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[Histidine]

Back when Homo habilis walked the earth, there were some posts bringing up a couple of issues:

• You have to fight one engagement round to defeat the enemy combat ships, then another to clean up the non-combat ships and other stragglers.
• Solo ship play: Player fleet has one combat flagship and 24 Atlases. Player solos enemy fleets of 80 ships, none of whom ever think to attack the juicy Atlases while the player ship is occupied (because they can't).
  (I call this "the Megas problem")
• And more recently: For non-combat freighters, cargo capacity and burn speed are pretty much the sole considerations. If you don't plan on deploying it in combat and don't run from battles, there's no point bothering with defense or armament.

This is a proposal to address the three issues. It also aims to introduce a new tactical problem: protecting your non-combat or damaged ships even when you're not running away.

Spoiler

The basics
If both sides choose to engage the other:

The map is tall. Really tall.

Spoiler

(open in new tab for full size)

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Ships start in the start area (duh). When they retreat, they have to go through the retreat area all the way to the edge of the map before they can leave.

Objectives cannot spawn in the start or retreat areas, only the empty area between them.

Spoiler

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Both sides pick the ships they want to deploy initially. Once this is done, all ships – including those not deployed – appear in the start area. Ships not deployed are inactive. They have shields and station-keeping thrusters (and maybe PD, if so desired), but otherwise cannot do anything else. Ships that stay inactive through the whole battle will not lose CR.

Spoiler

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If one side decides it needs reinforcements, it can select an inactive ship and activate it. This might cost a command point if we wanted it to. The newly activated ship moves out to do its thing; it'll have the standard CR cost applied at the end of the battle.

For fun, activated ships (including those in the initial deployment) could burn drive in for a couple of seconds.

Spoiler

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Flanking forces can threaten inactive ships. Activate a response force (a Hammerhead, in this case) as needed to protect your squishy freighters, and maybe the freighters themselves so they aren't just sitting ducks.
(This is why inactive ships still have their shields, so a couple of fast movers with strike weapons don't wreck everything)

Spoiler

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When the full retreat order is sounded, ships (including inactive ones) turn and run towards their side of the map, just like the current implementation. Individual inactive ships can also be given a retreat order (the only order other than Activate they can receive). Once all ships flee or are destroyed, the battle ends (no separate pursuit scenario).

Retreating ships are activated, with corresponding CR costs. This is so the player can't just issue a full retreat order at start to protect their non-combat ships while their flagship solos the enemy fleet.

What if one side decides to flee from the start?
Use the current vanilla escape scenario.

Because escaping in the new combat scenario is probably easier than in the existing escape scenario, I'm thinking the escape scenario should be mandatory if one fleet is much smaller than the other.
(Conceptually, the pursuing frigates are able to flank and surround the enemy before the battle begins)

Alternative implementation
In case the escape scenario hax above is too undesirable:

• A ship retreating without activation only incurs 25% of the usual CR cost (but will behave as if crash-mothballed).
• Retreating from a combat scenario doesn't end the battle, the old engage again/retreat dialog comes up. This proposal may still be worthwhile, because you can kill most (maybe even all) of the enemy non-combat ships without having to play the escape scenario.
• No mandatory escape scenario (only if one side actually chooses to flee in the dialog).

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Yea or nay?

[Megas]

Are all of the ships on the map, even if "inactive"?  If so, map battle size needs to be considered.  Even with (normal) max of 500, it is not always enough in huge battles.  If I want to cheese this (because I do not want to let the AI deploy as much) to maybe make soloing easier, I could lower battle size to the minimum (150?).

One other possible problem:  Long range weapons, especially those that may be added by mods.  Ships could fire blind to pick off enemy ships standing by.

If enemy warships did not have better loot than non-combatants, I would take Hyperion, teleport to where the non-combatants are, then kill them.  Again, only if warships did not have better loot than non-combatants.  (Part of the reason for me to fight is leveling and looting stuff shops may not sell, which is usually warships' equipment.)


Bit off topic:  Unless you get missions with ridiculous bulk requests (e.g., 10,000+ lobsters), Atlas is not much useful for normal trading, since it does not take much to stabilize prices.  Atlas is most useful for looting in completely hostile systems where there is no base to land and offload looted valuables.  For normal trading, a few Buffalos or a couple Apogees should suffice.  That said, I get what you mean with 24 Atlases - non-combatants that are helpless, but the enemy cannot touch due to game rules.

[Alex]

Hmm. Without thinking through all the implications of the proposed mechanics: anything that involves "deploy everything from both sides at the start of battle" is unfortunately a non-starter for performance reasons.

[Cik]

something like this does need to eventually happen, IMO

a system that can handle actual deep maneuvering instead of "you pick ship, they pick ship, slam together in middle"

if deploy all is impossible, perhaps some sort of dynamically loaded battlefield could do. until you are within X range units the transports don't exist, just counters in memory, when you get close they are "spawned" into existence? if the battlefield is big enough, actually raiding the rear lines might take a little while to arrive, even if you are very fast, so the amount of ships can be kept down as long as there is a battle and ships are destroyed before the rear echelon fight begins in most cases.

you could i suppose just break it down into two engagements. personally i think the game deserves a deep maneuvering/engagement/deployment system, but the simple thing to do is "if you send ships off the opposite side of the map, after the main engagement concludes they get to attack anything not deployed" then that's simply part of the "first engagement" after that it cuts back to the deployment dialogue and you can go into the next sally, if desired. leadership can be tied into this quite a bit imo, to gain favorable deployment options (the one thing that leadership really misses and that IMO, fits) such as:

being able to deploy bigger ships on the side
gaining automatic attacks against rear echelon with fast ships
being able to deploy behind the enemy
shaping (moving) terrain to your advantage
choosing the field
baits / gambits (force the enemy into unfavorable positions etc.)

anyway sky is the limit

[borgrel]

you have encountered an enemy fleet, they are hostile and move to prevent you from escaping.

you chose to:
1. Hail them
2. Transfer to another flagship
3. crash mothball some of ur vessels
4. attempt to disengage
5. attempt an encircling manouvre
6. move in to engage

if u choose encircle u select some ships, they are UNAVAILABLE during ur standard engagement and will appear directly in front of the retreating vessels if u win the engagement

if u lose they will still appear behind the enemy forces, except since ur trying to run they have problems .......

[Megas]

Seems similar to the options fleets had in 0.5x, when picking the right or wrong option gave more or less DP.  (I do not care, I just want to deploy my forces and smash things.)

[Alex]

One thing that I think is worth keeping in mind is whether something would belabor combat in the general case. Being able to get in and out of battles quickly is very important...

something like this does need to eventually happen, IMO

a system that can handle actual deep maneuvering instead of "you pick ship, they pick ship, slam together in middle"

... which is why, generally speaking, I don't share the same opinion. The "you pick ship, they pick ship" option has the benefit of being very expedient. Any "deep maneuvering" should take place in the combat dialog, if it's needed for any mechanical reason.

(That said, I'm on board with giving some incentive to deploy civilian ships. Just, without complexity that's outsized compared to the potential benefit. Also to consider: requiring civilian ships to be deployed would likely lead to players not using them at all.)

[Cik]

that's fine too my man

tie it into leadership to give leadership meaning thx

[Megas]

Also to consider: requiring civilian ships to be deployed would likely lead to players not using them at all.)

I would not.  If I get forced to deploy all, my cargo ships would all be warships with better capacity stats.

[Cik]

it shouldn't be an always-thing, but it would be good to have at least SOME chance of them being threatened if attacked by a numerically superior force, by a superior commander, or by a foe that significantly out-maneuvers you.

the game needs more "tactics" built into it. as of right now there's only really a "meeting engagement" and "pursuit" bare minimum my hope is that eventually it will include

smash & grab
king of the hill
skirmish
hit & fade
attack / defend
protect X thing

etc. if you want inspiration, look at battlefleet gothic's scenario rules. they're great.

[Gothars]

I like your fun mock up, especially the ancient "I'll help" meme

the game needs more "tactics" built into it.

Agreed! I'd say that's the most potential for improvement left in the combat system.

I'd connect different combat scenarios to the campaign layer, though. Say if you managed to approach a fleet in dark mode without being spotted until he last second, you get to choose some of the enemy deployments (including civillians).

[Linnis]

Agreed! I'd say that's the most potential for improvement left in the combat system.

I do agree, right now so much of whats interesting that happens is having diff compositions of ships fight one another. Like two frigate and a cruiser beating two crusiers, stuff that like. Alot of potential here, because right now combat is just two globs get thrown into one another. Capturing objective really do feel like a cheesy duct tape fix.

[Cik]

objectives don't do anything and taking them is mostly pointless. they used to do things back in the day, but the use of them has been eclipsed by built-in skills. combat flows too quickly for them to be of any use and most of the time diverting any significant forces to capture one is pointless as it's best to just blob into an overwhelming firebloc as quickly as possible and then shoot the hell out of the enemy's powerbloc.

space needs to be larger, more dynamic, more terrain types and the actual "objective" of the engagement needs to be variable. any sort of terrain control is basically pointless as long as the victory condition is always "destroy the enemy utterly."

[intrinsic_parity]

Maybe a new harass mechanic could be interesting. What if a small fleet with a much higher burn could begin a harass engagement with a large fleet where all non-combat designated ships from the large fleet are deployed, and the large fleet has some limited number of deployment points to defend the cargo ships from the harassment. It could make for a fun early game piracy mechanic where the player could make a bunch of money by taking down a couple freighters and looting them and then disengaging and running away, but I could also see it being reeeeaaally annoying if the AI did it to you all the time in the late game. I guess you could just not use civ ships to avoid that though. Would require some balancing. Maybe you could also choose to target a specific ship with your harass rather than the non-combat ships. You could use that as a way to capture a ship you want or to pick off a particularly dangerous enemy ship before engaging the entire fleet.

[PCCL]

Interesting, I made a post about this a LONG while ago, but figured I'd clean it up and present it here since the discussion came back up.

I do believe a dialogue based approach is the way to go here, the post below briefly outlines a version of how this may go:

In the encounter, each fleet chooses an action (attack, retreat) the encounter the proceeds as such:

AvA:

Spoiler

Phase 0 - Preparations: A vanguard and a rear guard may be selected at this time. The rear guard will lose one deployment worth of CR but will not lose additional CR if deployed in the "encirclement" phase. The rear guard will also be delayed if deployed to the main engagement.

Phase 1 - Skirmish: Both sides deploy their vanguard to engage the enemy, the vanguard force can only be consisted of light/fast units. The fight is over when one side dominate the map. If one side has no vanguard, this automatically ends in victory for the other side.
     - Retreat: the side choosing to retreat at this point goes to AvR, if it has won the skirmish, it gains a bonus in delay timer, if it has lost the skirmish, surviving enemy skirmishers can deploy early

Phase 2 - Flanking: Both sides get to send one or two flanking forces to the left and right flank consisting of light and medium weight units, the winning vanguard can join the flanking forces either flank or return while the losing vanguard will be forced to rejoin the main force. The flanking forces then engage the opposite flank (left to right) and will fight much like skirmishes. The winner of a flank will hold said flank for the main battle.
     - Retreat: the side choosing to retreat at this point goes to AvR, flanking forces begin the retreat at a small delay, enemies can deploy on any flanks held.

-Phase 3 - Encircle: Any sides that holds at least one flank may choose to push further to encircle the enemy, this will trigger a second battle between the surviving flanking force (perhaps with some reinforcement?) and any forces the other side chooses to deploy. Non - rear guard defenders deployed here costs extra CR (as they're likely unprepared for immediate deployment). Any side that wins this battle holds the rear of its enemy.
     - Retreat: the side choosing to retreat at this point goes to AvR, if enemy holds their rear, the rear forces may deploy from the top (!) and any held flanks. Holding enemy rear then retreating triggers a separate retreat scenario for the detachment. Pursuers deployed against the main force may not deploy against the detachment.

-Phase 4a - Engagement: Both sides engage in the middle of the field, the winner of the Skirmish will get a bonus in objective distance, each side may retreat on their own side and the flanks that they hold from the flanking phase. The flanking forces, if any remain, will deploy from the side they're holding while retreating flankers will rejoin the main fleet. Forces behind enemy lines may not deploy
     - Retreat: same as above
-Phase 4b - Rear guard: Any side with a detachment at the enemy rear may choose to engage the enemy rear. The attacking side deploys its detachment and chooses from the enemy fleet a detachment to deploy to the center of the map. The defending side then chooses a (smaller) detachment that has NOT deployed in the main engagement to deploy at the center of the map. Additional reinforcements may not be deployed for a limited time.
          - Retreat: same as above

Phase 4 repeats until one side chooses to retreat

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AvR:

Spoiler

-Phase 1 - Planning: the retreating side may choose a force to delay the attackers, the attackers choose to either chase or give up.

-Phase 2 - Delay: The delaying force engages the full attacking fleet, ships of the delaying force can retreat, but will be wiped out unless the delaying force can defeat the entire attacking fleet (highly unlikely). The battle will be on a timer depending on fleet size and the slowest ship in the retreating fleet. If the delaying force can hold out until the timer counts down to zero, the retreating fleet is in the clear and the delaying task force may safely disengage. The battle then returns to the deployment stage with the delay timer kept consistent (perhaps a small addition to account for battle time), from there the retreating side may send out another wave and the attacker may give up the chase.

If the retreating side is surrounded (enemy holds the rear). The main fleet is not in the clear when the timer reaches zero and instead engages the rear force. The main pursuing force then deploys at a delay in the ensuing battle.

Phase 2 repeats until the retreating side no longer deploys a delaying force

Phase 3a - Breakout: The main retreating fleet deploys from bottom while the enemy rear detachment deploys from top, the retreating fleet retreats from top. Surviving elements of the delaying force may deploy at a delay with the main pursuing fleet deploying at a further delay.
Phase 3b - Pursuit: Much like how pursuits currently work, but the pursuers are delayed based on the timer above. If the timer is at 0, the main retreating fleet is in the clear and the battle begins anew with the original delaying task force as the main fleet. The retreating side may send out a portion of the delaying task force to again delay the enemy so the rest of it may escape.

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RvR:

Spoiler

-No battle.

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