- Joined
- Aug 7, 2013
- Messages
- 15
- Reaction score
- 13
So, where to start?
I suppose I should start with the beginning of this whole calamity, that was Power 2.0.
A system with good intentions, but also many flaws. I am not going to recount the many ways in which it was broken, and just state that it made many players hate Stabilizers and the concept of Stabilizer distance. Personally, however, I still believe that it could have been something great, and I have spent the last 2 weeks creating a whole new system, taking the concept of Stabilizer distance and building a completely new set of game mechanics around it.
why go through all of this effort?
The traditional "spaghetti" reactors, as well as the current "post 2.0" ones, create a meta around ship building that is centered around using any available volume for combat systems, in order to keep maneuverability and armor at a maximum while reducing the target profile. This has negative effects on creative builds, since any hull cutout or fancy hull shape, any hallway, interior room or hangar bay comes with a penalty in performance.
It seems that opinions split around this topic, but I personally believe that Starmade is first and foremost a game about worldbuilding and creativity, and I believe that Stabilizers and the limiting of systems by hull size are an invaluable part in bringing crativity and competitiveness closer together.
Remember
I just crafted all of this in theory, there is absolutely no game testing to back these mechanics up. Also that I am alone and probably overlooked a bunch of stuff. So please, if you find any potential exploits or inbalances, feel free to point them out.
Also, I have left out some of the finer details, as I feel that these need to be figured out with playtesting.
1. NEW REACTORS
First, an overlook over the new basic reactor design. I have gotten rid of different symmetries, since these were way too rigid. Instead, you´ll now have to use x6 symmetry by default. But there is a twist ! Stabilizers don´t need to be placed at a fixed distance away from the reactor, instead the total distance from all 6 groups is added up to determine if they are far enough away.
This way you can place some groups closer, some other groups farther away, and use different hull shapes more efficiently in general.
2. NEW STABILIZERS
But that´s not all! I also advocate to change Stabilizers themselves, to get rid of advantages regarding diagonal placement and the whole "reactor align" weirdness.
Stabilizers should have a special side pointed towards the reactor, which determines the respective side of the reactor that they are stabilizing. The distance to the reactor should be measured only in the direction that they are pointing, again to make diagonal builds less op.
Players will have to place these down correctly by themselves, so some UI refresh to give clear info on what´s wrong may be vital to teaching the function of this block to new players.
3. Advantages of Power 3.0
This new reactor design is adaptable to all kinds of different hull shapes, and allows it´s components to be freely placed. A big step forward from the overly rigid symmetry reactors of Power 2.0.
4. Houston, we have a problem!
There is one cheesy ship desing that I caught on myself, and it is of the "fragmented" type. These ships split the up, down, left, and right Stablizers from the main hull and place them in their own, free floating pods. This gives them the advantages of having all 6 Stabilizers at an equal distance, which minimizes boxdim and therefore increases maneuverability, while simultaneously keeping a pretty narrow profile. Suffice to say, the advantage of such ships may be great enough to overpower any conventional hull design.
Power 2.0 had similar problems, which were attemted to be fixed with Stabilizer Beams, but those turned out to be ineffective.
So, how do we deal with these?
4.1. Do nothing
It´s fine I guess.
4.2. mild nerfs
These are easy to implement, but don´t quite fix the problem.
-1. rework maneuverability mechanics, so that ships with 3 equal dimensions have less of an advantage over long "stick" ships
-3. "spicy" stabilizers; essentially making damage to stabilizers critical, so that people will be incentivised to shoot them when the opportunity presents itself.
This may force players to hide the location of their Stabilizers within the hull instead of carrying them all out in the open.
Disadvantages:
A: shields exist.
B: may lead to frustration due to lucky shots disabling normal vessels.
C: possible counter-strat: instead of 4 separate pods, build a hollow ring around the ship and hide the stabilizers somewhere within the ring.
I do consider this a last ditch measure, that should be implemented in a mild manner, in case some other balancing measure isn´t 100% effective.
4.3. pysical shields
This could be a proper fix, and breathe some more depth into the game. However I doubt that it would be easy to implement.
Power 2.0 already reworked shields and gave us the shield bubble, an imaginary volume in which all blocks are protected. But what if the bubble itself was catching incoming fire on it´s surface? Then breaking your ship up into many smaller pieces won´t give you the same advantage on target profile, since your shield bubble would have to span over all the empty space, therefore increasing it´s surface area by a lot.
There are 2 more rules different to the current system, that are required to make it work:
1. only one bubble per ship
2. players should be able to influence the shape of the bubble, either by specific block placement or sliders, to elongate or squish it into ellyptical shape.
Going with spherical bubbles only would actually strengthen fragment ships, since they fill the spherical shape quite efficiently as opposed to, for example, a long and thin vessel, that would be penalized the same way in target profile, without having nearly as much reactor output.
And this was me vomiting my ideas out. All of these changes will probably require a lot of work to implement , but I think it´s worth it.
Until then, or whatever happens: fly safe o7
I suppose I should start with the beginning of this whole calamity, that was Power 2.0.
A system with good intentions, but also many flaws. I am not going to recount the many ways in which it was broken, and just state that it made many players hate Stabilizers and the concept of Stabilizer distance. Personally, however, I still believe that it could have been something great, and I have spent the last 2 weeks creating a whole new system, taking the concept of Stabilizer distance and building a completely new set of game mechanics around it.
why go through all of this effort?
The traditional "spaghetti" reactors, as well as the current "post 2.0" ones, create a meta around ship building that is centered around using any available volume for combat systems, in order to keep maneuverability and armor at a maximum while reducing the target profile. This has negative effects on creative builds, since any hull cutout or fancy hull shape, any hallway, interior room or hangar bay comes with a penalty in performance.
It seems that opinions split around this topic, but I personally believe that Starmade is first and foremost a game about worldbuilding and creativity, and I believe that Stabilizers and the limiting of systems by hull size are an invaluable part in bringing crativity and competitiveness closer together.
Remember
I just crafted all of this in theory, there is absolutely no game testing to back these mechanics up. Also that I am alone and probably overlooked a bunch of stuff. So please, if you find any potential exploits or inbalances, feel free to point them out.
Also, I have left out some of the finer details, as I feel that these need to be figured out with playtesting.
1. NEW REACTORS
First, an overlook over the new basic reactor design. I have gotten rid of different symmetries, since these were way too rigid. Instead, you´ll now have to use x6 symmetry by default. But there is a twist ! Stabilizers don´t need to be placed at a fixed distance away from the reactor, instead the total distance from all 6 groups is added up to determine if they are far enough away.
This way you can place some groups closer, some other groups farther away, and use different hull shapes more efficiently in general.
2. NEW STABILIZERS
But that´s not all! I also advocate to change Stabilizers themselves, to get rid of advantages regarding diagonal placement and the whole "reactor align" weirdness.
Stabilizers should have a special side pointed towards the reactor, which determines the respective side of the reactor that they are stabilizing. The distance to the reactor should be measured only in the direction that they are pointing, again to make diagonal builds less op.
Players will have to place these down correctly by themselves, so some UI refresh to give clear info on what´s wrong may be vital to teaching the function of this block to new players.
3. Advantages of Power 3.0
This new reactor design is adaptable to all kinds of different hull shapes, and allows it´s components to be freely placed. A big step forward from the overly rigid symmetry reactors of Power 2.0.
4. Houston, we have a problem!
There is one cheesy ship desing that I caught on myself, and it is of the "fragmented" type. These ships split the up, down, left, and right Stablizers from the main hull and place them in their own, free floating pods. This gives them the advantages of having all 6 Stabilizers at an equal distance, which minimizes boxdim and therefore increases maneuverability, while simultaneously keeping a pretty narrow profile. Suffice to say, the advantage of such ships may be great enough to overpower any conventional hull design.
Power 2.0 had similar problems, which were attemted to be fixed with Stabilizer Beams, but those turned out to be ineffective.
So, how do we deal with these?
4.1. Do nothing
It´s fine I guess.
4.2. mild nerfs
These are easy to implement, but don´t quite fix the problem.
-1. rework maneuverability mechanics, so that ships with 3 equal dimensions have less of an advantage over long "stick" ships
-3. "spicy" stabilizers; essentially making damage to stabilizers critical, so that people will be incentivised to shoot them when the opportunity presents itself.
This may force players to hide the location of their Stabilizers within the hull instead of carrying them all out in the open.
Disadvantages:
A: shields exist.
B: may lead to frustration due to lucky shots disabling normal vessels.
C: possible counter-strat: instead of 4 separate pods, build a hollow ring around the ship and hide the stabilizers somewhere within the ring.
I do consider this a last ditch measure, that should be implemented in a mild manner, in case some other balancing measure isn´t 100% effective.
4.3. pysical shields
This could be a proper fix, and breathe some more depth into the game. However I doubt that it would be easy to implement.
Power 2.0 already reworked shields and gave us the shield bubble, an imaginary volume in which all blocks are protected. But what if the bubble itself was catching incoming fire on it´s surface? Then breaking your ship up into many smaller pieces won´t give you the same advantage on target profile, since your shield bubble would have to span over all the empty space, therefore increasing it´s surface area by a lot.
There are 2 more rules different to the current system, that are required to make it work:
1. only one bubble per ship
2. players should be able to influence the shape of the bubble, either by specific block placement or sliders, to elongate or squish it into ellyptical shape.
Going with spherical bubbles only would actually strengthen fragment ships, since they fill the spherical shape quite efficiently as opposed to, for example, a long and thin vessel, that would be penalized the same way in target profile, without having nearly as much reactor output.
And this was me vomiting my ideas out. All of these changes will probably require a lot of work to implement , but I think it´s worth it.
Until then, or whatever happens: fly safe o7