FTL Discussion Thread

[exi123]

What i miss most is the big lategame step what Jumpdrives were. It sped up the lategame to ultra speed in times of war. No minutelong chasing of small whatever fleets, just jump in and destroy the enemy.

And i know no one wants to hear it but Doomstacking had one major advantage: The AI always had all its fleetpower against you at one point. When you fought a federation you fought all of them, not one by one. You needed to be really fast after the declaration of war to take out one enemy because after they stacked it was mostly impossible to win against a stronger enemy/federation. It was really tactical sometimes, with searching for lone fleets, ripping the enemy apart one by one if needed

Today the AI isnt even able to follow your fleet (you know there is a button in the fleet UI which should encourage your allies to follow) in times of war...

 

[Janx14]

What i miss most is the big lategame step what Jumpdrives were. It sped up the lategame to ultra speed in times of war. No minutelong chasing of small whatever fleets, just jump in and destroy the enemy.

Yeah I loved the game changer that jump drives were. The current jump drives rarely feel worth it.

Its just one part of a greater problem these days that isn't FTL tied, is that empires feel much the same their entire lifespan now. You just get *more* of the same and have to build megastructures.

 

[Acheron]

But there would be no Space Geography on that kind of map. I like playing on spiral galaxies where connections between arms are a chokepoint to control and defend.

I don't understand, you would still have such instances of space geography of course. In a spiral galaxy, the arms would be too far away from each other to form hyperlane connections, so you still had to go through the center.

 

[UltimateTobi]

Today the AI isnt even able to follow your fleet (you know there is a button in the fleet UI which should encourage your allies to follow) in times of war...

Guess why the AI doesn't follow each other anymore; Take Point (the button you mentioned) is broken since, at least, 2.2. It was the only feature that enabled you and AIs to work together.

And thanks to @CrazyJ, we've got an unstickied FTL thread instead of a DD.

 

[exi123]

Guess why the AI doesn't follow each other anymore; Take Point (the button you mentioned) is broken since, at least, 2.2. It was the only feature that enabled you and AIs to work together.

And thanks to @CrazyJ, we've got an unstickied FTL thread instead of a DD.

On the right side of the forum is a twitter feed, i would take a look at 18:30 CEST on the paradox twitch account.

*Edit* And there is an announcement that the written one is delayed until to 18:00 CEST.

 

[Mackus]

What I dislike about current hyperdrive system, is that all three tiers of hyperdrive are functionally the same, just a little slower or faster.
There could be three different tiers of hyperlanes:
Tier one: works just the same as it does now.
Tier two: to see them, you nee to have at least level two sensor tech. To travel them, you need at least level 2 hyperdrive.
Tier three: as above, but level 3.

There could be game settings/sliders determining percentage of hyperlane types.
You could for example have early game where connections are rare and choke-points important, but late-game where every system is connected to at least three others.

 

[CrazyJ]

Guess why the AI doesn't follow each other anymore; Take Point (the button you mentioned) is broken since, at least, 2.2. It was the only feature that enabled you and AIs to work together.

And thanks to @CrazyJ, we've got an unstickied FTL thread instead of a DD.

nobody reads stickied threads, it may actually get more attention now that it isn't stickied

 

[MichaelJanuary]

The risk of it not being stickied is that you might get people inadverdently opening new threads on this.

There are really two distinct issues here ....

1) Can asymmetric FTL be balanced in any meaningful way for especially MP (in Stellaris or a clone) without incurring massive technical debt? and,
2) Is Hyperlanes (freeways in space) the best/only/easiest way to handle FTL in strategy games of this type?

Many would like to believe that (1) is possible, but I think we have largely decided that this would not work in Stellaris I due to the impact of balancing and maintaining it was vastly underestimated in Stellaris design phase. Maybe that point should just be stickied so that people stop arguing it.

Personally, I would prefer games that used some kind of free movement mechanic, where geography was determined by stellar distance, galactic features (nebulae, clusters, voids, etc) and travel distance was a function of technology, fuel, and supply limits. However, Stellaris I was not designed for such a mechanic, hopefully Stellaris II will be.

 

[Malecord]

Personally, I would prefer games that used some kind of free movement mechanic, where geography was determined by stellar distance, galactic features (nebulae, clusters, voids, etc) and travel distance was a function of technology, fuel, and supply limits. However, Stellaris I was not designed for such a mechanic, hopefully Stellaris II will be.

As it was noted time and time again in this humongous thread, having that kind of geography or even hyperlane tiers that are unlockable via hypedrive techs isn't incompatible with the current "graph implementation" from a mere technical point of view. Geography is just about placing some graphical obstacle where there are no lanes, while unlockable tiers are certainly more complexity but essentially the same thing.

Nope. The rework was really about stupidify the movement in the game. They really want a system where you can set a fleet to follow another and forget about its existence. The Doomstak galore. No kind of movement suggestion will ever be take in to consideration if it doesn't allow a "follow and forget" gameplay.

Arguably that philosophy made 2.0 the worst patch in the game from fun perspective (that's my opinion at least). It's also true that after that the designers were "free" to focus on other mechanics in the game as they promised and that now in 2.6 those overcompensate the loss of fun in warfare and thus the game (imho) it's overall better. Once factoring out the bugs and some convenience gaps at least.

 

[Ediros]

Because megathread is unpinned and it's been 2 years, so now we can actually see how much the new ftl 'improved' the game by playing current version and reverting to 1.9.

Now, I did give 2.7.2 a few attemps, but truth to be told, I fail to see how did the hyperlane only gameplay made it better. Instead of whack a Mole we have got trench warfare in space. The doomstacking is still there, the defenses are still barely useful and Incredibly expensive to fix and it's all decided in one massive fight.

So, we got rid of the ftl types to:

A) Improve warfare - it's even worse. Park your fleet on a choke point and wait or go through every other choke point. At least 1.9 allowed us to split fleets and attack from multiple angels. Here, all I can do send my doomstack, because it's the best and only strategy.

B) Galactic terrain - I barely notice it.

C) Slow down the game? - it sure is slower, as I wait 10 years to move my fleet from one end to another. Science ships move slower, so you can put the game at max speed and barely notice.

So yeah, feel free to share your opinion.

 

[pliznobn]

A) Improve warfare - it's even worse. Park your fleet on a choke point and wait or go through every other choke point. At least 1.9 allowed us to split fleets and attack from multiple angels. Here, all I can do send my doomstack, because it's the best and only strategy.

I'm not sayng this happens much in the new system but did this ever, at any point, happen before the rework?

 

[Tamwin5]

I'm not sayng this happens much in the new system but did this ever, at any point, happen before the rework?

If you did, it was because you were vastly superior to your opponent. If chokepoints are an issue, just bump up Hyperlane connectivity.

 

[Gundabadguy]

I actually like the idea of choke points since that makes it more challenging and makes expansion interesting. Also, putting hyperlane density to 5, wormhole pairs and gateways to 5 makes this not an issue.

 

[MichaelJanuary]

Just having more connections to stars doesnt add dynamism. Pathing is still predictable and pathing doesnt change as tech develops and ships have longer ranges.

It's a band aid. Not a solution.

It also doesnt address the lack of asymmetry in stellaris.

 

[itsuart]

Warp and wormholes will never return, it would be too big loss of a face and require another costly, bug ridden overhaul.
So, in my opinion, such threads are pointless, a stream of "told you so!" and "no-no-no, everything is much better now!" posts.

 

[LWE]

After playing 1.9.1, the ultimate gameplay difference isn't really that great - static defences are still of limited use, and tactical positioning sometimes plays a role, but is often ignorable. In fact, from a very general point of view, it's about the same. It does add some flavor/differentation to various empires.

 

[Astax]

I am playing 1.9.1 also, and one of the so called benefits of hyper-only was so we could have locked off sections of galaxy to explore. Then we got the L-cluster... cool stuff. Then we got... nothing.... absolutely nothing since.... so total fail.

Warfare in 1.9 is a bit gimmicky as well, there is a way to hold on where in current version you would perish. I think it is a bit good, since I would usually have to abandon games otherwise.

 

[LWE]

You don't need hyper-only to lock-off sections of galaxy, anyway, just create a "special wormhole" (no erotic puns intended).

 

[Archael90]

Chokepoints are great... or at least on paper, but there are 2(or 3) issues with them to properly use it:
1. AI is dumb af and do not claim systems to make chokepoints, they are claiming as many as they can even if they will loose all defence capabilities.
1a. Claiming systems to make chokepoints on borders is no valid strategy. Valid strategy is to claim as many systems as you can and thus making chokepoints inside your territory, sometimes deep inside, and it makes borders undefendable.
2. Starbases as weak af, so they do not make any defences. Only time they play their role is when its system with gateway, your doomstack fleet awaits on the other side of gate, and enemies have to destroy the citadel to get rid of ftl inhibitor.

 

[sillyrobot]

I'm not sayng this happens much in the new system but did this ever, at any point, happen before the rework?

Yes, a few scenarios were like that. For example, taking FE star bases while avoiding the fleets by teasing them into chasing with another or having a few smallish fleets take under-defended systems near each other so rapid reassembly was possible if a real threat was detected.