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Author Topic: Suggestion: Duel Missions  (Read 9873 times)

Tomn

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Suggestion: Duel Missions
« on: May 27, 2011, 05:34:08 PM »

Hey,

I'd just like to preface this by saying that this is a bloody excellent game and I'd love to see where it goes.  Far too many spaceship games assumes that the player wants to be the fighter pilot, running light, fast maneuverable ships around and cackling with glee as they destroy half a dozen huge, lumbering capital ships.  There's not nearly enough spaceship games that reckon that maybe the player wants to be the captain, not the pilot.

Anyways, on to the suggestion.  At the moment, there's a spot of a learning curve to the game, with some things needing hard experience to learn.  I would suggest that in order to make it easier to learn how to play the game, one-on-one duel missions should be implemented.  These would allow players to get a better idea of how to fight a ship without having to worry about fleet strategy or other ships mucking things up, as well as also allowing players a closer look at exactly how particular ships handle and what they're capable of - at the moment, it takes guesswork and close attention to a couple of battles to learn exactly what a frigate (for instance) can take on with some hope of either success or at least damage.  

The duels can be implemented either using the current mission system (with the player tossed into either a mirror match or an enemy of equal power) or could be implemented by allowing the player to select which ship they want to fly and which ship they want to fight.  I'd prefer the latter myself, since it'd also allow players to figure out how well smaller ships match up to larger ships, but I understand it's probably trickier to code.

Also, side note, this is a really, really long-term and probably costly idea, but assuming it doesn't muck up existing UI audio cues too much (at the time of implementation), it'd be neat if your bridge officers confirmed orders verbally throughout the battle.  So you might get something like this during a battle:

"Aye sir, raising shields!"
"Firing Weapon Bank Four!"
"Full power to thrusters, aye!"
"Flux raising to critical levels!"
"Aye, sir, venting flux!"

And so on.  This wouldn't actually be for purposes of informing the player so much as it is immersion - the idea of listening to constant, almost incomprehensible battle chatter during a fight tickles me.  Of course, I understand that voice-acting is expensive, takes up megabytes, and that if implemented in this way has the potential to "clutter up" the actual interface and audio cues, so it's more of a "this would be cool" thing than an actual suggestion.  Still, it WOULD be cool.

Edit: Oh, yeah, and a "Defend This Position" order for the tactical map would be ace.  I want you idiots to mass the fleet in preparation for an attack, not to go charging off the moment you arrive at the destination!  :argh:
« Last Edit: May 27, 2011, 05:39:08 PM by Tomn »
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Alex

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Re: Suggestion: Duel Missions
« Reply #1 on: May 27, 2011, 06:22:47 PM »

Hi there! Happy to hear you're enjoying the game. Thanks for dropping by and sharing your thoughts.

You're definitely right about the learning curve, it is a bit steep. I think a slightly more generalized version of your suggestion is a "custom battle" option, where you get to pick the map size and opposing fleets. This is something I'd like to do at some point - in the meantime, the next version will have some easier missions that introduce various game concepts a in a more gentle way.

I think the first mission is a fairly decent playground - all you have to do is deploy your fleet and let them do their thing while you try out whatever you like, and it's unlikely anything *they* do will cause a loss - but the mission after that ramps it up way too much.

About comm chatter - I agree on every point, from it being a cool idea to the various problems surrounding its implementation :) It'd be tricky to get right, and seems almost bound to get repetitive (and probably annoying) after some time... but is potentially very neat.
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Avan

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Re: Suggestion: Duel Missions
« Reply #2 on: May 27, 2011, 10:24:24 PM »

It shouldn't be too hard to make a bunch of simple "Very easy" level modded missions as sort of a "beginner's pack" I suppose - emphasizing teaching a basic idea in one mission, and then a more advanced application of the concept in the next. Sort of how portal level sequences & puzzle sequences are designed.

IE, first you could have a basic mission of a large ship vs. fighters, to teach people the magic of autofire, and then a larger battle where again its necessary, and perhapse even vital to being able to realistically use your ship's armament (ie, having a bunch of ballistic hardpoints)

Too bad missions can't have the in-game popup boxes or dynamically spawned ships like the tutorial yet... or can they?

tinsoldier

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Re: Suggestion: Duel Missions
« Reply #3 on: May 27, 2011, 10:43:52 PM »

About comm chatter - I agree on every point, from it being a cool idea to the various problems surrounding its implementation :) It'd be tricky to get right, and seems almost bound to get repetitive (and probably annoying) after some time... but is potentially very neat.

I gotta say that the comm chatter in SPAZ still makes me chuckle occasionally. 

"Anyone know a good strip club out here?...   I need a job."

ha.
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Avan

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Re: Suggestion: Duel Missions
« Reply #4 on: May 27, 2011, 10:48:36 PM »

Its not context sensitive com-chatter though like what the OP was suggesting.

tinsoldier

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Re: Suggestion: Duel Missions
« Reply #5 on: May 27, 2011, 11:08:36 PM »

Its not context sensitive com-chatter though like what the OP was suggesting.

This is true although I thought that if it were subtle background chatter ala SPAZ and had suitable variety that it'd be comparable.
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Darkreaver1980

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Re: Suggestion: Duel Missions
« Reply #6 on: May 28, 2011, 05:20:00 AM »

How about an "Starship Academy"? it should be in the main menu (replacing the current tutorial?) and there you would find 6+ of these tutorial/duel missions
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Tomn

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Re: Suggestion: Duel Missions
« Reply #7 on: May 28, 2011, 04:53:22 PM »

A custom battle system would certainly be neat (not to mention useful for testing things out), it's true, but as you say, it's probably going to be a whiles yet.  It might be useful to have a few stop-gap mirror match missions out for the moment as an aid until proper custom battles are implemented.  That said, it might be that the new missions you mentioned could effectively fill the gap, so let's see how that goes.

By the way, on the subject of difficulty, are the missions we're seeing at the moment roughly representative of the sort of scraps we're probably going to get into for the campaign, 50%+ casualty rate and all?  Or are these more epic set pieces designed to make a lot of boom, and campaign battles should, unless you get in over your head, be less of a slaughterhouse?
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Avan

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Re: Suggestion: Duel Missions
« Reply #8 on: May 28, 2011, 05:30:30 PM »

Really, I would imagine it would depend on your tactics: ie, something like the last hurrah is going to be representative of a large attack, while a match where odds are stacked in your favor would likely be more common, so long as you managed things sensibly and didn't go running off getting into situations way over your head.

Alex

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Re: Suggestion: Duel Missions
« Reply #9 on: May 28, 2011, 07:05:05 PM »

I'll just add that it will also depend on your character. If you're focused on industrial production, and field large fleets that overwhelm with numbers, you'll see higher losses than if you focus on piloting and command skills and control a smaller, more elite task force.
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Avan

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Re: Suggestion: Duel Missions
« Reply #10 on: May 28, 2011, 08:50:03 PM »

but there is nothing to say you can't have both, right? (ie, having a large primary fleet, with divisions, some of which are elite divisions)

Alex

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Re: Suggestion: Duel Missions
« Reply #11 on: May 29, 2011, 11:14:32 AM »

but there is nothing to say you can't have both, right? (ie, having a large primary fleet, with divisions, some of which are elite divisions)

Well, your character's skill distribution is going to affect how good you are at commanding large fleets vs piloting vs actually building lots of ships. It won't be the only determining factor, but if you've invested enough points to be the best pilot possible, you're not going to be flying around with huge fleets. At least, not for long - upkeep/maintenance costs and all.

You could certainly have elite ships (due to crew and officer experience) in either case, though. They might be harder or easier to get (say, if your command skill is high, officers + crews level up faster, or some such). The exact details are squarely TBD.
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