Just A Few Thoughts About Rts Element
Post ideas and suggestions on new features or improvements here.
posted on December 10th, 2006, 9:51 pm
I've been a big fan of Star Trek Fleet Operations because it was such a major improvement over Star Trek Armada 2. This was especially in attention to detail and graphics. However, there must be more than eye-candy. There must be great dynamics in terms of gameplay for RTS games. On that note, I feel Fleet Operations is lacking. Here are some of my thoughts but I want you to know ahead that my argument of what I feel is missing in fleet operation is subtle like a sentiment or feeling which is why the flaws in gameplay are hard to describe and feel. I think it is hard to say that Fleet Operations does anything individually wrong but in the grand scheme of gameplay dynamics many different RTS philosphies are attempted to be incorporated which together provide disharmony. But I not say any solution to that or that I have any coherency to suggest here but instead draw upon the experiences of former RTS games especially Starcraft and Armada
Problems
1. Ultimately, many of the ship classes do not feel "unique". There is not much difference between monsoon and sabre class except in terms of damage and defense despite their different talents. In most RTS games, units possess distinct abilities over other units and which stack with other units to create unique attack forces (for ex. in Starcraft -> seige tank + marines + medics versus sunken colony + hydralisks + zerglings). We do not do this to any appreciable extent in Star Trek Armada 2. Regretably, we continue to rely on mass numbers and building the most powerful ships.
2. Most games feel too drawn out with an early stage of expanding early to conquer resources and fortifying defenses. While this is definitely something that occurs in many RTS games, it usually is just one strategy that can be pursued. In Fleet Operations, though, it is a necessity. This is because of the difficulty I feel in mounting an adequate task force to attack so early in the game. It is very difficult to destroy a construction ship with just 1-2 sabre starships before reinforcements come in and due to their closer proximity to their base from which to draw reinforcements from, they always inevitably win. However, like I said, many of the early units are the same in Fleet Operations, so it reduces back to numbers and brute force. Instead much of early as well as middle game is just spent defending while amassing forces. A consequence of which going back to (1) is that we just mass super units (excelsiors and sovereigns).
3. Most RTS maps actually allow a large portion of the map to be accessible with multiple routes to get to an enemy base. Unfortunately, the excessive use of asteroid belts have greatly limited actual free-roaming area. While chokepoints are used in RTS games, they are never so prevalent as they are in Fleet Operations. Chokepoints should just block access to much larger areas which may contain an enemy base but still leave enough area to stay out of enemy sight and give still considerable distance between you and the enemy. As it is now, it is almost impossible to assemble a taskforce anywhere outside your own base in preparation for an attack.
Solutions
1.
There remain very small differences between different starship classes, so we should scale-back the number of ships that can be produced and assign roles to them that are clear and distinct. A small task force, even if it's not all sovereigns and defiants, should still be a powerful force to be reckoned with under the right commander. This is what Star Trek Armada 1 proved. Defiants had pulse phasers to destroy destroyers, Sovereigns to take incoming fire, Steam-runners to lay down a devastating artillery barrage, and Nebulas as spellcasters.
We should also make units much more flexible and versatile in different roles. We need to give them powers which are meaningful. For example, the defiant should be able to lay mines, so that they can set up traps for incoming ships to gain an upper hand.
2. We must make it possible for games to end early on very quickly by making rush tactics not only feasible but advantageous many times. If, however, that is not possible. Then we should provide incentives for players to send their ships outside of their base frequently. One way to do this is to make capturing enemy ships and stations much easeir. In Star Trek Armada 1, players paid attention to capture such basic units such as birds of prey and defiants because they not only took away a unit from the enemy but added it to their own too. They also made expansionist players pay when they boarded their dilithium refinining facilities and their mining ships.
3. Unfortunately, space does not offer cliffs to seige from or rivers to attack safely from a distance with. However, Nebulas can be used more which would open up more space while increasing tactical oppurtunities. We should give them unique attributes that would allow us to play diffently. Red nebulas could continue to do significant damage to ships and act as a buffer early game to make it impossible to cross with smaller ships until stronger ones are possible. This also makes for interesting risk gameplay where medium ships could cross the nebula safely but be slightly damaged. Therefore, they would have to wait for repairs and their shields to regenerate, but they might be able to catch the enemy off-guard.
An alternative approach to red nebulas is to allow only certain ship classes to cross red nebulas. For example, perhaps only intrepid starships should be able to cross them without harm, opening up whole new strategies (which would be a reference to how voyager was assigned to explore the badlands b/c of its advanced neural packs).
Purple nebulas could also as a possible place to launch ambushes or seige from. This are essentially "cliffs" because the nebula obscures sensors as well as targetting computers until an enemy ship enters the nebula which would take time since approaching a nebula requires sub light speeds. At the same time, another ship would be required to act as a "spotter" for the rest of the fleet inside the nebula to fire outside the nebula.
Few More Comments:
-I only play single player against comp and only as federation so not all of the comments may apply to the other races (I love the unique feel to the Romulans).
-I realize that my limited experience may have limited me to miss quite a few more things I should appreciate about the game and I said I realize my argument might be more based more on look and feel than real concrete evidence.
However, I really don't feel much like playing it that much give it's current state. As one review said about Warcraft 3 "what you got to like about it, is it just feels right".
-Perhaps flagships like sovereigns should cost an exorbant amount but offer auras that give attack and defense bonuses like generals but not stack. Therefore, you would only really want one and this would prevent everyone from just building super ships.
-Choose gameplay over realism when it does make a huge difference and the sacrifice is not too big
I have lots of ideas and opinions, so I would be glad to talk to someone about these kind of things
Problems
1. Ultimately, many of the ship classes do not feel "unique". There is not much difference between monsoon and sabre class except in terms of damage and defense despite their different talents. In most RTS games, units possess distinct abilities over other units and which stack with other units to create unique attack forces (for ex. in Starcraft -> seige tank + marines + medics versus sunken colony + hydralisks + zerglings). We do not do this to any appreciable extent in Star Trek Armada 2. Regretably, we continue to rely on mass numbers and building the most powerful ships.
2. Most games feel too drawn out with an early stage of expanding early to conquer resources and fortifying defenses. While this is definitely something that occurs in many RTS games, it usually is just one strategy that can be pursued. In Fleet Operations, though, it is a necessity. This is because of the difficulty I feel in mounting an adequate task force to attack so early in the game. It is very difficult to destroy a construction ship with just 1-2 sabre starships before reinforcements come in and due to their closer proximity to their base from which to draw reinforcements from, they always inevitably win. However, like I said, many of the early units are the same in Fleet Operations, so it reduces back to numbers and brute force. Instead much of early as well as middle game is just spent defending while amassing forces. A consequence of which going back to (1) is that we just mass super units (excelsiors and sovereigns).
3. Most RTS maps actually allow a large portion of the map to be accessible with multiple routes to get to an enemy base. Unfortunately, the excessive use of asteroid belts have greatly limited actual free-roaming area. While chokepoints are used in RTS games, they are never so prevalent as they are in Fleet Operations. Chokepoints should just block access to much larger areas which may contain an enemy base but still leave enough area to stay out of enemy sight and give still considerable distance between you and the enemy. As it is now, it is almost impossible to assemble a taskforce anywhere outside your own base in preparation for an attack.
Solutions
1.
There remain very small differences between different starship classes, so we should scale-back the number of ships that can be produced and assign roles to them that are clear and distinct. A small task force, even if it's not all sovereigns and defiants, should still be a powerful force to be reckoned with under the right commander. This is what Star Trek Armada 1 proved. Defiants had pulse phasers to destroy destroyers, Sovereigns to take incoming fire, Steam-runners to lay down a devastating artillery barrage, and Nebulas as spellcasters.
We should also make units much more flexible and versatile in different roles. We need to give them powers which are meaningful. For example, the defiant should be able to lay mines, so that they can set up traps for incoming ships to gain an upper hand.
2. We must make it possible for games to end early on very quickly by making rush tactics not only feasible but advantageous many times. If, however, that is not possible. Then we should provide incentives for players to send their ships outside of their base frequently. One way to do this is to make capturing enemy ships and stations much easeir. In Star Trek Armada 1, players paid attention to capture such basic units such as birds of prey and defiants because they not only took away a unit from the enemy but added it to their own too. They also made expansionist players pay when they boarded their dilithium refinining facilities and their mining ships.
3. Unfortunately, space does not offer cliffs to seige from or rivers to attack safely from a distance with. However, Nebulas can be used more which would open up more space while increasing tactical oppurtunities. We should give them unique attributes that would allow us to play diffently. Red nebulas could continue to do significant damage to ships and act as a buffer early game to make it impossible to cross with smaller ships until stronger ones are possible. This also makes for interesting risk gameplay where medium ships could cross the nebula safely but be slightly damaged. Therefore, they would have to wait for repairs and their shields to regenerate, but they might be able to catch the enemy off-guard.
An alternative approach to red nebulas is to allow only certain ship classes to cross red nebulas. For example, perhaps only intrepid starships should be able to cross them without harm, opening up whole new strategies (which would be a reference to how voyager was assigned to explore the badlands b/c of its advanced neural packs).
Purple nebulas could also as a possible place to launch ambushes or seige from. This are essentially "cliffs" because the nebula obscures sensors as well as targetting computers until an enemy ship enters the nebula which would take time since approaching a nebula requires sub light speeds. At the same time, another ship would be required to act as a "spotter" for the rest of the fleet inside the nebula to fire outside the nebula.
Few More Comments:
-I only play single player against comp and only as federation so not all of the comments may apply to the other races (I love the unique feel to the Romulans).
-I realize that my limited experience may have limited me to miss quite a few more things I should appreciate about the game and I said I realize my argument might be more based more on look and feel than real concrete evidence.
However, I really don't feel much like playing it that much give it's current state. As one review said about Warcraft 3 "what you got to like about it, is it just feels right".
-Perhaps flagships like sovereigns should cost an exorbant amount but offer auras that give attack and defense bonuses like generals but not stack. Therefore, you would only really want one and this would prevent everyone from just building super ships.
-Choose gameplay over realism when it does make a huge difference and the sacrifice is not too big
I have lots of ideas and opinions, so I would be glad to talk to someone about these kind of things
posted on December 10th, 2006, 10:10 pm
oh yeah sorry I forgot I wanted to add in these other extra ideas. Unfortunately I don't know how to edit.
-create forward operations center with minimal defenses to repel one or two starhips and which would be cheap, easy to destroy, able to detect cloak, costing less than shipyards. Perhaps they could be upgradeable for more stregnth and defenses. These should also possess the ability to repair starships at a slower rate than shipyards while not possessing the ability to build ships. This would provide rally points for fleet operations while allowing starships to be repaired without having to travel all the way back to base. We can get rid of the newton class which by itself never portrayed star trek well. The engineering team from star trek armada 1 on the nebula should be given to another ship like the canaveral except in this case it should just restore engines and life support and maybe 1/5 of hp to allow it to travel back on its own legs for repairs. BECAUSE BUILDING SHIPYARDS WITH PHASER TURRETS seems so expensive and time consuming.
-bring back superweapons b/c it introduces more risk style gameplay where time has to be your friend if you want to win that way.
-create forward operations center with minimal defenses to repel one or two starhips and which would be cheap, easy to destroy, able to detect cloak, costing less than shipyards. Perhaps they could be upgradeable for more stregnth and defenses. These should also possess the ability to repair starships at a slower rate than shipyards while not possessing the ability to build ships. This would provide rally points for fleet operations while allowing starships to be repaired without having to travel all the way back to base. We can get rid of the newton class which by itself never portrayed star trek well. The engineering team from star trek armada 1 on the nebula should be given to another ship like the canaveral except in this case it should just restore engines and life support and maybe 1/5 of hp to allow it to travel back on its own legs for repairs. BECAUSE BUILDING SHIPYARDS WITH PHASER TURRETS seems so expensive and time consuming.
-bring back superweapons b/c it introduces more risk style gameplay where time has to be your friend if you want to win that way.
posted on December 11th, 2006, 9:50 am
No you have some really good points some of which are the reason im not playing Fleetops V3pr anymore because i just get bored of Mass ships when we play Mplayer
Hopefully someone will look at your suggestions and take them on board
Hopefully someone will look at your suggestions and take them on board
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