"Gamey" tactics like "Rock, none" races

[geoschmo]

Originally posted by spoon:
Well, that is the point I'm trying to make. There are "gamey" things you can do to give you an edge. I guess I have to repeat this in every post, but I never claimed that there was a way to guarantee a win. That's silly.

Spoon, I think that your position in total is fairly reasonable. You don't appear to believe that there is one "Uber weapon" or that there is "One way" to win at SEIV. Although others in the past have tried to make that claim. Please pardon our zealousness if we felt as if that is what you were saying at the begining.

I still don't accept the idea that these things you speak of are "gamey". They are part of the game. These are choices, either in empire setup or in game tactics. If you choose one you likely are not choosing something else that may help just as much, or nearly so. So it's all about tradeoffs and what makes you the most confortable.

Every game depends heavily on decisions you make before the game, or very early in the game. People don't claim that taking the center square in tic-tac-toe is gamey because it gives the player an advantage do they? Gaining an advantage is what games are all about. SEIV just gives you a lot more ways than the average game to do that. And it gives you ways to overcome disadvantages and poor decisions more than just about any game I have ever played.

There are two dozen things or more that you can do at game startup to get an advantage over an opponent. If you do all of them it will require a lot of racial points, even in the stock game. If you do them though and your opponent doesn't, you will have a big edge. That much is frankly undeniable. I would be an idiot to claim otherwise.

What I reject is the idea that any one of them makes you unbeatable. So you didn't make that claim, many have at one time or another.

Here's how it goes. Someone steps up and says, "PPB are unbalenced uber weapons!". I chime in and say, "Bah, there are no UBER weapons. The skill of the player is what matters most." Then the PPB cultist and I have a long discussion about why someone usign PPBs can or can't be beaten. In the end the person is always saying, "Well if you do this and that and this AND have PPB, you will be unbeatable.", at which point I simply laugh because the player that has the skill to do the "this and that and this" will do well regardless of weapon choice. That's was my point to begin with. They all come around to it in the end, wheether they know it or not.

Geoschmo

[spoon]

Originally posted by PvK:
This is a good point. I'd say fine, if we use Proportions mod, where I balanced the point costs. The listed advantages in Proportions cost 12000 racial selection points.

And you are a good man for fixing it. I guess my only complaint towards MM is that they don't do enough in the way of post-release balancing. And that's not much of a complaint, since the game is still so enjoyable without it...

[spoon]

Spoon, I think that your position in total is fairly reasonable. You don't appear to believe that there is one "Uber weapon" or that there is "One way" to win at SEIV. Although others in the past have tried to make that claim. Please pardon our zealousness if we felt as if that is what you were saying at the begining.

I still don't accept the idea that these things you speak of are "gamey". They are part of the game. These are choices, either in empire setup or in game tactics. If you choose one you likely are not choosing something else that may help just as much, or nearly so. So it's all about tradeoffs and what makes you the most confortable.

Ah, good, then we are just down to semantics. I consider min-maxing a "gamey" thing, and that's what you have to do to get the optimal race set-ups. The characteristics I listed earlier (research, ship combat, mining, construction, maint., Adv Storage, HI, Ancient Race) are so important, that you don't have any points left over (in a standard 2k game) to tweak the lesser traits too much. PvKs solution (balance the costs) leaves you, I think, with a lot more in the way of Choice, since you can no longer simply choose Everything That Matters. In fact, the biggest choices bow seem to be between choosing between Propulsion Experts, Defensiveness, and some Racial Tech. And if to choose Warrior, Bezerker, Engineer, or Merchant. And if to push Construction to 125 somehow, and if to drop Political Savvy to 80% or lower. (see, not denying that there are still hard choices to make - just that I don't think there are enough of 'em)

Also, I don't consider "gamey" to be a bad thing, either. (except maybe for role-playing). Playing with the numbers is great fun, to me.

-spoon

[spoon]

When someone said 'broke', I thought that there was something wrong in how the effects were applied by the program.

Heh, you must spend too much time hanging around with programmers and other such literalists...
Anyway, by "broken", I meant "does not work the way you think it does" (both undocumented and counterintuitive) and "is also out of whack balance-wise" (shouldn't be able to spend 500 points to get a 66% fleet size advantage)

[rextorres]

The only truly equitable situation would be for players to have to start with the same set up - sort of like Chess. But what fun is that?

Personally I think any strategy, tactic, or component that beats my playing style should be patched out.

[geoschmo]

Originally posted by rextorres:
The only truly equitable situation would be for players to have to start with the same set up - sort of like Chess. But what fun is that?

Actually it might be interesting for a change of pace once in a while. Sort of an IROC SEIV. We had the neutral challage game awhile back. That was kind of like that.

Geoschmo

[Suicide Junkie]

The only truly equitable situation would be for players to have to start with the same set up - sort of like Chess. But what fun is that?

I have a chess scenario, and its pretty cool. An 8x8 grid of systems, a resource-generating king (if he dies, you lose because your ships get scrapped) A powerful queen, Heavily armored Rooks, repairship bishops, fast & powerful knight cruisers, and a bunch of pawn destroyers.

Hunt down the enemy king, while protecting your own!