Shields
Lately I have been realizing how unbalanced Player vs. Player is for Starmade. There are only three things people need to consider when building a ship for combat. These are weapons, shields, and energy. This makes sense, but there is this one big problem. Shield Regeneration. It is possible to make the shields on a ship regenerate faster than you take damage. This means, someone can shoot at you and shoot and shoot and get no where. I could place my ship in the middle of a fleet of a hundred Isanth VI's or IV's (or whatever model it is) and sit there for hours on hours soaking in the damage and smirking at my foes (though my cheeks would start to hurt). But quite frankly, this is very unrealistic when compared to most people's ideas of how space ships work (setting aside the fact that any ships that have energy shields are fictional). Any ship with a DPS (Damage Per Second) lower than the regeneration of the enemy's shields will be incapable of dealing any damage what so ever. The only way to break past that barrier is to have a large ship. I don't have problems with having a large ship, but I don't think I should need a ship the same size (though it would probably be bigger) to even have a chance of taking them out. I'd rather have some skill and strategy put into fighting than solely material.
I have come up with a few ways I think that this problem could be fixed.
1. Lowering the amount of regeneration given from shields.
2. While taking damage, ships are unable to recharge, and will take a few seconds once the damage has stopped to regenerate.
These two points should really be kept together because it wouldn't be unfair if you missed your opponet a few times, or they teleport around due to lagg/crossing a sector, or they fly too close to one side of your ship that you can't hit them. I think the regeneration of shields should be a slow, after-you've-won-the-battle thing.
Weapons
But if we are going to reduce the power of shields, we mustn't neglect weapon power. Sure you may not be able to break through someones shields now, but if this is implemented, weapons would hurt a whole lot more. Now that we have one problem solved, we have to make sure that all the other features are balanced with this.
Here is another list of ways to balance combat, refering to weapons of course.
1, Reduce weapon's damage to shields. Note that this would not change weapon's damage to blocks.
2. As much as I hate to say it, increase power consumption for larger weapons. This would make batteries and energy generators more important.
Fighters
In the current game, making carriers for holding fighters and small assault ships is pointless when faced with a Dreadnaught, but with these changes, having you and your friends/faction join up on an coordinated ambush would be far more effective than fighting alone in another large ship. With the turning speed of large ships being so slow, a small group of agile fighters could easily flank the cumbersome ship. But there is a counter to this...
Turrets!
Turrets are the perfect anti-fighter weapon. You could place an abundance of Ai-Controlled Turrets on your ship to put the odds better in your favor, while giving those fighters a run for the money and a interesting challenge. However, there is one thing that needs to be addressed if the shields are nerfed. The shields from the ship should engulf and encase the turrets, that way you can focus more on adding firepower to your turrets, which are an extension of the ship rather than mini-ships that can't fly.
Thanks For Reading This!
I would like to thank schema for making this game and putting endless months worth of work trying to make it run smoother and play better. I would like also to thank Mr.BeetleBear for making awesome tutorial videos (which I hope he posts more soon). And lastly I would like to thank you for taking your time to read this.
Lately I have been realizing how unbalanced Player vs. Player is for Starmade. There are only three things people need to consider when building a ship for combat. These are weapons, shields, and energy. This makes sense, but there is this one big problem. Shield Regeneration. It is possible to make the shields on a ship regenerate faster than you take damage. This means, someone can shoot at you and shoot and shoot and get no where. I could place my ship in the middle of a fleet of a hundred Isanth VI's or IV's (or whatever model it is) and sit there for hours on hours soaking in the damage and smirking at my foes (though my cheeks would start to hurt). But quite frankly, this is very unrealistic when compared to most people's ideas of how space ships work (setting aside the fact that any ships that have energy shields are fictional). Any ship with a DPS (Damage Per Second) lower than the regeneration of the enemy's shields will be incapable of dealing any damage what so ever. The only way to break past that barrier is to have a large ship. I don't have problems with having a large ship, but I don't think I should need a ship the same size (though it would probably be bigger) to even have a chance of taking them out. I'd rather have some skill and strategy put into fighting than solely material.
I have come up with a few ways I think that this problem could be fixed.
1. Lowering the amount of regeneration given from shields.
2. While taking damage, ships are unable to recharge, and will take a few seconds once the damage has stopped to regenerate.
These two points should really be kept together because it wouldn't be unfair if you missed your opponet a few times, or they teleport around due to lagg/crossing a sector, or they fly too close to one side of your ship that you can't hit them. I think the regeneration of shields should be a slow, after-you've-won-the-battle thing.
Weapons
But if we are going to reduce the power of shields, we mustn't neglect weapon power. Sure you may not be able to break through someones shields now, but if this is implemented, weapons would hurt a whole lot more. Now that we have one problem solved, we have to make sure that all the other features are balanced with this.
Here is another list of ways to balance combat, refering to weapons of course.
1, Reduce weapon's damage to shields. Note that this would not change weapon's damage to blocks.
2. As much as I hate to say it, increase power consumption for larger weapons. This would make batteries and energy generators more important.
Fighters
In the current game, making carriers for holding fighters and small assault ships is pointless when faced with a Dreadnaught, but with these changes, having you and your friends/faction join up on an coordinated ambush would be far more effective than fighting alone in another large ship. With the turning speed of large ships being so slow, a small group of agile fighters could easily flank the cumbersome ship. But there is a counter to this...
Turrets!
Turrets are the perfect anti-fighter weapon. You could place an abundance of Ai-Controlled Turrets on your ship to put the odds better in your favor, while giving those fighters a run for the money and a interesting challenge. However, there is one thing that needs to be addressed if the shields are nerfed. The shields from the ship should engulf and encase the turrets, that way you can focus more on adding firepower to your turrets, which are an extension of the ship rather than mini-ships that can't fly.
Thanks For Reading This!
I would like to thank schema for making this game and putting endless months worth of work trying to make it run smoother and play better. I would like also to thank Mr.BeetleBear for making awesome tutorial videos (which I hope he posts more soon). And lastly I would like to thank you for taking your time to read this.
