Fractal Softworks Forum

Please login or register.

Login with username, password and session length
Advanced search  

News:

Starsector 0.97a is out! (02/02/24); New blog post: Simulator Enhancements (03/13/24)

Author Topic: A Boarding Idea that is actually simple to implement.  (Read 1420 times)

#Negi

  • Ensign
  • *
  • Posts: 38
    • View Profile
A Boarding Idea that is actually simple to implement.
« on: March 21, 2021, 04:51:37 PM »

We've already got a tracker for crew/marines killed by hull damage, and we've already got crewed kamikaze fightercraft (though I think that's from a mod only).  I think boarding could be as simple as putting the two together: 

A fighter or missile that is crewed by marines preferably over crew, that if it hits an unshielded, low armored section of hull, it does little hull damage but kills a lot of crew (unless the other guys have a lot of marines too). 

After that, a ship with low crew already has reduced combat rating so that's benefit enough no new effects necessary.  I don't know that it's ordinarily possible to kill all the crew through hull damage before the ship explodes thou (again, maybe through mods; I can think of one ship ability that repairs half hull damage received in diable avionics mod), so maybe a line of code for that; a ship with no crew is disabled and can be recovered after the battle (no, marines alone cannot pilot the ship, no changing sides mechanic) without added d-mods, but costs more supply (there was a firefight in all the halls, place is torn up inside) or can be salvaged for more. 

So there you have it.  No FPS hallway shooter minigame, just piggybacking off the crew casualties, missile/fighter, and salvage/recovery systems already in the game.  It doesn't have to be complex.  In the meantime marines are expensive and kamikaze fighters are also expensive (in a different way) and point defense is still a thing, and shields, and armor, so you've already got your give and take for the mechanic laid out for you.  (and no explosion on contact, instead burrow in like WH40K boarding pods, easy enough to do; just have the missile sprite move out of sight under the ship's sprite instead of over before it disappears)

Idea's over, the rest is extra:

One of the things I love about Starsector is how most systems serve multiple roles: the intel saying a trade convoy is moving from a to b carrying c goods there and bringing d goods back, provides many ways to interact with it: you can get there first with your own goods, you can wait to buy up their goods cheap from a saturated market, you can lay in wait and ambush the convoy, you can follow the convoy and counter ambush (that one isn't always effective of course), etc etc.  It's just raw information about the system and the use of it is up to you.  Nexerelin's mining does the same kind of piggybacking off of the colony resources and hazards, and mating them with the salvaging system, all already in the game.  (btw nexerelin make mining use the salvaging screen rather than text boxes, after every mine I've got to open the menu to make sure I didn't auto pick up more than I can hold and manage them if I did).  So the idea of piggybacking off of existing mechanics to provide a lot of new options with very few additions appeals to me a lot.  It's the main thing that's impressed me about starsector, in a AAA game there would have been miles of code and mechanics for each new system implemented, and here's starsector opening up whole new playstyles with a single added mechanic. 

What do you all think?  I'm fairly new to starsector by it's 10 years of life, so if I've said anything stupid, point it out for me. 
Logged

xenoargh

  • Admiral
  • *****
  • Posts: 5078
  • naively breaking things!
    • View Profile
Re: A Boarding Idea that is actually simple to implement.
« Reply #1 on: March 22, 2021, 08:18:18 AM »

This has already been implemented once (in Vacuum).  It was reasonably Fun, but I never made it especially "balanced".  I've thought about doing it again in Rebal, but I've been too busy working on my own game :)

The mechanics of implementing this are (fairly) straightforward; writing a kamakaze ship AI is pretty simple, and then a developer would just need to check if the fighter's close-enough, do the math on "how many enemies are still alive on this ship", etc., etc.  The hard part was making the captured ships permanently part of the player's fleet, IIRC.

Since I wrote that stuff for Vacuum, I've played Battlefleet Gothic, where boarding actions were a really distinct part of the game- successful boarding resulted in debuffs to the enemy ship, amongst other things.  That sounds like a good way to offset the high cost in Crew that would be implied by boarding actions (as making boarding cost Marines, the natural choice, would be a pretty expensive way to get new ships, if they didn't succeed very often).

Anyhow, I have no intention of releasing anything new to the public for SS until 0.95 has been released, as I just know, with my luck, I'd release code for 0.92 and then have it all broken by 0.95, and I have very limited time for modding right now :)
Logged
Please check out my SS projects :)
Xeno's Mod Pack

sector_terror

  • Commander
  • ***
  • Posts: 195
    • View Profile
Re: A Boarding Idea that is actually simple to implement.
« Reply #2 on: March 25, 2021, 09:50:03 PM »

Just a quick thing. Look into how Battlefleet Gothic Armada 2 did this. It's not a bad idea to have a third stat which can be "attacked" alongside shields(well, flux) and armor, especially one that can refill as needed. In concept it isn't a bad idea.

I'm a bit concerned with it being too punishing to the player though. Sure you lose supplied when deploying, but you gain just as much back if you deployed about even with the enemy and took that risk. But with crew there is no such thing, so it would lead to crew inevitably getting lost in combat without return, and highly limits the amount of encounters you have to, at most, single digit numbers. damage can be "repaired" and even avoided properly, but that can't apply well to crew "damage" at all. Maybe I'm being too conservative here, I have a history of it, but it bothers me.
Logged

SCC

  • Admiral
  • *****
  • Posts: 4112
    • View Profile
Re: A Boarding Idea that is actually simple to implement.
« Reply #3 on: March 26, 2021, 08:58:56 AM »

Just a quick thing. Look into how Battlefleet Gothic Armada 2 did this. It's not a bad idea to have a third stat which can be "attacked" alongside shields(well, flux) and armor, especially one that can refill as needed. In concept it isn't a bad idea.
That's actually one of the reasons why combat boarding isn't being considered. What's the purpose of adding Health Bar #2, if we already have the original Health Bar?

#Negi

  • Ensign
  • *
  • Posts: 38
    • View Profile
Re: A Boarding Idea that is actually simple to implement.
« Reply #4 on: March 29, 2021, 03:14:13 PM »

Anyhow, I have no intention of releasing anything new to the public for SS until 0.95 has been released, as I just know, with my luck, I'd release code for 0.92 and then have it all broken by 0.95, and I have very limited time for modding right now :)

So you're a modder?  Yep that's your name on it.  If you don't mind me asking; where do you learn this stuff? 
Logged