Are battles always one sided?
 

Hello all,

I've been in a pbw game for a 100 turns or so (the longest I've ever played a SE game) and every battle seems to be a complete demolishment of one side with the other taking few casualties.
I don't believe there is much of a technology difference to warrant this but the 6 or so major battles I've been in have all been one sided.

Some examples of the battles have been

50 ships vs 50 ships yields one side destroyed, the other losing around 4 ships (plus they captured one for a net of 3)

30 vs 20 means no loss to the 30 and homeworld exposed for the other guy.

30 ships ambush 40, destroying all and taking no losses.

And the most recent one
35 ships, (mainly battle crusiers with PPBs and level 2 phased shields) get surprised by 101 ships, mainly cruisers (with quantom torpedoes and level 4 phased shields).
The result?
101 ships blown to smitherenes with a single battle cruiser lost on the other side and no other damage no any of the fleet.

To quote the defeated

---
New estimates show that it takes approximately 100 Spoo ships to kill one People's ship.

Expense minister Mr. Big explaines this as "not exactly economical"
----


Just wondering what other people's experience has been.
Does fleet/ship experience points have that much of a difference? If so ...yuk!

Askan

Re: Are battles always one sided?
 

Yes combat is very one sided. The player who is higher on the player list always has the upperhand in combat with equal ships. Combat needs to be fixed. They need to set it up so ships shoot at the same exact time. That would fix combat alot. Or change it so defenders move and fire first.

Re: Are battles always one sided?
 

Yes, this is a problem of sorts in SEIV...
The chance to hit is very important. I have seen many battles such as the ones you describe...in the case of 35 vs 100+ ships, did the 35 have superior sensors, training, and/or stealth/scattering armor?

Re: Are battles always one sided?
 

Heh, ZeroAdunn posted one minute before me http://www.shrapnelgames.com/ubb/images/icons/icon7.gif
To correct you though, the player's number is ONLY a factor on wormhole battles, not in every single battle.

Re: Are battles always one sided?
 

Yeah, you're wormhole defense can be made or broken on who fires first. If the defender is higher in number, your only options are to attack in overwhelming numbers, accepting massive losses, or go around.

My Bashaka wormhole defense, in one game I'm in, has wiped out entire FLEETS of dreadnaughts without so much as a shot fired in return.

Of course, I do have 30 space stations, 50 WMG-armed sats there at all times, and use it as a staging groud for my fleets, so the total number averages about 100 ships firing before the attacker even gets to blink.

Phoenix-D

Re: Are battles always one sided?
 

30 space stations on one warp point??!!!! Thats crazy man. http://www.shrapnelgames.com/ubb/images/icons/icon7.gif and 50 sats to boot!! wow was that the only warp point into that system. Your opponents must have been pretty mad http://www.shrapnelgames.com/ubb/ima...ons/icon12.gif

Re: Are battles always one sided?
 

Regarding my poor 101 dead ships:

I had combat sensors 3.

Askan's fleet had Legendary status, while mine had no experience.

I had max tech in Quantum Torpedoes, he had max tech in PPB (but i had phased shields).

I only killed ONE ship! (I might have hit 3...)

All ships were set to break formation, optimal firing range.

So I guess it was the experience that did it. Looks like I'll be building training facilities from now on... And maxing out defense in my ratial traits... And maybe throw in religious talismans... Then I'll be invicible!

Doesn't seem balanced, does it?

------------------
Assume you have a 1kg squirrel
E=mc^2
E=1kg(3x10^8m/s)^2=9x10^16J
which, if I'm not mistaken, is equivilent to roughly a 50 megaton nuclear bomb.
Fear the squirrel.

Re: Are battles always one sided?
 

battles are always one sided if you plan well. for example, when planing your wormhole defense, try to plan ahead and join the game before anyone else http://www.shrapnelgames.com/ubb/ima...ons/icon12.gif

------------------
"...the green, sticky spawn of the stars"
(with apologies to H.P.L.)

Re: Are battles always one sided?
 

That's why I always play religious tech - that Talisman can be a HUGE factor in combat....

Re: Are battles always one sided?
 

askan,

Battles are lopsided, in my opinion and experience, at times without any discernable reason why. Especially with high tech fleets of 20 or 30+ or higher...
In simultaneous games I've played I was baffled at how two evenly matched fleets would clash- and one side would pretty much destroy the other while taking hardly any damage! The expectation would be that one side would win (because of and edge in technology or experience)... but in winning against that evenly matched opponent, the victor should take at least 50% losses. This never happens. It's always a butt-kicking!
After much investigation in trying to make sense of this, I asked my opponent, (who eventually won the upper hand in most of these battles) what it could be... And he said he tweaked the fleet orders much more. And I think there is much credence to this, I have watched combat replays with shock as many of my baseships and dreadnaughts broke formation at random and went off on their own while the bulk of my fleet whimsically engaged or chose not to engage.
It seems with simultaneous combat, unless you tweak your formation, fleet orders, and ship orders, you will be subjected to "Crazy Ivan" AI commanding your fleet. It is quite laughable to watch what the AI does with your ships when it goes into "idiot mode."

[This message has been edited by Stone Mill (edited 15 October 2001).]

Re: Are battles always one sided?
 

Askan,

Not only were his ships bigger than yours, but he was using PBB, which take up 30 Kt of space and fire every turn, and you were using Quantum Torps, which take 40 Kt of space and fire every other turn. So your 3-1 numerical advantage in ships is now down really worse than 2- 1, to almost equal strength in terms of force of firepower.

In my experience, ship experience won't overcome a huge advantage by the other side, but it will turn an otherwise even fight into a complete rout. You didn't have the huge advantage you thought you did, because you were merely looking at the raw numbers of ships instead of the total amount of firepower in the fleet.

Had your fleets had similer levels of experience, then it would have most likely been an very even fight, and quite a blood bath. Probably high damage on both sides with very few ships from either side capable of leaving the field of battle undamaged.

Geoschmo

Re: Are battles always one sided?
 

Also try ordering your ships to fire at point blank range. Once I've seen my ships (with order to fire at optimum range) moving away from the enemies right next to them FIRST and THEN fire on them (and missed), after that fight point blank became my standard strategy.

Also any sort of modifier can be a REAL advantage. I was helping a newbie friend of mine to design his ships. He gave me a new cruiser of his to try out against my DN in the simulator. ONE single dreadnought of mine beat THIRTY of his cruisers, and I bet I would have won even if he threw 100 of those cruisers at me. Wonder why? Because he forgot to put in a combat sensor and in 30 turns I took only ONE hit out of the hundreds of shots his ships fired. Overwhelming firepower alone won't help you one bit unless you score hits...


[This message has been edited by CW (edited 15 October 2001).]

Re: Are battles always one sided?
 

Yup. A ship can have a lot of defense bonuses (up to +50% from fleet experience, up to +50% from ship experience, plus +10% and +15% from stealth and scattering armor, plus +60% from ECM, plus +5% cultural once that's fixed, plus some percentage I don't remember from certain racial facilities, plus racial bonus). And if the other side lacks the Talisman or enough offensive bonuses to hit, well... yes, it'll be one-sided, especially if the high-offense side also got a range advantage and no speed disadvantage (so he can maintain maximum range and thus the other guy's difficulty to hit).

That's one way to design a planetary assault transport that can waltz up to a planet w/ 16Mtons of weapons platforms without backup, and without losing more than a tiny fraction of its shields. *shrug*


------------------
-- The thing that goes bump in the night

Re: Are battles always one sided?
 

Actually, my ships (not fleet -they were set to break formation) did have point blank strategy. And half of them were cruisers. And we had equal engines tech.

Geo,

You forget that quantum torpedoes do much more damge than PPB. It should only take about TWO hits to cripple one of his ships. The point is I only hit ONE of his ships more than ONCE (even w/ combat sensors 3).

And I agree that the odds were closer to 2-1 -um, shouldn't I win 2-1 odds? The thing is, my ships were firing like they had 1% accuracy. Is it possible that Askan had 160% defense?? I don't mean to whine, I'm just wondering how to avoid future slaughters (or how to be on the winning side of a slaughter).

Maybe there should be a limit of 100% defense and 100% to-hit.

------------------
Assume you have a 1kg squirrel
E=mc^2
E=1kg(3x10^8m/s)^2=9x10^16J
which, if I'm not mistaken, is equivilent to roughly a 50 megaton nuclear bomb.
Fear the squirrel.

[edit = typos]

[This message has been edited by Spoo (edited 15 October 2001).]

Re: Are battles always one sided?
 

1% accuracy can be had, I think.

Watch:
ECMIII: 60%
Stealth+Scattering: 30%
Legendary Ship: 40%
Legendary Fleet: 40%
Total: 170% (it can get worse, too- I think ship XP goes up t 50)

In comparision, the best attack:
Combat Sensors III: 65%
Legnedary Ship: 40%
Legendary Fleet: 40%
Total: 145%

Now, that's a 25% disadvantage just to start, and assumes the fleets and ships are equal in XP. Add in unequal fleets and the range modifier (10% per square) and things get ugly, fast.

Phoenix-D

Re: Are battles always one sided?
 

Phoenix-D: I'm pretty sure that the Stealth and Scattering bonus, are not cumulative.

Re: Are battles always one sided?
 

Stealth and Scattering most definitely ARE cumulative http://www.shrapnelgames.com/ubb/images/icons/icon7.gif

Also note that Quantum Torpedoes are exactly 62.5% as strong as PPBs from point blank range and 75% as strong from max range.

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>APB XII: 2.1 - 1.5, normal
CSM V: 0.8, seeker
MB: 1.75, normal
AMT V: 0.625, normal
QT V: 1.25, normal
PM V: 1.0 - 0.27, seeker
PDC V: 3.25, pointdefence, +70%
PPB V: 2.0 - 1.67, phased
RB IV: 2.5, normal
IB III: 0.9, normal, +10%
WMG III: 0.67, normal, +30%
TPC V: 0.375 - 0.188, Weapons only
ID V: 1.3, engines only
IPM V: 0.625, engines only, seeker
PN V: 15.0, planets only
NB V: 5.0, planet population only
GHB V: 1.21 - 0.33, normal
SD V: 7.5, shields only
DUC V: 1.33, normal
PC V: 1.33 - 1.0, normal, organic
HPB V: 1.67 - 1.0, normal, organic
ED III: 1.5 - 0.5, normal, organic
LR III: 2.0 - 0.5, normal, organic
SP V: 1.0, seeker, organic
AG V: 0.56, normal, organic
EAG V: 1.25, normal, organic
SC X: 1.17, skip armor, crystalline
HEM III: 0.917, normal, crystalline
TDB V: 1.0 (4.0), quad2shields, temporal
TS III: 0.33, skips all, temporal
TKP V: 1.75, normal, psychic
CW III: 6.0, warhead
MSD: 10.0, one shot, RuinsTech
MID: 5.0, one shot, RuinsTech
NSP: 0.4, skips all
CT V: 0.45, ships armor, seeker
SA V: 9.0, shields only, temporal
TC III: 1.2, normal, temporal, +10%
MSG III: 0.68, normal, psychic, +20%<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Where the damage rating is: Damage/KT/Turn
Accurate as of SE4 v1.35

Re: Are battles always one sided?
 

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Spoo:
Actually, my ships (not fleet -they were set to break formation) did have point blank strategy. And half of them were cruisers. And we had equal engines tech.

Geo,

You forget that quantum torpedoes do much more damge than PPB. It should only take about TWO hits to cripple one of his ships. The point is I only hit ONE of his ships more than ONCE (even w/ combat sensors 3).
<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>
Actually Askan, as SJ points out Qtorps don't do more damage that PBB. Actually they do the same damage at max range. The Qt does 100 damage every 2 turns, and the PBB does 50 damage every turn. And by moving to point blank you actually make it worse for yourself because at point blank the PBB does 60 per turn, so it actually does more damage than the Qtorp. Add to that the fact that the PBB takes up less space, and your enemy has bigger ships, and your numerical "advantage" is getting smaller all the time. http://www.shrapnelgames.com/ubb/images/icons/icon7.gif

It's impossible to calculate exactly the ratio unless you want to post the ship designs. Or at least how many weapons did each ship have. Then we could calculate precisly the differance in force between fleets. But it's going to be less than 2 to 1. Probably more than 1 to 1. Somewhere between those two would be my guess, with you having the slight edge.

Also remember that each of his ships can do more damage than each of your ships on an individual basis. With 130 ships in a firefight, more of your ships are going to be out of range than his are in any particular turn, simply becasue you have more. So this means he can bring even more fire to bear on the ships that are in range than you can.

Altogether what you have is two fleets that are much more equally match than you thought, with his ships having a large advantage in experience. End result is the rout you ended up with. I still believe if the experience, sensors, so on had been equal, it would have been a close, bloody fight with high damage on both sides. You might have won, but you wouldn't have much left to celebrate with.

One other thing you didn't mention, or if you did I didn't see it, was this a warp point battle? If it was then that could account for some of the difference if your enemy had a lower player number than you. Someone mentioned this before in the thread, but I didn't see if you responded to that point. If so all of his ships would have fired before any of yours did. Probably could have knocked out half your fleet before you got a shot off.

Geoschmo

Re: Are battles always one sided?
 

Tweaking Ship/Fleet Strategy is very important.
In my 1st PBW game I lost several battles that looked even without inflicting significant losses to the enemy fleet. Upon viewing the battles I finally figured out what was happening. My ships were failing to kill off damaged ships. They would fire until the opponent was disabled and move on to the next target. The opponent had enough repair ships to fix his fleet each turn. This is the default setting for SE4 and what very often turns a battle into a one sided slaughter. If your opponent has more ships you will almost always lose without inflicting any losses, all else being equal.

Re: Are battles always one sided?
 

Thanks for the numbers S_J. So I guess PPB really are king (although wavemotion guns with their 30% bonus look nice too). BTW when is the 30% added? Does it guarantee a 31% to-hit, no matter what?

------------------
Assume you have a 1kg squirrel
E=mc^2
E=1kg(3x10^8m/s)^2=9x10^16J
which, if I'm not mistaken, is equivilent to roughly a 50 megaton nuclear bomb.
Fear the squirrel.

Re: Are battles always one sided?
 

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>That's why I always play religious tech - that Talisman can be a HUGE factor in combat....<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>Assuming you can survive long enough to research it... <BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Once I've seen my ships (with order to fire at optimum range) moving away from the enemies right next to them FIRST and THEN fire on them (and missed)<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>I think that's because "optimum" range includes minimizing the potential damage the enemy can do, according to the manual.

------------------
Cap'n Q
My first mod! Hypermaze quadrant
The most merciful thing in the world, I think, is the inability of the
human mind to correlate all of its contents. We live on a placid
island of ignorance in the midst of black seas of infinity, and it was
not meant that we should go far. -- HP Lovecraft, "The Call of Cthulhu"

Re: Are battles always one sided?
 

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>BTW when is the 30% added? Does it guarantee a 31% to-hit, no matter what?<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>Yes. Yes it does http://www.shrapnelgames.com/ubb/images/icons/icon7.gif
I was playing a game once where I took max -ve on offense, didn't bother to research sensors, and kept "max range" strategies.

I had maxed out defensiveness, ECM, and was running up stealth tech, and using small ships (defense bonus), so nobody could hit me, and it worked out great.

Using Quantum Torpedoes (+15% to +25% accuracy in P&N, as tech improves):
I got a 16% to 26% to hit, and they were letting fly with 1% accuracy, even at point-blank, against my torpedo frigates http://www.shrapnelgames.com/ubb/images/icons/icon7.gif

Re: Are battles always one sided?
 

It is annoying when battles are repeatedly blowouts, particularly when there are large fleets of ships with seeming equal firepower. The combat sequence bug that the lower number player always goes first is something that ought to be fixed. I guess if the damage results would be simultaneous would be the most fair. Even adjusting for weapon types, accuracy, training and the like and strategies, the vast battle imbalances seems very odd and unfair.

On the formations, I guess it would be nice if one fix could be made: A lead ship changing direction would cause the other ships to change relative positions in their fleet. How often does a fleet get demolished because the lead ship turns around, and the other ships get roasted as they change places.

Re: Are battles always one sided?
 

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by suicide_junkie:

Quote:

BTW when is the 30% added? Does it guarantee a 31% to-hit, no matter what?<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>Yes. Yes it does http://www.shrapnelgames.com/ubb/images/icons/icon7.gif I was playing a game once where I took max -ve on offense, didn't bother to research sensors, and kept "max range" strategies. I had maxed out defensiveness, ECM, and was running up stealth tech, and using small ships (defense bonus), so nobody could hit me, and it worked out great. Using Quantum Torpedoes (+15% to +25% accuracy in P&N, as tech improves): I got a 16% to 26% to hit, and they were letting fly with 1% accuracy, even at point-blank, against my torpedo frigates http://www.shrapnelgames.com/ubb/images/icons/icon7.gif

Of course that strategy can backfire on you. I tried something similer in a game once. I had Frigate's and a few destroyers with tailsman's. I figured I could stay at max range and with my defensive bonuses he wouldn't land many hits before my tailsman powered weapons had chewed him up.

What I didn't know was this was a fleet that had just returned from a succesful mission against a race that used a lot of missles. His fleet and ships were legendary which negated my defensive bonuses. So my disadvantage in ship size and tech shined through glaringly.

Geoschmo

[This message has been edited by geoschmo (edited 15 October 2001).]

Re: Are battles always one sided?
 

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Lynx:
It is annoying when battles are repeatedly blowouts, particularly when there are large fleets of ships with seeming equal firepower. The combat sequence bug that the lower number player always goes first is something that ought to be fixed. I guess if the damage results would be simultaneous would be the most fair. Even adjusting for weapon types, accuracy, training and the like and strategies, the vast battle imbalances seems very odd and unfair.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>True this is a problem, although it really only affects warp point battles

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>On the formations, I guess it would be nice if one fix could be made: A lead ship changing direction would cause the other ships to change relative positions in their fleet. How often does a fleet get demolished because the lead ship turns around, and the other ships get roasted as they change places.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

I agree with you on this one. I hate this. I have started setting all ships to break formation. Every ship for itself seems to work better in large ship battles than trying to keep them in formation.

Geoschmo

Re: Are battles always one sided?
 

Yeah, running up against a fleet of Legendaries would have been trouble, but I had a minimum maintenance race, with over 2/3rds of my fleet in mothballs, so I could easily replace my 10-FG/DS WP patrol with a 50-LC/BC annihilator force for a few turns http://www.shrapnelgames.com/ubb/images/icons/icon7.gif
Also, that was 1% at point blank, so moving to max torpedo range (6) would cancel the 50% legendary bonus http://www.shrapnelgames.com/ubb/images/icons/icon7.gif

Re: Are battles always one sided?
 

If his fleet was legendary I think it's at, at least, 30 Experience. Then you have to figure most of the ships in the fleet would probably be around 20 or so experience (the max you can train at a training facility). So, due to experience, his ships would gain a +50% to hit and a +50% to defense. This is a huge advantage, if he can keep your ships at max range you have something like a 1% chance to hit him while he would have something like a 50% or 60% chance to hit. I would imagine that this is why your 100 ships bit the dust. Also, keep in mind that Battle Cruisers probably have 20-25% more firepower than a Cruiser, so instead of him facing 3 - 1 odds it was more like 2 - 1 odds.

Re: Are battles always one sided?
 

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Rich04:
Tweaking Ship/Fleet Strategy is very important.
In my 1st PBW game I lost several battles that looked even without inflicting significant losses to the enemy fleet. Upon viewing the battles I finally figured out what was happening. My ships were failing to kill off damaged ships. They would fire until the opponent was disabled and move on to the next target. The opponent had enough repair ships to fix his fleet each turn. This is the default setting for SE4 and what very often turns a battle into a one sided slaughter. If your opponent has more ships you will almost always lose without inflicting any losses, all else being equal.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Uhm AFAIK, repairs don't get made during combat. Only after combat. So I think it's a perfectly viable strategy to use the "fire till no more weapons" option, disable his ships, then hunt down the sitting ducks once none of them can fire back anymore.
In fact the only time I can imagine you would NOT want to use this option is if the fleets involved are so large (and/or slow) that you can't disable, hunt down and then destroy everything within 30 combat turns.

Anybody? Why is "fire until weapons gone" not turned on by default?

Re: Are battles always one sided?
 

I never said they repaired during combat Dragonlord. http://www.shrapnelgames.com/ubb/images/icons/icon7.gif
What was happening was my 30 ship fleet engaged a 50 ship fleet with enough repair ships to repair 40+ components each turn. Every time my fleet engaged they were wiped out without inflicting any losses or even slowing the opposing fleet. This happened 3 turns in a row. My ships even had the edge tech wise. Each engagement disabled a dozen or more enemy ships. If they had finished them off the attacking fleet would have been whittled down each turn rather than total blowouts. I might have won the second engagement and if not for sure the third one for by then 'I' would have had the larger fleet.

Re: Are battles always one sided?
 

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Of course that strategy can backfire on you. I tried something similer in a game once. I had Frigate's and a few destroyers with tailsman's. I figured I could stay at max range and with my defensive bonuses he wouldn't land many hits before my tailsman powered weapons had chewed him up.

What I didn't know was this was a fleet that had just returned from a succesful mission against a race that used a lot of missles. His fleet and ships were legendary which negated my defensive bonuses. So my disadvantage in ship size and tech shined through glaringly.

Geoschmo
<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

True it backfired that time. But what if your fleet had had the legendary bonus (and mine hadn't)?

The word 'unstoppable' comes to mind... small ships (virtually) unhittable but that always hit with direct fire weapons. http://www.shrapnelgames.com/ubb/images/icons/icon9.gif

My homeworlds would have died as fast as you could get your ships down to my homesystem.

Re: Are battles always one sided?
 

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by suicide_junkie:
Stealth and Scattering most definitely ARE cumulative http://www.shrapnelgames.com/ubb/images/icons/icon7.gif
<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Yes, you're right and I was wrong! http://www.shrapnelgames.com/ubb/images/icons/icon7.gif

I was confused, because in the past, the stealth and scattering bonus were not stacking with the ECM, and believed that when Aaron fixed it, also forced to stealth and scattering to doesn't stack between them.
Sorry.

Re: Are battles always one sided?
 

Hello again,

I've run Spoo's 101 ships vs my 35 ships in the combat simulator several times and I lost convincly each time (although I kill about 30 ships).

So as my fleet wiped the floor against his 101 ships in the real world ("space") I assume it was all down to fleet and ship experience.

This doesn't quite seem satisfactory to me.
I reckon either
1) Tone down the effect of experience.
2) Give all weapons an innate bonus to hit like the WMG so at least any shots has 15-20% chance of hitting.
3) Make sure offensive bonuses grossly outsize the defence bonuses.


Askan

Re: Are battles always one sided?
 

Why doesn't that seem satisfactory? He stated that his ships had no experience at all while yours were legendary.

I'm not exactly certain, but I beleive that legendary ships start at 30 experience. If he would have gone through the simple step of building a ship and fleet traing facility he could have easily gotten his ships up to 20 experience, which would have mostly offset your advantage and probably resulted in what happened in the simulator. It's not the fault of experience. He lost due to lack of preperation. You wouldn't send a ship into combat without guns would you? Then don't send one in that isn't trained.

Re: Are battles always one sided?
 

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>2) Give all weapons an innate bonus to hit like the WMG so at least any shots has 15-20% chance of hitting.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>I would be in favor of this. It does seem odd that even at point blank range you could have only a 1% chance to hit just because the other guy had more experience than you. Even if it was the cook manning the guns you would think he could hit more than one in a hundred shots from that close. http://www.shrapnelgames.com/ubb/images/icons/icon7.gif

Maybe The bonuses could be toned down a bit so that they have less of an effect on chance to hit, and more of an effect on amount of damage if they do hit. A more experienced gunner would be able to pinpoint the shot to do the maximum damage right? I guess that's probably too complicated.

Geoschmo

Re: Are battles always one sided?
 

I share the opinion of Cyrus that experience should play an important role. If not why would you bother with training facilities?
And Geoschmo - although I don't care a lot about realism in a game like this - if you look at the combat map one square might be easily the distance of 1000km or more (compare it to the planet size) so I doubt that the cook would reach 1% hit rate!
Therefore I am happy with the way it is although I hate when I am then one who looses an entire fleet and the enemy has almost no losses.

Re: Are battles always one sided?
 

I agree with leaving the experience bonus alone.

Phoenix-D

Re: Are battles always one sided?
 

I'm not saying experience shouldn't play a part, I just reckon it shouldn't be the be all and end all.

If you use the fleeting and ship training facilities you end up with a +40% attack and a +40% defence (correct me if I'm wrong).

This is pretty much the equivalent of the ECM II and the Combat Sensors II.
Now that my fleet's been roaming around and wiping out fleets of 100 ships it has a fleet bonus of 50%.
The worst ship in that fleet is gonna have a 70% bonus to hit and defence. Better than the best technology can provide.

That seems a bit lopsided.

I think experience would be better if it was a bit more subtle in combat.
Things like
1) Add to the component damage resistance (representing good engineers)
2) Self repairing
3) Better combat movement
4) Cool little skulls painted onto the side of your ships

Or another idea is that if a ship breaks formation is doesn't get the advantage of fleet experience. *chuckle*
That would effectively eliminate it (in my view)


Askan

Re: Are battles always one sided?
 

I would like it if you could lose experience as well.

Retro fit a ship and experience is halved.

Lose a battle and you lose some experience. ( due to replacement crews ) and at a lesser extent with winning a battle.

After a ship get to a certain age ( without retrofits) experience drops due to wear and tear or crew rotation.

During peaceful times crew experience should drop as well over time as well back down to peace level experience. (might take 5 years )

just some ideas.






------------------
Inter arma silent leges

Re: Are battles always one sided?
 

I think the idea of fleet experience is redundant. It would be one thing if fleet experience was reduced everytime a change to the fleet composition was made, but as it stands now, ships can be added to and subtracted from a fleet with no effect on the fleet's experience. You could swap out ships that had been in a fleet for a year and put in all new ships, and they'd still be Legendary. Not to mention fleets are basically just a tool to move large Groups of ships together, and ensure that they engage in combat at the same time. Is there really any benefit to the ships being in formation? It seems to me that having all ships break formation is gaing popularity, at least in PBW where the use of custom formations is not an option.

I say sack the fleet experience. (Ship experience is good. Keep that).

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Assume you have a 1kg squirrel
E=mc^2
E=1kg(3x10^8m/s)^2=9x10^16J
which, if I'm not mistaken, is equivilent to roughly a 50 megaton nuclear bomb.
Fear the squirrel.

Re: Are battles always one sided?
 

I'm for the scrapping the fleet experience as well. It creates too much inbalance between players in a game. A player with a legendary fleet of legendary ships has far too much power against an equivalent fleet of less experienced ships. If just the ship experience was used, it would still benefit experienced ships but in a more balanced fashion. It would also eliminate a majority of one-sided battles.

Can ship and fleet experience be modded or is it hardcoded? ie. Can I change the maximum levels of fleet and ship experience? I don't recall ever seeing any settings for this...

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"Reality is a nice place to visit, but I wouldn't want to live there."

Re: Are battles always one sided?
 

i dont know if the 50% limit is coded in the settings file or something, but you can change the 20% limit that is attached to training facilities.

I think that experience should be kept as a contributing factor to a decisive victory. without it, the game would turn into the same trash you see on RTS games like dune2, warcraft, starcraft, C&C, AoE, and all the other lame clones. build a base, mass troops, charge. rinse, repeat.

taking the time to train a fleet, or keeping track of one as it progresses thru battles adds a valueable element to the game that sets it apart from the standard rabble.

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"...the green, sticky spawn of the stars"
(with apologies to H.P.L.)

Re: Are battles always one sided?
 

If the training facilities were modded to take it up closer to the 50% mark it could be alright.

That way you still get the enjoyment of spending years training your destroyers.

Askan

Re: Are battles always one sided?
 

Spoo,
The way I've always looked at fleet experience is that its the experience of the Admirals commanding the fleet. Swapping ships around doesn't change the expereince of the command team. Now if you could tie fleet experience to the fleet leader you could have some serious consequenses if it gets blown away.

Re: Are battles always one sided?
 

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR> Now if you could tie fleet experience to the fleet leader you could have some serious consequenses if it gets blown away. <HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Now there's an idea. Too bad that probably won't be showing up anytime soon. Oh well, we can dream.

What I think would be a neat idea is dynamic to-hit bonus for all weapons. Let me explain. Suppose no empires in a given game are using Meson BLasters. If you reseasrch them, then they get say a +20% to-hit bonus. But if another race researches them, then the bonus drops to 15% and so on. It makes sense that a weapon that has never been encountered is harder to dodge, plus it adds variety to the weapon mix in the game. If every empire has the weapon then give it a negative "bonus". Just a neat idea, but with hardcode changes that would be required I don't expect to see it anytime soon. But does anyone think it has merit?

------------------
Assume you have a 1kg squirrel
E=mc^2
E=1kg(3x10^8m/s)^2=9x10^16J
which, if I'm not mistaken, is equivilent to roughly a 50 megaton nuclear bomb.
Fear the squirrel.

Re: Are battles always one sided?
 

spoo i woulod think just the opposite. If many races are using it then the technology would be more perfected and thus the to hit should be higher. The more races that use it, the more potent the weapon must be, I guess from a perspactive of encouraging a wider spread of weapons though, then it would be a good idea http://www.shrapnelgames.com/ubb/images/icons/icon7.gif.

Re: Are battles always one sided?
 

I am with Spoo on this one. If you have a weapon that is unknown to another race it should get a bonus or a partial shield/armor piercing ability. Good idea (for SE5, I suppose).

Rollo

edit: possible problem: racial tech weapons

[This message has been edited by Rollo (edited 19 October 2001).]

Re: Are battles always one sided?
 

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>I am with Spoo on this one. If you have a weapon that is unknown to another race it should get a bonus or a partial shield/armor piercing ability. Good idea (for SE5, I suppose).
Rollo
edit: possible problem: racial tech weapons<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>I like that better than the improved accuracy. It's still a "point, lead the target, and fire" situation, but the defenders don't know how, for example, antiprotons will affect their armor or shields.
Once you have researched the basic tech behind the weapon, you can figure out ways to mitigate some of the damage.

Note: If you are fighting racial tech weapons, theres nothing you can do. Modders can reduce the rated damage of the racial tech weapons, so they cancel out and have the normal effect on normal races. Using your racial tech weapons on other races with the same racial tech would have reduced effectiveness, so you'd pull out some non-racial weapons that they don't know about yet http://www.shrapnelgames.com/ubb/images/icons/icon7.gif.

EDIT: easier to implement than partial defense skipping (which I would really like to see sometime), would just be a % damage increase.

[This message has been edited by suicide_junkie (edited 19 October 2001).]