Hi all,
I just discovered this game and I really like the look and feel.
I have a small question for experienced players.
The game rules and ship stats (Weapon arc, shield management) lets me believe this is a deep strategy game but When I play it seems limited to a click fest. (Select all ships and click a target)
Do you take time to manage your shields and orient your ships?
(I.e. Yse Pause a lot or play using a slower setting)
Just wondering if I'm missing something.
Thanks
Newbie here - Strategy versus Clickfest
Moderators: th15, Moderators
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Rainman4500
- Ensign
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You can get away with straight up shooting in campaign mode.
But for skirmish modes like Grinder, you'll need to use tactical positioning and prioritize targets to get maximum points.
This applies to stock ship combat, not so much with custom ships that can fight brutally unscathed.
But for skirmish modes like Grinder, you'll need to use tactical positioning and prioritize targets to get maximum points.
This applies to stock ship combat, not so much with custom ships that can fight brutally unscathed.
Realism, seriously? It's a space ship game. Realism was thrown out the window a long time ago.
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Silverware
- Commodore
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I hate it how so many people confuse Strategy with Tactics.
This is a Real Time Tactics. Not a RTS.
There are very very few true RTS's out on the market today, and most of them feature RTT for the combat side of things.
To tell them apart is easy.
Tactical games are about controlling ships, individual units, or building a base on a single battlefield.
Typical examples are : Command and Conquer, BSF, Stronghold, Company of Heroes, Dawn of War (Partly).
While Strategy games are about controlling an empire, many fleets between stars, or large scale planetary conquest.
An example is : Imperium Galactica 2, Railroad Tycoon, SimCity.
There are few true Real Time Strategies but there are many turn based ones.
Like : Empire at War, Lost Empire Immortals, EndWar, Civilization.
Above I noted Dawn of War as being partly a RTT, this is because in Dark Crusade and Soul Storm, the campaign map is a Turn Based Strategy. But the major side of the game is the RTT combat.
I hope this will help distinguish the two.
And @rainman4500 : The Clickfest you described is actually a decent tactic. Concentrating fire will always prevail against an equal fleet that is not concentrating fire.
Also to orient your ships hold down right click when you give them a move order, and shields can be managed like any other targeted module, just select it then target the ship section you wish to have it shield.
Aegis shields however cannot be re-targeted like this.
This is a Real Time Tactics. Not a RTS.
There are very very few true RTS's out on the market today, and most of them feature RTT for the combat side of things.
To tell them apart is easy.
Tactical games are about controlling ships, individual units, or building a base on a single battlefield.
Typical examples are : Command and Conquer, BSF, Stronghold, Company of Heroes, Dawn of War (Partly).
While Strategy games are about controlling an empire, many fleets between stars, or large scale planetary conquest.
An example is : Imperium Galactica 2, Railroad Tycoon, SimCity.
There are few true Real Time Strategies but there are many turn based ones.
Like : Empire at War, Lost Empire Immortals, EndWar, Civilization.
Above I noted Dawn of War as being partly a RTT, this is because in Dark Crusade and Soul Storm, the campaign map is a Turn Based Strategy. But the major side of the game is the RTT combat.
I hope this will help distinguish the two.
And @rainman4500 : The Clickfest you described is actually a decent tactic. Concentrating fire will always prevail against an equal fleet that is not concentrating fire.
Also to orient your ships hold down right click when you give them a move order, and shields can be managed like any other targeted module, just select it then target the ship section you wish to have it shield.
Aegis shields however cannot be re-targeted like this.
I think more accurately it is:
RTS = Build a Base. Gather Resources. Build Units. Fight.
RTT = Choose/Get Units. Fight.
Command and Conquer (the originals, at least), are considered Real Time Strategy, as is stuff like Starcraft. This is by basically the "dictionary" definition of the term (well, more like game jargon, I guess). I would know, I did a pretty in-depth research assignment on its evolution since the beginning. RTSes puts emphasis on base and economic management, whereas RTTs do not.
Stuff that include building an empire and stuff is called 4X.
However, BSF is through and through a RTT: No bases. No economy. Just how you use your units.
RTS = Build a Base. Gather Resources. Build Units. Fight.
RTT = Choose/Get Units. Fight.
Command and Conquer (the originals, at least), are considered Real Time Strategy, as is stuff like Starcraft. This is by basically the "dictionary" definition of the term (well, more like game jargon, I guess). I would know, I did a pretty in-depth research assignment on its evolution since the beginning. RTSes puts emphasis on base and economic management, whereas RTTs do not.
Stuff that include building an empire and stuff is called 4X.
However, BSF is through and through a RTT: No bases. No economy. Just how you use your units.
BSF combat was designed to be very positional. Aside from hitting enemies in obvious weak spots on the sides and aft, attacking from multiple directions degrades interceptor performance (because they spend more time tracking around instead of just firing) and enemy targeting efficiency. Throw in dynamic obstacles like debris and asteroids, you've got a very fast paced battlefield.
BSF was expressly designed to avoid damage formulas and resistance ratios, if you wanted that you should go play Babylon 5 Wars or Star Fleet Battles (both of which BSF draws heavily from). But frankly, I don't call that sorta thing strategy; it's just math.
In the place of that, BSF has more tangible values. Inaccurate guns have trouble hitting small fast moving targets. Rotating your ships makes it hard for beamers to hit the same section for the entire duration of the beam. Arranging the formation of your fleet affects the performance of your interceptor fire.
Truth is, simply by being a spaceship RTT, BSF isn't going to be anything like Warcraft, Starcraft or C&C.
BSF was expressly designed to avoid damage formulas and resistance ratios, if you wanted that you should go play Babylon 5 Wars or Star Fleet Battles (both of which BSF draws heavily from). But frankly, I don't call that sorta thing strategy; it's just math.
In the place of that, BSF has more tangible values. Inaccurate guns have trouble hitting small fast moving targets. Rotating your ships makes it hard for beamers to hit the same section for the entire duration of the beam. Arranging the formation of your fleet affects the performance of your interceptor fire.
Truth is, simply by being a spaceship RTT, BSF isn't going to be anything like Warcraft, Starcraft or C&C.
Sean 'th15' Chan
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Silverware
- Commodore
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@Droid, 4x's are some of the few TRUE RTS's what are usually considered RTS are usually RTT and CnC is a Tactical Game not a Strategic Game.
tactics is how you position the ships and what ship to shoot, while strategy is having the fleet, and selecting the battles to fight. In strategy the outcome is decided before the battle while Tactics decides the outcome during the battle.
Thats about the best description of the two you can get but CnC still is a RTT even though its classed as an RTS just because RTT is a worse acronym and some idiots got it wrong at the start.
@thanto_, you have the right of it there. Excepting maybe the deployment as that is more tactics.
tactics is how you position the ships and what ship to shoot, while strategy is having the fleet, and selecting the battles to fight. In strategy the outcome is decided before the battle while Tactics decides the outcome during the battle.
Thats about the best description of the two you can get but CnC still is a RTT even though its classed as an RTS just because RTT is a worse acronym and some idiots got it wrong at the start.
@thanto_, you have the right of it there. Excepting maybe the deployment as that is more tactics.
To me this screams "I wish the definition were this because it would better fit my perception of reality and so I will impose said perception upon others." It hardly matter what was what at the start, because definitions change. Especially things that are not strictly defined at any point in time. Droid has accurately summed up the standard uses of the terms in today's game industry. To say that common usage doesn't matter because "some idiot got it wrong" is daft.Silverware wrote: Thats about the best description of the two you can get but CnC still is a RTT even though its classed as an RTS just because RTT is a worse acronym and some idiots got it wrong at the start.
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Silverware
- Commodore
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You can argue all you want but the reason it is a tactics game is because of the scale.
And CnC is on the Tactical Scale, not Strategic Scale.
If you are positioning individuals it is usually Tactical, if its armies you are positioning then its Strategic. Its the simplest difference and it is a rather large one.
If it were to be all like the CnC3 Kane's Wrath Global Conquest Mode then it would have real strategy in it. But frankly it doesn't and therefore cannot fit under the term Real Time Strategy, but rather under the term Real Time Tactics.
And CnC is on the Tactical Scale, not Strategic Scale.
If you are positioning individuals it is usually Tactical, if its armies you are positioning then its Strategic. Its the simplest difference and it is a rather large one.
If it were to be all like the CnC3 Kane's Wrath Global Conquest Mode then it would have real strategy in it. But frankly it doesn't and therefore cannot fit under the term Real Time Strategy, but rather under the term Real Time Tactics.
Okay, just because you can position individual units in an army, doesn't mean its not strategy. By that logic, Supcom is tactical, which it really isn't.
In this situation, tactical basically means that individual units matter; you have to use them to their full extent, and try to keep them alive. Strategy is essentially the opposite. Whether it's achieved by having a huge amount of units in the field (Sudden Strike, Supcom), or by allowing you to build more units (most RTS games), or by a combination of the two, individual units are essentially unimportant, because there are more where they came from (super units being the obvious exception).
The fact is, most RTS games nowadays are a mix of strategy and tactics, they're not pure to either fields. Some lean more heavily to one side or another, but not many (particularly modern games) are solely strategic or solely tactical.
Scale does matter, but it's not of the utmost importance. Sure a game with a huge scale is more likely to be more strategic, while a game with a small one is less likely, but just because a game doesn't let you battle across half the planet, doesn't mean it's not at least somewhat strategic.
In this situation, tactical basically means that individual units matter; you have to use them to their full extent, and try to keep them alive. Strategy is essentially the opposite. Whether it's achieved by having a huge amount of units in the field (Sudden Strike, Supcom), or by allowing you to build more units (most RTS games), or by a combination of the two, individual units are essentially unimportant, because there are more where they came from (super units being the obvious exception).
The fact is, most RTS games nowadays are a mix of strategy and tactics, they're not pure to either fields. Some lean more heavily to one side or another, but not many (particularly modern games) are solely strategic or solely tactical.
Scale does matter, but it's not of the utmost importance. Sure a game with a huge scale is more likely to be more strategic, while a game with a small one is less likely, but just because a game doesn't let you battle across half the planet, doesn't mean it's not at least somewhat strategic.
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Silverware
- Commodore
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No it doesn't matter. It's just as silverware said - to prove a point.
BSF is Real-Time Tactics through and through, by basically any definition of the term.
No strategy involved. Only tactics.
Now, there is quite some tactical depth into stock ship balancing in stock numbers. Even moreso in 1 v 1 battles. (Sadly, there's no way to play other people so you're up against the AI which does none of that).
You could just select all ships and click a target, but you probably won't be able to get high scores that way. It does work decently as something that's dead won't shoot you back but something damaged will, but you won't be able to maximize your ships' efficiency if you do nothing but that.
And custom ships? Well, those are mainly just to look at. Many are intended for AI v AI battles.
BSF is Real-Time Tactics through and through, by basically any definition of the term.
No strategy involved. Only tactics.
Now, there is quite some tactical depth into stock ship balancing in stock numbers. Even moreso in 1 v 1 battles. (Sadly, there's no way to play other people so you're up against the AI which does none of that).
You could just select all ships and click a target, but you probably won't be able to get high scores that way. It does work decently as something that's dead won't shoot you back but something damaged will, but you won't be able to maximize your ships' efficiency if you do nothing but that.
And custom ships? Well, those are mainly just to look at. Many are intended for AI v AI battles.