Like many others i like the fact that battles are results of your strategy and that they don't become a micromanging pain. Nevertheless i would like to have more things to do during battles like changing the formations, focusing fire on a particular ship, etc...

despite this derailing the thread a little bit, i feel i need to correct you on this

while i wont argue that certain design aspects of SotS 2 could be made better,and that it is time consuming (its a massive 4X, i would expect nothing less), i have to disagree with the combat side

i have not played SotS2 that much so i cant argue there other than saying "it works and it works OK", if you had disproportional lossess on autoresolve in SOTS 1 with both sides having more or less equal fleets, it only means either you were massively outmatched in technology, or that your ship designs were less than adequate.

I was really not afraid to use autoresolve in SotS 1, the unnecessary losses i had that way were minimal or none, and i only fought the big battles (big meaning several dreadnoughts + support) and i did not feel like i am being hindered by the system at all. The little damage i did recieve by doing autoresolve was mostly limited to light structural damage and was fixed by fleet attached support assets in a single turn.



So no, i did not feel obliged to do manual battles in SotS, and even limited mostly to strategic management side and waiting for BIG battles, i was comforted by the fact that i can jump into battles and make something explode, just because i can (not to mention bombing the planet to oblivion if i felt like it).

FridgePanic wrote:
Needs to be remade. An interactive movie is not my idea of a combat system.

I agree completely to this ^.^

The only problems I have with the current combat system is the length and the effects.

Opfor6 wrote:
If you want to not be invovled in the tactical details or chrun turns faster that is what the auto resolve is for. Seems prety straight forward.

Unfortunately, it is not that simple. The more complex the tactical side becomes, the less likely you are to delegate combat to autoresolve and the more likely you will feel the need to micromanage the battles in order to get even reasonable results. Since SOTS has come up, I offer that as exhibit A for this very problem. It's gotten much worse in SOTS2 (it executes very slowly,) the first version was ok and even had certain advantages in fighting random space menaces. But against strong AI opposition, autoresolve led to excessive losses compared to what you could do yourself.



Even in this game you can definitely get more optimum results in close battles by playing out the card system. But you don't feel absolutely obliged to do so.



A good strategy game should focus on, well, strategy, and avoid getting bogged down in the tactical details. This has basically killed SOTS2 for me (along with the horrible UI.) They've patched it to become playable more or less, but the design itself is deeply unfun and incredibly time consuming. This game moves along at a smart pace and has much greater focus and polish.

I just started playing and was extremely disappointed with the combat system. If I want to play the battle manually then I want to control the battle not pick a card out a non-tactical selection of gibberish and watch a movie. I do not beleive it has to be extremely detailed but it needs to be more than pick three cards. If the card sysem were to remain it should have more tactical selections such as "Concentrate fire" or "'Run away Bravely" If you want to not be invovled in the tactical details or chrun turns faster that is what the auto resolve is for. Seems prety straight forward.

(On a unrelated note - SotS both 1 and 2 "started" as broken, i dont know why but they chose to finish/polish both the games after release, SotS 2 is very much playable now and keeps being improved up to standard set by SotS 1)



I compared this game with SotS because there is a parallel, the battles are a culmination of your overall strategy, but you can fight them - and autoresolve system in SotS is actually one of the best ones i have seen, atleast in my experience.

With the amount of control you have in battles here, you might aswell autoresolve every time, and just skip the cinematic battles. But that essentially boils down the game to a very simple strategy management game, which loses its appeal for me because there are many games focused on the management side that do it better.

There is a contradiction in the fleets seeming as powerful task-forces (small ship limit), but melting like snowballs in hell when deployed to action, without anything to show for as assets you poured significant resources into.



It is difficult to compare these games, because both have a little different frequency and scale of combat that takes place and i have to take that into account. But it does seem like from "military" side ES is seriously lacking in balancing the military and management sides of the gameplay.

Whenever I do click manual. I pick the three cards then stare at the wall until it is done.



At least have an option to control to camera? Need more options overall... target missile ships, a certain ship, etc.

If anything does change, the cinematic experience needs to remain. Otherwise to me, it's losing some of it's space opera appeal.

Hello,

i found this game when my friend and i were looking for new games to play and promising games in development. I have not played the game yet, and i saw a fair deal for it for a pre-order, but decided to look at some gameplay videos first.



The screenshots seemed amazing, and the 20 or so minutes the game management side was shown in the videos was actually well spent and i enjoyed it and liked everything. The concepts and mechanics shown seemed innovative, somewhat simplified but seemed fun and functional both, and i was surprised to like them despite i usually prefer much more complex systems, in some aspects the more complicated the better. The game itself looks gorgeous and i was itching to get my hands on it.



However, then i got to the combat part of the videos. I started watching the battle scenes excited, and was disappointed by finding out the combat lasts only few short moments, and player decisions are limited to choosing some 3 cards for bonuses. The ships themselves looked beautiful, but even though the somewhat simple looking effects for weapons and shields can be excused given the early stage of the game, the combat system itself seems shallow to me, unenjoyable and very disappointing.

The cinematic approach might be innovative, but it offers absolutely no room for tactics or maneuvers or selective actions of any kind, which, as a dedicated space-nut, i just simply dont like at all. Its all over in a short while and your beautiful shiny hardware is limited to a merged HP bar and few pops and zaps. This effectively reduces the game to a simplified economy simulator (with resource resource drain as combat) for me.



I played a lot of space games, and all of them that i liked worked with spaceships not as with fodder, but as with hulking metric megatons of steel alloys bristling with deadly firepower, or machines packed with powerful drives and electronic suites for defense, duking it out in space in combat that i could fully control in one way or another.

A great example of that is Sword of the Stars (both of them have their specific advantages) or Sins of a Solar Empire, this game being much more similar to SotS (which economy is limited to series of sliders and trade routes and stations), but seriously lacking in all ship/combat aspects compared to it, while having a little more economy.



Given that this is a game project with community input development, i am posting a poll to see if anyone else shares my opinion.



I apologize if my post seems like a rant, but thats how i feel it and how i see it after approximately 3 hours of watching gameplay videos.

I also appreciate the simplicity of it, especially after the fiasco of SOTS2.



The game's focus is strategic. I actually autoresolve most battles anyways, particularly the lopsided ones. I don't want the tactical combat to become so complex that it gets in the way of running the galaxy. We wannabe galactic emperors have admirals to do this sort of busy work...

Personally I like the current combat system. Sure it could be expanded upon, but I wouldn't like to see it rebuilt.



The way it currently works, it does not interfere with your game. A better way to put it is that combat doesn't drag on. When you are at war with another faction and have something like 4 or 5 battles a turn, a 5 minute manual battle suddenly doesn't seem so appealing... In this case a single turn could easily in theory take 20 minutes. I am sure people would argue that you can always just "auto-resolve" a fight, but when a game has such an intricate battle system like say SotS you are severely nerfed if you don't go into manual.



The way it is currently implemented, it is over and done with nice and quickly letting you get back to your overall scheming. I also feel the developers are aiming at a slightly more casual approach to combat, which may help them draw in more buyers.



Just my 2 cents

To be honest i enjoy the combat. the combat is not the most important thing in this game. its just a result.

FridgePanic wrote:
Needs to be remade. An interactive movie is not my idea of a combat system.

The philosophy behind it is that it's only the pinnacle of your strategies. You see "the result" of th echoices you made the 10 or 20 or 30 last turn in terms of strategy.

Now, I'm an advocate from the beginning of more weapons differentiations and some more things to do (but not too much. I'd like a way to give pre-battle orders like in Dominions 3).

I chose option 'Other' - actually, I'm happy with actual system. To add to the comments above, I would like more cameras or control over cameras though. Just my point of view on it.

I enjoy the card combat system and think it is perfect for fluid multiplayer, however I think it needs to be expanded upon considerable. Ships, fleets, cards, and mechanics should really be made to have more depth.



Here are two threads in which I explain my ideas: /#/endless-space/forum/28-game-design/thread/11640-5th-tech-tree-military-doctrine and /#/endless-space/forum/29-archives/thread/13307-expanding-on-combat-doctrine-and-fleet-construction



I hope you read them and give me some feedback.

I would like a little more control over the battles than the 3 card selection. I am not looking for the spaceship battles to become a game to themselves.

- If a hero is with the fleet let it change the battle more than just a passive bonus

- Have a fleet engagement to have targeting preferences. ie Near / Strong / Weak / Single Target / Volley

- A fast manual fight, when at war with numerous fights happening each turn can make the battles feel even longer

Needs to be remade. An interactive movie is not my idea of a combat system.