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New Map: THE NEBULA (MORE DOGFIGHTING)


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Edited for clarification

 

I don't know what others think, but I do believe that we have too many maps that are favorable to two types of ships. Some maps favor Gunships and Scouts. Other maps favor Gunships and Bombers. I tend to see very little opportunity to play something in between... like Strike Fighters. On top of that, there is very little reason to use certain types of primary and secondary weapons. Therefore, to make things more interesting, why not create a new map that favors dogfighting with strikefighters?

 

MAP SUGGESTION: THE NEBULA

Description: Map inside a dust and gas cloud that drastically reduces visibility, making it annoying to play as gunship. This would stimulate players to play as either a strikefighter or a scout. Due to the large open spaces within the cloud, it would also be very difficult to play as a bomber (unless you are in a large group).

 

Edit: Gunships could still target using E and R, but would not be able to see the actual ship, just the target reticule.

 

Two types of areas within the cloud could make things even more interesting:

 

1. Dust areas: could potentially clog and slow down engines from scounts, gunships and bombers, stimulating players to use the strikefighter... otherwise everyone would use the Flashfire with cluster missiles over the FT6-Pike or the Clarion and Starguard. From a "lore tech" standpoint, we could say strikefighter engines are better designed for performance in heavy space weather conditions.

 

2. Gas areas: could potentially favor certain weapons such as Ion missiles or EMP missiles by doubling their damage/effects. Furthermore, it could possibly reduce gunship sensor range, forcing GS to get closer to target, or loose accuracy.

 

This is just a suggestion to add some tactical variety. Every game is the same... either people play gunship vs scout in deathmatch, or gunship, bomber, and scout for satellite capture maps. Hopefully Bioware will use this idea, or something similar?

 

Finally, keep an open mind and don't dismiss it so quickly or think so negatively about it. Sometimes the best things are the simplest. AND... if Bioware or other players do not like the idea of a map that favors strikefighters, at least a map with a Nebula setting that treats all equally would still look quite impressive.

 

EDIT:

 

On a further note... we all know that the developers are working hard to fix the strikers, but maybe a good way to balance things is to create maps (such as this), that favor certain weapons, or ship classes? Maybe one day we could have a map that favors gunships with Plasma? This map could be a stepping stone for further changes like that. Just a thought....

Edited by CommanderOtto
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A map with different rules only favoring strikes is probably the worst approach to make strikes more interesting.

 

Why not? It would be awesome to have pure dogfights for once. At least with this type of map, we know for sure that Bioware will not inadvertently make other ship classes weaker by messing/reducing stats of certain abilities. This solution is much simpler.... a map that stimulates real dogfighting. Because, let's face it, I would use a Flashfire or a Gunship over strikefighters the majority of the time... and I don't want that to happen. Just like any battle in real life, there are terrains that favor certain types of infantry or tanks. The same in this case.

 

Plus... I would like to clarify. Just because there is little visibility, it doesn't mean you can't use gunships... you can get closer and press E or R to target players, even though you can't see them. But the strikefighters will always have an advantage that they NEVER get in other maps. Would you go with a strikefighter out in the open on Kuat Mesa? That map purely favors the other classes.

Edited by CommanderOtto
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It's a cool idea but not a great one for a few reasons.

 

First off, this game already suffers from a super huge learning curve, this map would send that into overdrive. While certain maps catering to specific ships already does happen, it happens more from layout then it does specifically designed rules. Imagine a new player queues up and gets this map, he decided he likes the speed of Scouts and is leveling that ship first. Now suddenly his ship is slower and that promise of the Scout being able to out maneuver everyone isn't true.

 

Secondly I found it really interesting how you phrased every game is the same no one plays Strike fighters, because you listed every other class. (You didn't add Bomber to Death match, however most really good teams always have a Legion/Warcarrier on Standby if the enemy fields too many Scouts)

Wouldn't it just be better to buff Strike fighters so they have a place in all of those maps too?

 

Thirdly, all that dust and other particle effects would really affect lower end machines heavily. I know some players that when I drop a hyperspace beacon they lose half their frames. This is a smaller issue as it doesn't actually affect balance but I thought it worth bringing up

I've always really liked the idea of clouds or dust breaking line of sight as a mecanic. We've been saying forever on my stream that the dust cloud that happens when a ship explodes would make for a great system component.

 

 

Lastly making this new map would require a significant more amount of time to develop then just buffing up our Strike Fighter friends and this is probably one of the biggest hurdles were facing in GSF right now. Trying to find solutions that take a very small amount of time for these developers as they clearly don't currently have the resources for big fixes like this one.

 

 

I hope that helpful, love the creativity! :)

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I'll go into more detail.

On this map either sensor dampening has to be increased or sensor range has to be reduced to have the effect of not seeing anything. Also comm range needs to be reduced or gunships will have everything on their hud and just shoot at a <color of the nebula> screen while not seeing any models.

And how are people to find something to shoot at if they can't see anything.

I'm not sure what real dogfighting means to you but if there were only strikes, the dogfighting won't be interesting. Strikes lack the mobility to make good dogfights and most 1v1 situations probably will be decided by becoming a 2v1 situation.

There's a good chance bombers will just mine everything and wait until others trigger their mines.

There's an even better chance the place will be crowded by T3 gunships because (from what I've seen) they outperform strike fighters in dogfights.

 

Everyone without a highend pc will be screwed. I already have fps drops in lost shipyards when looking at the dust clouds and a friendly gunship is charging while in front of me.

 

 

Aside from this. I'm relatively sure people don't want to be forced into a ship that's worse than their other ships just to play this map. In the long run, this map will not help making strike fighters more popular (even if somehow the problems with sensor and comm range and T3 gunships etc are solved somehow) but people will know the next match will be boring as soon as the loading screen pops up.

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I'll go into more detail.

On this map either sensor dampening has to be increased or sensor range has to be reduced to have the effect of not seeing anything. Also comm range needs to be reduced or gunships will have everything on their hud and just shoot at a <color of the nebula> screen while not seeing any models.

And how are people to find something to shoot at if they can't see anything.

.

 

Well, you mention some good points. What I am trying to say is that... Imagine you are a gunship in the cloud. You can't see the other ships, but you can still use the target button to search for targets. You just wouldn't be able to actually see the ship you are hitting. If someone really wants to play as gunship in this map, he/she can spend his/her requisition in more comm range, just like in other maps. So, I suppose it is not absolutely true when I mentioned "it would be pointless to play gunship"... rather, it would be more difficult. I don't know, i'm just throwing out some ideas here. The basic outline is in my first post, but it doesn't have to be exactly as I mentioned.

 

There's a good chance bombers will just mine everything and wait until others trigger their mines.

There's an even better chance the place will be crowded by T3 gunships because (from what I've seen) they outperform strike fighters in dogfights.

 

Yes that is also true, but that already happens in large open maps. I suppose if a group wants to do that, it can. But we can't do anything about it. Players can use that tactic in almost any map already. Furthermore, IF the developers want to, they could add some kind of debuff towards mines, so they cause less damage, but again, that is something that is up to developers.

 

In the end, players can use any ship, but the map favors some classes more than others. So, if a player wants to play bomber, or gunship, he/she can... but the map would still give an edge to strikefighters.

 

It's a cool idea but not a great one for a few reasons.

 

First off, this game already suffers from a super huge learning curve, this map would send that into overdrive. While certain maps catering to specific ships already does happen, it happens more from layout then it does specifically designed rules. Imagine a new player queues up and gets this map, he decided he likes the speed of Scouts and is leveling that ship first. Now suddenly his ship is slower and that promise of the Scout being able to out maneuver everyone isn't true.

 

 

Maybe. If Bioware wants to take a look at this idea, they would have to test out the debuffs towards scouts, so that it is not impossible to play it, just a bit more inconvenient. That's what I also mean by "tactical variety". Players who want to play better should adjust to the setting... putting players out of their comfort zone.

 

Secondly I found it really interesting how you phrased every game is the same no one plays Strike fighters, because you listed every other class. (You didn't add Bomber to Death match, however most really good teams always have a Legion/Warcarrier on Standby if the enemy fields too many Scouts)

Wouldn't it just be better to buff Strike fighters so they have a place in all of those maps too?

 

That could also be true, but the idea with this map is to not do something towards other maps that people will complain about. The experimentation with debuffs and buffs would only occur in this map. See how it goes.

 

Thirdly, all that dust and other particle effects would really affect lower end machines heavily. I know some players that when I drop a hyperspace beacon they lose half their frames. This is a smaller issue as it doesn't actually affect balance but I thought it worth bringing up

I've always really liked the idea of clouds or dust breaking line of sight as a mecanic. We've been saying forever on my stream that the dust cloud that happens when a ship explodes would make for a great system component.

 

That might also be true. The developers would have to look into that as well. I am not a software developer, but maybe there is a lower graphics version of cloud effects? Maybe they can find something that would work.

 

 

love the creativity! :)

 

Thanks man ;)

Edited by CommanderOtto
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A gunship player (at least, one with a powerful computer) wouldn't have any problems aiming. You don't look for the ships-just the little red box is enough to aim. There are three reasons to target things:

1: Which railgun do you fire? The red box doesn't tell you if the target is shielded, what it is, if it has Dfield/RI up. It won't tell you range unless you mouse over it.

2: You have to disengage, and you need a way to keep track of your target.

3: You're at melee range, and I need the lead indicator to hit whatever pest is trying to kill me.

 

When you say "nebula map", I think "lots of gas clouds, no rocks." Without rocks, unless something else in terrain seriously messed with gunships' ability to see ships (sensor/comm deadzones and/or seriously diminishing accuracy with range), it would become a GSfest. The comm deadzones or new accuracy behaviors are important: gunships would just follow their scouts and shoot whatever their scout buddies' sensors would see.

 

Instead of just slowing down scouts, slowing everything down would make the game more interesting for strikers: part of the reason strikers are so weak is they can't control range. Scouts can go from medium range to in-your-face-under-your-guns really fast. Slowing everything down would mean they wouldn't be able to do that as quickly (and make range capacitor stronger-as long as your sensors could see what you were shooting at!). Making "gooey" parts of the map where ships were extra-slow would make terrain awareness a lot more important. Disabling all systems and/or dropping shields in parts of the map (Empire at War, anyone?) would change the balance even more. Or, for that matter, all active cooldowns except maybe copilot.

 

Edits: If we're going to make the map mess with your ship beyond providing walls to run into, a tutorial about how the map can mess with your ship would be nice. If the tutorial pretty completely explained how your ship was supposed to work under ideal circumstances and gave opportunities to try it out, this wouldn't be quite as essential. The admiral NPCs mentioning the special effects of the map on your ship would probably be enough if everyone at least knew what their ships were supposed to do in normal space:

 

"This is Fleet Admiral Aygo. We've found some Imps in a nebula. There's all kind of electronic noise, so your sensors won't work very well. Find out where these imps are and destroy them!"

 

"This is Admiral Ranken. We've detected Republic communications in this nebula. Due to the sensor and communication noise in the gas clouds, your ship systems will malfunction. Find where they are and destroy them!"

Edited by ALaggyGrunt
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Instead of just slowing down scouts, slowing everything down would make the game more interesting for strikers: part of the reason strikers are so weak is they can't control range. Scouts can go from medium range to in-your-face-under-your-guns really fast. Slowing everything down would mean they wouldn't be able to do that as quickly (and make range capacitor stronger-as long as your sensors could see what you were shooting at!). Making "gooey" parts of the map where ships were extra-slow would make terrain awareness a lot more important. Disabling all systems and/or dropping shields in parts of the map (Empire at War, anyone?) would change the balance even more. Or, for that matter, all active cooldowns except maybe copilot.

 

I think this pretty much nails it.

 

Strikes have more similarities to the X-wing series of games in terms of behavior, and disabling boost and systems would go a long way toward evening the odds when it came to dogfighting.

 

It would drastically slow the pace of the game though. You'd also have to make the "dead zones" really huge or else gunships would just massacre everything that was foolish enough to fly into them.

 

A sufficiently built up map would also be a decent scout and GS counter. With out a long range LOS that's clear to shoot a GS is pretty much crippled. Make the turns tight enough and the higher speed of a scout potentially becomes a liability. The drawback here is that instead of kills or objectives deciding the match it would just be a question of which side's newer players suicided to defeat first. Unless you disabled the one point per death feature for collisions.

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Instead of just slowing down scouts, slowing everything down would make the game more interesting for strikers: part of the reason strikers are so weak is they can't control range. Scouts can go from medium range to in-your-face-under-your-guns really fast. Slowing everything down would mean they wouldn't be able to do that as quickly (and make range capacitor stronger-as long as your sensors could see what you were shooting at!). Making "gooey" parts of the map where ships were extra-slow would make terrain awareness a lot more important. Disabling all systems and/or dropping shields in parts of the map (Empire at War, anyone?) would change the balance even more. Or, for that matter, all active cooldowns except maybe copilot.

 

Edits: If we're going to make the map mess with your ship beyond providing walls to run into, a tutorial about how the map can mess with your ship would be nice. If the tutorial pretty completely explained how your ship was supposed to work under ideal circumstances and gave opportunities to try it out, this wouldn't be quite as essential. The admiral NPCs mentioning the special effects of the map on your ship would probably be enough if everyone at least knew what their ships were supposed to do in normal space:

 

"This is Fleet Admiral Aygo. We've found some Imps in a nebula. There's all kind of electronic noise, so your sensors won't work very well. Find out where these imps are and destroy them!"

 

"This is Admiral Ranken. We've detected Republic communications in this nebula. Due to the sensor and communication noise in the gas clouds, your ship systems will malfunction. Find where they are and destroy them!"

 

I love your ideas, it makes a lot of sense.

 

For example, some areas of the map causing ships to slow even further would be amazing. Imagine the different sounds you could get from your engine if it was working harder on those conditions. Also, the tutorial, explaining how a map can affect your gameplay would also be highly useful.

 

Another possibility is that, Gunships could have some kind of sensor debuff, causing them to loose sensor range. That way they would have to get a bit closer to target. So, they can't see anything, but they can target. The only thing is that they would have to get closer to target due to the debuff.

Edited by CommanderOtto
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Not too sure about balancing just yet since I have been playing for about 2 months now. I would say that star-fighters need a overhaul. I think it would be nice to have two large fleets maybe a 20v20 with large ships AI and to who ever could defeat those first wins. second to allow guild ships to be upgraded with turrets, stronger shields etc. and maybe a new set of skills for using them to attack other guilds ships. Maybe move to alliances later on so you could have those big fleet battles and so smaller guilds are not left out. I think it would do great for the PvP of the game and get more people involved more with this portion of the game.

 

Just some ideas to maybe help improve the community.

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I think it would be cool to have some maps with more LoS opportunities and I like the creativity. However, I don't think this is a responsible choice to fix Strikes. And the balance would likely be very difficult to achieve.

 

I would suggest for sensor dampening and sensor equipment in general to be more important in the game, but then Target Telemetry gets even more important/OP.

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Targeting telemetry will become the number one choice anyway once stealthies show up. Burst damage + accuracy + decloak + everything worth killing stacking evasion will mean win.

 

The ability should be about painting targets for easier killing by strikers and gunships (i.e. evasion debuffing everyone nearby), rather than making the scout with it into a burst damage monster-it would be a scout ability, rather than a lethality upgrade which would make more sense on a striker.

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