[NGTM-1R]

You do realize that this is a mod forum and a thread about game balance in mods, right? You seemed to have gotten lost; I would recommend going here.

And I cast the choice as faithfulness to the original, to which you responded with much mod-talk. I recommend rereading what you were responding to.

You're not supposed to be a match for your opposition. You and your allies are supposed to be a match for your opposition. As far as I'm concerned, attacking a capital ship alone should be foolhardy and lead to a pilot's death. Fighters have strength in numbers. The more fighters there are, the better they fare. Fury's AI gives your wingmen a massive boost, to the point where the proper use of them can mean the difference between a successful mission and a very dead Alpha 1.

But again, that's not the way FS handles things or has ever handled things. The game and the genre lack the proper tools to enable a player to truly coordinate an attack on a capital craft as you describe or even to ensure enough fighters will make it to the point of contact to make such an attack! Do your capital craft run around without escorts? Do the escorts not have Fury's AI as well and thus match your own fighters so that you must fight them and take casualities? Just how contrived are you prepared to make things to ensure that your scenario plays out? Some missions broke their processes in FS2, but truly the classic FS player-vs.-capship battle of mods has always been that the player is the one who manages to make it through the fighter screen most quickly or had the most focus on his mission. And you want to penalize them for knowing what their job is!

And why are you so eager to dismiss my point about penalizing mediocre players? Do you just not want them here, or do you not care since it does not effect you personally?

[Woolie Wool]

You do realize that this is a mod forum and a thread about game balance in mods, right? You seemed to have gotten lost; I would recommend going here.

And I cast the choice as faithfulness to the original, to which you responded with much mod-talk. I recommend rereading what you were responding to.

But I don't consider the original way of doing things necessarily the best way of doing things, nor the way the FreeSpace universe (as it may be expanded by a mod author) will always operate. The one constant about weapons and warfare is that they are always evolving and changing. Weapons and tactics fall in and out of favor, the balance of power shifts. As far as I'm concerned, the "spirit of FreeSpace", looked upon from an in-universe perspective (I tend to look at sci-fi universes as a setting first and a game as merely an approximation of a setting), could be a very transitory state of affairs caused by the state of weapon and ship technology in the year 2367. The way FreeSpace is balanced changed dramatically between FS1 and FS2, given another generation it could change radically again; if it were to continue further in the FS2 direction, "scary capships" would be the result.

But again, that's not the way FS handles things or has ever handled things. The game and the genre lack the proper tools to enable a player to truly coordinate an attack on a capital craft as you describe or even to ensure enough fighters will make it to the point of contact to make such an attack! Do your capital craft run around without escorts? Do the escorts not have Fury's AI as well and thus match your own fighters so that you must fight them and take casualities? Just how contrived are you prepared to make things to ensure that your scenario plays out? Some missions broke their processes in FS2, but truly the classic FS player-vs.-capship battle of mods has always been that the player is the one who manages to make it through the fighter screen most quickly or had the most focus on his mission. And you want to penalize them for knowing what their job is!

Their job is (at least theoretically) to fight as part of a unit, because military forces do not act alone. Im fact. the tips that FS presents new users even reinforce this--one of them even recommends sending your wingmen in ahead of you and following them in once the enemy has engaged them. Even if many of them die, every turret or fighter shooting at your wingmen is one not shooting at you, and will buy you more time to start blasting turrets as quickly as possible. You could even FRED missions so that capship attacks are done in stages, with friendly small craft assets neutralizing heavy weapon turrets and pulling back to allow capital ships or a heavier class of bombers to deliver the killing blow. Sure, Alpha 1's inherent superiority over other entities in the game can be fun, but so is watching a combined arms strike unfold.

That's why I think "Nemesis" was Inferno R1's sole great mission. It was the interplay and cooperation of fighters, bombers, and capital ships that made the attack on the EASD Nemesis more memorable than anything else in the mod with the possible exception of the Gigas (which you only got to watch). I also liked the way the Nemesis herself responded, reacted, and retaliated in a way that seemed like her captain was actually trying to win a battle rather than sitting there throwing beams around.

And keep in mind that Alpha 1's coordination should only be on the wing or squadron level. Capital ship captains, flag officers, and Command (i.e. the mission designer) should be coordinating the assault as a whole.

Also remember that on difficulties below Hard, your wingmen with Fury's AI have better AI than enemies (if you use the wingman AI for your wingmen)--they will turn harder, fire faster, and behave more intelligently.

And why are you so eager to dismiss my point about penalizing mediocre players? Do you just not want them here, or do you not care since it does not effect you personally?

Most of these errors are not caused by lack of raw player skill, they are caused by improper judgment and poor choices.

[General Battuta]

All fluff points aside, it's been my experience that Fury's Elite AI on some warships simply breaks game balance. Even on medium, with that cushy .6 damage multiplier, survival against an Aeolus is too far outside realistic abilities to make the game much fun.

That said, it does require one to carefully disarm the warship at range with some of WiH's anti-subsystem assets, including the Uriel's Archer primary.  Which is an interesting dynamic I should maybe explore more. If the mission made it clear this strategy were expected, it could be fun.

The problem lies mostly with flak (and to a lesser extent with beams), though. I'm happy to slap the Elite AI on warships I want the player to stay away from, or on ships armed largely with blob weapons.

[NGTM-1R]

But I don't consider the original way of doing things necessarily the best way of doing things, nor the way the FreeSpace universe (as it may be expanded by a mod author) will always operate. The one constant about weapons and warfare is that they are always evolving and changing. Weapons and tactics fall in and out of favor, the balance of power shifts. As far as I'm concerned, the "spirit of FreeSpace", looked upon from an in-universe perspective (I tend to look at sci-fi universes as a setting first and a game as merely an approximation of a setting), could be a very transitory state of affairs caused by the state of weapon and ship technology in the year 2367. The way FreeSpace is balanced changed dramatically between FS1 and FS2, given another generation it could change radically again; if it were to continue further in the FS2 direction, "scary capships" would be the result.

The way FreeSpace is balanced changed dramatically between FS1 and FS2. The way it is played...did not. Your argument is therefore pointless. Yes mods have introduced new weapons, new tactics, but except for BtRL and WCS, they were things that could easily have been explored in or were very obvious extensions of things from FS2. No one, not Ransom, not CP, not Goober, not GalEmp, not Darius, has forced a new playstyle upon us as you wish to do. You can violate the conventions of a setting; and one of the enduring conventions of the FS setting is fighter superiority.

If you want to tell a story that is ultimately not a good FreeSpace story by violating the conventions of FreeSpace, that is your problem, but I'm pretty sure that's not something most of us are out to do.

Their job is (at least theoretically) to fight as part of a unit, because military forces do not act alone. Im fact. the tips that FS presents new users even reinforce this--one of them even recommends sending your wingmen in ahead of you and following them in once the enemy has engaged them. Even if many of them die, every turret or fighter shooting at your wingmen is one not shooting at you, and will buy you more time to start blasting turrets as quickly as possible. You could even FRED missions so that capship attacks are done in stages, with friendly small craft assets neutralizing heavy weapon turrets and pulling back to allow capital ships or a heavier class of bombers to deliver the killing blow. Sure, Alpha 1's inherent superiority over other entities in the game can be fun, but so is watching a combined arms strike unfold.

Which does not require scary capships. Starlancer managed it beautifully with decidedly less scary ones than FS2 has. If you want to illustrate combined arms, we already have more than enough for the means.

That's why I think "Nemesis" was Inferno R1's sole great mission. It was the interplay and cooperation of fighters, bombers, and capital ships that made the attack on the EASD Nemesis more memorable than anything else in the mod with the possible exception of the Gigas (which you only got to watch). I also liked the way the Nemesis herself responded, reacted, and retaliated in a way that seemed like her captain was actually trying to win a battle rather than sitting there throwing beams around.

Funny. You end up doing "Nemesis" more or less alone in the end.

And keep in mind that Alpha 1's coordination should only be on the wing or squadron level. Capital ship captains, flag officers, and Command (i.e. the mission designer) should be coordinating the assault as a whole.

And you still don't have the tools to do that. We have what, ten basic commands? Not very detailed? Sure you can stack them a little bit to give more complex orders but this is not a game that is set up to truly allow you to control a squadron-level attack. Also you're up there posisting assaults of squadron level just to take out smaller warships, and now you're saying that we have to rely on the AI to create anything better than that. That's not something that's gonna fly well in practice. That's not something that BP will want to be doing, either, if the missions I've tested are anything to go by.

Also remember that on difficulties below Hard, your wingmen with Fury's AI have better AI than enemies (if you use the wingman AI for your wingmen)--they will turn harder, fire faster, and behave more intelligently.

And the point about hostile warships with it stands.

Most of these errors are not caused by lack of raw player skill, they are caused by improper judgment and poor choices.

Player skill is inclusive of judgement. It is by definition something learned; a "skill".

[Commander Zane]

Put bluntly, scary capships break the game. FS is about the power and the dominance of the fighter. It always has been.

Put bluntly, I highly ****ing doubt FreeSpace is all about the dominance of the Fighter, otherwise you wouldn't have the ability to cooridnate wings.
What this means is that it's about dominance by cooridnation. Remove all the other fighters or bombers that you had command of, tell anyone that it's still about "dominance of 'The Fighter'" then.

[NGTM-1R]

Put bluntly, I highly ****ing doubt FreeSpace is all about the dominance of the Fighter, otherwise you wouldn't have the ability to cooridnate wings.
What this means is that it's about dominance by cooridnation. Remove all the other fighters or bombers that you had command of, tell anyone that it's still about "dominance of 'The Fighter'" then.

The existence of the message "There are no reinforcements available pilot, you're on your own." as an engine default invalidates your argument.

[General Battuta]

The question will always be 'is it fun?', followed very closely behind by 'is it cool?'

The sheer ROF you can get from a warship with the Fury AI is very cool. It could be used wherever it's also fun, but if it's not fun, it should go (and this can be decided on a case-by-case, mission-by-mission, ship-by-ship basis; there's no harm in gratuitous use of custom AI levels, special hit points, and weapon loadouts in a manner that totally defies reality.)

I think powerful warships are cool, and I think most people agree. So long as they can be made cool without restricting the player's ability to have fun, they can work. They just need to be gameplay enablers, rather than disablers. If you're stuck loading up on Stilettos every mission (like I ended up doing in The Procyon Insurgency) or resorting to Sushi-style disarm tactics, it might be a weeee bit much.

[Commander Zane]

Put bluntly, I highly ****ing doubt FreeSpace is all about the dominance of the Fighter, otherwise you wouldn't have the ability to cooridnate wings.
What this means is that it's about dominance by cooridnation. Remove all the other fighters or bombers that you had command of, tell anyone that it's still about "dominance of 'The Fighter'" then.

The existence of the message "There are no reinforcements available pilot, you're on your own." as an engine default invalidates your argument.

That's merely a moment of misfortune for the pilot, it has no effect on my arguement. Now if FreeSpace wasn't so easy that the player COULD single-handedly pass nearly every mission without any other support at the start, then there would be reason to worry about losing all your other fighters and bombers without having any other available support.

[NGTM-1R]

So basically you're saying it has no effect on your argument and every effect on your argument at the same time. Gotcha.

(Also what is with people screwing up quotes in this thread?)

[Fury]

I have this nagging feeling NGTM-1R won't like next stage of WiH beta much. But fredders could take it as a challenge, make him change his mind through first-hand experience.

Also remember that on difficulties below Hard, your wingmen with Fury's AI have better AI than enemies

That would be on difficulties below Medium, not Hard. Based on feedback that had been posted in the modding board, there doesn't seem to have need for penalties on medium. On the other hand there has not been many people testing easy and very easy, so penalties on those difficulties might be too low.

The only difference between friendly and hostile AI on those two lower difficulties are hostile penalties to turn and weapon fire rate. These two should be enough to give friendlies an edge when it is needed. On medium and above, both are on equal terms.

[Commander Zane]

So basically you're saying it has no effect on your argument and every effect on your argument at the same time. Gotcha.

(Also what is with people screwing up quotes in this thread?)

I don't know where the hell the sudden bust-in of the no reinforcements by Command remark comes from in the first place, or even the fact it's an engine default, I see no point in bringing it up, it's like you just blurted it out to say something.

I have this nagging feeling NGTM-1R won't like next stage of WiH beta much. But fredders could take it as a challenge, make him change his mind through first-hand experience.

Also remember that on difficulties below Hard, your wingmen with Fury's AI have better AI than enemies

That would be on difficulties below Medium, not Hard. Based on feedback that had been posted in the modding board, there doesn't seem to have need for penalties on medium. On the other hand there has not been many people testing easy and very easy, so penalties on those difficulties might be too low.

The only difference between friendly and hostile AI on those two lower difficulties are hostile penalties to turn and weapon fire rate. These two should be enough to give friendlies an edge when it is needed. On medium and above, both are on equal terms.

Maybe, since he wouldn't be able to single-handedly face any capital ship and win without quarrel.
I know I'm definately going to like the challange of your AI.

[headdie]

Already prioritizes bombs?  Huh, I need to start playing above Easy then.

Hmmm, do slash beams all insta-kill the player?  I can imagine that would break game balance (but also can't really imagine why they don't use them for anti-fighter use anyway).  Well, is there a way to have them go for subsystems instead of just scything wildly (assuming, of course, they do that.  I might just be missing it)?

having gotten between the hawkwood and Enif station lets just say i didn't survive

[c914]

First question that all of us should answer. Do we want to see nice looking bloody fight AI fight, or just give player opportunity to demonstrate his skills?

Answer to first part of question:
Give fighters, bombers more speed, manoeuvrability and high kick from thrusters. Also give AI ability to use them effectively that it won't charge cruiser from one direction (just like wings of bombers do). Give cap ships longer range defence where varied type of weapons had more varied (not just 500m difference) range.

Answer to second part:
Place him in front of Aeolus at Insane level

[Rodo]

I think Cap ships are always supposed to be scary, FS simply sacrifices this in order to induct the player into more "fun", still from my personal point of view if every ship has it's own purpose, then why the hell do bombers exist if you can actually destroy a cruiser with a simple fighter?

Anyways, I think cap ships should be scary, not deadly, just enough to make the player feel the rush when getting close to one.

[Fury]

Give fighters, bombers more speed, manoeuvrability and high kick from thrusters. Give cap ships longer range defence where varied type of weapons had more varied (not just 500m difference) range.

BP won't alter retail ships much and in turn new ships in the mod are equally balanced in their stats.

Also give AI ability to use them effectively that it won't charge cruiser from one direction (just like wings of bombers do).

While AI has been upgraded, it still won't do miracles. Not until someone completely overhauls AI code.

[NGTM-1R]

I don't know where the hell the sudden bust-in of the no reinforcements by Command remark comes from in the first place, or even the fact it's an engine default, I see no point in bringing it up, it's like you just blurted it out to say something.

The point is the game is literally designed to take into account your playing it solo. I'm sorry if that's lost on you, but it's not my fault you didn't see the obvious conclusion.

I have this nagging feeling NGTM-1R won't like next stage of WiH beta much. But fredders could take it as a challenge, make him change his mind through first-hand experience.

Hey I didn't mind M2

Spoiler:

NAME REDACTED haha sucker

except for the fact the gunships weren't apparently doing their job correctly because they needed specific orders on what to attack, not generalized disarms.

Also give AI ability to use them effectively that it won't charge cruiser from one direction (just like wings of bombers do).

You do realize that this is tactically the most rational thing to do if you're trying to overwhelm his defenses, right? Spreading out just lets him use more of his guns to fight you off.

[nuone]

In the Battle of Neptune it seemed as though the Karunas have a crap load of weaponry. In my opinion as long as the AAA weaponry is firing constantly, that would make for outstanding gameplay. It would also be nice if capital ships were not stationary, perhaps circling each other. Take cues from World War 2 and were good.

[Fury]

For those who have complained about gameplay differences in WiH in comparison to FS1/FS2, I'd like to make an analogy to old BSG vs. new BSG. It's essentially same thing, modernized. Fs2_open or mediavps do not have a chance to change gameplay, but mods do. We're taking that opportunity to explore our vast options. If it's fun, it will probably find its way to WiH. If its not fun, it's not used. Same goes to capital ship AI classes, should to prove to be detrimental to gameplay, they won't be used. But if the opposite is true, it will be used in moderation in key places to keep the game enjoyable regardless of whether said capital ship(s) is in your side or not.

[NGTM-1R]

For those who have complained about gameplay differences in WiH in comparison to FS1/FS2, I'd like to make an analogy to old BSG vs. new BSG.

I'm pretty sure nobody's actually done that.

[Commander Zane]

I don't know where the hell the sudden bust-in of the no reinforcements by Command remark comes from in the first place, or even the fact it's an engine default, I see no point in bringing it up, it's like you just blurted it out to say something.

The point is the game is literally designed to take into account your playing it solo. I'm sorry if that's lost on you, but it's not my fault you didn't see the obvious conclusion.

Which is the result of being such a piss-poor squad leader that you can't use Wingmen right, then you deserve being in the situation where you're alone and if capital ships could actually fend themselves against small craft with some effeciency like they should, the pilot deserves his imminent death. But no, the game's not designed to be done solo every single time. I don't know if you can decipher that but I for one would actually like to use the features that came with FreeSpace, that is, using my Wingmen to help accomplish the mission, not rush in alone and save the day a-la Superman.