Distension Beta Suggestions/Bugfix thread

[gdugwyler]

If it's valuable and helpful for the terr, then it shouldn't be something that "surprises" the terr and catches them off-guard. It's there to benefit the terr, and if the terr has a warning before it happens, they could react in a way that escape pods could benefit a lot more than they do now.

You've explained my point perfectly: were a notice given, it would benefit the Terr a lot more than it does presently. The ability is already an extremely powerful one, and I'm trying to ensure it doesn't get too much more useful. See roxxkatt's ominous statements, for example -- I'd be interested to hear more of the details of the problems this causes, however, rather than vague intonations of a bleak future for Distension should we neglect to heed the warnings.

Additionally, if a Terr has the pod, he or she will slowly grow accustomed to waiting to see if it fires. I would consider it another piece of strategy that gives those who are willing to think how best to exploit all of their advantages an edge, and something for new players to learn and overcome. Consider also that right now everyone is a new player. There are as of yet no Distension vets.

AFK check: it doesn't check chat; it doesn't check commands; it doesn't check weapons; it doesn't check rotation. Part of why it is implemented in the present way is to prevent players with profit-sharing from just going off into the rocks and reaping the benefits. If you think about how a human detects an AFKer, it's not easy for a bot to do the same. Though, I think I've just thought of something that, while not being completely foolproof, is pretty damn good.

- The UP cost is huge and the amount of energy given is tiny in the Weasel energy upgrades. Since the blue bullets cost so much to shoot it is really hard to make do with such a small amount of energy that results from the above.

All upgrade amounts are pretty much relative to the max energy a ship can have. However, the Weasel does have the smallest amount given per upgrade -- this is true.

- The spiders that are lvl 40+ seem to be making a HUGE amount of RP now that they got lvl2.

May need to increase the rank required for this.

- Leveling a javelin is a pain now that they can shoot less often.

As discussed Javs will have RP to next rank reduced, and a new ability added later on.

- The leviathan gets 80% recharge at 6/12 upgrades and the upgrades cost very much and only give 3% / upgrade. That feels a bit weird.

Compared to which ship or ships? I don't know how the percentages break down at all. I just deal with the CFG numbers. Also keep in mind that percentages are rounded to integers and aren't a very accurate indication of what the ship actually has. Levi recharge appears pretty good in my book after the buff, though.

The huge amount of bursts flying around in the FR is very annoying.

Ok, I may do the burst refund today. The idea is to dramatically increase the cost of burst for the second one on, but still allow players to purchase them. To keep that change fair the regen amount will be increased slightly, encouraging less suiciding and more careful terring.

It is almost impossible to capture a flag if the enemy has a shark and there isn't enough time to kill the whole flagroom.

Well, first off, on a team of 10 or 15 people, you should have at least one shark. If you don't, then you should take personal responsibility and play a shark. Teamwork is going to be necessary for people to succeed. Also keep in mind that Tactical Ops in action may make it easier to bust an FR, particularly your home FR. Assaulting the other base may also help. Part of why the 10 second requirement is in is to increase the value of sharks and the level of strategy required to hold a base, rather than a person rushing in with a weasel and holding the flag for 3 seconds to interrupt what has otherwise been a solid display of teamwork from the freq that probably really does deserve to win. Basically I would like to see people jumping into a shark themselves rather than making half-hearted attempts to get in while essentially just giving the victory to the other team. The bonus now given to players changing to shark on a sharkless team of a certain size reflects this attitude.

[Mjollnir]

A few observations, some of which Dug already knows of:

- The UP cost is huge and the amount of energy given is tiny in the Weasel energy upgrades. Since the blue bullets cost so much to shoot it is really hard to make do with such a small amount of energy that results from the above.

- It's great that dug is adjusting the yellow bullet damage to make blue bullets more usable. We just have to be careful not to make the damage so small that some ships can tank way too much before blue bullets become available. Also, the max energy levels for some of the ships may be too small or the energy costs too high to effectively use the blue bullets.

- The spiders that are lvl 40+ seem to be making a HUGE amount of RP now that they got lvl2. It does feel like they are a bit overpowered.

- Leveling a javelin is a pain now that they can shoot less often.

- The leviathan gets 80% recharge at 6/12 upgrades and the upgrades cost very much and only give 3% / upgrade. That feels a bit weird.

- The huge amount of bursts flying around in the FR is very annoying. I know we have discussed this before but I would love to see some radical changes to the amount of bursts given and then giving terriers an alternative way of getting more RP. It is currently the biggest luck factor in the game and dampening the effect of such factors can't be bad. The skill factor in aiming bursts is real but not enough to justify a huge amount of bursts.

- It is almost impossible to capture a flag if the enemy has a shark and there isn't enough time to kill the whole flagroom. Basically every time the game has ~20 seconds left and the enemy has a decent shark, the game is lost. All the shark has to do is sit and rep-wait-rep-wait-rep and keep doing it with all those zillions of repels they get. Even if someone gets to the flag and the shark dies, it will just attach again, rep the losing team away and touch the flag and the timer isntantly continues making it impossible to do anything. The odds of being able to recapture the flag are tiny and it all depends on a lucky terr kill or something similar. I am still of the opinion that the timer to change the flag should be shorter or something else should be implemented to help the attacking team.

[roxxkatt]

dug, does ur afk check involve pms to the bot, text in pub, AND firing weapons? idk about rotation, thatd be difficult.

and be -very- careful with antideath...

[AcidBomber]

Hmmm... 1400 today? ok! :grin:

[project dragon]

I'm not modelling it after HS; I just stole the idea. The way that it's set up giving you a warning isn't possible as of yet. I kind of like it that way, though I could implement the warning. Without the warning it's less valuable, more surprising, and I think it's too valuable as it is. I'd say try to get used to it, and consider using the !warp option. You have automatic priority rearm anyway, so rearming really shouldn't take that long at all.

If it's valuable and helpful for the terr, then it shouldn't be something that "surprises" the terr and catches them off-guard. It's there to benefit the terr, and if the terr has a warning before it happens, they could react in a way that escape pods could benefit a lot more than they do now.

[2kill]

Also, is there any way to warn a terr that their escape pod is actually going to work? I've made a habit of pressing warp after I die so that I can get out of safe before I rearm so that I can have full charge right away. However, I will do this whenever I see my ship appear on the screen, making me warp away when I get respawned in fr lol.

If you are modeling the escape pods like Hyperspace's antideath, hyperspace gives you a warning text in your chat that you are about to be resurrected with antideath, so I think it is a good thing to implement.

Just for convenience's sake, please!

ps. good work dug : )

lol I've done the samething a few times just a few

and it would be nice to know

[gdugwyler]

Mmm... What was L2 damage before you changed it?
I know you lowered it cuz of the 'overpowered' spids... L2s are now doing 1450 =o

keep in mind it cost 40 UPs to upgrade. -_-

Bypassing the slightly sarcastic reference to overpowered spiders, the main reason that I'm experimenting with lowering L2 is because L3 is not all that useful an upgrade. If you actually read the post just a few up where I talk about it, there's no mention of spiders -- the spider thing is more a side-effect than a main goal. All that said, L2 was previously 1600. I experimented with 1500 one day, 1450 yesterday, and am going to try 1400 today.

spec'd in duel

If it's causing a lot of problems I may have to up the frequency at which it checks you, at the cost of some resources. Sounds like you just got unlucky there. You must have been in roughly the same spot 10 different times, 20 seconds apart. Personally I've never had a problem with the idle except when sitting in safe.

and wtf, thats way less then the 50 UPs for a levi port.
so apparently
full gun lvl < 1 port

You can't compare ships in that fashion. Some upgrades are meant to force the player to make a decision. Levi port is one of them: it's costly because not everyone should buy it. Some will because they can make it useful. If you can make better use of the 50, do that instead.

Also, is there any way to warn a terr that their escape pod is actually going to work? I've made a habit of pressing warp after I die so that I can get out of safe before I rearm so that I can have full charge right away. However, I will do this whenever I see my ship appear on the screen, making me warp away when I get respawned in fr lol.

If you are modeling the escape pods like Hyperspace's antideath, hyperspace gives you a warning text in your chat that you are about to be resurrected with antideath, so I think it is a good thing to implement.

I'm not modelling it after HS; I just stole the idea. The way that it's set up giving you a warning isn't possible as of yet. I kind of like it that way, though I could implement the warning. Without the warning it's less valuable, more surprising, and I think it's too valuable as it is. I'd say try to get used to it, and consider using the !warp option. You have automatic priority rearm anyway, so rearming really shouldn't take that long at all.

[project dragon]

Also, is there any way to warn a terr that their escape pod is actually going to work? I've made a habit of pressing warp after I die so that I can get out of safe before I rearm so that I can have full charge right away. However, I will do this whenever I see my ship appear on the screen, making me warp away when I get respawned in fr lol.

If you are modeling the escape pods like Hyperspace's antideath, hyperspace gives you a warning text in your chat that you are about to be resurrected with antideath, so I think it is a good thing to implement.

Just for convenience's sake, please!

ps. good work dug : )

[roxxkatt]

Only problem with that is that people will then set it as an away message. A couple things I could do: reduce the radius for how far it tests you for being "not moving"; or provide a randomly-generated key that the player could PM the bot to verify they're not idle. I'll try the first one and see if it clears it up. Presently if you just move 5 tiles away from your present position and wait 20 seconds you shouldn't be counted as idle. If, on the other hand, you move 5 tiles away and move right back, when 20 seconds rolls around again the bot is going to think you're idle because you're in the same spot you were 20 seconds ago -- it doesn't check often to save on resources..

something has to be done about this...

today i got specced in the MIDDLE OF A FUCKING DUEL with someone...

keep in mind it cost 40 UPs to upgrade.

and wtf, thats way less then the 50 UPs for a levi port.
so apparently
full gun lvl < 1 port

[AcidBomber]

Mmm... What was L2 damage before you changed it?
I know you lowered it cuz of the 'overpowered' spids... L2s are now doing 1450 =o

keep in mind it cost 40 UPs to upgrade. -_-

[gdugwyler]

Is there any chance you can turn off the idle watch thingy for terrs ? sometimes i get speced even thought I move around. As a terr, sometime's all you do is sit around until nme comes so I dont think we should be checked. I think either turn it off for terrs, or in general, have a command we can send to the bot (like ::!notidle / ::!ni) so the bot doesn't spec me : )

Only problem with that is that people will then set it as an away message. A couple things I could do: reduce the radius for how far it tests you for being "not moving"; or provide a randomly-generated key that the player could PM the bot to verify they're not idle. I'll try the first one and see if it clears it up. Presently if you just move 5 tiles away from your present position and wait 20 seconds you shouldn't be counted as idle. If, on the other hand, you move 5 tiles away and move right back, when 20 seconds rolls around again the bot is going to think you're idle because you're in the same spot you were 20 seconds ago -- it doesn't check often to save on resources.

imho lvl3 is still not improving anything and it does that for the bargain of 40+ UP. cant u price some additional energy and recharge upgrade with the lvl3's? or bounce of course.

the only way to tank lvl2 is not to shoot, and noone does that. so lvl3's are still a downgrade kill/time wise. and u cant kill the terr because there are too many ships in between and the lanc is too slow so they dont help at basing either. the only thing they do is kill those running wbs in 1 shot but meh. im even having a worse time with levis, who emp me and than i cant shoot lvl3 anymore, while i could do so with lvl2. also after attaching i could shoot 1 shot of lvl2 but its impossible with lvl3 where i have to reload first.

or for lanc screw bullet upgrade for bomb upgrade.

Might consider reducing the cost for L3. However, I'm not saying it'll be worth it at all times to upgrade. If most people will die to L2, stick with L2. But think of when the game has actually been running in public a few months, and there are players who are rank 72 with ungodly energy and recharge -- in this case it may be worth it to take out these behemoths. However, I'm still adjusting L2, and will probably experiment with dropping its damage even further.

Lanc: may give it the L2 option later on. Still thinking about that one. Probably will do it in the end, though have it available only at a rather high level.

[Fluffz]

imho lvl3 is still not improving anything and it does that for the bargain of 40+ UP. cant u price some additional energy and recharge upgrade with the lvl3's? or bounce of course.

the only way to tank lvl2 is not to shoot, and noone does that. so lvl3's are still a downgrade kill/time wise. and u cant kill the terr because there are too many ships in between and the lanc is too slow so they dont help at basing either. the only thing they do is kill those running wbs in 1 shot but meh. im even having a worse time with levis, who emp me and than i cant shoot lvl3 anymore, while i could do so with lvl2. also after attaching i could shoot 1 shot of lvl2 but its impossible with lvl3 where i have to reload first.

or for lanc screw bullet upgrade for bomb upgrade.

[project dragon]

Is there any chance you can turn off the idle watch thingy for terrs ? sometimes i get speced even thought I move around. As a terr, sometime's all you do is sit around until nme comes so I dont think we should be checked. I think either turn it off for terrs, or in general, have a command we can send to the bot (like ::!notidle / ::!ni) so the bot doesn't spec me : )

[roxxkatt]

join us or die.
those are your only choices...

[AcidBomber]

cancel dist it is killing the basing community :sadoldsmi

Oh be quiet newblet! Distension is for both the pros and the newbs! Come join us! :grin: