Re: Bigger--not always better

On Tue, 25 Mar 1997, Mikko Kurki-Suonio wrote:

> On Tue, 25 Mar 1997, Oerjan Ohlson wrote:
> 
> > So? It's not hard to make new FT designs, you know. If the new
designs 
> > mean more variation in the game - since you suddenly see more than
one 
> > type of beam weapons, for example - I'm all for it.
> 
> Still, it's work. And with all changes of this kind, you're going to
run 
> into someone who designed his fleet with a different set of house
rules.
> Someone in a hurry is likely to whip the "vanilla" designs out of the 
> rulebook anyway.
>  
> > No matter how FT is changed to give a better balance between
weapons, 
> > ship classes etc old designs will have to be re-done.
> 
> But if you only change point costs, you can just re-calculate old 
> designs. If you change mass, you must re-do them completely.

Hopefully it'll be possible to balance weapons by changing the costs 
alone - after all, that's the basis for a descriptive design system!

However, it's not that easy. You tend to end up with fairly large 
point changes (which was why I started changing the masses instead). An 
"A" battery should cost something like 6 +4/arc if it is to be balanced 
against two "B" batteries - but then you haven't taken into account that

the two "B" are Mass 4, not Mass 3, so you have to add points for Hull 
(4 points), Thrust (varies) and probably FTL engines (2 points) to 
compensate. All in all, the Mass 3 "A" "should" cost something like 12 
+6/arc, to balance it against two Mass 2 "B"s. 

Changing the "A" battery mass to 4 is much easier from the 
game-designer's point of view :)

> > Not "screws up". It _improves_ the balance wrt other weapons. It
makes the
> > Pulse Torp a bit better (the original mass 3 A battery is almost as
good
> > (measured in damage/weapon mass) as the Pulse Torp against level-3
> > screens, and better against all other targets). 
> 
> I didn't analyse other weapons, but I was assuming they were somewhat 
> balanced.

They're not. Yet, at least.

> > and the efficiency of one-shot or area weapons like Wave
> > Guns or Submunition packs is pretty hard to compare in this way 
> 
> Well, for one-shots you have to assume an "average" combat length. ...

True. It takes more work than I had time to when I wrote the previous 
post, though :) Thanks for the input!

...
> > I don't think "longer games" = "Worse game balance", though...
> 
> I didn't say it's worse balance -- it's a different balance than
> originally intended (thus "screwed up").

The native English-speakers will undoubtedly correct me, but I've always

interpreted "screwed up" as something very similar to "gone straight to 
hell" rather than simply "changed"...

> > If you do, I'll be very happy blasting you to pieces with long range
A 
> > battery fire. It'll take me a while, of course. 
> 
> I admit, it's one of those "it works once" designs. Or do you
habitually 
> check other people's designs before playing? 

No. My designs usually have mid-range weapons, and I _am_ going 
to notice that you don't fire back when I keep the range open (and 
against a new opponent, I will be fairly cautious) so I keep keeping the

range open, and blast you to pieces :)

Of course, it depends on your maneuvers as well <g>

> We always play with limited intelligence.

Same here. The scanner rules from More Thrust are fun, though - Superior

scanners give you a fairly good idea of the enemy designs.

Oerjan Ohlson

"Life is like a sewer.
 What you get out of it, depends on what you put into it."
 -Hen3ry