Too Random.

General discussion about the game.
GoldenShadowGS
Posts: 122
Joined: Thu Sep 13, 2012 6:38 am

Re: Too Random.

Postby GoldenShadowGS » Sun Sep 23, 2012 10:25 pm

Incendax wrote:Just intentionally tried to beat the boss 4 times using only Drones/Teleport and it didn't work. All attempts were begun after boss offensive was neutered. First Try was 4 in the shield room and 4 in the cloak room. Med Bay Cycling meant no actual damage was done to either system. The ship cloaks after the second teleport and the boarding party started dying. Numbers got too low and it became unwinnable.

Second try split the team up around the shields and the med bay to stall long enough to bring the shields down. Cloak goes up, shields return, and boarding party started dying.

Third try split up into four squads in small rooms, breaking everything they could. This caused actual damage because Med Bay Cycling was spread too thin, but cloak happened and boarding party started dying.

Fourth try set the team on the cloak, and more outside the room on the way to the med bay to stall. Enemies walk past stalling boarders to stop damage to the cloak. Cloak happens, boarding party started dying.


You really need a teleporting bomb weapon to disable that medbay. You will never make a dent in those guys otherwise. The trick is to fight them until they get low and run to the medbay, then send a bomb over to kill them and damage the room. Teleport your guys back to heal if you don't have a healing burst, then repeat.
Lurkily
Posts: 15
Joined: Fri Sep 21, 2012 4:14 am

Re: Too Random.

Postby Lurkily » Mon Sep 24, 2012 12:58 am

Keep in mind, a lot of people play this game, and it's based on several factors of randomness.

It's not necessarily weird that he could do 20 play throughs, and not find a weapon shop. With the number of people that play this game, it would be weird if there were players who did NOT have this experience.

Moving on, this randomness is intentional. There is a lot of harsh experience built into this game. Like many of the roguelikes, FTL is intended to troll you. It's hard, and can be frustrating, and due to random chance can be really, really frustrating, but ultimately, can be extremely rewarding . . . sometimes . . .

I believe this randomness, which can result in some frustration, is not a flaw, but a design feature. Whether it's a good one, or a successful one, isn't for me to judge.
CaptainQuirk
Posts: 52
Joined: Sun Jul 15, 2012 4:42 am

Re: Too Random.

Postby CaptainQuirk » Mon Sep 24, 2012 2:32 am

Personally I am loving the randomness in this game. I've unlocked everything except the secret ship and now I'm just doing achievement and high score runs and I'm still addicted. Obviously there are times when you're going to have a bad run and I recall one run where I was trying to unlock Layout B for the Kestrel where I got to The Last Stand with only the base weapons.

However I have to point out that it's a roguelike. If you've never played one before the randomness is pretty harsh, but go and play ADOM (where you can encounter a Vortex in your first cave and be dead instantly) or Spelunky or DoomRL and you'll soon see that FTL isn't so bad comparatively.
Humour, reviews and rants courtesy of The Robot Overlords all at Robots Building Robots!
nfiea2
Posts: 43
Joined: Sat Sep 22, 2012 4:23 pm

Re: Too Random.

Postby nfiea2 » Mon Sep 24, 2012 3:12 am

CaptainQuirk wrote:Personally I am loving the randomness in this game. I've unlocked everything except the secret ship and now I'm just doing achievement and high score runs and I'm still addicted. Obviously there are times when you're going to have a bad run and I recall one run where I was trying to unlock Layout B for the Kestrel where I got to The Last Stand with only the base weapons.

However I have to point out that it's a roguelike. If you've never played one before the randomness is pretty harsh, but go and play ADOM (where you can encounter a Vortex in your first cave and be dead instantly) or Spelunky or DoomRL and you'll soon see that FTL isn't so bad comparatively.

I'd have to pint out that all you idiots say while the devs aren't inside you is that the flaws are features

flaws are features

it is a feature

they did that on purpose

are the sectors that don't let you get to the exit a feature?

does that random chance add to the rougelike elements

grow up
it isn't rougelike

they made a game that one plays through in 2 hours and they got mad about how long it took them to write and how it burns hardware so they played with code that controls the outcomes and make it fuck the player over and over in the face

I guess that is rouglike

random face fuckings to stretch out the lenth of a 2 hour game

they should have made this game in flash; that is the skill level and dedication they have
CaptainQuirk
Posts: 52
Joined: Sun Jul 15, 2012 4:42 am

Re: Too Random.

Postby CaptainQuirk » Mon Sep 24, 2012 3:42 am

nfiea2 wrote:
CaptainQuirk wrote:Personally I am loving the randomness in this game. I've unlocked everything except the secret ship and now I'm just doing achievement and high score runs and I'm still addicted. Obviously there are times when you're going to have a bad run and I recall one run where I was trying to unlock Layout B for the Kestrel where I got to The Last Stand with only the base weapons.

However I have to point out that it's a roguelike. If you've never played one before the randomness is pretty harsh, but go and play ADOM (where you can encounter a Vortex in your first cave and be dead instantly) or Spelunky or DoomRL and you'll soon see that FTL isn't so bad comparatively.

I'd have to pint out that all you idiots say while the devs aren't inside you is that the flaws are features

flaws are features

it is a feature

they did that on purpose

are the sectors that don't let you get to the exit a feature?

does that random chance add to the rougelike elements

grow up
it isn't rougelike

they made a game that one plays through in 2 hours and they got mad about how long it took them to write and how it burns hardware so they played with code that controls the outcomes and make it fuck the player over and over in the face

I guess that is rouglike

random face fuckings to stretch out the lenth of a 2 hour game

they should have made this game in flash; that is the skill level and dedication they have


Wow... that was... barely coherent.

It's just a game dude. If you don't like it what are you doing here? I also love being insulted because my opinion is different than yours. Really makes my day.

Obviously you've never played a roguelike if you really think that FTL is unfair.
Humour, reviews and rants courtesy of The Robot Overlords all at Robots Building Robots!
GoldenShadowGS
Posts: 122
Joined: Thu Sep 13, 2012 6:38 am

Re: Too Random.

Postby GoldenShadowGS » Mon Sep 24, 2012 4:03 am

The main problem with the randomness is the lack of direction. Its cool to have a randomly generated sectors, but when you have no idea what is going to be waiting for you at your next jump, that is kind of a problem. There is no purpose to planning a route through a sector if you don't have any information.
We should be able to plan a route depending on our current objectives. There is really no difference between what types of sectors you want to go through either besides giving you unique quests.
Green civilian sectors should have most of the beacons "revealed" maybe a few unrevealed ones to add flavor. Going through those unrevealed beacons is optional and could help or hinder your main quest.
The Nebula sectors should be totally unrevealed since most of them are uncharted. It would make them riskier, because you can't really plan a good route to get through there, but you may get lucky.
Hostile sectors would be similar to civilian sector, with lots of charted beacons, but most of those on the main path are being guarded by patrols, you'd stand a better chance of slipping past if you choose to go through the uncharted beacons.
Icehawk78
Posts: 230
Joined: Tue Sep 18, 2012 4:55 pm

Re: Too Random.

Postby Icehawk78 » Mon Sep 24, 2012 4:26 am

CaptainQuirk wrote:Wow... that was... barely coherent.

It's just a game dude. If you don't like it what are you doing here? I also love being insulted because my opinion is different than yours. Really makes my day.

Obviously you've never played a roguelike if you really think that FTL is unfair.

If you click on his name, you can select "add Foe" which will automatically hide the troll's posts until Monday when he gets banned for a second time.
Misery
Posts: 12
Joined: Sun Sep 23, 2012 7:53 am

Re: Too Random.

Postby Misery » Mon Sep 24, 2012 4:47 am

nfiea2 wrote:I'd have to pint out that all you idiots say while the devs aren't inside you is that the flaws are features

flaws are features

it is a feature

they did that on purpose

are the sectors that don't let you get to the exit a feature?

does that random chance add to the rougelike elements

grow up
it isn't rougelike

they made a game that one plays through in 2 hours and they got mad about how long it took them to write and how it burns hardware so they played with code that controls the outcomes and make it fuck the player over and over in the face

I guess that is rouglike

random face fuckings to stretch out the lenth of a 2 hour game

they should have made this game in flash; that is the skill level and dedication they have



Or you dont know what you're doing and havent enough experience.


I've played enough roguelikes, and similar games, to know that this is how it usually goes. BUT, a well designed roguelike (or any well-designed game that has heavy randomization) is usually designed in such a way that if you think hard, strategize, use good planning and tactics, and have the skill, you can use what you ARE given to overcome the challenges ANYWAY.

And really, I think this one allows for that. I'm playing pretty much exclusively on Normal, and pretty much every run I have, I will at LEAST reach sector 7. Havent beaten the boss yet, but I probably will fairly soon. Even when the RNG is being an absolute snot, I can usually find SOME way to persist regardless. So, the game's randomness is NOT just outright killing me. And that's not a fluke..... this is how it goes for me consistently, regardless of ship choice. On Normal. If you're having alot of trouble..... learn more, and get better.

All that being said..... I do think the stores could use some tweaks. I've little trouble FINDING the stores now that I have developed decent exploration tactics for scouting a given sector properly, but it's much too often that I'll run into the one particularly useless store, the one that sells sub-systems, like the cloak and such. I'm almost NEVER in a situation as to where buying one of these is even remotely a good idea. But this store seems to appear REALLY FREAKING OFTEN.

It's not THAT big of an issue, but it's still annoying.
Drasha
Posts: 85
Joined: Fri Sep 21, 2012 7:08 am

Re: Too Random.

Postby Drasha » Mon Sep 24, 2012 5:08 am

Misery wrote:Or you dont know what you're doing and havent enough experience.

I've played enough roguelikes, and similar games, to know that this is how it usually goes. BUT, a well designed roguelike (or any well-designed game that has heavy randomization) is usually designed in such a way that if you think hard, strategize, use good planning and tactics, and have the skill, you can use what you ARE given to overcome the challenges ANYWAY.

And really, I think this one allows for that. I'm playing pretty much exclusively on Normal, and pretty much every run I have, I will at LEAST reach sector 7. Havent beaten the boss yet, but I probably will fairly soon. Even when the RNG is being an absolute snot, I can usually find SOME way to persist regardless. So, the game's randomness is NOT just outright killing me. And that's not a fluke..... this is how it goes for me consistently, regardless of ship choice. On Normal. If you're having alot of trouble..... learn more, and get better.

All that being said..... I do think the stores could use some tweaks. I've little trouble FINDING the stores now that I have developed decent exploration tactics for scouting a given sector properly, but it's much too often that I'll run into the one particularly useless store, the one that sells sub-systems, like the cloak and such. I'm almost NEVER in a situation as to where buying one of these is even remotely a good idea. But this store seems to appear REALLY FREAKING OFTEN.

It's not THAT big of an issue, but it's still annoying.

It feels like subsystems have a higher chance of spawning then other types of shops. I normally buy out all the subsystems just so I won't have the appear in shops. There are also situations where a transporter or a drone (hull repair if you can find one) are useful.
send me a message with a link if you see spam and I will take care of it.
CaptainQuirk
Posts: 52
Joined: Sun Jul 15, 2012 4:42 am

Re: Too Random.

Postby CaptainQuirk » Mon Sep 24, 2012 5:32 am

Icehawk78 wrote:If you click on his name, you can select "add Foe" which will automatically hide the troll's posts until Monday when he gets banned for a second time.


Cheers for that.

Drasha wrote:It feels like subsystems have a higher chance of spawning then other types of shops.


I definitely agree with this. Often I'm looking for weapons or augmentations and I'll run into three or four stores in a row that sell systems and crew or useless weapons. However that being said I can usually make do, it's only when you get to the last sector that it becomes a problem if you don't have the right weapons to take on the Flagship. Normally I will know if I am going to be good enough by about sector 6ish.
Humour, reviews and rants courtesy of The Robot Overlords all at Robots Building Robots!