Disclaimer I apologize in advance, this may be harsh, I’m passionate about ISG and I’m a bit pissed off as I write. The below is my opinion only but I would wager that I’m not going to be the only player who will feel this way. Missiles are a joke now, almost totally useless and there are related negative results elsewhere because of it. At one time missiles were clearly superior to other weapons and as a result the devs reduced both their destructive power and speed. Now it is beam and kinetics that are the better choice as illustrated here where aReclusiveMind, offers his current preference. I quote him from another thread. "What I'm trying to say is focus on your weapons and you'll be in good shape. I generally go for the kinetic weapons at the moment". All weapons systems need to be effective, one shouldn’t be clearly superior to the other which is the case now. Take it a step further, what happens when the scanner tech that increases your beam and kinetic effectiveness by 30% is implemented? I’ll tell you what happens; missile research and the missiles themselves will be ignored. Yeay, let’s have useless components in the game, I’m sure that will be fun. Now I understand the reason why Missiles were nerfed but this was overkill Reduce their destructive power? Agree Reduce their speed so that my ships can outpace them? Disagree Do both? Overkill, completely disagree Go back to MoO2. Missiles were slightly faster than ships and had a better turn rate, you could evade them for a while, especially with the faster smaller ships, but sooner or later they hit. That is the correct balance. Missiles also received increases to their mobility as faster drive techs were researched and implemented. Sounds like Microprose actually put some thought into this matter. Where is the MIRV option by the way? Here is a technology that was first introduced in the 1970s and I have no option to research it in game? I can understand not including it as a starting tech for balance reasons but if missiles are so underpowered at least give a player the option to increase their destructive yield should he/she choose to do so. We have also discussed how battles are frustrating at times because the AI will flee. Rather than making the AI suicidal, increase the speed of missiles and we may get a kill or two before the cowardly rats run away. I like the reduced destructive yield at present, it is needed as the missiles were too overpowered from the start, the 25% reduction across the board hurt but was necessary I hate the speed reduction, even old fashioned torpedoes were faster than the ships they tracked so I can’t accept that capital ships are faster than the missiles targeting them. I fight manual battles almost exclusively, every time I see my own ship, which fired a missile on the previous turn, be able to outpace that same missile… one word keeps coming to mind Asinine (Rant over)
Ok, we'll have a look at the missiles speed at the moment and consider buffing that a bit. We'll check if the speed already increases with drive tech or not (I think it does already, but I'll check). This is normal, and expected. Not everything is in the game yet, so it's expected that some things may seem way off now but will work better when everything is in place. The missiles case is paradigmatic. We nerfed missiles because they were perceived as too strong, and they were for what the game offered at that moment. Now, they seem underpowered, because in the meantime we brought kinetic weapons closer to where they should be. It's constant balance work we need to do until release. So, you'll want to balance and change a few obvious things right away because they don't make sense, but what we need to understand is that by doing so we may have to change them later, again (and again), to fit in when everything's in. Please keep reporting any imbalance you find and we'll have a look at it, we just ask you to have patiente that things will get there when everything's in, which is one of the big objectives for the next major milestone.
Adam, I don't underestimate the work involved in attaining a good balance and certainly do not wish to denigrate the excellent work already produced by what is after all a tiny studio. This I completely understand as well and can say that over the last few days have been doing the same thing with some of my own tasks. Like you, immersion is important to me and can be broken easily. The missiles did exactly that and it frustrated me. You have both my empathy as well as my understanding that even the best of us (or anyone for that matter) can and will make decisions that will need to be revisited and revised from time to time. I'm quite protective of ISG, I admit that, yet at the same time I'm no "fanboy". If it doesn't sit well with me, I will let you know and at times will be quite emphatic doing so. That simply means I believe strongly in what I post. I think not voicing my concerns would be a dis-service. Realistically though, I don't feel as this requires anything but the most minor change from the current status. To be more precise, a 20% increase to the base speed of missiles versus their current speed will eliminate the problem. This will certainly hold true for the current game environment and may even hold up as other mechanics and capabilities are brought on-line
We need a game system where each weapon is the best choice for that specific situation. The only time there should be a clearly superior at everything weapon is one that is: Very expensive Late game "super weapon" Hard to build Otherwise, there needs to be compromises made in ship design. Do I want an "all or nothing" type of design or do I want a more balanced type of design?
Just to follow up on this, there was a bug in the missile speed calculations that was not taking into account all the speed factors properly, namely it was not taking into account the ship's drive technology as a factor in the missiles speed. I've made a few tests and missile speed now seems much better. With a Magdrive, the player will already notice a difference, especially if they overload weapons, where missiles' speed is doubled. This fix will be included in the next version. Let us know by then if the missiles speed feels right to you now. Thanks.
I'm not a fan of missiles the same way I dislike fighters.These things are never balanced and in many ways not realistic either with lasers. Fighters are just suicide darts with no gameplay reason to exist apart from Starwars cool.Carrier warfare is totally different to what 4x game battles have. Why would anyone be a pilot in 4x lore.You are certain to die.
Sword of the Stars had drones. Though the lore called them drones, they operated like "fighters" would from any other 4X games and they even had different "drone" types as well, with ships housing them being called "drone carriers." What was that Shakespearean quote about roses again?
In ISG, they are way too fragile and get torn apart by PD weaponry easily. There is an element of truth in that they are simply Star Wars cool as I've read quite a few papers that suggest Fighters would be impractical in space warfare. However, if we don't include them we can be certain that someone will bring it up as bone of contention. I suggest to give them a slight defensive bump (very slight mind you), and balance them in a way that a player can either use them, or not, without suffering consequences. It just becomes another in-game choice then that allows more players to exercise their own individual style. Missiles on the other hand were the weapon of choice in simulations run by the DoD in the 80s and the existence of Lasers doesn't make them obsolete automatically. You have to consider targeting effectiveness, fire rate, and defensive capabilities of missiles as well. A shiny mirror like coating on your missile would help it survive a laser hit for example. In the end, it is one more balancing factor, you should be able to play the game with them or without them.
I love fighters, bombers and carriers I'm a big fan of Wing Commander and Battlestar Galactica. I love the battles. Greetings Nico
Anyone read the Reality Dysfunction books? I loved the use of drones (called WASPS IIRC) in those books and IMHO a mobile, semi-autonomous weapon platform that can close range, perform high-g maneuvers, has its own armor-shielding, can double as a warhead is probably where weapons tech would go in space combat. That or stealth missiles. Lasers and kinetic weapons are only going to useful at close range (relatively speaking given the distances involved in space) and are probably most suited for use as point defense weapons. You're going to need things that track effectively to use offensively (like missiles, drones, etc.).
