Design Projects - suggestion for a new design mechanic

[Rising-Sun]

I would agreed too, since this is 4x RTS and doesnt have time to switch back and fourth while making the perfect designs. Imagine if you were playing with other players.

[WiZz]

Shadow Tiger made a nice improvement to the optimized design interface, but this doesn't fix failed idea with optimized designs at all. These upgrade is for player, not for AI. If this templates would be located in empire politics for every races this makes ai design tactic very predictable and not interesting.

I have a dream about design system from MoO2 [&o] [&o]. There if ai had enough technologies it made effective designs, different every times. But I suppose that my dream never becomes real...

[Shadow Tiger]

WiZz, this idea would be used by the AI instead of optimized designs. What I'm proposing is essentially an empire policy level system. It would be empire wide, and work from game start up to the end game. As for being predictable, that's already the case when every empire uses the same designs.

I can't comment on MoO2, but I do know that you wouldn't have to define everything in the template. And honestly, how many coders did MoO2 have vs DW? I think we've gotten a pretty good game considering the resources involved.

[Tophat1815]

Shadow Tiger i love this idea and it fits with the game design philosophy. The player is the governmental leader not a shipbuilder,policy is the players scope of work. You brought us right back into proper focus! Thanks.[&o]

[Shark7]

ORIGINAL: Shadow Tiger

WiZz, this idea would be used by the AI instead of optimized designs. What I'm proposing is essentially an empire policy level system. It would be empire wide, and work from game start up to the end game. As for being predictable, that's already the case when every empire uses the same designs.

I can't comment on MoO2, but I do know that you wouldn't have to define everything in the template. And honestly, how many coders did MoO2 have vs DW? I think we've gotten a pretty good game considering the resources involved.

In truth, ALL game AI's are predictable. After all, they only do what they are programmed to do.

[WiZz]

If I had played a few game sessions with all races I could see what designs every (or most) race uses, their strong and weak sides, types of weapons on designs and etc. That I mean when told about predictable designs.
As for me, solving of this problem could be creating politics with no binding to defined race.
For example, Boskara in first game got design politics, which concentrating on torpedo weapon. And in second games they got next politics with missile weapon for example.
This method could be bring some surprise into game.

[Arcatus]

Very nice Shadow Tiger!

Very cool that others are picking up on and are improving on my sketch. It starts to look like something that can be seen in the game

[onomastikon]

I second this (or twelve it or whatever). I've been wanting something like this for SO LONG. GREAT!!!!

Only two things I would add:

Thing 1: Explicit Choice for "fuel type" (e.g. Caslon or Hydrogen)

Thing 2: some sort of "never" list, such as:

- /checkbox/ NEVER put in /DROP DOWN/ on this type. Common things I would put in here would be, for example, engines of a type I do not want, reactors, planetary bombardment, troop modules, etc.

[Shadow Tiger]

ORIGINAL: onomastikon

I second this (or twelve it or whatever). I've been wanting something like this for SO LONG. GREAT!!!!

Only two things I would add:

Thing 1: Explicit Choice for "fuel type" (e.g. Caslon or Hydrogen)

Thing 2: some sort of "never" list, such as:

- /checkbox/ NEVER put in /DROP DOWN/ on this type. Common things I would put in here would be, for example, engines of a type I do not want, reactors, planetary bombardment, troop modules, etc.

I actually considered Thing 1 on my mockup. Went the other route because the only time it really comes up is the mid-game. To stick with Caslon you have to ignore the final reactor, but I can see going that route.

For Thing 2, I mentioned in my later post that it was something I'd forgotten to add to the mockup. Though the way I figured it most of the things you'd want on the list of 'never use this' would be accounted for. It's the weapons, shields and a couple other things that would need a specific list.

Oh hey, now that I look at it I see I also forgot to have the whole 'engine emphasis' idea I'd had. Plus a couple other things I had in my notes.

Thrusters (higher thrust, lower power req)
Beams (range vs power vs phasers)
Torpedos (range vs power)
Missles
Rail Guns (mix types, use only latest?)

[Arcatus]

As to determine how much space to reserve to weapons - I don't think it needs to be defined:

Ship size is set to 400
Engines, generators, shields, lifesupport, and all the other stuff a ship needs uses 300 space to reach defined output levels.
That leaves 100 space for weapons.

KISS right?

[Texashawk]

This is great. Fantastic, even.

My $64,000 question, however:

Does Matrix/Eliot know/care about this?

[onomastikon]

ORIGINAL: Shadow Tiger


I actually considered Thing 1 on my mockup. Went the other route because the only time it really comes up is the mid-game. To stick with Caslon you have to ignore the final reactor, but I can see going that route.

For Thing 2, I mentioned in my later post that it was something I'd forgotten to add to the mockup. Though the way I figured it most of the things you'd want on the list of 'never use this' would be accounted for. It's the weapons, shields and a couple other things that would need a specific list.

I can see what you mean. However: I actually LIKE to have 2 routes and keep all my civilian ships with Caslon the entire game, and switch my entire military to Hydrogen mid-game, for refuelling logisitic purposes. Hence I would like to separate.

Sorry I missed the mention of Thing 2 in your previous post.

Any chance you can consolidate your great ideas and some of the addenda in one last Grand Unified Mockup (GUM) and have this sent Special Delivery to Elliot?

[Shadow Tiger]

Alright onomastikon, I just finished a revised mockup to clean up all the ideas so far. You'll probably like the fuel type preference. [8D]

Folks will notice I did not add a 'never use this component' option this time around. The only spot I can think is for an option to not use a specific weapon type. And the way this should work is that if you choose specific weapon types the design will never use anything but that (or maxxos if not available). Basically the idea is build into the design policy.

I also removed the image because most of the time it will be determined by role then never change.

edit: tweaked the mockup to add (by role)

[Shadow Tiger]

So what good is a Design Policy interface without a way to manage lots of them easily? How about this? [:D]

[onomastikon]

Thank you.
To be honest, I think this is brilliant.
My only worry is that CodeForce / Elliot might believe he has invested too many resources into the static "optimum design feature" strategy to be willing to attempt going this route. I'd dearly love to hear some non-commital feedback from CodeForce / Matrix, drop-down choices could include:

- Thanks, but absolutely unfeasable (optional: give a reason or reasons)
- Thanks, but I think it's too much work, sorry
- Thanks, I will look into this some time next month and give you some feedback then
- Gee this looks very promising, I'll consider seeing what I can do
- Great, let me see what I can do
- Can you help me program that for free?

[ehsumrell1]

ORIGINAL: Texashawk

This is great. Fantastic, even.

My $64,000 question, however:

Does Matrix/Eliot know/care about this?

Hello Texashawk;

I am one of the beta testers for Elliot and the Distant Worlds series. Before this goes any
further I just want to make one thing known. I'm not sure how often you've surfed this forum,
but if you have over time, you would know that Elliot takes ALL comments and ideas mentioned
here VERY seriously. So do us beta testers.

In most cases, the many improvements that have occurred in the latest expansions to DW have been
due to ideas from 'serious' forum members as well as players of the game. As a small example, the
creature contest (why we have the SilverMist) was open to the public. Also, fighters and carriers,
influence spheres, and other features have been implemented into the game from public ideas.

I apologize if I seem a bit biased toward Matrix (I AM). But to finish my response to your
$64,000 question. The answer is an emphatic YES Texashawk! As a matter of fact. I personally
sent a PM to Elliot bringing this thread and its idea to his (and Erik's) immediate attention. He
has responded back to me and although I won't disclose the conversation, I will say he was very
positive.

I will close by saying one of my favorite ditties when it comes to subjects like this. "The needs
of the many, outweigh the needs of the few.....or the one!" Keep coming with the FANTASTIC ideas
forum members and game players. WE ARE trying to make Distant Worlds one of the BEST 4X space games.
Thus ends my $64,000.02 answer.

[ASHBERY76]

Elliot has already listened with free features like Sphere and colonizing range options.At some point work on the next expansion has to commence.

[Shadow Tiger]

ORIGINAL: ehsumrell1

I apologize if I seem a bit biased toward Matrix (I AM). But to finish my response to your
$64,000 question. The answer is an emphatic YES Texashawk! As a matter of fact. I personally
sent a PM to Elliot bringing this thread and its idea to his (and Erik's) immediate attention. He
has responded back to me and although I won't disclose the conversation, I will say he was very
positive.

Shiny!

Thanks for that juicy little tidbit, it's good to know this got a very positive response.

For those who are wondering if they can have this added in right now. Keep in mind that even if Elliot were to drop everything and work on just this, it still wouldn't see the light of day for at least a month or two. For all that it looks to be a fairly straight forward thing to add I can think of a few things that wouldn't be so easy.

Rewriting part of the AI ship design logic to follow this correctly comes to mind.
How to make these screens easily accessible.
When does the AI generate new designs (when there's new tech, but when else).
Prototyping it to flesh the idea out fully (including rules for 'if this, do that' etc).

I tried to make it relatively KISS both for the user and the AI, but that leaves plenty of work. On the other hand I can't think of another game that's taken a similar approach to ship design. It's a pretty elegant solution in my not particularly humble opinion.

eta: The above time estimate is utterly, completely, totally my random guesstimate that was pulled from the hinterlands of my fore brain. It in no way shape or pastry involves actual data from sneaking over and checking on the devs.

[WiZz]

As for me, not all features, that implemented in game from forum ideas, were great ideas. Many questions about useless of sphere of influence, about radius of colonization *special facepalm from me for this feature, thank God, we can turn it off* and at last customized designs. And I don't see, that play with this feature became (will become) more challenge and interesting. AI was weak and it stays weak. So, we come to the main question: for what customized designs were implemented?
About work above. No doubt, nice work and it will become a new one more instrument/exploit, that let to beat AI with comfort and without hard work.

[Falokis]

ORIGINAL: WiZz

As for me, not all features, that implemented in game from forum ideas, were great ideas. Many questions about useless of sphere of influence, about radius of colonization *special facepalm from me for this feature, thank God, we can turn it off* and at last customized designs. And I don't see, that play with this feature became (will become) more challenge and interesting. AI was weak and it stays weak. So, we come to the main question: for what customized designs were implemented?
About work above. No doubt, nice work and it will become a new one more instrument/exploit, that let to beat AI with comfort and without hard work.

I disagree. If you can set a policy for each race, like the idea in this thread, the AI should be putting out much better ships. Most of the time when I whip the AI, it is due to having better designs. Just doing the optimized designs (from the other thread) for a few races made the AI much harder to beat.