Prerelease v0.200.250

[GDPR 302420]

The problem may not exist in the hardcore PVP world, but it’s very real and very troublesome for the rest of us.

What is the problem you are even talking about?
[doublepost=1512950931,1512950793][/doublepost]One of the biggest problems with systems 2.0 is inspite of the devsquad saying it would "remove" forced design choices it did not even achieve that, it just changed those forced design choices to something else that is equally as restrictive (if not more)

 

[JinM]

fyi about the power update and it's biggest benefit:

If you now want to compare two ships, you can say that they can be equal, if they have the same length on their longest dimension. This has one immersive benefit: If I look at two ships, and they booth have the same length in one dimension, I get the impression, that they have the same size.

And that is the point: Ships that appear having the same size, should be equal in strength. That means they are still differing greatly due to chambers, specialisation, and weapon setups.


The old power allowed ships of equal size to have big differences in their power. The rule for pvp was: You tried to stuff in as much system blocks as possible in the least space possible.

This old power prevented rp-builders from participating in pvp, if they didn't want to gut their interiors.

The biggest downside still is, that now any ship aims to be very long into one dimension.


But what no one of the pvpers wants to admit is, that the old power forced design choices too: No interior (oh yes, that is a forced design choice too); Not too long into one direction, to prevent bad turning rates.

That ships are now one-dimensional (see what I did there?) is a bummer, yes.

On the other hand we now can easily match us up against other players, by comparing our power output. Want to fight someone now? Ask him about his power geneartion. If his one is 30% higher than your ship, you should think twice if this is a battle worth your time. Wanted to fight someone in the old power system? Ask him about his ship mass - the power was 2mill e/s anyway as soon as the ship is longer than 100m or above 5k mass (additonal mass meant more space for auxiliary power, so the damage a ship dished out was related to its mass).

 

[GnomeKing]

it is not so much that that it is restrictive per se - its more that only one shape is clearly better for min-maxing.
'deep' rules which promote various solutions would have been better than simple rules with an obvious single meta...

For example the new connection rules i think are a good start - but pretty basic, given what is possible for varied and interesting block placement rules.

[The turret select-aim is final sorted - great ]

The new shields might work just fine - but the huge size of bubbles seems to make 'area' mechanics a moot point.
IDK - but i am not convinced Reactor-HP is a great solution to anything at all really either- maybe that will work out fine also.
Warp and scanner systems seem needlessly simplified for single-core use - why bother?

And Still there are docked-thingy-exploits (as vigorously discussed here)- and still disconnected ship elements are possible (also)

Stabilizers are an interesting alternative mechanic, but soon get boring and and a bit ugly - they hold very little long-term interest for tinkering

In my opinion, people will (eventually) want the Devs to make it 'easier'...

"why do i have to have a nose spammed full of ugly stabilizer anyway!"

 

[Kelpaz]

yi about the power update and it's biggest benefit:

If you now want to compare two ships, you can say that they can be equal, if they have the same length on their longest dimension. This has one immersive benefit: If I look at two ships, and they booth have the same length in one dimension, I get the impression, that they have the same size.

And that is the point: Ships that appear having the same size, should be equal in strength. That means they are still differing greatly due to chambers, specialisation, and weapon setups.

The old power allowed ships of equal size to have big differences in their power. The rule for pvp was: You tried to stuff in as much system blocks as possible in the least space possible.

This old power prevented rp-builders from participating in pvp, if they didn't want to gut their interiors.

I have a flagship with a massive interior, it's still very combat effective (in the old power system)
With the new power systems 90% of that flagship is completely empty because I cannot use any of it.
The new system only cares about extreme distances between reactors and stabilizers nothing else.

Making a smaller ship able to take on larger ones should be a good thing, not the other way.

 

[Valiant70]

The previous forced design choice was "no interior, no nacelles, and for Pete's sake not a single extra point of mass!"
New forced design choice is "Put your reactor in one end, your stabilizers in the other, and make that one dimension of your ship as long as possible."

Basing stabilizer efficiency on overall box dimensions of all stabilizers spread throughout the ship should help to solve this. To clarify:

Placing stabilizers on the edges of your ship in all directions maximizes the size of the reactor you can put in that ship. Need more power? Add a nacelle, ring, fin or something like that.

Why do we want this? It gives ships an appropriate amount of power according to their box dimensions. Depending on config settings, this may leave room for interior space. This also gives nacelles, rings, fins, and other projections a use so that they aren't dead weight. In other words, it makes aesthetic features less of a disadvantage. They still add more mass, but it improves the situation.

Even without any kind of boxdim-encouraging mechanic, I like the new power better. It feels like building machinery instead of... whatever the old system was. Mostly stuffing hulls with shields I guess.
[doublepost=1512953854,1512953427][/doublepost]Really, hardcore PVP servers should just change their configs so that stabilizers can be placed right next to the reactor. The reason for having stabilizers doesn't apply where no one cares about aesthetics. Leave the mechanic in and improve it for the rest of the community.

 

[Ithirahad]

By the way, hovers are way underpowered. It seems like a ship must be made almost entirely of thrusters just to be able to get off the ground. Not much room for advanced armor, standard armor, or even deco blocks...

 

[GnomeKing]

I like the new power better. It feels like building machinery

maybe with the chambers - but Stabilizers spam ?! :/ ??

 

[JinM]

Really, hardcore PVP servers should just change their configs so that stabilizers can be placed right next to the reactor. The reason for having stabilizers doesn't apply where no one cares about aesthetics. Leave the mechanic in and improve it for the rest of the community.

Nooooooooooooo. :D

For years the servers with the most visitors had vanilla settings except for sector size. If they now suddenly change that and the server that deactivates stablizers gets the most visitors, I will go insane. ^^

 

[Valiant70]

maybe with the chambers - but Stabilizers spam ?! :/ ??

Stabilizers need to have their mechanics reworked, but I like the purpose for which they were added.

 

[kiddan]

It seems block numbers are affecting the balance of a repulsing ship, but not block mass. The center of mass indicator can be in the middle of four corner repulsors and the ship will still tip. Is this intentional? If one side of my ship has fewer blocks than the other, I'd like to be able to use heavier armour on the side with fewer blocks to balance my ship out, but that doesn't affect repulsor balance.

 

[GnomeKing]

The reason for having stabilizers doesn't apply where no one cares about aesthetics

!!! - so we don't want build-rules that make an interesting game ? - and the legendary RP player doesn't care about systems that make some kind of sense, or achievement in making ship-systems work well ??

If it really is that 'Stabilizers' are to promote aesthetics, than they could hardly be uglier or more dumb-looking :/ ... which is a shame given the many other possibilities, or even the existing mechanics.

 

[Calhoun]

The previous forced design choice was "no interior, no nacelles, and for Pete's sake not a single extra point of mass!"

No. No it wasn't. You could make virtually any usable shape into an effective PvP ship.

And considering that most ships were compared by mass, an interior did not impact that at all.

 

[Valiant70]

And considering that most ships were compared by mass, an interior did not impact that at all.

All those decorations were dead weight that increased the number of blocks you needed for defensive effects, among other things. Combined with my suggestion which I've reiterated here, the new system does a better job of making any shape effective. The consequences of a little extra weight (Say, 10-20%) are greatly reduced by the new chamber system, which I like on its own anyway.

I find the new systems to be a lot more fun to work with, and less tedious. We just need to get those darned stabilizers fixed so we don't always get stuck with a long stick for a ship. I want a flying saucer dadgummit!

 

[GDPR 302420]

The previous forced design choice was "no interior, no nacelles, and for Pete's sake not a single extra point of mass!"

The previous system absolutely allowed you to make RP interiors and have a generaly good looking ship while it still being effective.

Such examples of effective ships with RP interiors include FCM, who did a good job with looks while still being effective and some of kulbolen 's builds had a fully fledged interior as well.

If you believe that absolutely no interior, eye candy and whatnot was an absolute requirement for you ship to be effective in Power 1.0 (unironicly) then either you play on some server with really weird configs with power and what not or you have no idea what you are talking about.

If you now want to compare two ships, you can say that they can be equal, if they have the same length on their longest dimension. This has one immersive benefit: If I look at two ships, and they booth have the same length in one dimension, I get the impression, that they have the same size.

I don't know which RPer started this "everything should be measured by dimensions" meme but this is just downright incorrect.

Compare ship sizes based on mass, not dimensions. I should not have to explain why mass is better then length for comparing ship size.

Don't compare the size of ships using dimensions, use mass or better yet, block count.

All those decorations were dead weight that increased the number of blocks you needed for defensive effects, among other things.

Unless a ridiculous amount of the mass of your ship is decoration elements then this was not an issue and could be easily worked around in 1.0.

 

[[email protected]]

Yes, it's repetitive, but it's necessary, you guys need to dramatically reduce the stabilizer-efficiency distance gradient.
You need to fix this.
Your system currently is excessively dysfunctional, as the distance required for the stabilizers to reach 100% efficiency is absurdly large, and the stabilizers necessary to get full stabilization at reasonable ranges usually outnumbers the amount of blocks in the reactor group.
I get that you guys worked hard on this, and that's why I make this criticism instead of asking for its removal, but its absolutely critical that the necessary tweaks be made before release.
Instead of having the current model for stabilization efficiency be what it is now, make the distance equal to the dimension of the reactor, and be measured from the surface of the reactor.
In essence, take the width of the reactor, and make the 100% stabilizer efficiency zone that same measurement away.
For example, if you had a 5x5x5 group (filled with reactor blocks), make the 100% stabilizer efficiency zone 5 blocks away from the sides of the reactor, therefore, that zone would be 15x15x15 and larger, versus what would be currently an 83x83x83 zone.
I understand you want to gut the exploits of the game, but making the power system impossible to work with wont solve it. The best way to remove stick ships from being a thing is to exaggerate the turning slow down so that it takes 30 seconds for a 1k long ship to turn 90 degrees, or implement a structural integrity system that would make a stick ship be dismantled by almost anything.
Your power system on paper allows for more creativity and less exploitation, but so far, it will require fundamental changes to simply function in place of the old system. If you want this to work, and to work well, you absolutely MUST reduce the stabilizer efficiency distance gradient to something reasonable. If you want to fix an exploit or an issue, don't change the framework of the game to do it, just implement a system where everything except that exploit works, or balance out either that or everything else to be just as efficient, or change something small as to lessen the exploit's ability to work. Changing the power system must be a process that is thought out to the maximal degree so that it doesn't make the game unplayable. You guys have done a pretty good job except for this one issue. If left unchanged, StarMade would be better off on the old system.

 

[Valiant70]

The previous system absolutely allowed you to make RP interiors and have a generaly good looking ship while it still being effective.

Such examples of effective ships with RP interiors include FCM, who did a good job with looks while still being effective and some of kulbolen 's builds had a fully fledged interior as well.

If you believe that absolutely no interior, eye candy and whatnot was an absolute requirement for you ship to be effective in Power 1.0 (unironicly) then either you play on some server with really weird configs with power and what not or you have no idea what you are talking about.

I don't know which RPer started this "everything should be measured by dimensions" meme but this is just downright incorrect.

Compare ship sizes based on mass, not dimensions. I should not have to explain why mass is better then length for comparing ship size.

Unless a ridiculous amount of the mass of your ship is decoration elements then this was not an issue and could be easily worked around in 1.0.

You're missing the point. Sure, you could be combat-ready with a full RP interior. You were kind of pigeonholed into an armor tank if you wanted to make any use of the extra weight, though. (Ironic, the pretty ships are the ones least likely to keep their hull intact.) The HP update was a huge step forward.

HOWEVER! Power 2.0 further reduces the consequences of adding interior and could allow nacelles or fins to serve a practical purpose. These become interesting design choices because you get more power, but your stabilizers are more vulnerable.

I'm still waiting for armor changes to make the skinless PVP builds less optimal.

 

[Calhoun]

You're missing the point. Sure, you could be combat-ready with a full RP interior. You were kind of pigeonholed into an armor tank if you wanted to make any use of the extra weight, though. (Ironic, the pretty ships are the ones least likely to keep their hull intact.) The HP update was a huge step forward.

HOWEVER! Power 2.0 further reduces the consequences of adding interior and could allow nacelles or fins to serve a practical purpose. These become interesting design choices because you get more power, but your stabilizers are more vulnerable.

I'm still waiting for armor changes to make the skinless PVP builds less optimal.

No. Just no. Decorations weigh jack all and still add HP. You're not pigeonholed into anything, nothing is stopping you from adding more guns and making a glass cannon, or more shields and making a shield tank. Usable RP/PvP ships certainly required more effort, but they were no less effective then your standard PvP ship.

 

[GDPR 302420]

You're missing the point. Sure, you could be combat-ready with a full RP interior. You were kind of pigeonholed into an armor tank if you wanted to make any use of the extra weight, though. (Ironic, the pretty ships are the ones least likely to keep their hull intact.) The HP update was a huge step forward.

Your original point was that Systems 1.0 forced you to not use interior or decoration elements and what not.

Any player who actually has a clue can tell you this is incorrect, full RP interior builds that are effective at meta level combat is more then possible, groups like FCM and people like kulbolen have been there, done that and got the t-shirt.

Also, you are not forced in armor taking when using RP interiors for PvP, that is just idiotic to assume.

 

[Valiant70]

The previous forced design choice was "no interior, no nacelles, and for Pete's sake not a single extra point of mass!"
New forced design choice is "Put your reactor in one end, your stabilizers in the other, and make that one dimension of your ship as long as possible."

This is hyperbole, which I used to make the statement concise. You're constructing strawman arguments by taking it too literally.

What I should have written is something like this:

"In Power 1.0, mass mattered considerably more than it does now. This made it advantageous to shave off every possible point of mass. The fact that chambers scale on reactor capacity rather than mass has reduced the consequence of each point of extra mass added by decoration.

Details such as nacelles, rings, or fins which added only HP and armor HP were generally added more weight in hull than they were worth in system volume, except on ships under the power soft-cap where these details provided a way to expand the box dimensions of the ship's power lines. If the changes proposed here are made, Power 2.0 will extend that utility to larger ships as well, and to thinner projections (such as Trekkie warp engines) that would not allow room for very many power lines and thus would have been mass-inefficient under power 1.0."

EDIT: "Furthermore, even without the proposed changes to stabilizers, the only forced design choice I can find in the new power system is that one dimension of the ship shall be as long as possible with the reactor in one end and stabilizers in the other."

My apologies for not fully fortifying my previous post against misinterpretation.
[doublepost=1512959282,1512958403][/doublepost]

Also, you are not forced in armor taking when using RP interiors for PvP, that is just idiotic to assume.

Interior = additional structure and armor HP. A ship with interior always has a higher ratio of armor and structure HP to other systems than a ship with only a hull, or with hull/armor only in specific places. Generally it's a good idea to take advantage of the armor HP the extra hull blocks provide by installing armor effects and/or using heavy armor in critical areas.

I might add that you can't seem to debate without slinging insults. This does not speak well for your maturity or debating skills, and generally makes your points seem less valid. You might want to work on that.

 

[GDPR 302420]

This is hyperbole

This is a definitional retreat

I might add that you can't seem to debate without slinging insults. This does not speak well for your maturity or debating skills, and generally makes your points seem less valid. You might want to work on that.

This is an ad hominem and whats worse is you seem to not understand that my point is no less valid just because the manner triggers you or someone else.

Interior = additional structure and armor HP. A ship with interior always has a higher ratio of armor and structure HP to other systems than a ship with only a hull, or with hull/armor only in specific places. Generally it's a good idea to take advantage of the armor HP the extra hull blocks provide by installing armor effects and/or using heavy armor in critical areas.

Or you can use shields, which most people who have a clue already do.
[doublepost=1512960096,1512960039][/doublepost]

You're constructing strawman arguments by taking it too literally.

>Making strawman arguments by taking what you said as what you said