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Post by entropomorphic on Jul 15, 2011 15:16:43 GMT -5
It seems that there is a bug with boarding during combat... specifically that the boarded and boarding ships seem to get reversed.
For example, my nearly invincible Level 29 captain on Challenging had recently transitioned from explorer to pirate hunter. I ambushed a pirate cutter and pummelled the daylights out of it with torpedos. Unfortunately I was damaging the hull more than the engines or crew, so I closed in to board so I wouldn't lose the cargo. The torpedos had brought down the pirate to 2 hull, 7 engines, and 9 crew, while I had an undamaged 20-hull royal class with a full 80 crew. With my warrior skill of 23 and the Leviathan system, I figured this was a cakewalk.
Instead, after my first boarding attempt, the message said I had been boarded and damaged; half my crew died! I thought this was a freak accident, so I clicked Duel... and died when my previously undamaged hull collapsed!
I thought that was just really bad luck and hubris until I started my next captain on Crazy. Early in the game a Javat Destroyer caught me with a load of contraband. I tried to flee, but I couldn't escape. When it caught up to me, I still tried fleeing, except the message said that I had boarded the destroyer, doing 10 damage! I fled again... same result! The destroyer was hurting, somehow, but on the next turn he vaporized me with guns.
How could these happen?? Has anyone else experienced this?
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Post by Cory Trese on Jul 15, 2011 15:32:57 GMT -5
I have not seen it in the simulator. You're running the most recent version and both games are on Crazy?
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Post by Cory Trese on Jul 15, 2011 20:16:37 GMT -5
Anyone else? This sounds serious I'd expect there to be an uproar =)
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Post by Cory Trese on Jul 15, 2011 20:23:05 GMT -5
I found a bug where the message:
"%s's attack party boarded %s and inflicted %d damage"
Would over write the results of a failed attempt to escape if the damage done by the enemy is greater than a certain amount. That explains the second part of the post.
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Post by entropomorphic on Jul 16, 2011 9:11:22 GMT -5
The second part was 3.8.15 on Crazy, and the first scenario ocurred in the previous version, and on Challenging. I kicked myself fornot updating earlier when I saw the line "Damage Smoothing" in the changelog... I don't know whether that had anything to do with it. In the second scenario, it was not just the message.... I was actually dealing decent damage to the warship instead of fleeing, even with a warrior skill of like 2.
I've noticed similar things in previous games, where boarding encounters cause way more damage to the ships instead of the crew, even when the crew counts are wildly uneven.
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Post by Cory Trese on Jul 16, 2011 11:14:00 GMT -5
"Damage Smoothing" actually was a very isolated patch inside of the equation that applies damage from Guns.
I will continue to investigate as we go forward. This will also be re-checked with the "10 damage" message is decomposed into the various boarding / dueling / detonating results.
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Post by slawyer on Jul 18, 2011 17:41:30 GMT -5
I have seen that but I think it is working as designed, and the text is just not clear about what is happening. Maybe Cory can shed some light on my take below? It seems to depend greatly on the match-up being pretty lopsided (enemy lots higher level than you) and lacking enough stats/skills for boarding such a high level enemy (not enough Tactics maybe? or Stealth?). But I have had some fights that were lopsided in the extreme (usually against Aliens which do not seem bound by the "X% of your level" restrictions for the difficulty) and did not follow this pattern (instead I keep seeing "your boarding party was repelled!" messages). I keep Stealth and Warrior much higher than Pilot or Tactics, and keep lots of Weapons on board, but when I try to Board high level enemy ships, sometimes my stats/skills are not enough to do it without getting rocked, and I end up losing most of my crew and take damage (wounds), and losing Engines or Hull breach is possible. So against a high level Bounty Hunter, I typically let THEM board ME instead (they generally do eventually, if you keep them at close range and retreat), and let them take that hit -- THEIR stats/skills are not sufficient to board ME without getting rocked, and often their Engines get knocked out immediately. It seems without Attack Shuttles, the attacker has the big disadvantage when boarding (as it should be). When that happens, the message says I boarded them, when it was actually them boarding me, and I can see how that might be confusing. Sometimes I take a wound doing this, but usually only lose 1 health (and often don't get wounded at all, probably because of very high Strength). I just figure I repelled their boarding attempt and boarded them (taking advantage of the nice convenient placement of their ship alongside mine and the portholes they left open and all)! Note this works well against Bounty Hunters, but not Pirates or Military Officers (can't count on them trying to board you). I bet the improved combat messages will help a lot here. An update to the docs with some more Combat info would help too.  |
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Post by celu on Jul 19, 2011 10:12:59 GMT -5
I've had similar experiences in the past. When playing other than Military officer where my Warrior skill takes a backseat.
Whenever I try to board, even with loads of weapons and crew about the same ratio as the original poster's (about 80:10), my crew of mixed origins seem to either shoot each other, shoot themselves or accidentally shoot somebody by releasing the safety button too early.
So my resolution was, not do any boarding for now.
I was too busy playing merchant and smuggler to make any testing myself on boarding (but it was on my list)
Or if the tables are turned and I'm outnumbered: let them board me and let them strangle each other, choke themselves or shoot somebody with their 3 weapons by releasing the safety button too early.
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Post by Cory Trese on Jul 20, 2011 2:44:45 GMT -5
slawyer you make some really great points here. To be very good at close range combat use: Warrior, Strength, Tactics, Intimidate, Engines, Pilot (in that order mostly) A huge emphasis is put on Warrior if ... You are attacking (pressing Board) A huge emphasis is put on Strength if ... You are in a protracted battle on board ship (pressing Board 3 or more times) A huge emphasis is put on Tactics if ... You are trying to breach a larger Crew ship OR attempting to escape boarding w/ Crew & Hull intact A huge emphasis is put on Pilot if ... The try to Ram you while you are closing to Board
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Tenebrous Pirate
Exemplar
[ Star Traders 2 Supporter ]
Why? Well, why not?
Posts: 482
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Post by Tenebrous Pirate on Jul 20, 2011 16:00:09 GMT -5
I have found boarding works best when I am very, very, totally, absolutely, three-sheets-to-the-wind drunk. That way, it doesn't hurt as bad when I blow up my own hull and vent myself into space. ;-)
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Post by absimiliard on Jul 21, 2011 6:34:50 GMT -5
I have found boarding works best when I am very, very, totally, absolutely, three-sheets-to-the-wind drunk. That way, it doesn't hurt as bad when I blow up my own hull and vent myself into space. ;-) +1 -abs |
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Post by Cory Trese on Jul 21, 2011 19:36:26 GMT -5
Funny. Andrew and I had a long discussion about how the only character's we get above level 30 on Impossible are Boarding based fighters.
We both agree that Long range combat is simply too random and your Sails often take a hit from Torps at long range, causing instant defeat.
I only use Torps when I'm desperate or really, really bored ...
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Post by Cory Trese on Jul 21, 2011 19:50:30 GMT -5
I just did a long read of the results of a Forum search for "Boarding"
Not many people love it like I do.
Therefore, a scheme of adjustments has been hatched.
The first, damage smoothing for boarding damage, will be implemented tonight.
Changes will continue until morale improves.
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Post by gearheadwhat on Jul 22, 2011 2:57:04 GMT -5
The main issue is that to us... It is simply random and a gamble. We can only guess at factors, with no true understanding of what is happening. We can't even really react to the situation well with such little info outside of tidbits found here. I think you may find how it works elegant, and it may be so. But we can't see the elegance. Just the end results.
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