So, turret balance

[Radiant Phoenix]

If people desperately want player-controlled Guardians, why not a capturable Guardian Assembly Facility? It would work like the ASC and the AdvFac, only it would give you one Guardian type for every turret line you have unlocked up to max level. Human Guardians only function in supply (although you CAN take them out of supply, they can't use their weapons).

The point is that I want to use guardians instead of turrets.

I want them to be as dependable as turrets, not something I need to defend something else for.

I don't want to have to pay for turrets as a prerequisite for them, because then they will be balanced on the assumption that you're also using turrets.

[Hearteater]

But with the stats you've laid out, the main combat turrets would have roughly 2.5x the HP and actually more than 3x the DPS of fleet ships... wait, were those dps numbers for epic or normal combat style?  I didn't know if the %-vs-triangle you gave was "of" or "above"

Those were Normal/Normal numbers.  For example, the Fighter was cap 96, 165k health, 4080 damage, 4 reload, 750 AP, 300 Armor.  I used average CapBonusDPS of the triangle ships, so 540,160 CapBonusDPS and 15,264,000 CapHealth.  Of course non-triangle ships have higher CapBonusDPS.

I aimed for 200% triangle CapBonusDPS.  MLRS goes higher because its damage is low enough that armor really hurts it.  Flak I went to MLRS level just because people don't like it already, and doing anything else would actually nerf its DPS.  At least now you can put it outside a shield so you don't take the 25% damage hit.  Lightning went high for the same reason.

I figured armor separately.  1,000 Armor is actually a measly 1.5% more survivability against the triangle ships on average (assuming they are getting x6 bonus damage).  But 10,000 Armor is a respectable 24.6% damage reduction.  I actually didn't give the Flak armor because I wanted anti-armor to affect Basic and Flak differently.  So if the AI has a lot of anti-armor units, your Basics will feel it more and vice versa.  And also because I liked the idea of it having its own personal shield so Force Field immune would counter them, while AP countered Basics (with a Force Field module, I'd put Flaks at 300k health themselves, with a 1,200,000 health shield).

[keith.lamothe]

Those were Normal/Normal numbers.  For example, the Fighter was cap 96, 165k health, 4080 damage, 4 reload, 750 AP, 300 Armor.  I used average CapBonusDPS of the triangle ships, so 540,160 CapBonusDPS and 15,264,000 CapHealth.

Ok, thanks, makes sense.

Anyway, the "core four" turrets in your model have an average cap hp of 35.7M and an average cap dps of... well, the average is a little misleading, let's just go with the 1M (normal combat style) though it's a little higher than that.

That's 2.34x the HP and 1.85x the DPS of the triangle fleetship average.  HP matters a lot less than DPS but it does matter somewhat, so I'd say that makes a "mk-cap" of those turrets about 2.3x as useful a "mk-cap" of triangle fleetships in a situation where everyone's in range (and thus immobility is made moot).

So if you're willing to pay 1250 K per mkCap for fleetships, then if immobility and such didn't matter you'd be willing to pay 2875 K per mkCap for those turrets.  Am I right so far?  Or at least not massively off?

But in fact you're only willing to pay about 500 to 625 K per mkCap of these turrets (going off your suggestion of 1000 or 1250 for a mkII cap, but saying that 1500 would be too much).  In other words, an immobile unit is only worth 625/2875 = ~22% of a fully mobile unit to you.  Is that right?  I'm not disputing it, just looking for reference info as we're working with K costs.

[Cinth]

That's 2875 K * MK?  That puts some perspective on turrets.  That's practically what MK IIIs are set at now (on average).

[keith.lamothe]

That's 2875 K * MK?  That puts some perspective on turrets.  That's practically what MK IIIs are set at now (on average).

They're not that high   If it were, then unlocking a mkII would cost around 5500 K and unlocking a mkIII would cost around 8250 K.  For a total of nearly 14,000 K for II+III.  Yea, I don't see anyone springing for that

Anyway, I'm not suggesting 2875 per mkCap is fair for turrets because they are, in fact, immobile.  Nor are the current turrets as buff (in HP, at least) as what Hearteater is suggesting.

I just want some clarity into the ratio of "how much an immobile unit is worth" to "how much a mobile unit is worth", all else being roughly equal.

[Cinth]

That's 2875 K * MK?  That puts some perspective on turrets.  That's practically what MK IIIs are set at now (on average).

They're not that high   If it were, then unlocking a mkII would cost around 5500 K and unlocking a mkIII would cost around 8250 K.  For a total of nearly 14,000 K for II+III.  Yea, I don't see anyone springing for that

Anyway, I'm not suggesting 2875 per mkCap is fair for turrets because they are, in fact, immobile.  Nor are the current turrets as buff (in HP, at least) as what Hearteater is suggesting.

I just want some clarity into the ratio of "how much an immobile unit is worth" to "how much a mobile unit is worth", all else being roughly equal.

I meant it as a valuation of firepower. 

[Hearteater]

First to dig up my original thoughts to see if I still agree with them

I'd probably go with 1k/2k for Mark II/III for everything except the Basic.  I'd leave the Basic as 750/1500, mainly because its really slightly more of a damage-soak.  I might go as high as 1250/2500 for everything besides the Basic.  Past that point I'd probably never even look at them.

First, let's ignore the Basic.  If that gets a slight reduction, that's a separate consideration.

Alright, I still feel Mark II at 1000, and Mark III at 2000 is perfectly reasonable.  I'd unlock various turrets reasonable often.  More often than I unlock Mark II/III fleet ships right now.  So I'd consider this the min K-cost.

I do actually think those numbers might be too low, but if we keep our K numbers at multiples of 250, are next step is Mark II for 1250 and Mark III for 2500.  That's kind of pushing it, I'd certainly be a lot wearier about unlocking Mark IIIs.  I'd still probably unlock a few Mark IIs.

Now, if Turrets are 2.34x HP and 1.85x DPS, I'd say that's more 2.095x effectiveness (50% of each) rather than 2.3x.  That puts it at 2619 Knowledge.  If we pay 1250 for Mark II turrets that's about ~24% the K of a fleet ship unlock.  I don't think that's terribly far off.  Maybe the issue is fleet ship K-costs.  I've often wondered if K/Mark costs of fleet ships should go down as the Mark goes up, to make it more K-efficient to unlock deep into a few bonus ships rather than wide into many.  This makes each game more unique because which ships you take deep can vary.  Taking everything to Mark II makes games more similar because if you happen to have similar ARS picks, you have the same forces.  It is basically should we reward specialization (deep unlocks) or generalization (wide unlocks).  Keeping in mind that the AF/ASC already penalize deep unlocks (if Mark IV cost is wrapped into III).

No idea if any of that answered your question .

[TechSY730]

I just want some clarity into the ratio of "how much an immobile unit is worth" to "how much a mobile unit is worth", all else being roughly equal.

For these comparisons, I'm assuming EVERYTHING about the mobile and non-mobile versions is the same (cap, cost, range, damage, shots per salvo, etc) except for speed.

Unfortunatley, the ratio varies WILDLY based on the other stats.

If the mobile version of the unit had a very long range, high base DPS, and was already sort of slow, then maybe I would only consider the immobile version to have about 1/3 "utility".

If the mobile version of the unit had a very short range, poor base DPS, but high speed, then I would consider the immobile version to have around 1/20 utility, if that much...

Yes, the ratio of utilities can have that huge of a range (though I would say it would never get beyond 1/2 utility ratio, even in the best case)


Basically, when losing mobility:
Range: higher means less utility lost
Speed: higher means more utility lost
Rate of fire: higher means less utility lost
Base DPS: higher means less utility lost
Durability: higher means less utility lost
Resource Cost: higher means more utility lost (though this is a minor impact to the "ratio" compared to the others)

there are probably many other factors too, but those are the big ones I can think of.

[Faulty Logic]

I just want some clarity into the ratio of "how much an immobile unit is worth" to "how much a mobile unit is worth", all else being roughly equal.

Roughly 1/ (2* number of chokepoints).

Though in the best possible case (FS finale, one entrance) it's about 90%.

[TechSY730]

Yea Keith, for pretty much any playstyle, you are not going to get anywhere near a constant for this ratio. It will probably vary wildly.

I guess this is one of the reasons why most PvP RTSs I have played have metagames where stationary defenses, while not ignorable, don't form a dominant part of the strategy (unless it is a "cheese" strategy )
Similarly, I guess this is why those developers don't try to make turrets clearly worthwhile as mobile stuff in the average case, because then they would be OP in good cases (where the layout allows for a natural chokepoint or whatever). Mobile units almost never have anywhere near this wild a range in utility for the average and best cases.

Maybe we should just accept that to prevent OPness in the better cases, turrets will just be underwhelming in the average case because of how wildly being stationary affects utility based off of hard to quantify factors.

[keith.lamothe]

Now, if Turrets are 2.34x HP and 1.85x DPS, I'd say that's more 2.095x effectiveness (50% of each) rather than 2.3x.

Well, if something had 1x the HP and 1.85x the DPS, what would it be?

That puts it at 2619 Knowledge.  If we pay 1250 for Mark II turrets that's about ~24% the K of a fleet ship unlock.  I don't think that's terribly far off.

So roughly an immobile unit is worth 1/4 a mobile one.  Of course as others have pointed out it varies vastly by circumstances (1-womrhole choke vs 2-planet-choke vs wide-open and whether you're in defend-to-win mode at the end of FS, for example) and what unit we're talking about (Sniper vs Flak, for example).

Maybe the issue is fleet ship K-costs.  I've often wondered if K/Mark costs of fleet ships should go down as the Mark goes up, to make it more K-efficient to unlock deep into a few bonus ships rather than wide into many.  This makes each game more unique because which ships you take deep can vary.  Taking everything to Mark II makes games more similar because if you happen to have similar ARS picks, you have the same forces.  It is basically should we reward specialization (deep unlocks) or generalization (wide unlocks).  Keeping in mind that the AF/ASC already penalize deep unlocks (if Mark IV cost is wrapped into III).

I want to go ahead and remove the "paying for the ability to get mkIV" from the mkIII costs entirely, honestly.  Which means bringing the mkIII costs from 6000 => 3750 (i.e. 3/2 * the mkII's 2500).  Maybe to 4000 since mkIII is slightly more utility than 3/2*mkII due to increases in both hp and dps.  Though the m+c goes up a fair bit too.

[Toranth]

I just want some clarity into the ratio of "how much an immobile unit is worth" to "how much a mobile unit is worth", all else being roughly equal.

Roughly 1/ (2* number of chokepoints).

Though in the best possible case (FS finale, one entrance) it's about 90%.

If there's only 1 entry wormhole and only 1 destination/target for the AI, any time the range between those 2 endpoints in greater than the range of a turret (about 20,000 range units for the Basic), the turrets lose effectiveness.  20,000 range units is only 1/6 of the way across the inner gravity well.  Even if you assume close together source/target at 1/3 of the grav well, you're looking at 50% effectiveness for the turrets vs an equivalent mobile unit.

Mathematically, the expected distance between two random points in the grav well would be about 1/2 diameter, or 60,000 range.  Now you're looking at 33% effectiveness for a Basic or Laser turret.
But at the other end of the spectrum, that's still 100% effectiveness for the Sniper turret.

Even in the case with a single chokepoint, single entry-point, and single target/exit point, fixed-range turrets suffer a lot more than 10% loss in equivalence.

Now, if Turrets are 2.34x HP and 1.85x DPS, I'd say that's more 2.095x effectiveness (50% of each) rather than 2.3x.

Well, if something had 1x the HP and 1.85x the DPS, what would it be?

I'd think it's actually closer to Keith's 2.3x, rather than 2.1x - I made up imaginary ships with 1x HP/1x DPS and 2.34x HP / 1.85x DPS.  With exactly those stats it'd take 3 less ships to kill the more powerful one.  But if you buffed the less ships up to 1.2x HP/ 1.2x DPS, then it only takes two of the lesser to kill the greater.
That works out to more like 2.4x, doesn't it?

[Faulty Logic]

Even in the case with a single chokepoint, single entry-point, and single target/exit point, fixed-range turrets suffer a lot more than 10% loss in equivalence.

No, because the enemy are pinned with tractors, gravity, or both (or are killed before they get out of range). But the chance of something somehow breaking through all of that constitutes the 10% loss.

But this one very specific case.


For turrets, HP is not nearly as important as DPS, because the typical defense situation is "kill the enemy before they kill x."

[Hearteater]

Well, if something had 1x the HP and 1.85x the DPS, what would it be?

Here's an interesting formula to consider when balancing ships with different caps.  If you take a ship and change its cap but leave its CapHealth and CapDPS unchanged, you modifier its total damage over the course of a fight in which in which it is wiped out by a constant amount of incoming DPS.  The total damage multiplier for going from a cap of C to a cap of N is: ((N+1)C^2) / ((C+1)N^2).  So for example, going from a cap of 96 to a cap of 1 gives you 190 times more total damage output over the course of a fight.  Going from a Cap of 96 to a Cap of 192 reduces total damage output by about half.

If someone wants, I can break down the origin of that formula.  It's just a little long and awkward to type in the forum .

[TechSY730]

Well, if something had 1x the HP and 1.85x the DPS, what would it be?

Here's an interesting formula to consider when balancing ships with different caps.  If you take a ship and change its cap but leave its CapHealth and CapDPS unchanged, you modifier its total damage over the course of a fight in which in which it is wiped out by a constant amount of incoming DPS.  The total damage multiplier for going from a cap of C to a cap of N is: ((N+1)C^2) / ((C+1)N^2).  So for example, going from a cap of 96 to a cap of 1 gives you 190 times more total damage output over the course of a fight.  Going from a Cap of 96 to a Cap of 192 reduces total damage output by about half.

If someone wants, I can break down the origin of that formula.  It's just a little long and awkward to type in the forum .

I guess that would be great, and it would help give a guideline to the "how much should low caps and high caps balance targets be adjusted because of their caps?" question.