Nationbuilder in Space

It's Nationbuilder, but we use a big empty black hexgrid instead, and a bajillion sci-fi tropes.

The rules are usually passed around as a *.pdf file, but with MegaUpload, FileSonic and the rest of the file-locker services being a bunch of pansies, better to use a wiki.

Rules

The following is from a "Spacebuilder 0.3 by Kalmuk" document shortly before rapidshare deleted it... again.

This page is in need of cleanup. Srsly. It's a fucking mess.

Introduction

Welcome to SpaceBuilder, a NationBuilder in SPESS! This NationBuilder allows players to make their own unique empires on a galactic hex map, expanding, trading, colonizing and doing everything people love about sci-fi.

Sessions start when at least three players are onboard. Most sessions are once a week. There's usually an IRC channel for tabletalk, but any official diplomatic declarations, as well as rebuttals (saying 'yes' or 'no' to an offer) must be made in the forum so that everyone knows what's going on and important stuff is recorded publicly.

Creating Nations

When signing up for a game, you will need to provide the following to the game master to establish your nation:

• Race Name & Home Starsystem Name. It is heartily encouraged that your own unique aliens are created, though some game masters are okay if you really want to be CHINA IN SPEES or GREEN ORKS THAT AREN'T ORKS I SWEAR or Space Marines.
• Color for marking territory on the map. Since the map will be a white hexgrid on a black spacescape, don't be an idiot and say "white" or "black." Also see below about the colours used for system markers.
• Government Type. Autocratic? Democratic? During the game you will need to decide how much freedom to give your starsystem colonies.
• Ideology. This is important for diplomatic relations. A technocracy (Adeptus Mechanus) and a plutocracy (Ferengi) will have a better time getting along than, say, militaristic vegetarians (K'kree) and territorial hunters (Kzinti).
• Location. A vague idea of where you'll be starting. Rather than use sci-fi terms like 'coreward' and 'spinward', just "east, north, south, west" will do.
• Fluff. Some flavour and color for when you're interacting with the other players.

The Map

The map will be a large hexgrid, 21 or 23 hexes on a side. Each hex represents enough space for one solar system with planets (and comets and Oort cloud, etc), no exact measurements because that's a pain to keep track of. Travel between hexes must be with star-ships; it's assumed any colonized system has as many interplanetary ships, shuttles and patrol boats in to take care of any business.

The map starts out with a "fog of war" on any hexes not explored by players. When a hex is explored and a star system is found, the game master will mark that hex with a colored dot to show the resources in that system:

• Grey - lifeless system, either barren or exterminated, but enough solid mass/ solar radiation to build a base or fleets
• Light Red - average, one habitable world, gives one +1 bonus
• Dark Red - good, two habitable worlds or equivalent, gives two +2 bonuses
• Yellow - excellent, three habitable worlds or equivalent, gives three +3 bonuses
• Green or Purple - paradise, four habitable worlds or equivalent, gives four +4 bonuses
• Blue - mystery system. When colonized, 'dice+d6+d10' for number of habitable worlds and a 1-in-10 random effect. Blue systems may not have the same # of worlds nor random effect; if a duplicate of either is rolled, the next unique lower number is used instead.

Blue systems harbor terrible threats that will definitely ravage the galaxy, but when harnessed, will provide glorious bonuses. It’s advised that you refrain from colonizing blue systems until you have a strong military.

If a nation chooses one of the above colours as "theirs" for marking territory, the referee will adjust one or the other colour and notify the players before the game starts.

Taking Your Turn

In every turn, you post to the game's thread in /tg/, with 'dice+4d20' in the email field. You can state four separate actions in your message (one for each d20 rolled by the forum software, in order).

When your message is posted, the forum software will roll a d20 for each action; 11 or higher means that action succeeded. Rolling "20" means a miraculous success, rolling "1" means a disaster happened during the attempt.

During the course of the game, your nation will receive BONUSES. Bonuses are permanent until they are lost through dice rolls, or a player can SPEND that them, doubling their value for an action but discarding the bonus afterwards. Spent bonuses are discarded whether or not the action was a success, failure, miracle or disaster.

When posting your action, please remind the gamemaster your empire's colour and location to prevent confusion.

Example of a player's turn

Player A posts the following for their turn, with 'dice+4d20' in the email field:

1. Build a fleet
2. Research "hyperdrive" technology
3. Colonize a starsystem
4. Explore to the north

Player A posts the message, and sees the dice rolled 9, 12, 7, 1. "Build a fleet" is <= 10, so it would fail, but Player A's nation already has a "+2 orbital drydock" bonus, bumping that failing 9 to a successful 11.

Example of bonus use:

1. Build a Fleet (+2 orbital drydock)

Player A rolls a 9 but with the bonus it becomes an 11, meaning the action succeeded. When posting your action, please tell me which colour and location your empire has so I can be 100% sure when I post about your results.

Possible actions follow.

Exploration

Before systems can be colonized, they have to be explored. Exploration raises the fog of war in all tiles around the system you choose and means that your empire claims empty hexes in the exploration teams way. Systems you encounter have to be COLONIZED and the hex will be white. Systems you find through exploration have to be named by the player who found them. Natural 20’s means 2 layers of hexes around the system you choose are revealed and something nice happens. Exploration is an action roll. Natural 1’s means something bad happens.

Diplomacy

It is assumed that communication technologies are refined enough to allow contact between all empires in the universe (no ‘You gotta find me first’). This is for the purpose of speeding up the game. Technology knowledge can be traded with no bounds. However, trade routes have to be built and relevant hexes explored between empires.

Technology

There is no rigid tech-tree, as players basically open up their own tech trees, but traditional 4X tech tress will be used as my guidance for advancing your empire technologically. All empires start off with the ability to construct ships and colonize systems, militarily all empires have basic (crappy) weapons – guns and nukes (missiles). Keep in mind that this game is not hard sci-fi so all sorts of wacky research is allowed. Magic is allowed in the form it is found in sci-fi – The Force, The Warp and others. Do keep in mind that magic by itself will not win you the game but still, feel free to make your Stellar Wizard Empire.

Espionage

Espionage has its own level, like fleets. Basically, you have to build up your intelligence network through actions like you would fleets. Then, once the level of your espionage is equal to that of a different empires bonus AND IS HIGHER THAN THAT EMPIRES ESPIONAGE LEVEL, you can steal that bonus. In the process, the espionage points are spent and that empire will be invulnerable to espionage for the next three turns. The result? You get the bonus! Do keep in mind however that actions are worth their weight in gold and every action you spend at espionage will mean one less action dedicated to fleet building and colonizing.

Colonization

A natural 20 means 2 systems are colonized. 11+ roll at a colonization action means that the system has been colonized. Systems have one ‘capital’ planet and a subset of auxiliary planets dedicated to their own special fields. You, the player, choose the fields for these planets – this provides bonuses! This is why systems with more than one planet in them are valuable. E.g. Player A colonized Hymmonia, a system with two planets. One planet can be ‘specialed’ – Player A chooses espionage, giving a +4 espionage bonus.

Secession

Through random events, INACTIVITY or pacts forced upon a defeated foe, systems can become independent. Due to lack of leadership from the mother Empire, they will stagnate, though if threatened will produce fleets. These independent systems are colour-coded white in the hex map. New players are welcome to take control over such systems and create their own empire from them.

If you cannot play for a certain period of time (2 weeks or more) send an email to the game's referee. The referee may preserve your nation, but for the sake of the other players it will be played "on cruise control" as entering a period of isolation and stagnation. These kind of empires cannot be attacked before a AFK’s players consent (by email or chat). In that case, during a war the ref will roll for that nations fleet recruitment and war. A player may declare another player to be their proxy, if it is preferred.

If a player is inactive for a long time (absent from three weekly sessions) without warning as mentioned above, the referee will likely describe the collapse and fracturing of that nation. All systems that were in that nation's area of control are now independent and easily annexed into other nations; the collapsed nation's territory will no longer be marked with their colour.

War

Players can build fleets to increase their military. There are no ‘armies’ as in other NationBuilders but it is still worth researching land tech – this provides land combat bonuses! War is calculated by rolling a xd10+B, where x is the number of fleets you have and B is the total of relevant bonuses. So you can either spam fleets or concentrate on bonuses. Both sides lose a fleet when they roll a 1 in their combat roll and the side with a smaller overall roll loses fleets for every ten points difference. If the difference was marginal, that is ten or below, both sides lose a fleet but the winner forces the loser out of the system. These kind of battles are called FLEET BATTLES.

When fighting multiple enemies, you have to choose which fleets to send against a given enemy. For example, you cannot send your 12 fleets against two separate enemies twice – you have to split up your forces for that (e.g. two forces of 6 fleets). This makes diplomacy important so that you don’t get gangbanged!

There are two parts to attacking other empires – the fleet battle and the system battle. You choose the system you want to attack, the other player responds, you have a fleet battle. If you win, you can dedicate your remaining forces to a system battle. Fleet battles and system battles happen in the same turn, stay tuned to my updates on the battles!

When attacking systems, the attacking force must choose between INVASION or EXTERMINATION. In both cases, the attacking force rolls Xd10, where X is the number of fleets they wish to dedicate to the attack. The defending player rolls Xd10, where X is the number of planets in a system. When INVADING, land combat bonuses apply. When EXTERMINATING, space combat bonuses apply. When a system is EXTERMINATED, it is made uninhabitable for the rest of the game, though a space station or fleet can still be stationed there. These kind of battles are called SYSTEM BATTLES. When a system is successfully INVADED the conqueror gets one +1 bonus.

Random Effects

During the course of the game, random events will be rolled, at random times. They will either provide glorious bonuses to you or screw you over. In the early game, random events will not be rolled so as not to screw you over right when you start. Beginning from session 3, random events will happen. The referee will 'dice+d20' and check the following chart:

• 20 - Golden Age – All empires in the galaxy now experience a golden age of economic prosperity and scientific discovery! (+3 to rolls for next two turns, +3 to research actions. If you haven’t done much research before now is your chance to catch up!)
• 19,18 – Land Grab – Citizens of empires in the galaxy have decided, in a patriotic fervor, to colonize systems out of their own pockets!
• 17,16 – Economic boom – Galactic economies grow and billions of jobs are gained! (+1 to roll for next two turns)
• 15-8 – Nothing important happens, life goes on as usual.
• 7,6 – Recession – Galactic economies contract and billions lose their jobs. (-1 to roll for next two turns)
• 5,4 – Galactic Discontent – Discontent among empires has made some systems declare independence! (New players are welcome to take over those systems). If this happens early in the game then this just means that fleets have to take a military roll or else empires suffer a -2 to rolls for the next turn.
• 3,2 – Warp Storm – A warp storm has manifested itself! A new (blue) system has appeared, however

there may be terrible threats in the system, waiting for unlucky explorers!

• 1 – Disaster!

Each session has a general theme, from the videogamena.me generator. This represents new movements, subcultures, religions and other social events that transcend empires.

Final Notes

For a future run of this game, there might be more of a randomization process – exploration roll deciding whether you encounter a system or not. This could also appease players who wish to be placed in a particular part of the map and treat everyone fairly. For the first game I had a map with all systems on it in an even ratio, with rims having less systems but more overall quality of the systems and the centre having many low quality systems.

Any improvements suggested in threads and through chat/email will be put here, so as to improve the system. Finally, if there are any good, free hex-map creation software I would be very grateful for providing links to them.

Did you know that Hexographer has a space tileset?