AI War - Combat Styles
From ArcenWiki
What Can I Do If The Game Seems Too Slowly Paced?
Q: The run speed of the game is fine, it's not like there is lag or anything, but all the ships move so slowly and the battles take so long to resolve. My machine isn't good enough to just up the simulation speed, and even if I did then that would also speed up how often the game autosaves and the AI sends waves and stuff. Is there anything else I can do?
A: There sure is! Take a look at the Combat Style in the lobby. There is also a little button to the bottom-right of the minimap during the game which lets you toggle this. The Normal combat style is much slower-paced, pretty much matching most other contemporary RTS games. Players that like to micromanage their units, or who are new to the game, or who just like to take a lot of time to mull strategy and tactics, will prefer this mode.
However, for more advanced players or those who like a faster-paced game in general, the Fast & Dangerous combat style is the way to go. This mode does not cause any extra load on the CPU, so it does not affect system requirements like upping the simulation speed does, and it also does not affect the speed of the game clock, so things like resource income, build times, enemy wave frequency, and autosave frequency are all unaffected by the change. What IS changed is the speed of combat -- ships do twice as much damage, move twice as fast, and reload twice as fast. In-house, this is our preferred mode.
A note about the in-game toggle: that can only be toggled once per game (you have to save and then reload if you want to toggle it again). We put this button in the game so that people could start slow (or fast), and and then switch the mode if they later decide they need/want to. We do not intend for players to be switching this mode on and off multiple times throughout the game in order to speed the game up when attacking and then slow it down when being attacked. Because only the combat simulation is sped up, this would unbalance the game, which is why we made it more difficult to abuse it in this way. We hope you'll pick one mode or the other, then pretty much stick with that mode.
If you want to temporarily "fast forward" the game, feel free to use the simulation speed adjustments (+/- on the keyboard). Those do increase CPU load while the game is running faster, but it runs the entire simulation at a faster speed instead of just the combat elements, so it doesn't cause any balance issues.
Is "Fast And Dangerous" Mode Unbalancing?
A: Yes, definitely so -- or rather, the Normal and F&D modes have two different kinds of balance. There are unique benefits to each one, and unique drawbacks, and the two are NOT equivalent in the sense that F&D is not just a sped-up version of Normal. This is why you have to save and load before switching the mode back and forth, to prevent abuse.
Advantages of Fast & Dangerous over Normal:
- 1. Ships move 2x as fast, which makes it much easier for you to bring in reinforcements from adjacent planets or across a planet. This gives you effectively twice as much time to respond to any incoming wave warning.
- 2. Ships move 2x as fast, so this makes it much easier to quickly attack and approach an ion cannon or other hot target in an AI planet.
- 3. Ships reload 2x as fast and do 2x as much damage, which totals 4x as much damage in a given period of time. This makes it much quicker to take down hostile ion cannons and such.
- 4. AI reinforcements and waves do not come any more frequently, so this gives you more time between each wave in order to do other actions, and it also means their planets might be less defended if you manage to hit them early.
Disadvantages of Fast & Dangerous over Normal:
- 1. Same as #1 above, except in reverse. It's also easier for the AI to reinforce itself, and special forces ships move faster and so hit you earlier and flood their planets more easily.
- 2. Same as #2 above, except in reverse. AI players are able to hit your important structures much more quickly (especially bad with Captive Human Settlements, but also bad with harvesters, expensive constructors, missiles, and command stations).
- 3. Same as #3 above, except in reverse. If the AI catches you unawares, or unprotected, they can chew through your planets amazingly quickly. If you don't keep aware of things, they can really damage you before you notice.
- 4. Same as #4 above, except in reverse. Your ships also don't build any faster. So when the AI catches you unprepared, you have much less time in which to build replacement defenses. This can let the AI sweep through your planets with impunity if you are not careful, since once they get going it is hard to stop them if you don't already have the defenses you need.
