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Author Topic: Starsector 0.7.1a (Released) Patch Notes  (Read 291483 times)

Mudanzas Valencia

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Re: Starsector 0.7.1a (Released) Patch Notes
« Reply #450 on: December 20, 2015, 07:07:06 AM »

the problem with civilvian grade ships weak/vulnerable sensors is that civilian grade ships suck and further suckifying them is already tipping the scale against avoiding them outright.

in particular, one of the key times to use civilian grade ships (when you need your first transport cargo but can't afford anything good so you buy a mudskipper) is apparently when this penalty is the most egregious (i think) and also the time when you're most vulnerable to gettign wiped by by gank faste attack pirates so all of that's real  bad.

In general i oppose anything that nerfs your stealth and sensor strength since there's already so many dangers and penalties in regards to these systems in terms of emergency burning/beaconing/environmental effects on and on and on that just adding more on top of it is griefing and pretty gratitutous griefing at that (sensor dynamic penalties are pretty estoric and unfun). same goes for augmented engines, uh those things already cost a crap ton of ordanance points and now your blinding the ships in addition? Wow... Also augmented engines weaken your sensors but jury rigged unstable injectors (the initial mod) don't? makes no sense

If you MUST add difficultly through stealth/senor penalties, do the following: add a penalty based on the fleet point RATIO of military to civilian. For example, if you have one frigate and one civilian, there's is little to no penalty to your sensors. If you have one frigate and ten mudskippers, the penalty is maxed out. Basically, military ships have the ability to mask and augment the sensor profiles of civilian ships through their algorithims w/e. This penalizes people that are flying low cost high profit fleets of buffalos or w/e which is what you expect and rewards those who have proper escorts.  This also opens a roll for EWARS ships specifically designed to mask and augment a large number of civilian ships.
« Last Edit: December 20, 2015, 07:11:26 AM by Question »
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Cik

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Re: Starsector 0.7.1a (Released) Patch Notes
« Reply #451 on: December 20, 2015, 07:37:57 AM »

the AE signature increase is fine. once you get to a fleet with more than a few ships losing a teensy bit of sensor superiority once you can see any fleet that's capable of killing you a long way off is worth the ability to engage and disengage at will, and it makes sense lore-wise.

as to more complicated sensor options: electronic warfare seems like a neat option, though i'm not sure what sort of effect you'd want. signature increase (due to more emission) but muddled ability to determine fleet size (basically what a real jammer does)

flat lower signature? lower signature at cost of supplies?

there's a ton of stuff you could add on top of the sensor system without changing it's base components.

i'd really like the individual sensors to be more granular. having distinct passive/active sensors that behave differently, electronic warfare systems that interact in interesting ways etc, would be pretty neat.
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Alex

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Re: Starsector 0.7.1a (Released) Patch Notes
« Reply #452 on: December 20, 2015, 10:15:46 AM »

If you MUST add difficultly through stealth/senor penalties, do the following: add a penalty based on the fleet point RATIO of military to civilian. For example, if you have one frigate and one civilian, there's is little to no penalty to your sensors. If you have one frigate and ten mudskippers, the penalty is maxed out.

That's pretty much exactly how it works out given the formulas involved.

Also, it's true that adding on a civ ship in the early game is a more noticeable penalty, but the enemies you face in that phase - i.e. pirates - have much higher penalties than that due to their (D) hulls. Adding on a freighter or two merely serves to slightly reduce the sensor advantage you already have over them.
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Mudanzas Valencia

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Re: Starsector 0.7.1a (Released) Patch Notes
« Reply #453 on: December 20, 2015, 11:35:01 AM »

That's pretty much exactly how it works out given the formulas involved.

really? Then I literally have no idea how sensor profiles work? That might be a problem? Perhaps someone could post a sensor profile graph showing the log scale of military ships versus civilian ships versus 50/50 mixed ships???

By the way, could you briefly explain what the enemy sensor "radar rings" actually mean. If you see their radar ring , that means you can see them right? That is to say, you see the radar ring emanating from their "center" position, which is revealing a previously invisible enemy fleet. That is really confusing to me, because radar does not function that way "intuitively," it emanates from you, that's how you detect. So really, you shouldn't see any enemy's "ring" you should see an enemies "blip" which is a disturbance in your ring. Unless your not detecting the enemy but triangulating based on their own electromagnetic signature (their ring???)

That's a confusing question cause its totally different from the "radar burst" special function that both you and the enemy can do, THAT makes sense, that's exactly how radar works intuively. What I don't understand is the normal "background" radar dynamics. If you see the enemy radar rings, im pretty sure that means you see them, but they dont necessarily see you right?

Also, when they do their own radar burst, how can you tell if they did or did not see you from the interface? For instance sometimes I see the strong radar ring waver over my fleet, does that mean detection? Other times I see an outer solid small radar ring  in addition to the main ring, does THAT mean detection?

Fuuuuh, an explanatory youtube radar tutorial video would be appreciated...
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Alex

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Re: Starsector 0.7.1a (Released) Patch Notes
« Reply #454 on: December 20, 2015, 11:44:50 AM »

By the way, could you briefly explain what the enemy sensor "radar rings" actually mean.

That indicates the outer edge of the range at which they can detect you, and is only shown when you're near that range. If you're outside it, they can't see you (yet). If you're inside it, they can see you. You also have to see *them* to get this indicator in the first place.

really? Then I literally have no idea how sensor profiles work? That might be a problem? Perhaps someone could post a sensor profile graph showing the log scale of military ships versus civilian ships versus 50/50 mixed ships???

This thread in the modding subforum has a bit more info.

Basically, adding +2 or whatever to your sensor profile matters progressively less and less as the total value goes up, beyond it just being a smaller fraction of the total.
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Serenitis

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Re: Starsector 0.7.1a (Released) Patch Notes
« Reply #455 on: December 21, 2015, 03:30:13 AM »

There are two problems I have with the sensor mechanic - one is minor and down to preference/play style, the other is a fair bit bigger of a deal.

Firstly the minor: You can't pick your targets any more.
Spoiler
Without being able to "see" everything it is almost impossible to pinpoint juicy targets. Almost.
You can still do this to a degree but the synergy with the E-Burn means you simply cannot skirt (or even go anywhere near) hostile markets looking for targets anymore, because if you do you get ganked hard.
So you are limited to targets which are "in transit" which costs a lot more fuel and supplies (and time!) to locate as you cannot see anything that isn't right next to you, meaning you are more dependant on finding a good target, which is much harder to find as you can't go near where most of the targets are.

The combination of Sensors & E-Burn has basically made playing the aggressor both much harder and much more tedious.
(Sensors only would work pretty well, it would still be a pain to find stuff but at least you wouldn't get dogpiled.)
[close]

The biggest problem though is the whole mechanic is opaque.
Spoiler
Terrain is pretty straightforward. Hiding in stuff makes you harder to see.

I can see sensor ranges change as I change my fleet, but I have no idea how it works. Nor do I have any idea how much a given ship will help/hinder me in that regard.
There is no indication on the screen of how far I can see or be seen, save for a pair of numbers for the ranges. But without anything visually telling me how far that is it is not of much use.
There is no clear indication of what anything does save terrain, and the whole thing is pretty confusing tbh.

As to not being able to display sensor/profile values for individual ships, why not?
Those numbers must be available somewhere otherwise how does the game come up with the values to add to the detection ranges in first place? Every ship will have a base value somewhere for how much it adds to those two numbers above just for existing.
Literally anything that gives some indication of the relative difference between ship A and ship B would be helpful, and context really wouldn't matter as all it would be is a means to say "this ship can see further than that one".
[close]
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Cik

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Re: Starsector 0.7.1a (Released) Patch Notes
« Reply #456 on: December 21, 2015, 04:24:31 AM »

There are two problems I have with the sensor mechanic - one is minor and down to preference/play style, the other is a fair bit bigger of a deal.

Firstly the minor: You can't pick your targets any more.

So you are limited to targets which are "in transit" which costs a lot more fuel and supplies (and time!) to locate as you cannot see anything that isn't right next to you, meaning you are more dependant on finding a good target, which is much harder to find as you can't go near where most of the targets are.

this can be alleviated by adding an intelligence system. you already gain access to secure comms access, so have it require that and it taps you into the military intelnet of the faction you're working for.

so if you're a privateer, you would get alerts from friendly fleets calling out enemy locations through the net.

hegemony fast picket spotted sindrian merchant fleet in hyperspace 1 day ago. likely destination:hybrasil

or something like that.

i suppose you'd have to fill in the sensornet of everyone in their own territories so that they can actually spot things for you, but then you could add sensor platforms which would be a good addition anyway.

then you could chill on go dark in hyperspace and pounce passing mercantile convoys without having to directly see them.


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Gothars

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Re: Starsector 0.7.1a (Released) Patch Notes
« Reply #457 on: December 21, 2015, 04:38:57 AM »

As to not being able to display sensor/profile values for individual ships, why not?
Those numbers must be available somewhere otherwise how does the game come up with the values to add to the detection ranges in first place? Every ship will have a base value somewhere for how much it adds to those two numbers above just for existing.

You could at best show the value one ship would add/subtract for the exact fleet you have right now. That's what I suggested on the last page. The individual sensor performance is mostly dependent on the fleet the ship is part of.
The base value is the same for each ship of a size class, influenced by hullmods. You can see that in the Tripad sensor tooltips, but it doesn't really tell you anything.

Agree on sensors needing a better visual indication of range. I would not even mind a key to bring up this ruler like element we saw in the blogpost.
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RawCode

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Re: Starsector 0.7.1a (Released) Patch Notes
« Reply #458 on: December 21, 2015, 06:28:12 AM »

It will be a lot better and more simple to understand if:

1) Both scanner and profile use stepping (range 1-10 instead of raw value).

2) Ships have clear and fixed profile effect:
frigates 1-3
destroyer 4-5

3) Civilian ships instead of rawval bonus\penalty should have "destroyer profile".

It will be clear and simple, as long as player dont have any destroyers (or civilian ships) profile defined by just number of frigates:

1-4 frigates == profile 1
5-7 frigates == profile 2
8++ == profile 3

as long as player want to sneak around with minimal profile, he should not pick more then 4 frigates.

as soon as player get any destroyer or civilian ship, tooltip change into destroyer version (that defined by number of destroyers):
1-4 destroyers == profile 4
5++ destroyers == profile 5
number of lesser ships is ignored completely for profile calculation.

this will eliminate issues related to "system is overcomplicated, can't understand, unable to enjoy game cos this".

effect is clear, (number of ships with hullsize X) > value ? Y : Z

4) Scanner is property of ship like burn level and best scanner is used at all times, effects do not stack in any way.

This will result in fixed sensor power faction wide, making "sneaking" predictable.
It will be easy to sneak pirates and independant, harder for hegemony, ever harder with tritach and nearly impossible around elite fleets of minifactions like lion guard.


Currently size of enemy fleet have greater effect then player's actions related to fleet assembly.


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ChaseBears

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Re: Starsector 0.7.1a (Released) Patch Notes
« Reply #459 on: December 21, 2015, 07:26:26 AM »

Quote
It will be clear and simple, as long as player dont have any destroyers (or civilian ships) profile defined by just number of frigates:
I don't like this at all.  why should a fleet of 9 frigates have less profile than a single Hammerhead?    It's a set of arbitrary rules relating to not taking a particular type of ship rather than emergent gameplay like the current system.
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Alex

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Re: Starsector 0.7.1a (Released) Patch Notes
« Reply #460 on: December 21, 2015, 09:41:45 AM »

I can see sensor ranges change as I change my fleet, but I have no idea how it works. Nor do I have any idea how much a given ship will help/hinder me in that regard.
There is no indication on the screen of how far I can see or be seen, save for a pair of numbers for the ranges. But without anything visually telling me how far that is it is not of much use.
There is no clear indication of what anything does save terrain, and the whole thing is pretty confusing tbh.

As to not being able to display sensor/profile values for individual ships, why not?
Those numbers must be available somewhere otherwise how does the game come up with the values to add to the detection ranges in first place? Every ship will have a base value somewhere for how much it adds to those two numbers above just for existing.
Literally anything that gives some indication of the relative difference between ship A and ship B would be helpful, and context really wouldn't matter as all it would be is a means to say "this ship can see further than that one".

Just to make sure - have you checked the tooltips for those values? They show the contributions of each ship to your sensor strength/profile.

Larger ships are both easier to see and have better sensors, in equal measure.

The actual impact of your sensor strength on the detection *ranges* you see is non-linear, i.e. a strength of 20 will see far less than double compared to strength 10. And the ranges depend on the size of the thing you're looking at/is looking for you, so they're dynamic. There's really no single useful value there; there one that's shown is for reference only so you can see that adding ship X increased your detection range by a certain percentage.


I think Gothars' earlier suggestion to show the current impact each ship has on ranges is promising, though I still want to think through it. It'd involve not showing the base profile/strength values at all, probably, which... just not sure about it, really haven't given it enough thought.

Hmm. Maybe it would make sense to show the "range" values as a percentage instead. Yeah. 100% sensor range would mean "exactly average for a fleet of your size", under 100% would mean something like "you've got a civ ship or two dragging you down", while over 100% might mean dedicated sensor ships. Yeah. This seems like a good first step regardless of anything else - at least you get an at-a-glance "your sensor stuff is comparatively good or bad" evaluation. And it wouldn't confuse by showing a range number that's not useful aside from self-comparison purposes. Wrote this down.
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speeder

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Re: Starsector 0.7.1a (Released) Patch Notes
« Reply #461 on: December 21, 2015, 09:55:55 AM »

I have a suggestion to fix Serenitis complaint of thigns being unclear:

Make the sensor range actually visible on the map!

Although you tried to add some information on the tooltip (saying that 2000 units = 1 square or something like that), it would be great if you just pressed "m" and could see a circle around your fleet.
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Cik

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Re: Starsector 0.7.1a (Released) Patch Notes
« Reply #462 on: December 21, 2015, 10:02:56 AM »

sensor detection is adversarial though, so your fleet doesn't have a 'set range'. it only has a set range against a certain fleet size and composition.

which is what is making it opaque in the first place. it's one thing to know that's how it works but there's no real way for the player to say "if there were two onslaughts running dark in position to my left, i would be able to see them at THIS range.

and displaying that isn't an easy task.

intuition eventually gives the player a coarse understanding of at what range he should be able to detect a fleet of his rough size, but a precise ability to predict detection range against a huge variety of fleets seems pretty impossible.
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Mudanzas Valencia

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Re: Starsector 0.7.1a (Released) Patch Notes
« Reply #463 on: December 21, 2015, 11:06:09 AM »

maybe you could toggle your sensor ring to "threat range" and "sensor range" with threat range determining what range at which fleet size X can probably detect you and sensor range determining at what range you can probably detect fleet size X. You can plug in a fleet size of your choosing depending on the situation.

For example if you are fleet size 5, you are not really worried about fleet size 5, but fleet size 10 would be a problem, so you set your threat range to 10, a ring surrounds your ship. you intuitively know that any signatures outside that ring is bigger than 10, and too be avoided (or investigated).

if you get really CR trashed after a fight and need to hide you can set your threat range to 1, basically showing the safety "bubble" you have and what you need to keep away from any fast attack enemies

I dunno, i think right now there is no accounting intuitively for steathl bonuses or penalties in the UI outside of that little tiny number box at the bottom, so...meh

« Last Edit: December 21, 2015, 11:08:51 AM by Question »
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Gothars

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Re: Starsector 0.7.1a (Released) Patch Notes
« Reply #464 on: December 21, 2015, 12:05:53 PM »

Hmm. Maybe it would make sense to show the "range" values as a percentage instead. Yeah. 100% sensor range would mean "exactly average for a fleet of your size", under 100% would mean something like "you've got a civ ship or two dragging you down", while over 100% might mean dedicated sensor ships. Yeah. This seems like a good first step regardless of anything else - at least you get an at-a-glance "your sensor stuff is comparatively good or bad" evaluation. And it wouldn't confuse by showing a range number that's not useful aside from self-comparison purposes. Wrote this down.


How would that reflect that a frigate with 100% has far less actual range than a fleet of cruisers with 100%? Or worse, how could anyone guess that a Omen with ~150% has less range than a fleet of freighters with ~70%? And when you buy a freighter your sensor range goes up but your percentage goes down, that will confuse people.
I'm not opposed to normalizing the numbers, but if you do it on "average fleet of this size" base that could lead to a lot of confusion.

Mh, maybe you could weave it into the UI as secondary information, like coloring the range green when its over and red when its under "average".

But I think the really important info is indeed how far you can see what you're interested in (and how far it can see you), not how relatively well-sensored your fleet is. That's why I suggested the additional example fleets beside the "medium sized" one for the tooltip.
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