Hey guys, it’s good to be back. I’m LKohime, and I’ve been fairly seriously about GSB since before Tribes was released. I’m also the guy who broke the campaign in the beta, with the pure fighter fleet. I’ve let myself be distracted by other games, but GSB2’s been on my radar for well, as long as it’s been a thing. So I picked it up this morning, and finally got around to sitting down and playing with it.
It’s pretty. The updated graphical effects are really nice, the layering gives it at least a more believable 3D world, and the particles are much better. Honestly, graphically I don’t have any qualms. The tutorial’s are a bit on the overdone side, however as Cliff’s blog talks about he did that intentionally to try and make the game and mechanics a bit more accessible.
I’ve beat the first 4 maps now, and as I work my way through and do the harder difficulties I’ll update this thread more. But so far I’ve completely cut out fighters and gunships from my fleets. This may well be a playstyle thing, but I’ve found a single dreadnought with tractor’s and pulse lasers MORE then sufficient to deal with any hostile fighter swarm i’ve seen so far. Dread’s are awesome. Huge, roaming death barges that cares nothing about any enemy. Which is great for people like me who put as many missile launchers or other guns on them as they can, and just watch stuff explode. The problem is that, at least until we get challenges up and running, they sure do feel stupidly strong. I seem to remember Cliff saying he wanted them NOT to be anti-fighter capible, or at least need escorts. With Dread’s having access to tractor’s and high tracking guns, they have the ability to deal with fighters. Add the sheer number of hard points they have, and they seem to be potentially more effective as an escort then as the primary damage dealers. Not sure on this though, I’ll have to wait and see once challenges are up.
Aaaand first crash, when I clicked to load battle 5. I’ll be back later tonight with more thoughts, and maybe see about streaming some next week!
Edit the first: Forgot to mention, I’d tune battle credit caps. I’ve played 4 missions and got well over 100k honor. I’ve got all races, all but i think 13 modules, and all the dread hull’s unlocked already.
Hey welcome back, and thanks for the feedback. As you say, dreadnoughts might be too capable alone, and I’m open to the idea of removing the ability for them to have tractor beam entirely, and possibly downgrading the effectiveness of their anti-fighter defensive lasers.
One of the design ambitions of GSB2 is to support a combined-arms approach, and we definitely want the player to have those ‘oh crap, I just lost my destroyer escorts, my dreadnought is now f**ked’ moments, so it sounds like they are way over-specced right now.
When it comes to unlocks, one of my aims for them is simply to make a new players first few battles simple and manageable without them worrying about 100 module choices, hence a lot starts locked, but they unlock real fast. What I don’t want is battlefield 4, where 150 hours in, I still have only unlocked half the game I’ve bought…
But yeah, it may well need tweaking. I suspect a simple upping of all the unlock costs is called for.
Cheers
It’s good to be back. GSB’s a series I’ve invested some time in, and even as I put in more I find my enjoyment staying at worst the same. I really do think dreadnoughts are a bit too capable at the moment. I think there’s a hard fixes here, and one easy fix. As you said the easy solution is simply removing the tractor beams. I’d be careful about downgrading the defensive lasers, as they’re also useful against swarms of frigates or destroyers. Perhaps lower the highest tracking speed on a dreadnought class laser to 1.5? I think the highest at the moment is 1.8, but I’d have to check. The harder fixes requite a bit more work, sadly. Honestly they don’t feel like as big an upgrade from cruisers as cruisers from frigates. Perhaps increase the choices required in dreadnoughts by swapping the hardpoint/module slots, so they CAN field 20+ guns but only if they’re willing to have at best minimal armor and shields? The final point on dreadnoughts is they don’t feel quite as prohibitive to field in fleets, cost wise. They’re maybe twice as expensive as a cruiser. Perhaps make them have higher base costs, or make dreadnought modules cost a bit more?
While I like the combined arms approach, if someone can come up with a clever build that works, and is single spec, I don’t think they should be punished for it. I’ll have to play around more with other ship builds and get some more notes on that.
On unlocks, completely agree about the battlefield 4 point. I’m ~200 hours into it and while I’ve unlocked most guns, i’ve stopped playing because I’ve got my fun from it and now it’s just grind to unlock everything. I think making 3-5 unlock “tiers” would be a good idea, starting at ~300-500 honor for a module and ending in the 4-8k range? Not sure on the numbers, but it feels like some of the modules are clearly better, and paying more for them would maybe be a nice idea.
Finally, any chance you’ll make a survival challenge again?