If you want to explore the 'experimental' side of things as Jip was mentioning, maybe give the Fatboy 10 or so 'slots' where he can 'transport' (equip) units, which could still work when 'mounted'. Say it can equip 2 Parashields, 4 Mercies and 4 Cougars - then it becomes a mobile fortress equipped with additional shields, fire-power and very strong anti-air.

Or give it staggered fire, higher arc, larger scatter and larger damage radius - effectively, a small-scale Scathis. The better scatter + damage radius will make it harder to dodge, though you might want to nudge it's alpha then so it doesn't just wipe non-experimentals from existence.

Or just turn it into a MAA experimental, and have it's main guns able to fire at air targets lol.

Actually you could give it like, in addition to being able to produce T3 land, the ability to produce up to T2 air as well. If paired with I hope soon coming fix to the mobile factories working even when on move, you could churn out some bombers or gunships to help it against incoming direct-fire experimentals.

The issue is you are calling it ping, when it's hardly consequential - sure it can affect the game, but I'd defer to Exselsior's explanation.

The 'lag' problem in most cases can be traced to two primary sources:

1. bandwidth - can a player sustain the needed throughput to receive and send packages to every other player. Even if the player has the best PC out there, if the player can't send and receive data at required speed, it will lag.
2. simulation - even if the player has the best connection out there, if a player's PC can not calculate what to send in those packages fast enough, it will lag.

Regardless, the idea with the visual seems really interesting actually, but I see 2 problems with it, assuming you measure the above-mentioned things, and not ping that is borderline irrelevant unless you are playing from the low-Earth orbit on the other side of the planet (though feel free to argument otherwise):

1. Players could be running something in the BG while waiting for the lobby to fill.

As the 'title' states. This could affect both bandwidth and simulation testing. The solution to this could be you plea players to turn their stuff off before starting the game (a.k.a. putting the PC in the state it will be in while the game will be running), but I don't see how you could enforce this - hence, there will be some who will disregard this recommendation, and after a while, everyone will.

2. Who's the lagger?

Let's assume you have 3 players that are in a lobby - A, B and C . Let's run a little thought experiment, assuming all players have relatively low ping (<300, which in truth only means they are 'very close to each other', network-distances speaking).

A has awesome internet, both up and down way beyond necessary, and has perfect connection to both players B and C. Let's assume player B has a decent enough connection, where it's good enough to support what is required to have a smooth play. Player C, on the other hand, has a bit worse internet connection, and for some reason (not unrealistic), his connection to A is completely stable, while his connection to B is absolute chaos.

Hopefully I don't have to explain how player A could not be able to tell who of the two players was the source of lag - even if he had insight on their own points of view. And if he were the host, he would not be able to decide on who to kick. The situation gets even messier the more players you have of course.

If we are already thinking of a way to represent "connectivity fitness", why not, if possible, extrapolate that from the last few games (say 20)? Measure both connectivity and simulation rates (not sure if it's possible to do that, or if 1 player bottlenecking causes everyone to have reported reduced sim speed) during the game, and extrapolate a 'score' out of that.

To make sure data is more representative, you add weight(multiplier) to the score, depending on how many connections had issues - e.g. if you're lagging with everyone (from your perspective), you get a higher weight, if you lag with only 1 person out of say a team game of 12, you get less weight on your score (though in-game it'll probably play out the same, that is game will lag for everyone, but that's the exact purpose of the weight, to not punish players because they had a 'lagged' connection to someone because of that someone).

In order to make the system even more fair, you could keep independent scores for each player count. Reasoning for this is, often lag is not due to poor internet connection, but due to player's PC not being able to handle the simulation at proper speed. E.g. even though a player might have 100000 exabytes/femtosecond of upload and download speed, if he is playing on his mom's clothes iron, he won't be able to utilize that because his game is lagging internally. But, this might be due to him trying to play 50 player games, and maybe his rancid potato can handle 3v3 (and less players) amount of games without a hitch - so you don't want his score to look abysmal when he would actually run perfectly well in smaller games.

• this one, I'm talking from experience, I do not lag whatsoever in 4v4 games, but start having sim speeds in 6v6 and larger, which presents itself as lag.

Anyways, once you have a score, you can represent it by a simple circle, and a few colors. Say 3: green for 'great', yellow for 'good' and red for 'bad'. You then have 2-3 such circles, maybe representing (as before mentioned) your overall score in last 3, 10 and 20 games - so you don't get nailed by random noisy data. First one might be red, but if 3rd is green, you know that the player in general has good connection.

Another 'problem' could be that players run into 'bad rating hell' of sorts, where they get a red rating, so green rated players refuse to play with them, so they can only play with other red-rated players, but because of disproportionate lag in those, they get stuck on red rating.

In such a case, you could have an automated 30 second game simulation where a virtual game would be simulated, measuring connectivity to the server, but simulated as several ports, and measuring average game simulation speed at several units amount values, to see how well your PC can handle those.
This functionality would have to be used 'manually', a.k.a. there would be a 'Test connectivity' button somewhere in the settings menu, and it would just start a game u for you, you'd wait, not do anything, and then you'd get a 'fresh score' (then you'd get the first circle be in color, and the other 2 in black, so other players knew you 'reset'). The problem of 'you can login somewhere else and run a simulation on a better PC just to play on a worse one' can be solved by also gathering system hardware data, and invalidating the 'reset test' for the next several games if discrepancy is detected.

Why not something like this (assume image is split into image 1, 2, 3 and 4, left to right):

How it is

When attempting to build on an incline (figure 1), currently the game finds some average height, plops the building on that height, and proceeds to flatten the terrain around the building (figure 1). This results in these tiny portions of terrain to get extreme angles (red in figure 2), which can prevent further building and/or even prevent units from moving through previously passable terrain.

Currently proposed solution

In figure 3, we can see the 'skew the building to follow the terrain' that has been worked on. As most will agree, it looks odd. But it does fix the problem of not altering the topography.

Maybe this

Figure 4 holds my idea. The idea is you pick the highest edge-point of a structure, and use that as the structure Y position. Rather than highest edge-point, you could also find an average which is heavily biased towards higher-Y points (meaning it will be partially sunk, but mostly 'floating' above the lower parts of the slope). You then add a 'base' to the structure (blue in figure 4), so as it would not look like it floats - kinda like what naval factories do atm, with their 'infinite' legs that go down as deep as need.

Pros are you benefit from 'not altering terrain' while also not skewing the buildings.
A big con is you somehow need to model to 'extend' below it's usual lowest Y value. But I thin that, with diligent work, just extending the base of all non-floaty buildings to go down shouldn't be a big problem. The only problematic buildings are the unit-dispensing ones, where there would be an odd ledge the unit would have to cross - one solution is to just extend the existing ramp to also cover negative Y space, but it might look awkward if the ramp is on a similar angle as the terrain (it might extend like 3 unit widths away from it's usual terminating point, which would look like it's going under other buildings).

"This tournament is only open to all players."
Only to everyone, eh?

EDIT: heh

My current experience is I'm a 800~900 rated on the global ladder(600+ games) and around 500-600 on 4v4 TMM(<20 games).

Personal de-motivators for playing matchmaker (4v4 is my go-to) is:

• relatively long queue times (biggest factor)
• while the 'expanding map pool per rank' idea is great, I think the maps chosen for lower-ranks aren't great
• the ambiguity of it being a "ranked" or "casual" lobby is in a sense off putting (I see it as ranked, and am personally a casual player, so another negative for me)

What I see might be an issue for other, in particular new players:

• in general, the matchmaker in-client looks very bad UI/UX-side (lack of flow/direction)
• presence of the rating system (that is, it being visible) might be even more off putting to those who are straight-casuals, and aren't looking for strict gameplay

@mach said in Nuke Sub Rework:

I suggested to fix the intel problem by making them more difficult to detect, for example via trigger ability that gives them stealth (or even cloak) but prevents them from moving or attacking or even building a nuke while it is on, making them the threat they are supposed to be without the risk of accidentally discovering one by a random scout patrol and without them being an invisible win button either while maintaining the nuke submarine concept of the unit

This might sound good on paper, but I don't think it's realistically viable - even if you had an ability that went full cloak+stealth, this requires you to be actively monitoring your sub 24/7. And even if you did, how could you ever predict a Spy Plane/Torp bomber flying up above? Sounds cool, but it is either too much work, or would be op if somehow automated.

maybe if range is a problem on even medium maps, increase their range as well

The problem is, where do you draw the line? Their current range is quite good, given they are near the enemy coast. But if you make it very large, then on many maps you wouldn't even have to leave your dock, which kinda defeats the whole purpose of the unit. And how they are often used - build them, start a nuke, wait for it to be finished, move it in closer for the nuke - because they are so expensive it's not worth risking a random T2 sub or a few torp bombers stumbling upon it. And even if you do argue 'we could make it cheaper' (which you do), it still doesn't change the fact that you are effectively parading your SML around the map without much protection (if they are supposed to be stealthy) - I'm pretty sure in 99% of cases, you wouldn't build an SML in an unprotected position just to get an 'odd angle' on the enemy.

most importantly, if the nuke on submarines costed less (or should I say more proportional to its damage compared with sml) it could be used to wipe out enemy outlying firebases and mex clusters that don't have smd without it being a net loss in mass for the attacker which is the main reason no one uses them for it (need minimum of 15k or whatever damage in mass just to break even), this would be giving different uses to these 2 different levels of nukes, currently the only thing that has a similar purpose to this (mini nuking smaller base) is a billy nuke, and that gets stopped easily by tmd or even shield generators due to it being a tactical missile and extremely low damage and radius respectively (so just adding to/changing billy nukes to nuke submarines isn't a fix either)

total list of possible buffs (so far) that don't redesign them into something completely different:

• increase submarine nuke range
• increase submarine nuke speed (of nuke missile itself)
• increase submarine nuke damage / reduce submarine nuke cost (currently same cost as sml nuke while having less range and <1/3rd damage), I suggest reducing cost instead of increasing damage for reasons I explained above (tldr: mass effective nukes against smaller bases for 2 tiers of nukes with different uses)
• make nuke submarines more difficult to detect underwater at some downside (ex. immobile/completely "stunned" during stealth)

As previously addressed, giving it range will boil down to two problems: not enough range, so you are still forced to park it on the enemy shoreline, or so much you never even have to get close.

Unit speed won't help. And people are maybe forgetting, but I'd just like to remind that only the Cybran Nuke Sub has stealth - others are exposed by sonar, and T3 sonar, which is relatively cheap and I'd argue a must in a naval composition, outranges it (god forbid you move it more central to a water zone).

Buffing the missile speed won't change much, except in the scenario where you are nuking navy - but you are against that, so let's presume that moot.

Changing the price/strength might be a good idea, but keep in mind SML are as efficient as they are because they serve only one role - to nuke. On the other hand, not only do nuke subs have the TML capability, they also come with a handy T3 naval factory that allows you to diverge your initial plans. Given that, I'd argue you should never approach the efficiency of a SML with a nuke sub. Currently, you don't but if you ever do, I could see players building T3 naval yards in random pond near their base to get a cheaper nuke...

if you say they are useless for any "nuke purposes" in most situations, then that is what has to be fixed, their nuking capabilities/efficiencies, not the unit redesigned into something else that primarily exists for non-nuke missile use, at that point you deleted the original unit and put something else in its place, now that is hogwash

so yes I suggested to make them better at being nuke submarines, what you (and many others) are suggesting is to forget the nuke part of them because it currently doesn't work well (and instead of fixing that you choose to double down on it?) and turn them into some kinds of tactical missile ships that I don't agree this unit is about and like someone else mentioned, neither will be the newcomers that already know it as nuke submarine from non-faf versions or many other players that don't pay attention to balance forums

if such a unit is needed then maybe it should be created as a new one instead or added to different useless existing one (aircraft carriers maybe, at least missile barrage from them would make sense especially since they could have unique mercy-like aircraft they could be the only ones to build, aka homing anti ship missile, to barrage enemy fleet with from distance (or even a medium range missile that lands into water and becomes a torpedo, to deal with certain annoying underwater units like HARMS that otherwise need exploits to deal with, the possibilities are endless), instead of being giant defenseless radars they currently are)

The whole problem is the main reason nuke subs are currently pretty obsolete is there already is a better unit filling that niche - the SML. There really is no need to have another unit that does the same thing, but worse. Also, give this a thought: you are giving a game-ending capability to a somewhat cheap T3 unit. All other game-enders are super-high cost static emplacements, or if mobile, are mounted on experimentals. Like the Tempest or Scathis. Tempest is effectively a T3 Static arty on a boat. No other T3 unit (other than the nuke-capable ones) has the game-ender capability. They are either base buildings or experimentals.

The issue of 'what will new players do omg' is a non-issue, given how much is already different compared to the original SupCom and FA.

and with nuke submarines being "useless unless you already won navy", imo they are not supposed to be something you build to win navy by attacking navy with them directly like just another battleship, just like you don't build strats to take out enemy asf with, you build them to attack ground, which may very well win you air indirectly or the game itself, you do the same with nuke submarines to take out enemy bases, not their navy, because not every unit needs to be a direct combat unit against its own layer, some exist to push the advantage you have, to outside of the layer

The problem with this analogy is you are comparing 2 air units that have different targets - air and ground, to 2 naval units that have same targets - ground. Sure, not every unit has to be, that's why we have MMLs, MAA, and so on. But nuke subs are a bad example of this concept, because they are, in fact, designed to strike at (usually) naval targets. Because of their high power (nuke), they have to be slow (time-wise to get a nuke ready). This means that, in any realistic situation, even if you are planning to use a nuke sub to take down a base, that base more than likely already has a SMD. Which means you are in the end forced to use it - against enemy's navy. This is even more evident from the fact that, the moment you launch a nuke from a nuke sub, and the nuke gets detected, players will know there's a nuke sub, and unless they lost navy, your sub is dead - takes like what, 10-12 torps to take it down in one wave, half that if the sub is not surrounded by other naval forces - which you are heavily implying would be the solution for them, to go 'stealthily on their own'.

At the end of the day, what we need is a unit that fills a particular role, and Nuke subs do not do that. And if you make them as good as SMLs, then SMLs become obsolete on naval maps, which is just shifting the problem. What is a better solution IMO, is to have the unit serve a purpose other units don't.

P.S.: there is no "nuke sub" - that's just a nickname people give it because they launch 'nukes'. Their name is 'Strategic missile submarine' - and while again this is usually abbreviated to 'nuke', a strategic missile doesn't need to mean 'nuke' - it can mean it, sure, but it can also mean a missile of strategic scale. I'd take the liberty of generalizing 'tactical' scale as one that focuses on taking out one particular target, while 'strategic' scale is a weapon capable of wiping out an entire area or in general turn the tide on its own. Like in general, I'd categorize weapons in three categories - operational, tactical and strategic. Most units fall under the 'operational' scale, some fall under tactical (say mobile arty, or T3 battleships, and the obvious TMLs, I'd even put Novax under this category). And then some are strategic - most experimentals, T3 Static Arty and Nuke launchers. With the example I gave (and not saying that is THE way to go about it), it still stays a strategic weapon - it just doesn't do a nuke.

Not saying you have to go for it, but currently (til 5th Jan) the 'Gold edition' of SupCom + SupCom FA is on sale for 3€ on steam. I'm not gonna go into socio-economics of anyone, but if you can afford having internet, this shouldn't be that big of a problem.

Idk about the [UEF T2 Destroyer] Valiant change - it definitely needs a buff, but I'm not sure HP is the way to go. It's biggest drawback is the poor range of its main gun IMHO. Yes, it has bad torpedoes, but you can easily mend that slightly by say increasing the range by 5 and maybe making it's sonar as large as it's torpedo range (so if you are roaming with them, they actually start firing on subs as soon as they are in range, rather than half-way in, effectively making their superior torp range meaningless).

As it currently is, torpedo-wise, 1 Valiant dies to 5 T1 subs with 1 sub almost full HP left alive. A Salem kills all of them with over 25% HP left (and it already starts off with 1k less HP). It has 40% DPS with torpedoes of the 2nd worst Destroyer, and Salem has over 3x the DPS. I think there's space to make it's torps the same-ish strength as other destroyers have (say 50-60 DPS). Or maybe bolster it's torp defense (indirect HP increase).

But yeah, back to it's main problem. It's the range on those main guns. Yes, it has highest DPS, but only by a little (274 compared to Uashavoh's 250 - 2nd highest). The difference in DPS gun+torpedo is still on the negative for Valiant. So Salems can outrange it, and you can effectively kite with them, and on a say 5v5 matchup (no. of destroyers, not players), you can whittle down at least 1 or 2 Valiants before actual engagement, and as soon as Valiants get into range, Salems can move in and use their total higher DPS (330 vs 304) to end the fight. Exodus can employ similar strategy, theirs being weaker if you micro, but stronger if you don't/the enemy does (since high alpha really rewards shoot-and-scoot tactics, even with minimal micro by the enemy makes it even stronger). Uashavoh's have the advantage of not missing their shots like the rest of the 3, and it has marginally less HP than the Valiant (<5%), which is countered by evading 1 salvo (not to mention going underwater and just torpedo-duking it out).

So if you look at every Destroyer's main weapon:
Valiant:
+bit higher DPS
-range
-somewhat easy to dodge
Salem:
+range
+no overkill
-less HP
Exodus:
+range
+high alpha + AOE
-somewhat easy to dodge
Uashavoh:
+can't dodge his cannons
+can dive
+no overkill
-range

All of the destroyers except the Valiant have 2 '+' and 1 '-'. And on top of that Valiant has piss-poor torpedoes.

Some argue "Well, that's why the Battlecruiser exists". But that's a no-argument for me. Battlecruisers are indeed amazing. But they are only slightly less expensive than Battleships. And while they do have very nice damage and you can't dodge it, they are still out-performed by Battleships IMO. And after a fight, you can actually use a Battleship to threaten coastal bombardment, while the Battlecruiser has the same reach as Salem or Exodus, assuming no one built a sandcastle on the beach that day to block the laser - so in the end, it's only effective in water, vs naval units. But even then. If you have time to build a cruiser, the enemy will soon have a battleship of their own - they are only slightly cheaper (1 destroyer difference in mass, even less compared to cybran). And while a battlecruiser might be much better at clearing out the real fodder, the frigates - don't make the destroyers take the role of cannon-fodder, when there's much more efficient solution already. Battlecruisers won't save you if you are losing (slow to build and expensive vs a destroyer spam), and they are kinda sitting pretty doing nothing if you are ahead. But if you are even, you could've just built a battleship - they do lose out in skirmishes with other units mixed in, but battleships actually do something both before battle (long-range bombardment of enemy navy, which battlecruiser can't do efficiently vs equally-ranged destroyers) and after (killing in-land operations).

So what's my final take? Instead of increasing it's HP (that's what frigates and shields are for), I'd either increase it's range so the gun actually fills its role (note that the only '+' Valiant has is quite not that big of a plus, the DPS advantage is 10% over the 2nd best, which is not a lot) and makes use of it weapon (you maybe don't have to match the 80 range Salem and Exodus, but give it middle ground of 70, between them and Uashavoh). Another solution would be to make it more self-reliant, and have it's sonar, radar and vision ranges increased. Maybe in addition to that, make it's torpedoes slightly have larger range (but keep the poor dmg).

Another solution that's more on the silly side is, give it air-staging capability. Not that it's gonna increase it's solo potential, but it increases it's value and it'll actually give UEF a non-experimental naval-based air-staging facility. Cybran has both the cruiser and the carrier, while Sera and Aeon have the carriers. UEF has Atlantis (which is 3x more expensive than the T3 carriers).

@magge said in Delay between unit contruction for air factories..?:

The 1000ms delay feels appropriate to me, because otherwise the unit spam would look silly, comical and has probably balancing issues. Maybe a member of the balance team can have a final word on this matter.

Disclaimer: not a balancing team member. But another, I'd argue very important point is collision. If you could pump out units with 0 delay, there'd be absolute mayhem with collisions and units getting stuck on each other or on factory. I mean the unit's pathfinding is sometimes so dumb they get stuck on t1 PGens adjacent to factory if there is another unit in the same postal region - don't want to imagine the chaos of 50 T1 tanks coming into existence effectively simultaneously, in the same spot (with enough BP).

Hello there. As the title suggest, I have problems with the amount of impact 1 or 2 mermaids (Cybran T2 Stealth-field boat) can have on naval fights.

The who:
I'm a complete noob rated 900, and I mostly play custom games. I got a lot of setons under my belt, and the oh-so-mandatory-for-noobs gap games, but I enjoy 'real maps' here and there. I do prefer larger team-games, and I like maps where all 3 theathers of war are present (I actually enjoy navy the most). So there's my bias.

The event:
To further emphasize my bias, the example of a game I have played out on Setons: https://replay.faforever.com/18963421. Now, for the most part, you can ignore the first 32 minutes or so of the game (though you'll see I struggle plenty with stealth boats), and focus on the T3 stage, mainly after I loose my navy and my air player loses... everything he is worth for.

Now, I am quite aware (even at the time) I was, from the point my last Neptune fell, very much on the back foot. Yes, I didn't win the large naval battle that took place, given how 4 battleships were left standing, as well as a carrier and a couple of destroyers, but I was definitely not out of the fight. I had 2 Summits rolling out, and I knew the remaining battleships were somewhat damaged - 1 was almost out, 1 was solidly damaged, and 2 weren't squeaky clean either. So I planned to leverage the Summit's superior range to try and take out the two more damaged battleships and preferably the carrier as well. Well here rolls in a single T2 Mermaid. And I can do nothing. I can spam scouts, for sure, but those don't give enough time for my ships to lock on and fire. So instead of me being able to at least gain a tiny bit of ground back, I am completely helpless. Sure, I got T3 Omni Radar in the base, but that won't help. Even if i had a T3 air factory (or could rely on spy planes from my ally), the intermittent signal would simply not allow me to do anything. Because ofc there will be most likely some Cruisers in the area (especially given how strong Cybran cruisers are and how they benefit from destroyer-range battles, unlike MML cruisers).

Again, I'm well aware it was an uphill battle, and I could've done a few things better, but I think my situation got 5 times worse because of 1, later 2 mermaids and the T3 sonars stealth field (won't even bother trying to understand sonar's stealth field range - why not just make it as large as the T3 radar range fml).

The proposition:
Anyways, enough of the 'rant' part and explaining my viewpoint (though I would recommend, if and while watching the replay, to slow the simulation down just to see how bad the stealth is from my point of view). My suggestion is that the torpedo defense on the mermaid be removed or severely nerfed, and/or have its power drain increased (out of the pocket, I'd argue for 500-1k energy per mermaid).

The reasoning:
Stealth is, I'd argue, the strongest anti-intel ability in the game. Some might argue that cloak is stronger, but I'd beg to differ - most of information you gain you gain from the radar blips when zoomed out - and stealth wipes those. But it is somewhat easily countered - you get an omni. Except, in the naval situations, you can not get an effective omni coverage because enemy is on water. And you might think that it is not such a big deal, but all other units use stealth for one very obvious thing - to get in close to use their strong weapons. The Mermaid gives this same stealth ability Destroyers, Cruisers and Battleships - units with some of the highest ranges in the game.

You could argue for scout/spy planes, but in any kind of semi-decent naval army, you'll have AA that will kill those, so unless you have a constant stream of them, they won't help. Also 1 Mermaid is ~ 3 Spy planes, no way you can do anything useful in a large battle with just 3. In naval terms, there is no intel-counter whatsoever to stealth. So the only way to be able to fight it is to kill the Mermaids.

But how do you do that? Because of the stealth, it's very hard to get an accurate read on the current positioning of the enemy ships, and you are kinda left with 2 options. Go all-in so the stealth doesn't matter because armies are in each other's vision radius, or try and snipe them. So you'd think that T2 torp bombers should be an awesome solution to the Mermaid. But of course, not only is it hard to target it in the first place (because if it's moving, good luck actually getting to see it in the first place), it also has torpedo defenses, so you need like 5x in it's mass worth to actually kill it with torps (because, remainder, the enemy most likely has Cruisers).

Alternative solution (difficult):
Another thing that could be done is have the stealth boat have 2 operation modes - Silent stealth and Loud stealth. While in silent stealth, the stealth field range would be much smaller (say 1/5th range), allowing for the stealth boat to cover only a couple of units. While using loud stealth, the stealth field range would be large (as it currently is, or heck, even larger), but the boat itself would be un-stealthed (even if under cover of other stealth fields, like for example other Mermaids). This would still allow for it to pull of small stealth flanking actions on maps with more spread-out naval battles, but you'd need a lot of them to cover a large fleet with it in this mode. Or you could have it cover large areas, but then the Mermaid itself is visible, so the enemy has a chance of maybe more easily countering it. Though this would probably be very hard to pull off, if even possible (having a unit ignore stealth-field benefits while being in one).

The Jammer Disclaimer:
Some might argue that UEF's jamming is 'as busted'. And while that has nothing to do with my post actually, I'd like to address that non-argument with the following: jamming is only effective up to a cap of like 20 units, if we are talking large naval forces. After that, the density of the units simply results in 'fake' radar blips aligning with actual units. Stealth, on the other hand, get much stronger the more units one has. In addition to that, at least with jamming, your units will keep on firing, so they might make a random hit here and there (not to mention take down your Bulwark's shields "for free" - UEF jamming is the perfect counter to it's own Bulwarks), while when enemy's units are stealthed, your units are sitting pretty doing nothing.

TL;DR:
Mermaids give the strongest anti-intel ability to all of the units in a very large radius - stealth. Because of its location, that is the sea, there is no intel-grade counter (like the omni radar for land), so you have to rely on killing off the mermaids instead of countering it's anti-intel.
But one can't even do that effectively because there are two options - torpedo bombers (or subs, sure), but it has a torpedo defense, or clashing your army and hoping you are not even a tiny bit behind in army size, otherwise you loose purely to army strength (even if the enemy decided to turn off stealth to make it easier for you).
I suggest drastically increasing their energy upkeep for the stealth field, and/or nerfing/removing their anti-torpedo capabilities. Another wacky idea is given in the 'alternative solution', but it's probably not possible, so meh.

There is, you can export your maps (I'm talking height-map, stratum-maps, etc.), and then re-scale them using external software (gimp, PS, etc.). More detailed instructions on that over yonder on https://wiki.faforever.com/en/FA-Forever-Map-Editor and https://wiki.faforever.com/en/GPG-Map-Editor.

P.S.: 'Gap' maps are usually somewhat frowned-upon, and as you've already noticed, there are a bunch of clones already out there. If you wish to work on maps, there's an actual tournament held for creating real maps with some nice rewards for the winners: https://forum.faforever.com/topic/5862/princess-burke-mapping-tournament. There is plenty of time until the tournament is closed, so you have enough time for you to "git gud".

@spikeynoob with great power comes great insomnia

@swkoll Seems reasonable

"This tournament is only open to all players."
Only to everyone, eh?

EDIT: heh

My current experience is I'm a 800~900 rated on the global ladder(600+ games) and around 500-600 on 4v4 TMM(<20 games).

Personal de-motivators for playing matchmaker (4v4 is my go-to) is:

• relatively long queue times (biggest factor)
• while the 'expanding map pool per rank' idea is great, I think the maps chosen for lower-ranks aren't great
• the ambiguity of it being a "ranked" or "casual" lobby is in a sense off putting (I see it as ranked, and am personally a casual player, so another negative for me)

What I see might be an issue for other, in particular new players:

• in general, the matchmaker in-client looks very bad UI/UX-side (lack of flow/direction)
• presence of the rating system (that is, it being visible) might be even more off putting to those who are straight-casuals, and aren't looking for strict gameplay

I didn't make this clear (yet) - most of those who are proponents of adding AI, are suggesting it with the core idea being that AI will be only used to fill up the queue if there are no players to match up against.

I'll be going into more details of how (not that it's not a "How" discussion, "How" only related to how it will work under the hood) those could be regulated - a quick note for those pondering it: allow only when there are no appropriately-rated players to fill the queue, and even then, maybe give priority to off-rated players than to AI, depending on the scenario.

The only idea that doesn't fit the above is the idea to "have new ladder players have a couple of first games vs AI", which sounds reasonable.

Also yeah, most people would argue that cheat-modifiers for AIs are a no-no, and that weak AIs are not worth adding (but that is beyond the scope of what we could affect, things like which AI to include and which not to would probably be decided by existing team that take care of the ladder happenings and other game-related technicalities).

I'll also be adding a more detail explanation (in a latter message, as my own point of views, as to not sully the 'Log' post) why technically adding even the most braindead AI wouldn't really matter whatsoever - rating related or "bad habits" related, it doesn't actually matter at all - but again, I want to first complete the Log message (I'm not doing it non-stop, and I ain't paid to do it, so you'll have to be patient).

[Reserved for logging purposes, unless someone takes the lead in that department]
WIP: (btw, if you plan on commenting, and you already did in discord, you could be patient and wait for me to add it here eventually, so you can just say "I support §17.34." or whatever - but be my guest to write it down again, just know I'm following the stuff I have in my head right now, and it might be a while for me to start integrating new views from the forum posts)

Note that I'm only writing down what I've seen people write. I'm not gonna go into who said what (yet), and I'm not saying these are reflective of my opinion.

In general, the approach I've seen in the discord to the "What" can be split into these 4 broad categories (note they all consider both 1v1 and TMM). Note that I will add details as they come to light (be it pro and con arguments, or the approaches that could be taken, etc.):

§1. Absolutely no AI ladder.

This is quite self-explanatory. There are those who believe that AI should not be integrated into the ladder. Some of the arguments are:

• players don't want to play vs AI, that's why they are playing ladder
• it could have bad impact on player rating (e.g. players could learn patterns vs AI and get some free juicy rating)

§2. Yes to AI in existing ladder, but with restrictions.

This group argues that AI could be an ok solution, but only in particular use-cases. People aren't necessarily against AI, but are either concerned with players being stuck playing vs AI in times of smaller player base activity, or with how an AI could even function in a ladder matchup (in regards to "player" skill, rating, etc.).

Another point that in a sense covers all of the following is, regardless of the particular implementation, players would like to see number of games played vs AI capped in some way (e.g., 1 in 5 can be vs AI, or only 3 a day). There are two general reasonings for this:

• prevent players from being stuck in an unfortunate loop of playing a lot of AI games (say 2 players are active, but the length and offset of their games causes them to both be playing vs AI, instead of each other).
• prevents players from "boosting" their rating by intentionally playing vs AI only, assuming there is a way to exploit an AI

Given all of the above, here are the approaches to this general category of view:

§2.1. Allow players to opt-in to play AI.

There are those who believe that each player should be able to decide if he will be matched up against AIs. There are 2 general solutions proposed as to how it might work:

• have a setting somewhere that allows the player to opt in or out of AI matching: this approach would mean players don't have to play
• have a button that is always there, and if a player is not willing to wait to get matched with another player, they could just press it at any time (no need to opt-in as in previous approach)
  The general notion is that not all would be happy with an AI opponent, and might find it a waste of time, so this is a middle ground - allowing for those that would like it to have the ability to use it, without forcing it one those that wouldn't.

§2.2. Restrict AI's impact on rating.

Some consider games played vs AI should not contribute to the score above a certain threshold. Another more particular note was, winning vs AI should not allow for league promotion (if you want to go from silver to gold, you must win vs a player). Some of the arguments for this approach:

• most arguments for this idea are very similar to §1.
• there are suggestions rating should only be lost vs AI in higher-rated matches
  -- some point out that would effectively result in players being hostages in AI games - assuming a player doesn't want to lose rating, they have to waste their time on a game, since they can't gain nothing

§2.3. Restrict AI's matching to only newer/lower rated players.

Some argue that AI should only appear in ladder matches against new or very low rated players. The reasoning behind it is it could be a good approach to facilitate early progress and engagement of newer players, but because of the points raised in §1., it could have negative effects on the mid and high-rated ladder.

§3. Yes to AI in existing ladder, it goes through it just like a player would.

This one is self-explanatory in essence as well. The problem is a lot of people are worried on how this could even work.

§4. Create a separate ladder for "vs AI" games.

This one is also quite self-explanatory. The idea is to leave the existing 1v1 and TMM ladders alone, and create a dedicated PvE ladder that only features player vs AI games. Some of the arguments for it:

• there is a population of players that enjoy PvE situations
• all the different AIs available in FAF could be confusing and dissuading for players that want to partake in PvE
• custom games have a hard time being filled up if they are PvE
• given the points above, a dedicated PvE queue could entice players who prefer PvE games to join in on the ladder, and be in general more welcoming to new members of the community
• additionally, some of those that do join in the PvE could in theory transfer over to the PvP once they get more confident in their skills and experience (but it's not a given)
  -- some point out the opposite could happen, and already relatively small PvP ladder user base could be diluted with addition of PvE ladder

As you might know, @Deribus opened a discord channel to discuss AIs in ladder, in which why we would even want such a thing was discussed [this was added after @Katharsas first message].

There is a lot of back and forth, and it's hard to keep track of who said what and what was said and what wasn't. The essential problem is the discussion very quickly dispersed in all kind of directions, and we all know where that leads to - nowhere (not Netherlands). One thing that is somewhat agreed on is that AI in ladder games (in some form) would be a good possibility.

In lue of the aforementioned, I'm (I know I'm just a worm, but ¯|(ツ)/¯) starting this new thread. Why would we need a new one?

Well, the general problem of this discussion can be very crudely separated into 5 questions:
"Why" do we want to have this in the first place.
"What" do we want the AI in ladder to look like (if at all).
"How" are we going to achieve what we decide on (the technical nitty-gritty).
"If" the thing we decide on can even be done (even more technical nitty-gritty).
"Who" will be doing the actual work of getting this to - work (the omnipresent problem of open source).

The direction I'd like to steer this part of discussion (hence the title) is the 'What'. I'm ready to "hand over the microphone" to anyone who is willing to steer this discussion, and maybe log what things were and weren't said in one post, so people just joining the discussion can read on what has been already said in a summarized way, as reading even 10 posts is a hassle if they are long (like this one, sry). In the meantime, you are stuck with me.

I'm not saying the "If" or "Who" can't affect "What" indirectly by affecting the "How". I understand it can. But we need a baseline, and I feel like little to nothing was achieved in the discord discussion (apart from maybe few people that were maybe diligent enough to read through all of the messages - me NOT included, but I did read/partake in the majority of it).

The podium is open.

To address @Katharsas's message (3rd in this thread): the goal is to enhance the ladder experience by adding AI - to reduce queueing times, make it more approachable to new players, you name it. Keep in mind, this is a very brief summary.

A rough play on how my logic is structured, but will need further improvements and discussion - note that some of the bellow I'm pulling straight out of my a... hat - but I do feel they fit. Don't forget we are trying to look for unique identifiers - ofc they aren't all completely different, and those identifier might not be true for all of their roster.

UEF:

Core features:

• lore wise: oppressive order > group tied by traditional culture and order, strive for re-unification of all worlds under one rule
• core army principle: "jack of all trades, master of none" > their units are good all-rounders, but do not excel in any one task
• unit design: squared-off > tie it with multi-purpose systems - more spacious units allow for more systems
• experimentals: their experience and structured approach to things lead them to a simple core principle - ultimate utility

The paragraph: WIP

Cybran

Core features:

• lore wise: radical freedom > tech-augmented humans uniting against untouchable rulers, strive for freedom from established world order
• core army principle: "guerilla warfare" > lots of units use stealth in order to allow sneak-attacks and hidden advances
• unit design: spooky spiky triangles > could be tied in with their stealth focus - intricate designs allow for reduced radar signature
• experimentals: their cunning and quest for innovation lead them to a simple core principle - unexpected devastation

The paragraph: WIP

Aeon

Core features:

• lore wise: centralized thought > group tied in by their belief in the Supreme, strive to enlighten the others by any means necessary
• core army principle: "unit specialisation" > units at large serve a specific purpose, but this focus allows them to excel in their particular field
• unit design: rounded > WIP
• experimentals: their strive for perfection and methodology lead them to a simple core principle - monoliths of the battlefield

The paragraph: WIP

Seraphim

Core features:

• lore wise: alien warmongers > group tied in by their strive to extinguish all in their path
• core army principle: "alien tactics" > many units have unconventional features, allowing them to perplex any enemy
• unit design: unnatural flow > WIP
• experimentals: their strive for dominance and supremacy lead them to a simple core principle - unrestrained destruction

The paragraph: WIP

@angelofd347h said in Factions Text for Web Site, need suggestions:

People should pick their first faction based on either lore or visual design.

Just steal some Gyle lines like:

Spikey space socialists

Pretty sure he got this trademarked by now lol

But I do agree with @angelofd347h's sentiment
differentiating the factions by units will be hardly productive - since most of them play pretty much the same. Sure, there are some differences, but newer players might get the wrong impression if you use those as the descriptive differentiator in the page.

Focusing on the 'lore' and background as well as aesthetics as the main differentiator, while only maybe giving a lick of info on the slight difference in unit focus/performance should be the way to go.