InFlamesWeTrust wrote:
And in honesty we will need to test it before we know for sure how this is going to play out.

We are not quite there yet. (Add-on 4 will come first anyway)

I thought this was going to be add-on 4.

InFlamesWeTrust wrote:
I thought this was going to be add-on 4.

As the name says, it's probably going to be XP 1: Expansion Pack 1.

Looks really interesting but without the invasion document, as Znork said, hard to figure all out.

As for the priorities for the defense.... Usually, you tend to target what can destroy you. I.e. fleet defenses ought to want to tackle bombers before fighters, as the bombers can really hurt them. (in essence, what OldCat said)



I like the differenciation between fighters and bombers, adds diversity and flavour!



Can you give us a comparative order of lethality / mass unit between Fighters/Bombers and standard vessels?



And also, what is the minimum size for a carrier vessel? Can every actual ship design carry fighters/bombers or only the bigger ones?

Nosferatiel wrote:
As the name says, it's probably going to be XP 1: Expansion Pack 1.

Oh shh you, just because I'm not very good at seeing these things. :P

After discussing with SpaceTroll, we decided not to implement ship design for Fighters & Bombers. We do not want too much micromanagement because of that. So we prefer to work with you on the available archetype and how they will progress through the game. By the way, you can use this thread to make your proposal.

Okay, one matter on top of that.

Why don't you start the fighters during turn -1, in the preparation phase, so fighters and bombers will alway be automatically destroyed, if you retreat. This would severely affect gameplay, if bombers/fighters would explicitly not fully regenerate or not regenerate at all on lanes, but only when the fleet is in orbit, unless you got, let's say, a hero with "spare parts hoarder" or anything alike, to allow that very repair on the fly.

Also this would alleviate concerns that the new weapons could be underpowered, as they'd have no influence in phase 1.

I think it’s quite punitive to destroy all fighters & bombers if you plan to retreat and it does not make a lot of sense. If the fleet plan to retreat during the first phase, it seems more logical to have fighters & bombers waiting in the bay. That’s why we’ll need different scenarios depending on if a retreat is played or not and we need to define how fighters & bombers will behave if they are launched during the second phase instead of the first (in the case of a failed offensive retreat).

On another note, I'm missing the answer, whether fighters survive their capital ships, if those are destroyed during the fight, at least til the end of combat?

In my opinion, there is no reason to destroy all the fighters & bombers because their capital ships are destroyed, and they should fight until the end.

Truth be told, I'd loved to replace flak with point defence lasers (I tried mod-wise too), surely missiles should be able to differentiate between flak and spaceships. Flak is just metal chunks fired to either fool an/or destroy missiles. Give me counter missiles and point defence laser clusters!



Always wondered why there aren't preset designs as new ship classes are unlocked, or at the ability to store designs from previous games. I imagine that it cannot be too complicated, programming wise, to expand on the ship builder to include new designs.

Indeed, I’ll add this to the improve list (even if I think that it’s not that easy to do ^^). And I’ll upload a doc about the new weapons and ship design in a few weeks.

Shouldn't it be the other way around ? Bombers are lethal for ships, they should target them first, no ?

It’s like that because we want to have the possibility to have Fighters used as a shield for bombers. So, imagine that fighters are flying between the turrets and the bombers in order to damage the opponent the most, even if they are going to die. Gameplay wise, it will push the player to use a good combination of fighters & bombers. A full bomber tactic will be able to deal huge amount of damage on the short term whereas a good mix may deal even more damage on the long term period.

Anyway, it will certainly be a gameplay twist (I mean battle card or hero ability will certainly allow to target bombers first).

About flak/turrets : maybe each different kind of defense could help prevent fighters/bombers : shields would reduce fighters/bombers speed (or reducing the evade stats by the power of the shield), flak would have a chance to kill bomber's torpedos before the hit but the explosion would still do some damage (so it would mitigate damage), deflectors would have a chance to deflect bomber's torpedoes (thus canceling damage from them. Maybe even redirecting it to the enemy)



The idea is that an all around defense would be the most efficient against fighters/bombers.



Did you plan new heroes abilities tied to those fighters ?

There are good leads in using the existing defense and I’ll analyze that deeper. And sure, there are going to have traits / heroes abilities, battle card and so on related to the fighters.

Another question from me:

Normally, all weapons are fired by one ship at another. Fighters seem to have one intermediate zone, where everything fights everything and bombers are also followed by the remaining fighters, everywhere, right?

Does this also mean, that after the target ship of a bomber squad is downed, this squad will immediately start to bomb the very next ship in line?



I'm just imagining the following scenario: I build a onehit-fleet without any defense, but half of the fleet only with fighter slots and half of the fleet full of bombers.

My ships are destroyed in the first round. Now, if (as is still unanswered), the strike craft survive til the end of combat, this would mean, that they'd be capable of killing the whole enemy fleet, if the firepower is sufficient and the hostile defense is deficient? o_O



Any fleet without fighter/turret protection is then easily counterable by one or two monobomber-destroyers, maybe killing off the enemy fleet til the end of the third phase. This could, in this combination, end up totally overpowered. XD

Sure your scenario is viable for me, and it will force player to be prepared to face fighters. I don’t think it’s a bad thing and that scenario should be rare. Anyway it’s as overpowered as fighting a fleet without shields with laser only.

I like the differenciation between fighters and bombers, adds diversity and flavour!



Can you give us a comparative order of lethality / mass unit between Fighters/Bombers and standard vessels?

Here is a first draft of potential stats for fighters & bombers:



Fighter1

Evade: 25%

Health: 10

Shot Per Round: 5

Damage Per Shot: 1

Accuracy: 66%

State bonus: +10% accuracy and + 2 damage when Chasing

Tonnage: 15

Industry cost: 15

Quantity: 5

Invasion Strength: 3



Fighter2

Evade: 33%

Health: 15

Shot Per Round: 3

Damage Per Shot: 3

Accuracy: 75%

State bonus: +15% accuracy and + 1 damage when Melee

Tonnage: 15

Industry cost: 30

Quantity: 5

Invasion Strength: 3



Fighter3

Evade: 45%

Health: 7

Shot Per Round: 1

Damage Per Shot: 2

Accuracy: 80%

State bonus: +20% accuracy and + 1 damage when On Fleet

Tonnage: 15

Industry cost: 45

Quantity: 5

Invasion Strength: 15



Bomber1

Evade: 80%

Health: 30

Shot Per Round: 1

Damage per Shot: 25

Accuracy: 70%

Tonnage: 15

Industry cost: 30

Invasion Strength: 10



Bomber2

Evade: 50%

Health: 35

Shot Per Round: 1

Damage Per Shot: 110

Accuracy: 90%

Tonnage: 25

Industry cost: 70

Invasion Strength: 20



So a bomber 2 could deal up to 660 damage per fight, which will be coherent regarding the weapons of the same level. I think that bombers should be considered as powerful as any other weapons (actually they may be stronger than a weapon in order to reach a ratio 5 weapon module for a bomber) whereas the fighters are more a side ship to counter and protect bombers. They are not meant to destroy the opponent’s fleet.

And also, what is the minimum size for a carrier vessel? Can every actual ship design carry fighters/bombers or only the bigger ones?

They will require special slots & a certain amount of tonnage. You’ll have more info on the ship design in a few weeks too. But overall, one small ship will have one special slot and so will only be able to be equipped with one type of bombers / fighters whereas a large ship has three special slots, so it can combine different fighters / bombers.



The next document on the planetary invasion is going to be uploaded tomorrow afternoon. Until then, you can suggest different fighters / bombers archetypes, related battle card, hero’s abilities…

Thank you again for your feedback!

After discussing with SpaceTroll, we decided not to implement ship design for Fighters & Bombers. We do not want too much micromanagement because of that. So we prefer to work with you on the available archetype and how they will progress through the game. By the way, you can use this thread to make your proposal.

Very depressing news, was really hoping this would make it in. Any chance I you might reconsider?

iblise wrote:
Very depressing news, was really hoping this would make it in. Any chance I you might reconsider?

Everything is possible, but atm it is something we would like to avoid. Let's see how we can make fighters and bombers a good addition without having to design them as bigger ships. If designing them is the only thing that can make them interesting, then, maybe what we add around is not interesting enough.



ST

Okay, a few suggestions:



Fighter: Mosquito

Evade: 95%

Health: 1

Shot Per Round: 1

Damage Per Shot: 4

Accuracy: 95%

State bonus (Swarm tactics): +1 shot per round, if chasing, but not chased (meaning effectively for every fighter more on your side, you get one shot more per round, up to twice the number of shots)

Tonnage: 15

Industry cost: 40

Quantity: 5

Invasion Strength: 1



The rationale behind this fighter is to have something with a definite swarm-ability, that wins by the numbers, but can only shoot every now and then a rather weak shot. Not the best against bombers, though, as they'll typically have a thick hide.



Fighter: Hedgehog

Evade: 25%

Health: 100

Shot Per Round: 20

Damage Per Shot: 1

Accuracy: 50%

State bonus (Defensive Curl): 1 damage reduction per shot for every ship chasing the Hedgehog

Tonnage: 50

Industry cost: 40

Quantity: 1

Invasion Strength: 10



And here's the counter, a heavier fighter in a bomber frame, with some turrets. Easy to hit, but it can take a shot or twenty and deal LOTS of shots to take down those swarming fighters, easily.

Against medium fighters a sitting duck, though.



Fighter: Wolfhound

Evade: 33%

Health: 20

Shot Per Round: 3

Damage Per Shot: 5

Accuracy: 70%

State bonus (Pack hunting): +1 damage per shot per Wolfhound on your side

Tonnage: 20

Industry cost: 30

Quantity: 3

Invasion Strength: 5



The wolfhound is the intermediate fighter version. Weak against the Mosquito, because it will easily be overrun, but strong against the hedgehog, overcoming its defensive curl bonus with relative ease.



Fighter: Overlord

Evade: 20%

Health: 50

Shot Per Round: 1

Damage Per Shot: 50

Accuracy: 50%

State bonus (Free Fire): +30% accuracy if not chased by any enemy

Tonnage: 40

Industry cost: 40

Quantity: 1

Invasion Strength: 25



This design combines the invasion fighter with a definite bomber killer. Even if you do not want to invade with a fleet, this fighter still has some relevance.

It is a rather bulky ship, more weapon than anything else, with a compact accelerator in its frame (like the good old ion frigate in homeworld). The weapon can do a lot of damage, but the ship itself is not really useful against anything with a good evasion or that comes in masses.



__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________



Now to the bombers:



Bomber: End of all Hope

Evade: 0%

Health: 500

Shot Per Round: 0.33

Damage per Shot: 500

Accuracy: 100%

Tonnage: 100

Industry cost: 200

Invasion Strength: 100



This big guy is, if anything, a nightmare for any destroyer crew. It slowly closes in, nigh unstoppable, just to shoot one big mean shipkiller torpedo at its target.

Packing this bomber into any ship costs a lot, but the effect could determine a whole battle... if it reaches its target, that is. I'd like to think of this ship as an easily counterable Ender's game style of weapon.



Bomber: Mirage

Evade: 90%

Health: 50

Shot Per Round: 5

Damage per Shot: 5

Accuracy: 60%

Tonnage: 30

Industry cost: 30

Invasion Strength: 5



This bomber is more or less a decoy. It draws fire from the real threats and shoots more for show than for actual damage.



Bomber: Firestorm

Evade: 30%

Health: 30

Shot Per Round: 10

Damage per Shot: 10

Accuracy: 40%

Tonnage: 50

Industry cost: 50

Invasion Strength: 75



This bomber can give fire support to ground troops and bombard the hell out of a ship. Sadly, it is easy to hit and easier to down. So it got an armament with a very high fire frequency, to ensure maximum damage, before it explodes in a glorious storm of defensefire.



Well, before I come up with any cards or anything else, I'll take a break.

Now to the cards:



Bomber Rush (Offense)

+50% (+50%) bomber speed

+100% (-50%) damage on own bombers

Counters Tactics



Interception (Defense)

+25% (+25%) speed on fighters

+10% (+15%) damage of fighters vs fighters

+20% (+30%) damage of fighters vs bombers

Counters Offense



Barrage (Tactics - Commander ability)

+20% (+20%) damage for turrets

-30% (-20%) accuracy on hostile bombers

-30% (-20%) accuracy on all fighters in own airspace

Counters Offense



High Voltage Field (Engineering - Pilot ability)

-5 (-5) HP per round for every strikecraft in own airspace

-30% (+20%) on all defenses of own fleet

-20% (+10%) on all weapons of own fleet

Counters Sabotage



Remote Control (Sabotage - Adventurer ability)

1(2) rounds of friendly fire for all hostile fighters

1(2) rounds of bombers flying the wrong way

Counters Engineering

And finally, a few new skills:



Administrator



Requisitioneer: Reduces the industry cost of fighter/bomber modules in the system of the administrator by x%.



Corporate



Bounty hunt: Doubles the maintenance cost of ships with fighter/bomber modules in the system of the trader, but reduces the recovery time of said modules to a quarter.



Commander



Pattern-bombing (after Ground Pounder 1): Increases the invasion power of all bombers by x%

Target Practice (after Defense 2): Increases accuracy of tower-modules by x%

Barrage (after Target Practice 2): See the card proposal in my last post .



Pilot



Smart Bombs (after Lethal Modder): Bombers hit with 100% accuracy

Flares (after Defense System Specialist): +20% evasion for all strikecraft (except mosquito and mirage)

High Voltage Field (after Tactician 2): See the card proposal in my last post.



Adventurer



Armor piercing ammunition (after Dirty Tricks): +2 dmg on all fighters

Dogfight training (after Fearless Foe): +1 shot per round for all fighters

Remote control (after Master Hacker): See the card proposal in my last post.



Well, since we just have time til tomorrow, this is it in terms of my proposals, for now.

Going to try and divide up fighters / bombers into roles to better define role/purpose for a specific design. Currently fighters and bombers do exist in these roles but aren’t designed into said roles



Superiority Fighters (SF)

Role: Designed to effectively engage enemy fighters more than other types of spacecraft

Positive: Excels at short range combat, evasion, counters Interceptors & bombers

Negative: higher cost, cannot attack capital ship, lacks invasion ability



Interceptor Fighters

Role: Designed to effectively destroy enemy bombers

Positive: High speed, can attack capital ships? (can attack enemy missiles?)

Negative: Superiority fighters are a hard counter (poor evasion values), lacks invasion ability, not active during one phase



Multirole Strikecraft

Role: Designed to be all around fighter but excels at nothing

Positive: Cheap cost, good dmg, can attack capital ships, can support invasion

Negative: Superiority fighters are a counter



(Bombers are less flushed out... need better ideas)



Strategic Bomber

Role: Light bomber optimized for strikes deep behind enemy lines vs structures

Positive: High Invasion Support, high evasion (sacrifices dmg for stealth and maneuverability)

Negative: Reduced damage



Tactical Bomber

Role: Heavy bomber optimized for capital ships combat

Positive: can mount turret(s) Max:2, High Damage, high armor (can take punishment)

Negative: Slow, low evasion





Combat Cards



Bombing Run: bombers initiate an unstoppable high dmg strafe run on target

Short Range Interceptor Package: can launch a turn sooner than normal if equipped with short range package but must return to ship after one or maybe two phases powerful weapons





----



Regarding the ship designer for strikecraft - there are a lot of awesome ideas that could be implemented and being restricted to a limited number of designs is frustrating. I'm guessing there will be 6 designs available to each fraction, with maybe a couple of upgrades for each class, simply due to need to avoid overwhelming players with 10 different variants for each model. /end of dead horse beating

Well, since this is now official material, I'll just take the liberty to bump this, once. ^^

That's a lot to take in all at once!

Igncom1 wrote:
That's a lot to take in all at once!

You know, this all is just an elaborate ploy to blow your mind, again.

I would personally use the terms Fighter & Bomber only for ships which are specialized respectively to attack and defend Bombers and for the invasion of systems. It doesn't sound right if they are modules or armament which are mostly used in Fleet vs Fleet attack. Anyway they are a really welcome addition.

Nosferatiel wrote:
You know, this all is just an elaborate ploy to blow your mind, again.

DAMN YOU NOS!



But yeah, I like where this is going, many ideas presented here are similar to my own.



However with the rumours with a revamped combat system it is hard to comment either way.



Fighter kill: Fighters, Bombers, Ships



Bomber kill: Ships.



And both contribute to invasion as standard.



However I do feel like this could be expanded for things like:



Drones: Anti-bomber, anti-ship, act like faster bombers but are easy to shoot down.



Gunboats: anti-bomber, anti-fighter, anti-drones, act as fleet defence boats with great HP but no evasion but are themselves limited in number, and are hard to replace.



Gundamns: Ship disablers, tough to shoot down and quick to evade but are very limited in number and do little damage to ships on top of disabling enemy ships.



And of course subject to what works and what doesn't!

Iam just wondering if there will be an increase in Faction Points for the races?

cause new Faction Traits for the Bombers and Fighters would destroy the sensible (and i think now very good balanced) Faction Traitpoints System.



65 Points would be to less.



Or atleast the Sowers and the other races which had only 60 Points should get a boost to their points...everything else would be a downgrade for them

if not it would just increase the monotony in the Multiplayer as i always say...we got enough Sophon Players.



but i would pledge for a Traitpoint boost for all races.



Pls Keep this in mind if u didnt already have Devs.

In Love

Sovereign

marioflag wrote:
I would personally use the terms Fighter & Bomber only for ships which are specialized respectively to attack and defend Bombers and for the invasion of systems. It doesn't sound right if they are modules or armament which are mostly used in Fleet vs Fleet attack. Anyway they are a really welcome addition.

Pretty much my point of view

Sovereign wrote:
Iam just wondering if there will be an increase in Faction Points for the races?

cause new Faction Traits for the Bombers and Fighters would destroy the sensible (and i think now very good balanced) Faction Traitpoints System.



65 Points would be to less.



Or atleast the Sowers and the other races which had only 60 Points should get a boost to their points...everything else would be a downgrade for them

if not it would just increase the monotony in the Multiplayer as i always say...we got enough Sophon Players.



Pls Keep this in mind if u didnt already have Devs.

In Love

Sovereign

Well there are particular races that could use the trait boost if you ask me.