I thought all three options always did 25 points, but the cheap one had a random chance to cause an engine malfunction sometime after you got out to zee.
Combat is tricky but I think I am getting the hang of it, I did start with a legacy captain, chose a philosopher background for the mirrors and made sure that I bought a lot of guns for the Iron boost before setting out. So I mainly need to make sure that I don’t run into any rocks while going in reverse :) But I will say that those little things like bats, baby crabs and steam pinnaces are trickier than the big things and if I hadn’t used the legacy I think I would have been in big trouble starting a new game from scratch.
I must also admit to being a little disappointed at killing an Elder Crab and not getting anything for my trouble apart from a hunger reduction I didn’t need as I had just fed my crew. I wish that they at least gave a Hunting Trophy or had a guaranteed higher cache value.
Maybe the repairs costs have always done the same I can’t remember.
But yeah I just played another game. I had amazing mirrors, like 70 odd, 60 odd veils. I ran into a Pirate pinacle and got blown out of the water. You try to circle to keep them in your lights and just… yeah…
closes Sunless Sea I’ll come back later I can’t play this right now. It’s just not playable with this combat system. I just let three other people who own Sunless Sea all try it on my laptop and they all agree.
Some things I’m finding helpful as I get used to the new combat system:
Definitely invest in weapons. You need quality weapons equipped to both Deck and Forward to give you two shots at your enemy before you have to wait out the recharging timer, and an aft weapon doesn’t hurt for emergencies.
It took me a while to figure out that I could click on my enemy to start combat; I think that needs to be better signposted for new players, because it’s immensely better to start combat from a healthy distance rather than waiting until you’re in range of your enemy’s guns. Then close the distance just enough to start illuminating your opponent, throw your ship into reverse, and keep backing up as you wait to be able to fire. (And try not to run into any rocks in the process.)
Try not to get drawn into turning circles round a pirate ship trying to get it in your sights; for whatever reason, they’re MUCH more manueverable than even the smallest player ships, so that’s a game you can’t win. You want to engage from far enough off that they have to steam directly toward your forward guns as you back away. If you stumble right onto one, running away and using your aft weapon to cover your retreat is probably a better idea than playing tag with them at close quarters.
[quote=penknife]Some things I’m finding helpful as I get used to the new combat system:
Definitely invest in weapons. You need quality weapons equipped to both Deck and Forward to give you two shots at your enemy before you have to wait out the recharging timer, and an aft weapon doesn’t hurt for emergencies.
It took me a while to figure out that I could click on my enemy to start combat; I think that needs to be better signposted for new players, because it’s immensely better to start combat from a healthy distance rather than waiting until you’re in range of your enemy’s guns. Then close the distance just enough to start illuminating your opponent, throw your ship into reverse, and keep backing up as you wait to be able to fire. (And try not to run into any rocks in the process.)
Try not to get drawn into turning circles round a pirate ship trying to get it in your sights; for whatever reason, they’re MUCH more manueverable than even the smallest player ships, so that’s a game you can’t win. You want to engage from far enough off that they have to steam directly toward your forward guns as you back away. If you stumble right onto one, running away and using your aft weapon to cover your retreat is probably a better idea than playing tag with them at close quarters.[/quote]
[li]
At least in the beta branch of Steel you could just charge straight towards the enemy ships. At the last minute they would turn and run away, and either they didn’t have aft guns / that reset their firing solution timer by making them switch guns, so you could always take them out.
Oh my! It is possible to fight two enemies at once … sort of.
I was backing away from a Lorn Fluke and got into the firing range of an Unfinished Pirate. Took me a while to figure out that the second combat overrode the first and that I needed to click on the Lorn Fluke again to be able to attack it. Fortunately I managed to beat both of them :)
I think, if you want to not die during combat, you’d need to start out with both high mirrors and iron. I got them by saving the iron skill from a soldier character and starting out as a nat. philosopher. With careful maneuvering and photophobic tactics I managed to oneshot two pirate steamers. There’s something very fun about being able to sneak up to enemies. Granted, I’ve yet to try this against more powerful enemies. I likely will get eaten by a crab or lifeberg, or diefrom eventual terror accumulation. But hopefully by then I will have upgraded my weapons, ship, and skills.
Of course, if this specific background tactic is required to not die, then character creation gets needlessly restricted. I haven’t tried starting out with different stats, so I don’t know how difficult it is in comparison. It’s not too bad like that, is it?
.
edited by dismallyOriented on 10/11/2014
[quote=dismallyOriented]I think, if you want to not die during combat, you’d need to start out with both high mirrors and iron. I got them by saving the iron skill from a soldier character and starting out as a nat. philosopher. With careful maneuvering and photophobic tactics I managed to oneshot two pirate steamers. There’s something very fun about being able to sneak up to enemies. Granted, I’ve yet to try this against more powerful enemies. I likely will get eaten by a crab or lifeberg, or diefrom eventual terror accumulation. But hopefully by then I will have upgraded my weapons, ship, and skills.
Of course, if this specific background tactic is required to not die, then character creation gets needlessly restricted. I haven’t tried starting out with different stats, so I don’t know how difficult it is in comparison. It’s not too bad like that, is it?
.
edited by dismallyOriented on 10/11/2014[/quote]
[li]
It’s hard to tell but I think Mirrors and Veils are fairly interchangeable right now, so long as your total (mirrors+Veils) means you get the first shot. And it’s not too hard to get 1,500 echoes quickly for your first gun, especially if Godfall, Mangrove College, or Salt Lions are near London.
Having given it more thought, I think my real problem is with the conflict difficulty being absurdly skewed and making the early part of the game hellishly hard. Everyone here is giving good tips, and once I’ve got over my frustration I’ll put them into practice. But the point is that I should be able to download and start the game as a new player, no legacies, fresh from Fallen London, and have a chance in hell of surviving my first half-hour without having to min-max right out the gate. I expect to have to check forums for tips in mid- or late-game, that’s fine. But in the first battle?
I don’t think this is a problem with the model itself. I do think there need to be many more easy enemies, evasive options in battle, and ways to avoid the harder monsters until you’re in a better ship. Sunless Sea is unforgiving, certainly. But there’s a difference between unforgiving and relentlessly demoralising.
I would like to try the new system when it’s better balanced.
Oof. I started my old save and goddamn, my ship is slow. I suicided into an enemy just so I could start again in the smaller ship. I dread getting a bigger ship now.
Do I really have to be facing the enemy to light them up? This doesn’t seem… useful. EDIT: Okay, I see the arc now, but it’s still really hard to keep things inside that arc with this little mobility.
I feel REALLY immobile now, even moreso than when it was just turn-based. I can’t see myself actually choosing to fight anything right now… but I’m sure there’s things out there faster than me that won’t give me a choice, which will be a problem since I am inclined to stay in the smallest ship possible so I can actually move.
Oh my god, how am I losing this much hull to freaking bats?
I can shoot before the meter is filled? That’s not clear at ALL, I just did it by accident.
Well, that was frustrating and not fun at all.
Nope, I killed one flock of bats and was down a third of my hull. Game turned off, not really interested in playing more until the combat is… workable.
I’d love to see the new story stuff, but there is no way I can even get to it as it stands.
edited by MidnightVoyager on 10/11/2014
Okay, now for science. Decided to try naval combat between ships. Maybe it was just the bats?
Nope, died to a small pirate ship.
Attempt 3, old save: This ship is slower than molasses, and it’s just the Caligo class merchant cruiser. Saw nothing on the way back from the Uttershroom, which is quite far off. Saw something on my way to Venderbight from London after I bought another gun with my old game money. Managed to kill a ship finally! Would be nice if ports other than London did repairs.
Killed another ship. Combat feels really counterintuitive. Really awkward and heavy, and I didn’t seem to have a chance as a newbie. I see there’s lighter ships I may like the handling of better, but my already-upgraded ship seems to have no sale value? At least an engine upgrade seems to have helped my speed. Maybe just being on a newbie character was the problem. Big difficulty wall right out of the gate.
I feel like maybe the cargo hold upgrade should be auxillary-slotted. It would be foolish of me not to equip guns in the aft since they can be equipped there now, and it makes logical sense that a heavy merchant vessel would have aft guns and an upgraded hold both. The options for auxillary are limited as it is, too.
Making money is a bit of a problem, too.
edited by MidnightVoyager on 10/11/2014
There’s a bug where you can "trick" your guns into firing at targets outside their arcs, but it’s fiddly. If you’ve fired a shot at one monster but it hasn’t landed yet, and a second monster engages you & comes into range while the shot is airborne, it’ll hit the 2nd monster instead, even if the 2nd monster isn’t within the weapon’s firing arc.[li]
There’s also a bug where sometimes dead monsters (bloody corpses) aren’t traversable/lootable and just turn into bloody rocks you can’t sail through or gather from.[/li][li]
[/li][li]They’ve fixed the problem with ships turning to run away at the last moment if you charge them; now they’ll sail just past you which is infinitely more difficult.[/li][li]
edited by Dr. Hieronymous Alloy on 10/12/2014
my experience after playing around with steel a little:
forward guns allow you to fire a first shot when the enemy is still far away and hasnt noticed you - most of the time you can easily fire your deck gun as well before the enemy has you targeted if you strafe past the enemy, assuming the opposing ship is facing towards you, and keep the in the bigger cone, at least in my experience
the long range of the forward guns also makes it somewhat hard to run away from ships once they are close (looking at you faustian corsairs)
mostly it is fairly easy to avoid combat though though
most beasts seem pretty harmless - just go backwards while keeping them in the cone (sometimes they charge but even then they dont always hit, might be because I got out of the trajectory, not sure)
a little more mobility for the ships would be nice, as maneuvering mostly led to me taking damage when i tried it, hence the first strike tactic
damage is rather high – might be better to do and receive less damage - that would certainly allow you to experiment more and maybe actually flee if the battle isnt going your way
I couldnt really see a difference between guns or harpoons (no flanse attack? or whatever it is called -.-) havent tried torpedos yet
All in all I like the feel more (reminds me of pirates a little) but it could use some more tweaking
also finding new islands but not being able to do anything there is a little frustrating - but that is obviously to be expected in beta (those silky crawlies made me itchy all over - disconcerting to say the least)
yeah one last complaint … map shuffling is fun and all but getting an admirals report from a location that is very remote can be a harsh blow for a new captain - should maybe only choose closer locations at the start (still looking for that damn chapel of light in my current game … i think its in the upper right corner of my map … not fun)
I like however that a few trading routes are now actually lucrative
edited by Horrigan on 10/12/2014
edited by Horrigan on 10/12/2014
To quote myself from the Steam forums (regarding the recent combat overhaul):
[quote=Demut]Definitely worse.
One of the many reasons why I enjoy this game is the lack of “mechanical skill” needed to be good at it. Previously, solely my wits were relied upon to be successful. Careful planning and smart choices dictated whether or not I found my way back to the docks of London or got forever lost on the zee.
Now this has changed somewhat. These real-time battles require me to struggle with the WASD controls, always keeping the enemy in my sights and remembering to fire my weapons once they’re ready. This introduction of “mechanical skill” over strategical thinking does not fit the rest of the game and, at least in my opinion, distracts from what makes Sunless Sea great. As others have pointed out, it also removes certain lore-aspects of combat (cf. introductory page about the enemy, the Observe ability etc.) that added to the atmosphere of the game. Right now the world of SS lots a bit of its charm and became somewhat more bland because of this update.
As things stand I would much prefer a return to the previous system. If, however, FBG are for some reason firmly resolved to stick with this arcade-y replacement then I would ask for the option to use either system as I chose (assuming that is not too much of a bother).
tl;dr: Please change it back or give us the option to go with the system we like best.[/quote]
[quote=Demut]To quote myself from the Steam forums (regarding the recent combat overhaul):
[quote=Demut]Definitely worse.
One of the many reasons why I enjoy this game is the lack of “mechanical skill” needed to be good at it. Previously, solely my wits were relied upon to be successful. Careful planning and smart choices dictated whether or not I found my way back to the docks of London or got forever lost on the zee.
Now this has changed somewhat. These real-time battles require me to struggle with the WASD controls, always keeping the enemy in my sights and remembering to fire my weapons once they’re ready. This introduction of “mechanical skill” over strategical thinking does not fit the rest of the game and, at least in my opinion, distracts from what makes Sunless Sea great. As others have pointed out, it also removes certain lore-aspects of combat (cf. introductory page about the enemy, the Observe ability etc.) that added to the atmosphere of the game. Right now the world of SS lots a bit of its charm and became somewhat more bland because of this update.
As things stand I would much prefer a return to the previous system. If, however, FBG are for some reason firmly resolved to stick with this arcade-y replacement then I would ask for the option to use either system as I chose (assuming that is not too much of a bother).
tl;dr: Please change it back or give us the option to go with the system we like best.[/quote][/quote]
I don’t understand. I thought you just recently obtained a copy of this game. However. There is a pause button. Use it
I did and I do. That doesn’t really help.
And yes, I only recently obtained a copy of this game but prior to that I watched hours upon hours of Let’s Plays to make the wait until I got my hands on it more bearable.
I don’t like the new combat system either, I played this game for the strategy and for the story. Having real time battles like this make it really awkward for me and I haven’t played in a long time because of it. I wish they had kept something like old combat system instead.
Given that the game is still very much in development I think it’s possible that FBG will return to the initial system provided we petition for it numerously enough.
I’m honestly surprised the new system has that much opposition. I think it adds a great deal to immersion; there’s a feeling of actual sea battle that the game didn’t really have before.
Would the people complaining about the new system feel better if the game changed to 1/2 timescale in combat? I.e., everything just took twice as long? I mean, right now everything’s on the same timers it was before . . .
I mean, this is still nothing remotely like a twitch game; there really aren’t any "mechanical skill" elements, unless you count "putting your engines in reverse." There are some elements like Observations that we haven’t seen implemented yet but that’s because we saw like six month’s worth of development of the old system and we’ve seen like one month’s work on the new system. Have patience and give 'em a little time.
That said, if they wanted to take some of the old code and turn it into a "boarding" or "whaling" mini-game that triggered on ramming and operated like the old game, that would add some depth to the sea-monster battles and give different combat options for those that wanted them.
edited by Dr. Hieronymous Alloy on 10/12/2014
edited by Dr. Hieronymous Alloy on 10/12/2014
[quote=Dr. Hieronymous Alloy]I’m honestly surprised the new system has that much opposition. I think it adds a great deal to immersion; there’s a feeling of actual sea battle that the game didn’t really have before.
Would the people complaining about the new system feel better if the game changed to 1/2 timescale in combat? I.e., everything just took twice as long? I mean, right now everything’s on the same timers it was before . . .
I mean, this is still nothing remotely like a twitch game; there really aren’t any "mechanical skill" elements, unless you count "putting your engines in reverse." There are some elements like Observations that we haven’t seen implemented yet but that’s because we saw like six month’s worth of development of the old system and we’ve seen like one month’s work on the new system. Have patience and give 'em a little time.
That said, if they wanted to take some of the old code and turn it into a "boarding" or "whaling" mini-game that triggered on ramming and operated like the old game, that would add some depth to the sea-monster battles and give different combat options for those that wanted them.
edited by Dr. Hieronymous Alloy on 10/12/2014
edited by Dr. Hieronymous Alloy on 10/12/2014[/quote]
The problem is that some people were happy with combat that was ignorable because they didn’t play for the combat. I lost 1/3 of my hull to bats and then died to the first ship I saw when I wasn’t using an established character. I couldn’t get away from the damn things, and they sat behind me and just kited around so I couldn’t get away. I can’t ignore that to get to the story and exploration I am actually interested in, especially when I HAVE to fight to get some things for said story. And especially when some of the new features (weight slowing me down) made travel and exploration kinda insufferable.
With an established character that has money already, I can sortof overcome some of that, though I seem to constantly hemorrhage money. With a new character, I can’t make money period, which means I can’t overcome any of the problems I had with combat. I suppose it could be poor balance, but I feel like the slowest thing in the entire zee. Everything always seems faster than me. Evasion is not an option, because everything can run me down. I need repairs constantly, and I’m not making money as it IS with just supplies and fuel expenses. The expense of repairs is on top of the no money I am making in the first place.
Also, saying "well, I’m good at it, that means it’s easy!" isn’t… particularly helpful? I don’t know why you think slowing it down would help. I’m nearly dead in one shot with a new character. Just being nearly dead SLOWER, wouldn’t help me out. If anything, as I said, I just feel like I am super slow and everything else is faster. There is no way to even try to dodge. And even when I supply up with my previous character, I sigh in irritation every time I see an enemy because it means loss of progress and extra burning of fuel that I don’t want to deal with. Every. Time. Every time I fight, I lose progress and supplies, and I can’t run. And then I have to go back to where it died to pick up whatever it dropped.
I am not finding it enjoyable. I am finding it considerably more tedious than a back and forth I could queue up and not pay much attention to.
I did have one trip where I saw no enemies, and that wasn’t any better, because I was going SO SLOW. It was like the time I lost half my crew in a mutiny and barely limped into port, but it wasn’t exciting. I was fine and good on supplies and fuel, I just felt like "COME ON, LET ME GET BACK TO LONDON ALREADY."
I can’t comment on any of the new content because I haven’t been able to get to it before I just stop playing because it has ceased to be fun.
EDIT: Jesus, I wrote a lot, SORRY. I was trying to adequately answer your question, ehe. I think you just misunderstood what the problem was that I was having, in my experience.
edited by MidnightVoyager on 10/12/2014