- Joined
- Jan 14, 2016
- Messages
- 418
- Reaction score
- 255
I have not long returned from a forced, six month hiatus from the game and the power update hit me about 4 days after I got my new laptop. I had been tinkering with the pre-release version, reading the ever more toxic forums and watched a number of seasoned players on YouTube getting to grips with the new power too.
Actually playing the game myself I have gone through many stages, not unlike the five stages of grief, where I have found myself as daunted by the new mechanics as I was when I first started playing StarMade a couple of years ago. Having to work around new problems and plan the refit of many of my ships that I have built and developed over the years as my understanding of the game increased and building skills improved. Getting frustrated at many of the nuances of the new system as well as trying to hide the quite frankly ridiculous power (noodle, sausage, turd) thingy within my ships.
My biggest fear was this. I tend to build fairly small ships! The new power system just didn't seem to lend itself to my build style. The compact little ships that I built would be challenging to say the least to refit and I thought that some of the smallest ones would simply have to be scrapped or forever be in "old" power.
While I do have a couple of ships I would like to work on still, I have recently completed the refit of a ship that I thought I would find impossible to complete. I have a small defense drone that I simply refer to as a Giroship. It was originally developed in survival on an MP server and while it was more of an annoyance rather than a capable combat ship, eight of these would make short work of a couple of Isanth Type Zeros or at least hold them off until I could effect an escape or the cavalry arrived!
Now, a Giroship is in essence a 9m diameter "ball" of advanced armor with some power, shields, thrust and a twin (14 block each) weapon of some sort. Piercing beams, explosive rapid fire cannons or punch through cannons. The last version even had a (rather pointless) single block "nuke"! Every available block of space was filled with something apart from the small access hatch that gave access to the core that is in the middle of the ball.
It is still no more than 9m in any direction and has a 19 block reactor with stabilization. TWO chambers (shield improvement and top speed), adequate shields and the 14 block weapon system. The original did have lights but these were buried and simply gave the weapons their colour. I have found space for some logic to produce a slowly pulsating glow of red lights! I'm not quite yet 100% happy with it but any further changes will be purely aesthetic.
So how does it perform? Pretty well in fact. It is bloody fast though I may reassign the mobility chamber to turn rate(?), power stability is about there or there about and it has a more than adequate weapon system for a ship of its size. Putting it up against its old power predecessor it tore it up (even against 2 or 3), it took out a single Isanth Type Zero with ease (performing better than the original) and my usual pack of 8 of these dealt with all the ships thrown at it after they had smashed the shields on a pirate station (which I admin deleted once it had summoned the fighters) and whilst not all of the defending ships were combat vessels (but damn do I build some tough rail doors!) six of the eight were still at 100% and the other two were no lower than 95%.
So, in conclusion...
Can I still build little ships? YES
Are they as effective as before? YES, and in this case I would say better.
Is the RP element maintained? YES, it now has flashing lights when undocked so hey! Better!!!
Is the PvP element maintained? YES(?), I'm not a PvP player but a seasoned PvP player is more than welcome to put this up against their 9m drone and see for themselves.
Yes, there are still things I'm not totally happy with but then I wasn't totally happy with "old" power. I can live with this!
Actually playing the game myself I have gone through many stages, not unlike the five stages of grief, where I have found myself as daunted by the new mechanics as I was when I first started playing StarMade a couple of years ago. Having to work around new problems and plan the refit of many of my ships that I have built and developed over the years as my understanding of the game increased and building skills improved. Getting frustrated at many of the nuances of the new system as well as trying to hide the quite frankly ridiculous power (noodle, sausage, turd) thingy within my ships.
My biggest fear was this. I tend to build fairly small ships! The new power system just didn't seem to lend itself to my build style. The compact little ships that I built would be challenging to say the least to refit and I thought that some of the smallest ones would simply have to be scrapped or forever be in "old" power.
While I do have a couple of ships I would like to work on still, I have recently completed the refit of a ship that I thought I would find impossible to complete. I have a small defense drone that I simply refer to as a Giroship. It was originally developed in survival on an MP server and while it was more of an annoyance rather than a capable combat ship, eight of these would make short work of a couple of Isanth Type Zeros or at least hold them off until I could effect an escape or the cavalry arrived!
Now, a Giroship is in essence a 9m diameter "ball" of advanced armor with some power, shields, thrust and a twin (14 block each) weapon of some sort. Piercing beams, explosive rapid fire cannons or punch through cannons. The last version even had a (rather pointless) single block "nuke"! Every available block of space was filled with something apart from the small access hatch that gave access to the core that is in the middle of the ball.
It is still no more than 9m in any direction and has a 19 block reactor with stabilization. TWO chambers (shield improvement and top speed), adequate shields and the 14 block weapon system. The original did have lights but these were buried and simply gave the weapons their colour. I have found space for some logic to produce a slowly pulsating glow of red lights! I'm not quite yet 100% happy with it but any further changes will be purely aesthetic.
So how does it perform? Pretty well in fact. It is bloody fast though I may reassign the mobility chamber to turn rate(?), power stability is about there or there about and it has a more than adequate weapon system for a ship of its size. Putting it up against its old power predecessor it tore it up (even against 2 or 3), it took out a single Isanth Type Zero with ease (performing better than the original) and my usual pack of 8 of these dealt with all the ships thrown at it after they had smashed the shields on a pirate station (which I admin deleted once it had summoned the fighters) and whilst not all of the defending ships were combat vessels (but damn do I build some tough rail doors!) six of the eight were still at 100% and the other two were no lower than 95%.
So, in conclusion...
Can I still build little ships? YES
Are they as effective as before? YES, and in this case I would say better.
Is the RP element maintained? YES, it now has flashing lights when undocked so hey! Better!!!
Is the PvP element maintained? YES(?), I'm not a PvP player but a seasoned PvP player is more than welcome to put this up against their 9m drone and see for themselves.
Yes, there are still things I'm not totally happy with but then I wasn't totally happy with "old" power. I can live with this!
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