Why every race should have steal ship(s).

[Tietäjä]

Lately, there has been lots of concerns regards the game becoming a space micromanagement game instead of a wargame. There's plenty of discussion going on about the states of alliances, and why becoming a military powerhouse isn't attractive - and why any operations other than plain galaxy raiding or roiding fat large planets for XP aren't really worthwile. The obvious reason is because the only realistic ways to grow in value and score lie in gathering asteroids (and XP while on it), sitting on them (less wars, less roid leaks), and collecting resources and a stockpile for a win. This has been proven the "efficient" way to dish out the rank of lately. Given, a few guerillas and XP rounds have nudged it a bit, but still the outsiders remain small in comparison.

To bring diversity into the combat mechanics, there should be a way for a player to gain of attacking in addition to purely roiding. The reasonable methods include salvage and steal ships. The modern steal as Jester brought it back in round 13 is a key factor here. Round 14 showed a set of statistics by Appocomaster that evidently gained some praise, introducing steal for all races. Currently, steal excists in it's kind-of pathetic form for two races. Why would handing steal ships for every race bring incentive to attempt tactical operations such, primarily as, fleetcatches?

First of all, military dominance is best achieved through these. While it definately will be cocky to get your fleet torn apart in a fleetcatch, it is after all a wargame. And fleetcatches may just be the most thrilling moments of the game. The key element of wars, the attemt to demolish the enemy attack fleet. In order to promote the tactics as wargame instead of a space micromanagement game, there should be more effort put into arranging the battle engine so that there's incentive for other than just the "regulars". Hence, I'd say bringing back steal as it was (round 19 it wasn't all that unbalanced) would, in my opinion, encourage more diverse tactical combat instead of just roid swapping and galaxy raiding, and bring excitement into the game.

That's it!

[Monroe]

How about going back to a single tech tree that would allow anyone to choose some steal ships potentially at the exclusion of other ships? So back the way the origional tech tree was designed that allowed players to go either EMP, cloak, or regular. This would allow for what you are suggesting.

In addition I think part of what you are saying is that a lot of the 'improvements' that are being worked on right now have far more to do with game micromanagement then they do with enhancing combat. This is a valid point in my opinion and should be looked at for the future. Something like 'pirate raids' or some other new type of combat that gives the little or non-allied guy a chance to pillage/steal might bring about some of what you are suggesting. Maybe a sudo-ally category that if joined allows you to perform certain actions that normal ally members can't, but doesn't count towards a group dynamic score. So essentially a bunch of non-allieds get together to get special powers, perhaps even a def bonus, but who's earned score while in the sudo-ally can't count towards a normal ally's score. This would allow them to play as non-allieds, but without interfering with how normal allies function.

[arc]

what about ships that steal resources?

[Makhil]

A lot of players in addition to being raped by bigger planets for their roids will be hunted 24/7 for their ships even when their roid count has fallen below 100, that's the only problem I see. The way to solve these lowbie bashings would be to penalize one way or another the planets who target low scores for easy gain. Don't ask me know my only ideawas negative XP but XPs mean nothing now...

[Monroe]

Originally Posted by arc

what about ships that steal resources?

You mean r1 cargo ships?

No thanks, they were removed for the obvious reason that it leads to massive farming.

[Juffled]

i somehow think massive farming in a community of 2000 isnt going to be a big deal afterall roid farming isnt happening now is it and its the same thing, the idea of bringing back cargo ships actually adds something else to it all i think

in response to fleet bashing when you have less than 100 roids, if you do have that roid count why on earth are you not 3 fleeting with all your ships anyway, you dont have anything to lose, maybe setting it so that you cant go below x roids (a dynamic formula derived by average alliance roids or if you are not in an alliance it is set at ??? and increases inverse exponentially) would stop this so even though you have 150 roids but lots of ships the guy can attack you , wont gain any roids or ships if you run and thus a wasted fleet spot?

Or maybe have some sort of planet bashing formula which takes into account roids aswell as score and value,

when ship stealing in r19 you had fleet catches and such which was much more exciting in combat terms, the rounds are only 7 weeks long and realistically a proper fleet catch at say week 4 although is annoying puts you out of the game for 6 weeks of worthy rest or as has been discussed you can become a scanner planet/cov op planet if maybe you could have this as a setting where you get certain bonuses for scanning/cov opping (ie 1/2 price or something but you only get 2/3 res)

[Tietäjä]

Originally Posted by Monroe

No thanks, they were removed for the obvious reason that it leads to massive farming.

You'll have to admit, though, that given the triggerhappiness of the local rules enforcement team, massive farming is hardly going to happen anymore. I'd reckon mailing someone "LOL IM SENDING CARGO SHIPS AT YOU" might get a planet closed for farming incentives.

[Makhil]

good thing about every race having steal ships: it would make Havoc and Speedgame more fun for non Zik. ATM Zik build invicible armadas by landing on inactive/sleeping planets... nearly impossible to attack them.

[Juffled]

Originally Posted by Makhil

good thing about every race having steal ships: it would make Havoc and Speedgame more fun for non Zik. ATM Zik build invicible armadas by landing on inactive/sleeping planets... nearly impossible to attack them.

focus 100% on the round that people pay for, havoc and speedgames are added bonus to a round which not many people play with as much commitment.

If you even consider the fact that it improves havoc/speedgames for a reason for doing something then you will have alot of VERY unhappy people

[Appocomaster]

Originally Posted by Makhil

A lot of players in addition to being raped by bigger planets for their roids will be hunted 24/7 for their ships even when their roid count has fallen below 100, that's the only problem I see. The way to solve these lowbie bashings would be to penalize one way or another the planets who target low scores for easy gain. Don't ask me know my only ideawas negative XP but XPs mean nothing now...

I'm surprised that Kargool hasn't added his voice to support this point, as he (at least used to) believe very much the same thing.

At the end of the day, roids (and score) have to come from somewhere. Ziks have ships that are weak enough that they (used to, at least) end up hitting smaller and more inactive people (or people the same size) to get the vital ships they needed and then near the end of the round they have fewer weaknesses and so are targetted less. This leads to them rising through the rankings in the last couple of weeks of the round.
I know I was always put off by having a unit scan 3 screens large to try and plan an attack on, anyway

To further the original point, steal ships in the attack fleet - even if it's mine of the stronger one stealing to add to the weaker one, with no "steal chains" generally make people think about attacking to steal ships as well as asteroids - though less so due to the changes in steal now, I'd have thought.

This means that given two planets, they're likely to chose the one they're more likely to get decent ships from - often the smaller one, with perhaps a weaker fleet structure. This means that the bigger planets have fewer threats against them, and everyone else, especially the mediumish-sized planets, get trampled.

Obviously this isn't ideal - I'd prefer everyone to have a bit more motivation to hit the top planets (alliance politics aside), meaning they're always kept "in sight" and don't disappear into the distance. It also means the more medium / slightly smaller planets won't get so trampled. By the time the bash limit comes into play, half of them have probably given up.

[HRH_H_Crab]

A few points: up until the last round where all classes had steal ships, I had only ever played Cath (and prior to that Science).
I enjoyed thieving so much, that I have played zik ever since, and its been awesome, although the whole subversion thing was a bit dry.
Now... on to the topic of bringing it back for all classes, Im against it unless its for jokey summer free rounds (where I fully encourage it).
Why? It removes the value of choosing Zik. As for Etd, screw them. The race should be abolished in my opinion.
Zero loss stealing? I think it encourages way too much trivial greedy fleet catching, and is a license to farm. In my opinion the game mechanics should discourage fleet catching for anything other than strategic alliance attacks. Casual fleet catching should (imvho) be prohibitively costly, and a pain in the arse to carry out.

I agree, it is an important part of the game, and I don't want to see fleet catching die per se, just limit it to something that only big alliances in extremely tight political situations would ever bother to try. I think removing zero loss stealing has been fantastic at achieving this.

I have not had problems acquiring nice ships over the last couple of rounds. How foolish some people are. They whine and moan about no zero loss stealing, but totally fail to see that when you cap ships in defense, the salvage can quite easily make it close to zero loss anyway.

To bring diversity into the combat mechanics, there should be a way for a player to gain of attacking in addition to purely roiding.

Yes... and we call that XP.

[Juffled]

Originally Posted by HRH_H_Crab

Yes... and we call that XP.

xp is gained from a bravery factor * 10? * roids stolen

, hence no its based on how many roids you cap

[HRH_H_Crab]

xp is gained from a bravery factor * 10? * roids stolen

Yes, Im aware that its based on roids stolen, but my point is that it is a reward in addition to the roids themselves.

Also, on the subject of farming, (whether it be ships, resources, roids, xp), I am quite certain that if the galaxy of this rounds no.1 planet have managed to exploit the game mechanics to the extent that they did, within the rules, there are many many others who do so outside of the rules.

I've been playing this game since round 4, and while I believe that this sort of cheating has declined enormously since then, I have no doubt it still continues, and anything which makes it a lot easier should be discouraged.

For the record, I don't believe that cargo ships would necessarily do this though, if handled carefully.

[Kargool]

Originally Posted by Appocomaster

I'm surprised that Kargool hasn't added his voice to support this point, as he (at least used to) believe very much the same thing.

At the end of the day, roids (and score) have to come from somewhere. Ziks have ships that are weak enough that they (used to, at least) end up hitting smaller and more inactive people (or people the same size) to get the vital ships they needed and then near the end of the round they have fewer weaknesses and so are targetted less. This leads to them rising through the rankings in the last couple of weeks of the round.
I know I was always put off by having a unit scan 3 screens large to try and plan an attack on, anyway

I do agree, but the zik has been made weaker with having their stealships dying ergo a bigger change is not really needed in my opinion. However lowbie bashing will always happen in one way or another, make it harder to hit below a certain value compared to your own will probably help some. Luckly as the stealships die in the steal process you now get salvage for your lost ships.

[robban1]

zik wasnt weak this round

[Tietäjä]

Originally Posted by Kargool

However lowbie bashing will always happen in one way or another, make it harder to hit below a certain value compared to your own will probably help some.

This round I hadn't logged in for a week or a bit less maybe, irregardless, I had 300 roids and I attracted quite a bit of incomings, that is, a zikonian player and a cathaar viper escort. That is, even with zikonians losing ships while stealing. I guess I was around top300 at the time, and I reckon the zikonian player was well in to top100.

Cringe?

No.

The best way to avoid lowbie bashing isn't to remove or edit steal, but to increase bash limits if lowbie bashing is found a problem large enough to justify it.

Originally Posted by robban

zik wasnt weak this round

In fact, one could say, that during the last two rounds, zikonian has been (allright, given round 20 was an XP round) stronger than it was round 19 or round 17. And the fact that it was overpowered for round 18 was well acknowledged before the round but tux didn't seem to be interested in changing it (comes with a de ja vu feel regarding certain things for this round, maybe, sounds like thief for starters).

[Monroe]

Originally Posted by Tietäjä

You'll have to admit, though, that given the triggerhappiness of the local rules enforcement team, massive farming is hardly going to happen anymore. I'd reckon mailing someone "LOL IM SENDING CARGO SHIPS AT YOU" might get a planet closed for farming incentives.

Yes true, but I still don't think it's a good idea, covert ops allows you to steal resources quite effectively and I don't see what cargo ships would really add to the game at this point, other then give another way to bash poor newbies.

[nxtasy]

I haven't played since round 4, i'm only giving the speedgame a go for a laugh.

My 2 cents though.

1 tech tree, as someone suggested earlier.

My memory of round4 was that you decided what kind of player you were, not what "race" you were going to be. Races should only be used in reference to the advantages/disadvantage of your research/production speed etc. Your ship choices should be entirely up to you, because at the end of the day everyone knows that Zikonian is by FAR the dominant race in this game simply because they steal ships and nobody else can.

Bring back cargo ships too, those things were excellent fodder

I'm done