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The issue of Dreadspace |
Bash
Fleet Admiral
Joined: February 04, 2005
Posts: 365
|  Posted: 2009-02-23 17:23
my idea for a Rank FA or admiral cruiser level ship was kicked to the corner.
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Sardaukar
Admiral
Raven Warriors
Joined: October 08, 2002
Posts: 1656
| Posted: 2009-02-23 17:41
Please kick this discussion focused on the dreadnaughts, people. I think we need a solution, and I know we don't need a blame game.
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Jar Jar Binks
Grand Admiral
Joined: December 25, 2001
Posts: 556
| Posted: 2009-02-23 19:41
just bring back the old system that made lots of smaller ships be a serious threat to a larget one if not supported properly.
small ships NEEDS to be able to hurt a dread or a station, and even as few as 5 cruisers or 7 - 10 dessies should be able to make a bigger ship hurt.
but then something has to be done about the smaller ships ability to permadodge anything the bigger ship throws at them.
i really really miss flying a cruiser in a group and actually feel like i contributed to something, for MY team, not just be the free pres to the enemy like they are now.
if we want this game to grow we need to make ALL ships be useful, no matter how small they are. the first thing the devs should do is to look at the ship description and MAKE them what they are said to be.
because, what point is there to even have those ships in the game if you only fly them because u cant get anything better?
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Enterprise
Chief Marshal
Joined: May 19, 2002
Posts: 2576
From: Hawthorne, Nevada
| Posted: 2009-02-23 20:00
It WOULD be nice if all ships were useful to the point of everything being able to kill everything else, but its been consistently stated again and again that this wont happen.
Repeating it just means another shutdown of any attempt to actually fix the problem (whether or not its acknolwedged as a real problem), so might as well let it be.
Personally, I feel that once a ship is destroyed it should be gone for good, but garages could be used instead as blueprints of a ship rather than an actual ship. That is, you setup a specific kind of ship, you save it as a blueprint, bam, you can spawn that particular ship anywhere with the resources and technology.
The only issue is really enhancements, which in my opinion, really aren't helping the game.
I feel its a better idea simply to have a mechanisim for upgrading a specific ship in a specific way. Such as that, like modding, you can choose to enhance your ship in specific ways at a cost to something else (more armor for less manueverability, and so on), without once ever having to farm AI, and everyone is on an equal footing and can actually modify the ship exactly the way they like, without breaking the game.
But that deviated from the main point of DreadSpace, anyways.
Smaller ships have to be useful, thats just the point, period. In some way, in some form, they must have some way to be effective on the field, somehow. This isn't just for the sake of old players who want more variety in battles, more tacticts and different options, this is for new players too, who are going to be thrust into the middle of battle with nothing but a wooden stick as it is.
Usefulness is a broad term though. Combat ships need to be useful in combat, support ships need to be useful in supporting.
That means, point defence being neccessary, smaller ships actually needing smaller ships to kill them (and big ships needed to kill big ships). It makes sense, it makes things fun for everyone. Its time to step away from the model that Endgame Has The Best and move to Endgame Has More Options. Thats just as good. I don't see why it can't be.
One really can't even argue about Dreadnoughts costing more therefore being more powerful, you hardly lose anything anymore for what you get from it (hell, you can suicide dreadnoughts over and over and make a GAIN. So something needs to be done.
-Ent
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BackSlash
Marshal
Galactic Navy
Joined: March 23, 2003
Posts: 11183
From: Bristol, England
| Posted: 2009-02-23 20:01
Quote:
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On 2009-02-23 19:41, Jar Jar Binks wrote:
just bring back the old system that made lots of smaller ships be a serious threat to a larget one if not supported properly.
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That system is in place now. Two cruisers, or even three destroyers can take down a dreadnaught very easily if flown by skilled pilots.
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xTx
Chief Marshal
Joined: September 10, 2005
Posts: 101
From: Canada
| Posted: 2009-02-23 20:19
Combat in darkspace seems to be well balanced now, each faction has its strengths and weaknesses. I would like to see the anti-collision devices removed from missiles tho
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MrSparkle
Marshal
Joined: August 13, 2001
Posts: 1912
From: mrsparkle
| Posted: 2009-02-23 20:36
I would definitely like at least a little ability to mod our ships. I'd love to swap my Hive's useless missles for cannons for instance. But I wouldn't want missiles swapped for torps, or beacons for cannons or anything like that.
Then there's some modding options I would like removed, mostly UGTO's choice in armor which can render Kluth highly ineffective since almost every weapon of theirs is energy based. UGTO armor should go back to a simple choice of light armor with more mobility, or heavy armor with less mobility.
As for small ships not able to do much, a few people have said it here and I've been saying it for a while: Remove the auto leveling of weapons and armor. At least let us test it in beta. Destroyers are easily ignored in a battle, and cruisers only slightly less so. Seriously, all those ships are worthless. They do little damage, and don't have any survivability. The only other way to make them useful is to give them unique abilities, which is simply too much work.
(and I'll admit right now: I'm not at all against the idea of a Darkspace that's dominated by cruisers and destroyers instead of stations and dreadnaughts. It's more fun and requires more piloting skills that way)
I thought of one more very essential change to the game today: We need a countdown after being destroyed before we can spawn a new ship. It's way way too easy to instantly grab a brand new ship and rejoin the action after you've been destroyed, especially if your shipyard is close by. Even if it's not close by, and even if you don't have a shipyard in the system at all, there's the gates. You can come back and destroy that ship that just destroyed you. It's not right. The few FPSs I've played have a respawn timer, and I think it's absolutely imperative Darkspace has one too. It can't be difficult to add?
Sorry if that last suggestion doesn't fit this thread 
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Silent Threat { Vier }
Marshal
Anarchy's End
Joined: August 03, 2004
Posts: 278
From: Waiting...watching...
| Posted: 2009-02-23 21:41
What about making smaller ships faster? That would let them last longer. Of course they couldn't dodge beams but if they used their speed to stay out of range or behind bigger targets, they would become a much bigger threat to the larger ships. The dreads would then need help from smaller ships on their own faction...
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Kanman
Grand Admiral
Pitch Black
Joined: August 26, 2005
Posts: 1017
From: Virginia, United States
| Posted: 2009-02-23 23:33
I know I have been out of the loop for quite a while, but as I said, I still keep an eye on DS almost daily.
My two cents: This is a truly difficult problem, particularly because people work so hard for so long to obtain rights to these massive ships. If you have just obtained your rank, its the new and exciting thing to fly and if you have been old for a while, its the most effective ship to fly when flying in low numbers (most of the time).
I would suggest this. Make the smaller class ships useful by breaking the useful items of the game apart and assign them to specific classes. For example. One of the small ships seen often is the supply, because we NEED supply, regardless of the fact that is comes in a small, weak ship. We need it. So, it is used.
Hear me out on this. My suggestions involves a lot of little changes that will go a long way if you look at the big picture.
1) Put bombs ONLY on Destroyers.
---- Reason: This creates a very necessary role just for this class ship, which would, due to size, require that bombing runs be done with more than one bomber, encouraging team work.
2) Remove the Point Defense ability of Cruisers and Dreads. Manual targetting and firing of course still possible.
---- Reason: They are good enough as guns. They should be require someone else to watch their rear.
3) Put Sensors gear ONLY on scouts. That includes Beacons, ECM, ECCM, Scanners and anything new I don't know about.
---- Reason: A squad of scouts could hide a fleet, or reveal one. Very useful.
4) Remove Supply slots from all stations other than the Supply models. The Battle model fights and the Command model builds. That's 'role' enough.
---- Reason: Permits Supply ships and stations to be unique in their role.
5) Double the infantry slots on stations (last I checked it was 10, so adjust this statement according to current mod conditions).
---- Reason: Permits stations to defend planets more effectively, which is all they should really be doing.
6) Frigates are your point defense class ships, firing at double rate against missiles, etc.
---- Reason: Frigates have never been all that great for combat. However, they could be effective bomber-hunters as well as effective at escorting dread and cruiser formations for point defense purposes.
7) Scouts can Point Defense take out Torpedos.
---- Reason: When the scouting is done, you have a unique role in combat.
There. Now every ship class has a role. A Critical, fleet-necessary role.
Scouts: Sensors, anti-torp.
Frigates: Point Defense, bomber-hunters.
Cruiser: Front-line Combat.
Dread: Fighter/heavy fire support.
Station: Planetary Defense.
Supplies: Supply (Critical now).
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Max Kepler
Fleet Admiral
Templar Knights
Joined: March 08, 2002
Posts: 589
From: ICS Victory
| Posted: 2009-02-24 04:18
As I see it, the problem isn't that Dreadnoughts are too powerful. The problem is that the game revolves around the combat around and capture of planets, which don't move. Dreads are slow, but as long as they have to sit and defend or attack a planet, conflict is unavoidable. And Dreads should win in a conflict over smaller ships, really. The thing is that it just really isn't too fun when everyone flies in a Dread (except the poor new people, who strain to get prestige so they can get a Dread).
The way I see it, there are a number of ways to go about "fixing" it:
1: Make combat revolve around something else
Frankly, I'm not even sure how to do that. What else would it revolve around? Perhaps if you fiddled with the range on weapons drastically or really focused certain ships on certain roles, maybe you could pull off a more dynamic game where its better to have a mobile fleet than just one consisting of a bunch of Dreads. A lot of work, in any case, and probably not something the Devs are looking to do.
2: Make Dreads less useful
This tackles the problem directly, but I don't like it. Most people don't. Dreads are supposed to be frightening, don't neuter them.
3: Make Smaller ships more useful
This seems to be everyone's favorite, since you can implement it fairly easily. Change ship layouts a little, maybe create a few new devices to make it happen. But it's hard to narrow down exactly how this'll work. Some people recommend you give small ships a fleet "task" that they are better equipped for (as in the one of the posts above, someone said to only give them sensor equipment). Some people recommend you make them straight up better in combat. I say both, but let's make it subtle. Here are my suggestions:
Scouts -- So, we want scouts to actually have the tasking of scouting something right? Okay, so first of all we take off all weapons, except maybe 1 or 2 point-defense. Its not supposed to fight, so why try?
Second, we make scouting useful. This is more complex than you'd think because it basically calls for a significant change to the whole sensor/detection algorithm, so I'm going to reference this part for later (See * at the end of the post)
Frigates -- Two roles here, hunt down scouts, and limited combat support. Thus, they come in mostly two variations. One made to hit scouts (lots of beams, in other words, and NO other weapons), and one to hit big ships. Now, as we said, a frigate shouldn't win against a Dreadnought by itself... not even close. But a Dread backed up with a frigate should be able to have an advantage over another Dread. To do this, we must introduce a new weapon: the microtorpedo. This is too important to reference at the end, so we do it now.
Microtorpedo**: Basically, just as powerful against the hull of a ship as a regular torpedo. However, against any type of shields and armor, very ineffective (maybe 1/4 or 1/5 the damage?). The idea here is that two Dreads engaged will try to turn away their damaged parts from the line of fire so they don't start taking hull damage until their other shields/armor has failed. These torpedos will exploit the slowness of Dreads to take advantage of that. Maneuver around with your Frigates and fire a salvo of these right into the weak spot, and turn the tide of the battle. Microtorps will likely have low ammo supplies but fire pretty quick -- a weak spot may not be weak for long, and a small ship doesn't want to be in the fray for extended periods anyway.
So, back to the Frigate... give it a bunch of microtorpedos. Enough said.
Destroyer -- These guys will have a lot of roles. One, as heavier combat support. So Microtorps and maybe even a regular 1 or 2 torps. Still doesn't stand a chance against a Dread on its own, but teamed up with other ships, stands a chance at doing some real damage. Another variation for intercepting other Frigates/Destroyers armed with such weapons. Since they're quick the only thing to catch up with a Destroyer is another Destroyer. They'll likely have a complement of beams and cannons, and probably be just a little faster and more maneuverable. Finally, a multipurpose Destroyer. Microtorps and cannons, mostly. Can provide limited support but be able to survive encounters with the Interceptors, and also can track down some of the smaller Frigates.
Cruisers, Dreads, and Stations -- Pretty much leave these as they are, barring a few balance changes associated with changing the smaller ships. Note that some versions of various Dreads work better with fire support ships than others, but may be slightly adept at 1-on-1 combat.
That's pretty much it. Please ask questions if you have any, clearly the idea is not ironed out 100%.
* - Basically, I'm thinking of reducing the range of ECM/ECCM to a small radius, with more ECM/ECCM modules increasing its effective range (instead of just stacking the effects). So 1 ECCM might go out 200gu (practically useless except perhaps against K'luth), 3 to 800gu, and so forth. Also, reduce the signature of all ships. The idea is that Scouts are the only things maneuverable/fast enough to maintain a safe distance from a fleet and let you know what they've got. Simply jumping near a planet in any 1 ship should NOT reveal all the ships there, thereby negating the need for scouts. This is my best shot for only slightly modifying the sensor algorithm -- I have more thoughts, but it would pretty much change the whole game, which is not condusive to a Dev liking it.
** - Thanks to Jim Starluck for talking with me about these and giving input. This is not suggesting he supports the idea, only that he helped me get it right in my head and gave feedback.
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Code Red
Chief Marshal
Non Omnis Moriar
Joined: September 08, 2007
Posts: 184
| Posted: 2009-02-24 04:27
I will keep it brief but I really like what Kanman suggests , specific roles for classes of ships thus bringing their "need" back into the game.
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Jar Jar Binks
Grand Admiral
Joined: December 25, 2001
Posts: 556
| Posted: 2009-02-24 05:22
Quote:
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On 2009-02-23 21:41, Silent Threat wrote:
What about making smaller ships faster? That would let them last longer. Of course they couldn't dodge beams but if they used their speed to stay out of range or behind bigger targets, they would become a much bigger threat to the larger ships. The dreads would then need help from smaller ships on their own faction...
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they can already do that. and is probably what backslash was thinking about when he wrote his response to me about 3 "skilled" cruiser pilots being able to kill a dread.
well mashing A and D in cycles to dodge projectiles and missiles isnt what i would qualify as skill but nevermind.
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DarkScorpion
Marshal
Sanity Assassins
Joined: September 14, 2004
Posts: 237
From: London England
| Posted: 2009-02-24 05:59
can't we just change pres gain to include armor damage but ofcourse more pres gain for hull damage that way smaller ships don't have to pull off mission impossible if caught alone against bigger ships to earn a little before they run for there lives as no smaller craft is intended to blast the hell out of larger ships and if the is enough of smaller ships taking on the dread it will be swarmed as its a actual benefit to attack that slow moving hulk of a ship and yes i also restrict larger ships maxspeed to jump as in you can get 15gu out of you dread but cant jump at 15gu
[ This Message was edited by: DarkScorpion on 2009-02-24 06:10 ]
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Daedalus Bum
Marshal
Joined: March 26, 2004
Posts: 86
From: Finland
| Posted: 2009-02-24 09:32
Someone suggested to make smaller ships stronger, i think thats and bad ide, then we are back to the problem we had in earlier patches.
Etc. the new ICC dessie Escort Destroyer that could kill dreads easily.
Dreads shoots down smaller ships fast, well its kinda logical dreads got more power. and smaller ships are tiny with less hull and power and rooms even to have what a dread haves.
But instead of maiking any nerfing or power changes, 1. ide could be to give smaller ships longer range than dreads.
That way they could hit a dread before dreads could give em a smack.
This ide could be bad in many ways, but making smaller ships stronger wont fix the problem for sure.
And someone mentioned using resource for spawn, that very good ide.
Would stop the abuse of spawning new Fresh ships from SYs.
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Kanman
Grand Admiral
Pitch Black
Joined: August 26, 2005
Posts: 1017
From: Virginia, United States
| Posted: 2009-02-24 09:58
If I may expand thoughts upon my suggestion; although I stated frigates should be the main point defense ships, due to their low number of lasers, Pickets and Escorts will still be the BIG DOG of point defense, given thier larger number of lasers, even without the faster firing rate bonus I suggested for frigates in Point defense. This also keeps dessies in combat and escort roles.
I really think my suggestion could create the desired goal while no unbalancing the game or benefitting any group of the community significantly. This will simply encourage teamwork and diverse fleets.
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