Galtactic Civalisations 3 Concept Ideas (long)

from GalCiv2 Forums
Before i start first of all i love GC2, it has its flaws just like any game, but also like any game the could do soo much more, i like list few idea's of my own, i like see more strategy, more epic feel, all the while maintaining the basic simplisity of the current game, i try keep it it simple and easy to read, i apreciate people comments also


Deeper Stratergy

1) Seperate Weapons

Firstly i like see weapons work indvidually, as opposed to stacking up to single weapon
additionally i like see LOTs of weak weapon stack to deal MORE damage than a single uber weapon

Reason:-
firstly it make armour more viable option to choose, sure lots guns mean more damage overall, but big guns befit more for pentration

example 1 -
Ship A = 25 guns each do 1 damage each for total 25 damage, no armour
Ship B = 2 guns each doing 8 damage each for total of 16 damage, no armour

In this example the 25 gun ship will own outright due to superior firepower

example 2 -
Same weapons as about, but now both have 1 armour

in this example Ship B will own outright, reason being that even tho Ship A has more firepower, most of its weapons will bouce off the armour of the other ship (1 Damage vs 1 Armour), meanwhile the ship with big gun will puch right through as if the armour was not there (8 Damage vs 1 Armour)


ok, so you prob think it best to go big gun with armour right?
No not always the case, this is where it gets more stratigic read on...


Fighters

Fighter should be small and weak and can only be built in squadrons as opposed to singular ships
A squadron should compose of about 6-12 fighters each with 1hp each and no armour

Due to size there easy to replace so ship auto get replaced based on 'repair' rate

Fighters are like insects, alone there nearly useless, but in mass they are deadly, esp in right situations

example 1 -
Ship A = 25 guns each do 1 damage each for total 25 damage, no armour

each fighter has 1 hp, each weapon is individual, assuming all shots hit (read later) Ship A could destroy 25 fighers in a single round, thats a LOT of fighters going down


example 2 -
Ship B = 2 guns each doing 8 damage each for total of 16 damage, no armour

Ship B does lot damage but only 2 guns, meaning it can only kill 2 fighers in single round, its gong to be a long fight, esp if lot fighters, in this situation fighter have a hugh advantage (think Deathstar heehee)


Advance Stratergy

the above example alone add lot stratgic depth while keeping things simple, you obvoiusly be want ships with the uber weapons to quickly take out any heavily armoured capital ships, and you also want to have some ships with LOTS of weak gun for dealing with fighter fleets or unarmoured targets

these features alone would greatly enhance gameplay and combat, and i like hear peoples thoughts on that system alone...

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Now i getting little more complex, not everyone will like following ideas perhaps but i bring it open to discussion


Fighters Tatics

In my opinion fighter are differnt type of ship entirely, wher as most ship glide through space firing off weapon banks in all direction, i see fighter as much more like out modern aircraft, zipping around at high speed relying pury on agilty to out manuver the enermy, in MOST cases 1 hit means certain death

for this reason i like to introduce a new concept unique only to fighter ships, 'Evasion'

Basically when a fighter is fired upon, reguardless of the weapon, the fight makes a 'Evasion' test, if it succeed it lives, if it fails it dies, that simple

If it succeed it simply represnt the ship dodge the attack, or out manuvered the missile

I say 2 catagorsy of fighter
Light = 60% Evasion
Heavy = 40% Evasion

Heavy fighter have more firepower but less manuverable

Fighters Experiance and Technology

Becuase fighter dont have hp anymore, they cant benfit from experiance in same was as larger ships, we can easily correct this by adding directly to the evasion skill, more experaince a fighter is more like he is to dodge (think luke skywalker lol)


In addition to experence, technogy can improve evansion technique by inproving the fighters directly, or by addtional hardware options (strath drive that allow to litterally side step)

I would allow evasion to exceed 100% but cap at maybe 125%, but it should be no easy task to get that good, ill explain more

With high evasion we need something to counter it and we have 2 options...

Option 1:- Fighter evasion values cancel out each other

Example:
Fighter A has Evasion 60%
Fighter B has Evasion 40%

60-40 =20%

If fighter A fire at fighter B, then fighter B has no chance to dodge (or maybe a 2% minimum to represent 'luck')
If fighter B engages fighter A, then Fighter A gets a 20% evasion bonus


Option 2: Tracking Technology

Fairly strait forward here, tracking technogy is used on bigger ships to track small fast moving targets like fighter, this aid the weapon systems making the shot hard work to evade

Tracking system have rating which cancel out evasion in simlar way as explained above

Example 1-

Ship has tracking 20% vs a Fighter with 60% evasion
this means the fighter would only have 40% chance to evade


Example 2-

Ship has tracking 80% vs a Fighter with 60% evasion
this means the fighter has no chance (or the 2% minimum chance) of evdading the attack

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I personally this this concept idea would add even greater depth and perhaps make battles feel more epic due to larger number ships (as result of figher 'squadrons' as opposed to singular fighters), i dont think the evasion with over complicate things, it might seem complicated at first but it really very simple design.

Exact number maybe open to discussion mind, i onlt laying down idea for people to comment and add there own thought and opinion, so please fee free to say what you think


Anyway, i best leave it there for now, i lots more ideas but i dragged on long enough lol
ideas
5,977 views 3 replies
Reply #1 from Stardock Forums Top

Hi HuggyMonster, I have thinking about exactly the same concepts, the separate weapons concept, evasion bonuses etc..



I personally think that it may be possible to apply to CG2 with minimal alteration to AI, seing as it only really affects combat. Some of these ideas I have raised before but here are my thoughts..



Instead of evasion concept I thought about a maneuverability bonus being a function of ship speed divided by a hull size value (say tiny=0.33, small=0.66 medium=1 large=2 huge=3).



Defense values would be calculated the same way as normal but the value would be skewed up towards the higher end. Say, possibly using a technique similar to how academic scores are standardized. For example, the random number generated than normally corresponds to defense value is first put in an algorithm that skewes the value to the higher end (but with zero values still possible, just less likely to occur). This could be by default set so say 60% or 66% of the time defense results occur in the upper range (ie half defense max value or above). The maneuverability(?) bonus then skewes the value further. Eg.. tiny ship of speed=4 has maneuverability bonus 4/0.33 or value of 12. this then alters the damage algorithm so 60(base rate)+12(bonus)% of the time damage value is greater than 1/2max.

A ships sesors could also be considered a ships targeting systems, reducing the bonus described above by its value. 

I just feel the current system doesnt emphasize defense enough especially with 1 vs 1 combat. Making the defense value consistantly higher can somewhat IMO overcome this.

Reply #2 from GalCiv2 Forums Top

Well, what i would prefer when it comes to weapons and defenses is that the different weapons are there, but they ALL need to go through shields, the armour you have lowers the damage to the hp or something like that, i would honestly prefer that.

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Reply #3 from GalCiv2 Forums Top

Hi! A few comments:

You say you want "more strategy, more epic feel" - how does overhauling the combat system (again) provide that? As Yavrin said:

I personally think that it may be possible to apply to CG2 with minimal alteration to AI, seing as it only really affects combat. Some of these ideas I have raised before but here are my thoughts..

As such, I don't think this is really an important change. If GalCiv III has any form of tactical combat (not to say I want it to - the lack of tactical combat is a nice difference between GalCiv II and most other 4x space games) then I would obviously consider changes to the combat system important. Right now, though, I'm not sure why so many people keep wanting to alter it. Except for aspects such as the eventual pointlessness of defenses - which may not happen in all games anyway - I think the current system works well enough.

Also:

Well, what i would prefer when it comes to weapons and defenses is that the different weapons are there, but they ALL need to go through shields, the armour you have lowers the damage to the hp or something like that, i would honestly prefer that.
 

This is fairly unlikely to occur in GalCiv III. The current combat system has all three weapon types as having the same effects in combat, and if combat remains in its current form as simply a dramatization of a series of die rolls, I don't see why it would be necessary to change that.

Sorry if this comes across as overly antagonistic... I just feel, whenever anyone proposes some neat new combat feature (carriers, stealth, ramming, boarding, etc, etc.) that without some form of tactical combat there's no real need for it.

All this said, one thing I do agree with:

the above example alone add lot stratgic depth while keeping things simple, you obvoiusly be want ships with the uber weapons to quickly take out any heavily armoured capital ships, and you also want to have some ships with LOTS of weak gun for dealing with fighter fleets or unarmoured targets
 

I would like it a lot if the game provided a good deal more distinction between hull sizes, and also that both "small" and "large" ship strategies were equally valid. Right now, it seems that fighters in the late game are fairly useless.