Ideal Space Empire game part 2

First, something I forgot to discuss in the above discussion on research. Defenses.

Galactic Civilizations, which this system is heavily based upon, uses a simple three-for-three method. Lasers are countered by shields, Mass drivers countered by armour, Missiles countered by point defense. Having high protection against one will give you great survivability for that sort of attack, but also a much smaller degree (square root it) of defense against other attacks.

In this ideal game I've got in mind, there is a relatively similar system where each of the areas of protection have their best effect against their counterpart, but this effect is felt differently. Shields would automatically counter a certain amount of damage before 'shorting out', at which point they would have to recharge, with energy weapons only countering as a percentage of their total damage towards that 'short out' phase.

Armour is always effective, but in a manner stolen from the Heavy Gear games, the more damage it blocks, the less effective it is against future attacks (with solid stage mass driver weapons counting as only a percentage of their actual damage against the armour). To be precise, the armour completely ignores a certain amount of damage - meaning it may not take any damage at all - but the amount it auto-reduces is lessened by the amount of health the ship has. This means that a 'fresh' ship with high armour can take a hell of a beating, but once it's a bit more battle damaged then those small fighter attacks become more dangerous.

Missiles, as with the previous post, are the odd one out. Missiles function as normal against shields and armour, but their countermeasure (Missile point defenses, not to be confused with the point-defence turrets mentioned previously, although there could be a little overlap) are an all-or-nothing affair. Large missiles are either shot out of the air, or not, with no middleground. Smaller swarms of missiles may have some shot out of the air while others get into contact. Point defences, for obvious reasons, are useless against Mass Drivers and Energy weapons.

As you might guess from this, while each is more effective against a particular type of attack, it is certainly effective to have a ship possessing two (or even three) types of defenses. Missile defences do seem somewhat uneven, but perhaps this could be countered by giving the missiles higher damage, to provide some incentive to research countermeasures rather then just relying on the shields and armour to see you through. After all, it's a common cliche in space opera that the bombers still launch large missiles. Then again, with guided missiles there is no real concern over fire arcs and turreting. Perhaps missiles could be grouped based on their guiding? Unguided rockets and guided missiles... Hmm, it's a consideration.


Let's consider something I teased around before. Turreting. This links directly in with the ship design process.

Something I wish to consider in the designs of the ship is weapon arcs. In Galciv2 there was no difference where you put the weapon, since in the combat cinematic the weapons would often fire through your own ship in order to follow the line between your ship and theirs. However in a process of designing your own ship for a 3d space-based RTS game there needs to be more consideration for it. Part of the design process of creating your own ships would be weapon arcs. I know it seems needlessly complex, but I believe it would add to your enjoyment of seeing your own ships out in the depths of space.

First off we'll say you've created the basis for your ship (I'll cover things such as engines (which affect speed and manouverability later), life support, fighter decks, extra systems, etc, later) and now you're up to the stage of arming it. Obviously you want to put the heavy guns here... but wait! Do you want to attach it directly?

Instead this system would allow for 'turreting'. With turreting some of the ship design pieces you have access too are turrets. These have their own stats such as 'Maximum turn degree', 'available weapon classes', 'turn speed', 'cost' and 'manpower' (discussed later). These must be weighed up to judge which turrets you want to place where. Point defence weapons (as mentioned in part 1) are automatically turreted so they can just be placed wherever you wish. Heavier weapons (the medium and large weapons) can either be placed flat, in which case they have a very limited arc they can fire in. This may seem negative, but it is far cheaper then turreting, and allows for simpler, more streamlined designs. Alternatively turrets can be used. Turrets capable of full 360 rotation will either be relatively slow in their movement, or VERY costly, and possibly not even able to hold the largest class of weapons.

So in designing ships, the player must weigh up firing arcs. Do they want their ships to be far more expensive but have no 'blind spot'? Or perhaps this is a ship meant for engaging slow vessels and as such it doesn't need to alter it's firing arc much? Maybe the ship itself is highly maneouverable, so it doesn't need particularly impressive/costly turreting systems. Or perhaps the player will return to the 'good ol' days of ships having their heaviest armaments along their port and starboard sides. This way the player knows perfectly well how to arrange the ships in formation so they can fire effectively. As mentioned, Missiles have no fire arcs since they are able to change course in mid flight. This allows them unparralled versatility, but if the enemy has appropriate defences missiles are a very hit-or-miss affair.

All these things must be weighed when creating a ship, along with a vast array of others. What others? I'll explain in more detail in the next post, when I discuss extra systems such as: Engine, Life support, manpower, generators, and even things like docking.