Let's Talk: Terrain Height

Discussion in 'Planetary Annihilation General Discussion' started by brianpurkiss, April 15, 2014.

  1. Sorian

    Sorian Official PA

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    Here is an example system I use for AI testing.
    Note: the internals may (and probably will) change so this may not represent what goes into live.
    Also Note: I am using a mod to display the metal counts per planet.

    Main is an 800 radius moon with both sliders at 0.5.
    Smashy is a 200 radius moon with both sliders at 0.25.
    Resource is a 400 radius moon with both sliders at 0.35.

    smash_test.jpg
  2. stuart98

    stuart98 Post Master General

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    Why not get that mod implemented into the game since you find it so useful?
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  3. superouman

    superouman Post Master General

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    Seeing Uber devs using community mods warms my heart a lot.
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  4. aevs

    aevs Post Master General

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    Any chance this gets added back into the next build by default? It can be pretty important, and I don't see why it shouldn't be there.
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  5. Sorian

    Sorian Official PA

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    There is already a lot of work being done on a lot of the UI, so no point in me modifying it.
  6. cptconundrum

    cptconundrum Post Master General

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    I'm just happy that the devs are aware of the mods that are out there. We've seen them integrate mods or make their own versions a couple times already, so UI mods definitely do serve as a good way to suggest improvements.
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  7. Sorian

    Sorian Official PA

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    I came from a mod community. Of course I know what mods are out there :)
  8. aevs

    aevs Post Master General

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    Actually, looking at those figures, are you sure that's correct? For example, smashy has 16x less surface area than main, and is supposed to have half the metal density, but has just under half the number of metal spots.
    Shouldn't metal density be proportional to the planet's surface area (or equivalently, proportional to the square of the radius)? Shouldn't smashy have 32x fewer metal spots than main?
  9. Sorian

    Sorian Official PA

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    Perhaps. As I said, the numbers are still being messed with.
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  10. thetrophysystem

    thetrophysystem Post Master General

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    It shows their awareness of the game, and the work done player-side to engage into gameplay with the game.

    If players take the time to make content for the game, in order to make their own experience with it better, then the devs should consider it's value.

    In Sorian's case, he comes from a mod community, and honestly I bet he is a common mod user. It is good to have a least one dev who downloads PAMM and scrolls through it every build or so and grocery shops the mod list for legitimate improvement mods to use in-play. That is probably the best way to find things you would want to add to the vanilla game.

    Consider Economy Efficiency. That was a feature some of us took for granted, while others never used and didn't know how much better it was. When added to vanilla, vanilla players saw it for the first time. When they played using it, I bet they immediately saw how they played and benefited from seeing. Their personal conversation with themself: "Wow, that is how crippled my build speed is? My God, what am I doing to my gameplay? I need to aquire more resources and use less fabbers." Yes, yes, my God yes, less dedicated players having more of a clue in-game.

    Just playing a game pre-economy-efficiency with a casual newbie player, while you yourself are using economy efficiency, it is like they have no clue how bad things really are when they play. This being added to vanilla is the difference between playing blind and playing with your eyes open for the first time, and for the first time casual players play much better just off their casual play, they realize how bad their build speed is and actually fix it instead of trying to build with it being so cripple.

    Good job guys, good job good job.
  11. Sorian

    Sorian Official PA

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    Here is almost the same system after some more work to adjust metal spot distribution by planet size.
    Note: Again, the internals may (and probably will) change so this may not represent what goes into live. I am also (still) using a mod to display the metal counts per planet.

    Main is an 800 radius moon.
    Resource is a 450 radius moon.
    Smashy is a 200 radius moon.

    All metal cluster and density sliders are at 0.5.

    smash_test.jpg
  12. mered4

    mered4 Post Master General

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    Now THAT is a dynamic system. Neither player will go for the moon first unless they were winning the attrition war.....

    :D:D
  13. thetrophysystem

    thetrophysystem Post Master General

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    I would normally yell at anyone else that took a design thread and made it about balance.

    But call me a hypocrite, 129 spots on the main planet, 60 a player, each having a basic mex on them, generates 420 metal. Pot jokes aside, that is a lot of metal for a t1 economy, while acceptable just double that is 840 and a t2 economy generates more than that.

    My lord I can't wait to see the day those numbers are rectified. As far as the per-planet numbers go, much better.

    At least there isn't a dislike button for me ruining this for everyone. Just remember that it is immoral for you to go back to my previous posts and remove "likes" for another post made later, the posts aren't related and it isn't that post's fault, don't hurt the poor lil post lol.
    Last edited: April 16, 2014
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  14. tehtrekd

    tehtrekd Post Master General

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    That's looking awesome.
  15. Sorian

    Sorian Official PA

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    1) A two player game on an 800 radius planet is already nuts.
    2) The sliders work now, so all of that is modifiable. Setting both sliders to 0 on an 800 radius planet will give you (in my non-conclusive tests) about a couple dozen metal spots.
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  16. thetrophysystem

    thetrophysystem Post Master General

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    That will be reallly nice...

    Shouldn't the sliders set metal to 0? Or at least even lower than a dozen? What if we want that stuff to be so scare, it's harsh. We are talking, the allied mission in the black forest of Germany in Red Alert 2 kind of scare, or more scarce than that?
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  17. aevs

    aevs Post Master General

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    Much closer to surface area there, which I like ;)
    I just think making it proportional to surface area is the clearest way to define it.

    For those too lazy to do the math:

    129/(4*0.8^2*pi)= 16.0 metal spots per square kilometer
    43/(4*0.45^2*pi)= 16.9 metal spots per square kilometer
    12/(4*0.2^2*pi)= 23.9 metal spots per square kilometer

    so it seems metal density relative to surface area is higher for smaller planets still, but this time not by nearly as much.

    That's a size 800 planet there. Do you play 1v1 on size 800 planets? Because I certainly don't.
  18. Sorian

    Sorian Official PA

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    When I tried making it more linear it looked off/not fun. We haven't playtested it yet, so who knows where it will end up.
    aevs likes this.
  19. aevs

    aevs Post Master General

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    Alright; I guess it makes sense for a smaller main planet to have higher metal density than a larger main planet. The question then is, should the slider be set higher by default for small planets, or should the slider itself compensate for that?
    I feel like if the slider doesn't compensate for it, then you have a clear definition for metal density that you can display in the lobby, with a clear linear relationship to the actual metal density on a certain planet.

    (Also, I accidentally forgot to factor in 4, fixed the math in my post, but the relationship between the values are still the same :oops:)
  20. emraldis

    emraldis Post Master General

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    Pretty sure all the sliders are at 0.5 in that test, might want to check your math again...

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