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

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Author Topic: pathetic DP balance, is QA and playtest not part of the dev cycle?  (Read 15362 times)

ANGRYABOUTELVES

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Re: pathetic DP balance, is QA and playtest not part of the dev cycle?
« Reply #45 on: April 02, 2021, 07:51:12 AM »

I suppose you know we are taking about the same exact thing ANGRYABOUTELVES, late game enemy fleet have balance issue and as you have state inflated number of officer is the problem and i have point out what is causing the inflated number of officer is the growing enemy fleet size

You think the rule is ok because the calculation on both size is the same, but don't forget how player and AI get the officer is different
The rule is unfair, AI get extra officer when they grow to a bigger fleet size, and they grow to a fleet size double or triple to what player's ideal fleet size, with much more officer than player can normally have. Player normally have a 10 officer limit, more than that player need to spend Magic pt, which should be unnecessary since even you need to field 10+ ship you don't need every ship have officer, gameplay-wise. SO AI have a unfair advantage on all fleet size, officer number and DP calculation(yet our discussion haven't include how these will affect combat, but that is the "get good" thing so i wouldn't include it).

Half of the thread have change to discuss how to counteract this by making map effect more powerful(more powerful ecm effect and "you need to cap point" thing)
Or "we need more merc" so there are suggestion like "Why don't we buy a bunch of merc at the same time?"

And god damn it the problem is not how to live with the unnatural amount of officer but to deal with the problem causing it in the first place, and as you say problem will gone if the inflated number of officer, it is true,
but think about it, if both player and AI fleet get same number of officer(10+1~2 extra), both size have similar fleet point, what is the different of DP calculation between the 0.9 and 0.95?

Why in the Hell Alex add these two line

"officerAIMaxMercsMult":2, # maximum "over-the-limit" merc-type officers that can be added to an AI fleet, times doctrine officer setting
"officerAIMercsStartingFP":100, # start adding more "merc" officers at this threshold

when we know one of the problem is late game enemy fleet can grow too big than why tie the number of officer directly to the fleet size?
And Alex's 0.95 is about going small!

Maybe not a native english speaker and not good in writing is causing problem here but as my first post in the thread what I want to say is the whole DP problem and bounty low pay and late game balance issue are all in the same root. Don't know why I get in to this "fair" mess

And of course i know phase ship is op and that is why i say use phase ship to cap point is cheesing the rule, and using a op thing to solve a balance problem is never the right thing to do in the first place...
How the player and the AI get ships is also different. The AI just magics ships and fleets out of thin air, just like how they magic officers out of thin air. The main thing that has changed is that you can now get DP by capping points, and capping points is easy. It's a massive improvement over the previous version.

Dealing with the problem of too many AI officers is now very easy; those numbers just have to change. Setting officerAIMercsStartingFP to 200 or 300 and officerAIMaxMercsMult to 1 or maybe even 0.5 would massively reduce the amount of over-cap officers AI fleets get, simple as that. That's why those lines exist.

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Chairman Suryasari

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Re: pathetic DP balance, is QA and playtest not part of the dev cycle?
« Reply #46 on: April 02, 2021, 08:20:09 AM »

The problem with that is that players have to go out of their way to fix the said problem. If we take it to the extreme It's like saying "Project Buggy" is good and playable but first you need install Unofficial Patch plus Rebalance Overhaul and oh, don't forget lock your fps with your GPU driver so it doesn't break down over 60fps (Looking at you Bethesda).

I know it's easy to do but it's probably better if Alex deal with the problem so average Layman can enjoy the game out of the box. In my opinion, player shouldn't go out of their way like this to fix something fundamental that dev can and should fix, for the same reason I don't want to make my own drink in a food court.

I don't want in the future Starsector will have Bethesda "Let's the player fix it." mentality .
« Last Edit: April 02, 2021, 08:28:06 AM by Chairman Suryasari »
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hkmist

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Re: pathetic DP balance, is QA and playtest not part of the dev cycle?
« Reply #47 on: April 02, 2021, 08:21:25 AM »

Yes we get the capture point feature now and we lost the choose of getting more ship or killing ship in battle for more DP, why can't we have all? And if what the officerAIMercsStartingFP state is right than that is what it can do.

I think what starsector beautiful is many thing can be change easily by player
But I don't think fixing the problem on player side is why we are on the suggestion broad, only Alex have the final say on what should be in the final version of the game and how the balance should be. I am just suggesting not everything we get in 0.95 add up correctly with the small fleet idea and some unsolved old issue bring more issue now. But Alex seem more likely in getting new idea than balancing issue now, or maybe he think the only one answer situation in late game is want he want, I don't know
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ANGRYABOUTELVES

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Re: pathetic DP balance, is QA and playtest not part of the dev cycle?
« Reply #48 on: April 02, 2021, 08:47:42 AM »

My point is that it's now really easy for Alex to change and test as well. Sorry if that wasn't clear.
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Golde

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Re: pathetic DP balance, is QA and playtest not part of the dev cycle?
« Reply #49 on: April 02, 2021, 09:45:19 AM »

All very well said. It's not the player's job to be making these kind of balancing changes in the first place.

The key to having 240 DP all the time is to have 2 officered phase frigates with elite phase mastery.

Ontop of the infinite officer, and permanent ECCM penalty, this is a very important point.

If shafting players with 160 DP is mere encouragement for contest objectives to reach DP parity or to force their hands to use frigates in the first place; then having two phase frigates to completely sidestep the mechanic shouldn't even be allowed.

The way I see it, it's a basic stat check mechanic shoehorned into otherwise good gameplay that's been implemented with very little foresight as to balance and whatnot.
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Alex

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Re: pathetic DP balance, is QA and playtest not part of the dev cycle?
« Reply #50 on: April 02, 2021, 10:18:43 AM »

And this is my question, WHY cut off one play style completely by making a new rule that only hurt some player which is not in the range of Alex's ideal play style AND this new rule don't do much good on player who are already playing like what Alex want? That is what I call unfair

I like the part of the new rule which when you have a smaller fleet you have way too win back the DP by capture point, but this don't contradict to "if you have a larger fleet you have more DP", why can't they both exist? Someone said earlier that you can't please everyone but on this case you can. Alex have do enough change in 0.95 to favor small fleet gameplay and most of them are reasonable, but this is the change I think is unfair and really not necessarily.

I think that's a fair question. Basically... it's really, really easy - once you have money rolling in - to just stack a bunch of Paragons (or whatever the highest-DP battleship happens to be) and to basically just roll everything with them, outnumbering the enemy on the battlefield. It's a way to win, for sure. Is it a playstyle that's interesting? I don't think so. It makes combat a trivial stomp. I'm not sure you can even really call it a "playstyle", it's just sort of an optimal thing you can do that beats everything with a minimum of interaction on the part of the player. It's expensive, sure, but past a certain point you have credits aplenty, so that's not a great balancing factor. The game shouldn't get less interesting as you get more stuff, right?

There's value in letting a player just throw credits (or some other kind of resource) at the problem to win, though. Players that aren't "the best" or w/e (nothing negative meant here) should have some way to win, ultimately. One idea I've had for a while is letting a player call in a support fleet, which'd cost a lot of credits, and would... essentially have the same temporary effect as lugging around 10 Paragons, but without that. And the nice thing here is its cost can be fine-tuned as necessary without tying it directly to the cost of ships in your fleet.

Another thought is adding a new story point use - something about pre-combat maneuvering, perhaps - that lets you start the fight with equal deployment points. I think that might feel pretty good, though I also think there'd be some thoughts that it's basically "required" or a SP-tax for having even-DP battles. But it'd be an option for someone having a hard time, is the important thing.

Yet another thought is perhaps fine-tuning things so that it's easier to win while at a 180-240 disadvantage - I think that gets more to the heart of the playstyle you're talking about, actually! Not so much stacking Paragons, but just not feeling forced to go for frigates/captures. I'm not actually sure this is *impossible* now - it could very well be doable with the right mix of ships, built-in mods, and skills - but it's certainly more challenging now than capturing points. Perhaps this could be as simple as changing the "worst possible" distribution from 60% to 40% to something smaller. Or having a Leadership skill provide a deployment bonus, like an objective you always have. It's something to think about, for sure; I've made a note. I'm actually kind of liking the idea of having a leadership skill give you say a 10% of max DP bonus, so if you had it, you'd be at 50-to-60 when outnumbered.

Agree with that. Enemy officer and ECM spam is complete nonesense. New system itself is OK as an idea, but numbers should be toned down. Every dog in the sector has ECM better, than mine, and i cant put ECM module on my ships, because there is no OP for that unless i make some mods build-in, which, again, requires SP, which means, i will must use upgraded ship to the rest of my days or the SPs will be wasted. I cant spend them for the story-oriented stuff, i cant experiment with ships...

Well... on the one hand, I think the numbers of officers should probably be toned down a bit, which'd also take enemy ECM down some. On the other hand, you absolutely could put ECM on your ships. Stuff like Omens with officers with Gunnery Implants is particularly impactful. And for smaller ships especially, you get a ton of those SP back due to bonus XP, so you really don't need keep using them forever. And ECCM is an option, too. That said, enemy ECM does seem like it's "too much" right now, you probably shouldn't be forced to hard-spec into your own ECM to counter it, and I've got an item to have a look here.

Overall, I want to say that I do appreciate all the feedback! As always, a major release is a bit of a turbulent time as far as balance. As much playtesting as I (and others on the dev team) might do, it's a small amount compared to what happens when the release is out; some things work out and some things need a bit of help. So: thank you, everyone!
« Last Edit: April 02, 2021, 10:24:22 AM by Alex »
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ANGRYABOUTELVES

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Re: ECM Examples and Discussion
« Reply #51 on: April 02, 2021, 11:41:52 AM »

If shafting players with 160 DP is mere encouragement for contest objectives to reach DP parity or to force their hands to use frigates in the first place; then having two phase frigates to completely sidestep the mechanic shouldn't even be allowed.
I'm not sure what you mean. Having 2 officered phase frigates for capping points isn't sidestepping the mechanic that encourages the use of fast frigates, it's leaning into it and doing it as efficiently as possible. That's like saying having 3 Drovers with the carrier group skill just for interceptor coverage is sidestepping the fighter game.
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Sordid

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Re: pathetic DP balance, is QA and playtest not part of the dev cycle?
« Reply #52 on: April 02, 2021, 12:08:54 PM »

I think that's a fair question. Basically... it's really, really easy - once you have money rolling in - to just stack a bunch of Paragons (or whatever the highest-DP battleship happens to be) and to basically just roll everything with them, outnumbering the enemy on the battlefield. It's a way to win, for sure. Is it a playstyle that's interesting? I don't think so.

Okay, you don't think that's fun. Fair enough, but you're not designing the game just for yourself. Some people do find fun and satisfaction in working hard to assemble a kick-ass fleet and then using it to kick ass. The issue is that you allow the former part of that but not the latter, and it's not clear that step 2 is not possible until step 1 has already been completed, so the player ends up feeling shafted and their work wasted. If you insist on enforcing your own preferred fleet composition on everyone, it would be a lot more palatable if it was made clear ahead of time what that composition is supposed to be. You could for instance cap not only the total number of ships in the fleet but also individual types, so a fleet could be limited to 2 capitals, 4 cruisers, 8 destroyers, and 16 frigates (or something, exact numbers TBD). And importantly, enemy fleets need to be limited in the same way.
« Last Edit: April 02, 2021, 12:23:50 PM by Sordid »
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Thaago

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Re: pathetic DP balance, is QA and playtest not part of the dev cycle?
« Reply #53 on: April 02, 2021, 12:39:31 PM »

I think that's a fair question. Basically... it's really, really easy - once you have money rolling in - to just stack a bunch of Paragons (or whatever the highest-DP battleship happens to be) and to basically just roll everything with them, outnumbering the enemy on the battlefield. It's a way to win, for sure. Is it a playstyle that's interesting? I don't think so.

Okay, you don't think that's fun. Fair enough, but you're not designing the game just for yourself. Some people do find fun and satisfaction in working hard to assemble a kick-ass fleet and then using it to kick ass. The issue is that you allow the former part of that but not the latter, and it's not clear that step 2 is not possible until step 1 has already been completed, so the player ends up feeling shafted and their work wasted. If you insist on enforcing your own preferred fleet composition on everyone, it would be a lot more palatable if it was made clear ahead of time what that composition is supposed to be. You could for instance cap not only the total number of ships in the fleet but also individual types, so a fleet could be limited to 2 capitals, 4 cruisers, 8 destroyers, and 16 frigates (or something, exact numbers TBD). And importantly, enemy fleets need to be limited in the same way.

... thats like all wrong. If a fleet doesn't kick ass, then its not a kick ass fleet. By definition. If the game is changed so that all cap fleets aren't as good, then they aren't as good.
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Sordid

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Re: pathetic DP balance, is QA and playtest not part of the dev cycle?
« Reply #54 on: April 02, 2021, 12:50:53 PM »

... thats like all wrong. If a fleet doesn't kick ass, then its not a kick ass fleet. By definition. If the game is changed so that all cap fleets aren't as good, then they aren't as good.

If a fleet doesn't kick ass, then it shouldn't seem like it would.
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hkmist

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Re: pathetic DP balance, is QA and playtest not part of the dev cycle?
« Reply #55 on: April 02, 2021, 12:57:51 PM »

I think that's a fair question. Basically... it's really, really easy - once you have money rolling in - to just stack a bunch of Paragons (or whatever the highest-DP battleship happens to be) and to basically just roll everything with them, outnumbering the enemy on the battlefield. It's a way to win, for sure. Is it a playstyle that's interesting? I don't think so. It makes combat a trivial stomp. I'm not sure you can even really call it a "playstyle", it's just sort of an optimal thing you can do that beats everything with a minimum of interaction on the part of the player. It's expensive, sure, but past a certain point you have credits aplenty, so that's not a great balancing factor. The game shouldn't get less interesting as you get more stuff, right?

Good to see you reply with the worst answer i suppose can get XD

Why every one hear more FP then the next word is "NOOOOOO they will field X paregons and "I" AM NOT FUN!!!", yes I think that is not fun too, and yes you can balance it as you like
But think about it, I never say I feel unfair because I can't field 1500FP ship again AI 300 FP fleet, I am saying on the new rule , a 300FP player fleet(which is include all non combat ship as a whole) again a 300FP late game AI battle fleet, you usually get the minimal Starting DP, I don't think it is too much too ask at least we have a even split? I don't have the exact calculation, how many officer do that AI officer that fleet will have and how can they affect the battle? Hiruma Kai have already show some math, even with a fair DP split AI still have advantage on many field, is this itself not enough? It must put all player not play like you want can't have fun? 
180-240 don't change much since the heart in this number is still "player should play like this, go get the flag, player can never get a fair duel", And one thing I don't know how to say exactly in english, something like "Our producer feel bad when player find the game too easy" style balance

Second of all, more on the DP system, ALL assumption on player can get a alot of credit and will slowball the system is base on a player taking advantage on the broken economic, yes many player like to take the easy way, but no one other than themself can blame them when they find the game not fun.
But i see in 0.95 you have put a lot of work on fixing the economic, well it is still not fixed, but why don't continue on these way and get most player live in a balance system rather than choosing a easy way as "I can't fix that but I don't like that too so i block it", why don't just let those people like to ruin their gameplay ruin their game and don't shot those near the line too?

In some other thread already have player suggesting we need better scaling on quest reward or bountry reward, what many of us thinking is we don't want to fuel our fleet on exploits credit. Flying a fleet for 25LY doing a 300k bountry fighting a 300+FP enemy fleet may seem ok on it own, but this don't include those time between finding a ok bounty and those time waste on god dame almost no pay defence of player colony. Income from legal way are just not enough.
I think player want to play the game in a way balance by fighting and doing quest is much more than those want to exploit the system, why don't help them first? I think thread like complain of can't do a smuggler mission prove these, why on hell do a 41k mission on some heavy patrol system when you can exploit 400k at the nearby star in half the time?

The DP system problem is not fixable if other part of the game don't get fix too, since it solve nothing on why some player need a larger fleet(player skill, play style, just like it be big, want to have some spare) and you fully understand why you think it have to look like this is partly because game economic is broken. I think this is time to do some clean up

P.S. Can we get back the kill ship to free up DP thing, it is honestly much more fun than that capture flag thing
« Last Edit: April 02, 2021, 01:30:17 PM by hkmist »
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Mordodrukow

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Re: pathetic DP balance, is QA and playtest not part of the dev cycle?
« Reply #56 on: April 02, 2021, 01:07:41 PM »

Quote
Well... on the one hand, I think the numbers of officers should probably be toned down a bit, which'd also take enemy ECM down some. On the other hand, you absolutely could put ECM on your ships. Stuff like Omens with officers with Gunnery Implants is particularly impactful. And for smaller ships especially, you get a ton of those SP back due to bonus XP, so you really don't need keep using them forever. And ECCM is an option, too. That said, enemy ECM does seem like it's "too much" right now, you probably shouldn't be forced to hard-spec into your own ECM to counter it, and I've got an item to have a look here.
I know how it works, but right now i am starving of OP. Again: i can start to use Build-in option, but i dont want to do that, because i dont know how much SP i will have at the end, and i dont know if i need them for some different things. And i dont know what ships i will want to use in future.

This build-in option looked like a cool thing in theory, but right now it is "use it, or die horribly", as well as many other new features. I dunno why are you saying that ECM numbers look fine, because i have negative numbers in almost every fight. And in some fights those numbers tell me: "Dont even bother trying to compete here, just put more armor and ram them to the death". In 9.1 there were a number of bad balanced mods with two major problems: 1) fighter spam; 2) ECM spam. Now you bring the second thing to vanilla. Thanks a lot...

And again: in 9.1 people complained about capital spam. They did that because capital spam was the way to play this game. Now you telling us: "Play this game in different way. It is mandatory". Whats the difference? And why there are so many options for skills and hull mods, if 90% of them are not viable, because you 100% need ECM mods, range mods, shield and flux mods, some weapons, a lot of vents...? Really, i even cant max vents right now (in 9.1 i always was able to). And you telling me: "Hey, put ECM there!"

What i suggest:
- tone down the number of enemy officers
- tone down ECM numbers a little bit (if it will not help, then we can try more, i agree that we can make it carefully)
- remove SP cost of build-in option, and make it cost money instead, just like the restoration. Something like the half of ships cost for the 1st upgrade, full price for the second, double price for the third. Maybe add increased supply usage per month also (but keep deployment cost the same)
- maybe remove SP cost of mercenaries, but make em cost more. Idk really, maybe it will nor be nessessary after first 3 changes
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Chairman Suryasari

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Re: pathetic DP balance, is QA and playtest not part of the dev cycle?
« Reply #57 on: April 02, 2021, 01:16:21 PM »

Quote
so a fleet could be limited to 2 capitals, 4 cruisers, 8 destroyers, and 16 frigates (or something, exact numbers TBD). And importantly, enemy fleets need to be limited in the same way.
Oh no, please don't turn Starsector into Overwatch with limited class system.

Quote
.
Quote
Some people do find fun and satisfaction in working hard to assemble a kick-ass fleet and then using it to kick ass.

Quote
.. thats like all wrong. If a fleet doesn't kick ass, then its not a kick ass fleet. By definition. If the game is changed so that all cap fleets aren't as good, then they aren't as good.

I kinda get what he trying to say i mean as Alex said in earlier post
Quote
Adding an extra 10 Paragons won't help much. 10 Paragons with officers vs 10 frigates with officers also doesn't make much of a difference.

It's made being a bigger predator feel useless and unrewarding, why Domain bother making capital if they're this useless and unpractical? It's just happening few hours ago, I get a bounty with 10+ officer it's just pure suffering. Maybe because I don't play the game as intended, it is my fault I guess.

It's feel like playing TES IV: Oblivion all over again, if you play vanilla without efficient leveling method, you will hate yourself by several levels later unless you use insane exploit or tone down the difficulty slider which Starsector doesn't have.

Quote
I think that's a fair question. Basically... it's really, really easy - once you have money rolling in - to just stack a bunch of Paragons (or whatever the highest-DP battleship happens to be) and to basically just roll everything with them, outnumbering the enemy on the battlefield. It's a way to win, for sure. Is it a playstyle that's interesting? I don't think so. It makes combat a trivial stomp. I'm not sure you can even really call it a "playstyle", it's just sort of an optimal thing you can do that beats everything with a minimum of interaction on the part of the player. It's expensive, sure, but past a certain point you have credits aplenty, so that's not a great balancing factor. The game shouldn't get less interesting as you get more stuff, right?

Alex, with the last version of Starsector the moment I get Paragon or any capital for that matter I feel like I accomplish something, I grind to this point, and now I feel overpower through my vein. Yes, maybe it's not an interesting "playstyle" to you, but for me, after grinding for the last 10 hours and finally able to eat pirate for days give a huge dopamine release to me. With this version, I feel more frustrated than I want to be, it feels stagnant and unrewarding the more I play it. I feel like I am missing an entire excel guide to play the game side by side.

And don't forget, it's a sandbox game, if player want 10 Paragon, player will get 10 Paragon and will having fun with that, even if you, me, and others don't like it.

The most fun I have for this release literally installing Vayra Ship Pack and using a cruiser coated with gun and finally able to vent the frustation i have after 40-50 hour of playing and steamrolling the content.

Don't get me wrong, the improvement and content that I see in this release is great and interesting. Effort without a doubt is poured into it, but the combat and it's encounter feel like a dam blocking it all.

It's picture perfectly what I'm feeling with this release.
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« Last Edit: April 02, 2021, 01:38:01 PM by Chairman Suryasari »
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Megas

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Re: pathetic DP balance, is QA and playtest not part of the dev cycle?
« Reply #58 on: April 02, 2021, 01:23:05 PM »

What i suggest:
- tone down the number of enemy officers
- tone down ECM numbers a little bit (if it will not help, then we can try more, i agree that we can make it carefully)
- remove SP cost of build-in option, and make it cost money instead, just like the restoration. Something like the half of ships cost for the 1st upgrade, full price for the second, double price for the third. Maybe add increased supply usage per month also (but keep deployment cost the same)
- maybe remove SP cost of mercenaries, but make em cost more. Idk really, maybe it will nor be nessessary after first 3 changes
I just want to be able to recover from losses cheaply like late-game of the previous release (building ships yourself).  Right now, once s-mod ships enter play, they stay in your fleet forever, but restoring them costs too much, building new ones eat too many story points, and Field Repairs take too long to remove more than a few d-mods.

And endgame fleets of human factions should honor the same restrictions as a reasonable player (i.e., not one who can grind the game for months to get perfect stats.)  The officer spam (both quantity and level 7s) smacks of exceeding the fleet cap, but with officers instead of ships.
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Alex

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Re: pathetic DP balance, is QA and playtest not part of the dev cycle?
« Reply #59 on: April 02, 2021, 01:41:33 PM »

I dunno why are you saying that ECM numbers look fine

I'm ... not?

- tone down the number of enemy officers
- tone down ECM numbers a little bit (if it will not help, then we can try more, i agree that we can make it carefully)

That's literally what I said in the part of my post that you quoted, so, yes!

- remove SP cost of build-in option, and make it cost money instead, just like the restoration. Something like the half of ships cost for the 1st upgrade, full price for the second, double price for the third. Maybe add increased supply usage per month also (but keep deployment cost the same)
- maybe remove SP cost of mercenaries, but make em cost more. Idk really, maybe it will nor be nessessary after first 3 changes

That on the other hand seems unnecessary. The reason you're not spending SP on hullmods I don't think is actually borne out by the game mechanics. They're one of the primary uses for story points, and you get tons of bonus XP (and thus some of those points back) if you use them on smaller ships/cheaper hullmods, too.



Alex, with the last version of Starsector the moment I get Paragon or any capital for that matter I feel like I accomplish something, I grind to this point, and now I feel overpower through my vein. Yes, maybe it's not an interesting "playstyle" to you, but for me, after grinding for the last 10 hours and finally able to eat pirate for days give a huge dopamine release to me. With this version, I feel more frustrated than I want to be, it feels stagnant and unrewarding the more I play it. I feel like I am missing an entire excel guide to play the game side by side.

Well - I can't tell you you're wrong, since how you feel is subjective, and I respect that! I don't understand, though - getting a capital ship is still hugely impactful as far as your fleet's power. ... ah, re-reading what you said, I guess it's not about that specifically, but rather about being able to just maul things easily after a certain point. So, it's powerful, but it's not enough to roll everything over. Ok, that's fair.

But, say, "eating pirate fleets for days" - you should still be able to do that, no? They're still, well, pirates; their stuff isn't very good. Remnant fleets, sure, they're very tough. Again, though, as I keep saying (and it feels like people keep not hearing, sigh), officers and ECM probably do need to be toned down a bit. That alone might take things to where there's a bit more play regarding deployment point ratios. Anyway, like I said, keeping an eye on all this and have some things on my todo list.
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