Topic: Questions on small-ship draws

[K'Hexx]

I think the whole reason for the nebula rule was to preserve areas of the map for the smaller ships.  You allow the D5L in and all of a sudden you have a ship which is used on the front lines now in non-nebula hexes.  This totally defeats the purpose.

I vote no changes for ships allowed in nebulas, fix the ai draw.  If  you allow the D5s in, you  might as well get rid of about 90% of the shiplist.

I know its a shame that the EEK missions don't play friendly with the ED and TG mishions, but at least the PvP houses have the option to go to gamespy to have an AI free match, when grabbing territory in nebulas, no one has a gamespy option.

[Bonk]

I vote no changes for ships allowed in nebulas, fix the ai draw.

AI draw cannot reliably be fixed with server gf settings, it would require pulling the missions.

Though it is possible that modifying the MinFuzzAIBPV, MaxFuzzAIBPV, ChanceForTwoShips, ChanceForThreeShips in MetaMap.gf might have the desired effect, but a script can override these settings as far as I know and I suspect that they only apply to server AI, not mission AI.

If  you allow the D5s in, you  might as well get rid of about 90% of the shiplist.

I think that's a bit extreme.

I know its a shame that the EEK missions don't play friendly with the ED and TG mishions...

Since we cannot obtain the source for the EEK missions, but can for the ED and TG missions, theoreticaly we could recompile the ED and TG missions with an fWait parameter that is inline with EEK mission specs, so that they all have an equal chance to come up.

... but at least the PvP houses have the option to go to gamespy to have an AI free match, when grabbing territory in nebulas, no one has a gamespy option.

Good point.

[Slider]

Then as someone told me adapt and play on.

Ive flown Nebs both alone and with a team mate AI and won the matches., its hard but not imposible. Much easier with a wing.

Nebulas are just a small part of the map. Remove the Missions and the non nebula hexes suddenly become wide open to frigate attack flippers, which too changes the tone of the server.

Again I dont see why pull missions from the entire server for the sake of a few nebula hexes.

[762_XC]

If you let D5L's in, you might as well trash the concept. D5L has 90% of the firepower of anything else generally available.

I think the whole point of making it frigs only is that it's SUPPOSED to be hard.

[Julin Eurthyr]

As the concept of the nebulas are to force use of weaker and not-commonly used vessels, I'll go on record stating that if the nebula rules need to be adjusted and a larger ship needs to be added, I'd vote that the D6-series (only D6, D6B and D6K are on-server) be the only ship-grade added.  Considering that the "heaviest" D6 carries what, 3xPh-1, no wing phasers, and FA-only arc disruptors, I see the concept of the nebulas (nothing horrendously overpowering) being kept while allowing a heavier ship that can survive the draws in.

Meanwhile, I'll ask those who are much more familiar with the server kit's draw system and the current mission construction to check as to why this would be happening...

[Hexx]

After a staggering 2 missions flown (both EEK)

E4C+E4B with AI G2C +F5B helper drew D6,F5B,G2C
Result all three enemies destroyed, no friendly losses

E4c E4C E4B , no AI help Drew 1 (yes ONE) F5L ,
F5L destroyed, no friendly losses

I will try a few more tonight, but I'm not seeing the problem.

[FPF-DieHard]

After a staggering 2 missions flown (both EEK)

E4C+E4B with AI G2C +F5B helper drew D6,F5B,G2C
Result all three enemies destroyed, no friendly losses

E4c E4C E4B , no AI help Drew 1 (yes ONE) F5L ,
F5L destroyed, no friendly losses

I will try a few more tonight, but I'm not seeing the problem.

Anyone else shocked that Hexx beat the AI?

[FPF-Jem]

I ment to chime in a lot sooner but forgot 

Anyway, a redeeming feature of the EEK missions is that they don't increase the AI if you're flying more than one ship while the other missions do. Of course EEK missions with multiple ships on both sides also tend to always draw at least one cruiser AI even if your ship is a frigate so it kind of balances out.

Here's a possiblity, since we're already allowing 3 FF fleets why not allow 2 DD fleets so long as only one is a F6 or FWL?

[Hexx]

After a staggering 2 missions flown (both EEK)

E4C+E4B with AI G2C +F5B helper drew D6,F5B,G2C
Result all three enemies destroyed, no friendly losses

E4c E4C E4B , no AI help Drew 1 (yes ONE) F5L ,
F5L destroyed, no friendly losses

I will try a few more tonight, but I'm not seeing the problem.

Anyone else shocked that Hexx beat the AI?

Actually my Ai killed them.. I was making sure no one sneaked up behind us..

[Dfly]

I flew several mission in Nebulas earlier this server.  Never lost a ship.  Perhaps because I used the 3 ship rule it made all the difference.  When combining 3 small ships, you can do quite a bit of damage to the biggest you face just in the first pass, and still have all 3 ships.

If any ship is to be suggested to be allowed into the nebs as slightly larger ship, I would suggest then the F6 be allowed. 

btw, I did try some with FWL and did fine although it was very tough.

[Gook]

Try flying the small ship for several hours.

Now beating a FWL in a an E3/4 may be a stimulating exercise once, but having the equivilent every few games is just tedious. For example the last draw I had when flying my E4CR was a D5K, no I didn't win I wasn't in a neb and paper thin shields against a Crusier are pretty useless. You can't even sabre dance effectively because your Dizzies are range 10 or so and he has for type 3 dizzies range 30.

I am not sure what the answer is, but in or out of nebs there is a big penalty in time for small ship Captains, which there should not be. In a Cruiser you can probaly get away with say 4 missions without resupply in small ship you need to do it after every long tedious game,not just for supplies but for repairs.

I take my hat off to those who are able to fight cruisers in 5 minutes win and need no resupply in lowly E4s you are better players than I. But I and many others cannot reach those halcyon heights, and as the stated aim of this campaign is fun, it needs to be adressed with something other than barely concealed contempt as it doesn't fit in with one vocal section of the "community".

[Hexx]

Gook Please- I answer ALL questions people throw at me with barely concealed contempt.
I may have misunderstood your original point, I've sent you a PM.

[NuclearWessels]

...

I know its a shame that the EEK missions don't play friendly with the ED and TG mishions...

Since we cannot obtain the source for the EEK missions, but can for the ED and TG missions, theoreticaly we could recompile the ED and TG missions with an fWait parameter that is inline with EEK mission specs, so that they all have an equal chance to come up
...

<gathers up some very rusty brain cells>

Actually the fWait parameter isn't the key here (tried that way back when), the bigger difference is in the mission drafting specs used to determine if a mission is offered.

The EEK scripts specify to draft ships of any class and any BPV, then throw away any AI drafted and generate their own AI choices.

The older style scripts (Taldren/ED) specify a draft range closer to that of the ship doing the drafting and actually use that drafted AI in mission  (with a few tweaks and exceptions).

Both approaches have their advantages and disadvantages:

The EEK approach is wayyyy better for PvP, in that you can easily draft any human in the hex (friend or foe), regardless of size differences between the drafter and draftee.  The downside is that, since the AI gets replaced with script-selected AI instead of drafted AI, the server admin doesn't have much influence on scaling the opposition - you can pick Admiral/Commodore/Captain, but the secondary server difficulty modifier (e.g. 1.1or 1.15 or whatever) isn't accessible for use by the script.

The EEK approach also makes it way more likely a mission will be offered, since the game engine is just looking for any ship, rather than a restricted BPV/size class range.

I don't know about Tracey's missions, but the ED ones would need substantial rewriting/debugging to adapt to the other approach.  (But you're more than welcome to take a shot at it if you want !)

</scriptobabble>

I'm actually enjoying the mix for the current server, but can't climb into a frig too often outside a nebula.

dave

[Bonk]

No, No, No, you misunderstand me... of course the fWait has nothing to do with AI draws, it only affects the probability that a mission will actually come up as a choice. This is important because the fWait settings that the EEK scripts use make them dominate over other scripts on dynaverse servers. If the fWait parameters were equalised, the AI draws of EEK missions would not be so much as an issue as there would be a better mix of missions.

Nevertheless, your comments are informative and appreciated. 

[762_XC]

That was interesting info nonetheless.

[NuclearWessels]

No, No, No, you misunderstand me... of course the fWait has nothing to do with AI draws, it only affects the probability that a mission will actually come up as a choice. This is important because the fWait settings that the EEK scripts use make them dominate over other scripts on dynaverse servers. If the fWait parameters were equalised, the AI draws of EEK missions would not be so much as an issue as there would be a better mix of missions.

Nevertheless, your comments are informative and appreciated. 

Unfortunately it wasn't a misunderstanding - in earlier experimentation I modified the fWaits, but those were still outweighed by whether or not the game engine can find suitable matches, and the chances of it finding suitable matches (even manufactured ai) increase if you include no drafting restrictions (as per EEK).  If you put optimal fWait values in the ED scripts they'll still only come up a tiny fraction of the time versus the EEK scripts (been there, done that, the difference really was negligible so I put them back to "normal").

dave

[Bonk]

Oooohhhhh! That is very interesting, thank you for relating your experience. Very useful information.

[NuclearWessels]

Oooohhhhh! That is very interesting, thank you for relating your experience. Very useful information.

Actually - we need to brainstorm at some point.

I've been trying to think of ways to provide [albeit limited] sql support for a flatfile server - i.e. having the missions contact a sql server to get extra information (e.g. difficulty settings, current campaign date, etc).  But I'll pick your brain on that after KCW 

dave

[Gook]

This maybe of interest to Dave and Bonk. I have been playing with a 3 ship G2C fleet and E4B fleet and mixtures of the two over the last couple of days. All the mission matching was fine whether EEK, ED or TG in origin. The fleets would either pull 3 other small ships with the correct BPV variance or one big ship such as a D7L or the like. No missions were more than 30% + BPV (estimated) for the AI which is within expectations. None of the horrible mission mismatching with a single small hull. I don't know why but maybe Bonk or ED can use that info. TIA.

[Dfly]

I will second Gook's comments.  I flew several mission with 3 small frigs in nebula hexes, and a few missions in regular hexes.  I did not lose any of my ships in any of them and they were proportional to the AI I drew as to compared to when I flew my FWL.