StarMade v0.202.86 - Balance Changes

Hello players,

Update 0.202.87: Fixed missile speed for AI tracking

The universe update is well underway and the code bases are now so different that any change on the old version takes a lot of time because of migrating. For this reason, this will probably be the last update on the non-universe-update version of StarMade.

 

It introduces balance changes that the Quickfire initiative developed and tested.

Unobfuscation

To make modding and general extensions of the game easier the game's code is now unobfuscated.

 

Quickfire

The Quickfire Initiative configs are very different from the old defaults. The config set was created by Quickfire's core team of configurators, with input from other members of the community, including PvP enthusiasts, creative builders, and others.

This is a complete overhaul of the game's configs. Most systems are balanced very differently than they were previously, including power consumption, mass, potency per block, and even some aspects of mechanics. As such, you should expect that most ships will require refits to function.

The Quickfire team is available for any support, question, suggestion for changes, or barrage of rotten tomatoes on their thread here https://starmadedock.net/threads/the-quickfire-initiative-rebalancing-starmade.31326/ , or in their discord server https://discordapp.com/invite/45zmQBe

 

OVERVIEW​

 

The Quickfire config changes cover a broad spectrum of StarMade's systems, which have been determined to be broken or imbalanced in the vanilla game. The following is a short overview of the most important changes, with a more comprehensive document of all changes available via a link below.

 

Power:

-Disabled stabilizer distance.

-Set maximum power from stabilization to 100%. (25% was pointlessly unintuitive)

Chambers:

-Rebalanced chamber capacity requirements across the board (see document below)

-Changed chamber size formula, to not force certain reactor sizes for optimal mass efficiency

Thrusters:

-Nerfed thruster scaling overall. There should be more variance in ship maneuverability and top speeds now depending on ship size and design.

-Made diminishing returns on thrust harsher.

-Increased TWR cap for max speed to 5.0

Armor:

-Made armor lighter and more effective.

-Made armor layering/stacking significantly more effective. (should make thick or slanted armor more viable)

Shields:

-Buffed shields relative to weapons overall

-Nerfed/adjusted Anti Low Damage chamber to only block actual low damage relative to shield capacity

-Buffed Anti High Damage chamber, lowered threshold for "High Damage" to better protect against large hits.

Weapons:

-Rebalanced weapons across the board

-Removed cursor recoil on cannons

-Helped to track down and resolve the infamous 'tunnelling' bug with cannon projectiles

-Replaced the broken Doom Beam with a high-range pulse laser

-Worked with Schine to fix missile guidance

-Made missile capacity less restrictive

-Adjusted bomb to hopefully be more usable (see document below)

Other:

-Buffed Tractor Beam

-Adjusted some chamber abilities, such as scanning and Thrust Burst.

 

A more detailed document is available here: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1qrqa4wB13Djx09Ql1atWfHxKD7MJCubFsidHwQgV3x4/edit

 

Additional notes are available here:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1ilNdPmw-8wMq2nooUcBZhrYG3Z1IWA59vwSo8hhF9Js/edit

Thanks to all the quifire members who developed and tested these changes.

This will also likely be the last major change to balance for ships. Unless it’s absolutely necessary, changes after this will only affect smaller aspects.

 

Thanks for playing StarMade,

- The Schine Team