I don't 'get' the need for a suppression icon? Why not just show the unit cower?

[StellarRat]

yeah the cyberdiscs were a challenge early in the game. It's a shame that this level wasn't kept all the way through. But hey, no Psi or Blaster Bombs round here, so that should help.

No??? That's not going to be in the game?

[Gorlom]

Nope, human psi and blaster bombs are not going to be in Xenonauts. (although aliens get psi as far as i understand)

One of the kickstarter extended goals were to program blaster bombs so they could be modded in but the campaign did not reach that goal.

[Oathbreaker]

Ah but that just adds to the fun when you leg it over with your stun baton and it superheats your kidneys with a plasma rifle...

Just me then?

I'm with Gauddlike. You should know when an enemy is suppressed. And if it's crouching in cover, how the hell would your soldiers on the battlefield see if the enemy is suppressed or not, anyway??

People want drones to be suppressable? Sorry, that'd be just ...meh, sure, whatever.

If you take fire in the real world you will be scared and you will take cover and press yourself down into whatever little dimple in the ground you can find. But there's no icon popping up over your head.

[Max_Caine]

In answer to you, Oathbreaker, I'll quote a game designer, Raph Koster here:

a deep system with poor feedback will read as shallow to players 1

In XCOM: Enemy Unknown, it's very clear when a unit is suppressed. The suppressing model takes repeated pot-shots at the suppressed model. The suppressed model ducks and flinches. There are sparks where suppressing shots hit cover. It's important to convey that kind of information in a clear and unambigous manner, as otherwise the player has no idea if the state of the unit he has affected is either positive or negative. It is not clear that a crouched enemy is suppressed as well as crouched, only that the unit has crouched. Without additional visual or aural queues that express suppression in an unambigous manner, the alternative is an icon that clearly states "suppressed".

1: Notes on game feedback, Ralph Koster. (http://www.raphkoster.com)

[StellarRat]

But, Caine you wouldn't know if a unit was suppressed or merely trying to use available cover. Suppressed usually means, enough incoming fire to significantly degrade the unit's capabilities. I don't know how you could tell that by a quick observation nor should you be able to. You would need to watch it for while for clues like it's not moving much" and/or it's no longer firing as much. You would have to determine suppression by inductive reasoning. Suppression markers are great for games where you can't make said observations like board games or computer games that utilize large scale units or counters, but in Xenonauts we can observe actions of individual units in detail over time, so a marker decreases from the immersion and the suspense by making obvious that the unit is no threat anymore. Basically, the game becomes too easy. The only way a suppression marker would really work for me is if the alien could suddenly become "unsuppressed" in the middle of your turn and start reaction firing.

[Vivisector 9999]

Too little information hurts immersion, not the other way around. If I know that something is possible but I can't even tell whether I'm doing it or not, that's not immersive - it's a more boring version of the lottery. The more bullshit there is keeping the player from understanding what's happening, the less immersive it is.

That isn't to say there needs to be icons and numbers all over EVERYTHING, but it's all the more immersive when I can work out the rules of the game, when I can tell that the system is polished and well thought-out. With too little feedback, there's no chance of that.

[StellarRat]

The best solution is to allow the player to turn the markers on and off. I prefer more realism. To me, not knowing for sure that an alien is suppressed is more realistic.

Edited August 23, 2012 by StellarRat

[Khall]

This is one of the reasons I'm more in favour of a percentage or tier based suppression system rather than the current binary one. In the current system you can suppress them 99% and they'll be no change in combat effectiveness, but fire one more shot and they become paralysed. Right now you would need an indicator to show if they are suppressed, you don't know otherwise if you hit the "magic number" if they were already crouched. With a percentage based system you wouldn't have this problem, you would be able to roughly guess how suppressed they are by the amount of fire they are taking, without an indicator.

Some ideas on suppression systems

[Max_Caine]

StellarRat, we can observe the actions of individual units over time but I would argue there are insufficent clues from observed behaviour to determine if a unit was suppressed or not. Take the common example of an alien crouched behind cover (which Chris tells us will happen). A player can order his troops to shoot at the alien. It may be that the player is unable to kill the alien but has done sufficent suppression damage to suppress the unit. Now in the next turn, the penalty the alien suffers is 50% of all APs lost. Which means that an alien, even though it is suppressed can still shoot back. The a.i. may decide that as the alien only has 50% APs it will stay where it is and shoot from cover. At what point can we deduce the alien is suppressed? All observable behaviours can be carried out whether the alien is suppressed or not and there aren't any other visual or aural queues that the alien is suppressed. After all, the same a.i. not suppressed may decide that as the cover it s hiding behind has protected it, it will stay there and shoot. Therefore, if feedback (suppressed) is indistinguishable from feedback (not suppressed) what's the point in having a state which the player does not know and cannot capitalise on? To quote from the same article I referenced in my last post:

If you have a deep system, your feedback should accommodate revealing that depth or else you may as well cut the depth because people will often literally not be able to tell it is there.

While it may feel jarring to have an icon, I would say in Xenonauts' case there's either an icon to indicate state of suppression or no state of suppression at all, because the other clues are either subtle or non-existant.

Edited August 23, 2012 by Max_Caine
too many commas

[StellarRat]

StellarRat, we can observe the actions of individual units over time, but I would argue there are insufficent clues from observed behaviour to determine if a unit was suppressed or not. Take the common example of an alien crouched behind cover (which Chris tells us will happen). A player can order his troops to shoot at the alien. It may be that the player is unable to kill the alien, but has done sufficent suppression damage to suppress the unit. Now, in the next turn, the penalty the alien suffers is 50% of all APs lost. Which means that an alien, even though it is suppressed, can still shoot back. The a.i. may decide that as the alien only has 50% APs, it will stay where it is and shoot from cover. At what point can we deduce the alien is suppressed? All observable behaviours can be carried out whether the alien is suppressed or not, and there aren't any other visual or aural queues that the alien is suppressed. After all, the same a.i. not suppressed may decide that as the cover it s hiding behind has protected it, it will stay there and shoot. Therefore, if feedback (suppressed) is indistinguishable from feedback (not suppressed) what's the point in having a state which the player does not know and cannot capitalise on? To quote from the same article I referenced in my last post:

While it may feel jarring to have an icon, I would say in Xenonauts' case, there's either an icon to indicate state of suppression, or no state of suppression at all, because the other clues are either subtle or non-existant.

If the number (and/or accuracy) of shots coming from said alien decreased from say 3 down 1 per turn you would have a good clue that it is suppressed. In the current model it would simply stop firing. If you've been shooting and the enemy hasn't returned fire at all in a couple turns that's a pretty good clue they are suppressed or out of ammo (or dead or wounded IRL.) Even then you'd want move troops up with quick reactions, cautiously, and maybe lob a couple grenades in for good measure. With the marker and current model, you just suppress and then casually walk up and shoot them point blank with no worries. That's just silly and very unrealistic. Edited August 23, 2012 by StellarRat

[Max_Caine]

Where in the current model does the alien not return fire? The alien is unable to reaction fire in the players current turn, this is true, but it can still fire in its own turn. And how would a player tell that an alien couldn't reaction fire without some kind of clue? An alien that is already crouched doesn't give away that it is suppressed, and we cannot presume that all aliens that can be suppressed have a crouching animation (but that will become clear in the beta). Furthermore, the only way to tell if an alien is shooting fewer shots than it normally would, would be if the player had been able to observe that alien for at least a full turn without that alien expending any APs prior to encountering the players troops. Even then, alien weapons have snap, aimed and burst fire modes. An a.i. with on 50% APs (suppressed) could fire several snap shots instead of aimed ones, and if the snap shots landed fairly accurately, how would you know? There aren't enough distinguishable clues.

[StellarRat]

Where in the current model does the alien not return fire? The alien is unable to reaction fire in the players current turn, this is true, but it can still fire in its own turn. And how would a player tell that an alien couldn't reaction fire without some kind of clue? An alien that is already crouched doesn't give away that it is suppressed, and we cannot presume that all aliens that can be suppressed have a crouching animation (but that will become clear in the beta). Furthermore, the only way to tell if an alien is shooting fewer shots than it normally would, would be if the player had been able to observe that alien for at least a full turn without that alien expending any APs prior to encountering the players troops. Even then, alien weapons have snap, aimed and burst fire modes. An a.i. with on 50% APs (suppressed) could fire several snap shots instead of aimed ones, and if the snap shots landed fairly accurately, how would you know? There aren't enough distinguishable clues.

I've never had a suppressed alien fire at me. Perhaps they can. But, it makes no difference, if they can't reaction fire you just march up and shoot them in the head. Too simple. I might support your position if there were various levels of suppression or if I can turn the markers off as an option. I still maintain that realistically you can never know if something is suppressed or just taking cover. The only "obvious" clue is when an alien is in the open, you fire, and it suddenly crouches, I don't have a problem with that. To me that is the same as "hitting the dirt" so you know you suppressed at least enough to slow them to a crawl. Edited August 23, 2012 by StellarRat

[Max_Caine]

Well, fair enough. I do agree that suppressed aliens in the current alpha don't shoot back, even in their own turn. The suppression model does permit them to shoot back in their own turn, as they loose 50% APs. Unless the suppression model changes, I presume with the ai developer working full steam, when it gets to beta time, suppressed aliens will shoot in their own turn. On the point of the suppressed icon, we are not going to agree. I feel that in Xenonauts case, they need an icon. You don't feel they do for the reasons we have both given. But I do agree that control of the various in-game markers and icons would be good feature to have.

[StellarRat]

Well, fair enough. I do agree that suppressed aliens in the current alpha don't shoot back, even in their own turn. The suppression model does permit them to shoot back in their own turn, as they loose 50% APs. Unless the suppression model changes, I presume with the ai developer working full steam, when it gets to beta time, suppressed aliens will shoot in their own turn. On the point of the suppressed icon, we are not going to agree. I feel that in Xenonauts case, they need an icon. You don't feel they do for the reasons we have both given. But I do agree that control of the various in-game markers and icons would be good feature to have.

That's really funny. Driving home today I pretty much came to the same conclusion. At least it's a civil discourse. Cheers!

[Oathbreaker]

Too little information hurts immersion, not the other way around. If I know that something is possible but I can't even tell whether I'm doing it or not, that's not immersive - it's a more boring version of the lottery. The more bullshit there is keeping the player from understanding what's happening, the less immersive it is.

That isn't to say there needs to be icons and numbers all over EVERYTHING, but it's all the more immersive when I can work out the rules of the game, when I can tell that the system is polished and well thought-out. With too little feedback, there's no chance of that.

Sorry, I don't get this.

A soldier on a battlefield shooting at an enemy will have a very crappy chance at figuring out whether or not that enemy is suppressed or not, unless they see a ton of bullet impacts around that enemy's position.

What's immersive about more icons over the sprites in the UI? You're getting dangerously close to the old WoW territory here, where every enemy is more identified by it's floating hp bar and targeting circle when you tab-target to it - than it is defined by its graphical representation in the "game-world".

I understand the desire for absolute, total, complete, information mastery for the player. Lots of people want a game where they know EVERYTHING. Where they know how many hp's a monster has, exactly how much damage that shotgun blast just did, what the average chance is of two more shots taking down the enemy. But that has jack all to do with any sort of reasonable simulation of reality. It is, by definition, not immersive. Immersion is a simulation of what it would REALLY be like to be a commander of troops in the field, with very little clue about chance-to-hit and exact capabilities of enemies.

[Vivisector 9999]

But that has jack all to do with any sort of reasonable simulation of reality. It is, by definition, not immersive. Immersion is a simulation of what it would REALLY be like to be a commander of troops in the field, with very little clue about chance-to-hit and exact capabilities of enemies.

Gotta draw the line somewhere, though.

You know what would be even more "immersive" than taking away the little suppression icon? Taking away that total control and FOV of your troops that you get.

After all, it's not like a real commander could micromanage their every movement and see everything they see like some kind of hive mind, either. It'd be so much more immersive if you could only control the commander (if he's even on the battlefield in the first place), and merely send orders to your troops and hope they don't mess it up. Hell, you shouldn't even get to see the map at all, at least not with real-time updates of where everything is. It'd be more realistic if you only got what reports your troops could be bothered to radio to you. Every turn, you could get messages from them (text only, it's not like you have a video feed or anything) and maybe hear the gunshots, then you'd have to issue orders solely based on that.

Would that be more immersive? Probably. But I wouldn't be interested. Would you prefer it like that?

I'm not being facetious there, I'm honestly curious as to how far you'd be willing to take this whole "total immersion" thing.

This debate over suppression icons is close to pointless, anyway. Like others (including myself) have stated on the thread, it wouldn't be hard to throw in an option to turn it off, so players could have it either way. Maybe it could even be modded out.

[Gorlom]

I understand the desire for absolute, total, complete, information mastery for the player. Lots of people want a game where they know EVERYTHING. Where they know how many hp's a monster has, exactly how much damage that shotgun blast just did, what the average chance is of two more shots taking down the enemy. But that has jack all to do with any sort of reasonable simulation of reality. It is, by definition, not immersive. Immersion is a simulation of what it would REALLY be like to be a commander of troops in the field, with very little clue about chance-to-hit and exact capabilities of enemies.

Immerse: to involve deeply.

A game doesn't have to be a simulation to be immersive/involving the player. I would expect it depends on what you want out of a game. For you it would be more immersive if you did not get any information because you want a simulator. For Vivisector it would be more immersive to get feedback so that he knows what he is doing is working. If he didn't get feedback he probably would feel a bit frustrated and that would break his immersion.

[StellarRat]

Gotta draw the line somewhere, though.

You know what would be even more "immersive" than taking away the little suppression icon? Taking away that total control and FOV of your troops that you get.

That wouldn't be any fun though. :-) I think it's a question of where you draw the line too. I know of few games that have suppression mechanics without markers. So, really the best option is allow them to be shut off. I'm a bit curious though, Viv, we already have hidden movement, hidden damage, hidden morale, and the weapons are fairly realistic in their mechanics. Why are you so set against not having suppression markers when you don't seem to have a problem with the other stuff?

[Gauddlike]

And how would a player tell that an alien couldn't reaction fire without some kind of clue?

You don't get an icon to show if they have AP reserved.

Without that they couldn't reaction fire either.

More importantly though WHY should the player be told when the enemy is helpless?

Where is the risk in that?

I could understand the icon being attached to the analogue system to show that you are having some kind of effect.

With the binary system it instantly tells you that the enemy is now vulnerable and can be approached at your leisure.

Maybe if you were playing on easy it should happen but not be available on harder difficulty levels.

You don't get told when an enemy runs out of ammo, has no AP reserved, has no morale etc so why is it so much more important to know when they have been suppressed?

[Oathbreaker]

Gotta draw the line somewhere, though.

You know what would be even more "immersive" than taking away the little suppression icon? Taking away that total control and FOV of your troops that you get.

After all, it's not like a real commander could micromanage their every movement and see everything they see like some kind of hive mind, either. It'd be so much more immersive if you could only control the commander (if he's even on the battlefield in the first place), and merely send orders to your troops and hope they don't mess it up. Hell, you shouldn't even get to see the map at all, at least not with real-time updates of where everything is. It'd be more realistic if you only got what reports your troops could be bothered to radio to you. Every turn, you could get messages from them (text only, it's not like you have a video feed or anything) and maybe hear the gunshots, then you'd have to issue orders solely based on that.

Would that be more immersive? Probably. But I wouldn't be interested. Would you prefer it like that?

I'm not being facetious there, I'm honestly curious as to how far you'd be willing to take this whole "total immersion" thing.

This debate over suppression icons is close to pointless, anyway. Like others (including myself) have stated on the thread, it wouldn't be hard to throw in an option to turn it off, so players could have it either way. Maybe it could even be modded out.

I'd like to take it way farther than modern PC gaming systems are capable of, or modern game developers are interested in developing - which is about 10x further than the vast majority of gaming consumers. I'm an outlier, an anomaly, and anyone who designs specifically for me will have a few very loyal customers, but miss out on many more consumers who value their convenience above most else. People like yourself are much closer to the game's target audience here.

I'd love to see it be an "opt in" or "opt out" feature - problem is I don't see the developers interested in going down that road. It's just an added feature that few would use.

Either way, at least we had a discussion about it and more people considered different options and might think of this when it comes up again. Medium-size defeat with a small small silver lining, I guess. Meh.

[StellarRat]

I've been thinking about the whole suppression thing lately mostly because the "marker" thread. I don't like the way it works at all. It needs to be a graduated system that basically reduces the action points a unit has available and, this is important, the amount of reduction that is added and removed by each incident of fire or recovery should be randomized and not visible. Of course, this can be partially based on the weapon, armor, unit type, etc... A random amount of recovery should occur during the between the end of the alien turn and beginning of the Xenonaut turn. This is realistic and that will give everyone the best of all possible worlds. The realists will be happy because even if a unit marked as suppressed it is quite possible the unit will "snap out of it" during your turn and reaction fire at you. Also, since each incident of fire inflicts a random amount of suppression, the more you fire the more likely a unit will be heavily suppressed, but you'll never quite be sure how much or when they'll "wake up". Voila!

Edited August 24, 2012 by StellarRat

[StellarRat]

I'd like to take it way farther than modern PC gaming systems are capable of, or modern game developers are interested in developing - which is about 10x further than the vast majority of gaming consumers. I'm an outlier, an anomaly, and anyone who designs specifically for me will have a few very loyal customers, but miss out on many more consumers who value their convenience above most else. People like yourself are much closer to the game's target audience here.

You ought to check out Battlefront's CM:SF, CM:BN, etc...sounds like it's right up your alley.

[Vivisector 9999]

I'm a bit curious though, Viv, we already have hidden movement, hidden damage, hidden morale, and the weapons are fairly realistic in their mechanics. Why are you so set against not having suppression markers when you don't seem to have a problem with the other stuff?

As others on this thread have stated, it's a interface/UI issue - is that alien suppressed or just crouching? If it crouched when you started firing at it (on your turn), then sure, it's obvious, but what if it was already crouching?

Now, I do understand where the other side is coming from. I've never been in a real firefight - fist fights, yeah, but even there you have fear/rage and that adrenaline rush and other factors that can make it tough to focus. So I can buy that in a real warzone, it might not be so easy to tell if an enemy is suppressed or merely ducking. It just comes down to a matter of preference for me, and right now I'd prefer to have the icons. Maybe if the option to take them out is added, I'll try playing without them, just to see what it's like.

[Jean-Luc]

I'd like to take it way farther than modern PC gaming systems are capable of, or modern game developers are interested in developing - which is about 10x further than the vast majority of gaming consumers.

You should join the army.

[GoodGuyEddy]

I'd like to take it way farther than modern PC gaming systems are capable of, or modern game developers are interested in developing - which is about 10x further than the vast majority of gaming consumers.

You should start a fire fight with the police, and then use realistic and well developed cover. :3