As the games goes on, I feel like I get to experience less of it.

[Lancefighter]

wasnt the old mk2/mk3 unlock costs 2k/3k?

[Wingflier]

Fundamentally, one of the defining characteristics of a strong strategy title is difficult, meaningful choices.

SO THIS.  Games that allow the player to make these kinds of choices these days are so rare.  People just want victory handed to them on a silver platter, where AI War seems to be a game with bad choices will actually the punish the hell out of you, and good choices that can make your life so much easier.  In addition to all the other wonderful things about the game, this is one of the greatest aspects.

@Chris:  I agree with the points on your design decisions, and that AI War's "tech tree" (it seems so dynamic and unique that it's hard to stomach calling it that) is actually a lot "deeper" than in most RTS games.  However, I also agree with the OP that knowledge is becoming a little slim, especially on harder difficulties.  Sure, you get more per planet now, and MKII unlocks for free; but let's be honest, the game has become A LOT harder since you made the 3k knowledge change back in 3.x.  Guardians have been added, the AI has been improved several times, and now with this new "Sieging Mechanic", things are so different than they were before.  Also, I just have to be honest with you, free MKII ARS unlocks certainly SOUND good, but with so many underpowered bonus units, it is not something you can really rely on to help you win the game at this point.

Do I think the player has too little knowledge right now?  No, I would say at this point it's almost perfect.  However, I remember you saying something earlier about causing Starships to cost a lot more knowledge.  To me this would be the straw that breaks the camel's back.  I sincerely hope that Starship knowledge costs do not get changed, or if they do, that Starships are significantly buffed to compensate.

[TechSY730]

wasnt the old mk2/mk3 unlock costs 2k/3k?

I'm pretty sure it used to be 3k/4k

[mavorspam]

Please don't make the game any easier. The market has been saturated with dumbed-down jokes of rts's as of late. I love the fact that I've lost every game of AI War I've played so far, and the fact that decisions on what tech's to unlock have to be taken very seriously.

[PineappleSam]

Please don't make the game any easier. The market has been saturated with dumbed-down jokes of rts's as of late. I love the fact that I've lost every game of AI War I've played so far, and the fact that decisions on what tech's to unlock have to be taken very seriously.

I agree that the game doesn't need to be made easier (that's why there's a difficulty modifier ), but that's not what this discussion is about. It's more that there are so many different paths players can take with unlocks etcetera to win but it's impossible to try everything/most-things in a single game.

With fabricators, golems, asteroids and the various capturables around the possible combinations grow exponentially so it becomes difficult to try every possible combination...  I'm curious to see how a mixed Zenith mirror/Neinzul Youngling Weasel fleet would fair but with 53 unlockable ships if I start with one of the two then getting the other at an ARS comes in at 2%.

...to have a 50/50 chance of getting both in the game I'd need to capture roughly 25 ARS

EDIT: I could start with multiple command stations but that always feels a little like cheating 

[Suzera]

Please don't make the game any easier. The market has been saturated with dumbed-down jokes of rts's as of late. I love the fact that I've lost every game of AI War I've played so far, and the fact that decisions on what tech's to unlock have to be taken very seriously.

The game is getting harder overall with the balance changes actually. Much harder. You can't just pick the few good ships and have a cakewalk game against Z Chameleons, Mirrors, Microfighters and Autocannons anymore. You can't floor AIP forever. Hanging out at mk1 attack level isn't so hugely advantageous defensively (or offensively). You actually have to DECIDE now.

The only people who the game MIGHT be getting "easier" for are the people who were picking terrible ships all the time or were doing suboptimal strategy.

Feel free to change your difficulty to 10 backhacker + techsledge and 2x schizophrenic cross planet waves with all AI plots on though. There's definitely plenty of statistical difficulty for you to get regardless of the current round of balancing and diversification if that's your worry. You can continue to lose the game every time, but that does not make it "hard" in a meaningful sense.

By your definition, I could make the hardest RTS ever in a couple seconds. In fact I can program it for you to play right now on this forum! Here it is:

GAME OVER. YOU LOST. REREAD THIS TO REPLAY, LOSER.

Real difficulty comes from variety of valid choices, not being statistically destined to lose or playing russian roulette with small chunks of your life (the time you put into the game). You still need a statistical challenge obviously or the choices don't matter at all, but AI War has more than plenty of that with going up to difficulty 10 (unless you do cheeses like mad bomber + no waves). Statistical difficulty is trivial to add. See my simple game above. It's also trivial to take away:

YOU WIN! REREAD THIS TO REPLAY YOU WINNER YOU!

AI War also pretty much goes down to that point with things like difficulty 1+no waves+human resistance fighters and easy golems/spirecraft. You can certainly pick your statistical level needed here. What was lacking two months ago was valid choices unless you just didn't care about really winning effectively (and that got statistically harder per difficulty settings too overall, not easier).

This is why RUSE is probably going to be one of my favorite, if not my favorite, strategy computer games of all time. It's very close to chess. It's about decisions and thinking ahead, not busywork or statistics (although it did have some exploitable statistical issues). Anyone who wants a game focused on decisions and forward-thinking and maneuvering over micromanagement should give RUSE a try. It's a really different RTS than XCraft or C&C games. I don't mean to advertise RUSE, but it's just by far the best example of the point I am trying to make.

[Mithror]

Just because I've seen you using that phrase so often: when you say floor AIP are you referring to playing a game where you keep the AIP as close to the floor AIP as possible?

[keith.lamothe]

I'm curious to see how a mixed Zenith mirror/Neinzul Youngling Weasel fleet would fair but with 53 unlockable ships if I start with one of the two then getting the other at an ARS comes in at 2%.

...to have a 50/50 chance of getting both in the game I'd need to capture roughly 25 ARS

EDIT: I could start with multiple command stations but that always feels a little like cheating 

Yea, I was going to suggest the multiple homeworlds if you _really_ want to use those two types together.  Chris was asking elsewhere about possible changes to the multi-hw thing but I think the consensus is that enough players like the current approach (perhaps with a few balance tweaks) that we don't want to just totally take that away and replace it.

[x4000]

A few things about the current comments, here and in a few other threads:

1. When commenting on the current betas, please bear in mind these are beta.  There's been a lot of complaining about the siege mechanic, despite the fact that I've said it looks like there is some sort of bug in there.  There's this sprawling thread about how a bug is making the game feel grindy, which just strikes me as... well, whatever.  I guess it wasn't clear enough that there was a bug there, but I thought I was pretty clear that something was very, very off.

2. "How hard is the game" is a really tricky question.  Suzera notes that the game is becoming far harder lately, and that's certainly true for her: she was using some very niche tactics that were clever and abusive and which made the game a cakewalk where it shouldn't have been.  Cutting off those strategies makes it way harder for her playstyle, but I don't think those recent changes particularly effect the difficulty for the majority of players at all, because most weren't thinking of strategies like hers.

3. In the same vein, I really don't have much patience for the "mark II of a bonus ship from the ARS isn't that useful" argument, because I think we've made it clear that we're massively revamping all the bonus ships.  And that we're already partly done.  And that we're soliciting help and feedback, etc.  In other words: think of a too-weak bonus ship as another transient bug.

4. In terms of it being impossible to try everything in a single game: yes.  This is so much the goal.  I want there to still be new combinations coming up for you after 100 games, let alone 1.  Otherwise, where's the replay value?  This is a really different direction from any other RTS I can think of, because I'm not out to get your money on $60 sequels.  Since I'm planning more expansions, my fiscal incentive is actually the opposite: keep you interested for as long as humanly possible.  Of course, that's what I'd want to do anyway, since I also play the game and it's a matter of keeping myself entertained, too.


tl;dr: A lot of stuff is in flux now, let's wait until some of that settles before we make grand pronouncements.  Specific suggestions and complaints are always welcome, but the sweeping generalizations when so much is changing aren't overly useful.  Well, actually they are, too: it would be very useful for me to know the game was becoming grindy if I hadn't already said that the cause of that state was a bug.

Anyhow, carry on.

[Suzera]

Just because I've seen you using that phrase so often: when you say floor AIP are you referring to playing a game where you keep the AIP as close to the floor AIP as possible?

This post: http://www.arcengames.com/forums/index.php/topic,7785.msg65744.html#msg65744

You can't really do that anymore. At least not anywhere NEAR as easily.

3. In the same vein, I really don't have much patience for the "mark II of a bonus ship from the ARS isn't that useful" argument, because I think we've made it clear that we're massively revamping all the bonus ships.  And that we're already partly done.  And that we're soliciting help and feedback, etc.  In other words: think of a too-weak bonus ship as another transient bu

I'd actually like to see the number of ARS be increased now. That way there is more ship choice and presents a better opportunity to take advantage of niche strategy ships, since they'll be more likely to appear when they are more useful. It would help some of the end game sloggishness a bit more too now that they give mk2 and the bonus ships are getting more useful. That would present a somewhat radical balance change though that I'm not sure now is the time for though while the already done radical changes and rebalancing shake out, unless it were based on planet count instead of a straight up 5 maybe.

4. In terms of it being impossible to try everything in a single game: yes.  This is so much the goal.  I want there to still be new combinations coming up for you after 100 games, let alone 1.  Otherwise, where's the replay value?  This is a really different direction from any other RTS I can think of, because I'm not out to get your money on $60 sequels.  Since I'm planning more expansions, my fiscal incentive is actually the opposite: keep you interested for as long as humanly possible.  Of course, that's what I'd want to do anyway, since I also play the game and it's a matter of keeping myself entertained, too.

If you can do everything every game and be super efficient, that does cut out a significant portion of the choice aspect, since the obvious choice is "everything". Knowledge may still be a bit scarce though, which also cuts out unlock choice, but at least there's more worthy ARS unlocks than two weeks ago.

Most *craft style games the choice isn't in combinations, but the order you do things in. Time is still a limited resource, and boy is it precious. The person who makes better choices with regards to their time tends to win, and there's the unit upkeep and cap as well so you have to make a choice about fleet makeup just like AIW does through knowledge. In *craft, army composition can just fluctuate through the game. This is on top of all the micro stuff that's busywork. In AIW, fleet makeup choice is permanent until you win, lose or quit. Even if you could unlock everything in AIW though, the ORDER you choose would still be better or worse though, but eliminates knowledge as a critical resource, and thus devalues AIP (which you may or may not favor).

AIP is probably REALLY the thing those other games usually don't have that makes AIW much different.

[x4000]

I don't think I'm keen on having more ARSes, but I will concede that it's getting hard to experience all the interesting combinations one might like.  There's a neat way that some other RTS games have solved this, and that I've been considering for a while.  The time seems about right for it, I think.  I'll leave it at that for now, hopefully I can get that in place sometime by next week, and I think it will add a new element of choice that people will like.

[Wingflier]

tl;dr: A lot of stuff is in flux now, let's wait until some of that settles before we make grand pronouncements.  Specific suggestions and complaints are always welcome, but the sweeping generalizations when so much is changing aren't overly useful.  Well, actually they are, too: it would be very useful for me to know the game was becoming grindy if I hadn't already said that the cause of that state was a bug. Wink

It seems like we frustrated you with our comments in this thread and another thread, and please understand that it wasn't my intention.  Though we may be a little hard on the game at times, realize that it's only because we care so much about it.  We don't see the "master plan" like you do.  What seems like a bug to you can seem like a bad developer decision to us.  We are vocal about our opinions on it not because we think you made some horrible mistake, but because we are just trying to give honest feedback.

I am truly sorry that I do not make more threads about how much I love AI War, but suffice it to say that it is probably my favorite game of all time (or quickly becoming it).  Every day, I come up with ideas of things to thank you guys for, but I choose not to because I know you are busy, and I don't want you to have to spend more time in the forums reading unnecessary posts, or litter General with threads that aren't really helping improve the game. 

[x4000]

I was a bit frustrated, but it's no big thing from my end.  My frustration mostly comes from vagueness, especially when people fixate on something that's very much in flux.  I simply figured that a "I'm not ready to talk about that topic right now, too much is changing" is better than simply ignoring the issue until I'm ready to talk about it, but sometimes that comes across as "no criticism please," or something similarly unsavory.

I really love the fact that you all get so into it, and I know that the plethora of suggestions comes from an affection for the game.  Trust me, no one out of this community is harder on the game than I am (though, certain folks might be harder on feature X or Y, based on personal experience and goals, etc, of course).

At any rate, my point was mainly that folks shouldn't waste their breath on certain topics (ARS usefulness, the AI "stalking" mechanic) at the moment, because a lot of what I think people are commenting on are already things we're planning to change, and so much is changing with those that any comments right now are pretty useless in the long run.  BUT, once we hit the next stage of the revamp on those, of course we'll be super interested in feedback on those, and feedback there will be super useful again.

I just figure if you folks are in a suggestion-giving mood, there are other areas that would better benefit from your attention than something that's imminently going to change majorly anyhow.

[superking]

I don't think I'm keen on having more ARSes, but I will concede that it's getting hard to experience all the interesting combinations one might like.  There's a neat way that some other RTS games have solved this, and that I've been considering for a while.  The time seems about right for it, I think.  I'll leave it at that for now, hopefully I can get that in place sometime by next week, and I think it will add a new element of choice that people will like.

hmm

I guess a Company of Heroes style 2 tech choice for each ARS 

[Wingflier]

I don't think I'm keen on having more ARSes, but I will concede that it's getting hard to experience all the interesting combinations one might like.  There's a neat way that some other RTS games have solved this, and that I've been considering for a while.  The time seems about right for it, I think.  I'll leave it at that for now, hopefully I can get that in place sometime by next week, and I think it will add a new element of choice that people will like.

hmm

I guess a Company of Heroes style 2 tech choice for each ARS 

That would be neat , especially of all the ARS unlocks were good!