Should the Triangle Fleetships be balanced with each other? Why or why not?

[Wingflier]

When having a discussion with somebody, you both have to agree on certain base rules and principles, or discussion is impossible.  For example, if I was trying to prove Evolution to somebody, and they were convinced that all fossils were planted by an invisible being, the discussion with them is basically pointless.

On that same note, I was under the assumption that the community at large agreed that the 3 Triangle Ships should be balanced with each other.  The reasons for this are so painfully obvious that I didn't think there would be any controversy, but apparently not.

By "balanced", I mean should the all the Triangle ships be equally useful in different situations.  Should they all be worth using and upgrading depending on the AI you're facing and the bonus ships you happen to unlock?

This isn't a discussion about whether we should buff Fighters or nerf Bombers, or HOW we should balance the Fleet Ships.  I genuinely just want to know: Is it in the best interest of the game to balance the 3 Triangle ships with one another?  Yes or no.

Thank you very much.

[Draco18s]

By "balanced", I mean should the all the Triangle ships be equally useful in different situations.  Should they all be worth using and upgrading depending on the AI you're facing and the bonus ships you happen to unlock?

Yes.  Plain and simple.

Let me put it like this:
I almost never unlock Mk2 frigates, and rarely unlock Mk2 fighters, unless I have a ton of knowledge and nothing else to spend it on.
But Mk3 bombers are at the top of my early unlocks.

[Cinth]

Maybe instead of doing the next Best/Worst/Whatever poll, we could get Keith to do a cursory review of the balance in the triangle ships.

After having watched the last few threads blow up into a huge threatball of furious theory, I can't help but think that we play the game differently. All of us. No one solution will ever make everyone happy here. The best we can do is get the guys at the helm to look into it.

[Wingflier]

Do you think the Fleetships should be balanced with each other? Why or why not?

[chemical_art]

Yes, but how, when one of the triangle ships gets a bonus for like 40% of the units in the game?

*going to dig up someone's research, give me a minute*

[Wingflier]

That's a completely different discussion. Right now I'm just trying to get a consensus on this idea. Once we have a consensus, we'll make a new thread to discuss our options. Then make a new thread after that with a poll and people can vote!

[rabican]

No.

I don't think we need second fighter/bomber thread

[eRe4s3r]

We could just unify all ships into 1 type and all enemies into 1 type and be done with it...

Why nobody does that should be obvious hence I agree with rabican ;p

I know I am taking a lazy argumentative path here, but let me put it this way. AI War works. it does not need core level rebalance of basic gameplay. As such, why or why not is irrelevant. It is how it is because it works. And because it works, there is no reason to even think about a change. Unless you can prove a clear case where the current system is flawed and leaves you with no option, why should we argue about things that need not be argued?

[chemical_art]

After examining the options...

I could find no conceivable way we could all agree on what is balance to begin with, yet alone for ships of different roles.

So, no. It could never be done to satisfy everyone, so should not be the goal.

[Wingflier]

No.

I don't think we need second fighter/bomber thread

So the reason you don't think the Triangle should be balanced is that you don't want there to be a discussion over how to do it?

The problem with the previous threads was that we couldn't come to an agreement on what our focus was.  I think that if we can all agree that we want the Triangle to be balanced, the discussion will be a lot more productive than arguing over playstyles.  In the end, the solution will come up to a vote, so it should be pretty civil (if that's what you're really worried about).

I'm not sure if your answer is serious though.

We could just unify all ships into 1 type and all enemies into 1 type and be done with it...

Why nobody does that should be obvious hence I agree with rabican ;p

*Facepalm*, units in an RTS can be balanced for their cost and role, without doing the exact same thing.

In Starcraft 2 there are many different types of units that do many different things, but they are all relatively balanced for their cost.

In DotA (a game based on an RTS), you've got heroes with wildly different abilities and uses, but all whom are relatively balanced with one another, they just have different roles.

In Homeworld 2...etc.

---------

So, to be clear Ere4s3r, your stance is that 1 Triangle ship should be blatantly more powered than the other two, so that they all don't turn into the same thing?

After examining the options...

I could find no conceivable way we could all agree on what is balance to begin with, yet alone for ships of different roles.

So, no. It could never be done to satisfy everyone, so should not be the goal.

That's a discussion for a different thread, I already told you that.  We'll discuss our different options and eventually vote on them.  Who knows, we may come up with something most people agree with.  Don't just give up because you can't figure anything out.

I know I am taking a lazy argumentative path here, but let me put it this way. AI War works. it does not need core level rebalance of basic gameplay. As such, why or why not is irrelevant. It is how it is because it works. And because it works, there is no reason to even think about a change. Unless you can prove a clear case where the current system is flawed and leaves you with no option, why should we argue about things that need not be argued?

If you don't want to talk about it, then don't take part in the discussion.  Don't prevent other people from talking about improving the game because you think it's perfectly fine as is.  There's plenty of other threads to look at.

[pheonix89]

How's this for a clear imbalance? There is nothing in the entire game that is completely immune to bombers. Things that they have a hard time hurting or kill them before they do anything? Sure. But nothing is a total, absolute counter. Nothing just says 'You can't hurt me' by being immune to energy bombs. Shell immunity and missile immunity both exist. Just to add insult to injury, one of the shell immune ships, Bulletproof Fighters, is literally a fighter but better. AI Home commands are immune to missiles, and missiles are the only common ammo that has a area counter (counter-missile turrets). And not only do bombers have no absolute counters (things they can't beat period), they are THE counter to the closest thing in the game to a universal defense, fortresses.

[Varone]

Should be balanced with each other... No.

Should each be useful for a certain role / tactic / or as a general fleet ship... Yes.

If one of them isn't AS useful as the others i don't see this as a problem. If one of them is utterly useless then i would be willing to consider a buff for that particular ship.

[eRe4s3r]

Yes Wingflier, every unit should have a role. So depending on the role and game situation, bombers might be game winning or the most useless unit on the planet, they need to be comparable in anything to any other ship. Units need to have specific strengths or roles. And yes, they need to be balanced at least in such a way that the 3 start ships give a player a chance (with proper tactics) in 99% of all start situations.

My point is, I don't get why you ask. What is your specific problem with triangle balance and based on that, I will judge the topic on merit. Currently you are just fishing for opinions which is pretty pointless, if there is a imbalance show it to me (or "us") and we will look at it, and if it is one, I will support your mantis entry.

Sigh, now I answered your topic after all.. so "no" and as for why, see this post. This game needs no competitive balancing like the ones you listed (Where it makes sense)

[Wingflier]

So depending on the role and game situation, bombers might be game winning or the most useless unit on the planet, they need to be comparable in anything to any other ship. Units need to have specific strengths or roles. And yes, they need to be balanced at least in such a way that the 3 start ships give a player a chance (with proper tactics) in 99% of all start situations.

Okay, so your answer is yes.  All 3 Triangle ships should be useful in different situations.

I'm just trying to get this community to agree on something so we can go forward with a discussion about possible options later.  Our problem is that we have no baseline, we all have completely different criteria for what constitutes "balance".

This is simple, all Fleetships are equally useful (more or less) in different situations, or in their particular role.  That seems like what you want too, so thank you for your input.

[Martyn van Buren]

I've been trying to keep out of this discussion since it turned angry, but no, I don't see any reason for the triangle ships to be balanced off each other.  AI War isn't Starcraft; I feel like as long as an unlock option has a time when it's worth unlocking --- or has some players who rely on it heavily --- its good enough.  I'm not against doing a bit of work on fighters, but I wouldn't mind at all the kind of game where attacking planets revolves around getting bombers to targets and fighters are given more opportunities to do interception and escort.  For what little it's worth that seems entirely consistent with the way I understand real-world airforces to work.

I'm saying that as a vote rather than an argument; it seems clear that we're not going to come to an agreement about these things and also that nothing big is going to be done about it until AS has most of its key features working.  I suggest we call off the fight and let Keith have a trawl through all these threads and get involved in the discussion when he has time; I feel like there have been enough arguments that we're not going to learn much more about the issue without finding out what the devs think about the issue and what changes they might be interested in making.