Forums » Suggestions
Player Owned Capship Balance In Deneb Skirmishes
Currently, in Deneb you can bring your player built Capships to any skirmish. In Large or Medium or any bigger skirmishes this isn't too bad of a balance/broken issue because there are more enemies around like in quantity as well as anti caps like the Teradon. But this isn't the case in Small or Fighter skirmishes, especially that one. It absolutely is broken someone can just bring their cap with full shields in a fighter skirmish and just use their turrets and clean out all the fighters, its a fighter skirmish after all and there is no capship support. This also is not fair to any new or intermediate players in VO who don't know or don't have the capability to take out a capship. Currently the only way is to stack swarm missiles or use Avalons, the first needing a plugin, the second manual or also a plugin. Lets be honest, this isn't always the case especially if the Capship pilots move, if they are wise or game savvy. Also, the bot fighters really cant do much either against a Player cap on their own.
For the small skirmish I really don't see why player caps would even be needed as there are 2 dents on both sides, it makes the fight extremely lopsided..without a cap it already is just with player presence so there really is no reason for player caps to be used or brought there, especially when you can reload in the skrimish/convoy caps if you are a bomber.
So my idea to mitigate this is to have a special strike force, similar to one that spawns if you dont join any of the skirmish missions. Both sides will send this if they see a player cap(from itani it would be a Serco Force, and vice versa) jump into these smaller skirmish types. It could be composed of but is not limited to a group of 4-8 ragnaroks, maybe some pcb bots ,wtds, or vultures altogether, aggressive ai similar to the unrats, and if possible a Teradon if the Ragnaroks are not enough or either or(this would be up to the devs). This is for fairness and would apply to both sides, and to be fair to new players in Deneb that most likely will pick the smaller or fighter skirmishes since they are just new to it, and should be given a chance to win or influence the battle thru normal means. Everyone should be on the same playing field with an equal chance . I'm open to feedback but I think this would be a good temporary stopgap for balance till whenever the dev revamp Deneb in the future. This is open to ideas to improve or refine this suggestion from the community! Feel free to add or refine the idea! Thanks :)
For the small skirmish I really don't see why player caps would even be needed as there are 2 dents on both sides, it makes the fight extremely lopsided..without a cap it already is just with player presence so there really is no reason for player caps to be used or brought there, especially when you can reload in the skrimish/convoy caps if you are a bomber.
So my idea to mitigate this is to have a special strike force, similar to one that spawns if you dont join any of the skirmish missions. Both sides will send this if they see a player cap(from itani it would be a Serco Force, and vice versa) jump into these smaller skirmish types. It could be composed of but is not limited to a group of 4-8 ragnaroks, maybe some pcb bots ,wtds, or vultures altogether, aggressive ai similar to the unrats, and if possible a Teradon if the Ragnaroks are not enough or either or(this would be up to the devs). This is for fairness and would apply to both sides, and to be fair to new players in Deneb that most likely will pick the smaller or fighter skirmishes since they are just new to it, and should be given a chance to win or influence the battle thru normal means. Everyone should be on the same playing field with an equal chance . I'm open to feedback but I think this would be a good temporary stopgap for balance till whenever the dev revamp Deneb in the future. This is open to ideas to improve or refine this suggestion from the community! Feel free to add or refine the idea! Thanks :)
Hakone said:
Currently the only way is to stack swarm missiles or use Avalons, the first needing a plugin, the second manual or also a plugin.
stacking doesn't require plugins.
for Missiles and swarms, you simply fly at your missile's velocity by tapping the turbo button. swarms + gemini missiles fly at 80m/s, so you need to tap turbo in a way that you're going about that speed. fly towards your target from far out, begin actually firing ~2km (might be wrong about that distance). keep firing, adjust your heading as needed. A stingray/firefly setup (which is cheaper and requires less licenses, although gives less 'headroom' in peak burst damage) can do the same at 95m/s.
For avalon torpedos, they have a set speed that is below your cruising speed, of 40m/s. While at a standstill, fire. turbo ahead of them, then brake back to 0. when the missiles intersect with you, fire again to 'stack' more avalons in the group. rinse and repeat. You CAN fire them while moving, but you need to do the math of how fast your ship needs to travel, in order to keep them all stacked up. I don't know much about how some people will restock these and continue firing within the same group - I've simply never done it.
Neither case requires plugins. There are plugins that assist you in finding your target speed, but that's it.
As for the suggestion itself
I'm not sure I agree or disagree. I get the argument, you want to try and keep things fair. In their current state, depending on participation, it is easy to really snowball the fighter and small skirms to the point you're twiddling your thumbs waiting for engagement. On the other hand, if you actually have that much participation, a better option is to provide better avenues to 'let off' that pressure in other more engaging ways.
If you're talking about a specifically one-v-one situation, where one pilot is new, and the other is an experienced pilot with a capital vessel, however... I DO disagree. There are methods a non-capital pilot can disrupt, ignore, or even defeat a capital pilot (grumble grumble ammo spamming capital vessels need some limitations grumble grumble). Yes, the newer pilot needs to take time and learn these methods, but they're not out of reach. Or, recruit more pilots, as this is a social game.
As for a player-v-only NPC situation, I disagree even more, but for different reasons. Most of the game is harsh, punishing, and heavily skill- and knowledge-based, and pilots should be allowed to engage in 'overpowering the opposition' gameplay sometimes, especially once they've reached the level of experience and time investment that is required to have a capital vessel in the first place. As much as I hate capital ship gameplay, its important to remember that the capship is not the reward for the journey taken - its the experiences you can have while using it. I don't think the player-v-NPC balance needs to consider 'fairness' that heavily, as that style of gameplay has value too.
I do think there's a legitimate discussion to be had specifically around player-v-player balance in fighter skirmishes, especially for newer pilots. I simply disagree that automatically spawning an anti-cap death squad is the right solution.
Alternative
To that end, just throwing an idea out there: what if we approached this from the opposite direction, by adding new tools that newer or undermanned pilots can actively pull instead?
Consider a system where, based on the current state of the skirmish, the losing side gains access to targeted reinforcement requests or battlefield support options. If there are no players involved, this doesn't significantly alter the normal NPC battle flow. But if players are participating, they could spend accumulated contribution (time in mission, kills, objectives, etc.) to request temporary assistance.
That assistance could take different forms:
• a targeted anti-capital strike,
• additional NPC fighters for a short period,
• temporary bomber support,
• a complete second reinforcement squad,
• or other situational battlefield interventions.
Importantly, these options would only become available if that side is actually losing, potentially by a significant margin. Requiring contribution before activation would also reduce the effectiveness of simply parking an alt on the opposing side to manipulate the system.
Personally, I think systems like this are more interesting than simply spawning a hardcoded anti-cap "death squad," because they give players more agency and create more dynamic battlefield swings instead of just punishing someone for bringing a capship.
Such mechanics might also overlap nicely with whatever future "commander"-style gameplay Deneb may eventually get, but that's probably a separate suggestion entirely ;)
Currently the only way is to stack swarm missiles or use Avalons, the first needing a plugin, the second manual or also a plugin.
stacking doesn't require plugins.
for Missiles and swarms, you simply fly at your missile's velocity by tapping the turbo button. swarms + gemini missiles fly at 80m/s, so you need to tap turbo in a way that you're going about that speed. fly towards your target from far out, begin actually firing ~2km (might be wrong about that distance). keep firing, adjust your heading as needed. A stingray/firefly setup (which is cheaper and requires less licenses, although gives less 'headroom' in peak burst damage) can do the same at 95m/s.
For avalon torpedos, they have a set speed that is below your cruising speed, of 40m/s. While at a standstill, fire. turbo ahead of them, then brake back to 0. when the missiles intersect with you, fire again to 'stack' more avalons in the group. rinse and repeat. You CAN fire them while moving, but you need to do the math of how fast your ship needs to travel, in order to keep them all stacked up. I don't know much about how some people will restock these and continue firing within the same group - I've simply never done it.
Neither case requires plugins. There are plugins that assist you in finding your target speed, but that's it.
As for the suggestion itself
I'm not sure I agree or disagree. I get the argument, you want to try and keep things fair. In their current state, depending on participation, it is easy to really snowball the fighter and small skirms to the point you're twiddling your thumbs waiting for engagement. On the other hand, if you actually have that much participation, a better option is to provide better avenues to 'let off' that pressure in other more engaging ways.
If you're talking about a specifically one-v-one situation, where one pilot is new, and the other is an experienced pilot with a capital vessel, however... I DO disagree. There are methods a non-capital pilot can disrupt, ignore, or even defeat a capital pilot (grumble grumble ammo spamming capital vessels need some limitations grumble grumble). Yes, the newer pilot needs to take time and learn these methods, but they're not out of reach. Or, recruit more pilots, as this is a social game.
As for a player-v-only NPC situation, I disagree even more, but for different reasons. Most of the game is harsh, punishing, and heavily skill- and knowledge-based, and pilots should be allowed to engage in 'overpowering the opposition' gameplay sometimes, especially once they've reached the level of experience and time investment that is required to have a capital vessel in the first place. As much as I hate capital ship gameplay, its important to remember that the capship is not the reward for the journey taken - its the experiences you can have while using it. I don't think the player-v-NPC balance needs to consider 'fairness' that heavily, as that style of gameplay has value too.
I do think there's a legitimate discussion to be had specifically around player-v-player balance in fighter skirmishes, especially for newer pilots. I simply disagree that automatically spawning an anti-cap death squad is the right solution.
Alternative
To that end, just throwing an idea out there: what if we approached this from the opposite direction, by adding new tools that newer or undermanned pilots can actively pull instead?
Consider a system where, based on the current state of the skirmish, the losing side gains access to targeted reinforcement requests or battlefield support options. If there are no players involved, this doesn't significantly alter the normal NPC battle flow. But if players are participating, they could spend accumulated contribution (time in mission, kills, objectives, etc.) to request temporary assistance.
That assistance could take different forms:
• a targeted anti-capital strike,
• additional NPC fighters for a short period,
• temporary bomber support,
• a complete second reinforcement squad,
• or other situational battlefield interventions.
Importantly, these options would only become available if that side is actually losing, potentially by a significant margin. Requiring contribution before activation would also reduce the effectiveness of simply parking an alt on the opposing side to manipulate the system.
Personally, I think systems like this are more interesting than simply spawning a hardcoded anti-cap "death squad," because they give players more agency and create more dynamic battlefield swings instead of just punishing someone for bringing a capship.
Such mechanics might also overlap nicely with whatever future "commander"-style gameplay Deneb may eventually get, but that's probably a separate suggestion entirely ;)
If I understand this correctly, this is about the use of capships in fighter and small skirmishes, and a new player trying to experience Deneb. The suggestion to have mechanism to be able to have bots to attack player capshops if they enter these skirmishes.
Fiigher skrimish is mostly a 1 v npc or maybe 1 v 2. As a new player in a light fighter, would it be overwhelimg to see capships that.can potentially have cap rails or cap gause, tu mine? What would that experience be? As a player community should we promote a good experince especially to new players?
Fiigher skrimish is mostly a 1 v npc or maybe 1 v 2. As a new player in a light fighter, would it be overwhelimg to see capships that.can potentially have cap rails or cap gause, tu mine? What would that experience be? As a player community should we promote a good experince especially to new players?
I could be misremembering, but I think Inc said years ago that the goal is to remove all player owned capships from Deneb battles. Or something to that effect.
Edit: Found it:
"As mentioned on Discord, this was created to counteract exploit issues. It is not a bug. Don't bring your personal capship to Deneb." (2023)
-Incarnate
Edit: Found it:
"As mentioned on Discord, this was created to counteract exploit issues. It is not a bug. Don't bring your personal capship to Deneb." (2023)
-Incarnate
Easy solution would be to spawn PCB wielding NPC's in concert with periodical waves that specifically go for player controlled capships.
That way if if a player wants to splode the player capship all they have to do is coordinate with the npc's and keep the capship in question confined to the skirmish sector.
If player countering NPC's get implemented to the skirm I would really like to see capships becoming available for replacement closer to deneb.
As far as capships being overpowered... well that's a given - the only real solution is getting multiple players to coordinate with you to take it down.
Afaik the deneb unrats purely a side effect of exploit mitigation capships don't have a proper place in deneb yet and the rats were just a fix to prevent cheesing the missions by using neutral capships that the NPC's wouldn't touch. The greater goal as far as I know is to eventually have ranks/player capships integrated into the skirms where capship pilots are higher value targets and something to that effect.
That way if if a player wants to splode the player capship all they have to do is coordinate with the npc's and keep the capship in question confined to the skirmish sector.
If player countering NPC's get implemented to the skirm I would really like to see capships becoming available for replacement closer to deneb.
As far as capships being overpowered... well that's a given - the only real solution is getting multiple players to coordinate with you to take it down.
Afaik the deneb unrats purely a side effect of exploit mitigation capships don't have a proper place in deneb yet and the rats were just a fix to prevent cheesing the missions by using neutral capships that the NPC's wouldn't touch. The greater goal as far as I know is to eventually have ranks/player capships integrated into the skirms where capship pilots are higher value targets and something to that effect.