Some balance suggestions

[Cristao]

Peeps - just play the game first time and learn the tricks. Then try a second playthrough and learn more tricks. This is my second playthrough and I will most likely start my third in Q4 this year.

Is it me or are people beginning to whine? This is not meant to be an easy game. You want easy - create a god mode ruleset and play!

[Arthanor]

That's a ridiculous statement. Nobody wants an easy game.. What is seeked by everybody here, I think, is good balance between all the game elements, so that it isn't about replaying to find more exploits, but about replaying to try different, equally viable tactics.

No need to insult anybody by insinuating that they are whiners and/or need to cheat to succeed...

[Cristao]

Arthanor - I am not insulting anyone especially on creating god mode rulesets. I played through XPiratez the first time doing that to get a feel of the game.

[Eddie]

The goal of good balance is to give every item a use and diversify gameplay. In vanilla, you have an interesting starting loadout of weapons. They are well balanced against each other. You even have different ammo for some weapons. There is no "best weapon" or "best ammo". You have a combat situation where one weapon is more useful than another, but in a different situation a different weapon will be most useful.
Unfortunately, this situation lasts for two missions. Then everyone gets laser rifles. A bit later everyone gets heavy plasma.

We mod because we like diversity.

[BetaSpectre]

I never really got away from a pretty basic layout where everyone has rifles. Its just that tactically I want to prevent friendly fire, collateral damage to civies/destroying loot. The most practical solution would be a single accurate powerful round to take out enemies.

With high reaction fire set for each door even if an enemy storms in by opening a door they're usually stunned by suppresive fire or taken out in the reaction shots.

I use grenades early game because the rifles aren't tough enough, but when they do get tough enough I rarely find myself using anything else. Like using the Euro las gun, or Bozar/Bossar

If I know I'm up against etherals I generally use smart rifles or just harpoons. Sometimes I just drop weapons at the end of each turn.

[Eddie]

The skillbased primitive weapons would be a lot easier to balance if there was a way to cap the scaling.

For example, the fuso knives could be:

Code: [Select]

damageBonus:
   throwing: 0.9
   maxthrowing: 70

This would limit the throwing skill considered for damage calculations to 70 and thus cap damage at 63. Then you can have a strong scaling without having to to worry about things like the amazon armor that boost throwing skill by 20 to a maximum possible 110 (and then ridiculous knive damage of 100). Also bows could have a strength based damage, and better bows are different in that they have a higher skillcap that is used.

[Dioxine]

What would be the point of having the amazon armor then. This might be 'balanced' but a fun-killer IMO.

[Eddie]

You could preserve the fun of the amazon armor by allowing it to modify the skillcap. maxthrowing: +20 or something like that. The same mechanism could be used as a penalty for heavy armor. maxthrowing: -20.

[Dioxine]

wut

[yrizoud]

(edit: I misunderstood. Eddie's last post means that an armor could let a character use higher stat caps on weapons which use stat multipliers.)

[Bloax]

That sounds like it could get really fucking complicated really fucking fast.

It's not an issue for a turbonerd like me, but the numbers game has already gotten really heavy.

[Dioxine]

And an useless complication at that. What practical purpose would that possibly serve?

[BetaSpectre]

Personally I don't think metal knives should ever do more damage than the holdout pistol. Even if you were the hulk throwing a knife would be dodgy at best compared to any gun.

Throwing IMO should be for future plasma knives, and grenades.

Heavy armor limiting throwing wouldn't make sense if the strength was modified as well IMO. Personally I'd like to see a larger variety in the factions. Like base assualts looking different depending on what race holds the base. Like spartan bases having a certain open military camp gibe. For reticulan bases to be trading post/towns.

Maybe for those who have too much time have manual shipping where things are shiped using aircraft to move to a location, trade/buy then deposit upon return. With all the contacts being locations on the planet. That if attacked or destroyed by the player would disappear but also be looted.

[Dioxine]

1. Yeah it's NINJA SKILLS of hitting the enemy in the throat or the eye, instead of just firing in the centre of mass. Or something like that. It's a simulation, but obviously not 1:1 simulation. But ninja weapons do add something unique gameplay wise, so they'll stay.

2. The throwing penalty on the heavy armor is mostly because of grenades and bows, not knives.

3. You're welcome to find any mod which has more faction variety. It's not my ill-will but I only have a single life.

4. It has been discussed. It's a good idea but way impossible in this engine.

5. Do you really think you could simply 'take out' the Eurosyndicate? Lol. But yes, in principle it does make sense (but again, way impossible).

[BetaSpectre]

If I ever learn how to mod I'd be doing alot tweaks xD! I just never thought of it like that lol.

I was thinking less about destroying the entire syndicate (at once) but like assaulting specific bases/towns/cities. But it would be pretty suicidal xD (I'm thinking a multistage mission with like 8 maps, and high tiered troops)!

If I had enough skill and time I could imagine it like the two stage final mission. Where multiple maps could be linked during the attack.

So far I've been mind controlling drones and random things to see how they play out. Then changing the stats of a few items/things. So far its been fun xD. Awesome mod.