Fenikso
Templar
[ Star Traders 2 & Elite Supporter ]
Nobody expects the Rychart Inquisition!
Posts: 753
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Post by Fenikso on Aug 25, 2011 23:17:15 GMT -5
Thanks! I hate to be locked in "it works fine on my system and nobody else is seeing it, go away" situation . It is frustrating when I am trying to help, but I look like a fool who is imagining things.
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Post by slawyer on Aug 26, 2011 10:25:49 GMT -5
I too am seeing no XP at all under any circumstances when blockading -- and I don't like it one bit. My Stealth is 375 so encounters are few and far between. My Tactics is 106 so my blockades almost always succeed and get lots of money, but no XP now, even when there is a solar war and I have rank 18 with the other faction! I could understand taking away XP from blockade/surveillance at independent systems, in exchange for extra XP for blockade/surveillance at factions with more than one solar war/spy war. I bet the folks at Marquette will be happy to see me leave; I've been hanging around there way too much anyways. IMHO, the XP for blockade with solar war/surveillance with spy war should be awarded like the XP for blockade/surveillance at independent systems used to be (when you get enough money/records and don't fail the skill check), and it should 1 XP per war so you can get more XP when there are multiple in effect. Chasing those down should be rewarding!
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Fenikso
Templar
[ Star Traders 2 & Elite Supporter ]
Nobody expects the Rychart Inquisition!
Posts: 753
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Post by Fenikso on Aug 26, 2011 10:49:09 GMT -5
Hmmm. I have just realized that there is a difference between "slawyer" and "slayernz" so those are two different persons . Now I feel really silly. Sorry guys.
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Post by Cory Trese on Aug 26, 2011 12:39:07 GMT -5
OK I'll keep looking.
Difficulty is CRITICALLY important, Fenikso, for everything.
Two factors that are literally REQUIRED for me to find any bugs -- difficulty and turn.
Now, most people don't care to supply details, so I just guess (I guess a lot on bugs.)
LOGIC TREE:
FOR (All Conflicts) { GET WAR OPP. RANK IF MIL_RANK > 0 IF CREDITS > ADJ_DIFF * 799 RUN XP_CHECK() END END END
So what I am testing is this:
Thulun Captain Turn 2345 Diff: Hard Target: Javat Thulun: Permit, Edict + 2 Rank Javat: None, -443 Reputation Conflict: Javat vs. Thulun Open War XP Granted for Credits > 1800 XP Checks Earned so Far: 4
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Post by Cory Trese on Aug 26, 2011 12:42:43 GMT -5
Thanks! I hate to be locked in "it works fine on my system and nobody else is seeing it, go away" situation . It is frustrating when I am trying to help, but I look like a fool who is imagining things. I do really appreciate your help. The more details I get the better I am able to work to improve the game. Each bug report is added to the list and investigated as quickly as I can. It can be frustrating for both sides of the situation. I am mashing buttons, getting XP and confused about what is going on. I'm hoping for details, begging over e-mail and mashing buttons more. Trust me, spending 4 hours troubleshooting a bug you cannot even reproduce is not fun.
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Post by slawyer on Aug 26, 2011 13:47:17 GMT -5
Ah, maybe I have misunderstood the changes.
So you have also changed the award of XP to require "better" results to get XP than before? And it varies according to difficulty and game turn? How good do the results need to be now? I know before it would not award XP when the blockade was successful and the money was too low (<~$500 on Impossible) but I am getting big bucks and still not getting XP in the solar war, and I have rank with the opposing faction. So I guess it is this part stopping the XP award for me:
IF CREDITS > ADJ_DIFF * 799
Can you elaborate a bit about the math of this ADJ_DIFF for each difficulty?
Assuming there is a solar war and I have rank with the opposing faction, how much money do I need to get from blockade to get XP on Impossible with Tactics 106 and 205 Weapons in the hold on turn 91117? What are the odds on actually making such a roll in the game? I think your ADJ_DIFF is way too strict, because it seems to me that Tactics has to be much higher now (or game turn much lower) to earn any XP.
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Post by Cory Trese on Aug 26, 2011 14:27:56 GMT -5
Thanks for the input everyone.
The next release will have some new rules, I will post the specifics with the new update.
Thanks for everyone's e-mails and posts.
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Fenikso
Templar
[ Star Traders 2 & Elite Supporter ]
Nobody expects the Rychart Inquisition!
Posts: 753
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Post by Fenikso on Aug 26, 2011 14:34:55 GMT -5
slawyer - Cory claimed that "the mechanics didn't change at all", just the Solar War condition was added. It was two-way misunderstanding which leaded to describing various skill tests and checks. @cory - As I am software designer, I had my own idea what would be helpful, obviously I am wrong as I do not know the structure of your code. I will try to be more helpful next time and try to be more descriptive of the issue. I see a few ways out of this "misery" . 1) Create bug report template -- so we are always consistently providing the needed information 2) Add a button to Roster, which will allow us to copy all needed information about Captain to the clipboard, so we can just paste it to the forum. That would be also great for various strategy discussions etc. 3) For this specific issue I can just prepare the situation which awards me with XP in 3.9.15 and does not in 3.9.17 even during Solar war and send your the my game data.
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Post by Cory Trese on Aug 26, 2011 14:38:01 GMT -5
Ah, maybe I have misunderstood the changes. So you have also changed the award of XP to require "better" results to get XP than before? I did not change the award of XP to require better or worse results -- there has been some misunderstanding. This check has always been in the game (the line was added when I added the "Blockade" system.) Passing this ADJ_DIFF is what the Blockade Exploit was about. The people who e-mailed the exploit guides showed me how you could get +3 / +4 XP per Blockade with the right techniques. Done correctly, this could yield several thousand XP in the first 3,000 turns which was totally unbalancing. By removing the "automatic" XP check that was in the previous version, and moving the secondary XP check into the "Effective Blockade Check" against ADJ_DIFF the number of XP points in the exploit play was reduced back inside of the range of the curve. However, I have clearly reduced the XP severely for people who are Blockading with less success. I'm working on an improvement patch. Keep firmly in mind is that Impossible is not our baseline and turn 91,000 is not our baseline. I cannot focus on your individual character who has reached the upper levels of difficulty. I'm focused on making the game fun for the vast majority of the game's players. My test games are on or around the Hard difficulty being played over the first 3,000 turns.
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Fenikso
Templar
[ Star Traders 2 & Elite Supporter ]
Nobody expects the Rychart Inquisition!
Posts: 753
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Post by Fenikso on Aug 26, 2011 14:41:08 GMT -5
But we would like to have fun even on Impossible and in turn 100000 - if we survive of course ;D.
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Post by Cory Trese on Aug 26, 2011 14:48:21 GMT -5
I will always enjoy the occasional 100K turn game as well but the game changes as you go.
Exploration, Blockade, Merchant, Bounty Hunter -- All of these classes change as the game enters the high turn range. If Blockade isn't granting your character XP, perhaps they're better set up for Surveillance or Trade XP?
The key thing for me is that there are only so many hours in a day and I have no choice but to prioritize. I will always prioritize balanced game play for the majority at the top of the list.
An easier solution would be "You die at turn 64,000" and then stop trying to balance past that point. But I won't do that because while the priority is balanced game play for the majority I am not trying to exclude anyone's game -- simply be aware that you are playing high difficulty when you play high turns. Your character might not be set up to score XP late in the game the same way they did early in the game.
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Fenikso
Templar
[ Star Traders 2 & Elite Supporter ]
Nobody expects the Rychart Inquisition!
Posts: 753
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Post by Fenikso on Aug 26, 2011 14:58:43 GMT -5
I understand. The point of this specific issue was that the behavior changed between 3.9.15 and 3.9.17 significantly for the same situation, but you claimed that you just added the Solar War check.
I can understand if some activities do not yield much success later in game, but this changed all of the sudden even when we meet the new condition in place and you suggested that you did not touch the mechanic at all -> there is no other explanation than it is bug.
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Post by Cory Trese on Aug 26, 2011 15:01:10 GMT -5
It is a bug I will fix it.
Thanks!
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Post by slawyer on Aug 26, 2011 15:23:22 GMT -5
I noticed the fuel curve is significantly different in the update too. My Pilot of 150 and Intimidate of 106 are not nearly sufficient now to get good fuel economy (or even reasonable good) in my hyper freighter with Titan Components and Mercenaries. I used to go around with 10 fuel but now I need like 25 + 25 luxuries to go anywhere.
Can you provide some hints about optimizing fuel economy with the new curve? Do we need tons more Pilot and Initimidate, or just get a slower ship? I noticed my fronitier freighter gets way better mileage than my hyper freighter now (it has titan + mercenaries too, but much bigger hull).
Also, how is fuel use when blockading related to fuel use moving now? Before I was able to blockade continuously and use no fuel, even after sail damage. In fact, I used no fuel at all, even with only 2 sails left, when blockading at Marquette (red square), using the hyper freighter, but not using the frontier freighter. I figured it was because my pilot + intimidate is big enough for the hull + crew of the hyper freighter (24+64), but not for the hull + crew of the frontier freighter (38+115), and that it would eventually work for the frontier freighter too, once my stats were high enough. Is that right? How does this work now?
I'm not complaining about the change to the fuel curve -- making it harder is fine -- I just want to understand the change and how to improve my fuel economy (pump stats? get slower ship? something else?).
I would love to know all the gory details -- enough to actually make a spreadsheet to calculate red and green fuel use for a given set of stats for character and ship. It would be an awesome tool to use when ship-shopping. Of course, you could always add that into the ship comparison for us; that would be very cool, but then I still wouldn't understand how the fuel curve works.
One more comment about game difficulty: I don't like the way ST uses the game turn to crank up the difficulty so much. I feel like the player should be REWARDED for surviving to late game and getting high stats, but it seems to me that the game PENALIZES you for that (i.e. high game turn count) significantly more than the XP awards can counter that with increased skills. In other words, it is not possible to counter the penalties associated with very advanced game turn with high skill stats, because either the XP awards are too low, or the game turn penalty is too high. I really like the way the enemy level scales with your level as the game progresses, and the way that scales according to the difficulty level, but it seems many other aspects of the game are much too harsh when scaled to game turn number on the harder difficulties (explore/blockade/surveillance on Crazy/Insane/Impossible).
As Fensiko said, we want to keep having fun late game and keep advancing, not get stuck where we can't advance anymore because of high game turn.
I like the really late game because that's when you see enemies 200-300 levels higher than you, but I still want to be able to get XP and keep advancing levels! And I still want to be able to explore/blockade/surveillance with success late game (at least some times) without having to totally dedicate my XP to those relevant skills!
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Post by Cory Trese on Aug 26, 2011 15:34:32 GMT -5
I'm always working to share as many details as time permits.
I think there are some really big misunderstandings in this thread.
I will try to get together the energy to write up a response under a more appropriate topic heading.
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