Devblog 11th July 2017 - End Goal Document Part 1

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    1. Playing to see if features works
    2. Playing to see if said features are properly balanced (which falls under the "works" part)
    3. Playing to see if said features are fun and find out what to improve upon
    You know I work in a factory assembly line and your post immediately reminds me of a engineer who comes around to check what fucks up with our ability to get things done in time, who then relays the problem to another engineer who never ever lowers himself to the level of us working class filth so much as to come and see himself what the problem is. He who looks at listed problems, measures and numbers, does the math, goes to the workshop and makes a fancy new tool. This tool is then given to us and we're told "use this from now" and all should be well because the smart engineer made the calculations and this absolutely should solve our problems at certain point in the assembly line.

    The tool works good for the first few hours, but then it's gears loosens up, the metal bits soften and get worn from contact with other metals. We don't know how to fix this tool because we don't know what measures it's calibrated for. We can't use our old tools because they were taken away. Now our quality drops, the overseer comes and pours shit down our neck. These tools don't work because the smart engineer who made them never had to see them being used in practice or even the station they were going to be used at.

    But of course, that's our fault.
     

    Lancake

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    You know I work in a factory assembly line and your post immediately reminds me of a engineer who comes around to check what fucks up with our ability to get things done in time, who then relays the problem to another engineer who never ever lowers himself to the level of us working class filth so much as to come and see himself what the problem is. He who looks at listed problems, measures and numbers, does the math, goes to the workshop and makes a fancy new tool. This tool is then given to us and we're told "use this from now" and all should be well because the smart engineer made the calculations and this absolutely should solve our problems at certain point in the assembly line.

    The tool works good for the first few hours, but then it's gears loosens up, the metal bits soften and get worn from contact with other metals. We don't know how to fix this tool because we don't know what measures it's calibrated for. We can't use our old tools because they were taken away. Now our quality drops, the overseer comes and pours shit down our neck. These tools don't work because the smart engineer who made them never had to see them being used in practice or even the station they were going to be used at.

    But of course, that's our fault.
    ...?
     

    Lancake

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    Metaphors are hard to understand, I see.
    You mean pointless, I gave extra explanation on what I do when I play the game and why it can't be considered as "really playing the game".

    That metaphor is about big bosses not cooperating with their employees, and then also blaming the employees if something is wrong again. How does that have to do with me or what I said in those 3 lines?
     

    LunaIsBestPony

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    You keep giving proof that you don't play the game.

    We're trying to express how outstandingly egregious it is that the head tester and person who is in charge of virtually all game balance doesn't actually play the game.

    Boro's metaphor has to do you with dismissing Zyrr's and Lecic's posts as "trolling" when really all they're trying to do is raise complaints about where this game is going, in what way, and how information about the game is being delivered. As one of the devs of the game, you have an obligation to consider what they're saying and the veracity of their words.

    All of us really do have the wish of seeing Starmade become something better then it already is. Our methods of communication aren't the kindest, but our intentions are good and it's wildly offensive that you don't take into consideration the words of three of the most experienced players of the game.

    Posting before you are three of your potentially most valuable resources for doing your balancing and game development. It's genuinely upsetting to see you consider them as nothing more than dickheads who want to cause trouble.
     
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    No plan survives contact with the enemy, on in this case the forums.

    If they had said nothing. People would complain. They said something, and people did complain.

    What we as the players have been shown, is only the tiniest tip of the iceberg of what the developers are doing. They have a vision, and want to see it to the end.

    We as players, want a functional game that is enjoyable to play, and we want to know when this functional and enjoyable game will be ready. However, what we want and what the developmental vision is are two very different things. Furthermore, the time table for the game development is not up to the players to dictate, we are along for the ride, and can either work with, or work against the game as it stands.

    I for one was excited to see what the developmental vision was, and where they where aiming to take us, only to see a few sour apples jump in and try to derail the beneficent actions of the development team, with the their usual banter about how the Dev's are not doing a good enough job, or making claims about how the Dev's are out of touch with the community. Of all the MMO's I have played, and of all the sandboxes I have gotten into, Starmade is the only one that has ever given me prompt responses from the Dev's when I had a question regarding why something was not working, or how to do something in game.

    Love it or hate it, you play it by choice.
     
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    The post was interesting. The comments were...more interesting.

    I don't post much but I've been around here for a long time, I've read every dev blog there has been in the last 4 years. I admit I was a little disappointed in this post initially as I had also expected something a little meatier. I was expecting graphs, charts, a full Word document, spreadsheets, all that jazz. Essentially I was expecting the game design docs, although having read the various comments I've now realised that I read previous blogs wrong and so my expectations were far too high. In hindsight, releasing design docs when the game is still in alpha would be a fairly stupid idea given how much is likely to change in the coming years. I studied computer games technology at university and having written a couple of design docs myself, I know how monumentally stupid it would be to make them public for a game still in alpha (I will also say that I absolutely hated that course. Playing games is infinitely more interesting than actually creating them!).

    I'll reserve final judgement until all parts of the goals document have been released. I would however just point out the primary objective in releasing this sort of information should be to keep people interested in the game. You want people to get a glimpse of your ultimate vision, but there's not a massive amount of new information in this post, a lot of it has either been said before or is just common expectation. I think that in future parts we need to see something new, something fresh. That could be a hint at a previously unannounced feature, an update to the roadmap, maybe even a screenshot or two from an internal build? Just something to keep people coming back and playing the game.

    Please don't take the above as a criticism, just a friendly suggestion. This game has bags of potential, I just want to see a bit more of it! ;)
     

    Keptick

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    Reading this thread is just depressing...
     
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    Let me start by commenting on some stuff
    You mean exactly like how it is now, where small ships in "large" numbers (I put large in quotes because a dozen or two isn't really that large a number) weighing under 4000 mass each can annihilate pretty much anything up to at least half a million mass, or even higher, because you don't actually need very much to push out a few hundred thousand DPS.

    The fact that the devs don't seem to realize that small ships are already quite powerful, dare I say even overpowered, is extremely concerning. When is the last time any of you have actually played this game? I mean really played this game. Or even just asked the more hardcore PvPers for their opinions on the meta?
    I feel like I may be pretty much the only one of them left who even tries to talk to you guys about these sorts of things, and when I do it's usually just to ask Lancake when a massive balance breaking bug is going to get fixed. Pretty much every other PvPer I've talked to is either massively ignorant of the problems with the current game and not useful or has tried to get your attention on these problems in the past and been brushed off or ignored and has given up on trying to communicate with you all.

    Overall this dev blog has been pretty disappointing for the hype it was given. Who wrote this junk?
    I feel your disappointment m8 but what 4k ship survives getting blasted by a half million mass ship? Also bearing what kind of wonder weapon to actually harmthe big boy? The weapon system even though a few options are viable still is pretty solid balance wise. the only disadvantege bigger ships have atm are the srificially softcaped powergeneration limiting the linear scaling weapons to out gun smaller ships guns and that will be fixed aka replaced with a new system we have no clue about if it will not doom starmade forever.
    Anyway afaik will they redo weapon systems as well - a pity for it is a good system.

    I'm somewhat underwhelmed by this to be honest. (what a shock)

    Everything mentioned about the intention for this post has lead me to believe that the Game Design Documents would be released. Documents detailing how everything would work in the end. Not a wishlist for how things should feel.

    But which blocks? And how are you going to do it?

    We've been lead to believe that Schine has significant documentation on the end goals of the game. Bench stated that there's 23,000 words in 2015. Even if all of that got replaced, it had to have been replaced with something Where is it?

    The recent roadmap with all of the redacted nonsense that was completely pointless had tons of blocked out entries. Were they just filler to make it look like more was planned than there actually was?

    Schine is in the uncommon position to not be beholden to a larger company that dictates what you can and can't do. If you want to be, you can be completely transparent with the community. There's nothing stopping you from releasing everything.

    This post feels like it wasn't written to be transparent, or to tell the community about what's planned. Pretty much everything in this post has been said in some form over time, and while it's nice to have a singular post explaining it, it's nothing new. It feels like it was written to keep a community quiet without having to change anything.

    I know it's the first of several to come, but if it's any indication of what's to come, I'd rethink the approach. The power proposals, thrust proposal and capital ship proposals have all been good ways of schine showing the plans and letting the community discuss it with you. Please follow that kind of template. Explain the systems, how they'll work and interact with other systems. It shouldn't be too difficult to do if those documents really exist.
    yeah the vagueness and at the same time aimlessness is stunning. instead the finally will state that ships and station only differ because only stationary objects aka station can become homebases and all other blocks could be used everywhere they go lkike and yeah there are tons of interesting blocks but we rather not talk about them. Dear schine you really wonder why people go "WTF?!"

    Strap in, this is going to be a long one.

    This document is a mess of indie game dev cliches and a thorough example of Schine fundamentally failing to communicate goals both to itself and to the community in a concise, coherent and comprehensive manner. Per Jordan Peterson, the absolute first step to accomplishing anything is stating your goals in a simple and easy to read manner. These goals are not stated simply nor are they easily read. I'll give you the benefit of the doubt and say perhaps you aren't accustomed to writing these sorts of documents or were pressed for time, but this is honestly just not great. Ignoring all of the other problems, just at the very least organize this. Bullet points, to the point explanations, alphabetically or chronologically listed information, et cetera.

    But I have a bigger issue with something stated at the beginning of this document.



    This paragraph specifically, only the third one into the document, and it's already told me everything I need to know about how Schine is going about developing their endgame features - and why it's wrong.

    Before you e-crucify me for telling someone their method of game development is wrong, let me explain. As Schine says itself, two sentences later, StarMade is a sandbox game. The fundamental concept behind a sandbox is that the player is free to do as they please, and this includes doing whatever activities they please, whenever they please and in whatever order they please. The game world exists to provide the player the means to carry out these activities ONLY - if it forces the player to do anything, it is not a sandbox.

    This intangible, non-binding "player role" style of sandbox game development, where a development team will put themselves "into the mind of a player" and then add features and balance their game around this vision, is critically, fundamentally flawed. Why? Because this is a sandbox game. Because these style archetypes are not physical features, and they're not binding (like a class in an MMO), players have absolutely no reason to adhere to them. Not only will they not adhere to one specifically, but they will switch between them at will, or will play like many or all of them simultaneously! If you structure the game around roles, what happens when someone playing your game says "I don't want to be just one of those, or any of those"? Any semblance is balance or continuity is completely obliterated.

    So why is this, specifically, a problem? Because this kind of development will ASSUME the goals are binding. Players must fit into one of the roles, otherwise they are now not being considered in the grand scheme of things. Features are added, gameplay is expanded, balance is created but only in respect to these roles, only within the scope of these grounded playstyles. As soon as any player steps outside these molds, again, because they're non-binding, the balance that was carefully constructed is totally shattered. Balance is give and take - the idea of roles is that each one does some things well, other things not as well. For example, the Builder role here is supposed to work on the idea that resources are unbalanced, distributed unevenly - this allows them to be able to source some materials well, others not, therefore reducing the amount of things they can build or increasing the time it takes to build as much as they want. But what if the player is also what Schine would call an Imperialist, who controls large amounts of space and assets? And an Explorer, too, having searched for and located these other areas? And an Industrialist, having a massive base of production to quickly create whatever they need? And a Trader, too, successfully making deals with those from other locations for resources they don't have? Perhaps a Fighter, when diplomacy fails, forcibly seizing resources they don't have or need more of? Or even none of these things, perhaps someone who instead prefers to simply purchase their ships and roam around looking for missions or opportunities? How does this fit within Schine's vision of game balance that says players fall into roles?

    There is a critical, fundamental problem of developing a sandbox game by assuming roles that you see but others may not. There are many examples of this going awry, but look no further than a game called Of Kings and Men. Here, too, they tried this idea - four non-tangible, non-binding roles for their game. They only expected players to be one of these four at any given time. Like all game devs, they prioritised the role they saw to be most important (in this case, the one they expected players to most often be, and the most critical to further development) and began developing that role only. But very quickly that fell through when they opened their game to testing; players not only did not favor this role, but also showed that it was not the most critical to development. Time was wasted, plans had to be reshuffled, and it lead to a catastrophic implosion of a game studio that is irrelevant in this context. The point of the matter is that it has been done before, and simply because your ideas on how to play any given game are likely different from mine, the concept of these molds players fit into is broken.

    This, too, is problematic;


    How can the community trust Schine to effectively develop a game based on roles if Schine does not also play the game nor listen to the community? Even if this idea of intangible, non-binding roles was a working solution, how far from reality would Schine's vision of them be? Their ideas could be on a totally different page from where the game actually is, and this disconnect could lead to major balancing issues. This sort of thing already happens, but not on the scale that it could happen should it continue into this.


    Despite the doom and gloom above, I'm glad you posted this now and only posted a glimpse, so that it can be corrected going forward. Should you heed my advice, I'd suggest doing these things;
    1. Organize your ideas from the start. "What is it I want to do, and how can I state in it the fewest words without losing meaning?" Follow this rule, always, and then work towards it. Concisely state what you want to do in order from largest to smallest goals, grouping goals based on progression and/or where it's encountered in the game and/or the difficulty in coding and implementing. Read the document, re-read it, and then pretend you're someone who has absolutely no connection to StarMade whatsoever. Does the document make sense? Can you make heads or tails of what is being said? The hallmark of a good internal goals document is it being able to be understood universally, regardless of context.
    2. Step away from the development strategy of creating roles and then balancing based on that. Remember that, at its core, the universe you've created serves only as a means for players to discover and carry out activities. All features of the game are activities. Every activity should be enjoyable, or be minimally tedious, time consuming and/or boring so that the pursuit of enjoyable activities can continue in the shortest amount of time necessary.
    3. Instead of roles, think of the game universe as an empty canvas. As said before, all features of the game are activities the player can carry out - think of them as that and that only. All features are activities and all activities are optional. They must appeal to the player in some shape or form, and/or appeal to different types of players. But most importantly, they can and will appeal to a player at different times, all at once, or not at all. Do not balance your game with the idea that players will carry out every activity or activities in a certain order, because this will not hold water. Balance your game and structure your universe so that these activities can occur independent of any player or a certain type of player. A critical component of any sandbox game is the notion that the gears will turn regardless of the player, but the player may alter how, when, why, where, etc the gears turn. Change your perspective from the universe requiring the player to the player requiring the universe. Proceeding in this fashion will allow you to better identify what features need to be added, in what order, where they ought to be located and how they should be balanced.
    4. Consider that what you think may be enjoyable can be different from others, so get a wide range of input from Schine, community members and ESPECIALLY non-players. For example, let us say you are working on the exploration aspect of the game. Ask yourselves in Schine what it is you want to see most when exploring (the how, the what, the where, then when, the why, the who) and then present these options as a poll to the Dock community, as well as allowing them to suggest things you may not have thought of. Balance what the Dock says with what you think and what is feasible, and then take these options to non-players you may find. I know, for example, Saber was in communication with the YouTuber TheXPGamers, otherwise known as CaptainShack. Ask him what he'd like to see, ideally, out of exploration in a voxel universe. Then balance what he and anyone else you ask thinks with what Schine thinks, what the community thinks and what is feasible. This will give you the most diverse amount of opinions you can accrue for the most efficient use of your time.
    5. But most importantly, keep sharing with us. Keep taking criticism. The most important part of active development for a game like StarMade is being constantly up to date with the community.

    To summarize; this document has numerous problems but can be easily remedied. Start by organizing your goals clearly and concisely - this will make any further progress, however you decided to go about it, magnitudes easier. Then, reconsider how you are going about constructing this vision of the game's future, so that it includes input from many sources and appeals to as many players as possible.
    Listen to this man! He writes out of hope you guys might still change. Hope a lot of us lost and you strengthen their believe of, schine not knowing what they do, every time some generic "we wrote something for you..." gets posted which is totally out of focus of what the game actually needs or where we see the game going. I am deeply sorry for you talking about limiting resources in order to achive - what was it exactly? WHILE THE ENTIRE CRAFTING SYSTEM SCREAMS "REDO ME, FOR NOONE EVER PLAYS SURVIVAL BECAUSE OF SHITTY ME" Nobody building seriously building ships does this in survival. Shipyards are messed up that is what limits your game to a building game best played with factions turned off for they just bump into your stuff...

    You know I work in a factory assembly line and your post immediately reminds me of a engineer who comes around to check what fucks up with our ability to get things done in time, who then relays the problem to another engineer who never ever lowers himself to the level of us working class filth so much as to come and see himself what the problem is. He who looks at listed problems, measures and numbers, does the math, goes to the workshop and makes a fancy new tool. This tool is then given to us and we're told "use this from now" and all should be well because the smart engineer made the calculations and this absolutely should solve our problems at certain point in the assembly line.

    The tool works good for the first few hours, but then it's gears loosens up, the metal bits soften and get worn from contact with other metals. We don't know how to fix this tool because we don't know what measures it's calibrated for. We can't use our old tools because they were taken away. Now our quality drops, the overseer comes and pours shit down our neck. These tools don't work because the smart engineer who made them never had to see them being used in practice or even the station they were going to be used at.

    But of course, that's our fault.
    man i so love this... Well put.

    You keep giving proof that you don't play the game.

    We're trying to express how outstandingly egregious it is that the head tester and person who is in charge of virtually all game balance doesn't actually play the game.

    Boro's metaphor has to do you with dismissing Zyrr's and Lecic's posts as "trolling" when really all they're trying to do is raise complaints about where this game is going, in what way, and how information about the game is being delivered. As one of the devs of the game, you have an obligation to consider what they're saying and the veracity of their words.

    All of us really do have the wish of seeing Starmade become something better then it already is. Our methods of communication aren't the kindest, but our intentions are good and it's wildly offensive that you don't take into consideration the words of three of the most experienced players of the game.

    Posting before you are three of your potentially most valuable resources for doing your balancing and game development. It's genuinely upsetting to see you consider them as nothing more than dickheads who want to cause trouble.
    I kind of agree with you intentions m8 but who measures which individuals are the most valuable to listen to again? i kind of dislike this notion strongly as the arguments should count.
    Nothing against vocal minority or smth i just wonder if only looking at the forums, people really consider represents the community. nope they do not!
    ---

    Dear Schine do not give out end goal papers when you are stating you are not sure of your endgoals and these papers are subject to change. (you expressed it differently but that is kinda the essence) Also do not claim to build a sandbox game but then talk about mmorpg roles. Btw. also please scrap the damn chambers for they will never work as a replacement for eve modules, sorry Crizz. But Starmade needs a solid power system and then we can talk about other stuff systems can accomplish using the power...
    I really strongly dislike the hints of adding further restrictions to the game... as i meantioned already the crafting system is a nightmare noone can bear to really like. talking about limited ressouces only available in - what was it... is like a smack in the face of the people actually trying to play the game in survival.
    I am not toxic i am trying to express - sadly again - how frustrating it is to see a game of tremendeous potential and then - basically the devs are talking about another game or showing no concern about gameplay issues we encounter on a daily basis... It is just sad.
     

    Lone_Puppy

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    Nice! I like how you've categorized the player types.
    In my experience with this game, I have approached the game in a cascade of these categories. For me they have lead from one to another through me reaching a stage in each category that would most likely be different both in time, interest and skill base for other players.

    Maybe you could interview players who started playing at different stages, perhaps over time or based around the different major updates.
    You might be surprised by the feedback of the player experience and their expectations from when they heard about the game, what their expectations were to their growth and learning curve in actually playing the game. Perhaps feedback on their observations around their experiences in the different game styles and arena's (single/multi play etc).

    For you to draw useful statistical information from this, perhaps one of your team could generate a simple survey form with a few personal opinion fields here and there. Or perhaps hand that over to one of those survey outfits that do this for a living.

    By the way, the mention of Shipyards reminded me that the hotbar screwyness needs to be fixed.
     

    Matt_Bradock

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    1. Where dies it read that there's a plan to force anyone into those roles? Duh. For me it looks more like a list of all aspects of being a player in StarMade.
    You build your ships and stations.
    You explore to find a suitable system to settle in, or to find resources, shops, other players.
    You acquire and process resources to build an industrial complex to help you do it on a larger scale.
    You trade with NPCs and other players for resources you don't have.
    You fight pirates and other players for fun, for resources, or for territory.
    You try to either establish a strong faction or become a prominent member of one.

    2. Who gets this idea that Lancake hasn't actually played the game in 3 years? He said he hasn't played for real (meaning to have fun, just to play it) in 3 years because as head tester it is his freaking JOB to play Starmade. No wonder he counts it as work.

    3. Did you pessimistic cynical, whiny bunch seriously expect a developer team to release actual development documentation to you, when you already clearly demonstrated that even if they breathe, you already stand at the ready prepared to take them apart? Sounds like the old joke in my country where the fox and the wolf decide to beat up the rabbit, but need a reason for it, so they decide if he's wearing a cap, that's why, if he's not wearing one, that's why.

    Reading through this comment section actually proved me that the lot of you already came here with so strong pre-existing opinions that you even blatantly ignored obvious information that would have contradicted those. That's enough for me to see to know what Schine has to deal with. For every piece of actual useful constructive criticism there's 3 shitposts/trollposts. Shame.
     
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    sometimes i wonder how many of you are actually palying this game. we have these crazy bugs for month, so i'm not surpirse about that anymore, if noone of you actually bothers to play this game in way an interetedted person would do.
     
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    A community like this doesn't deserve a developer team like Schine. None of the previous whiners understand anything about developing a game with such a small team, very small budget and a community that whines about everything that happens. They think it's simple to construct and develop a game.
     
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    Az14el

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    you build flying space guns to shoot or mine with

    There's your three (3) roles, and the three aspects of the game that really should be tight as fuck before beta.
    Building, Combat & Gathering. Building is getting there but the other two hang loose like sleeve of wizard. Maybe there's a lot of pipe dreams out there but I'd wager all a reasonable player wants from you moving into beta is working core gameplay, it doesn't have to be completely balanced and have all the extra bells and whistles, just a solid proof of concept. I don't like to say it but I do see it, we're becoming DayZ in space.

    Reading through this comment section actually proved me that the lot of you already came here with so strong pre-existing opinions
    Is it really worth diving into it? also pkb tbh
     
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    Napther

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    what 4k ship survives getting blasted by a half million mass ship?
    Not to be off topic, but, there really isnt anything most 500k mass ships can do, in the generalist and RP categories, that can stand up to spammed, dirt cheap drones.

    these small, lightweight drones deal up to 100k DPS per drone. Up to 400k shield DPS if some are suing Ion effect but are more expensive units. Being 1/1000000th the total cost of a titan class (they dont even need proper shielding nor armour), its easy to field hundreds of these things in 1 encounter. 100x 100kdps is 10m dps every second from many small ships. Even the most Stalwart of shields at that size area would last only 30 seconds under such withering fire, before becoming sliced by the weapons due to the 2m e/s soft cap each of them carries, fielding in total a staggering 200m energy/second compared with most ships of that size having between 35-100m total e/s betweeen all docked enetities, on board power, and aux etc.

    Due to these things being small and numerous, Defences on the target ship will struggle to cut a reasonable amount of them down before the automated turrets begin to fail from lack of shields and pop off, then the main ship is destroyed if it is unable to escape.
     

    Keptick

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    Not to be off topic, but, there really isnt anything most 500k mass ships can do, in the generalist and RP categories, that can stand up to spammed, dirt cheap drones.

    these small, lightweight drones deal up to 100k DPS per drone. Up to 400k shield DPS if some are suing Ion effect but are more expensive units. Being 1/1000000th the total cost of a titan class (they dont even need proper shielding nor armour), its easy to field hundreds of these things in 1 encounter. 100x 100kdps is 10m dps every second from many small ships. Even the most Stalwart of shields at that size area would last only 30 seconds under such withering fire, before becoming sliced by the weapons due to the 2m e/s soft cap each of them carries, fielding in total a staggering 200m energy/second compared with most ships of that size having between 35-100m total e/s betweeen all docked enetities, on board power, and aux etc.

    Due to these things being small and numerous, Defences on the target ship will struggle to cut a reasonable amount of them down before the automated turrets begin to fail from lack of shields and pop off, then the main ship is destroyed if it is unable to escape.
    I haven't done this in practice, but couldn't you just blap a couple of them, jump out, wait for shields to recharge, jump back in, and repeat? The AI is retarded, so if you selectively engage the swarm or avoid it then it becomes useless.

    That or use a dedicated swarm missile ship. Swarm missiles > swarm fleet. (This I have tested, and it works well). The challenge then becomed to predict what the enemy will use, which turns into fun strategy.
     

    Zyrr

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    I haven't done this in practice, but couldn't you just blap a couple of them, jump out, wait for shields to recharge, jump back in, and repeat? The AI is retarded, so if you selectively engage the swarm or avoid it then it becomes useless.

    That or use a dedicated swarm missile ship. Swarm missiles > swarm fleet. (This I have tested, and it works well). The challenge then becomed to predict what the enemy will use, which turns into fun strategy.
    No, swarm missiles versus fleets doesn't work lol. You're so far out of date with the combat meta my man
     

    StormWing0

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    No, swarm missiles versus fleets doesn't work lol.
    This part here. Swarm Missiles don't work vs any of my drone fleets because of a combination of AMS Drones and AMS Turrets on the main damage dealer drones. You'd be lucky to see them leave the barrel in a fight with me. XD

    Needless to say my issue has always been miscalculating the target's threat level and getting annihilated for it. >.<
     
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    this end goal document sounds like wrote by some marketing persons.
    not saying it is not good. But i prefer the old starmade way.

    point out the issues, combine in a list, follow the list and fix all the problems with the cat's magic

    Now this end goal document sounds promising but yet a bit vague