Posted December 23, 2014
So, I'm under the impression that this is an actively developed game. If not, then hopefully a sequel is in the works. Anyway.
My aim is to add further depth to the CURRENT combat system.
The idea is to add a maneuvering/initiative aspect to the game. This would work as a statistic on Ships and Engines, and possible have skills to affect it as well, or passive growth with your character.
Ships would have a base initiative value, with larger ships having LOWER values, and freighters probably being lower for their class as well. Engines would also have a value, which for game balance reasons should be higher on lower "usefulness" engines, and lower on the faster or utility engines.
The second part of the idea is to allow you, the player, more control over special engagements. So if you have long-range lasers, you can actively try to force a long-range combat even on non-long-range AI, and the opposite for if you use rapid-fire lasers, and maybe nebula as an option as well.
This would either be a pre-combat option set in your character screen, or an option that you select at the engagement phase of each combat (at the stage where it gives you the "hostile ship approaching" flavour text.
This would have a chance of succeeding based on the difference in initiative. However, for the NEXT part of the initiative mechanic, an attempt at forcing engagement terms would reduce your EFFECTIVE initiative for the remainder of the combat, to reflect the time lost in maneuvering.
The second part of this mechanic is that many skills and event skills would scale with the relative EFFECTIVE initiative of the ships, especially special event skills like closing gaps and fleeing, with a higher chance for the ship with an advantage.
Thirdly, the ship with the highest EFFECTIVE initiative after the engagement phase would take the first turn, instead of the player always firing first.
Fourth, special skills such as AP have a chance to turn up that scales with effective initiative ratings.
What I expect as consequences: More depth in choosing equipment, possibly requiring some rebalancing of weapons that give advantages at certain ranges.
A reason to use different engines.
More even combat between different classes of ship, as smaller ships would commonly take the first shot, and would have a higher chance of obtaining extra AP during combats.
More friendliness towards multiplayer in a future iteration.*
My aim is to add further depth to the CURRENT combat system.
The idea is to add a maneuvering/initiative aspect to the game. This would work as a statistic on Ships and Engines, and possible have skills to affect it as well, or passive growth with your character.
Ships would have a base initiative value, with larger ships having LOWER values, and freighters probably being lower for their class as well. Engines would also have a value, which for game balance reasons should be higher on lower "usefulness" engines, and lower on the faster or utility engines.
The second part of the idea is to allow you, the player, more control over special engagements. So if you have long-range lasers, you can actively try to force a long-range combat even on non-long-range AI, and the opposite for if you use rapid-fire lasers, and maybe nebula as an option as well.
This would either be a pre-combat option set in your character screen, or an option that you select at the engagement phase of each combat (at the stage where it gives you the "hostile ship approaching" flavour text.
This would have a chance of succeeding based on the difference in initiative. However, for the NEXT part of the initiative mechanic, an attempt at forcing engagement terms would reduce your EFFECTIVE initiative for the remainder of the combat, to reflect the time lost in maneuvering.
The second part of this mechanic is that many skills and event skills would scale with the relative EFFECTIVE initiative of the ships, especially special event skills like closing gaps and fleeing, with a higher chance for the ship with an advantage.
Thirdly, the ship with the highest EFFECTIVE initiative after the engagement phase would take the first turn, instead of the player always firing first.
Fourth, special skills such as AP have a chance to turn up that scales with effective initiative ratings.
What I expect as consequences: More depth in choosing equipment, possibly requiring some rebalancing of weapons that give advantages at certain ranges.
A reason to use different engines.
More even combat between different classes of ship, as smaller ships would commonly take the first shot, and would have a higher chance of obtaining extra AP during combats.
More friendliness towards multiplayer in a future iteration.*
