Woo, more changes
 

Preempting the inevitable whines, I'm looking forward to seeing how the new changes play out. I like the ETA removal to compensate for the cluster ETA bonus. Something like that was necessary to let people sleep ;)

I also like the scan changes. Going back to partial information setups rather than the deterministic play we had with Military Scans is a step in the right direction.

I don't like the change to stealing. I understand the motivation, but I don't think this provides a fun alternative. I look forward to seeing if anyone can wring quality out of zik with this setup.

The paid/trusted thing is cool as well, good job on getting that in for this round :up:

Re: Woo, more changes
 

i only managed a glance at the new stats, as i dont have much time now. but....if zik is such an evhul and awful race, then why not take it out alltogether, instead of weakening it to such extent!

Re: Woo, more changes
 

First of all the changes sound interesting.

However, personally I fail to see the reason for that 5th race. Looks like a race newbies or solo-players are supposed to choose; since I don't know the stats I cannot comment on how different they really are from terran. If they have comparable armour values then terran are probably obsolete.

The zik change certainly cannot be judged completely until we know the formula and saw some beta results for it.

Also, why increase salvage for cath? I don't think that it really fixes some of the issues cath have.

Re: Woo, more changes
 

I think this may have been done to compensate for them getting little or no salvage due to not killing ships, this way when they do get some they get more.

Re: Woo, more changes
 

that 5th race will be an,.. interesting,.. one to play. A mixture of ships from other races, surley means it isn't newbie friendly and is meant more for your experianced players.
I've a few comments on the stats but im sure their meant for the strat forum and not here :P.
But i say huzzah to PA for implimenting as many changes as they have, see how people react to so many changes at once :) deffintly should add a few new elemeants to the game.

Re: Woo, more changes
 

Yes I do see that intention, but it won't really help there. If salvage works like in previous rounds then battles at cathaar planets will generate more salvage, which does not necessarily mean that the cath gets the salvage but rather the other defenders gain from it.

While this does increase the incentive to defend cathaar it is unlikely that it really helps the cathaar itself because not every incoming will be covered, and cathaar kill rate is (of course) still very bad.

Re: Woo, more changes
 

Or learn to read ;)

Re: Woo, more changes
 

Yowsa ;) Noticed that myself. 1:1 value sounds fair.

Re: Woo, more changes
 

With the zik loosing ships equal to what they gain and still having the lowest init I think they have been weakend to much. That is without having had the time to test it though

Re: Woo, more changes
 

Pragmatically, at this point, you can introduce a bunch of things which could restrengthen zik. Stealing taking place before capping being probably the most obvious (just in terms of "fame", not anything to do with whether or not it should be reintroduced).

Re: Woo, more changes
 

i don't believe that killing stealing ships is the way forward, even without testing. i'd support their damage per cost to be lowered to the 25-30 range though. This should be sufficient by itself in my mind.

Re: Woo, more changes
 

I've always been a fan of ziks dying when stealing. The main problem with zik is the potential for exponential growth - just lowering d/c doesn't stop this, it just slows it down slightly. Having steal ships die when stealing is really the only way to stop the exponential growth. The only problem I have with it is the ratio. I think losing 1 value for every 1 you steal is a bit inhibitive, I would have prefered it to be 1:1.33 or something similar.

Re: Woo, more changes
 

If the ziks don't lose as much value as they gain, the potential for exponential growth remains in the same way it would previously with bad armor/damage.

Re: Woo, more changes
 

not really,... ziks are gaurenteed to loose ships at the moment,.. if they didn't die when stealing theres scope for them to steal freely without any loss, no matter how bad u make their damage and armour.

We tried xan cloacking and mill scans again for a round,.... lets just try ziks dying for a round to,..
and the Eits (much better name then Etd) should be difficult to master to, but could be great in the right hands :P

Re: Woo, more changes
 

will u play zik?

Re: Woo, more changes
 

Let's just try ziks dying on 1:1 ratio for a round "too"? Hey, now that we're on the trying scheme here, why don't we try a round with zikonians having no astropods. Hey, that's a cool idea! What about trying a round where terran ships never get to shoot? Yeah, trying is good.

Re: Woo, more changes
 

its very good if you hate zik :)

Re: Woo, more changes
 

Close, but no cigar. 'Free' stealing can be just as bad as 'value losing' stealing. I'll leave it as an exercise for the reader to figure out why this is so.

Re: Woo, more changes
 

ooo few replies :P,.. i havn't chose a race yet, probably leave that till late, but i've gone Zik before, i'm not a great zik :P

as for the trying responce, can we try PDS again? :P its not the first time zik ships have died 1:1 is it? or am i wrong??? maybe 1:1 is slightly off,.. but the amount of zik growth which we've seen in the past few rounds NEEDS to be addressed.

as for the Value loosing conunderum,.. meh,.. a zik to big in value, only has himself to blame :P it's easy to loose value :P harder to gain it,... if that's not what you meant then never mind :P,.. your obvioulsy far to clever for the likes of me :D don't lower yourself to my level :P

Re: Woo, more changes
 

I think im the no1 person against the zik die rule... it was taken out the game and now were bringing it back.

When you burn yourself you learn when something is hot so you dont burn yourself again as you know what it feels like. Forget what its like to burn yourself and you will burn yourself again.

I think the ziks have been reduced so that cats can benifit with salvage.. but tbqh i dont like the idea.

Re: Woo, more changes
 

I rather see a max cap on stealing that the 1:1 that we are getting now. I have played zik many times and I can't see how it can be fun trading you attack fleet for a new one that you can't replenish with you own ships. I see ziks ending up with many small attack fleets on different classes that only works if you bash a smaller target.

Re: Woo, more changes
 

Just to be fair, the reason Zik steal ships dying was taken out of the game had absolute nothing to do with the feature itself. I'm not sure of which Planetarion "generation" you are, but i assume by the comment you made you never played the game that existed before PaX (round 10). Steal ships dying was inevitable back then due to the rankings being decided on value. XP didn't exist back then, so all score was made up from your value (research/constructions gave you some value, but most was made up from the roids and fleet you had). If Zik stealing would have been the same during that time (and thus the ships not dying), there would hardly be any reason not to play Zik as they (like the current game) would always be on top of the value (and thus the final top) ranking. With the introduction of PaX ALL race features were dropped, resulting in ships only being able to kill. There are so many differences between the old and current game (both combat engine and universe) that you can't really compare either atm, apart from the game name and a few fundamental setups (like the coords) they are nothing alike.

As for the Zik dying thing being reintroduced, i think it is a good thing. But as others pointed out it isn't as simple as it has been done right now, the impact of a change like that is far more serious then PaTeam usually realises (as is with alot of things they change). And the 1 on 1 steal/death ratio is a fine example of that. iirc, even in the old days that didn't happen as it happened on armour, which in itself added more tactics to the race opposed to the current "it doesn't matter what you hit you'll still convert 1 on 1 in value"-change. With a 1 on 1 convert ratio steal ships will need a 'normal' iniative opposed to always firing last, adding ofcourse the problem that stolen ships in theory should still fire. Or the value of dying ships should be seriously lowered or their armour should be upped and damage reduced to make the losses bearable.

Re: Woo, more changes
 

good point
actually also with the current stats, a zik that hits a target without pods, during the battle he steals some pods and that pods should normaly fire so you should get roids out of it. if my logic is ok

Re: Woo, more changes
 

I'm not sure which Planetarion "generation" you are, but i assume by the comment you made you never played the game that existed before round 3.

Re: Woo, more changes
 

Correct, i started playing halfway through r3, but in either case i felt it didn't matter as stealing was reintroduced with succes by the new Zikonian race in round 6, so whatever had happened before (some quite unbalanced stuff from what i heard, but feel free to enlighten me instead of just posting the obvious ;)) didn't really matter as round 6 onwards showed steal ships dying the way they did (combined with the stats and combat engine existing back then) balanced out quite nice.

Re: Woo, more changes
 

There was only one "race" in r2 and it had stealing ships which were pretty good. Extrapolating roughly to today's game, every race should have the ability to steal some ships!

Re: Woo, more changes
 

#Its the same old thing since 1916... er round 14#
to the tune of zombie by the cranberries

Re: Woo, more changes
 

It wasn't like that when I was making stats in round 13. It's stealing, not subversion.

Re: Woo, more changes
 

My observation with zik is that the 1:1 ratio thing is a myth... (at time correct going to press with many thanks to thrud who made his calc update by the minute)


http://bcalc.thrud.co.uk/index.php?loadfile=main28428
looks like a plausable roiding senario looks kinda 1v1

http://bcalc.thrud.co.uk/index.php?loadfile=main28428
say for example if the ziks faked cr as bs and thats what came up with...
18% profit in terms of value.

http://bcalc.thrud.co.uk/index.php?loadfile=main73095
if the zik hits jackpot. that is over 50% profit in terms of value....aka 3:2 ratio

http://bcalc.thrud.co.uk/index.php?loadfile=main449010
like anyother fleet if there is too much def then a recall is needed.


Points to take from those calcs...
1. it is possible to cap ships for value profit.
2. it gives ziks new attack options (especially if the aquire pods of a class they dont have.) / a new weakness due to lack of anti frig for example guess who is getting etd frig incs.
3. this cant be done on a regular basis as the cr would take time to rebuild back up.

Re: Woo, more changes
 

And are you basing that assumption solely on an external source? If the manual says the ratio of dying steal ships is 1 on 1 in value of stolen ships we have no reason to doubt that. And if those numbers do not show up in the bcalc we can only conclude the bcalc (update) is wrong or that the manual is (once again) wrong or that they changed something already without telling us.

[edit]Forgot to mention that according to the announce conversion ratio, the only way to make profit is to be on the defence side and collect the salvage.[/edit]

Re: Woo, more changes
 

Nah, think about it, he's right, if your ships steal above their value weight if you send only enough to max-cap you'll still gain value.



I didn't consider that originally /o\

Re: Woo, more changes
 

Well i had assumed it would be like roids, where you can't steal more roids then the pods you send can take. Hence you shouldn't be able to steal more value than the ships you send to steal have, but like you said i suppose that is a possible feature.

Re: Woo, more changes
 

That would require the addition of an extra feature, which considering the fact it hasn't been mentioned, is probably a bad idea to assume exists.

Re: Woo, more changes
 

Or in English*, if you send ships that kill more than they're worth, you can make a profit.

*That language where 'value weight' means absolutely nothing.

Except pods work by dealing damage to asteroid 'armor', and you take as many roids as you 'kill'. Which is exactly how zik stealing works. The only difference is that pods don't die after they've stolen something.

Re: Woo, more changes
 

I thought I better write quick note about the implementation within the bcalc of the stealing algorithm. I don’t know what the implementation within the game may be but I have made the following assumptions while implementing the bcalc.

Ships that don’t fire can’t be destroyed as part of the stealing algorithm, so EMP’d ships don’t die to make the 1:1 value rule match. Part of the same assumption also means that if you send 1000 ships and it only takes 100 to steal all of the target ships, only 100 of the stealers will be killed (by the value rule) regardless of the value of the ships.

I don’t know if these assumptions are valid but it seems like the sensible way to do the calculations. I don’t have enough information on how this is treated atm as I’m not sure that it had been considered that the Zik ships would kill more ship value than they have themselves. It is effectively changing the 1:1 value ratio.


Thrud