floating mex vs underwater mex

[Regret]

Team games? Isolate your variables noob.

Stopped reading right there.

[Pxtl]

Actually, DeltaSiege (non-dry) would be a far better testbed for team-oriented sea development than all these stupid 1-sea-mex teamgame maps. The worst example Small Supreme, which gives one sea player a full roster of metal spots on land a short walk from the sea-start (the crater-player), while the other player has along walk up the beach (the beach-player) to get to a decent supply of metal.

FolsomDamDeluxe has a long walk from those two isolated metal spots to the sea - there's a lot of free metal in the rocks, but what're you going to use to reclaim them, your comm? The rocks are on land. Taking your comm away from the lab is borderline suicide on a naval map - you need his repair-power on your 'vettes. This is probably why hovers usually win the naval engagement on FSD - they get that huuuuge pile of starting metal.

Similarly, Tabula v3 has terrible naval starts. All these teamplay maps depend on getting a land player to assist your lab so they're spending the resources you don't have at the start, which is why naval gameplay is so frustratingly one-sided - the team that backs-up the naval player wins, assuming both are familiar with naval gameplay.

[JohannesH]

Team games? Isolate your variables noob.

Stopped reading right there.

Its true though. You never seem to play games that arent half filled with newbs (apart from a few drop all-ins) afaik, its kinda hard to see any meaningful timings from that.

Theres no point to balance a game for anything but 1v1 and teamgames where people cooperate smartly, bigger game strats are determined so much by silly trends and noob mistakes.


And pxtl, on folsom its just as viable to go veh->sea as veh->hover. You save on the lab and get ships, while still being able to defend the coast.

[Tronic]

The current BA sea gameplay is very well balanced and is in pretty much every way far better than CA's. Hovers cannot raid mexes, but they do eat L1 ships and tidals for breakfast, and they are very good at killing SYs too. Decades or Corvettes can defend, but they are far worse than tidals, thus a sea player should upgrade to L2 around the time the enemy starts spamming hovers.

Still, L1 ships can defend against small numbers of hovers and hovers can beat small numbers of Enforcers and other L2 ships. Therefore allowing for a balanced gameplay.

If hovers could kill the mexes too, they would be completely OP and there would be no point in making ships in the first place. Or if Skeeters could raid mexes, there would be no point in trying to expand without a lot of porc. The constructor ships getting raided by skeeters is already painful enough (and you cannot afford to protect them early game).

I think it is a very good thing that the sea gameplay is not simply a replica of what happens on the flat part of DSD.

[hunterw]

Team games? Isolate your variables noob.

Stopped reading right there.

Its true though. You never seem to play games that arent half filled with newbs (apart from a few drop all-ins) afaik, its kinda hard to see any meaningful timings from that.

Sure there is. Team games that are half smurfs half noobs are 90% of Spring's online community. It is advantageous to have balance which suits such a game.

Isolating variables in a 1v1 situation gives the lion's share of balance information, but multiplayer scenarios where not everyone is veteran need to be catered to if we want sea is to be popular for mass consumption.

[Pxtl]

What hunterw said - the game should be balanced for 1v1, but it's also not too much to ask that it be _fun_ (balance will come with tweaking) for teamgames, since that's what most of the game is.

[1v0ry_k1ng]

The current BA sea gameplay is very well balanced

im guessing you forgot to read any of the posts in this thread.

balancing for 1v1 is vital, since an un-cordinated teamgame just boils down to a number of 1v1s. sea is much more likely than other factory type to just boil down to a 1v1 with the corresponding guy on the other team who went sea.

the only fun sea map is sands of war- why? because all the metal is on the surface where it can be easily raided, and all the land can be attacked from the sea stopping the porc.

[Tronic]

What's wrong with DSX (1v1 water if there are not too many players, unraidable mexes) or SSBv2 (1v1 on each pond, unraidable mexes)? Both are fun and regularly played on [fi] autohosts (not to mention various other partially water maps).

What exactly do you think breaks the water game balance in 1v1?

I guess the reason why water-only maps are not popular is that most players never play water. You've got to have land positions for those players to keep them happy.

[Pxtl]

SSB water has the problem that there isn't enough metal at the start spots, and the two oceans each have highly asymmetrical gameplay - one player starts next to the very high-metal landmass for each of the oceans.

People like SSB because of the combined gameplay of the map - I'd say the individual oceans are a weakness of it.

[Tronic]

Notice that I mentioned SSBv2 which, unlike SSBv1, has plenty of underwater mexes.

[Pxtl]

Notice that I mentioned SSBv2, which does have plenty of metal in sea.

Not at the start points. The crater start spot works well enough, but the beach-side start spot has just too big a gap between the metal patches and possible shipyard sites.

[Tronic]

But then, you only need one to make conship that will build the rest for you. No reason to try taking the land metal spots (even though that, too, is a valid strategy). Still, agreed, the long shore starting position is harder in the beginning. The difference is not enough to give an easy victory for the other team, but it certainly does have an effect.

[JohannesH]

SSB water has the problem that there isn't enough metal at the start spots, and the two oceans each have highly asymmetrical gameplay - one player starts next to the very high-metal landmass for each of the oceans.

Yes... This map is bad, what can we do to balance it out??

Though in SSBs defense, its quite possible to share resources and you should. If one plays together and other one doesnt then...

[pintle]

SSB water has the problem that there isn't enough metal at the start spots, and the two oceans each have highly asymmetrical gameplay - one player starts next to the very high-metal landmass for each of the oceans.

Yes... This map is bad, what can we do to balance it out??

Though in SSBs defense, its quite possible to share resources and you should. If one plays together and other one doesnt then...

The reasoin SSB can be a good map is that there is no way in hell you are going to win without using teamwork, unless your opponents are all retards.

The asymmetrical start positions exist within the context of the standard air reclaim rush, and tbfh I reckon you get a much stronger team if the guy on the "sweet" spot is whoring eco/prepping for the mid game, and the guy who takes that ocean actually starts in the small alcove with the 1 mex.

More than having slightly less opening metal than your opponent, being significantly later in spamming vettes than your enemy is going to end things fast. You can get resources from your allies, you cannot get your lab up and units out in the same way.

[Saktoth]

A 1 mex start just isnt good enough, with its higher BP and lack of compush, sea is very metal hungry. This is often why people get raped by scouts and vettes etc. I mean yeah, you'll get raped by vettes, if you can only afford one every 5 minutes, whoever wins the first vette rush is gonna win! (Though, there is also reclaiming any corpse if you're defending, but noobs will be noobs).

[Gota]

Or placing an offshore thingy than making a sub followed by a con after you did a long start with several mexes.

[Tronic]

A 1 mex start just isnt good enough, with its higher BP and lack of compush, sea is very metal hungry.

True, you will be mostly stalling metal if you have any decent amount of E (and tidals cost M too).

This doesn't prevent you from building a lot of stuff, and getting two more mexes in the beginning doesn't really make that much difference. The initial building is done mostly with startmetal and once the ship has built a few more, you won't even notice the difference. Unless, of course, you were planning not building that conship and instead pushing a rush of some kind (which would mostly be just stupid even when you have the metal because there is a very real risk of ending up donating all that metal to the enemy).

This is often why people get raped by scouts and vettes etc. I mean yeah, you'll get raped by vettes, if you can only afford one every 5 minutes, whoever wins the first vette rush is gonna win! (Though, there is also reclaiming any corpse if you're defending, but noobs will be noobs).

The game ain't over at that point. Either the enemy kills your shipyard or he kills your conship (which would be in opposite sides of the pond at that time). In either case, you still have a bunch of mexes (thanks to them being underwater) and possibly also wrecks to reclaim. Build a new SY guarded by a torpedo launcher (repaired by the comm as needed), making the enemy corvettes useless.

[Saktoth]

This doesn't prevent you from building a lot of stuff, and getting two more mexes in the beginning doesn't really make that much difference. The initial building is done mostly with startmetal and once the ship has built a few more, you won't even notice the difference.

Starting conship to expand is a death sentence: He will kill or chase off your conship with his vette, if he is at all a skilled player, and probably have scouted you with a scout boat already so he'll know exactly where you are.

The game ain't over at that point. Either the enemy kills your shipyard or he kills your conship (which would be in opposite sides of the pond at that time). In either case, you still have a bunch of mexes (thanks to them being underwater) and possibly also wrecks to reclaim. Build a new SY guarded by a torpedo launcher (repaired by the comm as needed), making the enemy corvettes useless.

The only wrecks you have will be your own- a con cant kill a vette. By the time you reclaim the factory wreck, make a new one and a TL, he will be all over the sea. Even if you managed to get a mex up before he killed your con, he will be expanding freely, and he will still have his first vette to contain you. It is not 'useless', first of all because just 2 vettes beat a TL, and secondly because he can kill any con you try to expand with.

Thats just not how sea plays vs a competent opponent.

[Pako]

I usually start with a con ship(two cons in tropical) and it has been mostly succesfull. Com is nothing but defenseless in water and losing a shipyard doesn't mean much.

Just in last two weeks I have played 26 sea games which all had over 10 players, it would have been excellent to notice these geniuses who think sea is horribly broken in those games.
I didn't even wait or seek these games so sea maps are actually played quite often?

Balancing a sea for 1v1 sounds like a reasonable idea but is not for many complex reasons. 1v1 is like bunch of basement nerds measuring who got the largest penis where team games are more of a social experience and psychologically much easier.

Only way to succesfully balance the sea is to observe hundreds of sea games between differently skilled people and understand the human psychology behind. The result maybe an awesome sea game which no-one still plays.

[Tronic]

Starting conship to expand is a death sentence: He will kill or chase off your conship with his vette, if he is at all a skilled player, and probably have scouted you with a scout boat already so he'll know exactly where you are.

Let's assume that you even skip making that scout and just rush a corvette (just for the sake of finding the best possible time frame), you will have it done at 1:38 and around enemy base at 2:26 at the earliest.

If the enemy started with con (done at 1:16), followed by scout (done at 1:28), he will see the corvette early enough so that the commander can still build a torp (takes about 15 seconds, a bit more if M stalling - which can mostly be avoided by canceling the next order from SY) and the only thing the corvette can kill is the conship - which by that time (remember that corvettes are slow) has built a mex or two, and possibly reclaimed a rock worth 100 M.

Even though I think con-scout start is a viable option, the more popular scout-con approach has its benefit too, mostly because it can avoid nasty surprises if the enemy player is getting support from the team.

Using your suggested strategy scout-corvette-con is not at all feasible with one mex only, so you are forced to walk the comm to get more mexes and during that time you lose even more time - the enemy will have mexed half of the sea by the time you can attack.

The only wrecks you have will be your own- a con cant kill a vette.

That's why a competent player quickly builds a torp when he scouts and sees that he is being corvette rushed or subrushed. That brings the defending player the advantage, even if he ends up losing the shipyard in the end under a massive team-supported rush.

By the time you reclaim the factory wreck, make a new one and a TL, he will be all over the sea.

He will have hard time building a conship because he only has that one mex and wasted all his starting metal (and team support) on the rush. Even if he does kill my conship, I still have vastly superior amount of metal in wrecks (if he attacked the base) and in production (say, 3 mexes against one). If he attacked the base, I still have the conship producing E (at least for a while), so I am not totally E stalled while building new tidals.

Even if you managed to get a mex up before he killed your con, he will be expanding freely, and he will still have his first vette to contain you. It is not 'useless', first of all because just 2 vettes beat a TL, and secondly because he can kill any con you try to expand with.

Thanks to my vastly superior metal production, it will only take a little while for me to push out a sub or simply outnumber the enemy in the number of corvettes. Building a corvette with just one mex takes 3:20 (when already out of startmetal), so building another one is simply not an option until after he has built a conship (takes 1:46) and some mexes with that - by which time I've had plenty of time to rebuild my base.