Outpost Universe Forums
Outpost Series Games => Outpost 2 Divided Destiny => Topic started by: Lugia3 on March 10, 2012, 10:26:01 PM
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Recently there has been discussion about creating an "update" for the game that would improve neglected features of the game, such as panthers, scorpions, and repairs. How many of you guys would support this?
Here is my contribution to the topic:
Units and unit groups should have a slider that marks the percentage of health remaining before the unit automatically flees and heads for the nearest marked garage for repairs. Garages could also be marked to be used by ally units. This would open up numerous strategic advantages, like building a forward base with many garages to extend the length of your supply lines. Doing this would also require an upgrade to the system used to store units in garages, it would have to keep them "active" (teleporting them off map) instead of turning them into a number (that effectively killed them, as demonstrated in Renegades mission 3).
Spiders and repair vechs should also be able to "patch" units to full health, but the patch decays back down to half health after 30 seconds. They should also have a toggle button that sets them to automatically repair nearby friendly units and buildings in a designated area or in a set radius around the unit. This would take less focus on keeping your base from falling apart and more focus on the objective, for example in Eden Population I by tick 3000 storms are hammering your original base location so badly that you only have seconds to do other things before having to send in a repair team.
Scorpions, I don't have any ideas for them. Panthers were already discussed here (http://forum.outpost2.net/index.php?showtopic=5360). Some units could be rebalanced, such as tiger construction cost and panther turrets.
Tigers seem like very tall units, maybe arachnids and repair vechs could move under them. Command centers could be given a dock where the colony symbol "peg" stands. Evacuation transports could load specific colonists there for jump starting a fallen ally who has lost everyone.
Post your ideas on features that could be included in a patch. And yes, I know the source code would be needed to accomplish something like this, and many days of programing would be needed. It would also need a complicated menu revamp to avoid messing up the campaign and colony games.
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One thing that always frustrated me in multi was the lack of ability to share tubes through ally buildings. Though, since alliances can be made and broken at random, it's justifiable.
I personally don't like the idea of automating combat units any further than they have been already. It makes things easier and takes a bit away from things. Automating repair vehicles, on the other hand, seems like it could add to the game quite well if done correctly.
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This poll covers too much for me to simply vote with "yes" or "no". Generally I do not support changing any unit's capabilities or properties (though I can support this in special cases).
I think that adding some automation to the game (such as repairing) would drastically change the gaming experience. Right now op2 is much about who can click and use hotkeys most quickly. Imo that's a bad basis for gameplay. Automating some aspects could allow players (especially new ones) to focus more on tactics. This could help us attract new players who would otherwise have trouble with the outstanding amount of micromanagement in op2. However, I think that automation should be limited. For example I don't like the (hypothetical) idea of adding scripted behaviors to units (such as automatic fire and retreat for ESG).
Ideas:- production queues
- research queues
- improved garages: add a "repair" button to units that makes them drive to the nearest garage, get repaired, leave the garage (not sure what it should do then - driving back to where it came from seems like a bad idea, since it would be an easy target).
- EMP'ed units should not forget what they were doing (possibly requiring an rcc)
- more settings for multiplayer games: unbreakable alliances, more control over starting resources, tech tree and tech level, etc.
Well, there are many ideas. But who's going to implement them? All we have is the disassmbly. Yes, its possible to work with that, but adding the things mentioned above would involve more changes than everything before. I don't see that any of the people capable of doing this have the time to do it. Also, rewriting the whole game could possibly be easier.
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I'd suggest a few easier things:
- Adjust unit/structure cost
- Fix Sticky foam upgrade research so that it actually works
- Adjust weapon damage/range
- Add some more missile options ?
- Increase spider repair capabilities
- Adjust research durations
Overall goal would be to adjust known issues in Eden vs Plymouth balance.
Also it would be nice to get Flashy's colonist trading and Arklons wall-near-lava hacks into the normal game.
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Wait...the stickyfoam research doesn't work? That's news to me...
What about unit upgrades? I know it's convenient that all the units auto-patched, but what if they didn't? For things that would just be a software patch, that would just be transmitted, but complete drive train refits...It would also be nice to be able to choose the non-upgraded form of the unit for when you need to conserve resources.
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Overall goal would be to adjust known issues in Eden vs Plymouth balance.
And who decides what is an issue and what not? Who decides how to make it balanced? What do we do about breaking of the original missions?
What about unit upgrades? I know it's convenient that all the units auto-patched, but what if they didn't? For things that would just be a software patch, that would just be transmitted, but complete drive train refits...It would also be nice to be able to choose the non-upgraded form of the unit for when you need to conserve resources.
That would turn Outpost 2 into another game, a change that I would dislike. Nice idea for a sequel though.
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Example of imbalance in eden and plym units:
When causing damage, the ESG causes enemy units to auto-attack. Meanwhile, the AcidCloud does not. I personally think that either the both should or both should not trigger an auto-retaliation.
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Example of imbalance in eden and plym units:
When causing damage, the ESG causes enemy units to auto-attack. Meanwhile, the AcidCloud does not. I personally think that either the both should or both should not trigger an auto-retaliation.
Agreed. Or even better: let the player choose.
But not every thing is as clear. My point was, that we'll have to start a discussion about balance, which can take a long time. And seeing that previous discussions of this subject have led to no agreement, I doubt we'll find an agreement now.
The problem with balancing is, that there are too many different strategies. You can't be sure, that there is no strategy which you don't know which makes one side superior. Furthermore, the game has different modes (morale, disasters, the map itself, etc.) which influence gameplay quite a lot. Is it really possible to make Eden and Plymouth equally strong under all settings?
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Balancng isn't about makig them equals under all strategies, it is about making them equal on the default setting. The advantage plym has early game is nowhere near as large as the advantage eden has late game, and I think most people here agree that is a fact. I think the somewhat low accuracy of the thor's hammer was an attempt to balance this, but it is too easy to overcome that and be a wave of destruction. What if we were to adjust the damage settings? What if the weapon caused damage to the platform it is on? The first could be dome the same way things have been changed, the second might take more than we are currently capable of.
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Is it really possible to make Eden and Plymouth equally strong under all settings?
Yes! ... By making both colonies identical. ;)
Actually, I've long been impressed with Starcraft's balance of three rather distinct colonies. Outpost 2 has two not all that distinct colonies, and balance discussions keep coming up. Mind you this isn't something I find very noticeable outside of multiplayer, due to the structure of the game and the AI.
It kind of makes you wonder if perhaps better balance can be achieved by adding new units, rather than editing existing units. That approach might also work well for not interfering with the original game if the new units aren't used. Perhaps a simple on/off switch of some kind? Of course this ignores the difficulty of actually adding new units to the game.
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Well, by now the game has existed for a long time. So far nothing substantial has been added to the game.. most of what has been done has been editing what was already there (At least it seems so to me)
So, if a revamp was to be attempted I would think it would come in the form of more editing and perhaps tinkering with unit and weapon's values/costs.
If we go about with too many grand plans, I would fear it would all come to the same conclusion as all the other projects posted on these forums - lots of talk and ideas, not so much substantial produced. (Feel free to prove me wrong though!!)
The balancing of OP2 would mostly be directed at Multiplayer, since this is were most issues arise.
Some of the things I mentioned in my previous post would certainly be nice to work into the game itself, but mostly one would attempt to balance multiplayer.
Singleplayer is already ok I would say. It certainly isn't broken.. (And if it isn't broken, why try to fix it?)
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Balancng isn't about makig them equals under all strategies, it is about making them equal on the default setting.
You mixed up "strategies" and "settings".
The default setting is disasters on, morale unsteady. Most people don't play that. And if we decided to care only about disasters off, morale steady, that would be a punch in the face for all the people who prefer to play with morale unsteady.
The advantage plym has early game is nowhere near as large as the advantage eden has late game, and I think most people here agree that is a fact.
Exactly this is an example where people didn't agree.
I think the somewhat low accuracy of the thor's hammer was an attempt to balance this, but it is too easy to overcome that and be a wave of destruction.
Why care about Thor's Hammer if Acid Cloud is even stronger?
What if we were to adjust the damage settings? What if the weapon caused damage to the platform it is on? The first could be dome the same way things have been changed, the second might take more than we are currently capable of.
We can think about it. Need to do excessive testing, before your question can be answered.
It kind of makes you wonder if perhaps better balance can be achieved by adding new units, rather than editing existing units.
That would be wonderful.
So, if a revamp was to be attempted I would think it would come in the form of more editing and perhaps tinkering with unit and weapon's values/costs.
If we go about with too many grand plans, I would fear it would all come to the same conclusion as all the other projects posted on these forums - lots of talk and ideas, not so much substantial produced.
That's right. But still, if all our changes are mere edits of some values, there are ways to do it well or not so well.
The balancing of OP2 would mostly be directed at Multiplayer, since this is were most issues arise.
Agreed. But again, there is not one setting "multiplayer". "multiplayer" are several possible settings.
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QUOTE (CK9 @ Mar 12 2012, 05:57 PM)
Balancng isn't about makig them equals under all strategies, it is about making them equal on the default setting.
You mixed up "strategies" and "settings".
The default setting is disasters on, morale unsteady. Most people don't play that. And if we decided to care only about disasters off, morale steady, that would be a punch in the face for all the people who prefer to play with morale unsteady.
I'm afraid you've misunderstood me here. A wave of supernova lynx sneaking into an undefended base is a very unbalanced strategy. No matter how well balanced we can make the two colonies, players will always fid a strategy that leaves a huge imbalance.
By default settings, I mean the actual unit comparison. Eden has a HUGE firepower advantage over plym that makes it impossible to beat eden without one or more of the following being true:
[/li]- The person playing eden is inexperienced
- The person playing Eden is preoccupied with a fairly large attack from a third player
- You rush them early game with a good number of microwave lynx
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The advantage plym has early game is nowhere near as large as the advantage eden has late game, and I think most people here agree that is a fact.
Exactly this is an example where people didn't agree.
I don't see where there is room for disagreement. An upgraded microwave lynx attack has been showed to be moderately easy to hold off against in several games. Meanwhile, an acidcloud/thor's grouping (even with lynx) is devistating without the use of emp missiles. However, the ammount of ore that goes into making the missiles makes it very difficult to effectively use them to fend off the attacks.
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I think the somewhat low accuracy of the thor's hammer was an attempt to balance this, but it is too easy to overcome that and be a wave of destruction.
Why care about Thor's Hammer if Acid Cloud is even stronger?
That's like arguing "Why care about SOPA or PIPA when ACTA is so much worse?" Just because one is stronger doesn't mean that the other doesn't have a huge impact. Also, how is the acid cloud stronger? Acid cloud is area of effect only, thor's has a directed attack with an element of area of effect. The main advantage the acid cloud has is that it doesn't trigger auto-retaliation.
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I don't see where there is room for disagreement. An upgraded microwave lynx attack has been showed to be moderately easy to hold off against in several games.
Also, how is the acid cloud stronger? Acid cloud is area of effect only, thor's has a directed attack with an element of area of effect. The main advantage the acid cloud has is that it doesn't trigger auto-retaliation.
A Micro rush is nigh impossible to fend off if you are an Eden player. Only exception is Pie (Or similar map), or where you have an obstacle between yourself and the rushing player (I.e an AI or another player). At least this is true as long as skill levels are the same.
Acid is stronger just because of the area effect. When two armies meet head on, the Acids will kill/damage 9 units, while Thors will do the same to 1 unit at a time.
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My strategy is to remain of the defensive until I'm sure I can win. I try and have at least 1 more VF than anyone else, and a stable ore income when building tigers at each. 3-4 groups of 32 tigers, assisted by some spaceports, is enough to punch through any Eden fortification.
A few weeks ago me, High, and Drib had another match. High killed Drib early and we both went into an arms race. 1500 marks later I decided I had enough to kill High. I sent in 3 full armies of tigers with 2 EMP missile spaceports backing them up. Both ways into Highs base were thin, only letting a few units through at a time, and were heavily defended. By the time I had punched into the clearing I had already lost 2 armies and my remaining army was half dead. I killed a few areas as I went to the CC, and won.
The point I'm trying to make in the above rant/brag is that Plymouth will usually lose 1v1 with an Eden player late game. Plymouth has to rely on gorilla warfare and more tactics. It all depends on having a stronger economy and manufacturing capability than your Eden opponents, and a motivation.
In my opinion, the balance between Eden and Plymouth doesn't need to be patched unless we change something critical.
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I'm afraid you've misunderstood me here. A wave of supernova lynx sneaking into an undefended base is a very unbalanced strategy. No matter how well balanced we can make the two colonies, players will always fid a strategy that leaves a huge imbalance.
The situation that you describe can happen, yea. But imo its not an example of imbalance. A game is imbalanced if there is a strategy for one faction that will always win if used by a good player. Or: If in a series of games between two equally skilled players one faction will win more than 50% of the time. (assuming that there are only two factions)
By default settings, I mean the actual unit comparison. Eden has a HUGE firepower advantage over plym that makes it impossible to beat eden without one or more of the following being true:
*snip*
One may argue that Eden can hardly defend against emp missiles and is thus inferior. See below.
I don't see where there is room for disagreement. An upgraded microwave lynx attack has been showed to be moderately easy to hold off against in several games. Meanwhile, an acidcloud/thor's grouping (even with lynx) is devistating without the use of emp missiles. However, the ammount of ore that goes into making the missiles makes it very difficult to effectively use them to fend off the attacks.
Apparently, for some people its not hard to spam missiles. The disagreement is proven by threads like this (http://forum.outpost2.net/index.php?showtopic=2565) or this (http://forum.outpost2.net/index.php?showtopic=3851). They are basically about the question whether Acid/Thors or EMP missiles give the bigger advantage. Another thread which may be of interest could be "Balancing OP2" (http://forum.outpost2.net/index.php?showtopic=1537&hl=missile).
And as we can see, there are even people who think that the "balance" is alright as it is.
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-.- I'm s*** at communicating my thoughts
From what I have seen, a micro rush is not close to impossible to fend off as:
1) both microwave and laser weapons require the same research steps and around the same time in research
2) both units are similarly, if not exactly the same, in ore costs
3) unless both colonies are very close, eden has plenty of time to increase the number of units it has before the microwave units arrive.
missle spamming is only successful on maps wherein plym can get a good number of mines and smelters operational. The time spent building this up is only available in games with more than one opponent or very large maps.
I'll try to post more when I get back from class, as this is proving to be a rather interesting discussion and I am enjoying reading the counter-arguments.
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From what I have seen, a micro rush is not close to impossible to fend off as:
1) both microwave and laser weapons require the same research steps and around the same time in research
2) both units are similarly, if not exactly the same, in ore costs
3) unless both colonies are very close, eden has plenty of time to increase the number of units it has before the microwave units arrive.
In an unmarked game on Pie between two equally skilled players, one Eden, one Plymouth, micro rush wins. At least that's what I observed in the rare cases where I saw this. On different maps the situation may be different. But that proves my argument of different maps/settings effecting balance.
missle spamming is only successful on maps wherein plym can get a good number of mines and smelters operational. The time spent building this up is only available in games with more than one opponent or very large maps.
Yea, but that's just one aspect, of unknown impact. We have to evaluate the complete equation.
I'll try to post more when I get back from class, as this is proving to be a rather interesting discussion and I am enjoying reading the counter-arguments.
I'm also enjoying this discussion.
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I think it would be worthwhile to test that by having two "equally skilled" players switch colonies over two games. It would be interesting to see if that has an impact on the results.
Yes, looking over it maps do have a major balance factor. Perhaps we could use this to correct the issue rather than changing any game settings? I haven't done the coding end of making a multiplayer map yet, but building the terrain itself is certainly much easier than going through numerous tests trying to decide when one unit has been balanced.
The ability to process large quantities of ore is one of the biggest factors in effectively spamming missles, especially when you're trying to build up units to deal with an oncming army at the same time. The second you start having to pause your production, your chances have decreased.
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1 micro upgraded is worth nearly 2 laser lynx. Which means you need a much bigger army as Eden.
In addition Plymouth has stickyfoam, which can immobilize the enemy forces.
As long as the map is like pie chart or you have a similar base location, bottlenecks can help the eden player, but once mobility is a question it's just gg.
As for missile spamming it's hard to counter if you can't get at your opponents rare, more so if he has a lot of it. In any case, those missiles seems to be coming rather cheap compared to their potential damage.
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I think it would be worthwhile to test that by having two "equally skilled" players switch colonies over two games. It would be interesting to see if that has an impact on the results.
Indeed. Would have to do more than 2 games though, because one can always be (un)lucky. So, who are the players to test this?
Yes, looking over it maps do have a major balance factor. Perhaps we could use this to correct the issue rather than changing any game settings? I haven't done the coding end of making a multiplayer map yet, but building the terrain itself is certainly much easier than going through numerous tests trying to decide when one unit has been balanced.
I'm not sure what your suggestion is. We can't just tell people to not play Pie any more (or even take the map out of the game). I like how op2 has very different types of maps. Taking away map types would take away from the goodness of op2.
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With the maps I prefer to play on (Fractures, Arund the World, etc) there is more than enough time for a suitably sized force to be built up. The smaller the map, though, the more likely it is that the rush might succeed. Even if they do have stickyfoam, though, it isn't much more than a pain in the backside. If you have at least kept up with vehicle priduction and research at an equal rate, by the time micro is upgraded and sticky is available, you should have emp almost ready. Unless the person playing plym is very agressive, they usually back into a defensive position the first time they get hit by the first eden emp.
Whenever I spammed emp missiles, it wasn't the rare that was the big problem. I ran out of common metals much faster than rare metals every time. Of course, I stuck with emp and rpg lynx and sometimes spiders to get to the disabled enemy units fast.
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If I do a micro rush against Eden I don't take the time to upgrade anything. I rush as soon as I have 10-15 micro lynxes. (upgrades are a good idea, though, if rushing against Plymouth)
Missiles are probably most useful if used with care, i.e. you use them in the right moment, just when your tanks are close enough to the enemy tanks to kill them in the moment the missile comes in. This allows a Plymouth player to eliminate a small army for the cost of one missile and maybe a few tanks.
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And when not upgraded, micros and lasers are on much more even ground. Not to mention that them being at your lines gives you an advantage of faster reinfrcement.
Most of the times that I have used missile spamming, it has been when I don't have the units to be able to take on more than a handful of enemy units. That says more about my unit handling than anything, though, heh`
``
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without upgrades lasers and micros are not at all equal. Laser does 0 concussion damage, micro 20. Penetration damage is about the opposite. I don't know the exact damage formulas, but concussion damage is what matters most against units with light armor, such as lynxes. Furthermore, the laser has a higher reload time. Hence a microwave lynx wins against a laser lynx.
But I was a bit imprecise in my post above. Usually there is enough time to research Heat Dissipation Systems, which is only available to Plymouth early in game. Hence, micros are even more powerful.
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With that in mind, it seems rather curious that players who prefer eden would choose to play on a smaller map.
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Most maps has decent defensive positions, which outweighs the distance offered in larger maps.
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And therefore it is easily arguable that the microwave blitzkrieg is not nearly as effective in practice as it is in theory. Looking at the numbers, it definately looks like mics overwhelm lasers. once you take the map into account, though, you see the potential for lasers to hold out and fend off attacks. Even on smaller maps, the defender has faster reinforcing time than the attacker. That combined with the natural defences (and the occasional case of a cliff that a laser can shoot down from on top of...strange occurance that I have personally whitnessed in the plym campeign) makes it possible to survive the attack long enough to get the next weapon tier and stop them in their tracks. Yes, it would take some practice to get it right, but it wouldn't be impossible.
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And therefore it is easily arguable that the microwave blitzkrieg is not nearly as effective in practice as it is in theory. Looking at the numbers, it definately looks like mics overwhelm lasers. once you take the map into account, though, you see the potential for lasers to hold out and fend off attacks.
You claim, you're talking about practice, whereas everything you say is theory.
I saw micro rushes defeating Eden. Clearly, player skills may have been different, but it is at least some practical observation that supports my argument.
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Yes, we have all seen the micro rushes overwhelm, and just about every time I have seen that it was a very unbalanced fight where the stronger player took out a weaker player. I have also seen circumstances where the two were much closer in skill and eden did push back plym because of the volume of laser lynx they were able to produce.
Furthermore, with the effect of bottlenecking (as I experienced in a game agains Fiologist), which can be created artificially fairly quickly if none exist naturally (not saying you will always get it done in time, just that you will sometimes be able to if you start right away) it is possible to fend them off even if both sides have the same number of units.
Granted, most people instantly destroy walls when they come up to them. However, this is yet another thing that will temporarily delay them, giving you more time to get closer to bringing emp into the fight.
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Look.
Players are the same.
# of units are the same.
1 unit is twice as strong as the other.
Bottlenecks can in most cases be circumvented.
- If every factor is the same, except the unit strenght, then it's GG for the lasers.
Creating walls limits you in other ways because it takes time, attention and ore. Which gives your attacking opponent the lead in the match and you will be forced to follow up on what he does.
And it's never Micro vs Lasers only. Plymouth has Stickyfoam as well. Either you damage units from afar, get them stickied. Then either your opponent will pull back and you can destroy the stickied units, or he rallies his units around the stickied units and you can sticky his army and go around it, or attack it from the most convenient angle.
If a Micro rush goes wrong against a Eden player, it's usually because the Plymouth player messes up, rather than the Eden player doing something right.
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If building walls distracts you from development, you're doing it wrong. By the very nature of how the games does things, you are left with pockets of time during which you are waiting. Even if these are a second each, you can get a wall-made bottleneck up without taking a serious hit to your development time.
Circumventing a bottleneck takes time: Either they need to take the long way around to another opening or they need to shoot the wall down. These both give you more time to build up more units and, because thisis at your base, you will have more effective units at any one time if you and your opponent are building at the same rate.
Stickyfoam still has the same hinderence of all vehicles: they have fire delay. Splitting your units into three groups to defend the opening gives you a chance to strike stickyfoam units as they come in to hit you. If plym is whack-a-moleing the unit, they aren't producing new units as effectively. Since you will more than likely have the factor(ies) close to the opening, you can keep an eye on units while building more.
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The advantage of having factories close when defending your own base is not as big as you may think on small maps like Pie. The time it takes to move a lynx from base 1 to base 2 is probably no longer than it takes to produce two lynxes in one vf. Hence, even if the defending player has 2 vfs, he/she would have 4 more lynxes than the attacker. For exmaple, Plymouth could attack with 12 micros and Eden could defend with 16 lasers, i.e. numbers would be 3:4 for the attacker. But due to microwave being twice as strong as laser (didn't check that claim), overall strengths would be 3:2 Plymouth vs Eden.
The natural bottlenecks on Pie are rather useless against small armies (unless you can defend them with Stickies). Walls are destroyed quickly: The time that destruction of 2 wall tiles takes is no longer than the time that it takes for the attacker's tanks to gather next to the destroyed wall. And if the defender is serious about building walls and makes one really thick, that will be a distraction.
Not to mention that walls can be a pain if you need to expand beyond the wall. I.e. the Plymouth player can always decide to expand his base instead of rushing, while the Eden player would be trapped inside his base (assuming the situation from above, where the Eden player builds walls for defence).
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But on pie, players mostly try to hold the center rather than push forward. Of course, this is mainly true in team situations because of the multiple fronts...
As to walls, I've had several games where I was able to get very thick walls without it taking away from my development. Granted, I tend to be slower than everyone else as it is. However, it stands to reason that someone who takes time to practice it can get a decent defensive position in the time it takes to get enough mics to have an effective rush.
With regards to expansion, it's no more of a pain than normal. The speed of the vehicles is the same, the kits are not affected, and you still have the tube going through either way. The only thing that it has an impact on is moving large numbers of units through.
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Let's take 4 maps that are played a bit. Pie, Root, Frac's, AtW.
Pie has a good defensive position. 2 Entrances.
Root has 4 good def positions on the cliffs. 2 Entrances
Frac has cliffs as well. 3 Entrances at least to all base locations.
AtW, open, except for the Fort. Fort has 5 entrances.
Only on Frac and AtW would distance come into play. However, on both maps, the amount of entrances makes it hard to set up a proper defensive position
On both Pie and Root, it would take some time to go around, but not much more than 1 min topmost.
Not enough time to build up so you can defend both entrances at once.
On both Pie and Root, walling yourself in your base, saves you for the moment. But it gives you opponent free access to all the ore on the map. In addition, the bottleneck becomes "his" in terms of advantage, when you try to break out.
If you need twice as much weaponry as your opponent, why do you spend ore on other stuff than weaponry ? Building walls cost ore after all..
I'm not sure any of us can persuade you in this matter CK.. Would you prefer a practical demonstration of what I'm trying to explain ? We can put down the game speed to compensate for any skill differences..
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My favorite base location on Fractures (80% chance of common ore being 3-bar) has only 2 entrances. One of these is a natural 1-tile bottleneck, but the location is not on top of the cliff (but that's only a problem late-game).
On one version of root (why there are two versions is beyond me, but they are different game modes...) has 4 build spots with a single entrance each.
Around the World has a few locations that are slightly more defensible than you give them credit for, but yes overall that map does lack in defensive positions.
On pie, walling yourself in is just a strategy to get over the hump. It isn't a long-term thing. The cost of walls (I think it's 50 each? or is it tubes 50, walls 75?) is easily compensated for with the proper mine setup. The single-minded approach of putting everything into one thing is not a good approach.
Game speed won't have a lot of impact in skill difference, especially in a case where one person knows the tech tree a lot better than the other. If I were to see two people objectively testing it though, I would take it into consideration.
Do you guys mind if I separate this discussion from the thread and move it into the debate section? It seems we've allowed ourselves to hijack the thread with it, lol.
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An interesting idea to patch up the game. My question is, is it even possible to build a patch for it. Is anyone here knowledgeable enough to do it (I'm not).
If it was able to be done I'd suggest (My changelog; bit long):
-> Make it more randomized on where and when a disaster will strike.
-> Queues would be awesome. Early game its not a huge problem, but mid-late game it becomes difficult to manage building kits, building units, research, and combat all at the same time (and by that I mean you generally just choose one of the above)
-> Would be nice if you could have a Set Buildpoint (ie you build a unit and it travels to the location)
-> Would be nice if the ConVec would return back to the structure factory AFTER it built a building, so that you don't have to hunt around for the ConVec later (that is when you don't have a Robot Command Center)
-> Would be nice if Lava Walls lasted longer or were permanent. Also be nice if Microbe Walls lasted longer or were permanent.
-> Would be nice if when you loaded a unit onto a garage platform it would automatically load it inside to repair and then automatically unload it.
-> Would be nice if the script was removed that makes turrets randomly explode, when they aren't hit by a disaster or an enemy unit.
-> Would be nice if you could continue playing in a Colony Game after you reach the objective. Also, would be nice if you could continue playing after you launch a starship PROVIDED you had enough scientists leftover.
-> Would be nice if the class size for a university was increased from 10 to say 15.
-> Would be nice if having more than 1 nursery actually increased Child growth rate.
-> Would be nice if there was a conventional missile for Plymouth, that simply did say 1500 damage in a small radius, that would be launched from the spaceport.
-> Would be more realistic if there was a food supply capacity per agridome.
-> Would be great if a Spider could repair units up to 100% of maximum HP. Also be able to repair fellow Spiders and Scorpions.
-> Would be great if certain Techs had research tiers (ie you could research Environmental Psychology 3 times and each time increases maximum residents at the Residence and Adv/Reinf Residence by 10)
As far as units and weapons goes, I'd say leave them alone
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I have to admit, the idea of increased automation has occurred to me a few times. Particularly with research, building deployment, auto garage loading/unloading, and perhaps vehicle production too. Mind you, that would seem to change the nature of the game. You can also take things too far. I once came across an RPG "game" that was totally automated. There was nothing for the player to do. They just loaded up the game, and watched the computer play it by itself. There was no way for the player to actually interact with the game. I suppose it was meant more as a statement of sorts than to be an actual game, but it does kind of make you think.
I think the damaging missile idea would be really bad. If a Plymouth player stocked up on missiles, they could take out all their opponent's CCs in one go, with no chance for their opponent to repair them.
I kind of like the agridome idea, to an extent. I feel food is often not as much of a worry as it should be. Granted, you need to make allowances for land rush games where the player starts without any agridomes. I think something like that could be handled by having a certain base food amount, that you always have storage space for. That would allow land rush games to work. Plus, even if all your agridomes are destroyed, it still takes a while for your population to feel the food crunch and start starving to death. If gives someone at least a little bit of time to save their people, who I'm sure aren't all eating 24x7 anyway.
The non-exploding guard post idea was discussed before. I don't recall any consensus on it though.
As for actually doing these..., well, there's the time it would take, but there's also the issue whether people would accept the changes. Some people might not want changed behavior to the default game. How would this be addressed?
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I agree that automation is a bit difficult to balance in this game. One thing that could help is limit it to something along the lines of factories only continuing to produce the same item over and over. However, my discussion with th and high makes me think that would only compound existing problems.
Back during the WON days, some people brought up the idea of damaging AOE missile, creating images for their ideas. I think most of us agreed that emp missiles where bad enough as it is and ones that could do physical damage would be too much.
I think the novellas talk about the agridomes and command center having a certain storage capacity...it could potentially add another element to the strategy of the game, but it also might not do anything...
turrets randomly exploding? I know that, if they are damaged enough, they do explode at random because of the damage...I've never seen one explode for no reason, though...
I *think* tech teirs are an idea that would be possible to include, seeing as we can make custom tech trees for missions.
...and I might have just killed my power adapter, lol
anyone able to confirm any of these things?
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Yes, your power adapter is dead. :P
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Edit: If we are serious about this, we should organize this a bit better. Maybe create a new forum section and have one topic per idea.
is it even possible to build a patch for it. Is anyone here knowledgeable enough to do it (I'm not).
Depends on what shall be done. Some changes will be easy, some will be more difficult and some will be (almost) impossible. We can certainly not change everything. But if there is enough incentive to change one thing, however hard that is, chances are that we can do it. When I say "we", I am mostly talking about Hooman who knows the most about Outpost2's internals. I know a little bit and a few other people know a little bit.
Generally, there are two categories for changes: changes of the interface and gameplay changes. I am putting your ideas into those categories:
interface
-> Queues would be awesome. Early game its not a huge problem, but mid-late game it becomes difficult to manage building kits, building units, research, and combat all at the same time (and by that I mean you generally just choose one of the above)
I find that multitasking in the beginning is as difficult as later in the game. But only later in the game will queues really help. As I stated before, I am all for queues.
-> Would be nice if you could have a Set Buildpoint (ie you build a unit and it travels to the location)
+1
-> Would be nice if the ConVec would return back to the structure factory AFTER it built a building, so that you don't have to hunt around for the ConVec later (that is when you don't have a Robot Command Center)
Sometimes I find it quite useful when ConVecs stay at the last thing they built., for example when building outposts.
-> Would be nice if when you loaded a unit onto a garage platform it would automatically load it inside to repair and then automatically unload it.
+1
-> Would be nice if you could continue playing in a Colony Game after you reach the objective. Also, would be nice if you could continue playing after you launch a starship PROVIDED you had enough scientists leftover.
+1
gameplay
-> Make it more randomized on where and when a disaster will strike.
That part belongs to the individual missions, i.e. the disasters in mission XY are entirely defind by the dll file that belongs to mission XY. Hence I'd leave that decision to mission creators.
-> Would be nice if Lava Walls lasted longer or were permanent. Also be nice if Microbe Walls lasted longer or were permanent.
That would make certain missions too easy. No.
-> Would be nice if the script was removed that makes turrets randomly explode, when they aren't hit by a disaster or an enemy unit.
I always wondered why gps explode and tanks don't. The fact that gps explode is the most important reason why I don't use gps.
-> Would be nice if the class size for a university was increased from 10 to say 15.
unneeded.
-> Would be nice if having more than 1 nursery actually increased Child growth rate.
I always found it strange that one nursery is enough for a colony of any size. Not sure if your solution is the right answer to that, though. We could also introduce a nursery demand similar to the residence demand.
-> Would be nice if there was a conventional missile for Plymouth, that simply did say 1500 damage in a small radius, that would be launched from the spaceport.
clearly no.
-> Would be more realistic if there was a food supply capacity per agridome.
maybe. But if we wanted to be realistic, food would also be stored in residences and in command centers. So, maybe, we could assign food storage capacities to all buildings. Colonists should possibly be able to carry a limited amount of food, e.g. 100 each.
-> Would be great if a Spider could repair units up to 100% of maximum HP. Also be able to repair fellow Spiders and Scorpions.
Not sure about that. Garages have to remain useful.
-> Would be great if certain Techs had research tiers (ie you could research Environmental Psychology 3 times and each time increases maximum residents at the Residence and Adv/Reinf Residence by 10)
sounds boring and is not needed.
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Well from my OP, If I had to choose only a couple things that would be less controversial it would be:
-> Vehicle Build Point (Built vehicles travel to the location)
-> Remove exploding Guard Posts (And yes I've seen it happen a lot; sometimes damaged, sometimes undamaged; for the undamaged I make sure they weren't hit by a minor earthquake or a meteor right beforehand)
(If only one extra queue is added, there is still some micromanagement involved but a fair bit less)
-> Research Tree Automation (Can set beforehand a single extra research topic that will start after the current is finished; must add another to the queue)
-> Vehicle Factory Automation (Gets a single extra queue added to it; ie you are building a Lynx Laser, and then add to the queue a Cargo Truck; both gets built once)
-> Structure Factory Automation (Gets a single extra queue to build a structure kit)
By extra queue I don't mean it can build two units at the same time, just that a second unit will be built immediately after the first one.
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Hooman, you are correct sir! I did indeed kill my power adapter...good thing a new one is almost here :D
I'm a bit confused on how an undamaged GP is exploding...I personally have never witnessed this happen under any difficulty setting, and I have always used GP's a lot in defensive positions...does anyone have a vid of this or a code snippet that shows that this happens?
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I think its a timed lifetime thing. I've placed a turret down in a spot (Eden Starship Mission) away from direct combat, and most disasters. If you then play a regular game and leave it alone, it will eventually blow up.
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Maybe your guard posts have been destroyed by a sneaky tornado.
You think it was away from most disasters, but you cannot be sure.
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I always check the Time Log to see if a disaster occured near or at that spot after seeing a building is destroyed regardless if it was a GP or not. Sometimes its a residence that got nailed by a Huge Meteor.
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Also, for a post of patching out problems how'd it devolve into a battleground between microwave lynxs being better than laser lynxs?
I do agree that Late-Game plymouth is hard pressed due to the trouble of getting a SuperNova into the combat. A tiger Starflare or Supernova is great only for stationary targets. I think the Devs thought that this would work great against Acid+Lightning, but the SuperNova is one use and if its destroyed before it reaches its mark its resources wasted.
I also agree early game that Plymouth does have an advantage against Eden. Now I'm sure that you guys can figure out some strategy that Eden could use to win against Plymouth otherwise you'd never play against a Plymouth player as Eden on a small-nondefensible map. For example is it more time and cost efficient to build a wall of laser turrets (close together so that fire overlaps) than to go for Laser Lynxes early game? Especially as if they are connected to the command center by several paths, wouldn't that overcome its ROF shortcomings for the early game? And as Stickyfoam does non-existent damage to turrets?
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It is VERY rare to see anyone play as eden on maps like piechart.
I've used walls of unupgraded mic gp's in the past to hold back rushes of upgraded mics, but I personally prefer playing as plym because I like sneaking supernovas into bases.
Considering you can start building gp's significantly sooner (and arguably faster) than lynx's, that could be a viable solution. GP's can't be sticky-lured into destruction, and sticky's need to get within range of the GP's in order to do significant damage.
I have a feeling you got hit with a traveling disaster (electrical storm or vortex) and had a damage-induced explosion.
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totally useless and maybe not possible but remove the nova and flare gps. seems like a waste of space i have never seen any one use them.
GP's can't be sticky-lured into destruction, and sticky's need to get within range of the GP's in order to do significant damage.
if i remember right the splash damage from stickies puts stickies out side the range of damage and can kill a gp with out ever being fired upon. unless its a gp with a simular aoe effect such at esg and acid cloud or sticky itself. but even then you have to manually fire them.
Tubes.
I know tubes were talked about. Is it a option to make tubes have there colony color on them just a single stripe perhaps nothing like the beta picture where it has those nodes with the color.
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On the subject of tubes, couple questions:
-> I know that tubes are indestructible but in the Sheets.Vol, building.txt file (believe its the one) it says it has HP and could be destroyed. But ingame they are indestructible unless destroyed by an Earthworker.
-> In some of the ingame demos you see colonies that don't need tubes to connect the buildings... I wonder why that is.
-> Finally, I hate how removing a tube by an earthworker causes it to lose about 40% of its HP. Would love if it was patched that an earthworker DIDNT lose health when it removes a tube. Or at least increase the health of an Earthworker so that it can remove more than 3 tubes before dying.
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sticky's need to get within range of the GP's in order to do significant damage.
No. Splash damage kills the KD without any damage to plymouth units.
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Tubes have no "owner" and thus can't get a color assigned.
The Earthworker looses HP when destroying tubes, because otherwise there would be more annoying Earthworker "attacks" in multiplayer (i.e. people send their Earthworker to the enemy and destroy tubes, before any defense is possible).
I like the Flare and Nova GPs. Don't have to be useful for me. They're just another means for having fun with underpowered enemies.
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Would the answer for the stick would be to shorten its range by one tile so it would have to be in range to kill a gp.
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The problem I see is that the game seems to have hard-coded ranges for its weapons because you can't change the range of weapons and make it stick.
For example I gave the microwave the range of a Thor's hammer and it only ever attacked things within the vanilla microwave's range.
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it is possible to change it. infact isnt there research in the tech tree to make one of the weapons fire further.
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Oh via research it works (ie Extended Range Projectile for EMP and Stickyfoam I think or something) but increasing that value by more won't make it fire any farther.
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I have personally seen modified laser lynxes auto fire nearly half way across the map on Colony, Eden Starship. They were attacking the main enemy base from where they popped out of the vehicle factories near where I started.
... their accuracy at that range lacked something to be desired though. They were sometimes off by a few tiles, so it took a while to kill anything.
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Actually, there is a little thing that OP2PATRIOT made a LONG time ago that increases the fire range of units. I don't know what exactly it does to accomplish this, but I personally would discourage its use. Weapons with already low accuracy have a tendancy to crash the game by fireing off screen.
Edit: ninja'd y hooman
High, the splash damage can (potentially, have only tried this with the eden mining mission and mic's firing at a GP) be negated with a convec on repair duty. This is another thing I would like to test some time.
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The point is not to make it longer I dont care about that. To make it shorter so the sticky cant be set outside a gp range or even vec range and hit them with splash damage and kill the gp with out ever being engauged.
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Regarding weapon range: There is a range value in the tech files, so yes, it can be changed to anything, you just have to mind the researches which alter that value.
I've personally tested the effects of ridiculous range and find that the game adds some pretty big errors to shots longer than 10. Heck, the Thor's Hammer should give you a good hint, seeing how it's often enough missing its target, the middle of its target tile.
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Is that ONLY for shots longer than 10 tiles? If so, it shows an attempt to balance out the weapon power...
If we did change the distance files, we would need to change that reserch thing too.
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"...Radiate; recognize one silent call..."
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Don't worry about range. Better to remove it's damage - at least so that it doesn't damage buildings.
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K back to the OP, so what can be patched and fixed that won't be totally controversial or complicated?
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K back to the OP, so what can be patched and fixed that won't be totally controversial or complicated?
That is indeed the question.
Perhaps some polls should be started once the list is narrowed down appropriately.
Perhaps something like the this: Guard Post Patch? (http://forum.outpost2.net/index.php?showtopic=4216&view=findpost&p=64057)
Which also has a result here: Op2 Gp Patch (http://forum.outpost2.net/index.php?showtopic=4417&view=findpost&p=66255)
Of course, what level of agreement needs to be reached to patch the default play environment? (And how do we agree on that level of agreement?) :P
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For independent changes we should just make polls and look for a certain level of agreement. I think, we should be conservative here, and require an agreement of at least 75%. Especially for the changes that will be well visible. Most interface changes belong into this category.
For some changes it is possibly necessary to group them together (e.g. make one plymouth unit weaker and make one eden unit weaker). These groups will probably require a long discussion. Most gameplay changes belong into this category.
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topic separation would be good