World building new major races

Well, not random encounters. I'm trying to randomly generate the ferengi and the klingons and the romulans and the cardassians - and the vargr and the Aslan and the hivers. There are thousands of systems, and dozens or hundreds of episodes between finding each of those.

There are still going to be other things encountered - like races that do not have jump, which will occur multiple times per sector, and multiple times per subsector for failed civilizations.

These ultra rare ones are just the things that involve E.T. civilizations - and as soon as an active E.T. civilizations is found, then hundreds or thousands of systems will involve them, and they will suddenly be a Big Deal (just like they are in star trek and charted space).
 
Increase the probability of something the further you explore?
That would be like random encounters, which is what I thought @Nelphine was doing. However, random generation (at world building/sector building time?) is desired - regardless of whether such anomalies are encountered by players or not. Still, could increase likelihood per additional subsector tho. So your idea would still work. But for me this is a game mechanic that relies heavily on the wrong side of the brain, and doesn't stimulate the creative circuits and referee's aptitudes needed for campaign/adventure writing, IMO.
 
Pebbles in a pond.

Drop two species home worlds in different parts of the galaxy and then dice their expansion decade by decade until their ripples overlap.
 
Pebbles in a pond.

Drop two species home worlds in different parts of the galaxy and then dice their expansion decade by decade until their ripples overlap.
That is the top-down approach that I thought was being used; but I was wrong. The overall construction is bottom-up; systems are added and defined one at at time, and need to make sense both when they are created, and later when the map around them is completed. It is a neat approach that would be great for solo-play, but I am not sure it is really possible.
 
So, I think what we need to do for this kind of exploration game (even if I would go system by system), is to have something where you only actually roll the exploration of half a dozen or so systems per sub sector. In game, the rest are explored too, but for the players, this allows us to focus on the most interesting ones rather than just doing all of them. This way, we can dramatically increase the number of interesting results, and we hand wave the rest of the systems (and if you need to know them for whatever reason, great, you can roll them normally)
 
So, for the math previous to this post, certain worlds (if you know RTT bio ratings, you understand) have a 1/36 chance to have sophonts (including failed civilizations) on them.

Therefore, my proposal is, instead of exploring every single system in a sub sector, we instead roll 2d6 to determine how many systems we actually explore (in this way, again, trying to match Star Trek, where episodes are only about the interesting worlds, even though they spend a lot more time exploring than just what is shown in the episodes. You could still roll the other systems, just count any results of sophonts as a sophisticated ecology instead)

11-12: 5 systems
10: 4 systems (Yes I know there should be more 4 systems and less 5 systems, but this gets the math right, and follows 'higher is better', so meh)
8-9: 3 systems
6-7: 2 systems
3-5: 1 system
2: 0 systems

Randomly determine which systems in the sub-sector are these 0-5 systems.

For each of these 0-5 systems, the first lifebearing world that could roll that 1/36 sophonts, instead automatically has sophonts (or failed civilization). Any further life bearing worlds generated in one of these systems still has the normal 1/36 chance to have sophonts.


In addition, since we are now exploring sub sectors rather than individual systems, the roll for E.T. encounters needs to change as well. (This also makes it easier to plot the E.T.s, as now we are going to generate their territory by sub-sector rather than individual system)

So, what was 4d6 per system before now needs to change to match per sub-sector, so roll 3d6, and a total of 16 or more indicates an E.T. explored sub-sector. (Since this then indicates the chart from post #128, if that 2d6 roll is less than 9, randomly determine which system in the subsector the result is found in)
 
OK, so: in the 0-5 systems of interest per sub sector, roll 2d6:

Now I have a choice:

2-3: sophont civilization without space technology (TL0-8)
4-5: apex predator (like weeping angels, reavers, or Alien, which might have wiped out a sophont civilization, but might not)
6-11: failed civilization (TL0-10) [not wiped out by apex predators]
12: high tech civilization with space technology (TL7-10)

Or

2-7: failed civilization
8-9: apex predator
10-11: sophont civilization without space tech
12: high tech civilization with space tech

Thoughts? I think the first is better math but the second is more intuitive for playability
 
I like the second option better, simply for the probability distribution:

Out of 36 chances:

1 high tech civilization with space tech (1/36)
5 sophont civilization without space tech (5/36)
9 apex predator (9/36 or 1/4)
21 failed civilization (21/36 or 7/12)

I would note that a "sophont civilization without space tech" could also be interpreted by the Game Master as "without interstellar space tech", allowing for extraplanetary bases/colonies. Also, an apex predator may be co-present with a civilization, allowing for situations of ongoing battles between the two (see the plotline of Neon Genesis Evangelion). And a failed civilization may not necessarily be extinct, although unless circumstances change, that's probably the way things are trending.
 
Sorry, I describe it better elsewhere - space tech refers to the ability for the civilization to detect the space traveller's (presumably the players) ship.

The lower tech level with space presence (roll of 12, but TL 7 or 8) is the ones that would have stations and potentially colonies (well, outposts) on other bodies in the system.


Edit: when I'm happy with the whole thing I'm going to post it all again to be complete.


For failed civilizations, you're correct, but there will be a chart to determine how long it's been since it failed - if it's been thousands of years, they'll be extinct.
 
Ok.. next.. once you find an explored sub-sector of an E.T., how do you determine which of it's neighboring subsectors are also explored by that E.T.? When will you find a core sub-sector?

for an E.T. civilization (and are a standard type), they have a core region:
TL9: 1 system
TL10: 1 sector
TL11: 3 sectors
TL12: 8 sectors
TL13: 22 sectors (most will only get out to 16 or so sectors before running into another E.T.s core, and therefore not being able to expand)
TL14: 49 sectors
TL15: 81 sectors

For the 'simple' version, we start with the assumption that this core area is as close to a square as possible.

Around this core, they have an explored region, which extends approximately 1 sub-sector for each TL above 8. (So, TL11 would have an explored region about 3 sub-sectors 'thick' around its core). Unlike the core, the explored region will extend into other E.T.s core regions. Again, we work with the 'simple' version where this is a square.
TL9: 3x3 sub-sectors (1/9 are core)
TL10: 6x6 sub-sectors (16/36 are core)
TL11: 11x11 sub-sectors (48/105 are core - note these numbers don't match the 11x11 because the core is not actually a square in this case)
TL12: 16x16 sub-sectors (108/240 are core - core is not a square again)
TL13 (assuming 16 sector core): 21x21 sub-sectors (256/441 are core)
TL14 (still 16 sector core): 22x22 sub-sectors (256/484 are core)
TL15 (still 16 sector core): 23x23 sub-sectors (256/529 are core)

Therefore, when the players initially find a sub-sector of an E.T. that is previously unknown, they (among other things) will determine the TL of that E.T.

Then, since this is the first sub-sector of the E.T., we know that it will either be on the edge of the square.

TL9: 1/3 of being an edge sub-sector, 2/3 of being a corner.
TL10: 2/3 of being edge, 1/3 of being corner.
TL11: 9/11 of being edge, 2/11 of being corner.
TL12: 7/8 of being edge, 1/8 of being corner.
TL13: 19/21 of being edge, 2/21 of being corner.
TL14: 10/11 of being edge, 1/11 of being corner.
TL15: 21/23 of being edge, 2/23 of being corner.

With this, when someone explores 'sideways' from the explored sub-sector, the chart is the basis to determine whether the adjacent sub-sector is also explored.

If they explore in a direction immediately opposite of where they know that the sub-sector is not explored, then, if it's a corner, that opposite sub-sector will be explored. If it's TL10+, and it's an edge, that opposite sub-sector will be explored. If it's TL9, that opposite sub-sector will actually be the Core sub-sector for that E.T.

With TL10+, the 'depth' before finding a Core sub-sector is identified above (the 'thickness' of the explored region by TL)

Once the core is found, instead of worrying about the square shape, we simply ensure that there is always a connected 'chain' of core sub-sectors, until as many are found as identified above. (I'll figure out an exact chart later to determine if any given sub-sector is core or explored if it's adjacent to a core sub-sector). Then the explored subsectors are always going to make that x deep 'ring' around the core sectors. If the core isn't found yet, the assumption will be that the explored region will make a square, for simplicity sake. If the core IS found, then the shape will fit the core.


This obviously is fairly high level, and not very helpful. The goal is to take this idea, and translate it into a simple chart, so that based on the knowledge of 1 or more of the adjacent sub-sectors, and how far away the closest non-territory sub-sector is, and how far away the closest known core sub-sector is, you'll have a chart to roll on to tell you if the next sub-sector you are scouting is explored, core, or not part of that E.T.s territory.
 
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