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In the Defence of Armour


Mask

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  • 4 months later...
On ‎1‎/‎3‎/‎2020 at 12:33 PM, Coffee Potato said:

You could always throw in the Silent Storm system on top of a more basic system. All the benefits of a locational system without the technical fudgery. (There's an option in SA that turns on critical debuffs, which give all manner of different injuries, from busted limbs, to bleeding, blindness, unconsciousness, etc. You could have a unit in a mech suit suddenly get knocked out by a sniper shot getting through their armor. Felt really cool)

Is what I proposed really that complex?

7 armor pieces (or 5, if left/right arm and left/right leg are mirrored, but that make asymetrical armor impossible), each with 2 protection variables.

I don't see what is hard to understand, if the armor has 50 protection and 70 coverage on the arms it simply means the armor covers 70% of the arm effectively with 30% being a weak spot, hence a 30% chance to hit a weak spot if the arm is hit. I don't think it is possible to  simplify this system further without loosing all the good part about it.

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A bunch of replies turned up, without me being alerted. I'll try to answer the main points that were raised.

On 1/2/2020 at 8:49 AM, TrashMan said:

I very much agree with OP.

Armor is so often done poorly. The one thing I'd like that should be brought in from original X-Com is armor coverage - with armor covering different body parts and each part having it's own integrity. Naturally, armor wouldn't be equally as thick everywhere (front torso is usually thickest, arms and legs usually thinnest), nor would every armor cover as much, so there's always risks involved.

Front torso, back torso, left/right arm, left/right leg, head

 

My ideal armor system would also work in the following fashion:

- each armor body part has a %coverage and protection value. Depending on what weapon hits, %coverage can degrade, maybe every protection value, depending on weapon (some scy-fi weapons or compounds could weaken the armor). If a body part is hit, roll coverage to see if armor protects. If success, then apply full armor protection calcs. If fail, either full damage is done or perhaps with some minor reduction (your undersuit should provide SOME protection)

- armor has a maximum damage value that it can absorb harmlessly (your high-tech power armor will shrug off pistol bullets completely, as long as no weak spot is hit). Heavy armor can render you virtually invulnerable to weak weapons, but there's always a risk of lucky shots (and shots in the back).

- hits above a certain damage treshold will penetrate, but will be reduced (percentage reduction).

- Weapons can have have an armor penetration multiplier that doesn't multiply final damage, only damage for armor penetration calcs. For example, a railgun would do 25 damage with a 3x armor penetration modifier, thus armor will treat it like it does 75 damage, but will still do 25 damage to the soldier, simulating overpenetration with a tiny, ultra-fast round. Thus you can simulate different kinds of weapons. The coverage degradation modifier could also be part of a weapon, which specifies how good the weapon is at stripping away armor. In the above example, a railgun round would make a very tiny wound/hole, resulting in little armor coverage degradation, while something like a plasma gun or explosive could melt/shred entire pieces off.

Trashman's system is like the original XCOM, and is a good system in general, where like in reality armour has coverage and protection ratings. I am also in favour of the idea of damage and an armour penetration multiplier. As said, this works to make weapons unique within a damage type, instead of just working on what has the most damage of that type.

 

Armour HP Indicators:

It was mentioned that, with armour degradation, you don't know what state your armour is in. We could add in a stat or two to show this, or even a little human body outline like in Battletech, or we could have a notification come up if a soldier's armour has been badly damaged. Overall, I'm not too concerned with the matter, as gunfire is a good enough indicator that you should take cover and get support, and that's what low armour would tell you to do.

 

Simple Straight Damage vs Complexities:
There were many ideas about how to handle the details and complexities of the armour system. However, from what I could see, most everyone was in favour of a simple straight damage or damage-reduction system as its basis. I don't think anyone was against Trashman's point about armour coverage, either.

So is it reasonable to say we all agree on that as our basis, and the Devs should pursue that line? We can hash out the details as we go.

 

Armour Degradation:
The formula for armour degradation should probably be something like....

AmrDmg = Armour * Min( (Attack * ArmourPenetration / Armour), 1) * DegradationMod

To explain the key points of that formula:
1. Any damage that can penetrate the armour ought to damage it, since you put a hole through it.
2. Damage shouldn't exceed the armour rating, because no matter how powerful the rail gun slug, if it only puts a 3mm hole in the armour, that isn't going to damage it much.
3. The Degradation Mod allows you to do a lot more or a lot less damage to armour. If you bathe the armour in plasma, so you melt the entire chest-piece, you're going to do a lot more damage than a little hole.

This is realistic, and about as direct and simple as you can get, while still having depth of detail.

Edited by Mask
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The opportunity to productively discuss armour has unfortunately come and gone. There is a new armour system that will be going into v13-14, which Chris put up for discussion and debate at the end of Feburary. It got 8 replies. I can give you a summary of the armour system if you like.

 

 

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4 minutes ago, Max_Caine said:

The opportunity to productively discuss armour has unfortunately come and gone. There is a new armour system that will be going into v13-14, which Chris put up for discussion and debate at the end of Feburary. It got 8 replies. I can give you a summary of the armour system if you like.

 

 

I somehow missed that discussion, unfortunately. With only 8 replies... it seems everyone missed it. Could I please have a link to the thread, so I can see?

I would be interested to hear how X2's armour system works, thank you.

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Again, unfortunately I can't - Chris has wiped all the threads I guess in prep for the upcoming version. However, I can do a summary:

Locational Damage

Raher than weapons doing 50-150% of damage, a body location is randomly chosen and has a damage multiplier depending on the body part. The examples given varied from 50% to 200%. at the moment, all locational damage will do is determine the damage multiplier but Chris has suggsted that this can form the skeleton of a more complex system which could become DLC later down the line. 

 

Armour HP

Armour provides a squaddie a seperate pool of Armour HP that absorbs damage before the unit takes damage to their own HP. Armour HP is s permanently used when it stops damage, so 20 Armour HP is only ever going to prevent 20 incoming damage.

 

Resistances

The current armour system, which is a percent deduction from the damage caused by the weapon will still be present, this represents natural or implied resistances, e.g. wearing a rebreather will give 100% damage resistance to gas-type weapons. 

 

Weapon Level & Armour Level

So, this is the complicated bit. It had me scratching my head at the time. All weapons and armour is assigned a "level". When the projectile from a weapon collides with armour, the weapon "level" and the armour "level" are compared. If the weapon "level" is higher than the armour "level" the weapon projectile gains an armour penetration bonus which ignores reistance and armour HP, if the armour "level" is higher than the weapon "level", a percentage of the damage is ignored. The degree of the bonus that either the weapon or the armour gets is dependant on the difference betwen the weapon and the armour. 

 

E.G. If starting heavy armour had an armour level of 2, and the starting alien MAG pistol had a weapon level of 1, then the armour is 1 level higher than the weapon and gains a relatively small bonus, say, 30% of damage is ignored in addition to any natural resistances. However, if an alien plasma rifle had a weapon level of 5, then the weapon is 3 levels higher than the armour, and gains a much larger bonus, say, 90% of damage penetrates the armour and ignores armour HP and resistances. 

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1 hour ago, Max_Caine said:

Again, unfortunately I can't - Chris has wiped all the threads I guess in prep for the upcoming version. However, I can do a summary:

Locational Damage

Raher than weapons doing 50-150% of damage, a body location is randomly chosen and has a damage multiplier depending on the body part. The examples given varied from 50% to 200%. at the moment, all locational damage will do is determine the damage multiplier but Chris has suggsted that this can form the skeleton of a more complex system which could become DLC later down the line. 

 

Armour HP

Armour provides a squaddie a seperate pool of Armour HP that absorbs damage before the unit takes damage to their own HP. Armour HP is s permanently used when it stops damage, so 20 Armour HP is only ever going to prevent 20 incoming damage.

 

Resistances

The current armour system, which is a percent deduction from the damage caused by the weapon will still be present, this represents natural or implied resistances, e.g. wearing a rebreather will give 100% damage resistance to gas-type weapons. 

 

Weapon Level & Armour Level

So, this is the complicated bit. It had me scratching my head at the time. All weapons and armour is assigned a "level". When the projectile from a weapon collides with armour, the weapon "level" and the armour "level" are compared. If the weapon "level" is higher than the armour "level" the weapon projectile gains an armour penetration bonus which ignores reistance and armour HP, if the armour "level" is higher than the weapon "level", a percentage of the damage is ignored. The degree of the bonus that either the weapon or the armour gets is dependant on the difference betwen the weapon and the armour. 

 

E.G. If starting heavy armour had an armour level of 2, and the starting alien MAG pistol had a weapon level of 1, then the armour is 1 level higher than the weapon and gains a relatively small bonus, say, 30% of damage is ignored in addition to any natural resistances. However, if an alien plasma rifle had a weapon level of 5, then the weapon is 3 levels higher than the armour, and gains a much larger bonus, say, 90% of damage penetrates the armour and ignores armour HP and resistances. 

I wish that this thread had been taken into account. There are 25 replies in it, since January, and none of them appear to have spoken in favour of using armour as an HP buff, or having it reduce damage by a percentage. The mass consensus was for a more logical, simple, and realistic damage reduction model.

X2's armour and weapon level system sounds like it came from some horrible MMORPG.... It's confusing if you try to think about it, but really it's just dumb and simple: "That enemy is too high a level for you, grind more level 1 alien scouts until you level up." 

I'm amazed such a decision was made with barely any feedback....

 

Thank you for bringing this to our attention, and filling us in, Max. It was very kind of you. It's not easy being the bearer of bad news.

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I think you misunderstand. Armor has HP but it only absorbs maybe 50% of damage and the portion of that damage which actually reduces the armor rather than being wasted is like 30%, which is the same system as X1.

The level mechanic has a dumb name, but that doesn't mean it's some "horrible MMORPG" thing, nor is it as simple as you think. It's a new system, a way of merging the stats "penetration" and "shred". IIRC with +1 level differential (e.g. lvl 4 weapon and lvl 3 armor) you get most of your penetration, but you need to reach +3 level to get most of your shred. So very high-caliber rounds will shred armor altogether allowing any weapon to deal more damage to the target, while moderate-caliber will pierce which is effective only for that one shot. As opposed to the odd behavior you see in most games (X1 included) where miniguns and shotguns are the best shredders due entirely to high rate of fire and low damage. Or the gamey behavior you see in XCOM2 and Phoenix Point where shred is a fixed value regardless of whether you're shredding wood or titanium.

Positional damage is a little odd if it uses realspace rather than rolling randomly regardless of your firing angle, because the game doesn't give you any info about realspace trajectories.

But otherwise it's a really good system. Certainly more complex, but it aims to fix problems in the genre, and it has the appearance of being simple which is nice for some players (not me).

Edited by Bobit
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53 minutes ago, Bobit said:

I think you misunderstand. Armor has HP but it only absorbs maybe 50% of damage and the portion of that damage which actually reduces the armor rather than being wasted is like 30%, which is the same system as X1.

That was my general understanding of it. But, your exact description contradicts Max's summary: 

2 hours ago, Max_Caine said:

Armour provides a squaddie a seperate pool of Armour HP that absorbs damage before the unit takes damage to their own HP. Armour HP is s permanently used when it stops damage, so 20 Armour HP is only ever going to prevent 20 incoming damage.

 

53 minutes ago, Bobit said:

The level mechanic has a dumb name, but that doesn't mean it's some "horrible MMORPG" thing, nor is it as simple as you think. It's a new system, a way of merging the stats "penetration" and "shred". IIRC with +1 level differential (e.g. lvl 4 weapon and lvl 3 armor) you get most of your penetration, but you need to reach +3 level to get most of your shred.

Clearly, my issue is not what it is called.... The mechanic was difficult for Max to explain, as it was unintuitive. My comment was about what the system boiled down to, which is simple level-appropriate weaponry mechanics, as the unintuitive details of how it works do not matter seeing as there is nothing innately good about complex nonsense.

53 minutes ago, Bobit said:

So very high-caliber rounds will shred armor altogether allowing any weapon to deal more damage to the target, while moderate-caliber will pierce which is effective only for that one shot.

What is this meant to be? Realistic? Intuitive? I'm not even sure how this is meant to be tactical or interesting. Are we expected to shoot aliens with Level 5 BMGs to shred their armour, and then send in guys with SMGs to take them out? And should the SMGs be level 5, or does level not matter once you destroy their armour? I'm not sure how that'll work out mathematically, if we're using % based armour... will the alien tank half the damage of a .50 cal rifle?

Like, say a tank came over the hill: Should you shoot it with another tank, and then send in a wave of riflemen to kill the tank, because you destroyed its armour?

By the time we get a scenario for what you are doing and why with this mechanic, it starts to feel like we're incorporating Tail Whip from Pokemon into the game (which also reduces the armour of your opponent). But Tail Whip made sense and worked within its context, it was well designed for Pokemon, whereas awkward and forced mechanics tend to make gameplay feel forced and awkward.

53 minutes ago, Bobit said:

As opposed to the odd behavior you see in most games (X1 included) where miniguns and shotguns are the best shredders due entirely to high rate of fire and low damage. Or the gamey behavior you see in XCOM2 and Phoenix Point where shred is a fixed value regardless of whether you're shredding wood or titanium.

The thread contains some excellent ideas on how to deal with armour shredding and simulate those details. It would be very clumsy if we said titanium was level 5, steel was level 4, and wood was level 1.

53 minutes ago, Bobit said:

But otherwise it's a really good system. Certainly more complex, but it aims to fix problems in the genre, and it has the appearance of being simple which is nice for some players (not me).

This is not a good system. In a game about simulating how long it takes to stand up or turn around, with modelling of suppression fire, we're suddenly adding in mechanics so gamey, complex, and weird, that not even FIRAXCOM would touch them.

It's not going to be simple for players. They're going to have to think about what % of what types of damage is reduced by that character's armour, while remembering the current HP of that armour. If they get hit by a level 4 weapon compared to their level 2 armour, its penetration and shred values go up by X%, they should try to remember. Oh, and don't forget that 30% of weapon damage hurts your armour's HP.

So players will just equip the highest level weapons and armour they can get, and won't understand why they win or lose, aside from having bigger numbers.

Edited by Mask
Correcting grammar.
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The one thing I will say is that at the time, Solver raised similar concerns and it has been quite a long time since the post was first made. I don't imagine that the fundamental concepts would have changed that much but the way that they are implemented may have changed. This is pretty much a case of wait-and-see once v13 comes out.

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Quote

Like, say a tank came over the hill: Should you shoot it with another tank, and then send in a wave of riflemen to kill the tank, because you destroyed its armour? 

Shred was never realistic in the first place. Armor doesn't get weaker when you shoot it twice. It gets bent when you swing a mace at it, or melts when you shoot a plasma bolt at it, but how that actually affects it is pretty complicated.That argument can be made against any other XCOM system just as much as this one.

Quote

It would be very clumsy if we said titanium was level 5, steel was level 4, and wood was level 1.

Yes, tier-based shred values with no deviation within tiers are bad. But that's not inherent to the system. The "level" word implies that, it's a terrible word.

Quote

It's not going to be simple for players.

I think the intention with these sort of abstractions is to make it simple for player who just want to say "oh this gun has more anti-armor capability than the other" and don't care for the numbers, while keeping it strategically complex especially for the players that have to know everything. I don't agree with this design philosophy, because it's incredibly bad for the players in between who want to know the numbers without asking on the forums, but it is a pretty prevalent one. For example in MMOs, MOBAs, Dark Souls, Skyrim all the armour uses a complex formula that the game pretends is simple for the lazy players.

Quote

Oh, and don't forget that 30% of weapon damage hurts your armour's HP.

...so you don't like shred? It's a pretty interesting mechanic in X-Division and some OpenXCOM mods. Makes anti-andron strategy more complex, largely because you have to have one unit shoot before another, the same way that shotguns+stun are interesting together. And veteran players are used to it by now, so that part is not added complexity.

Again, the purpose of the system is that weapons change roles from penetration to shred throughout the game depending on their tech level. You don't always use a ballistic minigun to shred. You use a plasma rifle to shred tanks or a laser rifle to pierce tanks. Then later in the game you use anti-matter for shred and plasma for pierce. Or if you see a very high-armor enemy, you have to resort to only using piercing weapons and your low-caliber weapons are completely irrelevant unless you brought C4 and position it very well.

I hope you get some of what I'm saying. While resistance and armor is there to make certain weapons obviously bad against certain enemimes, shred is there to make certain weapons bad against certain enemies under certain conditions. It can bypass armor but you have to have a strategy of prepping the target, and different targets will require being prepped different ways, you can't cover all the corner cases with 100% effectiveness. I'm not saying this system is the best way to do that, but it does work.

Edited by Bobit
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19 hours ago, Max_Caine said:

Again, unfortunately I can't - Chris has wiped all the threads I guess in prep for the upcoming version. However, I can do a summary:

Locational Damage

Raher than weapons doing 50-150% of damage, a body location is randomly chosen and has a damage multiplier depending on the body part. The examples given varied from 50% to 200%. at the moment, all locational damage will do is determine the damage multiplier but Chris has suggsted that this can form the skeleton of a more complex system which could become DLC later down the line. 

 

Armour HP

Armour provides a squaddie a seperate pool of Armour HP that absorbs damage before the unit takes damage to their own HP. Armour HP is s permanently used when it stops damage, so 20 Armour HP is only ever going to prevent 20 incoming damage.

 

Resistances

The current armour system, which is a percent deduction from the damage caused by the weapon will still be present, this represents natural or implied resistances, e.g. wearing a rebreather will give 100% damage resistance to gas-type weapons. 

 

Weapon Level & Armour Level

So, this is the complicated bit. It had me scratching my head at the time. All weapons and armour is assigned a "level". When the projectile from a weapon collides with armour, the weapon "level" and the armour "level" are compared. If the weapon "level" is higher than the armour "level" the weapon projectile gains an armour penetration bonus which ignores reistance and armour HP, if the armour "level" is higher than the weapon "level", a percentage of the damage is ignored. The degree of the bonus that either the weapon or the armour gets is dependant on the difference betwen the weapon and the armour. 

 

E.G. If starting heavy armour had an armour level of 2, and the starting alien MAG pistol had a weapon level of 1, then the armour is 1 level higher than the weapon and gains a relatively small bonus, say, 30% of damage is ignored in addition to any natural resistances. However, if an alien plasma rifle had a weapon level of 5, then the weapon is 3 levels higher than the armour, and gains a much larger bonus, say, 90% of damage penetrates the armour and ignores armour HP and resistances. 

 

That the entire system went by without enough feedback from the community is dishartening.

Reading that description, I can't say I like that system. Still better then nothing.

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Bobbit: What's the point of replying to me, if you're going to ignore half of my points, then quote pieces out of context so you can then respond to arguments I never made like, "you don't like shred"? This is especially weird, considering you also seem to be very disenchanted with the system you are arguing for.... If even the proponents of the new system don't particularly like it, that is very damning indeed.

1 hour ago, TrashMan said:

Reading that description, I can't say I like that system. Still better then nothing.

If 'nothing' was leaving the system the same as X1, I would say this is worse than nothing.

1 hour ago, TrashMan said:

That the entire system went by without enough feedback from the community is dishartening.

Worse than that, they ignored all the feedback in this thread, which was far more extensive and probably with more user opinions.

I often worry that developers are not paying attention to community forums, that I waste my time. This appears to confirm it, where the very few people who happened to be around while the thread was up were the only ones who got any say.

Apparently, one of them did bring up the same problems I did, and he was ignored... so I guess it doesn't matter.

 

....And seriously, why on Earth was the discussion scrubbed, so that no one even knew about this system until Caine was kind enough to tell us? We don't get to see the feedback or share in the discussion that was posed in those 8 replies, nor do we get to see the workings of the system. So, we're literally having to go off of second-hand memory, because it was apparently considered to embarrassing to remain public?

Edited by Mask
Actually, I just had another thought....
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A quick reminder to everybody, address the arguments made, not the person behind them. I'm not going to speak for Chris - he's more than capable of speaking for himself. What I can say is that the post regarding his proposed armour system was put up Feb 26, the last reply to it was March 12, and it has only been removed at some point in May, so there were at least 2 months where it sat for anyone to have a look and comment on. If it's going to sit uncommented on for a month and a half and only garner 8 comments in the time it was up, then the interest from the community in a fundamental system really wasn't there now, was it? 

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1 hour ago, Max_Caine said:

A quick reminder to everybody, address the arguments made, not the person behind them. I'm not going to speak for Chris - he's more than capable of speaking for himself. What I can say is that the post regarding his proposed armour system was put up Feb 26, the last reply to it was March 12, and it has only been removed at some point in May, so there were at least 2 months where it sat for anyone to have a look and comment on. If it's going to sit uncommented on for a month and a half and only garner 8 comments in the time it was up, then the interest from the community in a fundamental system really wasn't there now, was it? 

Normally, you don't delete threads because no one has commented on them for a while. For that reason, I had already left most of my thoughts on armour here in the forum, and had thought they'd be taken into account along with the feedback of other users, which seems to be contrary to this system. I've been too busy IRL and worrying about the pandemic to pay much attention to the forum, sorry to say.

In general, the fact the thread only generated 8 replies over months is kind of odd.... Maybe people didn't understand the system well enough to comment on it (I can only speculate, since the thread was deleted)? Clearly, it's not that we lack people who have an interest in armour mechanics, as there was quite a bit of discussion here about exactly that.

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On ‎5‎/‎28‎/‎2020 at 1:36 PM, Max_Caine said:

A quick reminder to everybody, address the arguments made, not the person behind them. I'm not going to speak for Chris - he's more than capable of speaking for himself. What I can say is that the post regarding his proposed armour system was put up Feb 26, the last reply to it was March 12, and it has only been removed at some point in May, so there were at least 2 months where it sat for anyone to have a look and comment on. If it's going to sit uncommented on for a month and a half and only garner 8 comments in the time it was up, then the interest from the community in a fundamental system really wasn't there now, was it? 

I would have commented... IF I KNEW THE THREAD EXISTED. How the hell was it even up for 2 months with so few noticing? Lul in activity? Corona?

Then again, I'm not camping on those forums 24/7, such important things should be advertised. Especialyl if there were few replies, the devs should have gone and placed a big "Look guys, we need feedback on this, please take a look" message on the top of the forums.

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The Armorthings are done and we Betas will see how it´s working in the next Beta. Maybe some of the suggestions from here get implemented or not. We only will see it after the Beta is out.

Maybe there will be a rework much later in an DLC or so, but the Basegame have to be finished asap for next Year Release and Early Access.

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1 hour ago, Alienkiller said:

The Armorthings are done and we Betas will see how it´s working in the next Beta. Maybe some of the suggestions from here get implemented or not. We only will see it after the Beta is out.

Maybe there will be a rework much later in an DLC or so, but the Basegame have to be finished asap for next Year Release and Early Access.

If there's a hurry, shoving in a complicated armour system with levels and percentages and armour HP in the last few months sounds like a very bad idea. A reductive armour system would be easier to balance and more predictable in audience reaction.

You can't really fix this in DLC, either... If you change the armour system totally, people who liked or got used to the first one will be thrown off, and you already have lost the chance to appeal to the majority of people who preferred the more sensible system, so it would be a bit late to change to it. It is possible there'll be a big demand from the playerbase to change/fix the armour system... but it's more likely players will just not be having fun and won't understand why, and so might make nebulous suggestions or even review-bomb the game and demand refunds.

It's baffling that the feedback here was totally ignored, and this system was pushed in while no one was looking, then the evidence hidden away. If the feedback here is any indication of audience sentiment, I can only imagine this going down very poorly.

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Then you haven´t played Baseversions and later on DLC´s. The DLC´s are changing a lot. Best Example is Hoi 4 where you thought that and that won´t get changed and it get or will changed.

For Xenonauts 2 that Means: There is got in a new Armor System and have to be Betatested first from Head to Feat. Then could be decided to upgrade or refit it. If there is something more to get in, refited or changed we know it AFTER the internal Betatest, not before.

But should be there something to fix or so, the Ideas if possible will flow in.

Edited by Alienkiller
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Trashman, I must confess I have some difficulty believing that you didn't know the thread existed. You see, I can see that on April the 23rd you checked out the Xenonauts 2 features board - which had the Armour discussion thread, which was titled "New Damage/Armor system" - went to the orbital bombardment thread and gave your opinions on  Orbital Bombardment. Are you saying you went to the orbital bombardment thread and didn't once check out the armour thread? If you are, fair enough, but that day when you went to the specific forum on which that thread was advertised would have been your opportunity to give your two cents. 

 

Mask, you say that the armour systems proposed and implemented by Chris are complicated - why is that? An extra HP bar is intuitive, especially if you see that on the UI. Resistances aren't hard to work out, the only complex matter is how armour penetration works. In a recent update on the Kickstarter page, Chris is now using the terms "armour penetration" and "armour hardness", so I imagine there has been some development on that situation. 

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1 minute ago, Max_Caine said:

Trashman, I must confess I have some difficulty believing that you didn't know the thread existed. You see, I can see that on April the 26th you checked out the Xenonauts 2 features board - which had the Armour discussion thread, which was titled "New Damage/Armor system" - went to the orbital bombardment thread and gave your opinions Orbital Bombardment. Are you saying you went to the orbital bombardment thread and didn't once check out the armour thread? If you are, fair enough, but that day when you went to the specific forum on which that thread was advertised would have been your opportunity to give your two cents. 

That's some impressive homework you're doing. That doesn't really answer the points that were made, however, and it seems you don't understand our concerns. It doesn't matter WHY there was effectively no feedback to the thread... rather, shouldn't it be a concern to the developer that the thread got little feedback? If the thread isn't getting enough attention, deleting it certainly won't help with that.

The best argument I can think of for why Trashman or anyone else may have not replied in the thread, is they thought they already spoke their opinions on the subject of armour somewhere, such as in this thread, and that their feedback would be taken into account. Why does it matter if they give their feedback in this thread or in that thread?

Also, if Trashman's appearance at the end of April is any indicator of other users' activity, it's no wonder the thread saw so few replies. It sounds like players weren't here for the first months, possibly due to the virus taking up their time and concerns, or possibly due to releases like Bannerlord (probably both). I also ended up showing up again in May, as coincidence has it, because another user checked back to the forum around now and messaged me.

So, tragically, the thread was deleted at the time when people were returning to the forum and could've given their feedback? How did that end up happening?

1 minute ago, Max_Caine said:

Mask, you say that the armour systems proposed and implemented by are complicated - why is that? An extra HP bar is intuitive, especially if you see that on the UI. Resistances aren't hard to work out, the only complex matter is how armour penetration works. In a recent update on the Kickstarter page, Chris is now using the terms "armour penetration" and "armour hardness", so I imagine there has been some development on that situation. 

...Caine, you were just having trouble describing how the system works to me. And now you're trying to convince me it's perfectly intuitive? The only complex thing about the armour... is how to defeat armour.

I described at length the problems of Ablative and Percentile Armour... so why are you asking me why using both of those systems together, with another one on top which YOU find complex, is a problem?

11 minutes ago, Alienkiller said:

Then you haven´t played Baseversions and later on DLC´s. The DLC´s are changing a lot. Best Example is Hoi 4 where you thought that and that won´t get changed and it get or will changed.

The best and only example. Except it's not an example, if you're not going to inform us what core mechanic changed completely in a DLC.

How many betas have you tested, where it was normal to change foundational mechanics with DLCs? How many games are there which completely change how they're played in their DLC, in general? I think there must be some miscommunication here, as what you're suggesting isn't making sense.

There is an unfortunate trend in the industry lately, where beta testers are completely ignored and the core systems that have been broken from version 0.4b are still broken in the release (Phoenix Point comes to mind, though this was also an issue in Bannerlord). I suppose we could consider fixing the game months after its release a complete change via downloadable content, and that is more common in the industry of late.
Of course, this isn't referring to Xenonauts but the industry in general, since Alien brought up common practices for betas and DLC.

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Baseversions and DLC´s / Add-Ons I play a lot since the 80s and 90s. Don´t discuss that with me, I´m a Gamer of the real first Generation.

I only say wait what the Betatesters of Beta 13 have to say sonething about the new Armor / Whatever System. We all don´t know what it is and how many doable Ideas from here are involved.

 

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Mask, before I continue to write, let me be perfectly clear. I am not staff. It's important to remember that, because as a consequence I'm not obliged to answer for the decisions GH makes. Now, onto my response.

 

Firstly, I think that Trashman is perfectly capable of answering for himself, if Trashman decides to answer, which he doesn't have to. Secondly, if Trashman says he didn't know, but goes and visits the specific board that the thread was on while the thread was up, then I reserve the right to be skeptical about the claim. Everything else is moving the goalposts beyond the specific claim which I query.

 

Now, concerning complication. Please read my original post again. The sole issue I had complication with is what is now the newly implemented armour penetration system. As I said, that's what had me scratching my head. The argument you propose is a conflation of the thing I had complication with, with the things I don't. So, again, regarding an extra HP bar, regarding adding resistances - why is it complicated? Not why is it bad, which is what your OP addresses - why is it complicated? 

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The old armour thread isn't gone exactly, it's been hidden. But we've done because we've rolled all the info about the various new systems into several new summary posts that will be unlocked next week. Most people don't really know what mechanics are and aren't in the current design for X2 because it has changed a lot over the past few years.

That specific previous thread also included several other mechanics that haven't all made it into the game, which would be confusing.

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