View Issue Details
| ID | Project | Category | Date Submitted | Last Update | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 0014284 | The Last Federation | Balance Issue | Apr 19, 2014 11:48 pm | Apr 22, 2014 5:32 am | |
| Reporter | Professor Paul1290 | Assigned To | |||
| Status | new | Resolution | open | ||
| Product Version | 1.001 (Bugfixes, Large Screen Resolution Support) | ||||
| Summary | 0014284: Suggested Combat Re-Balance. [Warning: Long] | ||||
| Description | Copied over from the forums: "I think there might be a short-term fix that won't require as much finicky balancing as I just got reminded what "Misery" difficulty does and why Misery perhaps doesn't see the same problems as the other players do. -Increase the speed of enemy shots on "Normal" by 30%: This probably sounds crazy, but hear me out on this. If I recall correctly, "Misery" difficulty has shot speed increased by 60% and the person who plays it most can still evade most incoming fire without kiting and hasn't blown an aneurysm yet (correct me if I'm wrong). That means that this tweak is already out there and has effectively already been tested and determined to not "break" combat. As such, this tweak should make out-speeding the shots much less viable without requiring that much fixing after the fact. -Increase weapons range of "slow" flagships and turrets to significantly beyond the player's weapons range: These guys are much less agile, carry more armament, and use completely different weapons from you. I think it would make sense for these guys to be able to shoot farther than you can. Also right now turrets aren't very effective at doing anything due to their short range, and again it make sense for dedicated immobile weapons to be able to shoot farther than their mobile counterparts. The flagships that can fly faster than you and Gravity Lances probably should NOT get this for obvious reasons. -Have enemy flagships only pursue until the player is within of weapon range: It doesn't make sense for the player to fight at point blank, so maybe the enemy shouldn't try to do this either. Instead they should only pursue until they can fire effectively. With their increased range, this should put them at the distance the player would want to fight at anyway and they won't encourage the player to make a run for it because then the player's weapons would become ineffective before the enemies would. In the short-term this may accomplish four major results for people on both sides of the fence. Theoretically this will: A. Hopefully "hard-kill" the player's kiting behavior by making it so that retreating to where damage can be completely avoided will mean sacrificing the ability to do damage, and making it so the enemy won't encourage kiting behavior via relentless pursuit. B. Reduce "battlefield clutter" due to higher projectile speeds causing projectiles to leave the immediate field of play much quicker than before, mean fewer actively dangerous projectiles in flight at any given moment. (This would also hopefully compensate for increase in difficulty due to faster shots) C. Keep the ratio of enemy DPS and player DPS the same as it is now, as the maximum DPS a given number of enemy ships can do to the player stays about the same (only shot speed is affected, not rate-of-fire or damage). This means that combat difficulty only makes a minimal leap, "kiting exploit" aside. D. Better satisfy people who don't want to spend so much time in combat by making combat generally shorter. I'll try to explain why I believe this would also accomplish that last result. By changing the optimal combat distance in this manner to one where everyone has a clear shot more of the time, weapons on both side will be provided with a more "target-rich environment" for a greater fraction of the total time you spend in combat. This means that weapons on both sides will be able to take advantage of their maximum DPS more of the time, including the player's. Drops in overall DPS on both sides due to distance will be reduced, and as such the death of one of the sides should theoretically occur in a shorter amount of time. Also because kiting would no longer offer as much benefit, situations where the player has to "return to the blob" after killing a bunch of enemies, and therefore time in which neither side is dealing damage, would be drastically reduced. Combat blobs would theoretically stay together more of the time, and this reduces the "travel time" that may occur on either side. So in summary I believe (and I could be wrong) that this would result in: -Less kiting! -Less clutter! -Minimal change in difficulty! -Shorter battles with fewer turns! That said, admittedly a lot of this is "theory" and may have some or a lot of holes in it, but in the interest of trying to throw any possible solutions for this dilemma on the table for this I really thought I should plop this in here anyway." Source: http://www.arcengames.com/forums/index.php/topic,15287.0.html | ||||
| Tags | No tags attached. | ||||
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As I"d said in the topic on the forums, I agree with all of this stuff. All of the kiting that most players are doing seems to be the thing that's making the combat seem bad for some of them, or at least not as good as it could be, since it's simplistic and mindless, and the game tends to push them towards doing this, as it being the best tactic. It's boring as heck though and takes no skill, and doesnt encourage experimentation. If players HAVE to get within enemy firing range to battle the enemy, it should keep things much more interesting. That's certainly been my experience on Misery; I dont kite things to begin with, but I know full well that even if I wanted to, it's very much NOT viable on that difficulty and will only get your face melted. Also it's worth noting that these changes are mostly only needed on Normal; Misery difficulty is just where it should be, and I dont think Hard needs much change, though it could do with a bit of testing to see if it does. This will also have the effect of making it easier and less jarring for the player to step up to the next difficulty if they want to, after spending enough time on Normal, because they wont go from "Kiting is always best" directly to "Kiting gets you splattered, dont do it". |
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Seems this change would remove maneuver as an important element to greater of lesser extent. To exaggerate for effect, if every combatant was in range of every other, there would be no point to movement except if damage was range dependent. This would then give weapons that don't have damage dependent on range the edge, and the strategy would be to have only these weapons and sit in one spot and spam missiles or whatever. |
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P.S> I may of misunderstood, you are saying the enemy flagships get extended range as I reread. I have not played as much as you guys, but right now I struggle to get in range of the flagships when destroying them is the mission as they always evade, so I have not kited at all on normal. |
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I recognize the kiting is an issue, but I simply do not play it that way. Except for the challenge duels, I'm usually in the thick of it dealing and taking damage, so I'm not sure these behaviors all need to be made for the "normal" combat level. Still I think it's good advice for one difficulty level above. |
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@Percopius It's already mentioned in here that it should apply to "slow flagships" and that "The flagships that can fly faster than you and Gravity Lances probably should NOT get this for obvious reasons". Those don't need a range boost as you can't kite them to begin with. This applies more to the majority of other flagships that are not nearly as agile. Also this doesn't remove the incentive to maneuver for the player because the player's main incentive to maneuver is maneuvering to avoid enemy fire, not to get into range. Enemy fire flies slower than the player for this purpose. The enemies aren't affected as they only maneuver to get to where they attack. @pepboy Some of us don't, and theoretically this would not affect us much at all as conditions where we do combat would generally stay the same. This would mostly remove the incentive to do so for people who do. |
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@ProfessorPaul That's fair. I do feel that if the speed shot is increased for the normal level, there will need to be other tweaks (additional health, lower damage, etc) to compensate as a higher speed shot will result in more hits (as it's more difficult to dodge). However I do agree that this would help remove the kiting that makes the combat more challenging, especially the "don't chase if out of gun range". On that note, it might be nice to see more "fleet" maneuvers by the enemy. E.g. ships flying in formation, ships unwilling to go too far from their supporting ships. |
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@percopius As ProfessorPaul said, these changes would most definitely not lower the need or use of maneuvering. It's the other way around. The kiting tactic used by many currently already involves a near total lack of maneuvering. Yes, technically you are moving... but only in a simple line, never changing, and always remaining in pretty much the same position relative to the enemy force. When you cannot do this though, this all changes. You now HAVE to maneuver in order to not die. YOu have to consider positioning carefully, and watch the constant changing battlefield, and think carefully before plotting your movements, so you can get into safe positions that also allow you to most efficiently attack the enemy. You also have to choose your targets carefully; simply spraying bullets vaguely at enemies will not work here, and can get you wrecked. YOu need to choose your targets, and often, you will have to be aggressive to get at them... something utterly non-existent in the kiting method. AND, you have real reason to USE your abilities, which are one of the most tactical parts of the combat, yet a part that simply is not necessary when kiting. Making real use of them for a real purpose is MUCH more satisfying, and also much more interesting. The only thing about this is that the devs need to make sure not to change things TOO much... this isnt another situation where the combat needs a total overhaul. There are plenty of players that enjoy this part of the game, and it is of course impossible to please everyone. I reiterate that in addition to these things, there seriously should be an "auto resolve" mechanic in place, for those that simply end up not liking the combat part of the game. |
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Man good thread here, but I'll be brief. For myself the kiting kills the fun making any encounter something I dread to play. In the alpha it's what was driving me away from playing as it became pretty repetitive. Sure I could try other ways to try to make it fun, but in the end when I want to get back to the main game, tedious though it is, I've tended to kite. In short these type of changes I'd like to see. |
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Hi, So as I play more, I see the OP point and agree in the main; I will have to compete some games to differing difficultly levels to speak to this point further, I defer to OP. But I don't have too many hours under my belt to know the answer to this question; Do the enemy flagships also have three weapon slots or just one weapon? The reason I ask this is to see if a behavior that is basically "I will attempt to attack with a weapon that has range to hit my target while being outside of the targets current weapon, regardless of damage potential. If they only have one weapon, then they have to close to within the targets weapon range envelope in order to damage the target, and if there is an armada and they could communicate, they would attempt to all close to within weapon range at the same time, to act as one fleet to overwhelm the target, else it is silly to get into weapon range if the AI knows it will die first in an exchange. So I guess the question is does the AI use Fleet Tactics; in particular optimal range strategy for combat with weapon load-out, and operating as a fleet. It seems if they could cooperate as fleets it would get rid of some of these unwanted behaviors and and tactical depth - but since you are alone a lot it seems in your solo flagship, it may not be a perfect solution. Please tell me how it works now. BTW my go to book for fleet tactics is; http://www.fas.org/pub/gen/oelrich/HughesChap6&7.pdf Perc. |
| Date Modified | Username | Field | Change |
|---|---|---|---|
| Apr 19, 2014 11:48 pm | Professor Paul1290 | New Issue | |
| Apr 20, 2014 1:15 am | Misery | Note Added: 0036312 | |
| Apr 20, 2014 1:21 am | Misery | Note Edited: 0036312 | |
| Apr 20, 2014 7:56 am | Percopius | Note Added: 0036318 | |
| Apr 20, 2014 8:02 am | Percopius | Note Added: 0036319 | |
| Apr 20, 2014 11:17 am | pepboy | Note Added: 0036323 | |
| Apr 20, 2014 12:17 pm | Professor Paul1290 | Note Added: 0036332 | |
| Apr 20, 2014 12:19 pm | Professor Paul1290 | Note Edited: 0036332 | |
| Apr 20, 2014 12:19 pm | Professor Paul1290 | Note Edited: 0036332 | |
| Apr 20, 2014 12:30 pm | pepboy | Note Added: 0036333 | |
| Apr 21, 2014 2:07 am | Misery | Note Added: 0036350 | |
| Apr 22, 2014 4:23 am | Sounds | Note Added: 0036415 | |
| Apr 22, 2014 5:32 am | Percopius | Note Added: 0036419 |
