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Deceiver_0
Deceiver_0
Join Date 12/2008
+42

Possible expansion improvement on all units:

Weapons range slices rather than circles and hold position behavior adjustment

June 23, 2009 7:48:40 PM from Sins of a Solar Empire ForumsSins of a Solar Empire Forums

You know when you hit alt or hover over units you can see the circles that represents their weapons range? Why not represent them as pie slices instead? I feel the circles can be improved in this way to encourage better micromanagement of fleets. You could represent their weapons damage statistics on the info card in colors and the represent those respective weapons around the ship as pie slices so players could see them and could manage how to use them better( because we all know that most ships cant fire in an area directly behind them.) Some of course would remain complete cricles (like starbases), but their repective weapons ranges could be visible (since they differ). Also, if it seems like a lot of additional calculations would have to be made, and thus slow down the game, you could make it so you only see that on your own ships.

Also to help utilize this you can make it so if you set your fleet on 'hold position' and tell them to move within their firing range they rotate to face that position rather than move towards it (as if you were attacking something).

I feel this could drastically improve the experience in battle and incourage more players to be more invloved with the battles and be rewarded for their focus.

 

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Deceiver_0
Volt_Cruelerz
Join Date 06/2008
+115
Reply #1 June 23, 2009 8:56:54 PM
from Sins of a Solar Empire ForumsSins of a Solar Empire Forums

True...  If we had infinite processor power, what would be nice would be having a rough damage area scale...  Start on red and slide up the spectrum as the DPS goes higher and higher... (dark red=1 DPS; bright blue=10,000 DPS)  If you could "add" the colors you could show how they overlap, you could potentially see a fleet's "kill zones."  (this would be especially effective with the "Formation Lock" suggestion).  Ex: With just a bunch of Cobalts, you just get a forward line in the mid-red range to red-orange at the overlap points, but if you throw in some LRM's, you could go into orange all the way through.  That would help people understand the ranges of weapons better and would help in engagements...

In general though, I think this idea should only be activated when you hit Alt=>Shift.  That way you see the colored pies as opposed to just the circle...

Alt: Circles

Alt=>Shift: Colored Pies

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Deceiver_0
TheRezonator
Join Date 12/2008
+27
Reply #2 June 23, 2009 9:21:45 PM
from Stardock ForumsStardock Forums

do you mean pie slices like firing arcs? so lets say a heavy cruiser has maybe a 90-120 degree firing arc right infront of itself, but it cant fire at targets behind or to the immediate right or left of itself.

because i was thinking, missiles can change trajectory in flight, so a Long-Range Missile frigate facing one way can actually fire backwards as the missiles change course as soon as they leave the tube, meaning that they too, would have circles instead of arcs

illums, too, would each beam have its own arc?

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Deceiver_0
dresda
Join Date 04/2009
+6
Reply #3 June 23, 2009 10:03:30 PM
from Sins of a Solar Empire ForumsSins of a Solar Empire Forums

i'm not quite sure how many people would actually pay attention to it.  i mean this game isn't meant for actually watching the battles play out and doing lots of micro.  while ships are fighting, you are supposed to be doing other helpful things, like making more frigs, upgrading, things of the like.

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Deceiver_0
Deceiver_0
Join Date 12/2008
+42
Reply #4 June 23, 2009 10:05:25 PM
from Sins of a Solar Empire ForumsSins of a Solar Empire Forums

do you mean pie slices like firing arcs

yes

missiles can change trajectory in flight,

this is true, but only once the missile is fired, the frigate must be facing the target to fire on it. there for it does have a firing arc

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Deceiver_0
Volt_Cruelerz
Join Date 06/2008
+115
Reply #5 June 23, 2009 10:21:32 PM
from Sins of a Solar Empire ForumsSins of a Solar Empire Forums

Quoting dresda,
reply 3
i'm not quite sure how many people would actually pay attention to it.  i mean this game isn't meant for actually watching the battles play out and doing lots of micro.  while ships are fighting, you are supposed to be doing other helpful things, like making more frigs, upgrading, things of the like.

 

I don't know... I think people would...  If you incorporated it into the tutorials, I think it would help.  If you added in my idea, I think it would be even more helpful...

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Deceiver_0
Deceiver_0
Join Date 12/2008
+42
Reply #6 June 23, 2009 11:04:46 PM
from Sins of a Solar Empire ForumsSins of a Solar Empire Forums

i mean this game isn't meant for actually watching the battles play out and doing lots of micro.

then why make them so awesome?  why do anything if it wasnt meant for that. You build just giant fleets and put them up against each other and try and win it with numbers and not tactics? thats just wrong. You're given the option to micromanage your fleet (autocast off, attack local area, hold position, stop, attack, retreat) so why would you not be meant to do that?

My suggestion would just encourage more interaction in the battles, and show how to maximize the effectiveness of certain units (akkans for example)

The point is you have to balance micro and macro management.

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Deceiver_0
Angros
Join Date 05/2007
0
Reply #7 June 23, 2009 11:25:37 PM
from Sins of a Solar Empire ForumsSins of a Solar Empire Forums

I don't know if it would matter much for normal ships, but even if it isn't implemented for all ships some arcs for capital weapons could be really handy. Even in large battles there are only a handful of them and their positioning can really matter.

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Deceiver_0
Volt_Cruelerz
Join Date 06/2008
+115
Reply #8 June 23, 2009 11:35:55 PM
from Sins of a Solar Empire ForumsSins of a Solar Empire Forums

That is true...

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