Guns Of Icarus Online

Info => Feedback and Suggestions => Topic started by: Khamael on May 27, 2013, 01:27:11 pm

Title: Other than Airships
Post by: Khamael on May 27, 2013, 01:27:11 pm
Alright, so obviously there is not going to be boarding and for very good reason, but that doesn't mean the game's combat shout be restricted to airships alone. Even though I have absolutely no experience in game development or concepts, I hope my ideas will at least be considered by someone.

When Adventure Mode is released, there is going to be trading between towns and factions at war. If the two towns are going to be fighting, it's unlikely that in reality the fight would be only in the air. I'm not talking about a Battlefield styled FPS game, but I do like the thought of a kind of siege mode in which one team is in airships attacking a town and the other team is in the town manning turrets on the ground. I have also seen fan art of tanks to be used in the game, though I don't know how much that would contribute to gameplay, if at all.

Another idea my friends and I had is larger airships. In the story of Guns of Icarus, there used to be massive airships, but that technology was lost, leaving everyone with the smaller, four person ships currently in the game. Well, I think it would be interesting to have the technology rediscovered and have ships with crews of ten and greater. This would also explain why there are light and medium guns but no heavy guns. The heavy guns would be on the larger ships. Also, with a teamwork based game, this would make the game much more teamwork oriented because everyone would have to pay attention to every subsystem on the ship.

Another concept that goes with the larger airships would be biplanes. A friend of mine mentioned that it would be interesting to have the ability to launch planes off of the larger ships for a more fast paced aerial combat. However, another friend pointed out that this would have the ability to destroy the entire premise of the game, teamwork. One player in an airplane might have the ability to lead the whole game, rendering the rest of the team inadequate. Which is why I also suggest the planes not be totally self-sufficient.

The first way to do this would be to require a pilot and a gunner. Instead of one player flying and shooting directly in front, there could be a player who flies the plane and another, or maybe two, players who man an ball turret underneath the plane and/or a tail mounted gun.

Another way to balance the biplanes, which I actually think is better than the previous option, is to have specialized planes. While there could be more advanced varieties than these, at a basic level there would be fighters and bombers. The fighters' guns would be very ineffective against the airships due to their size, but their mobility would make them great at shooting down other planes. Then there is the bomber, whose bombs would be very inaccurate. This would not be a problem against the airships because they are so large, but it would be extremely difficult to hit planes with them. This would make it necessary for a squadron of fighters to protect only one or two bombers. It would require more coordination because of the amount of people needed to simultaneously launch, as well as making sure the bombers don't get shot down. While there could be others, like heavy fighters for taking out groups of planes or interceptors specifically for taking out bombers, the basic concept would be the fighters and bombers.
Title: Re: Other than Airships
Post by: Audie Murphy on May 27, 2013, 01:39:59 pm
but that doesn't mean the game's combat shout be restricted to airships alone.

...This is a game about airship combat. Yes, the game's combat is going to be restricted to airships.

Large, boss airships and biplanes are coming with adventure mode. However I don't think that they are going to be available for players to fly. I like the idea of player-driven sky fortresses with large crews, but I hate the idea of players driving biplanes. I don't think it'll be at all possible to allow that without destroying the teamwork aspect of this game that makes it so fun.

One thing I would like to see would be if the heavy guns required 2 crew members to operate. Perhaps one to load the ammo and the other to aim and fire. Or one to spot and one to fire (think sniper team). It would balance the heavy guns by requiring lots of teamwork to make them fire, add variety to crew roles, and inject a cool realism factor that no other game has explored.

Town siege sounds pretty cool. I'm in for that idea. However, creating towns that you can explore with your avatar is pretty far down Muse's checklist for Adventure Mode, so if that idea does happen, it won't be for some times.

Tanks? No. At least I hope not.
Title: Re: Other than Airships
Post by: Khamael on May 27, 2013, 02:28:39 pm
Someone suggested to me that the airplanes be AI controlled so that they serve more as an annoyance attack that's only effective if you ignore it, like fire. I suppose that would make the game more balanced and easier to play.

I really like your idea of the heavy guns requiring two people. It would definitely add more complexity to the game and a lack of teamwork would render the most powerful weapons useless.

Also, I should reword "town siege". You wouldn't so much be in the town as you would be on the walls or in a nearby fortress. The town itself would be no more than decoration. So it could be walls surrounding the town with mounted guns along the edges. Falling off the walls would do the same thing falling off a ship does. That or the town would be off to the side (or maybe no town at all, seeing as it serves no purpose) and the players would be in a contained fortress.

As for the tanks, it was a random idea I saw somewhere. I really don't think it's a good idea, but I figured I'd throw it out there anyway. However, there was one aerial combat game I once played that had AI controlled flak cannons on the ground. Something similar could be done with the tanks. They'd serve a similar purpose to the AI biplanes.
Title: Re: Other than Airships
Post by: Ofiach on May 27, 2013, 03:23:41 pm
I believe someone made a suggestion along the lines of your town siege idea in another post, maybe in the adventure mode suggestions thread, but that is 21 pages long so.... yeah.

I will say this to your idea, I do not want to be forced to play a gametype like this. I don't mind flying against a fortress or city but I do not personally want to be a wall gunner.

With that being said, I know some people do want this and I think it's a great idea. I just don't want to be forced into playing this gametype. It should have nothing to do with any airship progression, maybe a Faction status building side event, but not a main event. 

Once again I do think this is a really cool idea.

Also ground based defenses that shoot at airships are just, common sense, that's hopefully going to be added. Basically Steampunk AA, that's gotta make an appearance or Muse is gonna make me cry.

As to the biplanes, I think that would ruin the team centered core of this game. I would personally like to see them as AI only

Anyway just my two cents on your idea.
Title: Re: Other than Airships
Post by: Khamael on May 27, 2013, 04:10:17 pm
Yeah, the siege shouldn't be mandatory. It should just be another optional gamemode, like how they have deathmatch and king of the hill right now.

Also, AI planes could be a captain item. Like, they have the ability to target a ship and then a bunch of AI planes will fly out and attack it. They'll basically be like a swarm of bees. More of a distraction than anything seriously dangerous. But they become dangerous of you leave them, so you'll want to shoot them down anyway.

I don't know, I just like the thought of a bunch of biplanes flying off of a massive airship straight at another massive airship.
Title: Re: Other than Airships
Post by: Audie Murphy on May 29, 2013, 12:24:34 pm
I will say this to your idea, I do not want to be forced to play a gametype like this. I don't mind flying against a fortress or city but I do not personally want to be a wall gunner.

I understand where you're coming from on that, but I think that big fortresses or skyships would be a great opportunity to continue exploring team hierarchies. I think that part of what makes the teamwork in GOIO fun is the fact that each crew has a captain, that they answer to.

What if, in larger crew, there was another level of depth added to the hierarchy? A skyship would have multiple gunners and engineers, so what if they were each treated as their own crew, who answered to an Ordinance Officer and Chief Engineer, respectively, who then reported directly to the Captain?

I can already think of a lot of valid objections to that, but one of the things I like most about GOIO is the way that it immerses you into the game by using the rules of the game to enforce a hierarchy within each team. You feel like you're actually crewing an airship because you have a captain, who is a real person, who gives you orders that you have to follow in order for your ship to survive, and the your success depends on your ability to work together with your captain and fellow crew.

What makes wall-gunning boring is the fact that you are forced to shoot at only what the computer puts in front of you. But on a big skyship, you will be shooting at what your captain and crew put in front of you, which I think would be just as rewarding of an experience as gunning for a smaller ship.
Title: Re: Other than Airships
Post by: Sonoskay on May 30, 2013, 12:09:47 pm
Alot of these ideas are good. But they are VERY ambitous.and take time and money.

Money i dont think muse has. Im going to use world of tanks as an exsample. Before  they got a bigger base of players they really wernt able to do much. Add a few tanks here.. a few maps here..  so on and so forth.  I think Muse is going to have to come up with a solid way to make money besides the game themselfe... I think it would be cool if they added custumizable ship features... like a logo on the balloon or effect the color of the airships... (slightly) i mean an airship thats bright pink thats not  at all faded or worn would kill part of the atmousphear... add a few more costumes and so on.. and use the steam wallet to acces it.

In this way you are not restricting game play in the slightest. but also making it so there is SOmthing offered if you spend a little bit more money. But since we did buy the game in the first place make a few free customizable things. i would love to see all the ideas you stated come to fruitoin but i think there needs to be a stable way to make money.. (though if they are careful the adventure DLC will make them oodles.)
Title: Re: Other than Airships
Post by: Arthem White on May 30, 2013, 01:33:41 pm
I think the notion that biplanes equal no teamwork is narrow sighted. Player driven biplanes could be made as teamwork heavy as airships.

Imagine a 4-biplane squad working the same way an airship does, it needs 4 people to be manned and functions as a single unit. One biplane is the refueller (the rest need to constantly go back at it for repairs). Another is a bomber + ammo depot, but it's very slow (so it powers the rest and needs to be protected) and there are two fighters.

With setups like this, or similar (such as a couple of two-person biplanes that exhibit synergy) could be teamwork heavy and offer a faster paced, twitchier gameplay for those interested.

I'm all for it, as much as for bigger, meatier boss ships =)
Title: Re: Other than Airships
Post by: Rainer Zu Fall on May 30, 2013, 02:04:59 pm
I really like the idea of those 2 player operated heavy guns, that sounds like something that might work. Still, for those guns there need to be more ships which need to be balanced to other ships and maps, with guns balanced to each other and so on...
This looks very ... well, time-consuming.
Furthermore, if we get about, let's say, 3 more ships (pyramidion, squid and junker only with light weapons; galleon, goldfish, spire only with medium weapons) we already have 9 ships to choose from.
You please go ahead and try to explain to new players how to operate every single gun and ship and how to use them effectively (besides the balance effect, as said before). I don't think that's gonna happen with the adventure mode in the works. (Although, I have to confess I really like the idea of big ships with 1 pilot, probably 3 engineers and 4 gunners or stuff like that. Of course, they would need more/bigger engines, maybe more than just one armor/balloon [?] that need to be repaired. So you can make the engineers and gunners related to the area they're gonna be used at.)
Title: Re: Other than Airships
Post by: Gambrill on May 30, 2013, 02:55:20 pm
what about this as a possiblity?

trading tech? being able to add something to a weapon like an enhanced zoom, but obviously have a downside as in maybe you have an extra setting on zoom yet you fire 20% slower etc.?

i'm just spit balling here, you could get a carronade but with a longer barrel to make it reach just a little further away yet its spread is less.

that way its not just about what the gunner is equiping for the gun, but if the guns got certain attachments the gunner may want to rethink his load-out :)
Title: Re: Other than Airships
Post by: Rainer Zu Fall on May 30, 2013, 03:26:09 pm
Well I actually think that the ammo choices are enough of a modification - I don't wanna modificate the modification.
Furthermore, same as before: Everything needs to be balanced. This balance (modifying a modification of a gun) will be hard to achieve as well as much calculating all the percentages and forces that are going on.
Pretty much work to do too if you ask me.
Title: Re: Other than Airships
Post by: Gambrill on May 30, 2013, 03:43:07 pm
i see your point but im an Airforce engineer in real life and i see it happening all the time, this includes our files all the way up to our jets, (cannot say too much- all hush hush you know)
Title: Re: Other than Airships
Post by: Rainer Zu Fall on May 30, 2013, 03:51:43 pm
Yeah but this is a game which needs to be programmed by people that are programming adventure mode too. Limited ressources and limited time. Plus, most of the people around here aren't in the army/navy/airforce, so ...

Still, your Jets don't need to be balanced. You want them to be better! This is exactly what we don't want in a game. Furthermore you don't have to calculate all the ... uh ... calculations that are necessary to make this game work. Physics apply to real life without them being calculated earlier, but this may slow down things a bit - especially servers and/or players machines.
Title: Re: Other than Airships
Post by: Gambrill on May 30, 2013, 03:58:30 pm
Yeah but this is a game which needs to be programmed by people that are programming adventure mode too. Limited ressources and limited time. Plus, most of the people around here aren't in the army/navy/airforce, so ...

Still, your Jets don't need to be balanced. You want them to be better! This is exactly what we don't want in a game. Furthermore you don't have to calculate all the ... uh ... calculations that are necessary to make this game work. Physics apply to real life without them being calculated earlier, but this may slow down things a bit - especially servers and/or players machines.

i never took into account THAT! haha and there's me demanding the devs spend more time sweating trying to perfect something like this :') they'd never sleep again, haha sorry guys xD
Title: Re: Other than Airships
Post by: Khamael on May 31, 2013, 02:51:13 pm
What if, in larger crew, there was another level of depth added to the hierarchy? A skyship would have multiple gunners and engineers, so what if they were each treated as their own crew, who answered to an Ordinance Officer and Chief Engineer, respectively, who then reported directly to the Captain?

This may be way too complicated for the game, but what do you think of twelve person crews?

Say there are three main parts of the ship. The bridge, the engine room(s) and the gunnery posts. With a full crew, you would have four gunners and four engineers, both in their respective areas, and then on the bridge you have four people with specific duties that aren't hands-on.

The Ordnance Officer's seat would have a whole bunch of dials that show the status of each weapon so that they know exactly how everyone is doing. They also have a speaking tube connected to a loudspeaker in the gunnery room (or whatever the word would be, I honestly don't know) which is the only way the bridge can communicate with the gunners. There'd also be a speaker connecting to a mouthpiece for the gunners to communicate back. He would have authority over the gunners and would tell them what to do.

Then there's the Chief Engineer. His seat would be basically the same, except obvious everything connects to the engine room. Again, there would be a speaking tube and speaker and he he would have authority over the engineers and would tell them what to do.

Then there's the Helmsman. He would have a good view of the outside and would basically be what the pilot is on the smaller ships that we have now. Probably wouldn't be altered much.

Lastly is the Captain. From his position on the bridge, he would have a general knowledge of everything going on on the ship, including the engines, guns, and exterior, but not as detailed as the other bridge officers. He would also have the ability to speak to the entire crew, however these one be one-way, unlike the Ordnance Officer and Chief Engineer. The Captain would have ultimate authority over everyone, though he would have to work with the other crew members due to his still limited knowledge of what is happening.

Again, this is probably far too complicated and might not be received well by the players. However, it would be very interesting and would force the crew to work as a tight-knit group.

EDIT: Something went wrong with the above quote and I've forgotten how to fix it. Please just ignore the error.

[Edit: fixed broken BBC ~Sgt. Spoon]
Title: Re: Other than Airships
Post by: Sgt. Spoon on May 31, 2013, 03:46:14 pm
It's certainly something that I'm dreaming about which would be quite epic, would it be implemented.

But due to the complexity and limited resources of MUSE, not even talking about preformance issues, it would be quite a pain to implement.
Title: Re: Other than Airships
Post by: Audie Murphy on May 31, 2013, 08:50:58 pm
Yeah, GOIO gets laggy already when there's more than 16 players on a server. Before they even think about implementing a ship with 12 crew, they'll need to upgrade their servers and optimize their game so that it can handle much larger battles. And again, with Adventure mode being the giant project that it is, I wouldn't hold my breath.

I was thinking ships with maybe 6 crew.
Title: Re: Other than Airships
Post by: Rainer Zu Fall on June 01, 2013, 04:12:54 am
As said before, 8 people on one ship would sound perfect for me, since there's 4 people on a ship now - 2 ships together makes 8 people on a big ship.

But yeah, Spoon, that's almost the same I wrote before... Sad but true.
Title: Re: Other than Airships
Post by: Khamael on June 02, 2013, 12:12:52 am
Ah well. It was just a thought.
Title: Re: Other than Airships
Post by: Ofiach on June 02, 2013, 02:04:49 am
Don't censor your thoughts just because some of us don't like them man keep shooting em out there for people to discuss!
Title: Re: Other than Airships
Post by: Rainer Zu Fall on June 02, 2013, 05:15:44 am
Ofiach is right about that! If there's something on your mind just write it down here. (By the way, there aren't many people disliking your thougths, most of the answers here are just to explain why those ideas probably won't come [soon?]).
Title: Re: Other than Airships
Post by: Sgt. Spoon on June 03, 2013, 11:29:16 am
Yeah it's still always useful with suggestions. And even if it's not possible right now to implement we can atleast see the general public opinion on that certain feature. For example, even though MUSE has declared that boarding is never going to happen, one wonders what would happen if literally every player wanted it (ok maybe not boarding but other certain features that'd be more feasible). If a lot of players want it, it's really worth taking time to think about.
Title: Re: Other than Airships
Post by: Audie Murphy on June 03, 2013, 11:34:13 pm
Well, here's what I would like to see (keep in mind that I'm not taking balancing or ease of implementation into account, just thinking of what would be fun):

Muse upgrades their servers so that 24-player matches become the standard.

3 classes of ships: Frigate, Sky Destroyer, Cloud Cruiser

Frigates: Squid-sized, 3 crew
Sky Destroyers: Pyramidion-size, 4 crew
Cloud Cruisers: Galleon or bigger: 5 crew

Each team would still only get 3 captains, so each team would get one ship from each class (I suppose they could also just get 3 destroyer-class ships, but I'm not sure why they would want to, or how that would be implemented). I think that this could be a really fun way to play GOIO and it would fit the theme of teamwork and role specialization.  Each player has a role to play on their ship defined by their class and loadout, and then they work together with their fellow crew to perform their ship's role within the team.

I think that 8-crew ships should be reserved for special boss fights in Adventure mode, but I think that varying crew sizes slightly would be a great way to add replayability to the core game mechanics.
Title: Re: Other than Airships
Post by: Rainer Zu Fall on June 04, 2013, 10:57:13 am
Well, here's what I would like to see (keep in mind that I'm not taking balancing or ease of implementation into account, just thinking of what would be fun):

Muse upgrades their servers so that 24-player matches become the standard.

3 classes of ships: Frigate, Sky Destroyer, Cloud Cruiser

Frigates: Squid-sized, 3 crew
Sky Destroyers: Pyramidion-size, 4 crew
Cloud Cruisers: Galleon or bigger: 5 crew

Each team would still only get 3 captains, so each team would get one ship from each class (I suppose they could also just get 3 destroyer-class ships, but I'm not sure why they would want to, or how that would be implemented). I think that this could be a really fun way to play GOIO and it would fit the theme of teamwork and role specialization.  Each player has a role to play on their ship defined by their class and loadout, and then they work together with their fellow crew to perform their ship's role within the team.

I think that 8-crew ships should be reserved for special boss fights in Adventure mode, but I think that varying crew sizes slightly would be a great way to add replayability to the core game mechanics.



That actually sounds really good! Keep going with the ideas! I'd like to see something like that too.
I see one problem on first place though: For the big and the small ships you need an experienced crew if you think of it like Squid and Galleon. The Pyramidion is an easy ship, so everybody can fly as well as be gunner and engineer on that one, but a Squid and a Galleon... I don't quite think you'd get the teams filled. There'd probably be many games with the Destroyer ships filled but empty small and big ships. Furthermore, if for example I wanna play with some friends but we both like to fly Squids...well, it'd either not be allowed to do so or make balance too difficult to calculate.

Since I don't think that the bosses in the Adventure mode will be playable by humans, I really would like to see them in skirmish at least, so we can use them (or at least one).

Going into the balance issues (and yes, I know you just wanted to present your idea, which is really good!, but just showing every side of the possibility Im gonna write that down too), I don't think that 3 people on a Squid are enough to keep it alive - 5 people on a Galleon though makes it almost invincible as the ships stand now. Only making 1 big and 1 small ship available for every team destroys some different tactis though, and making them available in any mass is...well, just as we do now but with different crews (see above).
I'm not even gonna start with implementation.
Title: Re: Other than Airships
Post by: Audie Murphy on June 04, 2013, 12:20:33 pm
That actually sounds really good! Keep going with the ideas! I'd like to see something like that too.
I see one problem on first place though: For the big and the small ships you need an experienced crew if you think of it like Squid and Galleon. The Pyramidion is an easy ship, so everybody can fly as well as be gunner and engineer on that one, but a Squid and a Galleon... I don't quite think you'd get the teams filled. There'd probably be many games with the Destroyer ships filled but empty small and big ships. Furthermore, if for example I wanna play with some friends but we both like to fly Squids...well, it'd either not be allowed to do so or make balance too difficult to calculate.

Thanks! Glad you liked the idea! One of the devs once mentioned to me that the squid was actually originally a 3-person ship. In any case, it has not been my experience that players shy away from crewing squids or galleons. Especially galleons. A lot of new players jump into the game wanting to have the biggest ship in the sky. I do however think that you might be right about the squids. They have a high skill ceiling, which many players might find intimidating.



Since I don't think that the bosses in the Adventure mode will be playable by humans, I really would like to see them in skirmish at least, so we can use them (or at least one).

Going into the balance issues (and yes, I know you just wanted to present your idea, which is really good!, but just showing every side of the possibility Im gonna write that down too), I don't think that 3 people on a Squid are enough to keep it alive - 5 people on a Galleon though makes it almost invincible as the ships stand now. Only making 1 big and 1 small ship available for every team destroys some different tactis though, and making them available in any mass is...well, just as we do now but with different crews (see above).

The thing with letting the players choose any mass for their ships is that the total crew has to be 12.

And yeah, balancing it would be way hard, but there's a few ideas that I thought might work. What if the larger ships' hull armor was spread throughout multiple components, which corresponded to different areas. This forces more people into the engineering role to keep the ship alive without making it too fragile. It also makes it vulnerable to focus fire. Throw in another reduction in their manueverability, and the result is a ship that is merely specialized, instead of overpowered.

Likewise, by consolidating the vital components of the squid and other frigates, you make it so that keeping them in full repair is much easier, which frees up more time for the engineer to gun. And the reduction in manueverability that the Cruisers suffer makes it absolutely viable for a frigate to sit in their blind spot and knock out their engines.
Title: Re: Other than Airships
Post by: Gambrill on June 09, 2013, 12:40:33 pm
ATTACK THE FORT MODE!!!!!!

Defenders are on the ground protecting from airships, airships destroy key objectives... discuss 

(can't wait for the negativity on this :') )
Title: Re: Other than Airships
Post by: Darcain on June 10, 2013, 03:57:15 am
Very large ships sounds like an awesome idea, I'd actually love to have engineers actively divvy up where they are and what they are going to do between themselves, they'd be vital to keeping everything up as most would probably be dedicated to repairing and rebuilding everything everywhere on the ship.

And something that could be quite cool, what if there's a mode where one team has one massive ship, basically the boss, LOTS of heavy and light guns on the hull to shoot at the smaller ships with while the other team is spread across multiple ships all trying to take down the boss, this would require careful balancing though since it could easily turn to the boss either being near immortal or the smaller ships incredibly easily overwhelming the boss.

Something else that might be interesting would be battles with simply more ships, something like a 6v6 or 8v8, maybe 10v10 if your servers can handle it, would be interesting, maybe even have the possibility for captains on either team to be able to "join" their crews and ships together before the match to form a big ship.
Title: Re: Other than Airships
Post by: Coldcurse on June 10, 2013, 05:54:24 am
some new game modes:

search and destroy: one teams carries a bomb and tries to drop it on a spot as the other team tries to stop them.
assault: one team defends a spot and the others attack to take over the spot.
team deathmatch hardcore: its like every normal game but this time you only have 1 live, first team that exterminate the other team wins.
free for all: everyone against everyone.
VIP: each team has a VIP ship that needs to be defended, you score points by killing the enemy VIP ship.
Title: Re: Other than Airships
Post by: Darcain on June 10, 2013, 07:11:38 am
A free for all sounds like something that could be quite fun with 8 ships in total.
Title: Re: Other than Airships
Post by: Khamael on June 10, 2013, 12:20:43 pm
I found another page discussing the idea of a boiler room. This would go will with larger airships like those discussed here.

https://gunsoficarus.com/community/forum/index.php/topic,1325.msg22021.html#msg22021
Title: Re: Other than Airships
Post by: Phores on June 13, 2013, 06:24:23 pm
Allow crew to equip fun but mostly ineffective "fluff" items.
Just things which make the crew seem more like people than avatars of non-stop ship-ship war or give "idle" animations and the like. Examples:
On the note of that point: character voices would be nice (especially for things like captain changing "priority"). "Macro voices" has been suggested elsewhere too for audio yells for those without a mic for things like "Balloon down!" or "Man starboard guns!".

Depending how far you can go with the age rating there is ofcourse:

Edit: This whole section:

Bigger ships would be awesome though smaller(3 and less crew) would be very awkward to ballance to a playable level.

Bigger ships could pull in up to 8 man crews for capitol ships/flagships used in scenario/"asymetric" matches (hey, fun doesn't always mean equal teams)

Simply big ships in the 6 man area would be more managable for skirmish

Ballance could be interesting, offsetting tremendous firepower and armor for becoming more akin to an angry terrain feature.
 Large guns having separate "turn speed" and "reload speed" hit locations could make engineering them more awkward while simple fear of being in arc makes them an area denial. Basic gun ballance can be extrapolated from current weapons by increasing projectiles/second with an increased bullet life and/or reduced bullet drop, some weapons could even be given continuous fire (fire rate slowed by damage).
 The boiler room idea could work maybe even make it never have enough power to siginificantly power everything at once: forcing the tough decisions of fight or flight for the cumbersome giants.

 As is the galleon feels to me like it's in an awkward palce, overgrown and clumsy for a 4 man ship yet too stunted to be a terror of combat that would justify a "heavy" placement.

 On an aside, large weapons that would be interesting to see on some of these bigger ships: (probably wouldn't be affected as much by special ammo though)
 Baloon mines: Think inverted sea mines, fire from a mid range cannon, reload and clip size prevents too many being around before their baloons fail. (Genuine area denial/cloud trap)
 Superheavy mortar: Only fires at distant locked enemies, fires a very high arc shell at the enemy landing several seconds later, devestating the local area. (Flush enemies out)
 Bolas: (could possibly fit this to current mid-size) Functions much like the harpoon but binds 2 other ships together.
 Ball and chain: Fire a harpoon at a ship with a heavy weight attatched, generally messing with their momentum and turning (possibly sinking)
Title: Re: Other than Airships
Post by: Khamael on June 14, 2013, 09:37:38 am
I like your fluff items, though I think it's incredibly unlikely they will be implemented anytime soon due to the fact that they have absolutely no gameplay applications. Then again, aesthetic is a major feature of this game, so they might be added eventually.

For the differently sized ships, I kind of imagined there being only certain levels when they can be used, or at least made so that whoever sets up the match can decide, as in there's an option that looks along the lines of:

Teams [ 2 ]
Ships:
3-Man: [ 1 ]
4-Man: [ 2 ]
5-man: [ 1 ]

I like your heavy weapon ideas. They also have the feature I want added which is guns that don't do direct damage, like your balloon mines.

Also, I was discussing heavy weapons with a friend, specifically the concept of them requiring two people. He said that, while that's a good idea, it should be at least possible to fire them alone and just be at a disadvantage. Sort of like requiring a gunner in a seat to fire and another off to the side reloading. That way, if they're desperate enough, you could get in the seat, fire, then get out, walk to the other side, reload, walk back, repeat. It would be much slower, but it would probably prevent people from refusing to use heavy weapons outright due to the difficulty.
Title: Re: Other than Airships
Post by: James T. Kirk on June 17, 2013, 11:49:27 am
Just to make a quick backtrack:

A free for all sounds like something that could be quite fun with 8 ships in total.

Personally, I don't think so.

A free-for-all completely negates the need for harassment ships, disablers, or any other support loadout; one player would do all the work on a kill, and someone else would swoop in and take the point.

Free-for-alls would be made of Merc/flack Pyramidions, gat/flack junkers, and, maybe every once in a blue moon, a gat/mortar Pyra.

While crew-based teamwork would be maintained, team balancing of ships and captain coordination (two major parts of the game) would be out the window.

Making a shaky alliance between another ship to take down a Galleon would be interesting, but coordinating the strike without alerting your prey to your plans would be hard to implement.
Title: Re: Other than Airships
Post by: Phores on June 18, 2013, 08:57:41 am
Yeah, some ships really arent possible to take down solo without some real work or BS meta reducing the game to one of a handful of builds. A 2v2v2 match would be interesting though.
 LMS would be the most viable but favours hiding a lot while kill count favours a lot of killstealing, either would have a rather interesting metagame within them.
Title: Re: Other than Airships
Post by: Echoez on June 18, 2013, 09:01:46 am
Yeah, some ships really arent possible to take down solo without some real work or BS meta reducing the game to one of a handful of builds. A 2v2v2 match would be interesting though.
 LMS would be the most viable but favours hiding a lot while kill count favours a lot of killstealing, either would have a rather interesting metagame within them.

Now that is a pretty cool suggestion, 2v2v2 still has the team element into it and sounds very fun to me personaly at least. Though I'd like to only see it on objective based maps, not DM.
Title: Re: Other than Airships
Post by: Plasmarobo on June 18, 2013, 09:45:54 am
I think the "Flintlock" or any personal firearm items should only work against birds.

There should be an achievement for that.
Title: Re: Other than Airships
Post by: James T. Kirk on June 18, 2013, 09:48:48 am
Yeah, some ships really arent possible to take down solo without some real work or BS meta reducing the game to one of a handful of builds. A 2v2v2 match would be interesting though.
 LMS would be the most viable but favours hiding a lot while kill count favours a lot of killstealing, either would have a rather interesting metagame within them.

http://media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m9uwqiFJQr1qcvueb.jpg
Title: Re: Other than Airships
Post by: Phores on June 19, 2013, 06:15:11 am
Why dont we have both?
Was what I was erring towards, though don't want to overcomplicate it.

Non DM would be a good way to do it, you could easily do a koth match with 3 teams (would have to lower/remove the conversion timer though).

Thinking about it, with a bit of scripting, could have some pretty interesting scenarios:

Actually, thinking about it: What I'd really like to see is a map/scenario editor with something like a contest every other month for best map(s) to be entered into official circulation.
Title: Re: Other than Airships
Post by: James T. Kirk on June 19, 2013, 12:44:08 pm

  • Triangle of hate, each team has a target team and is scored by that team dieing but not the other (who is targetting them)


Now this sounds interesting.

It would be cool to fire at a target that can't fire back, but on the flip side, you can't do anything to stop the guy firing on you.

Disablers would be thrown out of the equation, as your only defense against the guy shooting at you is the guy you're shooting at.

Harassers, snipers, and brawlers are still a part of the mix, though.

It would be either really fun, or really annoying, depending on how people end up playing it.
Title: Re: Other than Airships
Post by: Phores on June 19, 2013, 05:43:15 pm
It would be cool to fire at a target that can't fire back, but on the flip side, you can't do anything to stop the guy firing on you.

An interesting idea, I was thinking more along the lines of being able to shoot back but if you killed them it would just give points to another enemy.
ie. all can shoot all but any of team A dieing gives team B points, B dieing gives C points and C dieing gives A points.
Title: Re: Other than Airships
Post by: James T. Kirk on June 19, 2013, 10:47:57 pm
Too easy for trolls to troll.

Also, that Powder Monkey who either can't hear you or thinks he knows better could also screw you over.

Maybe if the Game mode was locked to level 3 and up...
Title: Re: Other than Airships
Post by: Khamael on June 20, 2013, 02:08:57 am
I really like the thought of the two teams racing and a third trying to kill them both. It's really unorthodox.

If that's not received well though, how about this? Two teams, each with two ships. One ship on each team is carrying cargo that they have to get to the finish line before their opponent does and the other ship on the team tries to intercept the cargo ship and keep it from reaching the finish line.
Title: Re: Other than Airships
Post by: James T. Kirk on June 20, 2013, 09:41:02 am
The little story on the loading screen could say something about two factions (red and blue team) racing to receive payment for the same cargo, while sky pirates (black team) try to take it for themselves.

They could even have the teams rotate every round! The trick would be making each round short enough so all three teams could go without the game taking more than 10 - 20 minutes.

I really like the idea of working with a different ally (or working on your own) every round.
Title: Re: Other than Airships
Post by: Phores on June 20, 2013, 10:27:52 am
They could even have the teams rotate every round! The trick would be making each round short enough so all three teams could go without the game taking more than 10 - 20 minutes.

I really like the idea of working with a different ally (or working on your own) every round.

The rotation may take a little work but a feature I'd want to see anyway (forming a small team/single ship that gets randomly slotted in to matches as a whole unit).

 Keeping it fast would be pretty easy, no respawns and a course length in the region of 4x length of dunes.
I really want to play this now...
Title: Re: Other than Airships
Post by: Khamael on June 26, 2013, 01:59:25 pm
That would work really well. The rotation could work if it was made so that the round ends as soon as a team gets a kill. Or rather as soon as either the black teak is killed or both the red and blue teams are killed.

I don't think they should return to the lobby after that though, because that would break up gameplay. Maybe each game has everyone on each team once?
Title: Re: Other than Airships
Post by: James T. Kirk on June 26, 2013, 02:02:01 pm
That would work really well. The rotation could work if it was made so that the round ends as soon as a team gets a kill. Or rather as soon as either the black teak is killed or both the red and blue teams are killed.

I don't think they should return to the lobby after that though, because that would break up gameplay. Maybe each game has everyone on each team once?

Muse would have to implement some sort of round system, because (as far as I know) nothing of the sort exists in the game as of now.
Everyone just keeps shooting till 'ya win.
Title: Re: Other than Airships
Post by: Khamael on June 26, 2013, 03:08:38 pm
That shouldn't be too complicated a feature to implement. Though I can't imagine a time it would be used except for this game mode.
Title: Re: Other than Airships
Post by: Phores on June 27, 2013, 06:05:13 am
Automatic match generation and team placement coudl be used for a lot of things... notably automated tournaments... was about to suggest it myself (will make a new topic for it though, we're so far deviated from the original ideas).
Title: Re: Other than Airships
Post by: Gambrill on July 08, 2013, 07:27:59 am
That would work really well. The rotation could work if it was made so that the round ends as soon as a team gets a kill. Or rather as soon as either the black teak is killed or both the red and blue teams are killed.

I don't think they should return to the lobby after that though, because that would break up gameplay. Maybe each game has everyone on each team once?

Maybe not a return to lobby but just before where you see the scoreboard it'll show you who's changed teams to where?
Title: Re: Other than Airships
Post by: Khamael on July 10, 2013, 07:55:02 pm
That would work really well. The rotation could work if it was made so that the round ends as soon as a team gets a kill. Or rather as soon as either the black teak is killed or both the red and blue teams are killed.

I don't think they should return to the lobby after that though, because that would break up gameplay. Maybe each game has everyone on each team once?

Maybe not a return to lobby but just before where you see the scoreboard it'll show you who's changed teams to where?

Like a team scramble? I just meant to have red team switch to the pirates. Would it be a good idea to mix up everyone? I'm not sure it would, since most people set their equipment specifically for the ship and team they have, so that could cause problems with a team scramble.
Title: Re: Other than Airships
Post by: James T. Kirk on July 10, 2013, 10:30:53 pm
Yea, full team rotations would work just fine.