Scans

[Shiprex]

I find the the intelligence gianed from one scan (fleet/unit) is too detailed. Makes the game too easy. I would like to see the target planet race hidden apart from alliance/gal mates and that only the ship types read from a unit/fleets scan.

The exact type and race make it much easier to plan against. Perhaps for zik this would be easier but alterations on the steal success/ease of scanning of Zik stealing could also be incorporated. The need to delve deeper into the news scan could allow for easier identification of race/ship type etc.

Basically making it more difficult to choose and reconnoitre a target.

[xFLiNTx]

Imagine how many scans a minute you would have to do in 1 minute tick games! f34r!

[Monroe]

Well it's an interesting balance between too much information making the game boring and too little information making the game very chaotic and unpredictable. Through many rounds of experiment with this balance it has been determined that the majority of players prefer less chaos in terms of information rather then more. Hence the only non accurate scan is the unit scan, and it is within limits. This balance seems to allow for a level of randomness that players can deal with.

[Shiprex]

How about hiding the races and actual ships though Like only give say 1200 Fighters, 3000 Corvettes etc rather than current 800 Harpy 400 Mandrake. Thus allowing only the most skillful to make a judgement call on what race and ship types the target has. rather than telling them almost exactly

[Nadar]

The unit scans is already* inaccurate and have been inaccurate for rounds. Scan might show 1500 ships, but in reality he only has 1200 or 1934.

*Or is it removed now? Can't remember

[Lοki]

Thought the random factor was 20%...

but I wouldn't like this. It would take even more time to find a target for most people, you'll have to guess more and scuicide more. I like a scan and a bcalc that can tell me what to expect.

[Dr_Zaius]

unit scans aren't accurate afaik, they can be upto 20% wrong! (If you want closer figures scan em 3 times and take average :P)

I like this because it's not set in stone what they have, but it's close enougth to guess it, which adds a little spice as you actually have to think!

As for hiding name, just showing class it just woudn't work, especially on ZiK! They may have anything, it would make Zik so powerful you couldn't stop them as you could never work out what defence they wouldn't be targeting

[Shiprex]

The 20% inaccuracy is irrelevant as my experience is that a XAN double my value would build CO/FI fleet and hey look no losses and all def ended up being useless coz he knew the capacity for defence was low. had he not been able to determine race/ship numbers then it may not have been that way. The fact one race cannot have its fleet type determined makes it pointless defending against when your ships will suffer more than his lower value one because of its lower initiative.

[Dr_Zaius]

Originally Posted by Shiprex

The 20% inaccuracy is irrelevant as my experience is that a XAN double my value would build CO/FI fleet and hey look no losses and all def ended up being useless coz he knew the capacity for defence was low. had he not been able to determine race/ship numbers then it may not have been that way. The fact one race cannot have its fleet type determined makes it pointless defending against when your ships will suffer more than his lower value one because of its lower initiative.

a) You need a better alliance :P
b) you can guestimate a Xan fleet pretty easy with unit!

[Shiprex]

Originally Posted by Dr_Zaius

a) You need a better alliance :P
b) you can guestimate a Xan fleet pretty easy with unit!

(a) Or make defence more rewarding
(b) And the opposite is what lands <---bye bye defence fleet

[Ultimate Newbie]

Originally Posted by Shiprex

(a) Or make defence more rewarding

I was going to go into detail why this might not be such a good idea, and then i had this massive wave of deja vu. Thus, i found my post where i went into great detail why this might not be the best idea. Turns out it was in response to you the first time as well, thus i'll re-post your question and my reply and perhaps this time you might actually read it :\.

Originally Posted by Shiprex

Community spirit and all that. Also for the casual player (majority?) who may not have an active gal/alliance surely keeping them in the game and seeing more green than red will make things more difficult for the serious players which will make them need to evolve from hitting half value targets and picking more risky strategies on bigger targets to get easy roids.

Originally Posted by Ultimate Newbie

Community spirit indeed - the only way for players to get more green incoming fleets is for other players to actually launch them. Whilst the bottom player might get one or two defensive fleets every now and again, if there are large defensive incentives then the people who would benefit the most would - again - be those in the top alliances. Thus i dont see any more defence being sent unless you implemented something like a Galaxy defence (4th) slot, which imo would help new players at an in-gal level. However, there are problems with this suggestion which is outlined in great detail in another thread. In the end, new players must be more willing to defend other new players before they will see any increase in defensive fleets inbound - doing so without making the players in the top alliances too powerful or stagnated is difficult i think.

Additionally, i dont think the last half of your statement is correct - the more easier it is to defend, the weaker the target must become in order to get the same chance of success. As a result, players at the bottom will get hit more often by even more overwhelming fleets than before - i dont think that's a move in the right direction. Especially combined with incentives for defence, attacking top players would be nigh on impossible.

At least with the current system, many players in top alliances grow so fast that after the first week or two, they are unable to attack the lower players due to the bash limit - this is prolly the best thing.

Originally Posted by Shiprex

(b) And the opposite is what lands <---bye bye defence fleet

I think i;ve gone into this before elsewhere as well, so i'll just post the jist;

Being attacked by 2000 Xan Frigates will do alot damage to your fleet, especially if you have Cruisers (ie because of Ghosts). Being attacked by 2000 Xan Fighters will do next to bugger all to your fleet - 2k FI isnt very much and Xan FI are as cheap as chips. If you fleet is going to get killed by 2k FI, then you are going to loose your fleet to 2k FR. Thus, its prolly a good idea to run your ships. If you leave behind *just* enough units to kill 2k FI, and focus on defending against FR, then if its a bluff with FI then you win. If its actually FR then you dont loose much more than you would normally.

TBH, i think Terrans who use Jammers to stop Fleet Scans, and/or use complex fleet-renaming skills so that its hard to tell the difference between two Destroyer waves and a Battleship wave is far more likely to cause you harm.


Stop picking on the poor old Xans.