PPB Rebalance Poll

[Thei R'vek]

Geo, it took you THAT long to figure out that PPBs are the best weapon for short-term games? Everybody who ever played a game against any one of the old greats from the Ladder or the BC before the advent of SE4 knows that one!

Fortunately, a good portion of good SE3 strategy carries over to SE4 strategy, we wouldn't want any of you pitiful SE3 players being able to hide forever would we?

[raynor]

Here are the tests I ran:

LC with 4 large APB VI and 2 Shield 5 costs 5200
LC with 4 large PPB V and 2 Shield 5 costs 7100

I compared seven APB to five PPB ships in the simulator.

The five PPB ships ALWAYS won against the seven APB ships.

I ran another simulator run using Shield 3's. This gave me ship costs of 4700 and 6700. So, I tested six APB ships costing 28,200 total to 4 PPB ships costs 26,800 total. In this test, the six APB ships won 1 out of 10 times.

Take a look at the damage potential of the ships:

The large APB VI's are doing 80..50 (6) damage compared to 120..100 (6) for the large PPB V.

If we say that you can build 18 APB ships to 12 PPB ships, that is a 3 to 2 cost ratio.

APB VI 3 * 80..50 => 240..140
PPB V 2 * 120..100 => 240..200

So, the APB and PPB are doing the same damage at point blank but the PPB has better damage at max range of six. This makes the weapons look fairly well balanced, right? The APB does less damage but is cheaper to build. They seem pretty well balanced, right?

But did I forget something? Oh yeah, the PPB skips shields.

With shield I's or maybe even shield II's, I guess the larger number of APB ships might defeat the smaller number of PPB ships. But by the time you reach shield III's, the PPB ships have an overwhelming advantage.

[rextorres]

Once PPBs come into the picture no one going up against the PPBs is going to have shields - they would be using armor - I know that's what I would do. So these tests lack a little realism.

Certain weapons are great for different strategic situations.

In a very small universe such as Universe Cup where a game Lasts 50 turns or less the DUC would be all that is needed. Anyone who goes after PPBs will get beat because the 100,000 points they used to start researching PPBs will be used for sensors, armor, or ecm be their opponent.

In any game Lasting over 90 turns anyone who sticks with PPBs again will get beat by long range APB Xs or better.

The point that people seem to keep making is that PPBs are so powerful there is no point in developing other main weapons - I disagree. If you go with PPBs and you don't knock out your opponent then you run the risk of having a VERY less effective weapon in the later game. In fact the Long Range APBs are so much better that the extra research is probably justified.

PPBs are great for a middle length game. The challenge IMO is to figure out if your in one.

Instead of going back and forth on the PPBs - How about this. I've always wanted to use a missile only race, but wouldn't dare in PBW. I think the missile system needs more tweaking than the PPBs.

[Rollo]

First of all let me say that I typed this post yesterday (May 29), but then couldn't get to the board all day. So it will not include answers to the latest Posts:

Whew, lots of answers to type. Good thing the board is currently down (Zulu 11:00). That gives me some more time to type, before even more Posts show up .

Andres - Phased weapons doing only half damage against phased shields is a good suggestion. That would certainly put more emphasis on PPB being a mid-game weapon.

Phoenix - Sorry I left out the damage. I figured those numbers would be pretty well known. Didn't want to state the obvious and wanted to give a new perspective (cost). No ill intent here. My point is: Just looking at damage without considering the cost, the PPB seems a lot stronger than it really is.

Also don't forget that not all people play with medium research cost. At low cost APB XII does not cost millions more, just about twice as much. Also at low cost you can have APB VI or Shields IV just for the 100k that opens up PPB.

Quikngruvn - Yeah, I also noted that weird progression of PPB. Rather than increasing the levels to eight, I would just tone down the lower levels. I still think PPB V is balanced, but PPB II is not. So here is a suggestion for the lower levels:

I 30 25 25 20 -- --
II 35 30 30 25 25 --
III 45 40 40 35 35 --
IV 50 45 45 40 40 40
V 60 55 55 50 50 50

Along with the raise of base research cost from 5k to 10k that could do the job (just one note: PPB III would now compare to DUC V damage-wise against unshielded opponents). A further increase in cost could also be a turn-off, but I wouldn't go as far as one third or one half extra. 20% extra cost (PPB V for 600 min) would be more than enough, IMHO (and with the changes just mentioned, I'd rather go without no additional cost).

Tenryu - Your suggestion makes PPB waaayyy too weak IMHO. For a 100k "admission fee" you get a PPB I with damage 15 10 00 00 ...? No offense, but that is just worthless. Using your system you'd have to have at least PPB V before even considering using them.

My dearest M.B. - How can I compare PPB V to APB V or VI? Simply because that is what you get for the same research prize. I thought that would be appropriate. I do know that the APB does less damage than PPB at those levels, but APB V (plus 100k of research to use for other things) is a good comparison. But I made one mistake: I only compared PPB V to the APB. I agree that PPB II is overpowered (see my reply and suggestion above). I agree that the cost of radioactives is not important, although I admit that I had some serious rad problems in some of my games...,but that was just because I didn't pay attention .

I guess that challenge is directed at me. Your idea of duking it out is totally childish, immature, will not prove anything, nor will anybody change their opinion because of it. That is exactly why I love it ! Anytime, anyplace... I love playing mano-a-mano and have never met you in a game, this should be fun.

Hope, I didn't forget anybody...

Rollo

[oleg]

Just a random thought:

The new ionic dispensor that does NOT skip shield
can actually balance PPB !!!

Imagine that your are against somebody who uses
normal shields (say lavel 4). Now, if you use PPB, ID as a secondary weapon is useless: it should down shields first ! If however you use APB/MB and ID...

[Master Belisarius]

Originally posted by oleg:
Just a random thought:

The new ionic dispensor that does NOT skip shield
can actually balance PPB !!!

Imagine that your are against somebody who uses
normal shields (say lavel 4). Now, if you use PPB, ID as a secondary weapon is useless: it should down shields first ! If however you use APB/MB and ID...

I'm not sure if it was a serious comment, right?

Just in case that it was, I can bet that probably I will use PPB/ID and try to destroy the other ships before my shields are down... And considering that I will have PPB, my opponent probably will have only armors (or mostly armors), then, with the ID, the advantage still will be in my side...

[Tenryu]

Originally posted by Rollo:
Tenryu - Your suggestion makes PPB waaayyy too weak IMHO. For a 100k "admission fee" you get a PPB I with damage 15 10 00 00 ...? No offense, but that is just worthless. Using your system you'd have to have at least PPB V before even considering using them.

Rollo

Rollo, They skip shields. I 'rebalanced' ALL the other weapons, and the tech trees related to them, I also gave them to you after Physics 1. I was NEVER happy with my tweaking, the issue is very complex.

My point being, if you go mucking with the ppb you will need to muck with darn near everything else, not to mention the AIs.

I agree the issue of WEAPONs, {what they do, how they do it, how many types there are, what mounts they can use, what level they can be researched to, what they cost, and what they cost to maintain, what race can use them}, is important, but, it is not an issue amenable to a quick tweak. It would need the sustained attention by several modders completely familiar with the potential impacts on AI designs and behavior.

In short, you would need someting like happened with the TDM Group to do it WELL. That group has a well articulated and focused area of attention. At the outset they set clearly defined bounds for the project. TDM has been a SUSTAINED, but CASUAL, group effort. It will be a difficult act to follow.


[ May 30, 2002, 14:17: Message edited by: Tenryu ]