I was trying to play the multiplayer game this evening. The main problem was I lost before I could even get started.
How could the other player upgrade there base right away? I was building my base on a similar start position neither of us had debt so how could they upgrade right away?
Otherwise I see some major flaws with starting a new game right now in multiplayer if you haven't played for a while or are new to the game.
Thanks for help anyone who can.
Hey Seilore,
It was me who did that to you. Don't get discouraged... when the game is released, or if you play more now during prime-time hours (3pm-9pm east-coast usa, 5pm-1am europe), you will get more diversity of opponents. The match-making system will improve once the game is release and there are more live players to match skill levels better.
I was able to upgrade to HQ2 almost instantly only because I was playing the Robotic faction. This factions starts with more starting resources. They get more starting resources to offset the fact that they are not generally as strong economically as some of the others. So, strong players will sell their excess starting electronics (10) and use that money to upgrade almost instantly to HQ level 2. Don't let that scare you, because robots really suffer in the later stages of the game compared to other factions.
By the way, I highly recommend playing robotic when you are learning the game for your first 50 online matches. Their economy is easier to learn, allowing you to focus on other game mechanics. Also, kudos to you for taking advantage of this great community like you did by posting here. I know that there are many here like BlackMagic who have mentioned a willingness to offer some live training sessions to help newcomers improve! Maybe try sending him a message in Steam.
The robotic HQ has a couple of advantages for upgrading quickly. As Wino mentioned they get excess electronics (start with 20 but only need 10 to upgrade to HQ2).
When you found on top of resources you crush them and start with them in your resource bank. One way to expand quicker is to found in a big patch of something (say iron or water) and then you start with resources you can sell down. Robots have a special advantage in that they double the resources they crush. You'll normally see robotic players flying through upgrades. If I can I normally found next to a high tile of something and crush some lower resources so I have some starting cash to push for that upgrade quickly. Upgrading to HQ2 quickly sometimes means you can get the best resources on the map if there's scarcity.
They are working on matches with like rated players but that's farther off. If I waited for a player that was similiarly ranked at the moment i'd be waiting all night. a lot of the top 10 in quickmatch live in europe so they're not playing at the same time I am. I understand the frustration though. Coming in to the game new is difficult when some in the community have been playing since it's been launched.
Here's my advice if you want to learn a lot about the game:Watch some videos. Zultar, PBHead, Deathtacticus, Yerand, and Cubit all have videos posted on twitch or youtube where they do commentary while they're playing. Invaluable resource. Everyone plays a little different so it's really interesting to watch what other people do and more importantly why they did what they did.
If you're not comfortable playing on the multiplayer level yet I suggest playing skirmishes against the AI until you can consistently beat at least the manager level. I started out just like you did and dove directly into multiplayer and got CRUSHED by the best players. Playing better players though is fantastic so don't shy away from it. You'll learn a lot more playing against a good player than you will a bad player.
As Wino mentioned I'm more than happy to help out people via Skype (especially new players) if they want some strategy tips, bounce off new ideas, ask questions, or anything else. I normally play most nights from around 8-11 PM Eastern time and on saturdays and sundays from around 1-3 PM. Drop me a line if you're interested and i'd be glad to help.
Also, please note that you can use the Replay Game feature to watch the last game you played if you want to see what your opponent is doing. You can use the number keys to switch the player perspective to see what exactly they are doing.
This is something that I've done since early on (starting on top of resources), I guess I've never realized how big of advantage Robotics gets at the beginning of the game. I've been playing incorrectly I guess the whole time by playing as expansive.
Oh well thanks for the information I appreciate it.
Good regular's always found as close as they can to their construction resources so they can upgrade ASAP and race to HQ3 and above as quickly as possible. Metall mines & steel mills or quarries should always be a player's first construction projects. Upgrading to the highest HQ levels first unlocks additional claims and gives you the ability to control and exploit the resource market at your whim. Being the first to produce the most profitable resource of the time allows you to profit from it until someone else starts producing it too. By having a stockpile of a resource, you can control its price and sell out of it when someone else gets into it.
When you found, you should always look for multiple founding locations and rate them by how good they are compared to the best founding location, and found early if the 2nd best spot is a lot worse than the best spot.
One common newbie mistake is upgrading for too high a price, after HQ3 upgrading ASAP is no longer automatically the best choice. Upgrading to HQ4 may leave you with too little wealth to defend yourself in case someone makes a run on your stock. Additionally some of the time you'll actually have enough cash to eliminate your opponent with through majority purchase (ie. buying 6 unowned stock). If upgrade resources are expensive, evaluate your other options first. Many of my opponent's I've seen upgrade when they were at 90% of the way to buying me by majority.
Yeah, expansive are late-game powerhouses whereas robotic are early game powerhouses, so it makes perfect sense that you would feel incredibly far behind if your trying to play as expansive vs robotic
Offworld Trading Platform seems to be getting me every time, I can't seem to get there.
Here are a few more points and I've said this from the beginning (early Alpha)
It's important not to focus too much on the "needed" resources and make sure that you are always paying attention to what will make the most money. If power stays low all game, you may never want to produce it. On the other hand, even a scav should make steel if it's $300 and nobody else is making much (especially if power is cheap). If you're making money off the most expensive resources, you can afford to buy the less expensive resources (or just afford the debt).
I'm curious as to what you mean by a "balanced" company.
I do agree about the borrowing money thing.
Assuming we're really talking about 1v1 quickmatch and basing conclusions off that, I'd tend to agree. In my experience, because 1v1 is so close to zero-sum, things can snowball a lot quicker and thus leave games lopsided and over fairly quickly. We've moved away from the need to rush offworld single-mindedly to win, but the 1v1 game still seems too short and prices too volatile to leverage tech effectively in most cases. As a result of rarely reaching the late-game, the experience feels rather flat, which is part of why I don't play much 1v1, even with the potentially deeper tactical space available (black market, price manipulation, other micro things).
I understand the rationale for wanting this, as it certainly feels bad to have to watch for an impending buyout and not have much you can do, but I feel like in most cases these sorts of delaying actions just drag out the game longer without really changing the outcome (or maybe be far too powerful if they do force a change in results). In larger games in particular, delays can create very large swings for one player relative to another, and that sort of potential for players about to be bought out to have large effects on the game's outcome should be minimized.
Other players already have to pay double your price for every stock you own (up to 3x if 5 stocks are bought by another player and you want to buy the last 5 shares in the player). As for the second point, I have a very hard time seeing it ever being relevant; anyone in a situation where they're gaining more debt than they're making money is likely already in a dire situation (and there would also be a question of how to account for discrete jumps in debt/income from interest/offworld launches, for example).
I'd imagine borrowing money directly would be a nightmare to balance properly, especially given how much more cash is currently worth than avoided debt. One could also argue that you could make a conscious effort to borrow money, though, by avoiding producing power/life support or by producing it in a way that allows you to sell it before it's automatically consumed (i.e. shipping it).
Note: The red isn't meant to be accusatory ro representing a teachers marking system or anything liek that, I jsut couldn't find a better colour that would show up on the grey background
Borrowing money would just be a worthless feature since everyone would immediatly borrow their full amount everytime, because the more money you have the more you can make and thus the higher your income causing you to have a higher net value causing you to be able to orrow more. All this would do is shorten the early and mid game a LOT. Heck, you don't like that people can upgrade ot level 2 right at the start, imagine if they could go to level 4
Okay what I mean by well balanced.
A well balanced company with a large enough reach makes or contracts out it's needs so It's not stuck paying a premium for goods it needs to run. So in this game you need power, water, food, oxygen, and assuming your base is not all linked fuel. So as a company I would want to look at cost/benefit to producing my own versus buying elsewhere. So a balanced company would produce 3 of the 5 to be able to support it's basic needs. (most of the time).
Now I've played several games and I see the same tactic over and over again and can't beat it any way. That's as follows Build base/build steal than branch out. Why would anyone do anything else? For one they are inexpensive to build and usually iron is cheap to begin with.
So ultimately what I mean by well balanced is just that. You may not agree with it but, that's the way I see it.
There isn't a huge benefit to being small, however, there should be other strategies to win, such as one may rush to win, however, if one does this and builds smart where they don't have to rely on the market for needs they may grow slower but, hold steady longer and potentially out pace the person who took the quick money and now has to slow way down because costs got too high. Right now that doesn't really happen, you grow quick you have enough tiles you can keep yourself growing at a huge rate. If you make a well rounded company that doesn't rely on the market you may be more solid but, they have out paced you so bad they just buy you out.
Again you may think that isn't a viable option, however, if I don't depend on anything and market crashes guess who's still here. In the game market doesn't crash or if it does it's too late to matter as you have off world trading options that your immune.
You also mention Gal Civ III, there are many strategies that can do you good there, all depending on the type of games you play Rush gets you only so far in that game.
Final Thoughts
All in all ultimately I'm suggesting options to attempt to avoid the sudden death. For those NFL fans it would be like the Packers from last weekend, holding your own, only to give it up with 1 quick blow and you feel left on the sideline watching the game end.
I would like to see a better way to try to protect yourself from the quick 1 shot blow (Player A just build offworld trading, sold 100k worth of goods just as I got to it boom they bought me out.) I understand it's not designed to be a long drawn out game, however, on the other hand there should be a way to hold on and have a chance for a come back such as a hail mary option.
All in all my points were attempts at suggestions on potentially how to do this and, I welcome thoughts/ideas for or against it. In PvP 1v1 right now it seems like which ever player pulls away at the beginning isn't being caught and, I have yet to find a strategy to offset the steel rush because you need it to upgrade.
I would certainly like to extend the 1v1 games a little so that at least patents are viable. What do you guys feel like would be the best way to do that?
At the moment I semi regularly use patents as Scientific. (Ie. I replace a steel mill at HQ3-4, get teleportation, nanotech and maybe slant drilling or carbon scrubbing and then recycle the patent lab.) I think one way to make patents more viable is to have colony lab modules reduce the price of patents (by no less than 10% per module) rather than the time to obtain them. As it is the extra time cost of building the patent lab away from your HQ cancels out the bonus somewhat. Time to obtain a patent is a relatively minor facet in my patent related subroutines, especially because lab adjacent tiles have little utility for anything except patent labs.
Naturally simply reducing the price of the patent lab and patents for 1v1s would increase their use,but that wouldn't be a particularly neat or clever way to do it.
I think patents are viable as scientific in a 1v1 but only certain ones. Nanotech, thinking machines, teleportation and in some cases slant drilling are certainly worth it. After that though it gets situational. Most of the other patents aren't worth it with only 1 opponent because the price of goods doesn't spike enough.
Engineering labs are almost useless because on-world prices never get out of control. 1v1 is all about hacker array and offworlds. Hacker arrays are arguably most important.
In order to make patents more viable I'd make the colony increase in size more in a 1v1 than it does now. That makes on-world prices higher on life support, power, glass, and electronics and thus makes virtual reality, water engine, carbon scrubbing, and cold fusion more usable/relevant. Making the colony grow more makes engineering labs as well as patent labs more relevant and gives you another way to win besides an offworld/hacker array combo.
I would re-work steel factories and have them require something other than just iron. All other expensive items require at least 2 resources some even 3 see below...
(xx) = default pricing...
Iron (20) -> Steel -> (60) (Steel is high demand for all but, scavenger bases so this typically stays high and is a rush target and easy to build)
Carbon (20) + Fuel (40) -> Chemicals (80) (Chemicals will fluctuate but, to make it worth while early in game need to be scavenger and be able to produce Fuel.)
Silicon (20) + Oxygen (40) -> Glass (80) (Glass not really needed until mid to late game so if one focuses on this it drops rapidly plus have to produce Oxygen.)
Aluminum (20) + Silicon (20) + Carbon (20) -> Electronics (100) (Needed late game to upgrade, usually need to mine Silicon/Carbon as one of them is going to be expensive.)
Water (20) -> Fuel (40) or Oxygen (40) (Needed for normal operation plus Chemicals/Glass.)
Thoughts...
If you had Steel require something other than just Iron it would open up other possibilities for winning or if there were other uses for Aluminum/Silicon other than Electronics/Glass such as have different base types require different core elements similar to the scavenger base requiring Carbon instead of steel.
So with that being said Steel means victory and with only two players especially if they are both non-scavenger this will stay high enough to get them to level 4/5. I've tried playing Carbon based and Scavenger to offset it, simply meaning I don't need any steel and it does keep steel lower in cost but, not enough for it to be an alternative.
I would try focusing on Silicon -> Glass, however, no matter what base you have you don't really need too much Silicon until you level 4/5 therefore you have to get past the low levels where your spending too much on oxygen/power to make that viable. Plus your then saturating a market with glass that doesn't need it and that cost falls to nothing. Not to mention you still need Carbon or steel to upgrade and the little bit of glass you need doesn't offset what you're not producing.
All of this would help bring the game to later stages with the added bonus of offering alternatives to winning other than rushing steel.
Other Questions...
Why is it if your stock is all bought say 60/40 why is it that player B can still purchase player A's stock for the share price to make it 50/50 but, player A can not purchase their own stock for share value to make it 70/30? Not to mention why is it when player B purchases said stock (which would be in player A's pocket) Player A doesn't get the cash value of the stock, after all they would if they sold it prior to player B purchasing it. This may offer an additional way to attempt to stay alive by keep buying back your own stock.
Game Error?
Last night when playing 1vs1 pvp the other player was able to buy me out right after game start. No one had really purchased much, however, game end received message that I was bought out. Forgot to view replay to see how that happened.
Bug in Multiplayer...
If starting a game and your waiting for player to connect and for whatever reason that player doesn't connect there is no way to back up. The game just sits on that screen and one has to force close the game to leave it. The Esc button doesn't do anything.
This is to allow the game to end fairly quickly. Allowing people to rebuy their own stocks delays the game potentially for a very long time.
Please save your replays and log files when encountering a bug, many bugs are really hard to bug fix without them.
@Soren, I think having the game auction the ability to "rent" colony modules would increase the use of patents. Perhaps you could even rent colony modules for a fixed price, kind of like you can currently buy things on the black market. Labs would give you some time to expend on obtaining patents, engineering modules would give upgrade abilities, warehouses would give a global player specific buff to OW profitability and offices would give you a minute to spend on hacking, renting a hab module would give you cash over the span of a day (like a PD). The rent-time only goes down as used where appllicable. I think it may be a good idea to have a daily or semi daily auction in addition to the regular auction that runs for the entire day, lets say from 18:00 to 18:00.
(For multiple auctions to work without interfering a lot with the players, you'd have to be able to set a max bid price up to which the game would automatically bid you.)
They used to have the mechanic where you can buy back all of your own stock but have gone away from it. I personally like the direction they're going where you can buy 1 stock at a time until the final 5 shares.
If you allow people to buy back their own stock it feels like that would make the game REALLY long. Just back and forth stock purchases forever. Not sure I'd be a fan of that.
Game Error?Last night when playing 1vs1 pvp the other player was able to buy me out right after game start. No one had really purchased much, however, game end received message that I was bought out. Forgot to view replay to see how that happened.
If you have enough money you can Shift Buy. Essentially you hold the shift key and hit the buy stock button to buy available shares.
Bug in Multiplayer...If starting a game and your waiting for player to connect and for whatever reason that player doesn't connect there is no way to back up. The game just sits on that screen and one has to force close the game to leave it. The Esc button doesn't do anything.
Yep. That happens right now when there's a failure to load. You have to kill the game in order to escape (alt + F4 will kill it). Happens enough right now in 1v1 that i have a couple of those a night.
So really there is no reason to purchase more than 5 shares of your own stock, because you loose the money you spent on it should a different player purchase it over the top over you. Not to mention what's the point then of even having the stock option being that you can't block anyone from buying you out and as soon as more than 50% of your stock is purchased by other players game over for you. At this point you might just as well have 6 shares that you can't purchase because as soon as that 6th is your done. Now I know if you have 50% they have to pay several times more for that last share of stock as much as 10x (basically paying the player double value for their shares). That is just a formality at that point.
To me stock should work like stock. See below...
So really there is no reason to purchase more than 5 shares of your own stock, because you loose the money you spent on it should a different player purchase it over the top ove you.
Player B in that scenario doesn't buy your stock for the share price. Player B has to pay 2x the amount if the share is already owned by player A. So it is advantageous to buy up your own stock to make yourself less vulnerable/desirable to a buyout because they need twice as much cash to buy you out. It's essentially a defense mechanism to protect yourself and make it harder for people to buy you out more than a revenue generating strategy.
In terms of getting cash back when someone purchases a share you own they are currently experimenting with that in the next_version.
Seilore
First of all thank you for creating this thread. Hopefully it will allow other struggling players to realize that this game can be extremely newbie unfriendly and that they are not alone. And while the learning curve is steep to begin with, the transition from single player to multiplayer is so much steeper. It doesn't help that default settings have almost nothing in common with the settings used by the core MP community or ladder games. IIRC at the moment it's assistant difficulty, scanning and changing speed. I know that game designers don't want OTC to be purely MP oriented and also not all of the above was their choice. But maybe decision maker see this thread and alikes and will understand that making transition from SP to MP virtually impossible for someone who hasn't watched hours of fan made videos does not help with increasing the player base. Only the opposite.
As for your comments regarding winning strategies... Here's the thing...the game is all about interaction with the market. Whether you actively affect it by manipulating the prices or react to rivals' actions or natural changes, you cannot escape it. You can't build a company that's not influenced by the market just as you can't build an army that's not influenced by the combat. What you can do is to improve your company's robustness by investing in multiple resources, upgrades and patents. Pretty much all new players think that robust (balanced if you wish) company is self efficient one. But this is just not true with OTC. Robust company is the one that keeps making cash. And turning that cash into more cash. Think about it. The match lasts 20-30 minutes. What kind of long term goal in a traditional sense of the word could there be? OTC really isn't empire building type of a game. If you are more into long term goals and building up, you might like the campaign. Multiplayer is the rush. And 1v1 even more than FFA, because upgrades and patents seldom pay off short term and long term simply doesn't exist.
I know from personal experience how overwhelming the transition from SP can be. Everything is too fast, too cutthroat and too unforgiving. But it gets better, trust me. You get used to the faster pace and the community is great. As long as you're willing to make an effort and learn, there always will be people willing to help.
So really there is no reason to purchase more than 5 shares of your own stock, because you loose the money you spent on it should a different player purchase it over the top over you. Not to mention what's the point then of even having the stock option being that you can't block anyone from buying you out and as soon as more than 50% of your stock is purchased by other players game over for you. At this point you might just as well have 6 shares that you can't purchase because as soon as that 6th is your done. Now I know if you have 50% they have to pay several times more for that last share of stock as much as 10x (basically paying the player double value for their shares). That is just a formality at that point. To me stock should work like stock. See below...
The game is simplified so that it can be an RTS wherein matches last about 15-30 min. I'd like a slow paced (ie. more complex and more realistic) version of OTC like you describe though.
Alright, so your idea is that you be self-sufficient so that you dont' have to pay a premium for goods right? Well let's just try to change your perspective a little. Think abotu it liek this: You need steel to upgrade, and steel to make buildings. You want to upgrade and build buildings as fast as possible so you want to use up your steel as fast as possible. With 3 steel mills your making 2.4 steel per second. Ideally, your also consuming 2.4 steel per second, because you need to consume steel to grow more. Compare that to the next highest thing you run a deficit on, power, which would be about 1.2 a second in that game. The early game ahs this self-sufficiency, but self-sufficiency in building resources, not in life support, which is why we go for steel, iron andaluminum at the start. We dont' want to pay a premium for the thigns we are going to be consuming the most. Ontop of that, we can't use the debt system for that particular consumption, but we can do for power, food etc. so it makes perfect sense to go for steel and aluminium first. So you see, your desire to be self-sufficient should lead you to make building resources first.
There are other ways of playing that do not do this ofcourse, but they arn't really usuable in 1 vs 1 and I have no idea how I would buff them without harming the FFA scene, which is what the game is designed around.
Also, you don't want to use the market yes? You want to be able to survive anything it throws at you, you want to do a defensive strategy right? Well, in other RTS games that is called turtling. The analogy follows that in another RTS you would be making a muillion turrets and sitting in base. Think going 2 bases in starcraft, then building a million turrets and then.. what? Hoping your opponent dies from boredom as he sends waves and waves of units into you? From my perspective it's arguable that your asking to be able for the turtler to win in this situation. Turrets are bad, as is sequestering yourself away from the market completly. And finally, if the market crashes, you can't make cash either, so both you and your opponents would be in a no-win situation
We haven't talked about it much, but the game is very moddable. Not just the XML but the core game C# files. We haven't released documentation for it, but the files are available under C:\Users\[name]\Documents\my games\Offworld\mods\Hidden\Reference. You should be able to do some of these things (and a lot more) with a mod.
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