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86 votes
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Attercob
commented
Huh....
Haven't seen this thread poked at in awhile. Over a year it seems.
I strongly disagree with @olegboleg.
I am not a very new player. I'm not even a new player. But I am a player, and I don't see the relevance of ranking players opinions by their experience. There are some pretty bone-headed veterans out there.
But on the note of new players, it's a pretty weird assumption to make that new players are frustrated or confused by the existing combat system. It's pretty simplistic and straightforward the way it is. Even the combat order is fairly easy to get. I think players who support this idea are looking for something a little more dynamic and complex that expands strategic options.
The game is in fact about realism. The original author of the game went to great lengths to make this game as realistic as possible. Chess is symbolicly representative, but VGA Planets is closer to simulated representation. VGA Planets is so much more than circles, dots, lines and triangles being moved around a game board in arbitrary ways. They behave according to a set of rules designed to mimic a space empire, so much so that a space empire is easily recognizable in the representation. Most unrealistic game mechanics exist due to the limitations of programming of the 1990's. You're right, that Chess was never meant to be realistic. But VGA Planets was.
This fleet combat mod was infact an existing mod for VGA Planets. It was called the Killing Floor. You're right that it was a significant change to VGA Planets... But to call it a different game entirely? In order to make that claim, you'd have to make a convincing argument of where the line was that would cause VGA Planets to be a "different" game. Cause I could argue that simply having a different collection of players who play differently, make the game a "different" game. And that's not to mention all of the addons and options that are available on the Nu platform.
Here are some other remarks about how this combat system would change VGA Planets:
"Under TKF (The Killing Floor), the smaller ships in a game are given more emphasis. Since they can attack en masse they can simply overwhelm anything in their path; ie, 3-4 Patriots (8 beams, 24 fighter bays, 120 fighters) can take out any individual ship, including the positively monstrous Federation heavy carriers (when they get them).
The biggest individual general change to game strategy is simply this:
One of the base principles of war set out by Sun Tzu was to outnumber your enemy at the point of contact; TKF makes this worthwhile, where VCR could not. If you can concentrate your firepower, when the enemy must divide his, you will win every time. Under the normal VCR program, concentration of forces was far less important, since the point of contact was limited to ONE SHIP fighting. Under TKF, general strategy is made simpler. You'll have to learn how to think slightly differently, think a little bit against the way that we've always had to with VCR installed. For newbies, this will be easy, but for people who've lived and breathed single ship combat for years, it could prove difficult. Using TKF requires a fundamental difference in the way that we approach combat using VGAP, the impact is especially felt in the mid and end games... and if you haven't prepared for it...The roles of fighters and torpedoes are different now. Fighters are best used when the enemy doesn't have them, and the best defence for a fighter, is more fighters."
An error occurred while saving the comment Attercob
commented
Actually it's more realistic.
If five guys fight five other guys on equal terms, chances are even the winning side will take losses. But if 50 guys fight 5 guys, then the winning side is almost certainly going to go to the larger group AND they stand a better chance of fewer or no losses.
But I agree, that fleet behavior controls would make fleet combat much more interesting. Things like target prioritization, or aggressive/defensive fleet stances would make extremely dynamic battles. Having some ships with orders to flee and escape (freighters) while other ships having orders to escort, guard, blockade, decoy. And on the other side you have ships with orders to persue weaker targets, or focus on stronger ones. Some ships with orders for fire-supression, & fighter interception. And give other ships orders to ignore blockades and go straight for the vulnerable planet, or freighter. So much potential.
A final note...All games will always be unbalanced to stronger players. That's why they're considered stronger.
Attercob
supported this idea
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7 votes
An error occurred while saving the comment Attercob
commented
Agreed.
Attercob
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0 votesAttercob
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25 votes
An error occurred while saving the comment Attercob
commented
@Finn I disagree with your comment about injecting an artificial random elements in the game.
Take a look at the game of Chess. There is no random element. No one is rolling dice, or drawing cards. There are no statistics influencing moves. There are no hidden forces working against you. Everything you are capable of and everything your opponent is capable of is revealed for all to see on the board. The only thing you can't see is the inner workings of your opponents mind. But other than his plans, he can't hide anything from you.
Take a look at Poker. Arguably, still a game of strategy, but now it's less about considering your opponents capababilities, because there is no certainty there. Now it becomes more about statistics. In Poker you play the odds. Strategy is reduced, but is still present. But now Math is a huge factor.
Both of these games are incredibly complex and fun. But none of these games are made fun because of the random element. I would like to imagine that VGA Planets is kin to these kinds of games.
I said that the left side advantage was artificial, because there is no reason for one side or the other to perform better. It's completely arbitrary. Tim Wiseman has even agreed it was an unexpected bug. To say that a fight should have a random coin toss to see if one ship should get an advantage for no other reason just doesn't jive with the rest of the feel of the game. I say make the game more about math. Statistical probability based outcomes can still generate difficult to predict events, or unexpected wins and losses with out making the whole thing seem arbitrary.
An error occurred while saving the comment Attercob
commented
@thin - What does that experience actually do? As far as I can tell, ship experience only helps for surviving ion-storms, and has nothing to do with battle performance.
Attercob
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An error occurred while saving the comment Attercob
commented
@Veldan I agree. Fix the problem. Make left side/right side irrelevant.
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1 vote
An error occurred while saving the comment Attercob
commented
Same thing happened to me. Including the ship components I built, still present in the starbase, even though the commands for tech levels increase weren't processed.
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11 votesAttercob
supported this idea
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An error occurred while saving the comment Attercob
commented
I would like to see this implimented as well. Here are my specific suggestions, some of them already covered by Kasper.
-Allow pre-determined team games. (My team challenges your team in a private game!)
-Allow add-ons, stellar cartography, edge wrap, and any others.
-Allow default config settings to be altered.
-More options for map configuration. Mineral Richness, natives or no natives, shape of the galaxy, etc.
-Scenerio options - Ashes of the old empire. Everyone starts with multiple planets, and ships.
-Allow for more than 11 players. -
2 votes
An error occurred while saving the comment Attercob
commented
I've been thinking along these lines for awhile now. It's hard to say how much you should change a game with out just making a whole new game altogether. But some of the game play features were implemented as restrictions due to the limited processing ability of computers 20 years ago. Today there is no real need for a 500 ship or planet limitation except if it served some kind of game mechanic, and I'm not sure this one does.
I'll put one vote toward evolving a game, through community discussion!
Attercob
supported this idea
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15 votes
An error occurred while saving the comment Attercob
commented
I like this. Letting you click to any point in a waypoint path allows you to easily have multiple ships travel along the same way path, without using towing.
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9 votesAttercob
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13 votesAttercob
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Even in reddit forums where you can vote down other peoples threads, you're generally not supposed to just because you don't like it. You're only supposed to vote down inappropriate or abusive threads.
All I read in your post was "I think VGA Planets should be played a certain way, so I don't want other players playing it differently." No one's gonna take original VGA Planets away from you. Why would you block an idea that doesn't affect you, just cause you don't like it? You sound like Kim Davis.
I read through your whole rambling post, and there wasn't a single reason why fleet combat was a bad idea. Only that it was different.
Nu has already added mods that have significantly altered the strategy of Planets. All of the Campaign perks. Stellar Cartography was pretty radical. Don't even get me started on the new Priority build que. I think the biggest change was sphere. It's such a simple change, but has had a huge impact on the way players manage their expansion, and fight a war. And all of these are optional. You can try them out, but you aren't forced to play them.
Isn't that pretty great?
Anyway, I don't think devs look at these old idea forums anymore anyway. You're probably safe that this will never happen. Which is a tragedy, cause now i'll never know if a swarm of Swift Hearts can take down a Biocide.