Topic: New cloak not working as advertised (Read 18740 times)

TarMinyatur · « **on:** July 18, 2003, 09:03:07 pm »

I have yet to observe a single Overloaded Photon do 4 points of damage. According to the published chart, 33% should do 16, 33% do 8, and 33% do 4. So far, approximately 2/3rds do 16 and 1/3 do 8 over about 100 shots.

Is the random number generator improperly set up? It may be giving a 0, 1, 2 when the intended results are 1, 2, 3, thereby shifting the cloak chart to a woeful:

IntRnd(3)
returns 0,1,2

0: Full damage (?)
1: Full damage
2: Half damage
3: Quarter damage (Can't occur)

IntRnd(3) + 1 would solve the problem if this is the case

Can anyone else confirm this?

Note that this is single-player. Are there two versions of the cloak chart? This would seem to be unlikely but it is possible. I'll get online and test multi.

I had some help from Centuri Vaughn and Sabercut on GSA. There is a bug here. Not a single OV Photon did less than 8 and a super majority of them did 16.

Tulmahk · « **Reply #1 on:** July 19, 2003, 04:35:06 am »

One of the reasons I stopped playing SFC2 (aside from time constraints) was due to the incredibly poor implementation of the cloaking device, making Romulan ships far more difficult to play.

And the SFB rules DO allow for invisible cloak. It merely requires a referee to moderate it. In the computerized version of SFB, the computer acts automatically as that referee, so there is no need whatsoever for the Shade-and-Die®. One of the worst game design decisions, ever.

Cleaven · « **Reply #2 on:** July 19, 2003, 04:53:26 am »

My guess is that it was a short-cut taken due to other pressures, as opposed to a deliberate design decision made in the initial planning. It has just taken a long time to put it right (almost).

SPQR Renegade001 · « **Reply #3 on:** July 19, 2003, 09:48:40 am »

Quote:

One of the reasons I stopped playing SFC2 (aside from time constraints) was due to the incredibly poor implementation of the cloaking device, making Romulan ships far more difficult to play.

I have yet to play the new patch vs another human, but vs the AI cloak is now a very usfull tool. Using old style cloak tactics in a WE and then in a Sph-A, I made short work of an admiral level AI F-CC+. Neither ship took internals. Later vs an F-NEC, I was happy to see that the good old "duck and clear" works just fine for ditching those pesky drones.

I don't know how hard it'll be for a human player to void cloak, but Shade-and-Die® is dead. The Romulans who've fought for so long in broken Gorn ships and learned to compete with them, will now be all the more lethal for the experience.

Let the Federation fear the sound of our silence.

*****

I was surprised to learn that of all people, TarMinyatur was not on the testing team. Wether RL constraints, judgement call, or just oversight, the meticulous manner he applies to testing would have been an asset.

NannerSlug · « **Reply #4 on:** July 19, 2003, 11:26:14 am »

sorry renegade, i completely disagree with that statment about tar. his post only proves no good deed goes unpunished.

dave has mentioned in different threads that it is an approximatioin of the sfb rule set - not exact.

so play the game and enjoy it. dave/taldren didnt have to do anything, but they decided to. i think there would be a little bit of a thank you. - as there is from many including your self (i dont expact any from tar).

play it. enjoy it. live it.

FireSoul · « **Reply #5 on:** July 19, 2003, 11:55:04 am »

You see..
.. David didn't enhance the cloak because he had to. He did it because we asked him if he could. Same goes for fighters being recalled by AI Carriers, AI pirates using engine doubling, and AI using ECM/ECCM. It's all been in good faith.

Tar: just play it, and use the ECM effect which isn't supposed to be there by SFB rules to compensate.

Lepton1 · « **Reply #6 on:** July 19, 2003, 12:04:40 pm »

Tar isn't complaining. He's pointing out an accident in what was clearly Dave's intention to use the cloak damage chart that is quoted in Dave's own posts. Clearly if something went wrong, we should at least be aware of it, if not ask that it be changed since this was Dave's intention in the first place.

As for the cloak only being "like-SFB", that has more to do I think if you check Dave's and other posts with the loss of lock for seeking weapons. This is SFB emulated portion. But the cloak damage chart is the cloak damage chart and I firmly believe that is what Dave and everoyne else wants.

This is from Dave's own post:

Cloak changes:
1) Decreased flash time by about 1/4.
2) Seeking weapons now are removed if firing ship looses lock.
3) Being tractored will no longer prevent cloak from being brought on-line.
4) If a ship being tractored cloaks, the ship holding the cloaker will maintain lock.
5) Weapons damage is reduced according to the following chart:
33.3% chance weapon does normal damage.
33.3% chance weapon does 1/2 damage.
33.3% chance weapon does 1/4 damage.

If it isn't doing 1/4 damage, then that's a problem.

I'd be interested to know if any weapons are suffering 1/4 damage. Perhaps there is some photon bonus that is effecting the cloak DAC.

Lepton1 · « **Reply #7 on:** July 19, 2003, 09:51:08 pm »

I am surprised there has been no official response. 100 trials says it all I think. If it doesn't work the way intended then it should be stated so or fixed.

3dot14 · « **Reply #8 on:** July 19, 2003, 09:57:07 pm »

Is this such a big deal?

Consider the cloak has gotten a few bonus from its SFB cousin, it's not surprising it loses a few. Personally, I am inclined to simply alter the readme.txt to match the current situation.

Now I know I prefer this cloak to SFC3's hidden cloak (both as seeker or hider) and this OP cloak is far from shade and die. but I am curious, Tulmahk, how Exactly does the SFB's referring system work?

Scipio_66 · « **Reply #9 on:** July 19, 2003, 10:19:52 pm »

Yeah, yeah, maybe it doesn't work exactly as Mr. Ferrel intended. But you know what? It works so much better than it used to, and so much closer to SFB standard rules than it used to, that I'm not currently inclined to gripe about it.

I'm having so much fun watching a real cloak at work that I can't be bothered. Now if Dave feels irked that it isn't quite what he intended and decides to make it match what he announced, that's all well and good. I'll be glad. But I'm not going to let this glitch annoy me right now. I'm one happy Gorn...... errr I mean Rom..... errrrr I mean player.

Now I've got to go master the art of engaging these dastardly improved Roms. (Yeah, yeah, little pointy-eared freak. Cloak and ditch my plasma. Let me get a little closer...... just a little closer....... <evil laughter> )

Thanks, Dave! Very nice work indeed.

======

3dot 14:

In SFB, there were advanced optional rules that let you use hidden cloak if you and your opponent wanted to experiment with it. It required a very honest opponent, or a moderator. As I recall (been years since I used hidden cloak):

1) The cloaked ship was removed from the board, and it's location was kept track of secretly
2) 4 times a turn the enemy could ask for range and bearing
3) The enemy could fire whenever it wanted, but damage was kept secret.
4) The cloaked ship recieved a MASSIVE boost in BPV.
5) Everybody except the Rom got very, very bored.

Yeah, I was usually the Rom. People (including me) have much more fun now that I use standard rules. That doesn't mean it wasn't fun for specific scenarios, it was, but for general use I find (IMHO) that standard rules are more fun for everyone. As with all opinions, your mileage may vary.

-S'Cipio

Lepton1 · « **Reply #10 on:** July 19, 2003, 10:32:55 pm »

No one is griping. We are merely making statement of facts and my own limited testing w/ regular photon torps seems to confirm his results. And I am just going to say it. Here goes. Prepare to flame me. Why didn't the beta testers catch this??? Seems logical to test something like this. If Tar et al. can do it in a couple of hours I assume or even a few hours, why not the beta testers?? Look I love this new patch, so don't get me wrong. I am very excited about it and it is truely fantastic that the support has continued so long for this game. Kudos and thanks to Dave and the beta testers, but this should have been easily caught either in the code during testing or in the announcement to characterize correctly how the cloak is working. That simple.

Cleaven · « **Reply #11 on:** July 19, 2003, 10:38:41 pm »

Quite right, I'm happy as it is, but I do like to know what the numbers are. If it's a mistake then that's cool (mistakes? in programming? never!) but it would be nice to know.

FireSoul · « **Reply #14 on:** July 20, 2003, 01:31:17 am »

Considering that the patch was released on Thursday, and this post was done at 7:30pm PST on a Friday night.. it's not surprising that nothing has happened yet.

I think the best thing to do is to wait for a bit through next week. If they want to fix it, they can... and it's all up to them.
-- Luc

Rod O'neal · « **Reply #15 on:** July 20, 2003, 08:33:01 am »

I'm a bit taken back by some of the negative comments directed at Tar here. All he did was find a bug and report it.

Toasty0 · « **Reply #16 on:** July 20, 2003, 08:58:37 am »

Nanner,

Always with the negative waves Moriarty! Always with the negative waves.

Woof Woof!!

Best,
Jerry

David Ferrell · « **Reply #17 on:** July 20, 2003, 11:14:31 am »

It is a little sad that this (apparently) happend, but it's not a
big deal. The cloak is still much better than before. In fact FireSoul had a
valid opinion that having this reduction along with the ECM bonus was
too much.

This (if true) was a mistake made by me. It is not the end of the world
or even the end of SFC. If someone is always a glass half-empty guy
about this, that is their problem.

Why no response till now? This was first posted Friday night, I still
haven't had a chance to check it yet and yesterday I spent a wonderful
day with my daughter at Comic Con in San Diego (thank you for asking).

Thanks,

Dave

David Ferrell · « **Reply #18 on:** July 20, 2003, 11:40:31 am »

I didn't see Jinxx. Comic Con is HUGE! Probably the biggest Con
I have ever been to (maybe World Con in the 1980's?). There were
probably tens of thousands of people there.

My daughter got pictures with Maurice LaMarche (voice of the Brain),
Rob Paulson (voice of Pinky) and John DiMaggio (voice of Bender). A
very cool day!

Thanks,

Dave

News:

Topic: New cloak not working as advertised (Read 18740 times) var addthis_config = {"data_track_clickback":true};

TarMinyatur

Tulmahk

Cleaven

SPQR Renegade001

NannerSlug

FireSoul

Lepton1

Lepton1

3dot14

Scipio_66

Lepton1

Cleaven

TarMinyatur

TarMinyatur

FireSoul

Rod O'neal

Toasty0

David Ferrell

David Ferrell

Strafer

Topic: New cloak not working as advertised (Read 18740 times)