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[kytuzian]

If you want my suggestion, don't have players buy tech; just say you use all tech that costs 10,000 RP or less (there's a nice button to do this in SM mode). Trying to allocate research points just makes things more complicated and encourages over-specialization.

Yeah, I think that's a much better idea, at least in terms of ease of setup, but I might just go ahead and test it out with some specified amount of research points.

I'm interested. I agree in principle with Bremen's suggestion (component research should also be free), but 10,000RP is on the low side for a cutoff.

Yes I agree on the component research. We could also have different tournaments for different levels of technology:

• 10 000 RP - Low Tech
• 100 000 RP - Medium Tech
• 300 000 RP - High Tech

or something similar to those ranges. Not exactly sure what those numbers should be but I think you get the idea.

Also I'll start the list, so, Bremen, does that mean you are also in?

[Flying Dice]

But 300k RP cutoff is... like TL4-5 at most, less than halfway up the tech tree. 

--

My suggestion is to not use real stars, set the number of systems to around 200, and set spawn chance to 100.  If you start with 1-2 nprs you should find them within 8-10 points from your home.

I would, except I'm having a huge issue with tiny intervals in one of my games - 25 second intervals for literally many thousands of steps - so I'd rather just spawn one and be sure they won't create more.

You're actually better off starting without any and then turning spawn chance up to 100% whenever you open a new system. A from-start NPR will usually end up getting locked into lengthy conflicts with Swarm.

Also, never play with Invaders on unless you want a quick fight, because they will always kill a campaign with delays in the long run.

[kytuzian]

But 300k RP cutoff is... like TL4-5 at most, less than halfway up the tech tree. 

--

You're actually better off starting without any and then turning spawn chance up to 100% whenever you open a new system. A from-start NPR will usually end up getting locked into lengthy conflicts with Swarm.

Also, never play with Invaders on unless you want a quick fight, because they will always kill a campaign with delays in the long run.

I considered it high tech because it's the point that I'm just now starting to reach in my game so, naturally, I consider it high tech, what would you suggest? 1 million? I really have no idea.

Yeah I think I'm going to start up a new campaign because one of mine has the 25 second interval issue (no Invaders though), and one is going by 1 day intervals, which is kind of alright (with Invaders).

I also feel like the Star Swarm probably slows it down, so I'll probably do only precursors, with 100% NPR spawn chance? That sounds reasonable to me, but I'd like a second opinion if anyone cares to.

[Bremen]

If you want my suggestion, don't have players buy tech; just say you use all tech that costs 10,000 RP or less (there's a nice button to do this in SM mode). Trying to allocate research points just makes things more complicated and encourages over-specialization.

Yeah, I think that's a much better idea, at least in terms of ease of setup, but I might just go ahead and test it out with some specified amount of research points.

I'm interested. I agree in principle with Bremen's suggestion (component research should also be free), but 10,000RP is on the low side for a cutoff.

Yes I agree on the component research. We could also have different tournaments for different levels of technology:

• 10 000 RP - Low Tech
• 100 000 RP - Medium Tech
• 300 000 RP - High Tech

or something similar to those ranges. Not exactly sure what those numbers should be but I think you get the idea.

Also I'll start the list, so, Bremen, does that mean you are also in?

I might join if you don't get enough players, but don't count me in just yet. I'm actually considering a possible followup to your tournament, taking it to a more strategic level (sort of combining it with the battle scenarios I mentioned earlier).

Another thing you might want to consider for your tournament is minimum deployment times and ranges (with parasite craft being excepted if they're aboard a mothership, obviously).

But 300k RP cutoff is... like TL4-5 at most, less than halfway up the tech tree. 

Actually, 300k RP cutoff is T9 for most techs. It's Solid Core Antimatter drives, a tech which I don't think I've ever gotten to in a normal game.

10,000RP: Ion drives, Ceramic Composite Armor, 20cm Lasers
100,000RP: Magnetic Confinement Fusion Drives (Not Magneto-Plasma), Biphase Carbide Armor, 35cm Lasers
300,000RP: Solid Core Antimatter drives, Superdense Armor, 50cm Lasers

By my standards, 100,000RP is high tech; by the time I get there I usually have a sprawling interstellar empire and am on the verge of declaring a game "won."

[Flying Dice]

Whoops, yes, I think I mentally misplaced my decimal point there, my mistake.

That said, the scaling of RP is such that I would still only place that at the upper range of mid-tech; there are only four more drive techs above that, but the time to research them increases drastically even with a large, established empire. That's a good peg for the point where all of your tech is advanced enough that you can basically build anything and it'll be at least halfway efficient, and all the increases past it are mostly just refinements rather than the magical power spikes you get when your tech becomes good enough for useful missiles, fighters, PD, jump tenders, mine-layers, &c. (the most important being that your fuel efficiency is good enough for ships to move around for months or years without needing constant top-offs).

[Lord Shonus]

I'm in for a tournament, although I disagree on the research thing - I'd actually prefer to have to spend from a pool of RP, as I think that would make for more varied and interesting designs.

[Bremen]

I'm in for a tournament, although I disagree on the research thing - I'd actually prefer to have to spend from a pool of RP, as I think that would make for more varied and interesting designs.

In my experience, exactly the opposite. If you spend from a pool of RP, then there's a big advantage to uber-specialization; just all long range missiles and no PD, stuff like that. Making it everything under x RP means you can actually create varied designs.

[Flying Dice]

You're going to have the same problem either way, since anyone who knows what they're doing and wants to powergame is going to follow pretty much the same route. Though what you could do would be to have a category for non-missile fleets, since you can actually do a half-decent mix with E/KW.

[Micro102]

I think specialization should be encouraged. Don't want people ending up with similar ships. It's also the natural thing to do in-game, specialize to increase research efficiency. And with fleets, I'd say having all of the ships being one type of ship is too easy to counter.

[Flying Dice]

That's the thing, though, the nature of the game makes missiles naturally and overwhelmingly superior in nearly every situation. Just about the only way you might be able to counter would be with cloaked reduced-thermal ships, but that's questionable, as the stealth techs generally aren't good enough to let you close to E/KW range with an enemy with equivalent levels of sensor tech, provided they don't just slap on a lazy R100 active. Blocks of armor and shields aren't going to cut it, either, against a player who knows what they're doing with their missile ships.

Hence why I suggest barring missiles. There's at least enough room in the various E/KW types to make arguments for different things being viable against other players. No matter what limitations you place on missiles, allowing them to be longer ranged at all will let players build ships which can kite endlessly unless their opponent uses a ton of paper-thin super-light FACs. Fights like that would devolve into a battle of attrition to see whether they run out of ammo before they killed all the other guy's ships.

Missile v. missile engagements work, of course, but at that point it's just going to be pure missile combat with some point defense.

[Shooer]

unless their opponent uses a ton of paper-thin super-light FACs. Fights like that would devolve into a battle of attrition to see whether they run out of ammo before they killed all the other guy's ships.

Stop giving away my strategy.

[pondicherry]

I'm getting obsessed with this game... (and I don't know much (yet)...) I just can't read about anything else !!! All because of you guys, thank you kytuzian for recommend me those videos and the wiki is also extremely useful.

I can't wait to know all the things about this, and understand what are you talking about!

[kytuzian]

Yeah I think that missiles will probably be overpowered compared to the rest of the weapons. We won't really know what works until we try, so perhaps this Friday, a couple people will be free and we can just test out a couple battles? I'm thinking doing both the everything less than 100 000 RP and also trying giving out like 1 500 000 RP and just letting people spend, just to see if one ends up being more fun than the other.

I'm getting obsessed with this game... (and I don't know much (yet)...) I just can't read about anything else !!! All because of you guys, thank you kytuzian for recommend me those videos and the wiki is also extremely useful.

I can't wait to know all the things about this, and understand what are you talking about!

You're welcome, I always like to help out especially if more people get interested in the things I like.

[Flying Dice]

If you'd like my suggestion, I'd say that it would probably be best to do the "everything 100k on down" as the type which allows missiles, and the flat 500k as the no-missiles one.

The first setup means that you're not going to have anyone pumping most of their RP into missiles and supporting tech, so everyone should be at roughly equivalent levels, and the second gives people room to play around with different E/KW builds.

[Micro102]

I'm seeing a lot about limits on tech, but what about limits on resources? Would that curb the missile problem since you have to buy all the individual missiles?