Diminishing returns formula for shields

[SkyCore]

Shields truly trivialize the late game (and massive firepower as well... but thats another topic) so i suggest diminishing returns for shield generators. Such a change would give shield booster components a new lease on life (and perhaps reduce the full +turret layout norm that we have now). I have never needed more than 600k shields even on insane difficulty so that is the marker which the rest of the math of this post will try to aim to hit.

 

After fiddling around on an online graphics calculator https://www.desmos.com/calculator iv found a hyperbolic growth decaying equation which can be easily modified optimizing 2 factors: linear growth which is a fraction of added shield generators, and a limiting factor which when approached reduces the gains from additional shield generators.

 

(100000*x/(100000+x)) + x/13

 

This equation will gain 1 shield for each shield point a shield generator generates at low values; but as the shield points increase, the fraction of actual shields gained becomes less and less. !00k shields would be impossible if not for the small "x/13" linear growth factor which gives a minimum of 1/13th the shielding from a shield generator.

 

Of course these numbers are just a suggestion, they could be changed to make things easier or harder on the player, to provide more/less linear gains or more/less exponentially decaying gains. Simply by changing the 2 constants in the formula.

[Uthael]

People would still play the full +turret layout. With nerfed shields, they would just end up two-shotting everything. But they've said they'd change the Xsotan artefacts. Make them player-unique each too, I hope.

 

The idea sounds fine though. I'd suggest that this 100000 constant becomes related to the health of your ship. Either plain 100% or some other value.

 

And about that x/13... Connect it to the volume of the ship. Let's say x*V*10^(-8).

 

This would encourage small craft to be agile more than just stack some more shields for survivability.

And check my post here: https://www.avorion.net/forum/index.php/topic,3872.msg22611.html#msg22611

This would actually reward building a small, agile ship.

[Perq]

I was thinking about something similar. Been thinking about other aspects of the game, and one of the biggest issues I ran into was shields on bigger objects, namely stations. If universal formula like yours was applied to everything, stations would be VERY squishy in terms of shields, or they would have to have overly large number of shield generators (which means they would be expensive as all hell, and they would field massive amounts of materials - both are very bad for the game).

 

The solution is, of course, quite simply (in theory). Ship's volume (or health) needs to be factored in. The bigger your ship gets, the higher the asymptote gets, meaning it is easier to reach higher shield numbers with less shield generators.

 

Big cons to all this is that formula gets pretty complicated therefore balancing the curve shape might prove to be problematic.

It also isn't very easy to understand for new players, especially those who aren't that good with math.

A stat for shield effectiveness would be needed, as well as explanation how it works.

[SkyCore]

The idea sounds fine though. I'd suggest that this 100000 constant becomes related to the health of your ship. Either plain 100% or some other value.

 

And about that x/13... Connect it to the volume of the ship. Let's say x*V*10^(-8).

Connecting shields to volume or health wont solve the problem. You would still be able to build a big ship thats virtually unkillable, which is the fundamental issue.

 

By using proper constants, you would need a ridiculously huge ship to reach that unkillable status. This creates a challenge.

[Uthael]

The idea sounds fine though. I'd suggest that this 100000 constant becomes related to the health of your ship. Either plain 100% or some other value.

 

And about that x/13... Connect it to the volume of the ship. Let's say x*V*10^(-8).

Connecting shields to volume or health wont solve the problem. You would still be able to build a big ship thats virtually unkillable, which is the fundamental issue.

 

By using proper constants, you would need a ridiculously huge ship to reach that unkillable status. This creates a challenge.

Plain 100% makes for a health=shield to be close to optimal. Anything higher than that gets very expensive.

With that other constant you can choose which ships you want to be affected less by that cap, big or small ones. Or ou can just leave it neutral, as you suggested.

[SkyCore]

Plain 100% makes for a health=shield to be close to optimal.

 

That doesnt solve the issue with creating unkillable ships at all. Its easy to reach a 500k+ hull ship.

 

 

[Uthael]

Well, fine. Make it 5% instead. That good enough? I'm not insisting on 100%. And with the other half of the formula, make smaller ships not affected as much.

 

And even 150% would be better than what we have now.

 

With the formula you suggested, you're implying that everyone should have 40-100k shield, no matter their size.

500k hull is sluggish and deserves a bigger shield than that.

Tankem, from The Brotherhood is somewhere close to that. And that thing ain't really worth calling a dreadnought in terms of durability either.

 

Edit: But THIS is a bit too much:

Found it on the official beta server. Maybe it could be fine for an XL station or bigger. But NOT on ships.