Hey folks, new to the site and game but having played the alpha last night- really excited.

To the topic...
First let me say that being able to play as the Borg is probably a bad idea. Unlike Armada1/2 I think they really could be balanced with few, powerful ships, but I don't think it's worth the effort. The Borg are larger than any other power in our galaxy. They're a force of nature; a danger to everyone. They're in a league of their own and should be treated as such.

However, for that very same reason they can be used as an excellent mechanic.

There are three things that we've seen drive the Borg, in order of most pressing to least:
1. Self-preservation - they'll attack you if you attack them first, and they dropped everything to fight 8472
2. New technology distinctiveness
3. New biological distinctiveness
4. The need for more drones/resources (not actually seen but can be surmised)

Realistically two cubes could have conquered Earth at any time, considering how hard it's been to defeat one. So why didn't they send two? If they're so much more advanced than all the other races around their space, why haven't those races been assimilated? From what I can tell the Borg have had the resources to conquer the entire galaxy for some time, and yet they don't. In answering the question of "why" there are some elements that might be fun to see in their AI. So some of my ideas.

- They'll first be attracted to the most technologically advanced player race, but not exclusively
- They'll be attracted to minor race systems for their unique technology and biology
- They'll be attracted to systems with unique empire buildings (Daystrom, Starfleet HQ, etc.)
- The more you fight them off successfully, the greater threat you'll be perceived as and the more they'll attack out of self-preservation
- The more they're fought off in general, the more they'll attack in general to resupply their resources

This would create an interesting paradigm and potentially introduce a handicap. The more you're attacked by them, the more of your distinctiveness they assimilate, the less they care about you. If you make another technological breakthrough, expect to be paid another visit. Have the Borg suffered defeat at the hands of another race? Your colonies might be drone-fodder. Do you defend those colonies? It might make the Borg perceive you as a greater threat and come knocking on your door more often.

"So what if all the races just let their technology and biology be assimilated and don't fight back? Wouldn't that eliminate the Borg threat?"

Enter Species 8472. Have an event in which 8472 swoops in and kicks a little Borg butt, forcing them to resupply. The harder they're hit, the harder they'll hit the player races. Plus would you let them assimilate your people, lowering morale, and forcing you to rebuild the planet? The choice is yours.

Hmm, on the same episode, during the assimilation of Species 10026, 4 people managed to escape (with Seven's help ) but the Queen was so determined to completely assimilate everyone as "... if so much as one escapes, then the species itself remains unassimilated. "

Yup, I read those prior and those ideas do sound good. I like the notion of an Anti-Borg Alliance and hope to see that possible. It reminds me of the Klingons being mentioned as having fought the cube in The Best of Both Worlds.

I agree a balance must be struck between predictability and the mystery that surrounded the Borg when they were first encountered. But maybe that would exist inherently? A new player wouldn't know what to expect and may in fact expect a pretty plain, unintelligent behavior. Over time, like with any AI in any game, the player will catch on to the conditions. In this case I actually think that's alright. The Borg largely do have set behaviors. They might adapt new strategies over time, but I think their inherent behavior is rather predefined until that proves ineffective. And even then that might take a while. Remember that drone in Scorpion that just stands there trying again and again to put its tubules into the hull of 8472?

But I digress. If the Borg end up being an AI empire of their own then, while it might start from an event, I think the door has been opened to a much broader utilization of AI; the same realm of capabilities that any AI empire would have. Deciding the logic behind who/when they attack other races might be more versatile.

But then.. I really don't know how AI is coded or if events and empires would have separate models, so I might be talking out my arse. Having logic such as you described, though, in which an event can be mapped over several moves, I think would be a must-have, though.

The AI is actually one of the areas where we intend to greatly improve upon BOTF; we've got plans to utilize it much more in the game, with the introduction of system governors to take control of colonies that players don't want to micromanage themselves. Players will even be able to create pre-defined construction lists for new colonies that the AI will automatically implement for them on the foundation of new colonies. Mike has termed this gameplay style as "macromanagement", as it allows for players to highly customise their game towards their particular gameplay style. We also intend to make the AI more intelligent and challenging than it was in BOTF. Programming codes have come a long way in the last decade afterall.

Of course, the AI is a work-in-progress at the moment - barely. It's closer to the initial planning stages rather than the playtesting/implementation stages, which means there's a long time yet for the game and eventual AI usage ideas to mature and develop. You will see this development in future updates and announcements that we make on the forums, and i've already discussed with Mike some big changes that are coming. They won't be in the Easter update, but they will be in an update sometime this year if everything goes to plan. I'm sworn to secrecy though so I can't say anymore about it muahahaha.

I'm good at arm twisting. Don't tempt me. And my Indian burns are something to be feared!

But I digress...

Another side-thought I had regarding the Borg was to take a page from Voyager - which I do hesitantly since I think Voyager did a good job of demystifying the Borg. This may, however, end up introducing a component of a larger scale: technology stealing.

Keeping to the Borg aspect for the moment, the idea would have been that the Borg assimilate technology as they take over planets and ships that employ it. So the flip side would be that when a Borg ship is destroyed or one of their worlds conquered, that technology could be salvaged.

I can quickly see where that might become a difficult thing to put into practice, or something that would be difficult to balance. A simpler version might simply be gaining "research points" from salvage that can be put towards something you're currently researching. Technically this could be expanded to be applied to anything you destroy or take over from any race, but I think there's the most precedence regarding the Borg.

Technology stealing is something that we hope to have in the game - via random events and Intel. But as for including it as part of the Borg event, I believe that's a new idea. It remains to be seen what exactly can be done in the game and what can't, but I think this is a thread that Mike really needs to be a part of, so i'll send him a PM with a link to this discussion. We don't want to come up with wild ideas and discuss how they will be implemented when the guy who is actually making it knows it can't be done. And on the flip side he knows if it can.

I personally would love to see the borg as a playable race, but only after you beat the game with all the other races first. I think there should be a Unimatrix one system, but I think it should be hard enough to destroy that all the other races need to form alliances to beat it. Instead of just destroying eachother it would make diplomacy a more interesting and rewarding experience.

Don't worry about disappearing; we're a fan-based project and we all know that our lives can get in the way of our obsession. Many people that at one time were major posters and contributors to the forums no longer visit - some of them I particularly miss because they were a right laugh, such as CVN-65, or made great contributions, such as OmniQ. And other people, such as SonOfMogh, are both, and still randomly pop up on the forums once or twice a year. Ok, i'm probably one of the very few people who would know about people like them, but life goes on. The BOTF2 project has been around since September 2004 and we're still here. I don't see it going away anytime soon, so there's no reason to worry about disappearing.

Say Moe, did I ever end up sending you that PM about the Borg a while back? I only ask because I was wondering if if would be ok for me to post it here. Let me know here or in a PM.

Oh, you mean the unlockables idea? Sorry that I never replied to your PM...actually I have no idea why I didn't, as it is an idea worth discussing before Mike starts to implement the Borg.

As it's your idea, you're welcome to post it in the thread, or we can discuss it via PM. It's your idea, so your choice. Check your sent box messages (Not your out box as messages are removed from your out box when the recipient has read them) if you're trying to remember how you worded your idea to me. Or if you can't find it, I can send you back a copy.

There was talk about a mod to replace one of the major races with the Borg. You would want to change the stats to reflect their abilities as well.

That would be ok, but it'd be nice if you could play the game with all the super powers, rather then substituting one of them, for another.

But anywho, any thoughts on any of that stuff?

I think if it is possible you should have the option of playing as the Borg. But there would have to be a number of adjustments. For example there wouldn't be any diplomacy or intelligence. granted it might be too easy with their ships being as powerful as they were but perhaps the species 8472 AI could be enhanced when humans play the Borg.

On a side note, do we know if it will be possible to assimilate worlds rather the conquer them? So when you take a system it replaces the native population, say Klingon, with Borg.

As I understood it the Borg will just wipe out all population on a planet. Otherwise how would you take back a Borg planet?

Simple, kill all the drones with planetary bombardment.

Which of course would reduce the population to zero. If that's ultimately going to be the case might as well have the Borg wipe everyone out as your colony is already destined to be a loss and at least this way the game doesn't have to worry about the activities of a Borg planet.

But it makes it more interesting if the Borg assimilates half of the population of the planet and takes it.

Can't argue there... Would they be able to construct ships etc from the planets though? I'd kind of assumed Borg vessels weren't hindered by range or fuel, however if they can assimilate planets and build ships or even outposts then is that the case? I know nobody is implying this will be the case, but if it were it brings the Borg closer to being a normal race rather than an unpredictable force of nature.

I guess I just prefer the Borg as they were in Best Of Both Worlds, you don't really know if there are any other cubes, if they control any space, or how large they are. Instead just a random cube show up and causes complete havok.

I agree that they were more interesting before Voyager in terms of a TV show, but in terms of gameplay they are more interesting if they have their own space.

Well if the Borg are just going to wipe out the population then they should gain strength with each world they destroy. As the assimilate more worlds they should get more ships ect. Since they won't have planets or the ability to construct ships they should gain them by assimilating new planets. It makes sense since the Borg didn't really kill anyone, rather they assimilated them, and these new drones will need new Cubes ect.