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[Wyvern]

This is actually a current concern/something I'm thinking through - I think it'd make sense to have another story point "sink", but haven't sorted out what it would be, exactly.

Here are some obvious ones:

• Conceal your colony's AI cores from a hegemony inspection fleet that you forgot (or "forgot" if you had a spare story point but no credits) to bribe in advance of their arrival.
• Rush construction of a building or restoration of a disrupted industry.  (Not sure on what sort of timeline 'rush' should look like - but the general idea here is to rapidly fix things if your spaceport gets disrupted, help get a space station online before that first pirate arrives, or just get things back online after a Pather attack.)
• Restore stability to a colony you're visiting - whether it's yours or not.
• Purchase a ship from a military market without a commission (still have to have the rep, though, and the credit cost may be increased too.)
• Wipe out your black market suspicion level at the colony you're currently visiting.  (This one probably merits a good chunk of bonus XP, though, similar to the 'avoid a scan by a patrol' option.)
• Reduce the credit cost to bribe a faction expedition.  (Would want this to grant some bonus XP, but not 100%, so it's still a sink.)

[Alex]

Thank you - these all generally sound good (and a couple are even already on my list!) And, certainly, having more ways to spend 'em helps. What I mean, though, is something more, what's the word... systemic? The way building in hullmods is a something that has the potential to absorb *a lot* of points over time; something like that. A "you will spend points here, and will want to, and points you spend elsewhere for bonus XP are basically just waiting to be eventually spent here", if that makes sense.

Edit: an example might be letting *all* officer skills be made elite, eventually. That would be 40+ points right there. In fact, might not be the worst idea.

[intrinsic_parity]

2) Well story points are unlimited at the moment.  So you're not really obligated to keep your combat ships up to par. ...

Just because you have more theoretical options, doesn't mean you will take them. In the current skill system, you can take whatever skills you want but you always take loadout design. Loadout design isn't technically an obligation, but in practice it is. I just feel like these hull mods will be the same way. If there are a ton spare story points, it probably works out ok, but it still cheapens the decision making. I was hoping for a way to make your flagship special, but I'm worried that instead we will replace the mandatory skill point tax with a mandatory story point tax. It's just much more interesting to me to give all ships those extra OP as a baseline, and then make the built in hull mods a really special thing that you will only do on a handful of ships. That just feels more interesting to me.

Ah, I see what you mean. Well, I didn't go and nerf the OP on all ships across the board! Plus, most NPC ships wouldn't have perma-mods. So it wouldn't make sense to balance ships around in this sense.

I guess I think about the game being 'balanced' around the +10% OP from loadout design (because that is all I ever play with) so it feels to me like all ships did just get an OP nerf. Weapons like the heavy blaster become worse when there is less OP to support them with vents/hull mods so changing the baseline OP does change the balance of everything else. As I've said above, I would like the +10% OP to be the baseline because I feel like it allows for a larger variety of builds, and then built in hull mods to be more special (probably by costing a lot more story points), but I admit it's definitely possible to be balanced in the way you're doing it. Ultimately I will have to play it to see how it feels.

I'd also like to say that I like big fleet battles with many ships, and I think a some other people do to, so I hope the game isn't taken too far in the direction of only 8 ships in a fight and only officered ships.

[Goumindong]

Case in point: i do not always take loadout design.

I understand the concept of dominated choices but i dont think youre going to have as much issue as you think here. Not only do “non value” options as youre describing not cost as much in terms of points (as you get them back by leveling faster) but making a hull mod permanent is a big deal and will secure that specific ship as part of your long term strategy. Youre unlikely to do that with every combat ship you acquire.

[Cyan Leader]

Perhaps toning story points down to 2 per level would be enough, though; at 4 right now it feels like you'd be drowning in them in short order.

I had this concern as I was reading it, it seems too much. Hard to tell without playtesting it though.

[Alex]

I guess I think about the game being 'balanced' around the +10% OP from loadout design (because that is all I ever play with) so it feels to me like all ships did just get an OP nerf.

Right, that makes sense, but it's definitely not how I'm looking at it. (I tend not to take Loadout Design during playtesting, btw, or if I do take it, take it pretty late...)

[Sun_Rendered]

Overall I like where this update is going, though I can't say I'm overly thrilled with where the missile specialization skills is currently sitting in the skill tree, generally speaking missile spec is usually the only combat skill I take because i tend to make missiles the cornerstone of my flagship's loadout. of course id need to actually see the skills in the skill tree before passing any solid judgement but right now, with no knowledge of all the skills in this new system, I'm having a hard time justifying 1/3 of my points to continue that play style.

[Alex]

Yeah, I definitely see what you're coming from there. As it stands right now, I think you could make effective builds both putting 5 points into Combat and not, but, well, we'll really just have to see how it works out!

Also, Missile Spec is a bit different now - stronger, but also some of its effects - the missile maneuverability/speed ones - got moved into the ECCM hullmod, so I think if you want *basically* the same level of missile use as you're getting now with Missile Spec, you could put on ECCM plus Expanded Missile Racks, and get most of the way there.


Hi and welcome to the forum, btw! I know it's technically your second post but it's the first one I saw

[Baqar79]

I guess it could be argued that not all ships need it, but a good question to ask is how many people don't choose Loadout Design 3 in their games?

I'm pretty dependent on that extra OP, so while not having it is technically not a reduction in OP, it does seem a bit like it in practice.  However I don't know whether this is true for other players (you don't necessarily pick it all the time as you mentioned), perhaps I'm in the minority with Intrinsic_parity in thinking that it is super important.

With story points I'm almost certain to be able to actually squeeze more OP into a ship with the hull mods, but rather than being a specialization, I'm thinking about integrating the most expensive hull-mods first to free up the OP lost with the absence of LD3.  I guess it would feel better to me if integrating hull-mods with story points was an upgrade rather than being a requirement of getting that additional OP I count on in 0.9.1a.

I admit though that once I see the new mechanics in action, perhaps I will change my mind, and I want to emphasize that I'm genuinely excited about the new skill system overhaul; it just seems very much more interesting than the current system.  I'm just greedy when it comes to ship customization!

A possible compromise would be to create a hull-mod that gives that 10% additional OP of "Loadout Design 3". Perhaps make it logistics based (was the limit on those 2 right?), though that may mean buffing other logistics hull-mods so that the OP reduction hull-mod doesn't become the default choice.

Building on this idea, how about offering several unique hull-mods only available with story points?, some random examples:

"Lightweight Weapon Mounts"
- OP cost reduction per size class of weapon (Small: -1 OP, Medium: -2 OP, Large: -3 OP)

"Waste Flux Re-Routing" <-- I struggled for a name here....
- +50% to Energy Weapon damage at high flux levels

"Hull Repair Droids"
- +0.5% Hull integrity restored each second up to 50% hull (maybe requires 5 seconds of not receiving enemy fire to activate).

Ignoring my randomly chosen bonuses, these unique hull-mods could be more expensive in story points, and be of a limited amount (eg 5/10 per game, but refundable) so that they don't end up replacing all the standard hull-mods as the de-facto choice.  You could even make these special hull-mods into something that you need to acquire through salvage rather than be given immediately.

[Dexy]

Speaking of the old skills system. I often took missile specialization as first combat skill. It is very effective in the early game when piloting a Wolf built as missile platform. There's nothing like oneshotting a Hound and Cerberus with a salvo of atropos missiles before they can even get in firing range, and then having all the flux to deal with a third ship, and thanks to expanded missile racks still having a quick finisher. Being able to quickly remove ships from the battlefield is very valuable.

It sounds like being able to pick missile specialization early on will no longer be possible because I have to progress through several tiers of combat skills before that. On the other hand some of its effects are available through hull mods.

[Morgan Rue]

Will "elite" fleets like the Diktat subfaction and maybe some inspections/bombardment/expedition fleets have builtin hullmods? They seem like a good way of making "late game" NPC fleets stronger. Or maybe for high ranking commanding officers, would make sense for them to have customized ships. Maybe also put a few of them on mission flagships.

Also, I do think more information is good, but knowing bonus hullmods or all officers skills might be too much. Maybe just anything remarkable, rumored or storied about the officers? Like one or two Elite Skills they might have?

[Midnight Kitsune]

How moddable is the new skill system?

[Megas]

I guess it could be argued that not all ships need it, but a good question to ask is how many people don't choose Loadout Design 3 in their games?

I'm pretty dependent on that extra OP, so while not having it is technically not a reduction in OP, it does seem a bit like it in practice.  However I don't know whether this is true for other players (you don't necessarily pick it all the time as you mentioned), perhaps I'm in the minority with Intrinsic_parity in thinking that it is super important.

I always choose Loudout Design 3 early because too many ships are OP starved without it, and some ships are OP starved even with LD3.  In addition, Resistant Flux Conduits is the only way to get EMP resistance, and with LD3 giving enough OP for another hullmod, it is effectively more EMP resistance or other perk.  I consider Loadout Design 3 the baseline.  No Loadout Design 3 is too crippling.

The only perk more important than LD3 is Electronic Warfare 1 because it is the only way to get basic ECM defense.  Spamming ECM Package on all ships is not really an option when ships are OP starved.

In every game, Electronic Warfare 1 is the first perk I get, then Loadout Design.  Those two perks are the most critical and universal perks in the whole game.

I will most likely view story points as Loadout Design tokens, and will probably spend them on the most expensive hullmods to squeeze the most OP out of ships.

[Rounin]

If i were a guard on patrol duty and had to scan a ship, i would accept a credits bride because we all need credits, not some magical "you're immune to 1 scan" pass.

Considering that the AI smuggler fleets can wander around with their transponders off without faction patrols so much as looking at them, I, for one, will be quite pleased to have an option to do something even vaguely similar.

why would the faction patrols look at us so much and not smugglers then? maybe we're not doing as well of a work, unlike smugglers.
Remember, if you're a known smuggler, you're doing something wrong

Don't look at this so rigidly. It's not a "magic pass", it's an abstract guaranteed success. You smooth talk the captain, maybe you know him from cadet school and he lets you go after some banter, he fu... dated your sister, he mistakes you for his favourite space celeb, you did him a favour ages ago, etc. etc.
It's a storytelling tool only limited by your (lack of) imagination. There are already plenty of things abstracted in the game, so if you can put up with them you can swallow this one too.

[Cyan Leader]

How moddable is the new skill system?

To add to that, I'd like the new skills to be modified more easily, without having to recompile the game. Maybe it's a tall order but hey.