[Suggestion] - Assimilating surrendering opponents

Basic premise - a player (conqueree) may surrender to another player (conquerer) but rather than exiting the game, the player has the option to be assimilated (BORG reference ) into the conquerers army. They become "allied" with the conquerer and must fight on the conquerers behalf.

Conditions
- If the conqueree misbehaves, the conquerer may end the assimilation and the conqueree's units are destroyed. This ensures the conqueree's co-operation with the war effort.
- Once the conqueree is assimilated, they cannot engage in any further alliances. Only the conquerer can.
- If the conquerer dies, the conqueree is destroyed aswell. This ensures they protect their conquerer to their best ability.
- 30 sec delay for assimilation to occur to allow for uplink to be established, allowing other players time to react.

Consequences of assimilation
- forced resource sharing: an adjustable portion of the conqueree's resources are automatically streamed directly to the conquerer.
- forced unit sharing: the conquerer can take control of certain units (limits can be placed on this) if they need them for their war effort
- shared line of sight: assimilated players can be used as scouts and be "the first wave" when invading other planets

Benefits
- Players that lose initially early on in a game can still take part and in a sense help to "win" the game for their conquerer.
- Players that are aggressive early can secure assimilated "allies" that will help them in the later game against other players that just turtle.
- Games that initially a big FFA 'royal rumble' turn into "team" based games. This could add an interesting dynamic where alliances are forged (no pun intended ) as the game evolves.

It is an interesting idea but it opens up a a lot of options for abuse in multiplayer. Imagine your 'ally' moves some troops into your base to 'support' you and immediately surrenders to the other team.

Yeah I suppose theres always a way to abuse alliances in multiplayer. Im thinking more along the lines of 'once you surrender to another player, you cannot unsurrender' (is that a word?). So in essence, once you've (allied with/surrendered to) someone, the person who surrendered cannot change their alliance. I suppose thats why I'd call it assimilation; once you're in, you dont get a choice to leave and must fight for the conquerer against all his enemies.

There would have to be conditions placed on surrendering. Some examples could be that the decision has to be mutual for both conquerer and conqueree and that the conqueree cannot be engaged in combat on a planet with another player other than the conquerer. And further to this, the conqueree cannot engage in further alliances; only the conquerer can.

Could get tricky to get the conditions right but i'm kind of imagining it as a player on the brink of defeat agrees to fight for the conquerer in exchange for his life.

EDIT: Perhaps another way would be to allow players to only surrender to someone who has destroyed a certain percentage of their units. Thus, players cannot ally with another player on the other side on the galaxy; only with the player whom they have been engaged in combat with.

Don't get me wrong, I love the idea. But I want some build-in precautions. Just assume there is one player who just wants to see the world burn and think of a way how we can make his job harder.

All assimilated troops could be inactive for 30 seconds for example. That would leave enough time to destroy them if they are threatening your base. Maybe they need to uplink to the new control network and receive their new orders. (In case we need an explanation for fan fiction... )

Yep i like that idea. A time delay and message to all players (or just players within sight range) of the impending assimilation would give people time to react.

If the assimilated player misbehaves, the option is there to end the alliance, which removes the misbehaving player from the game and destroys their units or gives them to the conquerer. Harsh it would seem but remember; the player should only surrender and agree to assimilation if they believe their defeat is imminent. Once they're assimilated, they do as they're told and fight for their conquerer or face deletion! (there's some lore for you )

There allready is a huge thread abou Assimilation gameode

Ah cool. On this forum? Do you have a link?

Why not just have it so that you take control of every enemy unit once you kill their commander?

Because player elimination is unfun. Possibly necessary, but if it is possible to have all participants in a multiplayer game stay active, then it is good gameplay.

It seems to me that player elimination is unavoidable in a game like PA. Even highly marginalized players are effectively eliminated, even if they are technically still alive.

Computer games, especially online games, have far fewer problems with player elimination than board games do, mostly because the player is immediately presented with the option to play again. In a board game, player elimination would consequently mean the eliminated player basically must wait for the game to end, and play in the next round.

Assimilate! ASSIMILATE! ASSSSIIIMMIILLLAATE!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wWeP3u5hY8w

Yeah i think ledarsi explained it well. In my initial post (which i edited afterwards) i had an explanation of how i used to play lans with my friends for TA and supcom and when one person was eliminated, they would pretty much sit out for the rest of the game. Its not so bad in online play but it'd still be cool to take part in the game which you participated in.

And the reward for a conquerer is there aswell. Instead of everyone playing passively, it encourages aggression and action. And in 40 person multiplayer games which take place over 10-12 hours, the rewards for securing early assimilated allies could tip the game in your favour at the end; rather than people sitting back and letting others battle it out then claiming victory by killing the winner who was weakened from previous encounters. Thats just my line of thinking anyway; keep people in the game and make the game a bit more interesting dynamically.

This idea is great! The best I've seen yet. If the conquerer dies, will the conquereers die with him or be free again?

Thats a great question and one i didnt think off. And further still, if the conquerer surrenders to someone else, what happens to the conqueree?

I think the conqueree should be free in both cases. But i dont know; could be problems with this.

Well backstabbing might be fun.

If player will get free once their assimilator gets destroyed they might continue in hope of him getting destroyed or chance to destroy him themselves.
So a player that have assimilated other players might just have to be a little careful with what he lets these players do so he doesn't get a nuke sent his way or his commander among many assimilated units.

If the assimilated player dies when the assimilator dies then they have uttermost incentive to continue fighting if they wanna stay in the game.
Offcourse if they feel like taking revenge for being assimilated they might not care if they destroy their assimilator and dies in the process.

Another question is how much control the assimilator got over his assimilated players and how much information and resources he gets from them.

Assimilation could just be having control over the self-destruction mechanism of another players' Commander without any additional bonus.
Actually you could do this in TA by comnapping. Loading an enemy commander into a transport that is.
Although this scenario rarely played out.

The assimilator might be able to self-destruct all units of the assimilated players while he see what they see and can chose how much resources they get.

There is lots of options.
Interesting indeed.

Some definitely interesting points. Reading what you said and thinking about it now, I think the assimilated player (conqueree) should be destroyed if the assimilator (conquerer) is destroyed. Although its fun to backstab, like someone mentioned above, it could be abused in online play. Whereas, if the conqueree knows they die when the conquerer dies, then they much more incentive to help the conquerer and protect them.

I think thats the best way to ensure that the whole concept of assimilating opponents to aid you will work