Add-on to the planned faction system

[Nauvran]

So there is a new faction system planed with points needed for securing ones homebase and maybe other bases/stations.


But what if we add another kind of point, a type of point that is obtainable via special missions or something.

These points would be used for ships.
The system would be made so that ships under a certain mass, lets say 50, are free, so you have a chance to fly around and get more of these points.

The ships would cost a certain amount of points depending on they mass/size (depends on what devs thinks is best).

But to make it a bit more interesting for factions, we could also add a vehicle cap, which might be upgraded by either adding something to your station(might need a new type o' block) or by doing some special missions.

Spoiler: Point and cap system like 40k?

It could be like in the top left, lets say the blue control points are for the bases, they are used for protection, the green energy points are for ships, they are needed to spawn in ships bigger than a certain mass, now the cap system would work like it does in the 40k strategy games (like the on there is a pic of), you need upgrades/buildings to increase the amount of vehicles you are able to spawn/build


In theory this might make sure faction needs to be more tactical with their battles and the need to do the missions are now greater. Of course there could be added other ways to obtain the points for these ships.

It might also be an idea to do so that certain blocks increases the amount of points that is needed to buy this ship. For example would shield storage need a bit more points than normal hull.

And now you might be thinking, what about if I build a ship instead of spawning one.
well to handle this matter it could be made so that you can build the ship until you run out of points, and the system would warn you if it thinks you are a building a ship bigger than what you have capacity for.


Im sorry if this is confusing, I just made it up as I began writing. But feel free to "correct" me or give suggestions and of course tell me if you would like this ingame and yaddda yaddda yadda....

Hope you liked the read of my mind :p

Oh and my thanks to @Incap and @iHasTnt for giving me the idea.

 

[jayman38]

I think capping purchase and faction piloting will be a good thing... After the Alpha stage of the game. It'll be good for keeping new players in small ships in Beta testing and release. Players who get to play with gigantic ships will have earned the right. While the game is in Alpha, this limit will probably not be implemented. We need to test late-game features such as big ships without having to build up to it.

I believe you should have the right to build unlimited, but maybe it could be a server configuration. (E.g. FACTION_POINT_BUILD_LIMIT=True) Limiting building size by faction points would have a good effect on limiting troll behavior. They will be less troublesome in smaller ships. Generally speaking, your standard-issue troll won't have the patience to build up faction points before spreading havoc. I imagine an entire faction in a server dedicated to trolls, so faction points should not be something that the faction owner is able to hand out like candy. If they could, troll faction owners would just give all their members full faction points to drive any ship they want. I shudder to think of such a faction, but coop trolling is all too common in online gaming.

 

[Nauvran]

It would also make sure that factions would need to be a bit more strategic about their battles and decisions.
And maybe one day we can get a command central like thing to have one use that to command the members around, kinda like in Natural selection 2, where you have a guy to command you around.

hmm maybe it could be made so that you would only use the capacity points if the ship is factioned.
So you can build how large you want but if you want to use it in a faction or use the turrets, you would need to have the capacity to have such a large ship.

 

[mrsinister]

I like this and it sounds very interesting to me Also, could I have a rough estimate on points needed for a Titan Class ship? I just need something to plug into the chart I am doing. That way I can adjust for smaller craft on down to shuttles and fighters.

 

[Nauvran]

I like this and it sounds very interesting to me Also, could I have a rough estimate on points needed for a Titan Class ship? I just need something to plug into the chart I am doing. That way I can adjust for smaller craft on down to shuttles and fighters.

Well if I can find time to do it then I will certainly try and see if I can make some suggestions on how the point system would be.
But it would probably take some time and be kinda difficult since I havent done such things before.

 

[mrsinister]

Well if I can find time to do it then I will certainly try and see if I can make some suggestions on how the point system would be.
But it would probably take some time and be kinda difficult since I havent done such things before.

No worries, take your time, I will leave a space to plug the numbers in then.

 

[NeonSturm]

I think it would be great if stations act as control point towers act in WH40K.

Owning a control point gives you +4. Building a small stations gives you +4+1. Building a big gives you +4+5 ... I like the requirement of stations and territory. rather than all stuff in a protected home.

As far as I remember, "Dark Crusade" uses energy for basic troops which are limited by a global unit limit.
More advanced troops require control points (or is it the opposite?) Vehicles have a separate limit.

One goal in WH40K is to get most power with lowest usage of unit limit.

Smaller troops spawn in groups of 2-5 but count as 1 or 2.

I am not sure if this can work similar in StarMade (first-person), but it can work for a fleet-battle (strategic).

 

[max stripe]

and wut if i decided to get rich and spawn in my titan wile not in a faction?
then ur saying it wouldnt spawn because i dont have "faction points"?
cant have points if ur not in a faction

 

[mrsinister]

and wut if i decided to get rich and spawn in my titan wile not in a faction?
then ur saying it wouldnt spawn because i dont have "faction points"?
cant have points if ur not in a faction

you could make your own faction....or you possibly could get points another way, say.. mining, selling, trade runs, missions, etc... I don't know, just throwing that out there...you could be considered neutral faction and accrue points and use them that way, and they would also carry over if you make your own or join one.

most important point would be this.... if what the OP is doing, is in-fact an Add-On, then don't download it. then no worries.

 

[Nauvran]

I think it would be great if stations act as control point towers act in WH40K.

Owning a control point gives you +4. Building a small stations gives you +4+1. Building a big gives you +4+5 ... I like the requirement of stations and territory. rather than all stuff in a protected home.

As far as I remember, "Dark Crusade" uses energy for basic troops which are limited by a global unit limit.
More advanced troops require control points (or is it the opposite?) Vehicles have a separate limit.

One goal in WH40K is to get most power with lowest usage of unit limit.

Smaller troops spawn in groups of 2-5 but count as 1 or 2.

I am not sure if this can work similar in StarMade (first-person), but it can work for a fleet-battle (strategic).

Hmm that might be a good idea, to use the territory for expanding the max capacity of ships but maybe it would be more balanced if the points and and capacity upgrades can be earned by both the missions and by conquering territories.

I believe its control points for normal and then control and power for special, since the control points are easier to get.
Vehicles uses both but in higher numbers, at least that's what I remember from last I played soulstorm.

Is it? I usully just make some tanks and some support units, depending on what race I play.

Well that depends on the race, race's like the Imperium can get lots more troops in one small group than the others, same with orcs.

I think we could get it to work with the ships and the strategy that would be needed to fight battles.

 

[Nauvran]

and wut if i decided to get rich and spawn in my titan wile not in a faction?
then ur saying it wouldnt spawn because i dont have "faction points"?
cant have points if ur not in a faction

You would need to make a oneman faction and do the missions that gets you the points you need but the problem you will have is not with my idea but with how the new faction system will work, as far as I remember the devs said something about them wanting to get rid of oneman factions and make people work together. But I could remember wrong, so dont take my word for it.

you could make your own faction....or you possibly could get points another way, say.. mining, selling, trade runs, missions, etc... I don't know, just throwing that out there...you could be considered neutral faction and accrue points and use them that way, and they would also carry over if you make your own or join one.

most important point would be this.... if what the OP is doing, is in-fact an Add-On, then don't download it. then no worries.

I have no idea how to make mods, so this is just a suggestion for what the devs could add on to the planned faction system.

 

[jayman38]

Just some quick ideas on how faction points could work with regard to lone-wolf players:
1. Server-configurable max limit on "none" faction points. Maybe you can get up to some arbitrary number like 200,000 and you can't get any more no matter what you do, and that's the most blocks you can have in a ship you own while you are not a part of any faction. (This is just an example, and the numbers will need more thought.)
2. Have a faction-configurable percentage carryover of faction points. For example, assuming you hit the lone-wolf limit of 200,000 faction points, you join the "School of Hard Knocks" faction with a 0% carryover, and you have to start over at 0 faction points when you join that faction. On the other hand, you could instead join the "Easy Breezy" faction with a 99% carryover, and you start that faction with 198,000 faction points. (Faction names are fictional. Any relation to real factions, living or dead is purely coincidental.)

 

[Nauvran]

So I finally got some math together for this suggestion.
Though it wasnt me who did the math (since Im terrible at the math needed for this)
So I got a friend to help me out.

The formula is: p = 1*10^(-22)*x^4+1.8*10^(-13)*x^3+1*10^(-9)*x^2+0.05*x-25
P is the points for which you buy the ship.
X is the mass

This is how my friend got the curve to look like.

honestly I do not understand the equation/formula very well myself
But I hope some of you math people can understand it well enough :P

 

[Megacrafter127]

p = 1*10^(-22)*x^4+1.8*10^(-13)*x^3+1*10^(-9)*x^2+0.05*x-25

That is a nice polynome.
However, the rate of it's growth will grow out of control after a certain point.

 

[NeonSturm]

p = 1*10^(-22)*x^4+1.8*10^(-13)*x^3+1*10^(-9)*x^2+0.05*x-25

Is bad formatted and like machine code instead of Java to humans with the collapsed white-space.

Likewise you could write all posts on this thread in a single line. and expect users to use the horizontal scroll bar.

p = 1*10^(-22)*x^4+1.8*10^(-13)*x^3+1*10^(-9)*x^2+0.05*x-25
Can be written as:
p = 0

+ 1 * 10^(-22) == (22 zeroes in) 0.000...0001

* x^4​

+ 1.8 * 10^(-13) == (13 zeroes in) 0.000...00018

* x^3​

+ 1 * 10^(-9) == (9 zeroes in) 0.000000001

* x^2​

+ 0.05

* x​

- 25​

This formula has 5 parts. It is a function utilizing x 5 times. (-25*x^0 == -25*1 and thus not written explicitly)


Thus it has 9 "segments" which are separated by the break-even point of 2 parts

each part after the first splits one previous part in 2 and adds a third, thus adding 2 new parts.

more descriptive:

9 = 1+ 2*(5-1)​

easier version:

9x = 2*4visible-x +1invisible-x
((x = number segments))​

That is a nice polynome.
However, the rate of it's growth will grow out of control after a certain point.

The function will go to +MaxInt on the Y (=cost axis) faster than reaching +maxInt on the X (=mass axis)

This means that the credit cap is a hard cap on ship mass and you also have a soft cap before.

 

[marcus87]

Maybe the limit could be crew. For a ship of a certain mass you have to have say x crewmember. Crew cost money and need housing at a base. This way you have to balance how many you hire and the need for infrastructure.

And it could get expanded quite good. Think about experience for the crewmember. The basic crewmen starts with 50 points in engeneering, combat and command. A Ships gets a certain amount of command points. Lets say I build a frigate which needs 100 command points to operate. Players could get more of those from the start, so I could command the ship alone. But if I wanted to use a cruiser which needs 200 command points I need to hire crew and link them to the ship.

The same way all other components require such point to operate. If I have a lot of guns I need crewmen to operate these.

 

[Megacrafter127]

That is a nice polynome.
However, the rate of it's growth will grow out of control after a certain point.

The function will go to +MaxInt on the Y (=cost axis) faster than reaching +maxInt on the X (=mass axis)

This means that the credit cap is a hard cap on ship mass and you also have a soft cap before.

I wasn't referring to type-limits there. The growth rate of this function at a given point X is:

p'(x) = 4*10^(-22) * x^3

+ 5.4 * 10^(-13)* x^2
2* 10^(-9)* x
+ 0.05​

That still is a polynome 3rd grade(might also be known as a cubic function). The growth rate will grow extremely high at one point, and cause and addition of 0.1 mass to result in an addition of multiple billion faction points of the ship's worth.
Polynomes above 2nd grade tend to be bad balancing functions when there is no upper limit on the control variable.

 

[NeonSturm]

Maybe the limit could be crew. For a ship of a certain mass you have to have say x crewmember. Crew cost money and need housing at a base. This way you have to balance how many you hire and the need for infrastructure.

And it could get expanded quite good. Think about experience for the crewmember. The basic crewmen starts with 50 points in engeneering, combat and command. A Ships gets a certain amount of command points. Lets say I build a frigate which needs 100 command points to operate. Players could get more of those from the start, so I could command the ship alone. But if I wanted to use a cruiser which needs 200 command points I need to hire crew and link them to the ship.

The same way all other components require such point to operate. If I have a lot of guns I need crewmen to operate these.

On the 1st + 2nd sentence I was like "another linear scaling thing "
On the 3rd sentence like "Money sink, NOOO! I serverely dislike!"

But then I got the idea about "loyal" crew-members.

Loyalty can increase (thus no cost) if you work very close and on a "we are family" basis.

1. The more crew you have, the more difficult it gets to have all being loyal.

2. 100% loyalty should be easily possible with 3+you to maybe 10+you crew-man (except you are a dick towards your crew).

3. All above this number will be more distant to you Math(increases loyalty PreMult proportionally to (1/AfterMult) around x^pow)
​

A general and a merchant will both have equal 100% locale peoples.

1. A general will additionally have some loyalty less than 100% among his crew (= more in total)

2. But also more which want to get paid (=more paid on average per crew member)​

If you continue to suicide crew, they should ask for more money as base value (maybe dependent on how many % survive an ingame-day with you)

You are able to reach a point where you are only able to have loyal crew or illegal slaves (more common among pirates?).​

I wasn't referring to type-limits there. The growth rate of this function at a given point X is:

p'(x) = 4*10^(-22) * x^3

+ 5.4 * 10^(-13)* x^2
2* 10^(-9)* x
+ 0.05​

That still is a polynome 3rd grade(might also be known as a cubic function). The growth rate will grow extremely high at one point, and cause and addition of 0.1 mass to result in an addition of multiple billion faction points of the ship's worth.
Polynomes above 2nd grade tend to be bad balancing functions when there is no upper limit on the control variable.

I think you copied the formula wrong. where is your x^4?
But I agree on your last sentence

 

[marcus87]

While this loyality sounds interesting, it is something to be implemented when crew allready work. What we need is a limiting factor for ships. That could be simple points, but that would be boring. And I dislike hardcoded barriers. When you have to hire crew for your ship and have to pay them. Then we have the beginning for a real economy. A faction had to work for her fleet.

And pleaase I do not mean to limit the number of ships a faction can have. Letzt say you have 1000 npc´s in your faction 600 are on ships and you want to hop in the titan, well not today this one needs 800 crew. Take the friate :D

 

[NeonSturm]

And pleaase I do not mean to limit the number of ships a faction can have. Letzt say you have 1000 npc´s in your faction 600 are on ships and you want to hop in the titan, well not today this one needs 800 crew. Take the friate :D

partially true, partially invalid arguments...

A faction has no limits. Player have.

And you could man many ships with the same crew, just not simultaneously.

(Maybe could be RP limited to ships with the same language on alien-interfaces ... ​

I like my idea because it does not look artificial.

The game does not even have to require them on a ship, but instead could also accept them in a maintenance area for the ship on your home-base and ignore how often you are there.
They just have to be ready for the case (which would also let them enable many ships simultaneously without looking artificial or being annoying to a player.)​