StarMade Dev Blog 17 November 2017

[Non]

you ship would be less effective because you spent more power on getting a weaker shield

Have you done any pvp shipbuilding?

 

[Fellow Starmadian]

yeah Non I think schema is referring to how he would like to balance shields, not how they work currently.

 

[schema]

For fun, yes. But I never did it in a very serious manner i must admit. it is just not my style of playing the game.

 

[Dire Venom]

Great work. Some exciting features and some necessary fixes. There are still issues as others have pointed out - so I won't get into those.

I'm interested in what the next few major updates will bring - I feel they will make or break this game.

Pressure is on.

This^^
Some really awesome additions here, such as manually aimed turrets (from mother) and various system configs for sector wide effects etc and the like. I'm glad to see these features getting added, they sure get me excited!
Of course there are various other issues to work through <(as some players have verbaly diarrheaed all over this thread -_- )>, but thanks for all your hard work devs!

 

[Zekester81]

you cannot place a shield within another shield's radius

Does this mean if I create docked hulls, the shields on either the docked hulls or the main entity will not work because they are inside of one of the others shield bubbles, or will the docked entity retain it's own shields on top of the main entities shields? I ask because i haven't tried. Got tired of the huge linear distance now required(in dev builds) to power anything. Will wait for a full release to try any more, kinda burnt out right now.

 

[Non]

I think schema is referring to how he would like to balance shields

What he is describing and what the dev builds are showing simply don't line up

 

[schema]

pretty much Zekester81
there will be finer tweaks on it. We are also still looking into finding the best balance for power distances. Disclaimer: nothing is final yet
[doublepost=1510979406,1510979365][/doublepost]Non yes it's not in the dev build like that yet. They aren't finished yet.

 

[Ithirahad]

For fun, yes. But I never did it in a very serious manner i must admit. it is just not my style of playing the game.

Yeah, which is understandable... but with that being the case, given the intricacies of how some mechanics pan out in PvP, you'd be ill-advised (literally) to go implementing entire new features that largely affect PvP, without first at least asking for thoughts on how it might pan out (and what alternatives might exist to accomplish the desired goal).

 

[Non]

Non yes it's not in the dev build like that yet. They aren't finished yet.

Not to offend, but given how ineffective the new shields are at accomplishing what you want, why should we trust you to fix it? Why don't you trust out ideas and solutions to these problems?

 

[schema]

Ithirahad we asked and read a lot of things. That's why also changed our original proposal. Our current approach tries to span the distance between non pvp and pvp building. Everyone has their own idea of how things should work. There is no way to make everyone happy unfortunately, as much as i would love to have it.

What this new power system excels in, however, is in how dynamic it is in terms of balance. It can take drastically different shapes with just a few config changes.

 

[kiddan]

schema Would it not be possible to arrange testing sessions with a couple experienced PvP players? I'd assume some in-game brainstorming between experienced community members and Schine might speed-up balancing and help avoid exploits. There's only so much that can be communicated on a forum, let alone with hypothetical scenarios.

 

[schema]

Non you dont have to trust me in anything, and it's obvious that you don't. I outlined the way I want them to work, and all I can say is that I will do my best to make them work right for balance.

 

[Non]

What this new power system excels in, however, is in how dynamic it is in terms of balance. It can take drastically different shapes with just a few config changes.

Same for current power.
[doublepost=1510979901,1510979846][/doublepost]

I can say is that I will do my best to make them work right for balance.

While it doesn't comfort me in the least, I appreciate that.

 

[schema]

kiddan I would like that. However, looking at this thread so far, it cannot get out of hand in terms on how we talk to each other. I'm always willing to listen to criticism as long as people are polite and respectful. Unfortunately conversations often end up with name calling and grudges afterwards.
[doublepost=1510979971,1510979913][/doublepost]Non the old power system has no control over reactor size, which is one of the most valuable factors for tweaking balance.

 

[Non]

the old power system has no control over reactor size

Please explain.

 

[Ithirahad]

IthirahadOur current approach tries to span the distance between non pvp and pvp building.

Looking at the system, that's clearly the intention, but evidently the optimal configurations of ships for this system are actually even further from typical 'non-PVP building' than in the old one (ignoring spaghetti for the moment)

What this new power system excels in, however, is in how dynamic it is in terms of balance. It can take drastically different shapes with just a few config changes.

Kind of, but the base mechanic has unfortunate implications regardless of config...

 

[Zekester81]

We are also still looking into finding the best balance for power distances.

Well, if you want my input, I liked the distances between reactor/stabilizer in build 200.136-137 a lot better than the current ones. Just my opinion though. With those shorter distances I was able to fully refit older ships that had been made to fit the new system, while still not reaching maximum stabilization, but I could make them functional. Under the last one I tried(200.171?) I was not able to do so, meaning all previous builds would have to be scrapped and completely started from scratch. I know that not everyone agrees with me on this, but I'd like to be able to use SOME of my older builds with the new power system. Every previous update we have been able(mostly) to refit and get them to work, but it seems like that may not be the case with this update. Don't get me wrong, I will totally start over if I have to, but I won't necessarily like having to do so. I'm not even building PVP ships yet, waiting until a beta game at least to start that stuff where more things will be fleshed out and much closer to a complete game.

 

[schema]

Basically the main idea behind the stabilizers is to tie ship size to reactor size. The problem in the old system is that you can always fill your complete ship with power. Now if you put on any limit on that, you effectively put a limit on ship sizes as well.

The problem is always that ships don't scale linear, which means that a ship that has double the surface doesn't have double the volume.

The new system keeps the reactor small while forcing the player to build bigger. That way we made the system independent from the surface-to-volume problem

 

[Lecic]

Maybe this should make things clearer.

This is a simple example that allows your ship to keep a large number of shields due to the generator's placement at the rear of the ship, while making it essentially invulnerable from the front until the giant block of armor is removed enough to effectively damage the shields. At combat ranges (3-10km) there is no aiming around the edge of the front to clip the tops of the turrets or engine pods.

And that's just with "normal" ship shapes. What if I decided to build a sphere ship that's entirely surrounded in thick, low tier armor, or other irregular ship designs?

 

[schema]

As said, the reactor distances are in no way final. Unless we see different builds and what exactly they are capable of we can only kind of calculate it based on the formulas and tests. We will of course adapt balance when necessary.
[doublepost=1510980429,1510980327][/doublepost]Lecic what exact difference does this make over a global shield in the same situation? In that case you would take out the shield first and then the armor. you would go through the same amount of damage.