Unix

Actually, if anything I think it's too good.

You balance cyclone by the fact that it's a signature item. That alone can and will deter people from using it. If they have to sacrifice a sig spot for the ability to spam something or possibly shoot faster bombs that are lvl2, some might not view it as worthwhile. You can also up the cost to shoot the bomb, that way even if you do spam it, the likelihood of you being able to survive after 3-4 shots is extremely low. There are ways to balance it. Efficiency Booster does serve a very worthy purpose. What other item can help your weapons improve? What other item can give your ship a boost in terms of offense without getting a sig weapon? Also, last I checked, there was only one item that lowers bombdelay, and that's a 5m item. Venting Coils is meant to be a downgrade of Radiating Coils. That's the entire purpose, that way you can get the benefits of Radiating Coils, but not to the extreme. There is only one nonsig item that even helps against inactshrap, other than exoskeleton, there is no item besides Radiating Coils that is an armor against proxless shrap bombs. I've proven also that many of the items are built on the foundation of either an item that is powered up or an item that is powered down. Phaser and Sharrpinger, Omega and Baryon, Solid Nutronium and Adamantine Armor, Disruptor to Positron, Gamma and Pulse are nearly identical even. Just because they're downgraded or even upgraded doesnt mean no one will use it. I bet any one of those three items by themselves would have more users than quad core and oracle combined. There was even a point in which Field Generator had nearly 3-4x the amount of users of those two sig items combined and Fields were disabled for nearly a year. I'm not even going to argue about the balance, if they're not balanced in your opinions, get them to the numbers you would believe they ARE balanced then. These items can be useful and players would be willing to use these items. Just because they are downgraded doesnt mean they arent going to be used, doesnt mean they shouldnt be developed and especially doesnt mean they shouldnt be put in the game. If the issue is balance, then simply balance them. I can think of several builds that can utilize any of those three items. Efficiency Booster and Venting Coils especially both fulfill a vacancy in Hyperspace that is seriously lacking. Efficiency Booster aids in your offensive capability without relying on a signature weapon and Venting Coils gives another armor that can be used and at the same time not just in base against bursts, but in center where proxless shrap bombs would have an effective armor against them. There isnt really a whole lot that can be used effectively against falcon/cluster.

No, because there is still a purpose for system optimizer. You went from one extreme to the next, either it's the exact same or it's so good that it'll make the other addon sig obsolete. I think I made valid points, those items are more than feasible and can be balanced to within your standards. Those items would also be useful and not be overpowered whether they are a sig or not.

If not all the ideas were shot down in the previous thread, why havent we seen a new item in nearly two years if not more? You even said that if someone laid down the groundwork and you approved of it, you would put it up. The items that I suggested might be overpowered in your opinion, so if in fact they are, change the variables so that they arent overpowered. These items would be extremely useful. You claim the items would be a watered down version of a sig, but a lot of the items are watered down versions of sigs and some sigs are simply two weapons combined into one. Sharppinger is just a faster phaser. Quad Core is essentially Jedlik Dynamo without the negatives. Positron is a faster and more energy efficient Disruptor. It sure seems that you do have a lot of watered down versions of items. Why is this item necessary, it looks surprisingly much like radiating coils with smaller numbers and without the 'Signature' item type? Can you name another item other than Exo and Radiating that is meant to go against bombs that cause inactshrap? Venting Coils might be like Radiating Coils, but that's the point. The purpose was to make a much weaker version of Radiating Coils, and I'm sure plenty of players would use this armor, not only to base, but to also use outside of base to defend against bombs like falcon. Extremely low bomb delay. It was overpowered back in the day, it still would be. Edit: Let's not even start about the damage potential this has on a non-emp ship. When DPS is in a range that's several times that of existing items, it's not balanced. Then increase the bomb delay slightly. The entire point is to have a bomb better than salvo, but since it is a sig item, most players might not even want it to rush. A lot of players want that combo mount to rush, and I'm sure there would be plenty who would still be in favor of more specials instead of being able to shoot them faster. If you're worried about the damage potential, then make the cost of shooting higher, or at the extreme, put it to an EMP ship only. I would think raising the cost of this, then allowing only the med/heavy ships possibly? There are lots of choices to make this item "balanced" according to you. What makes this item unique? It looks like an alternative system optimizer. And, newsflash, we already have a system optimizer item. What makes this item unique is that it helps weapons in comparison to the system op helping in your overall ship. Combining this item, along with shell for example would allow your ship to have a -3 bullet cost. This item also has bombdelay decrease, alongside having your weapons just be cheaper. Last I checked, System Op doesnt do that. System Op concentrates more on the ship's maneuverability, whereas this item would increase it's killing efficiency.

Which one would be more feasible then, a flag league based on pub or a base duel league? Would players actually come and play a flag league and if so, would we have enough population to support it?

Wanted to get some thoughts and ideas about a potential league in the zone. There are some pretty nice positives that could come out of this, the most important being people becoming exposed to Devastation, more so before and after league matches. If we can expose a player base to Devastation during times when more people are there, I think that'd encourage people to come when they normally would not had come and hopefully encourage not only event play, but also pub play. Some ideas for leagues I was toying around with were mainly Base Duel League (BDL), a Hockey League (HL) and a form of Elim League (EL). For BDL, the settings are pretty much set in place, and the rules are pretty set. The main changes that would need to be done though, however, would be the green settings to make sure "randomness" doesnt occur, shared greening becomes nonexistent, and then lag settings would be enforced more stringently for a league. The only thing that might need some serious work would be a newer/updated map with a mix of current/older bases to keep a full map. For HL, the settings just need small fine tuning, the rules are pretty set as well. There arent really any map changes that would need to be done or anything, the map and green settings are perfectly fine, and there shouldnt be anymore randomness in terms of someone taking only some damage and not dying when they hold the ball except for goalies and high energy ships against lvl1 bullets. For EL, the only thing that would really need to be taken care of would be the rules. How teams would be setup, if there are any teams or would this be individual based. The map might be something that needs to be tweaked or possibly even completely redone. Thoughts about what should/could be done?

+------------------+ | Venting Coils | +-----------+------+-----+-------+----------+-----+------------------+--------------------------------+ | Buy Price | Sell Price | Exp | Ships | Max | Ammo | Item Types | | $30000 | $23000 | 4500 | 1234567 | 1 | None | Armor | +-----------+------+-----+-------+----------+-----+------------------+--------------------------------+ | Venting Coils are effective at protecting from bomb and burst shrapnel. | +------------------+----------------+-----------------------------------------------------------------+ | Property Name | Property Value | +------------------+----------------+ | inactshrapdamage | -5 | | shrapdamage | -175 | | burstdamage | -75 | | bombdamage | -5 | +------------------+----------------+ +------------------+ | Cyclone | +-----------+------+-----+-------+----------+-----+------------------+--------------------------------+ | Buy Price | Sell Price | Exp | Ships | Max | Ammo | Item Types | | $52000 | $21000 | 6200 | 1234567 | 1 | None | Bomb, Signature | +-----------+------+-----+-------+----------+-----+------------------+--------------------------------+ | Cyclone fires medium yield bombs. Its strength comes in being able to shoot bombs very rapidly while also allowing other items to be launched rapidly. The consecutive damage potential can be deadly. | +------------------+----------------+-----------------------------------------------------------------+ | Property Name | Property Value | +------------------+----------------+ | bomblevel | +2 | | bombdelay | =15 | | bombenergy | =265 | | maxmines | =4 | | minedelay | =100 | | mineenergy | =250 | +------------------+----------------+ +-------------------+ | Efficiency Booster| +-----------+-------+-----+-------+----------+-----+------------------+---------------------------------+ | Buy Price | Sell Price | Exp | Ships | Max | Ammo | Item Types | | $65000 | $25000 | 7000 | 1234567 | 1 | None | Signature, Addon | +-----------+------+-----+-------+----------+-----+------------------+---------------------------------+ | The efficiency booster offers small upgrades in a wide variety of areas that normally are overlooked. | +------------------+----------------+------------------------------------------------------------------+ | Property Name | Property Value | +------------------+----------------+ | recharge | +1 | | bulletenergy | -2 | | bombenergy | -20 | | multienergy | -2 | | mineenergy | -20 | | bombdelay | -5 | | jittertime | -10 | | afterburner | -2 | | stealthenergy | -75 | | cloakenergy | -350 | | antiwarpenergy | -120 | +------------------+----------------+

CDB, the effect of not having people develop is because even if a group of players were to develop them even now, they wouldnt be put up. In another topic where items were being suggested, the staff believed that none of those items were worthy for whatever reason. If players dont believe their effort will be put to good use, then why would they even try in the first place? Even if the items arent "balanced" in the eyes of the Sysops, they could easily balance them out and keep the purpose of the items intact, yet none of those items that were suggested had that done. Currently my theory about the zone is that it's replay value is declined, especially since little content has been added. The best analogy I can come up with is, if you were to play a RPG and restart from the beginning over and over, with no change in the story, items and gameplay. It's just the same over and over. Eventually it's bound to get stale.

Would you be able to plant autoturrets to help you fortify your position once you receive 100 ownership or after reaching a certain point? When I think about this, you would need a decent population to do this, early on when it's 4v4 even, I dont think it'd be very feasible to do something, at least not without the help of autoturrets helping you along the way. Also, how much running/mobility would be involved? Would there be any basing involved or would it be similar to that old turf arena? I would hope there's more action rather than more running in this kind of game play. If the sectors are spread out as they are and the ability to get to one area to the next without attaching is slow, I dont think this is very feasible at all. What else would change in terms of ship settings to foster this change in pub? The spawn ticketing seems to enforce running more than anything. I dont understand the concept behind that. I'm not sure exactly how this will work though, and what other changes this would institute.

I think that's more in regards to reactors and one addon though. This is also due in large part because that's how the "current" items are. If you were to add more items that did different things, I believe that would fix your ideas of polarization. In Wolfie's previous post about new items, I suggested an addon where it was similar to system optimizer, but concentrated more on system efficiency. A small difference, but a difference that could easily be felt with the right weapons and pilot.

Is there anything really wrong about the current item set other than it being stagnant? If we can infuse the current item set with close to a dozen items, I'm sure that can change the item set around. This solution is less complicated and can be implemented rather quickly. I'm not sure whether you need database access to make items or not, but even if it is needed, you can have it written down, then have a SysOp or whoever make the change/add items.

Are you telling me players wont buy rotating items just simply because later down the line it'll be taken away? If that's the case, none of us would play Hyperspace. It's more about making builds and having fun with them. You can try it out with a few items, like 2-3 to see if people are willing to play with them if they're on a rotating basis, if they are, good, if not, not a huge loss and you dont have to do a rotating item system anymore. If I remember correctly, that's what happened with the current item set. A reset occurred and Arnk's item set was put into place very suddenly. Good and bad I suppose. If we do it in one fell swoop, we wouldnt be able to see any effects an item would have in game play until the game/money was well established to the point a majority of people could afford it. Adding in items into the current item set is probably best, maybe not right "now", but later down the line when the money/exp settle down. A big reason why this item set didnt take full effect until a long while was mainly because no one knew anything. It took about 3-4 weeks until someone actually started rushing successfully.

Perhaps then instead of offering the refund or doing it automatically, make the item inert and have the sell price what the "refund" price would be, at the same time no longer have the item purchasable. I would imagine that would be easier to do than to manipulate the database.

Changing items isnt just about nerfing, but also boosting. Quad core could use a boost, Oracle as well can use a boost. Items that mabe 1% of the zone uses could use a boost.

If you modified some of the items that we have now, that could also help a lot. Changing not as useful items into useful items will drastically change game play with very minimal effort. Oh, and at the same time, if a committee were to make any changes, it would probably be best if it were announced publicly on the forum. Having items change without any kind of notice is kinda ew.

I would say only a small minority has been asking for one.

Rotating items wouldnt be about balance, rather than just getting more items out there. And if any items are actually good/balanced, then keep them in, otherwise they could easily be thrown out. If they are thrown out and you have the item, a simple refund plus 5% or something for an inconvenience would suffice. Also, an introduction of an item doesnt automatically mean it is unbalanced, even if in the beginning it proves to be useful. Best example of this is when this item set was first introduced and WBs were all using Omega. At this time, many believed Ampere Imploder was an inferior signature item in comparison to Omega Drive. After seeing one player show that Ampere was a very good signature item to have on WB over Omega, more began switching over to Ampere. Same thing with Flash Drive, many believed initially it was an inferior sublight to Omega. After some time though, there are some who even believe that Flash Drive is an overpowered item even though little to nothing has changed about Flash since it was first introduced.

Who has been asking for one?

Possible solution other than committee. 1) "Contest" to have one or more new items added. Staff would determine a winner, and must have one winner at the least. If staff sees more than one item that they like or think would work well add all of them. 2) Rotate items. Similar to the idea of restaurants changing up their menus depending on the season and the raw materials available to them. Instead of completely changing the items, every 2-3 weeks, new items are added in a rotating style, so that way players can toy around with new things, obviously this would require around 6-10 new items per rotation, then you can also have same items on the "menu". If you do have a group, probably a small group of players who understand the game play and have played in at least two resets would be best. Then you could test it out in a subarena to see if the items are overpowered before having them introduced. Then of course, the group would be an extension of like a player government, rather than an extension of zone staff. So they dont have any authority in moderation, that way a larger player pool could potentially be involved in helping make/design new items. You could also have a moderator handle the group so that there is some direction and staff involvement at the same time.

When I mean hard coded, I mean a module cant change it. It's like how only jav and wzl have bounce bombs, how wzl and shark have EMP bombs. Upgrading the level isnt that big of an issue in comparison since it's already possible that it can be level four.

I think that's a thing that's hard coded into the game itself, that cant be changed as far as I know, kinda like how bounce bombs are. Oracle isnt worth the sig slot it uses up.

I'm sure there could be plenty of useful ships, definitely more than what oracle can as a sig.

If something along the lines of purchasing this slot item, it becomes a sig, then you have to choose which category it belongs to, then depending on the category you have X amount of points to use to enhance your ship, and you have only Y many options in that category. I think that could potentially lead to a very large potential of new ships in the zone, depending on what the options are.

Perhaps back then having customized slots was boring, but if you add it into the current system and make it a sig, there's a chance it might not be as uniformed. I'm not sure how it was done back then, was it one ship gets 10 slots or something like that? If that's the case, you can assign the slot to a given category, armor, guns, bombs, etc. and then assign the stats to an array of available options, given the category.

Use your own theory on rushing, each has their own theory on how to rush. Build around that theory.