Hey everyone,
I was looking for some opinions on the average strength/duration of different disasters during a multiplayer scenario. I'm most interested in balancing them for something like a Last One Standing scenario in particular.
They should probably be strong enough that they are noticeable to the players (or else why would you turn on the disasters), but weak enough they do not typically throw the game. What I mean is an electrical storm damaging a Tokamak and making you repair is a good example. A vortex starting on your CC just throws the game unfairly.
I think vortices should not be on by default as they are just too powerful. Even if they are set not to hit your starting base, a vortex appearing at a satellite mine and destroying 2 smelters, the mine, and half the trucks is too much. I was thinking that if vortexes were added, they could be relegated to vortex corridors represented by rectangles on the map where it would be reasonably appropriate to place them. IE not next to mining beacons but maybe somewhere where no one would usually travel to.
The specific values I was thinking are:
Disaster Weights (Over an interval of time say 15-25 marks one disaster will be cued to occur. Below is the percent chance of what that disaster would be):
- 15% of time no disaster occurs (skip)
- 35% of time meteor
- 20% of time electrical storm
- 20% of time earthquake
- 10% of time vortex
For meteors:- 40% small
- 40% medium
- 20% large (unless disabled)
Safe ZonesI was thinking about setting safe zones for each person's starting base (or anywhere else on the map that it makes sense). This keeps some of the nastier disasters from throwing the game early. For example a large meteor destroying your Tokamak or a vortex through your starting mine beacon/smelters, etc. Safe zones would not allow the following disasters to occur within them:
- No large meteors
- No Vortices
- No Earthquakes (an earthquake on the edge might cause minor damage within a safe area, but the earthquake wouldn't originate on say your Structure Factory and destroy all three of your waiting ConVecs.)
Vortex Duration (If allowed):- Min: 5 marks
- Max: 20 marks
Electrical Storm Duration- Min: 10 marks
- Max: 55 marks (or until it leaves the screen)
Earthquake Strength- Min: 0 (still does damage, but least settable amount)
- Max: 4 (I think about 7 is considered base destroying sized) I think 4 is weak enough it should not destroy a smelter, but would probably knock out a lot of the trucks in a satellite mining operation. I should test this.
I know that most people play with disasters off for competitive rounds. But since it is an option to select for every map I think it is important to include with at least a little bit of though. Hopefully one of these days I'll get a multiplayer scenario out.