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Author Topic: [0.65.2a] ICE Faction  (Read 134043 times)

iceone

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Re: [0.65.2a] ICE Faction
« Reply #270 on: November 19, 2015, 09:37:21 PM »

The crash in the log appears to be from a bug fixed in 0.7, although the mod will not be compatible there till someone updates it guess it'll have to be me again.

Additionally, the exile fleet having a food shortage suggests an out-of-date ICE version.

the latest 0.3.3 ... I use the Ice-mod in the game version 0652a
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Weltall

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Re: [0.65.2a] ICE Faction
« Reply #271 on: March 17, 2016, 10:07:14 PM »

For anyone that loves ICE as much as I do (>.> well I love all of them XD) you should check out a RC for 0.7.2a that Deathfly released and maybe help with testing~
http://fractalsoftworks.com/forum/index.php?topic=9614.msg184958#msg184958
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Ignorance is bliss..

Reh

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Re: [0.65.2a] ICE Faction
« Reply #272 on: June 20, 2017, 05:13:52 PM »

Any chance of resurrecting this mod? I'd do it myself but I have absolutely no idea how mods work.

It has such a fantastic ships and abilities design.
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LB

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Re: [0.65.2a] ICE Faction
« Reply #273 on: June 28, 2017, 05:14:00 PM »

ICE was my favorite mod back in the day too, and I've been working on some code reorg on and off for a while in preparation to build the mod into a usable state in 0.8.1a. Life's been busy and I doubt I'll be done for another few months yet. If someone else wants to snipe it, be my guest. I've also yet to ask Sundog for permission, since I don't believe it's sufficiently complete to merit even considering release.

Some rambling: with the overall lowered combat lethality in 0.8, some significant balance issues with playing ICE in extended campaigns are less problematic, but there's still the fundamental issues:
1. balancing defense of phase-only factions in general, and
2. the weapon range "normalization" built-in hullmod combined with the weird ICE weapon ranges which make ICE/vanilla/other-faction interop weird and often unbalanced.

For the former: I've been tinkering a bit with a different system to change how ICE defense works to make damage taken follow a shallow log growth curve - basically, damage shaving that's increasingly effective against high single instances of damage. This is a way to address a frequent frustration (in my perception) with unshielded ships where you're much more vulnerable to instant death from e.g. Reapers or high-alpha strike weapons in situations where a shielded ship could just eat an extra-long overload, since shields are instant-toggle but phase ships are subject to the phase cooldown. There needs to be a downside too, which I haven't fleshed out yet - likely one of two things:
1. decreased armor damage reduction vs. low-damage attacks, e.g. a Hellbore hit will do reduced balance, but sustained Light Assault Gun fire will be more damaging than usual; or
2. damage reduction based on distance from your enemy, which may be impossible since iirc it's not yet possible to find how far a given projectile has traveled.

For the latter - I think it should just be removed, and weapons balanced appropriately so that they're not overwhelming when mounted on other ships but sufficiently useful on ICE ships. Achieving this could require some kind of penalty or bonus built-in to ICE ships, but the weapons themselves should be balanced to the vanilla baseline. The precise mechanics of the Falx beam are also a headache - it should probably stay a ICE-only builtin. Armor repair is a rabbit hole as well - maybe some sort of per-engagement cap, or have ICE armor breach earlier and "leak" hull damage at a higher rate so hull attrition can accumulate.

I'm not sure whether this will turn out to be a fun way to differentiate ICE or just a bad gimmick. I did really like how different the ICE playstyle was, despite the occasional balance problem, and I want to try to preserve that uniqueness while fixing some of the edge cases.
« Last Edit: June 28, 2017, 05:37:44 PM by LB »
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Sundog

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Re: [0.65.2a] ICE Faction
« Reply #274 on: June 30, 2017, 01:48:13 PM »

Hi guys. Sorry for the late reply. I'm glad you guys liked it  :)

I've been working on some code reorg on and off for a while in preparation to build the mod into a usable state in 0.8.1a
You have my thanks, respect, and condolences. Sorry it's such a mess. You also have my permission to do anything you like with ICE. This thread might be relevant. Also feel free to clone the repo. If you have questions feel free to ask. You seem to have a solid understanding of many of the problems with ICE and it seems like you're on the right track with fixing them. Best of luck!

HELMUT

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Re: [0.65.2a] ICE Faction
« Reply #275 on: July 01, 2017, 10:52:58 AM »

I'm also really eager to see an eventual 0.8 update for ICE, sadly deathfly doesn't seems to have much free time to do it either.

As for the balance issues. Phase ships, like pretty much anything without a shield, tends to suffer greatly against quick, high-impact weapons. Even more so against beams like the Phase lance or the HIL.
I don't like your first idea of tweaking with armor damage reduction, it radically goes against the basic of how armor works in general, which is not intuitive in my opinion.

Second one should be possible, if hacky, it would probably screw with missiles and other scripted weapons. Not sure it would play well with beams either. I don't think anyone truly found a solution to handle beams. Perhaps a mix of natural beam resistance like Exi have, coupled with an AOE range debuff like old ORA?

Another idea would be something like a reverse temporal shell. Basically a slow AOE that would affect enemies the closer they are. This would give enough time for a phase ship to react against a slowed projectile. This would also works with beams to some extent.

I've never really seen the range normalization hullmod causing issues and can't really think of any off the top of my head... Do you have any exemples?
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OzarMidrashim

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Re: [0.65.2a] ICE Faction
« Reply #276 on: July 20, 2017, 12:07:56 PM »

Its just terrible ...could we at least get weapon pack update?
I miss chupacabra fusor! xD
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Mods are like drugs for games - they allow to customise and expand experiance...
...yet be carefull not to mix to much or overload...as conflicts yield terrible results.
There is only one rule always in (load)order...be responsible and know what you're doing.

Agalyon

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Re: [0.65.2a] ICE Faction
« Reply #277 on: December 20, 2018, 08:35:21 PM »

I really hope someone is still working on this to some degree, even if it is just an unbalanced port to the new version. It was always one of the most unique and interesting factions, I would hate to see it die.
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Sundog

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Re: [0.65.2a] ICE Faction
« Reply #278 on: December 20, 2018, 09:49:07 PM »

Unfortunately, many of the unique aspects of ICE also make it difficult to keep up to date. I really tried to push the limits of Starsector's combat engine with this mod, and I had some success, but I broke a lot of things in the process (the AI in particular). I honestly don't know how much work it would take to get ICE back to a playable state, but getting it to the point where I would want to use it? That would take several hundred hours (if not thousands). If I ever get back into modding for Starsector, I'll start from scratch.

Agalyon

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Re: [0.65.2a] ICE Faction
« Reply #279 on: December 20, 2018, 11:26:04 PM »

Unfortunately, many of the unique aspects of ICE also make it difficult to keep up to date. I really tried to push the limits of Starsector's combat engine with this mod, and I had some success, but I broke a lot of things in the process (the AI in particular). I honestly don't know how much work it would take to get ICE back to a playable state, but getting it to the point where I would want to use it? That would take several hundred hours (if not thousands). If I ever get back into modding for Starsector, I'll start from scratch.
Ouch, thats really rough to hear. I assumed it was in part because ICE was so technical, but I didn't think it was that bad. For what its worth though, your work is appreciated and I'd love to see anything you make if you decide to work on it some more.
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Sundog

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Re: [0.65.2a] ICE Faction
« Reply #280 on: December 21, 2018, 03:32:00 PM »

Thank you  :)
I've been kicking around some ideas for a refined version of ICE for a while now that I'd like to make a reality someday, but at the moment I've got a lot of other things going on. Hopefully it's something I'll be able to work on soon.
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