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Author Topic: My long list of constructive criticism, so far  (Read 8009 times)

BonhommeCarnaval

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My long list of constructive criticism, so far
« on: February 25, 2012, 12:18:43 PM »

So this is my feedback thread for every aspect of the game as it currently is. It may sound negative but I assure you I love the game and already got my money's worth. The entire point here is to discuss what I feel could/should be improved.

Keep in mind that some of these things would obviously be OPTIONS so, for example, even though you may thoroughly enjoy the fact that your admiral smashes his radio against the wall once he has given X number of orders (equal to your command points), having the option to disable such things would be PURELY beneficial as no one would be forced to do it. :)


1) While the AI for fast frigates is pretty good, it seems like all fighter pilots are complete ***. They're way too careless and they don't seem to take into consideration that their carrier teammates can magically respawn their wingmen if they make it back alive. With the current (strange) mechanics, the best fighter AI is a cowardly one since you would then rarely lose an entire wing. Hopefully there will be a setting in the future to let us decide when a fighter wing goes back to refit & repair. I would obviously set it to "whenever you lose a single craft".

2) Slightly related to the above, I find it very immersion-breaking that the last craft of an entire fighter wing is magically super important for no reason as he is necessary for the reconstruction of his wingmen. It seems like the carriers should either be able to build fighters or not, regardless of having one of them docked there. Even if you were to find some excuse such as "they use the remaining fighter as a blueprint to know how to rebuild his wingmen" then I would like to be able to order one fighter of every wing to remain docked at all times, making the wing effectively invincible. The current implementation feels gimmicky and obscure.

3) At a cost of 1 CP each time it is issued, the "Refit & Repair" order for fightercrafts becomes rather useless.

4) Nav buoys and sensor relays are way too powerful and game-breaking. While nerfing them into the ground would help, changing their bonus to something more reasonable would be better. For example, nav buoys could decrease the chance for your retreating ships to get lost and captured (increase the chance of having them regroup with their fleet after the battle), perhaps based on how long you've held nav buoys during the fight or how many were held when the ship retreated. Sensor arrays could give more line of sight to your ships or simply give a large radius of sight around the relay itself. I don't really have a problem with comm relays as they are right now.

5) I find myself having the most fun in small engagements with no capture points. Can we have an option to change what size is considered a small engagement? I would like to remove capture points in my game.

6) The enormous handicap where the player takes 50% of normal damage should definitely NOT be activated by default. Finding out that it has been on and then turning it off (which I assume most will do when they finally find out about it) is the equivalent of having your characters' levels reset to 1 in an MMORPG, except that what you lose in this case is all the knowledge you thought you had about ships and how to fit them. Ship setups that were valid or even very powerful can become useless without this massive game-changing handicap.

7) This is probably already in the plans but there needs to be an option to more precisely manage how you distribute your crews of different experience levels.

8) If you don't have 4 weapon groups, you can select a non-existent one (for example pressing 4 when you only have 3 groups) which allows all your weapons to be on autofire. There's no reason for this not to be possible with 4 weapon groups and it would even the playing field between us and AI controlled ships as we would be able to shoot all our weapons AND control an omni shield aswell. This can be particularly frustrating when, for example, you have an incoming Salamander missile and you have to STOP SHOOTING the enemy in front of you so that you can turn your shield to cover your engines.

9) It would be nice if we could set our shield to automatic just like weapons. At least for the direction of an omni shield.

10) In the mission Forlorn Hope, the player's greatest enemy is his own terrible weapon groupings. Being forced to disable your tactical lasers, autopulse lasers and point defense just so that your heavy blasters stop overloading your ship with flux is pretty ridiculous.

11) While I like the concept of nebulas adding an extra tactical layer to battles, they seem to be way too common and some of them are so small they are barely larger than a battleship, making them somewhat insignificant on a tactical level but just as annoying when you're trying to get to the battle.

12) Please add an unlimited control points mode which obviously would be off by default. While I have only rarely been annoyed by command points, I've never felt like they added any enjoyment to the game (so I lost little but gained nothing). In the few cases where they annoyed me, they did so by preventing me from compensating for the occasional shortcomings of the AI. For example, if I'm using a lot of fighter wings then I will most likely either run out of command points for Repair&Refit or the AI will get a bunch of them killed. In either case I end up frustrated instead of having fun. Those who enjoy command points would simply not turn them off.

13) It seems absurd for any fleet to travel any more than 10% slower than the travel speed of their slowest ship, regardless of fleet size. I doubt there's a lot of obstacles to dodge in space and I assume most captains are at least semi-competent, enough to not randomly steer or slow down their ship.

14) Since the slowest ship(s) of a fleet are obviously not going to mistakenly wait for other ships that are significantly faster than them, any ship significantly faster than the slowest ship of a fleet should not slow down the fleet at all. "Oh my, our Tempest is very slightly behind everyone else, slow down the Paragons so he can catch up!"

15) If fighter crafts are kept in hangars then it would make sense that they would not slow the fleet down at all. They would rarely do so anyway if suggestion 14 is implemented.

16) This one is very obvious and already known but the current algorithm that determines when an enemy fleet retreats is the most cowardly thing I've ever seen. I've captured a Paragon using a frigate because he decided to run away after I killed a few fighters. For the record, he could easily have travelled to his destination with his 360 degree shields up, ignoring my insignificant damage indefinitely.

17) It is annoying to (for example) have an extremely slow Venture be able to retreat from my Lasher just because he reached the imaginary end of an imaginary box in space. Unless a ship actually got away from all its enemies, it should not be allowed to retreat, only surrender. Otherwise, a slow missile boat can enter a battle, deal any amount of armor or hull damage to a ship that would usually defeat him, then retreat and re-engage (or be re-engaged). Someone suggested that the map boundaries themselves should move to follow the center of mass of all ships currently fighting and while I don't know how hard that would be to implement, it's the kind of solution that would restore the feeling of actually fighting in space, not in a tiny box. If a ship actually has enough speed to be able to surrender then it would be able to disengage from its enemies in battle and gain some distance, then be allowed to retreat without surrendering. If it cannot do that, why would the battle boundaries allow it to?

18) Retreating ships sometimes stop using their shields for no reason, making them many times weaker than they actually should be.

19) It would be useful if we could decide if we want our PD lasers to prioritize ships, fighters or missiles. It's annoying to have your burst PD lasers waste their shots on practically harmless swarmer missiles when the enemy fighter launching them is in range of said PD laser and will continue launching them for at least 2 full minutes anyway. In that case I wish the PD would shoot the fighters first. This is situational so a setting would be best, even if it can only be changed from the refitting window.

20) AI ships being shot by a tachyon lance will often raise their shields then turn them off before the lance is done dealing damage, resulting in hull damage that obviously shouldn't have happened.
« Last Edit: February 25, 2012, 06:18:52 PM by BonhommeCarnaval »
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Uomoz

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Re: My long list of constructive criticism, so far
« Reply #1 on: February 25, 2012, 01:17:10 PM »

I think that once a ship is out of the boundaries of the fight zone it speed up at a whole different speed. Think about it, during fight you move in speed relative to ship lenght, while traveling in system you travel relative to planets.
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BonhommeCarnaval

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Re: My long list of constructive criticism, so far
« Reply #2 on: February 25, 2012, 01:23:46 PM »

I think that once a ship is out of the boundaries of the fight zone it speed up at a whole different speed. Think about it, during fight you move in speed relative to ship lenght, while traveling in system you travel relative to planets.

Then why can't we use that in the middle of the battle map? If it's because we have to be out of combat, then why can a slow ship retreat from my faster ship even through I'm CURRENTLY shooting at him?

I don't mind a ship retreating if there are no enemies nearby but retreating into a magical safe zone from within range of an enemy's weapons is pretty annoying, particularly when the person retreating is obviously slower and would die within a short amount of time.
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arcibalde

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Re: My long list of constructive criticism, so far
« Reply #3 on: February 25, 2012, 01:42:39 PM »

This can be easily solved. The ship whose speed is lower then speed of a player's fleet can not retreat and it is captured.


And we forgot about FLEET GOAL> If it's in defense its unlikely to be captured :)
« Last Edit: February 25, 2012, 01:47:51 PM by arcibalde »
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BonhommeCarnaval

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Re: My long list of constructive criticism, so far
« Reply #4 on: February 25, 2012, 02:05:50 PM »

This can be easily solved. The ship whose speed is lower then speed of a player's fleet can not retreat and it is captured.


And we forgot about FLEET GOAL> If it's in defense its unlikely to be captured :)

This is pretty much what I'm saying, as long as the AI is aware that retreating will result in a capture so it only retreats if it intends to surrender.

Then again if a slow ship gets to the edge of the map and is NOT engaged in combat then I wouldn't mind if it was allowed to retreat.
« Last Edit: February 25, 2012, 02:37:03 PM by BonhommeCarnaval »
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Uomoz

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Re: My long list of constructive criticism, so far
« Reply #5 on: February 25, 2012, 07:04:29 PM »

I think that once a ship is out of the boundaries of the fight zone it speed up at a whole different speed. Think about it, during fight you move in speed relative to ship lenght, while traveling in system you travel relative to planets.

Then why can't we use that in the middle of the battle map? If it's because we have to be out of combat, then why can a slow ship retreat from my faster ship even through I'm CURRENTLY shooting at him?

I don't mind a ship retreating if there are no enemies nearby but retreating into a magical safe zone from within range of an enemy's weapons is pretty annoying, particularly when the person retreating is obviously slower and would die within a short amount of time.

Because like in all sci fi movies and such there are cruise speeds and combat speeds. Imagine the ships in cruise speed: they get caught in the engagement but if they manage to align to a new destination and prepare the engines (the time the ship spend leaving the combat box) they will leave the fight and force the pursuers in cruise speed (and that's why the fleets come back to the map interface).

If then you say "why do the ships even get caught off cruise speed", man it's a game, it have to let the player initiate the fight. (making all retreating ships surrender would be a horrible game mechainc iMho)
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agrophobiac

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Re: My long list of constructive criticism, so far
« Reply #6 on: February 27, 2012, 03:30:43 AM »

BonhommeCarnaval is not against a retreat option...

but i too think it should be implemented within the logic of the game universe

so either a check if a ship is being chased by a faster ship and shot at or some kind of warpengine spinuptimer with downed shields and weapons.

anyhow nice list

additional

21) Omni shield and extended shields should either be taken out of the refit screen
     or given some different enhancements to a ship already having them installed

22) An option to define strikegroups before combat
« Last Edit: February 27, 2012, 04:05:03 AM by agrophobiac »
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Ephraim

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Re: My long list of constructive criticism, so far
« Reply #7 on: February 27, 2012, 11:14:32 AM »

 I agree with a vast majority of OP's suggestions, with following exceptions or points i want to shamelessly bump:

  • I actually like the command points! I'd say 'it makes the game original!' but it's just a lame excuse for the fact I dont exactly enjoy microing, I believe the current AI generally does a better job than I would (yeah, well) and I quite enjoy watching how ship assignements change as I bellow orders, aside from...
  • ... the suicidal fighters *_*. It's a pain when you sometimes have to babysit each and every one of them not to lose any because they find it amusing to charge into a crossfire and stay there as if sunbathing in PD laser fire

Hm I did a bit of research writing this, and it seems all of my other thoughts have already been covered somewhere else.
And it's never bad to remind that I love the game as it is, what troubles me is merely minor crap.
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BonhommeCarnaval

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Re: My long list of constructive criticism, so far
« Reply #8 on: February 27, 2012, 11:18:43 AM »

I agree with a vast majority of OP's suggestions, with following exceptions or points i want to shamelessly bump:

  • I actually like the command points! I'd say 'it makes the game original!' but it's just a lame excuse for the fact I dont exactly enjoy microing, I believe the current AI generally does a better job than I would (yeah, well) and I quite enjoy watching how ship assignements change as I bellow orders, aside from...
  • ... the suicidal fighters *_*. It's a pain when you sometimes have to babysit each and every one of them not to lose any because they find it amusing to charge into a crossfire and stay there as if sunbathing in PD laser fire

Hm I did a bit of research writing this, and it seems all of my other thoughts have already been covered somewhere else.
And it's never bad to remind that I love the game as it is, what troubles me is merely minor crap.

Apparently every time I express my dislike of command points, people think I want to play this like an RTS. I don't. I like that all your ships have a mind of their own, go about their task how they feel is best, etc. I don't want to "micro" I just want to be able to change my global overall strategy as much as I want. The few times I want to micromanage are when the AI isn't good enough, like the suicidal fighters we both mentionned.
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Ephraim

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Re: My long list of constructive criticism, so far
« Reply #9 on: February 27, 2012, 11:22:12 AM »

Hm I think It'd be nice not to limit the command points, as sometimes they can be too easily waisted on random things like repairing fighters or assigning escorts, and to somehow otherwise punish an RTS -like approach, tho I've no idea how could that be accomplished.
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BonhommeCarnaval

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Re: My long list of constructive criticism, so far
« Reply #10 on: February 27, 2012, 11:25:36 AM »

Hm I think It'd be nice not to limit the command points, as sometimes they can be too easily waisted on random things like repairing fighters or assigning escorts, and to somehow otherwise punish an RTS -like approach, tho I've no idea how could that be accomplished.

I think the solution is in front of everyone's eyes, add an option to remove command points. It's a singleplayer game afterall, why punish a playstyle?

I can understand that Alex has a vision of what he wants the game to be. If I were him and I liked the CP system, I would want people to give it a try before they disable it. That can easily be done by having the default option be with command points. Have the option be "Command Mode" and it can be set to Normal or Easy. Most people will either leave it on normal to try it out or out of pride. Once that's done, if they hate it then I don't see why they shouldn't be able to disable it.
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Zapier

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Re: My long list of constructive criticism, so far
« Reply #11 on: February 27, 2012, 11:48:36 AM »

They shouldn't be able to disable just yet for various reasons... the first being that the AI system is still working out bugs and getting things tweaked as well as everything else. If you put the ability to remove the CP system, then there will be far less feedback and testing with it, thus making it longer to fix and properly optimize it. The enemy AI uses the very same CP system as well, so if you made it be disabled, and then half or so of us 'alpha testers/financial backers' will no longer be able to actively help optimize both ally and enemy AI. It would weaken the pace of development in my view.

Second, other game features like individual officers and character skills are also not yet added. These things will certainly augment and modify how both the CP system and the AI in general works. With these features in players may not even notice the CP system as much as they do now because it may work far smoother and better than they thought it could.

Third, similar to my first point, the enemy AI uses the very same CP system, removing it would drastically alter how effective the enemy AI could be to face a human opponent or Alex would have to spend time working on two AI systems... one that incorporates the current CP system and the other without it. Later on in the development it might be a good option, but currently I think it'd be too silly to have to work on both... and if you don't I fear one will be left very wanting and very unchallenged.

Fourth and final, this game does and will support further modding by the community. I'm sure at some point even the CP system can/will be modded for those that wish it to be more flexible/forgiving/less restricting. I say let the community change the game they wish to play, rather than appeal to Alex to spend his time changing/offering an alternate system that he has said is here to stay for the time being.
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Reapy

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Re: My long list of constructive criticism, so far
« Reply #12 on: February 27, 2012, 12:04:25 PM »

I think the AI could use some engagement modes. I think at some point you want the fleet to generally not fully engage. I think in spots they do a lovely job with that, and in others not so much. I agree with you that I usually see fighters killing themselves when they really don't need to.

I think the solution here might be somewhere between changing how fighters work with their ship respawn and /or a method to keep them in a 'harass' mode more so than they currently do on their own.

As a player we understand carrier fighter mechanics. Because of this, we want our fighters to go out, empty their weapon canisters while staying at max distance, and avoiding approaching large ships. Then when ammo is low or they take any slight damage, run home, repair, and repeat.

Maybe this isn't quite the best way for the game to be played. I mean it IS, but maybe a change somewhere. Fighters are already in a somewhat protected space where you can't configure them and they fill highly specialized rolls, so I think it would be ok to continue tweaking them so they behave better.

Perhaps fighters could stop being groups of 2/4/6 and instead just be X number of fighters, IE I have 10 talons and 7 broadswords. Perhaps so you need hanger space for each one, and maybe they need to operate off a carrier before you can have them (or maybe you need enough hanger space before you can leave the system with them).

Maybe you can group up the fighters, decide how many wings you want, or they just do best fit, IE the talon's always form groups of 4, if you have 6 you get a group of 4 and a group of 2.

So you would deply ships in groups. Deploy one talon group of 4 and it costs how much it does now. If the wing comes back to repair and it's lost one ship, it takes one from the pool of fighters. EG, you have 12 talons, 3 groups. You deploy 2 groups at the fleet point cost that it takes now. You now have 4 talons in reserve.  While fighting 2 talons die, leaving a group with 2 left. The go repair and take 2 out of reserve, leaving 2 left.  You now can not deploy another talon group since you only have 2 remaining and don't meet the requirement of 4.

Ok maybe that gets overly complicated. I'm just rambling here anyway, but I have a feeling that as the campaign ships up, the way fighters are used and employed is probably going to need to evolve somewhat.

----------------------------

Also agree with retreating AI. That needs some tweaking too. There should be some factor or punishment for retreating. I honestly really love the (once again) concepts in tie fighter, where a ship will take X amount of seconds to prepare for hyperspace, the ship is vulnerable during that prep time and it's really obvious when they are going to do so. Once they prep and hit the go button, the ship accelerates rapidly and rockets back off into space.

It doesn't immediately disappear, so you still get those last second shots to blow them up 'at the buzzer'.

I guess right now it is OK if the AI chooses to flee while they are in the center of the battlefield, this way you can tell they have turned tale and are running and can react to it... but if your fighting has drifted into a corner somewhere, and the AI gets set to run, often they can be long gone within seconds of you realizing they have chosen to flee.
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j01

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Re: My long list of constructive criticism, so far
« Reply #13 on: February 27, 2012, 01:47:08 PM »

...If you put the ability to remove the CP system, then there will be far less feedback and testing with it...

I'd just like to point out that if making command points optional resulted in the vast majority of people choosing not to use them, then that is a good indication that most people do not like the system and thus it probably doesn't belong in this game after all.

I'm the kind of guy who detests these arbitrary limitations in theory, even when they are almost never actually an issue in practice. I will not play a roguelike with hunger mechanics and finite food, for example. I want to, in theory, be able to play forever if I so choose. Likewise, I want to be able to micro to my little OCD heart's content, even in Starfarer.

An option to toggle would probably be for the best. If not, I'll most likely always just mod command points away anyway.
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intothewildblueyonder

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Re: My long list of constructive criticism, so far
« Reply #14 on: February 27, 2012, 02:02:48 PM »


18) Retreating ships sometimes stop using their shields for no reason, making them many times weaker than they actually should be.

This actually worked to my advantage. Once I was chasing down a retreating Lasher and it was getting away. So I lined up, lead my target, and fired the reaper torpedoes at the retreating ship. The Lasher, instead of simply dodging the torpedoes decided to slow down, use its PD while raising the shields to deal with them. This allowed me to stay in range and whittle down the Lasher.

20) AI ships being shot by a tachyon lance will often raise their shields then turn them off before the lance is done dealing damage, resulting in hull damage that obviously shouldn't have happened.

there is another thread on this and Alex said it will be fixed in the next release
« Last Edit: February 27, 2012, 02:07:45 PM by intothewildblueyonder »
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