Alex, will ships flee battle at some point? I'd hope the AI nurses and commits its resources more carefully once the strategic layer is hooked up to the tactical, rather than a constant spamfest. In most wars, there are only a half dozen large fleet actions: Pearl Harbor, Coral Sea, Midway, Guadalcanal, Leyte Gulf... the rest is build-up, maneuvering, and skirmishing.
Yeah, AI will retreat. In fact, retreating already works, but the enemy admirals don't know about it quite yet, though they will soon
To retreat, ships have to run away off the combat map after being given a retreat order. After the battle, if their side loses, the retreated ships have a chance to be captured by the enemy. The chance depends on the type of battle - for example, if a defending side's ships retreat, the chance is low (to represent a more orderly retreat by a side focused on defense), while an attacking side's retreated ships have a higher chance to be captured (to represent the relative chaos and lack or organization of an all-out attack). Of course, if you win, your retreated ships just rejoin your fleet - so it's a good way to save valuable ships from destruction.
As far as few battles vs spamfest, I think there's a balance to be found there. After all, a lot of the game is about the battles, so we don't want to avoid them *too* well. On the other hand, the AI blindly sending ships to their doom would be annoying and even immersion breaking. I think getting it just right will involve lots of playtesting.
Having the AI strategically withdraw would be interesting, especially if them withdrawing now means the next encounter is even harder (to a point, since eventually they'll run out ships to run back to). Or at least harder than it would be if you just obliterated the fleet.
Right! And on the flipside, it's a way for you, the player, to survive a lost battle.
sage advice from Firgof Umbra
as a consumer price does have an impact on my buying decision in several ways. I felt that Star Ruler (its £16 i think, i was when i bought it) was a very fair price for its quantity of content.
other space games;
Gratutious Space battles: if you dont get it in a sale and with all the addons its over £25, but doesnt match the same quality as an A list game - over priced
Distant worlds: has come down abit i think, now about £22, slightly over priced but not too bad, as it has alot of content, visually its along way off games in a similar price band though.
AI war: i Havnt bought yet as im not sure its worth the price, i had mixed impressions after the demo, is about £25 with all expansions. (i have an obsession in getting the expansions with the game if they exist).
Flotialla: i bought this in a sale for £3, i think its worth slightly more than this, £6 would have been fair imo, as its good short game but doesnt have enough content to push through to £10.
in my view £1-8 is a mini game that will last a about 5-30mins per play, and i may replay upto ten times if its good. £8-18 is what id expect to pay for an indie. The higher the amount, the more content and greater replayability. £18+ means this game is competeting with niche A lister games such as paradox and stardock, £25 or more and your competeiing with Valve, or any other major developer and you must meet similar levels of quality imo. Its worth saying i never pay more than about £25 for a game, i usualy wait for A listers to drop in price.
Just from browsing images/videos and reading blerb starfarer looks to me like something id expect to pay more than £12 for but would have to be convinced to pay over £20. A demo will either convince me, or unconvince me, i might buy at £12-15 with out a demo, much over this and its less likley.
Thanks for the insight. I'll take where you put Starfarer on that spectrum as a compliment
The smaller fighter/bomber class vessels (or any actually), will it be possible to automate their behavior somewhat? Maybe just an order of what their order of targeting is? Say a squad of interceptors put on guard and has a preference of attacking bombers or other fighter craft first? This mostly if the game grows of course, so the player can concentrate controlling their larger spacecraft in major confrontations.
Funny you should say that. Interceptors (certain types of fighters are tagged as such) actually prefer fighters/bombers automatically, while bombers prefer larger targets like cruisers and capital ships. All typs of fighter wings also automatically go back to a carrier to rearm and repair if they are beat up too badly or are out of important ammo (such as say torpedo bombers after launching a salvo).
You're only directly controlling your flagship, by the way - with broad orders for the rest of the fleet, which is organized into battle groups.
Im personally interested in this game, reminds me of that one game that one company made, that was a text based RPG in space with a very well thought out storyline.
of course ive entirely forgotten the name of the game, but it was decent, and i played the hell out of it.
super nova?
nova?
EV Nova? That's not text based, though. Maybe it had a predecessor...
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Topic: Starsector [TopDown Sandbox RPG on Space] (Read 370718 times)