Recently I've been playing a lot of a game called From The Depths (FTD), and noticed a few things that I think would work well for Cosmoteer.
Prefabs
FTD is very complicated, and you may not learn everything you need to build a complete design for quite a while. In order to flatten the learning curve and make building faster there are pre-made groups of parts that come with the game. For example, if you wanted to build something with a fuel engine but don't know how to make one you can just use one of the multiple prefabs. This also helps new players learn since they can simply place the prefab and look at how it works.
I think this could be very useful for helping new players in Cosmoteer learn stuff like factory ratios without them having to read a tutorial. Of course, there are a few downsides, such as overuse of prefabs could lead to new players actually learning less because they feel they don't need to, or that giving new players competitive-level prefabs could make the campaign too easy.
Anyway, here's my list of potential prefabs (will probably change on Steam release):
- Standard HE, EMP, nuke, and mine modules
- Different sizes of ion cores with included reactors
- One or two thruster blocks, some others with boost and huge respectively
- Standard PD module
- Standard 2-flak module
- Standard 2 HL, 1 EB, 2 shields configuration
- A cannon module of some sort
- A single and double railgun setup (potentially with shields)
If this is implemented it would probably be directly through the build menu since many people don't know you can drag ship files into build mode. This could also allow for easier access of player-made modules than what we currently have. Would probably be added for the Steam release since it's a semi-significant UI change.
Difficulty
While many of the best Cosmoteer players (including myself) like to build design contest ships to push the boundaries of not competitive it admittedly isn't the best for new players. We can hope they get beaten by them and think "wow that was a good design" and go look at it, but the more common response is going to be "that was bullshit". At the moment a ship's difficulty is decided based on cost brackets alone, and while more expensive designs do tend to be tougher than less expensive ones, it doesn't take into account how well they are designed. Playing Bounty Hunter at different difficulties also only changes things like the bounty you get when you destroy a ship, your starting credits, and the cost brackets of the different difficulty zones.
FTD goes a step further and divides designs up by their relative strength, not just cost. There are easy, medium, hard, and godly tiers, with the latter being essentially META craft. If you play the campaign on easy you will encounter primarily easy-tier craft, and on very hard godly-tier, etc.
This helps fix the problem the latest design contest is trying to lessen. All the difficulty levels (amateur, professional, etc.) under vanguard are comparatively easier due to the lower number of design contest ships, so once players hit vanguard they are hit with competently-built ships everywhere. It also fixes the issue that luck plays a huge factor in how difficult Bounty Hunter is because of the huge disparity in design strength from ship-to-ship.
