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 Post subject: Isnt the game too static?
PostPosted: Tue Aug 18, 2009 8:58 am 
Trial
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Just got back to this awsome game since I left it three years ago. All the changes and progress that has been done is great.
But the reason why I decided to register on ths forum is to ask one question to the developers:

Did not the awsome game become too static?

After few days of playing I came to conclusion, that majority of the changes made the game pretty complex, but static.
People are building planets not to lose them, but to keep them! Therefore they build hudge defences. And thus making the game prety static. Players are keeping the money on theirs ships and building the planets to produce the money. Not to store them. Credits dont make credits in the pure meaning (interest). Credits must be invested in order to make more and that is the point where you can lose within seconds. Result is heavy static defence. Other result is, that those who did not use full amount of turns or got wiped lost at that moment and there is no reason to continue the game.

As I remember the initial system, which was pretty "mobile" game and I miss it alot. We were trading regularry up to certain point, but than the game changet to "chasing the opponent". We stored the team money on few planets and made money of the interest. Hudge amounts of credits. Therefore we were able spend our turns on building hideouts and on chasing our opponents. The sector naming is a great idea, which makes the game more versatile to plan the hideout strategy rather than stupid 1-10.000 chase. We had planet with techs over 500, but those were planets build to sacrifice them at the point needed. The tons of credits we had was impossible to store on low tech planets. Hudge planets were also respect making things, but not the thing we wont sacrifice to win. Our team had arround 30-50 planets as ready hideout. We spend turns on building them, we spend credits to hide them and defend them reasoneably. Not the "unpenetrable" way.

So on the end the game stood on moving ... move, move ... move again. Thinking about our strategy, because tomorrow you can be on the other side of the rank list. And it acctually happend!!! Many times ... until the restart. And that was the awsome point of the game. You wont lose now, but the next minute, so do smothing!!!

Now days the game is about turns, luck and defence. This makes this game static and everyone is basicly spending turns on highly profitable trade and planet building. Not on searching and planing next step. All the ideas implemented are great as the planets production and other little, but awsome upgrades. But all tohgether lead to static game, which is about sitting on my but and defending all I have.

And the last (Second, third and fourth) question:

Would it be possible to implement the optional setting for admins to alow reasonable interest on credits stored on planets? Including the option of dignitaries interest raise?
Even if some other conditions will be required?
Just to make the game more "mobile" and versatile ...


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 Post subject: Re: Isnt the game too static?
PostPosted: Tue Aug 18, 2009 1:36 pm 
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Jack wrote:
Would it be possible to implement the optional setting for admins to alow reasonable interest on credits stored on planets? Including the option of dignitaries interest raise?


Let me answer this one first.

You talk about how things are static and people just build big defenses to keep their planets. This is because planets make a HUGE amount of money as they are. Your suggestion for interest would make it worse. People would be fortifying their planets and sectors even more. It wouldn't make the game more fluid or mobile. This is why we REMOVED planetary interest years ago. It made things even MORE static as people made huge defenses no one ever had a hope of breaking. BTW, there is a dignitary that can boost credit production but it doesn't boost by interest.

One of the things I don't like is how quickly planets make money but Tarnus likes it this way. :) I think it should be a little harder for planets to make money. As a counter to the HIGH credit production on planets we added high value commodities to make trading more viable and so people could trade and make as much money as owning planets.

Jack wrote:
People are building planets not to lose them, but to keep them! Therefore they build hudge defences. And thus making the game prety static. Players are keeping the money on theirs ships and building the planets to produce the money. Not to store them. Credits dont make credits in the pure meaning (interest). Credits must be invested in order to make more and that is the point where you can lose within seconds. Result is heavy static defence.


One thing that experienced players know is that defenses in this game are NEVER a sure fire protection. There have been players who have had what appear to be impregnable defenses go down in flames. This is because we have added all kinds of ways to break a players defenses to the game. Some players just don't know how to use them effectively yet. It's a learning experience. We know the game is complex but we try not to make it TOO complex just challenging. There are a bunch of easy to play browser games that require little thought and we would rather be a thinking players game.

And you can lose credit QUICKLY in the game. If you store credits on your ship and your ship is destroyed you can lose way over HALF of the credits on the ship. And with planets you must invest credits into the tech on the planets to be able to create larger credit amounts faster.

There are new Probes that can take down players and some coming that can take down planets and defenses. Probes are underused in the game except by the few players who have figured out how useful they can be.

Spies have been made far, far more useful than ever before. Spies used to be almost useless. About the only reason anyone used them was to try and keep enemy spies off their planets. Now spies are HARDER to detect, HARDER to get rid of and easier to get onto an enemy ship without them knowing. Some players are capturing planets just to fill them with spies and nothing else. When someone takes the planet again they will usually get a spy on their ship. I know some players who have spies on MANY enemy player ships and know where they go at all times and where all of their SG sectors are located. They are just waiting for the right moment to use the information. ;)

Jack wrote:
As I remember the initial system, which was pretty "mobile" game and I miss it alot. We were trading regularry up to certain point, but than the game changet to "chasing the opponent". We stored the team money on few planets and made money of the interest. Hudge amounts of credits. Therefore we were able spend our turns on building hideouts and on chasing our opponents.


All of that is still in the game and being used by the players. Most of the people in the Top 20 are doing just what you mentioned.

Jack wrote:
We had planet with techs over 500, but those were planets build to sacrifice them at the point needed.


Now there I think you are thinking of a different game or one that someone set up that was set up using grossly outlandish settings. The amount of money for a 500 tech is so far out there, and has always been too high to achieve, no one could even get ONE tech level at 500.

Jack wrote:
Now days the game is about turns, luck and defence. This makes this game static and everyone is basicly spending turns on highly profitable trade and planet building. Not on searching and planing next step.


Actually it has been this way for years. We have been tweaking things to make both trading, attacking and building all pretty much even. Trading has almost always had the short end of the stick until recently with the addition of all the new commodities. We think there is a pretty even balance between attackers and builders now. It could still use some tweaking but that will come with the addition of a couple more probes and the Build and Research.

I know B&R has been mentioned for YEARS but we are finally to a point in the coding where B&R will be a reality. So much of the game required a rewrite from the ground up and considering how much code is in the game it was a huge task. Especially for part time work.

We should have a beta for B&R up later this year and you should see things become even more fluid and mobile than you can imagine. All new weapons and defenses. Things you have probably never thought about being in the game. :)



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 Post subject: Re: Isnt the game too static?
PostPosted: Tue Aug 18, 2009 3:06 pm 
Trial
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Joined: Tue Aug 18, 2009 7:20 am
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Location: Czech Rep
Hnestly, I dont want to blame all that has been done at first pace. = Do not consider this as a flame.
On the other hand I would like to get into the changes done as much as I can.
So far I came to conclusion which I recently wrote ...

Panama Jack wrote:
Let me answer this one first.

You talk about how things are static and people just build big defenses to keep their planets. This is because planets make a HUGE amount of money as they are. Your suggestion for interest would make it worse. People would be fortifying their planets and sectors even more. It wouldn't make the game more fluid or mobile. This is why we REMOVED planetary interest years ago. It made things even MORE static as people made huge defenses no one ever had a hope of breaking. BTW, there is a dignitary that can boost credit production but it doesn't boost by interest.

One of the things I don't like is how quickly planets make money but Tarnus likes it this way. :) I think it should be a little harder for planets to make money. As a counter to the HIGH credit production on planets we added high value commodities to make trading more viable and so people could trade and make as much money as owning planets.


I played on local server, which had pretty common setting and did not noticed such defences as today. That was because of one simple rule. Once they found you, it was just a matter of time before the planet is gone. Sometimes even minutes ... So it was not about the hudge, everybody stopping defence, but about the hideout itself, its reasonable defence, cloaking and placement ... further more also about logs, spies, tracking opponents, probes and keeping there status under control.

Panama Jack wrote:
One thing that experienced players know is that defenses in this game are NEVER a sure fire protection. There have been players who have had what appear to be impregnable defenses go down in flames. This is because we have added all kinds of ways to break a players defenses to the game. Some players just don't know how to use them effectively yet. It's a learning experience. We know the game is complex but we try not to make it TOO complex just challenging. There are a bunch of easy to play browser games that require little thought and we would rather be a thinking players game.


Actually that was the game I enjoyed few years ago ... move and think two steps ahead. We were not glued to planets and if we did not lose all of them in one day, we could easily rebuild them elsevere, where we had enough conficence in few days hideout. The interest of app 10%-13% of few thousands of Trillions made a good profit for fast and reasonable upgrade. First upgrade we done was cloaking ... usually arround 500 according to the opponents ships ... and the rest of techs were reasoneably high in order to make the planet to work the way we wanted. So changes made past three years would make a bit different behavior to us rather than destroing that planet ....

Still works that known planet is lost planet ...

Panama Jack wrote:
And you can lose credit QUICKLY in the game. If you store credits on your ship and your ship is destroyed you can lose way over HALF of the credits on the ship. And with planets you must invest credits into the tech on the planets to be able to create larger credit amounts faster.

There are new Probes that can take down players and some coming that can take down planets and defenses. Probes are underused in the game except by the few players who have figured out how useful they can be.

Spies have been made far, far more useful than ever before. Spies used to be almost useless. About the only reason anyone used them was to try and keep enemy spies off their planets. Now spies are HARDER to detect, HARDER to get rid of and easier to get onto an enemy ship without them knowing. Some players are capturing planets just to fill them with spies and nothing else. When someone takes the planet again they will usually get a spy on their ship. I know some players who have spies on MANY enemy player ships and know where they go at all times and where all of their SG sectors are located. They are just waiting for the right moment to use the information. ;)


We culd lose majority credits fast even before ... but we were able to regain them back if we got the chance ...


Panama Jack wrote:
Now there I think you are thinking of a different game or one that someone set up that was set up using grossly outlandish settings. The amount of money for a 500 tech is so far out there, and has always been too high to achieve, no one could even get ONE tech level at 500.


Thanks to interest it was possible ... usualy only cloaking was 500 or wery close ... it assured long use of the planet ... no visible defence ... many good players just passed by ... :-) ... now got tears in my eyes ...

Panama Jack wrote:
Actually it has been this way for years. We have been tweaking things to make both trading, attacking and building all pretty much even. Trading has almost always had the short end of the stick until recently with the addition of all the new commodities. We think there is a pretty even balance between attackers and builders now. It could still use some tweaking but that will come with the addition of a couple more probes and the Build and Research.


Well before I quit playing .. it was more about luck and strategy ... turns were useles at some point of the game, because we did not use them as much as they grown (10p5). Now turns come into account ... and heavy defences seems too.

Anyway ... I will try to get more deep into the game after what you wrote ... and I am looking for the upcomming features even more. Thank you for your time spent.

Panama Jack wrote:
I know B&R has been mentioned for YEARS but we are finally to a point in the coding where B&R will be a reality. So much of the game required a rewrite from the ground up and considering how much code is in the game it was a huge task. Especially for part time work.

We should have a beta for B&R up later this year and you should see things become even more fluid and mobile than you can imagine. All new weapons and defenses. Things you have probably never thought about being in the game. :)


Looking forward and going to study the system, how it changed ower the three years I was not in AAT ..


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 Post subject: Re: Isnt the game too static?
PostPosted: Tue Aug 18, 2009 3:32 pm 
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Jack wrote:
We culd lose majority credits fast even before ... but we were able to regain them back if we got the chance ...


Actually it is still possible. I have seen players lose over half their worth and come charging back. You just can't sit back and let time regain your worth using an interest based credit system. That was the lazy way. As with anything worthwhile you have to work at it to achieve what you want. :)

Jack wrote:
Panama Jack wrote:
Now there I think you are thinking of a different game or one that someone set up that was set up using grossly outlandish settings. The amount of money for a 500 tech is so far out there, and has always been too high to achieve, no one could even get ONE tech level at 500.


Thanks to interest it was possible ... usualy only cloaking was 500 or wery close ... it assured long use of the planet ... no visible defence ... many good players just passed by ... :-) ... now got tears in my eyes ...


Actually we removed planetary interest before we went to a 600 max tech level system. We had interest when we used a 50 tech level system but that was probably close to 4+ years ago.



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 Post subject: Re: Isnt the game too static?
PostPosted: Wed Aug 19, 2009 2:58 pm 
Trial
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Honestly, I MUST say, that I was wery wrong!!!! The game tactics can be very mobile and versatile.
Probes are deadly ... R&B dont work yet ...
R&B will be realy the end game option comparing to credit production dependent on the planetary tech lvl and credits in pocket ...

But you PJ were also wrong .. planetary interest still works!!! Just checked ...

The point is in balancing the planet tech level (max credit storeable) and the actual stored credits together with maximizing the planet population allowed for particular planet tech lvl.
The difference in credit production is realy HUDGE (x10 at 90% credit stored)!!!

So based on the player actual credit balance, the profits can be very interesting and allow players to build high tech lvl planets quickly and easily later in the game ...

LOOKING FORWARD the new beta ...


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 Post subject: Re: Isnt the game too static?
PostPosted: Thu Aug 20, 2009 1:11 pm 
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Jack wrote:
Honestly, I MUST say, that I was wery wrong!!!! The game tactics can be very mobile and versatile.
Probes are deadly ... R&B dont work yet ...
R&B will be realy the end game option comparing to credit production dependent on the planetary tech lvl and credits in pocket ...

But you PJ were also wrong .. planetary interest still works!!! Just checked ...

The point is in balancing the planet tech level (max credit storeable) and the actual stored credits together with maximizing the planet population allowed for particular planet tech lvl.
The difference in credit production is realy HUDGE (x10 at 90% credit stored)!!!

So based on the player actual credit balance, the profits can be very interesting and allow players to build high tech lvl planets quickly and easily later in the game ...

LOOKING FORWARD the new beta ...


Its actually a credit bonus. It may look like interest, but its technically not :) What it does is say the credit bonus is 10X at 100% max credits. If your planet is set at 90% of max on credits and the credits that are normally produced is around 10 bill, then a a planet at 90% max credits would make about 90 bill instead of the normal 10 bill. Not so much interest as it is a credit bonus. This is designed to encourage users to leave credits on their planets.



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