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)

Pages: 1 ... 22 23 [24] 25 26 ... 34

Author Topic: Combat Readyness isn't fun..  (Read 151260 times)

mendonca

  • Global Moderator
  • Admiral
  • *****
  • Posts: 1159
    • View Profile
Re: Combat Readyness isn't fun..
« Reply #345 on: September 25, 2013, 01:49:56 PM »

It's not fun getting killed, but it is amazing fun recovering from your own mistakes. Try it, next time.

Shun the quicksave/quickload! Embrace your inner ironman!
Logged


"I'm doing it, I'm making them purple! No one can stop me!"

Kommodore Krieg

  • Commander
  • ***
  • Posts: 233
    • View Profile
Re: Combat Readyness isn't fun..
« Reply #346 on: September 25, 2013, 02:03:45 PM »

I have been playing this game for a long time, and as a result I am quite good at it.  Not only do I find CR to be a great mechanic that really helps to integrate the campaign map with the battle map, as well as making which ships I choose to deploy a meaningful decision, I find this version to be EASIER than previous version because I am absolutely rolling in money from all the extra supplies I am selling.  Managing your fleet well is rewarded; rolling around with a deathball with no cargo capacity and flinging every ship into every battle isn't.  As I see it, that is a good thing.  

Edit: Ironman mode is only mode!

Also, I've read more of the thread and I have to say much of this analysis is just pointless.  That isn't meant as an insult, but really, when you find yourself getting better at the game you won't have problems with CR.  I just hope the availability of supplies that can be looted from enemies is toned down because otherwise I think cash will be far too abundant. 
« Last Edit: September 25, 2013, 02:06:43 PM by Commissar Krieg »
Logged

Fireball14

  • Ensign
  • *
  • Posts: 22
    • View Profile
Re: Combat Readyness isn't fun..
« Reply #347 on: September 25, 2013, 02:04:54 PM »

It's not fun getting killed, but it is amazing fun recovering from your own mistakes. Try it, next time.

Shun the quicksave/quickload! Embrace your inner ironman!

Yap its fun recovering from your own mistakes, but mistakes made by you when playing a game, and not because some silly game rule says i have lose a game because i won hard battle. This is exactly why most of gamers will quit playing it afterwards. One thing when you win a hard fight and yeh sure you pay recovery costs but its still a victory and totally different story when game punish you because you got your self in that fight in first place.

This is a hardcore type of games, and really don't like those... I don't know maybe thats because im really am a softcore player, but in my opinion game have to cover both types of players and they both have to have chance to win in a way they want. Right now i don't enjoy playing 0.6 like i enjoyed 0.5x. But i'ma patient man, so i'll just wait and see what happens next.  ;)
 
« Last Edit: September 25, 2013, 02:06:27 PM by Fireball14 »
Logged

Kommodore Krieg

  • Commander
  • ***
  • Posts: 233
    • View Profile
Re: Combat Readyness isn't fun..
« Reply #348 on: September 25, 2013, 02:09:16 PM »


This is a hardcore type of games, and really don't like those... I don't know maybe thats because im really am a softcore player...
 

There isn't anything wrong with that, but that doesn't mean the game needs to be changed to suit your needs.  There are plenty of other "softcore" games out there.  Don't take this as an insult either, I am being genuine when I say there is nothing wrong with enjoying softer games.  Just think though, I am sure if you persevere at this game you will be able to enjoy the rewarding feeling of overcoming a rather challenging game!
Logged

CedricO

  • Ensign
  • *
  • Posts: 14
    • View Profile
Re: Combat Readyness isn't fun..
« Reply #349 on: September 25, 2013, 03:15:59 PM »

Personally, i can see it working (but not in the current build) all it has done for me so far is make a long battle vs a fast enemy hard to pin down even more long and horrible since weapons randomly malfunction.
Logged

Ravendarke

  • Captain
  • ****
  • Posts: 276
  • Nemesis
    • View Profile
Re: Combat Readyness isn't fun..
« Reply #350 on: September 25, 2013, 03:27:51 PM »

Quote
Instead of tinkering with the current Capital balance much, though... perhaps another type should be introduced, that can serve in that "Boss" role, is far more challenging, that cannot be captured and never gets sold?  Just a thought.

>>>>>>>>>>>>>MODS<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<

 ;D

I would welcome new ship type.. actually I would welcome ability to define own ship types and even new mounts....
Logged

Megas

  • Admiral
  • *****
  • Posts: 12118
    • View Profile
Re: Combat Readyness isn't fun..
« Reply #351 on: September 25, 2013, 05:12:43 PM »

If the game puts you in a game over loop, it should have the courtesy to tell you so, not torture the (likely new) player for thirty minutes to an hour with false hope.  Otherwise, the player will probably give up in frustration, say "This sucks!" and give Starsector a bad name to his friends.
Logged

Andy H.K.

  • Commander
  • ***
  • Posts: 232
    • View Profile
Re: Combat Readyness isn't fun..
« Reply #352 on: September 25, 2013, 06:14:48 PM »

It's not fun getting killed, but it is amazing fun recovering from your own mistakes. Try it, next time.

Shun the quicksave/quickload! Embrace your inner ironman!

Yap its fun recovering from your own mistakes, but mistakes made by you when playing a game, and not because some silly game rule says i have lose a game because i won hard battle. This is exactly why most of gamers will quit playing it afterwards. One thing when you win a hard fight and yeh sure you pay recovery costs but its still a victory and totally different story when game punish you because you got your self in that fight in first place.

This is a hardcore type of games, and really don't like those... I don't know maybe thats because im really am a softcore player, but in my opinion game have to cover both types of players and they both have to have chance to win in a way they want. Right now i don't enjoy playing 0.6 like i enjoyed 0.5x. But i'ma patient man, so i'll just wait and see what happens next.  ;)
 

I don't know.... but game rule said if you get damaged you need to repair it..... if you suffer any battle damage you probably made some mistake...

On the other hand, if you won any battle at all, the player have all kind of advantage.... they get to pick a lot of loot, and the "stand down" option is always available if you're worry about CR cost.... the remaining part being "winning the fight". Well, that's what playing games are about isn't it?

IMO, if there's no chance of failure there's also no joy in victory.... probably the reason why I always stop playing Starsector when I started farming SDF... fortunately there's mods...



Maybe I carry such view because I am leaning towards the "hardcore" side of gamers (in fact I believe my gaming skills to be terrible), but then I also believe in this:


Logged

Joush

  • Ensign
  • *
  • Posts: 16
    • View Profile
Re: Combat Readyness isn't fun..
« Reply #353 on: September 25, 2013, 06:22:15 PM »

I have been playing this game for a long time, and as a result I am quite good at it.  Not only do I find CR to be a great mechanic that really helps to integrate the campaign map with the battle map, as well as making which ships I choose to deploy a meaningful decision, I find this version to be EASIER than previous version because I am absolutely rolling in money from all the extra supplies I am selling.  Managing your fleet well is rewarded; rolling around with a deathball with no cargo capacity and flinging every ship into every battle isn't.  As I see it, that is a good thing.  

Edit: Ironman mode is only mode!

Also, I've read more of the thread and I have to say much of this analysis is just pointless.  That isn't meant as an insult, but really, when you find yourself getting better at the game you won't have problems with CR.  I just hope the availability of supplies that can be looted from enemies is toned down because otherwise I think cash will be far too abundant. 

The problem with Combat Readiness is not one of difficulty.

The problem with CR is that it adds very little fun or interesting choices while instead putting a cool down on ships that has nothing to do with anything. Of the ways to interact with it, one of them is flatly broken in the current build and the others effectively boil down to holding down the shift key while you watch a progress bar refill, or running back to a station and pressing one button. Whatever cost it involves the game still suffers from the introduction of combat readiness.

This isn't to say that CR can't work. In any development features will be added, assessed and changed or removed.

Current problems with CR:

It makes the supply economy more confusing. A fleet has a greatly varied set of possible cost. Repairing, recovering CR and constant maintenance all drain different amounts of cash and outside of a friendly station it's hard to tell how much you will need to spend before you are back to just the base drain to your wallet. It's hard to know how much Supply-bucks a fleet should keep on hand in limited storage space.

It's unclear what CR is supposed to represent. Crew exhaustion? Ammunition reloading? Ship Damage? Routine maintenance? Every ship comes across as a fragile hanger queen that goes from ready to fight to degraded effectiveness after one brief fight.

It discourages some play styles and rewards others, apparently in unintended ways. For an example, look at Harry, one of the few current ways to interact with the CR system that isn't resting at the inn (back to a friendly station) or holding down shift to wait. Harry takes combat situations that might be interesting (chasing a fleeing fleet) and reduces them to something best left to auto-resolve.

None of these are because people don't like complicating factors or feel the game is too hard. But right now, there are only a few fun choices to make when dealing with CR and it's contributing to the game being hardest at the start and very easy once established, in an inverted difficulty curve.

While I'm not crazy about the execution, the ability to use frigates that have limited peak deployment time vs frigates that have unlimited deployment time is a interesting idea. Some ships being more resistant to wear and tear and sustained combat then others, or recovering from combat faster, is also an interesting idea that I don't feel is executed very well currently.
Logged

Joush

  • Ensign
  • *
  • Posts: 16
    • View Profile
Re: Combat Readyness isn't fun..
« Reply #354 on: September 25, 2013, 06:35:18 PM »


I don't know.... but game rule said if you get damaged you need to repair it..... if you suffer any battle damage you probably made some mistake...

On the other hand, if you won any battle at all, the player have all kind of advantage.... they get to pick a lot of loot, and the "stand down" option is always available if you're worry about CR cost.... the remaining part being "winning the fight". Well, that's what playing games are about isn't it?

IMO, if there's no chance of failure there's also no joy in victory.... probably the reason why I always stop playing Starsector when I started farming SDF... fortunately there's mods...


The Stand Down command isn't always available. In fact, one of the frustrations with the way CR works is that it's confusing and arbitrary what the game considers a hard fought battle. (A powerful ship effortlessly destroying several lesser ships without takeing any damage almost never gets the Stand Down option, for example.) Beyond that, some ships are desinged to win fights while at least takeing armor damage. An Onslaught that gets hit isn't doing it wrong, it's following the play style of a slow, heavily armored ship with a very poor shield generator, 360 degree weapon coverage and a Burn Drive.

Hardcore games aren't, by definition, more difficult then other games (many are, or at least can be if you turn the difficulty up). Hardcore more refers to games that ask a player for a lot of time and focus to learn about complicated rules and concepts. Starsector isn't hardcore because it's not easy (that's debatable), it's hardcore because a lot of the fun is playing with ship loadouts, managing fire arcs and balancing a bunch of separate systems that work together.

Right now, CR is in rough shape. It was just introduced in .6, however, and given how much fun I've had with this game I'm sure that it will be in better shape by 1.0, possibly unrecognizable shape as Crew Endurance (recovered by time, R&R facilities, Med Bays and Coffee commodities), Ammunition (how loaded weapon systems are) and Maintenance. Or maybe it will be how it is now, but with much better documentation and systems to interact with it.
Logged

Zapier

  • Commander
  • ***
  • Posts: 216
    • View Profile
Re: Combat Readyness isn't fun..
« Reply #355 on: September 25, 2013, 07:04:34 PM »

The problem with Combat Readiness is not one of difficulty.

The problem with CR is that it adds very little fun or interesting choices while instead putting a cool down on ships that has nothing to do with anything. Of the ways to interact with it, one of them is flatly broken in the current build and the others effectively boil down to holding down the shift key while you watch a progress bar refill, or running back to a station and pressing one button. Whatever cost it involves the game still suffers from the introduction of combat readiness.

This isn't to say that CR can't work. In any development features will be added, assessed and changed or removed.
I disagree that it suffers from combat readiness unless all you're looking at is a game that uses no other systems in its campaign. This one does use other systems, they are just not created/implemented yet to get a better feel for how it'll interact with everything else. As it's been said, CR adds consequences to something that really had no consequences previously.
Quote from: Joush
Current problems with CR:

It makes the supply economy more confusing. A fleet has a greatly varied set of possible cost. Repairing, recovering CR and constant maintenance all drain different amounts of cash and outside of a friendly station it's hard to tell how much you will need to spend before you are back to just the base drain to your wallet. It's hard to know how much Supply-bucks a fleet should keep on hand in limited storage space.

That can be easily modified in future installments, but if we waited for Alex himself to put every piece of documentation in, we might have been looking at even more weeks of waiting. That's part of testing. To Alex he may not have thought about it much because the numbers may just appear instantly in his head because of developing it, whereas with us it doesn't. So, the amount the number of supplies needed to fully repair and such is more of a documentation problem rather than a confusing system.

Quote from: Joush
It's unclear what CR is supposed to represent. Crew exhaustion? Ammunition reloading? Ship Damage? Routine maintenance? Every ship comes across as a fragile hanger queen that goes from ready to fight to degraded effectiveness after one brief fight.

Sometimes the simplest answers are the ones people don't want to actually consider. CR can represent all of those things combined. What do you consider as combat ready with most situations? Rest. Supply. Numbers. Equipment. Being ready for combat alone can sometimes be draining to the mindset of those being ready for combat... for some it doesn't bother them. Being at the ready for a battle can be quite draining, whether you fight or not. Having your ship on full alert and things primed for a situation can be draining too. I'm not saying these are exactly what CR represents but its easy enough to consider these. Some people just hate the simplest views just as some hate complex views.

Either way, I've used frigates and destroyers (a single one...) in multiple fights in a row against a couple larger fleets and still come out winning. Degraded effectiveness does not mean something is now ineffective. Often the ability of the human player is able to overcome these much easier than the AI. In my opinion this system hurts the AI way more than it hurts the human player, and that's not necessarily bad either.

Quote from: Joush
It discourages some play styles and rewards others, apparently in unintended ways. For an example, look at Harry, one of the few current ways to interact with the CR system that isn't resting at the inn (back to a friendly station) or holding down shift to wait. Harry takes combat situations that might be interesting (chasing a fleeing fleet) and reduces them to something best left to auto-resolve.

None of these are because people don't like complicating factors or feel the game is too hard. But right now, there are only a few fun choices to make when dealing with CR and it's contributing to the game being hardest at the start and very easy once established, in an inverted difficulty curve.

While I'm not crazy about the execution, the ability to use frigates that have limited peak deployment time vs frigates that have unlimited deployment time is a interesting idea. Some ships being more resistant to wear and tear and sustained combat then others, or recovering from combat faster, is also an interesting idea that I don't feel is executed very well currently.

I think this issue is once again due to the developing nature of the campaign system. Just because CR has already been put in doesn't mean everything else it'll interact with has... or all the other options have as well. I recall a lot of people in this very forum starting to complain about the lack of another release and were getting worried about 'feature creep' happening. Well, we got what we asked for and we're in the middle of something not yet fully fleshed out. This is still .6 and not 1.0. Yes, we give feedback and everyone obviously has, but too much feedback in this very thread has appeared the be a want for a complete removal of CR and I think that's wrong.

As you said, much of the problems can be that they aren't very well executed, but I think Alex is on the right track with the beginning being hardest right now with the end being much easier... considering much of what we can do after our initial start isn't implemented yet, that means our late-game comes much sooner... and most people find games easier once they've accomplished all they've set out to do. Some people call this an ending. Others the end-game. Either way, being successful and progressing tends to lead to easier stuff, not harder. The difficulty is keeping it difficult enough to make it challenging and interesting... but all that gets balanced when we have everything.

P.S. For those who see the CR spiral of death or whatever they call it as a problem, there's a reason why we get increased rewards for losing battles and that even in ironman, losing isn't the 'end' but the new beginning. The idea is that at times you WILL lose. If you want to have a perfect playthrough, then you play without ironman and use save and reload. This is an option in most games. If you 'victory' turns out to be more of a slow loss, then reload and play it again. I hate to see some people try to alter the gameplay for others when the options to avoid these death spirals are in the game already. It's called trying it again to get a better result or avoiding the battle entirely. If you can't accomplish either then yes you may have to restart or settle with getting beat and starting over (ship wise... you keep skills and stuff in the neutral station).

You don't have to be perfect and shouldn't expect to be perfect. The game is setup with the expectation that you won't be... and actually rewards you for getting knocked down once in awhile... but it doesn't prevent you from having to accept it if you choose the proper save method.
Logged

xenoargh

  • Admiral
  • *****
  • Posts: 5078
  • naively breaking things!
    • View Profile
Re: Combat Readyness isn't fun..
« Reply #356 on: September 25, 2013, 08:26:38 PM »

Quote
I agree, it would be smart move but totally not fun. Its not fun getting killed not in battle, but rather by game rules.
There you're touching something that's kind of core to what Alex has expressed about what he'd like the final game to feel like, and that's probably worth discussing a bit.

1.  Alex has talked about how this is a game where scarcity is going to be a major factor, and resource tightness is a goal.  IOW, if you don't like how "game rules" are hampering your desire for a more casual-game experience of an open-world type of game, then this is a concern, and I think it's legitimate; while no game can please everybody, I see some ways that the game could please a wider playerbase.

However this is something where game options regarding difficulty probably need to be analyzed and constructed, but it's not all that hard.

For example, there might be five levels of difficulty:

Casual:  No CR costs, damage nerfed to 1/4 for you and your fleet.
Easy:  CR costs are 1/2 normal, 1/2 damage.
Normal:  CR costs normal, 1/2 damage taken (the current stock setting IIRC).
Hard: CR costs 1.5X, full damage taken.
Insane:  CR costs and damage taken doubled.  Good luck!

This kind of option structure could be fleshed out as economic / build systems come into play and give a very wide range of real difficulty options for players of all skill levels.

2.  The core game is really meant to have rules that go beyond just fighting skill.  That's the goal.  

We're all engaged in a bit of tug-of-war about what this means- some want things to be much more 4X-like in the final game, some want things to be much more single-fleet-heroic, most of us are somewhere in the middle.

But it's clear that there will be meta-game activities and game mechanics that are going to go into skills that aren't just twitch and careful buff selection in the final game, so the game's going to be able to "make you lose due to rules" by design, because it's really not meant to just be a game about Blowing Stuff Up.  What that means is up to Alex, but I am pretty sure he listens to us and tries to give us roughly what he thinks we want, with a bit of unique spin on it.  

Does that always result in perfect gameplay and balance every release?  Not at all; usually that arrives by iteration.  Any of you folks who've done game dev know how that works- you never see a lot of the things players will see unless you have AAA QA and tons of testers; on a system this big you just plain miss stuff.  It's just how it goes and it's OK, we're pointing out issues and Alex will fix them.

But I've gotta say, for all of the newcomers to the game... just wait a bit, you got here after a pretty big update and the next patch release will almost certainly smooth out a lot of the current bumps.  

Alex's record in that regard is quite good; while there are lots of things we can argue about needing nerf / buff and overall balance (and all of us vets like to have fairly silly arguments about that stuff, lol), it'll get there, or at least close enough that if people want more refinement, they can turn to mods.  Gotta note, though, that there aren't any "rebal" mods for this game that have the exclusive goal of cleaning up the minor balance issues at all, though, at least none that are current, so perhaps that's somebody's opportunity to get down in the trenches and buff / nerf things until the low-level mechanics are perfectly polished :)
Logged
Please check out my SS projects :)
Xeno's Mod Pack

Debido

  • Admiral
  • *****
  • Posts: 1183
    • View Profile
Re: Combat Readyness isn't fun..
« Reply #357 on: September 26, 2013, 12:02:26 AM »

Thanks for you valuable feedback and analysis Fireball14/DrNoid
O1.1 A tutorial is on part of a larger picture of gameplay experience and difficulty curve.
If you're not on iron mode it's quite easy to take on a fleet bigger than yours, die, respawn, attack it again, rinse and repeat until they're dead and you get lots of loot to start the game.
On the other hands if you’re a new (or old) player starting out and die repeatedly without knowing what you did wrong, it provides a bad gameplay experience for them.
New players always come to a game with a pre-concieved notion of how it 'should be', and having said that, so do old players (more later). SS CR system is not like most people have experienced in a game before, so we need ease them into it or disable it when their fleet is less than 3-5 dp so that they can learn the basics of the system before delving into the complex parts.

Any good game has a difficulty curve and introduces concepts and elements gradually. Tutorial or not full CR from the get go is a bad gameplay experience, and gameplay experience is paramount!
And if a player is in a death spiral there it would be an advisory pop-up to warn them, and to suggest how they resolve it such as scuttling un-needed ships.

I work in professional IT environments and often need to train users in new information systems, I take it as MY responsibility if I am unable to educate them properly in how to use a system. I often need to take them through multiple scenarios to help them make the connection between all the different elements that make up a solution.

If I explained the CR system to a normal person, then walked out of the room and told them it’s their fault if they can’t get it working to their advantage they would take it as a very bad ‘experience’.
Anyway…
The following solutions from Fireball14 can address the issue:
1) CR regain do not cost supplies.
2) CR combat start cap needs to be removed.
3) CR restoration in exchange for money implanted into starbases.

Megas has also suggested reducing the cost of supplies initially. Now in the final game I would suggest that ‘Tutorial Sector’ is spaced either a long way away from the rest of the sectors, or that after to leave it you cannot return. In the ‘Tutorial Sector’ the cost of supplies can be significantly reduced to ease players in, this is a common mechanic in many games to help ease players in.

There also needs to be an update to the navigation GUI to show daily supply usage for CR recovery and total remaining, then another part needs to shows how much is being consumed for repairs and how much is needed for complete repairs of the fleet.

If a new gamer initially sees that the supplies per day is being consumed by CR recovery, then after a battle they see it go up they’re going to make the wrong connection that it is caused by CR and not damage. The current supply usage stat is inadequate and is tantamount to misinformation. The player needs the right information at the right time and the current GUI does not do this.
Logged

Debido

  • Admiral
  • *****
  • Posts: 1183
    • View Profile
Re: Combat Readyness isn't fun..
« Reply #358 on: September 26, 2013, 12:02:48 AM »

O2 Hurry not working
Known bug, being worked on. However if you haven’t read my post on Fleet formations, I still think it would add to the game immensely more than CR.
http://fractalsoftworks.com/forum/index.php?topic=6847.msg111764#msg111764
Logged

Debido

  • Admiral
  • *****
  • Posts: 1183
    • View Profile
Re: Combat Readyness isn't fun..
« Reply #359 on: September 26, 2013, 12:03:15 AM »

O1.2/O3 CR Recovery time/Big Ships
CR Recovery times has been described as a framework to make interesting decisions leading to interesting combat.
In practise the result has been to skew the gameplay experience away from FUN(er)* gameplay experience. Sure StarSector is still fun, but CR is detracting from that fun by promoting lots of cheaper faster units such as frigates, carrier groups and the occasional destroyer for good measure.

/********** History Lesson Interjection************/
In real life the battleship quickly faded away with the emergence of carrier groups supported by smaller ships (such as frigates/destroyers). Carriers had the ability to project their power via Fighters, Bombers and Torpedo bombers from afar with little to no chance of reprisal from battleships.
Due to the ineffectiveness, low accuracy, high capital and operational expense - battleship production stopped.
To this day carrier groups are the most effective way a country projects “kinetic diplomacy” from afar.

/********** History Lesson Interjection************/

Ok so what if history support the death knell of battlships: we can talk about speed, limited speed, limited range damage output vector vs multi-highspeed input damage vectors for a large surface area, and realism and so on – but I still want battleships to be the pinnacle achievement and reward for playing the game. If the game is going to make them cost so damn much they’d best perform to the expectation.
But no, not only are battleships fairly vulnerable lumbering beasts, their endurance is nowhere near as competitive. If you’re a high technology battleship forget it, these things require a return to base after every engagement to recover the CR quickly enough.
[My apologies for the long post, please feel free to take a tea break before continuing]

Fireball14 came up with 3 solutions
1)   Rounded fleet speed – viable, but he doesn’t like it either
2)   Stationary targets – viable
3)   Faster perusing fleet – viable but noted difficulty and poor experience for new players
Now I’d suggest
1)   Get rid of tugs, this things are so emasculating. I’m a big bad battleship and I need to be tugged between battles so I can pull my big guns out? (humour intended). You’re trying to represent the additional cost of burn speed for large ships, tugs ruin the fantasy of self-powered hurtling through space.
2)   Alternative to tugs is to have engine mounts or augmentations that cost credits, extra fuel, extra logistics.
3)   Allow the player to push engines beyond 100%, let a guy with big ships push the fleet faster at a cost of CR to model the engine being burned harder. This let’s a player have a tactical advantage in catching up to an enemy or fleeing to a safe area.

I believe Alex proposed a scenario where your base is under attack, and you have some choices in how to get there. In this case you can sprint there, sure your ships will have reduced combat readiness but they did get there in time when it mattered. Kind of like Sulu in Undiscovered country when the ensign says “She’ll fly apart” and Sulu is a boss “Fly her apart then!” http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c7xvi6GL9Fk.

You could also have it that always flying it at 200% results in ships occasionally receiving hull damage or in rare cases complete destruction.
 Mission Capability
Another alternative is to modify CR cost. Before I being I want to make a differentiation between
•   CR cost (in %)
•   CR recovery time (% recovered per day)
•   CR supplies used  (supplies used per day per CR% recovered)
Al these elements influence the usage/mission capability of larger or more technologically advanced ships.
At the moment larger and more tech oriented ships have a low Mission Capable Rate (MCR). I am not arguing that they can’t complete missions against large fleets, I’m arguing that their MCR and cost effectiveness outside of occasional defence fleet conflicts is significantly reduced compared to previous versions.
I would be interested to see the effect of the following as larger ships are deployed
•   Very low CR cost, 2%, 5% and up to 10%
•   High relative CR recovery time (1 days for full recovery)
•   Very high supply usage per CR% recovery, perhaps 100 – 1000 supplies for single deployment recovery depending on ship effectiveness/tech.
This would mean that you always have the option of deploying your battleship frequently to reflect a model that they’re a robust pinnacle of engineering – not a
...
a fragile hanger queen that goes from ready to fight to degraded effectiveness after one brief fight.
...

Now this potentially reduces its cost effectiveness, the cost effectiveness is now tied to the set supply usage cost which can tie back to actual credit cost.
I’m not saying it’s the best way but it’s certainly worth trying.

Combat Deployment

Something else to increase the MCR of large ships in flee scenarios trying to chase smaller ships is simply allow them to burn longer up the left and right side until they get to the top, they can then turn around and approach from the top whilst fighters/frigates from from mid left/mid right and destroyers approach from the bottom.
Logged
Pages: 1 ... 22 23 [24] 25 26 ... 34