New special: Asteroid Coating

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MatGB
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Re: New special: Asteroid Coating

#16 Post by MatGB »

Sloth wrote:It's currently implemented like Reinforced Hull. Asteroid hulls immediately get the bonus for max structure, but need to be "repaired" to actually get the bonus to current structure. Depending on the techs available this means visiting a drydock or be in supply range.
Remember Basic Damage Control doesn't require you be in Supply (or even be stationary), merely that you're not in combat this turn, so 5 turns after getting the special it'll apply to virtually all your ships.

I don't have a balance concern with that at all (like you say, Reinforced Hull does the same), but the 'fluff' doesn't quite reflect the implementation.
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dbenage-cx
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Re: New special: Asteroid Coating

#17 Post by dbenage-cx »

Deepsloth wrote:Feel free to come up with something better. I won't mind scrapping the worm story.
Pulling the discussion back to here as I don't have a solid solution to the description.

I've not been able to imagine a scenario where an object at a planet maintains an effect on a ship without a supply line.
At least not when the effect disappears without control of the planet.

So some additional alternatives:
Go nuts with trans-dimensional in the description, with the worms only working for the current caretakers.
Change the description and logic to granting an un-researchable tech, keeping a similarity to Reinforced Hulls.
Require a supply line with only slight changes to the description/theme.

This seems like such a minor issue for a fun concept. Personally, I wouldn't mind if this started to stray into comic relief.

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Sloth
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Re: New special: Asteroid Coating

#18 Post by Sloth »

dbenage-cx wrote:So some additional alternatives:
Go nuts with trans-dimensional in the description, with the worms only working for the current caretakers.
Change the description and logic to granting an un-researchable tech, keeping a similarity to Reinforced Hulls.
Require a supply line with only slight changes to the description/theme.

This seems like such a minor issue for a fun concept. Personally, I wouldn't mind if this started to stray into comic relief.
Because i really like the mechanic as currently scripted (Conquering the Asteroids can immediately swing the tides of war), i will have a try at option one: Go nuts with transdimensional worms.
An outpost or colony on these asteroids will grand a structure bonus of +10% to all ships with Asteroid hulls in the empire.

These asteroids are infected by transdimensional worms that eat tunnels through rock, leaving behind a sticky slime that seems to automatically spread over the whole surface of the affected asteroid and prevents it from breaking appart. The worms do not tolerate to be brought away from this Asteroid field in whole, but due to their transdimensional nature it is possible to just take their heads to any asteroid in the empire to gladly eat away at their new meal, while they manage to stay connected with their lower bodies by dimensional tunneling. Applied to ships build with asteroid hulls, the slime produced by a worm head will naturally increase their durability, while the damage done by feeding the heads can easily be repaired.
Hoping for a realism debate now... :lol:
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Re: New special: Asteroid Coating

#19 Post by dbenage-cx »

re: description comments

Just a suggestion, replacing the sentence `While scientists ...`:
`While this slime does not last long, these worms will frequently visit the affected ships, replenishing any lost slime before returning to their home. Unable to catch a living specimen, scientists theorize their mode of transport appears linked to our communications in some manner.`

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LienRag
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Re: New special: Asteroid Coating

#20 Post by LienRag »

Sloth wrote: Tue Sep 01, 2015 9:55 pm Here is another attempt to add something like a strategic ressource special to fo:

Asteroid Coating

Effects: The Empire that controls an outpost or colony on an asteroid field with the Asteroid Coating special (and has the detection strength to see it) will get a structure bonus of +10% to all Asteroid hulls.

Stealth: 25 (normally needs Active Radar)

Spawning location: Any Asteroid field (but restricted to 1 or 2 per galaxy). Will be guarded by 2 Asteroid Snails if not too close to an empire's homeworld.
(...)

Thoughts?
Interesting idea, it hasn't been added to the game apparently ?

There's one big problem with conditional Structure benefits though : what happens when a wounded ship loses it ?

I mean, let's suppose an Asteroid Ship gets a +30 bonus from the Coating, and gets damaged in combat so much that his Structure becomes less than 30.

What happens then if the Asteroid Coating-bearing planet is lost ?
The ship gets negative Structure ?

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Re: New special: Asteroid Coating

#21 Post by Ophiuchus »

LienRag wrote: Sun Aug 22, 2021 6:04 pm I mean, let's suppose an Asteroid Ship gets a +30 bonus from the Coating, and gets damaged in combat so much that his Structure becomes less than 30.

What happens then if the Asteroid Coating-bearing planet is lost ?
The ship gets negative Structure ?
For me the suggestion makes only sense if it is about maximum structure. Not about current structure.

In order for the coating to apply automatically initially one could add a repair for the 10% bonus only. So a 300 max structure ship would get a 30 max structure bonus. If the structure of that ship is at least 300, it gets +1 structure per turn. In order to prevent an initial jump of max structure and a lot of ship repaired by drydock messages, one could gate the max structure bonus by the invasion age/policy adoption age.
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LienRag
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Re: New special: Asteroid Coating

#22 Post by LienRag »

Oh, so if the Max Structure is lowered due to loss of the coating, it doesn't affect current structure ?
Then indeed there is no problem then...

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Re: New special: Asteroid Coating

#23 Post by Oberlus »

Can ships have specials attached? If so, ships built while owning the asteroid belt special could retain the structure bonus of the special is lost, and ships built when not owning the special would not get the bonus when acquiring the special (for first time or again).

Edit: Now I realize we already have asteroid armor plates (without the special) that kinda overlap with this. What about making it a special for ship stealth instead?

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Re: New special: Asteroid Coating

#24 Post by Ophiuchus »

Oberlus wrote: Mon Aug 23, 2021 12:11 pm Can ships have specials attached? If so, ships built while owning the asteroid belt special could retain the structure bonus of the special is lost, and ships built when not owning the special would not get the bonus when acquiring the special (for first time or again).

Edit: Now I realize we already have asteroid armor plates (without the special) that kinda overlap with this. What about making it a special for ship stealth instead?
Yes, all universe objects can have specials. I think getting the bonus from a special would make a lot of sense.

I dont think the plates and the coating overlap too much (one is coming from investing in asteroid tech/building) and one is coming from connecting to a planet. Ship stealth bonus probably needs some thinking to get balancing right.
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Grummel7
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Re: New special: Asteroid Coating

#25 Post by Grummel7 »

Just saw this ship built by an AI. I don't think it was intended to apply multiple times, was it?
asteroid_coating.png
asteroid_coating.png (13.98 KiB) Viewed 1913 times
...has been fixed with https://github.com/freeorion/freeorion/pull/3824

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LienRag
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Re: New special: Asteroid Coating

#26 Post by LienRag »

From my games so far, the Asteroid Coating is way too abundant in the Galaxy, making it mandatory (and upsetting the balance).

It would be interesting to have a Universe generating rule that allow to fix the number of a particular Special relative to the number of players (like n-1, or n/2), in order to force some interesting competition, a bit like space musical chairs.

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LienRag
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Re: New special: Asteroid Coating

#27 Post by LienRag »

Before we get that feature which requires changes in the back-end code, it would be nice to just reduce the probability of Asteroid Coating, so it's not everywhere in the Galaxy.
Wobbly mentioned a way to do that about the Gas Giant new specials, maybe the same method could be used there ?

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Re: New special: Asteroid Coating

#28 Post by Daybreak »

Its effect is not huge - what do you perceive to be the balance problem, as many don't use asteroid hulls that much overall?

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Re: New special: Asteroid Coating

#29 Post by wobbly »

Code: Select all

Special
    name = "ASTEROID_COATING_SPECIAL"
    description = "ASTEROID_COATING_SPECIAL_DESC"
    stealth = 25
    spawnrate = 9.0
    spawnlimit = 20
Spawnrate is high. I'd be willing to bet someone set it that way for testing purposes and never toned it down.

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Vezzra
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Re: New special: Asteroid Coating

#30 Post by Vezzra »

wobbly wrote: Fri Jul 29, 2022 4:15 amSpawnrate is high. I'd be willing to bet someone set it that way for testing purposes and never toned it down.
Very likely correct. Just adjust it to something more reasonable...

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