Submarine Balance

[Hawkei]

Hi there,

One issue that has not really been addressed yet in FAF is the general underwhelming state of submarines in SC:FA. I believe that in the Vanilla game T1 subs were generally OP and destroyers had real difficulty stopping them. Now we have the opposite problem.

No one has ever really attempted to address this, and the general result on gameplay is that sea can effectively be controlled by one vessel. The destroyer. Which is dominant in both naval direct fire, shore bombardment, and anti-submarine warfare. It is effectively a "Spam this to win Sea" vessel. Which generally turns naval combat into a one dimensional exercise. With it's only real weakness being air, and this is countered by the cruiser.

The idea for this balance suggestion has already been play tested in a mod. Which can be found here: http://forums.faforever.com/viewtopic.php?f=41&t=9123&hilit=submarine+rebalance
and downloaded from the vault. The mod is currently at v4, and further versions might be released as other refinements are made.

The purpose of this mod was to give submarines a new role, as stealth raiding units. None of the weapon or HP statistics have changed, and with the presence of full intel, the units would behave precisely as they did before. But now with sonar stealth, and the underwater vision changes, submarines can effectively sneak around the map a bit more, and are no longer hard countered by the T2 and T3 sonar installations.

The mechanic of underwater vision has been adapted to serve as submarine detection, with Sonar Platforms, Submarines, and Frigates being given greater underwater vision. Destroyers and Torpedo defences have adequate underwater vision to effectively return fire - but need other spotting vessels to utilise their full attack range. Other softer targets, such as Cruisers and Carriers, have had their sonar and water vision nerfed. Such that a submarine can fire upon them without being detected.

A full list of changes is as follows:
- T1 Subs: Sonar Stealth = True, Water Vision = 35 (up from 32)
- T1 Frigates: Water Vision = 45 (up from 16)
- T2 Sub Hunters "Vesper" & "Barracuda": Sonar Stealth = True, Water Vision = 60 (up from 45), Energy cost = 0 (Down from 30 for Barracuda)
- T2 UEF Torpedo Boat "Cooper": Water Vision = 60 (up from 40)
- T3 Seraphim Sub Hunter: Sonar Stealth = True, Water Vision = 80 (up from 45)
- T3 Missile Subs "Silencer", "Ace", and "Plan B": Sonar Stealth = True, Energy cost = 0 (Down from 200 for Plan B), Water Vision = 45 (up from 35)
- Destroyers: Sonar Radius = 45 (up from 37), Water Vision = 25 (Down from 45)
- Cruisers: Sonar Radius = 60 (down from 120), Water Vision = 16 (down from 60)
- Battleships, Carriers and Missile Ships: Water Vision = 16 (down from 50, 36 and 50 respectively)
- T1 and T2 Torpedo Defences: Water Vision = 35 (down from 45)
- T1 Sonar: Water Vision = 60 (up from nil)
- T2 Sonar: Water Vision = 80 (up from nil)
- T3 Sonar: Water Vision = 100 (up from 25)
- T3 Spy Planes: Omni Radius = 64 (because underwater vision doesn't work on planes)


There are still some refinements which need to be made. The first is the reintroduction of an energy cost for personal stealth. The second issue is combating submarines from the air. There is no way to detect submarines, from the air, without using the spy plane, and to do this I increased the Omni radius for the spy planes. Which is a bit excessive and shall need to be reduced. As this would completely imbalance the land game. This mod has been play tested, and does create a more interesting naval experience. So I'd like to put this forward for balancing consideration.

[keyser]

Or just add underwater mexx on water map.

[Ithilis_Quo]

Or just add underwater mexx on water map.

In game balance need deal with map that we have. Is not possible change 10 000 maps(i have 2gb maps) , but its possible change submarines.

[Exotic_Retard]

guess in which mod this is fixed!

currently we use almost the same method of making submarines interesting. however, its not perfect; it leads to some "random" gameplay where you can go right past each others submarines, ect which changes the outcome of the game from a small change. this is not very consistent and we were not happy with that.

so we are currently working on a slightly different way of doing it; it works something like this:

we go back to the very original balance (from supcom beta) but add a key difference with torpedo defense to make it all work.

the roles we have for all the units are this:
T1 attack submarine <- that's its unit description, and that's what it will do. they are buffed quite a bit to make them very mass efficient for sinking surface ships.
T2 sub hunter <- hunts subs. this has a longer range than subs and very low hp/dps. the crucial part is its great torpedo defense. this means it can sink sub easily with low hp.
Surface ships <- these have weak depth charges, which bypass the great torpedo defense on the sub hunters, and can sink them, while being sunk by submarines.

we already have this system working to some extent, but its unfinished, with seraphim not being added to the balance yet. (theyre gonna be tough but we have a plan for them too)

you can download and play this today at https://github.com/Ithilis/Equilibrium/ ... al_Balance

just be aware that this is the unreleased version, so it will likely be tweaked and perhaps even scrapped entirely (very low chance). also currently only t1/2 navy is really done, with exps/sera/amphibious units not changed yet.

enjoy.

[Ithilis_Quo]

currently we use almost the same method of making submarines interesting

yes because we use Hawkei mod that was testing with him and put him lot of suggestion and after all integrate it in eq.

[zeroAPM]

guess in which mod this is fixed!

currently we use almost the same method of making submarines interesting. however, its not perfect; it leads to some "random" gameplay where you can go right past each others submarines, ect which changes the outcome of the game from a small change. this is not very consistent and we were not happy with that.

so we are currently working on a slightly different way of doing it; it works something like this:

we go back to the very original balance (from supcom beta) but add a key difference with torpedo defense to make it all work.

the roles we have for all the units are this:
T1 attack submarine <- that's its unit description, and that's what it will do. they are buffed quite a bit to make them very mass efficient for sinking surface ships.
T2 sub hunter <- hunts subs. this has a longer range than subs and very low hp/dps. the crucial part is its great torpedo defense. this means it can sink sub easily with low hp.
Surface ships <- these have weak depth charges, which bypass the great torpedo defense on the sub hunters, and can sink them, while being sunk by submarines.

we already have this system working to some extent, but its unfinished, with seraphim not being added to the balance yet. (theyre gonna be tough but we have a plan for them too)

you can download and play this today at https://github.com/Ithilis/Equilibrium/ ... al_Balance

just be aware that this is the unreleased version, so it will likely be tweaked and perhaps even scrapped entirely (very low chance). also currently only t1/2 navy is really done, with exps/sera/amphibious units not changed yet.

enjoy.

May i humbly suggest something to make the surface ship part a bit more flavorful at the expense of modeling needs?
Could the "depth charges" proper be exclusive to the Aeon and give the other faction different ASW weaponry? Ie: the UEF could use a Spigot mortar capable of also hitting on land at short ranges while Cybrans get, dunno, a electro-blast* or something?

Spoiler: show

*any similitude to another RTS unit is purely coincidental

[Exotic_Retard]

1. that would require lots of work, using skills we dont really have xD
2. things like the hedgehog would need modelling skills. we have a deficit of modders in faf overall
3. peoples favorite complaint is that eq is too different and has crazy changes with 0 thought. so every change we propose is automatically weighed against this.


overall, it might be nice but it wont change too much i guess, and we dont really have it on a huge priority.

if there was an already done mod with these changes then maybe : P

[Ithilis_Quo]

f there was an already done mod with these changes then maybe : P

I know that nomads use underwater railgun what is kinda amazing weapon realy different as everything else (beam also destroy torpedos and work then as torpedo def too)
And Brute experiment with mortar anti navy weapon that was on bomber and then on destroyer. Model was extremly ugly, it was total different again but it was kinda work.

But its not possible to integrate it right now while people will have "wtf is this shit" effct while it work on diferen principles

[keyser]

bad map design shouldn't impact balance. Otherwise we should be balancing the game around thermo and gap.

[Exotic_Retard]

everything is to an extent.
if we take the opposite approach and just make a balance that only works on 5x5 maps it probably wont be too good either.

in short, if there is a problem, it needs to be solved, not telling people they can solve it themselves

asking everyone to change maps is probably not too great an idea, and while i guess that current subs could work on such maps, it contains side effects like extreme snowballing, too much mass income, and likely more.

meanwhile this is making subs more interesting and useful on all maps. is that so bad?