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 PDS (new and unnamed): More concrete plans
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| TelQuessir |
Posted on 10-06-2008 10:58
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 Posts: 2598 Joined: August 30 2005 |
More info: I'm looking for a novelty feel instead of "build super ship to kill enemy super ships" like the developed or developing wartime feel of PDS. Its very cool to watch but also a bit uninvolving because everyone else have basically developed all there is to be developed to the point where you have a "standard issue" kind of gameplay. Pre-packaged food. What if the player could be more involved? Bring back the classic research items but also give a more realistic feel. All the technology is already there - you just have to decide what to implement in order to specialise the fleet for a mission. So ship powerplants, engineering and weapon systems are basically all in place for the new version. But it's a peacetime fleet you start off with. Equipment and weapons are designed to be inter-compatible just as the USN currently employs systems such as Aegis, Harpoon and (Sea) Sparrow. Different variations of the same system, to maximise interoperability. High-maintenence or single-purpose ship designs are placed at a minimum; the Navy's backbone are a strong core of multi mission capable warships. As the game starts, you thus start off with a dependable array of units. One or two classes of fighter, a multirole frigate, a sort of defensive cruiser and a capital cruiser doubling up as a fleet carrier. Pretty solid for starting off... but wait, they are impressively armed but with "standard" everything. The same missiles are used for fighters and starships alike; infact the starships are mostly armed with missiles backed by defensive energy weapons. Missiles pack the most firepower "per ton" in terms of available space weapon systems. But not the most capable when you want to say, slice up an enemy mothership from point blank range. That's where topics such as beam cannons and active stealth come in - specialised capability that the player requests to reinforce the patrol fleet. By all means you could fight a war with the initial core of deep space patrol ships - they're not bad at all and you could form walls of Arbiter cruisers and bash enemies with them. But standard missiles and point defense autocannons won't even scratch a decent deep-space battle force which will just stand far away and batter away with strategic weapons. In short, you won't stand a chance. Unless you turned the tide. With cloaking technology to allow you to close the range past the frigate-sized capital missiles and the strategic massdriver/missile hybrids and bomb them to bits with your low-tech saturation fire. You'd have the advantage cos those big systems are so slow as to be hopeless in close combat against fast patrol ships. How it works? The ship list you start off with is quite comphrensive in terms of ship sizes available. Researching relevant weapon systems and avionics grants access to more specialised variants of the same ship classes. Meaning to say you could have "torpedo" cruisers specialising in demolition of huge slow targets, and at the same time you can fit the same torps to the fighter-bombers and give you a strong anti-capital punch with the click of a button. Sounds nice? It is, but consider too that specialisation is permanent and will detract in certain areas, in this case like small craft defense and energy weaponry. Sure, the torpedo boats would have their proper share of secondary weapons but not the kind that is considered a primary weapon in power. You'd be hard pressed to lay a shot into an enemy fleet that is focused on energy weapons.. which requires better than normal powerplants and so are very fast and lightweight. Demolition missiles aren't good against these. But if you could ambush them at close range it won't matter - torpedo salvoes would just smash them to bits before they could react. That's where sensor stealth research comes in. That's effective but passive stealth limits combat ability. Spend more and you get more advanced active stealth technology which doesn't hamper combat performance. F117 vs F/A22 if you wish. And this is an example of what uniqueness I'm talking about. Secondary benefits of your research direction applicable to an expanding chain of sub-technologies that complements your combat style: and you can have fun comparing a torpedo/stealth fleet to a beam/speed fleet as above. And have the technological handicaps dictating the tactics employed in the given battle. This might sound Volkswagen but like it, and it'll be built, its as simple as that. |
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| Admiral666 |
Posted on 10-06-2008 15:46
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 Posts: 84 Joined: September 21 2005 |
Soundsawesome.
"With all this power at its disposal,there is no question that the Beast Mothership is currently the most dangerous vessel in the Galaxy.It is not just a starship. It is a plague come for us all."-Somtaaw Fleet Intelligence.
[i] "We are the Borg |
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| aspasticninja |
Posted on 10-06-2008 18:33
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 Posts: 97 Joined: May 28 2008 |
That sounds sick. Definitely sounds like my kind of game. I think stealth ships would be a great (and logical) addition to the game (I always loved HW1 cloaked fighters 
Ford, I don't mean to alarm you, but there are an infinite number of monkey's outside and they want us to go over their screenplay for Hamlet.
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| B0nes |
Posted on 10-06-2008 21:31
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 Posts: 38 Joined: April 29 2008 |
Sounds really cool. So, is it going to be you purchase better things(better weaponry and cloak capabilities) with Ru's, like subsystems, or do you just send for them in the research tech? And is the population going to be up'd? Not population but like capital ship limit and so fourth. Also, is the resource model going to be changed at all? I mean resource gathering and mobile refinery's and such. Lastly, is it going to be only capital ships and destroyers that get the upgrades? (ie: cloak, anti missile defencce) Or will smaller ships get them too? Like frigates and corvettes. Sounds really cool by the way :
Edited by B0nes on 10-06-2008 21:33 May the PDS be with you.
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| Admiral666 |
Posted on 10-06-2008 23:23
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Posts: 84 Joined: September 21 2005 |
After waking up, I'm gonna reply again: One: This sounds so awesome; This is the kind of thing I've always wanted, because I like to operate carrier groups behind enemy lines, but it's rather hard without effective active EW/Stealth systems. And I really like being able to customize to my needs. Two: I agree with increased ship caps; I always found them just a little too small, and have just about gone in and changed them 34,564 times. Yes, 34,564. Three: Keep it up, Tel! Good luck on making this as awesome as you've told us it will be(I'm assuming it's gonna be a challenge; I dunno, never really got into the modding and such.). I'll be here to cheer you on and give you randomly awesome yet complex ideas. OH. I remember; My Capital ship docking of old! You take a crippled..PoH for example, and your shipyard. Add a docking arm of sorts, or some type of external scaffold(Optional of course) that the cap ship docks at, repairing it and repairing and destroyed innates(Because for the life of me I dunno if you can repair those or not). Just my input for the day. "With all this power at its disposal,there is no question that the Beast Mothership is currently the most dangerous vessel in the Galaxy.It is not just a starship. It is a plague come for us all."-Somtaaw Fleet Intelligence.
[i] "We are the Borg |
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| Twitch |
Posted on 11-06-2008 05:39
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 Posts: 49 Joined: August 11 2007 |
i don't think destroyed modules can be replaced - they can only be rebuilt (if the option is open). or at least that's how it was in v11. but the idea of cap docking sounds interesting to say the least. in fact tel's idea is made of pure win. awesome awesome awesome YAY!!!! 1000th MEMBER!!!
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| Komo val |
Posted on 11-06-2008 10:04
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Posts: 392 Joined: September 27 2006 |
Bloody brilliant. That'll give even more depth to PDS. That said I'm more of a speed\energy player, that's why I loved the Taiidani in v11 (although their primary offensive system was the anti-matter torpedo, however the mag-directed ion beams were amazing) On the shipyard note, I doubt the effectiveness and realism of standard shipyards in the battlespace Tel's talking about, they would be siting ducks, besides I always thought it absurd how that relatively small bay can build battlecruisers and such. So either make shipyards into battlebarges in size and armament or simply have the more massive ships hyperspaced in, which is better than to take such massive undertakings as building supercapital ships a few hundred km from battle. Now supercarriers are another story. I can already imagine what a supercarrier would look for those two options. Torpedo/stealth: The massive stealth ship hides in a dust cloud near-by providing swarms of strikecraft to the battle as well as strategic missile bombardment fulfilling the roles of both fleet carriers and battleship in WW2. The enemy sends a task force to destroy the target, however when they reach the predicted site they find nothing. The carrier's sensor suit picked up their non-stealth shape long pefore they could pick up its. The speed/beam: The assault has begun. Fast assault cruisers rush in before the main force, attacking the high-level enemy targets, beams of light slice the space. However in this fleet not even support ships stay behind. The large Battle carrier rushes in slicing several frigates with beam weapons, after which it saturates one of the enemy battleships with a plasma storm, granted by it's impressive broadside plasma armament. Although lacking the carrying and production capacity of option 1(stealth) it more than makes up in speed and firepower. The carrier is primarily used as a fast refueling platform, supporting it's air wing while itself performing radical maneuvers. Thus it's repair speed and refueling would be faster than that of option 1, given it's a dedicated platform as well as it's more advance energy - matter conversion system. Ok, that was longer than anticipated, but what the hell. Edited by Komo val on 11-06-2008 10:06 |
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| TelQuessir |
Posted on 11-06-2008 11:33
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Posts: 2598 Joined: August 30 2005 |
Exactly what i needed. Ideas. That sounds like a perfect template to aim for. |
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| Dafeaz |
Posted on 14-06-2008 13:37
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 Posts: 84 Joined: September 02 2007 |
One or two things that have been ramming around in my head of late. As has been brought up before, spending a crapton of RUs to get a supercap only to have it crippled in an opening torpedo volley is ridiculous. Maybe it's more realistic, but it leads to drawn out gamplay with ships having only a few functional weapons about a minute into the battle. What we have to remember is that both the Hiigarans and the Vaygr/Taiidan have access to Phased Disassembler Arrays, essentially fusion torches that break down matter into its component atoms and then reassemble them in a desired form via nanotechnology. Now, as we cannot incorporate ammunition and fuel into the game due to engine constraints, we must assume that even frigates have at least a small version of this system in place to produce autocannon rounds, torpedoes, etc. Therefore, it would make sense that a ship's CO could easily order the damaged or destroyed subsystem, assuming most of it still physically exists despite not being usable, to be tossed into the nanite foundry and reformed. It would take time, but it would work. Another idea is modular vessels, which have been brought up earlier. A simple way to do this would be to give cruiser-class vessels and higher (anything bigger than, say, a Cazador) a build option for subsystems, only these subsystems would be weapon emplacements. These subsystems, much like their original game counterparts (fire control tower, hyperspace inhibitor) could be scuttled and replaced at will. This would allow you to convert say, an Arbiter, from a hard-hitting hunter-killer with long-range rail guns into a picket defense cruiser with numerous smaller autocannons and HVM tubes very quickly in an evolving battlefield. Just some thoughts. I'm an idea man after all. I have no other abilities >_> http://www.nationstates.net/feazanthia
Resident forum lurker, no coding or modeling skills required! Turnin' Battle Barges to swiss cheese and lookin' good doin' it. |
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| CIWS2000 |
Posted on 14-06-2008 14:46
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 Posts: 41 Joined: January 23 2008 |
PDA were fusion torches, but they did not reassemble the matter into anything, they simply broke it down and separated it into different elements, which were then stored for later use in manufacturing. all this was in the well made handbook that came with the first homeworld game. there was never any mention of using any form of nanotechnology in making ships, or ammunition. the PDA broke down asteroids and then used the resulting slag or whatever you want to call it as armor around certain key systems on the mothership, as well as filling massive storage chambers with the metal. |
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| Dafeaz |
Posted on 14-06-2008 15:52
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Posts: 84 Joined: September 02 2007 |
You sure. I could have sworn that there were references to nanotech somewhere. GOOGLE HO! http://www.nationstates.net/feazanthia
Resident forum lurker, no coding or modeling skills required! Turnin' Battle Barges to swiss cheese and lookin' good doin' it. |
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| CIWS2000 |
Posted on 14-06-2008 16:11
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Posts: 41 Joined: January 23 2008 |
i think that the contents of that book are on some editions of the homeworld cd but really there was no substitute for that great book, wish i still had a mint copy |
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| Elukka |
Posted on 14-06-2008 16:29
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Posts: 103 Joined: February 13 2006 |
The PDA isn't quite the Star Trek replicator, as after the PDA broke the materials down, "Robotic Materials plants then combined these elements into whatever alloys and composites were required..." Then there's the reverse variety of it, used on repair vessels, but it was described as "painfully slow" and evidently isn't efficient enough to replace more traditional construction methods. I'd imagine it can't do much else than spray new layers of armour on top of existing ones, which is simple compared to building entire ship systems. However, i think something has to be done about the easily-destroyed weapons systems, too. It just gets silly when it's more efficient to scuttle your ship after a single battle than to repair it. Maybe just make them temporarily disabled like in vanilla HW2. It'd be really cool if you had to bring in support ships to "rebuild" them, but that probably isn't possible. Edited by Elukka on 14-06-2008 16:32 |
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| TelQuessir |
Posted on 19-06-2008 07:53
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Posts: 2598 Joined: August 30 2005 |
I sort of like the idea of permanently destroyed weapons on durable ships. It's all about tuning the weapon and hull values so they don't lose everything in the opening salvo... Besides the things like disposable external stores that is. |
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| CloudAge |
Posted on 23-06-2008 22:27
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Posts: 2 Joined: June 21 2008 |
Hi This is my first post for PDS i just jumped Mods from the Complex Mod and i was reading this fourm about how you wanted more player involvement and as i recall a lot of people over at Complex were thinking the opposite they wanted more PDS feel and thus were thinking that a merger between PDS and Complex would be ideal because Complex can be a run on boring game at times but it has ALOT of player involvement! and yeah in regards to your post i was just wondering if thoughts were shared over here and if this is at all possible. Lol, its a long shot idea that popped into my mind anyways thanks for reading!:rofl: CloudAge And here is the quote of of the Complex board by Viper54K "I have been playing Complex for awhile it is by far my favorite Mod for Home world but i keep thinking and I don't know if this has been talked about yet or if it has awhile back maybe, but since PDS is alive and kicking and we are still taking models from it why don't we go a step further and actually ask or borrow some of there scripts such as AI scrpits or even ask for a merge and what not as in changing a bit of the core game instead of adding just new models of sorts too it. PDS had a great AI script and they were able to actually expand on the the basics of the game not just adding more they in general added more aspects almost to the engine itself!! If you know what i mean like we can only go too far before we come back again to the point where we need to do some more basic programming work in the core files. I was browsing this forum and i heard a lot of people talking about how stupid fighters seem now like they crash into themselves and they crash into other ships MOST of the time not doing any damage even in a collision but losing there lives PDS worked with these ideas( this is PDS of course before they started getting very critical about what is realistic or not as in that portion of there thoughts made no sense because the game inst real life anyways) and there ideas went as far as new scripts for other ships as well not just fighters which brought a more immersible, cinematic, diverse feel to things which if it can be coupled with there sheer content Complex adds would be amazing! there are a lot of dead mods for home world that if used together could be amazing! Anyways thanks for reading i had to type this fast so sorry if there's no punctuation!! " Edited by CloudAge on 23-06-2008 22:32 |
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| TelQuessir |
Posted on 24-06-2008 01:15
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Posts: 2598 Joined: August 30 2005 |
Hmn, new input from the players, definitely worth reading and lacking here. Motivation for V12 +10 increase |
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| TheSizzler |
Posted on 24-06-2008 01:54
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Posts: 54 Joined: January 10 2007 |
I really just sorta skimmed tel's first post, so is this correct? You intend to have larger and more branching "research", as to provide the player with a more diverse and eventual specialized fleet of ships to engage his opponent. Sounds decent so far, let me provide some input/thoughts to go with this. Sorry if it's dumb or redundant, I didn't really think up much else.. Have the capitol ships that you can build bare hulls. Maybe include the point defenses for the player, but past that, make the player pick and choose which specific weapon subsystems to build on each hardpoint. So, for example, say I want to build an arbiter. It finishes production full with engines, sensors, and standard point defenses. You decide that you need some advanced scouts/command craft for your fleet, so for the rearmost hardpoint, you build a highly advanced AWACS suite, and for two other slots, you install long range hyper-velocity torpedoes so your ship can skim the battlefield taking its pick of who to engage, while being far enough out to stay out of harm's way and provide good sensors data on incoming hostiles. For the last slot, you figure that the enemy might divert some bombers to try and take it down, so add in an extra heavy point defense battery. That IMHO offers a lot more depth and variability to strategy. If it's not the most militaristicly realistic, it sure as hell would be fun. You could choose to add more armour to the ships, or add extra powerplants to the engines to increase speed, etc. Of course, these would be fairly impractical to build because it would cost about 75% as much as normal and take 90% of the time, but you'd still need to buy each and every extra subsystem individually, causing it to actually cost more and take longer in the long run. For that reason, you'd still have the standard array of normal craft available. Welcome to the internet
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| TelQuessir |
Posted on 24-06-2008 02:11
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Posts: 2598 Joined: August 30 2005 |
Problem is with the huge subsystem options its first of all difficult to create and maintain. It's much easier, and more believable for a fleet action game to just have the player choose the ship loadout desired and it arrives full spec. So for just one Arbiter chassis we have like a half dozen variants to suit the desired capability. |
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| Admiral666 |
Posted on 24-06-2008 04:40
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Posts: 84 Joined: September 21 2005 |
Yes; The Arbiter is a good ship.
"With all this power at its disposal,there is no question that the Beast Mothership is currently the most dangerous vessel in the Galaxy.It is not just a starship. It is a plague come for us all."-Somtaaw Fleet Intelligence.
[i] "We are the Borg |
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| McOdd |
Posted on 24-06-2008 21:00
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Posts: 6 Joined: June 19 2008 |
Back in PDS v7 I realised I could recycle one of the Soban carrier turrets in favor of an hyperspace module and hyperspace a shipyard in. I thought such modularity was cool. Then played PDS v11. The feel was different, the modules are destroyed forever and... I liked it. For the same reason I think a large number of capital ships or even a Shipyard shouldn't be there. You are not the Taiidan Emperor. I don't even believe there is one, or the Vaygr would have never had their chance: faster warships in the game = highest technology. I think of the taiidanis more as warlords each in her/his highly advanced heavy cruiser, commanding it as a mobile base/ Star Destroyer and counting with a certain number of supporters, but also a great number of rival Warlords. The very reason the Vaygr had no real adversary when invading. In fact I think it is only now, more than 100 years later, that taiidanis are gaining a bit of organization and are able to use their superior technology against both vaygr and hiigarans. You aren't Karan either. In fact I don't know why such a vulnerable target as a slow shipyard is even there in the first place and not in small fleets of them orbiting a highly defended planet. Putting such precious resources in the front line sounds weird. Even more weird is that the High Command would trust its defense in one of the many officials in charge of small taskforces (hiigaran numbers after being almost decimated *twice* shouldn't be high). As the Vaygr, with your whole unbound clan living in a vulnerable space-faring city, you wouldn't like to risk your people lives putting them in the front line either. I'll gladly play games in which you are supossed to defend a factory world with quite a few shipyards there, or assaulting a taiidan outpost (Makaan's ship could play the role here), or trying to defend your clan from certain genocide. But I think you should start with a Praetor/ Qwar'Jet/ Reina de los Condenados, a small flotilla of carriers and destroyers, maybe a cruiser or some auxiliary vessel and no shipyard on sight. You are not that important, there are a lot other officials/ warlords/ clanlords out there, each one really busy trying to achieve their very own goals overcoming at the same time their own share of problems. P.S.: First post of mine. Hi there from Canary Islands, Spain ^^ Edited by McOdd on 24-06-2008 21:10 |
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