Limit total energy generation per sector

[Malacodor]

Big ships as well as big fleets cause performance problems. Mass-based maintenance FP costs were suggested to solve this. While this would limit the total mass of a faction's entities, big factions would still concentrate a lot of mass in one spot and unfactioned ships weren't affected either. Also, players shouldn't be punished for building stuff. I think the best solution is to give people an incentive to spread their fleets. Inverted FP and multiple invincible stations in combination with limited power generation per sector could do the trick.

Let's say the limit is 10 million energy per second in each sector. Then a fleet with a total power generation of 20 million e/s couldn't fully use its reactor power while being concentrated in one sector. Each ship would suffer a 50% penalty on its power generation, so splitting up the fleet and sending the parts into two different sectors would double its total power generation.

However, this would encourage operating around sector borders. A fleet concentrated around a sector corner could be spread across 8 sectors without splitting up. Also, ships in neighbouring sectors could still participate in a battle and would therefore still cause performance problems. To solve this, the ability to drain energy from neighbouring sectors could be added. Then a fleet positioned perfectly around a sector corner could increase the available power by only 137% instead of 700%. Of course the maximum power per sector should be adapted accordingly. The exact calculation would be like this:

1. Determine which sectors are occupied by ships or stations.
2. For each occupied sector, sum up the total power generation of all entities and store that value. If it exceeds the allowed maximum per sector, set 'deficit' flag and increase the 'drain' counter of the 26 surrounding sectors (3x3x3 sector area) by one (default is 0).
3. For each sector with a deficit, add the unused power generation of the 26 surrounding sectors, divided by 'drain'. If there's sufficient power generation now, remove the 'deficit' flag.
   
4. For each sector still with a deficit, apply a power penalty of powergen_available/powergen_used to all entities in that sector.

Recalculate this when

• A ship crosses a sector border, passes a warp gate or uses a jump drive
  
• An aux reactor is switched on or off
• An entities power generation changes due to damage or construction

To avoid performance problems, recalculations should be done only every 10 seconds, if necessary, or even less.

RP-wise we could say that reactors convert vacuum energy into a usable form. Used up vacuum energy is refilled by influx from other sectors, but that takes time. This then results in a limit of usable energy per second in a sector.

 

[StormWing0]

This idea isn't going to fly far. >.>

 

[siserith]

this sounds terrible. no offense.

 

[StormWing0]

What's going to be funny is if someone like this gets what they want they'll just say the devs screwed up the implementation of it and want it gone. XD

 

[Brokengauge]

Hey now, it's just an idea. It's good to know of every possible alternative, even the *bad* ones. Just he brought it up as an idea doesn't mean necessarily that he likes the idea. It's simply an alternate way to implement something that's been brought up before.

Although, this is definitely a bad idea lol.

 

[Groovrider]

Good on you for coming up with a solution. It's a really terrible idea though.

 

[Lone_Puppy]

So, each sector has 6 sides.
What happens if you leave your ships guarding a station and enemies attack from all six other sectors or at least 2 sectors outside?
[doublepost=1477778082,1477778019][/doublepost]Remember, the station is also drawing power.

 

[Lukwan]

Wow...tough room . I should add to that; the Mass-limit thing seems like all stick and no carrot (just sayin').

The multiple HB mechanic that Lecic was riffing on had some great overall concepts. I don't know if it's the best solution but it certainly warrants further brain-storming.

 

[Spoolooni]

This idea just doesn't seem like it'll help the game at all, we need to stop introducing all these exceptions and rules. I can understand suggesting other methods of keeping both fleets and titans at bay but this literally does not solve anything because people are just going to build small and in larger quantities than before. While your others suggestions are favorable, this one seems utterly horrendous.

 

[Malacodor]

So, each sector has 6 sides.
What happens if you leave your ships guarding a station and enemies attack from all six other sectors or at least 2 sectors outside?
Remember, the station is also drawing power.

This would heavily depend on the fleet sizes. It might result in a heavy penalty for the besieged station. But as soon as the attacker entered the station's sector, they'd suffer from the same penalty. Also, the defending fleet could make a sortie and attack its enemies in their sector.

Wow...tough room . I should add to that; the Mass-limit thing seems like all stick and no carrot (just sayin').

The multiple HB mechanic that Lecic was riffing on had some great overall concepts. I don't know if if the best solution but it certainly warrant further brain-storming.

The link doesn't work for me, but if it's about the same suggestion as the link in the OP, then that is the carrot. Also, the power limit should be so high, that it only kicks in shortly before performance problems come up. So either you're impaired by the power penalty or by the lag and low fps.

but this literally does not solve anything because people are just going to build small and in larger quantities than before.

It doesn't matter if there are few big or many small ships, since the penalty is based on total power generation of all ships in a sector, not ship size.

 

[Spoolooni]

This would heavily depend on the fleet sizes. It might result in a heavy penalty for the besieged station. But as soon as the attacker entered the station's sector, they'd suffer from the same penalty. Also, the defending fleet could make a sortie and attack its enemies in their sector.


The link doesn't work for me, but if it's about the same suggestion as the link in the OP, then that is the carrot. Also, the power limit should be so high, that it only kicks in shortly before performance problems come up. So either you're impaired by the power penalty or by the lag and low fps.


It doesn't matter if there are few big or many small ships, since the penalty is based on total power generation of all ships in a sector, not ship size.

So you've effectively removed the community's incentive to create and innovate upon existing technologies because of a hard-cap in power limitation.

 

[Malacodor]

So you've effectively removed the community's incentive to create and innovate upon existing technologies because of a hard-cap in power limitation.

No?

 

[StormWing0]

No?

actually yes you have, reread your own idea and think of how you'd play because of it in play. I can tell you it wouldn't end well.

 

[Malacodor]

actually yes you have, reread your own idea and think of how you'd play because of it in play. I can tell you it wouldn't end well.

I'd try to build efficient ships of different sizes and spread my fleets to protect the faction space. Furthermore, I'd try to attack opposing factions in several different sectors at once and avoid concentrating to many ships in one place. So what should be the problem?

 

[StormWing0]

I'd try to build efficient ships of different sizes and spread my fleets to protect the faction space. Furthermore, I'd try to attack opposing factions in several different sectors at once and avoid concentrating to many ships in one place. So what should be the problem?

You're still thinking like someone before the theoretical patch with this idea. This is not how you make people fight each other willingly it's how you force them to and to the point they refuse to go along with it and find way to break it at that, or they just leave.

 

[Malacodor]

it's how you force them to and to the point they refuse to go along with it...

What?

 

[Dire Venom]

Great that you've been thinking up ideas!
However the devs have avoided hard-caps left right and center for ages, they in no way want to arbitrarily limit player like this would.

 

[nightrune]

What about something that just inversely affects ships? Thinking like the more energy usage in a sector the higher likely hood something will happen like blackhole? or some cosmic event?

 

[Comradecolonel]

Hard limitations like this make for a boring game. It'd really rain on my military parade if I had to count of my power regen before attacking someone. I'm all for spreading out my forces to avoid WMD type weapons, but having to split them up just so they can function doesn't sound fun to me. I would like to see more mixed fleets and more interesting combat without annoying popups telling me I'm doing it wrong.

 

[Erth Paradine]

I'm trying to see a "practical" analogy for this idea. For instance, an analogy from any modern SciFi story...and I'm just not finding it.

What's the underlying goal of this suggestion? To discourage gigantism?