OK,
here is a thought, planet compatibility affects how the races behave on a range scale.
SKylaxians move from benevolent on prime worlds to fractured and warring factions of terrorists on completely incompatible worlds.
Burlusts move from noble warriors to fearful farmers.
Peltians move from passive planet bombers to aggressive saboteurs.
Andors move from helpful to hurtful.
Acutians move from capitalists to street beggars.
Thoraxians move from warlike hiveminds to organized supportors.
Boarines move from isolated to outgoing.
Evucks move from research to thieves guild.
Pirates move from hostile raiders to gypsy wanderers that bring bonuses to the worlds they visit.
*Note 1 -- The reason to have a range of behaviors in the races at all is so that the races do not act in predictable ways in game after game. One player in a recent thread said they never wanted to make the skylaxians their enemy due to the skylaxians being so helpful at backdooring in other races into the Federation. Well... if the races were on a range, and the skylaxians were fractured smallish groups of infighting terrorists, then that 'helpful' backdoor tactic would be gone, replaced perhaps with a backdoor raid, or if the player preferred they could incite raids and battles inside the factions themselves so that they kill each other, thereby removing the skylaxians if that is what they want. Or have different skylaxian factions fight other planets or invaders of different planets. All producing different outcomes. Anyway, the whole point of the idea is to have the races behave in different ways from their defined behaviors now. So the game becomes more dynamic. It might mix things up alot, if the Peltians are warmongers in one game, and peacebrokers in the next. Makes for a lot of interesting stories, as was the 'Dwarf Fortress' intention i thought when TLF first started development.
*Note 2 - the black market instead of simply being a collection of whatever we want, should consider being only a repository of what is found on the worlds where pirate factions, or thieves guild exist.
Minor Factions are groups of refugees that leave a planet when a planet is at least 50% incompatible with their race. WHich means there will be a few per game, sometimes many if not all races and sometimes not any of the races will produce minor factions. -- THe purpose of the minor factions is two fold, to provide small bonuses when they leave their homeworld and are accepted by another race. To provide a negative attitude for the race that rejects them on their journey to another homeworld. Or a reason for the parent race to go to war if the immigrants are killed by one of the other races when the immigrants attempt to land on their new world.
This would provide a story reason to go to war, making war not simply an occurrence that happens out of the blue.
In addition a mechanic to have wars 'wind down' would be a better mechanic than having wars go on for decades. If they wore down and stopped, due to population or resource costs for the warring parties, then if the 'player' wanted the wars to continue it would be a conscious decision and steps to resupply and re-aggitate the involved races would have to be undertaken by the player, on purpose. Else the war would wind down and stop.
I know this doesn't answer all the problems with RCI and values not shown and things just happening for what seems no reason at all, but it does answer a couple of them, and maybe could be a start.
-TeaL
