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[Botaragno]

I suppose this is 0.81a related but still

Having the named bounty fleets be at minimum 10ly away from the inhabited worlds is more of a pain than anything. Primarily because you're bruning fuel to hunt after a couple of Wolf's a Hound and maybe a Buffalo in the early game, then when things rack up you just see these large huge pirate fleets hiding out nowhere in particular, presumably chewing through supplies with no actual pirating being done.

Also the massive "buff" to storms compounds on travelling outside the Core Worlds problems, from having to toggle Sustained Burn on and off to avoid running into another thicket, to how even the slightest graze sucks out 30 of your supplies in one go. So to get a medium game bounty, you have to gear up on fuel extra extra supplies for busting through any inevitable storm attrition for both the outbound journey and back.

Then you have to contend with running into the Scav fleets on your way in and out, and I don't think I've come across one where their size wouldn't give any inner-system faction detachment a run for their money.

Also I heard Survey payments got nerfed into the ground, so bang goes that sliver of non-combat income

[Drokkath]

Yeah, known/established star systems have all planets surveyed by default now and it's why I got stuck in that damn tutorial as I couldn't activate the sensor burst and thus went in circles and then some with no results of finding that probe's/derelict's AI core in the tutorial, was so irritated about it earlier today that I almost felt like nuking the tutorial with something, I already know the basics and then some about the game so to me tutorials are always a chore as I prefer to usually fly by the seat of my pants and experience a game in my own way. I already had set up my character with necessary gear and skills but didn't account for getting stuck half-way in the tutorial like that. Note to self: Make a random never-used character first before making your actual character. *headdesk*

Ended up just leaving the first character's two save folders so I could skip the cursed thing and be free from point A and not at point B plus I don't like siding with either Hegemony or Tri-tachyon, at least Hegemony seems like somewhat lesser of evils but still lore-wise when trying to count on the now disassembled Domain-era government stuff feels wrong as something had to went seriously off the scale fubar with the gate systems going dead so I tend to think twice or more before doing something for either of the factions.

Wanton tutorial's frustrations and faction choosing lore-wise aside in 0.8.1a, I'm about to dive in the game again as so far I've not even gone into a battlemap mode in the recent update yet due to wasted hour or two in the bloody tutorial.

[Dri]

Warthogs are love, Warthogs are life! I love these tough little buggers and while they are defs slow for a fighter, tossing in a Talon or Claw wing to chase down a fast frigate so the Warthogs can catch up works wonders! Their triple mortar just wrecks stuff—not even cruisers are safe!

[Megas]

Warthogs were up there with Sparks and Lux during 0.8.0.  Now, Warthogs are the most powerful non-bomber fighter.  Their only weakness is slow top speed (and higher OP cost).  During 0.8.0, leash was 3000, but that has extended to 4000 in 0.8.1.  I plan to abuse Warthogs so much in 0.8.1.  More speed from Wing Commander 1 is very good on Warthogs (but not so much on Thunders).

[Igncom1]

So are warthogs and broadswords mid tech or low tech fighters? Their armament suggests low tech but the colour of their hulls suggest mid tech.

I suppose the same question to the khopesh rocket bombers as well.

[Dri]

I'm not sure how much attention to "Epoch" color David and Alex give to fighters. I seem to recall some lore about fighters not really being much of thing during early low tech times. So maybe it makes sense that they look midline-ish as it was during that time that fighters took off.

[Botaragno]

Christ these hyperstorms combined with the Core/Survey/Salvage nerf have really sucked the fun out of the game for me

[Alex]

Just in case you're not aware- the later hotfixes have halved the rate of storms happening, so you might want to make sure your game version is up-to-date.

[mangalore]

Not sure if I'm alone but my impression of 0.8 thus far is that balance wise the core gameplay loop is out of wack as I find in comparison to earlier game versions I now avoid combat at all costs and even in mid game find most bounty missions being more powerful than my fleet which means high risk little reward as the money won't cover potential losses and expenses, thus I rather go to survey/trade instead.

As to me the core gameplay loop of Starsector is mainly: gain funds > upgrade > fight > repeat, the fight part being not in it anymore is a worrying feeling. In the same sense trade only works via missions and survey/salvage aren't not that challenging in terms of game mechanics as fighting in 0.8 a lot seems lost balance wise.

Imo there should be some rebalance to make bounty hunting and fighting more fun and profitable to progress and an integral part of the game again. Hopefully it would suffice to have more variance in bounties aka a wider abundance of lower to higher paying bounties so if one cannot/dares not to go after the big prizes there is something smaller to go for ro build up.

[sectorfan]

Here is my feedback, New game 0.8.1a, Level 40, 215 cycles.  Sorry it’s long, but hopeful helpful.

First and foremost, I love the combat.  Always had I bought the game years ago just for it.

That said, I find the balance to be very off in many places.  At the start of the game things are way too hard.  I believe this to be a combination of factors:

1. Missions are way too far away (20-30+ ly) and located in too difficult space for early game
2. It’s too easy to get into a spiral of death with low CR/supplies and/or running out of fuel
3. The starting area/core worlds are a mix of either too easy pirates that always run away or way too hard enemies with massive fleets with no middle ground

I started my build focused on salvage and survey for income.  I knew that CR/supplies would be a pain so tool ALL the skills in industry.  But I often found no fuel or supplies on longer missions.  Then I’d get frustrated that finding a less than 20 light year mission would require me to have too many ships just for support.  This loop of needing more fuel, that also needing more supplies, leading to needing bigger ships just to get places felt like a forced grind and was not fun for me.

After frustrations with survey and salvage, I switched over to doing bounties.  At first they were awesome paying $200k+ for some rather easy fights.  I made a ton of money and soon levelled to max 40.  However, I then hit the second grind wall... reputation.  It takes forever to get any reputation.  Even with a 60/100 reputation I still can’t buy good ships without a commission.  And that then makes you enemies with basically everyone else.  Not something a lower level player would want.

Now, I had played a much older version of SS and I knew I wanted a paragon.  But the TriTach have like three planets and only one military base?  Fine, so I keep travelling to them looking for missions to gain reputation.  However, I found most of the time they don’t even list misions for their faction at their base!  More frustration.

But then by pure chance I came across a Paragon-D!  Hooray, just what I wanted!  Except it had almost no weapons and was damaged.    Fair enough, I played for several more hours fixing it up and getting support vessels.  Then I try to do a new bounty for 280k.  3x onslaught battleships and like 6 carriers plus a bunch of hounds/etc.   Where is that balance?

Now I’ve got 3.5m credits, and a ton of weapons and mostly repaired D hull ships.  But I’m no longer finding the game fun.  I end up spending more time trying to get to missions and ensuring I have enough resources only to either find it again way too easy or way too hard.  And since I can’t even buy good ships with my credits I’d be forced into a war with factions and/or more grinding for reputation. 

My fleet at this point.  215 cycles and few days of play.
Paragon (D), Astral carrier (D), Heron carrier (D), Aurora (D), Medusa (non D/blackmarket), Harbringer (D), Omen, Tempest, 2x Wolf (D), Promethous Super Tanker (D), Atlas Super freighter (D), Colossus Freigher (D), Tug, Salvage Rig

No problems in core worlds, but often find I’m way outclassed anywhere else.  The cost to run is 5.3/supplies per day and 47 fuel per light year.  Makes it damn expensive to go places.

So that’s where I’m at.  I love the combat, I love the ship building... but kind of dislike most everything else.  CR/Supplies just feel like an unnecessary burden or chore that I’m forced to endure to get to the fun bits.  Sadly, I was spending more time playing around in the simulator then the main game.  My big request is that you put a multiplier option for supplies and CR.  I’m not opposed to them, but they just make the game too much of a grind.  Something easy like CR * X where 1 = 100% normal game and if I put 0.5 in it would be half normal rates.

It would also be nice if you can change your skill points, even if it cost.  Having to do it all over again to try out a new build seem even less fun.

[Midnight Kitsune]

Do you play or plan to play with mods? I would suggest that you do if you haven't already
One thing I would suggest is the Console Commands mod for access to both the Respec command and the ability to use Save Transfer.

I would also suggest taking a commission with either the Hegemony, for access to cheap supplies and many markets, Sindrians, for access to stupid amounts of cheap fuel, or the new Persian League, for comparable amounts of markets to the Heg.

[Megas]

Persean League also has many of the hullmods otherwise exclusive to Tri-Tachyon.  They are also the faction most likely to have Mjolnirs for sale if you want them.

[ANGRYABOUTELVES]

If you take a commission before you start doing bounties, the reputation comes naturally. Being enemies with people doesn't matter as long as you turn your transponder off in hyperspace, which you should be doing anyway, and don't go to systems held by opposing factions. The Persean League is probably the best commission choice for a new player; they're only hostile to the Hegemony so you can still buy your fuel at Sindria, they've got a lot of systems and markets, and they sell pretty good ships.

[sectorfan]

Yes, I did look through the mod list for anything that reduced or removed CR/supplies/etc.  I didn't see anything, and many were out of date for 0.7.x or earlier.  I even took a look through the game files.  But it seemed there were too many places that appeared I needed to change to get it to work.

Thing is with a commission, you're at war with so many other factions I didn't want to deal with more CR issues.  And the transponder trick also works against you more often then not.  Since a friendly faction will come after you and you lose -5 rep faction and -5 station/planet just for having it off in or around their space.  Yet doing missions for them over and over rarely nets me more than 2-3. 

My biggest problem with CR is that there are tons of enemies out there.  With how often you get harassed by smaller fleets draining CR with each encounter.  Then the a bigger one appears from nowhere and you are screwed. 

Just seems like everything in this game is just designed to delay your ability to play.  Use emergency burn to catch or evade a target and you lose CR.  Run into a storm or need to use a ship to often.  Then the worst one is a limit on battle playtime due to CR reduction per minute of deployment.  I under the purpose, but seems too harsh a system forcing me to avoid combat... the main thing I *want* to do in this game.

[Megas]

There is always loading the game in devmode and cheating yourself up a ton of money, XP, and reputation with some clicks or button presses, if adding mods is undesirable.

The thing I dislike most about modern combat is the AI fights like a grief-ing, cowardly, spawn-point camping, turtle player we fight in a fighting game or deathmatch FPS.  It kites and turtles until it has an overwhelming advantage then it swarms and kills quickly.  While effective, it almost needs a matching or superior fleet to counter, and that gets expensive.  With the latest release, bounties level up faster than you can and combat is not a good idea until endgame.