Sensors

Dude there has about 6 post on this look for them if you want more INFO!! It would also help to Watch the Streams on Friday or catch them later on youtube!

EDIT This post will not be received well.

The devs don't. In fact, they're intending on teaching the AI to do it. Besides, on the really big maps, sensor stacking is positively required.

Really? It's required? You just gotta have a single ship that sees out 120 hexes, you couldn't possibly manage say a handful of ships that have a vision of 25 instead?

Are you sure you heard the devs talking about doing for the AI? I'm pretty sure they just know where stuff is, their constructor and colony ships b-line it for resources/planets without ever having explored there before.

And I got news for ya, not every map is insane in size so what works for it shouldn't ruin the game for any other size.

Man, can we stop with the nerfs?

The CEO of STARDOCK uses sensor stacking, the lead developer uses SENSOR stacking. Its a feature not a bug. I never ever will get why someone will call for nerfs to a solo player game. 

How I play the game (which I LOVE sensor stacking) is not hurting you in anyway. You play without them fine. Make yourself a mod and have it be a unique ship part that way you can only equip one. Case closed. 

Yes, on Insane maps they are absolutely needed. The maps are simply too large to be able to only see 4 hexes out. 

I don't recall him every saying that. However, I do recall him stating in the last dev stream that they are going to implement diminishing returns for sensors.

So do you read posts before you reply? Lets try again:

-Just because it works on one size of map doesn't mean it's ok that it breaks the game for the smaller maps.

And I just gave an example of a ship with a reasonable vision of 25, there's no reason to get all dramatic talking about a vision of 4, that's about what ships have at the begging of the game without any sensors.

Oh noes, your 200 ship empire fleet might need more than 1 scout!!

Sigh, yes, when the map is a couple of thousand hexes across, you need a ship that can see that far.

On higher difficulty levels, the AI has no FoW. On lower difficulty levels, it does.

Yes, that goes both ways. What works for smaller sizes shouldn't ruin the game for big ones either. And tbh, big maps are considerably more screwed than small ones right now.

No

Well, for one thing it's a multiplayer game too. But even if it was SP only, I wouldn't agree.

People like games to be balanced. When one option is overwhelmingly better than others (like in this case, one sensor barge is way better than 5+ tiny scouts) picking other options is just silly. I don't doubt most people use sensor stacking - it feels dumb not to when the option is there; that doesn't make it a good mechanic.

In this case, we're talking about a 4X game; eXplore, eXpand, eXploit, eXterminate. Generally in that order. The current sensor mechanics render that exploration stage moot for all but the larger maps. It hurts gameplay by taking away what I would expect to be a game mechanic - choosing where to scout, how many scouts to build, etc.

Let's say it was another feature: Let's say Kinetics did 20x the damage of beams, cost half the price, and had the same mass requirement. At the high end, Kinetic would do so much damage that 1 weapon is enough to 1-shot a Medium ship. Is that a problem?

I think it would be. It would eclipse beams - and what if I like beams? Well tough luck. 

Most people who see that situation would say 'eh, super kinetics are fun, but we really should keep the different game options in line with eachother'. So, either buff up all other weapons (this brings its own problems) or nerf kinetics. Such is life.

It's really not increasing my enjoyment of the game, and I (and a lot of people, actually) think less powerful sensor stacking would be more fun.

And once it's changed, it won't have to hurt you. You don't even need a mod! Just open the console and type 'fow'. You clearly don't like having to deal with the Fog of War anyway. I don't see why anyone would have a problem with using a console command in a solo game, after all.

Shouldn't the FoW just be off by default? It's mostly annoying.

See... I think if you can understand why the FoW shouldn't just be off automatically, you're 90% there to understanding why people don't like sensor barges.

It seems to me that this is an argument that sensor should scale with map size. Lots of things should scale with map size - the game is currently balanced for Large and smaller (see the LEP, etc). It'll get there.

Pretty much. Ship range already does, so there's no real reason that sensors don't. 

The fact is, sensor stacking is OP; no-one argues with that. No ship should ever reveal the entire map by itself (which a huge sensor barge does even on insane maps). But it shouldn't simply be abolished, as that's breaking the game on one setting to fix the game on another. Very, very large maps are so big that the default sensor ranges are meaninglessly tiny and you MUST stack at least a few sensors on early ships; a game-breaking number of sensors on a low-tech explorer in a tiny map is my usual lowbie scout. On my present map, I have half a dozen medium-hull, 49-range sensor boats dotted around my influence just to have full sensor coverage of my own empire. That's why just disallowing stacking outright is not the answer.

Diminishing returns combined with map size scaling would be a good way to go about it. The diminishing return means that sensor stacking ceases to be viable, and the map size scaling would prevent it screwing over one map size or another.

I'm slowly getting to bigger maps, but my last game on gigantic turned out very depressing.  I was surrounded by 3 good guys, and the other 3 bad guys were just tossing off.  By turn 150, I had the highest galactic power research, economy, and manufacturing.  I think I need to try with more races, and try minors for a change.

My point however is that when I create a sensor boat, I personally do it for my tactical surroundings on a front.  And I leave plenty of gaps as well, that could be snuck through.  Seeing 10 star systems back is really too advantageous, for ANYONE.  Hell, the AI needs every advantage it can get (except during the colony rush! ), but as Brad said in dev streams, he thinks the AI is borking because it sees too much.  If I see a huge fleet come in, my sensor range gives me time to retreat, but it doesnt give me a 5 turn heads up of whats coming.  Might as well go into debug console and type 'wingame'.

True; however, I'd be careful about catering much for a map size that the game itself categorizes as insanity.

I don't agree that sensors should scale with map size.  (I'm all for diminishing returns, and have called for such since Day 0.)  Giant maps need to come with challenges that aren't necessarily as much of a pressing concern on the smaller maps, and the added need for a more populous sensor network is one such challenge.

OMG! Why is everyone calling for nerfs! 

I win every game I play using this method. On the larger maps, especially on the higher difficulty level, it's absolutely required. Otherwise I would just have to play the same game for months.

Stardock, please don't take out the debug console! This is a single player game!

Right on TurielD, I was about to say the exact same thing: people that don't understand enjoying a rewarding challenge and balanced game play use the word "nerf"

As I said in my first post; ship capacity shouldn't be the primary factor for sensor range. Sensor tech level makes sense to me but maybe another modifier based on map size is the solution. 

One sensor per ship. No stacking.

Sensor level 1 - range 3 hexes

Sensor level 2 - range 5 hexes

Sensor level 3 - range 10 hexes

Sensor level 4 - range 15 hexes

Sensor level 5 - range 25 hexes.

Bonus to sensor range (based on map size) +0% to +200%.

Then do the same thing with ship engines. One engine per ship. No stacking.

Some variation on this would be wonderful.

It would certainly be easiest to balance. While part of me agrees with Node that larger empires can afford to spend a lot more on building up their sensor network, the simple fact is building up and re-positioning sensor ships ISN'T FUN. It's mindless busywork. I'm not sure I'd want to see engines limited to 1 per ship (maybe just increase their mass a lot to make stacking impractical), but with sensors it makes sense.

If sensors (and engines) scale based on map size, and sensors generally keep a range about equal to double or triple a ship's maximum move speed, then well-placed sensors will prevent anyone from being to attack from outside the FOW.

This would make resource-using sensors and engines even more valuable, which I think would also be good for the game.

Although I'd be fine with a cap on engines per ship (space empires still friggin rules) I don't really have a problem with the current system, it seems pretty balanced  (unlike sensors) they take up a fair amount of space and they get costly quick so if you do want a ship with tons of moves/turn it's going to take a lot longer to build and be far less effective in combat. It works for me. 

The issue with engines is that it is tied directly to the issue with sensors.

If you allow for ships with movement of 40 per turn, then you have to have sensors that go out at least 40 range in order to see threats. This is why sensorboats are used. The AI has a very difficult time handling players who launch attacks from even 15-20 hexes away. I doubt the AI could ever be made to defend against or handle ships that can travel huge distances, even if it could see the threat.

LOOK the dev team already said they will be adding Diminishing returns  to the sensors,....... the whiners got there way!!

Enough on this subject!!! Stop beating the dead horse!!!

Haven't the sensors already been cut back?

I know that my potentially first turn sensor boats cant be built since the last patch. I did a mod so I could build them. As long as I have this kind of control they can do as they wish.

Paul has also mentioned that there is a major issue of breaking player ship designs that is complicating the sensor issue.

Okay, I just took a look and navigational sensors, since patch 1.03 have a range of 1 and a mass of 8. So how many can you squeeze on to a turn one hull. Less than 20 I suspect. I can't recall the starting cargo capacity but it is around 150, I think. They also buffed up the star base sensors, I think, but I have not noticed much change in any of my games so far. 

As others have said they are planning to scale the sensors at some point, but I think it is not a high priority item at this juncture

Yes Franco they have and Paul said he will be doing more to them. Atlease that is the way I took what he said about it. Best I can guess I lost about 40% on each of my sensor boats I had. No since in having them if the are going to be nerf that bad!

mass is what Paul was about. He has to do something about it. When he does it will brake a lot of ships,...... what he plains is to be able to load the ship up in designer and take parts off till it can be used. Not going to be a Happy day when this happens.

It is easy to mod the sensors in ShipComponentsDef in a game file and plug it into your docs as a mod, (see below). I changed the range to 4 and the mass to 6. This is probably a little too much. You can build a sensor boat on turn one with about 35 range. I usually build one colony ship in addition to the starting colony ship so I get the 3 constructors. I upgrade the constructors to colony ships and then I build one sensor drone. I do not rush it usually. It only has 25 range and it will usually take 9-10 turns to build. I sometimes rush it about halfway for abour 1000 bc.

That is usually the only sensor boat I build until about T100. I might build a couple of more at that point.

Navigational sensors

<EffectType>SensorRangeMass</EffectType>
<Target>
<TargetType>Ship</TargetType>
</Target>
<BonusType>Flat</BonusType>
<Value>6</Value> (Was 8, you probably could leave this one as is)
</Stats>
<Stats>
<EffectType>SensorRange</EffectType>
<Target>
<TargetType>Ship</TargetType>
</Target>
<BonusType>Flat</BonusType>
<Value>4</Value> (Was 1)