ENDLESS™ Space 2 is turn-based 4X space-strategy that launches players into the space colonization age of different civilizations within the ENDLESS™ Universe. Your Vision. Their Future.
I might have been playing a lot of battlefleet gothic, but that game does have a lot of stuff that could be good in endless space.
For one thing, the purpose of particular weapons:
In BFG the Imperial ships have two primary weapons, like most races, the Lance and the macro cannon.
The Lance is a Anti-armour laser that cannot miss it's target. Lance batteries do a good deal of damage but have few turrets per battery, they often have good range and due to them being lasers do not lose accuracy at range like macro cannons. They count all armour as being at 25% and so always have a 3/4 chance to deal damage.
The Macro cannon is a basic ballistic weapon that does a moderate amount of damage. Macro batteries fire a large number of shots but suffer from range and accuracy issues, and must pass the armour roll of whatever they hit. Macro cannons are conman enough and come with enough turrets to be used in mass quantities.
Lance weapons are great choices against high armoured targets at long ranges but suffer against shields due to a low damage per second when compared to macro cannons.
Macro weapons are great against enemy shields and when used in mass amounts but suffer against enemy armour due to having only a 2/4 or even a 1/4 chance to deal damage per shot, if they hit at all, when compared to pin point lances.
Using just these two weapons I have accounted for a large number of imperial ships, from the lance wielding Gothic cruiser, to the macro cannon wielding Dominator cruiser and even the jack of all trades, master of none, lance AND macro wielding Luna cruisers.
The game gives you a clear use to each of these weapons that makes it easy to use and easy to learn.
I am not sure the same can be said of ES2 or ES1 or most 4x space games as their weapons are all very generic.
One way of making the battles more distinctive would be to create specific uses for the weapon classes such as the ones above to create a system of weapons that have purpose and thus give a greater purpose in battle to the ships that wield them.
Our design team is working on a post explaining the current changes and direction we're headed for Space Combat. We're looking at end of week, possibly earlier.
After finally being engaged in bigger ERA III battles, I think that the experience would be more solid if we had different battle plans for each of the flotillas in play, not just a single one for all.
For example if there are 3 flotillas , I would want one stack to attack mid-range, the 2nd one with the big ships to act as snipers and a swarm of small ships to close in. Of course for that to work properly, I would need to be able to arrange the composition of the flotillas manually as well as their positioning on the battlefield.
Also It could be awesome if I could choose how to deploy my reinforcements (behind the enemy lines, or the flanks) as well as their own battle plans (sneek attack, blitz, bombard from distance etc).
Our dev teams are currently in overdrive, working tirelessly to get content and features in, fix what needs fixing, debug what needs debugging. There's an Improve List available for those of you who are curious about where we're headed. Under the vague header "Space Battle General Improvements" are covered a bunch of changes, sometimes radical, that are going to happen to the Space Battle as we currently know it. Input during the Space Battle itself is however still off the table from what I know.
As comes with an important game release, along with the release of an expansion, everyone here is pretty much strung out. It falls to the Community team to make sure the dev team can work in the best conditions, and that includes safeguarding their peace of mind so they can focus on the real issues. Reading abrasive posts from anyone will definitely go against that effort, and regardless of the reasoning behind one's manner of speech, there is a huge gap between "no sugarcoating" and what we've seen in this thread. That's not okay.
Please either present your opinion in a respectful way (we're asking for elementary courtesy), or refrain from posting altogether. We have enough players who share opinions of both sides but not the need to throw vitriol to carry on the discussion, and as such, we will be operating with extreme prejudice because we have literally no time for this.
Thank you for your understanding.
Thank you for joining in. On a positive note, it is a general rule of thumb, that the most passionate critics are most dedicated and true fans of the game. From that perspective the team should take solace they have a lot of truly dedicated fans here. :) I am not worried as I mentioned in my previous post but I am really glad you guys are on top of this! :)
In my opinion, especially mid to late game the battles are really really cool. Seeing your ships send volleys of missiles long range at an ark.. is just so fulfilling. the auto camera does need A LOT of work in my opinion though as everyone else is mentioning.
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Do you guys understand that Battlefleet Gothic is not a 4X game and that Endless space is strategical, not tactical, game?
That doesn't stop us discussing the premise of better vocabulary in the battle space and using other games to suggest ideas that might help with improving Ship Micro. I quite like the thinking of the BF:G concept of specialised weapons where you have high accuracy / Low DPM type weapons, and situational weapons that aren't "one size fits all"
After ~5h with the game I agree with the op, but for different reasons. My issue with the combat system is that I simply do not understand it. There are some numbers involved and some buttons with correlated percentage values and then you start the fight and miraculously some result appears that seemingly has nothing to do with anything.
I'm sure it's possible to understand what's going on because others on this forum apparently managed to do so, but after 5h of gameplay I'm at a loss.
So my hope is that the devs make the battle system easier to understand. It should be crystal clear what the numbers and percentage values actually do. That's way more important than fancy graphics (and the battles do look quite nice).
After ~5h with the game I agree with the op, but for different reasons. My issue with the combat system is that I simply do not understand it. There are some numbers involved and some buttons with correlated percentage values and then you start the fight and miraculously some result appears that seemingly has nothing to do with anything.
I'm sure it's possible to understand what's going on because others on this forum apparently managed to do so, but after 5h of gameplay I'm at a loss.
So my hope is that the devs make the battle system easier to understand. It should be crystal clear what the numbers and percentage values actually do. That's way more important than fancy graphics (and the battles do look quite nice).
I do agree with this point and at least after-battle reports will hopefully be available for this purpose. More clarity in ship design window will be appreciated too.
As for the main topic, I can assume by experience in ES1. And the assumption is that in multiplayer everyone plays autobattle, so the planned system is a perfect compromise between decision weight and quickness of battles. And that's what is needed provided good implementation.
I quite like the thinking of the BF:G concept of specialised weapons where you have high accuracy / Low DPM type weapons, and situational weapons that aren't "one size fits all"
I also like situational weapons...to a point. The key for me is the differences between specialized and niche.
Just sake of argument, lets say you have a weapon that is inferior in most cases, but superior in blue star systems. If 30% of the systems are blue starts, than this weapon to me represents a good strategic weapon....worth considering for specialty battles or to take key defended systems.
If its 5%....than that weapon is just a toy, a waste of design space.
I think my biggest issue with the weapons right now is that the moment you get to the next tier you basically just want to hide them all from the list as they're just cluttering space. It'd be nice if there were a few effects on some of them.
After ~5h with the game I agree with the op, but for different reasons. My issue with the combat system is that I simply do not understand it. There are some numbers involved and some buttons with correlated percentage values and then you start the fight and miraculously some result appears that seemingly has nothing to do with anything.
I'm sure it's possible to understand what's going on because others on this forum apparently managed to do so, but after 5h of gameplay I'm at a loss.
So my hope is that the devs make the battle system easier to understand. It should be crystal clear what the numbers and percentage values actually do. That's way more important than fancy graphics (and the battles do look quite nice).
Totally agree with you dude. I understand why the dev team want to avoid input during battle but in this case all the strategy has to be done before the fight. It's already the case when we build our ships and during the pre-battle strategy choice but I personnaly haven't understand anything and I learn nothing from my victories or defeats, that for me the main problem. The fancy battle view should give these information and I also think pre-battle decision need to more clear.
without reading the whole thread, I'll add my 2 cents:
Happy with combat as is, just needs a few polishing touches:
Make AI use formations other than close and weapons other than slugs. Too predictable.
Let us freely split ships between formations (Era II onwards). My long-range Ark should not be flying with my short-range Gouges.
Select range tactic per formation. As is long range formation has bottom group fly long and top group medium range, does not make any sense.
Maybe add some fancy and custom tactics (as in that screenshot from planning stage, pincer formation or other.
Explain meaning of combat efficiency (weapon ranges times tactic range). Does it affect damage done, or is it simply a numerical representation of what fraction of maximum weapon firing time you'll get because of the tactic.
The combat is no different to any other strategy game like HOI4 - you set up your forces and employ them, and choose the formation and the reinforcements. Then watch it progress. That's fine for me and I really enjoy watching it like many others here. It also gets the combat out of the way quite quickly so you can carry on with the rest of the game rather than, like the TW games, spend a whole hour fighting just one small skirmish.
I've played games where you could control the combat and they were rubbish small skirmishes with a few ships and most of the time it was chasing them around an empty map.
Play SOTS etc if you want that sort of game because this one obviously isn't for you. As long as there is some strategy in the choice of the weapons, defences, and the weapons are suited to certain ranges but that can be expanded through research, and there is a good chance you will get beaten by the AI - then I am happy and I trust Amplitude to do it well.
Without going too much into the debate I want to add that showing CP requirements and greying out fleets is exactly the kind of visability the game needs so players understand what is going on so I am happy for small details like this. (as mentioned https://www.games2gether.com/endless-space-2/forum/66-game-design/thread/21403-early-access-space-battle ) "Display the unavailable flotillas in the battle setup (grayed out) to show how many CP are required to unlock them (and give a hint to new players that flotillas split exists)"
Our design team is working on a post explaining the current changes and direction we're headed for Space Combat. We're looking at end of week, possibly earlier.
Very cool. Because this way the combat ist boring. There are no decisions to be made, just "chose best battle plan" and thats it. Boring.
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