Akiva wrote:

Okay, I take it back. Restarted ES2 and now it all works as long as the '-compat' switch is engaged. Adding the log to the other thread.

Thank you!

We have just released a new preview patch, check it out here: https://www.games2gether.com/endless-space-2/forums/65-general/threads/27950-1-0-54-patch-notes-preview?page=1

We will adress this as soon as possible in the G2G balance mod :)

The shield issue is definitely not a MP only issue. Not sure what's holding things up unless the devs are working on other things more important.

BUMP

The ship balances were not addressed, as in the projectile defense, shields uselessness, and medium ships lacking any kind of resource effiency. (this means they are only useful on a dense galaxy high resources map)

Granted again, this is a MP issue.  Just starting to get tired of the small ship spam

I agree quite a bit. Because on fast you can build on a good production planet 8 empty ships a turn at about turn 40'

Then you can insstantly upgrade those ships into a fully functioning top tier fleet in one turn. Im not sure if this was intended but if there is a way to limit or pace upgrading that would be a great idea. Maybe make upgrading a production builsing? I would imagine though this issue is difficult because it doesnt seem like it would be a easy fix. 

It is something id definitely be curious about on how easy of a change it could be.  Thanks for listening again

me myself i am a Multiplayer person aswell and definatelly i have to agree with Plutar. in mp , things are always going to be exploited as much as possible and theres very little room for roleplay

mp es 2 for me IS es2

Medium ships currently are not really very viable in comparison to the small ones, considering how the mp game flows most of the time. i think plutar described main problem good enough

as a side (but very impotant to me ) note: 

my  view is that disregarding the above mentioned problem with M vs S ships, the whole concept of instant upgrades is not something i like both from gameplay and realism angles

could there be an optional slider/option to play with or without instant upgrades

It also has something probably to do with being able to upgrade your fleets, not saying this is a bad thing, its just the first ships you start spamming on a production planet you can retrofit anytime you like.  A strat in MP that is often used is you build empty hulls while you wait for your tech to catch up, immediatly buyout/upgrade all ships and BOOM instant 22cc fleet all ready to go.  The small hulls are the cheapest per resource and most effective, plus you know if you use them early game, then you know they won't go to waste because upgraded they are just as dangerous.

The problem I think like Kyn said is in the HP, because as is, tier 0 hunters are almost useless in MP.  Upgraded medium ships are a different story, they are worth there salt, but the resource requirement is emmense.  Hence the small ship spam is still more succesfull because it can almost be never ended.  The addition of fighters and bombers was to 'I think' give the medium and large ships more purpose, which it has most definietly.  Just allowing small ships to take 1/2 damage from fighters and bombers still puts them at the top of the go to list on offense/defense quickly.  

I really like where the fighters/bombers are in the tech tree, it plays well because they don't revolve around a core tech (the advanced ones at least) there just has to be a way to NOT SKIP, like you can't access the advanced fighters before first getting fighters.

Fighters could definetly use some extra DPS though that is FOR SURE. 

Gzar, what do you think is more effective counter to bombers?  A fleet full of kinetics or a fleet full of fighters?

I ask Gzar because he is probably one of the best MP players around.  

plutar wrote:

Gzar I think thats the intended purpose, I love the new placement in the tech.  It works out well because it makes bombers VERY dangerous to ships and the only true way to counter them is fully loaded kinetics which have been nerfed on ship to ship damage. 

Things that are needed <- Fighters before advanced fighters, no way to skip, same goes for bombers.

Also by tuning small fighters to do 50% damage vs small attack craft we still have the same problem I've been complaining about since day one.


There is zero reason to use anything but small ships as a hard counter to fighters and bombers, and simply outgun your opponent.  

That is something that really needs to find a way to get fixed.  In the end game I still am making 22CC fleets with 2-4 small gaurdian class, rest attack class.  There is no reason to do anything else because they are naturally resistant to fighters/bombers.  

I would like to use all the ships, and I think a big revamp is needed on the damage distribution.  

I do like the idea of fighters being the hard counter to bombers, but gzar does make some good points.

I just so tired of using 2 classes of ships every MP game..

BTW I like where you placed fighters and bombers in the tech tree, tweaking there damage is in order now.  The placement is perfect the damage balance just needs to be worked out a  bit. 

Not sure why, but I was using the small enhaced hulls tactic, before fighters and bombers came into the game. It was working well for me, with 22CP armadas of lots of atteckers and few protectors with flotilla shields. Specially packing all this into a flotilla.

Not having time to test propperly, but I think that this tactic was working before and is working after, not only due to F/B balance.

I think small ship spam will be less of an issue with reviewed HP on Medium & Large ships. It'll still be a strategy to counter Squadron fleets, but if they start switching to having some squadrons & weapons they'll tear into you :)

How about giving Fighters an advantage against Attack ships to create a possible strategy to counter small ship spam?

Hi! Thanks for your feedback on Fighter / Bombers.

We could have these kinds of changes:

• 50% Dmg against Small / 100% against Medium / 150% against Large (we could further down the road go to 75% / 100% / 125% if that is not enough).
• Increase Fighter 2 DPS

Another planned balancing issue is Medium / Large Ships HP & defense efficiency. This will come further down the road via a test with the balance mod.

Gzar I think thats the intended purpose, I love the new placement in the tech.  It works out well because it makes bombers VERY dangerous to ships and the only true way to counter them is fully loaded kinetics which have been nerfed on ship to ship damage. 

Things that are needed <- Fighters before advanced fighters, no way to skip, same goes for bombers.

Also by tuning small fighters to do 50% damage vs small attack craft we still have the same problem I've been complaining about since day one.


There is zero reason to use anything but small ships as a hard counter to fighters and bombers, and simply outgun your opponent.  

That is something that really needs to find a way to get fixed.  In the end game I still am making 22CC fleets with 2-4 small gaurdian class, rest attack class.  There is no reason to do anything else because they are naturally resistant to fighters/bombers.  

I would like to use all the ships, and I think a big revamp is needed on the damage distribution.  

I do like the idea of fighters being the hard counter to bombers, but gzar does make some good points.

I just so tired of using 2 classes of ships every MP game..

BTW I like where you placed fighters and bombers in the tech tree, tweaking there damage is in order now.  The placement is perfect the damage balance just needs to be worked out a  bit. 

Dont kinetics counter bombers as well? Mixing fighters with some kinetics seems like it would help there.

CyRob wrote:

BarbeQ wrote:

This Sophons menu background is new, isn't it? Definitely cool.

It was added in Update 1.0.47 -- Target Locked

Hmm... never saw it before. But thanks for the intel.

Okay, I take it back. Restarted ES2 and now it all works as long as the '-compat' switch is engaged. Adding the log to the other thread.

For the record, this does not fix the Diplomacy issue for me—it still hangs until killed manually—but I cannot run ES2 at all without the '-compat' option else the various screens and overlays either are very translucent or flicker endlessly and randomly rendering the game unplayable. Do the devs still want to see the .log file?

Did the shield problem get addressed as well?

BarbeQ wrote:

This Sophons menu background is new, isn't it? Definitely cool.

It was added in Update 1.0.47 -- Target Locked

This Sophons menu background is new, isn't it? Definitely cool.

Uhh... neat. I'll start testing as soon as the download finishes. Hope this goes well with my ongoing game.