Eilarais wrote:
How is simulating "very quick reflexes" an improvement over what it does now? Sorry, but I seem to be fundamentally missing the benefit that twitch gaming is supposed to provide in a strategy simulation. Is this supposed to be the next great hybrid genre?

Agreed. Twitch reflexes have no place in 4x strategy gaming. What in the world is wrong with real turn based? It works great for Galciv2 and the Civ games. You don't have to re-invent the wheel.

Trying to be different one step too far I suppose, which was needless given that the slick presentation and otherwise mellow game play already had the battle won.

Mansen wrote:
Suspect? How so? - It speeds up gameplay immensively, which is perfect for multiplayer 4X games.

This is, by far, the most broken thing about Civ V multiplayer and they chose to implement it into their game. That's why it's suspect.



The OP's example is perfect. This "design choice" basically requires the player to be able to click extremely quickly to take advantage of the broken system. In a Multiplayer game, it would be very advantageous to run away from battles you can't win, which means you need to see the enemy coming in, and at the split second you see them, send your fleet away before the enemy can hit the "attack" button.



I don't want to do those stupid micromanagement tasks in a turn based game. It's not even skill-based micro (like you can argue starcraft is), instead it's "fight the interface" micro, which is a very odd design choice to make.



If they want to cut down on the time/clutter, do *actual* simultaneous turns. Everyone inputs their move commands but nothing happens, then when everybody has hit "end turn" the game computes all the moves at the same time. This kind of system is not easy to design, but it's possible if you cover every possibility with options for the player (set fleet status to 'intercept' or "avoid combat", etc.).



I was very much enjoying the game until I played a game in which pirates destroyed a fleet that was intended to save my blockaded system. Now that's not normally a problem, "Pirates Happen," after all. But in this specific instance, the fleet was destroyed by pirates while I was watching another battle. I had no way to know that the pirates were going to attack, I had no way to command my fleet to retreat. I had no option, as a player to try to counter their move. Instead, I was bypassed and the computer decided I wanted to auto-resolve it anyway. These are the kinds of problems introduced by the "real time" movement.



I have not boot up the game since then, and won't until there is a patch. I have recommended to all my friends who ask me about it to stay away until this problem is fixed.

Bridger wrote:
These are the kinds of problems introduced by the "real time" movement.

Actually, that problem is 100% solvable without the need to change any game mechanics.



Simply remove the timer from the "hey, a battle started" alert.



Voila.

Atlantis_Risen wrote:
Agreed. Twitch reflexes have no place in 4x strategy gaming. What in the world is wrong with real turn based? It works great for Galciv2 and the Civ games. You don't have to re-invent the wheel.

I don't want to be down on innovation and risk-taking in general, I'm just getting progressively more and more fatigued by single-player gaming getting co-opted by multiplayer architecture and design. Every game studio still seems to be looking for that magical fusion of offline and online gameplay, either ignoring or not understanding that these are different customer bases who want very different things.



There is a good idea for a simultaneous 4x concept somewhere in this game, but it won't be practical to teach the AI how to play it properly. And there is an excellent turn-based concept in here as well, but it is hindered by inconsistent application of the game rules.

Bridger wrote:
If they want to cut down on the time/clutter, do *actual* simultaneous turns. Everyone inputs their move commands but nothing happens, then when everybody has hit "end turn" the game computes all the moves at the same time. This kind of system is not easy to design, but it's possible if you cover every possibility with options for the player (set fleet status to 'intercept' or "avoid combat", etc.)

^This! 100%...

Eilarais wrote:
I don't want to be down on innovation and risk-taking in general, I'm just getting progressively more and more fatigued by single-player gaming getting co-opted by multiplayer architecture and design. Every game studio still seems to be looking for that magical fusion of offline and online gameplay, either ignoring or not understanding that these are different customer bases who want very different things.



There is a good idea for a simultaneous 4x concept somewhere in this game, but it won't be practical to teach the AI how to play it properly. And there is an excellent turn-based concept in here as well, but it is hindered by inconsistent application of the game rules.

This is why I hate the idea of MP in a TB game at all. Just concentrate on a fantastic SP experience and fans will flock to the game. Most fans of TB games don't play MP anyway, trying to grandfather it in causes problems like this.

IMHO that is too huge a redesign. Achievable things should be, queue countdown timers instead of simultaneous, and an option checkbox to prevent AI moving while I am moving during SP. The option checkbox means that AI fleets will not pop around when I take fleets off intercept, and all AI movement would take place after clicking end turn. It is quite different from "real" turn based since all the AI movement would be simultaneous to itself, but it is a much smaller implementation change.

I bought ES at the Alpha stage, at this point (and through Beta) thought that the odd AI movement during your turn was a bug that would be sorted out by release and that the combat timers were "obviously" going to be optional or pausable in some way.



Unfortunately I was wrong these were actually working as intended and were concious design decisions.



As has been posted above ES seems to have been optimised (by the look of things not successfully) for MP with some resultant major concessions made to the SP game.



When I bought it at alpha stage I thought I was buying a TBS Space 4X, what I have ended up with is a multi-player focused RTS/TBS hybrid - exactly the sort of game I didn't want and would never buy.



High hopes from an impressive Alpha release sadly that were far from realised in the final release, overall very disappointed in what ES has ended up as.

simultaneous moves as they are for now are just unrealistic. If u are fast enough u can catch a running fleet that has the same shipsengines (speed) than you. Its like jumping through time.



Why not make moves simultaneous but calculate them after all clicked on endturn (maybe add i timelimit). Add a option to skip/deactivate battlevideos: just play your cards and the rest will be like autobattle. So the waitime is minimalized.



example:



before move:

place A: my fleet.

place B: enemy fleet

place c: nothing.



now i move my fleet from A to B to attack the enemyfleet. So on my map it looks like a batte.



After clicked end turn:

i can see that the enemy has moved his fleet to c.

place A: nothing

place B: my fleet

place c: enemy fleet



AND: Fleet are not allowed to cross each other if one of the fleet has a interceptoption activated. So if my enemy has moved from b to a our fleets will meet on the way.





from the faq of the forum:

"Question: How do space battles play out?

Answer: Opposing fleets in the same system will engage in a fleet battle at end of turn."



mhh..



btw: isnt this thread for the games2gather section ?

this simultaneous real time turn based system is just a big, big headache for me and major reason (if not only one) to put this game aside.



BIG headache....

moraruro wrote:
this simultaneous real time turn based system is just a big, big headache for me and major reason (if not only one) to put this game aside.



BIG headache....

And how, pray tell, is it different than any browser based MMO ever made?

(No really. Find me a browser based MMO that doesn't work off either a concept of "action points per hour" or an "action takes x minutes to complete")

Surprisingly, and I'm not sure why, this is the first simultaneous-turn-based game where I've LIKED the feature. I LOATHED it in Age of Wonders 2, for example.

Taliesyn wrote:
Surprisingly, and I'm not sure why, this is the first simultaneous-turn-based game where I've LIKED the feature. I LOATHED it in Age of Wonders 2, for example.

Also agree with this statement. My loathing came from Space Empires, I believe. 4, was it?

Simultaneous Turn Based or WEGO as it is more commonly known is an excellent concept if it is done right, for example Birth of America 2 or Revolution Under Siege (both using the AGE engine) which are both Turn Based and Simultaneous.



ES unfortunately is not really Turn Based and not really Simultaneous which might explain why it doesn't really work.



Maybe it should really have been released as a browser based MMO ?



Equally I may just have been expecting / wanting it to be something it isn't.

Draco18s wrote:
And how, pray tell, is it different than any browser based MMO ever made?

(No really. Find me a browser based MMO that doesn't work off either a concept of "action points per hour" or an "action takes x minutes to complete")

Because Endless Space is NOT a browser based MMO...!





If ES was actually a simultaneous TBS (kind of like Frozen Synapse), then it would probably work.



Unfortunately it's not.

Atlantis_Risen wrote:
Because Endless Space is NOT a browser based MMO...!

Doesn't mean it can use the similar mechanics, or am I wrong?

Draco18s wrote:
Doesn't mean it can use the similar mechanics, or am I wrong?

Can... or Can't? Make up your mind.

You can only have simultaneous movement if the game is pretty linear and doesnt require user input on anything other than one thing at a time, unless the AI is very good. If the AI was better at fighting, and if the fleets/battles were less numerous and larger instead it probably would be such a big issue.



I am on the fence about this versus turn based. Turn based is so slow it drags down the whole gameplay - I cant even play UFO Enemy Unknown because of it. But on the other hand the Civ games seem to work rather well - mainly though because you have a lot to do per turn so you dont notice the constant turn waiting so much.



I think this game has it about right if they tinkered with the AI/battles/fleets.

Simultaneous turns does work, but only if movement orders are issued but no actual movement occurs until every player clicks End Turn. Then the battles are presented in a list whereby everyone chooses one battle to fight (if they want to) and Auto the remainder. (For SP the option to manually fight every single battle in the queue should be available.)



This may well be a redesign too far for ES but switching off the battle response timer might be the most impactful solution verses development effort. Yes, it will result in other Human players having to wait a bloody long time in the later game due to epic fleet spam and only being able to engage one fleet at a time but that shouldn’t put anyone off the idea as that is another issue unrelated to the turn sequencing mechanic.



As has been echoed many, many times now, losing a vital battle to auto because it initiated and ended whilst you were busy elsewhere in the game being unable to respond is at best awkward and at worst game-breaking. Sadly, this sort of problem is only noticeable once you’ve played the game a fair bit. I have no doubts that if prospective new players were aware of this some might have thought twice; if I’d known ES did it this way I certainly would have, which is an immense shame because the game otherwise has huge potential (san the poor AI).

nats wrote:
You can only have simultaneous movement if the game is pretty linear and doesnt require user input on anything other than one thing at a time, unless the AI is very good. If the AI was better at fighting, and if the fleets/battles were less numerous and larger instead it probably would be such a big issue.



I am on the fence about this versus turn based. Turn based is so slow it drags down the whole gameplay - I cant even play UFO Enemy Unknown because of it. But on the other hand the Civ games seem to work rather well - mainly though because you have a lot to do per turn so you dont notice the constant turn waiting so much.



I think this game has it about right if they tinkered with the AI/battles/fleets.

Turn based has worked well for more than 20 years of PC strategy gaming, it's the standard for this kind of game. If a player can't be patient while the AI is making it's turn than maybe TBS games aren't a good fit for that person.