View Issue Details
| ID | Project | Category | Date Submitted | Last Update | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 0021990 | AI War 2 | Suggestion | Oct 28, 2019 5:32 pm | Nov 5, 2019 9:08 pm | |
| Reporter | Apthorpe | Assigned To | Chris_McElligottPark | ||
| Status | resolved | Resolution | fixed | ||
| Product Version | 1.003 Sortable Objectives | ||||
| Fixed in Version | 1.005 Answering Your Top Requests | ||||
| Summary | 0021990: The XP problem for stations | ||||
| Description | People have been talking about how XP for stations can be problematic. We don't want to be incentivized to grind backwater econ stations. I like the idea of station XP--Chris mentioned how he wanted to emphasize locality--but its current implementation certainly poses some gameplay issues. Solution 1: Maybe mil stations get XP from battles, but econ stations get XP from relative stability? Like maybe they gain XP at a constant rate, but if there's a lot of action in their system, they get an XP penalty to represent the instability this caused for the structures, personnel, logistics, planning, etc., since the stations faced losses, distraction, , and whatnot. The XP penalty could be progressive based on action history in the system (the more combat there, the more it builds), but it would have a cap, and it would gradually return to 0 when peaceful. Not sure how to handle XP gains for logistics stations. Perhaps they be a mix of the two. The main issue here is that time is still a major factor, and you don't want to incentivize sitting around and waiting for things to passively gain XP. I don't think this can be entirely avoided, but there is a second solution which might manage it. Solution 2: Capturables: You can capture AI data banks with fleets. The concept could vary, but it makes sense that this sort of knowledge could be valuable to station staff and therefore represent XP. Extracting these would require your fleet occupying the system for a certain amount of time (maybe a minute?). Alternatively, maybe it would be done with a hack with a flagship present. It's important to note that neither of these would require capturing the system. This is primarily meant to help solve the time problem where you are incentivized to sit around doing nothing for your stations to passively gain XP. It also encourages you to be more intrepid with your fleets in the early game without having to necessarily drive up AIP. An alternative possibility for solution 2: Rather than being AI data banks, these are past data libraries of humanity. Thus they would contain lost knowledge for humanity to regain. I kind of like how this reminds you that the human race once spanned these stars, and that you still share their legacy. A final note: Even if station XP gets jettisoned, I like the emphasis on locality, and I hope that is somehow retained in whatever replaces it. And the idea of capturables could still transfer even without station XP. Like if stations had a perks system, each capturable could grant one or more perk points. | ||||
| Tags | No tags attached. | ||||
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Thanks for posting this! This does need to be addressed. |
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One thing to consider here is that stations getting xp makes station tech worth significantly less. If all my economic stations are 3 due to grinding xp and then moving them backfield, spending 5k science to move them from 3 to 4 or 4 to 5 isn't attractive. There isn't the same power curve as fleet ships for stations. |
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Thanks! * The non-turret defenses, and command stations in general, no longer get mark levels based on EXP going up on their fleets. * Mobile player offensive fleets are still able to gain EXP like they always have been, and in the main it is still very useless for most of them (since only their flagships upgrade, for the most part; very useful for things with a powerful flagship but otherwise not much). ** Note that this will get more useful in the future as we start adding in perks for these types of fleets that will affect other ships as you level up. That's just a TBD item. ** The goal with these is still to have a bit of that flair of "hero stuff" that people have been asking for since the early days of AI War 1. We're proceeding somewhat cautiously with it, keeping it more on the useless end of the spectrum rather than something that takes over the game. * All the other kind of fleets are no longer able to gain EXP at all. This means battlestations and command stations, mainly, for you. ** This was, by contrast, super duper useful to the point of being an absurd exploit. But it also wasn't a fun thing, requiring grinding rather than actual strategy of any sort. ** This was one of the really big ways that people could force a victory far faster than they should have been able to, and really mess up the economy of things. ** Existing savegames will lose all their unspent EXP, but WILL keep their existing added levels from this source, simply because a ton of games would have economies in the toilet without these levels remaining for now. But those savegames with leveled-up command stations are definitely overpowered in the player's favor, now. * When calculating how many fleets there are on a planet for EXP penalty purposes, it now ONLY counts mobile player fleets. It DOES include support fleets, but not battlestations/citadels, and not command stations. ** So this is something that makes it so that you're penalized a lot less rapidly for having many fleets on a planet. ** For the "max mark level" calculation that it does, it's now only based on the mark level of the mobile offensive fleets, too. * A new button has been added in place of the fleet EXP stuff for planetary (command station) type fleets. It's hovertext reads: ** Planetary fleets can be upgraded (all ships within them) by directly spending science. This can be a very science-cost-effective way to get more metal income or energy production. ** Changing the type of command station you're using, or losing the planet and recapturing it, won't cause you to lose your upgrades on this planet. * By clicking the above button, you can spend science in a whole new way an upgrade ALL the ships within the planetary fleet by one mark level (regardless of whether normally those would have been upgraded by EXP -- this isn't EXP, and you're paying science for it). ** The cost is pretty cheap for the first added mark, at only 1000 science. The next is 3k, then 6k, then on to the absurd with 9k, 18k, and 36k. So you CAN upgrade one of your planets like crazy if you really want to, but it's prohibitively expensive to do so. ** All of this gives you a lot more flexibility and allows you to do spot-upgrades for purposes of getting a better economy of having better defenses at a location. ** This is pretty important for high level play with the removal of the EXP for command stations (and battlestations/citadels, although they aren't gaining the science unlock ability). ** We may need to tweak the costs of these at some point to think about if we want the first upgrade to be even cheaper, to really tempt you. It's hard to say if this is tempting enough, as we want you to have strong defenses but be weighing that against the more generalized science expenditures that benefit offense AND defense. This of course also benefits your economy in a major way, so we may have to revisit how much more metal generators and the command stations generate as their mark levels go up if we reduce the science costs here. We shall see. For now, conservative steps. Anyone who isn't already a fairly advanced player may not even notice the difference here. |
| Date Modified | Username | Field | Change |
|---|---|---|---|
| Oct 28, 2019 5:32 pm | Apthorpe | New Issue | |
| Oct 28, 2019 5:35 pm | Apthorpe | Description Updated | |
| Oct 28, 2019 5:50 pm | Chris_McElligottPark | Assigned To | => Chris_McElligottPark |
| Oct 28, 2019 5:50 pm | Chris_McElligottPark | Status | new => assigned |
| Oct 28, 2019 5:50 pm | Chris_McElligottPark | Note Added: 0054071 | |
| Nov 4, 2019 11:26 pm | donblas | Note Added: 0054361 | |
| Nov 5, 2019 9:08 pm | Chris_McElligottPark | Status | assigned => resolved |
| Nov 5, 2019 9:08 pm | Chris_McElligottPark | Resolution | open => fixed |
| Nov 5, 2019 9:08 pm | Chris_McElligottPark | Fixed in Version | => 1.005 Answering Your Top Requests |
| Nov 5, 2019 9:08 pm | Chris_McElligottPark | Note Added: 0054382 |
