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Author Topic: Hull Restoration change  (Read 3451 times)

PreConceptor

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Hull Restoration change
« on: December 27, 2021, 12:56:00 PM »

I know people love Hull Restoration, but here goes anyway.

The over-time Dmod repairing granted by Hull Restoration is, well...cheesy. It encourages the player to sit in orbit with the handful of expensive ships they want repaired for months on end. It seems like busywork in the vein of recovering ships to sell them, which was mechanic'd out to eliminate busywork. Except over-time repairs aren't even work, it's just a matter of holding Shift. It also only costs 2 story points to reassign skills into Hull Restoration for months of idle over-time repairs and back to one's normal skill set, which makes it even more cheesy.

Being able to fix ships on the cheap is fantastic, but completely free over-time repairs doesn't seem the best way to do it, since time is an unlimited near-zero cost resource in most cases. In a meta perspective, the sheer utility, QoL, and credit savings (and/or the perception of potential gains) offered by Hull Restoration also pushes players heavily into the Industry tree over others, which skews the player experience towards it and the hyper-efficiency of said tree.

Instead, I propose the over-time repairs effect (and only that) be removed and replaced with a large percentage reduction to dockside Restoration costs, perhaps a 50% cost reduction or even more. This turns the effect from an unpredictable lottery that encourages awkward meta-based fleet management to gain the desired outcome into a concerted choice, saves time, also saves vast sums of credits, and better complements the 'chance for Dmod removal on recovery' effect. Thoughts?
« Last Edit: December 27, 2021, 01:04:16 PM by PreConceptor »
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JUDGE! slowpersun

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Re: Hull Restoration change
« Reply #2 on: December 27, 2021, 02:03:19 PM »

What, my suggestions on that other thread weren't good enough?  Don't neuter skill by making it a dockside thing, then players can't repair in deep space (although maybe landing on planets to repair single d-mod per month would be cool, but super tedious).  Either:

1.  Make ship size/class change length of repair times (so frigates get repaired in a month, 2 for destroyers, 4 for cruisers, 6 for capitals; 6 months might take too long, length of time per class is subject to change)

OR

2.  Just require length of time to repair D-mods be related to crew size (so running a lean crew basically becomes a drag on skill, whereas an oversize crew repairs normally).

But I do agree that this skill kinda OP in current configuration, and definitely cheesable once player figures out how to swap ships in and out to repair expensive ships and just spend cash to repair cheap ships.
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Yunru

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Re: Hull Restoration change
« Reply #3 on: December 27, 2021, 02:24:05 PM »

I wouldn't call it OP. I would, however, call it passive and uninteresting.

The reason I prefer the OP's suggestions to your's is that it removes the waiting part.

Thaago

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Re: Hull Restoration change
« Reply #4 on: December 27, 2021, 02:38:11 PM »

For me the most powerful part of the skill is recovering ships with fewer D mods to start with, so I would not mind the automated D mod removal going away and being replaced with something else.
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PreConceptor

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Re: Hull Restoration change
« Reply #5 on: December 27, 2021, 04:55:09 PM »

1.  Make ship size/class change length of repair times (so frigates get repaired in a month, 2 for destroyers, 4 for cruisers, 6 for capitals; 6 months might take too long, length of time per class is subject to change)

OR

2.  Just require length of time to repair D-mods be related to crew size (so running a lean crew basically becomes a drag on skill, whereas an oversize crew repairs normally).

These have the same problem as the original effect, but worse. All they'd do is make you wait longer. Dramatically longer in the case of the first one, and if you want to fix a really damaged Onslaught for example you'd end up paying a similar amount in total upkeep over the year or more it takes to fix as it would cost to Restore it. As long as the repairs happen automatically and progress with time, it'll be a problem.
« Last Edit: December 27, 2021, 05:16:34 PM by PreConceptor »
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Hiruma Kai

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Re: Hull Restoration change
« Reply #6 on: December 27, 2021, 05:18:31 PM »

It also only costs 2 story points to reassign skills into Hull Restoration for months of idle over-time repairs and back to one's normal skill set, which makes it even more cheesy.

Instead, I propose the over-time repairs effect (and only that) be removed and replaced with a large percentage reduction to dockside Restoration costs, perhaps a 50% cost reduction or even more. This turns the effect from an unpredictable lottery that encourages awkward meta-based fleet management to gain the desired outcome into a concerted choice, saves time, also saves vast sums of credits, and better complements the 'chance for Dmod removal on recovery' effect. Thoughts?

If it's just a respec to Hull restoration, save 50% credits instantly on X ships, respec back, I'm kind of not enthusiastic about such a change.  It does nothing to avoid the "only costs 2 story points to reassign skills", and in fact, makes the opportunity cost even less, making that behavior more likely, not less.  I don't think campaign layer instant benefits (as opposed to a benefit for having a skill over time or benefits directly in combat), are good, because they generally lead to that problem, namely metagaming skill reassignments even more.

Might as well just add a general option to spend a story point to halve the cost of the restoration of a ship, which avoids constant respec behavior.

In general, I'd much rather have over time campaign effects as that encourages me at least to play with the tree as opposed to using it as a one time instant windfall.  At least in that case you're playing with the skill.

I do find it interesting there are some combat focused players who still won't touch Industry because it means taking at least 2 skills that don't affect combat directly (and potentially more if you're piloting a high tech doctrine ship).  Typically Technology and Leadership combined with Combat is considered better from a maximal combat power perspective since it only forces you to take 1 non-combat related skill, and has multiple fleet wide buffs. Then there are posts like the OP here which suggest Industry is too strong.

I'll also point out, time is not free.  This perhaps is more obvious to me because I play a fair bit of spacer start games.  You are still paying your officers, supplies to keep CR up on the expensive to restore ship, and crew salaries.  And potentially a mysterious debt.  Not to mention simply loss of income from simply trading in the core worlds, which basically goes as fast as just sitting in orbit.  Or bounty hunting with your slightly weaker, but still pretty powerful d-mod fleet.  A 4 d-mod Paragon is still a Paragon, and will still defeat most ships 1 on 1 not named Radiant.

I'd also be hesitant to remove the d-mod over time removal and replace it with something less related, since players who intend to use the skill permanently would run into the issue that their already d-modded ships gain no benefit what so ever from taking the skill when they finally get around to it.  Which would tend to make players take it as early as possible to get the most benefit (i.e. less d-mods on acquire or loss).  Which feels weird to me.
« Last Edit: December 27, 2021, 05:20:19 PM by Hiruma Kai »
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JUDGE! slowpersun

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Re: Hull Restoration change
« Reply #7 on: December 27, 2021, 05:29:02 PM »

1.  Make ship size/class change length of repair times (so frigates get repaired in a month, 2 for destroyers, 4 for cruisers, 6 for capitals; 6 months might take too long, length of time per class is subject to change)

OR

2.  Just require length of time to repair D-mods be related to crew size (so running a lean crew basically becomes a drag on skill, whereas an oversize crew repairs normally).

These have the same problem as the original effect, but worse. All they'd do is make you wait longer. Dramatically longer in the case of the first one, and if you want to fix a really damaged Onslaught for example you'd end up paying a similar amount in total upkeep over the year or more it takes to fix as it would cost to Restore it. As long as the repairs happen automatically and progress with time, it'll be a problem.

But having repairs happen automatically and progress with time is the point of the mod.  So player can repair ships when out exploring, instead of accumulating d-mods after getting beaten up once or twice then having to schlep aaaaalllll the way back to the core to repair (assuming vanilla, Nex of course might have closer markets).  You are basically suggesting to redo the entire skill.  But player can still use ship while it is repairing... otherwise player has to accumulate money some other way in order to repair ship.  At a port.  Which is why I had also suggested maybe it should just require landing on any random unoccupied planet to fix something once a month, but I can see that becoming really really tedious (even if historically accurate for when a ship's masts have to be replaced with a random tree trunk, or barnacles sanded off bottom of ship to make it go faster).
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PreConceptor

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Re: Hull Restoration change
« Reply #8 on: December 27, 2021, 05:55:10 PM »

But having repairs happen automatically and progress with time is the point of the mod.  So player can repair ships when out exploring, instead of accumulating d-mods after getting beaten up once or twice then having to schlep aaaaalllll the way back to the core to repair (assuming vanilla, Nex of course might have closer markets).  You are basically suggesting to redo the entire skill.

If ships keep getting dmods outside the core, you'd need to return to the core anyway to replace lost crew unless you hit a cryopod windfall. It's not like the skill also has several other excellent effects. It's just that the over-time dmod repairs is all anyone cares about because it's maybe the single most useful skill effect in the whole lineup, to the point of making other top tier skills less valuable by comparison. It's easy to decide to make-do without Systems Expertise or Neural Link or Best Of The Best, it's dramatically harder to do the same with Hull Restoration.
« Last Edit: December 27, 2021, 06:25:30 PM by PreConceptor »
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JUDGE! slowpersun

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Re: Hull Restoration change
« Reply #9 on: December 27, 2021, 06:53:02 PM »

If ships keep getting dmods outside the core, you'd need to return to the core anyway to replace lost crew unless you hit a cryopod windfall.
Not unless player is running lean and bringing minimum crew.  You can bring more than the minimum, you know that right?
It's not like the skill also has several other excellent effects. It's just that the over-time dmod repairs is all anyone cares about because it's maybe the single most useful skill effect in the whole lineup, to the point of making other top tier skills less valuable by comparison.
That depends upon the player, and respeccing is both doable and relatively cheap (costs 1 SP).  And it is a top tier skill for a reason!
It's easy to decide to make-do without Systems Expertise or Neural Link or Best Of The Best, it's dramatically harder to do the same with Hull Restoration.
I do agree, which is partially why I have pointed out that the skill is kinda OP.  But nerf the skill by making it take longer, instead of neutering it by completely changing its meta... hence why I instead suggested that repairs take longer or require above minimum crew.
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Yunru

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Re: Hull Restoration change
« Reply #10 on: December 27, 2021, 07:06:57 PM »

I think you're forgetting an important fact: This is a game, that is played to have fun.

Increased wait times? That's a mechanic to get you to engage with microtransactions, not fun.

JUDGE! slowpersun

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Re: Hull Restoration change
« Reply #11 on: December 27, 2021, 08:42:18 PM »

Increased wait times? That's a mechanic to get you to engage with microtransactions, not fun.

Regardless of having fun or not, pretty sure loot boxes are the key to micro transactions (just also gambling).  Increased waiting is just as likely to build anticipation.  And besides, only suggestion 1 had increased repair times set, suggestion 2 just forces player to bring more crew OR wait longer... but they are just suggestions.  More well thought out suggestions IMO, but I'm clearly biased since they are mine.
« Last Edit: December 27, 2021, 08:46:49 PM by slowpersun »
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Oni

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Re: Hull Restoration change
« Reply #12 on: December 27, 2021, 10:46:13 PM »

All I can say is if someone wants to spend a couple of months in game in orbit slowly repairing D-Mods instead of... you know... exploring, trading, fighting, or otherwise doing things...
Well, why not? More power to them if that's what they enjoy. I'd be more concerned that the other Industry tree capstone looks a little lackluster in comparison.

Just going to say though that if they've got Nexerelin installed with a few extra factions... six months waiting is long enough for someone to conquer half the sector while you weren't looking. Hope they're friendly to you.  ;D

PS: I do think more skills need Elite abilities.
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vladokapuh

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Re: Hull Restoration change
« Reply #13 on: December 28, 2021, 12:17:58 AM »

I do what i always do, and just bring the ships i wanted repaired with me, and use them as i normally would. I dont see incentive to just sit in orbit, while i could be doing normal starsector stuffs and having them repaired at the same time.
Removing automatic repair is just gonna kill the skill for me entirely.
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Kriby

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Re: Hull Restoration change
« Reply #14 on: December 28, 2021, 12:52:48 AM »

I do what i always do, and just bring the ships i wanted repaired with me, and use them as i normally would. I dont see incentive to just sit in orbit, while i could be doing normal starsector stuffs and having them repaired at the same time.
Removing automatic repair is just gonna kill the skill for me entirely.

I agree with this 100%. D-mods are annoying but not world-ending, especially when most enemy fleets also have them. Slowly repairing out of them is really strong though, so I also wouldn't ever pass up on it.

My only real issue with the skill tree is how unimpactful I feel the combat line is, given that I always pass it up. I've only done a few playthroughs though, so maybe if I try them more seriously I'll change my mind? Like, give up colony building and having a big fleet and just playing a small fleet with a lot of active combat play.
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