Starmade is a wonderful little game with quite a lot going for it, even in this early alpha stage. As it stands Starmade has me almost as excited a Minecraft did in its heyday.
However I would like to address something before Starmade enters later stages of development, as to 'catch the problem when its young'. The problem being the only choice is energy.
Now don't get me wrong, I like energy and its a wonderful and important part of the game. However Starmade needs more then one source of power to pull from. I can see dozens if not more suggestions for countless kinds of blocks from warp drives to massive computers but all of them have the same cost. Energy. Just more and more energy.
How do I make this balanced? Raise the energy cost and/or the number of blocks needed to make it effective.( unless your a missile, then it will just take a day to reach its target
)
The problem is that there is too few 'cost holes' to balance things out. What Starmade needs is other 'holes' to sink the cost of blocks. Its boring if every gun has the same ammo.
For example: Heat. yes its generic, but by having things generate heat and having the need to counter it you make the game more complex, and also allowing the designer to balance things out easier.
That Missile is too OP but you don't want it costing more energy then a laser beam? Make it cost something else as well(or make it cost a totally different resource that depends on energy but is gated by its number of blocks.), a renewable 'mana bar' like Energy, but requiring different blocks, in different configurations to allow more diversity. with 2 or more different pools to draw from you can balance your blocks any witch way you want. Don't think its possible? Look at the old mech warrior games, with several cooldowns and ammo and heat to manage people played that game like it was a shooter, even with all that stuff to manage!(Speaking of, the GUI needs a little bit of work, no rush though.)
However: These complexities need to be given out to newer players piece meal. Nothing is worse then having a wall to climb right when you pick up a game(ask any Moba player how hard it was to pick up and they will tell you.). Honestly as the game stands now it is at the perfect level of complexity for a new player, and their small ship. However when they want to build a behemoth battle cruiser that blocks out the sun they will need to pick up these extra energy pools, learn how they work and design a bigger and better death cube.
My Logic: Is mostly centered around larger ship balance. Small ships should be cheep, easy to make and simple. While larger ships should be expensive, a feat of engineering, and deserve their cost. The piece meal part was about making it easy to pick up Starmade, only getting into more advanced systems and different energies when you want to make a larger more complex ship, not something your going to be doing when you first pick up the game(your going to be exploring and making a base first, or at least that is what I did, after being murdered by pirates).
My ideal world(which might not be yours) is a large ship covered with turrets filled with computers and other systems fighting off a fleet of smaller ships while focusing less on aiming at each individual ship and more of commanding your large, powerful vessel to do it for you as you shut off overheated generators, battle off enemy data attacks, and scan for incoming reinforcements while waiting for your main cannon to recharge.
The idea of new players starting with a little lazer boat, then upgrading to a turret boat, then adding more and more complexity until finally they are rolling around in a war crime in space excites me.
Too Long Didn't Read: Starmade needs more energy types, simply to balance out larger ships and to make the game more interesting.
How did I do? This is my first post so tell me how full of myself I am! Ill be posting a lot more ideas in the future as things progress.
Edit: Made some clarifications.
However I would like to address something before Starmade enters later stages of development, as to 'catch the problem when its young'. The problem being the only choice is energy.
Now don't get me wrong, I like energy and its a wonderful and important part of the game. However Starmade needs more then one source of power to pull from. I can see dozens if not more suggestions for countless kinds of blocks from warp drives to massive computers but all of them have the same cost. Energy. Just more and more energy.
How do I make this balanced? Raise the energy cost and/or the number of blocks needed to make it effective.( unless your a missile, then it will just take a day to reach its target
)The problem is that there is too few 'cost holes' to balance things out. What Starmade needs is other 'holes' to sink the cost of blocks. Its boring if every gun has the same ammo.
For example: Heat. yes its generic, but by having things generate heat and having the need to counter it you make the game more complex, and also allowing the designer to balance things out easier.
That Missile is too OP but you don't want it costing more energy then a laser beam? Make it cost something else as well(or make it cost a totally different resource that depends on energy but is gated by its number of blocks.), a renewable 'mana bar' like Energy, but requiring different blocks, in different configurations to allow more diversity. with 2 or more different pools to draw from you can balance your blocks any witch way you want. Don't think its possible? Look at the old mech warrior games, with several cooldowns and ammo and heat to manage people played that game like it was a shooter, even with all that stuff to manage!(Speaking of, the GUI needs a little bit of work, no rush though.)
However: These complexities need to be given out to newer players piece meal. Nothing is worse then having a wall to climb right when you pick up a game(ask any Moba player how hard it was to pick up and they will tell you.). Honestly as the game stands now it is at the perfect level of complexity for a new player, and their small ship. However when they want to build a behemoth battle cruiser that blocks out the sun they will need to pick up these extra energy pools, learn how they work and design a bigger and better death cube.
My Logic: Is mostly centered around larger ship balance. Small ships should be cheep, easy to make and simple. While larger ships should be expensive, a feat of engineering, and deserve their cost. The piece meal part was about making it easy to pick up Starmade, only getting into more advanced systems and different energies when you want to make a larger more complex ship, not something your going to be doing when you first pick up the game(your going to be exploring and making a base first, or at least that is what I did, after being murdered by pirates).
My ideal world(which might not be yours) is a large ship covered with turrets filled with computers and other systems fighting off a fleet of smaller ships while focusing less on aiming at each individual ship and more of commanding your large, powerful vessel to do it for you as you shut off overheated generators, battle off enemy data attacks, and scan for incoming reinforcements while waiting for your main cannon to recharge.
The idea of new players starting with a little lazer boat, then upgrading to a turret boat, then adding more and more complexity until finally they are rolling around in a war crime in space excites me.
Too Long Didn't Read: Starmade needs more energy types, simply to balance out larger ships and to make the game more interesting.
How did I do? This is my first post so tell me how full of myself I am! Ill be posting a lot more ideas in the future as things progress.
Edit: Made some clarifications.
