How to balance between combat and trading

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Warnoise
Posts: 674
Joined: Mon, 7. Mar 16, 23:47

How to balance between combat and trading

Post by Warnoise » Wed, 9. Jan 19, 07:03

Now, the biggest problem with X-foundation, is the combat aspect of the game. Why do you think people are either complaining about the game for being easy/boring or about how the game lacks of late game elements, that's simply because they all follow the same pattern which was indirectly imposed by the game upon them, how? Let me explain.

Now, in X-Foundation, there is no other way to advance without trading. If you want to amass those 5mill to buy your first M? You gotta first trade/mine for some easy money. Why is that? Because there are simply no elements in the game that encourage combat! Ok, there are some assassination missions or destruction missions, but their rewards are pathetic and some of them get very repetitive/tedious. So players will have to go with the fastest method of trading then build stations and by the time they got the millions and think "ok let's get an army and get some action", the world is dead. Nemesis factions (xenon, pirates, khaak, etc...) are too weak to offer any challenge. One would ask himself "Why the hell did I amass this army??" Leaving the player with sense of disappointment followed by drop in motivation to continue playing the game.

Some people say "But you can wage war with other factions!" Well, no. Most of the players don't want to wage war with other factions simply because the advantages of being friendly with them by far outweighs the advantages of battling them.
Thus, the game has turned in a boring trading SIM for most players where they just SETA their way to the billion credit and Save ALT+F4 the game.

Now, how to make the game more exciting? Simple. Improve the balance between combat and trading.

For example, I liked the idea of war missions, unfortunately it is horribly executed.

In order to give players more freedom on how they want to help their favorite faction, I would split the war missions into 3 categories: Combat missions, Scout/Infiltration missions and Trading missions.

Combat missions: Combat missions are simply missions where you are required to directly confront the enemy faction. It can go from the simple destroy x number of enemy laser towers, ships,etc.. to capturing ships and even destroying/capturing stations. The more reputation you have with said faction, the more difficult the missions you get. Combat missions should give the highest rewards, I am talking about millions of credits and even unique blueprints, weapons and even prototype ships, to compensate for the loss of reputation with that enemy faction.

Infiltration/scouting missions: They can start from deploying satellites and stuff to hacking ship/station, stealing blueprint, picking friendly agent and escape from enemy territory, etc...This kind of missions gives less reputation penalty with target faction after completion of mission but gives rewards good enough to compensate for that reputation loss and makes it worthy (special engine, powerful fighters, special deployables, etc...)

Trading missions: Those missions are for the people who want to contribute in the war without losing too much reputation with other factions . Missions would range from delivering specific goods to stations all the way to building stations, building ships, donating money, offering trading ships, etc...Trading missions should be the least impactful reputationwise, but rewards should be things like special discount with ally faction, special production blueprint, highly trained trader/manager, cheaper plots, etc...


While this is a very rough idea that just came to me, I think it will bring multiple layers of depth to X-foundation and give more reason to different type of players to assist in the war and turn the game into what it supposed to be, a 4X game.

Sparky Sparkycorp
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Re: How to balance between combat and trading

Post by Sparky Sparkycorp » Wed, 9. Jan 19, 14:13

I generall agree with your post, and I like the war mission grouping idea.

Just to note though, when a small ship bails that often gives >million when equipment is sold before the ship (and loot from kills many be valuable too sometimes).

Anyhow, like I mentioned, I'd like to see adjustments in this area since I like to be combat-focused and the existing war mission chains often inhibit that. For example by requiring a non-fight sub-mission to be completed before a subsequent fight sub-mission can be started.

Bubonosaure
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Joined: Tue, 13. Nov 18, 00:26
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Re: How to balance between combat and trading

Post by Bubonosaure » Wed, 9. Jan 19, 15:07

Same sentiment on my part. But this is something they always struggled to do and X:Rebirth was probably the closest to whole out war (main plot).

A type of mission I'd really like to see is battles. You see, all your war efforts should lead somewhere. Right now, you do stuff but it doesn't feel impactful. "put laser turrets here" great. "Deliver chips" great but nothing happens after.

So hear me out. Once you reach 27 reputation (allied) faction sometimes offer the ultimate mission chain : supply goods to help them build a fleet, bring some ships of your own (they could for example ask you to bring an auxilliary carrier with 40 fighters) and go to the designated area to wreck havoc. Once the mission is triggered, the opposite faction should be informed of what's about to happen and bring a huge fleet to counter you. The objective could be to destroy a bunch of stations, for example. Rewards should be of course in the millions and/or a free plot in one the territories of the faction you just helped. Or whatever, you decide.
Now, another thing that would be interesting to add even more meat to the bone : the opposite faction should try to poach you in exchange for better reputation and credits. something along the line of "join our side and we'll forgive what you did and greatly compensate you" BAM ! There you go. Factions should strive to reconquer their lost territories and rebuild destroyed station, not just be pushovers.
Other idea : if you attack a faction's and they are left with too few forces to defend, then they could hire Teladi mercenaries. This would greatly stimulate Teladi's economy and the endangered faction could use this forces to push back invaders.

Teladi need more interactions with Xenons as well. Conquest and invasions, basically (hi blackrain). They could have missions to down certain Xenon stations and Xenon should try to regularly stockpile fleets in one big push. There's no reason the universe should be so static. The problem right now is either nothing happens or the player goes on a rampage and factions roll over and die (on top of many despicable bugs and shortcomings).

We already have aggression missions but this would be the late game fantasy that, I feel, many players desire. It's too easy to reach a critical mass in this game and that's partly due to factions having very little leverage to counter us. I know Egosoft wants to bring more content to the game, and they should, but this kind of content would be absolutely amazing. What's the use of having a dynamic and fully simulated economy in a completely static world ? Go wild, Egosoft.

breizhbugs
Posts: 37
Joined: Mon, 10. Dec 18, 14:09
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Re: How to balance between combat and trading

Post by breizhbugs » Wed, 9. Jan 19, 15:38

I make decent money when i want to scan station by killing nearby xenom, khaak and roaming SCA. Roughly 10k from the station and 30k from the Faction per kill!
I nearly make no missions (some transport from time to time) cause i think they don't pay enough for the work. Also i don't want a world that only change with missions. World evolution should be independant from player gameplay choice. Invasions should happen even if player don't do war missions, etc....
What I don't like in this game is the ability to up both HOP and opposite faction reputation. You shouldn't be able to be friend with everyone in this game! As one rise, the other should go down!
This issue cause HOP Traders to go to enemy territory. And i think you can become red to friendly faction when they -ANT in my case - attack HOP traders and friendly shoot you: you then become red to the patrol that start attacking your base! I was lucky to not put defenses on by base so it doesn't respond to the patrol attack and i was able to bail 2frigates without further consequences on my ANT rep....

Also, i dont find it clear of whether the player IS a faction or if we are purposed to be part of a faction.
If We are a faction, then, who cares other faction war missions. We have to do what we need to grow and take over the world, not helping other faction to do so...

Helmut_AUT
Posts: 81
Joined: Thu, 29. Nov 18, 19:29

Re: How to balance between combat and trading

Post by Helmut_AUT » Thu, 10. Jan 19, 14:51

I gave the game back a few weeks ago, but from what I still read here I tend to agree with the intial post... Combat seems to be a "Sideeffect" of a Economy Simulation here, not really a goal of the game in itself. It's certainly a lot more basic and underdeveloped compared to the trading and station building.

I know I'm repeating what I said in another thread, but to me it seems one of the easiest ways to employ the player for a Faction in war would be to make him a Corsair (or think U-Boats in the Atlantic WW2...). Get assigned an "enemy" sector from your "Allied" Faction Representative, go patrol that sector and capture or sink enemy resource miners, cargo vessels or combat ships. Get rewarded per "tonnage sunk" and from selling your prizes.

It's not really a novel idea, and it would sit nicely on the underlying "living" economy.

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