Space Combat (madness)

For what's not in 'Top Priority Game Design'. Post your ideas, visions, suggestions for the game, rules, modifications, etc.

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Impaler
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#46 Post by Impaler »

Just had a Look at PD's Movie mock up (had to figure out how to Open .rar files and then how to view a .mov (thanks Utilae).

If I understand it correctly the ships move on a 2D grid but are 3D objects that can be viewed from any angle and zoomed in/out. This is a good aproatch...

But it also seems to show limited scope which reminds me of StarWars Galaxies (aka Planet in back ground). For a good visual on what Full system combat would looklike check out this StarFury Demo.

http://www.malfador.com/starfury/sfdemo.html

Your not able tp change your view in StarFury but you can move about the whole system (with just 1 ship which is why the view never changes) By combining the 2D movment + 3D models + Full system Map + 360 Degree view we would end up with the best combination.

Some Mathematical Analysis.
The Systems in StarFurry are Square and it takes your Demo ship about 3 minutes to cross the length of that Square. If we take this as the speed of a moderatly fast ship and our phased Combat Engine plays out 30 Seconds of Realtime Battle each round then it would take 6 rounds to cross from one end of the system to another. In this game Entering and Exiting the system happens at destret "Warp Points" generaly located on the edge of the system. We could instead alow a player entering the system to start at any point along the periphery which would bring all parts of the system within 3 turns of movment which seems rather reasonable to me. Very Fast late game ships might traverse a system in as little as 2 or 3 full rounds and slow ones 10 or more. Combat would roll over to the next turn after 10 rounds (a nice round number).
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drek
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#47 Post by drek »

Note, I still have a slight preference for full system combat. I'm the one who thought it up in the first place :P.

Pd's mock-up inspired me to re-consider planet to planet combat, so I'm thinking of ways to make scenic combat "better". I'm brainstorming, not debating.

ellestar:
What if i don't want to participate in open space stage because i will not win and maybe even will not be able to retreat (say, enemies have better drives), but i can defend planets with my fleet?
No, you'd have to flee from open space in stage 1. Otherwise, a player could keep a fleet stashed in a system forever, never engading. Any portion of the fleet that survives would arrive in a minute or two as re-enforcements to help the planet.

But, another stage 2 target would be your cowardly fleet. So the attacker could go after your fleeing fleet first anyway.

edit: or I suppose there might be an option to garrison fleets at a friendly planet rather than send them off to the open space stage.
What if i want to attack one planet with fast or stealth ships, then move to a second planet when main fleet approaches? What if i'm blocking one starlane exit, but enemy comes from another? IMHO my proposal with operational orders can add a lot to a tactical aspects of the game.
Starlane defense would be automatic. If *any* ships enter a defended system through a starlane, then the open space map would include a minefield or other defenses for the opposing fleet to plow through first.

If you have a stealth fleet they could dodge stage 1. A fast fleet can flee stage 1. The remaining fleets (if any) would have to win stage 1 in order to have tactical initiave.

A fleet that dodges can attack a stage 2 target even if you don't have tactical initiative.

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#48 Post by miu »

I'm too for whole system wide combat, because of more varied strategic options it allows: terrain, splitting of forces because of multiple targets, different planets,more importance on fleet manouvers and orbitals taking part in battles. With time/turn limits, it will work well.
Last edited by miu on Fri Sep 24, 2004 4:20 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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#49 Post by Impaler »

Drek thats all unessary and overly complecated these "stages" your proposing. Just have a single "Placment" Phase, everyone puts theirs ships on the map in the position they want. The defender would get to know from what Starlane the attacker is coming from unless the Attacker stealth himself in. Thats by far simpler and more straitforward. Lets agree on Full system combat and some of the other features here that have overwhelming support and spend our time brainstorming on more usefull things like implementation of nailed down features.
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#50 Post by krum »

I had an idea about how to perhaps improve the concept of phased combat. Essentialy, it involves player getting the ability to pause the battle for orders at given intervals of battle execution time, whose lengths depend on a number of factors, including experince of the crews and the level of his communication technology.
When a player pauses, only he may give orders to his fleet. If other participants want to do the same when someone else has currently paused, they have to spend one "order action", too.
I was also thinking there could be a minimum time between two pauses a player makes to give out orders, some fraction of the the time it takes to get another pause action.

Also, I'm still pro- full system combat. There are some good ideas about planetary combat, but I think full system combat would streamline gameplay, and will also be more fun.

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#51 Post by drek »

Lets agree on Full system combat and some of the other features here that have overwhelming support and spend our time brainstorming on more usefull things like implementation of nailed down features.
There's still plenty of time between now and the offical start of v.4 design.

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#52 Post by utilae »

drek wrote:
What if i don't want to participate in open space stage because i will not win and maybe even will not be able to retreat (say, enemies have better drives), but i can defend planets with my fleet?
No, you'd have to flee from open space in stage 1. Otherwise, a player could keep a fleet stashed in a system forever, never engaging.
I was thinking that a player could exit his ships from battle, if they were far enough away from the enemy. And if a player kept his fleets stashed in a system forever, never engaging, couldn't the other player head over their and waste his ships or at least exit from the battle.
han_krum wrote: I had an idea about how to perhaps improve the concept of phased combat. Essentialy, it involves player getting the ability to pause the battle for orders at given intervals of battle execution time, whose lengths depend on a number of factors, including experince of the crews and the level of his communication technology.
When a player pauses, only he may give orders to his fleet. If other participants want to do the same when someone else has currently paused, they have to spend one "order action", too.
I was also thinking there could be a minimum time between two pauses a player makes to give out orders, some fraction of the the time it takes to get another pause action.
I just want to clarify whether your understading of phased real time combat is the same as mine.

Phased real time is not really being able to pause in battle. But more you have two phases. The give order phase comes first, where all players give orders for their ships at the same time. When all players are ready, the second phase occurs. In the second phase the battle plays out for X seconds. Orders are executed, ships destroyed, etc. Plays cannot interfare during this phase, only watch, which is why it would be cool to have this part in 3D. Then the order phase occurs again. And so on, etc etc.
drek wrote:
Lets agree on Full system combat and some of the other features here that have overwhelming support and spend our time brainstorming on more usefull things like implementation of nailed down features.
There's still plenty of time between now and the offical start of v.4 design.
There is no harm in exploring all options, if we have the time.

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#53 Post by miu »

I could see both order and execution phases implemented in same 3D-view, In order phase you would have access to different tools (trough buttons, mouseclicks and keyboard shortcuts) and info screens. The gameplay/fleetmovements are stopped or very slow. Shortcut to zoomed-out, right from top view where you can cleary see your fleets as icons and all the surrounding enviroment and can easily assaing orders your fleets trough waypoints and different behaviour options. Kind of 2d-strategical mapview, but done with 3d engine.
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#54 Post by Geoff the Medio »

miu wrote:I could see both order and execution phases implemented in same 3D-view
I'd always assumed it would be like Baldur's Gate battles, or any tactical RTS, except that you can only give orders while paused. How else would it be done?
In order phase you would have access to different tools (trough buttons, mouseclicks and keyboard shortcuts) and info screens.
A bit off topic, but I'd suggest that we design the interfact to not have any "info screens". All needed info should be visible on the main interface screen. Combat speed issues, especially in multiplayer, would suggest that anything relying on flipping between different info screens would take waaay too long.
Impaler wrote:...and our phased Combat Engine plays out 30 Seconds of Realtime Battle each round...
It's far to say this with any certainty, but IMO rounds should be much less than 30 seconds (at least in the standard game setup). More like 10 or even 5 seconds of "action" between order giving phases would be best, imo. Any longer than 15 seconds, and things can change too much between order phases that the player wouldn't really have much control over what happens.

Obviously this depends a great deal on how "frantic" combat is though...

IMO it'd be nice if ships took a decent pounding before they are disabled / blow up. Just a single salvo of missiles / beam shots shouldn't cause anything of roughly equal tech level to be destroyed.

As well, the general level of manoeuverability of ships is an issue... can then stop on a dime and accelerate instantly wherever they want to go, or are big ships giant lumbering behemoths that take a round or two to start moving? Granted, bigger ships generally move more slowly, but presumably engine technology will improve with time, so even small ships at the start of the game would move pretty slowly.

I envision prolonged continuous rapid exchanges of weapons fire between slowly moving and turning capital ships, not tiny weak overpowered gunships that buzz around trying to get off their single load of missile before the enemy's missiles reach them and destroy them in one hit.

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#55 Post by utilae »

Geoff the Medio wrote:
miu wrote: I could see both order and execution phases implemented in same 3D-view
I'd always assumed it would be like Baldur's Gate battles, or any tactical RTS, except that you can only give orders while paused. How else would it be done?
I'm thinking more like at the start of a space combat, combat is paused. It is the order giving phase. When everyone has given orders, space combat plays out for X seconds. Then order giving phase again.

Also players wouldn't choose when to pause combat, like Buldars Gate, combat would be paused at certain intervals (between the real time parts, the real time parts being of a fixed amount of time, like 15seconds).

I hope there is no more confusion between phased real time combat and buldars gate style combat, because I think some people are getting the two confused. Of course both methods are pretty close.

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#56 Post by Geoff the Medio »

utilae: What you just described is exactly what I'm envisioning for FO. The Baldur's gate reference was not meant to imply the player-initiated pausing thereof would be used in FO. I fully support and like the fixed-interval pausing system (see my discussion of the length of time between the pauses above... this would be meaningless if the timing was player controlled).

What I was asking was in reference to:
I could see both order and execution phases implemented in same 3D-view
How else would one display combat than with the same 3D view for the order and execution phases?

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#57 Post by utilae »

Geoff the Medio wrote: What I was asking was in reference to:
I could see both order and execution phases implemented in same 3D-view
How else would one display combat than with the same 3D view for the order and execution phases?
Well the order phase would be player controllable 3D, maybe defaulted to a top down isometric view, but still changeable by the player.

And the execution phase could also be player controlled, except they only control there camera, to watch the battle from all the best angles.

I guess there is no other way in which you would display it. I was initially thinking that if we did this method of combat and we did it in 2d we would have to at least do the execution phase in 3D, because since the player is just watching and maybe controlling the camera, you would want the best graphics.

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#58 Post by drek »

IMO it'd be nice if ships took a decent pounding before they are disabled / blow up. Just a single salvo of missiles / beam shots shouldn't cause anything of roughly equal tech level to be destroyed.
It may be best for gameplay purposes, open to debate.

But one of my pet peeves in rts games is watching a single unit take an unreasonable amount of "pounding". It just looks silly to me to see a single guy hacking away forever at another, or a single ship taking a huge missile salvo like it's nothing.

Esp. if we use scenic combat I'd like to try for more cinematic, exciting combat. Maybe supercaptial ships can take a little bit of a pounding, but the rank and file goes up like firecrackers. It looks really cool in my head anyway.

Another thing often lacking—debris. Esp. when a big ship dies, I’d like for there to lots of it.

Imagine the after combat report: a stark note is played as the camera pans through the shattered wreckage, while a counter tallies the casualties.

An issue that hasn’t really been addressed yet: what happens to ship outside of the engine’s ship cap?

There will be a ship cap, for performance and gameplay reasons. It seems fairly obvious in scenic combat: as ships on the line die or flee, new ships warp in (unless a general retreat has been ordered). But, where would they warp to/from in the full system combat version?

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#59 Post by PowerCrazy »

I think full-system combat would be great. I don't want combat to span multiple turns though. "Phased real-time" is perfectly fine. The full system map should be fairly large, where you can only quickly cross the map at a very high tech level, also planets should be in the order they are from the primary star.

At the beginning of combat Attacker places his fleets within some bounded area. The defender can see the attackers ships if he set up avanced sensors or starbases, or some kind of forward observing post. Defender places his ships everywhere but behind the attackers "main line". i.e. The defender cannot just surround the attacker "ex post facto." There should be some minimum distance the defender must put between his ships and the attacker ships.

Whenever the defender builds starbases, etc, he gets to put them in the system within some radius around the planet that built the starbase (this radius would increase as tech increased). Same with any other space building the defender builds.

Planets orbiting etc, should not be considered in our simplified system model. A sufficently advanced race should be able to handle any natural phenomenon that would affect the placement of minefields, etc.

At the beginning of the game the Attacker only gets a narrow band of ship placement, as tech progresses that area increases, and perhaps eventually both players can place their ships anywhere within the system at the start of combat.

If attacker has some sort of stealth advantage he would get to place his ships after the defender (but still within his area). I'd say that becuase we have such a large combat map a Fog of War should no be included.

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#60 Post by miu »

Geoff the Medio wrote:
miu wrote:I could see both order and execution phases implemented in same 3D-view
I'd always assumed it would be like Baldur's Gate battles, or any tactical RTS, except that you can only give orders while paused. How else would it be done?
I havent played much in multiplayer, dont know how things work best. that sounds reasonable.
A bit off topic, but I'd suggest that we design the interfact to not have any "info screens". All needed info should be visible on the main interface screen. Combat speed issues, especially in multiplayer, would suggest that anything relying on flipping between different info screens would take waaay too long.
Bad choice of wording. Idea was that there are little bars/condition reports on top of ships/fleets.some kind of UI tell their condition, and these could be turned on/off.
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