View Issue Details
| ID | Project | Category | Date Submitted | Last Update | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 0000990 | AI War 1 / Classic | Suggestion - Balance Tweaks | Oct 31, 2010 10:44 am | Nov 6, 2010 8:21 am | |
| Reporter | KDR_11k | Assigned To | keith.lamothe | ||
| Severity | minor | ||||
| Status | resolved | Resolution | fixed | ||
| Product Version | 4.021 | ||||
| Summary | 0000990: Fortresses are too weak | ||||
| Description | When the planet summary shows a fortress it used to be an "Oh ****" moment but with all the buffs that have been going around fortresses are barely even speedbumps these days. The pathetic damage output against Polycrystal hulls and the vulnerability of Ultra Heavy hulls means it goes down without even causing much damage. A Zenith Starship is a much better fortress than a fortress because the Neutron hull doesn't have as many powerful vulnerabilities and even a large blob will have to chew on it for quite some time. Maybe the fortresses could be dangerous again by giving them a Neutron hull so they're not as easily hard-countered. | ||||
| Tags | No tags attached. | ||||
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I think it has more to do with the armor rating mechanic making the fortress's massive-salvos-of-relatively-small-shots approach not nearly as effective as it once was. But will keep it in mind. |
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well, the neutron hull's vulnerability is MLRS, both in turret and ship form. Fortunately for players, the AI is guaranteed neither of these. (i think a guardian has a bonus against it, but also they just do a ton of raw damage sometimes) |
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The neutron hull and better damage output would go far to making fortresses better. |
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The UltraHeavy hull is an important part of its place in the balance system, as it's supposed to be vulnerable to stuff with bonuses against UltraHeavy. Neutron is for the weird stuff ;) That said, we can just 2x fortress health or something, halve the shots, and double (or perhaps triple, to give it a net bonus) the damage of each shots. Alternatively we could look into armor piercing but I think that's contra the intent: it's not armor piercing, it's beat-the-door-down :) |
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It could have neutron hull - and you could take it away from AI's. They have all the new toys now and don't need fortresses. |
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honestly, im not sure i disagree with that. Fortresses at one point were feared - let them be so again. (id still say there needs to be fortresses in ai home or whatnot, but having a fortress in EVERY system just gets a bit silly) |
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Well, the MkIII should be feared, at least. MkIs being speedbumps to midgame fleets is not out of kilter. MkIIs somewhere inbetween. Personally I think they could stand to be seeded on not-quite-as-many AI worlds. |
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If they functioned when out of supply they would also be more formidable. As another buff they could have 2 weapon types instead of just missiles (a long range - missiles and shorter range ???close defense weapon) (configurable Fortresses were a poll winner iirc) |
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Oh yes, modular fortresses are coming, it's just something that keeps getting pushed back (along with modular command stations, etc) time-wise. |
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Ok, I've made some changes for 4.023 that should help. |
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There is one more thing - they regen and can't be repaired which means that if one gets severely damaged you simply can scrap it since regen time to full is in hours. |
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I think Fortresses may actually need a design change. In my view, the essential problem is that existing defences are sufficient to deal with most anything except bombers... and bombers steamroll fortresses. So, for players, they dont make a system much tougher against real threats. And for AIs, well, players always bring bombers anyway to deal with force fields and frigates. So their fortresses always get stomped in short order. |
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Missile turrets are absolutely amazing vs bombers..... |
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I'm actually glad Fortresses are a lot easier to kill than they were pre-4.0. Prior to 4.0, Fortresses were extremely powerful, but also nearly impossible to kill without upgraded bombers. 1. I don't like being pigeonholed into a certain unit type simply because of 1 enemy unit that I basically can't deal with without them. 2. The rate at which Fortresses killed fighters was extremely frustrating to the player. When you entered a system against T3 Fortresses and up, your entire army of Fighters was gone within seconds. I can't think of another AI unit that can kill 1 unit type on such a massive scale, nor do I see the need for it. 3. I feel like Fortresses remove depth from the game because they limit the strategical options of the player. Since, if not targeted first, they will slowly eat away your army (except for Fighters which die almost instantly), they force the player into attacking them, limiting their tactical options. Sure, you can make the argument that Fortresses add 'depth' to the game by influencing the player to use "hit and run tactics" on enemies, killing critical targets and escaping before they take too much damage from it (or them); but even then I would disagree because most of the time you HAVE to kill the fortresses since they will inevitably be on planets you need to capture. Considering the ridiculous amount of damage Forts do against light units, on such a large scale, I would almost prefer that they just chose random targets, so they wouldn't decimate entire Fighter armies so quickly. Either way, I sincerely hope they never reach the state they were at prior to 4.0. |
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Actually fortress in their current form were quite dangerous when we played yesterday. It's hard to tell if they were to good - since when you attack full planet of units you can't really tell what made you run away with rest of your fleet :D |
| Date Modified | Username | Field | Change |
|---|---|---|---|
| Oct 31, 2010 10:44 am | KDR_11k | New Issue | |
| Nov 1, 2010 10:34 am | keith.lamothe | Note Added: 0002453 | |
| Nov 1, 2010 10:35 am | keith.lamothe | Status | new => considering |
| Nov 1, 2010 11:12 am | Lancefighter | Note Added: 0002454 | |
| Nov 1, 2010 12:14 pm | 83E63 | Note Added: 0002458 | |
| Nov 1, 2010 12:31 pm | keith.lamothe | Note Added: 0002460 | |
| Nov 1, 2010 1:40 pm | orzelek | Note Added: 0002462 | |
| Nov 1, 2010 2:02 pm | Lancefighter | Note Added: 0002466 | |
| Nov 1, 2010 2:04 pm | keith.lamothe | Note Added: 0002467 | |
| Nov 1, 2010 2:18 pm | Winter Born | Note Added: 0002469 | |
| Nov 1, 2010 2:20 pm | keith.lamothe | Note Added: 0002471 | |
| Nov 1, 2010 4:35 pm | keith.lamothe | Note Added: 0002483 | |
| Nov 1, 2010 4:35 pm | keith.lamothe | Status | considering => resolved |
| Nov 1, 2010 4:35 pm | keith.lamothe | Resolution | open => fixed |
| Nov 1, 2010 4:35 pm | keith.lamothe | Assigned To | => keith.lamothe |
| Nov 1, 2010 5:50 pm | orzelek | Note Added: 0002487 | |
| Nov 5, 2010 9:09 pm | TheDeadlyShoe | Note Added: 0002798 | |
| Nov 5, 2010 9:12 pm | Lancefighter | Note Added: 0002799 | |
| Nov 5, 2010 10:59 pm | Wingflier | Note Added: 0002802 | |
| Nov 6, 2010 8:21 am | orzelek | Note Added: 0002809 |
