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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: Starsector 0.6a (Released) Patch Notes  (Read 553299 times)

BillyRueben

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Re: Starsector 0.6a (In Development) Patch Notes
« Reply #210 on: May 24, 2013, 07:40:33 PM »

Fleet points removed from the campaign (remain as "deployment points" in combat)
So is the leadership tree a lot more useless now?

EDIT: Oh, and would you mind doing something like a blog post to explain this new logistic system? I'm a little confused...

EDIT 2: And I'm kinda happy to see the supply cost increase. It actually makes them meaningful, and every hit you take in combat that much more painful.
« Last Edit: May 24, 2013, 07:42:51 PM by BillyRueben »
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Zaphide

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Re: Starsector 0.6a (In Development) Patch Notes
« Reply #211 on: May 24, 2013, 07:42:35 PM »

--- snip ---
Added SectorAPI.getPersistentData(), used for saving arbitrary data in the savegame
Expanded ShipVariantAPI. Combined with FleetMemberAPI.setVariant(), should be enough to allow mods to dynamically create custom variants.
--- snip ---

Very cool. Also, just had a look at the changes to ShipHullSpecAPI, extra very cool! Plus moddable AutoResolve!

The UI stuff also looks really interesting.
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Alex

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Re: Starsector 0.6a (In Development) Patch Notes
« Reply #212 on: May 24, 2013, 08:09:00 PM »

Fleet points removed from the campaign (remain as "deployment points" in combat)
So is the leadership tree a lot more useless now?

Well, no. Think of logistics as fleet points, except encompassing more stuff - anything that consumes supplies, which now includes ships. For now, all the skills that used to increase fleet points increase logistics instead.

EDIT: Oh, and would you mind doing something like a blog post to explain this new logistic system? I'm a little confused...

Yep, thinking about doing that soon. Made sense to put out the patch notes first, though, so that there's something in them that wasn't already talked about in detail :)

EDIT 2: And I'm kinda happy to see the supply cost increase. It actually makes them meaningful, and every hit you take in combat that much more painful.

Yeah... that came out of doing the numbers on maintenance costs/CR loss from deployment. An Onslaught costing 50 (number totally made up, but in the right ballpark) credits worth of supplies to deploy wasn't exactly meaningful.

The UI stuff also looks really interesting.

:) I'm hoping it'll let mods do qualitatively more/different stuff.
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Thaago

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Re: Starsector 0.6a (In Development) Patch Notes
« Reply #213 on: May 24, 2013, 09:04:48 PM »

Type safety is overrated :P *runs as fast as I can*
I'm very excited for the persistent data though - it should make things a lot easier than having custom spawn points to store info!

Question about logistics: Say I'm running a fleet at near max logistics capacity, and I get in a fight. All of a sudden I have CR/repairs supply consumption added. If this pushes me over my max logistics, do those repairs just not happen? Or does that start the accident chance? (And is that why the player can adjust the repair rate, so they can control the risk levels?)


Quote
Goal is to make boarding a way to acquire new types ships rather than to acquire *more* ships, thus the risks associated with boarding are very high - on average, should be more than the cost to buy the same ship

This is... interesting. Does this imply that once you have a type of ship you will be able to reproduce it? Or am I reading into things too much?

Quote
Sensor Array now provides a 10% damage bonus to all weapons (was: 25% range bonus)

Ah man, now I have to choose between nav arrays and sensor arrays. ;) Do bonuses apply to frigates and fighters again now that they are CR limited, btw?
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Decer304

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Re: Starsector 0.6a (In Development) Patch Notes
« Reply #214 on: May 24, 2013, 09:59:41 PM »

Quote
Goal is to make boarding a way to acquire new types ships rather than to acquire *more* ships, thus the risks associated with boarding are very high - on average, should be more than the cost to buy the same ship

This is... interesting. Does this imply that once you have a type of ship you will be able to reproduce it? Or am I reading into things too much?

Yeah, thats what i first thought as well. I'm wondering, because alex said that, does it mean that your chance of successful boarding action decreases after every successful boarding of the one type of ship?
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K-64

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Re: Starsector 0.6a (In Development) Patch Notes
« Reply #215 on: May 24, 2013, 10:05:44 PM »

I don't think that'll happen, doesn't make sense from the fluff side of things
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RawCode

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Re: Starsector 0.6a (In Development) Patch Notes
« Reply #216 on: May 25, 2013, 12:13:37 AM »

Quote
"Second in command" option (autoresolve) no longer available to the player (possibly a temporary measure, depending on things)
+
Quote
Autoresolve algorithm changed, is now fully moddable

full of win
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mercy

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Re: Starsector 0.6a (In Development) Patch Notes
« Reply #217 on: May 25, 2013, 01:22:36 AM »

Can't wait til v1.0. I will check out this game then.
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Gothars

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Re: Starsector 0.6a (In Development) Patch Notes
« Reply #218 on: May 25, 2013, 02:04:35 AM »

Oh, this is most interesting. Logistics seems to be another one of those clever mechanics, I can't wrap my head around it fully either. Looking forward to the blogpost.
I assume you did just not mention all the old mechanics that will be gone to make room for the new ones? Like determining crew level with ship position and manually suspending repairs on a ship?



New boarding mechanics:

Any new thoughts on the ability to influence boarding chance during combat? Is that of of the window (again)?


Oh, and something I missed in the notes:
On the one hand, yeah, it'd be a pain to swap to another ship [every time your flagship has low CR]. On the other hand, having your flagship be in bad shape is a tactical consideration that may not warrant having a free pass out of. Hmm. I'll give it some thought. Might just make the first transfer command (if the flagship isn't on the field) instant and see how that feels.

Have you tried it, will it be like this?


Yep, thinking about doing that soon. Made sense to put out the patch notes first, though, so that there's something in them that wasn't already talked about in detail :)

Don't know how other's see it, but I prefer hearing about big new features first in form of a blogpost. A text format explaining a mechanic, giving reasons and talking about iterations is much more exiting to read than bullet points. To try and split the excitement between those surrounding factors and the inherent "wow, new feature" (which is now in the patchnotes) is, in my opinion, detrimental to the overall fascination. I for one wouldn't mind if the patch notes were just a comprehensive list, introducing only minor new things and changes.
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Silver Silence

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Re: Starsector 0.6a (In Development) Patch Notes
« Reply #219 on: May 25, 2013, 02:56:38 AM »

I think I'll sit and wait for the blog post to explain stuff because at the moment, the patch notes just look like this to me.


Changes as of May 24, 2013
  • Reinvented Starsector.
  • That is all.
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Lily

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Re: Starsector 0.6a (In Development) Patch Notes
« Reply #220 on: May 25, 2013, 09:44:42 AM »

Quote
New boarding mechanics:

    Goal is to make boarding a way to acquire new types ships rather than to acquire *more* ships, thus the risks associated with boarding are very high - on average, should be more than the cost to buy the same ship
    Boarding takes place as a series of choices in the new encounter dialog
    Both marines and crew can be used to board, marines are much more effective
    At the end of the encounter, one of the losing side's ships disabled in any of the engagements has a chance to be repaired by its crew. The winning side has a number of options:
        Board it: requires picking a number of combat-ready ships for the job - only the crew capacity of these may be used for boarding), and one of:
            Hard dock: best chance of success, high chance of losing ALL ships in the boarding action to a self-destruct. As harsh as it sounds.
            Launch assault teams from a distance: low chance of success, requires more marines to succeed, high chance of enemy escaping
        Engage with nearby ships: enemy ship will either be disabled, destroyed, or manage to escape
        Let it go: enemy ship will be able to escape
    If the player loses a battle, similar mechanics for the AI kick in (though at this point it will always pick the "engage" option)
    Increased marine cost 10x
    Fighter wings can not be boarded

Not sure what I think of all of this.  @Launch assault teams from a distance and @hard dock: Why do we have to risk our ships; it takes forever to repair a ship, and wouldn't you just be camping within range of it so that if it does repair the engines you can just disable it again?  That's what emp weapons are for, right (I always carry a few on my ships, and even then, you could just fire a few shots into the engines of the ship from any weapon and it would do the trick...)?  Secondly, don't most ships, at least cruiser size (from most Sci-fi anyways) have shuttle bays?  Wouldn't most smart captains just send the marines over in the shuttle, thus only potentially losing that?  I may just be looking to far into it, but I really don't like the idea of losing my hard earned investments, especially now with the lack of auto resolve (game will take a LOT longer to get to that stage, at this point in development).  Secondly, who's to say the crew inside is even still alive?  You lose a lot of crew when you take heavy damage; wouldn't it be possible that all the crew is dead?  Thirdly, on fighter wings; what is to prevent you from just scooping them up with your carrier and repairing them?  And from the way I'm reading this, only one ship?  How does this work, randomly?  I'm pretty mixed on a lot of this, really.  But the other patch notes are awesome (or so they seem), can't wait!
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Gothars

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Re: Starsector 0.6a (In Development) Patch Notes
« Reply #221 on: May 25, 2013, 10:22:27 AM »

You might want to read the blogpost about the new boarding mechanic, scroll to the third headline. In the corresponding forum thread (link at the bottom of the blogpost) everything has been discussed in detail.

Your idea with the shuttles is by the way the same as "launch assault team".
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Alex

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Re: Starsector 0.6a (In Development) Patch Notes
« Reply #222 on: May 25, 2013, 10:28:33 AM »

First of all, just to make sure there's no confusion: the boarding stuff is what was talked about in the blog post, so it's not "new" relative to that.

Question about logistics: Say I'm running a fleet at near max logistics capacity, and I get in a fight. All of a sudden I have CR/repairs supply consumption added. If this pushes me over my max logistics, do those repairs just not happen? Or does that start the accident chance? (And is that why the player can adjust the repair rate, so they can control the risk levels?)

Due to this, the logistics rating wouldn't go down just due to CR loss.
Quote
Ships at maximum CR only consume 10% of the maintenance cost in supplies, but the full value is counted against the logistics rating

As for repairs, they'll still happen, but your ships will gradually lose CR to the adjusted (due to lowered logistics rating) maximum. They'll then recover it after repairs are finished.

Being at 0% logistics rating for a day or two kicks off accidents. And, right, that's why the player can adjust the repair expenditure, to control how much of a hit LR takes. You can repair quickly and lose some combat readiness, or repair slowly/not at all and retain maximum readiness.

Quote
Sensor Array now provides a 10% damage bonus to all weapons (was: 25% range bonus)

Ah man, now I have to choose between nav arrays and sensor arrays. ;) Do bonuses apply to frigates and fighters again now that they are CR limited, btw?

Not at the moment, no. Still thinking through all that.


Quote
Goal is to make boarding a way to acquire new types ships rather than to acquire *more* ships, thus the risks associated with boarding are very high - on average, should be more than the cost to buy the same ship

This is... interesting. Does this imply that once you have a type of ship you will be able to reproduce it? Or am I reading into things too much?

Yeah, thats what i first thought as well. I'm wondering, because alex said that, does it mean that your chance of successful boarding action decreases after every successful boarding of the one type of ship?

What I meant there is that if you've got a chance to board a ship you already have and don't specifically need any more of, you would probably pass up the opportunity to board. I.E. it's not an automatic opportunity to increase the strength of your fleet that you'd mostly want to take.



Oh, this is most interesting. Logistics seems to be another one of those clever mechanics, I can't wrap my head around it fully either. Looking forward to the blogpost.

Hopefully not too clever. It's actually intended as a streamlining of several existing mechanics.

I assume you did just not mention all the old mechanics that will be gone to make room for the new ones? Like determining crew level with ship position and manually suspending repairs on a ship?

There's still a "suspend repairs" toggle for ships. Ship position does matter for crew allocation in that the highest-level crew goes to the first ship to need it, with "logistics priority" ships getting first dibs, in the order they are listed. That's actually the only thing it matters for now.


Any new thoughts on the ability to influence boarding chance during combat? Is that of of the window (again)?

Well, again, the boarding stuff isn't really "new" new :)


Oh, and something I missed in the notes:
On the one hand, yeah, it'd be a pain to swap to another ship [every time your flagship has low CR]. On the other hand, having your flagship be in bad shape is a tactical consideration that may not warrant having a free pass out of. Hmm. I'll give it some thought. Might just make the first transfer command (if the flagship isn't on the field) instant and see how that feels.

Have you tried it, will it be like this?

Funny, was just thinking about this. Will try it out shortly.

Don't know how other's see it, but I prefer hearing about big new features first in form of a blogpost. A text format explaining a mechanic, giving reasons and talking about iterations is much more exiting to read than bullet points. To try and split the excitement between those surrounding factors and the inherent "wow, new feature" (which is now in the patchnotes) is, in my opinion, detrimental to the overall fascination. I for one wouldn't mind if the patch notes were just a comprehensive list, introducing only minor new things and changes.

But, but! What about fueling ill-informed speculation?


... lots of stuff ...

You might want to check out this thread, and the blog post linked in its OP. Lots more detail on the boarding mechanics there.

.... and, Gothars'ed.
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Lily

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Re: Starsector 0.6a (In Development) Patch Notes
« Reply #223 on: May 25, 2013, 10:55:43 AM »

You might want to read the blogpost about the new boarding mechanic, scroll to the third headline. In the corresponding forum thread (link at the bottom of the blogpost) everything has been discussed in detail.

Your idea with the shuttles is by the way the same as "launch assault team".

How?  They have a huge chance to escape; there should be little to none.

Edit: to clarify from my post
Quote
wouldn't you just be camping within range of it so that if it does repair the engines you can just disable it again?  That's what emp weapons are for, right (I always carry a few on my ships, and even then, you could just fire a few shots into the engines of the ship from any weapon and it would do the trick...)

Edit2: Too easy?  How so?  isn't there still an RNG factor?  and honestly, if you invest in capturing things, it SHOULD be 'too easy'.  To take a look at how EV: Nova did it (Not saying this needs to be exactly like it or like it at all) you could buy 'Marine Platoons'.  They took up weapon / outfit space, and in return you had a higher chance to capture things.  I don't see why there couldn't be a similar mechanic; why does it have to be hard to capture something?  Tractor beams, marines, attack droids, etc; all made for this stuff, should make things significantly easier if you invest a ton into them (just like investing a ton into anything, really), rather than a trivial amount, IMO.

Edit3: and I did read the post, I still see no reason why you can't make it at least a 50% chance capture rate (if you invest in something, as I said.  Besides, you could make them AP related if you really wanted, forcing the player to pick between combat/travel/trade skills, etc.  It's not like it's just a 'freebie', nor should it be).
« Last Edit: May 25, 2013, 11:10:41 AM by Lily »
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FloW

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Re: Starsector 0.6a (In Development) Patch Notes
« Reply #224 on: May 25, 2013, 11:25:05 AM »

why does it have to be hard to capture something?

I guess you want to know why it is hard gameplay-wise: Because otherwise it's a money-printing machine.
Gameplay of a similar game, X2: You sit outside a pirate base and start capturing ships. If you know what you do, you get around 2-3 ships every 10 minutes. So if you capture 4 ships after around 15 minutes, each with 50% hull remaining, you captured enough to buy a new heavy fighter (I'd compare it to a destroyer in Starsector). And that's without your victims' cargo.

If the current idea is implemented, you will only try to capture ships you actually want. For example, it's very hard to get the Astral. So if you want one, you should expect to lose some ships in the process.
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