Here is my current mod that I put together to extend the life of the game. It's nothing major, just a few tweaks to take care of a few persistent problems I have seen be voiced (and experienced). This is as much of a minimalist mod as can be...there are no wholesale changes to gameplay at all...just a few tweaks to the combat balance.



Changes:



1) Lowered damage for Long Range Kinetics a notch (they are still a decent choice, but don't seem to be the end all be all now). Since the default AI ships don't use LR Kinetics, this does not negatively impact the AI.



2) Increased the 'active' aspect of the defenses by 20% (Deflect/Absorb/Intercept). This is to mitigate the 'glass cannon' dominance, particularly in the early game. Again, this assist the AI since they typically always put some defenses on their designs.



3) Removed the 'Adventurer' trait (replaced with one of the other four for each hero that had it). Adventurer was pretty weak/underdeveloped compared to the other traits and the AI would waste time and experience on those traits so again, this is an assist there.



4) Added burlsifu's English translation mod for the cards. I just prefer to see the text being less cryptic. If putting this as a 'submod' is a problem, please let me know and I'll remove it.



Any feedback on the feel of the tweaks encouraged. I think it feels quite a bit more 'balanced' now. Please let me know if you give it a go.

Just played 200 turns against Hissho and Amoeba. Long range is still king but I do think this helps balance it a bit. Good job, no crashes.

Thanks for the feedback. It's certainly possible to take the LR Kinetics down another notch but I didn't want to reduce them uselessness.



When you're saying 'long range is still king' do you mean long range weapons in general or specifically the LR Kinetics?



Thanks!

Yes, I meant to say LR Kinetics. As a human it was still possible to exploit the strength of LR Kinetics using 'Glass Cannon' throughout the game.

Interesting. I can take them down another notch or I could boost defense a bit more so that glass cannons aren't as favored. So far, I've only increased 'active' defenses but I could increase the passive defenses as well if needed. Or if it's truly just the LR Kinetics then indeed, that 3 damage might have been a typo in which case reducing it again would be appropriate.

Jumped over here from the other thread to keep thoughts on this mod all in one place.



first, thanks for the mod, pretty cool adjustments. Only on first game still but I do like the balance - perhaps it's because since my days of Civ games, I play with a no-save mode since the AI doesn't get a do-over via save/reload, and on endless with non-custom factions usually.



Given that caveat, it does seem like it's added a decent bit to the AI ability and while I agree LR kinetics are still the go-to design, I'm not sure reducing the dmg further would be that helpful (because while that may then eliminate LR kinetics as the go-to weapon, it seems all that would do is then promote LR lasers as the "new normal" for no-brainer weapon design. Perhaps a tiny bit more reduction (see below re: thoughts on that from my admittedly one game so far)



The main core advantage of LR kinetics is that it is long range, and that any fire you do with it disables enemy weapons/ships on the same round you fired. So unless dmg was reduced to near impotence, the advantage will always go to whatever weapon that can shoot first, kill on the same round, and do reasonable dmg of course. Which basically means either the x4 LR kinetics or x2 LR lasers - and due to dmg and fire rate, LR kinetics in vanilla game was the lead by far.



This mod reduces that lead a good bit, plus adds the additional defense which I like. Makes game a bit less offense only.



My experience unlike other reply though - with admittedly just the one game with mod so far - is that glass cannon wasn't that good an option, as it never has been before in my non-modded games. Again, perhaps it's because I play endless mode with no save, but the AI usually has at least 1 runaway power, usually couple, that starts fielding dreadnoughts and bombers - and I've never found glass cannon designs to be that good even in non-modded games where the AI is weaker. (They do great dmg, I just don't like ferrying replacement ships because my glass cannon fleets always lose some ships once AI gets bombers and dreadnoughts)



So summary so far for me is:

1. cool mod, adds I don't know what percentage to the feel of how much stronger AI is, but seems decent margin of additional defense for the AI



2. I think glass cannon LR kinetics is viable so not saying it isn't, but I've never liked the steady stream of replacement ships you need to ferry when you take losses to bombers and dreadnoughts, and either I have some weird luck, or that's just how a lot of my AI games turn out - so no glass cannon advantage for me. As clarification - I usually play huge map, 8 empires, disk 4 or spiral 8, on endless mode with my personal handicap of no save/reload



3. I think if LR kinetic dmg was slightly more reduced, that may force human players to resort to other LR weapons mix, but holding off on that recommendation until I play a few more games. The current one I'm finishing now I basically used 75% LR kinetics with 25% LR lasers mix on my ships, with fighter screen to protect from bombers and that still let me kill most AI fleets at long range.



Question - when you mod dmg, can you change dmg numbers at specific range only? Or are you only able to mod the dmg value of a weapon type overall regardless of range?

Thanks for the feedback. I think your experience largely mirrors my own but after a few games, I'm starting to agree with Scrivener that LR Kinetics are a still bit too good of an option. I've tweaked my mod to take another half-point away (damage is now Min:1 Max:2 rather than Min:2 Max:2). I'm on my first real game since that change and it seems to put the LR in a really good spot. It might just be placebo, but I feel like missiles now have a point again, especially if the enemy uses Kinetic defenses. The LR Kinetics don't score many complete kills vs defended ships now whereas the missiles can still get kills fairly easily, albeit after the LR gun damage has been dealt.



As far how to mod the damage, yes it can be changed by range. What makes me think this was all a bug is that the damage for Kinetics is 3/3 for LR, 1/1 for Medium, and 1/1 for Short. Makes me think it's reversed...The mod as posted is LR 2/2 MR 1/1 SR 1/1 while my personal mod is LR 1/2 MR 1/1 SR 1/1. Honestly I think it could go to 1/1 at LR they would STILL be a solid option just by virtue of getting a lot of damage in first...



Play around with it as is and if you want to see the 1/2 version, let me know.



Thanks for playing it and providing the feedback!

That does seem odd, the 3/3 for LR vs SR kinetics. I mean, on one hand disharmony did away with the notion of any weapon having an optimal range other than what you install it as.



But the 'lore' so to speak established till then was that melee kinetics was described as being more powerful once you got into melee range. So yea, it does seem that 3/3 got flipped backward, and should be 1/1, 1/1, and then 3/3 for LR, MR, SR.



Given how many melee kinetics you can cram it though, it would make it absolute murder on anyone you finally get into melee range, but maybe that's the point.



Which XML file is the range damage adjusted in? I'd like to tweak it myself and see how a 1/1 LR , 1/1 MR, and 3/3 SR kinetics plays out. Makes me want to make a bunch of tank ships packed with nothing but melee kinetics lol

Yeah, I think the RoF and whatnot is plenty at close range without the need to triple the damage. But the file you need is 'Weapon Module.xml'. You can change the one in my mod folder and be good to go. You can confirm that it works in the ship designer. Let me know how it goes with the hideous SR Kinetics lol. I'm more concerned at this point with making the long range weapons all viable but it could be fun to have a buzz-saw for SR

Maybe theres another angle to hit this problem than just the LR kinetic damage threshold. When you only consider how effective the damage is then you are still only deciding if "it is the best or is it not the best". There must be a way to break this up. I havent looked for any specific properties to change but maybe this can be solved by adding special ship modules that specialize in damage control at a given range. As a module this specialization is optional but I figure it could work like this.



LR Damage Control Module

+30% LR Defense. -15% MR Defense, -15% SR Defense



MR Damage Control Module

+30% MR Defense. -15% LR Defense, -15% SR Defense



SR Damage Control Module

+30% SR Defense. -15% LR Defense, -15% MR Defense



and of course no special module or some other like a Power Module.



When you take a damage control module you are basically making a bet on what range your enemy will primarily attack you from. I like this because it gives you the option to force an enemy to change tactics if you have the industry to produce new designs. One big challenge I see to this is setting up the AI to know that if they are taking a pounding and losing fleets at long range, then start building ships with LR Damage Controls. Just some ideas I had for balance.

Scrivener07 wrote:
Maybe theres another angle to hit this problem than just the LR kinetic damage threshold. When you only consider how effective the damage is then you are still only deciding if "it is the best or is it not the best". There must be a way to break this up. I havent looked for any specific properties to change but maybe this can be solved by adding special ship modules that specialize in damage control at a given range. As a module this specialization is optional but I figure it could work like this.



LR Damage Control Module

+30% LR Defense. -15% MR Defense, -15% SR Defense



MR Damage Control Module

+30% MR Defense. -15% LR Defense, -15% SR Defense



SR Damage Control Module

+30% SR Defense. -15% LR Defense, -15% MR Defense



and of course no special module or some other like a Power Module.



When you take a damage control module you are basically making a bet on what range your enemy will primarily attack you from. I like this because it gives you the option to force an enemy to change tactics if you have the industry to produce new designs. One big challenge I see to this is setting up the AI to know that if they are taking a pounding and losing fleets at long range, then start building ships with LR Damage Controls. Just some ideas I had for balance.

Sounds interesting. My 'Mod-Fu' is not strong though lol. I pretty much just can fumble around and tweak numbers. I haven't even tried to mess with adding anything new. Maybe one of the more experienced modders could add something like that.

I'm gonna give this a try if I get some time over the next day or two. Thanks for taking a look at this issue which has really sucked a lot of the fun right out of the game for me since Disharmony, OP.

Hi Daniel,



Please let me know what you think if you get a chance to try it. I can also upload the further reduced damage build if you think that the one I have here doesn't go far enough.

Edit : Well I installed ultima ratio mod and there is already a lot of changes to the weapons, so I don't think I'll need the fixes here in the end.





Hey there,



Would it be possible to get only the fix for LR kinetics? I didn't test it yet, but I've been reading the post on the main forum of ES and it looks way overpowered. I don't really think the rest of the changes are needed, I actually like the adventurer class, I think you get dust and science leech wich can be usefull, but maybe you're right that it is underpowered. As it is I won't use LR kinetics and that's a fix for the problem too, since it seems the AI doesn't use it. I'm still a laser fan, must come from the star wars movies when I was a kid



PS : I tried finding the fix in the files, but there is way too much data to go through ^^. these XMLs files don't take a lot of space, but it is still a lot of text.

kazuma6666 wrote:
Edit : Well I installed ultima ratio mod and there is already a lot of changes to the weapons, so I don't think I'll need the fixes here in the end.





Hey there,



Would it be possible to get only the fix for LR kinetics? I didn't test it yet, but I've been reading the post on the main forum of ES and it looks way overpowered. I don't really think the rest of the changes are needed, I actually like the adventurer class, I think you get dust and science leech wich can be usefull, but maybe you're right that it is underpowered. As it is I won't use LR kinetics and that's a fix for the problem too, since it seems the AI doesn't use it. I'm still a laser fan, must come from the star wars movies when I was a kid



PS : I tried finding the fix in the files, but there is way too much data to go through ^^. these XMLs files don't take a lot of space, but it is still a lot of text.

Ok no worries. I was just trying for more of a quick fix so if the other mod addresses the issues then all good!