How the Zenith faction will work in Expansion?

[Spikey00]

Where is the information regarding how the Zenith faction functions in the expansion?  I would like to read some of it, and then offer my insight to it--or simply be satisfied of the current plans on implementation (and mind you once my eyes gaze upon the information, I will be infatuated with AI and player interactions or non-interactions).

I've done some scouring of the forums already--though it seems to evade me.


Thanks!

[Alex2290]

It will probably be explained once the expansion features webpage is updated.

[x4000]

Great question.  I will expound more later, but basically the idea is that there will be a new dropdown in the lobby that will let you select a "type" of Zenith aliens, including None or Random.  This is like selecting an AI type, essentially, but it is for this new faction.  Then, based on the type selected, it will include some neutral Zenith aliens somewhere out in the galaxy, and they will have some behavior.

I say "some behavior" because they will vary wildly in how they act based on the style chosen for them.  Think of these as sort of like scenarios, almost, or sub-scenarios:  the Zenith aliens are a fragmented race of very disparate groups, and depending on which groups you encounter (the dropdown again), they'll act very differently.

The current ideas for them:
http://arcengames.com/forums/index.php/topic,2002.0.html
http://arcengames.com/forums/index.php/topic,1997.0.html

And then I'm also looking for at least two broad new behavior styles, if not more.  I'll come up with some of my own, but depending on how hard they are to implement I may do more than the minimum of 4 that I've kind of set as my benchmark.  I also expect to see this grow over time to some extent, this might be one of the few cases of "expansion-only DLC," which generally I'm very much going to shy away from.  I'll have to think about how to expand that in the future, hmm.

[Spikey00]

Excellent.  I'll spend some time brainstorming on some ideas--thanks for the information, Chris.

[x4000]

No problem!

[x4000]

I realized that I haven't updated this for a while as to how these will work.  There won't be any new interface elements to deal with them, or anything like that (no dialog trees, etc).  There will be four different ways in which they work, in this expansion:

Traders: http://arcengames.com/forums/index.php/topic,2428.0.html
Devourers: http://arcengames.com/forums/index.php/topic,1668.0.html
Miners: http://arcengames.com/forums/index.php/topic,1997.0.html
Dyson Sphere: http://arcengames.com/forums/index.php/topic,2002.0.html

All of those are fairly simple, but they have distinct different personalities and ways of behaving compared to any of the AIs, etc.  Some of the details with a couple of those are not yet noted down, but I've got plans for those which should be out in the next week or two.  For reasons of scope more than anything else, these are going to be a fairly simple neutral faction, but even with those simple rules they should be pretty interesting when combined with all of the complexity of the rest of the galaxy they are in (which is higher than ever with the expansion, anyway).

The way I am implementing having a "neutral faction" is going to be Zenith-agnostic, by the way.  All of the neutral faction styles in this expansion are going to be Zenith-related, but in future expansions they might be other groups, factions, or races with wildly different behaviors.  If this proves to be a popular feature, which I think it will be, I expect to grow this greatly in the future.  This first expansion is only the beginning!