Fractal Softworks Forum

Starsector => General Discussion => Topic started by: pairedeciseaux on June 03, 2019, 01:28:44 PM

Title: Jan 3, cycle 213 - 0.9.1 campaign feedback
Post by: pairedeciseaux on June 03, 2019, 01:28:44 PM
Jan 3, cycle 213 is the point where I ended my first 0.9.1 campaign, last Thursday. I have enjoyed it, and it was certainly better than any 0.9.0 campaigns I've played - which were already good. Here is an hopefully not too boring feedback of the full campaign. Ahem, sorry about the post length. :)

The first thing I want to point out is: in the past, playing 0.8.1 or 0.9.0, vanilla or modded, a campaign would have a much shorter duration. I think the reasons for this are:

I consider this run duration and progression change a good thing. It feels a bit more "organic" now, there is much less of the typical early to late game quick jump I had before. In short:

A few words about the way I played:

Early game

Mid game

Late game


My end game fleet (two third of these ships have 1 D hullmod, one third are pristine)

Colonies

Last, a few random notes, ideas and suggestions

1. in the ship recover screen, I'd like to have a [?] icon with a similar look and behavior to the one in the fleet screen (mouse-over to display info), the reason for this being I find existing UI finicky when I want to review ships available for recovery

2. in addition to the current ship list tiles, have an alternative view for the fleet screen, with one ship per line, columns being used to display relevant ship stats; it would then be easier to review/compare ships; user can toggle between classic view (existing ship tiles) and alternative view (one ship per line)

3. thinking about point 1 and point 2 above, I think it would be neat to display both current fleet and ships available for recovery in a unified screen; this would then be similar to the comodity/weapon market/storage screen; also user can choose between a classic view (existing ship tiles) and a table/list view (one ship per line); it would then be easier to review/compare ships

4. following this train of thought, how about a unified ship buy/sell/store screen (without tabs) ? diplay both current ships, and ships available on the market/storage; the buy/sell/store icons would then be replaced by drag and drop, just like with comodities/weapons; it would bring the same benefits as previous points in addition to some UI consistency

5. recap of the previous ship list screen ideas :
- default display is player's fleet ships, fullscreen
- if in a recovery operation, also display recoverable ships
- if in a market/storage place, player can toggle between either (a) only fleet ships or (b) fleet ships + market ships or (c) fleet ships + storage ships
- player ship list is displayed top, secondary ship list is displayed bottom
- player use drag and drop between both lists, player can confirm/cancel, UI is now similar to comodities/weapons
- also, player can toggle the way lists are displayed between classic view (existing ship tiles) and alternative view (one ship per line)

what do you think ?

6. there is (what looks like) a trap with some exploration missions : if the target position is not clearly explained (such as "is orbiting a barren world"), then player may spend the rest of his fleet's supplies trying to find it - and never find it, this happened to me and I had to reload last save (and I tried the same mission twice), I guess this is where the sensors skills would have helped - how do you handle this ?

7. [I wrote down this one 2 weeks ago, and ... don't remember the details, so I'm trying to interpret things here - sorry if this is confusing] "display the difficulty rating icons in the personal bounty section of the intel screen" - I think currently the difficulty rating icons are only displayed on the "campaign screen" when player does mouse-over a fleet, it would be neat to have these difficulty ratin shown for bounties in the intel screen

8. minor thing, I'd like to hear some music / ambient sounds in the Asharu ATP and similar places

9. visiting Eventide I had the opportunity to compare the prices of the regular Falcon (=102250) and the XIV version (=174250), I find the difference too high (maybe it was already the same ratio with 0.8.1, I don't remember)

10. in the colony infrastructure UI, I find the click-to-remove action strange

11. AI inspection : unless I've missed something, the colony will always comply by default, I'd like to have persistent choices like "always resist"

12. in the intel screen map, when several events are displayed with "arrows" (such as the one showing the origin of a raid and it's target system), I find it a bit messy; it would be helpful to have some sort of persistent visual accent (bigger arrow, lighter color, visual effect, anything) that would clearly show what the currently selected event on the left side actually is on the map

13. at several point during the campaign I noticed enemy ships with average or plain bad loadout, I don't know what mecanics are involved under the hood (randomized, fixed variants, weapon priority, ...), but I'm sure there is room for improvement of the end result - the good thing is, it made some hard battles a bit easier for me; a few month ago I noticed this with 0.9.0 too, but I don't remember with vanilla 0.8.1; I certainly remember facing ships with good loadout in 0.8.1 + DynaSector mod

14. I like the big 0.9.1 combat changes : carrier behaviour is much better, escort order is now good; for me battles are now smoother, with less micro management; though I had a Mora come once in close range of an enemy station, I had to retreat the ship to save it while it had 30% hull, but doing it once in a full campaign is certainly much better that having to give specific orders for every battle as in 0.9.0 - also in this occurence the Mora was actually helpful by eating all that damage at a point where the whole fleet was struggling

15. the Pirate Shrike, given the way I used it in 0.9.1, didn't feel much different from the regular Shrike as I played it in 0.9.0, yes it had a Railgun; I haven't done a comparison in 0.9.1; anyway I like them both - it is a closer situation to, say, the Pirate Enforcer being identical to the regular Enforcer, compared to the Pirate Falcon being much different than to the regular Falcon

16. didn't see any Medusa or Aurora in battle, these are really rare since 0.9.0

17. last but not least (for me): it would be much more comfortable to have some sort of UI scaling option (like in RimWorld where I use 1.5x scaling) - eyes being 1 meter away from a 27 inches display, playing in 2560x1440; but I have to admit I've somewhat gotten used to it - I probably tend to avoid reading text in Starsector without even thinking about it anymore; obviously there are clear benefits for me to play in 2560x1440 (larger view for hyperspace travel and for battles) so I'm thankful to have that option but would love to have bigger UI/text
Title: Re: Jan 3, cycle 213 - 0.9.1 campaign feedback
Post by: Electrum on June 03, 2019, 01:51:43 PM
Thanks for sharing your story!

Quote
9. visiting Eventide I had the opportunity to compare the prices of the regular Falcon (=102250) and the XIV version (=174250), I find the difference too high (maybe it was already the same ratio with 0.8.1, I don't remember)
From the same vendor? If so, that's a huge difference. But open market vs. military market will always be different.

Quote
12. in the intel screen map, when several events are displayed with "arrows" (such as the one showing the origin of a raid and it's target system), I find it a bit messy; it would be helpful to have some sort of persistent visual accent (bigger arrow, lighter color, visual effect, anything) that would clearly show what the currently selected event on the left side actually is on the map
Yeah, it would be nice to clear them away or disregard them.

Quote
16. didn't see any Medusa or Aurora in battle, these are really rare since 0.9.0
Same! I've only seen 1 Aurora in my entire save which has been going for several weeks now, and it was a derelict that I wasn't able to recover.
Title: Re: Jan 3, cycle 213 - 0.9.1 campaign feedback
Post by: Megas on June 03, 2019, 02:28:07 PM
Nice read.

(XIV) ships cost more not only to buy, but also to produce if you have blueprints and heavy industry.  Where they do not cost more is restoration.  It is cheaper to restore a lightly damaged (XIV) ship than to build a new one with your heavy industry, let alone buy it from market.  (I already posted the bug and Alex dealt with it for later.)

Several classic high-tech ships, like Medusa and Aurora are used only by Tri-Tachyon (only place to get the blueprints guaranteed is to raid Culann).  Their warship setting is at 1, while carriers and phase ships are both at 3.  This means Tri-Tachyon fleets rarely use Medusa and Aurora, and they are hard to come by.  Hyperion and Scarab are similarly rare.
Title: Re: Jan 3, cycle 213 - 0.9.1 campaign feedback
Post by: pairedeciseaux on June 03, 2019, 02:48:33 PM
Quote
9. visiting Eventide I had the opportunity to compare the prices of the regular Falcon (=102250) and the XIV version (=174250), I find the difference too high (maybe it was already the same ratio with 0.8.1, I don't remember)
From the same vendor? If so, that's a huge difference. But open market vs. military market will always be different.

Honestly I don't remember, but good point!

Still I just checked the data files:

175% is too high IMO

(XIV) ships cost more not only to buy, but also to produce if you have blueprints and heavy industry.  Where they do not cost more is restoration.  It is cheaper to restore a lightly damaged (XIV) ship than to build a new one with your heavy industry, let alone buy it from market.  (I already posted the bug and Alex dealt with it for later.)

You know what ? I recovered a lightly damage XIV Eagle during that campaign. I have a soft spot for the that ship because it was my first cruiser while playing 0.8.1.  :) But I certainly would not have spend the credits required to restore it for my end game fleet, even with the bug. On the other hand, restoring an Aurora ... Yes sir!  8)
Title: Re: Jan 3, cycle 213 - 0.9.1 campaign feedback
Post by: eidolad on June 03, 2019, 05:02:02 PM
I appreciate the detailed accounting.  I tend towards combat/salvage/recovery fleet building as the basis for most of my gameplay and fleet building as well. 

In vanilla I too find the Hammerhead just superb as all-around survivor (except for its rear arc against Salamanders/heavy missiles...sure could use a third emplacement back there, at least until extended shields hullmod is obtained).

Where I differ mostly from your accounting is in the mid-game...where I find usually find it critical to establish a fairly solid carrier core asap, and carriers/fighter composition is an important emphasis for hunting in the far regions of space.

However your post reminds me that there are several ways to play the "fleet composition strat-game"...
Title: Re: Jan 3, cycle 213 - 0.9.1 campaign feedback
Post by: Alex on June 03, 2019, 05:29:30 PM
Thank you so much for the detailed feedback! It was fun to read, and I made a few notes along the way :)

Quote
4. following this train of thought, how about a unified ship buy/sell/store screen (without tabs) ? diplay both current ships, and ships available on the market/storage; the buy/sell/store icons would then be replaced by drag and drop, just like with comodities/weapons; it would bring the same benefits as previous points in addition to some UI consistency

5. recap of the previous ship list screen ideas :
- default display is player's fleet ships, fullscreen
- if in a recovery operation, also display recoverable ships
- if in a market/storage place, player can toggle between either (a) only fleet ships or (b) fleet ships + market ships or (c) fleet ships + storage ships
- player ship list is displayed top, secondary ship list is displayed bottom
- player use drag and drop between both lists, player can confirm/cancel, UI is now similar to comodities/weapons
- also, player can toggle the way lists are displayed between classic view (existing ship tiles) and alternative view (one ship per line)

what do you think ?

This is something I actually looked at doing and just couldn't make it work UI-wise. It's hard to lay out everything you need to in a way that works and also fit two places worth of ships in non-claustrophobic UI elements.

Much earlier versions of the game actually had two sections with drag and drop (i.e. buying ships behaved very much like cargo) but there were less things you could do with ships (no mothballing or officers, or CR to display) and the UI was worse in other ways; it ended up becoming what it is now because that was the best I could come up with given all the requirements it had to meet.

So this is an "in theory I agree, but in practice, details", if that makes sense :)

As far as having a separate mode of viewing the fleet, in general these kinds of things can be trouble, because that's something that requires more testing (or, more likely, it'll mean more bugs slipping through), due to one or the other of the modes just not getting as much testing time.
Title: Re: Jan 3, cycle 213 - 0.9.1 campaign feedback
Post by: Thaago on June 03, 2019, 07:49:57 PM
This was great to read! I'm also really enjoying the new 'mid-game' that the pacing changes have made. I think its in a pretty good spot, and ready pacing wise for their to be more story based missions. I think before, it would be too easy to catapult right out of the mid game, so quest rewards in that range wouldn't have much time to be relevant. Now its in a better spot!

Regarding the XIV price difference: I'm ok with it because a XIV is almost entirely an upgrade from a normal ship. I too have a big fondness for XIV Eagles, they are some of my favorite ships.
Title: Re: Jan 3, cycle 213 - 0.9.1 campaign feedback
Post by: Goumindong on June 03, 2019, 11:25:32 PM
I am also totally OK with huge markups for XIV ships and other “higher quality” skinned ships. These ships dont pay deployment price costs for their raw power so even if the power is small theyre pretty much strictly better.

Re: point 11

If you resist once you will resist forever. This is because the hegemony will declare war on you and you will be hostile. You probably avoided this by waylaying the fleet with your transponder off and so not triggering hostilities.
Title: Re: Jan 3, cycle 213 - 0.9.1 campaign feedback
Post by: Megas on June 04, 2019, 08:40:19 AM
What I would like is persistent bribe.  I bribed the first inspection fleet, and the next time, it defaulted to comply.  Defaulting to bribe after I do it once means I can completely ignore inspection alerts.  "What, they want to be nosy again?!  Fine, give them a cut of the profits and leave me alone.  What does it take to get a working answering machine?"

Quote
You probably avoided this by waylaying the fleet with your transponder off and so not triggering hostilities.
In my case, I waited for the inspection fleet to see what they did, and they failed to show because passing pirate ships (on their way to raid core worlds) smashed them.  I had to reload and kill the pirate armada to save the inspectors.  Afterwards, they went into my system, then got distracted by chasing enemy (League) merchants instead of inspecting my colony.  They really need to focus at the job at hand instead of getting distracted by targets of opportunity.
Title: Re: Jan 3, cycle 213 - 0.9.1 campaign feedback
Post by: pairedeciseaux on June 04, 2019, 11:54:27 AM
Where I differ mostly from your accounting is in the mid-game...where I find usually find it critical to establish a fairly solid carrier core asap, and carriers/fighter composition is an important emphasis for hunting in the far regions of space.

However your post reminds me that there are several ways to play the "fleet composition strat-game"...

Hmm, weren't my 2 Mora enough ?  :D

I've also played a 0.9.0 campaign with a greater focus on carrier, I had something like 3 Heron and 3 Mora. The way I play, I don't plan ahead being carrier-focused or not, nor do I plan precise fleet composition, it all depends on :

Indeed, there is more than one way. One of the greatest strength of Starsector.
Title: Re: Jan 3, cycle 213 - 0.9.1 campaign feedback
Post by: pairedeciseaux on June 04, 2019, 01:27:05 PM
This is something I actually looked at doing and just couldn't make it work UI-wise.
[...]
So this is an "in theory I agree, but in practice, details", if that makes sense :)

Makes sense.  :)

I suspect at some point having the fleet screen ship "tiles" fairly large also became a requirement in it-self. If I were to praise the current UI I would say the large tiles are great to show ship scale at a glance, without having to go to the refit screen and simulator. I suspect (again) this is mostly useful for new players that could be confused otherwise - being able to assess size of ship in the fleet / store is very important, especially when you don't know them well enough.

I think the value of having big tiles in the fleet screen decreases as player gains knowledge of the ships and experience of their uses. But I don't have a magic UI design wand to solve the new player vs veteran player thing in "non claustrophobic" way,  so I will happily continue to use current UI - for now.  ;D

(... and I have probably no idea how complex the fleet screen requirements really are)
Title: Re: Jan 3, cycle 213 - 0.9.1 campaign feedback
Post by: pairedeciseaux on June 04, 2019, 02:11:10 PM
Regarding the XIV price difference: I'm ok with it because a XIV is almost entirely an upgrade from a normal ship. I too have a big fondness for XIV Eagles, they are some of my favorite ships.

I am also totally OK with huge markups for XIV ships and other “higher quality” skinned ships. These ships dont pay deployment price costs for their raw power so even if the power is small theyre pretty much strictly better.

Ok, I'll trust you guys more than I trust my memory. I probably did underestimate how an upgrade the XIV versions are. I'll give them a closer look next time.

If you resist once you will resist forever. This is because the hegemony will declare war on you and you will be hostile. You probably avoided this by waylaying the fleet with your transponder off and so not triggering hostilities.

Thank you for the explanation! Indeed now I kind of remember seeing this behaviour playing a 0.9.0 campaign with AI cores in a colony. If player being sneaky induces a bit more micro management, then that's a well deserved punishment.  :D

On the other hand ...

What I would like is persistent bribe.  I bribed the first inspection fleet, and the next time, it defaulted to comply.  Defaulting to bribe after I do it once means I can completely ignore inspection alerts.  "What, they want to be nosy again?!  Fine, give them a cut of the profits and leave me alone.  What does it take to get a working answering machine?"

Agreed.

In my case, I waited for the inspection fleet to see what they did, and they failed to show because passing pirate ships (on their way to raid core worlds) smashed them.  I had to reload and kill the pirate armada to save the inspectors.  Afterwards, they went into my system, then got distracted by chasing enemy (League) merchants instead of inspecting my colony.  They really need to focus at the job at hand instead of getting distracted by targets of opportunity.

Haha, I like when that sort of thing happens (fleet being distracted). Maybe those merchants where higher profile targets for the Hegemony masters, the fleet had to pursue them for whatever crime they previously did in Hegemony space. Who knows, maybe they were plain AI cores smugglers !
Title: Re: Jan 3, cycle 213 - 0.9.1 campaign feedback
Post by: Alex on June 04, 2019, 02:18:31 PM
Makes sense.  :)

I suspect at some point having the fleet screen ship "tiles" fairly large also became a requirement in it-self. If I were to praise the current UI I would say the large tiles are great to show ship scale at a glance, without having to go to the refit screen and simulator. I suspect (again) this is mostly useful for new players that could be confused otherwise - being able to assess size of ship in the fleet / store is very important, especially when you don't know them well enough.

I think the value of having big tiles in the fleet screen decreases as player gains knowledge of the ships and experience of their uses. But I don't have a magic UI design wand to solve the new player vs veteran player thing in "non claustrophobic" way,  so I will happily continue to use current UI - for now.  ;D

(... and I have probably no idea how complex the fleet screen requirements really are)

You've pretty much got it, yeah - the tiles need to be large-ish, both because of those things, and because of the need to have the various per-fleet-member actions/officer/etc there. It's possible to move that elsewhere (i.e. "scuttle" could be a button in the left side, which requires you to click it, and then click the fleet member to scuttle), but that's also less than ideal, and has some other problems.

Hmm. This is making me think that perhaps the tiles could be a bit smaller - not enough that showing two screens worth of ships at once would be doable, but enough to make single-fleet management a bit easier. Perhaps I'll get a chance to take another look at it! Some of the bits of that UI are a touch old and not quite up to snuff (e.g. the CR/hull bars don't light up on mouseover; the tooltips for the bars are not 100% style-consistent with newer ones, minor stuff like that.)
Title: Re: Jan 3, cycle 213 - 0.9.1 campaign feedback
Post by: Goumindong on June 04, 2019, 02:44:42 PM
Ok, I'll trust you guys more than I trust my memory. I probably did underestimate how an upgrade the XIV versions are. I'll give them a closer look next time.

Its not “a lot” but its still +5% dissipation and capacity, +10% armor, and +5 OP for -4 speed. If we calculate the OP value of those (minus the speed) This is effectively 19.26 OP in exchange for 4 speed. Since the deployment points are the same unless you need that 4 speed the XIV ends up being a good deal better than the standard.
Title: Re: Jan 3, cycle 213 - 0.9.1 campaign feedback
Post by: Baqar79 on June 04, 2019, 09:10:28 PM
Ok, I'll trust you guys more than I trust my memory. I probably did underestimate how an upgrade the XIV versions are. I'll give them a closer look next time.

Its not “a lot” but its still +5% dissipation and capacity, +10% armor, and +5 OP for -4 speed. If we calculate the OP value of those (minus the speed) This is effectively 19.26 OP in exchange for 4 speed. Since the deployment points are the same unless you need that 4 speed the XIV ends up being a good deal better than the standard.
The Armor bonus is a flat +100 rather than 10%.  It actually works out better than 10% for the Enforcer (XIV) and Falcon (XIV), but not as good as 10% for the Dominator (XIV) or Onslaught (XIV), while the Eagle (XIV) works out to be +10%.