Hot posts in thread: Turn based tactical combat

no RTS element please.

 

Thanks for the link.
Not really that thrilled with what I saw. (combat reminds me of strange adventures in infinite space), cute but the flavor seems off for a Moo2 sucessor

 

Like in The Last Federation (http://store.steampowered.com/app/273070/ )?

 

I see, a very refined RTS mechanic with aspects of WEGO tbs.
This would work if the scale of the battles stays manageable. (dozens not hundreds or thousands)

 

I think you could indeed have all those tactical options in realtime. All the things you mentioned are not exclusive to turn based, they are just easier to implement in turn based and all the realtime games you have played the developers didn't have the skill or time/money to implement them with a realtime engine.

The way i would envision (or dream) realtime would be is it is phased approach (a turn based/realtime combination), such that the game will have "turns" where it pauses at a fixed time interval, and during that pause, and only then, can you give orders. You can plot out your moves, set way points (and multiple way points) for each ship, along with setting ship orientation at each way point, set targets (and multiple targets in order) for each ship, and have ships fly in formation or set each ship individually, and when all your orders are given and you are ready, then you hit go, and the orders play out for about 1 min in realtime, and then it pauses again where you can then issue new orders. You would definitely still have weapon arc of fire, and shields would still have 4 sides to them.

The advantage of a good realtime engine is that you can add a new design parameter to weapons: rate of fire. In Moo1/2 every weapon fired once per turn, with one exception torpedoes that fired once every other turn. All weapons effectively then fired at the same rate. With realtime, you could have weapons that fire once a minute, or 9 times a minute, or once every 5 minutes (like a death star). And improvements in tech could increase that rate of fire.

The problem with this is that it is just too much work for a developer of turn based 4X games to implement. In fact i have only seen it implemented on a few top notch RTS games. But since I have seen it, I know it can be done

 

There is another problem with real-time combat.
Even if implemented well, a switch to real time combat would cause collateral effects in the game.
Once you implement real time combat you dilute the effects of ship building and design and alter the tactical opportunities available in combat..
Think Moo2.
Your choices in designing ships were not limited to what systems you installed but also allowed choices in firing arcs as well as the mix of weaponry you wanted, etc.
This played out in combat nicely
You could rotate a ship facing to protect a weakened shield, hold fire if wished and move first, fire missiles at one target and beams at another, and even use your pd weapons on a third.
These tactical choices will not be available in RTS even if it is done well.
Now compare SEV
Ship building was real nice in this title but did not matter as much.
Oh you could still decide what to install and how much of it but your decisions in designing a ship would not really matter as much once you got into combat.
All your weapons were basically 360
pd weapons same
your shields were a bubble, once down, they were down on all sides.
Firing on multiple targets became impossible.
etc.

While I agree that real time can be done well as I have seen that and played it in some games, once you implement it, you must also address any other aspects of the game that will be affected. (such as ship design)
The problem then becomes that you have differences between this project and Moo2 and the more these differences pile up the less likely that these game will be considered a spiritual descendant of Moo2. At the same time, the number of players that will have cause to complain could increase.

If ship building and design is to truly matter, real time combat becomes less attractive.

 

Maybe we should take a look at this from a different perspective.

What games have distinguished themselves with their excellent tactical combat?

- Sword of the Stars to me
- Age of Wonders 3 was good, but it's obviously 2D and not a direct comparison
- You could make the case that Stardrive 2's instanced tactical combat with a few changes could be a great game, although ship design and the AI need work (the modding community helps a lot on that one


I personally would also prefer real time tactical combat, but instanced like in the three games above (versus a large scale type of game). So far the only ones that have made non-instanced 4X gaming work are Sins of a Solar Empire, Distance Worlds, and arguably Star Ruler 2.

 

The problem with real-time tactical combat in all the MOO clones so far wasn't the real-time aspect, it was the development team that implemented it. They just didn't know what they were doing and tacked it on. Making a real-time tactical combat is akin to making a whole game, but making a MOO type game with it now becomes making 2 whole games, the turn based strategic layer and the real-time tactical layer. Both are major game development projects, and they need to be treated as such. Moo4 didnt do this (give the combat is deserved attention) and the result was blaaah.

I personally would prefer real time combat, but it needs to be done exceptionally well and follow the conventions established in other RTS games, not a cheap afterthought like moo4 was. There also needs to be terrain and other things going on in arena, such as the battlefield being the whole solar system, with the sun in the center and all the planets and moons and asteroid belts and battle stations present for the whole solar system, and even throw in nebulas and such (I know not realistic for a scientific view point, but it would make it more fun and thus can be allowed).

So for me, i would prefer RTS combat, but i know that the developers wont ever implement it properly and thus it will suck so i would suggest the developers do TBS combat instead.

 

The point is that real time is not inherently better. The problems won't be solved by simply changing turn based to real time. Examples I've listed are real world examples where devs went on to "fix" tactical combat with by making it real time. Bad execution is very real possibility.

How about skipping real time part and going straight to HoMM (5?) system? There is a lot to be gained by analyzing what made HoMM formula work and how can it be applied to MoO setting.

Your mind is made up in advance and no amount of arguments will convince you otherwise. Have you played any race aside from Psilons?

AI is not very bright. But I don't remember having two AI's attacking me with same ship designs. They'd vary quite a lot, maybe because racial traits put them on different paths and made them pick different technologies.

 

No, it's not, in real time combat, smaller ships have at least some chance of inflicting damage on larger opponents. In turn based as implemented in MOO2, they do not.

Well, if you're gonna start with premise that real time combat will be badly executed from the start, there's really no point in debating nor arguing for something different. Your mind is made up in advance and no amount of arguments will convince you otherwise.

Really?! Research path of almost any race is virtually same for any race. Build order too. The difference is that you don't have to farm (if silacoid) or chose research path if psylon and klackon. Anything in between... too similar.

Precisely! You have to look really hard to notice differences. I would be delighted if on my first contact I could grab my head in my hands and bang it on the wall saying: "Why alkari?! of all the races why did it have to be alkari?! I don't have anything stronger than laser as PD!!!!! My ships will be ripped to shreds!"
Have you ever had that reaction playing MOO2? If so, that would have been first time I ever heard of it.

I think we are rehashing the same argument over and over. You keep saying there's a difference, I keep saying it's not noticeable, you repeat but it is, I repeat but it is not. So, let's leave strategic layer for now and concentrate on tactical:
Are there any material differences between AI race designed ships? I claim there are not
Are there any material differences between AI race tactics? I claim there are not
Is current turn based system mostly outdated and strongly in favor of attacker (i.e. is attacker able to decisively cripple defense fleet on first turn)? I claim it is

My suggested remedy for first two would be race based constraints that would force design changes on ships to a certain degree. That would reflect on tactical combat.

My suggested remedy for third is real time combat. If it's not feasible or not chosen as tactical combat method for whatever reason, then I would suggest modifying combat to something similar to HOMM system where each ship design has individual initiative and moves when initiative dictates, perhaps modified to allow very high initiative ships to move twice per turn. That would, of course, had to be heavily balanced to be allow only on specific ship classes, and most certainly not on anything heavier than, say, light cruiser.

 

Maybe you missed, this is equally true for real time (pausable of not) as it is for turn based.

Pathfinding for whole group of units is not as simple programming feat. Showing of how efficiently hundereds of zergling move down the narrow ramp was huge brag point for Starcraft II team. Empty space looks deceptively simple but 4X devs somehow manage to mess it up. Take a look at MoO 3, MoO:CtS and Armada 2526. For some reason ships are compelled to keep distance, small ships can't stay put and you constantly have to issue movement orders to prevent them from rushing into grinder. Good luck executing tactics while hearding cats. SotS well works because number of units is limited.

AI is not very bright.

You can play each race the same way but at your own determent. There are non-zero differences across the races and if you look around you'll notice how they shape both strategic layer and tactical combat.

 

Matter of programming, path optimization and, in large percentage, wrong movement orders, not tactics (though latter could be argued as bad tactics). Unless battlefield changes to something that's not just empty space around planet (hopefully it will), I don't believe pathfinding would be as difficult as ground based RTS that actually has terrain.

Aaaand we're back at the beginning of the argument. Let's try to sum it up:
Game can be played with many races. Each race is different.
Each race has a playstyle... that is NOT different from any other race, especially as AI and in combat. Playstyles are possible, but not needed.
Since playstyle is essentially same... I would recommend changing it to something more immersive, to put it mildly.

Where did you get that?! I'm advocating certain constraints that are in line with each race philosophy, not predetermined designs. Once constraints are satisfied do with design whatever you want. Please do not put words in my mouth.
What you failed to understand is that RTS games were example of asymmetric races and their philosophy of each-race-is-different should be implemented, NOT their mechanics.
The reason I'm advocating that is because original MOO2 AI ships were bland as white paper. There was literally zero difference across the races (please read entire thread). Constraints would ensure that AI has at least a semblance of differences.

One can always hope, but in the absence of it, I'll take space based tbs, even if it's not 3d.

 

This isn't going to be an asymmetric real-time strategy game so I really don't think the design decisions in those games translate to this. Whilst obviously the races will have different traits, if you use that to dictate exactly what weapons and strategies they will use, then you're basically ditching the whole customized ship strategy element (which was a big part of the old MOO2 appeal) in favour of RTS-style predetermined unit designs.

Frankly, you'll need to look elsewhere if you want 3D RTS and the gameplay that goes with it. It's a completely different genre.

 

On impossible difficulty it's AIs who continually expands and player has to go through them in order to gain ground. They don't lag in technology department it's just they focus too much on chemistry and not enough on computers.

That it true for real time too where pathfinding can produce spectacularly stupid behaviours. Plus it is prone to devolving into Starcraft like clickfest.

Racial traits don't force hard rules but do a lot to encourage player to take one path over another especially when see how it interplays with other game mechanics. Silicoids don't eat food so they don't have to build (nor can research) food production improvements and don't have to overexert themselves with terraforming. Klackons don't worry about morale so loss of homeworld doesn't cripple them. Bulrthi can utilize large rich planets from the start. Mrrshans don't need accuracy improving technologies that much so they can concentrate on force fields early on instead of physics and make ships with high damage resistance.

The game doesn't force you but it does tell you. You get omniscience so you know where everybody are from the start, you telepathy which can mind control a planet without ground combat and you get feudalism which along with research penalty gives you 33% ship construction discount. I quite clearly tells you "build a cruiser and pick an easy victim, research can wait". Oh and turn 20 combat is very different from turn 300+.

This I agree with, there is room for improvement. This doesn't mean to completely overhaul everything like MoO 3 and CtS (going real time and dropping special weapons and equipment) but building upon old thing. As Sid Mayer used to say, one third same old, one third improved old and one third new. I miss repulsor beam (pushes approaching ships away) from MoO 1.

 

Then what's even the point of having different races? They could be as easily named as human faction 01, human faction 02, human faction 03... And so on. perfect place to save resources for development right there! No need for races, hell, they can all even have same ships. Hey, just found another place to save resources!
What I'm trying to say is that if race doesn't affect what you can research and build then don't go with races at all. Yes, there might be lots of design, changes and fine tuning, but end result would be much more satisfying. Take a look at starcraft, warcraft, even sots 2. What you choose affects how you play. First two were enormous hits precisely beacaus of that. I won't go into reasons last failed. Not relevant here.
As for combat, it was great for that time. Since then technology did progress and now there are both hardware and software opportunites for better. Sure, we don't have to do better, but is that a reason not to try?

 

Sorry I disagree. Play style should come from the strategic and tactical choices that players make throughout the game, rather than having something "forced" on them from turn 1. Also, I imagine that having qualitatively different rules for different races will use a lot of developer time and be much harder to balance - I would much rather have one good system of mechanics that works for everyone.

Obviously there should be racial bonuses and AI style preferences, but having different hard-coded rulesets for each race is both complicated and gimmicky.

A final point - there's a limit to how much you can directly pander to "passionate" MOO2 nostalgia, because I imagine the Orion races will all be copyrighted and unusable, so there won't be any Darloks etc anyway.

Back to the general points about combat - I was surprised to see anyone suggesting changes to the MOO2 2D turn-based model since that was a cornerstone of why that game was loved. It was crisp, clean, and simple to understand, but did allow for some quirky tactics to be used if you wanted to experiment.

That said, some battles did descend into fairly basic affairs where you simply parked next to each other and traded lasers. From memory, whilst an incapacitated or tractor-held ship was easier to hit as it lost its evade chance, a ship that had decided to stop moving did still retain its evasion. Maybe there is some argument to include a simple momentum or speed tracking system, to avoid that situation (I would suggest that, if you are going slow, you are easier to hit - but on the flipside, it is also easier to aim your own lasers from a stationary position).

There was an old turn-based aerial combat game called "Over the Reich" which had a nice and simple movement system - you selected the throttle and steering settings each turn and were shown the arc of movement that created on the map:

Spoiler

At a basic level, the throttle / steering system was fun to use, and it might translate to MOO2 quite well to create more dogfight-style battles.

 

Human player still have much more flexibility and brainpower than best 4x AI. By the time you reach endgame, your empire is, unless you play with personally chosen handicap, far more powerful than any other empire, probably all others combined. I disagree that endgame is problem of not playing until endgame. It's more of the opposite. You continually expand and reach endgame phase before other AIs. You reach final techs and then... you basically send 4 ships to each enemy remaining system and it becomes boring.

Didn't play MoO: CtS, can't comment on that. Homeworld series had excellent real time tactics (plus it was 3D). Sots had pretty decent combat as well.

All tactics become obsolete in the face of 10 titans or 15 battleships.

It sure as hell doesn't help with the immersion. What I probably didn't clarify enough was that each race should have distinct building style COUPLED with race specific buildings. Same for ships. I wouldn't mind if Alkari had restriction that their ships have to have at least 40% (or some balancing number) of their ships devoted to small craft operations. It would fit with their philosophy and play style.
Race should affect play style by enforcing some rules on ship design and colony development. Darlok ships MUST have stealth system mounted, Psilons sensors use half as many space, but are twice more efficient, Silicoids would armor even their bulkheads so Achilles wouldn't have effect on them (or something less drastic)... and so on. It could be even something unpredictable, for example if race is race of individual warriors that compete for honor, captain could go berserk and attack nearest ship with twice the standard rate of fire at the cost of overkilling it. That would force player to certain playstyle. MOO2 did not have any similar restrictions.

That sums up the point. Elerians are meant to be played certain way, but game never actually forces you to do so. Any race can be played like any other race. That translates to combat that is never really different whether you play as Humans, Psilons, Elerians, Klackons or any other race. I think this game should do better.

Especially considering all the passionate fans.

 

AI is so bad at designing ships that I can't even tell if it is because the AI is not playing the same game the player does or if there is genuine game design issue. MoO 2 has two combat modes, tactical on and off. I have played a few games with tactical turned off and it's super weird. I've asked on MoO:CtS forum about got some info from MoO2 v1.5 patch author: http://www.spheriumnorth.com/orion-forum/nfphpbb/viewtopic.php?f=9&t=33498

Long story short, you can't design ships in non-tactical, ships have fixed number of best (highest tech level) beams, missiles, bombs and other equipment, there is no miniaturization, all weapons hit immediately (including missiles) and ship quantity trumps quality. In tactical games AI seems to follow some rules from non-tactical, jack of all trades ship designs, always equipping the highest tech level weapons, not caring much about miniaturization and completely ignoring initiative mechanic. Because of this player can easily make designs which always play a turn first. Additionally AI doesn't bother with hyper advanced technology levels (in it's eyes there is no miniaturization mechanic) so once it researches all regular technologies it moves all scientists to production and starts building gigantic fleets, probably supplied with trade goods and/or industry taxation. If an AI had more awareness about the game it's in, it could easily counter 2, 4, 20 titans by either trying to get higher initiative or with better beam defenses.

No, it's a problem of players not playing the game until end game. It's like playing Civilization by ignoring military and diplomacy until you get tanks and nukes. If you are going for Star Trek fantasy MoO 2 will ask you to play 21st, 22nd and 23rd century before getting at 24th century content. You won't suddenly start with while alpha quadrant in federation YOU will have to make it happen and that means actually playing early and midgame. Endgame content is there to deliberately unbalance the game in order to brake a stalemate and bring the game to conclusion. If you want to spend more time in endgame, I hear Stellaris is good there.

No they don't unless you are short on command points. Smaller ships have higher cannons per industry point ratio making them better choice if you have command points to spare. I find battleship big enough for the late midgame, it packs enough fire power, can be built before it becomes obsolete and greater quantity gives more flexibility at distributing ships on the galaxy map. I rarely build doom stars because they take too long.

Never or maybe once. Default 90° + inertia stabilizer good enough for most situations and 270° effectively covers all angles. I used backward facing a few times for shooting at star base while running away from missiles . I believe weapon facings were not designed well. Choosing between them would more meaningful if ordinary forward facing was more restricted, say 45° or 30° and extended forward was not wider then 180°. I suspect they took a shortcut and applied shield facing math to weapons instead of making separate logic.

MoO:CtS show us what herding cats in real time looks like. Good luck at executing flanking maneuver there. MoO 2 actually has more tactical options in flanking department. You can turn your ship away from opponent in order to hide failed shield facing from ion cannons and other situationally nasty stuff. You can indeed dance with faster ship around the slow one much like you would when fighting alien derelict in SotS 1. Have you ever been on the receiving end of black hole generator? That's one of the weapons AI knows how to use, immobilize your ship, move to blind spots and make you curse for not having least one 360° mount.

I don't understand you, how buildings look like has zero influence on play style, that's not what play style means. Race specific buildings are aesthetic issue which can easily be rectified by simply throwing more money at artist (in contrast to changing actual game rules which requires both money and redesign risky). Play style on the other hand in determined by which actions you take. Human traits make diplomatic and research actions more efficient while Elerian traits make planet capture more efficient but you can play Elerians like you would Humans if you so desire. It would be harder but you can.

 

I do believe you argued my point quite nicely. If you know you can win with just two, 4, or hell, even 20 titans, that you can topple interstellar empire with such a small number of ships... game loses appeal. It becomes tedious. You KNOW you're gonna kick enemy fleet the way to Antares and back. Antares themselves are not such a grand menace that they can't be beaten quite easily as soon as you have titans.
It's a common theme of 4X, the END game problem, though in MOO2 it comes even faster than in modern 4Xs. Not to mention the fact that cruisers and even battleships usually lost their utility maybe after half of game time.
Now be honest with me, how many times did you actually give your beam weapons full 360 degree firing ability?
I bet it can be counted on the fingers of a single hand. Because there was actually no need for that. Now if you have real time combat, you can actually make decent tactical choices.
For example, send squadron of cruisers on one flank, keep battleships/titans/whatever honest on the front with evasive actions and let's see how that forward firing arcs fare against someone who can keep dancing around your forward arc.
Sadly MOO2 lacks that tactical depth.
Especially sabotage you mentioned with Darloks.
I would like more tactical depth from spiritual successor to MOO2. If it comes with real time tactics than turn based gameplay, so be it.
And yes, each race has their traits, but ALL THEIR BUILDINGS LOOK THE SAME. Now what are the odds of that? That's just for start.
As for your Elerian point, it really shows that you can play any race in the same style regardless of their racial traits. Refer to buildings in the line above.

 

How about no. Literately every commercial MoO 2 spiritual successor did that. They'd leave colony mechanics more or less the same and change space combat in every way imaginable. Admittedly their "innovations" turned out bland more due to not having equivalent of special equipment then going real time.

If you get to build 20 doom stars then it's your fault that the game is lasting too long. You should have either attacked Antares long time ago, won by election, wiped out at least half of the opponents at the phasor age with cruisers, battleships and maybe a few titans.

2 titans with shield piercing phasors can destroy 100% of maximal enemy fleet in the first turn. 4 titans if they sport energy absorbers then and with distruptors if they have have hard shields.

Darlok ar bit bland but can make nice situations when saboteur destroys star base on exact planet you are about to attack. Have you tried asking for star systems with humans? They can expand that way very easily. Alkari great example how MoO 2 races are designed compared to MoO 1. All races (except Darloks) have mix of race stereotype traits and economy traits. Alkari for instance have their old evasion bonus plus early game research bonus. If you wait until 20 dooms stars it won't make much difference but if you play the game from turn 1 then it will allow you to quickly research ECM and inertia stabilizer, capitalize on ship defense bonus and make nearly impossible to hit ships.

I dare you to play Elerians the way they are ment to be played: build cruiser ASAP and take other player's homeworld. For start go with medium map size and 4 players. I can drop you a few more hints if you want me to spoil the fun.