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Tousansons

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Everything posted by Tousansons

  1. Do you have any source baking that claim? What are these gamers you are talking about, some kind of new social class taken out of some corporate asses? The DLC and microtransactions model is successful and show video game players are clearly not that stingy about them, despite what you claim or what the ever few vocal minority like to rage about on social medias. Hell, they aren't that stingy when new generation games costs even more. They don't bat an eye when some known editors announce new subscription models for their catalogue. What about mobile games, do we need to talk about mobile games? Today video game industry as never been so healthy. I'm sorry but I really don't see about which stingy people you are talking about. Even Hissy's post is not stingy about DLC's. He even agree with you on the carriers part and wouldn't mind some "what-if" navies. Still you act as if he is refusing them? I don't think raising concerns about price, quality and quantity of content -especially here- is being stingy. It show that there is still people who care enough to talk about money, be it to pay more or less for a product. If they want more, this mean the dev hit their target right and offered just enough content, allowing for expansion. If they want less, it just mean the dev missed it's audience, overestimated it's product and overall had too much ambition for what they could deliver.
  2. Dream game it is. I'll try to be short and not too far from what could be done in a reasonable time/budget: - Game scope reduced to 1890+ -> 1920-*. Less models to add, easier to "balance", no radars and overall simpler technology (that still evolve rather quickly), no need for extensive planes usage, no carriers (or the justification of their absence), more dreadnoughts and plenty of time for wars against a naval power. This will also have the advantage of reducing the engagement range while keeping the game entirely focused on gunnery and torpedoes without risking (too much) devolving into nonsense alt-history. Stopping before the period of historical naval treaties and most importantly before the dawn of naval aviation let the player create his dream dreadnoughts while keeping the ensemble plausible enough and much more grounded. Yes, even if it mean there will be no Kagero (I guess this is not my dream game then) - Ship designer reworked with at least stats more tied to the ship, not to the hull/superstructure elements. Let the player choose his visual flavor before the "best" stats pick. This also aims against some hulls who allows more main turrets placement than others. Finally, AI designs are chosen from a pool of decent/floatable lump of steel that could be expanded by the player. UA:D ship designer is really hard to figure out right now. On one hand there is plenty of good ideas to change it for the better, on the other hand I'm not sure on how deep it is imprinted into the game to change it without having to redo almost everything. I'll stick with my (I hope) basic changes for now. - Crew/officer: there should be a nation pool of crew/officer tied to a recruiting policy/naval prestige. Crew/officers experience is tied tied to a ship, changing how responsive and combat efficient she is. Replacing losses reduce the overall ship experience and drain the nation pool. This could give the player the opportunity to balance the need of competent naval personnel vs the more immediate need of greens to replace losses. Not too far from what we have in UG:CW. - Technologies are not in a basic tree, but rather linked to situation/tradition/doctrine/ship built. If a player build X number of Y ship type with Z main armament, he will unlock more technologies linked to the ship he built. If the player focus on a "decisive battle" doctrine, the game will be more inclined to unlock bigger gun, thicker armour.. If the nation as difficulty securing ressources or is losing a war pretty badly, fuel, engines or steel quality could suffer, but smaller, cheaper and no less efficient design could also be offered. I think in a relatively limited time period and with my following lines on campaign duration, this could lead to added variety. - Hard limit on battles in a war for the sake of gameplay. If UA:D is about designing and putting your ships to the test, focus on making each engagement worthwile should be a priority. Start a war with a small battle, then escalate until the fabled decisive one. Add doctrines (chosen by the player) that change certain type of battles or their order? Like a surprise attack, night fights or convoy raid/protection. When two nations with different doctrines clashes, the one with some sort of advantage (ship number/victories..) could "force" the other one into it's terms of engagement. One thing for sure, don't fall into the trap of a zilion samey battles. Focus more into something like: early -> mid -> late war with X different battles type each, their outcomes ranging from "game" war score to new technologies/ressources/doctrines. Defeats should cripple, but also allow the player to bounce back. If this mean a semi-linear campaign, so be it. - More stuff to do in battles. Tied to the fact that I want fewer battles in a war. Letting players click on stuff that do things. It's surely one of the hardest part to design and I am honestly not sure on how to do it well. In my opinion, the "win" should reward as much good thinking and good clicking on stuff than a good ship design. Note that a "win" could very well be "getting the hell out of here". Exemple of (I think) interesting micro-gestion, some of them are already in game: manual DCP, torpedo evasion, ordnance usage, smoke screening, ship speed, ship formation (Even if I think changing it in the middle of a battle is not a sound idea).. There, I hope it was at least as good to read as I liked writing it. It wasn't that short after all. *I know it is a tough one and I don't care. It's not on Steam and it's still in early Alpha. Things can and must be changed. I'm more than convinced UA:D will be better that way.
  3. Players should also lower their expectations and like this game, aim for realism. Telling that a naval video game will first and foremost be a naval video game will not help at all. Regardless of it's developpment You will still have flocks of people demanding that their shipfu be added, or that their research show that the shellweight at X moment is wrong, that there is no tactical map, or that battles takes ages and there is little to do in them, ect. If UA:D aim is to have some sort of realism in ship design and battles, I'll stick with that and start praising/roasting when the dev team will tell me that it is basically done. Which as of now is clearly not the case, mind you. I wrote and fought during the first great spreadsheet war against filling the game with 40 years of naval data immediatly. I have not changed my view, and I still find it useless. UA:D is already lacking some of it's base feature (like crew members) and the only way to test designs is random battles where the player have little control, or the puzzles of naval academy. Do we need to talk about ship AI in battle? Or the barebone UI? What about economy and design costs? How does campaign will work and how battles will be generated/fought? I couldn't care less about historical weight or range, or tonnage when it is already hard to TELL what the game is trying to do with it's numbers. I still believe it is much easier to start tweaking numbers when your base is solid enough to test them in a "realistic" environnement. And in my opinion we don't have this environnement yet. Will it take time? Certainly, like I already wrote somewhere else on this forum, a similar game of the same scope started it's developpement around 2013 (some of the first post in Steam and Iron forum date to this year) and spawned three games, countless patches and bugfixes. It is still flawed and developped to this day (RTW2 will have it's missiles DLC). This alone should have tempered the expectation of any UA:D early baker, without counting the fact that we also learned that the dev team at the time was three people, and their objectives was to release the game half a year later (correct me if I'm wrong). Thankfully this changed and we can now expect a bit more with no real ETA. Do we need to stop spreadsheeting? No, on the contrary, it is still important to show them that we want realism in the game at some point. It can even summon some needed changes early. While I understand it can be frustrating, we just need to be aware that we don't have their internal workflow and that the changes "we" want are probably not their priority, even after feedback. Be it good or bad in the long run. TL;DR: There will always be noise regardless of the gamey/realistic elements. There will probably be even more noise if suddenly the game shift developpment towards pure arcade. Telling the devs to "Admit" something will not help, this is not a trial but the forum of a game still in early Alpha after two years. And yes, this is a pretty bad sign if you want my blunt opinion on the subject.
  4. This is wrong. Games have a set of rules and propose a challenge to players. A big part of a game is overcoming the challenge. Depending on the game, the challenge will be different, be it easier or harder. There is nothing elitist at thinking a player that overcome the challenge by it's rules is good while the other is less good. Lazy was perhaps a bit harsh, but who cares it is the internet, your avatar can't be harmed. Age of Empire 2 force the player to micromanage. It is one of the best RTS ever made. Some will even say it is the best RTS to date. It is probably not avoiding torpedoes, but still. Converting unit is microgestion, setting farms is microgestion, ect. Also: Yay, hotfix.
  5. What is the point of a 3D game with RTS control if one of it's "only" crucial element is removed. What do we gain as players by removing the need of avoiding a weapon that can wype a part of it's fleet? For now it would only be: sit back and watch two battle line firing at each other. Pathfinding and torpedo warning could be improved. Overal fleet management need to be changed as to be more intuitive, but we certainly don't need to remove the torpedo avoidance from the player. RTS are not just about army composition. You need map awereness and some sort of reflexes too. Even freakin Azur Lane let the player avoid torpedoes. Why not UA:D?
  6. This was especially true the day we learned that the first UA:D dev team was three people. We'll see how this go with the new expanded one, even if it will mostly be slow. Graphics are a good way to attract a portion of the playerbase, for better or worse UA:D is a decent looking 3D game. We'll have to wait and see if they can improve in the areas where he is clearly lacking (ship designer, battle UI), add the missing features (crew, for exemple) and if he can deliver an enjoyable campaign. While retaining it's good look. I agree that it was probably a mistake to go 3D. There seems to be a common belief that wows gameplay is worse than a naval sim. Let me somewhat disagree with that. WoWs is not in the same league, period. At it's core it is a pretty good arcade game about warships, with nice graphics, fast battles, decent skill cap with several layers (captain skills, armor angling, concealment, consummables..) good selection of vehicles, ect. We can endlessly argue about game balance (OK: it's garbage, let's not argue anymore) or monetization (OK: it's even worse) but the base game is fun and if you like warships and want a multiplayer action game it is pretty much the only game in the market. Real naval battles on the other hands are slow. Shells are splashing everywhere. Turning a ship is slow. Firing guns is slow. There is no island cover, no capture point. Rendering the whole ordeal in 3D often make the game even slower. Just plain old battle between two battle line that can last several hours and most of the time ends up inconclusive. There is not much in term of gameplay there, you set a basic strategy, plot a course, sometimes pick a better target. But in most naval sim what you do is just wait for something to blow up in the distance after doing some menial micromanagement. It's not necessarely a "bad" gameplay, but I don't think that WoWs one is worse. What makes naval sim interesting is often the fact that you can chose what ship to take into battle, the reason they are here, their technology and crew experience, ect.
  7. You already made your choice as the tone of your post is clearly showing. I don't think you'll change your mind and I fail to see the point of your post. Well done, you win. Very bold and courageous comparison. RTW engine is pretty light, allowing a lot of abstraction a game like UA:D can't. But it is also the result of Y.E.A.R.S of active development. Rule the waves is only one game with the engine, they also released Steam and Iron before that who was pretty much only the core battle system with no campaign and only historical scenarios. They had a painfully long beta for the two RTW. And yet today there is still lot's of things that are underdevelopped (battle generation, anyone? Yes?) RTW is a superior game because it had at least 8+ years of development (Steam and Iron posts are as old a 2013) and you can bet the developement started way before that. Of course this is with no 3D engine whatsoever. Pathfinding is easier to code like that: have you tried colliding with ships in RTW? Most of the time there is an auto avoidance with RNG, a thing you can't do that easily in a 3D engine. Shell trajectory is just some number to write with no need to see if they go under the waves before reaching their target. Ships are just some grey blocks, with no visible subdivision and a rather strict (if realistic) turret placement. You can't actively avoid torpedoes, ect. Yes in it's state UA:D is inferior and unfinished. That's why the game is not even on early access on steam and that's why we are still in alpha. You are delusional if you expected otherwise. I don't know. Enjoy games for what they are now. Not for what they could have been with a bajilion more time and money? There, convinced UA:D is at least worth sticking for from time to time?
  8. I'm going to nitpick. Putting the best admiral/captain in history in a ship manned by incompetent will only result in mild disaster at best. Crew training is more important on ship level than having some cool name at the helm, even if it "can" boost morale. I know i'm not the best person to talk about "realism" and "accuracy", I'm even more enclined in gamey elements. On the other hand, UA:D is not an historical game. You deviate from history the moment you create your first warship with the nation you choose to play. In UA:D there is no reason to have a Beatty, Darlan, Nagumo or whatever because they will never be in the situation that made them famous. What could indeed be cool is special skill added to your commanders as they serve your navy, win or lose battle, ect (although i'm not fond of the WoWs treatment of better reload/accuracy). What I find not cool is adding another meta of: "you need to reach the year 1900+ with the nation X to recruit famous captain Y for your destroyers, he's so OP". We already have that with hulls and superstructures characteristics and this is a pretty bad thing because it reduce diversity. If all you want is having some known names as commanders, perhaps the game will add the option to change them?
  9. My mistake then. That show how much I play UA:D these days too I guess. This was defintely a nice touch without the need of any player input.
  10. We have already a few ranging shots when firing at long range against a target, this is automatic. We also have the option to separate Secondaries and main battery target. I'm all for more options in game, on the other hand I'm not sure it would add anything than "more microgestion". Perhaps a toggle on the campaign map that allow to "conserve ammunition" or "always full salvoes". Definitely not an option per ships in battle though.
  11. The long awaited roadmap is here \o/ I'm curious to see how naval dominance will influence a war between two nation and how "victory objectives" will be set. I'm also sad that we'll need to wait more before being able to save design in custom battles. Good luck with 2021.
  12. Modding doesn't work like that. A game is not "tailored" and "balanced" for modding in the first place. The game mechanics and all other elements are designed to work within the game scope, not some fan made content happening after release. There can however be some tools or things making modding "easier", but this is a topic to discuss when the game will be close to release. On the other hand, we can discuss about the fact that hulls/towers are just some historical skins adding bonus to the ensemble. I don't really mind it, although it feels gamey and in the end there is no point in chosing the "inferior" one even if it looks cooler. There is exemple of game with mods aiming to salvage the broken release, even some naval ones (Pacific Storm). Modders will find a game worth modding as long as the files are relatively easy to fiddle with and there is at least their Discord friendlist eager to try their work.
  13. I remember reading that crew and their mechanic was scheduled for the first iteration of the campaign. We all know what happened from there. Still eager to try the new formation mechanics with an hopefully improved pathfinding.
  14. It will become a more valid complaint if the campaign ship with this poor early year hull selection. I'm just seeing them focusing on the more visible and well known ship hulls to keep us waiting while they are working on other gameplay elements. In my opinion it is a bit too soon to complain about them "skipping" anything. Although the development is really slow and I can understand that a few shiny end game new hulls is starting to feel not enough.
  15. If having less copy pasted hull for the year XXXX make the dev team focus more on the numerous core gameplay issues listed in several threads and for a long time. I couldn't care less. For exemple right now I'm more interested in having my copy pasted hull not run into each other when I order some basic movement while retaining some semblance of historical doctrine of the time period. About new player impression, I don't really know. UA:D seems already lost between people expecting to recreate historical ships (and not being able to because it's not an historical game) and those who just want some power fantasy with their shitty H-surelythiswillwinthewar and A-howdoweevenbuildthesewithoutsteel while theorically there is indeed 40 year of naval history before that. I'm more and more thinking that the engine and graphics was a mistake. UA:D will probably never let you create some mighty warship/blueprint of the time, because the campaign will limit you, the builder will limit you and finally the graphics will limit you.
  16. What's cool with projects is that they always sounds awesome when they are imagined. Then, 5-10-15 years later if the prototype is finally completed, this sound just like a colossal waste of money and time. Battleships are dead.
  17. Now I'm seriously impatient. Richelieu est très jolie, oui oui.
  18. It's as you said a fix. A bandaid while waiting for a better solution. Don't get me wrong, it is definitely needed right now, but it doesn't add much to the "realism" of naval combat other than being able to sink a crippled ship while stern chasing him.
  19. Kancolle si soo much better than Azur Lane è_é There is also Rule the Waves 2. Choose wisely.
  20. A new formation system and some kind of improvement with the damage model, now i'm impatient to try it out.
  21. I'll wait and I think this is for the better. More developpers and more time can only improve the overall quality of the game.
  22. Thankfully we are talking about games. In a game, there is definitively a challenge when the stakes are mutual annihilation in a matter of minutes. DEFCON is a perfect exemple. The game design is good, the rules are clear, the UI engaging and the game last for a decent amount of time. If you know what you are doing, even something where you "lose" in victory can be fun and very replayable. If modern naval warfare is all about finding first, striking first and hopefully disapear. Then make sure your game allow you to find first with all the range of sensor available and you have already an interesting game of cat and mouse. Cold Waters, even with all of its "arcade" controls is really good at it. I'm also certain a game like Command Modern Operation can be engaging too because it allow just that.
  23. Sea Power doesn't allow for ship building/design, doesn't allow to pick a naval power other than ReD/BlU and we don't really know how the campaign will play out "yet". Don't get me wrong, it is the sole naval game I'm waiting for right now because I'm a sucker for cold war. But I don't think it's similar to UA:D in many way other than having botes firing at each other. Rule the Waves 2 is closer to it because lately it added early cold war and missiles.
  24. You can build ships that are close enough and for several months, the team added hulls, superstructures and guns that look like the ship X of the nation Y. While It is true you cannot build the ships that existed with all their local quirks like faulty ammunitions, no torpedo protection near the rudder, subpar steel, bigger machinery than her sister, 100mm plating right above the wine reserves and so on. I don't think the game was advertised like that and I don't think it is headed that way. I understand the rant even if I disagree with it and find it trivial at this stage of development but the final comparison with World of Warships is a bit strange. It's a "third person" arcade multiplayer game about historical ship and ship design with a lot of liberty taken regarding specs and naval operation in general. Even if Ultimate Admiral: Dreadnought is not (and will not be) a simulation, it is a solo strategy game about designing the ships of a nation and make shell holes in the other nations hulls.
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