So is it safe to say sins is le caput? I come here once in a while now and it seems like nothing is happening.
I hope IC has just given up on the Expansion and is putting resources into a sequel!
Systems instead of planets!!!
I forget where I saw it, but I think one of the Frasiers said at one point that they had 500,000 people who owned the game, but that 75,000 had come online at one point or another. If the online community had been given peripherals to thrive, it'd be easy to imagine that there would be somewhere around 500-750 people on at any given time.
CJ pretty much has hit it on the nose. The devs released a very poorly supported online component to the game and few put up with it, and because of that, the community never really grew. I hate to say it, but there's very little incentive to listen to the needs of the multiplayer community, even though we're basically the forum outside of N3Rull.
Because games without MP get slammed with that fact in reviews and only rarely do they get away with it. Even if nobody uses it, an MP component will draw a larger crowd because the people who love competition have to prove they are better than everyone at everything, including new game X. A couple bad reviews from major sites or shows can really hurt a game's chances, even if it is a solid game.
Mass effect and bioshock are the only two HUGE hit games that are single player only, and BIoshock 2 might have MP so the trend is fairly clear...
It's possible that it might not have ANY multiplayer at all. The reasoning goes like this. Why spend 20% or whatever of the development costs for a feature that only 1% of all purchasers will ever try or use?
END QUOTE
Tkins' Post:
I swear you and I had this discussion and we were on opposite ends of the argument hahaha
This is definitely valid, and I've argued it before. If it's a sins2 game though, the development costs won't be 20% because they should be able to take a lot of the resources and experience from sins 1 to deliver a better mp experience with fewer costs. Now if they have the management skills to produce those results is unknown.
wow... sweeping statement much?
im going to oppose this just on principal because it is such a blatant, unsupported and misleading assumption
i like to think i am a decent (larger than average?) part of the forums, yet i dont play MP (usually because of time differences and work but...)
and i know many people who dont play MP being the same
Bad Amish, Bad
I totaly agree Rez
Multiplayer is tightly connected to singleplayer experience.
Whatever people do in multiplayer is simply overgrown, abused and exploited version of what people do in single player. If something is OP/UP in multi, it is the same in Singleplayer, only not so brightly.
Sins balanced with MP in mind will lead to a better SP experience as well.
If all caps are useful in multi, they will be useful in SP.If egg stops being the only cap that makes sense for Vasari in MP, it becomes more enjoyable to try new stuff with other caps in SP (you feel less of an AI abuser).and so on.
All bow to N3rull, you get it. Having an MP component is like taking the game through a stress test, any weak point WILL be discovered. The devs play the game like it was intended, the players play the game to win. I would spam pink hippos for 20 hours if it was the only way to win, and sadly, the days of a balanced fleet beating spam are over...
Yeah! You're forgetting all us modders too!
Yeah, if you'll forgive a foolish amishman. I've been working on the balance mod again. Speciically I'm trying to get what I can from Kitkun's post on making capital ships viable in beffore I release another version of the mod.
Point being, the more I work on the mod, the more frustrated I get. Kinda a wierd side effect that'll make me spit out statements such as:
And by the way:
TBH I'm trying to eliminate the spam, bring balance. I'm a random college student who enjoys the game enough to balance it with a calculator. I have no reason to attack Stardock for if they hadn't released the game, I would have nothing to bitch about, but tell me, how would listening to the most blatant of the multiplayer problems be a problem? How would giving balance to multiplayer play ruin single player play?
I think I'll rephrase my opinion from before. The online players are the most well versed players in the game. I won't make the sweeping statement and say that people who play single player and use the mods aren't knowledgable, when in fact they make up most of the community. When it comes to being the voice of experience and knowing how to play the game, it's the multiplayer community who in general gives the best advice. Why we aren't listend to when there's a consensus among them (such as there is no counter to repulse), confuses me.
I dunno if I'm there, but hell, the mod will be WAY closer than the current balance.
Right up until someone figures out which unit is 'god' and spams it
Exactly, spam is easy and quick, if winning is the only satisfaction you get from the game then contracting illumspamitis and TARS (Traumatic Abusive Repulse Syndrome) is the best way to get there.
Building a fleet that is completely balanced and has all counters in perfect proportion to your opponent's fleet takes time and a lot of people don't actually know all of the effective counters. LRFs and LFs are obvious, fighters counter a lot, but they do not counter a lot very effectively.
The main advantage of spam is it is easier to manage than a diverse fleet. Someone may have nice fleet diversity, but not be as good at micro managing and getting optimal results with it, so the guy who throws wave after wave of the same ship may start winning because he is using his simpler tactic more effectively.
The real balance problem occurs when you get Illuminators + some Flak + several Guardians w/ Repulse + a Progen + a Halcyon. Fleet size and player skill being even, this fleet will win. Of course, this isn't spam anymore, it is a diverse fleet...one that keeps getting nastier as it grows in size and get additional capitals.
Take away the flak and its still a winning combo, and is still spam.
I ithink the issue I have with calling
that a diverse fleet. It's largely because the fleet is a fleet that was not intentionally balanced, it was a template. By that I mean,
1. Build Illums
2. Build Flak to counter the Fighters your opponent brings out
3. Add in the Guardians with shield bubble and then repulse to add the killing blow that is lethal when combined with illums
4. Get a halcyon at your luxury
So yeah, it's "diverse", but it's built to exploit, not be balanced.
Personally, I say nerf repulse by doubling everyting about it or more, and then nerfing Illums so they're on par with the other lrfs. That should do it. Or at least that's what I hope it does.
There are only a few workhorse ships in Sins -- LRM, HC, and somewhat Carriers ... everything else supports or protects the main damage dealers, so of course people are going to pick their strategy and spam the crap out of these few ships. From my perspective, EVERYONE spams one kind of a ship or another...and this is common of a lot of RTS.
Don't muddy the water and call it a spam problem, call it a balance issue. Everyone spams a few ship types, with a few caps and support ships in tow.
Taken from wikipedia:
Spamming, in the context of computer games, refers to the rapid, repeated use of the same item or action.
When applied to real-time strategy games (or even some turn-based strategy games), spamming refers to the use of many units (usually of the same type) against an opponent. The units are usually cheap and quick to build, allowing players to send wave upon wave of the same unit against an opponent, with the intention of overwhelming their defenses with sheer numbers...
...To prevent this style of play, game developers do such things as designing the game to have increased unit strength through diversification, hence players are encouraged to build different types of units that support each other. Also, by having automatic initial base defenses, some games prevent the possibility of an early unit rush being easily successful.
Illuminator spam is the problem. Guardians, Motherships, Flak and Halcyons only serve to keep the spam strong past the first 20-30 minutes of a game. Remember that the illuminator/guardian problem begins as a unit spam problem, IE illuminators are too powerful for their cost and build time. I think a ship/race balance problem and a unit spam problem can be the same thing Cykur, hence the arguement. To each his own I suppose.
I disagree with this generalization as well.
Exactly, it is an Illuminator balance problem. That they choose to spam it is not the problem. When you complain about spam, it is a vague complaint, because in my experience, most games of Multiplayer Sins from the day it came out had spam. Redirect your complaint specifically to Illuminators.
At one time or another I've had attackers spam me with Scouts, Disciples, LRMs, Assailants, Illuminators, Kodiaks, Enforcers, Marzas and the various carriers. At one time or another, I have successfully killed people with my own spam of Disciples, Cobalts, LRMs, Assailants, Flak, HoHos, and various carriers. The only time spam is extremely hard to counter is when it is the Illuminator, hence I'm calling it an Illuminator problem, not a spam problem.
I hear some guys over here are talking about poor MP implementation...
Can't agree more!
The biggest, and perhaps only!?, mistake developers made with Sins is to underestimate importance of MP!
Game as such is PERFECT for some real online fun - in casual way, in enthusiast way, in semi-pro way even in pro way...
Yet that extra few elements of attention MP needed from devs - it unfortunately never received...
Total and utter shame
Also, when Frogboy comes and says "majority of Sins players are SP guys" - I mean... LOL
Yes!
Simply because MP part isn't quite there yet to attract people!!! Jezuz...
I hardly ever log into ICO... Why? Coz I NEVER have 2-3 hours of free time to spare for single round of Sins so I go and play SP instead...
Yes, Forgboy - I belong to that majority of SPs as well! But because I am forced in there...
I am looking forward to Diplomacy - of course - but frankly I much rather have massively improved MP experience!
The problem is that a player who is using one unit (with a couple support units) should be vulnerable, but they aren't with the game's current system.
An illum spam, even without repulse, is hard to beat early in the game. So is a huge blob of assailants or TEC lrms.
If nobody spammed the illum, it's balance would not be a problem since there would never be enough of them to turn a battle. But many people do, so the OPed illum's strenght is magnified by numbers and turns from an annoyance to a serious balance problem.
There is no problem with the illum being as strong as it is now, there is a problem with it being as spammable as it is now, but take away the illum and the advent have nothing but caps for most of the game.
Sigh.....the problem is there is no counter to Illum / Flak / Repulse. All I'm trying to say is people should discuss this and not cry "spam spam spam". You don't have to nerf the Illum, there just have to be viable counters, like Subverters were a viable counter back in 1.05. Just like strikecraft were a viable counter in 1.10. Guess what, people could have used different fleet composition and used tactics (like spreading out a bit) that were more resistant to Subverters, but instead everyone cried because their spam tactic wasn't working so Subs got nerfed. Strikecraft were a wee bit OP, but it was fairly even across the races, LRF's suddenly had an effective counter and couldn't comprise 90% of a fleet....rather than adapt, SOME people cried bloody murder, and now we have semi useless strikecraft again.
Now the problem is not that the Illuminator is too strong....which it is pretty damn strong, the problem is that there is no effective counter to Illum / Flak / Repulse / Progen / Halcyon ...keep adding ships as you grow bigger.... Entr 1.03 Illums have 10% less firepower than Vanilla 1.05 Illums....but they seem stronger because of the current racial balance.
All I'm trying to say, don't cry spam and muddy the issue, focus on the current balance of the Illuminator vs the other races. The Illuminator can remain strong as long as there is some kind of effective counter to an endgame Advent fleet.
As for spam, it is just a catch all that people cry all the time, especially when they are losing. I have built fleets that are using 2 or 3 types of ships, and supported by a couple caps, and people cry "Cykur, you damn spammer". And that is when I'm playing TEC or Vasari!!!! I almost never played Advent until just before I took a break from the game.
It is clear when people cry spam right now what they are usually talking about is Illuminators. But there are some people who get rolled by LRM spam, get HC rushed, or get rushed by Scout spam....guess what? Too bad!! You should have been able to defend yourself, or there was a reason why the other guy had more money than you. Period. There has always been different kinds of spam in Sins...in my opinion 1.10 was the patch that required the most balanced fleets.
Maybe we should ask Ironclad to just in the next patch to go back to Entrenchment 1.00 and Sins 1.10. It's a very imperfect solution, true, but it does represent a step forward over the current status quo.
We'll see what bugs there are, have them fix it, if there's any more Illuminator like tactics (which I don't think there were in 1.10), we'll ask them to fix. Other than that, the game was fine as it was.
Isn't it sad sometimes when devs try so hard to balance a game and then the end result is a game even less balanced than what they started out with? Sins isn't the first game to go down like this, and I doubt it will be the last.
The real problem with RTS games is the standard three races, almost all modern strategy games (COH aside) have three playable races. It is fine to have one light/quick/weak race and balance it against a slow/powerful race, but trying to go in between the two extremes is very hard. Look at supreme commander, all the races have essentially the same units and the game is still horribly balanced.
Sins will always be unbalanced to some degree, the armor/counter system makes that much sure. some counters will always be more powerful than others out of perceived neccessity, remember when flak was useless and carriers ruled? other way around now and it's not changing or it will be like pre 1.1 again
This is where I have to disagree, AOE, from II onwards, if I am correct, warcraft
Not to mention C&C, with GDI and Nog
There are many great features available to you once you register, including:
Sign in or Create Account
