Ion cannons - remove AI wave penalty

[Wingflier]

This is exactly why I play on "cross-planet attack" mode, because I really like Ion Cannons, and I'm not foolish enough to ignore how useless they would be if owning them increased the wave size against that planet; that's kind of counter productive isn't it?

Sure, you can make the argument that you don't want them on the "outer" planets, but then what the heck is the point of having them?  A good defense consists of making chokepoints which the AI can't easily penetrate.  You simply don't have enough turret supply to defense up every planet even if you wanted to, nor is spending the knowledge to do so efficient if you are trying to win the game.  In addition, having an Ion Cannon on an "inner planet" seems pointless for 2 reasons:

1.  Ion Cannons should be covered with shields or they will die very quickly to an assault.
2.  Why would you waste a valuable shield on an inner planet that shouldn't be getting attacked anyway?

Ion Cannons on a planet should be (from my perspective) a good incentive to capture that planet and turn it into a chokepoint.  There is a "natural" defense on that planet (similar to a mountain in another game), that gives it merit as a defensible position which you want.  From a player standpoint, we are being punished for making what should be a solid tactical decision on our part.

I understand that you want there to be a drawback to having Ion Cannons, that is completely acceptable; but the drawback should be something logical that is easy to grasp and is consistent with the flow of the game.

It doesn't even make sense that the AI would send 10x waves to a planet with an Ion Cannon.  I once had a planet with 3 Ion Cannons which said it had 60x waves coming to it.  As a logical player I ask myself the question, "If the AI can send 60x waves to this planet, why don't they just send 60x waves to any planet?"  So from a design perspective, it makes sense to you as a discouragement from taking the Ion Cannons, but from a logical and story coherency standpoint, it makes no sense at all.

If you want to discourage players from taking Ion Cannons, why not just give them a massive energy cost?  See, that makes sense to me.  Here we have this extremely powerful weapon that the AI built, and costs 300,000+ energy to operate.  I can't have very many of them because it will cause my economy to crash, so I have to only keep the ones I can afford.  That's a way you can keep them in the game, but discourage players from using them, without hurting their tactical options or hurting the game from a logically coherent standpoint.

Edit:  Also, you can circumvent abuse by preventing the Ion Cannons from being able to be "turned off", a la saving energy when you don't need them.

[Giegue]

I'm actually gonna go with Chris on this. Removing the wave penalty easily makes Ion cannons an impenetrable wall on any choke world.

except for the fact that their fire rate is really slow, and there are tons of ships immune to instakill. as well as the really low ship cap.

edit: why not just make MK III and higher immune to capture?

[Vinraith]

Without the wave penalty they'd be flatly too powerful. People would capture every cannon they came across, player territory would be thick with them. It'd encourage blobbing (because people could move formerly defensive ships to the front line) and increase stalemate likelihood (makes it harder to lose but no easier to win), two things the design has been trying to move away from.

[Wingflier]

Without the wave penalty they'd be flatly too powerful. People would capture every cannon they came across, player territory would be thick with them. It'd encourage blobbing (because people could move formerly defensive ships to the front line) and increase stalemate likelihood (makes it harder to lose but no easier to win), two things the design has been trying to move away from.

If they costed 300,000 energy a piece to maintain (maybe less for lower Marks, or more for higher Marks etc.), I'll bet you anything players would not capture every Ion Cannon they came across.  If they did, you wouldn't have to worry about a stalemate, because they would get absolutely crushed when they had no economy.

[Ozymandiaz]

Maybe its just me being used to only Mk I and MK II cannons being in the game, but I always considered the Ion Cannons more as a AI weapon, that the humans could be able to salvage. And when they salvage the hefty stuff the AI gets pissed about it

[Giegue]

Maybe its just me being used to only Mk I and MK II cannons being in the game, but I always considered the Ion Cannons more as a AI weapon, that the humans could be able to salvage. And when they salvage the hefty stuff the AI gets pissed about it

yeah, but the only way the AI would react the way it does is if it were a female AI and it was... that time of the month. 

I get the wave penalty, but X16? X8? the Ion cannons aren't THAT important. its simply a matter of sending in a squad of starships to eliminate them when you don't capture them.

Without the wave penalty they'd be flatly too powerful. People would capture every cannon they came across, player territory would be thick with them. It'd encourage blobbing (because people could move formerly defensive ships to the front line) and increase stalemate likelihood (makes it harder to lose but no easier to win), two things the design has been trying to move away from.

I suppose, but aren't you guys forgetting how rare higher level Ion cannons are? after all, this is only a max of 5-... idk, 8 planets we're talking about, not half the system. and Ion cannons are useful when the AI is sending random units to the planet or something, but during large waves, it gets overwhelmed. and as I said before: ship cap! the Ion cannon ship cap still stands at whatever it is, and its pretty low.

there's also another easy solution: colony ships aren't immune to insta-kill. (I'm pretty sure their immune as it stands)

oh! I just thought of something. how about as long as there is a MK III or above Ion cannon on the players side, the AI will attack that planet, regardless of where it is. and MK IV could have it that it attacks with twice the ammount of ships, and MK V, four times as many.

[Winter Born]

Lot of heat on this issue, esp after the boss has stated his position. 

[HitmanN]

Lot of heat on this issue, esp after the boss has stated his position. 

And that's probably exactly why.

I'm sort of middle-ground here. Ion Cannons without penalty would be too powerful, but the current wave multipliers are too harsh. I never capture or build higher than Mk2 Ion Cannons. They're not THAT good to be worth such a huge wave multiply.

I too think a high energy requirement would be a better penalty. Or a combo of a tiny multiply, like 2-3x, plus some energy consumption.

[Wingflier]

I too think a high energy requirement would be a better penalty. Or a combo of a tiny multiply, like 2-3x, plus some energy consumption.

I agree this could be a good compromise.

[Sizzle]

Not going to change it.  This is a disincentive from using ion cannons on the front lines.  And from players using ion cannons in general, as I don't really want them to have a ton of them.  This increase is only on the planet the ion cannon is on, so if you have that on a non-frontlines planet the penalty is actually nothing, anyway.

So Chris has made his point quite clear

• There is meant to be a stiff disincentive for using ion cannons, especially at the front lines
• Players owning ion cannons should not own many of them.

That all being said, players are saying that the incentive is such that there will NEVER be a use for them.

To other players, is that REALLY true?  Will there EVER be a place you would say "yea I think in this one situation it would be worth it"?

To Chris:
Is there ever a situation where you think that players SHOULD choose to keep the Ion Cannon?  

The key point I see for movement on the issue is this: Chris makes a distinction of "on the front lines" and the penalty on non-front lines is "actually nothing".
The other players have disagreed, saying a counter wave guard post picking a planet that has an ion cannon on it for the counterwave will get the multiplier, and potentially risk an unrecoverable setback that will lead to GAME OVER.   This risk is seen as too great to EVER risk keeping an Ion cannon.  

How about not having Ion cannon multipliers (or any multipliers) work on Counterwaves?    

I've intentionally made things black and white for illustrative purposes.   Is there a grey area here?

[Winter Born]

put your energy nerf/wave buff sugestion into mantis

Might wait untill LotS is out on the shelf and some of the pressure is off  

[Fruden]

 I have an opinion toooo!!

 I used to reeaaallly like the tanking ability of ion cannons. They were essential for me in 3.x challenge games because they ate evil bullets while i sent lots of happy bullets!

 Now i reaaally like the $$$$ ability of ion cannons. I keep a couple safely in stock, and when a roadblock shows up, i spend, sell ion, spend, sell ion, ... Throwing a couple billion of each resource in very few minutes at problems seems to have solved them quite nicely so far in my current 4.x challenge game. My current record is spending close to 5 billion resources in 4-5 mins!

 I think I'm liking ion cannons as player resource banks. Can we get 2 more per ai planet?

[Heavens]

Now i reaaally like the $$$$ ability of ion cannons. I keep a couple safely in stock, and when a roadblock shows up, i spend, sell ion, spend, sell ion, ... Throwing a couple billion of each resource in very few minutes at problems seems to have solved them quite nicely so far in my current 4.x challenge game. My current record is spending close to 5 billion resources in 4-5 mins!

 I think I'm liking ion cannons as player resource banks. Can we get 2 more per ai planet?

This is, in my opinion the main bonus of the Ion Cannon so far, intended or not.

Ion Mk III scraps for 640k Crystal & Metal.
Ion Mk IV scraps for 999k (1.120k exactly) Crystal & Metal.

This makes Distribution Nodes look very sad, and Ion Cannons can't backfire on you.


Keeping an Ion Cannon on border planets is suicide, we all agree.

[TheMachineIsSentient]

I disintegrate ion cannons 100 percent of the time. You can even buy one at the Zenith trader, if you enjoy pain.

However, for the sake of argument, let's say you are going against an AI that has a lot of weak middling ships( not children). I suppose you could put your ion cannon in the rear of your kingdom and farm ships with parasites and leech starships. Just a theory.

[HitmanN]

Since the Waves have now been buffed in 4.033 in general, I think this discussion gets additional meaning. Although I haven't tried, I could imagine high Mk Ion Cannons with the new high AIP waves being unbearable if multiplied. It's hardly even a choice anymore whether to use an ion cannon in a choke point or not.

Though I'm just guessing.