Matrix Games Forums

ORIGINAL: Shark7

The fix is rather easy actually.

You cap each ship roles size, then make each successive size ship exponentially more expensive.

So if we compare a frigate to a cruiser:

Frigate is size 230 at cost factor x 2, where a Cruiser could be size factor 920 at cost factor x 8. That way the cruiser is 4 times as powerful, but at 8 times the cost...you'd still want to build a few to counter larger enemy ships, but you'd also build a lot more frigates due to their lower cost.

The problem is..., like the other 4x game, that when you have research cruiser; destroyer and Frigate role in military will be void. You will tend to use the bigger ship as your main military combat ship.

It is also true to Distant World. I saw somebody show his / her ship design (fast ship, fire ship, etc) that have 800 size (rather than 150 or 200 ship size).

The reason is simple, Shield and the 360 degree weapon fire.

In real world, big ships always require escort. Because whatever they do, or whatever equipment they have, big ships always considered as easy target by the enemy. Thick armor can't help the ship to survive torpedo / missile attacks alone. But because of "Shield feature" in most 4x games, this problem become void. Big ship can always bully small ships. They can even single-handedly destroy a squadron of small ships without the help of escorts.

I'm not against shield feature. But, in most 4x games, shield is not considered as a kind of force field. It require no power to maxed it's potential capability. So... Shield is... and always is considered as an armor that has big HP. Plus, maneuverability of your ships won't effect the targeting ability of the opponent, thus make the need of fast / high maneuverable ship need become void.

Edit :
So, what about this idea (I don't know if it's work or not) : When a ship is not in combat, it's shield will work only at 1/4 power, and need the usual constant power like usual. But when it go to combat, it will take the free power from reactor to maximize it's shield potential. If by then the reactor lacks of power to empower all of it's combat feature (weapon, speed, and shield), then only of one them that can be activated (well, weapon always go first, so, you have two choice. To balance the number of weapon and shield of your ship or you get only 1/4 of your shield power.

To limit the number of reactor for a starship, you can always increase the need of fuel for each reactor and add the weight for it.

ORIGINAL: jalapen0

ORIGINAL: jpwrunyan

ORIGINAL: jalapen0

I think smaller ships should at least get a defence bonus. It should be much harder to hit a small ship vs a giant capital ship.

Why on earth do you assume that is not already the case? Have the developers stated otherwise?

Why on earth do you think it is?

I haven't seen any mention of a "small ship defense bonus" on the forums, either.

Ok smart guys, riddle me this:
I believe it states in the galactopedia that there are "other factors" used to calculate to-hit bonuses. What do you suppose those are? I suppose they are logical things like size, distance, and speed. I think that is a safe assumption because, well, like every war game ever factors those elements into to-hit bonus in every combat system since the stone age. Just an assumption, yes, but a logical one. So again why do you assume otherwise? As a particularly ingenious person once said: "have you the brain worms?!"
Or do you know something I don't? Cause you havent said anything yet.

Your brain: use it. Good things will happen. I promise.

This post may contain snark. Reader discretion is advised.

Brainsucker the power of small ships is that there are many of them.

Early game I have several times had the situation of having one destroyer defending a mining base from two pirate escorts. Often base destroyed (usually along with one pirate). If I had two frigates at half the price of the destroyer (and say 1/3 its firepower but still more than the escorts) the base would survive. Later game think about what happens if you have a single capital/death star defending a system with at least two targets (say mining bases) and I jump into system with two cruisers (say for simplicity sake half cost but only 1/3 firepower). I attack each target with one cruiser, you have lost one base. The other cruiser may take some fire from your capital but its smaller size will allow it to flee before it suffers any real damage since it is quicker than your behemoth.

Sure big ships are good. [:)] But smaller more numerous ships can cover more targets (offensive or defensive). Usually they are quicker and can outrun the bigger more powerful ships. Your death star is going to have a hard time destroying an escort when it can't catch up with it!

I like the way the system is now. I frequently build escorts for just that: they escort my larger ships (both civilian and military) and with their incredible maneuverability (and cheapness), they can often pester enough to keep my larger, more expensive ships, alive.
The "only" thing I find in need of improvement is, as someone else already mentioned, more diversification in naming, or rather simply more sub-roles under which we can save ship designs. A "dedicated carrier" or "dedicated troop transport" is useful in that its role is clear -- I can find them easily and use them accordingly. In a similar vein, I'd like to be able to save 4 or 5 further ship designs (no matter what the size, really) for certain tasks; while I won't have a "sub-hunter", I'd like to have a cruiser-sized ship with purely long-range weaponry, and one with ion-cannons, etc. to fit my needs.

I think the problem with ship types in DW is that DW does not allow for formations. Battles are more of a furball. Becuase of these, ships have to have a good balance of both offensive and defensive systems.

I am also violently opposed to instituting hard size and composition requirements for ship types, I generally build my Frigates about the same size as my Destroyers, using role as the differentiating factor. Specifically, my Frigates have crazy huge amounts of weaponry, especially Torpedoes, while my Destroyers have crazy heavy Armor. Cruisers are more balanced but favor armor, and Battleships have crazy huge everything. Also, once I get Battleships, I add Long Range Scanners to my Cruisers and make sure every fleet has at least one.

That said, I also support ship size being directly proportional to the accuracy of enemy weapons used against said ship. Bigger ships should be easier to hit.

This would then create a vastly more complex dynamic for ship creation, requiring one to make use of ships of all sizes to adequately cover all possible threats.

I honestly like the idea of ships size affecting the accuracy a lot.
Ships under certain size (under 600 - 800) would get bonus to evading fire. The smaller the ship the bigger the bonus. For example, ships of size 150 getting 30-50% evasion rate.
Don't know if big enough ships should get "penalties" in evading fire as they are too massive to dodge incoming fire.

Just my thoughts on this, but the idea is still great and I support it 100%.

Greetings fellow good humans
Main probem I can see lie into ccurrent classification.
Some people see this as role some as class size.
It leads to some sort misurdestanding.
Other problem is that with current state game favors bigger ships because of how shields and weapons working. Especially if you add fact that how construct cost and maintance works.
I think about some simple and plausible answers. This is one of them.
Make ships by classified by role and class.
So you have:
Gunships(former escort)
Frigate
Destroyer
Cruiser
Battleship
etc
and they are bound to size.
Say Gunships have max size 100(random number)
Frigate 1,5x
Destroyer 2x
Cruiser 3x
Battleship 4x
Where is the catch?
Construction and maintance cost is multipled too.
Which mean that when now if you bulid Destroyer 2x times bigger than gunship you pay 2x more(based only on used resources). With this system you will pay 4x more. Which make bigger ships much more costly to fund and make them more rare.
Also it should be allowed to construct big ships from the start. Better construction techs will just multiple allowed for ships space. Like tech multipler 1,2 will allow bulid ships 1,2X bigger. So you can bulid destroyer on 240size.
So you have class.
What about role?
Now it have very limited options. With double system possible options and designs grow in numbers.
Wanna small escorst? Bulid gunships and give them role escort.
Wanna bigger bulid frigate etc.
So examples for role.
Escort
Pirate hunter
Patrol ship
Attack ship
Line ship
Capital ship
Carrier
Troop transport
The roles are pretty obvius. I think.
It have one big problem. It needs gui modification and propably AI too.

In my opinion the current system is good and like Sylian said the alternative would limit the player too much.
The real problem is that building small ships is cost ineffective - you have to pay the maintenance or several hyperdrives, life supports, targeting computers  etc where in a single big ship you'd pay for those only once. However, that can by solved in a simple way. Instead of the cost being a simple multiplication o resources' prices times their amount the ship's cost should be:
(Ship's size/200[or some other number])^2 x Resource cost
Adding the squared ship's size to the formula for maintenance cost would make small ships much more viable.

Just my 2 cents [:)]