Rethinking speed parts

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LienRag
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Rethinking speed parts

#1 Post by LienRag »

I'm quite frustrated by the lack of maneuvering options at the start of the game, and I believe one way of adding diversity in that field is to rework how speed parts work.
Now once one has access to Symbiotics (usually quite early since they're necessary for cheap Colony ships) standard speed is 100, and can be raised to 110 with limited research.
Since Speed parts don't stack, that's the limit for an important portion of the game.

I understand that Speed parts stacked and that the stacking was removed because it made Solar Hulls way too fast in end game.

I also understand that Speed parts being too powerful early game would remove the balance between ship hulls that we have, and also would just set a new standard of speed that would not bring that much diversity to the game.

So here's my idea : have stackable Speed parts for Internal Slots with a higher base value, but whose speed bonus would be divided by the hull size (that is, the number of slots in that particular hull).

So, first Speed tech part would bring +50, divided by the number of slots : +50 for a Flux Bubble, +25 for an Organic Hull, +12.5 for a Symbiotic (+25 if two Speed parts), +10 for a Protoplasmic (+30 if three Speed parts), and so on.

I believe that to keep the balance we should make the Speed parts be quite expensive, so getting fast ships are a good idea only if you really know how to use them.

The Core slot Speed parts would give a bonus independent from the hull size (that's why they're core), like they do now, so that big ships could still get good speed, but not really more that what we have now (a Solar Hull could still get a bit more than what they can do now by filling their internal slots with speed parts, but paying a high price for a small advantage).

Note that by re-giving real and hard choices about what to put in internal slots, this would also help to rebalance fighters.

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Re: Rethinking speed parts

#2 Post by LienRag »

So apparently "Improved Engine Couplings" is +20 Speed rather than +10 like I wrote, so the numbers in the first post are not right.

I'm not sure if it should be made +100 (to keep the same proportionality, i.e a similar +20 to Protoplasmic Hulls for one IEC) or +80 to balance it better (which would mean that Symbiotic would get only +20 with one IEC, +40 with 2).

In both case that would make Flux Bubbles with IEC very good scouts for Trith and Laenfas, so I guess the price needs to be at least doubled compared to what it is now.

But fast ships would help a diversity of strategies , and if the price is balanced, they will add diversity in fleet composition (I mean, if they're expensive enough, a player will build them only if he needs them).

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Re: Rethinking speed parts

#3 Post by Oberlus »

I don't like this suggestion. Maybe I don't understand the point, or the issue it is supposed to fix.
Could you develop?
LienRag wrote: Thu Jun 23, 2022 8:58 pm lack of maneuvering options

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Re: Rethinking speed parts

#4 Post by LienRag »

The point is to allow for real maneuvering, which includes speeding to reach a point before the opponent.
As of now, speed is a factor, but usually most ships go quite quickly for 100 speed and stay there (as getting from 100 to 120 is usually not so much of a tactical nor strategic gain).

With my proposal, it would be possible to produce some ships that could be very fast and as such offer much more tactical options.
As these ships would be quite expensive (I proposed twice the cost of current IEC for the new equivalent, but maybe the cost should be multiplied by 3, I don't know) and, more importantly, be small ships, they would not be no-brainers.
One would have to balance the speed of the ship with its combat efficiency, so we would have raiders, flankers, whatever, to make combat much more strategic than just a big pile of something to throw at a big pile of something.
There also would be many more races than what we have now.

And again, due to the constraints to these fast ships (cost and limited slots), they would always be a minority of the player's fleet, only useful when integrated in a fully-fledged tactic or strategy.

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Re: Rethinking speed parts

#5 Post by Oberlus »

We already have hulls (and engines) with varying speeds (bonuses).
From start you have 60 and 75. Soon you can get 90 and 100 (organic hulls), robos with 115. End game you have up to 200. Plus the bonuses from the traffic policy and the lighthouse building.
If you want to outspeed your enemies, you go organics and maybe +20 or +40 speed from engines. At 120/140 (+ bonuses in own space), asteroids or robos without engines are clearly outmaneuvered.

It happens that the faster hulls available early game are already the ones with more internal slots, so stackable engines would be hard to balance. I understand the reason why stacked engines were removed, and I don't see the reason to change it.
You can have non-stackable engines with varying speed bonuses depending on hull size, either reusing the fuel efficiency tags already in place or adding new ones.

Your values seem to me way too high.

Let's make it +/- 25% bonus per "level":

Average fuel: +0% (engines give +20, +40, +60, +80)
Good fuel: +25% (+25, +50, +75, +100)
Great fuel: +50% (+30, +60, +80, +120)
Bad fuel: -25% (+15, +30, +45, +60)

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Re: Rethinking speed parts

#6 Post by LienRag »

Oberlus wrote: Mon Jul 04, 2022 7:54 pm We already have hulls (and engines) with varying speeds (bonuses).
Yes, I played this game.
But you are right that my proposal would upset the balance we have between hulls, and would particularly be a problem for Energy frigates, as the speed bonus they have by their hull is much lower than what Organic would have by my proposal.
I'm not sure how to fix that, actually.


Oberlus wrote: Mon Jul 04, 2022 7:54 pm You can have non-stackable engines with varying speed bonuses depending on hull size, either reusing the fuel efficiency tags already in place or adding new ones.

Let's make it +/- 25% bonus per "level":
Average fuel: +0% (engines give +20, +40, +60, +80)
Good fuel: +25% (+25, +50, +75, +100)
Great fuel: +50% (+30, +60, +80, +120)
Bad fuel: -25% (+15, +30, +45, +60)
That could be an option, especially to fix the Energy hull unbalance, but the problem is that it removes all (or at least most of) the difficult choices that my proposal offered, where speed and usefulness would be antagonists (if you have a fast Flux Bubble, what can you do with it ? and an Organic one is only marginally more useful, and half as fast).


Oberlus wrote: Mon Jul 04, 2022 7:54 pm If you want to outspeed your enemies, you go organics and maybe +20 or +40 speed from engines. At 120/140 (+ bonuses in own space), asteroids or robos without engines are clearly outmaneuvered.
Yes but nearly everyone has organics, so +20 isn't enough to really make a difference. And +40 is quite hard to reach now.


Oberlus wrote: Mon Jul 04, 2022 7:54 pm It happens that the faster hulls available early game are already the ones with more internal slots, so stackable engines would be hard to balance.
Right, but remember that each internal slot divides the benefit of the supplementary speed part.
Also, that's why I said that the part should be expensive, so to get a fast ship you need to use a Hull with a lot of internal slots and very few external slots, which means that it's an expensive ship with comparatively limited value (except its speed, of course).

But you're right that it may create too much problems with N-Dimensional Engine Matrix scaling the same way : +80 or +120 for 3-parts Protoplasmic Hulls may indeed be too high.

Maybe I should just create one stackable speed part whose bonus is dependent on number of slots, and leave the other parts as they are.
Don't know how to balance it so it doesn't de-valuate the Energy hull line though. I don't like the idea of making it use External slots, as it would favor things like Endomorphic Hulls and make Fractal Hull way too quick.

Also I'm not sure where in the Tech Tree to place this part, as i want it quite early is someone is committed to it but not make it a no-brainer.
Would it be interesting to have it researchable early with a very high cost for the part and then lowering the cost with further (more expensive) research ?
And/or maybe make it with a steeper curve at start (divided by the square of the number of slots) and have further research flatten somehow the curve (up to division by the number of slots) ?

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Re: Rethinking speed parts

#7 Post by Oberlus »

LienRag wrote: Mon Jul 04, 2022 10:01 pm Yes, I played this game.
I wasn't pointing that, but that there is already some maneuverability, as shown by the numbers you didn't quote.

+40 is quite hard to reach now.
It is as hard as always. It's a relatively cheap tech, and the part isn't too expensive. What's the problem?
Anyways, it would be +50 or +60 for certain hulls, like organics, so you'll get e.g. symbiotic with 1 gun, 1 armor, 1 fuel and N-Dim Matrix at 160 speed, and up to 200 with local bonuses.

my proposal would upset the balance we have between hulls, and would particularly be a problem for Energy frigates, as the speed bonus they have by their hull is much lower than what Organic would have by my proposal.
The problem is your proposed speeds for organic more than the other stuff. Early hulls with 140 speed. That's just too fast.

remember that each internal slot divides the benefit of the supplementary speed part. Also, that's why I said that the part should be expensive
You are right, stackable parts like this would be quite crappy. Not difficult choices, just crappy choices.
No stackable parts, just leave it alone.

(Oberlus proposal) removes all (or at least most of) the difficult choices that my proposal offered, where speed and usefulness would be antagonists (if you have a fast Flux Bubble, what can you do with it ? and an Organic one is only marginally more useful, and half as fast).
What difficult choices are removed? You still have to choose between hangars, fuel, speed, shields... There are plenty of hard choices. My suggestions gives you part of what you want: extra speed early game that is not just tweaked hulls.

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Re: Rethinking speed parts

#8 Post by wobbly »

I don't like either idea. Seems to be complicating matters for no real benefit. Speed parts already tend to favour the faster base ships. A speed 95 robotic is worse value then a speed 100 static. A speed 80 heavy roid is worse value then a speed 80 self grav. They are only good on ships that are already fast or ships big enough to be expensive already.

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Re: Rethinking speed parts

#9 Post by Ophiuchus »

The stated problem to solve is lack of maneuvering options at the start of the game.

The current speed parts are kind of simple. You have a hull speed and you can put in an engine part. So the possible combinations are quite clear.

With the proposed solution this becomes more complex, especially for balancing we would now have to compare a matrix of possible speeds. And we have no tooling to help with that.

I think there are a lot of solutions possible to the stated problem which do not involve such a matrix. E.g. change the speeds of the hulls (e.g. increase the spread), increase the speed boost of engine parts, add another early engine part (which could work differently), a single "turbo charger" part to stack up to the engine (so less values to consider). If we wanted to punish "heavy" ships i would rather increase PP cost of engine part for low hull speed (or for low fuel efficiency) than having them have different speeds....

"Now once one has access to Symbiotics (usually quite early since they're necessary for cheap Colony ships." i think this necessity problem is intended to be solved by the small robotic hull? probably should finish that.

Speed interacts with the map. On one hand there is the "cruising" speed, where a faster ship can travel a large distance in less turns (e.g. move ships to the other border, faster colonisation). The longer the distance, the closer a speedup reaps a linear benefit (so doubling the speed halves the number of necessary turns).
And we have the "map-tactical" speed, with high interaction with the map. Where ship speed is compared to starlane length. This e.g. most importantly if you can do a hop in one turn or you need two, especially on choke points. Here often speed gets cut down to starlane length. The speeds 60, 80 often need two turns for a hop, 100, 120 often need a single turn. So roughly I would estimate the difference between 80 and 100 to be more valuable than a boost from 100 to 200.
Also there is speed value as an enabler of the Charging military policy.

So i think the original suggestion introduces (too) much complexity for its worth. At the least I would make it less tangled (so not connected to slot count) for balance. Also for analysis we would need to see the speed matrix and combat value/PP values.
I would be open though to play a game with the proposed changes just to see what happens if we have such a lot of speed options.
wobbly wrote: Tue Jul 05, 2022 5:46 am Speed parts ... are only good on ships that are already fast or ships big enough to be expensive already.
my take from this is there could/should be an early option for using speed parts(?). we could tweak stuff like increasing average starlane length, adding an internal slot to all hull types, making having an engine part mostly mandatory...
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Re: Rethinking speed parts

#10 Post by wobbly »

@Ophi - I was talking about the economics. Why put a speed part in a robotic when it's cheaper to use a faster hull in the 1st place.

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Re: Rethinking speed parts

#11 Post by Ophiuchus »

wobbly wrote: Tue Jul 05, 2022 9:16 am @Ophi - I was talking about the economics. Why put a speed part in a robotic when it's cheaper to use a faster hull in the 1st place.
i was thinking you were talking also about the later heavy hulls, where the combat value is much higher, but the part cost is the same
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Re: Rethinking speed parts

#12 Post by wobbly »

Ophiuchus wrote: Tue Jul 05, 2022 9:34 am
wobbly wrote: Tue Jul 05, 2022 9:16 am @Ophi - I was talking about the economics. Why put a speed part in a robotic when it's cheaper to use a faster hull in the 1st place.
i was thinking you were talking also about the later heavy hulls, where the combat value is much higher, but the part cost is the same
Yes. Both cases.

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Re: Rethinking speed parts

#13 Post by Oberlus »

Can we modify the cost of a part based on the hull (tags) it is mounted on?
It seems we cannot.

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Re: Rethinking speed parts

#14 Post by Ophiuchus »

Oberlus wrote: Tue Jul 05, 2022 5:33 pm Can we modify the cost of a part based on the hull (tags) it is mounted on?
It seems we cannot.
In the backend, production cost is calculated in the ship design. There hull is asked for cost and each part is asked for cost and summed up.
Not sure if that happens after the tags are copied to the design.

The production cost in a part is a value ref. Maybe HasTag simply works?
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Re: Rethinking speed parts

#15 Post by LienRag »

Oberlus wrote: Mon Jul 04, 2022 10:37 pm
+40 is quite hard to reach now.
It is as hard as always. It's a relatively cheap tech, and the part isn't too expensive. What's the problem?
Technically, not really it isn't. The game has slowed a lot with recent changes.

But mostly the problem is the absence of fleet diversity : with a tech more or less expensive to research (first speed tech is not that expensive, the second quite more - I'm not saying that it's a problem, but that's a fact) and a quite cheap part, once one researches the tech, one tends to put the part in all one's ships (or maybe not all, but a bunch of them).
With a tech giving good speed to some hulls early, but with an expensive part, one has to think hard whether his ships really need this speed; so only a few of them will have the part.
That is clearly encouraging fleet diversity, and maneuvering.


Oberlus wrote: Mon Jul 04, 2022 10:37 pm The problem is your proposed speeds for organic more than the other stuff. Early hulls with 140 speed. That's just too fast.
Why ?
Needs testing obviously, but what says that speedy ships in early game (which, again, means more choices and more diversity in gameplay) is bad ?


Oberlus wrote: Mon Jul 04, 2022 10:37 pm Anyways, it would be +50 or +60 for certain hulls, like organics,
Yes. +60 for fully stacked Protoplasmic Hulls with the +100 base, +48 if we use a reduced value.
That's why I say that the part needs to be expensive, so it's not just a new standard for fleet speed, but generates the possibility to create fast ships if one needs them.
Oberlus wrote: Mon Jul 04, 2022 10:37 pm so you'll get e.g. symbiotic with 1 gun, 1 armor, 1 fuel and N-Dim Matrix at 160 speed, and up to 200 with local bonuses.
What ? Not at all, how do you reach this value ?
With the full speed of Internal Couplings (and double for N-Dimensional Matrix), this Symbiotic would get 150, and with my reduced value for it (+80 base) it would get 140, as of now.


Oberlus wrote: Mon Jul 04, 2022 10:37 pm What difficult choices are removed?
The choice between a Hull with a lot of slots to put things in, but that will never reach high speed, and a Hull that can go really fast.


Oberlus wrote: Mon Jul 04, 2022 10:37 pm No stackable parts, just leave it alone.
Stackable is the only way to make these parts useful on bigger hulls rather than only on very small hulls (so again, augmenting fleet diversity).
Small hulls still have an advantage (notably cost) and not all bigger hulls can really benefit from this speed parts, but it would be possible to have fast (and expensive) Symbiotics, Protoplasmics and even (though slightly slower) Endomorphics.

Ophiuchus wrote: Tue Jul 05, 2022 7:43 am I think there are a lot of solutions possible to the stated problem [...]. E.g. change the speeds of the hulls (e.g. increase the spread),
Indeed, putting the base speed of the Energy Hull line at 160 would solve the imbalance that my proposal creates in favor of Organics, and also would make going for the Energy Hull mid-game a clearly interesting path.

Ophiuchus wrote: Tue Jul 05, 2022 7:43 am At the least I would make it less tangled (so not connected to slot count) for balance.
Connected to slot count is extremely intuitive (everybody knows how to divide by 2, by 4 and by 5, and can grasp that dividing by 6 or more will yield an inferior result than by 2) and also makes balance very easy : you want one more slot for your ship, that'll slow it, so if you want to use it in a race, it will lose to a smaller ship.

Ophiuchus wrote: Tue Jul 05, 2022 7:43 am I would be open though to play a game with the proposed changes just to see what happens if we have such a lot of speed options.
That's the idea !
Maybe +100 base for IEC (+200 for N-Dimensional) is too fast, and we could try with +80 and +160 respectively, divided by slot count of course.
Also begin by tripling the cost, as it is balanced if it's expensive (so for a first try it's better to be too expensive than too cheap).

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