|
Mine balance suggestion
Here's a simple idea that will help balance mines, and also alleviate a problem that can occur in multiplayer games (that of players forming treaties, going behind each other's lines, and laying mines throughout the "ally"'s territory, then breaking the treaty):
Make it so if you lay mines when another empire can see your minelayer, then the mines are visible to that empire. I realize that this may cause problems if the first empire later lays more mines there when the second empire's not looking - the game would have to keep track of which mines are visible and which aren't. And when it comes time to sweep those mines, hoo boy! But it's only a suggestion, and besides, it wouldn't be too unreasonable to say that later mines laid there by the same empire while the minefield exists became visible even if the viewing empire wasn't present anymore... |
Re: Mine balance suggestion
That might be too much hard-code change to be workable for SE4. Maybe it could be done in SE5.
|
Re: Mine balance suggestion
Hmm how about simply a mine scaning component? Something that would show the existance on minefields in the system or possible within a certain range? Perhaps advanced levels could detect the which empire owns the mines and could determine the size of the field with increasing accuracy.
|
Re: Mine balance suggestion
Add a scanner that can detect level 5 cloaking, and you can see the mines in the default game. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif
|
Re: Mine balance suggestion
The level 5 (or 6) scanner would let you see any mines, including in systems that are not "yours"... now you would have an offensive component.
Instead, how about a facility that acts as a scanner (level 5 or 6)? Then you can detect any mines that are in your systems, but only in systems that you've colonized. This way you'll see the mines layed by your allies in your own systems without the ability to see mines in other systems... |
Re: Mine balance suggestion
That could work too. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif
|
Re: Mine balance suggestion
DOH! Never thought of a level 5 scanner. Guess now that I think about it, it would be pretty easy to mod a whole bunch of different mines with different cloak levels and scanners to match. I'm thinking it would be cool if cheap low tech mines only had a cloak level of 2 or 3 and would get better with better tech.
|
Re: Mine balance suggestion
Can facilities provide scanning ability? I've never tested this one. Of course, it would allow you to see all ships in the system as well. I don't know if that's a perk or a problem. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif It's probably a reasonable benefit--if you can detect 10kt space mines, you should be able to see 2500kt starbases.
|
Re: Mine balance suggestion
I suppose it depends on which type of cloaking/scanning is going on too. In P&N (and others I'm sure) the cloaking types are changed somewhat from the normal game.
What you could do is make mines up to level 5 in cloaking type N (gravo-harmonic for example: stationary objects create a stable/detectible gravo-harmonic signature, while mobile objects do not). Then give all ships a level 6 in cloaking type N... so that ships would still be cloaked/invisible. |
Re: Mine balance suggestion
Quote:
|
Re: Mine balance suggestion
Almost OT, but...
What if you modded the size of the minesweeper? </font>
Additionally, you could seperate the Mines and Minesweeping tech trees. Then it could be something like : </font>
[ August 01, 2002, 11:27: Message edited by: dumbluck ] |
Re: Mine balance suggestion
A though occurs to me as I read the cloaking thread. Is it possible to add a new type of cloak? ie in additions to Gravitic etc. add a 'Mine' cloak abilbiy. Then you could make a specific mine detector without screwing up the ship cloak/detector bit.
(or was this what you did Gandalph? ) [ August 02, 2002, 23:40: Message edited by: DavidG ] |
Re: Mine balance suggestion
Quote:
|
Re: Mine balance suggestion
Quote:
|
Re: Mine balance suggestion
Quote:
[ August 04, 2002, 18:58: Message edited by: Gandalph ] |
Re: Mine balance suggestion
Uh, Gandalph.. that will make your mine detectors give the ship they are mounted on infinite supplies..
Phoenix-D |
Re: Mine balance suggestion
Quote:
|
Re: Mine balance suggestion
Try something from a facility or star; those tend not to work. Put the quantum reactor AI reference on a base component or something, since those get infinite supplies anyway.
Phoenix-D |
Re: Mine balance suggestion
Mines are blanced at this point. the max you will ever face is 1000 or so. ( I mean 1000) But you can build ships that will counteract that. The glitch that lets put more than 100 mines in space is good. It keeps you guessing. so the patch to elimanate that glitch is a disappointment to me. Too many details in a game can bog it down.
|
Re: Mine balance suggestion
"The glitch that lets put more than 100 mines in space is good. It keeps you guessing. so the patch to elimanate that glitch is a disappointment to me"
It IS a bug though, and needs fixing. More to the point, there's a line in settings.txt that enables you to raise the max mines per sector limit. Phoenix-D |
Re: Mine balance suggestion
*snores...grumbles...and lurches to his feet
My good people! We must not let our efforts be hampered by mere minefields! It is our prerogative to expand without bound throughout the known universe...not cower and whimper in fear of a few drifting explosives! We shall endeavour to overcome these obstacles... regardless of the loss of life and prove to our enemies that...that... *thrusts his index finger dramatically into the air and collapses into a pile of feather pillows |
Re: Mine balance suggestion
Quote:
I've encountered a minefield with 190 mines in one sector, this was totally cheating! But no one seem to care about that. |
Re: Mine balance suggestion
Quote:
|
Re: Mine balance suggestion
Since it's fixed in the next patch, MM must consider it a bug. That's good enough for me...
|
Re: Mine balance suggestion
I think the 100 limit is not very realistic... 20000 units max... If I want them in one spot and all mines... that is my empires wishes... My empire spend all those resources doing that... so it is ok...
Just plain silly...limiting the mines to 100... To BC's with mine sweepers cleans that up... Not very realistic... so mines become useless in a game.... which is just silly.... Yea I am tired today... Paged Last night ... so not much sleep |
Re: Mine balance suggestion
Actually, two allies can each put up 100 mines.
If I was told correctly the invader would need to sweep 200. So you could still face more than 100 mines without cheating. |
Re: Mine balance suggestion
Mine fields should have an upper limit to how many mines can be in them... if you wallpaper space with mines then they'll be detected by incoming ships, and so won't really be a mine field in the common sense of the term (undetected, a surprise, etc)
That said, each sector is a pretty big chunk of realestate and so I think the max # of mines/sector could realistically reach 1,000 or even 10,000. I think MM was more concerned about people barricading themselves in during the early game, and so the later game (with huge minesweepers) suffered. My solution would be to increase the (modable) limit to 1000 per sector, but then make the mines far more expensive to build to reduce the number manufactured in the early game. Or reduce the number launched per turn (per kT of launcher space) to make it harder to put many hundreds into space in a short period of time. just my .02$ [ August 07, 2002, 19:14: Message edited by: jimbob ] |
Re: Mine balance suggestion
The whole minefield issue is one that is just impossible to discuss without getting emotional. That is the reason it is so nasty. Both sides have completely rational logical arguments as to how it should be, and the rules while appearing to be on one side of the issue, had a "loophole".
If you believe it to be cheating it's nearly impossible for you to see it any other way. And in your eyes anyone doing it is a cheater. If you feel that the limit is artificial and gamey then you can't understand why anyone would object to someone using it, and you are suprised when people aren't prepared for it. These two opinions are irreconcilable. Perception is reality, and whatever your perception is, that what determines the reality for you. This dichotomy is what prompted Malfador to close the loophole, not a decision based on what was or wasn't correct or even what his own original intention was. The fact was whatever you want to call it, a bug, a feature, a loophole, a technique, a cheat, it's going away. The issue is resolved, and everyone can be happy on both sides. If you like the 100 mines per sector limit you can now rest assured that it will not be exceeded. You can send your fleet of ships with exactly 100 mines worth of sweepers in it anywhere you want and will run no risk of suprise. If you don't like the 100 per sector mine limit, you can find others out their like you, and there are many like you, and modify the settings.txt files to allow more mines per sector and more mines per game. Everybody is happy, and no more need for labels. Geoschmo [ August 07, 2002, 19:26: Message edited by: geoschmo ] |
Re: Mine balance suggestion
You know, I get the impression that Geo is just a liiiiiittle bit tired of the whole "mine bug exploit" arguements....
[ August 08, 2002, 11:00: Message edited by: dumbluck ] |
Re: Mine balance suggestion
possibly a stupid question I know but can you not change the limit on mines per sector in the setting.txt file on SEIVG?
I thought I saw it there Last night.. |
Re: Mine balance suggestion
Quote:
MM seems to have left it open to be modded, for example cloaking devices, sensors etc would be needed to get them to work. And people have already done this. I don't think we have to toss them out of the game entirely just because they don't make sense. That is a common complaint for role-playing type games, and it really isn't a good arguement. Some hard code changes to make them more random in effect are worthwhile and worth waiting for. |
Re: Mine balance suggestion
For my tuppence worth, mines are imbalancing and against the AI, are something I personally do not use.
I consider that the balance needed has to be (a) a reduction in the damage they cause and (b) a reduction in the automatic hit percentage. Mines should do damage and yes, a field of a hundred of the buggers should be a problem but as currently specced, a field of 20 mines will blow all shankey out of a fleet of say 10-12 light cruisers. I think mines primarily should have a percentage chace to hit, which can be improved by mounting combat scanners as per fighters, and can be decreased by say ECM on the incoming ships. THe compromise you have then is a less destructive mine but with increased hit potential as against just an inert mass of super-TNT... Turning back to ships, I hate the mine sweeper component, I would prefer that PDC's should be able to knock mines down. In an ideal tigga-friendly world, I would view minefields as an irritant, something to soften enemy fleets up with rather the sword of damocles the damn things are now.... I think keep them cheap, but make them far far less effective |
Re: Mine balance suggestion
Quote:
All you need is a handful of minesweepers, and you can walk unopposed through minefields. I just had an idea: What if mines were made extremely large? Each "Mine" you design would be a sector's worth of mines in some pattern. Now, each mine would take a significant amount of time to build. Say two turns or more. Each mine would also hold 4-8 warheads. Remove minesweepers from the game for now. So with even one array of mines (One mine vehicle), you can lightly damage 4-8 ships, or thrash one smallish ship. And best, you can spread your mines thinly across a starsystem, and still have a great effect, since they won't be swept. EG: a modest enemy fleet enters the WP. Hits one mine array. Half the ships take armor damage, one takes light internal damage and has to either return home for repairs, or hold up fleet's repair ships. If they press on, next turn they hit another minefield on the path to your homeworld. 1/2 the ships have armor damage, and 1/4 have light internal damage and one or two take heavy internal damage (because they were already damaged). The fleets can also use dedicated armor ships to suicide in your fields, but that can get expensive. |
Re: Mine balance suggestion
Quote:
I would like the idea of them having a chance to hit like any other weapon, you would then have a bit more uncertainty on the effects and it would be a bit more random than the clinical 'just build a minesweeping wing able to blow 100 mines and you are sorted" approach.. it would mean a 100 ship fleet may take 1 or 2 light hits from a small 10 piece minefield irrespective of the point defence capacity it has, yet a single ship could try and ran a 100 mine field with a slim chance of actually getting through, without the blammo you are automatically stuffed which happens at the moment |
Re: Mine balance suggestion
Yes, mines are sadly deficient compared to other aspects of SE IV. These complaints are the same sort of arguments we have been throwing at MM since before the game was released. I suggest that all of you send email directly to MM explaining the problems with mines. It seems to take a very large 'popular' uprising to get him to change any significant feature of the game anymore.
BTW, since mines are supposed to be like 'seekers' I think they will always 'always hit'. He'd have to rewrite the combat system to change that. What can be changed is the number of mines that get a chance to hit a given ship. There's no need or logic for ALL mines to be omnipresent in the sector. The formula could be based on the size of the ship and the number of mines in the sector. Something like X percent of available mines + some modifier for ship size. Larger ships would logically attract more mines, being larger targets. Technologies that let you create custom settings for your mines or minefields would be even better. Hmm, do MINES obey strategies? Oh, they cannot. But with these changes maybe they could. Then you could have different models of mines with different strategies to attack larger ships first, unarmed ships, or whatever. Combined with special damage types this could be great fun. Also, the effectiveness of mine sweepers could be changed. Even PDC has at least some chance to miss. Mine sweepers are always 100 percent effective, which is every bit as ridiculous as mines being 100 percent effective. A simple calculation of 'to hit' percentages based on your ship's sensors and any defenses the mine might have would be nice. So, if MM would just add another set of options to the settings.txt file: Mines Always Present := TRUE/FALSE Percent of Mines Per Target := 5 Spaces Per Additional Mine := 100 First setting: TRUE = The old mine rules are in effect. FALSE = The new mine rules (using the additional settings) are in effect. Second setting: default percent of mines chosen to 'attack' any given ship. third setting: number of kt ship size that attracts an 'extra' mine, just like 'spaces per one' in the AI design file. Mines could operate much more realistically with these settings. Among the nice side-effects of realistic mine attack would be that some mines would be left over even after successfully passing through a sector, so you would be uncertain of the mine content of that sector for a long time, especially if mine sweepers were not 100 percent effective. And a large number of small ships could actually 'distract' mines and make it easier to get some ships through. [ August 08, 2002, 17:13: Message edited by: Baron Munchausen ] |
Re: Mine balance suggestion
I dunno what everyone else thinks, but I like to launch 2-5 small mines over each planet when I play vs the AI.
Just to keep it honest -- when they decide to declare war, I want them to be at least a little inconvienced and lose a couple of engines on a light cruiser or two. While I get to keep my one mineral miner moon a little longer until a ship can defend it. Since the A.I. can see weapon platforms (probably) There's really no point in building them any more http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon9.gif Edit: Actually, I do know what everyone else thinks, mines around planets are unfair vs. the AI. And hundereds of mines at choke points seems to set up a pretty dull game vs humans. But hey, no one's going to win with mines. Well maybe, but anyone can see it's kinda a hollow victory. [ August 08, 2002, 17:11: Message edited by: Arkcon ] |
Re: Mine balance suggestion
Quote:
IMO. Mark [ August 08, 2002, 20:06: Message edited by: Mark the Merciful ] |
Re: Mine balance suggestion
Quote:
In the next patch, IIRC, it will be possible for a mine to target only engines or another component. Maybe when it comes out we can mod a weak minesweeper only warhead, that might cause the same affect as a minesweeper sometimes missing. And better minesweeper components will have more resistance vs better mines ... Of course, it's our decision how we want to use mines. Once, someone came up with the idea of playing as a pirate. Before Suicide Junkie wrote the excellent mod, I tried to do it without a mod, just research pirate-like technologies and not colonize any planets. To gain the privacy I needed to even get started, I tried to keep all warp points mined ... and I couldn't succeed. The AI kept sending ships then minesweepers untill they succeded in breaking through. If people are really walling themselves in, maintaining the buildup should put them at some sort of deficit vs a determined opponent. |
Re: Mine balance suggestion
GT: Yes, it's in there somewhere. (As Geo pointed out)
|
Re: Mine balance suggestion
Mines are gross and disgusting, and the only way to balance them is to remove them from the game.
</rant off> Seriously, how can such a cheap technology - Infallibly tell friend from foe - Defeat the most advanced sensors and scanners in the universe. - Somehow be able to move faster then any warships (static mines couldn't possibly cover the amount of space in one sector). - Attack all ships simultaneously so that none of them have the chance to, say, notice the explosions and change course. Obviously, in a game with fantasy technology, you can build in whatever technical assumptions you like. But it seems a shame that most of the other parts of the tech-tree involve time and effort to get high-powered resullts, while mines have all this built in at the first level. But what I really don't like is their effect on the early game, where they essentially paralyse all attempts at warfare, and allow for evil tricks like laying mines in allies territoty. I'm pretty sure people would notice that sort of thing. Personally, I'd like mines to be completely re-done. There should be a probability of being hit depending on minefiled density. Sweeping should take time (that's the only way to do it safely), and again should be based on probability. Mines should be detectable. Then better mines could be harder to detect, harder to sweep, etc. Given that's a big programming job for a peripheral technology, let's go back to my original proposal - get rid of them. Mark |
Re: Mine balance suggestion
[quote]Originally posted by Mark the Merciful:
Quote:
|
| All times are GMT -4. The time now is 12:01 AM. |
Powered by vBulletin® Version 3.8.1
Copyright ©2000 - 2025, Jelsoft Enterprises Ltd.
Copyright ©1999 - 2025, Shrapnel Games, Inc. - All Rights Reserved.