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Author Topic: Teleporting systems ruin the game - and should be removed  (Read 3503 times)

TaLaR

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Re: Teleporting systems ruin the game - and should be removed
« Reply #15 on: October 13, 2019, 09:46:50 PM »

I think teleports are fine but they do seem to work better on larger ships (Recall Device, for example, is fine). On something the size of the Hyperion, the issue is that it's hard for a player to control. Why use a Hyperion when I could use a Medusa, a much more stable platform with more fitting options?

Because Medusa can't ever solo a Paragon?

It's not that hard to control once you figure out how, at least against larger ships.
Against frigates the problem is that their movement vector changes abruptly and isn't even visualized. I had a mod of my own to show target's vector and exact range of teleporter, my go-to challenge was to solo 6 Tempests (the scary version with fast offensive Terminator drone) in skill-less sim, something even Afflictor couldn't do (due to after phase vulnerability being exploited by lighting fast drones).

I'm not saying that game actually throws challenges at player which need a Hyperion as solution, but teleporter is much more than just a gimmick, it completely defines Hyperion's playstyle.
« Last Edit: October 13, 2019, 09:52:51 PM by TaLaR »
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Q8

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Re: Teleporting systems ruin the game - and should be removed
« Reply #16 on: October 13, 2019, 10:51:16 PM »

I think, that this is all going in a wrong direction.
Lets start from the top.

Embolism, at the top wrote, that:

a)Phase Teleporter is bad, ergo hyperion is bad.
 And i do agree. What Embolism fails to realize, is that he stumbled onto a much bigger problem.
Hyperion is garbage. That statment may be abit exaggerated, but whatever. Am not afraid to say it. And reasons for it are a bunch. The most important ones go as follows:
1. 70/100 weight approximately. The biggest reason is the fact, that AI is *** at flying frigates. This is a big subject, that deserves a topic on its own, so all ill write here is that if there are enemy ships present, that are bigger than a destroyer, frigates become useless, since AI is bad at fights where opponent has more range. And if there are carriers present, frigates become somehow even worse than useless.
2. 20/100 weight approximately. Second to the size is the fact, that as was mentioned before, AI is bad at using mobility abilities. So, Phase teleporter is just being wasted, while having something like HEF wouldnt be. Subjectively, if i may say so, i think that blinking is overated ingeneral...
3. 10/100 weight approximately. Tempest exists. Tempest is flat out better in everything but shield. It turns better, its stronger, has more armor, more hull, its dirt cheap compared to hyperion. It packs a mean punch with its HEF. It has better flux profiles arguable, if you consider that terminator drones are for free. And most importantly its faster, and has better mounts.

My point is, that the reason why hyperion is garbage, is not hyperion related. Its bigger. So if you decide to change the ship, into HEF or anything else, im afraid that that wouldnt fix the problem, it would just make it same type of crap but for a slightly different set of reasons.

To fix hyperion, you would have to fix all the frigates. You would have to address the AI problem. Or, you would have to give people reasons for flying frigates, even tho there are bigger ships around.

b)Recall Device makes the game boring.
 And again this is true, but you have it backwards. In a world where AI knows what to do, and for example is camping its fighters around the ship that your bombers are targeting, and attacking them before they reach the drop zone, Recall is nothing else, but a semi useful skill that sometimes saves a ship from destruction, but i dont care about it, since that bomber, that potentially can be saved, can be saved only after he dropped his bomb already, and at that point i dont give a *** anymore. Its even better, if someone is shooting at an empty bomber, instead of shooting at something more important, like bombs for example.
But because AI doesnt know what to do, and AI fighters just fight mostly whatever, bombing runs are safe on the runs to the targets, and in danger only after they droped the bombs already. ANd thus Recall shines. If the danger was, like it should be, on the way TO the drop zone, that would, potentially, force people to mix bombers with support to cover the runs, as you said you would like to see happening.
`And there is also a second point, that Recall is not really a safety mechanism, but a speed mechanism, since it cuts in half the time of a bombing run, so you could say that bombers in Astral are worth twice the value... If you want a simple nerf to the Astral, make it so, that recalled ships are frozen inside of it for a while.

And so this is also, mostly an AI problem. And as much as i would like to, i feel, like its impossible to fix the second floor, without fixing the first floor first.
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intrinsic_parity

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Re: Teleporting systems ruin the game - and should be removed
« Reply #17 on: October 13, 2019, 11:04:01 PM »

Hyperion is the way it is because the teleporter is so strong that the rest of the ship had to be nerfed into the ground to make it 'balanced'. It definitely needs to be adjusted. I would prefer a nerf of the teleporter (probably some sort of cool down mechanic) and buffs in other areas rather than a rework so that it keeps some of its identity, but it could be interesting to just make it into a different ship.

The astral is fine, in fact I think it's in a very good place. I don't see why every carrier has to be equally good with every fighter wing. There are many different combinations of bombers and different weapon loadouts that work very well on it, I don't think it actually lacks load out diversity.
« Last Edit: October 13, 2019, 11:07:38 PM by intrinsic_parity »
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Q8

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Re: Teleporting systems ruin the game - and should be removed
« Reply #18 on: October 13, 2019, 11:26:59 PM »

Hyperion is the way it is because the teleporter is so strong that the rest of the ship had to be nerfed into the ground to make it 'balanced'. It definitely needs to be adjusted. I would prefer a nerf of the teleporter (probably some sort of cool down mechanic) and buffs in other areas rather than a rework so that it keeps some of its identity, but it could be interesting to just make it into a different ship.
rofl
Teleporter is NOT strong. The only reason teleporter is "strong" is the fact that AI doesnt add blink range into the weapon range when considering anything, even basics like turning the shields up. This is NOT strength. This is exploit.
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TaLaR

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Re: Teleporting systems ruin the game - and should be removed
« Reply #19 on: October 13, 2019, 11:40:56 PM »

Hyperion is the way it is because the teleporter is so strong that the rest of the ship had to be nerfed into the ground to make it 'balanced'. It definitely needs to be adjusted. I would prefer a nerf of the teleporter (probably some sort of cool down mechanic) and buffs in other areas rather than a rework so that it keeps some of its identity, but it could be interesting to just make it into a different ship.
rofl
Teleporter is NOT strong. The only reason teleporter is "strong" is the fact that AI doesnt add blink range into the weapon range when considering anything, even basics like turning the shields up. This is NOT strength. This is exploit.

You don't teleport in front of opponent, only stupid AI does that. You teleport either behind, or to facing currently not protected by shield and fire HB/MB right away. Blocking this is possible, but requires shield to be down before Hyperion jumps (there is enough time to raise shield in correct direction, but not enough to drop and re-raise, assuming perfect timing by Hyperion).

While omni-shielded AI could be taught to duel a single Hyperion, fighting a Hyperion + anything else means giving unavoidable openings to Hyperion or the assisting ship (Hyperion jumps in when target needs to block something from opposite direction).
Non-360 front-shielded ships can cover each other by sticking back-to-back, but can't duel a Hyperion ever (unless they have enough armor+hull to simply tank whole Hyperion's CR, which is not the case even for Onslaught).

I'd say being able to constrict enemy mobility with single frigate is fairly powerful (and that's against hypothetical AI that understands Hyperion's threat and can handle it).

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SCC

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Re: Teleporting systems ruin the game - and should be removed
« Reply #20 on: October 14, 2019, 12:33:48 AM »

I don't expect Recall Device to go. More likely it's going to be balanced (nerfed) so that it isn't as strong as it is now, along with Reserve Deployment.
I never really liked playing with phase teleporter Hyperion. It's basically a strike frigate, except there are also phase frigates, which are also strike frigates, except way cheaper. Hyperion is a bit safer, but the difference in power between it and the Afflictor aren't big enough to justify Hyperion's massive logistic footprint. Hyperion is too weak and especially too short lived to plug holes in your line when needed. I once got Ship/Weapons Pack mod's Dawnstar (modified Aurora) ship system changed from weaker temporal shell to phase teleporter and it was a lot of fun; I was able to attend to the entire frontline, save my ships and eliminate single ships that were distracting my fleet. It was strong, but it wasn't a glorified bomber, like Hyperion is.

Now I'm totally ok with them having midline ships but why the hell shouldn't they have something unique?
Why fix something that works already?

Isn't Tempest techinally a high-tech frigate carrier?
Is it a ship with fighter bay(s)? Yes. Is it a ship that's classified in game as a carrier? No, it doesn't have that tag. Does it play like a carrier? Sort of. Maybe battle carrier. The faction doctrine will still consider it a warship and not a carrier, though, which means shepherd is going to be prioritised, if you want a frigate carrier.

Player does not want enemy carriers to be fast.  Player probably wants his carriers to be fast.
A slow (for its class), low-endurance frigate (no more than 180 PPT) with a single LPC should not be that bad.
For example, maybe a high-tech frigate, with one bay, a single synergy mount (for PD or missiles), and maybe active flares for its system (for missile defense).
Frigate carriers are a dangerous concept. I already consider Drover (75 speed) and Heron (80 speed) perhaps too fast, and a frigate carrier would obviously have to be faster. Though, Soren has a neat idea about decreasing this hypothetical frigate carrier's engagement range.

1. 70/100 weight approximately. The biggest reason is the fact, that AI is *** at flying frigates. This is a big subject, that deserves a topic on its own, so all ill write here is that if there are enemy ships present, that are bigger than a destroyer, frigates become useless, since AI is bad at fights where opponent has more range. And if there are carriers present, frigates become somehow even worse than useless.
Correct... Unless the frigates aren't alone. If the AI manages to harass the enemy and disrupt his formation, it's possible to single out enemy ships, and if there's more than a single frigate nearby and they feel they have the advantage, they will act on it. In Hyperion's case, it just isn't aware just how mobile it is.

Q8

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Re: Teleporting systems ruin the game - and should be removed
« Reply #21 on: October 14, 2019, 12:36:40 AM »

@TaLaR
Youre speaking past me, because i never made a single statement about a 'player piloted' hyperion. I even mentioned in my post before that:
[...]Or, you would have to give people reasons for flying frigates, even tho there are bigger ships around.[...]
That was a small point about the game pushing you, a player, to jump into the biggest ship youve got. So why would i even consider flying a frigate?

But okay, ill bite, lets talk about it.
First of all, your video of beating paragon with a hyperion is nothing if not making my point about AI being buggy. All that paragon has to do, is to turn the shield on, and u cant touch it anymore. Second, when was the last time you fought solo Paragon? Or solo whatever to that matter? Third, AI doesnt need to perfectly block any shots, it needs to kill you. It needs to kill you one time. And when you are fighting 200vs200 mid~late game fights, and where carriers are present, the strategy of jumping in the middle of a bunch of ships, without the omni shields or PDs vs salamanders, is semi-proper at best. So all you can do is pick off ships that stray on the flanks... And for clamping on the flanks you got Tempests, that are almost four times cheaper, and i would argue, that 205 speed +50 (coz the best part about the tempest is the fact that tempest doesnt lose the +50 for using its PDs) is at least comparable to teleporting. ***, for 15DPs you can have a falcon.
All things youre counting here can be done cheaper and more reliably with some other ship, and that other ship wont bankrupt you in the process...

At the end of the day, hyperion will stay just a fun little thing that you can *** around with in the simulator, and nothing else
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TaLaR

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Re: Teleporting systems ruin the game - and should be removed
« Reply #22 on: October 14, 2019, 01:12:40 AM »

Afflictor is always the more practical option, but using Hyperion in fleet fights is possible even if sub-optimal.

Yes, any big enough 360 shield ship, Paragon included, can protect itself in a duel. But then you'd just attack other more vulnerable targets.

First of all, you can afford to jump right into middle of enemy formation - window between 2 subsequent teleports is really small, sometimes you can jump right into a beam and out without taking single tick of damage (even if you take 1 tick, it's not much). To be hit with projectile, you need to teleport right on top of it. As long as your timing is perfect there is almost no risk (it's easy to get timing right by holding 'F' pressed).

Character skill boosted fighters can force you to vent at further point (so you'd have to double-jump to attack/retreat instead of just once), but that's about it. You just herd them and switch your vent spot to opposite side of enemy formation after every attack pass to ensure that fighters/missiles are always where they don't matter.

The real problems player-piloted Hyperion has are:
- doesn't kill nearly as fast as Afflictor.
- doesn't kill enough during it's CR allowance to justify supply costs.
« Last Edit: October 14, 2019, 01:17:05 AM by TaLaR »
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Plantissue

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Re: Teleporting systems ruin the game - and should be removed
« Reply #23 on: October 14, 2019, 02:54:43 PM »

Quote
People do have 6 bombers loadouts, because in all examples I have seen, they have filled their fleet with loads of fighters, usually totally more fighters than bombers, such that the entire battle is filled with fighters anyways,
Six bomber loadouts also work when the rest of the fleet are close to the enemy and tank for the bombers.
Yes, that is true. Including firing their payload whilst inside the ships themselves. But not if they are Cobras oddly enough. I was assuming fighters to distract with because they are the only truly expendable ships. You aren't always guaranteed a ship to distract for the bombers in the chaos of combat. But what you have written is true irregardless.

Hyperion works quite well as a phase ship alternative. It is 15 DP, and that should get you something in effectiveness between an Afflictor and a Harbinger. In theory itsuffers from CR decay less and so can stay fighting for longer. In player hands it can certainly strike unshielded areas like a phase ship. In AI hands, but if it does find an isolated ship can can and will teleport behind it, but it is quite careful in deciding what is isolated or not.
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Megas

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Re: Teleporting systems ruin the game - and should be removed
« Reply #24 on: October 14, 2019, 03:48:22 PM »

@ Plantissue:  Homing missiles passthrough allies harmlessly (until they flame out), but dumb-fires like Reapers do not.  (Back during 0.6.5, I used Swarmers on frigates for passthough until Salamanders became unlimited.)

My recent attempts with Hyperion is by the time I kill one big ship, PPT is gone and Hyperion needs to leave.  At least with Afflictor/Harbinger, PPT burns faster only for the phase ship and not the world.  With Reapers, Afflictor can kill one or two big ships now then leave.  Time shift lets Afflictor (with Reapers) kills ships faster, before the enemy kills one of my ships.  Also, phase ships only lose about 10-20% CR per deployment.  Hyperion loses 40%.

Hyperion costs too much and does not last long enough.
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Vind

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Re: Teleporting systems ruin the game - and should be removed
« Reply #25 on: October 19, 2019, 06:03:10 PM »

Hyperion is now a fun item - 120 seconds time is not enough for one cruiser destruction most of the time. This ship crippled by high maintenance, minimal CR time and biggest deployment CR cost. As player cannot target places outside camera view main ship feature - unlimited range teleport is not useful. Some kind of a special weapon linked to teleport is needed to offset all these penalties - right now this ship is a bad phase frigate substitute.
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