detection and ships on starlanes

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Ophiuchus
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Re: detection and ships on starlanes

#16 Post by Ophiuchus »

LienRag wrote: Wed Dec 22, 2021 8:03 pm It's not only the visibility bubble, it's being able to understand where the ships will be in the starlane and adjust the distance of the detection range to understand who will see what.
we probably could also project future visibility bubble(s) when one clicks on a ship
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Re: detection and ships on starlanes

#17 Post by LienRag »

Ophiuchus wrote: Wed Dec 22, 2021 9:12 pm
LienRag wrote: Wed Dec 22, 2021 8:03 pm It's not only the visibility bubble, it's being able to understand where the ships will be in the starlane and adjust the distance of the detection range to understand who will see what.
we probably could also project future visibility bubble(s) when one clicks on a ship
If it works for enemy ships then yes, it would solve the problem.

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Re: detection and ships on starlanes

#18 Post by Oberlus »

When scouts can't scan while on starlanes, you don't have any problem, just send a scout and cross fingers. With visibility from starlanes you can do the same. Will I get visibility of system X if I send my ship at system A to system B? the ship will be at 73.6% of trip towards B, the distance between A and B is D, the distance between X and the starlane is E, then... AH! COME ON! SEND THE BLOODY SCOUT!

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Re: detection and ships on starlanes

#19 Post by wobbly »

LienRag wrote: Wed Dec 22, 2021 8:03 pm It's not only the visibility bubble, it's being able to understand where the ships will be in the starlane and adjust the distance of the detection range to understand who will see what.
I've generally been able to do it with a combination of the turn number from the ship path and a visibility bubble from a system. Similar to when you are trying to work out whether a ship moving on a starlane will pass into the visibility bubble of a scout sitting in system.

One thing the UI is missing in general is a good way to measure the distance between 2 points. There are a lot of cases you could work out with a simple line distance. Irregardless of what happens with detection.

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Geoff the Medio
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Re: detection and ships on starlanes

#20 Post by Geoff the Medio »

I can relatively easily add extra rendered visibility circles at the expected location of ships / fleets after the next turn's movement. But this will not easily take into account any changes in their visibility ranges between turns. Already there are effects like reduce detection range in Nebulas that will complicate this, leading to inaccurate detection range predictions. Additional differences in range between in-system and not-in-system will increase the discrepancy.

And no, I can't just apply a scaling factor to the detection range values when out of system before rendering, as any variation of such ranges dependent on location will be implemented as an arbitrary effect which the UI can't assume works in a particular simple-to-account-for way. eg. the Nebula effect on detection range.

Properly estimating ranges at expected locations would probably involve adding a bunch of test ships at those locations and calculating what their detection ranges would be. Probably possible, but a bit annoying and more difficult to implement.

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Re: detection and ships on starlanes

#21 Post by Ophiuchus »

Geoff the Medio wrote: Thu Dec 23, 2021 9:32 am And no, I can't just apply a scaling factor to the detection range values when out of system before rendering, as any variation of such ranges dependent on location will be implemented as an arbitrary effect which the UI can't assume works in a particular simple-to-account-for way. eg. the Nebula effect on detection range.
A one off would be ok (as long as we do not have pre-movement effects).

I am not completely sure how detection and effects interact / when the visibility maps get updated. Also we have the complication of two times evaluation where there could be discrepancies (if new content was spawned).

The visibility circles will be wrong in the same way as e.g. speed prediction already is - stops and ETA are totally wrong when influenced by e.g. a void rift. So it would be good to solve/better this regardless of future detection.
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Re: detection and ships on starlanes

#22 Post by Ophiuchus »

if we change detection we still need omni detection - a way to detect any combination of stealth boosts. not sure what that means for detection distance. The only requirement i can think of: it must be longer than greatest distance to an experimentor system - any other planet is reachable by hopping along starlanes, so there are ways of getting intel.

oberlus suggestion of nerfed ship detection
Oberlus wrote: Tue Dec 21, 2021 12:21 pm In terms of areas:

Detection 1: 50 (base area 100%).
Detection 2: +25 -> 75 (+125% area)
Detection 3: +25 -> 100 (+77.8% area, or +300% with respect to detection 1)
Detection 4: +50 -> 150 (+125% area, or +800%)
Detection 5: +50 -> 200 (+77.8% area, or +1500%)

We could distribute more uniformly the area growth per level:

Detection 1: 50 (base area 100%).
Detection 2: +20 -> 70 (+96% area)
Detection 3: +30 -> 100 (+104% area, or +300% with respect to detection 1)
Detection 4: +40 -> 140 (+96% area, or +684%)
Detection 5: +60 -> 200 (+104% area, or +1500%)

And nerf it:

Detection 1: 50 (base area 100%).
Detection 2: +15 -> 65 (+69% area)
Detection 3: +20 -> 85 (+71% area, or +189% with respect to detection 1)
Detection 4: +25 -> 110 (+68% area, or +384%)
Detection 5: +40 -> 150 (+86% area, or +800%)


But really really stick to distances and radius in code and UI, not to areas.
i am not sure about maximum detection range. getting 120 ship speed is relatively easy. 140 ship speed is quite possible with all the hull lines (asteroid and xentronium need the RP-expensive core drives). usually 160 is also possible but needs an engine part, up to 180. sentient hull goes up to 200. solar hull up to 220.

so i guess maximum detection range should be lower than 160; so the proposed nerf could cut it.
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Re: detection and ships on starlanes

#23 Post by Oberlus »

I ponder if it is better to let maximum planetary detection range be greater than maximum speed of robotic hull line (80) + fastest engine (80) + traffic control (20) = 180, and lower than energy hull (120) + fastest engine + traffic control = 220.
I think a maximum detection range of 200 is OK as a first balance try.
I want to make tactical maneuvering more interesting mid to late game, but think it is OK late game to make scouting easier except against the fastest hulls+engines. Otherwise it will be just a matter of having a constant flow of inexpensive scouts to send one every turn, which isn't funnier than having enough range to see all adjacent systems. Even late game with maximum range of 300, one can prepare ambushes if the map is big enough, and a reduction of 33% is sizeable.

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Re: detection and ships on starlanes

#24 Post by wobbly »

How about max. tech sentient hull sees max. speed solar hull?

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Re: detection and ships on starlanes

#25 Post by wobbly »

wobbly wrote: Tue Dec 28, 2021 6:57 am How about max. tech sentient hull sees max. speed solar hull?
An extention of this thought. A max speed solar scout can't see its full jump without advanced spotters (with laenfa/trith possible exceptions)

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Re: detection and ships on starlanes

#26 Post by Ophiuchus »

wobbly wrote: Tue Dec 28, 2021 8:56 am
wobbly wrote: Tue Dec 28, 2021 6:57 am How about max. tech sentient hull sees max. speed solar hull?
An extention of this thought. A max speed solar scout can't see its full jump without advanced spotters (with laenfa/trith possible exceptions)
The scout-jump into the abyss. Not that using a solar hull for a scout sounds sounds like the best idea in the first place. But principle is nice.

One more thought: starlanes are rarely that long(?), so from a certain point on longer detection ranges cover all single jump distances. if multi-jumps are not straight, you can also see detect "further" than you can jump using speed.

it would be nice if there was a way to increase distance in the end game. not only slowing down ships going along starlanes but also deforming detection bubbles. what is possible currently is spawning a field around a system which you want to "detach", which decreases stealth and detection (actually multiple fields or some other way of gradual effects).
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Re: detection and ships on starlanes

#27 Post by wobbly »

wobbly wrote: Tue Dec 28, 2021 6:57 am How about max. tech sentient hull sees max. speed solar hull?
So a solar with the fastest engine is 200. Actually 240 with an interstellar lighthouse and traffic control, but 200 detection is actually 250 in a laenfa/trith ship. So I'm calling it 200 which lines up with:
Oberlus wrote: Mon Dec 27, 2021 11:24 pm I think a maximum detection range of 200 is OK as a first balance try.
Sentients are +100 detection. That'd give room for 4 steps of +25 for the scanners.

I'd also still like to see Symbiots detection range come down a bit, like this:
Ophiuchus wrote: Wed Dec 22, 2021 8:03 am
wobbly wrote: Wed Dec 22, 2021 4:40 am If symbiots were around +15 (compared to base hulls) and protoplasmics +30 you'd probably start seeing the green hulls more often.
looks good to me

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Re: detection and ships on starlanes

#28 Post by wobbly »

Any thoughts, disagreements, complaints before I write a pull request?
  • Nerf symbiots detection by 10 to create more space for protoplasm.
    Tech detection steps of +25 range
    Scanning Facility reduced to +50 range
    Snowflakes reduced to good vision
Too much of a detection nerf?

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Re: detection and ships on starlanes

#29 Post by Oberlus »

Let's try it.

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Re: detection and ships on starlanes

#30 Post by Geoff the Medio »


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