Progress update 10/13/17

[Stellar Tactics]

Hi everyone - another progress update this Friday. First, a video that covers ship skills and how they change the space exploration portion of the game.

https://youtu.be/yZJidlU29C4
Please excuse the bands at the top and bottom of the screen. This video was captured in the debugger and is running at 1/2 FPS and a non standard resolution.

Stellar Tactics takes a bit of a different approach from most other games. Your crew contributes to the performance of the ship over time based on their experience in four key skill categories - Piloting, Weaponry, Electronics and Targeting. Each of these categories is represented by a dedicated station on your ship.

Piloting affects:
--Ship speed - your base ship speed is calculated based on the mass of your ship. Piloting increases your base speed, afterburner speed and micro-warp speed.
--Ship turn rate - massive ships turn slower than small interceptors. Piloting skill adjusts this.
--Evasion - the ability to evade incoming fire as a bonus

Weaponry affects:
--Weapon damage bonuses - as you gain experience, your skill with weapons increases the weapons base damage
--Turret reload speed - How fast your turrets recharge and reload
--Weaponry capacitor drain (Efficiency) - the amount of charge taken from the capacitor each time the turret fires

Electronics affects:
--Scanning range and the quality of scanning data. Higher quality scanning data will sell for more credits to various factions
--Security - the stability of your ships systems against hacking - this is for the boarding module - you may be boarded if the enemy ship is trying to capture your cargo/ship or if they have a mission to capture you.
--Shield bonuses to your shields maximum durability and recharge rate

Targeting affects:
--Sub-system targeting (The UI in the video needs to be updated) - for the boarding module
--Overall chance to hit scaled by range for turret projectiles
--Shield bypass - your ability to bypass shields by attuning your weapons - this bonus applies damage directly to the enemy ships hull armor.

As you gain skill your bonuses are applied to each of the above. At various tiers you will also get perk selections similar to ground combat that allow you to fine tune your ships systems to adjust for different scenarios - Larger or smaller ships, the number of ships you are attacking/being attacked by and their weapon types based on scans. You can pause combat and scan ships and make perk adjustments at any time in addition to adjusting your power, turrets and targeting.

So, space combat, experience and skill bonuses are code complete - that's the majority of the work. I'll be moving on to the loot system next. Following that ship and ship equipment merchants, some faction work, simple space combat mission systems and testing. I'll be sure to post another update for you next Friday.

Have a great weekend and thanks for supporting Stellar Tactics!

[nottrusted]

Hi there,

as allways , it's nice to hear that progress is made, keep the pace ;)

... and don't tthink that I have lost interest, I'am still following all the forum activitys, just stopped playing until the milestone space combat is reached.

best regards
Arb

[Stellar Tactics]

nottrusted - Thanks for being patient! Looking forward to your thoughts once the system is ready.

[nobrien]

good stuff :} it is all looking like you will be ready for some beta testers soon lol :}

[Nevertheless]

Really looking great!
You said something like the enemy beeing scaled to your skill level. Is that something you want to do in the game too (at least to some degree or at som places)?

[Stellar Tactics]

Hi Nevertheless - Level scaling is used throughout the game for enemies/NPC's. The scaling keeps the game challenging regardless of your level. The scaling is tiered and takes into account the distance of the system you are located in from the center of the universe. Lets say you fly on the star map and your team is level 10 and you travel to sector 50, 100 - if you enter a system in that sector, enemies will have a base level of between 90-100 depending on your current level. The idea is that the farther from the center of the universe you travel, the more difficult the enemies and the higher the challenge.

I'll need to see how well that works. I think it will give players an challenge and something to work towards. There will be tons of procedural content to go up against as you work your way out towards the boundaries of the game universe gaining skill and earning credits, tokens, better ships and equipment so you can survive in deep space far from the core worlds.

[Demonbox]

Keep up the good work mate! Always good to see updates on promising indie projects like yours!

[Nevertheless]

Thanks for the explanation! Really appreciate that! I had to think about it a little..
I think keeping the challenge is a good thing, which means you obviously need some dynamic, especially in a game with a lot of procedural content. I also think it's essential to be able to actually feel and experience progress. Unfortunately a system that always perfectly adapts to the player level has the potential to eliminate experience of progress to at least some degree. They did that in TES Oblivion. It lead to monter rats in higher Levels and the other way around to first level playthroughs. Progress was almost meaningless, because the leve-distance has always been the same.
In case of Stellar Tactics, would it mean you progress to the farther away sectors, you climb some levels, then return to the center and find enemies which leveled similar to your own party? If that's so, wouldn't challenge-keeping mean you'd never outlevel anyone?
Could it then be a "solution" to slow down progression of enemies in "inner" sectors based on the number of completed missions in or outwards that sector tier? So you'd fight your way to 50,50, then return to the start and see and feel your progression?

[Stellar Tactics]

Yes, I followed the conversations about Obilivion and scaling closely because I played the game quite a bit. Those conversations carried over into Fallout 3-4 and Skyrim. There really is no perfect solution that will make everyone happy - it's the nature of game design and progression.

The problem comes in when you want a universe that doesn't make content trivial as you gain power and yet want to retain a sense of progression. I have a diagram I put together years ago. I'll dig it up and post it. The game universe is partitioned into various areas. The farther you get from the center of the universe, the more challenging the game gets:

UPDATED - Here is the diagram.
http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1170171865

Core Systems
Borderworlds
Outlands
Fringes
Deep Space

Ships may launch from the Fringes and travel back and forth to the Core Systems. Those ships are generated with skills and equipment at level 80-100 - scanning ships will be important and the higher your scanning skill the more information you will retrieve giving you a good idea of their level of challenge. You can always escape hostile ships by spooling up your Micro-Warp drive assuming you identify their difficulty in time.

Story content will always be scaled.

To answer your question "Could it then be a "solution" to slow down progression of enemies in "inner" sectors based on the number of completed missions in or outwards that sector tier? So you'd fight your way to 50,50, then return to the start and see and feel your progression?"

Yes - the tiered scaling system works to scale enemies several levels above and below your teams average levels to the areas minimum/maximum level cap. So, if you are above a regions maximum cap, enemies will always be generated at a lower level and you will feel the progression of your team. However, those enemies will not be trivial. That goes for any area where you are above the sectors maximum level. If you travel to the fringes at level 10 you will encounter enemies that are around level 80 and you will be crushed.

I'll be coding in some other scaling algorithms that let me tweak this based on feedback once we get to Alpha. It could very well be that setting it up so players come back to a lower level area to plow through trivial enemies is more fun - though in that case I'd likely cap loot quality to the maximum level for that region. Low risk = low reward ;)

One other thing to consider - traveling back to the core worlds is how you would train new crew members/teams that you recruited. Lets say you recruited several mercs at level 10 and never used them in your team. You would travel back to the core worlds and level them up.

I realize my TLDR post may fan the flames of larger discussions around game design, procedural universes, level scaling and trivial content. That's fine - I'm happy to talk about it further.

[willsama974]

Originally posted by Stellar Tactics:

So, if you are above a regions maximum cap, enemies will always be generated at a lower level and you will feel the progression of your team. However, those enemies will not be trivial. That goes for any area where you are above the sectors maximum level.

I don't get that, if the easiest planets have a level cap of 10 and you come in with a full team of level 100, how could that "not be trivial"?
I don't question level scaling here. I just feel like that quote bites its own tale.
Your approach is the best you can do along with specific modifications for some rare enemies who don't have to follow all the combat system rules imho.

[Stellar Tactics]

An example is if your team is level 100 and they go back to a level 10 planet and take a mission, the enemies will be scaled to your level to the minimum level possible. As it is now that would be around 5 levels less than your teams average. So, still not trivial and scaled to your teams average using minimum scaling making them easier overall. And you are correct - rare enemies do not follow the same rules - they use a different kind of scaling.

[willsama974]

So there is no level cap per system/region but rather a soft level cap per team members' levels within a system/region.
Thanks for clarifying that, looking forward to it, really seem the best option from all solutions devs have used so far.
Will that scaling system also work for space combat (to tell you the truth i suck at real time stuff and i'm scared that it will amper me eventhough i love what have seen so far about space combat)?
Would that be possible to have different difficulty options for ground/space combat?
EDIT: Missed a "?"

[Stellar Tactics]

Space leveling works a little different. Ships can come from higher level regions so scanning them will be important. I'll likely remove the faction hit from scanning ships just for this reason. So, you may be attacked by higher level ships, though you will get a warning well in advance so you can get out of their sphere of influence. They will then ignore you. Stations and the areas around them will likely be safe areas. Most ships are not hostile if the systems faction is aligned with your current factions. Of course, if you enter a system that is controlled by Raiders you are going to need to defend yourself - unless you are aligned with them.

As far as space combat, you will be able to pause combat. It won't be overly twitchy and you will be able able to make decisions at a reasonable pace ;) I'll tune things once I get enough feedback from everyone. I'll make sure difficulty settings are in. Not sure of these will be tied to the global difficulty settings or independent. Will see as I move forward.

[willsama974]

Thanks for all the explainations!

[Nevertheless]

Originally posted by Stellar Tactics:

I realize my TLDR post may fan the flames of larger discussions around game design, procedural universes, level scaling and trivial content. That's fine - I'm happy to talk about it further.

Wow, thanks! That was quite an answer! I don't know how you find the time for all that, and I certainly can't imagine any flame in this forum, but it's really intriguing and good to take part.
I'm glad enemy levels are limited (relative to the players crew) in the inner sectors. So I'm looking forward to see your concept in motion.
Also looking forward talking and learning more about it!

[abuster]

bought to game to support this idea. please keep working on it! it could really be a great game, could be one of the best tb games ever.