FAQ

Discussion about the project in general, organization, website, or any other details that aren't directly about the game.
Post Reply
Message
Author
User avatar
LienRag
Cosmic Dragon
Posts: 2148
Joined: Fri May 17, 2019 5:03 pm

FAQ

#1 Post by LienRag »

Shouldn't we make a real FAQ for people coming into the forum ?
So they'll know which questions have already been asked and which maybe nobody thought of.

I know it's a lot of work, and I volunteer for only the amount of time I can spare, which is not a lot, but maybe that could be useful ?

(and yes, I've seen the FAQ that we have, but it's really limited)

psychlops
Space Krill
Posts: 7
Joined: Mon Jan 31, 2022 3:59 am

Re: FAQ

#2 Post by psychlops »

I think one of the problems with a FAQ is the game keeps moving forward and so does the calendar. It's not only a lot of work to make a FAQ for something like this but it will constantly need pruning and updates as new versions make some of what was being talked about obsolete. I believe I originally downloaded FO in around 2004-2006 but I don't remember what my experience was with it then. I recently downloaded it again and trying to use the forums in general to get up to speed before trying to add my thoughts is pretty disappointing on some level because a lot of what is written here is from 2017-2019 and it's VERY hard for a new player to decide if anything that old is relevant. Admittedly what I've been doing here to this point has mostly been about playing more than helping. I'm a coder and I've got a small amount of game development experience but a lot of experience contributing to play balance for a host of games. The majority of my experience has been in CCG's both online and face to face because I've got a long time friend who has been the lead developer/program manager/designer on a half dozen CCG's.

It would be awesome if there was a quick way to get up to speed on the current state of the game but I think it's a far more daunting task than most people imagine and the worst part is the ongoing nature of keeping it germane. Even cleaning up the rules/tutorials is a massive undertaking for a project of this scale. I've been playing/lurking on the forum for roughly a month and I still discover new things every day because there's no clear path to understanding the game other than to keep at it.

A perfect example would be fighters. The pedia for launch bay makes it seem that launch bays only make interceptors launch faster when in fact they are required for any fighter to launch at all. It probably should have been intuitive to me that this was the case but the pedia tripped me up and it's possible that I've never successfully used fighters in combat until today. I only figured out that my understanding of fighters was completely flawed when I examined the combat log of a recent battle and realized none of my fighters were involved in the fighting. Even the combat log itself was a somewhat difficult find (took me several weeks) When you click the "combat" link in your reports it takes you to a bar chart that's not very informative and has a bunch of choices at the bottom that are mostly fluff. Unfortunately they are more brightly colored than the really important navigation at the top to get to the log so when I clicked on combat in my first game, I sort of discounted it as a waste of time and didn't click again for weeks. The "log" is so much more important to understanding the game it should likely be the default and the summary should be removed or made a secondary option. I would say it's important enough that I might force that screen open for the first 2-3 combats a new player has.

Ophiuchus
Programmer
Posts: 3433
Joined: Tue Sep 30, 2014 10:01 am
Location: Wall IV

Re: FAQ

#3 Post by Ophiuchus »

psychlops wrote: Tue Feb 01, 2022 9:54 pmThe "log" is so much more important to understanding the game it should likely be the default and the summary should be removed or made a secondary option. I would say it's important enough that I might force that screen open for the first 2-3 combats a new player has.
Thanks for the input. Which version are you playing?

I also think we should open the combat logs by default - i barely use the overview.

And if we do not have a beginner hint, we should have at least two to tell the player about the combat logs.

In the fleet info, there should be damage done by fighters, so that should be zero if your ship does not have a launch bay. (should this also be a beginner tip?) We probably should add some sanity warnings in the ship design screen which tells you all the things which are "wrong" with the current design, but that is not so fast to implement I guess.

@psychlops could you check the beginner hints in the pedia. Any important stuff missing/badly worded?
Any code or patches in anything posted here is released under the CC and GPL licences in use for the FO project.

Look, ma... four combat bouts!

psychlops
Space Krill
Posts: 7
Joined: Mon Jan 31, 2022 3:59 am

Re: FAQ

#4 Post by psychlops »

0.4.10.2 is the version I'm playing, I think it's the most current stable release and the last release before the overhaul to add influence/governments if what I understand from digesting the most recent stuff in the forums is correct. I plan to move to the development version eventually, I just thought I would play a bit and explore what you have working before I start really analyzing what you're doing and maybe trying to help out in some small manner. There's a pretty significant learning curve to get up to speed on everything from your design philosophy, what's already being done, what's on the road map and in particular everything that's been suggested and debated repeatedly so I'm not wasting anyone's time with poorly considered suggestions.

If there's a beginner hint for the combat logs I missed it. I'll install the next version I download in a different place so that the game will be sure I'm "new" and watch more closely/take notes when I start playing.

I'll definitely review the beginners guide in the pedia while I'm still newish and my observations won't be clouded by more knowledge. It's always hard for developers to unknow what they know and perceive things from a new users perspective.

Once I found the combat log window it was really easy to see what I was doing wrong. I think the problem I had was with the verbiage for the launch bays. I've played maybe 7-8 games and won them all without the fighters but I did lose some battles along the way where I thought I certainly was going to win and now I know why. There's a lot that wasn't clear about how fighters work. First there's the absolute necessity for a launch bay, second there's no reference to the fact that your ships will not use beam weapons to shoot down fighters so without a point defense weapon (flak or disruptor) or counter fighters you simply have to take your lumps. It's also not super obvious that fighters negate shields though it seems likely that had to be the case or they would be next to worthless.

User avatar
Geoff the Medio
Programming, Design, Admin
Posts: 13587
Joined: Wed Oct 08, 2003 1:33 am
Location: Munich

Re: FAQ

#5 Post by Geoff the Medio »

psychlops wrote: Tue Feb 01, 2022 9:54 pmThe pedia for launch bay makes it seem that launch bays only make interceptors launch faster when in fact they are required for any fighter to launch at all. It probably should have been intuitive to me that this was the case but the pedia tripped me up and it's possible that I've never successfully used fighters in combat until today. I only figured out that my understanding of fighters was completely flawed when I examined the combat log of a recent battle and realized none of my fighters were involved in the fighting.
Could you propse a better description for the launch bay? Ideally in the form of a pull request on GitHub...

Post Reply