RC5

[Song]

there's still the annoying "slice" missing out of the explosion you get from things like the Km100/120/500/550 , mags, and flensers.......couple that with the bug Wolfy has described, and I think it's a no-go from me.

[Aury]

So far, so good.

My only complaint has already been mentioned, I played around a bit and indeed, overheating on pretty much the standard equipment is probably bad. Should the Wolfen get a slightly bigger reactor to compensate, or should something not take as much power?

Atarlost says that the balance should be done item/weapon-side (the dual laser needs to draw less power)


.... also, I think that the shipyards should not force the player into an un-economical, linear, reactor-upgrade path.

[Atarlost]

That's where it was broken, and there aren't any problems with the lasers or kinetics in RC4, they just don't happen to follow George's ideal curve. This is in my mind a case of "if it's not broken don't fix it". The roundoff for the level 1d4 lasers is so bad against decent armor that it doesn't matter that the dual laser does nearly as much raw damage as the turbolaser.

[Blitz]

Apart from the Wolfen thing that's already mentioned, I had a Ranx Outpost spawn right on top of a star. It was still possible to destroy it - I had to be on top of it but I wasn't going to do that as I didn't want to kill myself.

I took a screen shot but I lost it cuz I pressed Ctrl-c...I still have the save game that I'm playing. I'll backtrack and take another one. I'll put it up in a bit.

[george moromisato]

So far, so good.

My only complaint has already been mentioned, I played around a bit and indeed, overheating on pretty much the standard equipment is probably bad. Should the Wolfen get a slightly bigger reactor to compensate, or should something not take as much power?

Atarlost says that the balance should be done item/weapon-side (the dual laser needs to draw less power)

I think I see where I went wrong. In computing the balance for each weapon, I double-counted power-usage.

For each weapon I computed damage-per-second (dps) and MW/point-of-damage (MWd). Then I computed the % variation of each against the standard curve.

For dual lasers, it was:

dps: +45%
MWd: -33%

Which means that dual lasers do 45% more damage than a standard weapon, but consume 33% less power per point than a standard weapon.

I then increased power consumption until MWd was +33%.

My reasoning was that the +45% deserved a proportional increase in consumption, so I bumped it up.

The flaw is that this is double counting power use. +33% means that it is consuming +33% more power PER POINT OF DAMAGE than standard weapons.

I should have set MWd to +0% (meaning is consumes power proportional to the damage it does).

So I think I can lower all weapon power consumption.

Note: Atarlost makes a great point about power breakpoints--I will have to do a separate pass to adjust for that.

[Psycholis]

Just beat RC4, time to tackle RC5. Been a long time since I've beat the game. Looking forward to this next edition.

[george moromisato]

I found two more bugs in my power balancing algorithm:

1. The calculation for power-per-unit-damage was not adjusting for damage tier. For example, a level 4 Flenser should do more damage per MW than a level 4 particle beam (because kinetic damage is less effective at level 4). That brings the turbolaser down to 6 MW and the Flenser down to 13MW. The dual TeV9 and the Hanzo are also OK at 60MW.

2. For the Katana, I did not properly adjust power consumption for its passthrough ability. Passthrough effectively gives the Katana almost double damage, which means that its power consumption should also be double standard. That means that Katana is OK at 75MW (as it was prior to RC5).

[Blitz]

Well, here's two things that are 'almost' issues...

A Ranx outpost spawned right on top of a star in one system. It was still possible to damage it however by staying on top of it.



And then there's this. Iocrym sentinel trying to shoot at me but actually happily blasting away at it's own outpost.



And I have to ask, what can you use the Longzhu spheres on to increase damage on and what cant you use them on? Cuz, I just found out in this game that you could use it on the fracture cannon but not on the lamplighter. Does it have to do with the level or the damage type?

Oh, and great work George. Love the new Sapphire. Actually playing it now.

EDIT: Oops. Saved the second image as a bitmap. Reuploaded as JPEG.

EDIT2: Just so you know, i'm using unmodded Transcendence but am using the decompiled Resources and xml file - aaand I gave myself a billion credits...

[Blitz]

And I have to ask, what can you use the Longzhu spheres on to increase damage on and what cant you use them on? Cuz, I just found out in this game that you could use it on the fracture cannon but not on the lamplighter. Does it have to do with the level or the damage type?

IIRC Longzhu spheres can be used on any weapon that has the "EnergyWeapon" modifier.

You're right.

Code: Select all

(itmMatches gItem "w <=10; +EnergyWeapon;")

Should have bothered to look earlier...Thanks though

[Aury]

IFC's are energy weapons!? I'm so going to have fun with them later...
(meanwhile, I'm just before charon. I'm trying to find that station that was offering the dual particle beam for sale to save the korolov. Dual particlebeams make the unwinnable winnable (in charon that is).
(I also found a 100MW reactor... for FREE! I love those marauders who 'donated' it to my inventory. They didn't even have anyone gaurding their station. Now how about that...)

[Song]

IFC's are energy weapons!? I'm so going to have fun with them later...
(meanwhile, I'm just before charon. I'm trying to find that station that was offering the dual particle beam for sale to save the korolov. Dual particlebeams make the unwinnable winnable (in charon that is).
(I also found a 100MW reactor... for FREE! I love those marauders who 'donated' it to my inventory. They didn't even have anyone gaurding their station. Now how about that...)

IFC+150...geez.....all I can say about is.....MUAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!!

As you've said...that is gonna be......fun......

[Psycholis]

IFCs aren't just great weapons, they're great end game rin collectors (not that you need rin at that point anyway..) 40k a pop at the teratons. last game, i had 5 in tact ones and 4 more damaged that i healed with longzhus. one MILLION rin.

[Song]

IFCs aren't just great weapons, they're great end game rin collectors (not that you need rin at that point anyway..) 40k a pop at the teratons. last game, i had 5 in tact ones and 4 more damaged that i healed with longzhus. one MILLION rin.

Geez. That's insane.

[Song]

And the IFC+150%....correct me if I'm wrong.....125X2, at 3.8 per second....
That's 950 DPS.

NINE HUNDRED AND FIFTY?!!! BOOYA!!!