Shroud of War

posted on November 24th, 2010, 5:26 am

I think that it would be great to have moons visible under fog of war, possibly as a separate setting from shroud. I don't care much about nebulae or other map features, moons are the ones that screw me up on new maps, especially when I spend thirty seconds sending my constructor two different directions to find my base dilithium moon and end up with a screwed-up build order. Expansion-hunting is more common than trying to find my base moons, and it is about as important.

posted on November 24th, 2010, 10:17 am

I've played a few RTS wherein shroud could be removed via tech upgrades, or shroud was on w/o fog of war. As much as I liked that style, it would be a horrible implementation for FO, simply because you can see what your enemy is building by clicking a yard. The games where the above worked well were coded so you didn't know what was being built until it completed.

As for seeing moons/nebulas/space objects from start, that would be great. Looking at the minimap before launch is helpful, but in a very limited way. As Neb said, moon hunting isn't easy. Even if I "know" from the minimap where a moon is, it's easy to get confused and pass just far enough that it's still shrouded, especially on a large map. The human brain just doesn't translate the distance and scale effectively enough. It's like looking at a map and navigating through a forest. If you've done it your whole life, great; otherwise, you're going to have trouble matching the scales to each other.

posted on November 24th, 2010, 11:23 am

In A2 and FO, "Shroud of War" is unexplored terrain.  "Fog of War" is everything outside sensor range.  So having shroud off would basically make the map pre-explored, but it wouldn't allow people to instantly see the whole map and know what their opponent was building.

The purpose of this is to make players know where expansions are, so I wouldn't mind making it only apply to moons.  But with that said, I don't see a reason not to do the whole map, either.  I mean, the same thing applies - experienced players know it, new players don't.  In this case it just isn't as much of a hindrance to new players.

posted on November 24th, 2010, 1:37 pm

I think playing with the shroud off is even harder for me.  I like to know where I have scouted at least some point in the game...  It also helps me know where my ally has scouted...

The solution to your problem is to just play more games.  The first couple on a map are hard; there is nothing wrong with that!  Losing games is not bad either!  It will happen!  Best to learn from mistakes and gain map experiences.  After two games, most map secrets are easily found.

posted on November 24th, 2010, 2:35 pm

Why would it matter to know where you did or didn't scout?  I can see that it could help if you're looking for enemy expansions or something, but you should be going and rechecking those anyway.  Other than that I can't think of anything.

posted on November 24th, 2010, 2:59 pm

It's hard dealing with so much of the map explored because it's difficult to remember where exactly you explored later in the game - that's at least most of the problem for me 

posted on November 24th, 2010, 4:40 pm

Later in the game, won't you generally have most of the map explored anyway?

posted on November 24th, 2010, 6:04 pm

Not for me at least - I only explore the bare minimum of what I need to - checking out corners where ships/fleets might be hiding, resource areas. If I don't see my opponent moving somewhere (presuming I haven't missed it), no need to waste time exploring that location. Fully open maps bewilder me and make it difficult to know where exactly I explored, especially in team games (since the map is larger, and you may not remember which resource moon sets you did explore). 

posted on November 24th, 2010, 6:43 pm

But why would it matter that some of the map is unvisited by your ships, then?  Are you worried about hidden bases or something (because those can be built on places you previously explored anyway)?

posted on November 24th, 2010, 6:46 pm

Doesn't the shroud prevent Warp-In from being sent to unexplored areas? That could be a point in its favor.

posted on November 24th, 2010, 6:49 pm

The game still knows where the player hasn't explored yet.  But you do have a point.  (I believe that some aspects of warp-in are being redone, though, and the idea to limit warp-in to visible locations seems to be popular when it's suggested.)

posted on November 24th, 2010, 7:31 pm

Doesn't the shroud prevent Warp-In from being sent to unexplored areas? That could be a point in its favor.

Most fed players just scout out the map anyways for this reason. Shroud doesn't really hurt warpins except by making them sometimes have to come from a nearby area, which is arguably better to do if built ships are being sent to meet with the warpins.

posted on November 24th, 2010, 7:34 pm

Not for me at least - I only explore the bare minimum of what I need to - checking out corners where ships/fleets might be hiding, resource areas. If I don't see my opponent moving somewhere (presuming I haven't missed it), no need to waste time exploring that location. Fully open maps bewilder me and make it difficult to know where exactly I explored, especially in team games (since the map is larger, and you may not remember which resource moon sets you did explore). 

so you keep your map exploration to bare minimum... but the answer to not knowing where everything is , is to explore the map?

thats pretty much shows my point. if you look at most youtube replays scouts are at enemy bases in less than 45 seconds, they go straight there. however if you had to go explore the map first to find your exps your losing time knowing where the enemy exp is etc.

This becomes a factor because i would be this community has more experience people playing than new people playing. so its not like 50 percent knows all the maps and 50 percent doesnt. its more like 80 percent knows all the maps and 20 percent doesnt.

posted on November 24th, 2010, 7:40 pm

There's a map preview for a reason as well .

Going straight to the enemy base is needed to check build orders, but is not absolutely necessary at the start - the youtube replays cover a small fraction of actual games, and thus a very small proportion of played maps - a lot of time, skilled players still have to scout for their expansion moon pairs.

Transwarp also needs shroud uncovered.

posted on November 24th, 2010, 10:24 pm

I don't remember transwarp even being in FO.

Anyways, would you be severely inconvenienced by the fact that shroud was off?  The only things it would affect, I think, are warp-ins and apparently transwarp (because you wouldn't necessarily know where you'd actually explored or not), but in my experience people will send scouts to the places where they want to warp in ships anyway (to see if the enemy has an expansion there, etc.).