Nominations for buff/nerf polls for Bonus Ship Types

[Faulty Logic]

I'd say make them more of a threat.

Like, with an N% chance, 25% (or so) of the wave will come in three seconds before.

That would make the wave less threatening.

[keith.lamothe]

Yea, one of the things I want to do post-7.0 is rewrite the wave composition code (all very old, though I have plumbed it through with logging and more recently moved it to the main thread for better access to read/write gamestate) and deployment code so I can have more control of it.  Pulsed waves (not just 3 fighters but "if you want an alpha-soak that's fine but you're going to have to send in at least, say, 20% of the wave to do it"), starship-only waves for the starship commander, guardian-only waves for a new guardian-centric AI type, etc.

[Aklyon]

Guardian-only waves sound...different, to say the least.

[keith.lamothe]

Guardian-only waves sound...different, to say the least.

They'd still just be guarding, you understand.  Just proactively.  The Defensive-Compassionate Invasion of human territory and all that.

[Aklyon]

Guardian-only waves sound...different, to say the least.

They'd still just be guarding, you understand.  Just proactively.  The Defensive-Compassionate Invasion of human territory and all that.

Are you saying someone taught the AI about aggressive negotiations?

[keith.lamothe]

Are you saying someone taught the AI about aggressive negotiations?

Bemused Reassurance: Oh, no, that's an entirely different program involving fully benign protocol droids not produced by an extremely prestigious assassin-bot manufacturer.

[chemical_art]

Yea, one of the things I want to do post-7.0 is rewrite the wave composition code (all very old, though I have plumbed it through with logging and more recently moved it to the main thread for better access to read/write gamestate) and deployment code so I can have more control of it.  Pulsed waves (not just 3 fighters but "if you want an alpha-soak that's fine but you're going to have to send in at least, say, 20% of the wave to do it"), starship-only waves for the starship commander, guardian-only waves for a new guardian-centric AI type, etc.

While hard to market using the Arcen "updates cross all expansions"  logic, the idea of a large part of the theme of 8.0 being "reworking the code" with both reworking (deflating) non-superweapon stats, the AI Wave logic, and maybe armor, I think would be very welcome.

To steal another idea, calling it "Return Rise of the Humans" With several units that aid humans in their struggles (new warheads, etc), or maybe "Evolution of war" With the AI and the player getting toys to fight smarter, not harder, in their battles.

With each update, I feel like things are starting to feel...bloated? Yes, that is it. Example:

The map gen logic, of being forced to select units? That was acceptable in the early days, with relatively few units.  However, with each new map, the time needing to select a certain unit with a certain map layout has increased dramatically. To the dedicated, it is a matter of time, but for those with no time, it is a deterrent.
A mechanic that doesn't stop veterans with a lot of time, but stops those with less time? By many criteria, this simply is not a good mechanic. Even for AI War, even for map gen. Not good. Not anymore.

I think it is key that, as much dread as the era was, the 4.X era's audaciousness is needed to change things up. If not necessarily in scope of redefining units, but in willing to gut code. I feel it is needed for long term health.

I feel my AI War desire fading...it is a slow fade, but I cannot deny it no longer. With each new expansion I'm using less and less stuff, and the reasoning for this being the same.

[TechSY730]

Yea, I think next major version should have little or no new "stuff" (certainly no new bonus ship types, though existing ones could get repurposed), very conservative on new mechanics or AI behaviors (though smarter ways to use existing behaviors, like wave composition, would be OK), and instead focus on bigger balance issues (armor, energy, "deflating" HP and weapons, the "superweapons problem", overall game "flow"), general balance (ship type balance, etc), and cleaning up "technical debt" would be great. This obviously would not be a full expansion, but just a major version bump.

At this point, TBH, the game large enough such that adding too much more stuff will just cause the game to "collapse in on itself". IMO, there really isn't enough room left for another full blown "expansion" without removing a bunch of stuff, at which point you might as well split of a new product line and make it a sequel (removing some stuff, but expanding the stuff that remains, and thus make room for future growth of that new line)

[LaughingThesaurus]

To be honest I would rather vote for new campaign types and such. New ways to play with the massive amount of stuff we've got. After all, if we've already got tons of stuff and exactly a game mode to play with it on... you (effectively) double the amount of stuff that you can do with it by adding a second game mode.

[Faulty Logic]

IMO, there really isn't enough room left for another full blown "expansion" without removing a bunch of stuff

I strongly disagree.
While I think we've reached "critical mass" on some stuff (like bonus fleetships), I don't think we're anywhere close to that in terms of genuinely new stuff. I've played over a thousand hours now, because there's always something a new combination of stuff to try.

Major factions (control planets, give missions) would be a great new addition to the next expansion, for example, as would additional "terrain" or "weather" and a new map type or two.

But I agree that the base game needs some attention right now, like the armor rework, and non-superweapon deflation.

[Kahuna]

It sounds like people place their turrets right NEXT to the wormholes..

[chemical_art]

It sounds like people place their turrets right NEXT to the wormholes..

One defensive setup is to have turrets range be barely within a wormhole, so they get a guaranteed alpha asap

[keith.lamothe]

I feel my AI War desire fading...it is a slow fade, but I cannot deny it no longer. With each new expansion I'm using less and less stuff, and the reasoning for this being the same.

You may just need a break   Your continued participation here has been a great help, but ultimately no one game is going to hold a person's interest forever, or at all times.   This is a large part of the reason we work on other games, like Skyward.

[chemical_art]

I feel my AI War desire fading...it is a slow fade, but I cannot deny it no longer. With each new expansion I'm using less and less stuff, and the reasoning for this being the same.

You may just need a break   Your continued participation here has been a great help, but ultimately no one game is going to hold a person's interest forever, or at all times.   This is a large part of the reason we work on other games, like Skyward.

Very possible, but this also stems from a tiredness of seeing 100+million critters popping on my doorstep within 2 hours (happened in both Ancient shadows, and triply so in VotM)

[keith.lamothe]

Very possible, but this also stems from a tiredness of seeing 100+million critters popping on my doorstep within 2 hours (happened in both Ancient shadows, and triply so in VotM)

I'm trying to draw the connection between that and the post I was replying to, and I'm not sure I see it.  Is this a separate concern regarding threat behavior and/or hybrids and/or nemesis units, etc?