New Mod: The Art of War Mod
 

As a spinoff to our discussion about SEIV strategy, I am going take a crack at modding some of these ideas.

The goal of this mod will be to offer players a few more choices in ship design and tactics. I am not one who thinks the game has only one right answer, but I will admit that as the game goes on the choices that have any legitimate chance at success get narrower. I want to hopefully tweak some of the weapons that become obsolete so that they can retain there usefullness longer into the game. I'd also like to try and offer the player some "Guns or Butter" choices so that the game is not strictly a matter of a race to the best ships.

The first decision I made was that I would be conceding the AI. Primarily this is becasue I have never been very good at tweaking them, and they are always the lion's share of the work in any mod I have ever contributed too. They have to be adjusted every time a new patch comes out, and in many cases they prevent some good ideas from even being attempted, because they just aren't capable of using some techs properly. Because of this this will be a strictly multiplayer mod. In fact I will be building the No AI Mod into this mod so one of the goals will be to get the AI to do nothing in the event you miss a turn in a multiplayer game.

More details to follow. If you have any suggestions by all means feel free. I wont promise I will use them, but I will listen.

Geoschmo

Re: New Mod: The Art of War Mod
 

You might as well incorporate different cloak types at different levels...for example, cloaking devices that only block 1 or 2 types of sensors. So if you want to be invisible to the entire spectrum you must carry several different devices (that required different research) and likewise if you want to detect all possible cloaked ships you must have researched/built several different sensors.

Armor - Regular armor is really not viable in the longterm: It's damage/kT ratio is lower than shields and it requires repairing after combat. I have always thought it should have a better damage/kT ratio than shields *because* it needs to be repaired. Hopefully armor can be improved so that there is a real choice between shields and armor in the mid to late game.

By that same token, I cannot think of any non-racial armor-skipping guns except for the null-space cannon and of course the special weapons (engine/weapon/computer killing). The problem with nullspace is that it skips shields too. It would be nice to have some more armor-skipping weapon choices. They should be at least as expensive as PPB's. And consideration must be made for crystalline/organic races. If everyone gets armor-skipping weapons real easy then these races would suffer. Perhaps do as others have done and remove the "Armor" ability from Crystalline/Organic armor and make them act like regular components and make them have higher damage/kT ratios. This way, they will not block every shot, but when they do block a shot they are more effective and they are also immune to armor-skipping weapons. In fact, it would be nice to have some Versions of "regular" armor that do not have the Armor attribute. This gives you a "bread and butter" choice: Do you want armor that always gets hit first but is vulnerable to armor-skipping weapons? Or do you want armor that does not always block the damage, but is not vulnerable to armor-skipping?

Engines: Make Versions that give different amount of supplies or use different amounts when used. This will give you a choice between range and speed. Also, make more Versions that are "heavily shielded". This gives a choice between speed and/or range vs survivability esp. against engine-killing weapons.

Well, those are some ideas off of the top of my head. I am not a modder though so take it for what it is worth.

<blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr>Originally posted by geoschmo:
As a spinoff to our discussion about SEIV strategy, I am going take a crack at modding some of these ideas.

The goal of this mod will be to offer players a few more choices in ship design and tactics. I am not one who thinks the game has only one right answer, but I will admit that as the game goes on the choices that have any legitimate chance at success get narrower. I want to hopefully tweak some of the weapons that become obsolete so that they can retain there usefullness longer into the game. I'd also like to try and offer the player some "Guns or Butter" choices so that the game is not strictly a matter of a race to the best ships.

The first decision I made was that I would be conceding the AI. Primarily this is becasue I have never been very good at tweaking them, and they are always the lion's share of the work in any mod I have ever contributed too. They have to be adjusted every time a new patch comes out, and in many cases they prevent some good ideas from even being attempted, because they just aren't capable of using some techs properly. Because of this this will be a strictly multiplayer mod. In fact I will be building the No AI Mod into this mod so one of the goals will be to get the AI to do nothing in the event you miss a turn in a multiplayer game.

More details to follow. If you have any suggestions by all means feel free. I wont promise I will use them, but I will listen.

Geoschmo<hr></blockquote>

Re: New Mod: The Art of War Mod
 

Maybe (if possable) weapons that can tgt like the bridge or SD device so boarding will be better without killing the hole thing, I am not sure but if the bridge is killed, have the Attack and Def suffer Just a thought

Re: New Mod: The Art of War Mod
 

Looking forward to this mod. I have a few suggestions to throwinto the pit:

1- Horribly complicated tech tree. Lots and lots of crossover techs will encourage players to research a variety of areas rather than committing themselves utterly to just one or two.
Also, you might consider duplicating certain techs and having identical components in different branches of the tech tree, to give players more choicve within their chosen research areas.

The other thing I'm suggesting not so much because it fits in with your mod but more because I can't believe I've never seen it suggested before and I'm itching to mention it: Multi-unit launchers: Once you've researched fighters 3 and drones 3 (Construction 2 as well?), you get a unit launch component that will launch fighters or drones. Ditto mines/ sats. They would probably have a small cargo and/ or launch rate penalty compared to the dedicated launchers.

Re: New Mod: The Art of War Mod
 

Multi unit launchers 'eh? Why hasn't anyone thought of that one before. Also, what about giving standard cargo bay some launch capability, maybe one per turn. I mean, what's wrong with opening the door and shoving it out into space. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif Not sure what the benifit would be, but it's something to think about.

Re: New Mod: The Art of War Mod
 

Does the game really need a major weapon overhaul to restablish balance ? I'm quit newbie so haven't much hindsight, but from what I've read (and I did read a lot http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon10.gif ) the main imbalances were with CSM in early game, then PB and PPB, each being too effective vs competition.

So why just tweaking/downing these a bit ?
While I don't have anything against mods http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif , I 'd largely prefer a mod that can be made compatible with the others and allow AI play rather than a new incompatible one only for PBEM/PBW games.

Very few people will be able to really get into this, and it will create new design/game paradigms only applicable to it (instead of refreshing he whole design thing for many players that play the vast majority of their games vs the AI).

Just my 0.02

Re: New Mod: The Art of War Mod
 

Damn... its about time this was initiated *LOL* You have a good head on ya shoulders, Geo. I notice you are typically a voice of reason.

Bman had a good point about the armor skipping weapons. I also fashioned one of these, as I feel its a fair enough advantage to have available to most players - at the sacrifice of damage and effectiveness at high range... I made mine taper off, so that at far range it does next to nothing, hell it generally doesnt even show on the damage meter (tactical)... But up close, its a fierce weapon... Called it 'Cold-Fusion Cannon' and made it part of its own tech area along with a weapon called Dark-Matter Torpedos (futurama fan, and dark matter just sounds so cool *LOL*)... they however, cannot skip armor and act as more of a bludgening assault. The Cold-Fusion Cannons (CFC's) are generally balanced, but thats my distoted view, would be happy to have someone good at balancing look them over - as they are a permanent part of my games.)

(sorry for double post, hit tab-enter on accident - or somethen! LOL)

Anyway - enough rambling. This looks interesting... I love variety and the rp aspect... I dont play PBW coz WTF? Why play if I have no choice but to play against a buncha cutthroat babies? LOL The game has an elegant flair, and it should be better utilized.

Its an amazing format for RP, which is what makes the choice so much nicer...its kinda lame when you engage an alien race who has the same armament as every other race. Good concepts, I am interested... wanna see how this evolves.

Re: New Mod: The Art of War Mod
 

<blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr>Originally posted by PDF:
Does the game really need a major weapon overhaul to restablish balance ? I'm quit newbie so haven't much hindsight, but from what I've read (and I did read a lot http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon10.gif ) the main imbalances were with CSM in early game, then PB and PPB, each being too effective vs competition.<hr></blockquote>Nope, you are quite right. I do not belive the stock game is extermely unbalanced. I am simply wanting to tweak a few that becom obsolete too early, and to give some more choices in the game. Anyone expecting huge radical changes to the weapons tech will be disapointed with this mod.

<blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr>Originally posted by PDF:
So why just tweaking/downing these a bit ?
While I don't have anything against mods http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif , I 'd largely prefer a mod that can be made compatible with the others and allow AI play rather than a new incompatible one only for PBEM/PBW games.

Very few people will be able to really get into this, and it will create new design/game paradigms only applicable to it (instead of refreshing he whole design thing for many players that play the vast majority of their games vs the AI).<hr></blockquote>
Right again. Since most people do play most of their games against the AI, I don't ever expect this mod to get the widespread following of a TDM mod. This will be a mod for those like me that don't care to play aginst an AI, no matter how good you make them. Because, no natter how good you make them, they will never equal even a bad human player in my mind, unless you give them bonuses or handicap yourself in some way. And even if you could manipulate the code to such a degree that the AI was truly as challanging as a human, there is just something about knowing that there is a human intelligence controlling those ships. A human intelligence that is reacting to your actions, and planning your demise. It gets my blood pumping in a way that no AI ever will.

I think there are enough people like me that I will be able to get a few games out of it at least. And if not, that's fine too.

Geoschmo

[ 30 April 2002: Message edited by: geoschmo ]</p>

Re: New Mod: The Art of War Mod
 

PDF - I do agree on one aspect, I would prefer to have -some- AI support, but thats an extremely daunting task.... If at all a possibility, Geo, you may need to hire an outside contractor for AI work ;-)

Re: New Mod: The Art of War Mod
 

<blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr>Originally posted by Cynapse:
PDF - I do agree on one aspect, I would prefer to have -some- AI support, but thats an extremely daunting task.... If at all a possibility, Geo, you may need to hire an outside contractor for AI work ;-)<hr></blockquote>As with almost all SE4 mods, this one will be a hodgepodge of ideas of my own, and stuff borrowed from others. If when I have it completed someone wants to take it upon themselves to make the AI useable with it, that is fine with me.

I am going to have fun with this and use some ideas that I think will give any prospective AI designer real headaches. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif

Geoschmo

Re: New Mod: The Art of War Mod
 

I have never liked the fact that you have to know how to build mines in order to clear them. I propose mine clearing devices available outside of the mine building tech tree.

I would like to see mine clearing technology in a separate tree from mine building technology. Make Mine clearing components avail in their own tree with something like a 50K base. Perhaps in order to get a more effective mine clearing device, you need to have at least level 1 mine building.

Secondly, give the common direct fire weapons intrinsict mine clearing ability of 1 mine to DUCs, MC, Point Defense Cannons, and APB).

Third, there should be some sort of scanner that can detect mines.

Keep mines cheap enough so the counters above still give players an incentive to develope special mine clearing devices.

Re: New Mod: The Art of War Mod
 

While you're modding weapons you could add a little variety by adding weapons that only damage at certain ranges.

for example: 0 0 10 20 40 70 40 20 10 0 0 0 0
or
0 0 0 0 0 10 10 20 20 40 40 70 70

I know that the AI's might not handle this kind of
thing well, but in a non-AI game...

Re: New Mod: The Art of War Mod
 

Here is another suggestion that I have seen other propose: Change the Supply Container to be recognized as a Cargo container for freighers (Allow Fuel Ships on Transport Hull). Do this by giving Supply Cargo a Cargo capacity of 1 unit on top of the 500 units of Supply space.

Create 5KT Versions of Cargo, Supply, and Armor so that space is not wasted early on when you have that odd 10KT you do not know what to do with and later, when you have that odd 5 KT when using a large mount weapon that has a size that is a multiple of 5.

Re: New Mod: The Art of War Mod
 

LGM:

I've already made most these changes to mines in my own personal 'mod'... mine sweepers are a seperate area from mines, and mines have only level 2 cloaking so you can see them once you get advanced sensors. I've still got to test whether the 'stealth armor for mines' works or not to improve their inherent cloaking ability a little bit. I have considered putting mine sweeping ability into PDC cannons but I'm afraid the AI might then use those instead of true sweepers in a mine sweeper design, or might start treating other ships as mine sweepers.

Geo:

Multi-unit launchers may cause the same problem as mine sweeping on a PDC. The AI might get confused about the roles of certain ships. Other than that, it might be considered a 'cheat' of sorts that reduces the value of the specialized bays and makes some aspects of the game too easy. It's worth a try. Only play testing will tell.

As far as armor piercing weapons, I've been requesting a 'lesser' weapon ability than the 'skips armor' since before the game was released. Simply have a 'double damage to armor' ability like the 'quad damage to shields' ability. I'd give this ability to the DUC (Mass Driver) because it's a solid projectile rather than a beam. A few simple extra abilities like this would make the game so much more fun! We can only keep asking for them. :-/

[ 30 April 2002: Message edited by: Baron Munchausen ]</p>

Re: New Mod: The Art of War Mod
 

Make weapon research costs higher. The 5K base for most of them means you do not bother deploying them until you max out the level. Does anyone ever deploy a ship with a PPB I? The always research to 3 to 5 before actually deploy it.

It seems silly that you sepend 155K of research to get PPB I but for another 10K you get PPB II. The weapon improvement should be much more difficult. Make weapons something like 15K or 20K and racial weapons 30K or 40K instead of 20K. Especially make the good weapons like Null Space and PPBs be larger bases.

Re: New Mod: The Art of War Mod
 

<blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr>Originally posted by Taz-in-Space:
While you're modding weapons you could add a little variety by adding weapons that only damage at certain ranges.

for example: 0 0 10 20 40 70 40 20 10 0 0 0 0
or
0 0 0 0 0 10 10 20 20 40 40 70 70

I know that the AI's might not handle this kind of
thing well, but in a non-AI game...<hr></blockquote>

Not the AI, the combat system itself doesn't handle a weapon that does 0 damage at any range before its final range. You'll have to start with some sort of non-zero damage. And yes, others have already modded weapons that do increasing dmaage with range. The DUC is a logical choice since the projectile gains momentum with range.

Re: New Mod: The Art of War Mod
 

"Armor - Regular armor is really not viable in the longterm: It's damage/kT ratio is lower than shields and it requires repairing after combat. I have always thought it should have a better damage/kT ratio than shields *because* it needs to be repaired. Hopefully armor can be improved so that there is a real choice between shields and armor in the mid to late game."

Easy enough to do..

By that same token, I cannot think of any non-racial armor-skipping guns except for the null-space cannon and of course the special weapons (engine/weapon/computer killing). The problem with nullspace is that it skips shields too. It would be nice to have some more armor-skipping weapon choices. They should be at least as expensive as PPB's. And consideration must be made for crystalline/organic races. If everyone gets armor-skipping weapons real easy then these races would suffer."

Yeah, they would. I like having more armor (and shield!) skipping weapons though.

Geo: this is like what I was doing for techmod, only explained better! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif Hopefully you can pull it off better. I got bogged down in the missiles section of the tech tree (5 missile levels, 7 warhead types, ~50 entires PER WARHEAD TYPE.. ug)

Phoenix-D

Re: New Mod: The Art of War Mod
 

Re: armor.

I created some extra standard armor levels for Armor 4-6, though am still tweaking the amount of protection to give them.

Oh, and I made a "lvl 0" armor called "basic armor" that takes up 10kt and has 10kt of structure. Like I said, basic armor that everyone has.

I also have a "lvl 0" point defense weapon called a "point defense cluster" that has pathetic performance, but is better than nothing.

Other things I'm testing are some lvl 0 facilities. Mainly an intelligence center and an atmosphere converter. The intel center has a low cost and low amount of intel points generated. The converter takes 200 turns to convert an atmosphere. Both are mainly for the AI since I've noticed they just don't build those things on their worlds very well, so I might as well use them as place holders.

Oh, and I'm still testing what I like to call the Seekers From Hell suite of seeker weapons. Basically, more levels of CSMs, Plasma missiles, seeking parasite and crystal torps with higher damage and higher seeker damage resistance so those designs w/tons of point-defense cannons aren't completely invulnerable. Muahahaha.

Re: New Mod: The Art of War Mod
 

LGM, I think I see what you mean. Give the weapons techs higher tech costs but take them out of the higher branches of the theoretical sciences. To put some distance between the levels, but keep the higest levels from becomeing astronimcaly expensive?

Baron, <blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr>The DUC is a logical choice since the projectile gains momentum with range.
<hr></blockquote>Not that it matters for game purposes, but wha? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/shock.gif How does a projectile with no internal propulsion gain momentum with range? Projectiles won't decelerate in a vacuum, but they won't acelerate either. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif

Phoenix, I remember your "modular" missles. I was disapointed when you couldn't complete that, it sounded way cool. I may add a simplified Version of it. I don't have to teach the AI to use them, so that helps a lot. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif

And now for an idea of my own, sort of. Devnull mod has tacheyon armor that protects weapons from the weapon damaging wepons that skip normal armor. I will be adding something similer that protects the engines, if I can pull it off. I think I have it figured out, just have to test it.

Geoschmo

Re: New Mod: The Art of War Mod
 

<blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr>Originally posted by geoschmo:

Baron, Not that it matters for game purposes, but wha? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/shock.gif How does a projectile with no internal propulsion gain momentum with range? Projectiles won't decelerate in a vacuum, but they won't acelerate either. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif

Geoschmo<hr></blockquote>

Well, my physics is not up to snuff at this time so it's hard to give the correct technical explanation. But this is a fact of armor and armaments from armor-piercing anti-tank weapons down to 'bullet-proof' vests and ordinary handgun bullets. The closer you are the LESS effective the round is in penetrating the armor. Granted, beyond a certain range there is a drop off in power due to loss of velocity to friction. But momentum is somehow related to the distance traveled before hitting the armor and it does make the weapon more powerful to travel a greater distance.

Re: New Mod: The Art of War Mod
 

<blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr>Originally posted by geoschmo:


And now for an idea of my own, sort of. Devnull mod has tacheyon armor that protects weapons from the weapon damaging wepons that skip normal armor. I will be adding something similer that protects the engines, if I can pull it off. I think I have it figured out, just have to test it.

Geoschmo<hr></blockquote>

I've been wanting to verify how to make 'decoys' for all of the standard 'special damage' weapons, shields only, weapons only, and engines only. Does Devnull mod have all three of these? If not, what other mods have these so I can see exactly how it's done?

Re: New Mod: The Art of War Mod
 

DUCs: Maybe they are emitting a stream of particles behind them which would propel them forward. Or maybe they are launched in a super-energetic state or something and as they travel this energy converts back to matter making the projectile have more mass, and thus more momentum. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...s/rolleyes.gif

Engine Armor: Good idea. I am guessing you make a new "engine component" which is just a damage sink? It might get tricky with the "all the engines need to be the same type to get the bonus" rule of se4.

<blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr>Originally posted by geoschmo:
LGM, I think I see what you mean. Give the weapons techs higher tech costs but take them out of the higher branches of the theoretical sciences. To put some distance between the levels, but keep the higest levels from becomeing astronimcaly expensive?

Baron, Not that it matters for game purposes, but wha? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/shock.gif How does a projectile with no internal propulsion gain momentum with range? Projectiles won't decelerate in a vacuum, but they won't acelerate either. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif

Phoenix, I remember your "modular" missles. I was disapointed when you couldn't complete that, it sounded way cool. I may add a simplified Version of it. I don't have to teach the AI to use them, so that helps a lot. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif

And now for an idea of my own, sort of. Devnull mod has tacheyon armor that protects weapons from the weapon damaging wepons that skip normal armor. I will be adding something similer that protects the engines, if I can pull it off. I think I have it figured out, just have to test it.

Geoschmo<hr></blockquote>

Re: New Mod: The Art of War Mod
 

Devnull has weapons only desoys, not the other two (Unless Rollo added them since the Last time I looked at it). Weapons only works by making an armor component that has low damage (No damage?) weapon ability. Since it's a weapon it gets hit by the weapon only attacks, since it's armor it gets hit before all the other weapons.

Shield only decoys and Engine only decoys would work the same way, at least that's my theory. I haven't tested it yet.

For engine armor though you run into the the problem of the Engine armor counting against your max number of engines per hull size. However, for AOW mod I will be making some changes to the propulsion system, including removing the max engines per ship limits, so it should work fine.

<blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr>It might get tricky with the "all the engines need to be the same type to get the bonus" rule of se4.<hr></blockquote>Yeah, I haven't quite figured that one out, which is why I am saying it should work, but not that it will work. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif


Geoschmo

[ 30 April 2002: Message edited by: geoschmo ]</p>

Re: New Mod: The Art of War Mod
 

<blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr>Originally posted by geoschmo:

For engine armor though you run into the the problem of the Engine armor counting against your max number of engines per hull size. However, for AOW mod I will be making some changes to the propulsion system, including removing the max engines per ship limits, so it should work fine.

Yeah, I haven't quite figured that one out, which is why I am saying it should work, but not that it will work. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif


Geoschmo

[ 30 April 2002: Message edited by: geoschmo ]<hr></blockquote>

One solution is to take all the different engines you will be making and make armored-Versions of them instead of making an engine-armor component. They are the same except they have a higher damage rating. They are available if you have researched the required propulsion tech for the regular engine, plus some level in Armor. Perhaps you could make varying Versions of each armored-engine. The tradeoff could be more armor for less supply for example. It would lead to *alot* of different engines for people to pick from though.

Re: New Mod: The Art of War Mod
 

Yeah I was wondering about that too - I had read somewhere that someone modded armor that wasn't pierecable by null weapons... or whatever. Just how -did- you accomplish that, anyway? The level that modding can be taken to seems to impress me every time.


Also - with regards to momentuum.
I came upon this issue too - how does it get faster in space? I read once about mass-drivers that the projectile is fired by "A series of magnetic rings that fire in a sequence, each gripping the core and sending it along the railgun to the next magnet, and so on... until the increasing moment barrels the core out of the cannon and well.. At that point, I have no idea why it would do more damage *LOL* but c'mon.... its a valid weapon concept - Just needs some technobabble or something to make it work. A torpedo weapon seems ideal for this... maybe it has some kind of ramscoup on it that harnesses stellar particles or some **** *LOL* So as it travels, damage increases. To be fair, it should really only be applied to seekers. Direct fire can be lethal with Talismans and an increasing range weapon. Its just not fair LOL

Re: New Mod: The Art of War Mod
 

"Phoenix, I remember your "modular" missles. I was disapointed when you couldn't complete that, it sounded way cool. I may add a simplified Version of it. I don't have to teach the AI to use them, so that helps a lot"

I could complete them, they work fine. AI wouldn't be hard to adapt either- they all have different families.

It's not bad actually DOING it- though having all the missile graphics be so similar is a bit funky. The problem is balancing. Make one simple change and you've got to change many many entires. The torpedos were even worse. OTOH, I *could* send you what I've got. Let me know if you want them.

Phoenix-D

Re: New Mod: The Art of War Mod
 

<blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr>Originally posted by Bman:
One solution is to take all the different engines you will be making and make armored-Versions of them instead of making an engine-armor component.&lt;snip&gt;Perhaps you could make varying Versions of each armored-engine.&lt;snip&gt; The tradeoff could be more armor for less supply for example. It would lead to *alot* of different engines for people to pick from though.<hr></blockquote>I think I can do the same thing by creating the armor component and give it the appropriate movement bonus but no standard movement. You would have to choose the correct armor for your engine, but if I have the tech req's and families correct it should be fairly easy for the user. Just need to come up with some tech sounding reason why you have to switch armor (Engine Harmonics? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif ) and then it should work fine. That will allow the user to choose the amount of engine armor they feel is appropriate for the situation, and reduce the overall number of components.

Geoschmo

EDIT: Actually I think I jsut figured out this isn't even nessecary. Apparently the movement bonus doesn't have to all be the same, you just get the lowest bonus of all your engine components. So if I give the engine armor movement bonus equal to the highest possible engine level, then one armor should work for all the engines regardless. Cool! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif

[ 30 April 2002: Message edited by: geoschmo ]</p>

Re: New Mod: The Art of War Mod
 

"EDIT: Actually I think I jsut figured out this isn't even nessecary. Apparently the movement bonus doesn't have to all be the same, you just get the lowest bonus of all your engine components. So if I give the engine armor movement bonus equal to the highest possible engine level, then one armor should work for all the engines regardless. Cool!"

Are you going QNP propulsion or sticking with the regular system? Because in QNP movement bonuses can be pretty imbalancing.. but you're said you're removing engine limits, and that would be nuts in the regular system, unless you really really want to make the smaller ships even more obselete.

Phoenix-D

Re: New Mod: The Art of War Mod
 

Phoenix, I am not going with the QNP, and I am removing the engine limits, and I am not nuts. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif

What I have planed, and this may end up getting modified or scrapped altogether, is a system similer to what was used for SEIII. As the ships get larger, the Engines per move goes up, but not as quickly as with QNP. And engines will always have one standard movemnet point, but with the higher level ones getting the bonus movement as is the current stock system. My idea is that the escort with level 1 engines to go a speed of 6 has 6 engines, and has 40% of it's mass dedicated to engines. That's percentage for a movement of 6 I want to remain steady as the ships get larger.

So for the Destroyer, it will be 2 engines per move, for the cruiser, 3 per move, etc. Every 150Kt step in hull mass will bump the engines per move up one.

So I will remove the max engines per hull, but the highest actual speed for a ships will be in the 12 to 15 range, and that will be with all engines. And I have some ideas to keep that further limited.

Again, it's all kind of preliminary at this point, so I am not sure how much of the current ideas I am kincking around will be in the final mod.

Geo

Re: New Mod: The Art of War Mod
 

OK, that I could see working. I was picturing a dreadnaught running around at speed 30 or something, running down the hapless escorts who could only go 12, max.

Phoenix-D

Re: New Mod: The Art of War Mod
 

"Scotty...we...need...more...speed!

Cap'n, I'm givin' her all she's got. She's comin' apart at the seams!" http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif

Actually, the more I think about it though I may have the levels wrong. As it is the destroyer will ahve less room for stuff than the frigate. Not sure that's right. Have to play around iwht it some more I think.

Re: New Mod: The Art of War Mod
 

You probably know most of this already, but if this is of any help...

<blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr> Weapons only works by making an armor component that has low damage (No damage?) weapon ability. Since it's a weapon it gets hit by the weapon only attacks, since it's armor it gets hit before all the other weapons.<hr></blockquote>

I think that p&n has a lot of specialized armor types (engines, weapons, etc). The component is designated "armor" so it is damaged first, but then it has an ability too. So for example, the component can specifically protect against weapon destroying weapons because it is designated "armor" but has an attack capacity (damage 0 at all ranges) so it is also considered a weapon.


<blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr> damage: 0 0 20 30 40 30 20 0 0 0 0 0 <hr></blockquote>

well, okay, not a direct quote, sort of a paraphrase... regardless, weapons that do no damage at close range but more damage at longer range do function quite well. Again, p&n (v2.6) and Ultimate (v?.?) both have weapons with increasing damage, out to a maximum range. Beyond that the damage starts to drop off again. I used the weapons, and had no problems. The weapons were successfully employed by AI, but I only saw them used by weapons platforms (stationary).

I look forward to this mod. Mods are great, it's like getting a new game every time a new one comes out. Keep up the good work!

Re: New Mod: The Art of War Mod
 

Geo,

I've got an old mod gathering dust in the download sections (the 'D-Mod'), you are welcome to use/incorporate/change any of it (new ship classes, anti boarding party weapons etc), as well as the Mount Mod. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif

The D-Mod had lots of 'extra' weapons as well as some funky facilities. (Decoy missiles to soak up PDC, shield skipping missiles, low damage weapons that can strike VERY far away, Shields that incorporate PDC, regenerating engines, solar engines, Knowledge shrines, etc, etc, etc,).

Re: New Mod: The Art of War Mod
 

Some ideas that may or may not have merit:

- All direct fire weapons have many penalties to hit (say, -50 or so base). Warships will need fire-control sensor arrays (low mass and damage absobtion, high cost) to offset this. Kill the firecon, and the ship is in trouble. Multiple levels are possible, plus hardening, etc. Alternatley, split this to hit bonus between the firecon sensors and the firecon computer (on the bridge). Gives the aux con a reason for being.

No limit on engines per hull. Go as as fast as you want, but if you are all engines, you have room for little else. Also, make engines powerful, but big. A frigate might have only one engine and still go speed 8. Once it's damaged, though....

As weapons improve, don't nessescarily make them longer-ranged or more damaging...lots of improvements are in miniaturization....The APB I is 30Kt, maybe the APB II has the exact same stats but is 25kT.

Wish there was a way to handle MIRVed warheads for missiles, but can't think of one off-hand.

Engines that have zero (or near zero) inherent supply. Requires supply to be put in as "fuel tanks".

I'm sure I'll come up with more, but sleep is overtaking me now &lt;L&gt;.

Re: New Mod: The Art of War Mod
 

"Wish there was a way to handle MIRVed warheads for missiles"

Drone. It's pretty much the only way.. then again, drones launched in tactical have unlimited range and you can't pick the targets.

Phoenix-D

Re: New Mod: The Art of War Mod
 

<blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr>Originally posted by Baron Munchausen:


Well, my physics is not up to snuff at this time so it's hard to give the correct technical explanation. But this is a fact of armor and armaments from armor-piercing anti-tank weapons down to 'bullet-proof' vests and ordinary handgun bullets. The closer you are the LESS effective the round is in penetrating the armor. Granted, beyond a certain range there is a drop off in power due to loss of velocity to friction. But momentum is somehow related to the distance traveled before hitting the armor and it does make the weapon more powerful to travel a greater distance.<hr></blockquote>

Definitely *not* true ... AP penetration is a game of energy, E=1/2 Mv², M is given, v decreases with range (grav + air), so penetration too, always ! Only tweak is that "discarding sabot" rounds could have problems at point-blank range...
Where did you read that ?

Re: New Mod: The Art of War Mod
 

And another idea : why not have "armored cargo/supply" comps, which will have more damage resistance but less free space ?
At the limit we will have "totally armored" comps which will just have damage resistance and no free space, sort of "damage soaking compartments", immune to armor-skipping.
So I'll go for 4 types of comps : normal/lt armored/hv armored/armored only.

This can be setup for any mod, perhaps armor tech requirements should be needed.

Feedback ?

Re: New Mod: The Art of War Mod
 

<blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr>Originally posted by Cargus10:
Engines that have zero (or near zero) inherent supply. Requires supply to be put in as "fuel tanks".
<hr></blockquote>

This is something I am considering. I need to be careful though as this will again put a strain on the smaller ship sizes to be useful later in the game. I may give the smaller ships some inherant fuel supply to counter this. Haven't decided yet.

I have done some more number crunching and I don't like making Destroyers need two engines per move. I am currently leaning towards following the levels of SEIII closely in that respect. i.e Cruiser, 2 per move, Drednaught, 3 per move. Basically the engines per move will match with the number of life support/crew comps currently.

This does make the Cruiser a little weak. Going from LC to Cruiser and keeping the same speed will only net you an additional 20Kt of space after the required comps. Add to this the reduction in defense bonus (Allthough that will be chonged a lot in this mod anyway) and you don't have much incentive to build cruisers. Honestly I am not sure this is much different in the current game, it woulld just be a little more pronounced. I rarely build cruisers in the stock game, prefering to wait for the Battle Cruisers before shanging hull sizes. I may try to come up with some things to counter that. Maybe giving the Cruiser extra fuel storage, or adding a mount for the 500kt design. Haven't decided yet.

I could also make the cruiser a little larger. Looking at the SEIII hull sizes compared to the SEIV ones the Light cruiser in SEIV is proprtionaly much larger than the Light Cruiser in SEIII and the Cruiser in SEIV is proportionally a little smaller. That accounts for the differance. Since I am modeling the propulsion system to SEIII it may make sense to tweak the hull sizes accordingly.

I am also strongly considering adding some "advanced" hull sizes, say for example when you get to Ship constructiuon lev 4 along with the 400Kt LC hull you also discover a new 150Kt ES hull, but that has an inherant speed of +1? That would make the smaller ships more usefull right? A little anyway.

Geoschmo

Re: New Mod: The Art of War Mod
 

<blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr>Originally posted by geoschmo:

I am also strongly considering adding some "advanced" hull sizes, say for example when you get to Ship constructiuon lev 4 along with the 400Kt LC hull you also discover a new 150Kt ES hull, but that has an inherant speed of +1? That would make the smaller ships more usefull right? A little anyway.

Geoschmo<hr></blockquote>

Oh yes that would be sweet. You can do some very interesting hulls based on ideas I've seen floating around this board recently:

Reach Ship Construction-? and Propulsion-? and you get a FastEscort hull.
Reach Ship Construction-? and Cloaking-? and get a CloakedEscort hull.
Reach Ship Construction-? and Sensors-? and get a hull with increased accuracy.
Ship Construction-? + Shields-? gives hulls with builtin shield generators.

Higher levels of the required techs would give you the advanced Versions of the bigger hulls. This kind of thing would basically increase the usefulness of smaller-sized hulls later in the game since they would essentially get some "free" space.

I'm sure there are more interesting hull abilities that could be given also...maybe one with a built-in bridge.

Re: New Mod: The Art of War Mod
 

<blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr>Maybe giving the Cruiser extra fuel storage, or adding a mount for the 500kt design. Haven't decided yet.<hr></blockquote>

I like the fuel storage idea... (SEIV has a major fuel problem. The reactor becomes a necessity, but Id rather not have to use it. Id rather just assume a ship has enough fuel for at least 50% more of what they give us now... the SEIV mentallity is fleet-based, which is cool and all, but I prefer individual ship superiority in smaller numbers than huge dependant fleets... ya might lose a vital supply ship and they are all screwed. Ugh. But I disagree with the mount, simply coz then its also available to Battle Cruiser, one more reason to hold off... I personally use BC for the flagship, usually supported by an optional fleet of sick-*** cruisers... Could be a better fleet if they were BCs, but its a matter of style. Adding a fuel incentive for each cruiser would make that battle cruiser much happier, coz it doesnt have to worry about a reactor as much, as each cruiser becomes a shaved-down Fuel Tanker with armor and weapons.

<blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr> I am also strongly considering adding some "advanced" hull sizes,
<hr></blockquote>
I like this one too... I made a type of cruiser that comes with a certain racial trait, (man...adding a new one teaches you a lesson about emp files, I tell ya. I was freaked at first.).. a kind of streamlined (yea yea, no streamlining in space...I've heard the argument) Version that allowed for a more compact ship... Still smaller and weaker, but a lotta misc functionality... a small launch bay, etc, that kinda thing. It made coz my thoughts were along the same lines...
"What the hell is cruiser good for?" LOL
I like em though. Style is everything.

Re: New Mod: The Art of War Mod
 

<blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr>Originally posted by Cynapse:
"What the hell is cruiser good for?" LOL
I like em though. Style is everything.<hr></blockquote>Exactly! Of all the ship hull names, "cruiser" just sounds the coolest. You have to say it slow, and you can't help but smile... CRUISER

I gotta' find a way to make them usefull in this mod. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon10.gif

Geo

Re: New Mod: The Art of War Mod
 

*lmao* Right on Geo, I feel ya.
Battle Cruiser sounds forced, ya know? LOL
Light cruiser is cool, but nothing tops that happy median of Cruiser. Engine modifications seem to be the most rational, since it is for cruisen ;-)

Re: New Mod: The Art of War Mod
 

Hey all,

Just a few thoughts from the Peanut Gallery:

Regarding Cruisers and other hull types:

One easy fix to do is to make the 'Hulls' cost significantly more as you go up in size and then climb steeper towards the top...ie, a 'surcharge' if you will on Capital Ships (above Cruiser size). This will encourage folks to make the bulk of their fleet the small fry and Cruisers, but have some Capital Ships available (maybe in mothball) for the inevitable wars.

Also, the artificially inflated costs make the build time longer which I also found to be far more realistic. Of course, for any of this to work, you have to make the Capital ships really worth it. To do that you have to break the basic mold of going up approx 100kt per size. The Capital Ships should have significant size difference to make up for the cost.

There are some other items that can be used to differentiate the big boys too. For example, an Armor component that takes up ~100kt but has a VERY nice ratio can go a long way to making Capitial ships nearly immune to small ships and will guarantee that only they can carry them. Some Weapons can be made to do the same thing...Massive damage and range, a nasty to-hit penalty and a huge size (although maybe a modest cost). Weapons like this would be required to penetrate the 'main armor' on other Capital ships, but would be nearly useless vs smaller, faster opponents.

In other words, the ship would have to have secondary batteries to deal with small fries or else be escorted. If you want some of the small guys to be able to affect Capital ships, weapons like a Torpedo that does good damage but fires once or twice a battle are a good option. Capital Ships wont want em because they can get the same performance from a Main Battery, but people can then design some small craft with lethal firepower at the cost of RoF and having vulnerability to other small craft.

Armor vs Shields can be a trade off between cost and space. Shields can be effective but have a MUCH higher cost (and thus add to the build time and maintenance). Armor is far cheaper, but more mass intensive. Weapons that defeat one or the other can round out the interaction as desired.

The possibilities here are endless if you dont have to worry about an AI.

A few other ideas to throw out:

In my original mod, I made the neglected resources much more necessary. This had a good effect on the game IMO as it required some actual resource management, but wreaked havoc with AIs. One way I encouraged the other two was to make Facilities on planets cost HIGH amounts of Organics and Radioactives...if you want to be colonizing a lot, you will need those two in much larger quantities. If you are simply going to war, you can dispense with some of them. This allows people to go on a 'war footing' by converting planets over and requires a retooling of the econ to go colony-happy...it made for a fairly good 'Guns or Better' decision-making process.

Population can be made to be far more important by adding a lot more early pop-breaks and giving the lower pops a huge resource and building penalty. That, coupled with higher cost facilities slows colonization down to a more 'realistic' level, but without the extreme slowdown of the 'Proportions' Mod.

I also agree with slowing down research a bit on Weapons. IMO, have the breaks come less often, but be more pronounced. I never really saw the point of having 10 levels of a weapon that you could get through all of the early levels in a few turns each. It just made for a micromanagement hassle of having to redesign the ships every few turns anyway.

The Missile/Anti-Missile Defense of the Devnullmod are quite good and IMO, should be a firm base for an AI-less mod. I havent explored all of the ins and outs in detail, but Missiles seem viable early on without being overwhelming and can continue to be viable even into the later game.

If using a Ship Size system as I had above, there is a lot of scope for Missile techs. Smaller Missiles are perfect for scrubbing the 'swarmers' and 'Ship Killers' can be made that are tough to knockdown, fast, and have huge warheads and space requirements. Give them a once or twice a battle RoF and they are good to go. Again, unlimited variety if the AI is not a factor.

Well, anyways, those are just some thoughts. If I had the time and the player-base locally for an AI-less mod to be successful, I'd love to take those ideas and pair them with some of the other great thoughts I've seen here and make a mod. Maybe these ideas will inspire y'all in ways I haven't even seen as well.

Thanx,
Talenn

Re: New Mod: The Art of War Mod
 

Armor penetration has everything to do with the balistic properties of the ARMOR.. when talking about modern firearms. What makes some people think that the ability to penetrate armor increases with range is the fact that modern Kevlar armors are LESS effective against slow moving projectiles. Hence, at point blank range where projectile speeds are highest, Kevlar armor is effective.. Of course, armor penetration is ALSO effected by the cross sectional area of the bullet (which is why a .22 calibur round penetrates better than a .45 calibur round) so speed isnt the only factor to take into account.

So, for a DU Cannon in space, range is going to have no effect on armor penetration.

Now I think the MESON bLaster is the item that should do more damage at range http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif reason being that mesons pass right through normal matter without effecting it.. until the meson decays into a normal particle (neutron? I don't recall the exact physics involved) So, over time, more mesons in the beam decay into high velocity neutrons that DO effect normal matter when they hit the target.. longer range means more time has passed = more mass the beam hits with = more damage. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif Technicaly, the meson could decay into a neutron IN THE MIDDLE OF THE SHIP and thus skip over any armor. Only a small percentage would though so most of the damage would be to the outer parts of the ship. Shields should be effective against a meson beam though.

Rob

Re: New Mod: The Art of War Mod
 

IIRC from my 'Traveller' days, that's exactly how the Meson Cannons worked. They ignored armor completely but were subject to a 'Meson Screen' that caused the premature decay of the meson before it hit the hull.

The end result was you had a Spinal Mount that basically was a ship killer regardless of the size and armor of the ship. If the shot hit and penetrated the Screen, the ship was essentially dead.

The upshot for fleet design was that even the largest of combatants were very vulnerable to opposing capital ships with spinal mounts. Smaller ships were harder to hit with those mounts, but they couldnt carry a spinal big enough to penetrate the larger ships' screens. Groups of smaller ships, however, could overwhelm the missile defenses on the larger ships and scrape weapons,sensors and screens off of the Caps making them more vulnerable.

Overall, it gave very interesting fleet and ship design mechanics for a game that was primarily a role-playing game.

Talenn

Re: New Mod: The Art of War Mod
 

While we are talking about things to put in a mod,
I had a thought about a new component. While playing P&N I thought how nice it would be to have a COMPONENT that would store resources. I
haven't checked out it the program will recognize
a COMPONENT with resource storage, but if so it would have been nice to have in a P&N game!
SO YOU GURU'S OUT THERE, IS THIS POSSIBLE? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/shock.gif http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...s/confused.gif

Re: New Mod: The Art of War Mod
 

<blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr>Originally posted by Taz-in-Space:
While we are talking about things to put in a mod,
I had a thought about a new component. While playing P&N I thought how nice it would be to have a COMPONENT that would store resources. I
haven't checked out it the program will recognize
a COMPONENT with resource storage, but if so it would have been nice to have in a P&N game!
SO YOU GURU'S OUT THERE, IS THIS POSSIBLE? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/shock.gif http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...s/confused.gif <hr></blockquote>

I believe that it did not work the Last time it was tested. We have been asking for this for ages, since it is necessary to make 'nomadic' races work properly. This, and research/intel from components and a 'habitat' module to grow populations in space. MM needs to know this is wanted. Keep asking. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif

Re: New Mod: The Art of War Mod
 

Taelenn, I like the sounds of your ideas. I hope to incorporate some of them. If you still have the files availabel somewhere I would love to see them. You could email me.

Ok, since combat +/- has so much impact on combat, and since all the bonuses add, instead of multiplying, I am looking at some major changes in these areas.

First of all, ECM. I am looking at ten levels of ECM instead of 3, but topping the maximum defense bonus at 10% (Maybe 20) instead of the current 60% for ECM III.

I will also be modifying the racial attack and defense characteristics to make them much more expensive. And I have some thoughts about changes to the training facilities.

The goal of these changes is to slow down the progression and lower the top end of these types of combat modfiers, so that combat doesnt' get so out of whack so early in the game. This will hopefully put more of a premium on the number and overall quality of your ships. You shouldn't be able to destroy 50 enemy ships with 5 of your own and not even get a scratch just because you have a level or two more of ECM tech. At least that's my opinion.

Comments?

Geoschmo

Re: New Mod: The Art of War Mod
 

<blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr>Originally posted by geoschmo:
You shouldn't be able to destroy 50 enemy ships with 5 of your own and not even get a scratch <hr></blockquote>

I agree. ECM 3 and religious talisman = victory without a scratch unless extremely outnumbered(20 to 1?).

Re: New Mod: The Art of War Mod
 

Combat bonuses are tricky. They need to be powerful enough to be useful, yet not so much they are an insurmountable advantage, agreed? So researching improved weaponry rather than improved sensors should be a viable option- miss more, but make up for it with better weapon performance. You can't really do that in standard SE4. Extending the ECM/CS tree while lowering the actual benifits sounds good.

Something else I've thought about, inspired by the proportions mod: better sensors/ECM, but they are bigger than the normal type and non-stackable. Again, it becomes a choice between increased accuracy (or defense) and firepower/direct defense. Proportions doesn't go far enough with it IMO; the components are always small enough that except on very small ships you aren't sacrificing much combat capability to go with the best.

Stealth and Scattering armor are a good example here IMO. You get 15% more defense plus a few other stuff- it's not the best cloak, it's not even the best armor. And it's fairly big; sticking both plus ECM on a ship makes you pretty hard to hit, but you pay a nasty price size wise.

Two other thoughts:
-making ships tougher? So that who gets the first shot in matters less.
-should ships really be able to *outrun* missiles? How about running away to give PD more shots?

Phoenix-D