Discussion of Bios changes

[juckto]

Gunships are hardly a natural ship. I mean, they don't even have their own model.

[Hellsyng]

Why not move GS to regular Garr tech?
It would remove the "any buff to gs is a buff to bios" effect and they would be seen a whole lot more.

[Adept]

QUOTE (Mastametz @ Jun 20 2010, 07:24 AM) I've always thought skycap1 should be tied to sy.

The ships should have normal or close to normal mass, and normal fuel loadouts.

A compromise with the prox could be having starting minepacks without needing a sup.

[Gothmog]

QUOTE (Hellsyng @ Jun 20 2010, 12:09 AM) Why not move GS to regular Garr tech?
It would remove the "any buff to gs is a buff to bios" effect and they would be seen a whole lot more.

Win.

All teams should have supplemental tech readily available in case they dont want to invest in tech at early points. bombers are offensive, gunships are rather defensive... scouts are good for everything! Let's make light gunships, put them into garr instead of starbase, and put a gunship research into starbase! Or just make gunships a garr tech as hell said and forget the whole lt gunship idea...

I think their cons should stay the same, but I am in favor of increasing ships' mass to regular levels, making them harder to fly with the cloak but normal without. I think this would solve many problems, if everyone is 5% easier to hit because of their extra mass, 10% more enemies will die and 20% more will get accomplished... increasing all their masses by a small amount would yield incredible results and makes perfect logical sense. They are bios, great at seeing stuff coming and hiding, but they should not be fast and maneuverable as well! At least no more so than other factions... and since the cloak is removable anyway, it might make a cloak more of a unique item that you use if you know you'll need it, like a retro booster...

1. Put gunships into garrison
2. Increase mass of all ships to reflect those of other races (without cloak taken into account)

[spideycw]

QUOTE (Hellsyng @ Jun 20 2010, 03:09 AM) Why not move GS to regular Garr tech?
It would remove the "any buff to gs is a buff to bios" effect and they would be seen a whole lot more.

Besides the super obvious reasons like rix having GS 10 seconds into the game?

[Makida]

QUOTE (Hellsyng @ Jun 20 2010, 03:09 AM) Why not move GS to regular Garr tech?
It would remove the "any buff to gs is a buff to bios" effect and they would be seen a whole lot more.

Or split GS into LtGS, slightly worse than gunships are now, and HvyGS, slightly better than they are now, and put the former in Garrison and the latter in Starbase. Bios would have to get first one, and then the other anyway.

[Jimen]

QUOTE (girlyboy @ Jun 20 2010, 12:24 AM) Oh, huh. It feels like a natural part of them now... Well, still, you've got the lighter ships and starting with Starbase, right? And I still say, start with a small change, not something huge.

And why all the hate against gunships? Bios is the only faction that ever fields them and some of you want them never to use gs either? Might as well just delete gunships from the core altogether, make space for something else...

QUOTE (Hellsyng @ Jun 20 2010, 03:09 AM) Why not move GS to regular Garr tech?
It would remove the "any buff to gs is a buff to bios" effect and they would be seen a whole lot more.

QUOTE (Gothmog @ Jun 20 2010, 07:20 AM) All teams should have supplemental tech readily available in case they dont want to invest in tech at early points. bombers are offensive, gunships are rather defensive... scouts are good for everything! Let's make light gunships, put them into garr instead of starbase, and put a gunship research into starbase! Or just make gunships a garr tech as hell said and forget the whole lt gunship idea...

So do you three actually plan to address the usage of the gunship to make it a more viable choice, or are you just going to declare "screw balance, just keep making it easier to get until people start using it"? Because the GS will never see common use until it is significantly better than enh tech...at which point everyone will just rush GS before even bothering to buy a techbase. Nobody worth listening to buys bombers until they have a clear use for them, and gunships can't do anything that can't be accomplished more effectively with four decent ints.

There's three states of existence for GS: worse than small ships (in which case no one will buy them), equal to small ships (in which case no one will buy them), and better than small ships (in which case everyone will buy them). Yes, I too like gunships and would like to see them more often. But you know what? I've actually thought (you know, used the thinky-stuff in my skull) about how to balance them and such, and IMO, it's nearly impossible (and definitely not worth the effort) to find a middle ground where they're only used sometimes.

And either way, take it out of here - this is the Bios thread, not the Gunships thread (and since we haven't had a GS thread in a while, might as well test the waters).

[Makida]

While I'd like to see more GS use, as far as this thread goes, I just don't want Bios gunships to be nerfed into uselessness. Bios uses gunships fairly regularly, and this doesn't prevent them from using other ships. Bios gunships are not "significantly better" than Enh tech (imho), yet see regular use. This is because of Bios' unique circumstances, sure -- which is why I don't want Bios gunships nerfed to the point where no-one uses them. Even if you don't buff other factions' gunships to make them useful (or make them easier to get), at least keep Bios gunships as they are, so we at least see what reasonably-balanced GS are like in some occasional games, as opposed to... never. In short, while I'd love GS to be changed in some way in general, as far as this thread goes specifically, I only want the status quo preserved as far as Bios gunships go; I'm not so much arguing for a change, as against one.

(Although as to my last post -- lighter, more fragile gunships for everyone with garrison, tougher gunships with starbase -- there's actually a way to appease people who think Bios GS are overpowered, here. Make Bios GS weaker than they are now, but give them the opportunity to get better-than-now GS after they get the weaker ones. If the change applies to everyone else too, the effect will be less use for Bios gunships, but more use for Gunships overall, perhaps -- and yes, there are balancing issues, but as you said, that's best left to another thread. I'm not sure I agree with your "all-or-nothing, because only I know how to think" analysis. For now, it'd just be good not to change Bios gunships at all. Nerf their starting figs instead, and leave it at that unless it becomes clear something else is still needed; discuss their, and everyone else's, gunships separately.)

[spideycw]

This thread about bios or GS?

[Hellsyng]

QUOTE (Jimen @ Jun 20 2010, 09:55 AM) So do you three actually plan to address the usage of the gunship to make it a more viable choice, or are you just going to declare "screw balance, just keep making it easier to get until people start using it"? Because the GS will never see common use until it is significantly better than enh tech...at which point everyone will just rush GS before even bothering to buy a techbase. Nobody worth listening to buys bombers until they have a clear use for them, and gunships can't do anything that can't be accomplished more effectively with four decent ints.

No.
My idea was to get rid of the problem of making any changes to GS that overly effected Bios.
I didn't suggest any changes to GS's other than making them more available to factions.

And Spidey just nerf Rix GS

I did however forget to keep to the topic.
1 or 2 seems like a good starting point to go from. We change make larger changes later if need be.