Navy fine tuning

[pip]

Seton's players seem to regret 3599 mostly because of navy aspect of the game. I also think GPG overdid some t3 navy buffs in 3603, especially since t2 was left untouched and that some things can be adjusted in this area. I tested values assuming two things :
T3 navy was mostly too long to build in 3599 (battleship buildtime = 45000 = 12 minutes 30 seconds !)but too fast in 3603 (battleships = 5 minutes unassisted), making t2 navy obsolete too soon (unassisted destoyer built by t2 naval yard = 4 minutes 20 seconds).

Here are my suggestions to sweeten the gap between t2 and t3 navy and fine tune some units :
- All destroyers buildtimes : 8500 (from 10000)
- All strategic Subs energy cost = 80 000 (from 800 000). These units are never built anymore because of a ridiculously high energy cost. Cybran would benefit the most from this because they have the best strat sub by far (it's an excellent but never used unit).
- All Battleships' buildtime (except Cybran): 21600 = 6 minutes for an unassisted t3 factory (from 18000 = 5 minutes).
- Cybran battleship = 8000 mass and 18000 buildtime.
- Battlecruiser same as in 3615 (7000 mass, 60000 energy, 20000 buildtime)
- Aeon Torrent Ship : 20000 buildtime (from 16000)
- Seraphim t3 sub : change damage of the torpedo weapon to 300 (from 335) and revert to the default salvo delay of 1 for 300 DPS in total.
- Tempest Mass cost adjusted to 14000 (half its previous cost, instead of the current 13000).

Difference in buildtimes between Destroyers and Battleships should be increased because Battleships are roughly as powerful as 3.5 Destoyers, they should not take only 1.8 time to build but more 2.5.
I sincerly believe that these values would greatly improve navy battles for 3616, on Seton or elsewhere.

[Ze_PilOt]

if only setons players were participating in this project, these tweaks should be done and heavily tested since a long time.

[pip]

if only setons players were participating in this project, these tweaks should be done and heavily tested since a long time.

Yeah, that's very sad that they complain more than actually trying to improve the game. If they just hosted only balance testing seton's games, there would be a huge amount of data and good feedback from them.

[Plasma_Wolf]

Regardless, I think that the T3 Strategic sub can have the described tweak immediately. The 800 000 energy cost is plainly too much (a typo).

[SeraphimLeftNut]

Thanks for bringing up those important number pip. Let me add to some setons experience to those numbers.

In a competitive setons game you will have 100+ engineers on the main naval factory after about 12 minutes. The build capacity of a t3 naval factory is 60 (12 engineers), which means that in 3599 build costs you would need about 90 seconds to produce a t3 ship (like the battleship), today this number is about half. This is a huge difference for a setons naval battle where the attacking player is at the disadvantage having to bring their t2 ships across the ocean. This leads to a simple defensive strategy, where the defending player builds up the engineers next to the t3 factory and as soon as they see that the t2 navy is about 1 minute away they put their entire eco into the production of the t3 ship, which can easily counter a couple destroyers, which then turn into a nice juicy mass chunks to reclaim.

I like your suggestions about strategic subs, I think this should obviously be fixed, but I have to disagree with your suggestion about decreasing destroyer build times. The current gap between T1 and T2 navy is very nice and it would be unfortunate to ruin it, this also makes engineer spam less important for naval production which reduces a big vulnerability that naval players have.

I think the best way for people to be able to relate to what the setons players are/were saying about navy is to look at the cost increases that were done to experimentals going from 3599 to faf. All of us love the fact that we are giving t3 land a bigger chance to play. This is exactly what the setons players asking, because t3 ships really are like experimentals on water, the game dynamic is slower, but the final result is very similar.

Zep continues to lament the fact that setons players didn't participate in balance testing, but there are a number of reasons for this. It is much more difficult to get 8 competitive players into a game for balance testing, than it is to get 2-4 players, especially when the really good setons players continued to leave. We lost the best player dim14 exactly because of the t3 naval domination, he no longer found the game interesting. Looking at the setons player base the players who were aggressive have for the most part left, and mostly the turtles remained.

In my opinion doing all those small adjustments to build times for t3 ships won't change the game much, because build capacity is very much respected by naval players. Only large changes(x2) would have a significant effect.

In my perfect world, T3 navy would be buffed in health and damage, and made as expensive as experimentals, 20k mass, 100k build time. T3 navy doesn't belong on 99% of the maps that people play, the solution is to have people play other maps and not to force T3 navy on top of T2.

[pip]

I don't think that bringing Destroyers' buildtime at the same value as Cruisers would affect the gap between t1 and t2 navy much. 8500 is still in the high range of buildtimes for t2. On the other hand, it would make the difference between destroyers and Battleships and t3 subs more significant. I'm reluctant to see the t3 buildtimes increased even more because it precisely makes heavy engineers spam mandatory (that's the reason why they were cut so deeply by GPG in the first place). The value I suggest is precisely in the range of experimental buildtimes (compare 21600 that I suggest with the 20625 of the Galactic Colossus).

You also forgot two big changes that have already been done, delaying a bit t3 navy and the strength of defending : the cost increase for the t3 yard and the "nerf" of naval wrecks mass values.

I believe the sum of all these changes can hit a sweet spot for navy balance, on most maps. And even if Seton's players are not fully satisfied, the situation would still be much better than 3614 for them.

[SeraphimLeftNut]

A cruiser and a destroyer are very different units in terms of naval combat, but I agree this change won't have much of an effect in terms of T1 vs T2 and T2 vs T3.

The build time for a frigate is 1250 which means that decreasing the build time of a destroyer from 10k to 8500 is basically allowing one less frigate to be built for the t1 naval counter of t2. Going from 10k to 8500 for the destroyer has basically no effect relative to the 20k build time of a battlecruiser.

I think I see where our biggest difference in philosophy about this game lies. You would like engineers to be less important, while I would like them to be as important as they possibly could(without making things absurd). What we have to realize is that there will be massive engie spam regardless of whether or not the build time for t3 naval ships is 20k or 100k(people still assist their nukes with engies, as futile as that is). Making engies less important however makes it more difficult to shut down naval production of your opponent, instead of taking out weak engineers you now have to either kill the t3 naval factory(which is nearly impossble) or you have to start destroying their mass production, which is also quite difficult especially with allies ready to give emergency mass and reclamation of freshly killed mass extractors/mass storage for emergency mass necessary to complete the t3 ships.

I think the decrease in the amount of mass recovered from naval wrecks was a great change for the game. I know that t3 shipyard cost has increased, but mass cost increases can be easily adjusted for by doing a little less upgrading and getting the mass later from the wrecks of dead ships(dead destroyers sill give ~800 mass each).(I do think it is a step in the right direction overall, looks like it went up by 2k mass, bringing it back to the 3599 level)

I think we are seeing the qualitative difference between mass and build capacity here. We should try to understand this difference and how it affects the game.

[SeraphimLeftNut]

I also saw the number 3.5 in your original post comparing how powerful the battleship and a destroyer is. I think these units are quite different in their capabilities so comparing them with a single number is difficult, but I this summary makes comparing t2 and t3 navy a little easier.

I think it is correct that t3 naval ships get you a more powerful weapon for the same amount of mass, but this is also the reason t3 should be put a little further into the future.

[Myrdral]

Could someone test in game if the FAF T3 strategic submarines have a cost to produce their nukes?
The unit database shows about half a nuke worth of energy to build the sub but no cost to build nukes.
http://www.faforever.com/faf/unitsDB/un ... bp=UES0304

http://www.faforever.com/faf/unitsDB/un ... bp=URS0302
Cybran battleship - 12000 build time

http://www.faforever.com/faf/unitsDB/un ... bp=URS0201
Cybran destroyer - 10000 build time

Currently, with equal build power(60,000 to make both result in complete ships not fractions) you can build 5 Cybran battleships in the time it takes to build 6 Cybran destroyers. Obviously, the battleships would win. Cybran destroyers require more build power to match Cybran battleships.

If you alter the Cybran battleship build time to 36000, then you can build 18 destroyers for every 5 battleships (both require 180,000 build time and almost equal mass 40,500 for the 18 destroyers and 40,000 for the 5 battleships)

To summarize stats of Cybran destroyers if the battleship is adjusted to 36000 build time

The destroyers take 180,000 build time and the battleships take 180,000 build time.
The destroyers take 40,500 mass and the battleships take 40,000 mass.
The destroyers take 270,000 energy and the battleships take 270,000 energy.
The destroyers have 4140 main gun dps and the battleships have 2250 main gun dps.
The destroyers have 80 main gun range and the battleships have 128 main gun range.
The destroyers have 108,900 health while the battleships have 235,000.

Balanced? I cannot test in FAF, only FA but if you care to test to see if 36000 build time on battleships is good start them beyond both ranges at 150 range or whatever. Queue focus fire for each group to attack through the other group one at a time or try just sending them on attack move toward each other.

Test with Cybran:
1 Battleship 3-4 destroyers
2 Battleships 7-8 destroyers
3 Battleships 10-11 destroyers
4 Battleships 14-15 destroyers
5 Battleships 18 destroyers

Fights should stay fairly even as long as the destroyers do not get within 50 range of the battleships to use their torpedos and ratio is kept near 1:3.6

Keep in mind this is the 'strongest' destroyer vs the 'weakest' battleship so the destroyers should win each round, especially if they get within torpedo range.

My best attempt at balance without looking into this further. Battleships 36,00 build time or slightly less. 24,000-30,000 build time may work better and i could even see having battleship build time as low as 18000. I can post my replays from 3.596 solo sandbox test if they are relevant.

[SeraphimLeftNut]

They do and it is very expensive in power, I don't know what the exact cost is, I just remember having big power problems, but the nukes work.