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Author Topic: Starsector 0.8.1a (Released) Patch Notes  (Read 276640 times)

Gothars

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Re: Starsector 0.8.1a (In Development) Patch Notes
« Reply #195 on: May 30, 2017, 03:26:09 PM »

Of course, if they are already just behind you it's not gonna help you much.
That's my point - going dark in pursuits is pointless, it's either for ambushes or "stealth sequences", like yours. I was asking explicitly because you've mentioned it as an alternative to the transverse jump in the context of escaping pursuit, if I'm not mistaken.

With "pursuits", do you mean only "two fleets at max burn chasing each other"? I was also thinking of patrols "looking for your fleet" with search patterns and such.



Quote
BTW, rocket launchers have limited and rare ammo, exactly for the reasons I described.

Yes, I did say that unlike Going Dark or hiding in asteroids, Transverse Jump eats resources. Thank you for agreeing with me.

The point of limited ammo of classic rocket launchers is so you still have to use other weapons. Are you saying the minuscule costs of TJ have the same effect in respect to other movement/sensor abilities? oO



It's an interesting point btw, about "skip mechanic" buttons existing in some games. Seems to me like a crutch - if you have one mechanic in the game that's initially fun, but won't stay interesting for the entire duration of the game, it makes sense to enable skipping it after its potential has been exhausted.  That's not really comparable to a skip function you can have from very early on, though.
 
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Megas

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Re: Starsector 0.8.1a (In Development) Patch Notes
« Reply #196 on: May 30, 2017, 03:59:21 PM »

I can see it now.  If fleets will get angrier at you (short of open hostilities) for interdicting hostiles, shouldn't the sector at large be angry at each other if they use it to catch everything?

This gets even sillier if player is able to build a polity later.  He gets rep hits from visitors for protecting his territory, but everyone else gets off scott-free.

How about this?  Say I can set up patrols to defend my system (in some future version with outposts implemented).  My patrols start clocking smugglers and other questionable types.  Reputation will go down with everyone because I am the player!
Pretty sure it's a penalty for the faction you're interdicting. Interdicting pirates with Hegemony around won't affect reputation, but if a Hegemony patrol comes to scan you and you successfully interdict them to get away, Hegemony will suffer a rep hit.
I was thinking more of collateral damage.  You interdict pirates and that merchant convoy or two that happened to be passing nearby.  You hit pirates and the convoy.  BAM! Rep loss!  Replace convoy with patrol, or non-pirate smuggler, or indie bounty hunter chasing your target too.

The point was if collateral damage with interdictor is too easy, only the player gets penalized for doing it.  NPCs can use it freely, much like how Midnight Kitsune points out that NPC fleets spam E-Burn like no tomorrow because they do not care about resource management.

P.S.  Never-mind double agents that freely change from Pirate to Independent and back like Smugglers and Salvagers.  We had some major reputation bugs with such fleets.  Imagine if you start a pulse when they were pirate, but change to indies when the wave hits (if it takes time for the pulse to reach your target).
« Last Edit: May 30, 2017, 04:04:25 PM by Megas »
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Thaago

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Re: Starsector 0.8.1a (In Development) Patch Notes
« Reply #197 on: May 30, 2017, 04:04:06 PM »

Looking good, thanks Alex!
I agree completely with the OP changes to Kopesh and Gladius. The small nerf to Reserve Deployment will help bring the Drover back into destroyer power levels.
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Sordid

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Re: Starsector 0.8.1a (In Development) Patch Notes
« Reply #198 on: May 30, 2017, 04:06:13 PM »

The point of limited ammo of classic rocket launchers is so you still have to use other weapons. Are you saying the minuscule costs of TJ have the same effect in respect to other movement/sensor abilities? oO

:-\

No, that's not what I'm saying. I'm simply pointing out that unlike the other avoidance/escape options it does incur a cost.

I can talk about the actual costs, though. If anything, the way to fix the skill is to make it cost way more to use. Or perhaps give it a dual functionality. One click to initiate a charge-up timer to jump for a small supply cost, second click to bypass that timer and jump immediately for a substantial cost in supplies/fuel and/or damage to ships. That would preserve its usefulness for both convenience and emergencies. It's still a get-out-of-jail card, just no longer a free one.


Quote
It's an interesting point btw, about "skip mechanic" buttons existing in some games. Seems to me like a crutch - if you have one mechanic in the game that's initially fun, but won't stay interesting for the entire duration of the game, it makes sense to enable skipping it after its potential has been exhausted. That's not really comparable to a skip function you can have from very early on, though.  

Just how early a "skip mechanic" should be available is a matter of opinion too, though, and even the same game designer can go back and forth on that. Dark Souls 2 and 3 just let you quick travel right from the start. On the other hand, Dark Souls 1 is unique in the series in that it lets you pick a Master Key during character creation, which lets you unlock some important doors and completely bypass a huge chunk of the game.

Sure, you could argue that Transverse Jump is accessible too early. Maybe. I'm not sure I would agree. Yeah, sure, you could rush it, but then you'd be compromising your fleet by not having other important skills. And is it really such a bad thing to have it accessible early? If you enjoy playing cat and mouse with other fleets on the map, more power to you. Some of us just want to get to the next fight, though.

they DGAF about supplies, CR or losses

That's an extremely important point that IMO deserves stressing. A lot of the design work that's being done seems to treat the overworld map as a multiplayer game, like some hyper-complex version of agar.io where every bubble is being controlled by a live player and everyone has to have equal chances. But that's not the case, there's only one player, and as you said the AI doesn't give a toss about supplies, CR, or losses. This throws the whole thing out of whack.

The job of a multiplayer game is to entertain everybody equally, so there can't be any "I win" buttons. Every skill or ability has to be counter-able in some way, you can't let one person keep winning all the time simply because they have a skill/item/whatever. The average player has to lose 50% of the time.

The job of a singleplayer game is very different, it is to entertain one person. It's very tempting to think that putting the player on equal footing with the AI is the way to do that, that it'll make the game challenging and fair and so on. But that's not how it works. If the player loses his fleet, it's a huge setback. If the AI loses a fleet, it doesn't care, it just spawns a new one. The willingness of the AI to throw its unlimited resources at the player is a massive advantage, so the player has to be 'overpowered' to compensate. Giving the player the same skills and same power level as the AI doesn't create equality, quite the opposite. But this imbalance is also what makes the game fun. Multiplayer games are about fighting more or less equal opponents, each fight tense and close, while singleplayer games are power fantasies based around mowing down hordes of AI mobs. The player should be challenged by the enemies, yes, but ultimately he or she should almost always win.

Attempting to balance a singleplayer game as if it were a multiplayer one is completely misguided. Not only will the AI always have some kind of 'cheat' that will just sour the experience (i.e. unlimited supplies, fleets, etc.), it will never put up as good a fight as a real opponent anyway, so what's the point? If I wanted an equal fight, I'd play a multiplayer game. I play a singleplayer game to curb-stomp hordes of enemies, and SS moves farther and farther away from that in every update.
« Last Edit: May 30, 2017, 04:36:20 PM by Sordid »
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Megas

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Re: Starsector 0.8.1a (In Development) Patch Notes
« Reply #199 on: May 30, 2017, 04:09:25 PM »

Looking good, thanks Alex!
I agree completely with the OP changes to Kopesh and Gladius. The small nerf to Reserve Deployment will help bring the Drover back into destroyer power levels.
That alone will not do it.  The main use of Reserve Deployment was to stop replacement rate from bleeding low too fast, not additional firepower.  Even Condor is kind of strong, just overshadowed by Drover.

Quote from: Sordid
...and SS moves farther and farther away from that in every update.
I agree at least partially.  I have the most fun after I build my overpowered god units and destroy everything.  This is why endgame is my favorite part of Starsector.  Everything before endgame is just practice or tutorial, and I love it when levels fly by so fast during pre-0.8.
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Thaago

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Re: Starsector 0.8.1a (In Development) Patch Notes
« Reply #200 on: May 30, 2017, 04:14:27 PM »

Looking good, thanks Alex!
I agree completely with the OP changes to Kopesh and Gladius. The small nerf to Reserve Deployment will help bring the Drover back into destroyer power levels.
That alone will not do it.  The main use of Reserve Deployment was to stop replacement rate from bleeding low too fast, not additional firepower.  Even Condor is kind of strong, just overshadowed by Drover.
...

Interesting - while I did use it some to stop replacement rate, I mainly did use it for the firepower increase. 5 Broadswords + 5 Daggers was a heckuvalot more effective than 3/3 and could punch through cruiser defenses with no other support. Not sure if 4/4 will be able to, but we'll see.
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Megas

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Re: Starsector 0.8.1a (In Development) Patch Notes
« Reply #201 on: May 30, 2017, 04:18:35 PM »

@ Thaago:  I agree more fighters is better.  However, when up against a stronger force, the main thing to remember is you cannot let replacement rate drop too low at all costs.  I suppose 0.8 Reserve Deployment did it all, give more fighters and kept the rate up.  I guess with the changes, it would make sense to use it when replacement rate starts falling, not as soon as possible.
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Sordid

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Re: Starsector 0.8.1a (In Development) Patch Notes
« Reply #202 on: May 30, 2017, 05:14:51 PM »

Quote from: Sordid
...and SS moves farther and farther away from that in every update.
I agree at least partially.  I have the most fun after I build my overpowered god units and destroy everything.  This is why endgame is my favorite part of Starsector.  Everything before endgame is just practice or tutorial, and I love it when levels fly by so fast during pre-0.8.

Exactly. That's your reward for all the effort you spent leveling up your character and building your units. Every progression-based singleplayer game has that. In Skyrim you're eventually able to shout the most powerful dragons to death, in Fallout you're eventually able to kill deathclaws with your bare hands, in Mount&Blade you're eventually able to solo armies with your horse and war bow, in Dark Souls you can stack so many buffs that you can one-shot most of the bosses, in Dragon's Dogma you can eventually kill the big bad dragon before he even gets out of the first phase of his epic scripted fight, and I could go on for a very long time like this.

It's okay to have overpowered skills in a singleplayer game because that's the whole point. Looking for ever more powerful builds and facerolling all opposition with them is what we play these games for. That's what gives them depth, that's what makes them fun. If your progression consists of perfectly balanced +X% bonuses with no room for exploitation, congratulations, you've just made the game boring and uninteresting.
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Midnight Kitsune

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Re: Starsector 0.8.1a (In Development) Patch Notes
« Reply #203 on: May 30, 2017, 05:33:34 PM »

...in Dragon's Dogma you can eventually kill the big bad dragon before he even gets out of the first phase of his epic scripted fight...
Yup. And if you REALLY leveled up, you could take down the stronger version of him SOLO. Got to love MA Hunter bolt spam with magic rebalancer! Of course this was with a max level character with literally the best gear from the expansion.  
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Dri

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Re: Starsector 0.8.1a (In Development) Patch Notes
« Reply #204 on: May 30, 2017, 05:36:43 PM »

So Alex, I'm curious where Starsector is setting in terms of challenges in its development you have yet to face! As far as raw difficulty of coding something into being, would you say you've got the worst done and over with? Or is there some major hurdle in the future of Starsector's development that makes you feel tired just thinking about it? This is all kinda nebulous so I don't mind a rather nebulous answer.

Also, other than Outposts, is there something still in store that you're excited to finally start digging into? Some new mechanic or feature? Or is that sorta talk still too REDACTED?
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Sordid

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Re: Starsector 0.8.1a (In Development) Patch Notes
« Reply #205 on: May 30, 2017, 05:45:55 PM »

...in Dragon's Dogma you can eventually kill the big bad dragon before he even gets out of the first phase of his epic scripted fight...
Yup. And if you REALLY leveled up, you could take down the stronger version of him SOLO. Got to love MA Hunter bolt spam with magic rebalancer! Of course this was with a max level character with literally the best gear from the expansion.  

Who would win? Blast Arrows + Conqueror's Periapts + Fivefold Flurry OR Daimon, the final boss of the extra-hard DLC?


And that's just an Assassin. A Ranger could have used Tenfold Flurry and a more powerful bow for more than double the DPS. ;)
« Last Edit: May 30, 2017, 05:53:46 PM by Sordid »
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Alex

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Re: Starsector 0.8.1a (In Development) Patch Notes
« Reply #206 on: May 30, 2017, 05:52:27 PM »

IP changes are interesting, will AI counter it by using ASB too?

Sometimes, yeah. It's aware of the potential and will do it in the right circumstances.


The Conquest armor buff on the other hand is a bit surprising, but i guess it needs it to stay competitive with its high-tech alternative.

Yeah, just a little something so it's not left *too* far behind. Being midline, it really ought to have better armor than the Odyssey anyway.


So if I'm reading this right, Reserve Deployment is now a thing you use when some of your fighters have been destroyed, rather than preemptively to put more fighters on the field in the first place?

I think it's still useful in both cases, just less so, in both cases.


Of course, if they are already just behind you it's not gonna help you much.
That's my point - going dark in pursuits is pointless, it's either for ambushes or "stealth sequences", like yours. I was asking explicitly because you've mentioned it as an alternative to the transverse jump in the context of escaping pursuit, if I'm not mistaken.
@Wyvern yes.

I'm hoping there will be some situations where using IP will open up a window where you can E-burn away and then go dark.

But, yes, if they're right next to you, options are... limited.


To add to Sordid's point, there is an Angband variant called Sil.  It has an id-minigame (style common to old-school roguelikes) I really dislike.  There is an ability called Loremaster that identifies everything and bypasses the whole id-minigame altogether.  I beeline for that ability every game I play.  If not for Loremaster, I would refuse to play Sil because id-minigames featured in some classic roguelikes tend to be frustrating.

More an argument for not having minigames, imo. Not a fan of those in general, except for where they are tuned to be easy and just add flavor. (I.E. Skyrim's lockpicking minigame is alright, though it being a full-fledged player skill and how that all works is another topic.)


...  AND they move

(They always moved, i.e. gradually shifted to affect nearby cells. Now they move more slowly.)

Alex, with the IP skill now using your sensor strength to control how powerful and how far it reaches, is the rep hit removed? Otherwise I can see this being a big source of annoyance or even bug reports due to higher sensor ranges meaning more chances to hit friendly fleets

If you use it with transponder off and the other fleets don't know who you are, there's no rep penalty. It's minor and can't make you hostile, in any case.


How about this?  Say I can set up patrols to defend my system (in some future version with outposts implemented).  My patrols start clocking smugglers and other questionable types.  Reputation will go down with everyone because I am the player!

That would probably be bad, so it probably wouldn't work that way. I mean, I feel like I'm stating the obvious here, but I guess it needs saying?


Ah, yup, I think you're right.

Conclusions:
  • Reserve Deployment is worded really awkwardly (though I'm not quite sure how to improve it).
  • Reserve Deployment is vastly more potent than I thought it was - I'd assumed that it simply deployed an extra 1/2 wing size fighters regardless of how many were or weren't destroyed.

Yep.


I have the most fun after I build my overpowered god units and destroy everything.  This is why endgame is my favorite part of Starsector.  Everything before endgame is just practice or tutorial, and I love it when levels fly by so fast during pre-0.8.

I feel like there's a lot of middle ground between "thing X got nerfed" and "there's no way to become overpowered". Frankly, TJ strikes me as a bit of an odd candidate here, and if we really care about how easy it is to achieve OP-ness, the Odyssey buffs would more than make up for it :)



So Alex, I'm curious where Starsector is setting in terms of challenges in its development you have yet to face! As far as raw difficulty of coding something into being, would you say you've got the worst done and over with? Or is there some major hurdle in the future of Starsector's development that makes you feel tired just thinking about it? This is all kinda nebulous so I don't mind a rather nebulous answer.

Also, other than Outposts, is there something still in store that you're excited to finally start digging into? Some new mechanic or feature? Or is that sorta talk still too REDACTED?

Ah, it's hard to say. There's a bunch of stuff I'm excited about more than outposts, though, that's for sure - but I don't want to spoil it, or discuss it before I'm more certain of it becoming a reality.

In terms of difficulty, probably the economy again. Figuring out how to make it performant, does the things it needs to do in terms of moving commodities around/supply/demand/etc, something your outposts can plug into, and something that's capable of dealing with fine-grained inputs like "the player sold X amount of commodity Y here" is a challenge. I'm going to need to take another look at it soon, and will probably have to make some simplifying assumptions - part of the issue is, I think, it's trying to do too much.
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Sordid

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Re: Starsector 0.8.1a (In Development) Patch Notes
« Reply #207 on: May 30, 2017, 05:57:50 PM »

To add to Sordid's point, there is an Angband variant called Sil.  It has an id-minigame (style common to old-school roguelikes) I really dislike.  There is an ability called Loremaster that identifies everything and bypasses the whole id-minigame altogether.  I beeline for that ability every game I play.  If not for Loremaster, I would refuse to play Sil because id-minigames featured in some classic roguelikes tend to be frustrating.

More an argument for not having minigames, imo. Not a fan of those in general, except for where they are tuned to be easy and just add flavor. (I.E. Skyrim's lockpicking minigame is alright, though it being a full-fledged player skill and how that all works is another topic.)

So why do you have an agar.io-like navigation minigame that you keep elaborating upon update after update?

Also, if it was an argument for not having minigames, I'd have given a bunch of examples of games that let you bypass minigames. I gave one such example and other examples of games that let you skip core gameplay mechanics and/or large portions of content. Clearly my point was more general and not limited to only minigames (which, I agree, are rarely a good idea).
« Last Edit: May 30, 2017, 07:09:44 PM by Sordid »
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Midnight Kitsune

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Re: Starsector 0.8.1a (In Development) Patch Notes
« Reply #208 on: May 30, 2017, 06:03:07 PM »

I can talk about the actual costs, though. If anything, the way to fix the skill is to make it cost way more to use. Or perhaps give it a dual functionality. One click to initiate a charge-up timer to jump for a small supply cost, second click to bypass that timer and jump immediately for a substantial cost in supplies/fuel and/or damage to ships. That would preserve its usefulness for both convenience and emergencies. It's still a get-out-of-jail card, just no longer a free one.
I have to say I love this idea and I feel like it would also add options for other skills to use as well
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isaacssv552

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Re: Starsector 0.8.1a (In Development) Patch Notes
« Reply #209 on: May 30, 2017, 06:37:21 PM »

Why the odyssey nerfs? 90 speed odyssey was able to kill almost every cruiser sure, but it still lost to other capitals. At best it could beat a conquest or flee from a Paragon.
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