FTL Discussion Thread

[BlackUmbrellas]

I really don't get the resistance here, what terrible drawbacks do I not see from making jump-distances correspond to map distances.

Because that... kind of gets rid of the point of Hyperlanes? If that's what you want, seriously, just turn Connectivity up all the way. The map will become one big web of triangles with almost every star connected to every star around it.

But if you do that, you lose any actual... routes. Or choke points. Or obstacles to navigation.

 

[darthsquirt2]

I really don't get the resistance here, what terrible drawbacks do I not see from making jump-distances correspond to map distances.

Well, we had that. That was the warp FTL type in the base game. It was removed for a number of reasons, namely that it was a nightmare to balance around. Hyperlanes have the distinction of allowing for more strategic gameplay, in that there are actually options for trying to block an opponent or wage any sort of defense. Now, hyperlanes-only introduces some other issues, otherwise everyone would love them forever and have no issues with the change, but the devs thought this was the most practical step to take. As for why not every system has a hyperlane to any other, or even to all of its immediate neighbors, there are many explanations. The easiest handwave is a Sci-fi staple. Hyperlanes can only exist where there are stable paths, unobstructed by gravity fields or debris or "hyperspace fluxuations." Basically how Star Wars does it.

 

[MichaelJanuary]

Maybe hyoerlanes are just poorly integrated into the various game aspects, but I find it does not help with immersion at all, and even breaks it for me.

There are three things that I am looking for in a game.

One is empire management (crusader kings, surviving mars, cities skylines, planetbase). The second is strategic warfare, something like hearts of iron or total war. The third is immersion. I want to feel like I am managing a galactic empire. In Space.

The best part of Stellaris is the early exploration, anomalies, archeology and so on. I love this phase of the game. The hyperlanes are manageable and does not totally break immersion at this stage.

Once you've established your empire though, the immersion goes out the window. The galactic map is largely irrelevant. The planet management does not integrate well with the galactic map and it doesnt feel at all as if you are managing a galactic empire. The introduction of trade routes, piracy and sectors helped slightly, but is rather weak. There is no distance from capital 'corruption', admin capacity and sprawl are pretty meaningless, there is mo such thing as resource distribution and logistics, because everything is global.

The lack of a fuel or supply system, the hardcoded nodes, bottlenecks and narrow frontlines have removed all strategy from the game. This is where the hyperlane system breaks all immersion.

There is no option to cut off supply lines, employ skirmish or guerilla tactics, encourage resistance, engage in sabotage, sponsor revolutions, assassinate key commanders, blockade vital planets. Its merely about bringing the biggest fleet to the node. Capture node. Next node.

Even the strategic resources aren't strategic at all. You wouldnt go to war to capture a system for its gas production, or to corner the galactic market on crystals (endless space, civ). There are enough planets that none are special, and hab is trivial anyway. I concede you might go to war for a relic world or to capture a megastructure site.

I guess I was hoping for more of a SOTS 3. I found SOTS2 immensely immersive, loved the total war style near-3d fleet battles. In some respects Stellaris is a step backwards.

 

[DreadLindwyrm]

Again, I do not care for realism but an intuitive map. Yes, maps in the real world may not be very intuitive, but that is why people use satnavs. Also, in the real world, managing a burger joint means a lot of boring formulas and spreadsheets, I see rather few people here bemoaning their absence in Stellaris.

Three jumps are okay, but what if I want to blast my way to an enemy capital more than a dozen umps away, with a hyperlane route that resembles a snake having an epileptic fit? Or figuring out where to best unite your dispersed fleets in the face of a big threat that just popped up?

I really don't get the resistance here, what terrible drawbacks do I not see from making jump-distances correspond to map distances.

We *do* have jump distances correspond to map distances.

A star system that is close in real space will be close by hyperlane (if you look at the distance the hyperlanes cover). Sometimes there just isn't a direct route (for whatever reason), and we suffered enough of that with old wormholes as well - and (I think, although I'm not certain now) the old warp system had problems with crossing overly large spaces. So you could still have two "neighbouring" systems that you couldn't go directly between, resulting in you having to have routes that resembled your snake just to cross relatively narrow gaps.

 

[Acheron]

I get the feeling that we are talking past each other. I do not (necessarily) want MORE hyperlane connections, I just would like that the existing connections correspond to the distances on the map. In other words, I want to look at the map from a fair distance and still be able to say "Aha, there must be a hyperlane route going there, because the star systems are so close together."

 

[MichaelJanuary]

and (I think, although I'm not certain now) the old warp system had problems with crossing overly large spaces.

Yes. You are correct. Warp had a euclidean range. You could warp to any star in range, but at game start this range was short, so you would sometimes need to do several hops to circumvent voids or gaps between spirals. It did make intuitive sense though.

And best if all, you wouldnt be blocked in by RNG bad luck on marauders, leviathans or other space fauna.

 

[BlackUmbrellas]

I get the feeling that we are talking past each other. I do not (necessarily) want MORE hyperlane connections, I just would like that the existing connections correspond to the distances on the map. In other words, I want to look at the map from a fair distance and still be able to say "Aha, there must be a hyperlane route going there, because the star systems are so close together."

I cannot visualize how that would work except in the same way that higher connectivity works.

"The star is close to this star, so it should have a hyperlane between them" just means "every star should be connected to every star around it". That's the only way to avoid systems that are a short distance away from each other on the galaxy map not taking multiple jumps to reach.

 

[DreadLindwyrm]

Yes. You are correct. Warp had a euclidean range. You could warp to any star in range, but at game start this range was short, so you would sometimes need to do several hops to circumvent voids or gaps between spirals. It did make intuitive sense though.

And best if all, you wouldnt be blocked in by RNG bad luck on marauders, leviathans or other space fauna.

Except when you were because you only had a few stars available to warp to, and they were inhabited by hostiles. It was rare, but I did get hit with it.

Similarly it's rare now, especially if you raise the connections a little. You might be blocked from going in a particular direction temporarily, but it's rare that you're completely blocked in by them without enough space to build up and break through the space fauna within a short period of time.

 

[DiscoRay]

I get the feeling that we are talking past each other. I do not (necessarily) want MORE hyperlane connections, I just would like that the existing connections correspond to the distances on the map. In other words, I want to look at the map from a fair distance and still be able to say "Aha, there must be a hyperlane route going there, because the star systems are so close together."

I think I understand what you’re getting as, though the main problem is that would require a “logic” built into what presently is (as far as I understand it) a random gameplay mechanic. Right now the “lore” on hyperlanes is some old race from ages past mapped them, and we all simply just use them, with no further routes on the network to be otherwise found or mapped.

While it would be nice as a fellow sci-fi nut for things like class of star, wormhole, nebulas etc all impacting what the resulting hyperlanes may turnout being when generated. It sounds like a horribly complicated process with lots of potential to do weird things in game that would require lots of dev tweaking and fixing. While random generation isn’t perfect, I’d say it works pretty well for the game, though maybe not great in the sci-fi sense.

I suppose a middle ground might be to initially range limit hyper jumps, and require research or projects to extend that range to map the routes beyond, as opposed to knowing straight off the bat the entire hyperlane network. Not really sure if that would work, wouldn’t address specifically you’re issues with it.

 

[Acheron]

I think I understand what you’re getting as, though the main problem is that would require a “logic” built into what presently is (as far as I understand it) a random gameplay mechanic.

Well, the idea is that all systems within a certain distance get a hyperlane connection. To preserve the current amount of connections, the required distance and the positioning of the stars would need to be tuned to each other.
Ideally, there would be a "forbidden" distance in which star systems are not placed from each other, that distance being just slightly beyond the hyperlane range, so it is more obvious from a distance where the routes are.

 

[DreadLindwyrm]

Well, the idea is that all systems within a certain distance get a hyperlane connection. To preserve the current amount of connections, the required distance and the positioning of the stars would need to be tuned to each other.
Ideally, there would be a "forbidden" distance in which star systems are not placed from each other, that distance being just slightly beyond the hyperlane range, so it is more obvious from a distance where the routes are.

Those are not going to be easy - especially with a 3D galaxy (or even a 2.5D galaxy) - to do at the same time.
Especially not if you don't want to effectively have a hexagonal grid of stars with voids in it.

It's also going to be *really* messy to generate a galaxy, then run through it to make sure no unconnected systems are "near" the maximum connection distance (whatever that's established to be, since there isn't a maximum at the moment).
And of course if "all" systems in a certain distance are connected, that will necessitate crossed hyperlanes - which is not desirable from a display PoV.

 

[Acheron]

Those are not going to be easy - especially with a 3D galaxy (or even a 2.5D galaxy) - to do at the same time.
Especially not if you don't want to effectively have a hexagonal grid of stars with voids in it.

It's also going to be *really* messy to generate a galaxy, then run through it to make sure no unconnected systems are "near" the maximum connection distance (whatever that's established to be, since there isn't a maximum at the moment).
And of course if "all" systems in a certain distance are connected, that will necessitate crossed hyperlanes - which is not desirable from a display PoV.

Well, I kinda was hoping for some algorithm to do all that automatically, am I asking for too much?
Didn't think of the crossing lanes, yeah I see that should be avoided. I take it the geometric formulas satisfying all criteria would be too complicated?

 

[BlackUmbrellas]

Well, I kinda was hoping for some algorithm to do all that automatically, am I asking for too much?
Didn't think of the crossing lanes, yeah I see that should be avoided. I take it the geometric formulas satisfying all criteria would be too complicated?

I just don't really see the point of making hyperlanes ONLY short-ranged. You could absolutely write a map-generator algorithm that did what you want... I just don't think the demand is there for Paradox to do so.

 

[Nighzmarquls]

Well, I kinda was hoping for some algorithm to do all that automatically, am I asking for too much?
Didn't think of the crossing lanes, yeah I see that should be avoided. I take it the geometric formulas satisfying all criteria would be too complicated?

Any geometric formula that accomplish this look absurdly predictable and static, anything that perturbs them sufficiently to not look boring, perfectly predictable and static tends to also perturb their ability to accomplish the correct goals. You can technically do secondary processing on things after the fact to 'fix' the peturbances and make sure everything works but all of that will add a LOT to generation time on galaxies and won't really help.

That said the essence of your request is not that you dislike the connection system at all. You don't like the pattern that are used to generate galaxies.

 

[Acheron]

Any geometric formula that accomplish this look absurdly predictable and static, anything that perturbs them sufficiently to not look boring, perfectly predictable and static tends to also perturb their ability to accomplish the correct goals. You can technically do secondary processing on things after the fact to 'fix' the peturbances and make sure everything works but all of that will add a LOT to generation time on galaxies and won't really help.

That said the essence of your request is not that you dislike the connection system at all. You don't like the pattern that are used to generate galaxies.

I do think that it would be better if hyperlane connections were tied to the distance between the stars, so that the star map actually means something.

That said, I am not a fan of the hyperlanes in general, I preferred the warp system and still do.

 

[MichaelJanuary]

I guess then there should never be any examples of cities or towns that don't have direct connections to their neighbours then?
Unlike the two examples I showed from a basic scroll around google maps.

There's no reason a go anywhere warp drive cant have 'terrain'. Even if you only consider euclidean distance in space there are clusters of stars, voids, and spirals with gaps between them. So unless your warp drive has unlimited fuel and range, you will defibitely have obstacles.

And that's without even considering artificial constructs the game developers can come up with ... such as nebulae that reduce range in a large region, fuel systems that only allow you to operate a certain distance from a depot, and area denial technologies.

 

[UltimateTobi]

I firmly believe they should've went with Warp instead of Hyperlanes.

 

[DreadLindwyrm]

There's no reason a go anywhere warp drive cant have 'terrain'. Even if you only consider euclidean distance in space there are clusters of stars, voids, and spirals with gaps between them. So unless your warp drive has unlimited fuel and range, you will defibitely have obstacles.

And that's without even considering artificial constructs the game developers can come up with ... such as nebulae that reduce range in a large region, fuel systems that only allow you to operate a certain distance from a depot, and area denial technologies.

Way to ignore the context of what I was saying, and how it was in relation to "these things that are close should be linked, with no exceptions", using real world maps (that incidentally don't have anything resembling an obstacle that I can see) as an analogy to the hyperlane map.

Sure a warp based system could have terrain, but it's utterly irrelevant to what I was discussing.

 

[MichaelJanuary]

My apologies @DreadLindwyrm if I misunderstood the context of your post.

I get that @Acheron finds warp more intuitive than hyperlanes, but not that he requires universal connectivity between all systems. Personally I prefer some kind of terrain, and preferably something that is intuitive to understand. To me, hyoerlanes are arbitrary, and for all we know IRL that just might be what we find: arbitrary routes between stars with no rhyme or reason we can understand. I hope not.

My perception Is that one of the primary arguments of hyperlane proponents in games is that it facilitates a galactic geography, which I dont agree with as being the only or most intuitive solution. Not sure where you stand on that. Not meant to be confrontational.

I can accept that the devs went with hyperlanes because it was least costly and easiest to balance, but not that they did it because it's the best/only way to do space 4x games.

 

[Acheron]

I get that @Acheron finds warp more intuitive than hyperlanes, but not that he requires universal connectivity between all systems.

Just for the record, I do not require this and didn't ask for, sorry if I wasn't clear enough on it previously.

Otherwise, I am with you, a warp system with some galactic geography would have been really nice.