Crazy Idea Re: Turret Caps

[MaxAstro]

It always makes me wonder when people say that halving the caps but making them per-planet would be a dealbreaker.

I rarely put more than a quarter-cap of turrets on a given planet, even if it is a chokepoint.  If it is a single choke I will throw everything, but the ~whole point~ of this change would be breaking single chokes to an extent, or at least moving them to midgame.

Plus, with a distributed defense, you'll actually have the AI going through ~more~ turrets than a single choke would would.  For example, if you half the cap, any AI fleet that goes through three planets is potentially facing 50% more turrets than a previous single choke.

As far as Core Turret Controllers being worthwhile: I would say that (as long as the rule about placing them with lower mark turrets is removed) the fact that they are global cap would make them more attractive in that situation.  Basically I think of them taking a role as chokepoint-enablers.

You would certainly want them to have significantly more firepower than a cap of core turrets has right now, but if that's the case I don't see them being significantly less desirable.

I do also like the idea of having a researchable MkIV that is global cap; fits well with my thoughts of "earn the ability to chokepoint".  The existence of that will make core turrets harder to balance, though.

Oh, core turrets could go an entirely different route: They could be "superturrets".  Make the controller itself a mobile ship that has the power to construct a unique turret with a cap of 1 that has firepower comparable to a cap of turrets.  That way they can be balanced as superweapons, instead of trying to balance them as regular turrets.

[Toranth]

Another potential option, that I think would be less fiddly though potentially less satisfying is:
- Make MkI, II, and III main combat (needler, laser, MLRS, Missile, Flak, Lightning, Sniper, Spider; leaving the HBC untouched for now) turrets per-planet cap.  Halve their caps.  Halve their K cost.  Maintain same cap-energy cost (so double the individual unit cost).
- Have Sniper and Spider turrets be separate lines with mkI, II, and III.
- Add MkIV turrets for each of those lines that are gained through Knowledge, and have a galaxy-wide cap.  The tooltip for these will need to be fairly clear about the difference from the lower marks.
- Have MkV turrets also be galaxy-wide-cap, probably with a higher cap than currently or some other buff to keep them a capture/hack choice that's roughly as attractive as fabricators.
- Remove the restriction against having MkV and other-mark of the same turret line on the same planet.

I very much like most of this, I think.
My concern is that I'm not really fond of the idea of the Mk IV turrets being galaxy-capped.  Maybe if they also get something special, but if they're just 33% more powerful than the Mk III...  Maybe if they come free(ish), like Mk IV fleetships?  Capture an Advanced Turret Manufactory to be able to build Mk IVs (Galaxy cap) of whatever Mk IIIs you have.

One idea to make the Core Turret Controllers more attractive in that case would be to have them unlock lines of turrets, like ARSs unlock new ships.  HBCs, for example, or Spider could need to be unlocked that way.

Another alternative to the current Mk V versions of the turrets, you could have the Core Turret Controllers be special turrets - Mk V Forcefields, Widow-tractors, Engine Damage/Riot, Implosion, etc - Stuff that you can't get any version of through K.

[orzelek]

Two things:
http://www.arcengames.com/mantisbt/view.php?id=2222 - some old proposal I tried long time ago with slightly less positive effects

Keith's solutions is A-Ok for me

[ZaneWolfe]

Another potential option, that I think would be less fiddly though potentially less satisfying is:
- Make MkI, II, and III main combat (needler, laser, MLRS, Missile, Flak, Lightning, Sniper, Spider; leaving the HBC untouched for now) turrets per-planet cap.  Halve their caps.  Halve their K cost.  Maintain same cap-energy cost (so double the individual unit cost).
- Have Sniper and Spider turrets be separate lines with mkI, II, and III.
- Add MkIV turrets for each of those lines that are gained through Knowledge, and have a galaxy-wide cap.  The tooltip for these will need to be fairly clear about the difference from the lower marks.
- Have MkV turrets also be galaxy-wide-cap, probably with a higher cap than currently or some other buff to keep them a capture/hack choice that's roughly as attractive as fabricators.
- Remove the restriction against having MkV and other-mark of the same turret line on the same planet.

So far, I have to say that I love Keith's idea, but I could see a few minor changes. I would buff the total cap on the Core Turrets to at least equal to the new cap of Mark I-III turrets. As for making Turret Controllers more attractive, perhaps you could change their name to Advanced Turret Controllers, and capturing them gives you BOTH MK IV and Core versions of the turret for that controller. Naturally that means you wont be able to unlock Mark IV via knowledge, but that also keeps it inline with how most of the game already runs. Only the AI has access to Mark IV and Core technology, and you need to steal it from them. However, I do feel that the number of controllers needs to be halved. Right now some of the controllers are just so lackluster I never really want to bother with them. How about merging them like this.

Needler & Laser
Missle & MLRS
Spider & Flak
Sniper & Lightning

The first two are rather obvious, they share a common theme. Needler and Laser are both mid-ranged, great against their respective targets. Missile and MLRS are both missile based weapons, the first long range, single target, and the second is short ranged, multi-target. The second two are where the pattern shifts. There is NO FREAKING WAY that Spider and Sniper should be on the same controller. They are powerful alone, together it would be too much. So I put them with the brawling range turrets. Flak is generally considered the weakest turret, so I put it with one of the strongest. Sniper is nearly as powerful as Spider, and Lightning is, IMO, barely better than Flak.

Combining these ideas, where Advanced Turret Controllers gives both MK IV-Core turrets, as well as giving 2 different turret types, seems best to me. It would allow you to still make super powerful chokepoints, but it requires you to steal tech from the AI to do it, either via hacking or capture.

Another alternative to the current Mk V versions of the turrets, you could have the Core Turret Controllers be special turrets - Mk V Forcefields, Widow-tractors, Engine Damage/Riot, Implosion, etc - Stuff that you can't get any version of through K.

However, this idea also seems pretty freaking sweet. IMPLOSION TURRETS!!!! You could call them Experimental Turret Research Centers. The only real downside I see here, is that it would mean giving up Core Turrets. Still, IMPLOSION TURRETS!!!! Also, if you get Core Forcefields, would they come with the same benefit that the AI ones have, IE do NOT reduce firepower?

[onyhow]

Yeah, I would rather prefer getting rid of Mk V turret and add in Experimental Turrets instead...(though make them have galaxy cap)

Other than that, I'm cool with Keith's idea.

[Tridus]

Yeah, I would rather prefer getting rid of Mk V turret and add in Experimental Turrets instead...(though make them have galaxy cap)

Other than that, I'm cool with Keith's idea.

Could have both. We have fabs for MK V ships and experimental ships. Could do the same with turrets, so you may not get all 8 MK V turrets seeded on a given map because some other turret was added instead.
 

[Lancefighter]

what about a mk4 turret factory.......(that builds all of them i fyou have mk3,blahblah)

[Tridus]

what about a mk4 turret factory.......(that builds all of them i fyou have mk3,blahblah)

I don't know, that might make it too much like the ship ones, only for turrets. I kind of like that they won't work the same way, and that building an uber turret wall can be done with K or with capturing the core turrets.

[keith.lamothe]

The idea of "defensive fabs" that give stuff like MkV forcefields, implosion turrets, etc is interesting but not really something that could be done in the short term.  They'd also be massive boosts to player strength (at least, those two examples would be) in an area where the player is already incredibly strong (static defense), so we'd either have to nerf other aspects of player static defense or otherwise adjust the balance to match.

So for now I wouldn't be altering what types of units the core turret controllers grant.

[Peter Ebbesen]

New types of turrets - and a revisiting of ways for the AI to bypass defenses using the topology already in place rather than simply jumping over it as the Warp Relay idea does - would make for a really interesting expansion with a defensive theme, though: "While we worked on learning their defenses, they worked on penetrating ours".

[Draco18s]

but not really something that could be done in the short term

That's fine, Keith.
Most of this discussion is completely free of development time concerns, along the lines of "what do we ultimately want."  Short term changes can edge towards that without hitting the final goal, which can come in a later expansion.

[Tridus]

The idea of "defensive fabs" that give stuff like MkV forcefields, implosion turrets, etc is interesting but not really something that could be done in the short term.  They'd also be massive boosts to player strength (at least, those two examples would be) in an area where the player is already incredibly strong (static defense), so we'd either have to nerf other aspects of player static defense or otherwise adjust the balance to match.

So for now I wouldn't be altering what types of units the core turret controllers grant.

Is the proposal to change how the turrets work something for 8.0?

[keith.lamothe]

Is the proposal to change how the turrets work something for 8.0?

You mean:

Another potential option, that I think would be less fiddly though potentially less satisfying is:
- Make MkI, II, and III main combat (needler, laser, MLRS, Missile, Flak, Lightning, Sniper, Spider; leaving the HBC untouched for now) turrets per-planet cap.  Halve their caps.  Halve their K cost.  Maintain same cap-energy cost (so double the individual unit cost).
- Have Sniper and Spider turrets be separate lines with mkI, II, and III.
- Add MkIV turrets for each of those lines that are gained through Knowledge, and have a galaxy-wide cap.  The tooltip for these will need to be fairly clear about the difference from the lower marks.
- Have MkV turrets also be galaxy-wide-cap, probably with a higher cap than currently or some other buff to keep them a capture/hack choice that's roughly as attractive as fabricators.
- Remove the restriction against having MkV and other-mark of the same turret line on the same planet.

I'll probably do that for next week's release, unless feedback here changes radically in a negative direction (not normally something I'd expect, but the warp relay idea was initially received really well, and then... )

[Draco18s]

(not normally something I'd expect, but the warp relay idea was initially received really well, and then... )

Hey, I love it.  Do I think it doesn't need to be tweaked?  No.  But I actually like the mechanic.  It says "hey, there's a pile of ships here you should probably deal with" and I go "you're right, there is" and I go deal with it.

I think there might be a bug, I kept having waves target a planet that was 1-hop away from a border world (so an AI at tech I with a warp relay adjacent to the border world could target it) but there were no warp relays that I could find (only had one alert that one was being built and neutered it and then blew up the relay; it was at 90% when I commenced my attack, so it finished).

If it happens again I'll make sure to create a save for it.

[Tridus]

Another potential option, that I think would be less fiddly though potentially less satisfying is:
- Make MkI, II, and III main combat (needler, laser, MLRS, Missile, Flak, Lightning, Sniper, Spider; leaving the HBC untouched for now) turrets per-planet cap.  Halve their caps.  Halve their K cost.  Maintain same cap-energy cost (so double the individual unit cost).
- Have Sniper and Spider turrets be separate lines with mkI, II, and III.
- Add MkIV turrets for each of those lines that are gained through Knowledge, and have a galaxy-wide cap.  The tooltip for these will need to be fairly clear about the difference from the lower marks.
- Have MkV turrets also be galaxy-wide-cap, probably with a higher cap than currently or some other buff to keep them a capture/hack choice that's roughly as attractive as fabricators.
- Remove the restriction against having MkV and other-mark of the same turret line on the same planet.

I'll probably do that for next week's release, unless feedback here changes radically in a negative direction (not normally something I'd expect, but the warp relay idea was initially received really well, and then... )

Cool. Then I'll find time next week to put down Diablo 3 and test it out.