Forums » Suggestions
Game Balance Suggestions.
First, I apologize for my fairly bad english, as it is not my native language. I hope I can make myself understood.
I have noticed some flaws in game balance, and I will, as this is the suggestions forum, suggest ways to fix these flaws. Most of you will probably disagree with me, but at least read it through and think about it.
The special ships should be just that: Specialised. Specialised does not neccesarily mean better, just best at one thing and bad at another.
I would rebalance the ships like this:
-Bus:
The starting ship should not be as good as the other ones, since it is free. This is the only exception of the rule. All other ships should be equal.
Hull: 4000
Agility: Medium
Cargo Space: 5
Weapons: 2 Small
-Centurion
The light fighter. Very agile, lightly armored and armed.
Hull: 5000
Agility: Very High
Cargo Space: 2
Weapons: 1 Small
-Vulture
The heavy fighter, more hull, more weapons, less agility, less cargo space.
Hull: 9000
Agility: High
Cargo Space: 1
Weapons: 2 Small
-Valkyrie
Specialised fighter, Very low HP, very high agility, lots of weapons.
Hull: 3500
Agility: Very Very High
Cargo Space: 2
Weapons: 3 Small
-Warthog
This ship should lack a fighters agility, but hit harder and be able to take more damage.
Hull: 10000
Agility: Medium
Cargo Space: 4
Weapons: 1 Large, 1 Small
-Hornet
About the same as the warthog, but with different possibilities of weapon configuration and a bit less cargo space.
Hull: 10000
Agility: Medium
Cargo Space: 3
Weapons: 4 Small
-Wraith
Lighter than the ragnarok, but with more weapons.
Hull: 12000
Agility: Low
Cargo Space: 4
Weapons: 2 Small, 2 Large
-Ragnarok
Heavy Bomber, Slow, Loads of armor.
Hull: 18000
Agility: Low
Cargo Space: 4
Weapons: 2 Large
-Prometheus
The tank in space. Should be able to take a lot of damage and deal some too, at the expense of agility.
Hull: 20000
Agility: Very Low
Cargo Space: 4
Weapons: 1 Small, 2 Large
-Atlas
The light trader. Lightly armed and armored, with some cargo space for short distance trading. Like the heavy shuttle from EVN.
Hull: 9000
Agility: High
Cargo Space: 12
Weapons: 1 Small
-Marouder (AKA Pizza cutter)
Specialised trader, Less armor, Less agility, more cargo space.
Hull: 7000
Agility: Medium
Cargo Space: 20
Weapons: 2 Small
-Centaur
Heavy Trader. More armor, Less agile, more cargo space.
Hull: 16000
Agility: Low
Cargo Space: 17
Weapons: 1 Large
I think these are pretty balanced. The special ships are not better at everything anymore, and the previously underbalanced ships like the Centurion are upped a bit to match the others. The special ships are specialised, traders are traders, fighters are fighters and bombers are bombers, as it should be.
I didnt include prices in the listings, because I think money is a bad way of balancing things, as:
1. Money is fairly easy to get
2. Money does not create balance, but makes it so that only a small elite group of people will have access to the über weapons that nobody else can afford.
3. If you can choose between a rusty volvo and a BMW, you take the BMW, right? Yeah, thought so. Money is not an issue, and people will always buy the best stuff.
But the price should be kept at different levels for the newbies, to have them climb the way up from the bus to the biggest ship in the game slowly, and not let them trade for a while with the bus and buy a prom or a ragnarok.
Money is only a balancing factor if the better ship is so expensive that the loss of it will make you bankrupt, as will be the case with capital ships.
The reason I post this is that almost everyone is only using the nations special ships, simply because they are better than the other ones. If that is the way things are supposed to be, you could as well delete all the other ships, since noone is using them. In a game like this, balance means everything.
Have you ever played Diablo 2 on battle.net? If you have, you surely understand what I mean. In one version, the pike was by far the best weapon in the game, and all you could see in the game, like 90% of the players were wielding pikes. No good.
Everything that is really good at something must be bad at someting else to balance it out.
What are your thoughts on game balance? How can it improve, do you think money is a good balancing factor, and why? Do you like überships? Whatever, this post is to long already...
/Vauk
I have noticed some flaws in game balance, and I will, as this is the suggestions forum, suggest ways to fix these flaws. Most of you will probably disagree with me, but at least read it through and think about it.
The special ships should be just that: Specialised. Specialised does not neccesarily mean better, just best at one thing and bad at another.
I would rebalance the ships like this:
-Bus:
The starting ship should not be as good as the other ones, since it is free. This is the only exception of the rule. All other ships should be equal.
Hull: 4000
Agility: Medium
Cargo Space: 5
Weapons: 2 Small
-Centurion
The light fighter. Very agile, lightly armored and armed.
Hull: 5000
Agility: Very High
Cargo Space: 2
Weapons: 1 Small
-Vulture
The heavy fighter, more hull, more weapons, less agility, less cargo space.
Hull: 9000
Agility: High
Cargo Space: 1
Weapons: 2 Small
-Valkyrie
Specialised fighter, Very low HP, very high agility, lots of weapons.
Hull: 3500
Agility: Very Very High
Cargo Space: 2
Weapons: 3 Small
-Warthog
This ship should lack a fighters agility, but hit harder and be able to take more damage.
Hull: 10000
Agility: Medium
Cargo Space: 4
Weapons: 1 Large, 1 Small
-Hornet
About the same as the warthog, but with different possibilities of weapon configuration and a bit less cargo space.
Hull: 10000
Agility: Medium
Cargo Space: 3
Weapons: 4 Small
-Wraith
Lighter than the ragnarok, but with more weapons.
Hull: 12000
Agility: Low
Cargo Space: 4
Weapons: 2 Small, 2 Large
-Ragnarok
Heavy Bomber, Slow, Loads of armor.
Hull: 18000
Agility: Low
Cargo Space: 4
Weapons: 2 Large
-Prometheus
The tank in space. Should be able to take a lot of damage and deal some too, at the expense of agility.
Hull: 20000
Agility: Very Low
Cargo Space: 4
Weapons: 1 Small, 2 Large
-Atlas
The light trader. Lightly armed and armored, with some cargo space for short distance trading. Like the heavy shuttle from EVN.
Hull: 9000
Agility: High
Cargo Space: 12
Weapons: 1 Small
-Marouder (AKA Pizza cutter)
Specialised trader, Less armor, Less agility, more cargo space.
Hull: 7000
Agility: Medium
Cargo Space: 20
Weapons: 2 Small
-Centaur
Heavy Trader. More armor, Less agile, more cargo space.
Hull: 16000
Agility: Low
Cargo Space: 17
Weapons: 1 Large
I think these are pretty balanced. The special ships are not better at everything anymore, and the previously underbalanced ships like the Centurion are upped a bit to match the others. The special ships are specialised, traders are traders, fighters are fighters and bombers are bombers, as it should be.
I didnt include prices in the listings, because I think money is a bad way of balancing things, as:
1. Money is fairly easy to get
2. Money does not create balance, but makes it so that only a small elite group of people will have access to the über weapons that nobody else can afford.
3. If you can choose between a rusty volvo and a BMW, you take the BMW, right? Yeah, thought so. Money is not an issue, and people will always buy the best stuff.
But the price should be kept at different levels for the newbies, to have them climb the way up from the bus to the biggest ship in the game slowly, and not let them trade for a while with the bus and buy a prom or a ragnarok.
Money is only a balancing factor if the better ship is so expensive that the loss of it will make you bankrupt, as will be the case with capital ships.
The reason I post this is that almost everyone is only using the nations special ships, simply because they are better than the other ones. If that is the way things are supposed to be, you could as well delete all the other ships, since noone is using them. In a game like this, balance means everything.
Have you ever played Diablo 2 on battle.net? If you have, you surely understand what I mean. In one version, the pike was by far the best weapon in the game, and all you could see in the game, like 90% of the players were wielding pikes. No good.
Everything that is really good at something must be bad at someting else to balance it out.
What are your thoughts on game balance? How can it improve, do you think money is a good balancing factor, and why? Do you like überships? Whatever, this post is to long already...
/Vauk
Hold up there partner, you wanna make the valk have less hull than the BUS?!?!
the prom would rule everything in that feild come on o_0
c'mon your trying to nerf all the "Special" ships except the prom!
On top of that your giving the prom 3 LARGE WEAPONS?!?!?!
Hows a prom with 3 adv gatlings balanced?
EDIT: I personally dont know how to balance things, but I trust the devs will figure something out :D
the prom would rule everything in that feild come on o_0
c'mon your trying to nerf all the "Special" ships except the prom!
On top of that your giving the prom 3 LARGE WEAPONS?!?!?!
Hows a prom with 3 adv gatlings balanced?
EDIT: I personally dont know how to balance things, but I trust the devs will figure something out :D
The valk will be able to outmanouver the prom anytime. The snail tank will turn almost as slow as a capital ship, so I would say the valk has a pretty good chance.
A prom with 3 gatlings would burn energy like a quad railgun in 3.2.1... Not very effective.
And according to me, I didnt nerf the valk. I made it a fighter, and not a superior-in-every-way-armor-slug-wannabe-with-lots-of-weapons-and-enough-cargo-space-to-steal-loads-of-cargo-übership-that-is-also-fast-as-a-dragster-on-speed.
Note that I want the valk to have a Very Very High Manouverability, and not just Very High. Also note that I want the prom to have a Very low agility, and not just low. If you cannot follow your target with the crosshairs, you will not kill it. The valk would be able to dodge every single damn shot from a gatling fairly easily with that agility.
The Valk would own the prom with 6 steps of agility. And I thought everyone had agreed that agility=Hull, just in a different way. You will almost be able to dodge railguns with the valk, while the prom would be sitting ducks taking the damage.
If you have a lot of agility, you have no need for lots of armor.
Prom------> Very Low - Low - Medium - High - Very High - Very Very High - <-----Valk
And I am not a Serco with Prom problems, I play neutral only, so I am nerfing my own damned ship.
But yeah, I am nerfing the valk a tiny bit, because nobody ever flies anything else, and it is the best fighter. I just put it on the same level as the other fighters.
(Now when everyone can have the valk, do you see anyone flying the vulture or the centurion?)
But yeah, you could change the Proms 3 Large slots to 2 Large and one small and reduce its HP by 6000. I read it through again, and yeah, it looked pretty superior.
A prom with 3 gatlings would burn energy like a quad railgun in 3.2.1... Not very effective.
And according to me, I didnt nerf the valk. I made it a fighter, and not a superior-in-every-way-armor-slug-wannabe-with-lots-of-weapons-and-enough-cargo-space-to-steal-loads-of-cargo-übership-that-is-also-fast-as-a-dragster-on-speed.
Note that I want the valk to have a Very Very High Manouverability, and not just Very High. Also note that I want the prom to have a Very low agility, and not just low. If you cannot follow your target with the crosshairs, you will not kill it. The valk would be able to dodge every single damn shot from a gatling fairly easily with that agility.
The Valk would own the prom with 6 steps of agility. And I thought everyone had agreed that agility=Hull, just in a different way. You will almost be able to dodge railguns with the valk, while the prom would be sitting ducks taking the damage.
If you have a lot of agility, you have no need for lots of armor.
Prom------> Very Low - Low - Medium - High - Very High - Very Very High - <-----Valk
And I am not a Serco with Prom problems, I play neutral only, so I am nerfing my own damned ship.
But yeah, I am nerfing the valk a tiny bit, because nobody ever flies anything else, and it is the best fighter. I just put it on the same level as the other fighters.
(Now when everyone can have the valk, do you see anyone flying the vulture or the centurion?)
But yeah, you could change the Proms 3 Large slots to 2 Large and one small and reduce its HP by 6000. I read it through again, and yeah, it looked pretty superior.
Every try to dodge one gatling cannon turret with 3 rocket ports? it's hard, imagine that with just 3 gatling turrets, 400 dmg per pop per cannon, that would be 1200 dmg per pop, about 6 pops per second, that would be 2 valks a second.
I don't get why everone wants to nerf shit out of the valk! first it was 18k, unbalanced, then 12k, balanced, now you want it to be a paper airplane!, listen, for more the firepower, slightly less the agility, more the health, there is the hornet, a ship that costs 21k would then be owned by a ship that is what? 5k?
Leave the valkyrie alown you weirdos! If you can't take down a valk with a lesser ship, a boo hoo hoo!
I don't get why everone wants to nerf shit out of the valk! first it was 18k, unbalanced, then 12k, balanced, now you want it to be a paper airplane!, listen, for more the firepower, slightly less the agility, more the health, there is the hornet, a ship that costs 21k would then be owned by a ship that is what? 5k?
Leave the valkyrie alown you weirdos! If you can't take down a valk with a lesser ship, a boo hoo hoo!
Thank you Lem, BTW Ive seen people who prefer hornets and centurions over valks. quit trying to nerf our damn ship you freaks!
weirdos? freaks?
Err.. I'm assuming that applies to me as well. I got to tell you that if you keep up with the arguement ad hominem I'm going to take the gloves off and tell you what I really think.
"Every try to dodge one gatling cannon turret with 3 rocket ports? it's hard, imagine that with just 3 gatling turrets, 400 dmg per pop per cannon, that would be 1200 dmg per pop, about 6 pops per second, that would be 2 valks a second."
Lemming, if you are going to do math, do it right and stop making things up.
Three linked advanced gatlings = 1200 damage per shot * 10 shots(not 6) per second = 12,000 damage per second or 1 Valk in one second, not two.
BUT, noone is going to hit every time with a gatling. Because of the scatter effect, Gatlings are inaccurate. Interestingly, its that inaccuracy that makes them accurate. You give up the ability to hit every time in exchange for the ability to hit some of the time. (That's balance.) At real ranges a reasonable estimate is that you _might_ get ~25% hits on average, or 1 Valk in ~4 seconds.
BUT, 3 linked advanced gatlings also means 360 energy per second. In order to kill a Valk with 3 linked gatlings you need to spend ~1440 energy. But, the most energy available to a ship in a four second period is 730 energy (wt. a heavy battery). In order to obtain ~1440 energy, the attacker must spend ~19.8 seconds. Ok, so now we are down to the first Valk in ~20 seconds and the second one in ~32 seconds.
Two Valks in 52 seconds is a far cry from 2 Valks in one second.
None of that is to say that I agree with Nemesis or am trying to defend his particular changes as balanced or well thought out. For that matter, neither am I offering criticism of his changes. But if someone's ideas are going to be attacked they ought to be attacked for fair and valid reasons not people making up facts as it suits them and hurling insults like 5th graders.
Err.. I'm assuming that applies to me as well. I got to tell you that if you keep up with the arguement ad hominem I'm going to take the gloves off and tell you what I really think.
"Every try to dodge one gatling cannon turret with 3 rocket ports? it's hard, imagine that with just 3 gatling turrets, 400 dmg per pop per cannon, that would be 1200 dmg per pop, about 6 pops per second, that would be 2 valks a second."
Lemming, if you are going to do math, do it right and stop making things up.
Three linked advanced gatlings = 1200 damage per shot * 10 shots(not 6) per second = 12,000 damage per second or 1 Valk in one second, not two.
BUT, noone is going to hit every time with a gatling. Because of the scatter effect, Gatlings are inaccurate. Interestingly, its that inaccuracy that makes them accurate. You give up the ability to hit every time in exchange for the ability to hit some of the time. (That's balance.) At real ranges a reasonable estimate is that you _might_ get ~25% hits on average, or 1 Valk in ~4 seconds.
BUT, 3 linked advanced gatlings also means 360 energy per second. In order to kill a Valk with 3 linked gatlings you need to spend ~1440 energy. But, the most energy available to a ship in a four second period is 730 energy (wt. a heavy battery). In order to obtain ~1440 energy, the attacker must spend ~19.8 seconds. Ok, so now we are down to the first Valk in ~20 seconds and the second one in ~32 seconds.
Two Valks in 52 seconds is a far cry from 2 Valks in one second.
None of that is to say that I agree with Nemesis or am trying to defend his particular changes as balanced or well thought out. For that matter, neither am I offering criticism of his changes. But if someone's ideas are going to be attacked they ought to be attacked for fair and valid reasons not people making up facts as it suits them and hurling insults like 5th graders.
This sort of a refixing is asking for too much right now, IMNSHO.
Mabye for Vendetta 3.5 or 3.6....3.2 introduced a lot of stuff to suggest totally overhauling it now.
Mabye for Vendetta 3.5 or 3.6....3.2 introduced a lot of stuff to suggest totally overhauling it now.
I basically agree with Freeman. Even if you do have a consistant design philosophy, you are asking too much at once. You want a complete rebuild rather than a rebalance. You have put some serious thought into obtaining something like balance between all the ships, which is commendable, but the process from here to there is just too much. Maybe start out with some incremental steps and see if we can't reach balance with the smallest set and small degree of changes possible.