Close Encounters

I was browsing the close encounters scale 1-7 and figured it could play a very interesting role in the game. The first part of the scale is sightings. Suppose an alien's spacecraft appeared over one of your races cities. This would simply be an appearance. You could attack it I suppose resulting in a war of the worlds sort of thing, attempt contact (I'll ellaborate later). Or dismiss it and let it float there possibly causing a panic resulting in a wide variety of problems like the aliens possibly attacking, citizens attacking the craft, people stealing from stores and taking shelter in fear, etc. The second part of the scale is physical affects from the ufo which is really just like the way the first part would be but with maybe higher chance of panics. Part three is "animate beings" which is quite vague unfortunately, but it could be a being which seems intelligent, but unlike anything that could evolve on your planet near a type 1. Again, hightened chances of panic, and perhaps hightened chances of citizens attacking, but attacking the alien causing a war. Four was not in the original scale but is abduction. Abduction of a citizen should ensure some kind of panic, and if there are any witnesses, there should be an almost definite chance of attack such as throwing rocks, shooting guns if a witness is armed, etc. Five is contact. Possibly by either a citizen, or even the government if initiated from a type 1 or 2; possibly 3, and maybe 4. Of course, its also perfectly possible that the alien race could contact the player, maybe even from their home planet. It should even be possible for the sharing of alien technology with the player's race resulting in huge leaps forward. Six was only proposed on a website, but it is ufo incidents causing injury or death of a citizen. This should result in a player's choice of hostile contact, or attack. The player should not be allowed to let this one fly. Seven seems rather disgusting in my opinion, it's breeding between aliens and the players race. I honestly have no idea how this could be implemented, but that doesn't mean someone else can't. What are your thoughts and views on this?

Gryphogrox wrote:

I was browsing the close encounters scale 1-7 and figured it could play a very interesting role in the game. The first part of the scale is sightings. Suppose an alien's spacecraft appeared over one of your races cities. This would simply be an appearance. You could attack it I suppose resulting in a war of the worlds sort of thing, attempt contact (I'll ellaborate later). Or dismiss it and let it float there possibly causing a panic resulting in a wide variety of problems like the aliens possibly attacking, citizens attacking the craft, people stealing from stores and taking shelter in fear, etc. The second part of the scale is physical affects from the ufo which is really just like the way the first part would be but with maybe higher chance of panics. Part three is "animate beings" which is quite vague unfortunately, but it could be a being which seems intelligent, but unlike anything that could evolve on your planet near a type 1. Again, hightened chances of panic, and perhaps hightened chances of citizens attacking, but attacking the alien causing a war. Four was not in the original scale but is abduction. Abduction of a citizen should ensure some kind of panic, and if there are any witnesses, there should be an almost definite chance of attack such as throwing rocks, shooting guns if a witness is armed, etc. Five is contact. Possibly by either a citizen, or even the government if initiated from a type 1 or 2; possibly 3, and maybe 4. Of course, its also perfectly possible that the alien race could contact the player, maybe even from their home planet. It should even be possible for the sharing of alien technology with the player's race resulting in huge leaps forward. Six was only proposed on a website, but it is ufo incidents causing injury or death of a citizen. This should result in a player's choice of hostile contact, or attack. The player should not be allowed to let this one fly. Seven seems rather disgusting in my opinion, it's breeding between aliens and the players race. I honestly have no idea how this could be implemented, but that doesn't mean someone else can't. What are your thoughts and views on this?

I'm not really sure what you're trying to say here. Are you trying to put labels on how far contact has gone with alien races? Because the UFO scale doesn't exactly fit with the game, but an altered version could. And attacking a UFO shouldn't be an automatic declaration of war if your race is as low on the scale as humans are right now. Real UFOs have actually been shot at--look up Battle of Los Angeles (not the recent movie, this was an event during WWII were shots were fired at what were thought at the time to be Japanese planes). Battle of L.A. isn't the only occasion either, it's just the most famous.

No, I'm not making labels for how far contact has gone, there was a guy (I think he was a ufologist) named hynek who created 1-3 on the scale. 4-5 were added later, and 6-7 have only been ideas. As far as attacking ufos goes, I suppose you're sort of right. Some aliens may not be very aggressive, but of course, when we attacked them then, our weapons were likely more primitive and the aliens may not have noticed. Like throwing sticks at a helicopter. But suppose we went to an alien planet and something was shooting at us with all they had, we would likely treat it as any other attack on Earth. Like I said, It depends on a variety of things, the aliens, your race, etc. I just think this would be interesting in the game. Especially aliens sharing technology with your race.

Gryphogrox wrote:

No, I'm not making labels for how far contact has gone, there was a guy (I think he was a ufologist) named hynek who created 1-3 on the scale. 4-5 were added later, and 6-7 have only been ideas. As far as attacking ufos goes, I suppose you're sort of right. Some aliens may not be very aggressive, but of course, when we attacked them then, our weapons were likely more primitive and the aliens may not have noticed. Like throwing sticks at a helicopter. But suppose we went to an alien planet and something was shooting at us with all they had, we would likely treat it as any other attack on Earth. Like I said, It depends on a variety of things, the aliens, your race, etc. I just think this would be interesting in the game. Especially aliens sharing technology with your race.

I know about Close Encounters UFO scale (I'm big into UFOs and other weird stuff like them). I don't see how the scale can be implemented besides just as labels. I agree with the concepts you're saying, but these are more advanced ideas that doesn't really fit into one single concept.
Also, just because you're in a spaceship and your being attacked like nuts doesn't mean your race should automatically go to war. Sure, you could if your playing your race as extremely warlike considering any attack as a threat, but again, look at the Battle of L.A. They were pretty much putting everything the could put out at that UFO, and nothing happened as a result. Just because your being attacked doesn't mean the race wants to go to war, it could just mean they're freaked out.

I guess you're right about the war thing, but war should be a possibility like you say. As for where this could be implemented, I guess mainly industrial stage, but a ufo could visit much earlier however with few possible results. Maybe just abduction as a low chance possibility.

The reason nothing happened at L.A. was because it was a baloon, and everyone missed. So I think that if a UFO from a paranoid race started observing a city, and then you took out a depleted uranium or naval gun because you were so terrified... It's gonna leave a dent, and if the race is warlike or paranoid, they would use it as an excuse to conquer the planet. And if you win, you immediately advance to Space stage. But depending on the level of tech you get lower levels of likely hood of defeating, renessaince being the lowest where you have any chance of winning.

I don't think instant space stage is reasonable, but you should be able to recover damaged technology.

I think it would be neat to have the technology boosts, but your probably right bout instant space stage.
That being said, I think it would be really cool to have a War of The Worlds type scenario.

that type of scenario is definitely possible so no worries there.