It's very simple.

 

Components are balanced pretty well in isolation.

 

Combinations of components into ship builds are not balanced at all.

 

The nature of gameplay is often not accounted for in balancing or in component design.

 

 

I'm working on the theorycraft for a, "Why Distortion Field needs to be significantly changed," post that's solid enough to convince the Devs that the howls of outrage that making DF balanced in the current meta would produce are justifiably ignored as the whining of people who want to retain a significant and unfair gear advantage.

 

The interesting thing I've found though, is that in isolation the balance of DF (with or without the missile break), is just fine and pretty much in line with most other shields. It doesn't become the God-King of shield components until after you start stacking it with other sources of evasion, engine breaks, and a ship that excels at maintaining favorable range control.

 

This holds for pretty much all components. If you can find a target with enough HP, low enough maneuverability, and no evasion, then Weapon Power Converter becomes a pretty competitive component. The only real failing is that capital ships, satellites, and asteroids are invincible and the gameplay doesn't reward blasting holes big enough to fly a starfighter through them.

 

The people in charge of balancing components within component classes did a really good job.

 

 

 

With the existing set of ship builds this kind of component balance has some profoundly nasty implications for gameplay balancing and meta diversity, because both revolve chiefly around ship builds, not components in isolation.

 

Some of it just can't be avoided. Things like weapon power converter where the mechanics of the component just provide no real value in GSF play, can't be tweaked into usefulness. A complete rebuild with new mechanics or simple deletion are the viable alternatives.

 

 

 

After dealing with (or ignoring) the components with mechanics that are fundamentally broken in GSF gameplay you get to a choice when it comes to gameplay balancing attempts:

 

A) Preserve the ship build concepts, and do major rebuilds of most of the components in GSF to compensate for the miserable failure to balance ship builds during development. For some ships new ship-specific components are likely to be needed for this to work.

 

B) Sacrifice the existing set of ship builds, and create a new set of ship builds where balance in play is a major factor in selecting which ships get which components.

 

C) Stick with the existing meta where only 4-5 builds (or minor variations) out of over 100 can seriously be considered approximately balanced.

 

 

In a perfect world where Bioware really loved GSF and had gobs of money slated for further development I'd probably prefer option A as a player. It's likely that at least 2/3 of builds would still suck, but you could probably swing decent balance for 1-2 builds per ship. The current meta would grow instead of being destroyed.

 

From a game design perspective, option B would be the logical choice. If you have a bunch of really well built parts that you put a lot of time and effort into building, but the system as a whole isn't functioning well because they were assembled in a very poorly planned way, the smart thing to do is to plan out a working system that uses those parts, then take apart the existing one and rebuild to the new design.

 

From a depressing realism viewpoint, I'm pretty much resigned to option C. We went from a battlescout-gunship meta to a battlescout-gunship-minelayer meta, and the probability of any other meta ever being implemented is sufficiently low that I consider the better options to be wild fantasy.

 

 

Bottom line is that if game balance and a deep meta are important development goals in any future GSF development, minor component tweaks are not going to do it. Minor component tweaks are really all the balance we've gotten in GSF, and it has resulted in the same 3-4 build meta for the entire existence of GSF. The only big change was not a component tweak, it was the introduction of the minelayer build.

 

 

 

For the set of base ship frames and components that already exist, we have a really small, stunted, and shallow meta, and fixing that would require a massive reengineering of the game.

 

I know Nemarus has advocated hitting GSF with a big metaphorical hammer in the past, and Verain tends to get in a tizzy at the prospect of minor scratches on the current meta's paint job. At this point I'm not really advocating either as being a better choice. My goal here is to point out the factors impairing both balance and depth in GSF's meta, to point out that a lot of the effort that went into component design and balancing is effectively wasted in actual gameplay currently, and to point out the realities (mostly unpleasant ones) of what a serious effort to solve the problems would entail.

 

Hitting GSF really hard with a really big Dev hammer, could be a really good thing for GSF. They'd have to hit it in the right places though, and be clear on what approach they wanted to take when rebuilding. Sticking to the chosen approach and making sure that enough resources were available to complete the job would also be important parts if they ever do a major rebuild.

 

Hit the current implementation in the wrong places, or do a very incomplete rebuild, and the result could be significantly worse than the current implementation.

 

 

Despite the massive post about why component tweaks are just ineffective band-aids for GSF's balance problems I won't stop asking for component changes in the meta as it currently exits, and I don't really expect anyone else to either. I just wanted to remind the Devs or people who trawl the forums on their behalf, that if they ever have the chance to scrounge the resources for major surgery on GSF that proper reconstruction is going to be a lot more effective than a few small band-aids.

 

Of course, I appreciate band-aids in the meantime, if they can manage to scrape together the resources to get a few. Just remember that the most serious wounds that need to be closed up are really in the ship builds, not in the individual components.

Is it wrong that I stopped reading at "Its very Simple"??

Is it wrong that I stopped reading at "Its very Simple"??

 

Well, it is very simple. Components (and ships) are balanced properly, but certain components can become a problem when they stack with certain other components. Like TT+BLC armor penetrating 1k+ crits, DF making it really effective to stack evasion, being able to frequently avoid missiles, etc. Ideally there would be major balancing so more than just a handful of ship builds can be viable.

It's not quite that simple. Sure, component/chassis combos are a problem, but there are many component inequities, even when viewed in isolation.

 

BLC's are better than LLC's or Rapids.

 

HLC's are better than Quads or MLC's.

 

Every other missile is better than Ion Missile, and Cluster Missiles are better than every other missile.

 

Every other railgun is better than Plasma Railgun.

 

I will happily concede that BLC's are much more balanced on a Gunship than they are on a Scout. But I still would never take LLC's on either craft--not when I could have BLC's instead.

 

Some components were just born silver spoon in hand. They have great starting effectiveness and a supreme suite of upgrades. These components are so good that if they are available, you always take them, without even the briefest consideration of alternatives.

 

BLC, HLC, Cluster Missiles, Rocket Pods, Slug Railgun, Ion Railgun, Distortion Field, Repair Probes, and Seismic Mine come to mind. If they are available, you equip them--or at least you do if you want to win against serious competition.

 

The T2 Scout is the only ship where you even have any contention between the above components--between Rockets and Clusters. Some might also say "Quads vs. BLC's" but I think that only holds true against farm-level competition. I think Quads are a solid mid-tier component at best--they lack both shield piercing and armor piercing, and they are limited in high deflection combat. Against talented opposition, BLC's are a much stronger play.

 

So what's the answer? Nerf the above components? Buff everything else? I think it's somewhere in between. I'd like to see tracking penalty and evasion play a smaller role in the game. GSF has lots of interesting shield-mechanics that are hardly used because of evasion. I'd like to see armor-piercing become less binary, with no 99% DR and no 100% AP. I'd like to see some of the really horrible components (Plasma Railgun, Ion Missile, Ion Mine) get some really big buffs. Buffing Ion damage or DOT's isn't too dangerous.

Edited May 27, 2015 by Nemarus

See I dont agree with this at all. You list Weapon power converter as a "well balanced component" against the other engine abilities. Which ones Barrel roll? which shoots you forward gives you 30% evasion for 3 seconds makes you dodge a missile AND makes you unlockable by another missile for those same 3 seconds? doesnt sound balanced to me vs "sacrifice Engine power for Weapon power" no where REMOTELY near balanced. Shield power converter? sure ya balanced in the respect that they both give the same amount of energy I guess, the issue then isnt OTHER components stacking here though, its the fact that Weapon energy is largely not all that needed, most dont have a weapon energy issue REGARDLESS of the weapons they choose. The system just doesnt have a weapon energy problem. That's the System vs the component not much else/

 

Ok what next Proton Torp vs .... what clusters? sure its balanced.... ASSUMING 0 people have missile breaks with CD's shorter then a minute and at best 1400 Hull.. ya its balanced. (if people are wondering the math on this, Clusters lock on time is 1.3 Seconds reload time is 3 seconds so its a 4.3 second interval between each missile, with upgrades the missiles do around 800 damage. Proton Lock time is 3.6 seconds, reload time 12 seconds, meaning that the interval between each missile firing is 15.6 seconds, you can squeeze in NEARLY 4 Clusters in the time it takes to get 1 P Torp. If the opponent dodges the first missile of both, then assuming he cant LoS for the ENTIRE time, it will take P Torp 2 shots or 31.2 seconds to kill its target (with health under 1,600) vs Clusters dishing out around (800x7) 5,600 points of damage in roughly the same amount of time (7x4.3= 30.1) as long as the shields on this 1,600 hull target isnt ALSO above A WHOOPPING 4,000 the cluster missiles will still kill faster... so balanced MY Donkey Rear, this isnt even taking into consideration that they have nearly 3 times as much time to find cover AND a tiny firing arc, sure better range is given in its stead so... I'll forgive the arc.. happy? the rest of the math laughs at the thought that Protons are remotely balanced as a good missile.)

 

Basically... no, no they arent.

Edited May 27, 2015 by tunewalker

It's not quite that simple. Sure, component/chassis combos are a problem, but there are many component inequities, even when viewed in isolation.

 

BLC's are better than LLC's or Rapids.

 

HLC's are better than Quads or MLC's.

 

Every other missile is better than Ion Missile, and Cluster Missiles are better than every other missile.

 

Every other railgun is better than Plasma Railgun.

 

I will happily concede that BLC's are much more balanced on a Gunship than they are on a Scout. But I still would never take LLC's on either craft--not when I could have BLC's instead.

 

Some components were just born silver spoon in hand. They have great starting effectiveness and a supreme suite of upgrades. These components are so good that if they are available, you always take them, without even the briefest consideration of alternatives.

 

BLC, HLC, Cluster Missiles, Rocket Pods, Slug Railgun, Ion Railgun, Distortion Field, Repair Probes, and Seismic Mine come to mind. If they are available, you equip them--or at least you do if you want to win against serious competition.

 

The T2 Scout is the only ship where you even have any contention between the above components--between Rockets and Clusters. Some might also say "Quads vs. BLC's" but I think that only holds true against farm-level competition. I think Quads are a solid mid-tier component at best--they lack both shield piercing and armor piercing, and they are limited in high deflection combat. Against talented opposition, BLC's are a much stronger play.

 

HLC are not Inherrintly better then Quads. Quads are better Anti-evasion weapons and Heavies are better anti-armor weapons, simply because Quads do more DPS and have better firing rate and less severe tracking, and people have already made arguements as to why Quads and Standards are on a pretty good level.

 

 

Also on the Disto thing... I put disto on my Condor, it doesnt have Evasion armor... its still SUPER GOOD.

 

On a day when I run into a TDM with scouts and Gun ships I would MUCH rather have quads on my strike then Heavies.

Edited May 27, 2015 by tunewalker

Ok what next Proton Torp vs .... what clusters? sure its balanced.... ASSUMING 0 people have missile breaks with CD's shorter then a minute and at best 1400 Hull.. ya its balanced.

 

Basically... no, no they arent. .

 

The problem is largely that the people in charge of GSF balance appear to have made exactly that sort of assumption. They also seem to have made the assumption that armor and damage reduction would be both good and commonly equipped and that evasion giving CDs would have low to moderate uptime and typically won't be stacked.

 

"Cluster missiles aren't a problem right? If they get too common people will just equip charged plating and laugh them off."

 

That's the sort of though process that's evident in the mathematical balancing of individual components. It COULD even work, if you were careful about considering balance when assigning components to ships. They didn't do that though, it was more along the lines of, "Hey that component description fits the battlescout ship theme, put it on."

 

This is sort of the tragedy of GSF balance. They put a lot of effort into making cool ship concepts and they put a lot of effort into building a set of components that have the potential to build a wide variety of well balanced ships. They just didn't cross check and make sure that the concept ships would be balanced if they used the components that had been built. So to make serious progress with balance you're left with major reconstruction of lots of the components, major revisions of what the ship types can equip, or a very unbalanced mess.

 

@ Nem, to a certain extent I agree, and lack of considering how components are used in gameplay is a lot of what creates the within component type power deltas. In math, LLCs are advantaged against evasive targets and have higher damage than BLCs, in gameplay the numerical advantage against a static target disappears against a live target that's trying not to get shot. On the whole though, those deltas tend to be of manageably small size . . . .

 

. . . . if you have enough sense to combine the components with greater than average power with other components with less than average power while considering how the mechanics work in gameplay on the ship frame you're mounting them on. As opposed to say, following the ship theme descriptions while completely ignoring relative power levels of, interactions between, and gameplay mechanics of the components.

 

It's sort of like we have the ship builds from one very cool and balanced GSF game and the components from another completely different very cool and balanced GSF game.

Edited May 27, 2015 by Ramalina

HLC are not Inherrintly better then Quads. Quads are better Anti-evasion weapons and Heavies are better anti-armor weapons, simply because Quads do more DPS and have better firing rate and less severe tracking, and people have already made arguements as to why Quads and Standards are on a pretty good level.

 

Huh?

 

Quads have 85% Accuracy at 5750m. Heavies have 95% Accuracy at 6900m, and somewhere between 95% and 100% at 5750m.

 

Yes, Quads have a lower base tracking penalty, but if you don't care about Armor Piercing, then you should still take Heavies, and instead of upgrading them with Armor Piercing, upgrade them with the Tracking Penalty deductible / Crit Chance upgrade. That upgrade makes your first 5% of Tracking Penalty (2.5 degrees arc off center--i.e. a quarter of your firing arc) free.

 

Not to mention shield piercing, the much longer range (which lets you center targets), and the lower power draw.

 

But using a T1 or T2 Strike in any competitive TDM is a void scenario anyway. You'll be dead to Ion Railguns and BLC's before you can do anything.

 

If you have success with a Strike in TDM, it's against fodder. And in such a case, the argument of HLC vs. Quad doesn't matter.

 

But in Domination, HLC's are your main utility weapon for clearing turrets and killing Bombers. Quads simply can't do the job.

As someone who plays all of the ships pretty regularly, I can say that the balance between battlescouts, gunships, and minelayers is almost close to 100% balanced. I think Bioware did an amazing job achieving this balance, because that's not an easy thing to do. If you tinker with DF, you take away a scout's ability to tunnel a bomber while being shot at by gunships/whatever. That's a huge loss in game quality IMO.

 

I don't think DF is the problem at all. I main a directional shield/power dive/BLC/cluster condor in deathmatch and I do very well with it, even when severely outnumbered and/or against a premade on super serious night. I have tried subbing DF into that build instead of directionals, but it underperforms over and over again. Although I used to primarily be a scout player, I think the Condor has become my best ship. I have a much much harder time doing well with the Quarrel because I can't run away from ion railguns as easily and I can't dogfight scouts as well. If I was going to use a gunship in domination, it would be the Quarrel for the ion AoE, not the DF (although yes, I would also equip DF because it's the best choice for this ship). This is surely a personal preference thing, but it's undeniable that the Condor is an incredible ship without DF.

 

 

I think the problem is that each of the aforementioned ships has a role, and the components we choose enhance these roles:

 

Gunships need to shoot things from far away - railgun. They also need to run away/survive when threatened - lightweight armor, barrel roll, DF, power dive, directionals.

 

Bombers need to control small areas - mine drops. They also need to tank heavy burst damage - charged plating or overcharged shields.

 

Scouts are a kind of general purpose fighter that can cover large distances and attack a variety of targets as required. They need to fly quickly - booster recharge, power dive, regen thrusters, barrel roll, default engine efficiency. They also need to be able to briefly tunnel targets and avoid being shot when out in the open - lighweight armor, DF, running interference, retro thrusters. They also need to kill quickly, otherwise they would just chase targets all day - target telemetry, blaster overcharge, BLC, quads, clusters, pods.

 

There isn't any room in that formula for Strikefighters or low evasion Scouts (basically Strikefighters with better engines and higher DPS). If you made Strikes the general purpose fighter and Scouts the anti-stealth ship, then things could work out differently. I think it would be very very tricky to get a 5 ship meta working properly because it seems like Scouts are already suited to be the counter to stealth ships.

 

Also, something that isn't mentioned very often - it's actually FUN going head to head in this game against an enemy with the same build as you. IMO in most videogames this is usually the most boring part. Battlescout dogfighting is fun and has lots of variety (pods or clusters? retro or barrel or power dive? quads or BLC? Running interference or wingman?) Every situation/build requires a different approach, and watching/timing cooldowns is super important. Trying to kill other CP bombers with interdiction mines + HLC is fun. Landing a mine while not getting hit yourself requires a great situational awareness and knowledge of the mine pathing. Landing centered HLC shots requires skillful use of your throttle, turning, and sometimes bashing off the SAT with CP. A lot of people say gunship duels are boring, but I find them a lot of fun - they are like a chess match. Lots of strafing and LoS with aggressive rushes and fake rushes. Epic battles around the damage overcharge pickups. If everyone is using a T1 Gunship then the DF/wingman popping can get a bit stale. But adding in Condor retro thrusters or power dive really mixes up the dynamic.

Edited May 27, 2015 by RickDagles

As someone who plays all of the ships pretty regularly, I can say that the balance between battlescouts, gunships, and minelayers is almost close to 100% balanced. I think Bioware did an amazing job achieving this balance

If this game had 1 Gunship, 1 Scout, 1 Bomber, then you would be right. This is not the case, if you use any other ship then you are at an disadvantage because you don't have access to a certain set of specific components. Is a Dustmaker GS with Plasma Railgun, Barrel Roll, any of its shields choices, in the same playing field as a Condor/Jurgoran? It certainly won't hit as hard as a Condor/Jurgoran at long range if the Dustmaker for some reason chooses Plasma, it obviously won't be as effective at close range as it lacks BLC and Clusters, it won't be able to evade missiles as effectively as Power Dive is simply the superior choice for that, specially if you pair it with DF. Even at running away it will be less effective as it lacks Thrusters. If I use your chess analogy, the Condor replaced all his Pawns with Rooks.

 

Certain ships are just too good thanks to their components, which also means that even if you do fly one of those privileged ships, you must stick to a cookie cutter build. Having a meta where only a certain set of specific components work, is not balance.

If this game had 1 Gunship, 1 Scout, 1 Bomber, then you would be right. This is not the case, if you use any other ship then you are at an disadvantage because you don't have access to a certain set of specific components. Is a Dustmaker GS with Plasma Railgun, Barrel Roll, any of its shields choices, in the same playing field as a Condor/Jurgoran? It certainly won't hit as hard as a Condor/Jurgoran at long range if the Dustmaker for some reason chooses Plasma, it obviously won't be as effective at close range as it lacks BLC and Clusters, it won't be able to evade missiles as effectively as Power Dive is simply the superior choice for that, specially if you pair it with DF. Even at running away it will be less effective as it lacks Thrusters. If I use your chess analogy, the Condor replaced all his Pawns with Rooks.

 

Certain ships are just too good thanks to their components, which also means that even if you do fly one of those privileged ships, you must stick to a cookie cutter build. Having a meta where only a certain set of specific components work, is not balance.

 

 

Cookie cutter build? There are at least 20 builds that are meta.

 

T1 Scout Laser/Pod/TT/Wingman

T2 Scout BLC/cluster/TT/Wingman (best anti-scout build?)

T2 Scout BLC/cluster/TT/Running Interference (evasion scout)

T2 Scout BLC/cluster/TT/Concentrated Fire (monster crit scout aka bomber melter)

T2 Scout BLC/cluster/BO/Wingman/freq capacitor (rapid fire BLC scout)

T2 Scout BLC/pod/TT/Wingman (highest DPS BLC build - original Scrab build)

T2 Scout Quad/pod/TT/Wingman/Retro/Distortion Field (Otoshi build)

T2 Scout Quad/pod/TT/Wingman/Retro/Directional Shield (I'm prob the only that uses this but it works very well in domination)

T2 Scout Quad/cluster/TT/Wingman (Sanic build?)

T2 Scout Quad/cluster/BO/Wingman

T2 Scout BLC/pod/Booster Recharge/Wingman/Barrel Roll/Double turning/freq capacitors (new Scrab build)

T2 Scout BLC/pod/TT/Power Dive/Double Turning/Running Interference (Willie build)

T1 GS with ion snare

T1 GS with ion regen

T3 GS with Reg Lasers/Retro/Directional (Vexxial jousting build)

T3 GS with BLC/Powerdive/Feedback or Directional or DF (slippery build)

T1 Bomber with Charged Plating/Interdiction Mines (anti-bomber)

T1 Bomber with Overcharged Shield/Engine 2 Shield Converter/Concussion mines (anti-scout)

T2 Bomber with Railgun Drone/Seeker Mines x3/Lightweight Armor/Running Interference (Deathmatch specialist)

T2 Bomber with Railgun Drone/Seeker Mine AoE/Deflection Armor/Hydrospanner (T1 Bomber Domination Ally)

 

 

Then there are a few ships that are super close to being meta:

 

-T2 Bomber with Interdiction Drone/Seeker Mine AoE/Lightweight Armor/Running Interference (anti-scout). This could be meta if you reduced the interdiction drone cooldown to 30 seconds.

 

-T3 Strike with Quads/Proton/Repair Probe/Directional Shield/Power Dive (Deathmatch - deroosting GS, killing railgun drones, and kiting scouts toward allied GS-bomber ball). This could be meta if you gave it concussion missiles.

 

-T3 Bomber with Ranged HLC/cluster/Interdiction Drone/Directional Shield/Power Dive (Deathmatch - good synergy with T2 Bomber against a Scout heavy team). This could be meta if you reduced interdiction drone cooldown to 30 seconds.

 

-T3 scout with Tensor or TT/powerdive/repair probes could be meta if you gave it either clusters or pods. The ability to replenish your own GOOD secondary would be important in some situations.

 

 

 

Personally I don't care about playing [oops the rest of the post got cut off]

Edited May 28, 2015 by RickDagles

Seems legit. I'm for anything that would encourage a wider variety of builds (i.e. less difference between the "best" components and other components). I get tired of seeing the same carbon copies flying around.

 

I'm glad there are those of you willing to do the research and properly formulate balance proposals. I never could crunch numbers when it came to gaming, far too tedious.

Cookie cutter build? There are at least 20 builds that are meta.

 

{sic}

 

Personally I don't care about playing

 

Maybe there are that many builds in theory, but you definitely don't see that many in the field. You see cookie cutters, and you see new pilots, and you see intermediates who are experimenting (a.k.a. beating their head against the wall). I'm sure there are a few oddballs like myself out there (for example, I like to use RFL on my Sting and prefer missile sentry drone to railgun drone) but I don't know them.

 

What do you mean, you don't care about playing? That you don't fly anymore?

Edited May 28, 2015 by Ymris

Maybe there are that many builds in theory, but you definitely don't see that many in the field. You see cookie cutters, and you see new pilots, and you see intermediates who are experimenting (a.k.a. beating their head against the wall). I'm sure there are a few oddballs like myself out there (for example, I like to use RFL on my Sting and prefer missile sentry drone to railgun drone) but I don't know them.

 

What do you mean, you don't care about playing? That you don't fly anymore?

 

 

Hmm somehow the rest of my post got cut off. I meant to say I don't care about playing 50+ different combinations of ships in the meta. I am happy with playing the current meta and switching to the weaker ships in easy games.

Edited May 28, 2015 by RickDagles

Changing out 1 component does not an entire new ship build make. Sure you can list "variants on a theme" of scout builds but you only listed a FEW of their components.... what Minor's dont need mentioning, heck you dont even need to mention shields 9 time out of 10 cus we all know its disto. The fact that their are 2 guns, 2 secondaries and 2 Systems on one ship that all combine to make roughly 2 different types of ships and the rest of the combinations are basically hybrid versions of those 2 basic play types. Burst and Cluster "anti scout" and Quads and pods "highest dps" are basically the 2, the other builds are variants on those themes or hybrids of them, that doesnt make them different enough in my book. The minors are still all the same, the passive crew is still the same the defenses are all still the same, its just SLIGHT variations on an offensive theme.

And again 2-3 people represent the whole community, how cool is that. A guy who has obviously no life sitting and writing huge walls of requests so the game of many to be tweaked according to his taste. Please, are you really sure you're the voice of the whole player base and everyone feels the same way about the meta that you do? I'm sure there are many people who will disagree, they just prefer spending time playing the game instead of generating GBs of text, trying to fix something that just ain't broke.

I set my ships up with the stuff i like to use, I have no idea about and dont care about what meta is.

No... the biggest issues in balance have to do with skill. Anybody can look up a good build on the net. Anybody can use a build, but it comes down to who uses it best.

 

The game is fairly well balanced on its own, but the information creep is very high and for an arcade shooter it is very complicated.

Yes and no.

 

Some of the ships components you have to be really bored or masochistic to use when there are others available, especially when you're facing actual opposition and not just random failpugs. Seriously, try to protorp a competent scout more than once. You might get one onceif you catch its pilot being overconfident (hah, pikenoob... owait) but once it knows what you're doing, you're not hitting it..

And again 2-3 people represent the whole community, how cool is that. A guy who has obviously no life sitting and writing huge walls of requests so the game of many to be tweaked according to his taste. Please, are you really sure you're the voice of the whole player base and everyone feels the same way about the meta that you do? I'm sure there are many people who will disagree, they just prefer spending time playing the game instead of generating GBs of text, trying to fix something that just ain't broke.

 

Well, analyzing the game's mechanics is something to do while waiting for the queue to pop. It only took about two queues worth of wait time to write the post, and various playing with spreadsheets and calculators I think took one weekly GSF quest plus two additional GSF dailies worth of wait time. It was more fun and interesting than any of the in game options that I could have done to kill time while waiting. I will admit, that that's very much an engineer's sort of sense of fun in terms of figuring out how something complex functions, and then considering ways that it might be made to function better or differently.

 

If you have no interest in game design or game theory, or the sorts of math modeling that go into creating a game, that's fine. "I just like to log in and play," is a valid approach to interacting with a game. It does sort of raise the question of why you're reading or replying to a theorycrafting thread in the first place though.

 

I also never claimed to be speaking for you. The only people I mentioned were Nemarus and Verain, and we, along with some other GSF players with an interest in the game mechanics, have been having periodic conversations about how GSF works approximately since it was first released for early access. If you have anything intelligent or worthwhile to add, then you're welcome to join the conversation, even if it's only to point out gaping holes in my logic.

 

Finally, to paraphrase Verain because I couldn't find his beautifully worded quote, if all you have to bring to the table is insults, then **** my thread.

Changing out 1 component does not an entire new ship build make. Sure you can list "variants on a theme" of scout builds but you only listed a FEW of their components.... what Minor's dont need mentioning, heck you dont even need to mention shields 9 time out of 10 cus we all know its disto. The fact that their are 2 guns, 2 secondaries and 2 Systems on one ship that all combine to make roughly 2 different types of ships and the rest of the combinations are basically hybrid versions of those 2 basic play types. Burst and Cluster "anti scout" and Quads and pods "highest dps" are basically the 2, the other builds are variants on those themes or hybrids of them, that doesnt make them different enough in my book. The minors are still all the same, the passive crew is still the same the defenses are all still the same, its just SLIGHT variations on an offensive theme.

 

Fair enough, but there are definitely more than 3 ships types as some people claim. The T2 BLC/pod/power dive/running interference "willie build" is definitely a unique build because it doesn't play anything like the other two builds. To play it properly you need to be focusing on short range BLC shots; the rocket pods are more of a utility weapon for killing turrets/mines/drones and tunneling bombers. With Quad/Pod you're almost always trying to shoot them in unison.

 

So with a revised list we're still at around 10 unique ships:

 

T1 Scout (similar to quad/pod so not sure if this counts)

T2 BLC/cluster scout

T2 Quad/pod/retro thruster scout

T2 BLC/pod/power dive/running interference scout

T2 Quad/cluster scout

T1 GS

T3 GS with Reg Lasers/Retro/Directional (aggressive build)

T3 GS with BLC/Powerdive/Feedback or Directional or DF (slippery build)

T1 Bomber with Charged Plating/Interdiction Mines (anti-bomber)

T1 Bomber with Overcharged Shield/Engine 2 Shield Converter/Concussion mines (anti-scout)

T2 Bomber

Edited May 28, 2015 by RickDagles

Again I call that "willie" build still a hybrid. The burst lasers are used the same way they are in the Burst Cluster, you have just swapped clusters out for the pods for better Turret killing. I can give that SOME see it as another unique build and playstyle, but for me its just unique enough. Burst scout still plays like burst scout. Quads scout still plays like Quads scout.

 

 

(To understand where I am coming from think of it like you were a Gunship or a Strike fighter against those builds, If a Strike runs into a Burst laser scout, it really doesnt matter what secondaries that scout chose, or its System, the fight still looks and feels exactly the same, same thing with a Strike vs a Quads using Scout the fight still looks and feels the same. I fly strikes more often then not because I like how they handle, I also have a hard time not laughing my rear off anytime my opposition isnt a bunch of good pilots and I am flying one of the Meta ships as everything I look at funny explodes and its so much vastly easier then a Strike build that I crash from not being able to see from laughing to hard at how STUPID EASY it is in one of those ships)

Edited May 28, 2015 by tunewalker

the biggest inbalance can be summed up with one word. Hybrids. ships like the Flashfire, sledgehammer and condor are king. and there is a reason for this

the biggest inbalance can be summed up with one word. Hybrids. ships like the Flashfire, sledgehammer and condor are king. and there is a reason for this

 

Sledge hammer and Condor's aren't king though..... Especially not Sledgehammer.

There aren't "unique builds". Everyone who wants to be successful uses the builds that the best players use.