Community is peoples too!

I think the lesson learned here is to find balance in all things.

Uh yeah starcraft become popular due to it's solid multiplayer play.

A good competitive game is what keeps it alive, it's how you have people still playing when the expansion comes out to buy the expansion.

Advertising for IC is largely word of mouth. People badmouthing it's medium and high level multiplayer play is NOT good. And most people, I don't, don't stay newbies, but after them getting rushed by X unit become better and figure out how to counter it.

I'm all for better in game tool-tips and such to explain better what counters what. Ingame I try to be as helpful as I can and give people advice on why they lost and what they could do better next game.

Just here on the forums I get annoyed with the stupid arguments people try to make against stuff, and not listening to what people who know what they're talking about have said. In the game I beat people and they listen fine to my advice. Here it's "OMG NO SOMEONE BEAT MY 5 DISCIPLES WITH 50 LRMS YOU'RE WRONG THEY'RE UNSTOPPABLE THERE IS NO COUNTER AND YOUR BUILD ORDERS ARE BAD." How helpful do you expect these veteran players to be when the people they're trying to help spit in their face when they try to explain intricacies of the game?

And being new has nothing to do about not being able to do MATH.


And as I said.. How does making the game balanced so high level play isn't about repeating one thing every game bad for the new players? Eventually the new players learn these.
You can't make X unit worthless because noobs REFUSE to learn how to counter it.(really the issue is there is no unit with a tooltip saying that it counters LRM except somewhat the carriers description, while flaks do great against them, and scouts do okay. The flak research icon doesn't flash when lrms attack you.)
A tutorial for how to build a fleet and counter others would be nice too probably.

having great fun w/ the game now guys (not that it wasn't fun before). thanks much for your hard work, and don't let the turkeys get you down.

so, uh, what's planned for the expansion pack, and when can we expect it?? j/k!

Ahh...the cancer is here too!   

I'm cancer?

I've never posted on this forum before, but after seeing this thread, I felt the need to say something.

There seems to be this argument between so-called 'casual' players (those who don't necessarily play at a high competitive play-to-win level [by their own choice and not by some deficiency]) and the competitive players. However, a lot of mud is getting slung around and the topic is getting shifted away from game balance into the territory of 'casual vs. competitive play.'

I am a competitive player myself, although not in this game (and not in many other games). In this game, I would be considered a casual player. Somehow, there is always a false dichotomy in any multiplayer-capable game of 'casual vs. competitive.' (note: I am NOT talking about MMO's, which are a complicated subject unto themselves...) It is in my experience (as both a competitive AND a casual player) that both camps really want the same thing.

So before, I go on, everyone give everyone else hugs. 'Casual' is not an insult in any way (remember, it's not a deficiency, it's completely by choice). Nor is a competitive player an elitist. I will explain both of these points and will elaborate on why game balance is good for everyone.

A lot of casual players are put off by the competitive players' attitude. They say (from the perspective of a casual player) that they know everything and that everything should be a certain way while seemingly ignoring the objections of casual players. There is a reason for the actions of both sides, and it's not pretty.

I occasionally play BfMEII mainly because I find the animations and such entertaining (why? no one knows...). My goal, therefore, is to tech up to the units that have animations (ooohh shiny) and such that I find amusing. Note that my goal isn't to win, EVEN THOUGH the object of the game (pretty much by definition) is to win. This is kind of a stupid example, but it's a good one. My goal in that game is not necessarily to win, but something else.

I also used to play (for several years) Starcraft. In that game, my goal was to win. I played at a high competitive level in Starcraft. I didn't care about animations or ANY OTHER GOAL, my goal was to win, and this was what brought me enjoyment. To meet this end, I STUDIED the game. I made spreadsheets. I did summations and used power series and other calculus to make mathematical models in my head of what to do given a certain situation. I also playtested, playtested, playtested. All the time. I knew the game intimately. Every minute detail and nuance was open to me.

Now, I don't think anyone can really make a good argument at this point that I know the mechanics of BfMEII better than Starcraft. This is the unfortunate position of the casual player in this particular instance. Someone who played Starcraft in order to make large Zerg swarms or roleplay an alien invasion would not know even half of the stuff I knew about Starcraft (assuming of course, that their goal was always to roleplay and they never did the INCREDIBLE WORK it takes to get to the level of knowledge and proficiency that I did).

Being more knowledgable about Starcraft doesn't make me a better person or a smarter person than the roleplayer. It just makes me more knowledgable about that particular game and its mechanics. That said, those who play at a competitive level have more knowledge of the intimate details of the game than those who don't. It's not about just opening up the files and looking at the math. There's situational analysis and pre-formed 'paths' and microing and 1000 other details that casual players just don't make use of (and why should they if they don't want to?).

Hopefully, we can all agree that competitive players are more knowledgable and in a better position to balance the game than casual players. If you still disagree, at least state your argument without calling someone elitist. Different people are better at different things (and mostly because they choose to be - a person more interested in game mechanics will be better at them than a person more interested in music or Greek literature or astrophysics). Someone who has more knowledge than you is not necessarily elitist. It's all about the attitude. (Also, competitive players - you don't gain anything by insulting casual players and calling them noobs or in some way implying that they're deficient other than by choice. If you can't make a good argument for your case without insulting someone, then you don't have a good argument.)

Now on to the subject of WHETHER OR NOT the game should be balanced in a particular way. I say it should, and that multiplyaer-centered game balance benefits everyone. Here's why. If multiplayer is not balanced, the game itself is not balanced (including single player). It's sometimes difficult to see why this is. But let's look at a particular example.

Let's say that strategy A is overpowered. What does this mean? Well, it means that competitive players have determined (through their advanced knowledge of the particular subject) that strategy A is more powerful than any other strategy. This isn't always completely clear cut. A more specific definition would be that a player has a much higher chance to win with strategy A than any other strategy. Usually this happens because all the counters to strategy A are weak against strategies B, C, D, etc. (in other words, very weak in general).

Why is this a bad thing? For one thing, it takes a lot of the complexity and strategy out of multiplayer games. This makes multiplayer games less fun. Instead of playing 'Sins of a Solar Empire' you're playing 'See Who Can Execute Strategy A the Best'. The loss of DIVERSITY is what makes this very UNINTERESTING.

Why does someone who never plays multiplayer care about this? Simple. If you have some other goal (we'll say for example, that you just wanna see really big fleet battles), you will have FEWER ways to reach your goal. You'll either be forced into strategy A by the AI (assuming the AI is 'competent') or at the very least, you'll have fewer decisions to make since lots of things may be too weak to your liking. Now obviously anyone can go into single player and just play against easy opponents and the problem goes away, but the problem is still there for everyone else. In effect, if you just cater to the easy-mode-single-player guy, everyone else kinda gets the shaft. (note that I am NOT saying that all casual players are easy-mode-single-player guys, this is just a particular example of a particular group that likes this play mode).

But there's a way that EVERYONE can be happy, and that is to simply balance strategy A so that there are other counters for it or so that it's somehow weaker in some other way (and also make many other strategies stronger). That way, everyone can have a good diverse game with lots of options for players NO MATTER what goal they have (whether it be competitive play or pretty fleet battles). The more diversity there is at the ultimate high level of the game, the more diversity there is all around - everyone wins with a balanced game.

Again, if you have an argument against this, please post it without insults or other logical fallacies. Whenever you type a response to someone, always remember to respond with reason instead of emotion. An argument argued from reason is simply a way to arrive at an answer to a question. An argument argued from emotion turns eventually into an attack, and that never solves any problems.

Sorry for the long post, but it had to be said.

Thanks.

(Also please note that 'whining' and 'complaining' are completely different. 'Whining' has a negative connotation and is used to insult someone. 'Complaining' has a pretty neutral connotation and someone's complaint can be either well thought out and valid or not so well thought out and invalid.)

(1) Just to be clear, I don't disagree with you. My whole point about diversity being important was referring to the diversity of the good strategies available to choose from. One race being overpowered is clearly not in line with diversity of good strategies (since good strategies are now limited to playing one race, in that example).

(2) You have to consider that there is no 'fix' to this. If people want to play at a competitive level, they will make themselves knowledgeable. Some people would like to do this, but don't want to devote the time. Others don't even care in the first place (those are people with different goals than being competitive). Despite all these different groups, there will always be a layer of competitive players at the 'top' of the game (meaning they have the most intimate knowledge of game mechanics and systems) who are able to, more clearly than anyone else, see imbalances. These are the players that have the best idea about balance in the game AND can demonstrate imbalance where it occurs.

On a side note, it seems that there IS no good counter to LRMs (besides more LRMs). (Disclaimer: I'm not a high-level player in this game, but I do follow all the discussions and [more importantly] watch relevant replays.) LRMs (before this patch, mind you) could be teched fairly early by all races. So early, indeed, that everyone was at such an early point economically that it wasn't feasible to tech up further into support ships and have a varied fleet (because you knew you were soon to be assaulted with LRMs so it made more sense to make more of your own LRMs instead of invest in economy).

There was a proposed strategy for a while of using flaks against LRM's, but the problem with that is: if the only counter to your strategy is an overall weak strategy, then your strategy is too good. In other words, using flaks to counter LRMs... maybe, but using flaks for anything else was very weak. This is all in 1v1 or 2v2, smaller maps. The larger maps seemed to always go past the economic point where players built up a varied fleet.

Sorry for the slightly off-topic.

Here's the deal. The developers made changes to the overall game play to suite it to everyone. Too many players here complain of unbalancing issues when the fact of the matter is simple. YOU need to change your strategy and not use your OLD strategy. In the current game setup (v1.03) the reality is the Vasari can pump out 10 Assailants before the TEC can even build Trade Ports AND LRMs. That's is a very important issue since the TEC has little hope of fending off Assailants with COBALTS! I play as both TEC and Vasari (still learning Advent) and as a Vasari player I know (even in v1.02) that if you sit back and let a TEC player econ up - YOU LOSE! It is your strategies that are failing the economic fight, NOT the balancing issue. A TEC player that rushes Trade Ports is an EASY target since their fleet will be very weak.

Yes the nerfing of siege frigates happened cuz you could murder a noob's econ super easy with 10 siege frigates with the right strategy. For better players it isn't a big issue since you still kill the noob off it just lets them live for a little longer. Any argument that makes any sense is that your just letting the noob have a slower more painful death and loss. Single player is easy enough to where it isn't a big issue.

From reply #65, posted by "Frogboy" :

Stardock nor Ironclad are going to make changes to the game that are to the detriment of the single player game experience [...] which is where most people play the game most of the time.

That very recent statement by the CEO of Stardock goes to the heart of my (previously posted) perspective : the vast majority of Stardock's customers do not spend a lot of time (if any) in online, competitive MP.

Those numerous customers, who have recently purchased well over 100 000 SINS game units, are not « idiots » : most of them simply do not have the time, energy, and competitive power-drive to spend whole evenings on ICO to practice MP and efficiently compete.

I can't prove it with statistics, but I suppose that most of those « numerous » casual gamers do not even have the time and/or interest to visit the SINS forum ... and if they do, I would be surprised if they read all the posts within long, complex threads where sophisticated strategies & tactics are analysed & debated to death.

Consequently, especially before version 1.03, they started a SP game, got bullied by some gross A.I. spams, and said to themselves « What the f**k, I don't have time for this non-sense! ». (And if they went on ICO and succeeded in joining a viable game, they risked being bullied by human spammers and by smart-aleck manipulators of the Black Market.)

Who has time for this ?! How come that tiny minority of self-glorified, « high-level » arch-competitors disposes of so many hours of leisure-time to practice, and practice, and practice ... until the fast & furiously efficient executions of their build-orders and their mouse-clicks become optimized routines ?!

Many of Stardock's customers have full-time jobs, a family life, other hobbies, other games to play ... or serious school study & reading to do (which is my case).

How many financial revenues can Stardock & Ironclad obtain from that tiny minority of self-glorified, « high-level » arch-competitors ?

My excerpt from reply #65 is then very eloquent ... even if you do not agree with my « stupid » « noob » arguments.

I don't differentiate between "casual" or "competitive" when discussing serious balance problems and I think it's a red herring here.

The fact is, it doesn't matter if you're casual or competitive when someone throws 50 LRM frigates at you 15 minutes into a game.

It doesn't matter if you're casual or competitive if the black market completely nerfs your faction.

It doesn't matter if you're casual or competitive if siege frigates are nerfed to the point of being useless.

It simply affects gameplay for everyone. What I see now is a game that might be really fun if everyone just stopped hitting the LRM button and played it out. That usually doesn't happen.

Stardock CEO post #15


Excerpt from reply #15, posted by Frogboy :


Some people have explicitly said that the hard core multiplayer players are the heart of the community and must be made top priority. And that's something I can't accept. Our goal has to remain to make sure as many people as possible enjoy the game.


/end of story

Hi Frogboy, I think it's great that you post on this forum and talk about your opinions on things. However, as a professional, it's good to keep in mind to not disregard a message simply on the basis of how it's delivered. These people complaining are your customers after all. I completely agree that many suggestions are bogus, but many are also very constructive and shouldn't be dismissed because of their tone.

I'm a developer for Electronic Arts, arguably one of the most villified and hated game developers in the world. That said, I agree there's a lot of things EA doesn't do well but they do at least listen to complaints even when they're dripping with venom (however, we can't implement all the changes due to budget constraints which we're not really able to do anything about...). I'm on an internal team working on multiple games and I can see the stress that everyone has trying to figure out ways to implement/fix/fullfill certain wishes of the community within the project budget and without intruducing too many risks.




I must disagree with this... the quick fix is an easy way out. It also serves to break things in the long run. Particularly this fix makes the game against the AI easier as well as changes the dynamics especially in multiplayer games. If this "fix" was simply put in place to reduce the amount of siege frigate spam the computer uses, wouldn't it have been easier to tweak the AI (I've never seen the AI code in this game, so I may be completely wrong here)? The only people who were complaining bitterly about siege frigates were, I'm sorry to say, people who didn't really know how to play.