Read by Schine Ship Specialization

[Captainredfox]

I think that currently there is no point in making a specialized ship in starmade for a reason other than size constraints. I have a simple idea which I wanted to share with the community which wouldn't break ships and would make it easier in the long run to balance ship types without breaking things.

Class Identifier blocks
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My idea is to add a block which allows players to choose what type of ship their ship is or alternatively, choose what bonuses and penalties it has.These bonuses and penalties to the systems of the ship it it attached to and make the ship better at doing its classes job.

Some examples

Asteroid miner: +50% salvage yield -75% weapon damage -15% shield recharge

Missile Cruiser: +%200 missile range and speed -50% AMC and beam damage -10% shield

Battleship: +100% shield capacity and recharge -50% missile damage +25% cannon and beam damage

Explorer: -80% to all weapons +100% faster jumpdrive charge

Without a class: -15% to all systems excluding thusters

Numerical buffs/nerfs to the entire ship would make it easy for devs and servers to balance out certain classes. Want better miners? +100% yield instead. Like battleships? +50% damage instead. Since this would be done from one block, it would help save block ids as well.

Custom Classes
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What if you want a combat salvager which isn't part of the default list? With custom classes, this wouldn't be a problem. There could be a list of all available bonuses and a list of all penalties and you could select the bonuses you want, but for every bonus you need to choose a penalty. After choosing bonuses and penalties you would name your class and choose what icon to show in the navigation tab based on the bonuses. The percentages of the bonuses would be limited and the sum penalty's percentages would have to equal the sum of the bonuses percentages.

That's my idea, tell me what you think.
Sorry for the poor organization.​

 

[Blakpik]

I know that many people are going to complain that this is too controlling and what-have-you. But I agree with it. Although, one edit I'd like to see made, I don't think any stat should be penalised in a classless ship, just set everything to the flat defaults.

 

[Captainredfox]

I know that many people are going to complain that this is too controlling and what-have-you. But I agree with it. Although, one edit I'd like to see made, I don't think any stat should be penalised in a classless ship, just set everything to the flat defaults.

Jack-of-all-trades-master-of-all ships make owning multiple ships just bragging rights, in my opinion. Right now ships of similar mass are basically skins.

I agree with no penalties on classless ships, that was kind of an afterthought on my part.

 

[friendofvampires]

I think classed ships would be very interesting and would allow some variation, and this seems one of the easiest ways to do it. Also +1 that the simplicity is easy on new players too

 

[Spartan-228]

This is good, but i don't really see the need for default classes, except for an example. Other then that players are more likely to just make their own.

 

[EricBlank]

I had been thinking of something effectively identical, although I didn't want to use blocks.

Spartan also has a good point about default classes.

And then there was a discussion about how to use faction points for similar bonuses a while back...

Perhaps all of this can be combined into a system like, you can enter the faction module on your ship and assign it some bonus effects, at the cost of a debuff to other systems not directly related, maybe determined at random with some restrictions, and save these as ship specializations for later personal use. When you reboot the ship, you get the specializations you selected applied, or removed. Rebooting in the middle of a fight already makes you very vulnerable for the duration, and gets reset, iirc, when you get hit.

But you can also pay faction points to get a faction-wide, lets call it a fleet doctrine, that does basically the same thing on any ship owned by your faction. You have to pay faction points every time you want to change it, depending on the buff values you wanted to apply, and the change takes a couple minutes.

Specializations extend down to children and nullify the child's specialization, if any, until it undocks.

As an example of a specialization for a non-combat craft, if you select a specialization that gives you a 30% salvage beam yield bonus, you get a 30% debuff to: weapon systems damage or range, weapon power usage increase. You could have two unrelated buffs, like 15% bonus to salvage yield and 20% to power production, but you get two debuffs this time.

Gods, this would be so goddamn hard to balance...

edit: I'd save the class specialization to the server, and apply it to ships, and save a copy of the class to the blueprints. You can roll a new class to hopefully get less painful debuffs if you don't like the one you got, but the old class remains on old vessels.
To kill server bloat (hopefully?), give players a limit to the number of personal class definitions they can have, and if they want to make a new one, prompt them to choose an old one to forget. Ships with that class will be reset to neutral. I don't see why these would be huge files, though, so I suppose the saved class limit could be pretty high without hurting the server real bad.

 

[philthy mcnasty]

Wasn't there supposed to be an RPG style system added to the game later on? Something to do with upgrading your suit?

I would rather have the buffs placed on players, not on ships. This would make hiring crew more useful then bobby ai, as having diggy dwarf man the salvage beams, and boom boom fred man the missiles for the respective buffs.

 

[MeRobo]

Perhaps all of this can be combined into a system like, you can enter the faction module on your ship and assign it some bonus effects, at the cost of a debuff to other systems not directly related, maybe determined at random with some restrictions, and save these as ship specializations for later personal use. When you reboot the ship, you get the specializations you selected applied, or removed. Rebooting in the middle of a fight already makes you very vulnerable for the duration, and gets reset, iirc, when you get hit.

I don't understand why there should be this random component to it.
Wouldn't it be easier to balance if there was the choice of 1:Type of buff, 2:Type of debuff and 3:Intensity?

 

[Winterhome]

Right now ships of similar mass are basically skins.

I beg to differ. I regularly see ships that are designed so completely differently from other ships that their function in combat isn't remotely the same or even predictable.

This will only serve to enhance the Rock Paper Scissors aspects of the game. If you build a specialized ship, you're already beating the hell out of any other ship that you're designed to counter.

 

[Captainredfox]

I beg to differ. I regularly see ships that are designed so completely differently from other ships that their function in combat isn't remotely the same or even predictable.

I don't really see that. Starmade combat is at its core is so simple.
1. Shoot missile 2. switch to cannon of correct effect until missile recharges 3. repeat until target or you die.

I would rather have the buffs placed on players, not on ships. This would make hiring crew more useful then bobby ai, as having diggy dwarf man the salvage beams, and boom boom fred man the missiles for the respective buffs.

That would make you have to be in teamspeak or skype to play effectively, not everyone can do that.

 

[Jaaskinal]

I beg to differ. I regularly see ships that are designed so completely differently from other ships that their function in combat isn't remotely the same or even predictable.

This will only serve to enhance the Rock Paper Scissors aspects of the game. If you build a specialized ship, you're already beating the hell out of any other ship that you're designed to counter.

In addition to this, think of all the factors from just five basic systems interacting with everything else.
High shield capacity in relation to everything else? Tanky, but difficult to jam properly or to have good weapons, even makes it difficult to move properly.
High shield regen in relation to everything else? Your hull can tank a lot, and anyone who doesn't have the alpha to kill you basically can't kill you. Pretty power intensive though so it's hard to jam, have good weapons, and move.
High power capacity in relation to everything else? Mother of glass cannons; alpha all the way. Can't move, jam, or tank, but it doesn't need to if it can kill you in one shot.
High power regeneration in relation to everything else? DPS is nice, jamming is easy. If you go overboard, it can be hard to move/tank.
High thrust in relation to everything else? If you can manage enough power to use overdrive, no one can out run you without a jump drive; and some time in the future that might not even be possible. You are a gnat though, you barely damage them, and if they hit you you're done. Road-runner personified.

 

[CyberTao]

Ever compared similar sized ships of different factions? Thryn has a lot of missiles, NFD has a lot of rapid cannons, and I know there is one that uses a lot of beams.

I dislike the idea of 'classes' because they are either so god damn many of them it's a pain to go through, or limited and there will be people who dont make something because it isn't supported. You'd have to strip out parts like "X battleship" because that starts defining builds. Schine has already said they are not going to define things like "Battleship" or "fighter", so you'rw down to "shield tank", "missile spammer" or other names that merely give people a boost for building ships within the lines.

No.

 

[Lecic]

No. You don't need to do this kind of thing, because specialized ships ALREADY have these kinds of things.

Missile Cruiser: +%200 missile range and speed -50% AMC and beam damage -10% shield

Not needed! Only AI can hit things that are outside your sector and any sectors touching it. Missiles that fast would also be completely impossible to hit with PD. That's faster than most cannon rounds. If you want a "missile cruiser," just build a ship with more missile tubes than cannon barrels or beam arrays! You use blocks to define your role.

Battleship: +100% shield capacity and recharge -50% missile damage +25% cannon and beam damage

How to build a battleship with these stats within the current game- take an existing battleship. Gut most of its missile systems. Replace with shields and cannons! Tada! Mother fucking battleship, as you have defined it.

Explorer: -80% to all weapons +100% faster jumpdrive charge

How to build an explorer with these stats within the current game- take an existing ship. Rip out most of the weapons. Replace with jump drive modules. Wow, it's almost like Schema intended for these kinds of classifications to arise naturally through BLOCKS.

Without a class: -15% to all systems excluding thusters

Yeah, just nerf everything that doesn't follow your strict class rules. What a great idea.

Schema has said on multiple occasions that he doesn't want things controlled by meta bits that have no actual effect on how a ship is built. He wants a ships stats to be defined by how many and the way blocks are placed. That's why he got rid of things like the weapon sliders in exchange for the master/slave/effect systems. This completely goes against that!

Specializations are already a thing, and a ship specialized to take on jack-of-all-trades ships will ALWAYS WIN if they're the same amount of blocks and the pilot of the specialized ship isn't a crappy pilot compared to the jack-of-all-trades ship.

 

[Jaaskinal]

I don't really see that. Starmade combat is at its core is so simple.
1. Shoot missile 2. switch to cannon of correct effect until missile recharges 3. repeat until target or you die.



That would make you have to be in teamspeak or skype to play effectively, not everyone can do that.

Divide et impera. You have to have the power capacity to make your missile worth anything, you have to have the regen to make your cannon worth anything. You have to have your shield capacity worth what your power capacity lacks and your shield regen worth what your power capacity lacks; a glass cannon missile/beam/ion + missile/beam/explosive ship with just enough power regen to jam would murder that.

 

[Captainredfox]

Ever compared similar sized ships of different factions? Thryn has a lot of missiles, NFD has a lot of rapid cannons, and I know there is one that uses a lot of beams.

Those factions don't have to use them, they choose to be different. If they wanted they could be a missile and beam and cannon faction. The combat in this game isn't tactical because there are too few differences and modes of attack. What's the need of a diverse fleet when you can use a bunch of the same ship that's good at everything?

This idea wouldn't limit anything, classless ships aren't nerfed by this. This idea just gives you more options.

 

[Winterhome]

Those factions don't have to use them, they choose to be different. If they wanted they could be a missile and beam and cannon faction. The combat in this game isn't tactical because there are too few differences and modes of attack. What's the need of a diverse fleet when you can use a bunch of the same ship that's good at everything?

This idea wouldn't limit anything, classless ships aren't nerfed by this. This idea just gives you more options.

Considering that you're able to use long range turret artillery ships to devastating effect while you have a tank ship or two in the middle of a fight...

 

[Captainredfox]

snip

Dude. It was just something that I thought was a good idea, calm down. Not to mention if you would have read all the posts you would have seen that I said nerfing everything was an afterthought and that it was a dumb idea and that those strict classes were customizable.

Sorry I'm so chalk full of awful ideas.

 

[CyberTao]

What's the need of a diverse fleet when you can use a bunch of the same ship that's good at everything?

Whats the point of restrictions and templates in a Sandbox game? These factions made these ships because they liked the weapons, and were allowed to use them as such. Weapons are "similar" by design, it's intention, that way we can have more options and not have to worry about optimal.

I'd rather see diverse faction fleets and toys then everyone using the same set of toys. A ship that is focused on cannons is inheritly stronger versus missile based ships. Missile based ships have an advantage over beam ships due to range. Beams can beat cannons on accuracy.
Beams can pierce systems, but not hull. Cannons are punchthrough. Missiles are counterable hull busters. Whats good versus PD, considering shields need to drop a bit first? What is best against hull or systems?

What you end up using depends on the enemy ships. If everyone used the same ships then everyone will continue to use the same ships because they are easily countered. That is the fault of community meta, not the game. Game is fine, people just like to min-max on Alpha numbers of an incomplete game, the whole reason "everyone uses missiles" is because they were told "everyone uses missiles". Missiles aren't the end-all anymore, and people are starting to use a wider range of weapons as the last update fixed a part of that. Give things time to adjust and normalize.

Nothing is nerfed, it just gives you a buff for colouring inside the lines. That is the same thing, just spun on it's head.

 

[Jaaskinal]

Those factions don't have to use them, they choose to be different. If they wanted they could be a missile and beam and cannon faction. The combat in this game isn't tactical because there are too few differences and modes of attack. What's the need of a diverse fleet when you can use a bunch of the same ship that's good at everything?

This idea wouldn't limit anything, classless ships aren't nerfed by this. This idea just gives you more options.

That's actually kindof insulting. A lot of time was spent pondering what weapons to use for what reasons; and not even that, how many in groups and how many groups is always pondered by my faction. I was yelled at by a factionmate because a hullbuster weapon I made wasn't up to spec, even though by your standards it would have been just the same. They didn't even want me to change the system, it was the same combinations of weapon, just in a different patter, with a different number of groups and a specific number of blocks in those groups.

 

[Captainredfox]

That's actually kindof insulting.

Well it wasn't supposed to be, my apologies; but that is just my opinion.