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Player Features and Ideas Discussion

 
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Introduce fog of war to make combat less predictable

Author
Hestia Mar
Calmaretto
#1 - 2012-03-19 21:53:24 UTC
I've recently been reading a book called Castles of Steel, which deals with naval warfare during WW1. Its a fantastic book, and the descriptions of the battles such as Coronel and the Falklands are really very detailed. However the text also makes it very clear how quickly things can go awry and FC's can lose control of parts of their fleets for any one of a number of reasons.

Anyway it got me thinking about combat in EVE, and it seems to me that in many cases combat - especially fleet combat - is entirely too predictable, as pretty much everything happens that way it should - jump into a system, lock up the reds, and fire away (at least in an ideal situation lol).

So maybe:

- Things such as asteroid belts can affect the functionality of sensors so that they can be used as hiding places (of course that means you could use them to ambush from);
- Nebulas in solar systems can interefere with comms so that random players lose contact with the FC;
- Fleet composition can be affected by th reputation of an FC (not security status - rep would need a new leadership skill introduced);
- FC's rep would be affected by how successful he is - excessive losses reduce his rep, minimal losses or a major win for his fleet increases his rep;
- Ships crews have to be trained (again a new skill would be needed);

Maybe there are some other things that could be introduced as well - anyone have any ideas?

i know this is likely to get blown apart (pun intended) by those players who like their instant pew pew, but I just feel that a game as mature as EVE can be a bit more immersive.

H

mxzf
Shovel Bros
#2 - 2012-03-19 22:01:09 UTC
Well, first off, 'FC reputation' based off of combat records which gives benefits is typically called "XP" in other games and isn't something we need in Eve. Also, ship crews have been discussed to death in other threads.

As to the comparison between Eve sensors and WWI sensors, lets just say that sensors have come a LONG way since WWI. Heck, there are sensors now which can tell the difference between a rock and a vehicle, I think the ones a couple hundred/thousand years in the future would be a bit more sophisticated.

And, above all, it would hurt gameplay to do this. It would make it frustrating to try to fight people and would take away from the fun of combat and it would either be brokenly OP or meaningless in combat.
Danika Princip
GoonWaffe
Goonswarm Federation
#3 - 2012-03-19 22:01:57 UTC
Why? What does any of this do to make combat more fun?

What does an FC's rep have to do with anything at all? How would this work with alts, or people who are just starting to FC?

You do realise every fleet uses out of game comms, right? You can't interfere with that.

Define a win? Most ships killed? Least losses? Strategic objectives? k/d ratio? most blues shot?

Expand on your crews idea, explain why it would be good, why it would be needed, and why it wouldn't encourage people to avoid PVP?



Actually, explain why this entire idea wouldn't serve to discourage PVP. With both ship crews and FC's ability to lead fleets on the line, why would anyone undock if they aren't 100% certain of victory?
Wai Ish'inre
Abyss Heavy Industries
#4 - 2012-03-19 22:33:48 UTC
OP should play WoT.
Kusum Fawn
Perkone
Caldari State
#5 - 2012-03-20 00:03:15 UTC
[quote=Hestia Mar

- Things such as asteroid belts can affect the functionality of sensors so that they can be used as hiding places (of course that means you could use them to ambush from)
- Nebulas in solar systems can interefere with comms so that random players lose contact with the FC
- Fleet composition can be affected by th reputation of an FC (not security status - rep would need a new leadership skill introduced)
- FC's rep would be affected by how successful he is - excessive losses reduce his rep, minimal losses or a major win for his fleet increases his rep
- Ships crews have to be trained (again a new skill would be needed)
[/quote

cloaked/covert cyno recon gangs, or other hotdrop

graphical loads cause players to dro

skill of fc (wing command+fleet command)
player knowledge of alliance/corp f

t3 skill retrainin


Eves fog of war is not knowing what the enemy has in their pocket, often its nothing, but sometimes its PL's supercap fleet, 400 tengu fleet, or whatever. metagamers (spys) can break this fog, but thats always been true of any conflict.

Implimenting a game fog of war idea usually means that someone will find an out of game way to break it, or it will be considered unfair by those on the receiving end, and everyone will be on the receiving end at least once.


Its not possible to please all the people all the time, but it sure as hell is possible to Displease all the people, most of the time.

Malik8
Aliastra
Gallente Federation
#6 - 2012-03-29 19:57:24 UTC
In Eve, I feel fog of war is basically not being thorough with scanning, scouting, and espionage. If your fleet doesn't know that the enemy has reinforcements inc, with a covops watching the fight, waiting for his buddies to warp to, you'll be surprised.

I do agree that LoS doesn't factor into combat very often, however, navigating complex structures in eve I'd imagine being a nightmare, since there's a top and bottom, and you're commanding rather than piloting your ship.
Buzzy Warstl
Quantum Flux Foundry
#7 - 2012-03-29 22:36:20 UTC
What Malik8 said. The terrain here is between star systems. If your opponent has massive reinforcements in the next system over and you miss that you can expect what looked like an easy battle to go pear shaped in a hurry.

http://www.mud.co.uk/richard/hcds.htm Richard Bartle: Players who suit MUDs

Misanthra
Alternative Enterprises
#8 - 2012-03-30 02:15:07 UTC
fc rep....why would losses affect that rating. Ever here of suicide roams? Quite fun. trash ships, not overplanned jsut get up and go kill ****. Not every fight has to be military by the numbers crap. And sometimes taking obvious bait leads to fun times.


Your idea hurts FC's who run these. Bad for several reasons. Kills a fun part of eve. Also bad since bascially this will kill any desire for people to FC up for noob roams. When I started in 0.0 I got lucky. Found a nice corp and an alliance that sucked leadership wise...but foot soldier type people in the alliance cool as hell. Me and some noob friends jsut wanted to head out and learn to pvp. Always found a senior player who said sure man hold up, I'll run the roam if you want to not run around completely clueless. An offer we took up lol. Cheap implants, cheap ships and no whining about losses if you didn't do either. We diaf'd alot, learned alot too. Your plan....noobs ain't finding these nice players to fc this stuff as easy.


serras bang
Caldari Provisions
Caldari State
#9 - 2012-03-30 02:32:07 UTC
think some of these would have some merit tbh and it would set the field for more complex battles for wars and fleet ops ide think some of these ideas would be fun.

however intruducing new skills no and rep for an fc i would have to say no to also just because there is far to many factors that a guy might really be a good fc but takes on bigger fight and makes losses ect.
Aqriue
Center for Advanced Studies
Gallente Federation
#10 - 2012-03-30 04:11:27 UTC
Wai Ish'inre wrote:
OP should play WoT.

Jeez dude, thats like suggestiong a man cut his own balls off. Not something to say lightly.

Terrible ******* P2W game, by the time you get to tier 5 in a KV its like back during the "Era of Super Carriers PWNING ALL" in EVE in the first year after Dominion. Terrible ******* tank, KV is better against stuff +2 and thats it...none of the +4 **** that is doesn't have the speed, armor, hitpoints or useful gun (imagine someone brings a Raven to a fleet battle...yeah thats how useless the KV is against an IS-4). Stupid gaming company as well, ban my ass for "AFK" during matches but I had chosen to leave the match (quitting at start up because the odds pit me against tier 8/9 all day, but half the time the tank never blew up even though that is what it was supposed to do if you chose to use the exit option)
Admiral Lysander
Deep Core Mining Inc.
Caldari State
#11 - 2012-03-30 13:48:16 UTC
mxzf wrote:
Well, first off, 'FC reputation' based off of combat records which gives benefits is typically called "XP" in other games and isn't something we need in Eve. Also, ship crews have been discussed to death in other threads.

As to the comparison between Eve sensors and WWI sensors, lets just say that sensors have come a LONG way since WWI. Heck, there are sensors now which can tell the difference between a rock and a vehicle, I think the ones a couple hundred/thousand years in the future would be a bit more sophisticated.

And, above all, it would hurt gameplay to do this. It would make it frustrating to try to fight people and would take away from the fun of combat and it would either be brokenly OP or meaningless in combat.


You obv have never played warhammer 40k lol 40,000 yrs into the future and thay can barely keep ther **** working
Admiral Lysander
Deep Core Mining Inc.
Caldari State
#12 - 2012-03-30 13:54:36 UTC  |  Edited by: Admiral Lysander
O O O and as for crew the only thing thay should effect is module cycle time, weapon range an accuracy, as well as a rep bonus,

This would need 3 crew types command, gun crew, and engineers.
and as for the lvl of ur crew you would have your officer's to go with these mebe 1 for each of the crew type then
mebe a Fisrt offiicer that gives a 5% boost to all the crew stats as he would be able to help organise staff
then lastly a medical officer to help with crew injurys that would happen once a ships shied was down.
FloppieTheBanjoClown
Arcana Imperii Ltd.
#13 - 2012-03-30 14:08:40 UTC  |  Edited by: FloppieTheBanjoClown
There is a fog of war:

If you don't have scouts in neighboring systems, you're blind to any approaching reinforcements.

If you don't have scanners active in system, you don't know the composition of off-grid elements.

Cloaking even further muddles intel with the ability of a bomber/recon wing to appear out of nowhere.

edit: once again, ship crews are a bad idea. They'd be just another module to fit on your ship and play min/max with. We have implants, rigs, modules, and subsystems. That's enough.

Founding member of the Belligerent Undesirables movement.

FloppieTheBanjoClown
Arcana Imperii Ltd.
#14 - 2012-03-30 14:11:30 UTC
Danika Princip wrote:
Define a win?


Also, this. Leaving the Eve system to decide who won an engagement is silly. If my fleet loses 50 cruisers, theirs doesn't lose anything, but they withdraw and we gain system we're fighting for, obviously we win.

Founding member of the Belligerent Undesirables movement.