An idea to improve gameplay

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Techedge
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Re: An idea to improve gameplay

Post by Techedge »

mr.WHO wrote: Mon, 2. Sep 19, 17:21 the OP ideas sounds good for some kind of strategy game for mobile, but not good for X4.

Why we would have to get a magical bonus from arbitrary selected sector?
Someone said to introduce rare resources, but this is basically the same - why having one special resource give you magical buff to some stats?

This doesn't fit X4 at all.
I find the OP changes interesting but have stated since the beginning that they would have turned X4 into a different game. I think the ideas won't have any chance (or little) to make into the main game however they are good and would be ideal for a total conversion (remember X3AP with LU+Mayhem? That was a totally different game!).

As a matter of fact, someone has already answered on the technical part stating it would be difficult to create some of the proposed changes, however discussing them won't do any harm to anyone! :D

(plus, the proposed changes of adding mods and boarding abilities to NPCs should really be taken into consideration by the devs, IMHO).
longliveX
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Re: An idea to improve gameplay

Post by longliveX »

Thanks for all replies! I think I can explain.

Before X4, I don't remember the existence of any random value function, right? but X4 added it. I just extended this function, not created it.

Modify ship parameters with random attributes already exist (the speed, radar range, weapon parameters...and so on). although I don't think it's particularly good (the player has to load save files many times for good result, it's better to remove random values in the final result and change to random grade raw materials, I don't know if I express it clearly. move all random values to the raw material), but this is a brave start.

Someone said that it became another game. I want to know what it must look like. if so, we think it should fit the elements of the 4X game: eXlore, eXpand, eXploit, eXterminate. This is a recognized definition of space games.

Now look at X4:

Is there any difference between Black Hole Sun IV and True Vision? Where is the meaning of exploration? If every sector has only factories and resources, what are we going to explore?

In the Civilization series, each region has its own attributes. in Stellaris, every galaxies are different. yes, they are all strategy games. but who stipulates that only a strategy game can have such a design?

Will the faction expand its territory? Where is its motivation? I remember that some modder has done such a mod in X3TC (simulated code):

Wait 600 seconds
If player is alive
Send out 100 K/I/P

This is too simple and rude to make people understand.

War should come from a motive, and motivation comes from the desire for important sectors, because in real history, all wars are territorial battles, aren't they? now every sector is the same. what is the reason for the faction to start the war?

There are a thousand Hamlets in a thousand people's eyes, everyone can express their opinions. anyway, when we start the game, we know that this must be X4, not EVE, why, because I did not suggest that you must finish reading dazens of professional books before you can drive a destroyer, I also didn't say that I wanted to turn it into a turn-based game. :mrgreen:
longliveX
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Re: An idea to improve gameplay

Post by longliveX »

Techedge wrote: Mon, 2. Sep 19, 21:52
I find the OP changes interesting but have stated since the beginning that they would have turned X4 into a different game. I think the ideas won't have any chance (or little) to make into the main game however they are good and would be ideal for a total conversion (remember X3AP with LU+Mayhem? That was a totally different game!).

As a matter of fact, someone has already answered on the technical part stating it would be difficult to create some of the proposed changes, however discussing them won't do any harm to anyone! :D

(plus, the proposed changes of adding mods and boarding abilities to NPCs should really be taken into consideration by the devs, IMHO).
I think LU is a good mod , the designer's philosophy is similar to mine. my problem is that I have no ability to implement it.If I can, I will immediately make a mod like I have suggested.
longliveX
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Re: An idea to improve gameplay

Post by longliveX »

mr.WHO wrote: Mon, 2. Sep 19, 17:21 the OP ideas sounds good for some kind of strategy game for mobile, but not good for X4.

Why we would have to get a magical bonus from arbitrary selected sector?
Someone said to introduce rare resources, but this is basically the same - why having one special resource give you magical buff to some stats?

This doesn't fit X4 at all.
Count-strike comes from half life mod
Dota comes from Warcraft III mod

They are all very different from the game itself, but they have created greater success.

I mean that changing is not a bad thing for X4.
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Sandalpocalypse
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Re: An idea to improve gameplay

Post by Sandalpocalypse »

This would not improve gameplay. It would encourage wars to be decided by the first battle. If you are losing it becomes harder and harder to turn around because the other side is stacking bonuses. And if you are winning it becomes easier and easier as your bonuses improve. There's a reason the faction enhancer mod adds bonuses to the *losing* faction.
Irrational factors are clearly at work.
Techedge
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Re: An idea to improve gameplay

Post by Techedge »

And that's one of the reasons I keep saying that applying such changes would clearly need a lot of work on the balance side.
longliveX
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Re: An idea to improve gameplay

Post by longliveX »

Sandalpocalypse wrote: Tue, 3. Sep 19, 00:43 This would not improve gameplay. It would encourage wars to be decided by the first battle. If you are losing it becomes harder and harder to turn around because the other side is stacking bonuses. And if you are winning it becomes easier and easier as your bonuses improve. There's a reason the faction enhancer mod adds bonuses to the *losing* faction.
Let me explain, as I mentioned earlier, there is a sector that its owner can produce aircraft carrier. even if you occupy it, you may have to face a joint attack of two or three enemies, because this sector is worth fighting for, maybe other factions will Form an alliance to deal with you and offset your gain. There are many factions in the game, not just two. The important sector is that all factions want to get, not only what your enemy wants.
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Sandalpocalypse
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Re: An idea to improve gameplay

Post by Sandalpocalypse »

Most sectors arn't going to have multiple factions bordering them.

You can't solve a fundamental design issue like that with balance patches. Trying to fix it by making the AIs tear down all winners would be aggravating at best - whenever you accomplished anything of meaning in a war sense the AIs would band together and reverse it. Even if you had to end up with dumb alliances?

I mean the baseline war in the game is HOP vs PAR, ARG. It's already a 2v1 and its that way for political reasons. Who's going to balance this out? Will Argon call it quits every couple spacedays and then TEL teams up with HOP to stop PAR from growing? If pure Machiavellian intrigue ruled the galaxy then ARG/TEL should be doing everything to encourage the war to keep the PAR crippled.
Irrational factors are clearly at work.
longliveX
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Re: An idea to improve gameplay

Post by longliveX »

Sandalpocalypse wrote: Tue, 3. Sep 19, 10:24 Most sectors arn't going to have multiple factions bordering them.
I have mentioned in the first post that the game will start with adding some unowned sectors, not just the existing ones, meaning that there are certainly sectors that will bordered by multiple factions.
Sandalpocalypse wrote: Tue, 3. Sep 19, 10:24 You can't solve a fundamental design issue like that with balance patches.
I am not going to discuss the design of the "balance patch". I don't even understand what needs to be balanced. It is only the e-sports game that needs to be concerned, like the Protoss and the Zerg in StarCraft. because it is a battle between people, we must ensure the balance of the three factions. what do we have to balance in this game? the player has nothing from the beginning, and the faction even has its own shipyard and aircraft carrier. Is this balanced?

Maybe I don't quite understand the true meaning of the balance you are talking about, if you want, wait for your guidance.
Sandalpocalypse wrote: Tue, 3. Sep 19, 10:24 Trying to fix it by making the AIs tear down all winners would be aggravating at best - whenever you accomplished anything of meaning in a war sense the AIs would band together and reverse it. Even if you had to end up with dumb alliances?
In all my posts, I have never said that let AI destroy everything. Maybe my English level is not enough to understand what you really mean. You said that when you do anything, AI will unite to stop you? If you occupy a worthless sector, why should other factions bother you?
Sandalpocalypse wrote: Tue, 3. Sep 19, 10:24 I mean the baseline war in the game is HOP vs PAR, ARG. It's already a 2v1 and its that way for political reasons. Who's going to balance this out? Will Argon call it quits every couple spacedays and then TEL teams up with HOP to stop PAR from growing? If pure Machiavellian intrigue ruled the galaxy then ARG/TEL should be doing everything to encourage the war to keep the PAR crippled.
Yes, the game settings are that ARG and ANT are allies, HOP and PRD are opponents, Xenon is the enemy of everyone, that is the outline of the story, I am talking about gameplay, there is no conflict between them, otherwise, how do you explain that in the multiplayer game of StarCraft, when you play 2V2 or 3V3, you use Protoss and your teammates use Zerg?
Techedge
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Re: An idea to improve gameplay

Post by Techedge »

By balance we mean (in a very simplistic way) that everything has, and must have, strenghts and weaknessess. It's a concept so deeply learnt by us old X players that I can't find a way to explain it better :P

However I must add that in X4 these balances seems to me more loose than in previous games, probably to make the game more desirable to casual players.

In your case, adding stats to the sectors would require a "balance" in a way that whoever owns the sector shouldn't gain an advantage so strong to overcome enemies with that bonus; however it should be strong enough to make it worth fighting for.
longliveX wrote: Tue, 3. Sep 19, 11:52
I am not going to discuss the design of the "balance patch". I don't even understand what needs to be balanced. It is only the e-sports game that needs to be concerned, like the Protoss and the Zerg in StarCraft. because it is a battle between people, we must ensure the balance of the three factions. what do we have to balance in this game? the player has nothing from the beginning, and the faction even has its own shipyard and aircraft carrier. Is this balanced?

Maybe I don't quite understand the true meaning of the balance you are talking about, if you want, wait for your guidance.
Do you want to know what the balance is in this case? It's the player himself! We as humans can (almost) easily overcome the AIs in such different ways that the developers can't think of when they program the game. And that's the balance, you start with nothing but you have the most powerful resource: brain. :D
longliveX
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Re: An idea to improve gameplay

Post by longliveX »

Techedge wrote: Wed, 4. Sep 19, 19:14
Everything has, and must have, strenghts and weaknessess

humans can (almost) easily overcome the AIs in such different ways that the developers can't think of when they program the game
I believe that I understand what you mean, this is the basis of the answer :)

If you can't think of it, then you don't need to think about it. that's why people always need to work together. everyone has different ways of thinking and different ways to solve problems. however, the purpose of developing X4 is not to design a perfect fighter to win all the battles against human pilots, I am sure this is what Alpha Dog needs to do, so in this game, balance is definitely not a thing to consider first.

When we develop games or mods, the most important thing is: what game experience do we want players to get? as long as the player does get in the game, then we are successful, even if the game AI's behavior is very stupid. like the StarCraft I mentioned, the protoss can simply build many cannons to block the road. this strategy has no effect on human opponents but very useful to deal with AI, which does not prevent it from becoming the best RTS game.

In fact, the AI of all games is very stupid, not that AI designers are stupid, but they know that this is not the point.

What are we going to offer players and how will the player deal with us? The former only needs to consider one thing, the latter has to consider a thousand ways or even more. But please don't misunderstand, I agree that balance is necessary, but I don't think it is so important.

So, come up with an idea and then implement it to make sure that the player gets the experience/fun/challenge you want them to get. this is a successful implementation. after this, balance is needed.

Obviously , X4 has not yet reached the goal of developers, so the balance should not be considered now.
Techedge
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Re: An idea to improve gameplay

Post by Techedge »

longliveX wrote: Thu, 5. Sep 19, 03:05 Obviously , X4 has not yet reached the goal of developers, so the balance should not be considered now.
Sure it hasn't. I hope it hasn't!
I get your point, still you need to take into account balance, even if not yet reached the goal, to avoid taking a wrong turn during development that won't be easy to correct at that point.
However, we are philosophizing here, shall we concentrate on improving gameplay?
longliveX
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Re: An idea to improve gameplay

Post by longliveX »

From I started posting, I didn't play X4 anymore(maybe writing a post in English runs out of my energy.:D)

Until now, I actually didn't even build an aircraft carrier, I have enough money, but I didn't want to build it, because everything is foreseeable. the factory keeps making money for me, building a powerful fleet and sweeping everything you can see. I can't get excited when I think about it.

A good script can produce a classic drama or movie. For X4, we can't expect it's story (I believe egosoft didn't expect it), then gameplay must be considered. Of course, it's just what I expected, and maybe more people like the current game.

I expect every time I start a new game, I will face different situations, from the best to the worst. for example, perhaps at the beginning of the game, the attribute of Holy Vision is "Xenon K / I / P caused double damage", I will immediately full of energy because I need to save the HOP before it was destroyed by Xenon. another example, Teldi became the first faction to build an aircraft carrier. However, it can't resist Xenon for too long. I need to improve my reputation as soon as I can and fight Xenon with all my power.

No matter how many situations I say, there is an equal factor, that is, when the game starts, it gives the player a motive, or a wish. This gives the player the motivation to play the game. And randomness can lead to catastrophic situations, but when players win the war at last(maybe lost), I believe that sense of accomplishment will be unparalleled.

Maybe some people like to play games without stress, look at their factory and the wallet. please, this is not a construction game.

Say some new content, I suggest that the sectors should be divided into core, general, border defense three levels, do not brush out pirates everywhere, in the core area, it should be absolutely safe, the general area can have pirates or Xenon fighters, the border area should It is the most intense place in the battle. So that different players have the place they want to go.

Of course, these areas will change as the sector gets and loses. Sorry, my English level makes me unable to describe it clearly. It may be necessary to draw a picture to represent it.

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