Reviving the Community

Discuss all things Battleships Forever that aren't Ships and Shipmaker - Missions, Development, etc.!

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Doogie12
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Reviving the Community

Post by Doogie12 »

After seeing only 3 posts being made in a day, it has come to my attention that this community needs to be revived. We need a way to get more members, such as an epic screenshot or new teaser video.
If this is beyond our limited reach at least recommend Wyrdysm like crazy to any website that has intelligent life.

On an unrelated note, I can't wait for judging to start.
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Normandy
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Re: Reviving the Community

Post by Normandy »

Well, I was more active back when the strategy part of BSF was still fun. Now I'm just killing time before I get to sleep.

What this game needs is a large, well-balanced set of stock-scale ships (hey, the game was meant to be played that size. The engine simply doesn't handle ranges larger than 1000 at all), a number of encounters, and some form of more powerful skirmish-mode modding, using many of the shiny new features we appreciate today. I personally liked the vector-style sections compared to newer SW-style sections as it tended to cleaner ships with more distinguishable sections (though that may just be my unfamiliarity with SW sections; I suppose with time I could learn to recognize them just as well).

Speaking of, are there any plans to fix the encounter maker for the latest version(s)? I remember hearing it broke. I miss viewtopic.php?f=6&t=2849. Reminds me of my old mapping days in wc3.

Put quite simply, the game isn't that much fun anymore for game junkies like me. BSF is unfortunately no longer a novel idea, and I've played through the skirmishes and the campaign enough times to make me sick.

I'm not exactly an artist, but I used to stick around because it's fun doing stuff like viewtopic.php?f=2&t=402, or when we first figured out that you can do stupid shit to doodads to get custom sections (too lazy to go find that thread).

In the meanwhile, I'll be playing Gratuitous Space Battles. I could only build lego models for so long before I started attaching guns to them. And then playing http://www.brikwars.com/ with them.
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Anna
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Re: Reviving the Community

Post by Anna »

I honestly don't think any of the things Normandy speaks of would bring or keep more players around. At no point in the forums history have we ever really had tons and tons of interesting, fun-to-play-with stock balanced ships available, and most people who are around seem to love the new Shiny sections, and with good reason, since they're pretty as fuck, and while difficult to get used to, they can be used to make beautiful, very interesting-looking ships.

Now, there was something in the works that would have drawn in new members quite a bit. Something that th15 and Kaelis worked together on. It was the reason behind the whole "change in the forum attitude" or whatever that lasted all of a month before th15 and Kaelis stopped giving a shit and I started losing my temper again.

Of course, whether we see that something, which apparently they already had working almost perfectly, is up for debate, since apparently th15 and Kaelis aren't getting along right now.

So if you want to know why you don't have Multiplayer BSF, it's because th15 and Kaelis aren't mature enough to resolve their problems civilly and get the awesome done.

Wait, did I just say that out loud? Whoops. :lol:
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Arcalane
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Re: Reviving the Community

Post by Arcalane »

Doogie12 wrote:After seeing only 3 posts being made in a day, it has come to my attention that this community needs to be revived.
Undeniable, but ultimately impossible. Wyrdysm as a community has been slowly dying and there is very little that can be done to change that. BSF is starting to get old, no matter how many innovations and upgrades we make.
We need a way to get more members, such as an epic screenshot or new teaser video.
One screenshot won't work, and we have no new material to unveil.
If this is beyond our limited reach at least recommend Wyrdysm like crazy to any website that has intelligent life.
No. :| Random advertising spam is bad.
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vidboi
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Re: Reviving the Community

Post by vidboi »

i agree with what normandy's saying right now. i feel the gameplay side to bsf has kind of been lost, and the shipmaker's taken over. there are hardly any fleets any more that are really fun to play with tactically, or just fun to play with full stop as they lag the game so much. i think that the meta 2 would have helped a lot with that, but it's almost grinded to a halt right now. really i see bsf more as a ship design tool rather than a game engine, and i suppose all the new sprites and sandbox features have brought that about. it's a shame really, and hopefully they'll be more smaller and game friendly fleets to play with in the future
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Arcalane
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Re: Reviving the Community

Post by Arcalane »

vidboi wrote:i think that the meta 2 would have helped a lot with that, but it's almost grinded to a halt right now.
We have a private development area in which things are coming along slowly. RL has been problematic.
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Son Tzu
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Re: Reviving the Community

Post by Son Tzu »

Well, if you want fleets of smaller ships why don't you just make 'em? I had loads (unfortunately in sb3 format), and as soon as the BP is over I'll be getting back down to that using the latest sprites. Making good small ships is just as challenging as large ones, maybe more so as you are making the most of limited resources. And if slowdown is getting you down, upgrade your system! It's not that expensive, unless you want an uber-system which isn't really necessary for BF. Pci-e vid cards of around 512Mb are plenty good enough, and shouldn't cost more than about £35. Of course, if you're using a laptop it's a bit more difficult...so get a desktop :lol: Some of Kaelis shiny-shinies seem purposely designed to make ww2 era fighter aircraft, think my first post BP project will be a fleet of such (low sprite count, side view).
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Re: Reviving the Community

Post by InsaneCat »

Only thing BSF is missing is the Multiplayer. Nothing will bring ppl to bsf than Multi.
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Bad Boy
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Re: Reviving the Community

Post by Bad Boy »

InsaneCat wrote:Only thing BSF is missing is the Multiplayer. Nothing will bring ppl to bsf than Multi.
Yes, the only thing it's missing is multiplayer, oh and a complete camgaign, a decent encounter maker, some more terrain options in sandbox/encounter maker - there's only so much you can do with what we've got, more useable gameplay mechanics (module triggers and other triggers like destruction would be great), proper formations (including maybe something like the peitho deflector formation), and maybe the occasional update. Oh and, if the underlining didn't stress it, a decent encounter maker; it works fine (to those who say differently, I have quite a few unreleased encounters that agree very wholeheartedly with what I say), but it's retardedly fucking limited.
So yeah, multiplayer would be wonderful, and would no doubt reinvigorate the community a lot, but there's still a lot of other stuff missing.

As for everyone who wants fun gameplay, do it yourself, or help someone who's doing it; why do you think that although I hardly touch sm nowadays I'm doing as much as I can to help jwa, the only person who's actually paying attention to that sort of stuff at the moment? Oh right, because after a while building ships for nothing but showing begins to get really bloody old.
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Anna
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Re: Reviving the Community

Post by Anna »

You're not asking for much, are you? :lol: "I JUST WANT THE WORLD!"

Multiplayer is done. Let me make that clear. To the best of my knowledge, th15 and Kaelis had it working somewhere in the region of well over four months ago. From what I heard, though I could be mistaken, they had it working very well at that. And Kaelis also figured out some ways to pretty significantly reduce framerate drops and increase performance.

But we're not getting to see any advancements, because th15 doesn't care (I'm guessing), and Kaelis is a wonderful antisocial jerk and they had a lover's quarrel which they still haven't gotten over, and I'm fucking sick of keeping all this under my hat since it looks like we're never gonna see any of it anyway.
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jwa8402
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Re: Reviving the Community

Post by jwa8402 »

Though theres lots of issues like Badboy mentioned, InsaneCat is right that multiplayer would do more to bring people in than any other feature. After awhile playing with yourself just doesn't...*looks at forum's male/female ratio* nope probably don't need to explain that one. It would help drastically because even if every other aspect of the game was top shelf, no multiplayer still makes other games way more fun. I was planning to give it a month or two then concentrate on other things but I hope things work out because this really is a unique and special game.
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Anna
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Re: Reviving the Community

Post by Anna »

jwa8402 wrote:After awhile playing with yourself just doesn't...*looks at forum's male/female ratio* nope probably don't need to explain that one.
You just made me lol so much, jwa. :lol: Basically, you've got it spot on. I don't even see the point of making ships these days so much, because I've been trying to make ships that are both pretty and... y'know, playable.

But playable ships that you can't actually do anything WITH are kinda... well, the enjoyment value is fairly short-lived. Multiplayer would inject a whole lot of new life into the community, and hopefully bring back a few of the old Shipbuilders who kinda lurk a lot but don't actually do anything anymore.
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vidboi
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Re: Reviving the Community

Post by vidboi »

Arcalane wrote:
vidboi wrote:i think that the meta 2 would have helped a lot with that, but it's almost grinded to a halt right now.
We have a private development area in which things are coming along slowly. RL has been problematic.
hmmm, if you would like more help i'd be willing to step onboard. i know you're going to hate me for this, but i've been working on the dps calculator xD
Son Tzu wrote:Well, if you want fleets of smaller ships why don't you just make 'em?
hehehe, you probably haven't seen my tendency towards the large end of shipbuilding. the limited stock entry i was making for the beauty pageant won't even load in game...
Son Tzu wrote:And if slowdown is getting you down, upgrade your system! It's not that expensive, unless you want an uber-system which isn't really necessary for BF. Pci-e vid cards of around 512Mb are plenty good enough, and shouldn't cost more than about £35.
not really neccesary. my desktop is still pretty fast after four years, and the main limit on bsf is processor speed for me, and i'm running with an athlon 64 x2, which isn't that slow at all, and i've already got a 512mb graphics card...
Anna wrote:Multiplayer is done. Let me make that clear. To the best of my knowledge, th15 and Kaelis had it working somewhere in the region of well over four months ago. From what I heard, though I could be mistaken, they had it working very well at that. And Kaelis also figured out some ways to pretty significantly reduce framerate drops and increase performance.
it's a shame none of this got released, but i suppose it's really th15's decision in the end
Anna wrote:
jwa8402 wrote:After awhile playing with yourself just doesn't...*looks at forum's male/female ratio* nope probably don't need to explain that one.
You just made me lol so much, jwa. :lol: Basically, you've got it spot on. I don't even see the point of making ships these days so much, because I've been trying to make ships that are both pretty and... y'know, playable.

But playable ships that you can't actually do anything WITH are kinda... well, the enjoyment value is fairly short-lived. Multiplayer would inject a whole lot of new life into the community, and hopefully bring back a few of the old Shipbuilders who kinda lurk a lot but don't actually do anything anymore.
i know what you mean, but it's still nice to test out some innovative ideas. even without full multiplayer i feel a tournament or an encounter challenge would bring some life back into that side of shipbuilding...
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Normandy
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Re: Reviving the Community

Post by Normandy »

Hehe. The fabled 'balanced' tournament rules. I remember when we were up in arms trying to figure that one out. In reality, the best way to balance something is to try it and try it again. Truth is, Anna is right. Still, couldn't hurt to have all that shiny stuff. It's a shame I've committed myself to academics at this point; all those sideprojects, languishing. It brings a tear to the eye.
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Re: Reviving the Community

Post by vidboi »

Normandy wrote:Hehe. The fabled 'balanced' tournament rules. I remember when we were up in arms trying to figure that one out. In reality, the best way to balance something is to try it and try it again. Truth is, Anna is right. Still, couldn't hurt to have all that shiny stuff. It's a shame I've committed myself to academics at this point; all those sideprojects, languishing. It brings a tear to the eye.
i prefer a mathematical method. you can either continually test individual weapons for balance, or find an absolute way of comparing them with much less testing. i've got an "effective dps" formula that is pretty stable that produces a value for almost any custom projectile, explosive, missile or beam weapon, and it works pretty well. basically it uses both the weapon's dps and also the effectiveness of a weapon against a target compared to a 90 degree arc, 1000 range beamer, and therefore provides a lot more information than just the dps. i'm thinking of implementing it in some sort of custom encounter challenge where entrants get to make their own fleet with a set amount of resources and go up against a wave system. hopefully this'll help with the problem that Anna pointed out, after all look at the interest that the meta 2 ship design thread created at first...
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