SE4 Stock Balance Mod

[geoschmo]

Allright, I have a suggestion. Let's rephrase that and call it a comment, because I am not actually suggesting we do it. I merely want to get people's impressions of it as an idea.

The "Nerf the PPB" party has some valid points. PPB is too strong and too easy to research. It dominates the midgame and only is a little less effective then the APB late game, and then only at very long range. Frankly I have never faced a late game APB opponent that scared me unless they also had the talisman. Because at the range where the APB has a clear advantage it's not really very easy to hit anything. And it's not all that difficult to close with the enemy and get into range where the PPB is better. So basically the weapons at that point I consider equal, even though on papaer a case can be made for the APB. I think in the end game other factors do a lot more to determine victory then whether you have PPB or APB on you ships.

Making the PPB a niche weapon I believe is too much of a change. It has been a mainline weapon for too long to put that particular genie back in the bottle. So what if we approach the problem from another angle?

Many suggestions have been made to soften the advantages of the PPB but keep it a valid mainline weapon. The main objection to these appears to be that they don't do enough considering the PPB ability to skip normal shields. Well frankly the fact that they skip shields is almost irrelevant anymore. Because the dominance of the PPB has almost obsoleted shields to begin with. And yet people still use the PPB becasue they are a good weapon even without the shield skipping ability.

So what if we took the shield skipping ability away?

Ok, pick your jaw back up off the floor and think about it for a minute.

Yes, it removes the distinctivness of the PPB, but how distinctive is it anyway if noone uses normal shields? It remains a valid mainline weapon so we don't have to redesign all the AI that use it. Shields become more usefull in the mid game. We can still tweak the PPB values so the MB isn't such a weakling mid game.

We can still have niche weapons that do skip normal shields and have a lower damage level.

Wait a minute while I light my cigarette... Ok, commence firing...

Geoschmo

[oleg]

Originally posted by macjimmy:
One topic for balancing that I've not seen is shields vs armor. Armor has less hp/kt than shields at a moderate level and has to be repaired too. Armor I,II,III is 3, 3.5, 4 hp/kt, IIRC, and the shields far outstrip this. Making armor more worthwhile might balance PPB without having to make large changes there as well.

Shields are vulnerable to shield depletors which have highest damage/kt ratio. Unless you are crystalline, you have to punch through armor. NSP skipps both and are irrelevant fro this discussion. Of course, shields also protect against boarding and ID. May be some rebalancing is nesessary, but not as much as simple hit points suggest.

[Suicide Junkie]

Shields vs armor have been like this since SE3, where the ratio was even worse. 4 armor points vs 24 standard shields vs 32 phased shields IIRC.

Adding 3 new levels of Standard armor with very minor additional benefits (as well as moving it to the bottom of the list in components.txt) would help the AI by allowing it to use all types of armor with calls from the design creation file.

Armor is a cheap, early game option.
I do like the idea of balanced armor vs shields (see P&N for proof)

However, consider all of the scifi to date... In those that had shields, was the armor ever even comparable in strength?

[geoschmo]

Originally posted by Suicide Junkie:
Armor is a cheap, early game option.

I agree that it should be, but I am not sure it really is. Since you have to research chemistry as a prerequisite. It's no easier to get early armor then it is to get early shields unfotunatly. If it weren't for getting to stealth armor I'd venture a lot of people wouldn't even research it. And very few use much of it on their frontline warships. Usually it'a a piece here or there to finish off a design when nothing else will fit.

Geoschmo

[oleg]

Another option to balance armor - increase EA effect. If we also reduce the benefit of mounts, it can make high-damage, low reload weapons like WMG and torpedos much more valuable than say APB or PPB !

[Loser]

Originally posted by geoschmo:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Suicide Junkie:
Armor is a cheap, early game option.

I agree that it should be, but I am not sure it really is. Since you have to research chemistry as a prerequisite. It's no easier to get early armor then it is to get early shields unfotunatly. If it weren't for getting to stealth armor I'd venture a lot of people wouldn't even research it. And very few use much of it on their frontline warships. Usually it'a a piece here or there to finish off a design when nothing else will fit.

---

Actually, Armor ought to be highly useful in PBW games and I know it is in tough TDM games, where you know the other guy is chasing PPB, so there's no reason to put Shields on your ships until you get to the sixth level. And even at the sixth level it's hardly worth it.

But Armor takes ten kilotonnes of space for forty kilotonnes of protection. Emissive Armor give you fifty kilotonnes of protection and thirty kilotonnes of a sort of recharging protection for twenty kilotonnes of space. That's pretty worth while. Unless you're facing a crystalline or NSP opponent Armor is a good thing. And it rocks on Weapon Platforms.

If Weapon Platforms are hit in order of placement, and I believe they are, then putting a few cheap 100% Armor WPs on a planet means the badum has to dish out serious damage before the shooting WPs or Relic/Sensor WPs are even touched. Shield WPs do the same, but are so much more expensive (take longer to build). I think it takes the third level of Phased Shielding to beat out Armor for protection/kilotonne.

And on Units, unless I am mistaken, Armor piercing is a moot point. The unit is not impaired until all its components are destroyed, so the Armor piercing still has to deliver the whole sum of the damage, while Shield piercing does not. Since the components do not need repair, the Armor could be said to recharge, just like Shields, and the only advantage to Shields over Armor in a Unit is the greater protection/kilotonne offered by higher level shielding, which is expensive and takes a long time to get.

I'm not sure on what the dividing lines are, but I'm thinking that it's Late Game before I'm putting Phased Shields on Weapon Platforms.

[ July 25, 2003, 15:44: Message edited by: Loser ]

[Loser]

Originally posted by oleg:
Another option to balance armor - increase EA effect. If we also reduce the benefit of mounts, it can make high-damage, low reload weapons like WMG and torpedos much more valuable than say APB or PPB !

The amount of 'soak' on Emissive Armor III makes it exactly equivalent to Armor III: 40kt structure/10kt for Armor III and 50kt structure + 30kt 'soak'/20kt for Emissive Armor III. If you increase the amount of 'soak' on Emissive armor I think it would be proper to decrease the amount of structural kt, as this balance seems appropriate.

I really think Armor is fine as it is. It is useful in it's time. That people fail to take advantage of this feature does not mean that the feature is unbalanced or nerfed, simply that its merit is undiscovered.

Do experienced PBW players avoid the use of Armor and Emissive Armor?

Am I just naive for thinking that it is a great component? This is possible...

[ July 25, 2003, 15:46: Message edited by: Loser ]