New Power DEV Thread

[Az14el]

You sure as hell can do it a better way than "put this group far from that group"

I've spent all 4k+ of my hours juicing old power and the same old general designs work optimally for new power with the exception of requiring less rail real estate. This isn't an improvement and doesn't fix the problem that RP designers themselves (not primarily pvpers like myself) have been rightly bringing up since forever.

 

[bricox01]

I'm not sure that extreme min-maxing is a thing that can be fixed by the game's rules. I think it comes down to the limits enforced or agreed upon by those playing together.

If you create a system, someone is going to min-max it to a degree never intended by the creator.

The optimal shape thing can't be fixed by the developers, only the players.

 

[Zoolimar]

Problem is that in the real world combat vehicles are the result of extreme min-maxing. It's what everyone asks from engineers - build me a more effective killing machine. Difference is in the real world you need to balance many more different needs in design which leads to more complex shapes.

So you are asking that people, when they are building combat focused ships, would discard the effectiveness aspect which is central to their design.

 

[Cluwne]

I feel like this video is very much related to this discussion.
Seriously though, I'd prefer reactors not taking nearly equal amount of stabilizer blocks to reach full power.
Hell, I'd like to see reactors outputting some power even without stabilization, small or not. Not the fixed minimal amount like they do now.

 

[Az14el]

The optimal shape thing can't be fixed by the developers, only the players.

I don't like saying it but that's absolute bullshit, there are less restrictive suggestions that dont rely on dimensions in this thread on its own already, besides the point what if someones preferred aesthetic on a ship is really long in this case? they cant do it because it would be too strong relative to others? You can't expect every player to agree here, and if you set a max dimension you'll have people riding that consistently, simply because that would be the "strong ship" archetype for that particular server. You can't expect us all to agree, and we'd have to in order to "fix" it as players. "Just don't do it differently to me then" isn't an answer.

*guh multipage arguments*; still mostly referring to builds on the "smaller than standard" scale here

 

[Panpiper]

In the old power system, there was NO shape that I could not put two million power into. The only exception was if you wanted something smaller than 50-100 meters and needed it to conform to a narrow/flat shape. Such a small, essentially fighter craft, 'would' be power limited to some degree. However I was still able to get sufficient power into fighter scale ships as to make them a serious threat versus 'much' larger ships. In short, there was nothing about the old power system that forced shape choices so as to get good power. Yes, there was a theoretical mass advantage to longer dimensions, but the mass savings from such scale was so trivial compared to the mass of the ship itself at that size, that the savings were utterly irrelevant.

The new system DOES create a very specific recipe for optimum power (distance between two points). Only the most casual of RP designers will ever build a ship that is not long (in one dimension) and likely thin. Power players (assuming they still bother to play, because much of the game depth in building has now been removed) will make stick ships that angle 45 degrees left or right and up or down, which is going to look seriously weird to everyone, including the power players, but that is the design the mechanics are forcing. Then there is the pod ship, with a normal looking ship trailing a stabilizer pod hundreds of meters behind, to one side and above or below. That too will be a thing. Welcome to the new Starmade.

ARGH!

 

[bricox01]

Let me re-phrase here.

What I meant in my last post was thatthere is no system the developers can implement that all players will be equally happy with. All game systems can be min-maxed and will be min-maxed.

Therefore, if a given group of players have an issue with doom-builds, they simply agree not to use them when playing together.

In real life, there are weapons of war that are banned by mutual agreement of virtually every country on earth. Biological weapons, for example, are extremely effective but considered too unpredictable and dangerous. Any country attempting to use them gets in trouble with virtually every other country on earth.

Of course, we're talking about a game here. Players will prefer to play with other players that have similar ideas about what style of play is ideal to them.

There is no system the developers can implement that someone won't see as flawed. A sandbox game requires that the players implement their own house rules to some degree. If I don't like the house rules you play by, I can go find another server to play on or set up my own.

All that being said...I agree that stabilizers are stupid. They serve little useful purpose and really don't contribute much to gameplay. The new system is fine without stabilizers. Bigger reactors should simply get less efficient in terms of total power output compared to block count as they approach a given threshold. So long as that thredhold is an editable config variable that the server admin can change, problem solved.

 

[nightrune]

.I agree that stabilizers are stupid. They serve little useful purpose and really don't contribute much to gameplay. The new system is fine without stabilizers.

I've seen this a few times. Can we dig a little deeper into, stupid and adds nothing to game play? We have our reasons for keeping them that I'll hold onto for awhile (We hold onto information because untainted/raw comments are the best kind of comments/feedback).

 

[Zoolimar]

I've seen this a few times. Can we dig a little deeper into, stupid and adds nothing to game play? We have our reasons for keeping them that I'll hold onto for awhile (We hold onto information because untainted/raw comments are the best kind of comments/feedback).

Size of reactor determines the size and distance to stabilizers. It also determines the size of chambers, how far some of them could be levelled up and so on. Size of reactors also in the end determines how easy they are to snipe and how easy some of their stabilizers are to be hit (because they also determine the size of stabilizers).

So in the end it all could be reduced to the size of reactor itself. The only thing stabilizers seem to actually determine is the minimum length of the ship.

 

[Top 4ce]

I've seen this a few times. Can we dig a little deeper into, stupid and adds nothing to game play? We have our reasons for keeping them that I'll hold onto for awhile (We hold onto information because untainted/raw comments are the best kind of comments/feedback).

My impression for those who have criticism for stabilizers is that it's a useless block who's only purpose is to be a limiting balance factor to reactors. Which is true, the purpose of stabilizers is to balance reactors. I think if the stabilizers also did something other than a "block you must have to make power work" it'll feel less like a box you have to check-mark.

I like the new system, and I don't have anything against stabilizers (other than having them as green boxes while building), but if the stabilizers had more of a purpose, more people would be on board. I don't know what that should be, maybe like a shield to the reactor hp?

 

[Panpiper]

My impression for those who have criticism for stabilizers is that it's a useless block who's only purpose is to be a limiting balance factor to reactors. Which is true, the purpose of stabilizers is to balance reactors. I think if the stabilizers also did something other than a "block you must have to make power work" it'll feel less like a box you have to check-mark.

I like the new system, and I don't have anything against stabilizers (other than having them as green boxes while building), but if the stabilizers had more of a purpose, more people would be on board. I don't know what that should be, maybe like a shield to the reactor hp?

Make power blocks 'explode' from damage the way auxiliary reactors did in the old system. Have stabilizers reduce the frequency and extent of the explosions, with maximum stabilizers eliminating all explosion effect.

I would certainly vote in favor of eliminating the distance factor for stabilizers, as that is going to result in seriously limiting ship shape design for anyone who wants performance out of their ship.

 

[bricox01]

Make power blocks 'explode' from damage the way auxiliary reactors did in the old system. Have stabilizers reduce the frequency and extent of the explosions, with maximum stabilizers eliminating all explosion effect.

I would certainly vote in favor of eliminating the distance factor for stabilizers, as that is going to result in seriously limiting ship shape design for anyone who wants performance out of their ship.

That makes some sense. It also helps with eliminating doom-sticks.

I've seen this a few times. Can we dig a little deeper into, stupid and adds nothing to game play? We have our reasons for keeping them that I'll hold onto for awhile (We hold onto information because untainted/raw comments are the best kind of comments/feedback).

Sorry. Poor choice of wording. The purpose of starmade seems to be build a ship your way. However, stabilizers continue to encourage or even require certain builds in pvp play in order to be sufficiently competitive. The stabilizers' distance requirement seems to be unnecessary. If they didn't have to be distanced, they would become largely pointless.

 

[Az14el]

Make power blocks 'explode' from damage the way auxiliary reactors did in the old system. Have stabilizers reduce the frequency and extent of the explosions, with maximum stabilizers eliminating all explosion effect.

I would certainly vote in favor of eliminating the distance factor for stabilizers, as that is going to result in seriously limiting ship shape design for anyone who wants performance out of their ship.

This is probably my personal favorite idea I've heard for them, I quite liked aux power on paper but due to armor being generally poor protection and penetration weapons just ripping through so many blocks it was fairly flimsly stuff in combat, you would generally lose a majority of it over the course of combat if your shields went down for very long, even if relatively little block damage was actually dealt, with stabilisers being a "buffer" against reactors volatility, more overall damage would have to be caused & position of the systems relative to eachother would be a more natural concern.

In short, there was nothing about the old power system that forced shape choices so as to get good power. Yes, there was a theoretical mass advantage to longer dimensions, but the mass savings from such scale was so trivial compared to the mass of the ship itself at that size, that the savings were utterly irrelevant.

In this case i just don't think you were experimenting enough m80, the most efficient line is over 1500 meters and saves ~15% of its mass compared to 2 lines, and it only gets worse from there. Considering every active part can be and should be self powering under current systems it's huge design considerations, There are <10k mass cloud ships half a sector in size/multi kilometer sticks with sometimes more dimensional size than mass stat being utilized largely because this dynamic exists and rewards them for it massively. And true enough these are extreme examples from a system thats being phased out, but the underlying reason for it is just the boxdim based/non-linear power. I'm mostly worried that that's being emulated to some degree here, and that simply "minimizing" its impact is more or less equal to just not having the mechanic in the first place the moment it's "nerfed enough".

 

[kulbolen]

I'm not sure that extreme min-maxing is a thing that can be fixed by the game's rules. I think it comes down to the limits enforced or agreed upon by those playing together.

If you create a system, someone is going to min-max it to a degree never intended by the creator.

The optimal shape thing can't be fixed by the developers, only the players.

youre both right and wrong. you cant stop minmaxing, but you can sure limit its effect by way of design.

 

[DevajC]

I've seen this a few times. Can we dig a little deeper into, stupid and adds nothing to game play? We have our reasons for keeping them that I'll hold onto for awhile (We hold onto information because untainted/raw comments are the best kind of comments/feedback).

Like someone else said its basically a "check mark" block. It adds nothing to the game but a dimension requirement, which sounded like a great idea at first,but now we have our hands on it its not very much different than the old system, so the core problem hasnt been effected at all. Even if you added a secondary function to stabilizers it wouldnt matter because the dimension requirement is the CORE PROBLEM. That is what has to go away.

Its just not fun for anyone(according to this thread.) Either choose to spend alot of space on reactor blocks or ideally get equal power with less blocks and use that new unused space for additional systems/interior- what would you pick?

My suggestion that you can implement TODAY easily: Make 1 reactor block equal to either 100,20, or 50 current reactor blocks. Stabilizers and chambers need to scale to it too. Boom there you go all the problems gone, no need to remove stabilizers, no ship shapes better than others, no huge space investments, MUCH easier for new players, easier to remove and replace and update in the future.

All you would need to power ships and stations is a reactor the size of a fridge or always less than 20x20x20. Huge ships like The Black, which is somewhere on the top of the community content for people who are not familiar, can require more.

This would be my ideal change for starmade, because I hate spending blocks for passive systems when I can do anything else there instead. We already have "required single blocks" in all ships today: The Core, Faction Module, Radar Jammer. I dont see any problem that would arise with making power a low block count system either. Maybe harder to destroy to kill your enemies but that can be fixed with the new Information update or in the future weapons update with weapons that target power. I know we can just change the config value to do this right now, but if you think about all my other points it would be a great idea to do it Starmade wide, atleast to test out for a while. 1 week?


If you hate the idea please let me know why! I want to hear what other people think of the dimension requirements. Yes it will make building power into even less of a mini game (but you can still have stabilizer webs) but I think the sacrifice is worth it. If you dont add this feature then yeah I think stabilizers should go and/or have a drastically lower required distance and block count because both those factors make long ships better. Plus its too extreme right now but that might be fixed when you scale all the system outputs accordingly.

 

[Az14el]

I don't want to "stop min/maxing", that would honestly ruin a lot of the fun, but I'd like the methods to be at least interesting, and certainly not define my shape for me beyond the obvious turning/rail real estate concerns, practical & interesting things. Though I know I get all absolutist when I'm arguing :D

 

[Top 4ce]

One of the ideas I've heard floating around to make the dimension requirement less of on issue (SchnellBier and Ithirahad I think), was to make the "orange" area of the stabilizers larger. If there's more orange area than you can still stabilize, by using more blocks, without having a large minimum distance needed.

Still have the red distance but make it closer, and have a larger orange area. This allows one to brute force stabilization if dimensions are restricted for the ship.

 

[dwguitarguy]

Hotbar chamber functions seem unfinished, for the most part. Have you tried having a separate reactor for your stealth chamber?

I haven't yet but I'm sure that would definitely work

 

[kikaha]

I like the new system, and I don't have anything against stabilizers (other than having them as green boxes while building)

Please option to remove that green box...

 

[diremage]

I've seen this a few times. Can we dig a little deeper into, stupid and adds nothing to game play? We have our reasons for keeping them that I'll hold onto for awhile (We hold onto information because untainted/raw comments are the best kind of comments/feedback).

As you know, there are at least three competing kinds of builder.

The first sort of builder builds because they need a ship to fly around in to do other things. This might not be the most skilled builder in the world, and to this person the requirement for stabilizers is "stupid and adds nothing to gameplay" because it's just one more hoop they have to jump through to get a working ship that they can use for other things, and it adds nothing to their gameplay because they are more interested in doing other things besides building. This kind of player is most interested in innovations that reduce the amount of time they spend doing things that are more like chores rather than fun. For this player, the new reactions are a step in the right direction but the system still isn't quite where they'd like to see it.

The second sort of builder is an RP builder. They will spend hours and hours making interiors and exteriors, and carefully consider that the appearance of their ship is exactly how they want it. For this player, the requirement for stabilizers is "stupid and adds nothing to gameplay" because it's a mechanical consideration that constrains the appearance of their ship a lot more than the previous system did. If they want their ship to actually be useful in game play, it's a serious consideration and it can prevent them from building the ship they want to build. This kind of player is most interested in innovations that reduce the number of limitations they have regarding ship design, and the new reactor systems are a step BACKWARDS for this player.

The third sort of builder is the optimizer. You see a lot of PVP players lean towards this end of the spectrum. Their interest is in making the most mechanically efficient ship they can given the constraints of the game, and they typically only care a little bit if it's ugly (a so-called "doom cube"). For this player, the requirement for stabilizers is "stupid and adds nothing to gameplay" because they are interested in having the most skill-dependent mechanical systems possible so that they can master those systems and get an advantage over their opponents. As counter-intuitive as it is, this player benefits most from having obscenely complicated mechanics that add "depth" and keep the player interested in discovering new and better loopholes, bugs and exploits. This player's goals are directly at odds with the casual builder because to them, the casual builder is prey, and the bigger the divide between skilled and unskilled, the more it benefits the PVP'er. This kind of player is most interested in innovations that add complexity to game play, and the new reactor systems are a step backwards because they simplify power generation.