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Bring back the configurable ship! |
BackSlash
Marshal
Galactic Navy
Joined: March 23, 2003
Posts: 11183
From: Bristol, England
|  Posted: 2011-04-25 05:10
For clarification, we never, ever stated that tech swapping wouldn't be back in some form or another. It still presents some balancing issues, however, I'd like to plug it into the planetary system in some way that makes it worth the extra umph you may receive (or the added customisation you get). However, as always, time is precious, and not many of us have the time to work on balancing such a feature when there's already much to do, and areas we can better concentrate our time on (like getting the new layouts sorted, balanced, etc).
We are totally against is the any-slot, or multi-slot, system. You will never, ever see missiles for torps, beams for cannons, torps for flux waves, etc, again. It just didn't work, and if you liked this system, then I'm sorry, but it just didn't work.
- Jack
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Enterprise
Chief Marshal
Raven Warriors
Joined: May 19, 2002
Posts: 2576
From: Hawthorne, Nevada
| Posted: 2011-04-25 06:43
Having it tied to planets is what might make them useful once again.
I've had this idea floating around for a little while, so it might be a little long winded.
First, you bring back player set trade routes between starports. A planet can import from any number of planets, but it can only export to one other. The idea is to make players build trade routes between vital planets.
So what makes a vital planet then?
Resources right now are pretty generic, but thats fine as it is. But the key is to make it a bit more important. Not the size, but the type.
There is, as anyone who knows that far back, flags on planets for many kinds of resources. Metals.. Heavy metals.. urdanium, and so on. While trade routes transfer resources, they also transfer that type of resource flags that a planet has. It would take a little planning, but you could make it so that certain resource types are singled out to a single planet in a system. And then spread it out further. Perhaps Hypermatter is found on only one planet in Sagi? Thats a pretty valuable planet. If Hypermatter is valuable that is.
This is the beginning of bringing back something lost when the resource system was put in place. You make it so that in order to build those structures you need those resources present. And to spawn ships that require those flags.
So what would make say Hypermatter, very important? It might be required to be on a planet in order to mod a ship's cannons with even better cannons. Interesting thought.
However, this all becomes a moot point in the end because when you die you still have your ship at 5% hull. All those hard won modifications don't matter when you don't lose them. So here is an idea brought back from way way back.
Personally, I think getting your ship saved to 5% hull is a bit of a joke. Yes, I agree we shouldn't lose enhancements, but I also don't think if we have a real modding system that those mods should be saved entirely.
So then you tweak the garage system a little. And by a little, I mean quite a bit. You make it so that you can save layouts of ships, and while you still have a garage to store ships, if you lose a ship, that particular ship is gone - you have to build a new one. So if you wanted to build a ship with a layout that had those great mods, you'd need the shipyard you're spawning from to have the resource types in order to build it.
As for enhancements, they're saved to the layout of a ship, so the durability effect still applies. You lose your enhancements once you die 20 times or so (as it is now). The idea behind it all is to make planets valuable.
Valuable enough to protect, to seek out, to hold, because they hold the keys to letting you build your favoirte ship. And it makes you really care about the ship you're in, with powerful mods that you might not be able to replace right away, you'd think twice about dying.
Its a fair bit of work, and a fair bit complicated, but it brings back value to planets that has been sorely lost for a while. And it brings back modding ability to the players. Nothing overpowering, but a tactical edge..
I'd like to see people fight over planets again like they actually mattered to lose. It wont take an easy fix to do that. This is just one idea among many. But anything is better than the counter-strike in a space we're seeing now.
-Ent
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Azreal
Chief Marshal
Joined: March 14, 2004
Posts: 2816
From: United State of Texas, Houston
| Posted: 2011-04-25 06:48
For my part, I would never advocate a slot for slot any weapon swap. Only what we had before with the needed limitations.
Missles for missles, torps for torps, beams for...er wait. no beam swaps.
No missles for torps, no flux waves etc. I like the way the gadgets are divided out now, personally, with the exception of the ew slots. That is all I am advocating (and daybreaming about)
To Ent;
What you are saying is pretty much my feelings. I want planets to matter again, which since the removale of different res types and the end of factory planets, we simply haven't had.
I don't think a single hypermatter in the entire server is a good idea, but having certain types being very rare is good. It used to be Urd and Darkmatter, in the old days.
As for the idea of ship loss, I love it. It only matters if we can have cross tech modding again really tho.
For the enhancement issue, I don't think it is anywhere near as complicated as you make it. Simply put, you die, you lose your ship, you are back in the garage. Your enhancements appear back in the storage area, one dura lighter, ready to be modded onto your new ship. Simple. This would also give us the "ability" in a way to swap out enhances on a ship.
Of course the unique/rares would maybe have to change some, as they have no dura. I would personally like to see that when you die your unique has a 2-5% chance of dying with it. Otherwise it appears in storage same as the other enhancements.
what ya'll think?
[ This Message was edited by: Azreal (Ret) on 2011-04-25 08:24 ]
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BackSlash
Marshal
Galactic Navy
Joined: March 23, 2003
Posts: 11183
From: Bristol, England
| Posted: 2011-04-25 09:12
I like that idea.
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Pakhos[+R]
Chief Marshal
Pitch Black
Joined: May 31, 2002
Posts: 1352
From: Clean room lab
| Posted: 2011-04-25 09:57
Quote:
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[Removed]
Please don't make-up your own stories about what happened, it paints the wrong picture.
[ This Message was edited by: BackSlash on 2011-04-25 05:04 ]
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you removed all the funny part!
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[-GTN-]BackSlash: "Azreal is a master of showing me what is horribly broken in the game."
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Kenny_Naboo
Marshal
Pitch Black
Joined: January 11, 2010
Posts: 3823
From: LobsterTown
| Posted: 2011-04-25 10:47
Quote:
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On 2011-04-25 06:48, Azreal (Ret) wrote:
It only matters if we can have cross tech modding again really tho.
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Meaning K'luth can use human weaps and vice versa?
Don't really favor this.
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BackSlash
Marshal
Galactic Navy
Joined: March 23, 2003
Posts: 11183
From: Bristol, England
| Posted: 2011-04-25 11:11
It would be VERY limited, if it were to exist.
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MrSparkle
Marshal
Joined: August 13, 2001
Posts: 1912
From: mrsparkle
| Posted: 2011-04-25 11:18
Quote:
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On 2011-04-25 05:10, BackSlash wrote:
For clarification, we never, ever stated that tech swapping wouldn't be back in some form or another. It still presents some balancing issues, however, I'd like to plug it into the planetary system in some way that makes it worth the extra umph you may receive (or the added customisation you get). However, as always, time is precious, and not many of us have the time to work on balancing such a feature when there's already much to do, and areas we can better concentrate our time on (like getting the new layouts sorted, balanced, etc).
We are totally against is the any-slot, or multi-slot, system. You will never, ever see missiles for torps, beams for cannons, torps for flux waves, etc, again. It just didn't work, and if you liked this system, then I'm sorry, but it just didn't work.
- Jack
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I'm against that myself.
What I wanted to see was a blank hull with a certain number of "points to spend on various gadget slot types. Certain restrictions would apply like only 1 jumpdrive, only 1 cloak for Kluth or 1 pulse wave for ICC etc. But we would choose how many missiles or torpedoes or cannons we had, how many engines we wanted, how much armor or shields etc.
The only problem is that the evolution of the game over the years changed the power and usefulness of some of these gadgets, like cannons vs torps. My idea was to assign "weight" to each gadget, armor weighing the most of all, shields a little less than armor, core weapons weighing the most of all weapons, torpedoes slightly less, missiles less than torpedoes, and cannons the least. As weight increased acceleration and maneuverability decreased. Additional engine slots would increase acceleration and maneuverability, but engine slots would cost more than any other slot.
Over the years cannons became the dominant weapon and torpedoes were all but forgotten. Missile counts rose dramatically, and indeed every ship saw a massive increase in the number of gadgets it carried. It's crazy how much of everything ships have now, even lowly frigates.
I don't like being able to turn a missile dread into a torpedo dread, because there's offsetting penalties like I always wanted, but there does need to be some customization. We simply don't have enough options currently, and the few we have don't do anything special (no cannon options that fire in spread pattern, missiles with AOE proximity warheads etc.).
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Borgie
Chief Marshal
Pitch Black
Joined: August 15, 2005
Posts: 2256
From: close by
| Posted: 2011-04-25 12:18
Quote:
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On 2011-04-25 05:10, BackSlash wrote:
For clarification, we never, ever stated that tech swapping wouldn't be back in some form or another. It still presents some balancing issues, however, I'd like to plug it into the planetary system in some way that makes it worth the extra umph you may receive (or the added customisation you get). However, as always, time is precious, and not many of us have the time to work on balancing such a feature when there's already much to do, and areas we can better concentrate our time on (like getting the new layouts sorted, balanced, etc).
We are totally against is the any-slot, or multi-slot, system. You will never, ever see missiles for torps, beams for cannons, torps for flux waves, etc, again. It just didn't work, and if you liked this system, then I'm sorry, but it just didn't work.
- Jack
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just give every facation QST's and luth jump drives and everyone would be happy
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DiepLuc
Chief Marshal
Joined: March 23, 2010
Posts: 1187
| Posted: 2011-04-25 13:31
I had an eye on EVE weapon encyclopedia. I have an idea for weapon swap:
- By default, ships of 3 factions use the same system - nothing best, nothing worst. Just different layout, with the exception to Pulse Wave, Cloak and Flux Wave.
- To swap to factionary system, they must orbit and use rare element on planet. Different element for different part.
- Factionary weapon exceed the other factionary weapon in 1 area in exchange of getting behind the others in 1 area.
- Death = ship removed in garrage.
- There are exchangable elements; some is unique and ain't transfered together with resource.
There are factors in weapon:
- Range of firing
- Power
- Speed
- Range of explosion
- Recharge time
- Ammunication
Mixed between them, we have many options for new factionary weapon.
There are also factors to engine, armor... apply the same idea.
If Az's idea is going to happen, it would be nice to have infinite storage.
Talking about element, I would love that planet worthes its type. Station requires unique element that only terran would have; dread requires arid etc. Except free ship that all planet types are able to produce, from destroyer to station, one type would and should produce one class only. Barren could not build bigger ship but its the only type to have rare element to upgrade to factionary system. So all types have their roles in game.
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-Shadowalker-™
Admiral
Galactic Navy
Joined: September 23, 2007
Posts: 709
From: Shadows
| Posted: 2011-04-25 14:58
So if we get back a more configurable ship, like what was stated above; will this include crossfaction?
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Gejaheline
Fleet Admiral
Galactic Navy
Joined: March 19, 2005
Posts: 1127
From: UGTO MUNIN HQ, Mars
| Posted: 2011-04-25 16:00
Just a quickie from me, since I considered writing a massive article about how in MechWarrior/BattleTech you could create a "balanced" 'Mech that could one-shot 99% of all 'Mechs, but then decided against it.
Basically, the problem with configurable ships is that they're nigh-impossible to balance; almost inevitably (and this applies for pretty much any game anywhere) you end up with the "perfect" loadout or selection that gives you the best possible advantage. In worst-case scenarios this loadout becomes the ONLY competitive loadout, to the point where you're doomed if you don't use it. This makes the game suck for people who like other loadouts but are stuffed because they die constantly.
This is why games like Eve and MechWarrior/BattleTech have such complex (and restrictive) customisation rules; to try and keep people from developing an uber-loadout. And even then it's not perfect and needs constant tweaking whenever someone finds the "best" loadout.
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Kenny_Naboo
Marshal
Pitch Black
Joined: January 11, 2010
Posts: 3823
From: LobsterTown
| Posted: 2011-04-25 21:34
Quote:
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On 2011-04-25 14:58, -Shadowalker-™ wrote:
So if we get back a more configurable ship, like what was stated above; will this include crossfaction?
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LOL. Cross faction weaps is the exact thing which should be avoided.
Would you want to face multiple Krills with 7 QSTs each? Fitted with 8 x Adv Weap Accels, they could decloak, hit you from 1200+ GUs, cloak, run around, rinse and repeat.
[ This Message was edited by: Kenny_Naboo[+R] on 2011-04-25 22:29 ]
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Azreal
Chief Marshal
Joined: March 14, 2004
Posts: 2816
From: United State of Texas, Houston
| Posted: 2011-04-25 22:38
core weapons would be on the non-swappable list, for sure.
What we are talking about is swapping fusion torps for am torps, IF you can get them. Or IT missles for Psi missles. Engines for engines. drives for drives. Not core weapons, specialty weapons, or beams.
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BackSlash
Marshal
Galactic Navy
Joined: March 23, 2003
Posts: 11183
From: Bristol, England
| Posted: 2011-04-25 22:44
For clarification, if we would most likely bring back tech swapping, it would be in a limited form that would give meaning to owning a planet. ie, you'd maybe get one or two devices available, not have all available for a complete re-fit. We might even give the gadgets durability.
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