Hi Developers!
I've just noticed that the developing of Stellaris turned to a bit chaotic and some of them brings the game to a wrong direction. Since the best thing about the game for me was the ship design part, where I have a place to "outsmart" my opponents I will talk about it in my first letter, but I will try to help as may parts as possible. (because I see tonns of potential in this game).
So first: pls do NOT revert the main part of the ship designing system with creating too many separated solo modules, especially in the ones that are available for all ships (defensive modules).
Let me explain it a bit: on the first version of the game (which I've played) I've noticed an insane way where players can show their calculating and resource managemant skills - defence (shields and armor) and energy support for the ships used the same slots, which has some upsides in gameplay and obvious downsides in realism.
In shields I've noticed that the most efficient shields were in small slots (they gave same ammount of shield/energy but had a little bit more regen on them than large slot ones), shield chargers because of that fact were best used in medium slots, because in large slots they gave only +50% extra regen compared to medium for +100% energy cost, making the energy generators themselvs the best to place there. and it was great to manage them (also it is a possible place for you to adjust AI power by making them some smarter ship design focus using these numbers)
All in all, I've found that part good and I've just got chocked when I saw that you made a completely separate slot for shield augmentation and also mage them % based. It could be a way for players to chose if they want strong initial shields or weaker bit higher regen shields, which are better in longer fihghts - larger shieps, but big initial shield are almost always better on smaller ships simply because they just wont make it to make shield regen that effective.
I realy hope that you can understand what I am trying to say here, realy hope that I have explained my thoughts well about it.
Just don't make ship designs a place where everything is just automatic, because there's only one thing to put into a slot.
Yes, the first version weren't too much better, but you still had to manage/chose, you had a way to set your preferences especially in shield ammount and shield regen.
You obviously had to put shields into small slots on ships, and shield chargers were best in medium and they were ineffective in large slots, but still, you could chose between double shield regen and stonger initial shields.
It was a choise between 500 extra shield or 7.5 extra shield regen/day. which makes players think about 'how ofthen wil I fight more than 70 days, when extra regen starts to kick in?' of course not much, but still, you might face constant weaves in war where ship durability, especially for battleships can matter a LOT.
My Ideas are currently to somewhat realise and separate slots and their function on ships.
Since every defensive module should take place on the hull of the ship, the armor/shield slot remain the same, so players have to chose to make a part of the ship armor heavy or shield heavy, make a part of the hull out of strong, resistent metal or mount there shield projectors.
In energy supply part, there should be a 3 type slot for energy generators, liquid/"living" metal holders - combat hull repair and generators or shield supporters - you will have to make some of them energy generators, but the rest is in players hand: focus on more firepower and get more energy or get some combat hull repair or make shields hold longer by giving them better recharge.
Also it is possible to mix into the armor/shield slot the point defense system too, because they are also sharing on the hull and every weapon, but that might make a too big and unpredictable twist in ship designs.
Another suggestion for how armor works:
currently it's % based, which makes armor only good if stacked, but then it is godlike, because only 80%+ penetration will be able to do noticable damage, which is somewhat stupid I think.
Armor should work on a flat amount of damage absorption in my opinion. that way it is much more easy to balance and calculate with it if well designed.
Also it will give a much clearer way to make rock-paper-scissors mechanics for weapons and armor types.
If I'm right, currently we have energy weapons, missiles and kinetic weapons:
- energy is a specialized weapon type, either focusing on armor penetration or focusing on shield destruction (disruptors)
- missiles are long range anti shield, but counterable weapons with some armor pen
~ torpedos are like lasers
~ missiles are just stronger lasers, but you can defend against them with PD, but only until opponent has swarmers, then PD is useless - you should realy rework this system, because giving this weapon type a complete upper hand in lategame is ridicculous, swarmers having 200% dodge and also dealing damage makes PD absolutely useless, swarmers should overwhelm, not completely NEGATE point defense
- kinetic weapons are a bit all around but no focus, they are just good against shields and moderate armor, but heavy armor still good against them, and disruptors are still better against shields.
The current numbers for me looks a bit too unbalanced, cause kinetic weapons with their high dps AND bonus vs shields and even having armor pen makes them overpowered
The base designs are good, but numbers and swarmer missiles realy needs some rebalancing.
The last part of my letter is ship roles:
Just revert it asap, Battleships are supposed to be the kings of the game and not pounching bags for the weakest ships just because weapons can't aim. It's the damn future, even NOW here in earth are systems that can give a weapon , ESPECIALLY a laser weapon 100% aim. And you are trying to make the game work around ships that can potentially live forever just by pule luck.
The faster ships are harder to hit is a good think, but try to rework the system by giving weapons aim time based on their targets size, like small-corvette; medium- destroyer, large-cruiser, XL-battleship and give weapons some aim/reload time based on the size difference towards smaller ships, like -1 size is +10% aim/reload time or something, maybe give +100% reload at corvette-XL weapons, but corvette still should be annihilated by an XL weapon.
evasion and trackin is good, but not for energy weapons, it's just not realistic.
Also an XL weapon missing a corvette a little, still should destroy it by 1 maybe 2 shots because of it's sheer force.
I hope my throwings with ideas are helping a bit and you see through my rage in some parts.
A possible future fan
I've just noticed that the developing of Stellaris turned to a bit chaotic and some of them brings the game to a wrong direction. Since the best thing about the game for me was the ship design part, where I have a place to "outsmart" my opponents I will talk about it in my first letter, but I will try to help as may parts as possible. (because I see tonns of potential in this game).
So first: pls do NOT revert the main part of the ship designing system with creating too many separated solo modules, especially in the ones that are available for all ships (defensive modules).
Let me explain it a bit: on the first version of the game (which I've played) I've noticed an insane way where players can show their calculating and resource managemant skills - defence (shields and armor) and energy support for the ships used the same slots, which has some upsides in gameplay and obvious downsides in realism.
In shields I've noticed that the most efficient shields were in small slots (they gave same ammount of shield/energy but had a little bit more regen on them than large slot ones), shield chargers because of that fact were best used in medium slots, because in large slots they gave only +50% extra regen compared to medium for +100% energy cost, making the energy generators themselvs the best to place there. and it was great to manage them (also it is a possible place for you to adjust AI power by making them some smarter ship design focus using these numbers)
All in all, I've found that part good and I've just got chocked when I saw that you made a completely separate slot for shield augmentation and also mage them % based. It could be a way for players to chose if they want strong initial shields or weaker bit higher regen shields, which are better in longer fihghts - larger shieps, but big initial shield are almost always better on smaller ships simply because they just wont make it to make shield regen that effective.
I realy hope that you can understand what I am trying to say here, realy hope that I have explained my thoughts well about it.
Just don't make ship designs a place where everything is just automatic, because there's only one thing to put into a slot.
Yes, the first version weren't too much better, but you still had to manage/chose, you had a way to set your preferences especially in shield ammount and shield regen.
You obviously had to put shields into small slots on ships, and shield chargers were best in medium and they were ineffective in large slots, but still, you could chose between double shield regen and stonger initial shields.
It was a choise between 500 extra shield or 7.5 extra shield regen/day. which makes players think about 'how ofthen wil I fight more than 70 days, when extra regen starts to kick in?' of course not much, but still, you might face constant weaves in war where ship durability, especially for battleships can matter a LOT.
My Ideas are currently to somewhat realise and separate slots and their function on ships.
Since every defensive module should take place on the hull of the ship, the armor/shield slot remain the same, so players have to chose to make a part of the ship armor heavy or shield heavy, make a part of the hull out of strong, resistent metal or mount there shield projectors.
In energy supply part, there should be a 3 type slot for energy generators, liquid/"living" metal holders - combat hull repair and generators or shield supporters - you will have to make some of them energy generators, but the rest is in players hand: focus on more firepower and get more energy or get some combat hull repair or make shields hold longer by giving them better recharge.
Also it is possible to mix into the armor/shield slot the point defense system too, because they are also sharing on the hull and every weapon, but that might make a too big and unpredictable twist in ship designs.
Another suggestion for how armor works:
currently it's % based, which makes armor only good if stacked, but then it is godlike, because only 80%+ penetration will be able to do noticable damage, which is somewhat stupid I think.
Armor should work on a flat amount of damage absorption in my opinion. that way it is much more easy to balance and calculate with it if well designed.
Also it will give a much clearer way to make rock-paper-scissors mechanics for weapons and armor types.
If I'm right, currently we have energy weapons, missiles and kinetic weapons:
- energy is a specialized weapon type, either focusing on armor penetration or focusing on shield destruction (disruptors)
- missiles are long range anti shield, but counterable weapons with some armor pen
~ torpedos are like lasers
~ missiles are just stronger lasers, but you can defend against them with PD, but only until opponent has swarmers, then PD is useless - you should realy rework this system, because giving this weapon type a complete upper hand in lategame is ridicculous, swarmers having 200% dodge and also dealing damage makes PD absolutely useless, swarmers should overwhelm, not completely NEGATE point defense
- kinetic weapons are a bit all around but no focus, they are just good against shields and moderate armor, but heavy armor still good against them, and disruptors are still better against shields.
The current numbers for me looks a bit too unbalanced, cause kinetic weapons with their high dps AND bonus vs shields and even having armor pen makes them overpowered
The base designs are good, but numbers and swarmer missiles realy needs some rebalancing.
The last part of my letter is ship roles:
Just revert it asap, Battleships are supposed to be the kings of the game and not pounching bags for the weakest ships just because weapons can't aim. It's the damn future, even NOW here in earth are systems that can give a weapon , ESPECIALLY a laser weapon 100% aim. And you are trying to make the game work around ships that can potentially live forever just by pule luck.
The faster ships are harder to hit is a good think, but try to rework the system by giving weapons aim time based on their targets size, like small-corvette; medium- destroyer, large-cruiser, XL-battleship and give weapons some aim/reload time based on the size difference towards smaller ships, like -1 size is +10% aim/reload time or something, maybe give +100% reload at corvette-XL weapons, but corvette still should be annihilated by an XL weapon.
evasion and trackin is good, but not for energy weapons, it's just not realistic.
Also an XL weapon missing a corvette a little, still should destroy it by 1 maybe 2 shots because of it's sheer force.
I hope my throwings with ideas are helping a bit and you see through my rage in some parts.
A possible future fan
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