Nov/December Dev Blog - How Do I Win?
Hello everyone! Hope you’re all having a happy holiday season, and are looking forward to the new year!
I want to talk about a very important part of the game: the Reign Score System, AKA ‘What am I supposed to be doing in this game, anyway?”
When you start Alliance, in the 1.0 release, we aim to have the option to play either a Sandbox mode or a specific Campaign - these will have their own win conditions, special rules, etc. In the Sandbox mode - the only mode that’ll be available in Early Access - you’ll always start in 3050, as the newly-crowned, 18-year old ruler of the Celestial Empire. Your primary goal in Sandbox mode is simply to be humanity’s greatest ruler, and this is reflected in the Reign Score System.
Your Reign is judged through your Reputation (Fear, Popular Support, and Power), your internal personality, and things that you do during that time. The more you do, the better your Reign Score, and the higher rank you can attain. Your Reign Score determines your final rank, from ‘The Forgotten’ to… well, you’ll just have to see! There are well over 20 ranks you can earn, as well as specific honorifics depending on your Reign Achievements.
Your Reign Score has three components - you get some straight from your Power, you earn some by completing Reign Goals, and you can gain - or lose! - Reign Score by acting in accordance or in conflict with your ruler’s Values.
The six Reign Goal categories are: Self-Mastery (goals that improve yourself), Expansion (goals that focus on expanding and claiming/connecting new systems and constellations), Security (goals that focus on developing the internal and external security of the Empire), Administration (goals that focus on planetary and Pop support), Exploitation (goals that focus on economy and production), and Discovery (goals that focus on science and stellar discovery).
Each Tier I goal and most of the Tier II goals act as a tutorial for that area of the game - you will have several subtasks that will introduce you to the basics of the game, and when you complete them, you’ll gain some Reign Score as well. If you complete an entire category, you’ll be entitled to an honorific depending on the Tier IV goal you completed - different goals have different rewards! Tier IV goals are also intended to be ‘capstone’ achievements - they are not easy, and you will most likely not be able to accomplish all of them in a single reign!
There are 4 Tiers in each category; as you complete a Tier Goal, you will unlock the next Tier and can then select a new Goal.
The Value component of your score corresponds to your internal personality Values - Honor, Humanity, and Piety. Throughout your reign, you’ll do things that are considered Humane, Honorable, and Pious - but also things that are considered Inhumane, Dishonorable, or Impious. You will gain and lose Reign Score for these Deeds in proportion to your devotion to the relevant Value. The higher your score in Honor, for instance, the greater the Score benefits of doing things that are Honorable, but the greater the score hit you will take if you do something Dishonorable. This makes playing a character with integrity more challenging, but also more potentially rewarding!
When you end the game, however that happens, you’ll get a final score, multiplied by the difficulty of the game settings, as well as a final Rank Title and a list of any Honorifics that you earned during your Reign. You’ll also be treated to a recap of your reign through a timeline screen, covering the highlights (and lowlights) of your reign, and how it ended, so you can share your story of your brilliant (or horrendous) time as ruler of the Celestial Empire with others.If you opt in, you will also be able to send this score and your rank to a leaderboard that other Alliance players are also populating, to see once and for all who is the greatest ruler of humanity! We’ll also be breaking out your scores for Honorable, Humane, and Pious Deeds into their own separate scoreboards, to keep things fresh.
This is the ‘bow that wraps up’ the gameplay that many of you have been waiting for. With games being a finite length (due to your life expectancy), the Reign Score System should keep the fun going through the mid and end game - unlike other 4X games, you won’t be able to ‘color the map’, but there will always be something happening to keep your attention focused! The flexibility of the Reign Goal system means you don’t have to be ‘stuck’ doing a category you don’t enjoy - it’s better to focus on a few Reign Goal categories and complete them than dabble around the Reign Goal map. We’re really excited about this system - we think it’s going to really transform the game for the better!
Enjoy your breaks and the rest of 2022, and we’ll see you in 2023!
-Steve Hawkins
Lead Developer, Alliance of the Sacred Suns
I want to talk about a very important part of the game: the Reign Score System, AKA ‘What am I supposed to be doing in this game, anyway?”
When you start Alliance, in the 1.0 release, we aim to have the option to play either a Sandbox mode or a specific Campaign - these will have their own win conditions, special rules, etc. In the Sandbox mode - the only mode that’ll be available in Early Access - you’ll always start in 3050, as the newly-crowned, 18-year old ruler of the Celestial Empire. Your primary goal in Sandbox mode is simply to be humanity’s greatest ruler, and this is reflected in the Reign Score System.
Your Reign is judged through your Reputation (Fear, Popular Support, and Power), your internal personality, and things that you do during that time. The more you do, the better your Reign Score, and the higher rank you can attain. Your Reign Score determines your final rank, from ‘The Forgotten’ to… well, you’ll just have to see! There are well over 20 ranks you can earn, as well as specific honorifics depending on your Reign Achievements.
Your Reign Score has three components - you get some straight from your Power, you earn some by completing Reign Goals, and you can gain - or lose! - Reign Score by acting in accordance or in conflict with your ruler’s Values.
The six Reign Goal categories are: Self-Mastery (goals that improve yourself), Expansion (goals that focus on expanding and claiming/connecting new systems and constellations), Security (goals that focus on developing the internal and external security of the Empire), Administration (goals that focus on planetary and Pop support), Exploitation (goals that focus on economy and production), and Discovery (goals that focus on science and stellar discovery).
Each Tier I goal and most of the Tier II goals act as a tutorial for that area of the game - you will have several subtasks that will introduce you to the basics of the game, and when you complete them, you’ll gain some Reign Score as well. If you complete an entire category, you’ll be entitled to an honorific depending on the Tier IV goal you completed - different goals have different rewards! Tier IV goals are also intended to be ‘capstone’ achievements - they are not easy, and you will most likely not be able to accomplish all of them in a single reign!
There are 4 Tiers in each category; as you complete a Tier Goal, you will unlock the next Tier and can then select a new Goal.
The Value component of your score corresponds to your internal personality Values - Honor, Humanity, and Piety. Throughout your reign, you’ll do things that are considered Humane, Honorable, and Pious - but also things that are considered Inhumane, Dishonorable, or Impious. You will gain and lose Reign Score for these Deeds in proportion to your devotion to the relevant Value. The higher your score in Honor, for instance, the greater the Score benefits of doing things that are Honorable, but the greater the score hit you will take if you do something Dishonorable. This makes playing a character with integrity more challenging, but also more potentially rewarding!
When you end the game, however that happens, you’ll get a final score, multiplied by the difficulty of the game settings, as well as a final Rank Title and a list of any Honorifics that you earned during your Reign. You’ll also be treated to a recap of your reign through a timeline screen, covering the highlights (and lowlights) of your reign, and how it ended, so you can share your story of your brilliant (or horrendous) time as ruler of the Celestial Empire with others.If you opt in, you will also be able to send this score and your rank to a leaderboard that other Alliance players are also populating, to see once and for all who is the greatest ruler of humanity! We’ll also be breaking out your scores for Honorable, Humane, and Pious Deeds into their own separate scoreboards, to keep things fresh.
This is the ‘bow that wraps up’ the gameplay that many of you have been waiting for. With games being a finite length (due to your life expectancy), the Reign Score System should keep the fun going through the mid and end game - unlike other 4X games, you won’t be able to ‘color the map’, but there will always be something happening to keep your attention focused! The flexibility of the Reign Goal system means you don’t have to be ‘stuck’ doing a category you don’t enjoy - it’s better to focus on a few Reign Goal categories and complete them than dabble around the Reign Goal map. We’re really excited about this system - we think it’s going to really transform the game for the better!
Enjoy your breaks and the rest of 2022, and we’ll see you in 2023!
-Steve Hawkins
Lead Developer, Alliance of the Sacred Suns