Battles, battles and MORE battles ! Turn based vs real time.

[Plasma Dragon]

This whole notion of the defender running away forever is silly. Defenders who run should lose. Delaying actions are fine--running one measly cloaked scout all over the edges of the map is twinky.

This is a very good reason to allow the attacker to conquer planets on the space combat screen, rather than have two seprate phases for space combat and ground combat. If a defenders runs around trying to bleed away time, the attacker takes or glasses the objective

I totally agree with you. You found a perfect solution. Congratulations ! Just one combat phase was partly done in Moo2 ( I mean bombard ).

However fast running away ships should be limited by the map borders I think. This will eliminate endless runaway. Otherwise superfast fleet will always stay in system no matter what attacker do.

[utilae]

1. 30 secs to order all ships : This purely favorite small number of BIGGER ships over the LARGE number of smaller ones.

If spacecombat is designed well, a player will only need 10 secs minimum. With the right macro functionality you could give orders to all ships, then use micro functionality to refine orders for specific ships. Of course a player could still give orders to all ships individually, but that would take a while. In the end the player should be able to set the time.

3. 5 minutes battle : It still favorites bigger ships over smaller ones, but it is not so bad as lower values of time.
No, 5 mins of battle means if you give orders to all ships and then all ordering is finished, you let the battle play out in real-time for 30secs. Then give orders, then let the battle play out for another 30secs until 5mins of real time action is up. I am assuming my system is used here.

b) negatives : favorites player who is defending his position : he can runaway forever and painfully delay battle.

He could do that no matter what shape the map is, besides game balance could easily prevent that. If he is faster, then he amy waste you, a viable strategy.

1. Moo2 map : corners - tactical disadvantage for defender - he cant runaway forever - better for attacker.

Too bad, cheap tactics like that are often annoying.

2. Circle / elipse map : more balanced for defender vs attacker, better missle / torpedo defence, tiny - fast ships can move at borders and runaway - this can favorite defender as well as attacker : depends on missle / beam strategy.

Of course a ship with long range could get in the middle and there would be no corner for the defender to stay out of reach of it's deadly lasers.

3. No borders map : I will ask last time : Do u mean a map with unlimited space ? If I this is a truth then battle will loose all strategy sense. Imagine a fleet of good heavy BB vs one tiny super fast FF. FF can runaway forever in space and if it has good defence bonus. This bonus plus speed will win for defender any battle, beacause no missle/beam can hurt tiny superfast FF.

Well, I mean no wrapping around the map (ie go out one side come in the other side). If the player does go to the edge of the map, the player should retreat, he would be asked yes or no.

[elfstone]

I definitly love the idea of decimal etas, so a battle can start With 2 vs 5 ships, than 6 ships arrive, and its 8 vs 5 suddenly.

[krum]

Just a minor note, I think the turns in MoO2 were decimal fractions of something that was asumed an year, I think in MoO3 it was going to be defined as a 'cycle' that didn't have a specified length but was said to be about 2-3 years. That makes a turn about three months (like those quarters, Q1, Q2-4 ), and a battle turn about a day.

[dirt-bag]

I think their may be some confusion on the turn length I was refering too, 3 days is the length of a COMBAT turn

ummm 3 days to load that torpedo bay for the next salvo?
seems kinda slow, like the snail empire attacking the sloth conglomerate...

i think any space combat about a planet could be resolved well within the confines of 1 unit of time of a galactic scale, given that the turns are rigid, ie turn based game. pax imperiaII had an interesting treatment of battle time in a real time game, basically the clock would slow down during the battle to allow galactic management during combat. it didnt 'work' in gameplay but was a neat idea.

i think perhaps i have a completely different idea of space combat. most of u seem to be talking of nearly completely automated battle sequences, with only minimal input from the player, ie send this bunch of ships that direction and shoot at that bunch of ships. this results in a fast paced battle that plays out like a movie on ur monitor, unfortunately there is precious little tactics in this sort of battle, so it would come down to who has more ships or better ships. as u add more control in a real time scenario the advantage shifts to the one with a better 'twitch factor' and or isp.

i see space combat more like a chess game except u move every peice every turn. i like the idea of simultaneous turns it seems to have the most tactical potential (in my mind). i realize this does very little for many of the fast food/instant gratification crowd who seem so prevalent in today's society. i suppose it is all down to what the game designers think they want to do. i read the 'vision' it was quite vague but did say 'based on master of orion' however failed to say which version of moo it would be based on.

so... if the designers have a definate mind set in this matter we could move on to other debates. do tell, designer guys, have u made up ur minds in this regard?

This is a very good reason to allow the attacker to conquer planets on the space combat screen, rather than have two seprate phases for space combat and ground combat. If a defenders runs around trying to bleed away time, the attacker takes or glasses the objective

good point drek... i always hated the 'chicken tactics' that work so well in moo2. we 'the moo2 community' or at least some of us have tried to find ways around it by imposing different rules but nothing was very effective.

[Nightfish]

so... if the designers have a definate mind set in this matter we could move on to other debates. do tell, designer guys, have u made up ur minds in this regard?

In what regard? Which version of moo we base our game on? If you believe that we will only improve MoO1,2 or 3 then you've got the wrong thing in mind. We'll have MoO elements but that's about the end of it. Every feature that will be in our game will be there because the team leaders think it's a good idea, not because any other MoO had it.

If you were refering to TB vs RT combat then I can tell you this: No decision will ever be made on the brainstorming board. Period. A lot of people don't even check that board. Everything major (and most minor things, too) go through a public review on the game design board.

[drekmonger]

so... if the designers have a definate mind set in this matter we could move on to other debates. do tell, designer guys, have u made up ur minds in this regard?

There will be a formal Design thread for combat sooner or later. Bet on later--we won't begin to worry about space combat until v.4, right now the coders are working on v.1 and design is working on v.2.

[Impaler]

I like the idea of "chess" like battle, thats what I have been proposing all along Turn Based battles. I admit 3 days seems like a lot compared to Star Trek battles but its nessasary to have a set turn limit if things like Decimal ETA's are going to be a reality (thanks for the support Elf Stone!). Ofcorse the number of combat turns in one Game turn could be higher or the length of a game turn shorter. But in the end its all the same in turn based play its my turn, its your turn, its my turn again, its your turn again ect ect. At the worst its just a sensibility issue. And we can adjust the units in such a way that ground units slug it out for many more turns then ships so that everything still feels right.

[a_card]

I really liked the MOO 2 "larger scale" combat, where each ship's attacks and damage were visible. I think one of the reasons I lost intrest in '3 was a lack of usable combat detail.
If the system here is going for a larger ship complement, what about a flagship-type view? One ship (or a few) in a fleet could be shown larger than normal to allow for better special effects, while still allowing an empire to spew the fleet of doom and swamp the enemy.
I could also see a representation of a group of ships (like a swarm fleet) as a large graphic, or any other way to show more than a swarm of lines and small explosions. Why can't the holotank point out larger fleet elements for its commander?

[OceanMachine]

I like the idea of "chess" like battle, thats what I have been proposing all along Turn Based battles.

I specifically dislike chess-like battle systems in a game like this. Battle is not like chess. It's messy and chaotic. Attempts to make it like chess completely divorce it from any reality. And while Aquitane has repeatedly scolded folks for making the reality argument, there is a degree of metaphor shear that I really don't like in making battle come off as a tidy board-game affair. There are games like Heroes of Might and Magic where it is fun and fits with the game theme, where it's supposed to be sort of quaint and board-gamey. I don't think that's the case for a 4x game which should be deeper and more complex.

[utilae]

Yeah, we don't want a glorrified game of chess. I would be happy with something similar to Moo2s combat system, of course vastly improved (my idea, heh heh). Also being able to travel to all planets in a system in one battle would be cool. Plus merging space combat and ground combat, while making ground combat as good as space combat would be cool.

[Thumper]

Personally I like the space combat as depicted in David Weber's Honor Herrington series and universe. Also as depicted in DW's non HH books but still in the same universe.

Very fast ships sub light. Even faster missiles. Great detail in the deployment of ships and arms. Great battle sequences. Good discussion about the ships and various arms. Worm Holes and Worm Hole Junctions. Protection of Worm Hole entry/exit points. Finding worm holes. One way worm holes. The need for system exploration... you need to find a worm hole before you can use it. And you need to study the worm hole before you start sending ships thru it. Fun, fun, fun...


Thumper

[discord]

well, back on the subject, wich as far as i can see is RealTime vs TurnBased combat engines, the only true choice(imho) is none of the above.

both of these are very well established ideas, and how they should be created, if we want anything remotely new, we have to think 'new' not in old classic terms....ahwell another thought on the subject is to look at it from another way, a game called 'titans of steel' a mech game based on the VERY old game called mech force(wich in turn was based on some other game, wich in turn was based on battle tech stuff.), but there is a very nice idea for vehicles there, and how to simulate control of them, it's turn based, yes. BUT the speed of your mech is very important(since you cant create a mech that can act on ALL turns) since each 'turn' is 1sec if i recall correctly, and the distances your mech moves is quite long for each hex(yes hexagons were used in it), recycle time of the heavy weapons were often quite abit longer then 1sec, main problem was most of the time heat though, on the matter of fire rate.

ahwell, just check it out, if you have not already, it should twist around your concept of what 'turnbased/realtime' really is....

http://www.titansofsteel.de/ <--- official home page.

not that i say that system is the best, but it gives.....another view on the matter, for wich there are more then two ways to do it.

another way wich i was the one to suggest if i recall correctly, phased turnbased(wich has some similarities with RT,TB,ToS systems) like the ones used in final fantasy games....

in the end it's all about how to create a decent math system to base it on, and a decent user interface to control the math behind the scenes.


oh, and hi to you old timers, the discord is back to wreck any semblance of order here *grin*

//discord

[Impaler]

Nice to have you back, though we had lost you when the forums changed.

[Kosslowski]

This is a very good reason to allow the attacker to conquer planets on the space combat screen, rather than have two seprate phases for space combat and ground combat. If a defenders runs around trying to bleed away time, the attacker takes or glasses the objective

good point drek... i always hated the 'chicken tactics' that work so well in moo2. we 'the moo2 community' or at least some of us have tried to find ways around it by imposing different rules but nothing was very effective.

you are right. It would be more interesting, if you could land your transports during space combat. Though I prefer a system with the ground combat initiated during space combat (depending on whether your transports reach the planet during the battle) but resolved AFTER space combat.
The threat of the invasion should be a sufficient incentive to actually defend the planet instead of using chicken tactics.
A ground which is resolved afterwards can last for several turns in this way. Both sides might have to send reinforcements and different ground combat strategies would have to be considered depending on the situation in space. For example if a relief force is expected soon, your defending army should consider survival a higher priority than fighting effectively. The invader on the other hand could be forced to accept a higher blood toll to rush the attacks before the arrival of the enemy reinforcements.