[Request] Reset cloak cooldown and refill O2 on safe jumps

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boran_blok
Posts: 15
Joined: Thu Sep 20, 2012 1:35 pm

Re: [Request] Reset cloak cooldown and refill O2 on safe jum

Postby boran_blok » Wed Oct 10, 2012 11:46 am

I still think it is silly to have a minute waiting period after every fight you used a cloak.

And the teleporter has insta cooldown when the coast is clear. there is no countdown then.
mqstout
Posts: 71
Joined: Mon Sep 17, 2012 5:48 pm

Re: [Request] Reset cloak cooldown and refill O2 on safe jum

Postby mqstout » Wed Oct 10, 2012 1:27 pm

I'm with the OP -- a "the coast is clear, speed up recharges" button would be nice to use before jumps. It'd, of course, check to make sure there are no dangers (asteroids, fires, depowered oxygen, intruders, etc) and that all your systems are repaired to full before being usable. Pressing it would fill up your O2, heal your crew and recharge your cloak. Basically -- everything that we all do before every jump anyway, but without wasting a few minutes (per jump after battle!) for it to fill up.

It's all about time conveniences, and not at all about difficulty. There's zero challenge in "I just have to wait a while before I click jump".
Icehawk78
Posts: 230
Joined: Tue Sep 18, 2012 4:55 pm

Re: [Request] Reset cloak cooldown and refill O2 on safe jum

Postby Icehawk78 » Wed Oct 10, 2012 5:41 pm

UltraMantis wrote:I understand it but i don't like that. It would remove a big challenge from gamplay, esp. if you use the cloak an awfull lot.

How so? You do realize that once you're "safe" (which is the only time anyone is talking about implementing the "speed up"), you can sit at a beacon indefinitely until your O2 is back to 100%, your Cloak is available, and your Teleporter is available? There is no repercussion to doing so (ie the fleet doesn't advance any further/faster by doing so - it's a static advance that happens once per jump that you make), so the optimal play is to always ensure that everything has fully refilled before jumping to the next beacon.

When I'm playing the Stealth Ship, I literally never advance to the next node until my cloak is available unless I'm in an asteroid field or near a sun (which I practically never am due to the Long-Range Scanners, as well). I fail to see what "challenge" this request would remove, other than the "challenge" of "impatience".

UltraMantis wrote:The only reason the teleporter resets automatically is because your crew can be stuck on a burning ship that can blow up if it takes more damage from fires. If the enemy surrenders or you eliminate them, you may lose your boarders. The game engine is kind enough to give you a chance to recover your crew in such situations, but it doesn't give you an advantage because your teleporter still needs to recycle once you beam your people back.

Actually, this does give you quite a significant advantage, in that you can warp over your crew to finish off the enemy crew and still be able to warp them back, even if rooms without hull damage (yet) are on fire. This is actually one situation in which I'd say that the "automatic speedup" would be an unfair benefit to the player (ie when the enemy ship is on fire/venting oxygen) since it's possible to still lose your crew to environmental hazards before your teleporter recharges.

UltraMantis wrote:Starting every fight with cloak and teleporter ready and with 100% oxygen would be too much of an advantage. Do it yourself when you have some peace.

Nobody is talking about being able to reset when there's any form of danger - they just want it to work essentially the same way it does with your FTL drive - ie if the end of the battle is deemed safe enough to auto-charge your FTL, then the same should happen for your O2, Teleporter and Cloak timers, since those are all things which otherwise optimally rewards you for not playing the game (and instead just sitting there staring at the screen).
Hyomoto
Posts: 3
Joined: Sun Sep 23, 2012 7:17 am

Re: [Request] Reset cloak cooldown and refill O2 on safe jum

Postby Hyomoto » Fri Oct 12, 2012 3:27 am

Some of you may be missing his point, I apologize if this is not the case. He doesn't want a hand out, he just doesn't want to pointlessly wait around after a battle just for his oxygen and cloak to recharge. I can agree that it is a bit of a waste of time; waiting to play versus playing; but I must disagree that it is important for two reasons.

One, if you did do this it might affect other situations such as perhaps a room has no oxygen and for whatever reason you cannot repair it. You could simply jump and voila! You could make it only work when your ship is in perfect condition but now its just conditional.

Secondly, if you refill oxygen and the cloak meter, why not just fix hull breaches, heal your crew and put out any fires on safe jumps as well? These are all things you will do once the battle ends, so they couldn't they all be considered a waste of time also?

The reason is disagree is because its completely circumstantial. I do agree that JUST waiting for your oxygen to replenish is a bore, and I've often jumped without it (sometimes forgetting it had no power). However, that's the nature of the game; risk vs reward (vs luck).
UglyMug
Posts: 46
Joined: Fri Oct 05, 2012 8:09 am

Re: [Request] Reset cloak cooldown and refill O2 on safe jum

Postby UglyMug » Fri Oct 12, 2012 6:03 am

Redirect Power to O2 while you're cloaked. You don't need power to engines after the initial dodge. It'll save you a lot of time. Move a zoltan to power the cloak if you need to to free up the power. Then move him back after the cloak finishes and you'll have an extra bar of energy that isn't locked out by the cloaking device's cooldown effect.

Also the teleporter resets since you can't fight fires on an enemy ship to prevent it from exploding. If you could, I'd imagine the cooldown would stay. Too finicky to implement I imagine.
parabellum
Posts: 4
Joined: Fri Oct 12, 2012 9:33 am

Re: [Request] Reset cloak cooldown and refill O2 on safe jum

Postby parabellum » Fri Oct 12, 2012 9:47 am

mqstout wrote:I'm with the OP -- a "the coast is clear, speed up recharges" button would be nice to use before jumps. It'd, of course, check to make sure there are no dangers (asteroids, fires, depowered oxygen, intruders, etc) and that all your systems are repaired to full before being usable. Pressing it would fill up your O2, heal your crew and recharge your cloak. Basically -- everything that we all do before every jump anyway, but without wasting a few minutes (per jump after battle!) for it to fill up.

It's all about time conveniences, and not at all about difficulty. There's zero challenge in "I just have to wait a while before I click jump".


I can only agree with this wise proposal.

If there are zero danger remaining -to the above list we can add breaches-, then, from my point of view, it's just a waste of time waiting for O2/shield/heal/stealth-cooldown ; and it adds nothing to the gameplay.
More annoying, it's a real waste of battery (as I'm only playing on a notebook) and it shortens the "real" game's session the battery can provide...

Moreover, implementing it as a button (or an option) would still let the hardcore players (that want to handle it all by themselves) the ability to play the way they like.

Win/win solution :)
Icehawk78
Posts: 230
Joined: Tue Sep 18, 2012 4:55 pm

Re: [Request] Reset cloak cooldown and refill O2 on safe jum

Postby Icehawk78 » Fri Oct 12, 2012 3:45 pm

parabellum wrote:Moreover, implementing it as a button (or an option) would still let the hardcore players (that want to handle it all by themselves) the ability to play the way they like.

I'd disagree with having it as an in-game button, as that would clutter up the UI, which is currently highly informative and functional - start adding in too many new buttons, and it becomes far more confusing. If anything, I'd prefer adding it as an option in the settings screen - "Reduce wait time during safe situations" or something similar, which simply automatically did everything in the same manner as the engine spin-up while "safe" (for some acceptable definition of "safe").
TheAzryte
Posts: 55
Joined: Sun Sep 16, 2012 7:51 pm

Re: [Request] Reset cloak cooldown and refill O2 on safe jum

Postby TheAzryte » Fri Oct 12, 2012 4:35 pm

You don't need 100% oxygen, so long as it's got a decent amount of air inside your ship, it's fine as said, if you're that worried about oxygen replenishment then upgrade it and open all internal doors for air flow. Also, you're not being forced to watch as your oxygen meter rises and cloak powers back up, if it really takes that long, have something to pass the time.
Personal fleet: Kestrel A & B, Engi A&B, Stealth A, Mantis A&B, Federation A&B, Slug A, Rock A, Zoltan A&B and Unidentified A.

GDM
Cronky
Posts: 2
Joined: Sat Oct 13, 2012 2:51 am

Re: [Request] Reset cloak cooldown and refill O2 on safe jum

Postby Cronky » Sat Oct 13, 2012 3:06 am

TheAzryte wrote:You don't need 100% oxygen, so long as it's got a decent amount of air inside your ship, it's fine as said, if you're that worried about oxygen replenishment then upgrade it and open all internal doors for air flow. Also, you're not being forced to watch as your oxygen meter rises and cloak powers back up, if it really takes that long, have something to pass the time.


I think you may have jumped on the wrong point here. I don't think anyone was saying that you needed 100% oxygen, or that it takes some ludicrous amount of time. It's that it's obvious that this idea is implemented in some way already considering that the FTL drives will auto-charge when there is no danger, so why not everything else in the same situation?

Why "have something to pass the time" when this idea detracts absolutely nothing from the actual gameplay... except the wait time to get back into it?

Definitely shouldn't be a button though. Mainly because parabellum's post sounded sarcastic, but also because that would make the UI needlessly cluttered.
Huzzah
Posts: 1
Joined: Wed Oct 17, 2012 7:36 pm

Re: [Request] Reset cloak cooldown and refill O2 on safe jum

Postby Huzzah » Wed Oct 17, 2012 7:52 pm

The problem becomes really obvious when you play with the Stealth Cruiser. Entering a fight with your cloak on cooldown can mean instant death when the enemy has a beam drone.

Furthermore, a good advice for game design is that 'optimal play should be fun'.

And waiting 5 seconds for you cloak to come off cooldown after every fight is very unfun, especially when your FTL instantly charges (mocking you with it's ready sound effect).