rhondabrwn
Posts: 2570
Joined: 9/29/2004
From: Snowflake, Arizona
Status: offline
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quote:
ORIGINAL: Joram
I read the first two and then gave up because it was obvious they would be lost forever. The first one was interesting but it went way downhill in the second one. I didn't think it felt that realistic to be honest though not being a navy man, it's subjective. Weber and Drake are more entertaining though I couldn't speak to the realism though it feels pretty real while you're reading it.
No, they aren't lost forever and it has a happy ending. You might want to give the series another shot as I never got tired of it or felt that the series was being dragged out to pad sales (like Jordan's "Wheel of Time" series started dragging and not getting anywhere).
Someone mentioned "Sins of a Solar Empire" - the difference between this sim and "The Lost Fleet" is what plagues the battles in most Space Sims... ships have to slow to a crawl so that they can sit there and shoot missiles and particle beams at each other. Given such an environment, combat has to be mutually accepted or one side should be able to disengage at will and refuse combat with a superior enemy force. In the "Lost Fleet" universe ships are moving at incredible speeds and spread over such a large area that commands can take 5 minutes to reach the units most distant from the fleet flagship. If there is anything a bit fantastic, it is probably the inertia dampers that allow crews to survive incredible levels of deceleration and maneuver as they "come about" for another pass. Flipping a ship and using main thrusters to reduce speed from 30,000 kilometers a second to reverse direction or make a turn within a few minutes is a bit incredible.
If I was designing a game, I'd probably slow things down quite a bit, but still have a battle system that featured realistic moving combat with an option to view a firing run that took a split second in real time in super slow motion so you could appreciate the action. Alternatively, you would do what "Black Jack" Geary does, consult your fleet display for a readout of hits and damage received and inflicted and then issue your fleet orders for the next fleet maneuver. That reminds me a bit of a WiTP battle display that you can watch play out or hit ESC and just jump to the "bottom line" of results.
"The Lost Fleet" has "Fast Utility" ships (which are too slow and constantly under threat) that can turn raw materials into power units, missiles, and other armaments to keep the fleet supplied. Finding sources of raw materials in the planetary system encountered is one of the constant challenges "the lost fleet" faces in the series (with unique methods utilized to find resources). Ship damage can also be repaired following a battle (to some extent... some ships do have to be scuttled when damaged past a certain point). At the strategic level, the game could include the introduction of reinforcements fresh from the shipyards, but with inexperienced crews. During the "lost fleet's" epic journey they destroy so many enemy ships that they begin to encounter "green" crews facing them. The game wouldn't have a time scale for an economic sub-system of colonization, new ship design, and so on...it would play out in a few hours. Perhaps, the starting situation could be varied, of course, with players building their starting fleets on a point system that could include design of new classes of warships.
I suppose we could consider this an "Operational Level" space combat battle sim with strategic movement to tie it all together.
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Love & Peace,
Far Dareis Mai
My old Piczo site seems to be gone, so no more Navajo Nation pics :(
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