View Issue Details
| ID | Project | Category | Date Submitted | Last Update | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 0002555 | AI War 1 / Classic | Balance Issue | Jan 19, 2011 8:36 am | Jan 19, 2011 3:11 pm | |
| Reporter | Red Spot | Assigned To | keith.lamothe | ||
| Status | assigned | Resolution | fixed | ||
| Product Version | 4.066 | ||||
| Summary | 0002555: Mk4 bomber starship | ||||
| Description | Way OP. They have 40m health and the speed to not get caught in the first place. I clear several planets of post with these guys without ever losing a single one of them. Their cost should indicate they are mean, but this is more like superman-like :) mk1's have, iirc, 5m health -> *4 = 20m health (40m seems twice as high as it should be) | ||||
| Tags | No tags attached. | ||||
| Internal Weight | |||||
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See issue 2554 for a savegame with a set of mk4 bombers ready to harras the AI, select controlgroup 3 for them and give them a testdrive :) |
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Please check them in the latest beta and make sure your comments still apply, these were rebalanced in 4.070. The unit data for bomber starships currently shows a max health of 4,700,000*mk (so less than 20m at mkIV); I don't think there are any general rules that multiply starship health but I could be wrong. I don't mind nerfing the health, but I'll want: 1) Feedback based on the same set of facts I'm working from ;) If my facts are wrong that's also important to know as there may be bugs to work through before actual balance questions can be considered. 2) At least 3 players weighing in. Preferably more. These have gone through a number of recent rebalances (and for a while were regarded as not generally worth it), so I'm not wanting to ping-pong them too much. |
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I can just copy the AIW folder and patch the copied install? I am currently 10hours ingame (20 hours RL) and really finally want to finish a campaign so dont want the current patches on my active install. (I have been restarting with every patch latelly, now its time to actually finish a campaign :)) |
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Yea, just copying the folder should be fine (in theory the thing can run off a jumpdrive, never tested that though). Just make sure you're clear on which copy you're using/updating :) |
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Ok, need to get some food in the house, after that I will give them a testdrive in the latest patch :) |
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Much appreciated :) |
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Maybe just reduce the ship cap on the fabbed starships. Bomber starship mk 2 takes twice as much knowledge to unlock as mk 2 fleet ships and bomber starship mk 3 takes more than mk 3 and 4 fleet ships combined. If they are being balanced to be roughly as good per ship cap as fleet ships, they're still underpowered through knowledge cost. The unlockable bomber starships at least were pretty weak before. How would you compare a cap of mk 4 bomber starships to a cap of mk 5 fleet bombers? |
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You can not research these puppies, they only come with a fabricator. The mk4 starships do better than a cap of mk4 bombers I can tell you that. They are faster, I do not lose x % of that cap (even if I only lose 1% that is more than what I lose with the starships), generally they return home even if unsuccesfull, with bombers I lose a % and if they fail I may end up losing a cap for nothing. (those tractorbeam units are a pain when using small fleets of fleetship!! :D) |
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Uploaded a screenshot ... and changed the resolution .. ahem .. :| |
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Well, our current approach to starship balance is very similar to how we balance fleet ships, but we aren't trying to make it too similar since the two categories are supposed to be quite different. Off the top of my head, a few of the intentional differences: 1) Starships cost a lot more m+c to build to cap. 2) Starships cost a lot more knowledge. 3) Starships do not get mkIV versions "for free" for having mkIII and an advanced factory (or equivalent). 4) Starship caps do not decline at higher mark levels. 5) Starships have somewhat more cap-health. 6) Starships have somewhat less cap-dps. Not universally, in that stuff like the siege starship can be more oriented towards damage than health. But it is a very good question to ask how these compare to bombers. They do have different roles (bombers actually being focused on being good against bonus types, bomber starships having no bonuses and a high general-dps), but the numbers should stand comparison. Cap-Health Mark Bomber Bomber-Star 1 15092000 18800000 2 27104000 37600000 3 36036000 56400000 4 42196000 75200000 5 37730000 Cap-DPS Mark Bomber Bomber-Star 1 31033-310333 140000 2 55733-557333 280000 3 74100-741000 420000 4 86766-867666 560000 5 77583-775833 So the Bomber-Star has a good chunk more cap-health and ranging from 45% to 65% of the cap-dps against targets that bombers are good against (and correspondingly 450% to 650% of the dps against targets that bombers are not good against). So I'd say it's pretty much ok. As for the fabricator question, that is an interesting point. Getting a fabricator bypasses a lot of knowledge cost in one sense. On the other hand getting and holding a fabricator (which can be lost forever, unlike knowledge unlocks) can be a royal pain in the backside. So I'd say that the bomber V and bomber-star IV aren't unbalanced in that regard. The harder question is whether the bomber V fabricator and the bomber-star IV fabricator are well-balanced with respect to each other. From the look of it, the bomber-star IV fab is fairly obviously preferable due to starships not declining in cap (which was the point of Suzera's comment, I gather). For now, I don't think that's a problem. Not all fabs have to have the same value as long as they're all useful. I don't think someone would pass up a bomber V fab because it was useless. But they would probably pick a bomber-star fab over it. That's ok for now. Later on we may need to look at perhaps making the rate of cap-decline for fleet ships even shallower than it already is (it used to be much steeper). |
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Oh, one thing that does skew things a bit is that the bomber starship has over 2x as much armor by mark. A MkIV bomber starship has 6000 armor (MkV bomber has 3000). That makes it have an _enormous_ effective cap-health against enemies without the ability to punch through that. I think I'll nerf that down to the same level as the bomber, so a MkIV bomber-star would have 2400 armor. |
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Aside from the bomb-star IV fab problem since we're vaguely on the subject of bomb-star balance in general, there is a problem with bomber-stars being "specialized" at blowing up big hard to kill things in that fleet bombers are already better at blowing up any common thing that takes a long time to kill that bomber-stars can hit, are far more versatile, cost far less knowledge and cost less M+C per cap (I think). All the common hard to kill things except raid starships are a bomber bonus. Fortresses, FFs, Spire FF posts, WH posts, AI Eyes and so on are all UH, Heavy, Structural or CG. Even all the dangerous or critical stuff that blows up quick if even a cap of mk1+2 fighters attacks it like Ion Cannons or Command Stations is on a bomber bonus. All the guard posts except Spire FFs (bomber bonus) blow up really quickly. Guardians generally don't hold out too hard either. Even minor faction stuff like golems, SC and astro-trains are predominantly bomber bonus. So are light starships, flagships, siege starships and raid starships. There isn't room for bomber-stars to "specialize" in blowing up big things unless you're going to make them better or at least more efficient at it somewhere near bomber's bonus damage or move some of those things off to a bonus hit by frigates or fighters so bombers aren't just plain better at it than bomber-stars, or change things that aren't UH/S/H/CG to be tougher so that bombers aren't the ultimate go-to for all your exploding important things needs. You could also make the hard to blow up things even HARDER to blow up so you'll need both a ship cap of mk 1-3 bombers and mk 1-3 bomber starships to do it in a reasonable timeframe, but that seems extreme considering they already end up being a "go eat lunch and come back" type affair at times, and would lead to necessitating picking a bomber-like in attack bonus ship being time-optimal, and still cut out bomber starships. Bomber starships MIGHT win at doing AI Eyes, but that seems like a pretty expensive knowledge cost for a ship to use effectively once then be underpar compared to fleet bombers or bonus unlock bomber-bonus-type the rest of the game when there are potentially a lot more useful things to get. |
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Bomber-stars have a somewhat confusing name in that they're not intended to be the starship-equivalent of a bomber, they were more designed (as of the last re-invention) to be a close-range/fast-moving/tough-as-nails alter-ego of the siege starship. Siege starships have since lost the ability to hit ffs and whatnot so there's much more difference between them now, but anyway. With bomber-stars it is possible to do very-fast-moving raids with no losses. Bombers are much slower and will take losses, and cannot ignore tractor beams (not that the AI has much in the way of tractors anymore... something I'd like to change). If you're in a position to use bombers against a hardened target, they will get the job done much more effectively, bomber-stars are helpful at that task but are not intended to rival bombers in it. |
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I guess I'm just not sure what unlocked bomber-stars are supposed to be good for since it is covered far more effectively in other things that are cheaper and more versatile. If you want to blow up an unshielded gate or post, a ship cap of mk1+2 fighters works just fine almost all the time. For everything else where you need to stick around and shoot at something hardened for a minute or three, there's fleet bombers. What is it they are supposed to do that I should want to pay 5k knowledge for instead of 2 mk 2 fleet ship unlocks (or just mk 3 + maybe 4 bombers)? With the recent change they are more useful, but still seems like something you get when mk 1-3(maybe 4) fleet bombers just isn't fast enough at killing things for you. |
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From what I understand, Mk II starships are supposed to be less attractive knowledge effeciency wise than Mk. II fleet ships (with the notable exception of flagships). A better comparison would be comparing Mk. II starships to Mk. III fleet ships. |
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Except that makes starships look EVEN WORSE. If they're supposed to generally be bad choices until fleet ships are all unlocked I guess that's ok though. |
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I meant comparing knowledge costs. With Mk. III fleet ships costing 6000 knowledge these days, I would consider unlocking a Mk. II starship for 5000 instead. |
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Except the mk 3 fleet bombers are more than twice as effective (maybe three times) as bomber starships. And you can get mk 4 with an advanced factory on top of even that. Unlocking mk 3 fighters would cover all the raiding stuff that you don't need bombers for, and then you get something that can blow the heck out of bombers that attack you to boot, and possibly mk 4 fighters on top! |
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That is true. Maybe starships as a whole need to be revisited cost and stat wise post-5.0. |
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If they're intended to be used as a last knowledge sink aside from the flagships, that's just costing an increasing amount per increment of effectiveness which is ok, but keith said a "high damage in general compared to bombers" neglecting that the majority of targets they hit are all bomber bonus, particularly all really important or hard to kill ones. |
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There is generally an imbalance here caused by all the recent balance-flux. In general: 1) You shouldn't be able to succeed with only fleet ships. 2) You shouldn't be able to succeed with only starships (this should be even harder, in fact). 3) Fleet ships and Starships are not fully interchangeable. For a while after the unity port it was very much the case that you needed starships, and fleet ships were disappointing to many folks. Now that we've rebalanced all the fleet ship types they're largely a lot better than they used to be. So the contrast is much lower now. Another thing that happened before the fleet-ship rebalance was an incremental and overall-very-strong nerfing of Guardians and re-orientation of them away from their initial purposes of eating fleet ships for lunch (and breakfast, and dinner, and elevensees). Not that we want all guardians to be anti-fleet-ship but in general it sounds like they should be next on the rebalancing block to be properly lethal. Which will impact the feel of fleet-ships vs starships because starships typically have a much higher survivability and are often more effective against guardians, etc. But right now the Bomber Starship is basically where we want it. |
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And I meant "high damage in general compared to bombers" in the mathematical sense. The damage-vs-bonus types varies from 45% to 65% of an equivalent mark bomber cap. Which is a tad low but overall ok. The survivability is much higher. |
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Not really enough to outweigh the less effective damage, much greater knowledge cost, restricted targets and so on in my opinion, but I'm fine enough with them being just an "extra punch" unlock to speed things up a bit in endgame when everything else more critical or mainline is unlocked. Even if bomber-stars ARE mostly just second-rate hard-to-blow-up-things-exploder ship, those ARE the hardest things to blow up still and at least worth a consideration for late game unlock from that (similar to a decision on when to go for a far off Adv factory, if at all, depending). I'm just saying they don't seem really comparable to unlocking fleet ships in effectiveness in any real sense to me. |
| Date Modified | Username | Field | Change |
|---|---|---|---|
| Jan 19, 2011 8:36 am | Red Spot | New Issue | |
| Jan 19, 2011 8:56 am | Red Spot | Note Added: 0009227 | |
| Jan 19, 2011 10:48 am | keith.lamothe | Note Added: 0009234 | |
| Jan 19, 2011 10:48 am | keith.lamothe | Assigned To | => keith.lamothe |
| Jan 19, 2011 10:48 am | keith.lamothe | Status | new => feedback |
| Jan 19, 2011 10:52 am | Red Spot | Note Added: 0009236 | |
| Jan 19, 2011 10:52 am | Red Spot | Status | feedback => assigned |
| Jan 19, 2011 10:53 am | keith.lamothe | Note Added: 0009237 | |
| Jan 19, 2011 10:54 am | keith.lamothe | Status | assigned => feedback |
| Jan 19, 2011 10:56 am | Red Spot | Note Added: 0009238 | |
| Jan 19, 2011 10:56 am | Red Spot | Status | feedback => assigned |
| Jan 19, 2011 10:56 am | keith.lamothe | Note Added: 0009240 | |
| Jan 19, 2011 11:53 am | Suzera | Note Added: 0009242 | |
| Jan 19, 2011 12:02 pm | Red Spot | Note Added: 0009243 | |
| Jan 19, 2011 12:10 pm | Red Spot | File Added: AIW MK4 Star-Bomber in 4.071.jpg | |
| Jan 19, 2011 12:11 pm | Red Spot | Resolution | open => fixed |
| Jan 19, 2011 12:11 pm | Red Spot | Note Added: 0009244 | |
| Jan 19, 2011 12:20 pm | keith.lamothe | Note Added: 0009247 | |
| Jan 19, 2011 12:25 pm | keith.lamothe | Note Added: 0009248 | |
| Jan 19, 2011 1:55 pm | Suzera | Note Added: 0009260 | |
| Jan 19, 2011 1:56 pm | Suzera | Note Edited: 0009260 | |
| Jan 19, 2011 1:57 pm | Suzera | Note Edited: 0009260 | |
| Jan 19, 2011 1:59 pm | Suzera | Note Edited: 0009260 | |
| Jan 19, 2011 2:03 pm | keith.lamothe | Note Added: 0009261 | |
| Jan 19, 2011 2:15 pm | Suzera | Note Added: 0009262 | |
| Jan 19, 2011 2:21 pm | Suzera | Note Edited: 0009262 | |
| Jan 19, 2011 2:23 pm | Suzera | Note Edited: 0009262 | |
| Jan 19, 2011 2:23 pm | Suzera | Note Edited: 0009262 | |
| Jan 19, 2011 2:25 pm | TechSY730 | Note Added: 0009263 | |
| Jan 19, 2011 2:28 pm | Suzera | Note Added: 0009264 | |
| Jan 19, 2011 2:29 pm | Suzera | Note Edited: 0009264 | |
| Jan 19, 2011 2:29 pm | Suzera | Note Edited: 0009264 | |
| Jan 19, 2011 2:34 pm | TechSY730 | Note Added: 0009265 | |
| Jan 19, 2011 2:45 pm | Suzera | Note Added: 0009266 | |
| Jan 19, 2011 2:45 pm | Suzera | Note Edited: 0009266 | |
| Jan 19, 2011 2:46 pm | Suzera | Note Edited: 0009266 | |
| Jan 19, 2011 2:46 pm | Suzera | Note Edited: 0009266 | |
| Jan 19, 2011 2:50 pm | TechSY730 | Note Added: 0009267 | |
| Jan 19, 2011 2:51 pm | Suzera | Note Edited: 0009266 | |
| Jan 19, 2011 2:56 pm | Suzera | Note Added: 0009268 | |
| Jan 19, 2011 2:57 pm | Suzera | Note Edited: 0009268 | |
| Jan 19, 2011 2:58 pm | Suzera | Note Edited: 0009268 | |
| Jan 19, 2011 3:02 pm | keith.lamothe | Note Added: 0009269 | |
| Jan 19, 2011 3:05 pm | keith.lamothe | Note Added: 0009271 | |
| Jan 19, 2011 3:11 pm | Suzera | Note Added: 0009272 | |
| Jan 19, 2011 3:11 pm | Suzera | Note Edited: 0009272 | |
| Jan 19, 2011 3:12 pm | Suzera | Note Edited: 0009272 | |
| Apr 14, 2014 9:29 am | Chris_McElligottPark | Category | Gameplay - Balance Issue => Balance Issue |
