Idea for Neutralizing Special Abilities

Which race do you like most? What do you like - what you don't like? Discuss it here.
posted on January 18th, 2013, 2:36 am
What if capturing an enemies science lab meant that your units would be immune to whichever special attacks were researched at that lab. This would add a new dynamic since it would make them very important to capture but since alot of your ships would have to lower their shields in order to transport over you would be more vulnerable.
posted on January 18th, 2013, 10:18 am
i like the general idea. but it needs some balancing.

1) complete immunity is too much. partial resistance is more like it. and not for all specials either. like proximity torpedo for example, there would be no way to adjust to that, it's just a standard photon torpedo with a different way of detonating.

but a special like is bomb could be mitigated, it could halve the time of engine disablement.

2) make it so that when you capture the station, you get a research button for some of the specials, pushing it costs mostly time and a little supplies, for your science teams to figure out how a special works. only some research buttons would be available. eg hyperimpulse definitely wouldn't be, as it doesn't cause an effect on the enemy.
posted on January 18th, 2013, 11:22 am
Yeah I was just referring to attacks or specials that cause you to miss like the sensor blackout from the Canavral class. Basically anything that directly effects your ships systems somehow.
posted on January 18th, 2013, 2:12 pm
could this work for different teams?

the dominion send over changelings to spy for instance?
borg assimilate
feds scan the individual ships tech rather than the stations?
romulans sabotage?
klingons capture
posted on January 18th, 2013, 7:57 pm
I really like this idea, although basing it on stations will be somewhat worthless as by the time you're hitting the research stations, the game is generally over.

The opportunity to research improved resistance to certain special weapons should come from interacting with the individual ships. Capturing is one obvious way, but Borg are problematic, so perhaps some sort of "special forces" boarding party ability? (Or Changeling / Romulan Spy, and so on).

Whether this could be implemented in Fleet Ops though, I have no idea.
posted on January 18th, 2013, 8:26 pm
the research stations tech being harass-able (without out destroying them or assimilating)
could be a good introduction to the game as at the moment its the mining ships only or picking off the stragglers of fleets.
posted on January 18th, 2013, 8:30 pm
It could be useful on the station if there was away to force the research stations to be built in more exposed areas.

that would additionally add more map objects to the game.
posted on January 19th, 2013, 4:57 am
I kind of like how they did it in Sin of the Solar Empire where you had to build more research stations in order to research higher tech and they limited how many you could put around one planet to prevent everything being located in one area. Perhaps requiring more than one of each research station in order to research all the upgrades and limiting it to only one of each type of research station in an area would force people not only spread out but also to think ahead if they want to tech up as they will not be able to just throw all their resources into ships right away. It also prevents turtling to some degree because now you just can't have all your eggs in one location and build turrets up the wazoo.

For example if you build one science lab you can research the first 5 upgrades but in order to research the other 5 upgrades you will need to build another science station but it can't be near the first one. You could either try to hide it in the corner of a map or build it next to some mining colonies around moons and fortify the position.

It would also innoculate someone against a possible early rush and encourage building multiple ship types instead of just relying on their early super ship. Lets face it there are always going to be ships that are really good for rushing the opponents. Well if the other guy does a raid on your science station early on and gets the defense against whichever ship you have spent all of your money and pumping out that leaves you at a disadvantage because you only built one ship type to that point and now they have a defense against it. Of course it could backfire and the raid could end up dying and that guy would have wasted his resources instead. :) It adds a bit of luck to the equation instead of the same old build order that people tend to get used to. Right now I build nothing but Defiants when I get to that point but something like this that could neutralize their disable weapons special would make me consider producing some Excelsiors and Sovereigns etc.


Not sure what do to do about the Borg though as they have insanely high pop numbers on their ships. Perhaps instead of requiring the capture of the station maybe you just have to beam aboard a certain number of troops or kill a certain number of the stations troops to simulate raiding the station for intel.
posted on January 20th, 2013, 1:07 am
perhaps you could reward people for placing certain stations near other location other than just the starting base. putting a science station next to mining station for instance gains you bonuses of some sort.
reduced costs?
armor buff to mining vessels?
sensor buff?
defensive weapons buff? (advanced targeting abilities?)
small trickle of resourses?

stations next to planets could get
increased defensive stuff?
ship build time decrease?
trickle of supplies?

they could be bonuses to the local vasinity or global benefits..
giving good reasons for taking the risk of splittling your base around the map (and making it more harrasable)
posted on January 20th, 2013, 4:00 am
Bonuses sound good to. Although their aren't any planets. :P
posted on January 20th, 2013, 12:41 pm
also we could have research station next to any nebula grants research time reduction, as there is a ready supply of technobabble in the nearby nebula. trek's always played fast and loose with how interesting nebulae are.
posted on January 20th, 2013, 3:16 pm
I like the general idea, but since most players place it right next to their base itll get blown to bits shortly after you cap it. And if you are at the point you CAN take it, like its been stated before, the game is likely already over. And unless there were substantial benefit from building it elsewhere, there would be no reason to risk it. Also assuming your able to capture a station located not far from the enemy base, but far enough away to not get taken out by his space station, you would have a hard time keeping it alive as its right by enemy terrirtory. And liely you wouldnt have time to research anything before they come to take it out, or try to take it back. Unless of course you have superior forces, in which case the game is likely already decided. I suppose in larger 4 player games it could be more useful. Or maybe you could make it so the science station take up a tritanium moon, that way you have to decide if your initial set of moons will be for resource (which im sure most will be) then youll always find the research station by the expantion moon.
posted on January 20th, 2013, 3:26 pm
quote nathanj
"Bonuses sound good to. Although their aren't any planets. :P"
actually there are, they are lower down in the map out of the way so you dont have to fly around them (if you start a game then press the button in the top right hand corner that looks like an eye you will notice them alot more when you look around in that mode :) )

quoteMyles
"also we could have research station next to any nebula grants research time reduction, as there is a ready supply of technobabble in the nearby nebula. trek's always played fast and loose with how interesting nebulae are."

yeah i like that idea! the more reasons to utilize other things around the map the better.
perhaps depending on what type of moon/planet nebula you place a science station gets different benifits (so placing one science station next to you nearest planet then another next to a pair of moons then another next to a nebula to get all the different benifits (more upgrades, a 3rd level of shield research/3rd level of weapons research etc etc))
posted on January 20th, 2013, 9:16 pm
I thought you were talking about planets you could build around, like in the original game.

Anything that forces you to spread out is a good idea. If you get to a moon you can either build another starbase (more cost effective than turrets) or a science station and a couple of turrets for protection. The science station will be harder to defend since it doen'st have the armor of a starbase but it will increase your mining production allowing you to ramp up your fleet production more quickly. This could be even more valuable on maps with sparse moon populations. As has been already mentioned you could get a lot of different bonuses like faster firing turrets etc. as well. They could be dependant on the avatar you choose. The defensive avatar could get the bonus to turrets and nearby ships and the offensive avatar could get the boost to mining since that would be more important for them as they usually have the more expensive ships to build.

@Equinox thats why you have to make sure that you can only build one science station around each area. The idea is that you have to build more than one of each science station in order to research all the techs on that station ala Sins of the Solar Empire. The first station gets lets you research half of them and the second science station lets you research the other half. You can't build the second science station near the first one (like how many RTS games have build range limitations) so you have to move it away to another area. I wouldn't make it attached to a moon, I would just say that you have to have it far away that way someone can try and hide it in the corner of the map and hope that no one notices it. :)

For races like the Romulans and Klingons which have several science stations compared to the Feds only having two you could just require that they only need one of each type but they can't build them anywhere near each other.
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