Author Topic: Starships in the sequel  (Read 22620 times)

Offline Kahuna

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Re: Starships in the sequel
« Reply #75 on: December 16, 2016, 01:16:41 pm »
I actually got motivated to grind AIW again.. I might try to find an effective and safe way to play against both of those ships that are my only cryptonites during the holidays.
That sounds like a vicious fight... do you record / stream / AAR your games? I'd love to read/watch it.
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set /A diff=10
if %diff%==max (
   set /A me=:)
) else (
   set /A me=SadPanda
)
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Offline dfinlay

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Re: Starships in the sequel
« Reply #76 on: January 18, 2017, 12:10:19 am »
I think having a whole bunch of modular starships right at game start might be a bit overwhelming. I like the modular ships in classic, but you don't get too many of them to think about. There's already a bunch of things you need to be dealing with right at the start of the game and trying to think through which modules you want on each of your starships in your first build of ships seems a bit much, especially for new players. I really like the idea of having the modular options appear at higher mark levels because it winds up meaning that the player only has to make that choice for ships that they've already (presumably) figured out the role of and decided they want to focus on in this game (at least to some degree). It's also a nice-feeling bonus for unlocking higher mark starships.
« Last Edit: January 18, 2017, 06:51:39 pm by dfinlay »

Offline Peter Ebbesen

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Re: Starships in the sequel
« Reply #77 on: January 26, 2017, 07:59:09 pm »
I must agree with dfinlay on the essence of the problem he raises, though not on the suggested remedy.

Since one of the goals of AI War 2 is to be more approachable for new players, having modular components on all starships from start for the player to fiddle with or be befuddled by is something that is contraindicated.

On the other hand, having modular components on all starships of all tiers eventually might well be interesting, though leaving itself open for a lot of balancing issues.

So I'd suggest rather stealing a page from other real time tactics or strategy games, of having one default equipment loadout for each component slot on a starship be considered the primary for the role, which is unlocked when you research the tech for the ship. Show it first in the list of loadouts or highlight it or whatever, so people are never in doubt which is the primary/generic choice.

E.g unlock Assault Frigate, you get a stock Assault Frigate with the default loadout and no option to change it, the alternative loadouts greyed out. Unlock Assault Cruiser and you get one with the default loadout for Assault Cruser. Mouseover a loadout you don't have access to yet and a tooltip should tell you what you lack to get access to it.

Thus the player is faced with a choice between five different starships at start rather than 15 flavours. There's time enough to agonize over whether you'd prefer flavour A, B, or C for starship type 1 later on. Don't even think of giving the player that choice from start in the basic game. Make him focus on the starship ROLE to start with rather than min-maxing. So long as the default loadout is one that is good for the role as indicated by the name of the shiptype (e.g. assault, siege) that is sufficient.

Gaining access to the alternative loadouts could then be handled by unlocking them at certain technological milestones, an obvious choice would be to link it to the total tech invested in starship techs.

The latter would tie in very well with an in-game tutorial approach to introducing players to new things.

E.g.

Condition: First research of starship completed.
Tutorial message if enabled: "You've researched your first starship. Starships are large ships designed to fill specific strategic niches with a flexible choice of equipment. For the moment you only have access to the standard equipment loadouts for their primary role, but rest assured that the bureau of ordnance is hard at work preparing alternatives for your use. Spend X total on starship technologies to unlock the first alternative loadouts."

Condition: Spent X total on starship technologies (whether in the same type of starship or spread over several, say X is enough to unlock a total of 4 or 5 mark 1 starship types)
Tutorial message: "You've spent X total tech on starship technologies and the bureau of ordnance construction have made alternative loadouts available for your starships."

or "has made alternative long range loadouts" or "has made available frigate loadouts" or whatever, depending on how many steps would be desired before everything was unlocked.

Basically introduce the loadouts gradually to players depending on their total investment in starships: That makes it easier for new players to deal with by introducing things for them to deal with slower and it provides an alternative resource balancing task for experienced players to take into consideration if they have specific favourite loadouts they want to get access to early.

Even simpler than "X total tech" could be "X loadout unlock points" (find better name) so the player wouldn't deal with adding disparate tech costs to try hitting X as easily as possible but could deal with doing the same with the easier rule of each tier x starship researched providing x points, and then having some nice little counter in the starship construction window showing current unlock points out of unlock points needed for next step.

E.g. If first step is X=10 points, then it can be unlocked by researching a single starship to T4, T3+T3, T3+T2+T1, or T2+T2+T2+T1.
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Offline keith.lamothe

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Re: Starships in the sequel
« Reply #78 on: January 26, 2017, 08:15:07 pm »
Basically introduce the loadouts gradually to players depending on their total investment in starships
That's a good idea for having the complexity for people who want it, not having it for new players, and adding the extra "resource" choices. For now I'm going with non-customizable starships until we have a better idea of how the game actually feels, but I'll bear this one in mind.
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Offline Squashyhex

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Re: Starships in the sequel
« Reply #79 on: January 27, 2017, 06:32:14 am »
That's a good idea for having the complexity for people who want it, not having it for new players, and adding the extra "resource" choices. For now I'm going with non-customizable starships until we have a better idea of how the game actually feels, but I'll bear this one in mind.
Could always be brought out as part of post 1.0 DLC/FreeLC, since it would only involve changing the stats of existing ships (and possibly weapon's animations).
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Offline Tridus

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Re: Starships in the sequel
« Reply #80 on: January 27, 2017, 09:37:44 am »
Basically introduce the loadouts gradually to players depending on their total investment in starships
That's a good idea for having the complexity for people who want it, not having it for new players, and adding the extra "resource" choices. For now I'm going with non-customizable starships until we have a better idea of how the game actually feels, but I'll bear this one in mind.

Seems reasonable. I'd probably handle this with module editing being done by creating loadouts in an editor, then picking a loadout. You have some pre-set ones so a newbie building the ship simply picks the loadout they want at the time of buliding the ship from a pre-built list. Ship comes out already set up, and off they go. Also, don't give people the ability to build a "blank" ship, because that was the default behavior in AWIC and it was clearly a bad default.

Advanced users can create their own loadouts in the editor.

Offline Butterland

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Re: Starships in the sequel
« Reply #81 on: February 14, 2017, 12:21:06 am »
Hey guys,

For what it's worth here is my breakdown of Starships in Classic:

1) Do you have access to an Advanced Starship Consturctor behind a chokepoint? 
A) Yes.  Then upgrade all of the Starships to level 3.
B) Not really.  Hack it in late game .....or ignore it and focus on Fleet

2) Ok well unlock the Spire Ships for 1k.   Also Raid II.  Oh man we need more Cloakers.....also Riot Control II are so good.  Ok well the first few worlds we can probably Tech II the rest because this is good firepower for 7k.  Ok well anything more see above.


And that was kind of it.  I was always mystified by the discussion of Starships online because it was an all-or-nothing-move for me.   I never didn't build Starships - nor did I really care what they were doing when I did.  They are all fairly slow, and fairly powerful - especially the higher Tech versions.  Just to be clear: I'm not trying to critiize the design of the ships....I did really dig into what they were doing.  It's just that from my position as The Player, the specifics of what they did was always very immaterial to me.  [Clarification Meatbag: It was cool that the ships did what they did....but I was building them anyways, and they all almost the exact same speed so....neat!]

Anyways, that's my two cents.

It's an interesting idea to have the Starships play pivitol roles....but my sense is that it has to be a choice similar to "Bonus Ship" in Classic.  Like fine invest in Boosting....but that's your angle now, like now your a boosting/long-range guy so Tech Picks you sink into  Brawler don't Synergyse.  [Edit: Despite the last sentence, I don't think AI:War needs to be Diablo IV or Hearthstone II]

Otherwise, honestly I just unlocked & built a full Tech II [Edit: or Tech III/IV depending] suite pretty much every game regardless of Starship capabilities.  From my perspective there is CNTL-1 and that's the fleet ball that needs Assault Transports and drops the G/V-Right-Click hurt - after the Star Raiders & my Champion (CNTL-3) is done cleaning up Ion Cannons etc..

« Last Edit: February 14, 2017, 12:52:59 am by Butterland »

Offline chemical_art

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Re: Starships in the sequel
« Reply #82 on: February 14, 2017, 08:14:45 am »
Hey guys,

For what it's worth here is my breakdown of Starships in Classic:

1) Do you have access to an Advanced Starship Consturctor behind a chokepoint? 
A) Yes.  Then upgrade all of the Starships to level 3.
B) Not really.  Hack it in late game .....or ignore it and focus on Fleet

2) Ok well unlock the Spire Ships for 1k.   Also Raid II.  Oh man we need more Cloakers.....also Riot Control II are so good.  Ok well the first few worlds we can probably Tech II the rest because this is good firepower for 7k.  Ok well anything more see above.


And that was kind of it.  I was always mystified by the discussion of Starships online because it was an all-or-nothing-move for me.   I never didn't build Starships - nor did I really care what they were doing when I did.  They are all fairly slow, and fairly powerful - especially the higher Tech versions.  Just to be clear: I'm not trying to critiize the design of the ships....I did really dig into what they were doing.  It's just that from my position as The Player, the specifics of what they did was always very immaterial to me.  [Clarification Meatbag: It was cool that the ships did what they did....but I was building them anyways, and they all almost the exact same speed so....neat!]

Anyways, that's my two cents.

It's an interesting idea to have the Starships play pivitol roles....but my sense is that it has to be a choice similar to "Bonus Ship" in Classic.  Like fine invest in Boosting....but that's your angle now, like now your a boosting/long-range guy so Tech Picks you sink into  Brawler don't Synergyse.  [Edit: Despite the last sentence, I don't think AI:War needs to be Diablo IV or Hearthstone II]

Otherwise, honestly I just unlocked & built a full Tech II [Edit: or Tech III/IV depending] suite pretty much every game regardless of Starship capabilities.  From my perspective there is CNTL-1 and that's the fleet ball that needs Assault Transports and drops the G/V-Right-Click hurt - after the Star Raiders & my Champion (CNTL-3) is done cleaning up Ion Cannons etc..

I feel similar. I may have "that one" that is specifically part of my strategy from the start in which I get to tech III, but the rest I get to tech II and keep in the fleet ball if resources permit (and if they do not, the starships are the first to go)
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