Let's Colonize Mars.

[gametwizter]

Introduction:
The game that I will be playing is UFO Afterlight. It is a game that uses what I like to call Modified Time Strategy (MTS). MTS is based around allowing the player to choose how fast time progresses, from standstill to real time to fast forward. This allows the player to think out strategies and give commands to all squad members without being pressured by anything but the situation. UFO Afterlight therefore is a game based around squad management. But there is also the aspect of how these squads get to their battles. This system is also done by MTS, albeit less critical to the minor characters in the story than the squad portion.

You all will be deciding what I do in the strategic gameplay of the colony while I battle out the tactical portions. In a way this is similar to how the neighboring game of Total War is being conducted.

Before I start, I need a few opinions to how I will conduct the battles.

First: As members of the squads are not replaceable, should I reload a quicksave and do my best to keep them alive (think Fire Emblem), or leave them at peace and hope to god that the choice doesn't screw over the colony later on? (I would go the quicksave route)

Second: How much control should I have over the following?
-Research
-Production (Guns, Ammo, Buildings[in the base])
-Squad Members
-The tactical battles
-Construction of buildings outside of the base
(Keep in mind that you may make it so that I am only the squad leader and can only request stuff [like ammo production] of you guys)

Third: I forgot. I will let you know if there is something else that I feel you may want to control.

I am open to any suggestions on how I will play this game to completion so fire away.

Story:
Prior to the establishment of the human colonial base on Mars, Humanity had been at war. In May of 2004, a large spaceship enters Earth's thermosphere and, without any visible means of resisting gravity, hovers for a multitude of hours. After what seemed like months to the leaders of nations around the world, the spaceship starts releasing plumes of spores into the atmosphere. These spores soon start falling to Earth, and within several days had killed the majority of advanced life by way of asphyxiation. Not knowing how to deal with this unknown threat, the majority of the Earth's governments were destroyed by these spores.

After about a month, the spores had disintegrated and small pockets of survivors started making their way toward the few still-standing governments. These governments soon had a tough foe to face. The spores that had rained down had started to mutate lifeforms into hostile and toxic aliens. In this period of time, many more governments fell to the increasing pressures being put on their existence. Research was conducted and weapons were produced that worked against these new lifeforms, eventually allowing the governments to control the immediate surroundings of their bases.

Then the aggressors appeared. The pilots of the spaceship that had caused this nightmare landed on the planet's surface. In order to protect humanity from this new threat, governments across the Earth allied themselves. More research was done, more weapons built, more people died, but eventually a way to translate these Greys' language was discovered. A Peace treaty was signed between the Reticulans, what the Greys called themselves, and the remaining portion of humanity. Humanity would give up their home planet and yet be spared from the xenocide of their species. In turn, humanity was given two opportunities, one group would work on the repair of the Laputa, a space-bound living quarters, and the other would colonize and terraform Mars.

The group that went to Mars consisted of approximately 10,000 individuals that were placed in cryogenic sleep and around 20 that were tasked with the exploration and terraformation of Mars. The population placed in cryogenic sleep are set to awaken in a year, will the colonists tasked with terraformation be able to pull off this important task or will they face endless complications that result in a lost hope for humanity? (A year in the game is forever, if we lose to time then we all fail at this game)

[Apples]

In answer to the first question, none of this quicksave stuff. If we screw up let the fires of our civilization light the way for other generations of screw ups! I would much rather fail horribly than succeed knowing that I /should/ have failed but quicksaved my way to safety.

As for the second, I think let's plays are fun when the people have a lot of control, but if you give them too much it becomes overbearing and nothing ever gets done because of a ton of micromanaging from people who haven't even played the game. I'll leave it up to you how much power we are delegated.

As for your third question (which for some reason was placed under Story instead of Third), I'm fairly certain that the end result of this will be a loss of humanity's hope, but we won't know until we fail. Err... try. I meant try. Really.

[gametwizter]

Oh, you got me wrong. When I am talking about using the quicksaves, I only mean during the tactical battles (the ones I have total control over). Like if someone were to be killed. If anyone is killed in combat then they are gone for good, none of this they retreated the instant before the bullet pierced the vital portions of their brain crap.

I am going to go with that you are kidding when talking about that third question. I just remembered the question though: How much guidance should I give you guys. Just remember that this game is based heavily on story and therefore we cannot do the random things we are doing in the total war game. Our goals are pretty much set, it is just that there are a few ways to get there. But by few, I mean more like four to five compared to hundreds.

[Accomplice]

For the first question: No. If we are going to die, then we should do it and decrease the surplus population.

On the matter of the second: I think you should control production, squad members, and the battles. That sounds like way too much micro-managing for the voters to do and would bog down the game if we tried. On research and construction I think we should vote for a general theme and perhaps occasionally vote to change it, but you should handle the specifics.

For the third: You should give us some basic guidance, enough that we know what we are doing, but still let us know little enough to make mistakes. Half the fun of a LP is watching the world burn from our mistakes.

Now go and colonize, for the glory of ENGLAND MARS!!

[gametwizter]

Earlier today, we sent a team composed of a scientist(Gene), an engineer(Jurgen) and a military escort(Diego) to check out the interesting signals we were receiving from one of the nearby excavation sites. Previously, these sites held no activity, but it is clear that there was life on this planet since the founding days of this colony. The findings that reported by the team were extraordinary, they found the presence of martian technology far surpassing the structures that were being excavated. Granted, the structures are only what looks like walls and general buildings.



Sadly, Jurgen was killed by one of the martian robots. Gene got to the scene to find the dead body and a towering Mech off in the distance. She was able to take down the Mech, which seemed to have had its lasers destroyed by Jurgen, with one of the handheld mining lasers on site.



After grouping up with Diego, Gene made her way back to the alien spaceship(UFO) that the Reticulans had provided us, but on their way they ran into a smaller robot. After disabling this robot with their mining lasers, Gene and Diego returned to base. Realizing that this may evolve into fighting between us colonists and these robots that seem to be automated to defend the landscape (and may hinder us by doing so), I decided to check the ammunition.

As I feared, the only weapons that are stocked in the warehouse are the weapons that were brought from Earth. They also do not have much ammunition available to them so until the researchers have discovered a projectile weapon that works in the environment of Mars, and the engineers have produced the weapons, we will be in danger of running out of materials to fight with.



((Now you guys are given a choice, any of the red gear-like marks can be attacked by our forces. The blue line running up to the north pole glacier is our water line (IMPORTANT). Anything with a white flag can be taken over by the colony (This falls under construction). I am going to start researching the tech tree associated with projectile weapons so that I will be able to actually attack targets. The next update will have more specifics on what areas can be researched.))

[Apples]

I say expand northward, colonizing first the white flag due north from our colony and just east of our water line. I don't know how safe I feel with that pipe seemingly unprotected further north, let's get it some coverage.

[Accomplice]

No! Jurgen! He was the finest mind of his generation. He will be missed.

I agree with apples. Securing the water supply should be our first priority. If we can encircle the entire glacier that would be even more magnificent.