006 12:33:41 AM
from Stardock ForumsStardock Forums
I'm sure we could think of some way for the terror star to wreak havoc without being destroyed. In GC1 it started out farther away from the star than any of the planets, and in one month (4 turns GC2 time) it destroyed the system and was still farther away than any of the planets had been. Going right up to the star, blowing it up, and outrunning the blast is something you can do with Hyperdrive, because it moves even a slow ship like the Terror Star faster than light. You can't use Hyperdrive to move planets out of the way, though, because their large mass prevents you from folding space around them efficiently.
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Thomasaurusrex
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Reply #57 January 30, 2006 1:12:57 AM
from Stardock ForumsStardock Forums
Whoa... yall are lookin into this thing a little too deep.
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BlizzardGR
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Reply #58 January 30, 2006 5:37:31 AM
from Stardock ForumsStardock Forums
Whoa... yall are lookin into this thing a little too deep.

My thoughts exactly.
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markos2
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Reply #59 January 30, 2006 6:49:52 AM
from Stardock ForumsStardock Forums
Whoa... yall are lookin into this thing a little too deep


well. this is a forum of GC2 sci-fi fanatics.

I would definitely expect these discussions to be deep!
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PJ_
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Reply #60 January 30, 2006 9:42:05 AM
from Stardock ForumsStardock Forums
That's just how I do things.
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PJ_
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Reply #61 January 30, 2006 11:56:07 AM
from Stardock ForumsStardock Forums
I didn't make up the part about not being able to fold space in the presence of a large mass. That came from Brad's explanation of why the distance between planets is so ridiculously out of proportion to the distance between stars. Hyperdrive ships fold through all that empty space like it's not even there, so it's not significant for figuring the distance between two points.
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Lord_StarPilot
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Reply #62 January 30, 2006 5:33:34 PM
from Stardock ForumsStardock Forums
The distance is significant for hyperspace folding. It's just that it takes less energy to fold space out away from star systems then it takes to fold it near things like stars, planets, starbases, ships, etc. That's according to Brad. However, since you can make a starbase the size of the Moon (a planetary object), then you can just as easily put engines on Earth and send it into hyperspace. Why you'd want to, I don't know. But it is just as feasible. It's just a matter of energy. And energy gets easier to obtain as you advance your technology. Otherwise Terror Stars wouldn't be able to travel, or power their star destroying weaponry.
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PJ_
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Reply #63 January 30, 2006 7:32:29 PM
from Stardock ForumsStardock Forums
Is a terror star the size of a moon? It's probably less massive than a moon, anyway.

Now that we've mentioned it, I can think of a few reasons to move a planet. "The Drengin transports are approaching! Retreat!"

Gives a whole new meaning to the "Spaceship Earth" ride at Epcot Center.
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Lord_StarPilot
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Reply #64 January 31, 2006 2:43:22 PM
from GalCiv II ForumsGalCiv II Forums
Well, remember that moons range in size from large cars to full worlds. So we should establish what a "moon" is if we want to say something is more or less massive then a moon.

You do raise a good point. However, as transports are smaller, they've be able to overtake a running world and still invade. So you still end up with needing a local defense force to intercept the transports before they can land on your worlds.
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Reply #65 January 31, 2006 3:16:12 PM
from Stardock ForumsStardock Forums
Heck, if we've got engines on our worlds we might as well put some lasers on 'em, too. What do we need ships for again?
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Lord_StarPilot
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Reply #66 February 1, 2006 4:17:52 PM
from GalCiv II ForumsGalCiv II Forums
Hey, I do agree that you should be able to put honking big lasers and missile bases on your planet. Then, your planet could defend itself, or at least lend aid as a military starbase does, to the ships defending the world. That is an excellent suggestion, that has been made time after time, both in GC1, GC1 AP, and now GC2. Now, in GC2, you'd only do this on your military hard points, as plaentary tileage is just too precious to waste like that on safe worlds.

Now, let's just look at why we'd ever bother with building space ships (small and capital), if you had a mobile world.
#1) It would cost a lot less to go investigate whatever it is that you were interested in (ie, anomolies).
#2) Allows you to project force in mulitple places. For instance, you can park a few fighting craft near a resource point as well as have your forces attacking an enemy world at the same time.
#3) no disrupting the local planetary ecology.
#4) you can get mobile earlier (ie, at the start of the game, you cannot make an engine big enough to move your world).

Just off the top of my head. I'm sure we can find a few other reasons.
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BlizzardGR
the original super dave
Join Date 02/2006
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Reply #67 March 8, 2006 2:24:05 PM
from GalCiv II ForumsGalCiv II Forums
I was a big fan of Gal Civ-1 and to find out theres no Terror Stars in Gal-Civ-2,well then if id known that,i wouldnt have bought the game! Bring back the Terror Stars and Bring them back sooner than soon! Balance smalliance,Terror Stars were Terifying,that was their intention,not for something friendly,like inviting the Drengins over for koolaid and cup cakes.
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