Planetarion Forums

Magdrill · 12 Nov 2006, 23:03

how often would you play your favorite game if you knew the outcome beforehand?
This game needs a little bit of the unknown.
Should attackers/defenders go blindly into the unknown?
hell no
100% acurate scans and battle calcs take some fun out of this though.
Maybe distorters could do just that? Fudge the scans a bit so they appear somewhat smaller/larger than they really are?

furball · 12 Nov 2006, 23:21

Quote:

Originally Posted by Magdrill

100% acurate scans and battle calcs take some fun out of this though.

Unless it's been changed, there's already +-20% disturbance in scans - just try unit scanning a zik twice and comparing the results.

Magdrill · 12 Nov 2006, 23:34

true, but a good DC will take that into account. So still everything is known.
Maybe that's not the way to go then.
Maybe In-Gal defence should not be scannable? Only incomming?

furball · 12 Nov 2006, 23:49

Quote:

Originally Posted by Magdrill

Maybe that's not the way to go then.
Maybe In-Gal defence should not be scannable? Only incomming?

But you can still military scan any planet in the universe, can't you? Or do you want to change that?

Magdrill · 13 Nov 2006, 00:03

Spider 0 4015 0 0
Beetle 0 0 3254 1986
Viper 0 0 211 361
Scarab 0 0 0 0
Black Widow 0 0 0 0
Roach 0 0 0 0
Tarantula 0 0 0 0
Scorpion 0 0 0 0
Mantis 0 0 0 0
Mosquito 0 0 552 324
Hornet 0 0 0 0
Termite 0 0 0 0
mil scan of an attacker in my gal
sort of a waste of time don't ya think? For both sides.
We know exactly what he's sending, and he's gonna scan us.
which means our defence is useless cause he's gonna pull, and his time spent trying to attack is useless.
All this = stagnent
Sometimes you can go 2-3+ days without landing a single fleet because of this.
Boring for the attackers and defenders.
Maybe the military scans should be different?

Nadar · 13 Nov 2006, 02:01

Unit scan your target 10 times and find the average.

It works..... a bit

Wandows · 13 Nov 2006, 02:08

Tbh, knowing the exact outcome of a battle doesn't matter a whole lot in the game. What does matter is defence being available or not, and that has little to do with knowing what is incoming as most DC's can work that out anyway (give or take a few very powerfull fake options combined with dist whoring). In the past with units scans being the prime source of fleet information battlecalcs could be quite inaccurate aswell, but in the end all that matters is whether the available defence is able to hurt to attacker enough to make him pull or not. Battlecalcs hardly play a vital role in that, they just make it a tad easier to see. With XP you can still get 'unexpected' battles with ppl landing on calls you considered covered.

So to me this isn't a needed change (i would be more interested in deeper strategy levels, as discussed in various other threads here), working out what is defending and how that effects my cost vs gain rating is 'exciting' enough to me.

K-W · 13 Nov 2006, 02:13

How about planetarion stays a strategy game and if you want to roll some dice you can go to a casino?

Seriously though, it would require a complete overhaul of the game. The way it stands now such uncertantity would mostly lead to nobody launching fleets or everyone xp whoring.

Magdrill · 13 Nov 2006, 02:58

with the amount of recalled fleets per week, per person just how many are succesful and who's NOT xp whoring this round?
Perhaps the game needs an overhaul.
Start at 1:1 and just skip thru the universe. Takes about 3 minutes. Pretty damn small compared to earlier rounds.

Magdrill · 13 Nov 2006, 03:43

Quote:

Originally Posted by K-W

How about planetarion stays a strategy game and if you want to roll some dice you can go to a casino?

Nothing wrong with stategy, but perhaps we're leaning to much towards automation.
I'm not asking to roll the dice, but an occasional "snake eyes" would'nt hurt eithier.
Take the new guy for example. He doesn't 100% understand the strategy for the first week or two.
his gal gets raped a couple times a week for 2-3 waves apiece. and there's absolutely nothing he can do about it, and everytime he grows he gets bungholed.
Do you think he will be back next round, let alone pay for it?
A few will, cause this game rocks, BUT the majority of them will not.
We get a smaller universe over the rounds, with less people, and fewer targets for the top alliances.
Which means more raping of galaxies and fewer people still next round.
The only people who hate the unknown are the fps bot users and rp trainer losers. They ruin every game they join.

K-W · 13 Nov 2006, 04:24

Quote:

Originally Posted by Magdrill

Nothing wrong with stategy, but perhaps we're leaning to much towards automation.

I dont see how automation fits into this discussion at all.

Quote:

I'm not asking to roll the dice, but an occasional "snake eyes" would'nt hurt eithier.
Take the new guy for example. He doesn't 100% understand the strategy for the first week or two.
his gal gets raped a couple times a week for 2-3 waves apiece. and there's absolutely nothing he can do about it, and everytime he grows he gets bungholed.
Do you think he will be back next round, let alone pay for it?
A few will, cause this game rocks, BUT the majority of them will not.
We get a smaller universe over the rounds, with less people, and fewer targets for the top alliances.
Which means more raping of galaxies and fewer people still next round.

How is adding uncertaintity going to make new players less likely to be attacked?

If anything, new players would be targetted more under your system, since they wont have distorters or amps. The game would be even harder for them to figure out.

Quote:

The only people who hate the unknown are the fps bot users and rp trainer losers. They ruin every game they join.

Huh?

JonnyBGood · 13 Nov 2006, 04:34

Currently I believe the worst possible thing for people would be having their fleet getting randomly destroyed. Enough people currently give up after losing it and this is in a round with perfect information. If anything I'd prefer to see scans removed entirely.

I mean seriously how do scans make this game more fun?

K-W · 13 Nov 2006, 04:42

Quote:

Originally Posted by JonnyBGood

Currently I believe the worst possible thing for people would be having their fleet getting randomly destroyed. Enough people currently give up after losing it and this is in a round with perfect information. If anything I'd prefer to see scans removed entirely.

I mean seriously how do scans make this game more fun?

More fun than what, a game where you launch random ships at random targets and random things happen?

Magdrill · 13 Nov 2006, 04:52

I know what your sending/you know what i'm sending it's too straight forward and automated. Hell, even the B-Calcs tell you wether you should land or not.

Distorters are useless. If someone spends the majority(50-75%) of his/her time building them, all an alliance has to do is have thier dedicated scanners that spend 75-100% of thier time on amps scan them.I could see if i had a number of distorters that would half-ass scramble a scan. But as long as you or your scanners have 1 more amp than i have distorters , you'll get all the info you need. So basically you can't hide any info from any of the alliances, hence making distorters useless. I'm not even in an alliance this round and never had a problem finding a scanner that couldn't penetrate a top players fleet info.
Don't be afraid of a little unknown.

K-W · 13 Nov 2006, 04:56

Quote:

Originally Posted by Magdrill

I know what your sending/you know what i'm sending it's too straight forward and automated. Hell, even the B-Calcs tell you wether you should land or not.

Straight forward yes, automated no. Making informed decisions is not automation.

Quote:

Distorters are useless. If someone spends the majority(50-75%) of his/her time building them, all an alliance has to do is have thier dedicated scanners that spend 75-100% of thier time on amps scan them.I could see if i had a number of distorters that would half-ass scramble a scan. But as long as you or your scanners have 1 more amp than i have distorters , you'll get all the info you need. So basically you can't hide any info from any of the alliances, hence making distorters useless. I'm not even in an alliance this round and never had a problem finding a scanner that couldn't penetrate a top players fleet info.

Not all alliances have super-scanners, super-scanners are not online all the time. And with fleet analysis scans, distorters will always be useful for faking.

I dont like the current scan system, but I dont like your suggestion either.

Quote:

Don't be afraid of a little unknown.

Afraid? Huh?

Magdrill · 13 Nov 2006, 05:06

"I dont like the current scan system, but I dont like your suggestion either."
How would you fix it?

K-W · 13 Nov 2006, 05:31

Quote:

Originally Posted by Magdrill

"I dont like the current scan system, but I dont like your suggestion either."
How would you fix it?

I dont think its broken in the same way you do. My biggest complaint is the neccessity of scan planets, I wish I could say I had an elegant solution to that problem that would stilll keep scanning interesting. I suppose the only solution would be a more complex scanning system, but that seems to be a bit off the topic of this thread.

JonnyBGood · 13 Nov 2006, 05:35

Quote:

Originally Posted by K-W

More fun than what, a game where you launch random ships at random targets and random things happen?

No, I mean, for example, everyone starts out with a full scan tree already completed. Let's face it, not having scans is shit and I imagine a significant percentage of genuinely new players who are unable to get scans crash their first few attacks, get disheartened by not having a fleet and don't bother coming back. I don't think scan planets are an appalling thing per se, just that their necessity is appalling.

K-W · 13 Nov 2006, 05:37

Quote:

Originally Posted by JonnyBGood

No, I mean, for example, everyone starts out with a full scan tree already completed. Let's face it, not having scans is shit and I imagine a significant percentage of genuinely new players who are unable to get scans crash their first few attacks, get disheartened by not having a fleet and don't bother coming back. I don't think scan planets are an appalling thing per se, just that their necessity is appalling.

Oh, then I agree completely.

NitinA · 13 Nov 2006, 08:47

EMP resistance? ^^ Or are you talking about something not so small in variation?

Ultimate Newbie · 13 Nov 2006, 12:00

Quote:

Originally Posted by NitinA

EMP resistance? ^^ Or are you talking about something not so small in variation?

Err... i would answer only - would you care to elaborate a little here?