That's what i figured, so is there a way that it can be balanced out so ODSs can't be used as an offensive force as they were not meant to be?
Edit:
Also wasn't the ravager supposed to be a beam weapon but wasn't due to OTA limitations maybe change that weapon to something similar to the one on the doomsday device in XTA...
Final Frontier unofficial 0.97b
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Optimus Prime
- Posts: 755
- Joined: 03 Oct 2005, 14:31
Thank u all for ur posts!
First of all i need to ask u, if u tried the boltturrets against the ODSs? I played one game on a metal map today and 2 players tried to attack me with hordes of ODSs. I scouted them eraly and saw the line coming slowly to my base. They used lvl 1, 2 and 3 ODSs and i build ONLY 3 BOLTTURRETS, which i changed to ANTI-ODS-TURRETS and none of the ODSs reached my Base. All ODSs have small range and so one single Boltturret can kill 2 ODS before reaching their attackrange. These Turrets cost only 2-3k metal and are cheaper than a lvl 2 ODS so I think, that ODSs are useless against a defense which knows, if ODSs are coming, and thats very easy to scout cause of their speed.
Another option to kill ODSs is, to use longrangeweapons like Longbowmissiles, Annihilators, Boltturrets on Ships or Plasma. The reason why u didnt hit the ODSs is perhaps, cause of the radar. In OTA the radar markes the exactly position of a unit, but in Spring its only a point which moves even if the unit dont moves. Try to scout them out and use Boltdefens against them (Thumper and Shaker).
I will try this out again in the next games, but I think u only didnt read the changes
.
Second: to the reaver: If its wanted from many people i can change that, but than core uses nearly only lasers and that will look a bit boring i think.
Third: to the lasers: Big ships (Battleships) shall be weak against Fighters, cause i wanted to force players to use multiple Kind of units for a win. Try to escort ur Ships with Frigates and Corvettes or with Fighters which are good against other Fighters and u will see, that u can handle this Problem easily :)
First of all i need to ask u, if u tried the boltturrets against the ODSs? I played one game on a metal map today and 2 players tried to attack me with hordes of ODSs. I scouted them eraly and saw the line coming slowly to my base. They used lvl 1, 2 and 3 ODSs and i build ONLY 3 BOLTTURRETS, which i changed to ANTI-ODS-TURRETS and none of the ODSs reached my Base. All ODSs have small range and so one single Boltturret can kill 2 ODS before reaching their attackrange. These Turrets cost only 2-3k metal and are cheaper than a lvl 2 ODS so I think, that ODSs are useless against a defense which knows, if ODSs are coming, and thats very easy to scout cause of their speed.
Another option to kill ODSs is, to use longrangeweapons like Longbowmissiles, Annihilators, Boltturrets on Ships or Plasma. The reason why u didnt hit the ODSs is perhaps, cause of the radar. In OTA the radar markes the exactly position of a unit, but in Spring its only a point which moves even if the unit dont moves. Try to scout them out and use Boltdefens against them (Thumper and Shaker).
I will try this out again in the next games, but I think u only didnt read the changes
.Second: to the reaver: If its wanted from many people i can change that, but than core uses nearly only lasers and that will look a bit boring i think.
Third: to the lasers: Big ships (Battleships) shall be weak against Fighters, cause i wanted to force players to use multiple Kind of units for a win. Try to escort ur Ships with Frigates and Corvettes or with Fighters which are good against other Fighters and u will see, that u can handle this Problem easily :)
As for the problem with them appearing to not hit them, they were withing LOS so radar is moot, I see your point in not making some of the capital ships good vs fighters, but i did have my heavier ships backed up with heretics, maybe change the firing speed of the heretics to be more in an anti-fighter role? Also the lance was supposed to be good against fighters, it fired some foward shooting large area shot, I didn't notice it shooting in spring but that might be because it woudn't show the custom explosion graphic. If it is indeed not shooting, maybe change that one so it has many week but rapid firing weapons good for fighter / small ODS defense but not much else.
As for the bolt turrets, I'm not sure what you mean, I assume you mean the former EMP weapons, I did not have many of them in my defense so that could be it, I did just throw up a game and cheated changeing sides and sending a large force at some emp turrets and they did hold quite a bit longer but were eventually overwhelmed even with the support of 3 of the large battle stations. (I lost 2 of the large battlestations to ODS)
As for the reaver it already is a beam weapon it just uses the old TA hack to look like a beam you might as well change it to a spring style beam so it looks nicer.
Further testing though shows that some things are going to need some tweaking, a single quasar can take out a Slicer while taking almost no damage, a single shard can take out 7 slicers in a row while taking almost no damage and a single razorback can take out 20 slicers in a row while taking almost no damage. The slicer consistantly misses the target even with radar coverage and when the targert is within LOS The slicers fare somewhat better if you have communication ship which acts as targeting facility. The slicer is also the main weapon of the firestorm and is meant to be an anti-fighter weapon (or any light ship for that matter) however 2 iron angel's can take out one slicer (with radar support) I was even able to take out a firestorm with a handfull of shards the only weapon that did any damage to the shards were the missles, the laser would constantly miss.
Edit:
A single shard can kill a single Shaker with the shaker missing consantly, matter of fact i attacked 2 shakers and a slicer with a single shard and the shard was able to damage all of them heavily before it actually got hit (thats what you meant by bolt turrets right? I had forgotten they shoot "ion bolts")
Sorry again for the long post I'm not trying to complain I├óÔé¼Ôäóm just pointing this out so you further balance an incredible mod.
As for the bolt turrets, I'm not sure what you mean, I assume you mean the former EMP weapons, I did not have many of them in my defense so that could be it, I did just throw up a game and cheated changeing sides and sending a large force at some emp turrets and they did hold quite a bit longer but were eventually overwhelmed even with the support of 3 of the large battle stations. (I lost 2 of the large battlestations to ODS)
As for the reaver it already is a beam weapon it just uses the old TA hack to look like a beam you might as well change it to a spring style beam so it looks nicer.
Further testing though shows that some things are going to need some tweaking, a single quasar can take out a Slicer while taking almost no damage, a single shard can take out 7 slicers in a row while taking almost no damage and a single razorback can take out 20 slicers in a row while taking almost no damage. The slicer consistantly misses the target even with radar coverage and when the targert is within LOS The slicers fare somewhat better if you have communication ship which acts as targeting facility. The slicer is also the main weapon of the firestorm and is meant to be an anti-fighter weapon (or any light ship for that matter) however 2 iron angel's can take out one slicer (with radar support) I was even able to take out a firestorm with a handfull of shards the only weapon that did any damage to the shards were the missles, the laser would constantly miss.
Edit:
A single shard can kill a single Shaker with the shaker missing consantly, matter of fact i attacked 2 shakers and a slicer with a single shard and the shard was able to damage all of them heavily before it actually got hit (thats what you meant by bolt turrets right? I had forgotten they shoot "ion bolts")
Sorry again for the long post I'm not trying to complain I├óÔé¼Ôäóm just pointing this out so you further balance an incredible mod.
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Optimus Prime
- Posts: 755
- Joined: 03 Oct 2005, 14:31
thanks again :) I like feedback if its with good arguments.
but some of them i think i can counter:
ODSs are good, i know. But they shall beat nearly all ships because of their speed. If there would be ships which are stronger in the price-strengh-relation, who would build ODSs then?
To your test with shakers and ODSs, there u made a big fault. You must have a completely line of sight with the Thumper and Shaker. The radarpoint is VERY inaccurate. I tested it ig (i gave the cpu a line of metalmines so he could see my attackroute and put my ODS on return fire) and attacked the Shaker. One sinlge Lvl2-ODS only damaged the shaker a bit (10%) and even a Lvl3-ODS only wins with about 1k HPs (was the cor version which is stronger than arm).
But perhaps this isnt strong enough for a counter... i ll have a look on that in the next few games. Perhaps i ll make the mobile Ionboltturrets on ships an ODS-Killer too. Dont know...
The slicers are a critical point... they SHOULD be better than they are. But they dont hit their targets. I ll look on that.
The heretics should be good enough like they are atm i think. They beat the armversion easily. Last game (which lasted about 3 hours -.-) our enemies never build antifighterfrigates or corvettes after an hour or so. They only build the big ships and my fighters died very fast in that battles (ok i only build with 2 yards fighters). But like the other points i will have a look on that in the next games
One bigger problem is the missing of Nanoturrets or a pendant. Cause in the last game the enemies build about 100 Constructionaircrafts and so the speed runs down to 50 or 60%. That really sucked. At the end of the game i asked them to kill all their cons and oh wonder the game was much faster after that. So i will kick my ass to implement a fastconstructionunit into the next version...
but some of them i think i can counter:
ODSs are good, i know. But they shall beat nearly all ships because of their speed. If there would be ships which are stronger in the price-strengh-relation, who would build ODSs then?
To your test with shakers and ODSs, there u made a big fault. You must have a completely line of sight with the Thumper and Shaker. The radarpoint is VERY inaccurate. I tested it ig (i gave the cpu a line of metalmines so he could see my attackroute and put my ODS on return fire) and attacked the Shaker. One sinlge Lvl2-ODS only damaged the shaker a bit (10%) and even a Lvl3-ODS only wins with about 1k HPs (was the cor version which is stronger than arm).
But perhaps this isnt strong enough for a counter... i ll have a look on that in the next few games. Perhaps i ll make the mobile Ionboltturrets on ships an ODS-Killer too. Dont know...
The slicers are a critical point... they SHOULD be better than they are. But they dont hit their targets. I ll look on that.
The heretics should be good enough like they are atm i think. They beat the armversion easily. Last game (which lasted about 3 hours -.-) our enemies never build antifighterfrigates or corvettes after an hour or so. They only build the big ships and my fighters died very fast in that battles (ok i only build with 2 yards fighters). But like the other points i will have a look on that in the next games
One bigger problem is the missing of Nanoturrets or a pendant. Cause in the last game the enemies build about 100 Constructionaircrafts and so the speed runs down to 50 or 60%. That really sucked. At the end of the game i asked them to kill all their cons and oh wonder the game was much faster after that. So i will kick my ass to implement a fastconstructionunit into the next version...
I will agree my test has a flaw in that when i tried it again the bolt turret did not lose, however i ran the test 4 times and the turret lost twice and won twice, I understand that the radar blips are innacurate in spring however, by the time the shard is withing firing range it is within LOS for the shaker, also the shard is a stealth unit so it does not have a radar blip so radar targeting does not come into effect (i believe all the OSDs are stealth i know the quasar is i'm not sure about the razorback)
Edit:
The razorback is indeed a stealth unit, also yes if the shaker has enough LOS it seems to win more often in a one on one, but only because of its great range if the shard makes it to firing range before the shaker hits it, the shard seems to win more often than not. Also using the same setup (even with the los) 6 shards can take out a firestorm, with one shard left at the end (though i only tried this once) perhaps the missles from the firestorm (which are the only things that hit) could have their range increased slightly and their dmg vs OSDs increased
Edit again
As for a fast construction unit, the fleet support vehicle filled this role quite well in OTA due to its high build speed but i noticed in the old 0.13 alpha of TAFF for spring that it didn't seem to work, it would never help build anything... perhaps you could fix them and put them back in as fast repair vehicles.
Edit:
The razorback is indeed a stealth unit, also yes if the shaker has enough LOS it seems to win more often in a one on one, but only because of its great range if the shard makes it to firing range before the shaker hits it, the shard seems to win more often than not. Also using the same setup (even with the los) 6 shards can take out a firestorm, with one shard left at the end (though i only tried this once) perhaps the missles from the firestorm (which are the only things that hit) could have their range increased slightly and their dmg vs OSDs increased
Edit again
As for a fast construction unit, the fleet support vehicle filled this role quite well in OTA due to its high build speed but i noticed in the old 0.13 alpha of TAFF for spring that it didn't seem to work, it would never help build anything... perhaps you could fix them and put them back in as fast repair vehicles.
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Optimus Prime
- Posts: 755
- Joined: 03 Oct 2005, 14:31
I talked about that yesterday. I will do so if i can fix it.Edit again
As for a fast construction unit, the fleet support vehicle filled this role quite well in OTA due to its high build speed but i noticed in the old 0.13 alpha of TAFF for spring that it didn't seem to work, it would never help build anything... perhaps you could fix them and put them back in as fast repair vehicles.
To the balancechanges.. i need to play more games or have more feedback from other players before i will nerv the ODSs. That ODSs are stealthy cant be true, because i saw them on radar slowly coming to my base... or what means stealthy?
The slicerlaser will sure be fixed...
While I'm not sure about the Arm couterparts, but according to the TAFF manual at least some of the ODSs are stealth
This is straight from the TAFF manual at
http://savant.tadesigners.com/corlist1.htm
(This is regarding the quasar)
"Designed to provide mobile defence to forward resource gathering areas, this sattelite is very effective against starfighters but is unable to challenge a starship. It is invisible to radar."
However I decided to check the FBI files and I discovered something rather odd...
For Core the Quasar does not have the stealth tag, while The Shard and the Razorback do.
For Arm the Pulsar has the stealth tag, while the Sidearm and the Glaive do not have it.
UnitName=CORODS2;
Name=QUASAR;
UnitName=CORODS;
Name=SHARD;
Stealth=1;
UnitName=CORHODS;
Name=RAZORBACK;
Stealth=1;
UnitName=ARMODS2;
Name=PULSAR;
Stealth=1;
UnitName=ARMODS;
Name=SIDEARM;
UnitName=ARMHODS;
Name=GLAIVE;
According to the manual the Quasar is supposed to be stealth but it is not
The manual also states the Pulsar should be stealth and it is, the manual does not state that the other ODSs are stealth but I would assume this is a characteristic that is shared among all of them. The manual does state this however "Like all satellites, it is extremely slow and suitable only for defence." and I agree with that. I'm not saying you should nerf the OSDs, just make it so stationary base defenses and capital ships can handle them with out a problem. There is no ODS designed to take on battle ships or any of the very heavy capital ships, the heavy one is only made to take on cruisers and frigates however a 8 Shards, not even the heavy ODS, can take out an Invincible and (only one shard survives) and if you add two more the number of survivers jumps to 6-7. It only takes 3 razorbacks to take out an Invincible.
My suggestion is to change the ammount of damage all stationary base defense do to ODS, the stationary defenses, especially the slicer, should be able to wipe out the smaller ODSs in masses, while the heavier ones should fall easily to the battlestation defenses. Also up the damage that the heavy capital ships do to ODSs and/or reduce the damage they do to the heavier ships.
Shards shooting at an Invincible should be the equivalent to shooting a handheld anti-tank gun at a battleship sure you might do some damage eventually but likely your just going to chip the paint before they fire back and blow you skyhigh
This is straight from the TAFF manual at
http://savant.tadesigners.com/corlist1.htm
(This is regarding the quasar)
"Designed to provide mobile defence to forward resource gathering areas, this sattelite is very effective against starfighters but is unable to challenge a starship. It is invisible to radar."
However I decided to check the FBI files and I discovered something rather odd...
For Core the Quasar does not have the stealth tag, while The Shard and the Razorback do.
For Arm the Pulsar has the stealth tag, while the Sidearm and the Glaive do not have it.
UnitName=CORODS2;
Name=QUASAR;
UnitName=CORODS;
Name=SHARD;
Stealth=1;
UnitName=CORHODS;
Name=RAZORBACK;
Stealth=1;
UnitName=ARMODS2;
Name=PULSAR;
Stealth=1;
UnitName=ARMODS;
Name=SIDEARM;
UnitName=ARMHODS;
Name=GLAIVE;
According to the manual the Quasar is supposed to be stealth but it is not
The manual also states the Pulsar should be stealth and it is, the manual does not state that the other ODSs are stealth but I would assume this is a characteristic that is shared among all of them. The manual does state this however "Like all satellites, it is extremely slow and suitable only for defence." and I agree with that. I'm not saying you should nerf the OSDs, just make it so stationary base defenses and capital ships can handle them with out a problem. There is no ODS designed to take on battle ships or any of the very heavy capital ships, the heavy one is only made to take on cruisers and frigates however a 8 Shards, not even the heavy ODS, can take out an Invincible and (only one shard survives) and if you add two more the number of survivers jumps to 6-7. It only takes 3 razorbacks to take out an Invincible.
My suggestion is to change the ammount of damage all stationary base defense do to ODS, the stationary defenses, especially the slicer, should be able to wipe out the smaller ODSs in masses, while the heavier ones should fall easily to the battlestation defenses. Also up the damage that the heavy capital ships do to ODSs and/or reduce the damage they do to the heavier ships.
Shards shooting at an Invincible should be the equivalent to shooting a handheld anti-tank gun at a battleship sure you might do some damage eventually but likely your just going to chip the paint before they fire back and blow you skyhigh
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Optimus Prime
- Posts: 755
- Joined: 03 Oct 2005, 14:31
hm if you do it this way, who would build an ODS? If its slow like a turtle, unable to handle nearly all kind of defense and only able to kill some fighters or a frigate no one would build them in late games and thats what i dont want to. I think making some defense better against them and make the mobile Ionbolts stronger in killing ODSs should be enough. I think ODSs shall be a tactic like all other tactics too.
The thing with the stealthability seems to be wrong thats a point where i think u are right... i will fix that.
The thing with the stealthability seems to be wrong thats a point where i think u are right... i will fix that.
