Node-based claiming and home-planet as core

[Archer6621]

Hi,

Was thinking a bit about how home bases are indestructable and how this could be changed, and I think I found something reasonable (comparable to UT2004's onslaught mode).

Basically, the home planet/station will function as a core. If no claimed planets/stations are connected to it, it will be vulnerable, so you have to claim at least one nearby planet to ensure that the home planet cannot be touched.

This same rule applies to other claimed planets/stations. Basically, the game would decide the links based on distance, and you would be able to see these links and faction territory on the map (shift + P).

The home base will require at least 1 link to be protected, all other planets and stations will require all links they can get, to ensure that the outer layer of a faction's territory is always vulnerable (except when: Read below).

Adding to this, a faction's bases cannot be attacked if there are no members online from it (maybe with a timer to prevent quick relogs). (emphasized this for people that have a hard time reading things)

With both of these "rules", I think faction wars will become much more interesting and strategical.


EDIT: Important note, it should be a setting. People that don't like it should absolutely not be forced to use it.

 

[Jim-Dandy]

Nope

 

[ImperialDonut]

Something along the lines of building your first faction base that\'s invulnerable, building your second base that is vulnerable and destroying that second base to make the first one vulnerable too.

Might need some adaptation to starmade, but interesting basis.

 

[Archer6621]

Yes you got the point, I think it would make the faction wars a lot more interesting like that, because the home-planet would no longer be permanently invincible either.

 

[Archer6621]

Make an even more interesting comment next time.

 

[LoLzboi]

Those planet links could let you send resources from, say, a claimed asteroid to a factory world where the collected materials are forged into components without having to have a player ferry it across space. Maybe have blocks that act as colony hubs (where you begin your colony), factory hubs (where collected material goes to via links), and mining shipping (where materials are placed to send them to the factory hub).

The process would work something like this:

-miners deposit resources into the shipping block (basically same as plex storage)

-shipping block takes a number of seconds to send each collected block to the factory hub

-factory hub recieves the blocks and puts them in bins for factory workers

(with updated mining/crafting you could make something like the minecraft tekkit mod where blocks placed in these automatically are fed into the appropriate machines, and machines mine and send their collected materials to the shipping block)

-maybe have finished products go in another shipping block that is linked to the home planet (allowing the home planet to have massive stock piles of finished products)

I really like this idea, so much possibility.

*edit*

The worlds would be visibly connected by the colony hubs, while the factory/ mining portion would be invisible to no other faction. Something like spore\'s empire marker system of \"choose a colour and that colour will mark all controlled worlds\"

 

[Archer6621]

The possibilities for expansion upon this idea are endless.

But I\'d prefer it to be simple to start with, after that there will be most likely mods and all you see, in the future :P

 

[LoLzboi]

I like to just throw ideas out so if schema comes across this and reads it then he could start putting some ideas into the basic coding (not saying he will). That way if he finds something he likes he can see where people might want it to go and make it go that way rather then start in \"the dark\".

 

[Trinova]

The central problem of your suggestion is the reason why home bases are invulnurable in the first place.

You can\'t be online 24/7. And as soon as you are offline and someone finds your base/planet and it\'s not invincible you are screwed. Even if they have to destroy all your outer bases first... what should stop them while you sleep for, lets say at least, 6 hours? That\'s a lot of time. And if you have a job or go to school you are completly vulnurable for about 16h a day.

If the game had rounds of 2h which reset the world afterwards your idea would be fine (as much as the current invincibility would be stupid). But in a persitent long time existing world there would no bases, no empires... just a huge universe full of piles of debris.



Nevertheless i like the linking concept. This could extend invincibility to outer layers like the way you suggested. So that the 3rd Layer protects the 2nd and has to be destroyed first.

On the other hand, we don\'t have any reason to build bases at all 9at the current state of the game) but getting our ships protected while we are offline. There is a long way to go until all the parts of the game fit together.

 

[Archer6621]

Did you even read the suggestion entirely?

Because I\'m pretty sure it covered that \"not able to be online 24/7\" bit.

EDIT: There, emphasized that bit for you and others that may follow

 

[Hanspeter Schnitzel]

I find it good that home-bases are invincible though, it prevents that big factions take over smaller ones and gives them a permanent safe-haven, which is good.

 

[Archer6621]

That\'s why it should be a setting, or maybe even a game-mode, so everybody would be happy then.

 

[Ciber]

Expression of Support

 

[CorneliousCrowe]

Should a faction be able to be wiped out entirely? I think it would be better if that home planet is \"indestructable\" (almost) but because of currently not-yet-implemented game mechanics such as resources and crafting without shops, having only one indestructable base would not be enough.

My method would be this: To create a faction, a faction block must be placed on a planet. The planet would become indestructable except in build mode. I like the idea mentioned above about espianoge, where to destroy a faction the faction block would have to be deactivated, which cannot be done from orbit.

The OP mentions node based combat. There is a little problem with this because our space is 3D. You could base the level of the node based on its distance from the HQ, but what if someone simply goes around and bypasses those planets. This idea seems based on the Sins of a Solar Empire system, where the planets are connected by FTL bridges and distances create chokepoints for heavy defense. Those maps are pretty much 2D though, so its a little harder to implement in Star-Made.

I like the idea that only the difficult method of actual \"capture\" of the faction blocks should allow the faction to be disbanded, making all blocks destroyable. This foces players to build elaborate bases defended by both exterior and interior defences. The faction block could be reactivated as long as its still not destroyed.

I don\'t agree that ships floating out in space should be made invinceable at all. Docked ships on the homeworld could be invinceable, but otherwise they are fair game. If a player is ofline, they should either have built thier base far enough away from enemies to avoid most conflicts, joined a faction to enable certain protections, or build automate defensive stuctures.

I love the idea of reciving an e-mail if your faction is under attack. It could send a message like \"your faction is engaging the enemy in sector (x,y,z)! Reinforcements are requested.\" Obviously, if the message is more than a few hours old it can be ignored. Also, if the enemy is defeated, it could send another message telling the player that. This could be configured in the players profile, wheather they recieve messages or not, or which ones they want, so they don\'t get spammed. I see a potential RL security risk with a moddable game being able to send messages to player e-mails, like spam or such getting mass sent to all players registered on a server... but i like the idea.

 

[Archer6621]

I\'m pretty sure something can be sorted for the links... It should not be that much of a big deal, it would be just another plane that gets added.

Also, nowhere did I state that random floating faction ships should not be destructable if nobody from the faction is online... It would simply be like it is right now: ships have to be docked at a home base, or any other protected area according to my idea.

Furthermore, and I want to emphasize this: It should be a setting

So home-bases don\'t HAVE to be destructable, they CAN be destructable if that is what the server owner wishes, nowhere should people be forced to play the game like this, it is merely a game-mode suggestion, not a game overhaul.

 

[Trinova]

Please don\'t be rude if you think someone didn\'t understand you properly (related to #9 and #10).


Adding to this, a faction\'s bases cannot be attacked if there are no members online from it (maybe with a timer to prevent quick relogs). (emphasized this for people that have a hard time reading things)


This doesn\'t solve the problem... it just moves it a little bit in another direction.

Following scenario: I have a faction with 3 people, I go online and see a hostile faction with (let\'s say) 10 people is completly logged in. Now I can only log of again and can\'t play because the moment I\'m online my bases get vulnurable and i have not the slightest chance to defend. Thus i have to wait until my teammates log in and some of the others log out. Otherwise i can\'t play.

This is not about \"strong faction should always be able to stomp weak factions\" (which i think is ritght). But if i have only one way to defend myself and that\'s going offline it just kills fun.

 

[Archer6621]

I wasn\'t rude in the first place, and the problem had nothing to do with \"understanding\". It had everything to do with properly \"reading\" though, I had all right to become rude if I did.

Also, the scenario you proposed is exactly why factions will try to operate in teams, which is a large objective of this proposed game-mode, so your point only enhances the idea behind this.

And for the third time: This type of gameplay is not meant as a replacement for the current system, it is merely an addition in the form of a setting/game-mode, for faction driven servers, to add a little bit more excitement to the game.

 

[LoLzboi]

What happens if, say, an enemy faction discovers your home base? All they have to do is sit and wait for one of the unlucky sods to log on and then BOOM goodbye hardwork and effort. It would be better if during a faction war the only way to win is to destroy a selected base (both teams would select a registered faction module of the enemy, and this would make that base destructible after a countdown). Once the faction module of that base is destroyed the winning factions base becomes indestructable once again. This solves the weaker factions unable to defend themselves from the larger ones. Also this makes factions way the risks more, since they cannot just pick a small one building base on the opposite side of the universe for their enemy to assault. This also gives those factions that have built up the infrastructure on their bases (turrets, building thickness, etc.) a pay off for their efforts, since the enemy can have a difficult time if they make it to your selected base.

*REMEMBER* this is for a proposed game mode, and NOT for regular (current) server game.

*edit*

Also both factions would be at full or close to full strength since it would be something agreed to by both factions, giving more epic fleet on fleet combat.

 

[Archer6621]

Larger factions will still have larger forces though.



I was thinking, what about making a predefined amount of factions with this type of gameplay, so all would start at the same time, and develop accordingly?

There would be a \"grace period\" as well then, an amount of time where attacks will not be possible yet, so all factions get the chance to settle down and come with a decent setup.

After that the war could begin.

I think a game-mode like the one I proposed would be best suited for faction-based servers that do not allow faction creation by players, but rather start with like 3-4 predefined factions instead. Additional players would automatically be assigned to prevent imbalances.



Side-note: Purpose of this thread is to come up with a faction-centered game-mode that will work well enough to be at least more fun than it is atm, I just proposed what I thought might work, but I\'d love to see other people\'s take on it, perhaps to merge it all into one awesome idea.

 

[LoLzboi]

That would be a good start though, but hopefully later on in development you could have player made factions (so that new factions could join) instead of having everyone kind of melted into one anonymous group sharing a name. I wouldn\'t want to be on a team that I barely know and try to work with people that end up going out on their own or in small squadrons. Another thing is what happens if my buddies are in one premade faction and the game just shunts me into another that needs members? Do I just stay there or will I be able to swap factions? Maybe even add a menu that lets you pick, but if you don\'t care will shunt you off to that low man/woman faction. Also what would command structure for the premade factions look like?

Factions don\'t all start at the same time, new groups of people make new factions to find like minded people. Thus the massive amount of variety makes for a more interesting combat experience, seeing as one faction could have an entirely different combat style then another. So to keep a game from getting boring factions would \"start\" the day the server goes up and constantly change and improve themselves to better fight the other factions. You would have splinter factions popping up from the main ones (even if they are not \"official\" factions) of people just wanting to own a planet out in the cosmos and play the way they want, so why tell them they must stay with X faction because it is \"official\"? The best way to solve this is have the admin make designated factions where people spawn, and then have player made ones that can be joined at any time (but you must leave the \"official\" faction you are a part of first)

The indestructable bases would give a faction as much grace period as they want before engaging in a conflict with a seperate faction. This way the game is more of a round the clock ship on ship skirmish, while the bases are left for large scale faction on faction conflicts. Large factions will always have more forces, but that is where the art of tactics comes into play. Sure their large group of titans can destroy your smaller group of titans, but if you by-pass their fleet or send out a diversion force to draw most of their team away you can begin to tip the odds in your favour for an attack on any ships remaining in your sector. This also would allow third party fleets to join in the combat (not destroying your base though). Smaller factions could call upon other allied factions to help defend them while they fight, thus leading to epic multifaction campaigns. Also bases are meant to be a hub of a factions power storing ships, and materials so why on earth would you not set up defenses that could scare a titan away? Remember you can build a protective sphere around a planet that is bristled with turrets and that is thick enough to stop most ships even for a little while (it\'s what I do on singleplayer since I hate pirates coming and trying to blow up my planet).

Side-note: I don\'t mean to sound harsh but criticizing others ideas is how you make an okay game become an amazing one, or in this case a game mode. It would be lovelly if others could say what they think should happen and then others give CONSTRUCTIVE criticism as in \"oh ____ idea was okay but...\" or \"if you added ____ or changed _____ to ____ I think it would work better\". This post hopefully comes across as some form of constructive criticism, and I would love to talk with you over the finer points via PM so we can actually get a working idea to post and see what others think. maybe even bring it to schema?