"That thing's operational!" - Atruejedi's Star Wars-themed thoughts on Alliance

[Daft Loon]

... I would suggest maybe 3 different unique map markers, one for airplane, one for boss, and one for the rest. Also, having names attached would be too chaotic with the large amount of alliance enemies, so maybe have a key on the left showing the difference between types of markers.

Isn't that how it is already? Airplanes get a small v-shaped marker, airships get a standard circular marker and bosses/player ships get the circular marker with a - sign inside it.

[Inkjet]

I agree with most of your points from page 13-21:
Too many enemies, none of them feel purposeful. Giving them names could help. I, too, want to feel more STORY in the game. Make other damage types useful, no, not every gun needs to be useful, but having precise disables be useful, especially against bosses, would be a welcome change.
I would like to see boss ships be juggernauts. slow moving, hard to kill, but not necessarily nuking the player (*cough* Mercantile).

I also like your idea for single-shot consumables. They could even be purchased with real money if players didn't want to take the time to grind them out. Other games have this as an option, and so long as the price point is fair and the for-money option isn't better than the grind option, I would support it. You could even put a cooldown on how often these could be purchased.

I also completely agree with making locations take longer to take control of, and making it a big, important thing, complete with benefits and so on. I also agree with having the whole front line be "available" for attack, requiring the most active parts of the community to discuss where to focus their efforts.

Aside from all this, I HAD to reply to respond to a few ship-related things:
Magnate: You don't need stamina to do the side jump. You don't need to jump on the balloon to hit the main, jumping onto and then from the railing beside the balloon is sufficient. You didn't mention that you can grab the mid-guns from the aft side.

Corsair: Why fool with a stamina jump between turning engines when you can run between them along the metal bit? I didn't know about this, and didn't figure it out until 5s after I failed my first attempt at your stamina jump. The only advantage I can see is if you need to hit the engine and then get to the gun immediately, but I assumed when going from engine to engine, you're thinking about tanking while burning. You also didn't mention that you can grab the mid-guns from the fore.

The Shrike takes ~2s from spawn to drop down to the helm. I don't think this is an obscene amount of time, though the positioning still leaves a lot to be desired.
As for the turning engines on it, it takes ~1.82s to run between them using the stairs, 1.43s to run across the plank, and I don't see TOO much issue with it, at least, not much more than any other tight movement on other ships.

[Richard LeMoon]

Going to jump around rather than chronological order and make a few posts touching on some of the subjects. First up, weak points.


Frankly, I hate them. Not because they are hard to hit, though that is part of it. Mostly because they make no sense. I am talking about both boss ships and bases. Especially bases. I can SEE the generators on the bases, but I can't damage them because this is not their 'turn'. For bases, make them all active at once. All bases, all generators. Make the base legs weak points as well, susceptible to Flechette damage. Actually, completely rework how bases work.

Step 1. Define how they work. The outer structure of the base is weak to explosive, but armored. The armor and guns rebuild very rapidly due to power generators on the platforms. The base has an armored core that can not be destroyed easily. The legs are also heavily armored. As an addition, there would be a small coms balloon over the base (cargo sized balloon).

Step 2. Define order of attack.

     a. Take out the balloon with flechette. (optional) This prevents the base from calling in long range aid. If you fail to destroy the balloon before assaulting the base, a boss will be called in.
     b. Take out the generators (optional). These allow the base to repair its armor and guns at a ridiculous rate. Constant use of piercing would be needed to keep the armor down, only to have it almost instantly rebuilt. Each one destroyed slows the rebuild rate. However, change them to a component like engines and guns, so they have to be destroyed with Shatter instead of Explosive. And they also rebuild/repair like engines.
     c. Taking out the generators and the armor exposes the structure (hull). Destroy that, and most (but not all) of the base will collapse. The legs and part of the structure will remain. That base is now counted as destroyed, and you can move on.
     e. However, the escape ship will only spawn if you collapse the legs, which have been damaged by the rest of the structure falling on it. For game purposes, the legs would take the same types of damage as balloons, being fire and flechette. Once the legs and final structure fall to the ground, the people panic and an underground bunker opens, releasing the escape pod.

Then we move to boss ships...

Weak points are a good idea, but there should be a point to them other than chewing through layers. Like the bases, destroy power generators to slow armor rebuilds (optional). THEN we can start taking off layers of armor and hull (with no weak points). Have the weak points actually effect something else as well. Destroy small ports on the midsection (shatter) to sabotage weapon stores, slowing down gun movement and reloading. Destroy a main engineering point at the rear of the ship to slow ship movement and slow engine rebuilds. Destroy the helm to slow all ship operations. You would not have to do anything other than take down armor and hull to beat them, but everything else would make it easier.

And slow them down with more guns pointing in all directions. Trying to get to a weak point is an act of frustration, not fun.

[Guagadu]

Something I forgot in my large post is the fact that Alliance stats shouldn't be included with Skirmish stats. For an example, let's use ram kills. I averaged about ram 1 ram kill every 2 matches is Skirmish. In the open alpha, I am averaging closer to 5 or 6 ram kills per match, due to the kamikaze airplanes hitting my Corsair and dying, bringing my overall average to about 1 ram kill every match. If stats for alliance are tracked at all, they need to be tracked separately, to avoid skewing stats.

[Richard LeMoon]

On upgrades:

Again, I hate them. Not for personal use, as they are fun. However, on a meta game level, they mess up everything. As a pilot, I use to be able to tell my crew to bring specific things for specific tasks. Now I just say "Just bring whatever you want." because upgrades can now be better than what you would normally take, or just because you don't want to argue with anyone over them wanting to use their upgraded shizzel. I don't care to ask what level tools everyone has.

I was actually going to suggest single (or multiple) use items as something special to use a while ago, but that was before I thought they would ever have an upgrade system for tools. So, I shelved the idea. Tools are the last thing I thought would be upgrades, since they define your role in the game. Changing roles is bad in a crew-based game.

So, moving on to those items. With tools, there are only so many upgrades you can get, and you can only earn them once. With items, the possibilities are endless. Some would be class specific. Others would be usable by all.

Full match items:

Loot crate. An item on the ship that allows crew to change their loadouts.

Stowaway. Adds one AI with a pipe wrench to your crew. Can not use guns.

Wingman. Start the match with a small ally escort ship.

Ship tweaks. Change ship stats slightly for the match. This could include a lighter hull with faster engines, or more armor with higher mass, greater lift with higher ignition chance, or slower turning guns with more power.

Coffee. Increase stamina regain rate.

Single use items:

Air strike. Call in your own fleet of bombers.

Artillery. Call in an artillery strike using rangefinder to target.

Specialty, one reload ammos. Completely OP, but Ok because you only get one clip per match.

Upgrade ammo. Upgrade your current ammo for one clip.

Spare parts. Allow the rebuild of some permahull.

Super buff. Buffs the entire ship instantly.

Fly the colors. Your ship will not be attacked until you attack. Your ship must be unspotted to activate.

Elixir. Fully refill stamina.

Anyways, if each of these came in tiers (lasting longer, more powerful, more uses) with higher cost, you can easily see how this would keep players much more engaged than a simple upgrade system. If something seems OP or overused, it is easy to balance by simply adjusting the effect, or removing future purchase. It is much harder to balance tools, since people already have them, and got them for the desired effect. Lessen the effect, and people will be upset.

 

[Huskarr]

On upgrades:

Again, I hate them. Not for personal use, as they are fun. However, on a meta game level, they mess up everything. As a pilot, I use to be able to tell my crew to bring specific things for specific tasks. Now I just say "Just bring whatever you want." because upgrades can now be better than what you would normally take, or just because you don't want to argue with anyone over them wanting to use their upgraded shizzel. I don't care to ask what level tools everyone has.

I was actually going to suggest single (or multiple) use items as something special to use a while ago, but that was before I thought they would ever have an upgrade system for tools. So, I shelved the idea. Tools are the last thing I thought would be upgrades, since they define your role in the game. Changing roles is bad in a crew-based game.

So, moving on to those items. With tools, there are only so many upgrades you can get, and you can only earn them once. With items, the possibilities are endless. Some would be class specific. Others would be usable by all.

Full match items:

Loot crate. An item on the ship that allows crew to change their loadouts.

Stowaway. Adds one AI with a pipe wrench to your crew. Can not use guns.

Wingman. Start the match with a small ally escort ship.

Ship tweaks. Change ship stats slightly for the match. This could include a lighter hull with faster engines, or more armor with higher mass, greater lift with higher ignition chance, or slower turning guns with more power.

Coffee. Increase stamina regain rate.

Single use items:

Air strike. Call in your own fleet of bombers.

Artillery. Call in an artillery strike using rangefinder to target.

Specialty, one reload ammos. Completely OP, but Ok because you only get one clip per match.

Upgrade ammo. Upgrade your current ammo for one clip.

Spare parts. Allow the rebuild of some permahull.

Super buff. Buffs the entire ship instantly.

Fly the colors. Your ship will not be attacked until you attack. Your ship must be unspotted to activate.

Elixir. Fully refill stamina.

Anyways, if each of these came in tiers (lasting longer, more powerful, more uses) with higher cost, you can easily see how this would keep players much more engaged than a simple upgrade system. If something seems OP or overused, it is easy to balance by simply adjusting the effect, or removing future purchase. It is much harder to balance tools, since people already have them, and got them for the desired effect. Lessen the effect, and people will be upset.

Also

on everything you said.

Exept the Shrike. I love maining the Shrike, but that is probably because I'm not a big fan of shooting in general (part of the reason why I love the flare so much.)

[Letheliah]

I've been writing this for two hours, Jedi. You should send me cookies.

So I agree with alot of what Jedi wrote, and said as much in game, but we figured I might as well post my thoughts on Alliance here (and I'll probably copypasta it elsewhere) so we can further the discussion and brainstorming.

Once more unto the breach, dear friends... Here's some more word vomit covering Jedi's essay, some replys in this thread, and further feedback I have on Alliance DLC that I hadn't already emailed previously to Muse. Sorry it's so spastic and lazy, but that's my thought process and writing style. While I truly want to make it perfect, i would go overboard editing it and it would be legit torture for me in the end. Gomenasai!~~ Q___Q



I would LOVE a more immersive backstory from Alliance. I have already gone through the main site reading as much as I can into the history of Burren and each faction, the famous pilots and ships, I have head canons for my own Bardgineer, Tribal Sniper, and Flight Lieutenant Pilot (she's not a captain, but her ship and crew were separated from their armada and are flying treacherous skies with only her own judgement to guide her! xD) and there is SO much that can be done to add to this that I am sure they just havent released yet. I think faction voice packs could be nice if done carefully. I like the idea of Newspapers, or perhaps a heavily populated "Tavern" or "Garage" or Faction Intelligence Base where we can get news of lost and gained territories and such. A "Base" could be modeled the same, but flavor text would style it to be unique to each faction. I.e. Fjords and Chaladons could probably have Newspapers, but Arashi and Angleans (who probably don't have wood or paper) would rely on scouts returning from the frontier with this information or an airship garage where they hear this information by word of mouth.

I don't mind the model style of the planes as the look doesn't detract from the game for me, but I DO think bi-wings and changing it up to make them more ramshackle and steampunk could only improve the atmosphere of the game. They become more of a problem than enemy ships in the harder game modes with 3 or 4 ships, and their AI paths could def use some remapping so they're not flying into things so much, but I don't think they are a big enough aspect of the game to focus on and so again they don't detract the submersion for me, they are just there.
You could improve on it this way though, as stated by HamsterIV:

* Restrict airplanes to open sky sections of the map. If an airship flies too low or too close to canyons the airplanes should peel off and go back to patrolling a safe stretch of sky. This would allow the pilot to out maneuver the airplanes and with the airplanes contained to a certain area they can be purposefully engaged with long range guns if they present too much of a threat.

* Add immobile ground or balloon based turrets in areas of the map that the airplanes can not reach. This can be a simple as a gun on the back of a truck that drives into position from a hidden spawn when the player is not looking. Being static and possibly ground based allows the players more agency in how to deal with them. Also slow moving shot drop weapons would be more effective since the gunners can calibrate their aim from the ground hits and the splash damage.

I think it's possible to use those stationary guns from defense well in this case. Though I think creating moving ground forces would be cool it would also require more time and work. But as Hamster stated, the need for different weapons and ammo types to target these forces could mean a ship has more play styles and objectives to choose from (also, achievements to work towards!).

Spotting as crew is a pain in the arse; it's only worth using far away, as the close you get when you're trying to kill this one ship, it's too zoomed in and you can barely see the hull and health. That being said, I also prefer the obscure way you can tell how damaged a ship is in Skirmish: the breaking ships and those red crosses.
Also it would be nice if ally ships were targetable as well, with the ability to see their hull and health a valuable asset (not all captains can communicate via mic, and chat while viable means taking your attention away from your ship to write). This is a skirmish complaint for me as well.
Otherwise, I like the spotting system for pilot, though needing to not use pilot tools to target it is annoying. I personally have difficulty seeing the faint light outlines around the spotted enemy combatants (and especially in the white clouds of some maps, Sea of Alleron being one, forget trying to spot planes..), perhaps having a menu option to choose to use a different color? Or an animated aura/target that circles the enemy?

Ramming could use more damage.

Ramming is perfect in novice it feels realistic , but in normal and higher difficulties there's a huge jump in the amount of damage it does. So in novice I'm able to get 3 hit rams but in normal it takes 3 times that.

Ramming is a fun part of the game for me and many others, but it wasn't really a feasible option in Alliance against any of the ships. With balancing out armors for all the player's faction ships and AI faction ships, please keep in mind ramming. Logically some ships are stronger rammers and some are weak being rammed, but with the AI repair and rebuild being notched up each mode it wasn't feasible.

Some very minor quibbles, but I'm nothing if not vain; there should really be more options for painting ships. Especially the new ones. Sure, you can paint the Magnate's balloon, but nobody's going to notice with all the bright yellow sails. They're all beautiful ships(mad props), but I'd love to customize them. Come on, there's an entire store tab dedicated to tricking out your skyboat.

It may be not as important, but I completely agree and it was my immediate complaint with the new ships; they were SO much more colorful than the Skirmish ships and I wanted to change there colors to suit ME. The ability to paint more textures on the ship would mean more paint sales for Muse, the ability to NOT confuse ally ships (the blue sails aren't always enough), AND a pilot can happily fly something that's to their palette (I like the shrike, but the colors are sooooooo not me. This is the case for most of the ships tbh).

One thing I dislike about Assault is how linear and predictable it is; I'd prefer if the outposts, base and respective generators, as well as the boss ship, were all targetable as soon as you load into the map (though I imagine this may cause issues with spawn and lag that would need to be addressed), though not seen on the map until spotted via spyglass or Captain spot. It would make scouting ship like the Shrike, Squid and Goldfish a desirable ally in searching for these targets as well as break up the mundane "Destroy outpost one, maybe destroy outpost two, forced to destroy Boss because it's hovering over the third outpost and thus you can't get to the base to end the game..." problem. War effort and personal points would be rewarded depending on the objectives you could complete, and while not all of them are necessary to be destroyed, just the end objective i.e. destroy the base, destroying outposts would benefit with less enemy spawns.

I enjoy Defense, but I think some minor tweaks may be needed to enemy and boss ships. While killing the boss isn't necessary, if you can't get the balloon back to base in time you lose, thus fighting the boss becomes mandatory. Perhaps if the ground turrets in one respective "lane" were destroyed before it could target the base, it would give pilots enough time without having to prioritize the boss. Losing turrets would mean losing points at the end of the match.

Upgrade system: I'm thinking of this from a Skirmish Mode perspective so if this remains in Alliance mode only, I suppose it could work if the system is tweaked. If it's implemented into Skirmish mode however I think it would unbalance the player base. Certain ships will be made stronger or weaker depending on the crew, it will encourage pubs to form, and as I've stated before in emails, it will make many of the items obsolete in comparison to the upgrade metas that the captains will force crews to take (assuming that said crew even listens to the captain. So far, they haven't). Obviously the ability to repsec your points could fix this, but it may be a constant thing in order to fit the needs of the ship your on, and I don't think I'd enjoy doing that every 30 minute lobby interval, not when I may also be attempting to fix various loadouts. The upgrade system really limits us. I personally prefer a diverse selection of tools and ammos to choose from to work my tactics.

On upgrades:
Again, I hate them. Not for personal use, as they are fun. However, on a meta game level, they mess up everything. As a pilot, I use to be able to tell my crew to bring specific things for specific tasks. Now I just say "Just bring whatever you want." because upgrades can now be better than what you would normally take, or just because you don't want to argue with anyone over them wanting to use their upgraded shizzel. I don't care to ask what level tools everyone has.

I was actually going to suggest single (or multiple) use items as something special to use a while ago, but that was before I thought they would ever have an upgrade system for tools. So, I shelved the idea. Tools are the last thing I thought would be upgrades, since they define your role in the game. Changing roles is bad in a crew-based game.

So, moving on to those items. With tools, there are only so many upgrades you can get, and you can only earn them once. With items, the possibilities are endless. Some would be class specific. Others would be usable by all.

Full match items:

Loot crate. An item on the ship that allows crew to change their loadouts.

Stowaway. Adds one AI with a pipe wrench to your crew. Can not use guns.

Wingman. Start the match with a small ally escort ship.

The idea of items intrigues me, though it would also be just as hard to implement as the upgrades I think. These in particular I like though; an added engie for that Corsair? Check!
Why don't we fly in with a battalion of planes of our own? Or at least an AI manned ally ship? It'd be necessary if you prefer or are stuck playing single ship in Alliance.

Speaking of, the macthmaking..... ughhhhh....
I have no idea how queues are formed, but it's usually single ships, the extended search time probably overrides your preference of server (even when t plops you in solo with an empty lobby), it ususally not even against the faction you originally set out against (and sometimes not even WITH your faction), and they take up the majority of queues so making 2vE or higher more difficult. Though I believe you will still be gaining the war effort in your deployed area, it's confusing and makes forming crews with friends in enemy factions more difficult. Making Custom Games is really the only way to play with your faction and friends. Is it even necessary to show the fighting parties, or could we do away with it altogether so that the war effort you gain goes to your deployed territory regardless of "where" you fight with your (enemy faction) friends?

Shrike: Just throw double gunner on it. They're stamina ability with the right ammos could make some arcs more feasible, yes? (But I don't plan gun arcs well. I main engie and my skills at Captain are limited to piloting and map awareness, not the weapons aspect.) The staircase rail could be fixed so engies can stop getting their clothes and tools stuck on those back engines.[/color]

[Hoja Lateralus]

When I think of it GOIO world always seemed like just steampunk air-pirates free-for-all, so it would be cool to actually have a zone which no faction controls, a kind of "What about this dark spot there? Never go there, Simba" place, an outer rim territory. It would be neat if some semi-random (low force) raid attacks could happen from that area, but that's probably not going to happen.

Well, newspapers is just an idea, it can be just explained as a kind of meeting with some of your faction higher-ups who makes a quick briefing (assuming: right before you move out to battle). It also gives opportunity for fluff exposition (hint hint, devs said that whatever happens in open beta is canon now). Anyway some kind of algorithm for creating short notes about the world, I think many forum witers can help with that.

About "marking" your ally being captain and knowing their hull - probably not going to happen, this is a design choice, such us unclear colours of sails/flags or whatever there is there.

Speaking of, the macthmaking..... ughhhhh....
I have no idea how queues are formed, but it's usually single ships, the extended search time probably overrides your preference of server (even when t plops you in solo with an empty lobby), it ususally not even against the faction you originally set out against (and sometimes not even WITH your faction), and they take up the majority of queues so making 2vE or higher more difficult. Though I believe you will still be gaining the war effort in your deployed area, it's confusing and makes forming crews with friends in enemy factions more difficult. Making Custom Games is really the only way to play with your faction and friends. Is it even necessary to show the fighting parties, or could we do away with it altogether so that the war effort you gain goes to your deployed territory regardless of "where" you fight with your (enemy faction) friends?

This is a huge problem for two reasons:
Firstly, we should assume that people would want to be loyal to their factions, because that's the point, to get more territories, to get faction rewards etc, so it creates a quick division. I am a Guild player - I want to play Guild matches only if possible. Then if situation is sticky I may consider being a mercenary. Match against my faction? Never. And at first, when hype was still there and population reached 700 it was fairly easy to find a good match, but when it dropped to 300ish (didn't play last 2 days, probably even lower now) it was really difficult and this is WITH most matches being one ship, which I think should be forbidden. At this point I am wondering if it wouldn't be smart to just scrap one faction entirely and leave it at 3.
Even bigger issue would be when people frustrated by not being able to find a match (and also by getting constantly whopped on the map) changed factions to the winning side. I'm willing to bet that this was at least partially the case in this 8-day alpha with Chaladon's domination (perhaps devs could check the 'active' members). I mean, we all want Alliance to succed, but what if? I think to avoid this devs would have to either:
a) implement a purge, map reset feature once in a while with borders going back to their default state (frequency up to debate)
b) implement a system of handicapping the factions that grow too strong (remember pirate raids?)
c) perhaps implement a system where territories further into core lands are harder to conquer (supply lines, more population solidarity and willingness to fight, etc) OR at least take longer to conquer. Or just every territory further has additional bonus-free fortifications?

Also, one thing that bothers me in world progress. The rewards sound like warfare is mostly through land (defense = palisades and stuff, and soldiers as attackers) which makes no sense to the lore. I thought that battles are mostly through ships, in the air and then whoever is left takes the city (people care about their lives so they don't revolt when literally at gunpoint). In game we see a lot of turrets, planes and ships OUTSIDE OF HIGHLY POPULATED AREAS. Land attack sounds like suicide. I think the defences (like palisades) should be replaced with turrets and offensives should be replaced with ships or sth like that.

And my pet peeve, while on assault it always frustrates me that every time there is something small blocking the view (and shots) in front of the generators (or whatever we are destroying on the towers). Like some small pipe, or rope or something. Not sure if it's on purpose or not.

[PuddleGrumpkin]

Something I forgot in my large post is the fact that Alliance stats shouldn't be included with Skirmish stats. For an example, let's use ram kills. I averaged about ram 1 ram kill every 2 matches is Skirmish. In the open alpha, I am averaging closer to 5 or 6 ram kills per match, due to the kamikaze airplanes hitting my Corsair and dying, bringing my overall average to about 1 ram kill every match. If stats for alliance are tracked at all, they need to be tracked separately, to avoid skewing stats.

I enjoyed my +300 kills from a week of Alliance Open Alpha and my +50 Ram Kills. Makes me look like less of a scrub (to quote jedi). They don't effect achievements, but I wouldn't be opposed to keeping them... or having a separate set of stats for Alliance.