OSG-35 - Social Distancing

[Ianus]

More than 400 turns have passed, and six races have clawed their way up from their respective homeworld.  Each stands poised to leap outward into the galaxy to claim their fair share, or more!

But all is not well in the universe.  Darlok legend tells of a dread plague; an extremely virulent sickness, spread by any form of physical contact.  Our soothsayers warn that any contact with outsiders will spread this sickness among The People. 

We must exercise extreme caution in our quest among the stars, and remain ever vigilant against contact with other races.  To this end we must avoid all diplomatic contact, trade, and espionage to avoid the risk of bringing contamination into our empire.  Passive spies are expendable and can be sent out; the plague will get them eventually. [I could be swayed to say that the stolen digital data doesn't pose any risk, but I'll leave that up to other players to decide.]

Game settings:
Difficulty: Hard
Galaxy: Medium
Races: 5
Player Race: Darlok
Variant: No trade/espionage/sabotage/diplomatic overtures/ground invasion.  We must Abstain from all galactic council votes unless we vote for ourselves.

Please indicate interest below!  I am excited to play, and would love to get this up and running ASAP.  I know that the world is a bit crazy right now.  Lets have some fun!

[Ianus]

With regards to this variant, the Darloks are actually a very strong race apart from their diplomatic penalty. We should be able to do very well on Hard difficulty. I'm also open to any other suggestions.

[RefSteel]

Sounds like fun!

No diplomacy meaning we can't even accept deals proposed by the AI, right? (They might call, but for all intents and purposes, when they look at their Races screen, they should see "Diplomat Gone" for us at all times! Meaning, for instance, that once we're at war with an AI, it will last until they or we are eliminated!

For proper Social Distancing, we really shouldn't invade anyone either, but perhaps that's going too deep into variant territory for this one. (If we wanted a more "normal" Darlok game, we could just forbid trading, tech exchange, [EDIT: threats, lest they send scientists to placate us with tech, carrying the PLAGUE], and invasions, but allow other forms of diplomacy. Then our only way to get tech from other races would be via spying instead of taking it off the table. But I do like the idea of the suggested play-to-our-supposed-weaknesses type of game!)

Oh, and in case it wasn't obvious: Whatever the rules we decide on, I'd be happy to play!

[shallow_thought]

I'm definitely up for a game, and this sounds fun. The last SG we did on hard was a bit of a snooze-fest IIRC (birds?), but this has some interesting challenges - I actually wonder if no espionage and no invasions (we'll have to tech everything - and hope it's in our tree!) might actually be quite crippling. And if we say "no diplomatic overtures == no diplo at all", yeah it's almost "always war" as well. But it does fit the theme ...

[Arnuz]

Noob friendly? If so count me in.

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[RefSteel]

I'm in favor of keeping it new-player friendly, yes! Meaning both lots of discussion and tips in the thread, and a not-too-crippling variant, even on Hard difficulty. Probably either stick with the original suggestion from Ianus or my "Go Full Darlok" tech from self-research and spying only. (As for new players being welcome to try, no matter how tough the game, absolutely! That goes without saying!)

[Cyneheard]

Sounds fun. Hard is definitely the way to go. I'm willing to play if you need another player, but I'm happy to watch if it's a full enough slate.

[shallow_thought]

Trust no-one, especially yourself.

To be Darlok is to know this. Our very bodies rebuild themselves, changing both form and thought, so that our current selves can be free of our past, and our future free of us. I believe this gives us a unique insight to the mystery of the ancients.

What could possibly have destroyed so powerful a race, one capable of changing the physical universe down to the smallest, most precise level, or at the largest conceivable scale? All but the most extreme of our thinkers accept that, within knowable limits, the physical universe is consistent - along with the provable (if partial) truths of mathematics. So, the answer lies elsewhere. The evidence is clear - the death of the ancients can only come from within themselves. In particular, I believe their powers of communication, of memory and of understanding became too deep. They achieved knowledge of the universe, each of themselves and - this is key - each of each other.

With such complete understanding, they became one mind, one view - one lie that they believed to be the truth. This fundamental failure  killed them.

We Darloks are better positioned than any others to avoid this fate. No other species is so capable of avoiding the death-lock of consistency. But even we are at risk. To avoid stagnation, we must avoid each other. Only through the insights into possibility that the uninformed call "mis-understandings" can we escape the trap. The need, harsh as it seems, is inescapable. We must separate, isolate, communicate only at sufficient distance to allow the "faults" and "errors" to mask our full thought from each other.

If we can do this, we can fill the stars, constantly changing, constantly other - undying.

[RefSteel]

Brilliant, shallow_thought! And the story definitely supports the original variant that Ianus posted: No talking to aliens! Our spies can look at their tech, but never communicate so closely as to learn how to make it! If we want to learn alien technologies, we have to reverse-engineer it by hand from their factories!

[shallow_thought]

Brilliant, shallow_thought!  And the story definitely supports the original variant that Ianus posted:  No talking to aliens!  Our spies can look at their tech, but never communicate so closely as to learn how to make it!  If we want to learn alien technologies, we have to reverse-engineer it by hand from their factories!

Yeah, that's exactly it. I worked backwards from Ianus' game constraints to develop an entire civilization's philosophy. I do my best work when provided good limits .

We should look to get this kicked off, as we seem to have some interest, including some new players !