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Post The future of team skills
Discussion topic for post: http://www.starsonata.com/blog/the-futu ... am-skills/


Thu Nov 05, 2015 2:03 pm
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Post Re: The future of team skills
I responded to the survey but I just want to put my thoughts here as well to maybe get a discussion going.

Permanent team skills in any form are essentially giving a bonus to old teams. I don't see a need for this. New teams already have an uphill battle to get established due to a number of factors that I won't bother listing. Why give the old teams even more of an advantage? It makes no sense.

So team skills should be revamped to work on a per-uni basis. I would be interested to see what the dev team comes up with for the actual bonuses.

I'm all about alternate XP sources, as well. In fact, I am not a fan of the current breakdown of team score.

-Loyalty and Activity are redundant since Loyalty is just the average of Activity over time. Remove one of these.
-Trading encourages EF-layer building since the Wild Space AI don't trade enough. Revamp or remove.
-Mining is seriously skewed by certain valuable commods. Maybe it should be more based on raw volume mined than on commod value.
-Deadliness should only keep track of boss kills, not AI kills.

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Thu Nov 05, 2015 2:10 pm
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Post Re: The future of team skills
Solution 2 is so much better.

And I really like adding more ways to get team xp besides literally afking. Lol.

Just general activity should be the main way to gain exp, by actually playing the game. None of this passive exp gain stuff XD.

MAKE US WANT TO DO LOCKOUTS MORE.

As for the "old teams being op" thing, that's true especially when its literally impossible to catch up to teams with years and years of team xp built up. Noobs need some help in this game, this would be one way to help that.


Thu Nov 05, 2015 2:11 pm
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Post Re: The future of team skills
That's me ^. Wrong account XD.

I'm all for making team skills that actually offer permanent upgrades cost something more than skill points.

Maybe we could do option 1 if we could buy Roster and Galactic control and perma drone slots etc with ingame commodities or credits or new builds that require a team to work together to finish them.

Team projects would help a lot towards making teams feel more like teams instead of groups of solo mcers under the same flag I think.

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Thu Nov 05, 2015 2:25 pm
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Post Re: The future of team skills
So far it looks like we've got pretty strong support for "Solution 2" in the survey.

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Thu Nov 05, 2015 5:58 pm
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Post Re: The future of team skills
When I was reading through the solution number 1, I had a thought about how different tactics teams had for this uni and how this could be turned into different exclusive skills.

Let me explain what I mean on real life examples:
EF has a little gals this uni due to war with Traders. There are a few well fortified outposts, some ambush kits on AP routes etc. This reminds me a Bule race for some reason, so that would be a first team skill based on Bule mythology.

Bule:
- More Outpost slots
- A little galaxy slots
- Higher kits limit per galaxy
- Stealth Bule kits available
- Overall better performance of kits in solo galaxies/ base stats in gal are inversely scaled to amount of connected and owned galaxies

Next are Traders. We built small, but well fortified and connected Territory. I'm not sure which race would fit here as I don't know much of them, but it's probably either Mzungu or Vazaha, lets say Vazaha.

Vazaha would have following perks:
- Low/mediocre outpost slots
- Average galaxy slots
- Average kits per galaxy count
- High kits performance - more resistant kits
- Overall bonuses to kits in a galaxy scaled with amount of connected and owned galaxies
- Overall bonuses to permanent drones
- Resistant Vazaha themed kits

Now there are teams not inflicted in war that gave up on fortifying gals and are hoarding colonies as much as they can. Let's call it a Mzungu way or whatever.

Mzungu would have following perks:
- Very high galaxy count
- Low kits per galaxy count
- Low outpost slots count

It's late here so I will conclude with Urqa. Urqa is basically a pirate team skill.
- None or very little galaxy slots
- Low amount of Outpost slots
- Stealth but weak Urqa kits
- Mobile Urqa BvB outposts/kits which at very low speed approach their target.
- Higher pvp ranges

So yeah, that's what I thought of when reading through Solution 1.


Thu Nov 05, 2015 7:25 pm
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Post Re: The future of team skills
Why does this content change seem to forget about the other major and related issue: team score calculation.

First and foremost we need solid measurements for deciding the scores. I've made it my own project to try to see how far I as an individual player could go in boosting the team scores of my own team. I researched this for a long time, and I've come to find several flaws in the measurements. It isn't something I wish to public on the forum without knowing if it will be changed, but either way I'm open to discussing this with the administrators if they feel like working out some better measurements for team score calculation.


Fri Nov 06, 2015 4:30 am
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Post Re: The future of team skills
andezrhode2a wrote:
Why does this content change seem to forget about the other major and related issue: team score calculation.

First and foremost we need solid measurements for deciding the scores. I've made it my own project to try to see how far I as an individual player could go in boosting the team scores of my own team. I researched this for a long time, and I've come to find several flaws in the measurements. It isn't something I wish to public on the forum without knowing if it will be changed, but either way I'm open to discussing this with the administrators if they feel like working out some better measurements for team score calculation.


Like enk said, nearly half of them don't reflect any meaningful information and thus should simply be removed or reworked.

In my opinion:
-Stations is fine the way it is.
-Trading is far too (if not only) dependant on EF layer, which is stupid and should thus be removed.
-Loyalty is basically the average Activity over time so remove one or the other.
-Ownership is fine.
-Deadliness is one of those easily boostable scores. You just go farm some Ares Warriors or whatnot if you need more score in this. It should only count boss kills or be removed all together.
-Population is fine.
-Mining is another one of those scores that just doesn't reflect anything due to the incredibly price difference in commodities. This can also be heavily affected by EF layer which again, is stupid.
-Experience has the exact same issues as Deadliness and I think this score is useless. Once people reach 3k most of them don't bother to hardcore level anymore and I don't think they should be penelized for it by having to level some 15th alt to get some score in this.
-Production is fine.

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Fri Nov 06, 2015 5:05 am
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Post Re: The future of team skills
I didn't really have the time to write up a list, but somehow I felt like I had to. Here is my list:

Stations - Too easy to manipulate with shell kits.
Trading - Too easy to manipulate, and this does not depend on the layer. This is just a flawed mechanic due to how AI trading work, and can be performed just as easily in Earthforce Layer as in Wild Space Layer.
Loyalty - I see no point in having this score.
Ownership - Works well in my book.
Population - Works well in my book, but can also be somewhat manipulated in safe layers.
Mining - Too easy to manipulate with manual mining of certain artifacts. Automated slave mining is too heavily focused on Fermium in Earthforce Layer, so this needs to be changed.
Deadliness - Too easy to manipulate with ambush spawners. Should not count ambush spawners. There might be other aspects as well that can be used to manipulate this score.
Activity - Works well in my book, but might be a bit too vulnerable to bots.
Experience - What DarkSteel said.
Production - This score still builds on values which I find to be flawed. But since I can't think of a better suggestion, I guess it works well enough.

So to sum it up, Ownership and Activity are the only scores that seem like ideal measurements to me. Population is close to an ideal measurement. Production is already built on a flawed system, which is the value system of items in Star Sonata. And the rest of the scores needs major rework as far as I have experienced.

Those are my viewpoints, to fill in on what enkelin and DarkSteel has said so far :wink:


Fri Nov 06, 2015 6:34 am
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Post Re: The future of team skills
Solution 2 for me also.

Some ideas for team skills:
Expansionist Protocol (For teams that want to expand like mad, more galaxy slots; Increases the base stats as more galaxies are claimed, small amout of galaxies gives negative base stats)

Hermit Protocol (For teams with just 1-4 gals, increases base stats; Reduces galaxy slots a lot, more galaxies claimed weaker the bases will become in stats)

Nutrient Paste Supplements (Makes workers consume 10% less rations per tick, reduces productivity by 5% per level)

Towing Service (Allows team members to be towed to hq, with initial 25% more durability damage) (each level reduces the extra damage by like 5%?)

Teleportation Network (increases the amount of jumps away from base, how many teleporters can be used): Will allow team mates to teleport items to a base with the teleporter item equipped/built on the base (requires team skill to equip) (Officers+ only). You must be docked.

Minefield Protocol (Allows bases to deploy/shoot out drones that explode when they hit a enemy)

Green Fingers (Makes solar panels +800% more efficient, +5% col suit, +10 solar panel slots; Reduces equipped energy stats a lot)

Tractor Lock-on (Allows bases to use tractors to either push or pull targets)

Aura Tweaking (Improves base aura stats, reduces some other stats?)

Protective Foam Protocol (Allows bases to use envelops)

Taunt Protocol (Allows owners of the bases to taunt in galaxy chat while under attack, each level decreases the time between taunts)

Self-Destruction Protocol (Allows the ability for team bases to vanish when killed/radded, can be skilled by % chance of vanishing)

Space Highway (Increases aura effects on speed aura type drones, 5% per level?)

Really Super Duper Bases (10% stat improvement to super items on bases per level)

Weapon Smithing (Makes bases multi-fire, but other base stats reduced)

Productivity Protocol (Increases build speed but makes all team bases have weaker stats).

Colonization Priority (Increases by 5% per level, reduces base other stats a lot)

Defensive Protocol (Increases shield bank and regen; Reduces damage, rof)

Aggressive Protocol (Increases damage and rof; Reduces regen, shield bank)

Seek Protocol (Increases radar, range, and tracking; Reduces rof)

Silent Protocol (Increases stealth attributes (base cloaks); Reduces energy regen, and energy bank)

Energize Protocol (Increases energybank, energy regen; Reduces shield regen, shield bank, Energy consumes +50% more fuel)

Station Zen of Shield, Energy, Reach, Expansion, Exterminators, Anchoring (anti-tractor effects)

--May add more later--

Multi-Target Solution (Each level allows for +1 target to be shot, "like deathblossom"; Reduces damage, rof per level)

Squaddie Team (Increases the amount of characters can be within one squad, +1 character per level)

Improved Bubble Wrap (All bases deployed will contain a Apollo energy, shield, and radar (stuck on base, size 1)).

Trade Protocol (Allows a team of 30+ characters to setup a automated trader message (director or councilors access only), each level reduces the time duration between each message; Starts with every 3 hours, -20 mins per level (Trade Chat)).

Solar Flare Shielding (Bases become immune to sun burns; Reduces shield regen -10%, each level reduces the negative effect by 2%).

Integrated Workers (Increases productivity by +10%; Consumes +50 workers per tick).

SS 9000 (All bases only require 1 worker for maintenance; Personal computers replace standard workers, they consume microchips. Increases productivity by 50%. If base runs out of microchips a 50% chance either the worker will be tossed out the base or the personal computers).

--I think I'm done for now--

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Last edited by Markoz on Sat Nov 07, 2015 12:36 am, edited 6 times in total.

Fri Nov 06, 2015 10:55 am
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Post Re: The future of team skills
Greetings...

If given only the 2 choices, I vote #2

I don't like the idea of having to reskill every uni - theres already too much to do, adding that on would tend to make it too much work.

Older teams SHOULD have an advantage - after all, that's kind of the point.

Having team xp based on team activities is a great idea - Perhaps TXP should be based not on Boss kills, but on how long and how many people on the team are squadded and get any kind of kills. This would make the "training" phase of new members important to thee team for TXP.

I don't really understand WHY there is any kind of limit to roster or organizational options - So I'm all for just eliminating those - or lowering the costs -

There really needs to be a few more choices for team skills - perhaps even another rank between officer and councilor - for a Battle commander (team leader) type of rank - that could be level or skill restricted.


Fri Nov 06, 2015 2:36 pm
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Post Re: The future of team skills
Zalistar wrote:
Older teams SHOULD have an advantage - after all, that's kind of the point.


Older teams have many advantages already. When you are adding a mechanic to a game, surely the most important question is: "does this mechanic improve the game?" Unless someone can explain to me why older teams need an even greater advantage, I don't see the value of the mechanic.

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Hi, I'm Anil, a long-time player turned developer. I am Star Sonata's lead content developer, which means that I run weekly dev meetings and make sure that any proposed changes to the game receive proper review before going live.

http://www.starsonata.com/features


Fri Nov 06, 2015 4:49 pm
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