Monsters

Creation, discussion, and balancing of game content such as techs, buildings, ship parts.

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LienRag
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Re: Monsters

#31 Post by LienRag »

wobbly wrote: Fri Oct 07, 2022 7:15 am Taking a look larval -> kraken and kraken -> great is same probability. So idea, add extra growth stage:
larval -> young -> adult -> great
Lower probabilities at older stages?

Good idea !



Ophiuchus wrote: Fri Oct 07, 2022 7:34 am could also add structure growth bonus like the organic ship line has - so we could nerf the initial version of krakens and great krakens and give some benefit if one has bad luck with maturing.

Very good idea !



wobbly wrote: Fri Oct 07, 2022 12:39 pm Yeah I'm not sure either. Thing is they take approximately 20 turns to evolve, so just adding an extra stage is likely the same problem, just 20 turns later.

Twenty turns later is a big difference, and leaves the enemy a chance to prepare for it (or kill them before they grow, or even capture the nest).
Also it was mentioned a reduction of maturation probability at older stage - so a player would have larval krakens (nearly unusable except in very early game), young krakens (usable, maybe 80% of current Krakens, but not very strong), a lot less Mature Krakens (3 times the structure of nowadays Krakens, so efficient in combat, but not overwhelming), and a lot less Great Krakens.
So, with the reduced probability for maturation (and maybe a longer delay), the player would have to choose to use the krakens and mature krakens, or to let them frolic on a Gas Giant for later use - a real strategic conundrum, so good for the game.




Oberlus wrote: Fri Oct 07, 2022 12:49 pm I think best option is make them grow slower. I think of changing the maturing effect so that instead of jumping from "max health of this stage" to "max health of next stage", the new stage departs from the health of the previous stage and grows from there each turn (much like the target health of living organic ships increases over time).
That way, getting an early kraken is not that bad: it still needs lots of time to become the huge monster it can be.

Interesting, but not "departs from the health of the previous stage" ; maybe from twice the last stage, both to make maturation a real (and immediate) boon for the player, and to keep with the "chrysalid-style" fluff.



wobbly wrote: Fri Oct 07, 2022 12:39 pm Looking at it a bit there is a logic behind having a different growth rate for owned compared to unowned. Wild kraken wander around rather then sitting on a gas giant maturing, so in practice the probability of a wild kraken maturing is much lower.

Didn't think of that, but you're right.


wobbly wrote: Fri Oct 07, 2022 12:39 pm Probably someone should count the number of nests that spawned in the LienRag/Ophiuchus portion of the map and then come up with a figure for how many and what size (and at what turn) is reasonable for game balance.

Remember that if we were not in a fixed team setting, none of these Nests would have been in uncontested territory.
Settling a Nest and then having to defend it (with the risk that the opponent just captures it with a low-cost troop ship) is not a trivial investment, and requires more skill than luck.
So, Monsters are not that unbalanced after all.


Ophiuchus wrote: Fri Oct 07, 2022 7:34 am also there could be some possibility a great kraken gets old and more fragile (so either another growth stage or via structure decrease when getting older) and maybe die of old age.

Interesting, but I have a better idea : this decline happens only when multiple mature Monsters of the same type are in the same system.
The formula for each monster being like : p = (c+kt)*n
With p the probability of decline, c an initial constant (like 0,01), t the age of the monster, k another game constant (like 0,001) and n the numbers of monsters in the same system.

The basic idea was to forbid monsters to be in the same system since one Great Kraken is not uncounterable and as such not really unbalancing (it's a great help in a fight, yes, but that's what it's supposed to be), while it's true that when we get 7 Great Krakens it will be very difficult for Oberlus to defend.
Also, forcing the player to disperse the Monsters he would get will make the game very much more strategic and open a lot of manoeuvring, both for Monster fleets and for those trying to counter them.
But restricting the manoeuvres to situations where no Monster would even cross each other's path would be bad for the game (forbidding coordinated attack, for example); making it possible but costly (incurring the risk of losing a Monster to decline) is way better.

It also works well with the slow Structure growth : the more you let a Monster grow the more it is likely to decline if you combine him with other monsters.

Note that letting monsters mature after larval stage (larval stage being immune to decline, both for balance and fluff reasons) would also be trickier : if one needs to separate them on different systems, it means putting some of them either far away from the frontline (so a long time for them to reach it once matured) or exposed to enemy pre-emptive strike.

It also allows "tamer" Species to bypass this restriction : good tamers would have that risk only with more than two monsters on the same system, great tamers only with more than three.
So a real power, and a different gameplay.


Ophiuchus wrote: Fri Oct 07, 2022 7:34 am that would also help with high number of monsters, naturally removing some instead of simply adding more.
Good for owned (incites to use them before they grow too old, so a more dynamic game), bad for unowned imho (we want unowned monsters to be a growing threat when the player doesn't address it).
So my proposition above works for differentiating the two...




wobbly wrote: Fri Oct 07, 2022 12:47 pm
LienRag wrote: Thu Oct 06, 2022 11:41 pm (the way Snowflakes have been when their Detection Range was nerfed ; now by the time one has a few snowflakes, he most of the time already has better scouts).
This was likely an over nerf. I've been meaning to change them to a midway point between where they were and where they are now, and just forgetting about it.

Indeed, it was. So please do.

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Re: Monsters

#32 Post by LienRag »

LienRag wrote: Fri Oct 07, 2022 2:13 pm
wobbly wrote: Fri Oct 07, 2022 12:39 pm Probably someone should count the number of nests that spawned in the LienRag/Ophiuchus portion of the map and then come up with a figure for how many and what size (and at what turn) is reasonable for game balance.
Remember that if we were not in a fixed team setting, none of these Nests would have been in uncontested territory.
Settling a Nest and then having to defend it (with the risk that the opponent just captures it with a low-cost troop ship) is not a trivial investment, and requires more skill than luck.
So, Monsters are not that unbalanced after all.

Which actually means that we need the specific Galaxy shapes (with kernelspace separated from userland) I proposed, and we really need them for fixed team MP games.
It's not only the monsters nests that can be really unbalancing with the Galaxy shapes that we have now.

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Oberlus
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Re: Monsters

#33 Post by Oberlus »

The common space idea is relevant for some galaxy shapes but not for others.

A solution for all galaxy shapes is preferred.

Finding a way for relatively homogeneous deployment of nests and other specials is the way to go.

One approach could be creating an evaluation criteria to count all good and bad assets nearby a homeworld (e.g. evalVecinity) and taking distribution-of-specials actions depending on that. It would work for all galaxy shapes more or less OK and would fix all issues at once (not only monster nests).

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Re: Monsters

#34 Post by wobbly »

So putting in an extra evolution stage (young kraken) is probably a good start and likely all I can do before when ever current game wraps up and we start the next. Though feel free to discuss longer term solutions.

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Re: Monsters

#35 Post by Oberlus »

wobbly wrote: Sat Oct 08, 2022 6:11 pm So putting in an extra evolution stage (young kraken) is probably a good start and likely all I can do before when ever current game wraps up and we start the next. Though feel free to discuss longer term solutions.
That will work great if enemies spot you have those krakens and come to hunt them down before they mature.

But in games like current MP it will just delay the problem by 20 turns. I wouldn't bother making that change.

Instead, I would change how they grow their structure, similar to organic living hulls that grow it with age.

Edit: a monsters that matures to a next stage gets Age=0.

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Re: Monsters

#36 Post by Oberlus »

Also, the proposed change on owned nest's spawning rate seems good (Grummel almost sketched the effect in a previous post).

And a new idea:
Restrict putting monster nests nearby other monster nests (like 8 jumps or so), making nests behave similar to players' homeworlds (that won't spawn close to other player homeworld).
That would help with improving the distribution among players without having to evaluate player's vecinity after galaxy creation.

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Re: Monsters

#37 Post by wobbly »

Oberlus wrote: Sat Oct 08, 2022 6:16 pm
wobbly wrote: Sat Oct 08, 2022 6:11 pm So putting in an extra evolution stage (young kraken) is probably a good start and likely all I can do before when ever current game wraps up and we start the next. Though feel free to discuss longer term solutions.
That will work great if enemies spot you have those krakens and come to hunt them down before they mature.

But in games like current MP it will just delay the problem by 20 turns. I wouldn't bother making that change.

Instead, I would change how they grow their structure, similar to organic living hulls that grow it with age.

Edit: a monsters that matures to a next stage gets Age=0.
Hmm... how would people feel about them maturing when they reach the right max. structure instead of a probability?
Organic-style growth, with a faster rate when stationary in appropriate environment?

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Re: Monsters

#38 Post by LienRag »

Oberlus wrote: Sat Oct 08, 2022 6:24 pm And a new idea:
Restrict putting monster nests nearby other monster nests (like 8 jumps or so), making nests behave similar to players' homeworlds (that won't spawn close to other player homeworld).
That would help with improving the distribution among players without having to evaluate player's vecinity after galaxy creation.
Why not ? It would indeed help distributing the Nests.




wobbly wrote: Sat Oct 08, 2022 6:25 pm Hmm... how would people feel about them maturing when they reach the right max. structure instead of a probability?
Organic-style growth, with a faster rate when stationary in appropriate environment?

Bad idea imho. Their maturation is probabilist, but also depends on the player's actions.
So this should stay the same (adding modifiers from megafauna techs eventually) : it's a different mechanism (so more flavour to the game) and still gives agency to the player.

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Re: Monsters

#39 Post by LienRag »

wobbly wrote: Sat Oct 08, 2022 6:11 pm So putting in an extra evolution stage (young kraken) is probably a good start and likely all I can do before when ever current game wraps up and we start the next. Though feel free to discuss longer term solutions.
Please do.
I agree with Oberlus that it's not perfect but it's still something and it'll allow us to test it.


Oberlus wrote: Sat Oct 08, 2022 6:16 pm But in games like current MP it will just delay the problem by 20 turns. I wouldn't bother making that change.
It doesn't need to be 20 turns. For last stage you can delay the starting time for possible maturation (from 10 now to maybe 20) and reduce the probability afterwards, so the average maturing time would be closer to 40 turns.

And a twenty-turn delay is already a big change (even more so a 40 turns-delay, of course). If your opponent can't figure a counter in 40 turns, he deserves to lose.

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Re: Monsters

#40 Post by Oberlus »

I've already made a PR to restrict nests location by distance to other nests of the same type, as commented above.
LienRag wrote: Thu Oct 06, 2022 11:41 pm
Grummel7 wrote: Mon Oct 03, 2022 8:52 am Maturing could be changed easily: The chance could depend on the age of the monster. E.g. it cannot mature in its first 5 turns, then the chance becomes 2% in turn 6, increased by 2% each turn. Of course maturing still requires the monster to be in a suitable location. It also makes sense that older monster have a better chance to mature.
Spawning is a bit trickier, but I guess adding an invisible special to the nest planet could give the nest some memory. So the actual spawning change would depend on the age of that special and it is replaced whenever a monster spawns.
The Special for spawning is interesting indeed.
But for maturing, the present formula already works like that.
No, present formula doesn't work like that: probability of maturing is constant.

I'll implement Grummel's suggestion.

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Re: Monsters

#41 Post by Ophiuchus »

Oberlus wrote: Sun Oct 09, 2022 10:55 am I'll implement Grummel's suggestion.
which one?
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!

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Re: Monsters

#42 Post by LienRag »

Oberlus wrote: Sun Oct 09, 2022 10:55 am No, present formula doesn't work like that: probability of maturing is constant
Random probability = (LocalCandidate.Age*0.01 - 0.1)
A constant that is variable then...

I'd propose to keep the Larval to Young Kraken as is, to use Random probability = (LocalCandidate.Age*0.01 - 0.15) for Young to Mature Kraken (Same weapons as Great Kraken, 2000 Structure after multiplier) and Random probability = (LocalCandidate.Age*0.005 - 0.1) for Mature to Great.

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Re: Monsters

#43 Post by Oberlus »

LienRag wrote: Sun Oct 09, 2022 11:44 am
Oberlus wrote: Sun Oct 09, 2022 10:55 am No, present formula doesn't work like that: probability of maturing is constant
Random probability = (LocalCandidate.Age*0.01 - 0.1)
A constant that is variable then...
Not a variable constant, just that I was wrong.

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Re: Monsters

#44 Post by Oberlus »

Ophiuchus wrote: Sun Oct 09, 2022 11:37 am
Oberlus wrote: Sun Oct 09, 2022 10:55 am I'll implement Grummel's suggestion.
which one?
The special to control spawning rate when nest is owned.

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Re: Monsters

#45 Post by LienRag »

Please do, it's a good suggestion.
Which formula will you use ?

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