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1

General Discussion / Re: realism

« on: September 23, 2022, 09:53:25 PM »

Is there an actual complaint here beyond "massive income inequality and concentration of wealth in private ownership is unrealistic"

we are less arguing about weather or not this is realistic and more on, the *** life of living in the sector and probably the domain

That's literally just canon, though?

The Domain of Man is no more. Their countless fleets and innumerable armies have been shattered and lost. The comforts of their civilization are a distant memory. Cut off from the Star Gate network and scattered in isolated pockets throughout the galaxy, humanity is trying to recover from the great Collapse.

Doesn't quite give off the feel of a Star Trek style post-scarcity utopia, eh?


In any case, while we've had a few people give rough guesses on the effective purchasing power of a credit (personally I think Ruddygreat's estimate of 1 Credit ~ $1000 is a good starting point), I don't believe you have yet.

2

General Discussion / Re: realism

« on: September 11, 2022, 02:10:29 PM »

Is 10 a lot?  Depends on the thing.

Kuwaiti Dinars?  A decent chunk of change (~$32 USD equivalent)

Iranian Rials?  May as well be nothing at all.  (~$0.00024 USD equivalent)


One of the issues with declaring that the small number for crew income is unrealistic (besides the prior observation that Star Sector simply isn't a sim) is that we don't have actually any good references to the effective purchasing power of 1 credit for the average Star Sector crewman, or even a civillian.  Perhaps you could compare something like the cost of food to a crewman's income, but there's a problem with that:  The commercial goods you purchase are all sold in bulk, sold for tens to hundreds of credits per cargo capacity.

And what is one cargo capacity?  We don't know that either, other than a few bits of insight, such that some military equipment (large weapons, for instance) are so large that they can take up multiple units of cargo capacity.  We don't even know which capacity it's measuring: Is Cargo Capacity a function of available mass or volume for a ship?  It's the same story with Antimatter fuel and capacity, for that matter.  Pretty much the only parameter that is spelled out is colony size, measured on a 10^X scale, and I absolutely would not be surprised if that is also axed eventually and replaced by a single abstract number.

So is 10 credits a little or a lot?  For the protagonist of the game (effectively a freelance fleet admiral), it's pocket change.  For large governments in the Persean sector like the Hegemony it's certainly not even that; they must make a killing on those insane trade tariffs alone!  What about for Jane Doe, the Jangala resident?  How about John Smith, the Buffalo crewman?  Well, we don't really know.  We can't really say one way for sure that they're making slave-level wages like you're implying, or if starship crewmanship is a quick path to become a Persean Sector's equivalence to a millionaire, as Gothars jested.  Personally, I wouldn't be surprised if standard groceries and such cost merely several milliCredits for people planet-side, with single-family housing ownership costs around the realm of low 100 credits for economy level, and 1000-ish credits and up for luxurious mansions and such. 

the fact that he will never be able to get that money because he cant even afford the shietest of ships, speaks a lot.

The initial cost isn't even the biggest hurdle here.  A Kite will still cost 2 supplies of maintenance per flight-month, equivalent to 200 credits/month if it were to be constantly flying, which is obviously not sustainable on a 10 credit/month salary.

This doesn't seem unrealistic at all.  I'm fairly well off, but I won't realistically be able to purchase, store and maintain a Cessna on top of all the other financial obligations I have now and will acquire in the future, such as various loans and upkeep on automobiles, housing, necessities, hobbies, etc.  Kites, obviously, are going to be much more complex, luxurious, and naturally more expensive than that!

3

General Discussion / Re: The purpose of scavenging

« on: September 11, 2022, 12:39:14 PM »

I've often thought it would be more fun if you actually had to spend resources to get more out of salvage finds.  Such as you get to skim the top first off, but subsequently, you need to pay in a certain amount of heavy machinery to get more and better stuff.  You can still recover some heavy machinery from this process, but it's definitely a matter of diminishing returns and increasing costs.

It used to be something like that, except you could also lose crew and a marginal amount of ship CR, and the yields became reduced with repeated salvage attempts.  It didn't add anything interesting to the game, and in fact caused some edge issues when multiple debris fields are on top of each other, where you couldn't actually access a salvage field due to one being overlayed on the other.

You can even add special events where you pay in exotic resources to get a chance at a better roll.  Like using metal to build scaffolding to stabilize a structure or transplutonics to restart a spent nuclear secondary reactor.  The special event stays there indefinitely, so you can come back and finish it.

The general idea of more special events associated with exploration is likely worth consideration, similar to random Officers found in pods.

4

General Discussion / Re: planned features?

« on: September 05, 2022, 11:22:06 AM »

The mod angle has been addressed so I'll approach it from the other side, of why this-or-that feature hasn't been implemented yet or whether they'll be implemented at all.

i only see 1 upcoming feauture, and im sure there are more stuff to add

I'm not sure what "1 upcoming feature" is referring to, since there's quite a few in recent blog posts, but I'm sure the Alex's primary objective right now is to complete the main story arc whose first part was released in 0.95.  There's more things coming such as some more Ships to toy around with, more weaponry mainly consisting of laser missiles, and a minor revamp of faction rosters to make them a bit more distinct to fight.

like there is barely naything for the sindrian diktat

The Diktat actually has a middling amount of exclusive assets compared to average with their special Lion's Guard skins equipped with built-in Solar Shielding.  Sure, Hegemony has some more exclusive assets (Auxiliary ships and XIV Battlegroup), but factions like the Luddic Church just has a handful of skins with no special properties, and Persean League doesn't even have that.

They are getting more assets next update though, including a heavily modified variant of a new Midline capital ship and a few new exclusive (or near exclusive?) weapons.

you cant colonise abandiooned space station or make one,

There's only a few pre-gen abandoned space stations that likely couldn't/shouldn't be rebuilt back to functionality, and I think only 1 of those is located in an uninhabited sector.  The randomly generated stations are basically loot.  Finding an abandoned station (or building one from scratch) suitable for recolonizing in the sector is a fairly interesting concept, it's just likely not a high priority item for Alex to spend time on, if he wants to at all.

more story and main side quests for each faction,

The main story line is in development for sure.  Faction side stories could be interesting, perhaps once the main line is complete to a satisfactory degree.

better control for your faction and diplomacy with other factions, tech reaserch maybe.

This stuff kind of sounds like 4X mechanics.  Star Sector is not going to be a 4X game, so these are definitely not planned, at least not in the way it sounds like you're envisioning them.

Increaseing your population past 6 with the cryosleep ships,

Using Cryosleepers to get through certain Colony restrictions is a fairly common suggestion.  Can't say I have a good idea what Alex thinks of it one way or the other, unfortunately.

and more stuff to do in planets, so that you can do stuff there and quests, and wait for things to happen in your colnies,

Most of this is pretty unlikely; Planets & colonies are a bit of a side show.  Barring basic quests (which typically has you doing something in space rather than planet-side, like freight hauling or bounty hunting), any content that increases the micromanagement required for colonies (doing things and waiting for stuff to happen) is likely to be a hard sell.

and even a epilogue of what happens after if there is a end game with lots of choices and factors like what colonies you had or how much money or income you had to decide how te life of your dude and the sector played out

Honestly, I don't personally want a big "where is he now?" epilogue once the main storyline is complete.  Just a credits screen and return back to the game to do whatever once the Big Bad^TM is defeated.

Plus it would take a decent chunk of time to implement, and whether or not it can be implemented in a satisfying way for a game as open as Star Sector.  Imagine getting a slide where your PC "becomes a well-respected yet ruthless board member for the Tri-Tachyon corporation" due to happening to have a friendly or cooperative rating when your only real engagement with them was doing some pirate bounties and convenient quests so you could acquire enough capital to finally push Jangala into the sun.

5

Suggestions / Re: List of minor improvements for major increase in quality

« on: September 05, 2022, 09:56:01 AM »

Why would this ever be a goal is beyond me. So basically what Megas had been saying for ages is now even more true with s-mods, and that is flawless victories. If I'm ever in a losing battle or in a situation where I'm forced to retreat, that's an instant reload. Because there's no way in hell I'm losing ships with s-mods.

Well, presumably in finished state the game will be pure ironman so no reloads.

Why, precisely, would that be presumed?  Why would Alex go out of his way to implement a feature (or rather, remove the optionality of a feature) that does nothing but reduce the pool of interested buyers once Star Sector is fully released?

6

General Discussion / Re: Is it time to get rid of Blast Doors?

« on: September 04, 2022, 09:08:08 AM »

My take on this is probably no, there are certainly some builds that won't be sustainable without blast doors and thus it shouldn't be removed.

Genuine question: what builds exactly would become unsustainable without blast doors?

7

Suggestions / Re: Make a variant of every weapon for all size slots.

« on: August 29, 2022, 08:18:39 PM »

Not every weapon, that's just way too much.

8

Suggestions / Re: Thumper buff

« on: August 24, 2022, 04:22:02 PM »

I just have to say, an Onslaught bullying 2 Light Cruisers and then promptly getting itself killed fighting a Conquest does not strike me as a ringing endorsement.

9

General Discussion / Re: Is it possible to re-enable the 3th mortar from the warthog?

« on: August 24, 2022, 04:21:01 PM »

If you're adding the 3rd mortar back in, I'd suggest taking a look at the Warthog's flux specs as well.  It's not going to result in much of a difference if your wings are flux throttling after 1 second of firing instead of 2.

10

General Discussion / Re: Is it time to get rid of Blast Doors?

« on: August 14, 2022, 03:32:10 PM »

3/5/8/15 OP?  Half the effect, half the cost?

11

Suggestions / Re: Vanilla Balance Tweaks

« on: August 11, 2022, 05:04:29 PM »

Phase Lance: Interestingly, I thought the same thing.  I've tested it out somewhat in what was otherwise basically Vanilla a year or two ago, so hopefully I'll bring some useful insight.

The main benefactor to 700-range Phase Lances are Midlines, rather than high-tech ships (though anything with both medium energies and some ballistics can benefit).  Falcons and Eagles are the obvious winners because the Phase Lance can range match quite a bit better than most other Medium Energy options (especially since their energy turrets are far back, giving them even shorter effective range compared to their already longer-ranged Ballistic hardpoints), but other ships can benefit somewhat from them as well depending on loadout, including the Pirate Shrike, Medusa, and to some extent Aurora.  Useful to a somewhat lesser extent on the Sunder as well, which can combine them with a standard 700-range projectile energy like an Autopulse.

Ultimately, I feel the range buff helps the Phase Lance differentiate itself from the other 2 "armor busting" Medium Energies on the roster, Mining Blasters and particularly Heavy Blasters.  Feels like a good addition to me.

Burst Lasers: The smalls are ok, if a bit expensive for their value.  Heavy Bursts could use some assistance, but I wouldn't recommend supercharging their ammo supply; Rather it's better if they have a bit more "oomph" per shot.  IME, a tiny bit longer burst (like 0.1 seconds) + a bit more DPS tends to do the trick.  Possibly throw in fire-over-friendly capabilities similar to the Paladin.

But mostly I just want them to have an even number of charges.  Not for anything rational; my dumb monkey brain gets annoyed when I want to throw Expanded Magazines on my boat.

Mortar/Chaingun/HAG: No thank you.  I prefer 'em as is.  Maybe a flux efficiency buff at most for the HAG, if people feel like it's too weak.

If we need a 800-range ballistic HE weapon, it should be something new, not a current thing revamped to shoehorn in the position.

Perhaps a Space Shotgun.

Trident: Always went Daggers over them due to cost and speed, but I'm not sure adding an entire third wing is the solution, to be honest.

Wasp: Way too fast.

Hull Changes: No strong opinion one way or the other on any of these.

12

Suggestions / Re: New Mod : Heavy Forward Plating

« on: August 07, 2022, 01:47:41 PM »

Initially I thought the OP was referring to the Paragon, and I was a bit confused, as that Cap still has pretty solid armor despite being an obvious (and slow) shield tank.

Seeing Sunders & Colossus IIs called out specifically, I think there's a lack of understanding on them fundamentally.  Neither of them are "shield tanks" and in fact have pretty poor shields for their type: Sunders have one of the worst shield efficiencies in the game at 1.2 flux/damage, and the Colossus II just has too poor flux stats (both dissipation and capacity) to be tanking anything.  Neither of these rely heavily on shielding to survive (not like a shield tank does, at least), rather they both use heavy firepower (and in Sunder's case, range) to kill or at least ward off other things before they die.  Since Sunders have, or can acquire, a considerable range advantage over most other destroyers (Beam loadout), they can accomplish this more easily than Colossus IIs.  Of course, a Sunder can't surprise you with 20 Hammers to the rear arc, either.

13

Mods / Re: [0.95a] Fighter Expansion Rebalanced v1.1.1a

« on: August 07, 2022, 12:36:43 AM »

Not dead.  Just nothing new to report.  Holding off on doing stuff with this until the next major Starsector patch, unless something truly game breaking crops up.

The XIV Fighters in general have a sort of theme: In addition to a basic upgrade package common to all XIV Fighters (Up-armoring, Flux- Core improvements at some expense of speed and mobility), their weapon packages are usually upgraded in some fashion.  The Khopesh receives ECCM, the Broadsword receives Swarmer missiles, the Gladius upgrades their LMGs to DLMGs, and the Thunder's Ion cannons get upgraded to standards.  I think it's mentioned in the codex file.  Naturally, the XIV fighters are also more OP intensive than their standard counterparts depending on the effectiveness of the upgrade, especially for stuff like the Broadsword & Thunder, so it's not a free lunch.

I'm pretty sure LG is not supposed to have that though.  I'll have to double check that.  Then again, this may be moot soon.  The whole LG fighter line may be getting the axe, based on my understanding of the upcoming new Sindrian Diktat; apparently the revamp has their fleet doctrinally using no fighter support whatsoever... (Based upon the "Uniquifying The Factions II blogpost)

(Relatedly, the Sentinel would be removed from Diktat fleets if the new concept goes live, and would probably become PL exclusive.)


I had originally planned on an update to this mod that included new fighters, weapons, and possibly even a carrier or two.  Unfortunately, the spriting process went poorly, and I got burnt out on both modding & the game as an unanticipated side effect, for a time anyways.

Long story short, my total inability to sprite is the main inhibitor of me implementing new content for this mod (and my Weapons Pack mod for that matter, stuck in limbo for the same reason).  At minimum, I'd have to partner with a spriter to co-create the mod who's capable of making small vanilla-like weapons and fighter craft, or enslave one pay for the service.  Neither seems likely in the short term, so the prospect of new content any time soon is low, but rest assured I will still continue to make compatibility and balance updates past 0.95.

14

Modding / Re: nutella jar rebalance mod

« on: September 15, 2021, 08:42:16 PM »

Oh my god
I'm dying
I'm literally cry-laughing

15

General Discussion / Re: how come the ship-mounted bomb bay isnt marked as system?

« on: July 12, 2021, 03:31:58 PM »

I recall occasionally receiving bomb bays in the campaign in 0.91 from station loot... somehow.  Haven't gotten any in 0.95 (yet) but I wouldn't see a problem standardizing the method with a SYSTEM tag, just in case.