thread: 2007-09-13 : Mechaton campaign: battle 5 setup
On 2007-09-24, Kilodyne wrote:
To NinJ:
You do have several valid points. It is *very* easy to fall into the death spiral trap, but with the proper aproach and some playtesting for balancing, it should not be too hard to avoid. Without hurting my head too much, I can think of 2 main ways to avoid that trap. 1) Create multiple resources in such a way that obtaining resource A makes obtaining resouce B much more difficult. 2) Create a singular resource with a cap on the returns of any investments of that resource.
In my opinion, with the victory points mechanic already in place, option 2 seems to be the way to go. The idea is that there are a limited number of victory points you can win in each battle, determined by the number of mechs and objectives fielded. if you have a maximum total of 50 points, for example, that you can win in a particular battle, and you spend 40 points in additional equipment, even if you play a perfect game, the maximum return on that 40 point investment is 10 points, however a player that spends only 10 points, doesnt necessarily win the battle but plays well may end up with a 20 point return on that investment. The underlying theory of this is that a resouce advantage should provide more options for winning, but also make that player more volunerable. I'm not saying balacing would be easy for such a mechanic, but in theory it should be quite workable.
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HAHA! Since you bring it up, perhaps even *more* importantly than the "build your guys" philosophy you mention, is the freedom to laugh maniacly while you rip apart your oponents prize model and not feel guilty about it afterwards since it only takes him a few minutes to rebuild later! Seriously though, you are correct about the philosophy of the game. I was only referring to the mechanics through which the game is played. Any additions to the Mechaton rules should maintain the same level of simplicity. That's the same reason 3 or 4 demension vector attacks were ixnay'd in the space battle, the level of complexity didnt match the the mechanics for the rest of the game.
I understand what you are saying about the strategic decisions, i really do. My problem is that all the strategic decisions are made in preparation for or during a single localized battle. I'm looking for a framework for enabling strategic decisions on a war level. Instead of "this battle is for S&C, if I cant win it I have to make sure that Vincent can't" im looking for a way to have decisions like "S&C is very important to me. I'm willing to give up a lot of influence in who wins the next J&E multiplier if i can have a better chance at winning the next S&C multiplier or at least ensure that Vincent cannot win the S&C multiplier". Does that make sense?
To Vincent:
HaHa! Great news for me! Thank you for sharing your vision. I have given some thought to named pilots as well especially ejection rules. Forcing the player to choose between abandoning the costly mech, its position, and potential remaining usefulness in battle vs saving the pilot, with comparitivly small recruitment costs but hard to obtain expirence, has merit, I think. My only thought for this was that a pilot can eject with 100% success on their go. If a mech is destroyed a pilot can auto-eject with a success rate that is inversly proportional to the damage done to that mech over the turn. Unfortunately, I havent thought of a good way to model a pilots learning curve yet. Thanks again for sharing your vision. I cant wait to see how the other campaign options develop.
