Large vs small mining stations

[Dovahkiin]

Once i researched large mining stations the only way to build small ones is to right click the location while the construction ship is selected. they both have the same number of extractors. maintenance cost for large is about 30% more than small. it seems like the plan should be us small stations for most places, and large stations on assets that have a larger value like your fuel locations since you can load up the large stations with more defense/weapons. i would prefer to have an option from the "new mining locations" screen. its tedious to wait for a construction ship to be idle, then go to the location you want mined and use right right click option. am i missing something ?

[APhoenixSoaring]

The game is not designed for a player to have more than one design for mining stations.

[Dray Prescot]

I would like to see a Medium Mining Station which is the present Large Mining Station design, with a new even larger Large Mining Station design/Tech. So we can have a Mining station that hold more military defenses.

[Thineboot]

At first we need multiple roles (for mining stations).

• Standard (Default)
  
• ...
  
• Nebula (Ion)
  
• ...
  
• Caslon (Fuel)
  
• Rare (Good)
  
• ...
  
• Core (System fleet)
  
• Rim (no threat)
  
• Outpost (possible threat)
  
• Border (Friendly)
  
• Pirates (Unfriendly)
  
• ...
  
• Busy (more docking bays)
  
• Rich (more cargo bays)
  
• ...

These are not meant as pick one but rather a list of checkboxes with some excluding each other.

Instead of two or more different hulls, one hull should become expandable (Small, Medium(?), Large, Huge(?)). Resources have to be spent as usual with the existing being used as deduction - not starting from scratch but expanding.

The AI has several hints for what to choose. Nebula is easy. Caslon and Rare goods, too.
When ship queue up at a station put it on notice. Fire a check after a meaningful time and expand when necessary.
Same goes for piling up resources. Farther away stations will see less frequently a freighter. Deals with Rim and Outpost, too.
Threat assessment could be based on game settings (do pirates respawn?), diplomatic relations (near the station), aso asf.

No specialized AI but a few basic rules it can apply. Gathering information about games, as long as player agrees, can be used to train the AI. Yes, DW2 has no AI and thus it can not learn by itself. But with every game played and with every piece of data exchanged, better working rules could be found instead of inventing arbitrary numbers in the hope that they will fit.
Different races, different governments, different rulers have different mindsets (and traits) and thus would alter their actual ruleset making each empire (more or less) unique.
As long as these rules are simple combing them should not make the game stutter. There is no need to check them with each tick. Put them in a queue after some time for reevaluation and do it when the game isn't busy.

Anyway, much too long for a simple response :(
Feel free to grab the above and throw it in another, more proper thread, to be mauled by the audience. Hopefully that will add some spice to the result.

[Nightskies]

Well, that would be cool and not hard to implement, though certainly not in line with the current way of things (one latest design to rule them all as far as the AI is concerned).

Given how simple the AI designer is... I think having this as a player option is as far as we'll get.

[Ax4711]

Hmmm custom roles would make the human player even more OP vs the poor AI
But if there ever are real difficulty options that don't have you just bathing in money, micro-designing custom roles could be the way to go against the odds.

[Thineboot]

... that's why I've tried to point out an AI based on simple rules. No sophisticated complex Ai based on millions of test runs in a single game world. Starting with a basic set of basic ideas the data based automated feedback of players would find actual better working parameters. Humans may consider other things having the big (hidden) picture on their screen. And since we're only running simple machines compared to those AI's the whole net is talking about, humans should be able to outsmart their code based simple counterparts. But a hive doesn't have to be smart, it just needs proper basic rules to function and react smart. And I'm not talking about the hive carriers, I'm talking about the empires and factions.

Multiple roles are just our human way of dealing with these problems. Give us hundreds of combinations and we wouldn't use them - ok, maybe a handful of nerds, but not most of the players. Give us dynamic role-trees, based on the same ones the AI would use, let us modify/add/merge our own silly ideas of what would be the better combo because we anticipate the evil (or good) moves of the opponents' moves, besides our own stumbles across the stars, and I'd happily let the AI run most of my stations while I concentrate on my own good (evil) moves.

[AK_icebear]

A simpler rule: the value of the mining station design should scale to match the price of what is being mined. Not perfectly, of course, but into the S/M/L framework based on resource mined.

These could them be doubled to either have significant ion shielding or not if the orb is in a nebula.

Simple rule for the AI to understand.

[APhoenixSoaring]

Originally posted by Thineboot:

At first we need multiple roles (for mining stations).

• Standard (Default)
  
• ...
  
• Nebula (Ion)
  
• ...
  
• Caslon (Fuel)
  
• Rare (Good)
  
• ...
  
• Core (System fleet)
  
• Rim (no threat)
  
• Outpost (possible threat)
  
• Border (Friendly)
  
• Pirates (Unfriendly)
  
• ...
  
• Busy (more docking bays)
  
• Rich (more cargo bays)
  
• ...

These are not meant as pick one but rather a list of checkboxes with some excluding each other.

Instead of two or more different hulls, one hull should become expandable (Small, Medium(?), Large, Huge(?)). Resources have to be spent as usual with the existing being used as deduction - not starting from scratch but expanding.

The AI has several hints for what to choose. Nebula is easy. Caslon and Rare goods, too.
When ship queue up at a station put it on notice. Fire a check after a meaningful time and expand when necessary.
Same goes for piling up resources. Farther away stations will see less frequently a freighter. Deals with Rim and Outpost, too.
Threat assessment could be based on game settings (do pirates respawn?), diplomatic relations (near the station), aso asf.

No specialized AI but a few basic rules it can apply. Gathering information about games, as long as player agrees, can be used to train the AI. Yes, DW2 has no AI and thus it can not learn by itself. But with every game played and with every piece of data exchanged, better working rules could be found instead of inventing arbitrary numbers in the hope that they will fit.
Different races, different governments, different rulers have different mindsets (and traits) and thus would alter their actual ruleset making each empire (more or less) unique.
As long as these rules are simple combing them should not make the game stutter. There is no need to check them with each tick. Put them in a queue after some time for reevaluation and do it when the game isn't busy.

Anyway, much too long for a simple response :(
Feel free to grab the above and throw it in another, more proper thread, to be mauled by the audience. Hopefully that will add some spice to the result.

Yes absolutely agreed. The game should double down on the concept of having multiple roles per ship type.

[shawn]

Originally posted by Thineboot:

At first we need multiple roles (for mining stations).

• Standard (Default)
  
• ...
  
• Nebula (Ion)
  
• ...
  
• Caslon (Fuel)
  
• Rare (Good)
  
• ...
  
• Core (System fleet)
  
• Rim (no threat)
  
• Outpost (possible threat)
  
• Border (Friendly)
  
• Pirates (Unfriendly)
  
• ...
  
• Busy (more docking bays)
  
• Rich (more cargo bays)
  
• ...

These are not meant as pick one but rather a list of checkboxes with some excluding each other.

Instead of two or more different hulls, one hull should become expandable (Small, Medium(?), Large, Huge(?)). Resources have to be spent as usual with the existing being used as deduction - not starting from scratch but expanding.

The AI has several hints for what to choose. Nebula is easy. Caslon and Rare goods, too.
When ship queue up at a station put it on notice. Fire a check after a meaningful time and expand when necessary.
Same goes for piling up resources. Farther away stations will see less frequently a freighter. Deals with Rim and Outpost, too.
Threat assessment could be based on game settings (do pirates respawn?), diplomatic relations (near the station), aso asf.

No specialized AI but a few basic rules it can apply. Gathering information about games, as long as player agrees, can be used to train the AI. Yes, DW2 has no AI and thus it can not learn by itself. But with every game played and with every piece of data exchanged, better working rules could be found instead of inventing arbitrary numbers in the hope that they will fit.
Different races, different governments, different rulers have different mindsets (and traits) and thus would alter their actual ruleset making each empire (more or less) unique.
As long as these rules are simple combing them should not make the game stutter. There is no need to check them with each tick. Put them in a queue after some time for reevaluation and do it when the game isn't busy.

Anyway, much too long for a simple response :(
Feel free to grab the above and throw it in another, more proper thread, to be mauled by the audience. Hopefully that will add some spice to the result.

I agree along these lines. It shouldn't be too difficult for the AI to ascertain what it needed and compute a hierarchy for station builds. A game 'memory' could even be created to remember its most successful builds and pick from among those in future campaigns.