Not sure I approve of the removed flux bonus. It added an interesting layer of brinksmanship to energy weapons. Perhaps this should change to being a per-weapon setting.
And I definitely don't approve of removing ballistic weapon ammo. Besides the flux bonus, ammo management is what separates ballistic weapons from energy ones.
The strength of Pilums are in their numbers though. I would think it would work better if the launcher waited for a full barrage to be loaded.
This is... why... why would you do this. I thought removing the flux bonus was a bit silly but then i kept reading. I don't know what to say that could convince you not to take this game down the road of other similar shallow games with the interesting bits ripped out to make things more "accessible". Maybe i'll try later but im just surprised right now.
I have to ask, what is the point of having balli and energy weapons now if there really isn't any difference between the two?
Ammo was cosmetic for many weapons, except for very long battles, and the mechanics of running out of ammo there weren't good. What separates energy and ballistic slots - and always did - are specialization through damage types and weapon mechanics (i.e. flak).
Very interesting changes, I'm looking forward to trying them out. Most seem to make sense, although scratching ammo seems a bit... mh, anticlimactic. Sensible, from a game design perspective, but not an exiting solution.
Potential issue with the cruiser CR timer: Isn't it a viable option now to "siege" them with worthless shuttles or the like? Stay just out of range until shuttle CP runs out, retreat (the shuttle) and repeat until 7-9 minutes are over. One of this "efficient but boring" things. (I feel like this is said so often it could use its own term. Boricient? Bofficient?)
Potential fix: For frigates CP only runs down while an enemy is within the sight radius. What if for cruisers (could be all classes, effectively) that enemy had to be of equivalent strength to trigger CR loss? So it had to be another cruiser or two destroyers or four frigates/wings nearby (or however the system that decides about auto assignment calculates that).
What is going to happen to Expanded Mags though? I mean their usefulness just dropped drastically
4) Peak effectiveness: finally define the role of the Capital ships. A very cool change.The CR timer making caps viable doesn't make sense as who the hell is going to run out of the timer on a destroyer let alone a cruiser?!
4) Peak effectiveness: finally define the role of the Capital ships. A very cool change.The CR timer making caps viable doesn't make sense as who the hell is going to run out of the timer on a destroyer let alone a cruiser?!
What am I missing here?
How about antimatters? While i can understand the reasoning, since battles usually were over long before ammo became a concern most times and didn't present much of a choice.. i can't see why it still can't be kept as a possible creator for some cool events at the end of a big battle. In some setups, ammo was an actual thing you had to take into consideration. Not a lot, sure but i understand you used it as you do peak effectiveness now which leads me to:
Again, don't know how i feel about beams, mostly since the AI can fail horribly when dealing with them, but if it can be worked around, i think this will finally set beams apart.
What am I missing here?
It's a bit hard to put into words, I'll try. I think the difference between energy and ballistic weapon is not only about their core mechanics (damage specialization/effect) but also about how you feel while you use them.
Even when ammo count is not a practical issue most of the time, when I'm using ballistic the limited ammo is always in the back of my mind, making me want to act tactical and efficient. On the other hand energy weapons give me sense of freedom, suggesting that I have limitless attempts to engage my opponent as long as I don't mess up my defense. Same with high flux damage bonus, while you're right in that it is very rarely intentionally used, it works as a consolation when I have high flux.
So, these little "side mechanics", while having little practical influence on the gameplay, attribute to the different feel of weapon classes over-proportionally. It's all just in the players' head... but that's the place you're aiming at anyway, isn't it?
Another question: How are the flux stats on the balli weapons going to be balanced now that they have unlimited ammo? (The theroy being that low flux but limited ammo vs unlimited ammo and high flux)
I like the thought of the "unlimited ammo" hullmod instead of just flat out having unlimited ammo
•Added Conquest battlecruiser to Sindrian Diktat fleet compositionNice. Can we have Astral, Valkyrie, and Trident wings added for sale? I have not found them (and Conquest) anywhere for sale!
•Beam weapons:?Standardized range to 1000 for most non-PD, from Tactical Laser to HILWhat happens to Tachyon Lance? It is a beam weapon, after all.
?Increased range for PD Laser and LR PD Laser
?Slightly reduced OP cost for all beam weapons
?Greatly reduced fade in/out time for most beams
?Tactical Laser, Graviton Beam, and Phase Beam are no longer interrupted by missilesWhat does this mean? That these beams cannot hit missiles? If so, does this mean IPDAI hullmod is worthless for tactical laser?
•Missiles:?Salamander: both versions have unlimited ammo and require 20 seconds to reloadThese sound like a big powerup, but will probably be mitigated by peak performance for most ships.
?Hurricane MIRV: regenerates 1 ammo every 20 seconds
?Pilum LRM: regenerates 1 ammo every 10 seconds
The Ammo mechanic is responsible for more than just an "Oh ***!" moment when it runs out. It shapes the entire playstyle. High-damage, low-ammo weapons have to be used with caution and aimed carefully. High RoF also means that you can decide to burst-damage your way to a blaze of glory early in a match to tip the scales, but it'll come at a tradeoff. A prolonged fight might've seen most of your Vulcans run out of ammo and you frantically twisting and turning shields to try and keep your head above water.
While the Flux damage bonus was rather arbitrary and we can all live without it, the other changes effectively turn all weapons into the same thing running on different numbers. We can all agree that ballistics are simply better than the alternatives. They can wreck you and do it not expending much flux. What comes next, upping their flux to not make them too OP in comparison to Energy? You see where I'm going with this. I love the variety and I'm forced to see this as a narrowing down of variety and playstyle, or conversely bringing all weapons up to a certain plateau of similarity and power. One less thing to worry about translates into more single-minded battles, which is in my opinion a bad thing. Arcade is fun and all, but simulation feels more satisfying.
Though, just to make it clear, this doesn't mean you shouldn't go for it. A game isn't static and nothing says we can't play it differently once in a while, see how it feels. I kinda hope it'll be a temporary change all the same. ;)
I'd rather have, like with how Tugs work currently, a freighter-class assigned to each capital, to give them 'unlimited ammo' in combat in the form of being 'well stocked'.
Would force more freighters in fleets and more to consider than just slapping on a capital and going wild. But then again, that'd imply making ammo less of a unitary thing, and more of a 'status' effect, even fractionary, which would be cool to apply to the entire fleet.
Another thing, related to missiles. Missiles could be split strategically in 'tactical' missiles like the Salamander, event the Sabot, missiles that alone cannot and should not win an engagement, which would be fine to be regenerative/unlimited. Then area-denial, like Pilums and Annihilators, which should work in bursts, unlike now where we mostly fire off unitary 'salvoes', but limited and used more in the sense of 'laying a minefield' or 'burning ground' rather than direct damage, and these should stay limited, but not too constrained, and direct-damage like Harpoons and Torpedoes, which should be used sparsely and given as they currently have, 1-3 shots maximum.
Salamanders and Sabots will need to have ZERO hull/armor damage though.
Point being, missiles as 'activateable' abilities. I never really considered them to be an actual weapon system, and i think most people use them as a tactical option. (AI aside, they just pew out all the Harpoons first second they see anyone)
Under this way of thinking, they'd be similar to ship systems and i don't think that's a bad thing. I'd actually think it pretty cool to integrate them as such, 'installable' ship systems in OP slots. Wouldn't per se change anything in the way the game plays, but in the way the game is felt and perceived.
Quote•Added Conquest battlecruiser to Sindrian Diktat fleet compositionNice. Can we have Astral, Valkyrie, and Trident wings added for sale? I have not found them (and Conquest) anywhere for sale!
Quote•Beam weapons:?Standardized range to 1000 for most non-PD, from Tactical Laser to HILWhat happens to Tachyon Lance? It is a beam weapon, after all.
?Increased range for PD Laser and LR PD Laser
?Slightly reduced OP cost for all beam weapons
?Greatly reduced fade in/out time for most beams
Quote?Tactical Laser, Graviton Beam, and Phase Beam are no longer interrupted by missilesWhat does this mean? That these beams cannot hit missiles? If so, does this mean IPDAI hullmod is worthless for tactical laser?
It does make me wonder whether giving ballistic weapons absurdly high ammo (Needler levels or above) purely for flavor might be worthwhile, although it'd also be misleading, as in presenting a stat that's actually meaningless. I mean, high enough ammo that the CR timer would always run out first, except for capitals.
Oh please no! This would make the gameplay worse for newbies because of the "phantom" CR loss and or supply lossIt does make me wonder whether giving ballistic weapons absurdly high ammo (Needler levels or above) purely for flavor might be worthwhile, although it'd also be misleading, as in presenting a stat that's actually meaningless. I mean, high enough ammo that the CR timer would always run out first, except for capitals.
If you implement my "CR decay only when facing equivalent strength" mechanic, there's no guarantee that CR will run out before ammo. Ammo count might be gamed with again.
How about another way to give it a similar feel: Reduce CR ever so slightly for used ammunition after the battle. Just to represent the supplies that have to be used to auto-fabricate new ammo. That would give you a (psychological) motivation to conserve ammo while not influencing the actual combat gameplay. You could even use a reversed "shots fired" ammo counter (or "%o CR cost").
Removed energy weapon bonus damage from high flux levelHmm. I can see that it didn't really add anything to the gameplay (and not having to deal with special rules is a plus), but it still had the "cool" factor (especially with the glowy weapons), know what I'm saying? Ah well.
Standardized range to 1000 for most non-PD, from Tactical Laser to HILBO-RING. Weapons should not be made more alike! :(
Salamander: both versions have unlimited ammo and require 20 seconds to reload[/li][/list]The gameplay reasoning seems to make sense (and hooray Hurricane buff!), but it still seems odd to have reloading missiles.
Hurricane MIRV: regenerates 1 ammo every 20 seconds
Pilum LRM: regenerates 1 ammo every 10 seconds
Ballistic weapons:And the big one.
Now have unlimited ammo, except for Bomb Bay
Hmm, so I can wave my offensive beam weapons over an incoming Annihilator/Swarmer/Harpoon to clear it? That's pretty neat. Can the AI do it too?Quote?Tactical Laser, Graviton Beam, and Phase Beam are no longer interrupted by missilesWhat does this mean? That these beams cannot hit missiles? If so, does this mean IPDAI hullmod is worthless for tactical laser?
It means they damage missiles, but pass through them and can hit other things.
This change still leaves Beams as the ultimate kiting weapon, due to range and no-miss advantages, yet the AI doesn't know how to use them effectively to help the team without getting killed. Until there are AI settings, and we can tell the AI that it's supposed to kite and stay out of the general engagement, I'm not sure how this helps Beams, from the AI / general-fairness POV.
Moreover, while it certainly gives Beams a niche, and a much more obvious niche than they had, I think it's going to be very difficult to get them balanced right. Lots of Tac Lasers at 1400+ range (with Tech and Hull Mod bonuses) are a completely different efficiency curve now. Wouldn't it have been a whole lot easier to just give them Hard Flux and balance them simply in line with their no-miss mechanic vs. their DPS and range and have done with it, as well as removing that other obscure mechanic?
Briefly, imo it gets weird without a per-weapon (not even per group, but per weapon) reload button - for example, you might be incentivized to fire off the last few shots to trigger a reload.Yeah, I know. Embrace the weirdness; it'll mean weapons running dry at variable rates, making Ballistics unique and interesting, imo ;)
It actually helps the AI quite a bit, giving more room for error in the optimal kiting range.That's going to depend on loadout. An all-beam Sunder using PD on the Smalls will be happier; a mixed-arms Sunder will not, because it'll confuse short-range DPS pew-pew that is only meant to absorb fighters / Frigates that manage to close with it with offensive firepower. I really feel like the one-AI-to-rule-em-all approach has serious problems with varying ranges, and doesn't emphasize range advantages over DPS well enough for these kinds of situations, personally, but we'll just have to see :)
Hard flux on beams would make them too similar to other energy weapons, imo. (Possibly another answer is an extra damage type, or some such, since their mechanics are differentiating within the energy type, and that's part of the difficulty.)Nah; they're already unique due to their no-miss nature and damage-over-time vs. armor-crushing single-shot-DPS mechanics. I think you worry too much about their niche, when their niche is largely due to those two things, personally. I would welcome another damage type, though, even if it's just to make things clearer to newbies :)
So, a thought; perhaps Ballistics should use "clips", where they have a long reload cycle but get X rounds back at the end? That gives their load and limit a practical meaning and would differentiate them from pew-pew, but allows them to have endless ammo.
Suggested fix: force all of the player's fleet to be deployed, up to X DP, and do not allow reinforcements. The whole concept of reinforcement in a space battle never made a lot of sense; instead, just force the player to decide what ships are possibly going to get killed and force them to deal with it. That means no more endless-frigate nonsense, but it'd mean real changes would have to be made to how Command Points worked.
Suggested fix: force all of the player's fleet to be deployed, up to X DP, and do not allow reinforcements. The whole concept of reinforcement in a space battle never made a lot of sense; instead, just force the player to decide what ships are possibly going to get killed and force them to deal with it. That means no more endless-frigate nonsense, but it'd mean real changes would have to be made to how Command Points worked.
I'd just like to highlight this idea. I really like it as it would eliminate the gamey fleet-of-one-type-of-frigate-deployed-one-at-a-time. At the risk of just parroting xenoargh here, reinforcements didn't really make sense either. I think it'd place more weight on the players shoulders at deployment time. Going small to save deployment costs is a lot more permanent when you can't panic and fall back to your freshly deployed Conquest if the battle turns the other way. My only issue is that it increases risk without really increasing reward, but I can live with that given that the risks are firmly in the player's hands.
Also, I fear that 1000 range tac lasers will trivialize shieldless fighters (eg, all of them) in many engagements. Maybe fighters should have an innate beam damage reduction.Not really, if tactical laser remains as slow at turning and firing as it is now. Various PD lasers have been more efficient at stopping them (because they turn and shoot faster), and IR pulse laser (non-beam) is even better.
I must ask, does one enemy ship pop up on screen and you run out of ammo shooting thousands of rounds into its hulk until it explodes?Against one ship, no. Against a large fleet with one player flagship killing each ship one-by-one singlehandedly like Rambo? yes.
Never really ran out of ballistic ammo to tell the truth, unless it was a long battle, kind of ambivalent on this decision.Such "long battles" happen all of the time in late to endgame when I have max Combat and Technology, but not enough Logistics to use a big fleet of my own, or I do have high Logistics but my big fleet is full of Atlases during a food run.
Suggested fix: force all of the player's fleet to be deployed, up to X DP, and do not allow reinforcements. The whole concept of reinforcement in a space battle never made a lot of sense; instead, just force the player to decide what ships are possibly going to get killed and force them to deal with it. That means no more endless-frigate nonsense, but it'd mean real changes would have to be made to how Command Points worked.
When the path of efficiency is to bring as little as possible onto the battlefield as possible, something might be wrong.
Potential issue with the cruiser CR timer: Isn't it a viable option now to "siege" them with worthless shuttles or the like? Stay just out of range until shuttle CP runs out, retreat (the shuttle) and repeat until 7-9 minutes are over. One of this "efficient but boring" things. (I feel like this is said so often it could use its own term. Boricient? Bofficient?)
Potential fix: For frigates CP only runs down while an enemy is within the sight radius. What if for cruisers (could be all classes, effectively) that enemy had to be of equivalent strength to trigger CR loss? So it had to be another cruiser or two destroyers or four frigates/wings nearby (or however the system that decides about auto assignment calculates that).
Hmm, good point. Did that.
I would be very on board with having both sides forced to deploy all ships, with NO max fleet size. Its always bugged me that civilian ships are never in danger - raiding civilians is effectively impossible when the AI has any combat ships left. They can hide on the edges, or try and stay on the opposite side of the players ships from their escorts, or whatever. Of course, the civilian ships could just retreat at the start of the battle, so I guess some other change would be needed.
And tacs + the point defense hullmod are going to have astounding range. Then again, that hullmod is a major investment for a frigate, so maybe thats okActually, for a Wolf (and probably Shade), it is not. However, it is not as effective as you think it is because the lasers turn and fire slowly (they cannot stop Salamanders unless the ship turns to follow the missile, and Swarmers or other multishots overwhelm tactical lasers), even with Advanced Turret Gyros. PD Lasers plus Advanced Optics costs at least the same, but are more effective because the lasers are faster. Even LR PD lasers only is better than Tactical Lasers due to speed, despite lower damage.
CR changes... not so keen on this; I've eschewed frigates since the CR timers went in in the first place, since my preferred play style is to pilot a single ship. Can we get at least a few specific vessels that - like the Brawler - don't have CR timers? Will wait to see how it plays out, but right now not a fan; yeah, I can swap to flying a Conquest or Onslaught or Paragon, but I'd like to have a few more options than just those three.
Suggested fix: force all of the player's fleet to be deployed, up to X DP, and do not allow reinforcements. The whole concept of reinforcement in a space battle never made a lot of sense; instead, just force the player to decide what ships are possibly going to get killed and force them to deal with it. That means no more endless-frigate nonsense, but it'd mean real changes would have to be made to how Command Points worked.
It would really change the game, but I would be very on board with having both sides forced to deploy all ships, with NO max fleet size. Its always bugged me that civilian ships are never in danger - raiding civilians is effectively impossible when the AI has any combat ships left. They can hide on the edges, or try and stay on the opposite side of the players ships from their escorts, or whatever. Of course, the civilian ships could just retreat at the start of the battle, so I guess some other change would be needed.
I agree that the loss of ammunition from ballistic weapons is a big thematic hit - and also agree that they need to have ammunition that's not a long-term limit. Short term, however... I'd like to see ballistic weapons that have limited ammunition and ammunition regeneration, with the expanded magazines hull mod increasing both capacity and regen - some of the smaller ballistic weapons (and especially point defense weapons) with the hull mod should just never run out of ammunition, while weapons that are currently very ammo-limited (gauss cannon, for example) would still be able to run short for a bit in heavy combat.
I'd also like to see reloading for ballistics happening in chunks - this isn't the "clip reload" mechanic you (rightly) disapprove of, just a cosmetic thing: instead of regenerating one shot every second (for example), have it regenerate 10 shots all at once every 10 seconds - especially important for theme if you have, say, a light machine gun that (with the expanded magazines mod) literally can't run out of ammo; you'd see ammo decreasing until it hit its reload time and then jump back to full.
Actually clip reloading could be implemented even without forced reload button - by having clip automatically filled if particular weapon hasn't fired for reload duration (or double to not make partial reloading too convenient).
Actually clip reloading could be implemented even without forced reload button - by having clip automatically filled if particular weapon hasn't fired for reload duration (or double to not make partial reloading too convenient).
Came here to make this type of suggestion. In my mind it would be cooler and more clean to have an 'individual weapon heat' mechanic control this, rather than spaceship-sized 'clips', but it would basically work the same way, so.... just an aesthetic suggestion.
Destroyers and cruisers now have a peak effectiveness timer like frigates
Roughly 5-7 minutes for destroyers and 7-9 for cruisers
High-tech/faster ships have shorter timers
Also with CR for heavy ships AI ships CR can be easily drained down by some specially created fast cruiser with heavy PDWhat fast cruiser do you mean? The only two I can think of that might want to do that instead of simply killing the enemy cruiser is the Heron (because it is a carrier, not a gunship) and Falcon (destroyer in cruiser chassis). If I have an Aurora or other cruiser out there, I rather simply kill the enemy fleet because I have enough firepower to do so.
Timers for destroyers and cruisers per se aren't a bad thing, but the overall supply cost for battles needs to remain reasonable. Fights are already very expensive, damaged ships prohibitively so, and I'd rather keep playing fleet battles instead of being forced into a cheap & lowball kind of scenario just to make a buck. I have a hunch this'll make Hardened Subsystems mandatory because it translates into money saved.
Now we got CR timer for all kinds of ships and only 3 orders per battle to order zero CR ships to retreat. How about ships with CR 0 automatically try to disengage and exit the battlefield? Also with CR for heavy ships AI ships CR can be easily drained down by some specially created fast cruiser with heavy PD. CR will hurt AI side more every time as AI prefers to stay away from battle being too careful. You can set battle timer at 5 or 10 minutes based on fleet size instead of CR with same result to prevent AI fleet kiting with solo ship. CR instigates fast battles with AI not willing to fight and running away if possible.
The only thing I can suggest is maybe make timer for ships that are fast and can kite, but for others please remove the timer, so I can at least play with some ships. So maybe a special mod for fast/high tech ship to have a timer, while others dont have it.Unfortunately, many player-controlled flagships can be made to kite most ships in the game. Gunnery Implants 5 perk greatly enables this. Pile on Helmsmanship 10, and hullmods Augmented Engines and ITU, and many ships can outspeed and outrange most ships. This is why I beeline for Technology 7 then Combat 10 in every game I play so far. Also, the fast high-tech ships that cannot kite (e.g., blaster Tempest or blaster Medusa) are agile enough to dodge incoming shots as necessary (or take hits on shield), pop off a few shots of their own, withdrawn, vent, and repeat.
I have a hunch this'll make Hardened Subsystems mandatory because it translates into money saved.Hardened Subsystems is a no-brainer for my high-tech ships once I get the Optimized Assembly perk. I use it on every high-tech (Wolf, Tempest, Hyperion, Afflictor, and Shade). It is that good, up there with Augmented Engines and ITU. So far, I do not use it with other frigates because they run out of ammo first, and Lasher desperately needs Extended Shields.
Ships I would suggest not get CR timers: Dominator cruiser, Hammerhead destroyer. These are both kindof the low end of their classes, and both feel like scaled-up variations of the Brawler frigate. No CR timer would also give me a reason to consider using these ships that, otherwise, I really wouldn't touch with a ten foot pole.Dominator is very strong. Hammerhead is weak, but it does not need much to be up to par with others, just a few more OP, flux capacity, and/or burn 5 will make it good.
I really like that ballistic weapons don't have ammo. It makes choosing ships and weapons less complicated. It also makes the thumper an almost useable weapon. Its biggest limiting factor was ammo so now it's merely too op costly of its DPSThumper is sub-par, but would be usable if ammo was not so low. With unlimited ammo, it (and HMG and Gauss Cannon) will be viable.
Than maybe a option/difficulty that will have timers (like hardcore dif will have timers in battles, while other will not).QuoteThe only thing I can suggest is maybe make timer for ships that are fast and can kite, but for others please remove the timer, so I can at least play with some ships. So maybe a special mod for fast/high tech ship to have a timer, while others dont have it.Unfortunately, many player-controlled flagships can be made to kite most ships in the game. Gunnery Implants 5 perk greatly enables this. Pile on Helmsmanship 10, and hullmods Augmented Engines and ITU, and many ships can outspeed and outrange most ships. This is why I beeline for Technology 7 then Combat 10 in every game I play so far. Also, the fast high-tech ships that cannot kite (e.g., blaster Tempest or blaster Medusa) are agile enough to dodge incoming shots as necessary (or take hits on shield), pop off a few shots of their own, withdrawn, vent, and repeat.
SpoilerAfter cooling down from my initial reaction, I'll try to explain why I'm surprised by this changes:
If anything I'd expected quite the opposite! It flatten the differences between ships and weapons slots making choices now more cosmetics rather than tactical.
Most of the weapons changes are "to remove useless mechanics". Well in my opinion they were not useless, just under-exploited.
You say the ammo limitation was not useful in most case, well that is true in the current vanilla balance. But what if suddenly we get to choose between a Hellbore with 50 ammo and less flux, or a Hephaistos with 1000 and highter flux? Suddenly one is the perfect short battle weapon, but quickly become useless in long engagement. There is now an interesting choice to make. In mods we could try even more radical changes that might not be fit for vanilla, like extreme range weapon extremely ammo limited that are only useful to apply pressure on a single ship and have to retreat afterward. To me unlimited ammo could only make sense for PD weapons.
With unlimited ammo, I don't see the point to buy high tech ships except maybe a frigate for player use, because low tech ships cost less, are more sturdy and can't run dry anymore. (yeah I'm over dramatizing but still...)
The beam range makes sense, they clearly needed an edge and a long range is definitively a strong one! (though now, you incentive players to get back to the "kite-for-hours-in-a-frigate" type of gameplay, switching ships when the CR counter run out) But then there is the removal of the flux boost, making them act closer to the ballistic. I agree with the fact that the bonus wasn't obvious enough to make a noticeable difference, but then why not push thing further instead of cutting it down? Like 25% damage at high flux, and 25%+ damage when the shields are not raised? (because of some sort of "energy interference" caused by the shield generator or some technobable) Suddenly, forcing a high-tech ship at high flux to drop it's shield makes it a much more dangerous enemy, even if it takes a beating doing so. It would help high-tech to clear some space before venting when now they are basically screwed if they have to drop shield.
Then there is the missile regen that really don't click for me. Missiles are already much more powerful now, but they get another boost? And one that take the opposite direction as how missile works in the game, in most other games and in reality (not in the "realism" sense, but in the sense you expect them to work). Except for the Pillum, missiles were like a poker game where you could count how many the enemy had left, and act accordingly. But now when you manage to run a Buffalo dry and vent before going in for the kill, suddenly it fire 4 missiles from his sleeve! And it's not cheating! If the goal was mainly to boost the Salamanders, why not make them a MIRV instead? And even better, the sub-missiles could spread and target random weapons in addition to the engines, meaning unless you have a bubble shield you will suffer some hits and get some weapons or engines disabled. If the regen is to stay, maybe consider reactivating the "CR cost per missile fired" in the settings?
And now almost all ships got CR timer. Okay fair enough, that's the new "ammo" mechanic replacement I suppose. But with so few battles lasting more than 5 minutes, I expect it will have exactly the same impact than ballistic ammo before: none except in a few cases. I'm very much in favor to limiting the deployment time, and CR is a great mechanic to do so, but the flat cost+timer implementation don't convince me yet. (why a ship deployed in pursuit a one tanker should loose 25% of CR after shooting only 2 missiles???) Instead, I would rather have all ships loosing CR as soon as they see an enemy, and only have different CR loss speed. That way it would make sense to take some risks to finish a battle more quickly, instead of taking the safe approach because you already "payed" for it the moment you deployed the ships. Deploying an overwhelming fleet would still cost a lot more than just what's necessary, and if needed maybe only add a minimum of 5% CR spent if the ship is deployed?
There are my thoughts, I feel like it's a lot of trimming the differences when I would have loved to see more of them. I'd be happy to be proven wrong though, and will try to test the future update with an open mind.
[PS] Okay I also don't like the changes because the ammo and missile regen was a huge balance factor in half of Scy weapons, now I have to find something else[close]
My concern is, I hope that the game will have some way of communicating how the missile ammo works in the refitting dialog. People who don't read the forums also need to know ahead of time how it works.
Also the way CR peak performance is going to increment or not increment based on the relative size, and the visibility radius and so on... it's very complicated and again, I hope the game can find some way to inform players of this ahead of time.
In this new version you could put an option to download from 64-bit to avoid those errors that have been reported in other posts in relation to saved games.
CR changes... not so keen on this; I've eschewed frigates since the CR timers went in in the first place, since my preferred play style is to pilot a single ship. Can we get at least a few specific vessels that - like the Brawler - don't have CR timers? Will wait to see how it plays out, but right now not a fan; yeah, I can swap to flying a Conquest or Onslaught or Paragon, but I'd like to have a few more options than just those three.
So now almost all ships will have a time limit in the game? The reason I am trying as fast as possible move from frigates to something else is because there is a timer.
This is really a big thing for me, when playing games. I am not interested in playing and fighting under time pressure. From this changes it looks like I will be forced to play under it for 75% of the game and even more until i get to battlecruisers now. This is a huge game breaker for me, and I hope you will change it until the game is released. The moment you start to balance the game around exploits and in that process remove the fun from people that dont abuse the exploits, you should stop for a sec and rethink it.
The only thing I can suggest is maybe make timer for ships that are fast and can kite, but for others please remove the timer, so I can at least play with some ships. So maybe a special mod for fast/high tech ship to have a timer, while others dont have it.
I am sorry that I sound this negative, but this is really a huge deal for me.
I agree that the loss of ammunition from ballistic weapons is a big thematic hit - and also agree that they need to have ammunition that's not a long-term limit. Short term, however... I'd like to see ballistic weapons that have limited ammunition and ammunition regeneration, with the expanded magazines hull mod increasing both capacity and regen - some of the smaller ballistic weapons (and especially point defense weapons) with the hull mod should just never run out of ammunition, while weapons that are currently very ammo-limited (gauss cannon, for example) would still be able to run short for a bit in heavy combat.
I'd also like to see reloading for ballistics happening in chunks - this isn't the "clip reload" mechanic you (rightly) disapprove of, just a cosmetic thing: instead of regenerating one shot every second (for example), have it regenerate 10 shots all at once every 10 seconds - especially important for theme if you have, say, a light machine gun that (with the expanded magazines mod) literally can't run out of ammo; you'd see ammo decreasing until it hit its reload time and then jump back to full.
The loss of the flux boost is worrying because energy weapons won't have any mechanical differentiation other than the fact that they do energy damage. "Fixing" this by giving ballistic weapons magazines, reload timers, CR loss, or whatever is not correct; that would make ballistic weapons more mechanically complicated/significant than energy weapons as a whole. If you want to do a mechanical parity sort of thing, try having most ballistic weapons fire more quickly at the start and then slow down with sustained fire (this would decay in the same manner as reload). The opposite would apply to energy weapons; they would speed up with continuous fire.
If you decide that weapons should cause CR loss, it should make the CR timer tick down faster (rather than implementing some phantom CR loss thing).
I get what you're saying. Unfortunately, I don't have a good answer for you. Personally, I see the time pressure as a positive thing for gameplay, though I feel like I can relate to your guys' mindset. All I can say is wait and see how big of a deal it actually is. With the length of the timer and the rules around when it actually ticks down (and possible with hardened subsystems), I think it's pretty likely that your playstyles won't be affected in practical terms.
And question for moders how easy/hard is it to remove the timers from the game if possible at all?
What about hull mod (something like hardened subsystems), or a skill that will lower the ship speed for 50% (or some other number) but remove the timer? Or a difficulty/in game option?Would make teleporters (only Hyperion in standard) overpowered. Hyperion cannot solo the largest of fleets (though it comes close) due to CR decay. Might make a few other ships that are extremely fast otherwise overpowered too.
That was already addressed here, maybe you missed it...A fix like that, where the CR doesn't degrade unless X points are on the board, might work, but:
It's one of those things that's a lot more complicated in operation than it sounds in practice, which is why instead I suggested that the player be forced to deploy a certain number of ships, period (and probably not be able to Retreat / Reinforce for a couple of minutes or so).I would get around this by using a fleet of one, forgoing extra ships and loot, if bounties are generous enough. Also, an arena trap would be bad for accidental pursuit (where attacking player wants to retreat to avoid relations drop to vengeful).
I have a concern, which is "Tactical Laser, Graviton Beam, and Phase Beam are no longer interrupted by missiles." Does that mean they can't shoot down missiles anymore? Tactical Lasers with the AI PD module were my favorite 'point' defenses, because they worked great and stayed useful even if missiles weren't a problem.From Alex on page 3: "It means they damage missiles, but pass through them and can hit other things."
@ Alex: I think nobody asked directly yet: What is your reasoning behind giving a CR timer to bigger ships?
Is it to deny kiting, even in it rarest forms? Or more about lore/game mechanic consistency? Or something else?
I like the idea of a magazine / reload mechanic, especially if you can manually trigger a reload.
If it's about ammo: like I said, in my view, it was not a meaningful balance tool or differentiator, except for extra-long battles, where it basically just means low-tech ships can't do those.
If it's about ammo: like I said, in my view, it was not a meaningful balance tool or differentiator, except for extra-long battles, where it basically just means low-tech ships can't do those.
Alex's reasoning for getting rid of ammo (certain weapons simply don't work for longer battles) is the EXACT SAME REASON you would want to get rid of the CR timer (certain ships simply don't work for longer battles).
@ Alex: I think nobody asked directly yet: What is your reasoning behind giving a CR timer to bigger ships?
Is it to deny kiting, even in it rarest forms? Or more about lore/game mechanic consistency? Or something else?
Short rant incoming.
The idea of removing deployment CR costs runs exactly counter to the main goal of CR, which is to give incentive to have more fair fights even if one side is stronger than the other.
wow thats something i dont experiance every day.... practicly every single change is in the other direction i was hoping for....
CR loss during battle:
how and why would my crew loose combat readiness within 3 minutes of chasing a freakin frigate? why would they start to go insane and disable and/or damage vital undamaged shipsystems? i can understand that my crew is not at peak performance after batteling for what seems like hours and seeing half their friends getting ripped apart and sucked into space, but sabotaging a ship that doesnt even have a scratch doesnt make any sense what so ever.
This is really interesting. I'm liking the "reload in chunks" idea, if mainly for feel reasons, though it *is* an extra weapon stat.
thnx Zapier, that actually helps a little.... i still think its waaaay overboard with all the systemmalfunktions but at least i have a rough direction where it would be conseiveable that there are malfunctions...To maybe help you imagine it better, let me remind you that the game time does run much faster than real time. A three minute deployment likely represents an hours long battle. Same goes for the distance between ships btw.
- Can we get some kind of info field when you click a system/station/planet in the map to enable a flavor texts in the campaign? It'll allow the possibility to add some Backstory to generic 3 planets orbiting a sun with some asteroids, Mass Effect did that to some effect and it did a lot for people who are into this...You get an info window if you hover your cursor over planets or stations. There's a lot of back-story to be found.
Keep in mind that the deployment cost does nothing that a slow timer decay wouldn't. It's still much more economical to keep ships off the battlefield if you have the option.That is not true. It would be most economical to finish a fight as quickly as possible by deploying an overwhelming force. It would also greatly favor alpha strike load-outs.
Keep in mind that the deployment cost does nothing that a slow timer decay wouldn't. It's still much more economical to keep ships off the battlefield if you have the option.As Gothars posted, "It would be most economical to finish a fight as quickly as possible by deploying an overwhelming force."
I'd assume the easiest way to keep players from kiting endlessly would be very simple (if maybe a little iffy on the lore side of things).That would backfire in fights where I have a small ship trying to solo a few cruisers and battleships, where I have the speed advantage and big ships very rarely chase objectives. Cruisers and up cannot go to objectives via Capture - they must do so via Assault or Rally. Of course, if the AI has unlimited CP, they can cheat.
After X amount of time, a new capture point spawns in the middle of the map, and whoever holds this point either gets some advantage or causes some debuff to the other fleet. If you actually had the advantage, you could ignore the objective and continue your attack, while keeping the enemy from grabbing it, or capture it and force them to engage or retreat. If you didn't have the advantage, you'd either have to finish the fight up quickly or retreat.
Kiting?
Not if the objective raises the other fleet's speed by 30% and cuts yours in half, or degrades your CR timer at a quick rate.
Hell, it could launch Pilum swarms and still be something that could help cut down on kiting.
Put simply, it'd be nice to have a fixed location you would need to control after a large amount of time, so you'd either have to "*** or get off the pot".
with the current cr system i dont use frigates at all, because there is a hard limit on their use. if it was normal and universal, that over time i notice my ship gradually getting a little slower and more sluggish, i would be ok with that. if we take out the damaging and disabling of shipsystems and keep and even expand the gradual decline of the ships performance, i think most people would be ok with that.
lets say at 50%CR(green crew) the ship runs at 100% and at 0%cr at 50%(or 75%?)(speed, manover, rof, acc, fluxdis, etc.)
more than 50%CR will only have very small %bonus on shipstats, but prolong battletime at 100% performace or above
cr loss per minute can be tied to shipsize: i would say around 4min for a frigate to get from 50% to 0 which would double if you have 2times the skeletoncrew. 6min for destroyers, 8min for cruiser and 10min for battleships. (with less than skeletoncrew these times would be lower, with more crew these times go up,)
summary: more crew means slower decline, higher quality means you start with a higher percentage. so a frigate full with elitecrew is going strong at 105% performance after the same frigate with a green skeletoncrew would have hit 0CR
hull percentage limits cr percentage == start battle with 100% hull and 50%cr > first volley shoots your hull down to 50%, your cr plumets to 25%. shipdamage realy should have an effect on CR. one could also integrate armordamage into the equation. but point is that a extreamly damaged ship at like 10% hull should not have 100% combatperformance but rather steep penaltys to speed, manoverability, rof, accuracy, fluxdiss, and so on.
by the way, i assume a cr system without cr loss per deployment and without a peakeff. timer. never liked to be billed 10%or more CR just for a 10second engagement where i blew up a lone tanker.
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/DarthWiki/RuinedFOREVER
... Making people be more pressured to do something, or to balance the bad AI, with arbitrary limitation is just the worst possible way.
...
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/DarthWiki/RuinedFOREVER
Seriously.
I really think everyone is blowing this whole CR thing waaaay out of proportion. How many fights are actually going to have 5-7-9+ minutes of engaged combat? My longest frigate fights (single frigate flagship vs 3 destroyers + escorts or a cruiser + escorts, I don't play as high level as Megas et al. so I don't take on defense fleets with them. Or I'm just not as good :P) will have me start to take CR loss, but not enough to malfunction.
Also, Alex has already implemented the suggestion (from this very thread, I believe) of the timer on destroyers and cruisers only ticking with sufficient forces around - no time limit from those pesky single frigates/fighters at all. I really don't think the time limit is going to be an issue.
Time limits may feel arbitrary, but they are also simple, which is a very good thing. Its really easy to understand: "This ship lasts X long in combat. You can push it by some, but it starts to degrade".... Making people be more pressured to do something, or to balance the bad AI, with arbitrary limitation is just the worst possible way.
...
I'd like to point out that every rule in every game is arbitrary. A game is the arbitrary limitations put together over some setting (which is just more limitations, though we don't usually think in that manner).
The point here is, because the dev doesnt know how to improve the AI, he is implementing a limitation in time. And he is doing it only because some people are abusing the AI and are playing a battle for 30 min and kiting *** of the AI. Because of them he is implementing something that will have a direct impact on my play style and how I play. If people want to abuse AI, let them. This is not a MMO where there is some player vs player competition, this is a offline single player game, you will not be able to prevent abusing mechanic (and if they do it for 40 min I dont see any problem with that), and trying to balance something like that with implementing very doubtful limitation is very bad in my book.A gap between "play to win" and "play for fun" does not stop being bad just because it's an SP game. SP or not, anyone who places a nonzero value on winning the game is going to have an incentive to sacrifice their fun for it, and many of them will do it (case in point (http://fractalsoftworks.com/forum/index.php?topic=8433.0)). MMO developers understand this and exploit it ruthlessly. (http://www.cracked.com/article_18461_5-creepy-ways-video-games-are-trying-to-get-you-addicted.html)
So it is bad, very bad. And if dev thought process is like this, I do not know what future arbitrary limitation will come if he can not balance some other mechanics.
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/DarthWiki/RuinedFOREVER
Seriously.
I really think everyone is blowing this whole CR thing waaaay out of proportion. How many fights are actually going to have 5-7-9+ minutes of engaged combat? My longest frigate fights (single frigate flagship vs 3 destroyers + escorts or a cruiser + escorts, I don't play as high level as Megas et al. so I don't take on defense fleets with them. Or I'm just not as good :P) will have me start to take CR loss, but not enough to malfunction.
Also, Alex has already implemented the suggestion (from this very thread, I believe) of the timer on destroyers and cruisers only ticking with sufficient forces around - no time limit from those pesky single frigates/fighters at all. I really don't think the time limit is going to be an issue.
Time limits may feel arbitrary, but they are also simple, which is a very good thing. Its really easy to understand: "This ship lasts X long in combat. You can push it by some, but it starts to degrade".... Making people be more pressured to do something, or to balance the bad AI, with arbitrary limitation is just the worst possible way.
...
I'd like to point out that every rule in every game is arbitrary. A game is the arbitrary limitations put together over some setting (which is just more limitations, though we don't usually think in that manner).
A lot of fights I have take a long time. And I do not play anymore with frigates because of the time limit as I often get lower CR.
Time limit is simple, do you know what is even more simple and easy to understand? Not having one, especially as it has some very strange rules when its on or off.
The point here is, because the dev doesnt know how to improve the AI, he is implementing a limitation in time. And he is doing it only because some people are abusing the AI and are playing a battle for 30 min and kiting *** of the AI. Because of them he is implementing something that will have a direct impact on my play style and how I play. If people want to abuse AI, let them. This is not a MMO where there is some player vs player competition, this is a offline single player game, you will not be able to prevent abusing mechanic (and if they do it for 40 min I dont see any problem with that), and trying to balance something like that with implementing very doubtful limitation is very bad in my book.
So it is bad, very bad. And if dev thought process is like this, I do not know what future arbitrary limitation will come if he can not balance some other mechanics.
Every step should be taken in order to make so the game respects the dev idea of gameplay. If Alex don't like the idea of slow grind battles to be the most optimal way to play the game, he should make so it's not the optimal way to play the game. In the end for as much is not a MMO, it's still his game, and if the feel of urgency granted by CR degradation is what he likes to play with who are you to deny the implementation of it?
If you don't like vanilla, you can play the dozens of mods that currently and eventually will offer a lot of different gameplay directions, of even simply remove the cr timers yourself with a very simple csv edit. Saying something on the line of "I do not know what future arbitrary limitation will come if he can not balance some other mechanics" tells a lot about your knowledge of game design, and is simply rude.
Quote from: UomozIt's still his game, and if the feel of urgency granted by CR degradation is what he likes to play with who are you to deny the implementation of it?
The customer? The guy who forked out fifteen bucks for the game and would like it to not be ruined? Please remember that the objective of a developer is not to make the game to their own precise interests, but to the interests of the many people who paid hard-earned money for a game they expect to become better, not worse.
What do you say to the other customers who don't mind or even like the changes?
Every step should be taken in order to make so the game respects the dev idea of gameplay. If Alex don't like the idea of slow grind battles to be the most optimal way to play the game, he should make so it's not the optimal way to play the game. In the end for as much is not a MMO, it's still his game, and if the feel of urgency granted by CR degradation is what he likes to play with who are you to deny the implementation of it?
If you don't like vanilla, you can play the dozens of mods that currently and eventually will offer a lot of different gameplay directions, of even simply remove the cr timers yourself with a very simple csv edit. Saying something on the line of "I do not know what future arbitrary limitation will come if he can not balance some other mechanics" tells a lot about your knowledge of game design, and is simply rude.
Rude or not that is how it is. I am giving feedback on thing that I think are wrong. Normally its his game, and he will do what he want with it. And every one of us here is giving feedback to the game or direction where the game is going. Not you or anyone else should stop anyone from giving feedback, positive or negative. There are mods, and they will fix the problem, but as I said i am very worried what will future bring and there is nothing rude in it, looking at how he implemented some things.
Quote from: ZapierWhat do you say to the other customers who don't mind or even like the changes?
They are clearly in the minority based on the replies to this thread. As a developer you shouldn't cater to some small group of people just because they'll mindlessly defend you whenever you make a *** change to the game.
If that was the general rule over the internet, the vocal minorities would easily win all the arguments and decide. Luckily for everyone, this isn't the case here.
Quote from: ZapierWhat do you say to the other customers who don't mind or even like the changes?
They are clearly in the minority based on the replies to this thread. As a developer you shouldn't cater to some small group of people just because they'll mindlessly defend you whenever you make a *** change to the game.
Time limit is simple, do you know what is even more simple and easy to understand? Not having one, especially as it has some very strange rules when its on or off.
The point here is, because the dev doesnt know how to improve the AI, he is implementing a limitation in time. And he is doing it only because some people are abusing the AI and are playing a battle for 30 min and kiting *** of the AI. Because of them he is implementing something that will have a direct impact on my play style and how I play. If people want to abuse AI, let them. This is not a MMO where there is some player vs player competition, this is a offline single player game, you will not be able to prevent abusing mechanic (and if they do it for 40 min I dont see any problem with that), and trying to balance something like that with implementing very doubtful limitation is very bad in my book.
So it is bad, very bad. And if dev thought process is like this, I do not know what future arbitrary limitation will come if he can not balance some other mechanics.
>Destroyers and cruisers now have a peak effectiveness timer like frigates
Wow, this change is particularly awful. Forcing players to play with a timer on every battle. I'll definitely be modding this out every patch. All the combat changes in this patch are terrible, but I can't even remotely understand the mindset behind this and the change to energy weapon flux damage bonuses. Energy weapons were already strictly inferior and now they're just a total joke.
The customer? The guy who forked out fifteen bucks for the game and would like it to not be ruined? Please remember that the objective of a developer is not to make the game to their own precise interests, but to the interests of the many people who paid hard-earned money for a game they expect to become better, not worse.
>Destroyers and cruisers now have a peak effectiveness timer like frigates
Wow, this change is particularly awful. Forcing players to play with a timer on every battle. I'll definitely be modding this out every patch. All the combat changes in this patch are terrible, but I can't even remotely understand the mindset behind this and the change to energy weapon flux damage bonuses. Energy weapons were already strictly inferior and now they're just a total joke.
This comes after the patch where fighters got nerfed into uselessness. Really not liking where the game is headed.
'vocal minority' has to be the most sickeningly overused buzzword lately. There is such a thing as a vocal majority, and guess what: that's what this is.
'vocal minority' has to be the most sickeningly overused buzzword lately. There is such a thing as a vocal majority, and guess what: that's what this is.
Prove. It.
I hope you are not offended from my posts, as some posters suggested here. I am interested what do you think about the proposal from Venatos few pages ago, where the CR will lower the speed of the ship, aiming and maybe some other things, but will not go as far in the area of malfunction of system or blowing parts of ship health. That way when CR hits the low, the ship will be a lot slower, and so not able to kit anymore, but it will not be a hard limit where things start to go wrong with all system shutting downThe point here is, because the dev doesnt know how to improve the AI, he is implementing a limitation in time. And he is doing it only because some people are abusing the AI and are playing a battle for 30 min and kiting *** of the AI. Because of them he is implementing something that will have a direct impact on my play style and how I play. If people want to abuse AI, let them. This is not a MMO where there is some player vs player competition, this is a offline single player game, you will not be able to prevent abusing mechanic (and if they do it for 40 min I dont see any problem with that), and trying to balance something like that with implementing very doubtful limitation is very bad in my book.
So it is bad, very bad. And if dev thought process is like this, I do not know what future arbitrary limitation will come if he can not balance some other mechanics.
The AI and the rules of the game are two parts of the same coin; expecting to have an arbitrarily good AI for *any given ruleset* is simply unrealistic. The two have to work together. Some mechanics, while a good idea in, say, a PvP game, are not something any (reasonably real-time) AI can handle, period. Aside from that, some mechanics the AI has problems with aren't an AI issue to begin with. For example, if you put a human player in a slower ship, they're going to get kited too, so that clearly isn't an AI problem. Of course, the AI could try some tactics to counter that (and it does), but ultimately it's an uphill battle because of the mechanics. Thus, the motivation for making mechanical changes to address the problem. You're welcome to question/disagree/dislike the actual mechanical chages, of course. My point here is that regardless of how you feel about the specific changes, it's definitely more a mechanics issue rather than an AI issue, and that further the two are much more intertwined than one might think. They have to work together to produce a good result.
As far as balance overall, the ideal is that the player trying to play the game optimally is able to have fun. Ultimately that's a large part of games (well, most games) - learning how to play, and improving. If, as you improve, you realize that your best options are un-fun (e.g. kite for 30 minutes), that's a big problem for a game's longevity and replay value. Of course, since we're talking about "fun", that's a subjective call to make.
I hope you are not offended from my posts, as some posters suggested here. I am interested what do you think about the proposal from Venatos few pages ago, where the CR will lower the speed of the ship, aiming and maybe some other things, but will not go as far in the area of malfunction of system or blowing parts of ship health. That way when CR hits the low, the ship will be a lot slower, and so not able to kit anymore, but it will not be a hard limit where things start to go wrong with all system shutting down
Also there was nice idea somewhere during discusion about adding one more Dmg. Type - Beam Dmg. I must say that it would be awesome to have it! It would help to claryfy things better. I know which weapon is beam and which is not - You know it as well... But it is knowledge obtained by actually using those weapons rather than making "quick glance" at it's statisticks and picture representing dmg. type. If Alex would suddenly brought 100 new weapons and 20 of them would be beam weapons, we would have no idea which are those really without trying them first (good we could do so in simulation) or reading description and hoping info will be there. So I think that this idea of adding representation for another Dmg. Type is good idea.
Ehh... I have headache and don't feel too good so I just hope my post was well organized, presented my point of view in rational, well explained and polite way and most of all - just made sense. Can't wait (actually I CAN wait but... You know, just saying) to try game with those new changes to "solidyfy" my own opinion.
EDIT: WHY? WHY?! WHY?!!! Why had I forgot to add that Question Mark there? It is so troublesome to edit posts just for this... ;) I like to exagerrate small things sometimes :P This was time like that. But lack of question mark where it should be is irritating me. Even more when it happens in MY OWN POST! >.<
Ahh, shame. I am not a fan of this, as you probably already know, but lets leave it at that.I hope you are not offended from my posts, as some posters suggested here. I am interested what do you think about the proposal from Venatos few pages ago, where the CR will lower the speed of the ship, aiming and maybe some other things, but will not go as far in the area of malfunction of system or blowing parts of ship health. That way when CR hits the low, the ship will be a lot slower, and so not able to kit anymore, but it will not be a hard limit where things start to go wrong with all system shutting down
(If we're being honest, I was a little bit, but I understand that things can get heated, and appreciate you saying this. So, no worries.)
About Venatos' idea: yeah, I saw that. My thought on it is that I actually really *like* how these malfunctions play out, and they also serve as a clear visual indicator that things are going wrong, which is particularly important if this is happening to a ship other than your flagship.
Consider that in a previous version, low-CR ships couldn't be deployed at all. The current system, where things eventually get really, really bad, is meant to provide a range of options there instead of a hard boundary - you can decide how much risk you're willing to take, and when to bail out. It also makes last-stand type fights more dramatic than simple stat changes.
Basically, the idea is that a ship at 0 CR is not something you can rely on for any length of time. You might get one last thing done with it, or you might not. If they're reliable (even if poor) performers, then it undermines the whole CR system. You'd end up encouraging the player to fight "free" battles with swarms of 0-CR ships against weak opponents. (With that in mind, one of the goals of the hull damage from critical malfunctions is to make sure it's very much not free outside of combat.)
I will say that the complexity of the rules around "peak performance" ticking down is bothering me, though.
I feel like a total badass when I take my Medusa (armed with Heavy Blasters, Light Needlers, and LR PD lasers) and destroy Captain RandomJoe's entire fleet for a 200000-credit bounty. I play all kinds of battles, but the most common type is when I need money and I use a single Medusa, Sunder, or Eagle to destroy a medium-sized pirate or faction enemy fleet for the bounty.I think this is a playstyle that needn't be blocked by these changes, just made dependent on investment in the Combat tree. There's definitely a case for letting PCs fly single ships for super-long battles but only if they've explicitly chosen to make that their playstyle by putting points into a 'Combat Drills' perk that increases their flagship's CR timer or something.
This upcoming patch will force me to play a different way, and my initial reaction to that is negative. But is my negative reaction because the changes will make StarSector a worse game, or is it because they will force me to play "properly"? I've decided that it's the second. The game will be better for the change, it just won't be the exact game I'm already comfortable with.
I think this is a playstyle that needn't be blocked by these changes, just made dependent on investment in the Combat tree. There's definitely a case for letting PCs fly single ships for super-long battles but only if they've explicitly chosen to make that their playstyle by putting points into a 'Combat Drills' perk that increases their flagship's CR timer or something.
Note about energy weapons: the damage is getting boosted to compensate for the boost change. So at low flux they will be more powerful than present, less powerful at highest flux. This is a significant improvement for the energy PD in particular - more consistent stopping power is much better.- AND -
•Increased damage values for non-beam energy weapons by roughly 25% to compensateDo not mix. It sounds like only non-beam energy weapons like pulse lasers and blasters will get the extra damage, which is good for the affected weapons now that they will be at a severe range disadvantage compared to beams and ballistics. Beams will be boosted by more range and cheaper OP costs instead.
Hmm. One issue there is something like the Graviton Beam, which is a beam but does kinetic damage. Still, something to think about.Maybe, let Graviton Beam deal hard flux (by retaining old kinetic or energy type), but change it into a burst (non-continuous) beam, so that AI won't be confused by continuous hard flux buildup. It might mess up its property of messing with other ships' velocity, though.
@ Alex:Which is why I suggest a separate indicator for hard flux / soft flux, rather than tying it specifically to beam weapons. The graviton beam idea is pretty good, though.QuoteHmm. One issue there is something like the Graviton Beam, which is a beam but does kinetic damage. Still, something to think about.Maybe, let Graviton Beam deal hard flux (by retaining old kinetic or energy type), but change it into a burst (non-continuous) beam, so that AI won't be confused by continuous hard flux buildup. It might mess up its property of messing with other ships' velocity, though.
Question: do you have an idea of roughly how much time that kind of battle takes?
... I don't have much of a problem with larger fleets, but when I run into a captain that has the same unfair BS powers that I do like "zero flux speed bonus at 25% flux" or "reduce flux while shields are up" it feels like a punching bag just reached out and smacked me upside the head. ...
I don't have much of a problem with larger fleets, but when I run into a captain that has the same unfair BS powers that I do like "zero flux speed bonus at 25% flux" or "reduce flux while shields are up" it feels like a punching bag just reached out and smacked me upside the head.This is what motivated me to switch from Medusa to Hyperion, and get Missile Specialization 10 so I can kill enemy flagship quickly with Reapers and save a few minutes. This is what I mean by enemy flagship is harder than everything else combined, and a few Reapers boosted by Missile Specialization 10 will often make it go away, permanently.
I'm glad someone else feels the same way about those skills... its really clear how powerful the level 10 combat skills are when fighting the AI. Levels 1-9: Not all that noticeable. Level 10: Ridiculous power boost.This is why Missile Specialization 10 plus Reapers is so useful now. Four Reapers will kill any non-battleship immediately. Onslaught and Paragon can survive them if the player lacks Target Analysis 10 or sensor objective boosts. Killing cruiser flagships immediately is very important because it will stop them from launching their Harpoons or Pilums (boosted by Missile Specialization 10) and kill your AI ships! Crippling an Onslaught with Reapers will make it flee and prevent it from slaughtering your fleet with a plethora of guns.
About Venatos' idea: yeah, I saw that. My thought on it is that I actually really *like* how these malfunctions play out, and they also serve as a clear visual indicator that things are going wrong, which is particularly important if this is happening to a ship other than your flagship.
Consider that in a previous version, low-CR ships couldn't be deployed at all. The current system, where things eventually get really, really bad, is meant to provide a range of options there instead of a hard boundary - you can decide how much risk you're willing to take, and when to bail out. It also makes last-stand type fights more dramatic than simple stat changes.
Basically, the idea is that a ship at 0 CR is not something you can rely on for any length of time. You might get one last thing done with it, or you might not. If they're reliable (even if poor) performers, then it undermines the whole CR system. You'd end up encouraging the player to fight "free" battles with swarms of 0-CR ships against weak opponents. (With that in mind, one of the goals of the hull damage from critical malfunctions is to make sure it's very much not free outside of combat.)
I will say that the complexity of the rules around "peak performance" ticking down is bothering me, though.
If I understand things right, eventually (not in this next patch) there's going to be NPC captains that have skills and fleets that have a variety of crew quality, so this will smooth out the abrupt jump between regular enemies and Combat 10 skill characters a bit.As Thaago noted, Combat less than 10 is hardly noticeable. Perhaps the most noticeable aspect of some Combat are enemy Harpoons are faster, and you need more time and distance to vent safely. The perks from Combat 10 make Combat 10 much more powerful than Combat 9, and the enemy flagship seems to have every Combat skill, while you probably will not because you need skills from other trees. For similar reasons, I beeline to Combat 10 as soon as I can for the perks, after I get Technology 7 for Entoptic Rangefinder perk and Augmented Engines and ITU hullmods.
(And a lore note: We've already got ships with auto factories that can build unlimited ammo - see any carrier with its fighters - so it's just a question of which launchers have the right hook-ups to allow reloading in combat.
...Speaking of which, why is there only one drone system that can regenerate drones in combat?)
on another note does the fast missile racks affect the salamander reload? and have you thought about applying the missile changes to swarmers?
>beam fade out time and beam damage
So... What? They reach something like 1100 but the last 100 units have decreased damage?
And a question! Are you happy with present set of ships? ;) (obvious fishing info 'bout more ships is obvious)
(And a lore note: We've already got ships with auto factories that can build unlimited ammo - see any carrier with its fighters - so it's just a question of which launchers have the right hook-ups to allow reloading in combat.
Removed energy weapon bonus damage from high flux levelSad to see a skill-cap / player technique cap mechanic disappear. I understand the AI did not use the mechanic effectively. Neither do brand new players. As the player is supposed to become godly with leveling up bonuses, why would the player also not become godly with hours spent understanding the mechanics of the game? Is the problem that either a) game is balanced for the player's choice of ships and thus AI high tech ships were underwhelming because not using weapons effectively, or b) game is balanced for AI ships and thus high tech ships are overwhelming for the player? As for players "abusing" the mechanic by firing at nothing to keep their flux high remember they are also keeping their ship speed low, their defensive capabilities low, their total damage/ROF low, etc. It's a skill decision for perhaps optimal play, not necessarily abuse.
Increased damage values for non-beam energy weapons by roughly 25% to compensate
Beam weapons:I'm sad beams won't pass through (over/under) friendly ships but I'll get over it. In my experience running large fleets with mostly beams in SS+ mod the longer range and standardized range really helps the AI roam as a pack and focus fire ships with beams. Mixed ranges means ships get in the way of one another's firing arcs as short range ships close to engage. This probably needs a second balancing pass on damage, because now HIL is really underwhelming for a large mount vs 4 tac lasers. If tac laser is used with PDAI, will it engage missiles or hold fire if a friendly ship is further downrange?
Standardized range to 1000 for most non-PD, from Tactical Laser to HIL
Increased range for PD Laser and LR PD Laser
Slightly reduced OP cost for all beam weapons
Tactical Laser, Graviton Beam, and Phase Beam are no longer interrupted by missiles
Greatly reduced fade in/out time for most beams
Still not sure why other missiles/rockets wouldn't regenerate even with ridiculously long timers if this is the way you're going. (1 min, 4 min, etc). With salamander, why can't the AI just treat it as a short range weapon such as Sabots even if range is medium (special rule)? Tried it and it still doesn't work?
Missiles:
Salamander: both versions have unlimited ammo and require 20 seconds to reload
Hurricane MIRV: regenerates 1 ammo every 20 seconds
Pilum LRM: regenerates 1 ammo every 10 seconds
I tend to agree with previous comments on implementing some form of magazine reloading. Another option might be a steep sliding curve of ammo loaded (like missiles loaded/not loaded) vs CR, so that at high CR there is plenty of ammo, medium CR there is roughly equivalent to current ammo levels, and low CR not much at all. It links into CR, uses the same mechanic as missiles loaded, and differentiates ballistic vs energy by CR...hm, not great but a low tech 'you need your crew to fight' solution? Maybe energy mounts are more likely to malfunction at low CR/EMP to balance?
Ballistic weapons:
Now have unlimited ammo, except for Bomb Bay
Reduced OP cost of Light Dual MG
ShipsOk with balancing pass, not convinced on timers but probably will be a non-issue. I'd probably prefer the CR degrades slowly when in combat but less/no drop just to deploy. Why do frigates need to be so fast now if nearly everything is on a timer?
Destroyers and cruisers now have a peak effectiveness timer like frigates
Roughly 5-7 minutes for destroyers and 7-9 for cruisers
High-tech/faster ships have shorter timers
Sunder: increased top speed, acceleration, and flux capacity. Reduced shield efficiency.
Brawler/Shepherd: increased burn level by 1 (to 6)
Condor: reduced supplies/day by 1 (to 4)
I just remembered something: Weren't frigates' top speed and recovery boosted from 0.54 to 0.6 because they were the only ships with CR decay at the time (when 0.6 came out)? One reason I use frigates, aside from high burn speed, is they recover quickly. Big ships (and fighters) take forever to recover CR.Hey Alex, I don't think you ever addressed this and I too would like to know if recovery speed is gonna be boosted
I'm sad beams won't pass through (over/under) friendly ships but I'll get over it.
If tac laser is used with PDAI, will it engage missiles or hold fire if a friendly ship is further downrange?
Still not sure why other missiles/rockets wouldn't regenerate even with ridiculously long timers if this is the way you're going. (1 min, 4 min, etc).
With salamander, why can't the AI just treat it as a short range weapon such as Sabots even if range is medium (special rule)? Tried it and it still doesn't work?
Peak effectiveness for destroyers/cruisers—like others have said, I don’t expect this will actually have much impact. I do wonder if it isn't sort of missing the mark—the problem with combat right now (as I see it) isn’t that destroyers and cruisers can kite too long, it’s that the optimal approach to combat is always to take a single ship at a time. After the patch, you'll still be able to have three Falcons in your fleet and just switch from one to the next as CR drops. I like xenoargh’s solution to this—take reinforcements out of the equation (unless, perhaps, total fleet size is really, really big). You pick the ships with which you think you can win, and you’re stuck with them.
Which leaves ballistic weapons. I actually agree that this change will barely be noticeable—I ran out of HVD ammo every once in a while, but I don’t think I’ve ever run out of ammo for the heavy mauler, my favorite early-/mid-game iron. However, though I think the change is okay, I do wonder if it’s not a missed opportunity. Ammo for ballistics didn’t just differentiate them from energy weapons, it was also (as I think somebody mentioned) a potential lever for balance. You can have two weapons with similar OP costs—gun A has enough ammo to deal twice as much damage, over the course of a long fight, as gun B, but gun B has three times the single-shot damage as gun A. Adds some interesting nuance to weapon design—I guess modders will still have access to that, of course.
However! As a twist on what Cosmitz suggested early in the thread, what about using freighters(and/or tankers and/or those supply ships we saw art for that got cut in an earlier build) to actually resupply ships in combat? A freighter comes in from the bottom of the map, flies straight to the ship that called for resupply, and both ships have to sit still (maybe with shields down?) for 5/10/20/40 seconds (depending on hull size) as ballistic (and maybe missile) weapons are refilled. AI ships will make a beeline for your resupply operations, so you need to send some escorts to run interference, etc. etc. It’s a dramatic change, maybe beyond the scope of this thread (in which case I’d be happy to drag it over to Suggestions), but it could kill a few birds with one stone—keep ammo in the game, get civilian ships into harm’s way, and encourage players to use more one warship at a time.
Also—Alex, you have the patience of a saint when it comes to all our griping. But hey, even if some reactions have been a little over the top, it’s great to see so many people so obsessed with Starsector that a dozen lines of patch notes can generate a dozen pages of heated debate. And probably a dozen more to come!
I just remembered something: Weren't frigates' top speed and recovery boosted from 0.54 to 0.6 because they were the only ships with CR decay at the time (when 0.6 came out)? One reason I use frigates, aside from high burn speed, is they recover quickly. Big ships (and fighters) take forever to recover CR.Hey Alex, I don't think you ever addressed this and I too would like to know if recovery speed is gonna be boosted
Is this what you are taking about?Peak effectiveness for destroyers/cruisers—like others have said, I don’t expect this will actually have much impact. I do wonder if it isn't sort of missing the mark—the problem with combat right now (as I see it) isn’t that destroyers and cruisers can kite too long, it’s that the optimal approach to combat is always to take a single ship at a time. After the patch, you'll still be able to have three Falcons in your fleet and just switch from one to the next as CR drops. I like xenoargh’s solution to this—take reinforcements out of the equation (unless, perhaps, total fleet size is really, really big). You pick the ships with which you think you can win, and you’re stuck with them.Well... there's another change I'm mulling over that'll take care of that, but :-X for now.
In the meantime, I ended up trying something simpler: "transfer command" now reduces the peak effectiveness time of the new flagship by the spent peak effectiveness of the old flagship, and further docks the new flagship for 10% CR. (Changing the command structure in battle is serious business!)
What about the blaster type weapons, do they still receive flux damage bonus?
What about swarmer, since they are tiny missiles should they also regenerate? Because most fighters easily refit them and spam them nonstop
...and ammunition was never a factor for vanilla weaponry anyway. Besides, any fight that goes on longer than 5-10 minutes was already likely to be multi-engagement run anyway, and now there's a reason to set objectives for yourself in larger battles instead of simply throwing everything but your frigates straight at the enemy.Not if you want to solo fleets with as few ships as possible, which happens much if you have no Leadership (and I do not put points at all in Leadership until level 38+, after both Combat and Technology are at 10.) The smallest ship reliant on ammo that I can use to solo fleets is an Enforcer, and only if most of its weapons are Heavy Needlers.
@Velox: First off, hi!
Re: why not - mostly feel reasons.
I get what you're saying about ammo giving feel; definitely still thinking about yours and a couple of other comments about this in this thread.
About the other stuff - autofactory on ships and all - would you mind moving it out to another thread? It gets unmanageable to discuss too many things in the same thread; and this one is really for comments on the patch notes and not radical suggestions :)
(Just a real quick note here, to reemphasize that most missiles have limited ammo. Only a few specific missiles have unlimited ammo, where it makes sense given their role.)
Er, I just feel I should say: I like the changes to beams, CR & ammo and think the reasoning behind it is pretty great.I don't mean to pester, but did you have any thoughts on this Alex? Given there's so much discussion going on about CR tickdown edge cases it seems like sidestepping the need for them might be useful.
W.r.t. a simpler way of handling CR tickdown without needing an array of exceptions and such... if it's to stop enemies baiting out CR by dripfeeding weak ships into the battlefield perhaps the old mechanic of "Take all the points and the opponents can't deploy" could come back into play? Or something like "If the enemy has ships in your deployment zone, you can't deploy more" (or perhaps "You can't deploy any smaller ships"). If you start a fight by committing a handful of frigates that you skirt around the edge of their cruisers, they can just park their fleet in your deployment zone and wait for you to time out and have to flee, handing them the match.
If you let them deploy equally-sized ships when their DZ is threatened, then they're punished for being driven to this by having their reinforcements burn in, shields down, and take a pummelling. This also stops the problem of frigates skirting around the fight to block off enemy reinforcements- if that is a problem, rather than an interesting new tactic. Equally it clashes with your goals to move the combat away from the edges of the map whilst a hard block supports those goals by preventing deployment when combat at the edges is likely.
I've mocked up an example below:
Deployment Zone open
(http://i.imgur.com/eoTbR2Ws.png) (http://i.imgur.com/eoTbR2W.png)
Deployment Zone blocked
(http://i.imgur.com/hEzpAaJs.png) (http://i.imgur.com/hEzpAaJ.png)
It's something that's quite easy to visually communicate, and the concept of a deployment zone is fairly intuitive and "Keep enemy ships out of your deployment zone if you want reinforcements" is a lot easier to communicate than the sets of circumstances in which you do and don't have to worry about CR.
@Talkie Toaster: Oh yeah! Did see and read it when you posted it, just didn't get around to replying and then kind of forgot to. Apologies - like you said, there's a lot of stuff flying around, and I can't quite keep up with everything.The other thought I had shortly after posting it (and meant to edit in) was that perhaps you need to claim at least 1 objective to be able to deploy. Then just add a single objective in the middle for all small battles. If you wanted to make it a bit more specific, you could make it only Comm Relays. That'd tie into the whole 'EW' stuff that's been discussed in other threads to an extent; unless you can deploy a comm relay in an optimal location, you can't call out for reinforcements. Or just that it's unsafe to burn into an active firefight without a Comm Relay feeding you co-ordinates. It'd also make it easier to lock the enemy out in large (4+ objective) maps, where otherwise you could easily backcap 1 out of the 4-5 points with a frigate even if the enemies were dominating. It'd also make Comm Relays more valuable; I tend not to micromanage my ships, so Comm Relays are my lowest priority objective.
It's interesting, and the idea of sidestepping some of the issues is a good one; ultimately that's probably what it'll take.
Specifically about what you're suggesting: I think that might, once again, make combat about preventing enemy reinforcements, and make the battle to take place around the enemy deployment zone near their side of the map.
If it was a little different - say, a "deployment beacon" nav buoy objective a little ways into the map, for each side... hmm. That'd make the fight stay away from edges, which is good, but beating an AI fleet could still turn on cheesing the deployment point in some way. You might say, make the AI defend it well, but that ties down a lot of forces and would make it susceptible to being defeated in detail. Plus, these would have to be present in any size battles, and currently smaller battles don't have objectives.
Still, it's an interesting idea, and I appreciate you putting it out there - it's definitely another angle for thinking about the problem, and that's a good thing.
If it was a little different - say, a "deployment beacon" nav buoy objective a little ways into the map, for each side... hmm. That'd make the fight stay away from edges, which is good, but beating an AI fleet could still turn on cheesing the deployment point in some way.Before 0.6, my strategy to lock out defense fleets was take two Hyperion, capture as many points as possible, then bring in the rest of my fleet to help smash the trickle of ships. By the end of the battle, it got so bad that my whole fleet destroy ships before they fully appear on-screen. The biggest threat to my ships was my own ships shooting each other trying to get at incoming enemy ships.
EDIT: One thing I like about 0.6+ releases is how objectives have been downplayed compared to before. Even then, I still prefer no objectives, and willing to keep my fleet small to squelch them until I get enough Logistics to play with big fleets. A fun mini-game for me is how can I make the most powerful fleet without exceeding 40 DP.
Also, the game allowing my ship can carry 10,000 tons of metal but only 6 missiles has always been fairly immersion breaking to me. Maybe have 6 LOADED at once, but there's only 6 on the entire ship? Ludicrous.
I'd second the suggestion of putting a cooldown on fast missile racks, simply because that's how the AI uses it - right now, a player-piloted Vigilance has a major advantage over an AI one in being able to use FSM multiple times in rapid succession.Actually, I've seen an AI-controlled Vigilence completely go ham on my Enforcer. I happened to think the same thing, but when I wandered up to one of them armed with Reaper torpedos with just moderately high flux, I lost my beloved Enforcer in about 10 seconds. Surprised the hell out of me when that happened.
Could you add ground battles for the next major update please!
You could use the top looking view and use all the current battle settings, would just need to tweak things to behave like ground vehicles but I am pretty sure a lot of people would really like it!
Btw, I really love this update, makes the game feel much more alive!
I'm going to miss the flux bonus. There were certainly situations where it was very relevant and central to my tactics. A few days ago I spent a long while seeing how far I could push a single Wolf, and I learned that my best option was to take advantage of the damage boost by riding the edge of flux overload. It was extremely rewarding and fun to be able to take such a risk and to pull it off successfuly. After this change, the risk-reward tradeoff is gone and there is no reason for me to do anything else than vent completely after every strike and tank with the shield instead of dodging. Boring.
I strongly dislike taking features out because they aren't applicable to most situations. Even if three out of four players never care, it's still there to provide more choice and enhance the experience for those that choose to take advantage of it. Even if flux boost is only relevant to a handful ships played in a specific way, it makes these ships more unique, interesting and worth playing.
Matter of opinion: where you see streamlining and removal of clutter, I see flattening the game and removal of nuance.
The exact same argument could be made for ballistic ammo.
Removed energy weapon bonus damage from high flux level
Standardized range to 1000 for most non-PD, from Tactical Laser to HIL
Salamander: both versions have unlimited ammo and require 20 seconds to reload
Hurricane MIRV: regenerates 1 ammo every 20 seconds
Pilum LRM: regenerates 1 ammo every 10 seconds
Now have unlimited ammo, except for Bomb Bay
Range is a pretty fundamental characteristic and one that should show variation though.
Along the lines of streamlining game mechanics by removing ballistic ammo and the flux damage bonus, what if "Flux" is flipped around and called "Energy" instead?
Firing weapons consume Energy, shields require Energy deflect damage, "Overload" becomes "Shutdown" when Energy runs out, "Venting" becomes "Recharge", "Flux Vents" becomes "Energy Generators", and Hard Flux happens because shields drain too much power causing capacitor plates to stick together and so shields need to be off to unstick the capacitors.
Gameplay will be totally the same, but much more intuitive to someone who just bought the game. Flux what? why is my ship sparking when this bar gets full???
MW? MechWarrior? I never played it (and thus know little about it); I played Doom instead.Yeah, Mechwarrior had heat mechanics that are kinda like those of SS but with a softer limit and a harsher penalty for the overload (your excess heat could set off your spare ammo, damaging you and removing the ammo.) And the overload could happen anywhere beyond a certain point
And the overload could happen anywhere beyond a certain point
Let's not forget the limited number of "quick vents" you had and the environmental effects as well (Stand in water and the mech cools quicker)And the overload could happen anywhere beyond a certain point
I really like such random elements, they allow you to gamble in dire situations and hope for the best:)
Actually clip reloading could be implemented even without forced reload button - by having clip automatically filled if particular weapon hasn't fired for reload duration (or double to not make partial reloading too convenient).
Came here to make this type of suggestion. In my mind it would be cooler and more clean to have an 'individual weapon heat' mechanic control this, rather than spaceship-sized 'clips', but it would basically work the same way, so.... just an aesthetic suggestion.
Removed energy weapon bonus damage from high flux level
Increased damage values for non-beam energy weapons by roughly 25% to compensate
Beam weapons:
Standardized range to 1000 for most non-PD, from Tactical Laser to HIL
Increased range for PD Laser and LR PD Laser
Slightly reduced OP cost for all beam weapons
Tactical Laser, Graviton Beam, and Phase Beam are no longer interrupted by missiles
Greatly reduced fade in/out time for most beams
Missiles:
Salamander: both versions have unlimited ammo and require 20 seconds to reload
Hurricane MIRV: regenerates 1 ammo every 20 seconds
Pilum LRM: regenerates 1 ammo every 10 seconds
Ballistic weapons:
Now have unlimited ammo, except for Bomb Bay
Reduced OP cost of Light Dual MG
Ships
Destroyers and cruisers now have a peak effectiveness timer like frigates
Roughly 5-7 minutes for destroyers and 7-9 for cruisers
High-tech/faster ships have shorter timers
Sunder: increased top speed, acceleration, and flux capacity. Reduced shield efficiency.
Brawler/Shepherd: increased burn level by 1 (to 6)
Condor: reduced supplies/day by 1 (to 4)
Really depends on what else you have in the fight. It makes the point defense module much more questionable for Tactical Lasers, as their range makes it so that if they're firing at missiles they likely cannot safely engage anything, particularly something like a Salamander, as it goes past them. Doesn't really matter all that much for Phase Beams, Graviton Beams, and High Intensity Lasers, at least not in my opinion, since those were unlikely to engage missiles in the first place.QuoteTactical Laser, Graviton Beam, and Phase Beam are no longer interrupted by missilesGreat as long as the missiles in question can be manually targeted for destruction/get destroyed anyway.
There are four offensive beam weapons. Three of these behave identically, with tactical variations coming mostly from range (being removed) and flux/dmg//sec.Two behave identically, all four behave similarly. Phase Beams have some EMP damage while Graviton Beams deal kinetic damage. Tactical Lasers and High Intensity Lasers are both straight energy damage. Kinetic damage makes Graviton Beams nearly as effective as HILs against shields on a per-weapon basis and significantly more flux-efficient but only about as good as a Tactical Laser against the hull. It's true that Tactical Lasers, HILs, and Graviton Beams all have very similar profiles and could perhaps use a bit more differentiation, but Tactical Lasers and HILs have the same performance (before shield efficiency or armor effects) against hull and shield and cannot go into slots which can be filled by the other, whereas Graviton Beams have differing performance against shields and armor/hull, and can replace HILs or be replaced by Tactical Lasers. The EMP damage of Phase Beams suggests that they should be used against unshielded hulls where possible, but they don't really offer enough EMP damage to do anything worthwhile, which leaves them with their somewhat lackluster energy damage, which is inferior against shields to that of the Graviton Beam and not terribly better than the Graviton Beam's damage against much else.
The two arguments I've seen in support of this are: 1) Ammo doesn't run out anyway, so it's a useless mechanic. 2) Ammo runs out in ballistic-based ships, whereas it doesn't in high-tech ships, an unfair advantage in prolonged battles.I'm not certain, but based on comments that were made earlier in the thread, it seems to me as though Alex may now be keeping some kind of ammo restriction on some ballistic weapons but including a clip reload. This would mean that if you had a weapon with 100 ammunition and fired 10-shot bursts every second that regenerates one burst every 5 seconds, it'd fire 10 shot bursts every second for 12 seconds, and then it'd fire one 10 shot burst every 5 seconds after that (not including the first burst after the 12 second period, which would occur 3 seconds after the 12 second period ended), unless you gave the weapon a chance to more completely reload, much like the Autopulse Laser can fire off 20 shots in the first tenth of a second or so of the engagement but is then restricted to one shot every half a second until given the opportunity to recharge. Another possibility for the clip reload would be a weapon with 30 ammunition which fires 1 shot per second and regenerates 3 shots at once every 10 seconds, so for the first ~43 seconds of combat you could fire the weapon continuously, but after that point you would fire 3 shot bursts every 10 seconds. I might, however, be wrong about this.
And in all my time using beam weapons, I never once thought that "hey these things should have a range of like, 1000!"...that just seems too high to me. Perhaps someone can explain to me the idea behind it
What you have to consider when you say "I love beams weapons [already]" is that Sector is not a mutiplayer game, so you never have to directly compare your play stile and loadouts to other players'. While beams do work nicely in many situations, hard hitting weapons like blasters are plain superior in most situations. When you begin to optimize your ships more and more you will inevitably gravitate toward such weapons (provided your play stile enables them). Maybe this update will change that.
What i'm trying to say is that while hard-hitting weapons like blasters and plasma cannons are obviously great, they are also geared toward a different playstyle
What i'm trying to say is that while hard-hitting weapons like blasters and plasma cannons are obviously great, they are also geared toward a different playstyle
Right, and an experienced player with that aggressive play stile can kill more enemies in less time, and with less ships. Seen that way, you can also think of the beam change as buffing the defensive, flux conservative play stile and preserving its role in an optimized fleet. At least theoretically, let's see how it turns out.
What you have to consider when you say "I love beams weapons [already]" is that Sector is not a mutiplayer game, so you never have to directly compare your play stile and loadouts to other players'. While beams do work nicely in many situations, hard hitting weapons like blasters are plain superior in most situations. When you begin to optimize your ships more and more you will inevitably gravitate toward such weapons (provided your play stile enables them). Maybe this update will change that.
They are only superior if you don't miss. Which is one reason I think beam weapons are powerful already. If you miss with blaster shots (like the high damage, high flux ones that the apogee has), you are spending a lot of flux for POTENTIAL damage (at a shorter range, as well! - very few of the hard hitting weapons have the same range as beam weapons). Hard hitting is great, but that's what high explosive ballistic rounds are for, or the antimatter blaster, IMO. Beam weapons are great for constant pressure on the enemy. Softening them up, as it were. I don't see why I would inevitably "gravitate toward [hard hitting] weapons" when their purposes are very different. I mean, for example...one of the cheesiest, but most effective loadouts (again, IMO) for the Medusa is 4 tactical lasers + 2 dual blasters. The tactical lasers generate a healthy amount of flux on the enemy's shields for frigates and some destroyers, and a few blaster shots can get them to overload (possibly), in addition to Sabot missiles as well (perhaps) in the universal slots. But the DPS of the blasters is dangerous, because you can cause your own ship to overload on flux because of how much they generate. However, if you have 2 phase beams + 4 tactical lasers + <just about anything> in the two universal slots, you not only keep building flux on the enemy's shields (for much less cost on your own flux, and at greater range), you can keep a constant stream of damage on the enemy when his shields overload, or he takes them down to vent flux. I will admit, though, that 2 phase beams will probably take longer than 2 dual blasters, provided you aren't too aggressive with the blasters (i.e. endangering yourself to overloading on flux).
What i'm trying to say is that while hard-hitting weapons like blasters and plasma cannons are obviously great, they are also geared toward a different playstyle (as you mentioned yourself) and that a good player in a nimble ship can mitigate a lot of blaster/ammo-based damage while keeping continuing DPS via beam weapons on the enemy with little effort, whether AI or human. And maybe it isn't enough to take the ship down alone, but how often do you fight the enemy (outside of simulations) when you are the only ship engaged? Even from the beginning of a campaign, having 2 ships is leaps and bounds better than 1 lonely ship trying to fight/trade/bounty hunt its way up the food chain. It is literally a game-changer. Likewise, I think that beams can already be game-changers...giving most of them 1000 range just seems a bit too much, considering even 800 would be an upgrade for most of them. And if they all have 800 range, that is still "synergistic", right?
Thank you for responding to my post, though! Please tell me more about what you think / what I'm forgetting or not considering / etc!
*Pretty much the only beams I use now are TLs on Cap ships, lots of LRPDs (the effectiveness/flux energy PD sweet spot IMO, though I know that some disagree), and the odd Tac Laser for anti-fighter use. Felt a bit sad slapping LRPDs into the Apogee's medium turrets, rather than any of the medium options, but she's a far better ship/build with that layout; she can then focus her flux allowance on the business end... though this is too minmax for my tastes, loving more balanced builds as I do, but can't be helped since the flux margins are pretty tight....For beams, I use Tachyon Lances (less than before due to buggy autozoom), (Heavy) Burst PD if I have the OP to spare, and LR PDs when I do not have enough OP or burst PDs to spare. If I have Advanced Optics, I may use regular PD laser on a Wolf. I sometimes put Graviton Beams on an Eagle, and Tactical Laser on phase frigates to deal with fighters.
1 You're much more likely to be up against enemies that can slaughter your nimble ships. Some very good players, with younger reflexes better than mine can still prevail, but I can't and hate to lose ships. The very nimble ships that you mention can be a bit of an exception to the rule, as you say, but the endgame's hard on 'em unless you're a very, very good player - so that exception's out of the picture for me. It's now time for more durable and solid ships, which aren't as nimble (mostly Apogees and Odysseys for me now, with the remarkable Apogee being my flagship);What I notice is the enemy flagship is the backbone of the enemy fleet. Kill it fast, and the rest of the enemy fleet is not that hard if your fleet is better than theirs. I can bring a frigate horde of over thirty ships and usually destroy the remaining fleet without casualties if the enemy flagship has been removed first. As for the enemy flagship, Hyperion is great for removing enemy flagships if Hyperion has Missile Specialization 10 and Reapers, but if that is not an option, I deploy an Onslaught (or Paragon, if handy) first and alone, then deploy my frigates seconds later after my Onslaught starts blasting enemy ships.
When I eventually get an Astral for this Lvl 50 Admiral, I'll play with that for a bit then give this Admiral a break, and start a new captain who plays very differently... be interesting to see if my conclusions hold true there.Good luck getting an Astral. I made it to level 71 and never found a single Astral, even after cleaning out Tibicena numerous times and bought about twenty Paragon or Odyssey ships. I do not know if the Astral can even spawn in Tri-Tachyon fleets; I did not see one (but I have seen Paragon and Odyssey) or else I would consider attacking such a fleet just to board their Astral.
Will the Brawler still have an unlimited combat timer? It seems like that will be a bit overpowered, considering now even cruisers won't have that ability. Maybe it should just be longer than the average frigate combat timer, closer to that of a destroyer?
- Ships
- Destroyers and cruisers now have a peak effectiveness timer like frigates
- Roughly 5-7 minutes for destroyers and 7-9 for cruisers
- High-tech/faster ships have shorter timers
- Sunder: increased top speed, acceleration, and flux capacity. Reduced shield efficiency.
- Brawler/Shepherd: increased burn level by 1 (to 6)
- Condor: reduced supplies/day by 1 (to 4)
For beams, I use Tachyon Lances (less than before due to buggy autozoom), (Heavy) Burst PD if I have the OP to spare, and LR PDs when I do not have enough OP or burst PDs to spare. If I have Advanced Optics, I may use regular PD laser on a Wolf. I sometimes put Graviton Beams on an Eagle, and Tactical Laser on phase frigates to deal with fighters.
What I notice is the enemy flagship is the backbone of the enemy fleet. Kill it fast, and the rest of the enemy fleet is not that hard if your fleet is better than theirs. I can bring a frigate horde of over thirty ships and usually destroy the remaining fleet without casualties if the enemy flagship has been removed first. As for the enemy flagship, Hyperion is great for removing enemy flagships if Hyperion has Missile Specialization 10 and Reapers, but if that is not an option, I deploy an Onslaught (or Paragon, if handy) first and alone, then deploy my frigates seconds later after my Onslaught starts blasting enemy ships.
Good luck getting an Astral. I made it to level 71 and never found a single Astral, even after cleaning out Tibicena numerous times and bought about twenty Paragon or Odyssey ships. I do not know if the Astral can even spawn in Tri-Tachyon fleets; I did not see one (but I have seen Paragon and Odyssey) or else I would consider attacking such a fleet just to board their Astral.
The Eagle's three medium (beam) mounts should be a ferocious amount of firepower... but isn't at all.It is if you put heavy blasters in them, but that requires max Combat and Technology to get the necessary OP and flux stats to support it, and only when controlled by player (because AI cannot manage its flux). It plays much more aggressively than long-ranged and more efficient configurations. Better firepower than Aurora without any missiles, but pales to an Aurora with missiles powered up by high Missile Specialization.
A lot of folks' comments here are heavily shaped by their playstyles, so it's good for those to be explicitly stated; so Alex has a better idea where each person/opinion is coming from. I never use the reinforcements system, and go in with the fleet I need up front - taking care to balance that with keeping some ships fresh for the second pursuit battle that often happens, to catch the faster units that retreated etc. The Flagship I choose at the beginning of the battle is the one I finish in, unless it gets destroyed (which it almost never does). For whatever that info might be worth *shrug*.That does not work if you want to pilot a slow ship, but want to get to the killer enemy flagship before your faster (and much weaker) ships do. If everything gets deployed at once, then slow ships are placed at the rear, and the fast ships up front will try to engage anything in their way unless you order them not to, which is not feasible if you want to capture objectives.
EDIT:One other boost is to destroy all of the wrecks except the conquest so that only it can be chosen
Until the next update, Conquests are not for sale anywhere. (Alex says Black Markets can sell them.) They rarely spawn as flagships for Independent deserter fleets. If you see one, and your game is not Ironman, save-scum until you board that ship!
One other boost is to destroy all of the wrecks except the conquest so that only it can be chosen
Removed energy weapon bonus damage from high flux level
Increased damage values for non-beam energy weapons by roughly 25% to compensate
Standardized range to 1000 for most non-PD, from Tactical Laser to HIL
Increased range for PD Laser and LR PD Laser
Tactical Laser, Graviton Beam, and Phase Beam are no longer interrupted by missiles
Salamander: both versions have unlimited ammo and require 20 seconds to reload
Hurricane MIRV: regenerates 1 ammo every 20 seconds
Pilum LRM: regenerates 1 ammo every 10 seconds
Now have unlimited ammo, except for Bomb Bay
Destroyers and cruisers now have a peak effectiveness timer like frigates
Tactical Laser, Graviton Beam, and Phase Beam are no longer interrupted by missiles
Meaning these beams will damage missiles and continue past, or just ignore missiles entirely and not be useful for PD?
...
There's more I could say on the whole thing, but I feel like my point has been made. The entire "combat balance pass" feels forced to me, even to the point of risking casualizing the entire game. There are a hundred generic space blasting games, the industry doesn't need another one. What was your thought process here? Right up to calling it a "balance pass". This is a drastic restructuring of some of the core concepts of combat in the game. What's next, removal of hard flux? Making armor a homogeneous HP pool instead of area-based?
I've mostly agreed with everything you've done with this game Alex, my posting history will reflect this. I can't agree with these changes though, I really can't. I urge careful reconsideration of these things before you start the downhill slide into a run of the mill shootemup like SPAZ.
...
...
There's more I could say on the whole thing, but I feel like my point has been made. The entire "combat balance pass" feels forced to me, even to the point of risking casualizing the entire game. There are a hundred generic space blasting games, the industry doesn't need another one. What was your thought process here? Right up to calling it a "balance pass". This is a drastic restructuring of some of the core concepts of combat in the game. What's next, removal of hard flux? Making armor a homogeneous HP pool instead of area-based?
I've mostly agreed with everything you've done with this game Alex, my posting history will reflect this. I can't agree with these changes though, I really can't. I urge careful reconsideration of these things before you start the downhill slide into a run of the mill shootemup like SPAZ.
...
Its good to share thoughts, but I think this is an overreaction. How are any of these changes "a drastic restructuring"? The main effect of the energy flux bonus was people complaining about energy weapons having low DPS because they didn't even know about it. Ammo for ballistics is a more important concept, but I think in this case its a case of "follow the fun": is it fun to run out of ammo? No. Is it fun to wait until the enemy runs out of ammo? Maybe, if you like that kind of thing, but personally I don't - I just get bored in any situation it would be good in. Yes is was a factor in choosing weapons, but there are so many other factors to that - per shot damage, flux usage, damage type, range, burst vs continuous, accuracy, turret speed... all of them are also important considerations and removing ammo doesn't make all weapons homogeneous by a long shot. The missile changes allow the missile weapons that are supposed to be pressure weapons (LRM, Salamanders) to actually be pressure weapons.
@ahrenjb: What you just suggested has come up a couple times already in this thread, termed as a "clip reload" mechanic. There are several good reasons why it's a bad idea, but the basic gist of them is that - especially on large ships with multiple different weapons - it encourages micromanagement of ammunition supplies and firing of weapons at nothing in order to get a reload before going back into combat. A better idea is what I'll call "chunk reload" - where, instead of reloading 100 shots 10 seconds after you empty the magazine, it reloads maybe 30 shots say 15 seconds after you started firing, and again every 15 seconds until it's back up to full, or perhaps it reloads all 100 shots every 45 seconds, or something like that. This way you get the same sort of feel, but don't actually have to empty a clip before it starts reloading.
Currently, the only weapons that DO run out of ammo are point defense, which in optimal setups, you would not use anyways even if they had unlimited ammo (on on lashers, you would end up manual fire to persevere ammo anyways, more tedious work then an actual game play option) that means unless you want ammo to run out within 1min, then it does not matter if it has ammo at all.I use Vulcans on several ships for PD. Lasher and Sunder need PD badly and Vulcans are the best they can get. For Dominator, I prefer Vulcans in small mounts and assault weapons in medium, instead of (dual) flak in medium and assault in light due to flux efficiency.
Perhaps the ammo change is too early, but once you play in actual fleet vs fleet combat, ammo is basically unlimited, and future of starsector is fleet vs fleet.Only when Logistics increases automatically on level up, base Logistics is raised to something much higher than 20, or leveling is much faster such that getting level 50 in a day is possible. Right now, player needs to spend AP/SP in Leadership/Logistics to get a big fleet. Player may want Combat and Technology more, and settle for a small elite fleet until he gets Leadership at endgame. Then again, maybe not - remember that Industry is coming, which will likely compete with the player's limited points.
@ Captain Pugh: Eagle can be good, although now, it is not as powerful as Dominator or Aurora because the Eagle cannot mount near as many missiles as those two.
... It is if you put heavy blasters in them, but that requires max Combat and Technology to get the necessary OP and flux stats to support it, and only when controlled by player (because AI cannot manage its flux). It plays much more aggressively than long-ranged and more efficient configurations. Better firepower than Aurora without any missiles, but pales to an Aurora with missiles powered up by high Missile Specialization.
That does not work if you want to pilot a slow ship, but want to get to the killer enemy flagship before your faster (and much weaker) ships do. If everything gets deployed at once, then slow ships are placed at the rear, and the fast ships up front will try to engage anything in their way unless you order them not to, which is not feasible if you want to capture objectives.
I do not pursue because I do not want Vengeful relations with any faction. In addition, if I get the option to Stand Down, I always take it to recover CR. Giving up pursuit for CR is a no-brainer.
Until the next update, Conquests are not for sale anywhere. (Alex says Black Markets can sell them.) They rarely spawn as flagships for Independent deserter fleets. If you see one, and your game is not Ironman, save-scum until you board that ship!
It can be done well enough if you don't have too much of a speed difference between your different speed/fragility tiers of ships that you deploy.Unfortunately, enemy flagships with Combat 10, especially those with mobility systems, are lightning bruisers. If the enemy Eagle/Dominator/Onslaught flagship gets deployed at first, it will be at the front or right behind the lead ships.
SnipI'm not really sure where you're coming from. In fleet vs fleet ammo will be less of a constraint, so what is the purpose of removing it all together? It still serves a function, and the CR loss discourages actually relying on ammo regeneration to have long battles.
Unfortunately, enemy flagships with Combat 10, especially those with mobility systems, are lightning bruisers. If the enemy Eagle/Dominator/Onslaught flagship gets deployed at first, it will be at the front or right behind the lead ships.
Hmm, IIRC there's a crossover point where, if you have enough mounts for them, a bunch of Tactical Lasers + PD AI > an equivalent number of PD/LR PD Lasers with no PD AI. I don't think any of the vanilla ships run into this, but some mod ships do - although there's no real sense in balancing the game to mods, so I guess this point is rather moot.
But beams weapons got a major upgrade now, you can count on them always be out putting their dps more reliably.
beam range is no longer the same range as ballistics means that the high tech AI not only will do damage better, but also stay more safe.Not completely true, Maulers (one of the best ballistics in the game, and not too rare) and HVDs have 1000 range too, and they fade away past that, not stop like beams. Against frigates and other small fry that cannot equip more than one medium weapon and/or have terrible flux dissipation, or AI with mediocre configuration; sure beams will be better. Also, without flux damage bonus, it will be harder for ships to overcome dissipation. I guess that is why their OP cost will get lowered. Beams will need Advanced Optics to outrange ballistics other than Gauss Cannon.
Quotebeam range is no longer the same range as ballistics means that the high tech AI not only will do damage better, but also stay more safe.Not completely true, Maulers (one of the best ballistics in the game, and not too rare) and HVDs have 1000 range too, and they fade away past that, not stop like beams. Against frigates and other small fry that cannot equip more than one medium weapon and/or have terrible flux dissipation, or AI with mediocre configuration; sure beams will be better. Also, without flux damage bonus, it will be harder for ships to overcome dissipation. I guess that is why their OP cost will get lowered. Beams will need Advanced Optics to outrange ballistics other than Gauss Cannon.
What I don't understand is if ammo doesn't do anything, why remove it? I have had times when I ran at of ammo, so why waste time removing it when you could do something else?^ THIS!
If we have combat timers why would we have things like ammo? 2 mechanics that stand for the exact same thing.
and advanced optics is super easy to get and cost very little op..How? Advanced Optics requires Applies Physics 7 (high SP cost), a skill I tend to totally ignore (or get 3 at endgame to shield a Cerberus fleet). The OP cost is not cheap. The only ships I consider Advanced Optics for is the Wolf and maybe Eagle, and only if I give up missiles (no Annihilators or Swarmers) and do not have Flux Dynamics 10, in which case, all spare points go to more vents.
If we have combat timers why would we have things like ammo? 2 mechanics that stand for the exact same thing.
Ammo does not function as a good combat timer mechanic because it mostly affects ballistic-based ships.
Here's what it does:
- It impacts the feel of ballistic weapons and differentiates them from energy weapons.
- There is a psychological component to ammo that grows the more the weapons are used.
- Ammo is presently an important factor in choosing between some ballistic weapons (e.g. Light Dual Autocannon vs. Railgun, Flak vs. Dual Flak, Hypervelocity vs. Heavy Needler, Heavy Autocannon vs. Heavy Needler, Vulcan Cannon vs. LMG, Gauss vs. Mjolnir, etc.)
- Mods bring a lot more weapons to the game, and many of those weapons are ammo-restricted.
I think that some of the changes to be introduced in this update are here mainly to simplify and standardize the gaming experience, and not to remove unnecessary, or to improve otherwise broken game mechanics.
How? Advanced Optics requires Applies Physics 7 (high SP cost), a skill I tend to totally ignore (or get 3 at endgame to shield a Cerberus fleet). The OP cost is not cheap. The only ships I consider Advanced Optics for is the Wolf and maybe Eagle, and only if I give up missiles (no Annihilators or Swarmers) and do not have Flux Dynamics 10, in which case, all spare points go to more vents.
I suppose all I'm concerned with is whether all of these changes are getting rolled in on the back end, or whether we'll still have control over them on the front end. For instance, I hope the ammunition counter hasn't been completely disabled for ballistic weapons -- i.e., if we wanted to, I hope we can go ahead and add it back in, in mod form, for those weapons we want to have ammo. If it's actually being handed on down from high that 'no, ballistic weapons no longer have ammo no matter what', then I'll be a sad panda. =PAlso, Alex is working on a clip based mechanic (Link: https://twitter.com/amosolov/status/545784125484175360 )
The flux-boost damage is at least 100% doable in mod code, through a scaled damage bonus, so that's not a major loss.
>clips
>clips
>clips
Alex, even on spaceboats, they're still magazines, goddamn.
Naval guns load ammunition into the firing chamber from a magazine into the turret itself.
They don't have "clips."
So.... is Alex going to be uploading an update tomorrow? A Christmas miracle?Last I checked, Santa isn't real.
So.... is Alex going to be uploading an update tomorrow? A Christmas miracle?Last I checked, Santa isn't real.
If we have combat timers why would we have things like ammo? 2 mechanics that stand for the exact same thing.
I think the way this works, is that instead of a central magazine, they have an autofac. The autofac produces clips of ammunition, which are then loaded into the individual guns' magazines.
- I can easily imagine an autofactory spitting out ammo not in single bullets but with connections, like the parts of a plastic mold (http://www.swannysmodels.com/images/F91/parts1.jpg). That would make for a natural, easy to transport clip and explain the whole mechanic.As for using an autofactory to manufacture ammunition as needed, I can only say that I cannot see this as being practical. The additional power required to run a factory is an unnecessary strain on the ship's reactors during a battle, and the space required to fit the factory (and possibly the extra reactors or the larger reactor required to run the factory on top of everything else required for battle) is in my opinion likely to cost you more space than you save by storing raw metal and the components for any explosives and propellant instead of complete shells. On top of that, manufacturing your ammunition is most likely slower than pulling it out of wherever you keep it when it's not in the ready magazines. I also doubt that it's significantly safer to store the components and manufacture the ammunition and propellant as needed than it is to just store the ammunition and propellant.
2 Combat timer, no limited ammo: Rewards spray and pray; punishes accurate and disciplined fire.I don't know that I'd quite say that the timer rewards spray and pray, as you still have a time pressure on your engagement and so accuracy still matters though having unlimited ammunition does remove the need to conserve ammunition and attempt to employ it for best effect rather than simply keeping a steady stream of fire on the target.
I have to ask, what is the point of having balli and energy weapons now if there really isn't any difference between the two?
I have to ask, what is the point of having balli and energy weapons now if there really isn't any difference between the two?
This, pretty much. The only differentiation will be hardpoint/turret compatibility, and if you were thinking along the lines of "flux bonus is gimmicky" or "ammo is an unnecessary resource", then think about the fact that you are now making it so that ships are primarily differentiated through the available slots. There's no real difference now between high- and low-tech ship paradigms now, as the only difference between the two will now be whether they go PEW PEW PEW or BZZZZZT.
Having ballistic weapons require ammo was a sacrifice at higher levels of gameplay, but it also had strategic value, especially as you got newer ships with universal slots -- slap in Ballistic weapons for better overall DPS, at the risk of having them run out if the battle ran too long, or go with Energy weapons for steady, if lower, DPS with no risk of running out of ammo. Now there's just going to be objectively 'best' weapons, in terms of DPS, and players will be rushing to either get the ship(s) that support that/those weapon(s), and everything else falls by the wayside. No more keeping low-tech 'brawlers' in your fleet composition because they have better short-term offensive ability, you might as well just stick with universal-slotted high-tech ships with better shields and reactors.
EDIT: I also realize I'm quoting from the first page of replies, didn't even think about the fact that there's been like 3 weeks of conversation on the topic; so if what I said has already been debunked/explained/accounted for, please ignore me.
Maybe tweak the damage profile of weapon types (and hull/armor value to compensate) to make things more dynamic? Personally, I edit the armor in the excel file for all the ships so anything other than explosives does squat to a fully armored battleship.
I think the game lost everything that was fun about it when Alex removed ammo. Now it's just unplayable.
QuoteI think the game lost everything that was fun about it when Alex removed ammo. Now it's just unplayable.
Aren't You exagerrating a bit?
I think the ballistic weapon changes (and the timers added to ships) is more because you could cause fleets to waste all their ammo with a ship like the Medusa or the Wolf, and then easily destroy them, rather than any weapons being especially imbalanced.
Stuff
combat balance pass:
Removed energy weapon bonus damage from high flux level
Increased damage values for non-beam energy weapons by roughly 25% to compensate
Beam weapons:
Standardized range to 1000 for most non-PD, from Tactical Laser to HIL
Increased range for PD Laser and LR PD Laser
Slightly reduced OP cost for all beam weapons
Tactical Laser, Graviton Beam, and Phase Beam are no longer interrupted by missiles (they damage missiles, but pass through them and can hit other things)
Greatly reduced fade in/out time for most beams
Missiles:
Salamander: both versions have unlimited ammo and require 20 seconds to reload
Hurricane MIRV: regenerates 1 ammo every 20 seconds
Pilum LRM: regenerates 1 ammo every 10 seconds
Ballistic weapons:
Now have unlimited ammo, except for Bomb Bay
Reduced OP cost of Light Dual MG
Ships
Destroyers and cruisers now have a peak effectiveness timer like frigates
Roughly 5-7 minutes for destroyers and 7-9 for cruisers
High-tech/faster ships have shorter timers
Sunder: increased top speed, acceleration, and flux capacity. Reduced shield efficiency.
Brawler/Shepherd: increased burn level by 1 (to 6)
Condor: reduced supplies/day by 1 (to 4)
About Ballistic weapons being weak:Quote-snip-I have to jump on the 'bring back ammo' band wagon, mostly because it offsets the power level of ballistics. IMO balistics should be super cheep in terms of flux generation, and SOME are, but I wish more were.. it would make Low Tier ships significantly more difficult to tangle with as opposed to - it fires twice, it's at 1/2 flux, I fire 1 reaper torp, it overloads, I empty missiles into its guts. GG.
Ballistics... wtf?
I like that low tier ships generally have high armor values but crap shields, and wish you guys played that up more than 'energy weapons and missiles are the ***.' I dont believe nurfing-buffing energy weapons is a good idea IMO - the 'high flux = bonus damage' is really cool factor for energy weapons and it DOES (as has been said) push you to potentially over extend yourself, which is good for a high tech ship, they are crazy risk-reward ships and quite brutally effective, and this just makes it easier to play them, which shouldnt be the case.
I say this because it again creates a heavy disparity between high-tech and low-tech ships. High tech ships have awesome hardpoints, speed, flux cap, shields, OP, abilities, (consider, if you will, ANY of the high tech frigates, and the Medusa) where as the low tech ships, like the enforcer are very very type cast, neutered by a crap tonne of ballistic hardpoints, that, if you want semi sustainable direct fire, they are hideously inaccurate, low damage (ish), and MONSTEROUS on the flux generation - and its HARD flux!
Beam Range
I like the different ranges as they are on the various mentioned beams, it makes each feel unique and even if it doesnt make much sense (lazors in space and all) uniqueness in weapons is a GOOD THING - there is actually a reason to take the Graviton Beam over the Phase Beam aside from just the OP difference. this is GOOD!
THE POINT...
Personally, I am all about leaving energy alone and just buffing ballistics by giving at least most of them positive dps:flux generation ratios and leaving ammo on them, or even buffing the ammo on them by +10-20%.
Missiles, these arent too bad, as they arent overly powerful, though the buff to the MIRV makes the Onslaught more disgusting.
more...
Buffalo...why?
I like the changes to destroyers and cruisers loosing combat efficiency, the downside is it hurts destroyers more, and they arent a super-powerful ship niche, at least tech level matters, as the ultra low-tier Buffalo missile support destroyer is in NO way comparable to any other destroyer. changing its ability from 'flares' (honestly, the last thing that is gonna kill it is missiles) to 'fast missile racks,' 'burn drive,' or even 'point defense drones' would be a gigantic step up for a ship who's only reason to be played, EVER, over ANY frigate, was its immunity to CR degradation.
Aurora... is too good. especially late. it solo's fleets. Onslaught fleets..
The beam change is both good and bad for it, good in that all those tactical lasers I like to use just got a +400range buff and will hit the same stuff as the Phase Beams, bad in that those very very few times when I have a gigantic buildup of flux, they dont do a lot more damage when compounded with its 'high energy focus' ability (hint: only happens against Onslaughts, and usually doesnt matter).
-Something in terms of its maneuverability, speed, or durability (shield) should probably change.
-Aside, but related: increasing the reload time of ALL Torpedoes as a trade-off to the colossal damage bonus they get from the lv10 buff in the 'Missile Specialization' skill tree.
ALL Cloaking Ships..
more flux generation when activating cloak, or more flux generation while cloaked, or slower. they are death to anything that isnt tweaked to crap, simply due to the twitch factor of the AI.
Ballistics are more flux-efficient, but low-tech ships have way worse flux stats and more weapon mounts to spend flux on.
I am also kind of amazed by how much blowback there has been about the ammunition changes given that the mechanic was almost entirely cosmetic aside from making like three weapons sorta bad (since they were never meant to have limited ammo as a balancing mechanic) and messing with Mega's gimmicky challenge runs.
I am also kind of amazed by how much blowback there has been about the ammunition changes given that the mechanic was almost entirely cosmetic aside from making like three weapons sorta bad (since they were never meant to have limited ammo as a balancing mechanic) and messing with Mega's gimmicky challenge runs.
It's a nothing change. Had it not been on the patch notes, I'd wager half of the people playing wouldn't even had noticed.
Beams are not main weapons, they are always support, if your killing something with beams that means you can kill it way faster with something way smaller using ballistics.This was not immediately obvious when I first played Starsector. Back then, I thought graviton beam was an excellent shield killer weapon because of kinetic damage. What a fool I was. Eventually, I discovered the best shield-killer weapon for the likes of a Wolf is the heavy blaster. Beams really should get their own damage type, so people not familiar with everything will not mistake that beams are simply more efficient and prettier pulse lasers like I did.
Turn off your shields unless you're about to take a big hit of HE damage or are fighting at noncommittal ranges. Your shields have terrible efficiency and using them to absorb damage in a brawl will quickly leave you capped out and unable to return fire. Instead, let your thick armor do its job and turn all that into hard flux for whatever poor bastard is trying to go toe-to-toe with you.Frigates and/or most high-tech ships are too squishy to take hits. Some ships can tank well, but not all. Also, without Damage Control 10, taking hits even on hardy ships like Dominator will take its toll in big, long fights with one flagship vs. enemy armada.
Ballistics are more flux-efficient, but low-tech ships have way worse flux stats and more weapon mounts to spend flux on.
The only change I am concerned about is beams, specifically the loss of damage. I am not sure if the range and OP cost changes will offset that.QuoteBeams are not main weapons, they are always support, if your killing something with beams that means you can kill it way faster with something way smaller using ballistics.This was not immediately obvious when I first played Starsector. Back then, I thought graviton beam was an excellent shield killer weapon because of kinetic damage. What a fool I was. Eventually, I discovered the best shield-killer weapon for the likes of a Wolf is the heavy blaster. Beams really should get their own damage type, so people not familiar with everything will not mistake that beams are simply more efficient and prettier pulse lasers like I did.
The best status condition to inflict on the enemy is death, not paralysis or insert other standard status effect. The best support weapons are those that kill the enemy as quickly as possible.QuoteTurn off your shields unless you're about to take a big hit of HE damage or are fighting at noncommittal ranges. Your shields have terrible efficiency and using them to absorb damage in a brawl will quickly leave you capped out and unable to return fire. Instead, let your thick armor do its job and turn all that into hard flux for whatever poor bastard is trying to go toe-to-toe with you.Frigates and/or most high-tech ships are too squishy to take hits. Some ships can tank well, but not all. Also, without Damage Control 10, taking hits even on hardy ships like Dominator will take its toll in big, long fights with one flagship vs. enemy armada.
Early game, good luck getting more than the starting blaster, for me, finding even mining ones were hard early on. god help you if your starting blaster wolf goes a'splodin.That applies to all weapons not on the open market (and open market has no energy weapon other than mining laser), since they need welcoming or better to access (barring lucky black market finds). By the time I get high enough relations with one faction to access weapons, it is midgame already.
early game you dont always have the firepower, range, speed to get a straight up kill in a fight. thus the place for the Phase beam and EMP in general. the Aurora is the best ship I know that can do what you mention here, simply because it has an alpha strike of over 14000damage. (I use Atropse(?)x4 torps, with reapers, it is substantially more.)Even in early game, I still want high offense for faster kills because of peak performance. Unskilled Wolf with heavy blaster can probably handle two frigates before peak performance times out. As it gets more skills, it can take on more and more.
Prior to the Vulcan buff, Mortars were viable in the onslaught's small mounts, as a short range, OP inexpensive, flux efficient dps spike for burn drive ramming.
WTF mortars? if you have a build that makes GOOD use of those PLEASE pm me
Say, I hate to be that annoying person, but is there a release date more specific than "sometime between today and the heat death of the universe"?
While the additions so far are definitely noteworthy, the one I really care about is the "Saves aren't so ridiculously huge" thing, as I'm playing the game on a glorified toaster.
Mein got, something happened! :D
"Hide hullmods that can't be installed" no longer hides hullmods that only can't be installed because they cost too many ordnance pointsI actually used that feature - I'd have my ship set up how I like with the bare essensial mods/weapons and then used that 'hide hullmods I can't fit/afford' to work out how to spend the rest of my OP.
Ship and weapon AI now more aware of target ship's overall shape (i.e. handles wide + short or long + narrow targets better)
Quick question if I may: does the clip reload mechanic interact with the expanded magazines hull mod, and if so, how?
I actually used that feature - I'd have my ship set up how I like with the bare essensial mods/weapons and then used that 'hide hullmods I can't fit/afford' to work out how to spend the rest of my OP.
Would be nice to have a second checkbox? I.E. a 'Hide incompatable hullmods' and a 'hide unaffordable hullmods' box?
Reload mechanics aren't really meant to be a buff from what I can tell. Indeed, in shorter battles it will probably be a nerf. All-in-all it will probably end up about even.
Is there a way in the API to adjust clip size or reload rate via hullmod or ship system or the like?Quick question if I may: does the clip reload mechanic interact with the expanded magazines hull mod, and if so, how?
The hullmod increases the maximum ammo. So, for example, if you had 100 ammo and a clip size of 20 (so, 5 clips), and you get +50% from expanded magazines, you'd have 150 ammo, a clip size of 20, and 7.5 clips. The number of clips is a stat derived from max ammo and clip size, so it doesn't actually have to evenly fit into max ammo, and isn't used for anything aside from giving you a sense for what fraction of the ammo gets reloaded per reload.
Is there a way in the API to adjust clip size or reload rate via hullmod or ship system or the like?
Do clips continue to reload even while the weapon is firing or does the timer till clip reload only tick down when the weapon isn't in use?
Is there a way in the API to adjust clip size or reload rate via hullmod or ship system or the like?No, there isn't. I could see adding it, it's just not in at the moment.Do clips continue to reload even while the weapon is firing or does the timer till clip reload only tick down when the weapon isn't in use?They continue to reload regardless of all other considerations.
It's this fellow: ¢
So, yeah.
So, with the changes to the Phase Beam there is now no medium sized energy standard beam weapon, right? I like the sound of the new weapon in general, but I'll have to change some of my fittings. I think this is a gap, now. We have the tactical laser in the small slot, the HIL in the large slot, and formerly the med slot was the phase beam.
So, with the changes to the Phase Beam there is now no medium sized energy standard beam weapon, right? I like the sound of the new weapon in general, but I'll have to change some of my fittings. I think this is a gap, now. We have the tactical laser in the small slot, the HIL in the large slot, and formerly the med slot was the phase beam.
Graviton Beam.
It's this fellow: ¢Why not ¥ or €? ;D
So, yeah.
At least personally I found that it was a little easier to compare when they were taken out from those unaffordable - especially when 50% plus are unaffordable. It isn't a big deal, just a small UI QOL feature.I actually used that feature - I'd have my ship set up how I like with the bare essensial mods/weapons and then used that 'hide hullmods I can't fit/afford' to work out how to spend the rest of my OP.
Would be nice to have a second checkbox? I.E. a 'Hide incompatable hullmods' and a 'hide unaffordable hullmods' box?
Ah, hmm. I don't want to mess with it for this release, but let me think about it. It does seem like the color-coding (red = unavailable) would still help you out here, with the list already being pruned of anything that's inapplicable. I suppose whether that's superior to outright hiding those mods is debatable/subjective. You generally don't have that many hullmod options available in the campaign, though.
It's this fellow: ¢Why not ¥ or €? ;D
So, yeah.
It's this fellow: ¢Why not ¥ or €? ;D
So, yeah.
Why would the universal interstellar currency (which is shared even between hostile-to-each-other factions) be aligned with a specific nation of the pre-space era?
¢ feels a lot more neutral (and also: ¢redits makes more sense than cred¥ts, cr€dits or credit$)
Nice! Does the new elliptical targeting area of ships hold any implications for potential shield form diversification? Or will shields definitely stay circles?
A bit of a shame with the pause function, but I agree that it didn't work out as it was. Any chance of trying something new with it, like an option to make pause cost CP?
Is there an API function that simulates the new 4-curve rangefinding algorithm? Such a thing would be quite useful because otherwise we have to basically guess how you've implemented it when making AI modules.
Yeah, I definitely want to write more blog posts. Expect one in the near future - probably a bit after the dust settles from this release.
One of the ideas way, way early was that not all weapon sizes provide weapons of all roles, giving another reason to fit smaller weapons into larger slots. Now, it didn't pan out exactly like that across the board, but with that in mind, I wouldn't say that a gap here and there is necessarily a bad thing.
You forgot to update the installer to create "0.65.2" folders.
LE: Uh.. Alex? Why does window mode now consider itself borderless windowed mode? I often started it out on window just to move it to another monitor and play. Don't get me wrong, i LOVE borderless fullscreen but.. atm minus setting my 'bigger' monitor as primary so SS starts on it, there is no way around moving the borderless window aside from using third party utilities or toying with settings.json. How about just a checkmark in the launcher?
You forgot to update the installer to create "0.65.2" folders.
What do you mean? IIRC there is no version number in any of the installation folders.
"If starting the game at full screen resolution in windowed mode, will automatically use an undecorated window"
This is borderless fullscreen, isn't it? Set by default. At least, that's what the changelog tells me.
I have no idea, then. My 0.65.2 installer wanted to create a "Starsector0.651a" folder.
"If starting the game at full screen resolution in windowed mode, will automatically use an undecorated window"
This is borderless fullscreen, isn't it? Set by default. At least, that's what the changelog tells me.
That's it then!
It's taking the resolution off my main monitor which is a 1280x1024 and deciding to borderless it even though i usually toss my 1600x900 window on the 1920x1080 monitor.
I have no idea, then. My 0.65.2 installer wanted to create a "Starsector0.651a" folder.
Weird - mine just creates a "Starsector" folder.
(This is where I'm supposed to say that computers are predictable machines and do everything for a reason.)
Can you still make ballistics that regenerate like the tpc still?
Cool, it's out; been waiting for this :) I'll have feedback when I have enough time for a real playthrough, hopefully this weekend :)
Thanks - hm, not crashing. I suspect the crash has to do with the contents of the mods folder, which would probably weigh in at rather more than 20 or even 300 mb.
I hope this mod doesn't put my energy weapons to shame. >w<
Or does it? O-O
I think you posted in the wrong thread :P .
As far as Protonus realizes, his dream of finally using reload-able ballistics has become a reality for which he can turn 550mm guns into Assault Rifles. :o
@EI
Why the red text? It rather hurts my eyes. o.O
Why would the universal interstellar currency (which is shared even between hostile-to-each-other factions) be aligned with a specific nation of the pre-space era?It was a joke, really. $ is so ubiquitous as a generic currency symbol that when someone uses something else, like the euro one, it's considered unusual.
The missile changes are a good first step, but they don't go nearly far enough. Every missile needs to work on the same ammo-regeneration system (either the Salamander fire-rate limited one, or the Pilums regenerating ammo - depending on role or whatever is easier to balance) - it stops them from being binary Overpowered-Useless and it's a great balancing lever.While I'll concede that it's a valid way to balance a game, it would also turn SS into the most boring space shooter ever. The kind that don't reward the player piloting skills and situational awareness because it's a RTS balance mechanic: it makes sense when you have no direct player control, and the units fire everything all the time in all situations to avoid micromanagement. I sure hope Starsector won't turn into one someday.
While I'll concede that it's a valid way to balance a game, it would also turn SS into the most boring space shooter ever. The kind that don't reward the player piloting skills and situational awareness because it's a RTS balance mechanic: it makes sense when you have no direct player control, and the units fire everything all the time in all situations to avoid micromanagement. I sure hope Starsector won't turn into one someday.
You guys do realize Alex already tried DatonKallandor's suggestion and ruled it out, right?
It's actually quite logical.
The missiles that got ammunition regeneration are the ones that are meant as long-range pressure, where when you fire you have no idea if the missile is going to do anything useful or just slow the target down momentarily; thus, the ammo regen, so you can't bait them out of ammo at extreme range when you're totally safe.
The ones that got no ammo at all are the salamanders, which are mid-range utility missiles; again, they were easy to safely bait out all the ammo - but, unlike the LRMs, Alex didn't want these to suffer from reduced rate of fire later in the engagement.
And the ones that still have ammo are all the short-range high-power missiles, where okay you technically can bait them out of ammo, but you can't do so safely, because you have to be in range of other weapons and (typically) at high flux before the AI fires the things.
The missile changes are a good first step, but they don't go nearly far enough. Every missile needs to work on the same ammo-regeneration system (either the Salamander fire-rate limited one, or the Pilums regenerating ammo - depending on role or whatever is easier to balance) - it stops them from being binary Overpowered-Useless and it's a great balancing lever.
Does 65.2a affect all of the mods because of the ballistics change, or do some of them work fine anyway?
...
And yet, Salamanders have never performed that role. They've always been damage-with-extra-benefits - easily as powerful as Harpoons in actual gameplay, if not better. Contrast with Sabots, which are actual utility missiles (which don't really work in their true role because of how the AI juggles shielding, but whatever) that are still ammo limited. ...
The missile changes are a good first step, but they don't go nearly far enough. Every missile needs to work on the same ammo-regeneration system (either the Salamander fire-rate limited one, or the Pilums regenerating ammo - depending on role or whatever is easier to balance) - it stops them from being binary Overpowered-Useless and it's a great balancing lever.
This is 100% true. As it stands now regenerating missiles are insanely OP compared to non regenerating, to the point of uselessness for the nonregen. Hmm let's see, do I want one inaccurate but powerful tropedo 5000 damage torpedo in a ten minute fleet fight, or do I want 100 500 damage missiles that can keep destroying the enemy for the entire fight from across the map. Eventually all missiles will be made regen, it is inevitable from a balance perspective. When you look at it from the damage per OP across the entire battle, nonregen missiles are just wasted OP when you could have unlimited missiles with the same OP that in aggregate do far more damage than the nonregen. And of course, with multiple missile launchers from multiple ship the ridiculous OP waste of nonregen missiles becomes even more glaring. The ability to spam a steady stream of regens across the battlespace from afar, from multiple angles, for the entire battle, makes whatever hard hitting, one time benefit of a nongen worthless by comparison.
And to top it off, it's really stupid from a lore standpoint. Really? The astral can load dozens, hundreds, of torpedos onto fighter bombers in a fight, but the 500 *** manning the battle ship can't figure out how to load a torpedo tube on the fly? Derp derp, I guess the special eds are working on the flag ship.
Those 100x 500 dmg missiles are 10 OP while the 1x 4000 dmg torpedo is only 2 OP and calls for a smaller slot size. Also, a Pilum launcher takes eleven and a half minutes to shoot off 100 missiles unless you have expanded racks, in which case it takes about eight and a half minutes. Most battles are shorter.This is like comparing garbage trucks to tomatoes.
As for balancing FMR, I think it should generate more flux, and make the flux it generates hard-flux.I doubt that will work, if Salamanders can still be launched afterwards.
QuoteThose 100x 500 dmg missiles are 10 OP while the 1x 4000 dmg torpedo is only 2 OP and calls for a smaller slot size. Also, a Pilum launcher takes eleven and a half minutes to shoot off 100 missiles unless you have expanded racks, in which case it takes about eight and a half minutes. Most battles are shorter.This is like comparing garbage trucks to tomatoes.
Missile spam is not a zero-sum proposition, like firing a torp generally is.
That 1X4000 torpedo misses / gets intercepted more often than not (practical hit rates are probably <30% when we include AI, not to mention torps never fired at all because the torp AI is so cautious), while about 20-40% of the Pilums will do damage, at a greater engagement range, with capabilities that that torpedo doesn't have, like finishing off multiple targets. It's a huge difference in real power :)
My take thus far: I tried various flavors of this out in Vacuum, and it's a pain in the neck to get it right, for a bunch of reasons, but mainly it was a performance issue for me, with the much bigger battle sizes, because dead missiles weren't getting removed from the battlefield, amongst other things. This is something I was going to fix, eventually, as it was causing some real problems; dead missiles in huge swarms (especially fast spammers like rocket racks) were a big problem, in terms of AI loading.
Ammo limits being off for all missiles is better, provided that feature is tweaked (say, a 1 second fade-out time after engines are out). It makes things simpler than the current system, which has suddenly gotten massively more complicated and has only improved gameplay marginally and erratically. Missiles have always had the pull problems associated with ammo-using weapons in general; if you can run them out, which was pretty easy with everything but Reapers / Pilums / Harpoons (sorta) then missiles were largely off the table and you could bring in your own missile shooters and have a huge advantage. Taking out the ammo problem largely fixes that issue.
But what we have here is, to be frank, utterly confusing and pretty arbitrary-feeling. For example, Annihilators seem like a perfect fit for endless ammo; they were always largely useless spammers with just a few squirrel cases; letting them spam all the time would make them a genuinely useful weapon as a no-flux spammer. But they have ammo limits. Pilums, which were already the best missiles for long-term pressure and were the hardest to pull completely, don't, which makes them really great, and massively better than an Annihilator.
A 5 OP Salamander completely wrecks an Annihilator, but more importantly, if the battle goes over 2 minutes, it wrecks a Harpoon firing three at a time, which costs more.
Sure, that Harpoon might be really lethal- once- but it's not likely, vs. targets with some PD, or if fighters pull them, or whatever, whereas that Salamander is still reliable against just about any target, if for no other reason than its engine-killing effects, and will stay in the fight. I'm not saying that the Harpoon isn't a good alpha-strike; it is, in player hands (and occasionally in AI hands, when it launches 12 or more in a massive volley) but generally speaking, the Harpoon has lost a great deal of relative power and I'd use the Salamander every time, if I could just get my hands on 3-pack launchers. Even the single-tube version is a massive step up from an Annihilator that costs more, though.
I don't think the right answer is to nerf the ammo-less missiles or to buff the ammo-limited ones, though. They really are about as lethal as they should be. I'd just put ammo regen on the rest of them and then pick some times that make sense; probably 10 seconds for a Harpoon, 30+ seconds for Reapers, <1 second for Annihilators, 15 seconds for Atropos. Adjusting those times to fix balance is probably the best way to get back to an even keel on this and simplify play, which has become massively more complicated with these changes and the clip system and is probably a confusing thing for newbies right now.
Is the clips mean unlimited ammo in limited bursts? Or does clips mean limited ammo in limited bursts?It is like the autopulse laser only the weapons regen ammo in chunks instead of single shots
I haven't actually tried the new version yet so I don't understand clips.
If you haven't played the new update yet, why are you saying that "we've gimped half the missiles, made the others completely OP, and energy is STILL overwhelming better than everything" hmm?
And to top it off, it's really stupid from a lore standpoint. Really? The astral can load dozens, hundreds, of torpedos onto fighter bombers in a fight, but the 500 *** manning the battle ship can't figure out how to load a torpedo tube on the fly? Derp derp, I guess the special eds are working on the flag ship.For what it's worth, several of the missiles without regenerating ammunition appear to be entirely external weapon systems, although Extended Missile Racks and Missile Specialization screw with that since they don't change the apparent number of missiles on the racks. If you mount a Harpoon Missile Rack, you get a weapon icon that shows 3 externally-carried missiles; Atropos Torpedo Racks likewise create a weapon icon showing a pair of externally-carried torpedoes, and a Reaper Torpedo (Single) shows a single externally-carried torpedo. This tends to imply that the weapon systems are exactly what their names imply - external racks carrying missiles for use in the next engagement, which are not set up with convenient access through the hull and armor for reloading during battle. Loading an external rack on a fighter that lands inside your nice climate-controlled hangar bay with its convenient trolleys or whatever for moving torpedoes quickly from the ammunition storage to the fighters in a safe environment is one thing. Loading an external rack from a likely inconveniently located cargo hatch while moving across the external surface of the hull of a ship under fire, when there's also likely not a particularly easy path between the missile rack and the cargo hatch, is a very different problem. Even if your Harpoon Missile Rack has a convenient hatch behind it (since there's clearly some kind of access there for the Salamander launchers, though it's possible that that only exists after you cut a hole in the hull armor), there's no guarantee that the reloading process would be easy; perhaps you would need to move the rack out of the way, or perhaps since the rack doesn't have a built-in reload system you need to tear it down and reassemble it, or perhaps you need to set up a temporary crane to move your missiles into position properly.
I really detest the clip based system. It sounded like an ok compromise between having the previous ammo system and no ammo at all, but in reality is worse than both. It doesn't serve any purpose but to break up engagements and interrupt your fights as you wait for ammo to trickle in. It adds an entire extra layer of complexity to ballistics that feels totally unnecessary, a step in the absolute opposite direction of what I understood the purpose of moving away from ammo in the first place was. To free up complexity for other parts of the game.I tend to feel that the clip system is, for the most part, fine. It's no worse than regenerating ammunition that can be expended more rapidly than it regenerates, it's simply more bursty (which is arguably an advantage, particularly against shields). Some of the weapons could probably be adjusted to make more sense for what the weapon is supposed to be (e.g. the Vulcan Cannon would more sensibly have 1x1000 ammunition with 1x1000 reloaded every minute rather than 5x20 ammunition with 1x20 reloaded every few seconds).
Starsector 0.65.2a - we've gimped half the missiles, made the others completely OP, and energy is STILL overwhelming better than everything, hahaha.
...
.... Balance the strike from non-strike missiles with reload time. ...
Range on Phase Lance is too short!
Range on Phase Lance is too short!Nah. The problem is that they don't do Hard Flux. So you charge in, and it actually does pretty efficient damage, for a beam, but wait, it's Soft Flux. So the Graviton Beam still, er, well, it still sucks a bit, but it's a genuine support weapon, kind of.
For what it's worth, several of the missiles without regenerating ammunition appear to be entirely external weapon systems, although Extended Missile Racks and Missile Specialization screw with that since they don't change the apparent number of missiles on the racks. If you mount a Harpoon Missile Rack, you get a weapon icon that shows 3 externally-carried missiles; Atropos Torpedo Racks likewise create a weapon icon showing a pair of externally-carried torpedoes, and a Reaper Torpedo (Single) shows a single externally-carried torpedo. This tends to imply that the weapon systems are exactly what their names imply - external racks carrying missiles for use in the next engagement, which are not set up with convenient access through the hull and armor for reloading during battle. Loading an external rack on a fighter that lands inside your nice climate-controlled hangar bay with its convenient trolleys or whatever for moving torpedoes quickly from the ammunition storage to the fighters in a safe environment is one thing. Loading an external rack from a likely inconveniently located cargo hatch while moving across the external surface of the hull of a ship under fire, when there's also likely not a particularly easy path between the missile rack and the cargo hatch, is a very different problem. Even if your Harpoon Missile Rack has a convenient hatch behind it (since there's clearly some kind of access there for the Salamander launchers, though it's possible that that only exists after you cut a hole in the hull armor), there's no guarantee that the reloading process would be easy; perhaps you would need to move the rack out of the way, or perhaps since the rack doesn't have a built-in reload system you need to tear it down and reassemble it, or perhaps you need to set up a temporary crane to move your missiles into position properly.
Furthermore, weapon systems which cannot be reloaded "on the fly" in the middle of battle are not stupid from a lore perspective. They have simply made a trade-off; a single Harpoon rack can get off its three missiles more rapidly than the Salamander launcher or hypothetical Harpoon launcher can get off an equivalent number of missiles. Even more extreme versions of such weapon systems have been used in reality; some WWI and WWII submarines had external torpedo tubes/drop collars which could not be reloaded until the vessel returned to port, there are several types of infantry rocket launchers which are single-use devices, and there are some types of handgun for which the reload instructions are along the lines of "ambush and kill enemy soldier, then take his gun and use that instead."
It can also be argued that this is a reflection of a safety feature. Harpoon missiles, Atropos torpedoes, and Reaper torpedoes have warheads whose explosive power is nearly (or entirely) unmatched by any other weapon, and additionally have whatever explosive power is stored in the propellant. For the sake of the ship's safety, such powerful weapons may be carried externally in an area where there is no direct access to the internal parts of the ship to minimize the danger posed by accidental detonation once the warheads are united with the fueled missiles. Sure, it increases the chances of the missiles being rendered unusable due to enemy fire in an engagement and it makes it inconvenient to reload the weapon system, but it also means that the ship probably isn't going to be completely gutted by its own torpedoes going off, it increases the chance that you can quickly and safely jettison a malfunctioning ready-to-use missile or torpedo before it explodes on or inside the ship's hull, and it makes lucky hits setting off torpedoes in tubes which penetrate the primary armor belt less concerning since there are no such tubes. The missile pods likely make use of a similar system, except with the (presumably internal) ammunition storage designed in such a way that the detonation of stored ammunition preferentially directs the force of the blast away from the ship, but having any internal doors open during battle for reloading would compromise this.
The previous update made missiles more powerful - to the point where people were calling Harpoons overpowered.
...The previous update made missiles more powerful - to the point where people were calling Harpoons overpowered.
Yeah that's awesome when they all get launched by the AI and the PD zaps them or they just miss outright or just get eaten by shields and you're like so overpowered thank God I didn't sink those 1-20 OP in worthless flux or vents or a weapon that can fire more than 3 times hahaha the enemy is so cowed I don't even need that 10% OP
People were complaining about skilled enemy Dominators evaporating a destroyer with every volley of 12 Harpoons, at 0 flux cost.Yup, that's a thing, if your Destroyer's Flux was high enough. Been there, got the shirt (it's mildly radioactive though, so I don't wear it).
Yeah this is a really cool explanation in a spaceship space game with cosmic time travel through wormholes and grammitron particle lasers. I especially love the touch about the reaper torpedo's being especially volatile and dangerous, as opposed to say the shipboard singularity of theoretically infinite piliums and their constituent explosive gels and powders, all being manufactured, charged and loaded in extreme combat that kills the equipment operators, blows up and fries the internals, and that could theoretically destroy the ships entire hull down to one hitpoint but keep this elaborate and terrifying supply chain running perfectly. You know what else is cool? How you can lose every piece of hull down to one and fully repair the ship in deep space given enough time and enough crispity crunchy deluxe fortified magic jiggawatt cubes (supplies). I would really like to see that in an aircraft carrier, torpedo it 4 or 5 times, strafe it with a GAU-8 Avenger, kill half the crew and watch the other half restore it to perfect readiness using duct tape and peanut butter OUT OF PORT1. It's a possible explanation for why it's done. Other explanations were offered. Beyond that, believe it or not, ships are just as full of singularities of Reaper Torpedoes as they are of singularities of Pilum LRMs, the only difference is they cannot reload the launchers in the middle of battle. The sizes of the infinite quantities of torpedoes and LRMs may be different, but they're still infinite quantities; you don't technically ever need to return to port to restock any type of ammunition.
On alpha striking with missiles:
A fleet with one a ship that has just used up all its small/medium missiles is basically a fleet with one ship operating on a 2-24 OP penalty, depending on what the mounts were and what was put in them.
A fleet with one ship that got alpha-struck out of the battle is a fleet that's down 40 - 140 OP worth of combat ability. And unlike the missile ammo, the lost crew and the hull damage aren't replaced for free. If the ship gets disabled instead of merely being forced to retreat, you lose any number of weapons and more often that not a hull that's likely to be hard, possibly near-impossible to replace.
Other than the boorish sarcasm, which frankly just undermines everything you say, this just tells me you really just never used them right. You fire them when the enemy is vulnerable, or you fire them in overwhelming force and get a straight up kill. Frigates can sometimes dodge, but destroyers and up can't. People were complaining about skilled enemy Dominators evaporating a destroyer with every volley of 12 Harpoons, at 0 flux cost.
Are you seriously advocating the introduction of regenerating reapers and other torpedos? Do you genuinely have difficulty getting reapers to connect on a regular basis, or making effective use of harpoons?
Why is it that hard hitting, alpha striking, fast moving, PD-proof anti-matter blasters regen, but hard hitting, alpha striking, slow moving, PD vulnerable Reapers do not regen? Oh right, because non regen alpha missiles are a complete worthless waste of OP compared to completely overpowered energy builds (more flux, more capacity, more energy weapons) and I guess with the new version regen missiles.AM blasters don't regen.
Personal attack removed.
There's an interesting disconnect here; limited munition things like missiles work much better when used directly by the player. Argh is speaking from the perspective of putting torpedos on AI-piloted vessels where, indeed, they are not all that great. Ahrenjb is speaking from the perspective of putting torpedos on the flagship where - especially with the skill to boost ammo count and damage and speed - it's easy to spend just a few ordnance points to be able to take an entire enemy ship out of the equation.
For the record I think alpha missiles are by far the coolest weapons in the game, I would really like to use them, I just can't in good conscious gimp my fleet of 10-15% of its OP on a one shot attack that usually ends up missing or just getting eaten by shields. I mean, do you all really think Repear torpedo's or harpoons are really so devastatingly effective?For some ships, with Missile Specialization 10, yes! Hyperion flagship with max Missile Specialization can kill almost any enemy flagship (with armor that takes only half damage and can regenerate hull damage) instantly with four Reapers. Without them, it will take minutes to kill such a ship with Heavy Blasters alone. Minutes lost means peak performance is gone and CR is decaying. When fighting a fleet with chain-flagships, burst damage is important to kill endgame bounty fleets quickly. Reapers allow the Hyperion to solo fleets it otherwise could not.
I really detest the clip based system. It sounded like an ok compromise between having the previous ammo system and no ammo at all, but in reality is worse than both. It doesn't serve any purpose but to break up engagements and interrupt your fights as you wait for ammo to trickle in. It adds an entire extra layer of complexity to ballistics that feels totally unnecessary, a step in the absolute opposite direction of what I understood the purpose of moving away from ammo in the first place was. To free up complexity for other parts of the game.
It feels disjointed and more in-the-way than anything else, and I hope to soon see it go away. An idea that was tested and didn't work out. Changes the entire feel of combat with ballistics, and not in any positive way.
I didn't think I would feel this way before, but after actually spending some time in game and using a variety of setups and weapons to give it a really fair try, I'm sure. If I had to choose between this and no ammo at all, I choose no ammo. I know you try things out all the time Alex, and based on how you think it works out it either makes it into the game or it doesn't, but I'm not sure what your thought process was here. Do you actually like this system? Did you decide to let the playerbase try it and, based on feedback, decide whether or not to keep it? Or did you try it, understand it sucked, and push it on the playerbase as punishment for not receiving the "no ammo for ballistics" change very well?
IMO Reapers > Harpoons even for AI, although I haven't tested Harpoons all that much. I think I'll go do that, cause why not.
One thing about AI Harpoon usage is that it'll quickly fire off large salvoes vs unshielded ships. Not entirely sure how to address it, since in many circumstances it *does* make sense to alpha-strike any Hounds and Cerberi (?) into oblivion, but in other cases it makes sense to save the Harpoons for other threats, and that's a tough call for the AI to make. Anyway, all that is to say, when you're trying out Harpoons, keep in mind that the AI is going to use them best vs shielded ships.I noticed this. Many of my ships spend their Harpoons early on unshielded ships, and that happens in most fights. Harpoons are not that deadly when not backed by Missile Specialization. I have resorted to either Annihilators (burst damage) or Swarmers or Pilums (homing option) for AI ships instead. Swarmers from 20+ frigates will hurt anything. Now that Salamanders are unlimited, I plan to replace Swarmers on all of my ships with them. Salamanders are just as lethal once the armor is gone.
Hmm. It might make sense to go back to infinite ammo for a few ballistics (conceptually, they can just reload as fast as they fire), and only leave the clip-based mechanic on a few weapons where it makes sense as a balancing factor. That'd also meet the original goal of simplifying things somewhat.Mm. I'll also add that, when I posited "chunk reload" mechanics (essentially the same as current clip reload), I included a suggestion that the expanded magazines hull mod should improve reload rate - most likely by increasing the clip size - and thought that for some weapons (especially small ballistic pd), this ought to bring the reload rate up to match the rate of fire.
Of course, different players, different playstyles; I've had this discussion with various people before, and it's usually a stalemate. Some people think the autocannon's slightly better armor penetration and lower ordnance point cost win out. Others (including me) think that the heavy needler's burst damage, shot speed (and thus ease of hitting targets) and flux efficiency make it superior.For what it's worth, the flux efficiency of the Heavy Needler is more than a little deceptive. Under the current patch, a Heavy Needler generates 80 flux per second as opposed to a Heavy Autocannon's 100 flux per second, but as long as you can add vents you can get 10 flux per second of dissipation per ordnance point and each Heavy Needler costs 5 more ordnance points than a Heavy Autocannon would. Heavy Needlers also generate ~283 flux per burst as compared to the Heavy Autocannon's ~140 flux per burst, which means they're a little harder to fire at high flux levels than the Heavy Autocannons are.
The flux generated by ballistic weapons was decreased.Odd, I'd expect to see that in the patch notes. The Mjolnir had its flux cost decreased, but it rather needed that. Other ballistics did not. Are you sure you're not using some sort of balance-altering mod?
You can always make them (and every other missile) unlimited. The only non-regenerating missiles I use now are either 0 OP singles, Reaper, and maybe Annihilators.IMO Reapers > Harpoons even for AI, although I haven't tested Harpoons all that much. I think I'll go do that, cause why not.
One thing about AI Harpoon usage is that it'll quickly fire off large salvoes vs unshielded ships. Not entirely sure how to address it, since in many circumstances it *does* make sense to alpha-strike any Hounds and Cerberi (?) into oblivion, but in other cases it makes sense to save the Harpoons for other threats, and that's a tough call for the AI to make. Anyway, all that is to say, when you're trying out Harpoons, keep in mind that the AI is going to use them best vs shielded ships.
I'm curious, which weapons specifically have you used that feel that way? And what length of fights are we talking about?
Hmm. It might make sense to go back to infinite ammo for a few ballistics (conceptually, they can just reload as fast as they fire), and only leave the clip-based mechanic on a few weapons where it makes sense as a balancing factor. That'd also meet the original goal of simplifying things somewhat.
So with the new weapon changes, does each category (energy, ballistic, etc) still feel distinct or is everything muddied now?It doesn't feel muddled. That really isn't a problem and hasn't ever really been a problem; the Kinetic / HE split from Energy was always enough to keep the border between Energy pew-pew and Ballistic pew-pew fundamentally interesting, imo, regardless of the other specific mechanics... and while the clip thing hasn't worked entirely perfectly, it definitely can add flavor.
1) As Tartiflette said: AM Blaster doesn't regen.On alpha striking with missiles:
A fleet with one a ship that has just used up all its small/medium missiles is basically a fleet with one ship operating on a 2-24 OP penalty, depending on what the mounts were and what was put in them.
A fleet with one ship that got alpha-struck out of the battle is a fleet that's down 40 - 140 OP worth of combat ability. And unlike the missile ammo, the lost crew and the hull damage aren't replaced for free. If the ship gets disabled instead of merely being forced to retreat, you lose any number of weapons and more often that not a hull that's likely to be hard, possibly near-impossible to replace.Other than the boorish sarcasm, which frankly just undermines everything you say, this just tells me you really just never used them right. You fire them when the enemy is vulnerable, or you fire them in overwhelming force and get a straight up kill. Frigates can sometimes dodge, but destroyers and up can't. People were complaining about skilled enemy Dominators evaporating a destroyer with every volley of 12 Harpoons, at 0 flux cost.
Why is it that hard hitting, alpha striking, fast moving, PD-proof anti-matter blasters regen, but hard hitting, alpha striking, slow moving, PD vulnerable Reapers do not regen? Oh right, because non regen alpha missiles are a complete worthless waste of OP compared to completely overpowered energy builds (more flux, more capacity, more energy weapons) and I guess with the new version regen missiles.
mean, do you all really think Repear torpedo's or harpoons are really so devastatingly effective? They are pretty good against low tech fleets but energy fleets will chaos blast them with PD without much difficulty.You are completely wrong. Common light energy PD will do very little against multiple Harpoons and nothing against Reapers; you need two or more Burst PD Lasers at minimum. For dealing with mass Harpoons (or Annihilators), flak beats any energy PD weapon (especially on a per-OP basis) short of Guardian PD.
My fighter wing is nothing but Repear fighter bombers, 5-7 wings of them, launching wave after wave of repears, and in that regard, they are effective. Backed by proper fire support, they can pop a destroyer or a cruiser, every few minutes or so, because you know, they get more than one reaper over a 5 minute fleet engagment...regenerating repear wings are a very good balance, non regenerating repears, gimp city. Same thing with harpoons, thunders get new harpoons every few minutes. But other ships can't? Because of balance? Ridiculous and overly complicating double standards...that add nothing to gameplay...You noticed something about those examples you used? Hint: they're both fighters, which are already a "double standard." Not only do they get to reload missiles mid battle, they even respawn when killed. Of course, they pay for it in certain ways, like requiring a separate ship (a carrier), with all its attendant DP and supply costs, to be able to use their special powers. They also use a lot of supplies relative to their combat power, especially if they're dying a lot. Also, aside from bombers, fighter wings just don't carry enough missiles to overwhelm targets.
HAHAHAHA, so I've actually gone all the way and actually played the new version, and holy motherloving crapoly I am literally 200% right. I'm so sorry for even starting the debate, because it's so lopsided that there's obviously some perception/fundamental personality differences here that can't be bridged. Literally L O L at the new version imbalances.Your attitude is embarrassing, and combined with the factual wrongness of your posts, extremely annoying. Stop it.
3. Lol at the missiles. Lol at the missiles. Starsector: spam piliums until EVERYTHING dies. Got a problem? Piliums. Got a problem? More piliums. Piliums piliums piliums for the auto win. Harpoon multilauncher? BWHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA *fires 30 piliums every 30 seconds for the rest of the battle* I haven't found them yet but I'm sure salamanders are just as bad. Anyway, balance it or don't, the new version is hilarious, I love it.2014 called, they want their strategy back. (http://fractalsoftworks.com/forum/index.php?topic=8886.msg150270#msg150270) (Yes, mass Pilums was a thing before 0.65.2a, believe it or not.)
a falcon stuffed to the brim with harpoons btw (lol).10 OP spent on Harpoons on a 105 OP ship is not "stuffed to the brim."
I watched another Wolf kite both an enforcer and lasher with tactical lasers and the blue one. Now granted they can't kill them but they can tie them up successfully until their CR gives out, and with the range boost it becomes even more devastating.Wrong again. A lone Wolf can't drain an Enforcer's CR (even when the Enforcer is firing, surprisingly) because it is a frigate against a destroyer. A Wolf can kite a Lasher to drain its CR... except for the fact that it also drains its own CR in the process. Guess who runs out first.
2014 called, they want their strategy back. (http://fractalsoftworks.com/forum/index.php?topic=8886.msg150270#msg150270)8)
Well balance it to be a factor then.To be balanced, Ballistics would have to be significantly more powerful, DPS/Flux-wise. More over, when it's "a factor" is largely dependent on play-styles; if you're a lone-wolf, one-ship-at-a-time arcade player, then ammo of any kind is a major deterrent from using Ballistics at all; if you're mega-fleet player, then it's much less important than how good the DPS/Flux efficiency is and whether you want to go Low / Mid Tech at all, past the early game.
QuoteWell balance it to be a factor then.To be balanced, Ballistics would have to be significantly more powerful, DPS/Flux-wise. More over, when it's "a factor" is largely dependent on play-styles; if you're a lone-wolf, one-ship-at-a-time arcade player, then ammo of any kind is a major deterrent from using Ballistics at all; if you're mega-fleet player, then it's much less important than how good the DPS/Flux efficiency is and whether you want to go Low / Mid Tech at all, past the early game.
Hmm. It might make sense to go back to infinite ammo for a few ballistics (conceptually, they can just reload as fast as they fire), and only leave the clip-based mechanic on a few weapons where it makes sense as a balancing factor. That'd also meet the original goal of simplifying things somewhat.(c.f. Autopulse Laser, Burst PD Laser/Heavy Burst Laser)
I am totally against the whole idea of degrading performance in combat, especially if there is no ammunition limits now. While it seems logical for frigates, it is killing destroyers because many high-end frigates outperform them, and there is only one really good destroyer on vanilla game - Medusa.I think you can argue that one either way. Personally, I feel that regenerating ammo has largely gotten rid of the lone-wolf tactic of running the AI out of ammo, but it hasn't gotten rid of lone-wolf kiting stuff, so I think that this change isn't totally unreasonable. It'd be better if total fleet sizes were big enough, on both sides, that rotating out whole sets of ships was a core concept in late-game, though.
Missiles weapons have repeatedly been proven ridiculously powerful when used en masse. Making them all regen ammo would completely break the game balance to the point that nobody would even consider using anything else...
I'm talking in a "mission" environment with no skills involved (but you are right, it becomes ridiculous with skills). And it's still true with one shot missiles. Pillums relies on cool-down instead of ammo and have been prone to create unstoppable death balls, the only reason they are vaguely balanced is the lack of medium missile mounts on cheap ships. Same goes for the extremely annoying Annihilator Pod. Making all missiles regen ammo, especially the ubiquitous small ones, would instead create death balls every few seconds. I don't see how you can tell this could be balanced, unless you also nerf their damage hard.
MindsEye, your method of 'balancing' ballistics would make using low-tech/midline ships unnecessarily complicated and tedious. For example what would happen if the ship that supplies ammo got destroyed when I needed it? I would pretty much have to abandon the battle because I couldn't attack. That change would immediately cause high-tech ships to become the superior (and more fun) option (something 0.65 has help fix).
Also how would the ammo be set so that each shot counts? Would it be set up for a short battle, a medium one? If so it would make that ammo ship mandatory if you unexpectedly had a long battle, causing more trouble for low-tech/midline and more reason to use high-tech. It would also make weapons like the assault chaingun and AC series useless considering their bad accuracy.
Personally I think how it is now is a step in the right direction. While some ballistic weapons need work (PD and needlers) most are actually useful, including those that were originally worthless like the HMG and Gauss Cannon.
Onslaught battleship with four piliums, fully upgraded missiles with both missile mods, set them on linked autofire for the whole battle...*whistles* no plausible reason for harpoons. The missiles ALONE can devastate half the enemy fleetand when said Onslaught is equipped with dual flaks and a few longer ranged weapons like needlers you just overload any frigates stupid enough to get close....just add a tug because Ons only has 2 burn :)
Aaaaaaaand piliums are nerfed ;D
Very quick, Alex. Well done!
Observations on Pilum nerf:
Fleet actions still seem to play out about the same. As they should, IMO.
In pursuit, Pilums are now nearly useless for catching things. Not saying that is good or bad, it just is.
Conquest with Augmented Engines, 75 0-flux speed boost from skills, the help of maneuvering jets, and with high readiness can now outrun Pilums. I'm not sure if that is acceptable or not. It does have the awesome side effect of a high-skill Conquest with four Pilum launchers riding into battle in front of a horde of missiles.
Edit: Friendly fire from massed Pilums might have been increased by this nerf, especially during pursuits. Will conduct further testing to see if this result holds up.
Edit2: Pilums definitely seem to be running out of fuel sooner or something...
Modding:
- Added CombatEngineAPI.Map<String, Object> getCustomData() - Time to plug them TwigLib memory leaks I guess
Ah, you know, I forgot to increase their flight time to match the reduced speed, so their effective range is now a bit lower - down to 7000 from 10000. Same flight duration, though.
Ah, you know, I forgot to increase their flight time to match the reduced speed, so their effective range is now a bit lower - down to 7000 from 10000. Same flight duration, though.
Corrected value should be 80, right? 40 -> 80?
Sure you couldn't implement some kind of multiple part ship system thing yourself Alex? Feel free to take any and all of my code to do with as you see fit :P Save me having to maintain it :) #IamLazy
Ah, you know, I forgot to increase their flight time to match the reduced speed, so their effective range is now a bit lower - down to 7000 from 10000. Same flight duration, though.
Corrected value should be 80, right? 40 -> 80?
Right, sorry - thanks for pointing it out. So yeah, Pilum range is 5000, though the AI will still launch them at 10k. Ugh, but probably not hotfix-hotfix worthy.
DamagingProjectileAPI.getDamageAmount() returns 0 after the projectile has dealt damage (i.e. in contexts outside of an on hit plugin, such as an every frame plugin). This causes a lot of issues, as you might imagine.
Unfortunately, I couldn't confirm this until now, but this bug has been in .2a the whole time.
It's been a while since I've played Starsector for long periods of time but is it me or the latest version makes AI a bit more close-ranged than before?
I remember vaguely AI kiting very well at the edge of its main weapon range in the old days but last night, I had the distinct impression that the AI gets, and allow you to get, much closer.
In a lot of battles, I just rammed (frigate to frigate) into the AI and unload my harpoons before the PD has a chance in to respond for a quick kill. I don't think I've ever abused this tactic before mostly because I remember having a hell of a time even getting a Hound into my weapons range in v5-something years ago. Maybe this is in response to the new beam range? Is the trying to get close so you can't kite them to death with just tactical lasers?
Oh Alex, any hint on what the next update will contain? Are the 'upcoming feature' on the website what's coming in the next major update or just a general to-do list?
So, I thought I understood it, how exactly does ballistics ammo work now?
The ballistics all seem purely unlimited now, with no reloading aspects involved. I saw that in the weapons_data that the Light Machine Gun, just an example, has a value under reload_size but I can't tell how this works in-game.
Also, the game doesn't communicate very well which missiles will and will not regenerate. There's not real way to tell any difference between the Salamander MRM and the Harpoon Rack/Single outside of testing them.
Edit; should we expect the clip functions to disappear from your base files? I ask because I liked the sound of the system and was going to use it, but I wouldn't want to do that if the next version would break all that.
So, then, it might actually be best to up the ammo for the Salamander (and Pod) to something like 2-3 bursts worth, keep the refire delay high, and add ammo regen at the rate of the refire delay or thereabouts. Then we'd get the reload rate in the tooltip, it'd work with FMR, and would otherwise remain about the same. Hm.
All ballistics have bottomless mags now? As in, no defined ammo count in weapon_data? I've been doing that anyway to all guns that aren't burst weapons in all mods I've been playing for a few months because I'm not a fan of just kiting all the guns dry and I edit the peak performance away because for similar reasons to kiting the guns dry, I don't like being under pressure to make it a quickie or to sit there and play "Do you feel lucky, punk?" with the AI as our ships crumble into shambles.
- Ballistic weapons: removed ammo/clips; mechanic still exists for modding/possible future use
I did like the reload mechanic. Kind of sad to see it go.
(Damn, I wish I'd kept the weapon_data.csv file handy - I meant to do that, and then obviously I forgot. Does anyone just happen to have that?)
(Damn, I wish I'd kept the weapon_data.csv file handy - I meant to do that, and then obviously I forgot. Does anyone just happen to have that?)
A guy on the internet delivers (https://www.dropbox.com/s/bu4euti0ukkiqu3/weapon_data.csv?dl=0).
inb4illegaldistributionofgamecode.
Thanks! I do want to play around with this as well; I think it should be usable as a good balancing mechanic for guns that are otherwise "too good" (Mauler, Mjolnir, etc.). That said, I also think that expanded magazines should really improve the reload rate as well; hopefully Alex got that in so I can play with it.I did like the reload mechanic. Kind of sad to see it go.
(Damn, I wish I'd kept the weapon_data.csv file handy - I meant to do that, and then obviously I forgot. Does anyone just happen to have that?)
A guy on the internet delivers (https://www.dropbox.com/s/bu4euti0ukkiqu3/weapon_data.csv?dl=0).
Tac lasers are maybe a bit too long ranged... would lowering to 900 make a huge difference against low tech ships? Might give Hounds the chance to close without getting zapped too long.Against a Wolf? Nah. Skimmers.
is via Vigilance spam, and that's a weird squirrel case if I ever saw one.
I don't care for the Pilum change, personally. I think it just about wrecked them for their job of killing Frigates and Fighters at long range. Honestly, I'd rather see their reload speed go down than their speed get nerfed, if nerfing is required. I don't think a damage nerf would work; then they're not able to do one-salvo kills on fighters or be a real threat.I think the speed was slowed because people with max Missile Specialization used them as Harpoons. I did, and it was very effective, enough to make Harpoons obsolete. Skilled enemy flagships with Pilums (e.g., Odyssey) always killed something if you did not kill them immediately.
I don't really get why that's even necessary, though; they only really became a major issue with ships that could mount them, which is mainly the big slow stuff that has enough PD to defeat them. I can't see killing an Onslaught with Pilums; the number of missile-carriers you'd need would be pretty prohibitive, considering that they're either easy meat (BMK2, Gemini et al) or they're very expensive, Logistics-wise. The only way I could see it happening is via Vigilance spam, and that's a weird squirrel case if I ever saw one.
DPS is almost irrelevant.
That's what I did for all missiles (except the regen is lower than the refire for all of them) - it works great. Keeps FMR and +ammo skills useful without being too good because the missile has a sub-5 second refire.
That was... kind of a quick about-face on the mechanic. Alex you made Assault Chaingun inferior in every way to Heavy Mauler again, I am sad :(
Either the weapon had enough ammo that clips did not matter, or it had so little ammo that DPS was effectively half for most of the fight. Expanded Magazines did not help low capacity weapons enough to matter.
The lack of ammo limits for ballistic weapons has had some interesting side effects: it is now much less important to mount a mix of damage types when using ballistics. Before, taking down shields with HE or armor with kinetics just chewed through too much ammo to be practical; now, the only drawback is if it takes so long as to mess with your CR timer, and (at least for me) that doesn't seem to be happening. As a result, I'm probably going to lean much more heavily towards kinetic ballistics (possibly backed by EMP damage), since they are much better at putting flux on enemy shields and thus limiting return fire.
I think the speed was slowed because people with max Missile Specialization used them as Harpoons. I did, and it was very effective, enough to make Harpoons obsolete. Skilled enemy flagships with Pilums (e.g., Odyssey) always killed something if you did not kill them immediately.So that's a problem with Missile Specialization 10, then? I mean, isn't that the only place where it's obviously OP (well, that and ships with FMR, but again, that's totally fixable)?
You see, I tend to feel that that is more of an argument for "Missile Specialization should be changed" than for "Pilum LRMs should be changed." Pilum LRMs were fine (and honestly not terribly impressive unless you brought lots of them) without the bonuses from Missile Specialization. If Weapon A is not a problem except in combination with Skill B, then the solution to Weapon A + Skill B being a problem probably isn't "make Weapon A kind of pointless without Skill B." But that's my opinion, and I tend to dislike how most of the Combat skills skew things anyways.I don't care for the Pilum change, personally. I think it just about wrecked them for their job of killing Frigates and Fighters at long range. Honestly, I'd rather see their reload speed go down than their speed get nerfed, if nerfing is required. I don't think a damage nerf would work; then they're not able to do one-salvo kills on fighters or be a real threat.I think the speed was slowed because people with max Missile Specialization used them as Harpoons. I did, and it was very effective, enough to make Harpoons obsolete. Skilled enemy flagships with Pilums (e.g., Odyssey) always killed something if you did not kill them immediately.
I don't really get why that's even necessary, though; they only really became a major issue with ships that could mount them, which is mainly the big slow stuff that has enough PD to defeat them. I can't see killing an Onslaught with Pilums; the number of missile-carriers you'd need would be pretty prohibitive, considering that they're either easy meat (BMK2, Gemini et al) or they're very expensive, Logistics-wise. The only way I could see it happening is via Vigilance spam, and that's a weird squirrel case if I ever saw one.
DPS is almost irrelevant.
the only weapon in the bunch where I'm still kind of ambivalent about it's niche is the Arbalest, which is just not useful in any way. I'd really like to see it double its DPS and Flux and halve its refire rate, personally, giving it the hard-hitter role (and perhaps a bit more OPs). Right now it's just the Heavy Autocannon, but worse in every way.Funnily enough, about the only time that I use the Arbalest is when I cannot find or do not have access to Heavy Autocannons or other superior kinetic ballistic weapons.
You see, I tend to feel that that is more of an argument for "Missile Specialization should be changed" than for "Pilum LRMs should be changed." Pilum LRMs were fine (and honestly not terribly impressive unless you brought lots of them) without the bonuses from Missile Specialization. If Weapon A is not a problem except in combination with Skill B, then the solution to Weapon A + Skill B being a problem probably isn't "make Weapon A kind of pointless without Skill B." But that's my opinion, and I tend to dislike how most of the Combat skills skew things anyways.
Perhaps an argument for bringing back ammo, or perhaps for shorter timers.
For my long-range Conquest configuration, I replaced Pilums with Salamander Pod. Pilums are too slow, but I still want to pile yet another mindless unlimited long-range weapon to torment the enemy, and Salamander pod was the only other option, and has proven useful.
Perhaps an argument for bringing back ammo, or perhaps for shorter timers.
Or maybe for even more damage reduction/bonus when a weapon is used against the wrong/right barrier type.
While I generally agree with you, certain weapons like the Mauler were more balanced with the smaller regenerating ammo pool than the are now.
Pilums were not the only missiles that became overpowered with MS 10.Well, that kind of illustrated my point, yeah. It's a matter of degree, not an absolute thing.
Pilums got a bit too good with the previous-version buff and regenerating ammo, anyway. If they were useful, unskilled, in outright killing enemy frigates by themselves, then that's performing rather beyond their intended role. Outright replacing Harpoons with Missile Spec is another symptom of the same - and, really, they could replace Harpoon Pods vs larger targets without Missile Spec.I don't recall you changing Pilums' speeds when you buffed the missiles last time, though- just their hitpoints and damage. I could be wrong, I've slept since then :)
The Autopulse Laser is adept at forcing up enemy flux, lest they take a ton of damage on their armor/hull. 1250 DPS for 2-3 seconds is no joke.
Yeah, I can see how that'd work. I do like limited ammo for Harpoons, Reapers, and the like, though - it adds an extra layer to the decision whether to fire them beyond immediate tactical considerations, and to me that makes it much more interesting. It also lets them be stronger weapons, with a higher player reward for skilled use. FWIW, I tried regenerating ammo for Harpoons and absolutely hated it, though that's obviously subjective to some degree.
Despite also being missiles, I think Salamanders and Pilums are just in a very different category with regards to how they're used.
As opposed to Swarmers currently being completely overshadowed by salamanders - no reason to take a utility small mount missile that doesn't regen when you can take salamanders.
Incidentally, I think Proximity Charge Launcher should just get the Point Defense tag and behavior - it's really the only thing they're good at (and they are really good at it if they're on a missile hardpoint that can pivot!).
You know what else can maybe kill one ship? A torpedo.
And you know what else can kill "literally infinite ships"? A pulse laser. Such as the above example included. So maybe you should try thinking about the example presented instead of being uselessly snide?You know what else can maybe kill one ship? A torpedo.
Yeah - once. And even that's not guaranteed since shields can absorb an infinite amount of damage as long as it's delivered in a single instance. How many ships can an Autopulse kill? Literally infinite ships.
This isn't multiplayer, it's not a combat simulation, it's an RPG with mildly deep but arcade-like space combat. It doesn't need, nor should it have, perfect balance.Does not need perfect balance, no. But that does not mean that balance should not be a goal, nor does it mean that people should not speak up when one weapon is strictly inferior to another.
This isn't multiplayer, it's not a combat simulation, it's an RPG with mildly deep but arcade-like space combat. It doesn't need, nor should it have, perfect balanceThe game should not have options so powerful that I would be stupid not to take them, even if they break the game. For example, before hotfix, I would be stupid not to use Doom and FMR Salamander everything to oblivion, before any enemy appears on my screen.
And you know what else can kill "literally infinite ships"? A pulse laser. Such as the above example included. So maybe you should try thinking about the example presented instead of being uselessly snide?Your example is nonsense - the game doesn't let you magically turn a single large energy hardpoint into a medium and a small. Comparing one hardpoint to two, as though that was a choice the game let you arbitrarily make is pointless, because it doesn't. You can compare different weapon types, and sizes (within certain limits) because universal hardpoints exist and you can put smaller weapons into larger hardpoints. You cannot say "this large weapon is bad because this medium and this small weapon together are better".
@Megas: what are those 0 OP missiles you speak of?He's talking about single-shot harpoons or sabot SRMs. Which cost one ordnance point normally, or, if you have the cost reduction from combat skills, zero. Of course, if you don't pursue combat aptitude, or aren't that high level yet, then there are no zero ordnance point missiles.
Thanks, I had no idea the reduction could bring the cost down to 0 OP. Seems OP. (scnr)Generally agreed; I have a skill rebalance mod I've been tinkering with that replaces the reduced ordnance point cost with reduced weapon flux generation (flagship only). Seems a better fit for a combat skill.
(hrrgh, asymmetry)
On further thought, I feel I should add: This is not the first time that the autopulse and pulse laser have had this problem; several versions ago, the situation was the same as it is now, where one could replace an autopulse with a pulse and find it to be a direct upgrade. Alex fixed that. I bring this up so that he can fix it again; as such, convincing the two of you is not a high priority for me. So present whatever further arguments you like; I have said what needed saying and am done with this topic.
Quick question: is the 25% energy damage increase just raw numbers ON the weapons, or is it built into the game? I'm doing a little fixing on the factions that aren't currently updated.Just raw numbers on the guns. And it isn't the same across the board either. Some weapons got a bigger boost than others
At least hope dev's won't remove ammo support mechanics in the next version with the statement that nobody uses it anyway :/
What about instead of ammo to balance ballistics, steadily increasing flux is used. So for the first second an assault chaingun costs 10 flux, then 20 flux, then 30 flux etc etc and the cooldown is literally a cooldown as the barrel steams off. hue hue hueI vote no. It doesn't make sense as something that applies only to ballistic weapons, and it's something that could easily spiral to ridiculous levels, especially for more or less continuous-fire weapons like the Assault Chaingun and Vulcan Cannon. Beyond that, I really don't think that most ballistic weapons need steadily-increasing flux generation to be balanced relative to other weapons.
@Alex: I hadn't thought about run-away cases that's a good point. Although I suspect the low fire rate would make those tactics fairly weak - I've found the low fire rate missiles require quite a bit of setup to be effective (enemy flux being high, overloaded or an unshielded section towards the missile vector because they're flanked) - the volume of missiles just isn't high enough to score persistent damage just from missiles alone (the old FMR combined with the old Pilums being an exception - they did score kills just through volume alone from a single ship). Except for missile mount heavy ships, but I can't think of one that's capable of the keep-away game (which is good ship design on your part by the way - keeping the brawlers more mobile than the skirmishers so there's no pure artillery duels).
What is the intention for PE anyway: Is it supposed to be a factor in most fight? Only in big fights? Something you only run into when you stall and play hit-and-run?
Strange, is there something wrong with my game playing style, given the fact that i actually have to consider ammo count all the time, run out of it on regular basis and have to use extended ammo upgrades quite often (i play 6.2.1 with a lot of mods). Seeing it removed with the statement that it never runs out anyway looks as mockery for me.
At least hope dev's won't remove ammo support mechanics in the next version with the statement that nobody uses it anyway :/
What about instead of ammo to balance ballistics, steadily increasing flux is used. So for the first second an assault chaingun costs 10 flux, then 20 flux, then 30 flux etc etc and the cooldown is literally a cooldown as the barrel steams off. hue hue hue
Ammo is basically an extra endurance mechanic, but with peak effectiveness time, that mechanic is already there, just in a different form. That said, I'm still thinking about it - there are some good arguments for bringing it back, but I'd like to see how things play out.
It's mostly there to discourage extreme kiting tactics and to encourage/reward more aggressive play.
- Can once again issue ship commands while paused. Tried it, didn't work out, moving on.
I see. I think the example you provided shows it probably doesn't succeed entirely at the kiting part - since staying away from things and spending as little time as possible near enemies is what keeps PE going longer.
No idea how to fix that though (if it even needs fixing)
Why LRMs and single EMP missiles in particular?
Oh, so this was not about changing weapon groups during pause, was it? Or is it an oversight that it doesn't work?Is it off topic to ask at this point that we be allowed to alter weapons groups while pause. :D
Ammo is basically an extra endurance mechanic, but with peak effectiveness time, that mechanic is already there, just in a different form. That said, I'm still thinking about it - there are some good arguments for bringing it back, but I'd like to see how things play out.
As someone who likes complex mechanical workings (if they have some flavor to them, which ammo certainly does) I think there might be a way to create a hybrid - something that combines ammo with CR (and allows ammo to stay relevant without being completely replaced by the abstract concept of CR).
We have ammo with reloading clips (or with normal reload rate), but the reload rate scales with combat readiness. Being at high CR lets you reload as fast as you fire, meaning you have infinite ammo, meaning players won't have to even think about ammo unless they're going into an unfavorable situation anyway.
As you get to lower CR you can't constanly fire anymore because your reload rate isn't keeping up (let's say you lose 1% reload speed for every 2% CR below 100). This could work equally for ballistics with clips, ballistics with individually reloading ammo, for reloaded missiles and for recharging energy weapons.
The reason I thought of that was because low CR already has the "missiles not fully loaded" stuff going on, and alongside that it'd make sense to also have "ammo not fully loaded" and/or "reload/recharge rate lowered".
It's mostly there to discourage extreme kiting tactics and to encourage/reward more aggressive play.
I see. I think the example you provided shows it probably doesn't succeed entirely at the kiting part - since staying away from things and spending as little time as possible near enemies is what keeps PE going longer.
- Maybe there was not even any change there, but let me say again that I just love all the little market condition icons!
- I don't really miss ammo. I can confirm the effect that I'm far less reluctant to use a HE weapon against shields and vise versa, though. I could well imagine the clip mechanic on big weapons like the Gauss Cannon, btw.
Oh, so this was not about changing weapon groups during pause, was it? Or is it an oversight that it doesn't work?Is it off topic to ask at this point that we be allowed to alter weapons groups while pause. :D
Also holy CRAP! Those memory optimizations helped out BIG TIME!
Just stopping by to say thanks for that little extra price info when hovering over commodities. Very useful and helpful improvement especially for large mods.
Is it to the point where you're considering pure-kinetic/pure-HE loadouts?For me, that's a no.
Is it to the point where you're considering pure-kinetic/pure-HE loadouts?
Is it to the point where you're considering pure-kinetic/pure-HE loadouts?
Re: Gauss, yeah, that was a case where I seriously considered it. Decided to go with a flux cost increase instead, since that seemed to do about the same job.
- if you have less than 330 degree shield coverage, you're a drifting target most of the time.
...
- playstyle without ammo constraints is way, way different. in exchange for what you got out of ballistics, you had to take care not to miss, maneuvering to fire at downed armor patches and stuff, and effectively using the right damage types were important. Used to be energy was about flux management, missiles were about timing, and ballistics were about aim/dmg type - they definitely feel much more homogeneous now.
...
- the vanilla skill tree is awful - I know it wasn't a focus of this release, but it needs help bad, especially around the burn speed thing. More viable upgrade paths would really drive different playstyles (I certainly found it did with the SS+ remake) but with the vanilla one there's pretty much just one way to go.
** an aside here, isn't the skill tree still very much an alpha/stub/work in progress? I know a lot of intense consideration around balancing missiles centers on the combat missile/10 skill, which seems a weird waste of time if the tree is due a massive rework at some point? **
...
Alex have you ever considered just taking the mods and integrating them whole cloth into vanilla cause they are kind of awesome and vanilla is kind of boring now that I've played the mods hue hue
More relevant question: Would modders be willing to give for free their mod in witch they often invested hundreds, if not thousands, of hours? And completely give up on the creative control over them?
** an aside here, isn't the skill tree still very much an alpha/stub/work in progress? I know a lot of intense consideration around balancing missiles centers on the combat missile/10 skill, which seems a weird waste of time if the tree is due a massive rework at some point? **
On that note: I think the recent rapid pace of release, feedback, and balance fix of the last week or so was very nice. Perhaps thats a bit selfish of me on the consumer side, but I feel like we had a lot of good discussions on the forums stemming from it.
- with the new beams, taking a ship without shields into battle is just a longer, more complicated "scuttle" button.
Definitely in the next release cycle, and no hints :-X
Briefly - players try to figure out how to do well in a game, right? The problem with the kiting strategy is that it's really, really good, to the point where it trivializes other strategies. It's also very time-consuming. So, a player would feel like they have to kite in order to make good use of their resources. Peak performance puts a hard cap on that, and so opens up a lot of other tactical possibilities. There are other ways one could deal with it, but they'd involve massive changes to overall balance/combat feel.
Balance:Played around with those weapons recently and it is certainly noticeable.
- Gauss Cannon: increased flux cost (from 800 to 1200)
- Storm Needler: increased flux cost (from 50 to 75)
Still wonder whether outfitting a Conquest with those and kiting capital ships to death with no risk is a thing, although I suppose 1-1 capital ship duels don't actually come up much at all.It is because Conquest will die if it tries to outgun a battleship (barring huge skill difference between ships). If I wanted to outgun things with a capital, I would use an Onslaught or Paragon. Before 0.65.2, I did not use Conquest at all in the campaign because it was merely an inferior Onslaught. Now with long range beams and unlimited ballistic ammo, Conquest can be configured to play to its strengths.
I never actually used Storm Needler even before the patch. The DPS is awesome, but I don't want to spend 28 OP on an 800 range large weapon with Crippling Overspecialisation.I wished plasma cannon and tachyon lance were as cheap. Both of them cost more and too much OP for what they do. Plus, plasma cannon only has 700 range. Heavy blaster is still competitive with plasma cannon for non-Apogee ships for much less OP (plasma cannon passthrough helps, but not enough), and tachyon lance is too underpowered. Tachyon lance is fun, but not when I need to give up killing power and so much OP.
For breaking shields, I always found Mark IX AC to be adequate while costing only 18 OP.
The problem I find with Storm Needler is that it's *too* accurate.I love Storm Needler's perfect accuracy. It helps focus on one point on armor and obliterates it, and it makes sniping from further away easier. Similarly, I sometimes prefer Railgun over Light Needler or even Arbalest/Heavy Autocannon due to accuracy. (Although I usually do not use Railgun over medium ballistics because Railgun is not too common.)
I think what is missing is not lower flux cost on the Needler, but a midline battleship with ballistic slots and decent flux stats that can make use of high-tech weapons. There's a big hole in between the ultra-high-tech Paragon and very-low-tech Onslaught.
I never actually used Storm Needler even before the patch. The DPS is awesome, but I don't want to spend 28 OP on an 800 range large weapon with Crippling Overspecialisation.But... why? Last patch, the Storm Needler was just better, to the point where if you were, say, considering mounting four Mark IXs on a Conquest, you were actually far better off mounting two Storm Needlers in just the front large slots and leaving the back two empty! Significantly more DPS, lower ordnance point cost, and a (if I remember right) similar flux/s.
For breaking shields, I always found Mark IX AC to be adequate while costing only 18 OP.
(There's a "pursue" behavior that's not broadside-aware; much of what you're seeing is that.)
Doesn't help that it kicks in when it feels the enemy is vulnerable.
@ Hartlord: I had a no-skills version but decided not to post it at the time because it was not necessary and tried to avoid bloating the wall of text even more (plus I dislike no +OP and no skills configurations), but since you brought it up...
It will be sold on Steam when it is ready.
A big premise of Ivaylo's lore (dunno how much of this part David has changed) is the UACs have enough future-DRM on them to prohibit them from being copied willy-nilly, which is why they're rare and important enough to fight over. (An alternative limiting factor would be access to autofactories).
Another limitation could be the complexity (high-tech/mid-tech/low-tech) of a blueprint (requiring better factories or otherwise risking the production of degraded ships or complete failure) and/or rarity (fancy experimental stuff) and/or amount (big stuff like onslaughts) of used materials.A big premise of Ivaylo's lore (dunno how much of this part David has changed) is the UACs have enough future-DRM on them to prohibit them from being copied willy-nilly, which is why they're rare and important enough to fight over. (An alternative limiting factor would be access to autofactories).
While it can be made sense of, I think that every other part of computers should have advanced by just as much as DRM has (or, more realistically, far more).
Hacking of DRM would have to still be a thing (even if it is inferior to having an original chip and doesn't grant access to newest stuff), so in that case there should at least be partially-functional copies of rare blueprints (which have degraded variants and/or cost more to produce and/or have failure chances during production).
Another limitation could be the complexity (high-tech/mid-tech/low-tech) of a blueprint (requiring better factories or otherwise risking the production of degraded ships or complete failure) and/or rarity (fancy experimental stuff) and/or amount (big stuff like onslaughts) of used materials.A big premise of Ivaylo's lore (dunno how much of this part David has changed) is the UACs have enough future-DRM on them to prohibit them from being copied willy-nilly, which is why they're rare and important enough to fight over. (An alternative limiting factor would be access to autofactories).
While it can be made sense of, I think that every other part of computers should have advanced by just as much as DRM has (or, more realistically, far more).
Hacking of DRM would have to still be a thing (even if it is inferior to having an original chip and doesn't grant access to newest stuff), so in that case there should at least be partially-functional copies of rare blueprints (which have degraded variants and/or cost more to produce and/or have failure chances during production).
Or just make using a hacked chip produce a (D) variant of the ship instead of the base hull.
The collapse was just the trade with rest of the galaxy right?Thing is, Starsector is supposed to be set in a frontier area. The ship designs are, for the most part, not something created within the sector; they came from the parts of the galaxy which were more developed and from which the sector was suddenly and unexpectedly cut off. This isn't like England suddenly becoming completely isolated from the rest of the world, it's more like Somalia suddenly becoming isolated from the rest of the world. There is some reasonably advanced technology available, and a handful of people know how to use it, but for the most part the infrastructure, expertise, and knowledge is not available; you're not going to see Somalia suddenly cut off from the rest of the world and dropped into a sea with a lot of islands worth colonizing or controlling and suddenly see Somalia start fielding F-18 Hornets and Nimitz-class carriers. The sector of Starsector is quite lucky that despite being an incredibly new region the infrastructure was available for building large starships, that that infrastructure survived the initial conflicts mostly intact, and that that infrastructure doesn't need a large body of skilled labor in order to be useful, because evidence suggests that the Sector doesn't have the expertise, the knowledge, or the skilled labor required to replace that infrastructure or create significant additions to it. There is only one ship in the game whose codex entry suggests that the design was created post-Collapse, and even that is a matter of interpretation; every other class of vessel is either a pre-Collapse design or a refit of one. 200+ year old technology and infrastructure remains incredibly valuable, not as curiosities but as the base of the sector's industry. Blueprint chips are rare and valuable to the point of being worth risking military action to acquire and protect them. This is not a setting where creating a brand-new chip giving you 10 Tempest-class Frigates or some such thing is an easy thing to do.
I mean, the people who built and designed the ships are still there right? It inst like the space zombie Apocalypse happened, even if like 9/10 people died, you think people with the expertise in ships and technology would likely be persevered with high priority no?
http://fractalsoftworks.com/2011/02/21/the-state-of-affairs/
Basically Starcraft lore, except the colonists where not prisoners, but farmers and migrants. But the thing that bothers me is just like I said, the zombie Apocalypse scenario, it seems cool, but don't stand up the scrutiny.
The colonists are the same people as the domain, so its not like caveman onboard spaceships, even with 99% of the population starved to death, the know how to create similar technology will survive... Its like saying that everyone out there is so busy killing eachother for 200 years and no one did any technology research or bring any educational material or manuals of kinds. While it is suppose to be the other way around! Modern technology was mostly the result of the push for technology in ww2.
Well you would think that someone would spend their lifetime trying to figure it out, and I promise you if you give a smart determined person 10 years they can reverse engineer the CPU, then with other sectors rapidly re improving progress will happen very fast.
There is a difference between reinventing the processor from imagination and realizing you need the thing and reverse engineering it.
You guys know all of this is subject to change for the needs of the game and story, right?
Well auto factories are still there right? Its not like the sector has lost all technology to make more technology, Its just cracking the autofactory code to make more autofactory parts. Not making them from scratch.It isn't nearly as simple as you make it sound. If you want to have an autofactory produce the parts for a new autofactory, you need to know what the parts that you need are, how they work together, how many of them you need, how they're supposed to fit together. You need to know what's in each of those processors controlling the factory, you need to know how to make them, you need to know how to program them or at the very least how to copy the existing autofactory code over. You also need to be able to understand how to put all of this into a format that the existing autofactory can use. Then you need to provide the "cracked" autofactory with the correct materials for producing the parts, because maybe making that blast furnace out of lead isn't such a great idea, and even getting a material slightly wrong can have a significant impact on the performance of parts which require very tight tolerances in order to function properly. Can you tell whether a part has a hundredth-inch tolerance or a thousandth-inch tolerance? How about whether or not that plate needs to be bolted in place with 100 lbf-ft of torque or 110 lbf-ft of torque? Does it matter whether this panel is made out of AISI No. 1030 Q&T steel, or out of AISI No. 1050 annealed steel, or out of H-11 steel? Do you have the ability to tell which parts are made out of what material and how that material was treated during the manufacturing process? Should that beam be prestressed, or is it just fit in place? Do you have the ability to gather all this information without taking the risk of dismantling the facility or performing destructive testing on some of its components?
However, itt would probably be a daunting but ultimately feasible act to reconstitute 50-75% of pre-collapse technology within the sector...if the sector was not in constant, apocalyptic, all out war. Kind of like trying to rediscover how to split the atom, while crack heads are throwing molotov cocktails into your lab.It's actually much easier to rediscover how to do something that figuring out if it can be done in the first place and then how. For example the French and Chinese nuclear programs supposedly cost about one half to one tenth of 23bil USD cost of the Manhattan project. Simply because unlike the US they knew it could be done and even roughly how. So you could say if it was done once it can be done again unless laws of physics change which very well might have been the cause of the collapse.... Imagine some freak scientific accident that caused the gate system to shut down....
The range boost from Tech doesn't apply to Beams at all, IIRC (bonuses to Energy Weapons don't apply to Beams; they're a special category).The Entoptic Rangefinder perk does not work on beams?! That... hurts.
(Just as a quick note, if we're going to be talking about "real" range with fade, then flux efficiency should have a big asterisk next to it, as damage drops off dramatically with fade.)True.
a beam weapon of the ballistic typeCan I have one?
In that case, it should cost less OP and be available in open market.Probably true. I also wouldn't be opposed to it getting a damage buff and flux cost increase (debuff).
Onslaught can use Storm Needlers effectively, if built for it, and kill things before they generate too much flux.I can confirm this :) As long as whatever youre shooting it stupid enough to use its shields its toast....anything below heavy cruiser will just get overwhelmed and overloaded in seconds and everything else might be able to lower shields but will have high flux and wont be able to fire effectively
Event-based trading is nice and all, but at some point we should consider that margin-based trading is not evil and it isn't boring either. It's just another way to make a buck.But margin based trading is boring. It's by it's very definition a rote repetitive action without challenge. You look where there's a profit margin. You trade goods back and forth between those two points for the same money for as long as your patience holds out.
After years of living there, why can a certain planet still fall into starvation within days? Why do planets even offer their hard-earned reserves of food to you, if it means they'll have a famine soon afterwards?Buying food should not cause a shortage. If it does, that food should not be in the open market (unless faction is corrupt, perhaps)!
Basically it is possible to become the baddest, most viciously powerful fleet in starsector trading 1 billion units of toilet paper.
Also there needs to be a limit on how much you can store in each base, its ridiculous than you can have 1000 food squirreled away on jangala when they are having a food shortage, the first thing the authorities would do is crack your vault locks during the crisis and raid the pantry, and maybe string you up for hoarding for good measure...
Sort of. During the Great Famine in Ireland, food exports to England actually continued even from the worst-hit areas (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Famine_(Ireland)#Irish_food_exports_during_Famine), because the English buyers could pay more for it than the locals could.QuoteAfter years of living there, why can a certain planet still fall into starvation within days? Why do planets even offer their hard-earned reserves of food to you, if it means they'll have a famine soon afterwards?Buying food should not cause a shortage. If it does, that food should not be in the open market (unless faction is corrupt, perhaps)!
Trading XP versus combat XP is bad imbalanced, but money is worse. It is very, very hard to make money fighting, once supply costs and fuel costs are factored in. If you want to be a mogul you have to move a lot of trading.
One way to think of this problem is this: it is possible for a trader to make a billion, level up completely, and then construct a fleet out of nothing from "the ground up." Basically like a mogul buying a private army, sowing dragon's teeth that he bought. Not only is this fleet fully pimped out and awesome, but your fleet is 100% experienced without ever firing a shot. If you managed to pick up expert crew along the way, you even don't have to worry about training them.
Basically it is possible to become the baddest, most viciously powerful fleet in starsector trading 1 billion units of toilet paper. that is wrong, wrong wrong. Perhaps it should not be possible to gain combat experience from trading.
Maybe experience should be divided into channels somehow. Like, trading only counts toward industrial/logistical experience, while combat only counts toward combat and technology. Something like thatQuoteBasically it is possible to become the baddest, most viciously powerful fleet in starsector trading 1 billion units of toilet paper.
^really, that's ridiculous
edit: Another way to think of it, could boeing, Northrup, raytheon band together and kill a battalion of marines armed with small arms? No, they could not, because ultimately despite their wealth, logistics and experience the nerds that work for those corporations wouldn't know the first thing about hunting down and killing the marines, whereas the marines would very quickly destroy all the infrastructure that gives war corps their force projection. If that's too out there, how about this: could five East India Company galleons defeat a Man of War? Probably not.
I disagree with you completely here. History is absolutely full of examples of commercial empires kicking the ever loving crap out of their impoverished military brethren. And if there was piracy and lawlessness in the US on the same scale as in Starsector, you bet the paper companies would buy standing mercenary forces to defend their fluffy, fluffy toilet paper!
To answer your question about boeing et al: absolutely they could, because they have enough money to hire a thousand battalions of mercenaries (Not kidding here - those companies combined have more money than most countries)! And those mercenaries have the skills to defeat the marines, even if the companies don't. Which, when you think about it, is exactly what you do in Starsector. You hire elite crew to man your ships - the crew you've had since forever won't have leveled up from trading. With regards to East India Company Ships: you're entire argument is backwards. The British Navy was as powerful as it was only because the East India Company made the country stinking rich in the first place.
What I do think is odd is that by trading you can suddenly become a master of technology and combat tactics. But then again, thats the price we pay for RPG elements that are not just 'level what you use', which have their own set of problems. Officers would be a fix: money can hire people who have skills, even if the boss doesn't have them.
If we're not supposed to try to get higher than level 50This is one reason why I prefer a hard cap.
SO WHY NO INCENTIVE TO FIGHT???
Why does this make narrative sense? There’s a race-to-the-bottom in the profit margins for safely shipping rocks, and that’s before you factor in faction-affiliated cargo fleets that don’t even have to operate at a profit. Frankly, if you think about it, it *wouldn't* make sense for easy profit to be available for shipping food or some such, under normal circumstances. Not of the magnitude the player would be interested in.
...but the player should not be personally holding down shift for an hour hauling cargo around...Holding the speed button constantly is no fun. Doom required this for running back in the early '90s, and successor games that had unlimited running inverted the controls so that running was default and walking required buttons (for those rare times you needed to walk for secrets). Something like a speed toggle, like Transcendence's autopilot, would be nice.
4: There is No Risk in Trading
Pirates largely do a bad job chasing trade fleets around. The player, with his +burn skill, is able to avoid most fights, as larger pirate fleets are too slow to catch him, and smaller pirate fleets do not pose enough of a threat to the player. It doesn't help that the fleet AI for pirates will break off the chase even if they are faster, if they don't catch the fleet within a duration. As a result, trading is a practically risk free way to make money, unlike combat. I'd say that this last point is debatable as being a 'problem,' but risk-free trading should not be very profitable, compared with reaching planets in pirate-heavy areas.
So, my main points on my solution:
1: Make supply, demand, and production drive the economy more than stability. Make stability instead drive some parts of demand. A more stable world is one that is better prepared for the common issues such as a food shortage, lack of domestic goods, lack of materials to drive the economy, etc. A more stable world has a higher demand for Luxury Goods, and a lower demand for things such as Food or Domestic Goods. A low stability world is on the reverse of that. It does not make sense that a high stability world would buy Organics at a moderate price when it already produces Organics, especially if there is another world nearby that uses Organics to produce fuel. Multiplying prices across the board by a number based on stability doesn't make much economic sense, and leads to low stability colonies having all their resources sold to higher stability colonies. If a higher stability colony can produce whatever a lower stability colony can, why was the low stability world founded in the first place, other than as a forward military base or something?
vanilla fleet dynamics completely disincentivizes all but lopsided battles in your favor (unfun) whereas it should be encouraging pitched battles where you take lots of exploding risks with your awesome fleet (fun).What's more, you are more likely to recover more CR (up to 50%), making it cheaper to deploy all than matching forces. If you cannot overdeploy, chain-flagships (one vs. all) is usually optimal.
Give the Gemini's point defense drones Vulcans so they can present a credible threat to missiles and light fighters. The Gemini was made much worse by the laser range increase now that any Wolf(D) in the sector can effortlessly destroy its drones in a few seconds, and in my opinion needs some kind of buff to compensate.Not sure if I want that. Most times when I need drones, I need them as an emergency against bigger ships, to help crack their shields. Unless Gemini gets its own drone system, other ships use the same type of drones, and I definitely do not want my Heron's drones to use Vulcans - I have plenty of PD on a Heron, and MG drones are useful for a Heron armed with a blaster or mauler.
The Heavy Machine Gun is better than it used to be, but now it's only "possibly situationally useful" rather than "terrible and never worth taking ever". If it wasn't as expensive as a Heavy Mauler or a Dual Flak Cannon it would have more of a niche. Personally I would buff the range to 500 or 600 and reduce the OP cost to 10.I agree. HMG will never compete with Flak for PD, so its only use is as a chainsaw for melee fights. Due to HMG's OP cost, anytime I would consider HMG, I gravitate toward Heavy Autocannon or Heavy Needler instead. The only time I actually mount HMGs is on a Falcon or Eagle armed with pulse lasers. For anything else, there are better alternatives.
I'm not here to be snarky, I just wanted to mention that I've been playing mostly as a frigate swarm in my latest campaign, and I notice that when I add a Front Shield Generator to the Hound, most front-mounted medium weapons stick out well past the shield, looks to me like the shield arc needs a tiny increase in diameter.
Not to be a smartass, The Soldier, but the picture I posted clearly shows chunks of rock at least the size of my biggest ships. Maybe real-life rings aren't asteroid belts, but StarSector planetary rings as they are shown in the game depict asteroids. Is there an asteroid belt in vanilla StarSector that looks anything like the combat screen I posted? If so, I would sure like to fight some battles there, and if not, I'd like a few locations like that added.
And no, there's nothing like that in the campaign mode of Starsector. I think that screenshot came from a mission mod that just came up recently.
Uuuum hello ^^' been away for a while so i have forgotten pretty much everything about how to do things.. How can i download the lastest patch? :)