The Next Generation

posted on December 15th, 2011, 1:40 am

I think the defensive ships taking fire first makes sense.  Just because we don't get to see it in game yet, just think of it as part of the maneuvering.  The defensive ships are in effect either placing themselves between the enemy and other friendlies, or maybe even extending shields to nearby ships.  If I recall, people have requested that this sort of behavior be possible.  We could all easily state examples from canon where a defensively strong ship moved itself inthe line of fire to protect a weaker ally.
 

posted on December 15th, 2011, 1:44 am

Gotta love the miranda 2 passive on the Monsoon. By the looks of things the gameplay will get a major overhaul which is a good thing because it levels the playing field between experienced and new online players.

I think i speak for everyone when i say that i can't wait to get my hand on the next version.

posted on December 15th, 2011, 1:59 am

hypotheticcly speaking, this means rediculus spams will be dead aswell, cuz all you'll need to do to stop them is throw a few super offensive ships in with a defensive fleet and they'll be dead. single unit spams will be immpossible to maintain anymore. in theroy though.

posted on December 15th, 2011, 2:21 am

I think what we need to remeber is that this is a redo.  While we can speculate on what may be, we really dont have a great idea on how things will interact.

The moonsoon is 25 defense, however for all we know it could now be a special warp-in ship.  However, for all we know, warp-in might not even exist at all... which could mean no galaxy..... and no saucer seperation.....   So really, anything could happen.

This patch is gonna be so cool.  I know you guys hate time questions, but I have to ask.  Are we talking about this patch taking over 12 months to be released or under?

posted on December 15th, 2011, 2:48 am

I suppose a couple people (myself included) are just nervous that the game will become over-balanced, like Warcraft III did.  The units were all so gloriously designed to work together that it reached the point where you could not win the game without using nearly every unit available to your faction.  I know it's a bad thing when it's too easy, but I actually like a game where you can build a lot of one type of unit and do okay.  To me it amounts to spending less brainpower on macro-play in order to focus on your micromanagement.

I'll probably get my head blown off here, as I've come to expect on this site, but it's my opinion and feelings on the situation.

I don't know what may have happened before I was a part of this community, but since I've been around I have never seen you mistreated in the slightest.  You show up and make callous, passive-aggressive remarks about our community and we defend ourselves fairly.  This comment itself is a jab that shows you consider yourself an outsider have no intention of being friendly toward us, so why should we try to be friendly toward you?  Friendship is a two-way street and all that.

In any case, the rest of your post was spot-on.  Nothing said in this thread can be taken too seriously, it's all wild speculation.  This is the first time we've had such solid feedback about a future release, and everybody's getting excited 

posted on December 15th, 2011, 2:55 am

I don't know what may have happened before I was a part of this community, but since I've been around I have never seen you mistreated in the slightest.  You show up and make callous, passive-aggressive remarks about our community and we defend ourselves fairly.  This comment itself is a jab that shows you consider yourself an outsider have no intention of being friendly toward us, so why should we try to be friendly toward you?  Friendship is a two-way street and all that.

I don't know why you have it in for me, but I am simply not going to respond to that. That's not what this thread is about!

In any case, the rest of your post was spot-on.

Thank you.

posted on December 15th, 2011, 5:06 am

Guys play nice in newsposts please cuz i dont like it when the news gets locked lol. Anyway wait till the new patch is released and just because it hasnt been said in a while the Soverign is way UP :p

posted on December 15th, 2011, 7:19 am

Very exciting. I'm very stoked about the showing of all pertinent information to the player.

I am super curious about the Defensive profile game mechanic. It almost certainly deserves it's own news post to explain how it will work. You guys (devs) are such a tease

I'm curious if a single Defensive profile ship will be able to 'Provide Cover' for an unlimited number of ships (within range) against an unlimited number of opposing ships (within range)?

I'm curious (now that I think about it) about how will range affect 'Provide Cover'?

I'm curious if a single Defensive profile ship at the maximum firing range of a Long Range opposing ship can 'Provide Cover' to a friendly ship that is within short range distance to the opposing (Long Range) ship?

If a Defensive profile ship is in the process of 'Providing Cover', will it have a movement aspect associated with it? (i.e. will the defensive ship jump in front of oncoming fire, like we saw the Ent-E do for the Defiant in First Contact?)

posted on December 15th, 2011, 7:26 am

Will the race redos include graphical updates?  Not neccesarily model wise, but explosions, weapons, how things break apart etc.

[Optec]

posted on December 15th, 2011, 7:53 am

Last edited by Optec on December 15th, 2011, 8:11 am, edited 1 time in total.

Yep. We will have many new abilities which get an array of new effects, but there will also be new vessels with new models and some of the older effects, like some explosions, might also get a facelift.

Removing the fog of the game mechanics is indeed one of the major goal of this redo. Players should consult the guide if they want to learn in-depth how the game works and want to become "progamers", but they shouldn't have to read it to freaking know what their vessels do! The "tag system" is very useful for us to explain the more complex special weapons. For example, you might have noticed that the tooltip actually says "Defensive Vessel", so you can actualy match to the "Vessel" part for any special ability that says "... and repairs two nearby friendly vessels". Okay okay, identifying a vessel might not be too difficult, but there are more relevant examples like "Station" vs "Platform" or "Yard" vs "Research". Speaking of abilities, we have also introduced a uniform tooltip layout, that helps understanding what an ability actually does without droping the Trek-lore behind it.


Another goal of the redo is to offer a wider array of options. So nope, you will not be forced to build any ship available. Instead, you have a far larger collection of available "builds" to chose from. But more about that in one of the next newsposts as we examine the new Federation tech tree and gameplay

//edit:
Oh, and i forgot: About the Sovereign. It's a bit hard for now to exlpain which profile it will have, as the SOvereign is now in a new role to better fit the image of a flag ship, like many players suggested on the forums. It's an interesting and powerful command flagship without becoming a planet blaster, like one would expect from a Klingon or Romulan dreadnought perhaps. It's still USS Sovereign, not USS Widowmaker Yet we are confident that the new Sovereign will fit well into the Federation image. But i will of course write a newspost dedicated to the Sovereign just for you!

posted on December 15th, 2011, 8:37 am

Does that mean the saber now uses multi target attack with hyper impulse?

The attack is a multi target attack, so it fires 4 beams at 4 independent ships?

or what is meant by "each 4 volleys"?

Neat, although I think my AI games are in for a real treat. lol. Right now early AI fed sabres are easy to deal with, (as klingons) one/two construction ships, 1 scout, mining station and a yard will deal two sabres easily. The construction ships and scouts cycle through yard while disabling one sabres shields, you use yard, mining station, and construction ship to transport and capture it. Then the other one falls just as quick. And bingo. You have yourself two new sabres.

The infamous weapon: the mining station and yard station duo transporter attack!

But a multi-targetting early AI sabre... oh dear. Whatever shall I do.

[ray320]

posted on December 15th, 2011, 8:53 am

Last edited by ray320 on December 15th, 2011, 8:55 am, edited 1 time in total.

But i will of course write a newspost dedicated to the Sovereign just for you!

Perhaps you could co-dedicate that post to saucer seperation.
*cough* I mean the galaxy class :angel:

Also, I like those new tooltips...

posted on December 15th, 2011, 8:55 am

This is great news guys, I am really liking the addition info in the tooltips, will make it just that much easier to play the game against a more knowledgeable player.

Thanks for the thought and hard work that you guys are dedicating to this update.

posted on December 15th, 2011, 9:05 am

Hehe, well:
Is there still Warp-In? Is there still a Galaxy Class? Is there saucer seperation?
2x yes, 1x no. It's up to you to arrange it

"Each four volleys" means that on every forth normal attack, the saber unleashes a light additional phaser volley on multiple hostiles. phew phew phew! I took Hyper Impulse as an example to demonstrate the new tooltips, as its actually among the most complex abilities.

posted on December 15th, 2011, 10:41 am

Hehe, well:
Is there still Warp-In? Is there still a Galaxy Class? Is there saucer seperation?
2x yes, 1x no. It's up to you to arrange it

I'm gonna guess, yes for still warpin, yes for saucer sep, and no meaning galaxy is removed forever. Saucer sep must therefore be a feature for another ship... I wonder which.