Fundamentals and Gamey

[Quikngruvn]

Originally posted by PvK:
Sounds like I need to finish my balance mod.

Yes! I, for one, would like to see it in use in PBW games....

Quikngruvn

[Grandpa Kim]

Originally posted by DavidG:
change "no effect at all" to "almost no effect" and "You will never overcome the deficit you've created." to "you will have difficulty overcoming..." and I would agree 100%

David, I stand by my complete statements. "No effect on your chance to win the game." It will certainly change the way you play the game, but not effect your chances. "You will never overcome the deficit..." and you won't. You could still win, but it will be much more difficult and much less likely.

But as Geoschmo suggests, even more important than all of this is player skill-- the true deciding factor.

[Shadowstar]

What SEIV really needs is to take a lesson from Stars! and release a patch that will allow modders to optionally set an exponent increase factor for each stat. Then, it will be less about min/max and thresholds and more about mathematics. The higher the stat goes, the more points it should cost to increase it, so that the costs go up exponentially.

For instance, it might take 1 point to go from Agressiveness 100 to 101, but maybe 2 points to go to 102, and 4 to reach 103, 8 for 104, 16 for 105, 32 for 106, and so on. That expample may be a little steep, but you get the idea, and the values should be definable for each stat in the settings file.

I've been tweaking the current settings and messing around with thresholds for a while now but I can't seem to find any settings I really like; none that would seem to create perfect (or at least near perfect) balance. I sometimes find myself yearning for Stars!' old race creation wizard... It may have been old and it had its flaws, but you really had to think, and plot, and compute, to get a "monster race" with it, and even then, chances are someone would think of something totally radical that you hadn't thought of that was just as good or even better, and discovering those races and the players who played them was part of the fun.

[Slick]

I look at it this way. Everyone starts with the same number of points, which is perfectly fair. Then you set up your race the way you choose, which is also perfectly fair. Now, your overall game plan has to be coordinated from the first click of setting up the race until the game is over. You need to set up your empire knowing how you set up your strengths and weaknesses and play accordingly. You have to be flexible to adapt to the in-game specifics, but so does everyone else; again fair. Now managing your empire relations is as important to your game plan as anything else. Sizing up other races as targets, allies, co-conspirators, or whatever should be done with your game plan and your relative strengths/weaknesses in mind.

One of my favorite games is "Risk". In that game, if you are playing with good players, it is often not the seemingly most powerful player that wins. Position, alliances (yes, with some backstabbing too), and timing make all the difference. The same is true in SE4. If you are leading in position #1, be prepared for everyone else to see you as a threat. If you are "sucking the hind tit" (pardon my French), then you are not seen as a threat. In either case, you have to play accordingly. I can remember playing Risk with this one guy who would always position himself around 3rd or 4th place during most of the game and he would always win by a combination of tactics. He would get the strong guys to fight each other and weaken themselves, he would ally with others to strengthen his position, he would strike at the perfect time. All these apply to SE4 and to consider them "gamey" is to lose the flavor of the game.

Yes, there are good players out there, and being beat by them is a good way to learn. It is easy to get into an always-win mode when playing agains the AI and then feel slighted when a human cleans your clock. The goal is to learn from each mistake, take your lumps and one day come back to be king of the hill (to borrow a cool title).

Slick.

[Shadowstar]

There is a difference between gamey and skill. Skill is legit and fun, gamey is lame and no fun.

Gamey is when the rules are set up so as to limit variety in play by having one combination that works so well that everyone uses it. That may be fine for some who consider the whole race design part to be just some annoying part you have to go through to get to the actual game, but for many it's part of the gaming experience.

Some factors of race creation have a much more significant effect on the game than others, and yet they are treated the same when it comes thier cost in points. As such, you have people minimizing the least effective stats and then putting those points into the areas that are most effective. 9 out of 10 players will end up essentially playing the same race, with very few or very superficial differences between them. The result is a stale game experience.

This has nothing to do with skill, and it amazes me how many people seem to be completely oblivious to this. This whole discussion is about how certain flaws in the game rules can eliminate or at least severely hamper the possibilites of creativity and variety in the game. Anyone who tries to be different or creative is squashed because they didn't copy everyone else and create an uber-race.

And the "you're better off because your score is lower and nobody considers you a threat" argument is crap, trust me. I've played enough games to know this. If people don't consider you a threat because your race sucks, the fact of the matter is, your race sucks and you might as well give up now and not even waste your time.

[DavidG]

Shadowstar: I for one disagree with your definition of gamey. I think they only thing that is gamey is taking atvantage of an obivous bug.

A lot of people seem to be saying that certain stats are a must and thus everyone (9 out of 10 you say) will be choosing the same setup. The problem with this argument is it is NOT happening. At least not in the few PBW games I'm in. A review of the other races in my games reveals quite a lot of variety. Including several races with Physical bonuses (even one God-Like )

[geoschmo]

Shadowstar, I must say I've played a lot of games too and my experience is not anything like your experience.

I rarely see these highly min/maxed races in actual games. People usually fall into one of two Groups. One believes such a min/max race would be overwhelmingly powerful and as such is cheesy and not worth considering. The other group believes that the min/max race is not as overwhelmingly powerful as it appears and that it has weaknesses that make it not worth considering. The result is it ends up being more of an acedemic discussion than a real in game problem.

Geoschmo

[Krsqk]

In one-on-one games, such as KOTH, there will be drastic differences in what race setup is most effective. These games cannot be compared to MP games like normal PBW, etc.

In a normal game, the advantages from a "superior" setup are balanced out by the multitude of players. If someone were to somehow be an uber-threat, then all other players would band together for their mutual defense. Look at what happens to religious-psychic players on PBW. It's like posting a sign: "Kill me first! I want to die!" Players with superior production or trade or intelligence or research can all get an edge on someone with a 125/125/beserker setup--especially in a 2000 RP game.

Bottom line--there is no "uber" strategy. A while ago, someone tried to prove that 125/125/beserker with enhanced construction was unbeatable--just build frigates with the latest level of DUC. He was right--it was hard to hit his ships--except that he had to remove engines to fit an extra DUC, also lowering his supplies, and his research was slower, and his production was lower, and the enemy had to be within 2-3 systems for his ships to be effective, and the enemy could expand tons faster, and they could just use missile ships/ramming ships/organic armor/PPB/whatever... There are so many ways to play that no one characteristic or trait dominates the game. It does come down to "hitability"--eventually; but there are numerous ways to beat a "superior" player before you face him in combat. A consistently winning race needs to be just as good politically and economically as militarily, at least on PBW. SP against the AI, all bets are off.

[Shadowstar]

I'll admit that SEIV is better than many of the games out there when it comes to this, but it does have its flaws, and what I talked about DOES happen, and it happens more than it should. If you haven't seen it, tell me what games you're playing, please!

The mere fact that this thread even exists proves my point, as well as all the balance mods and race creation mods which have been made and which are being made at this moment.

Ignorance is no solution.

All I'm asking for is a way to make race creation points work on an exponential scale system. I think it would go a long way towards fixing the existing problems.

[Taera]

shadowstar, i agree with your defenition of gamey.

I will be unavailable for a week, i'll continue this discussion when im back. Srry for not attending my own thread.