What is the Purpose of Aurora Ship Combat?

Player Questions
1

I know that it is a system intended to give purpose to the strategic and design system. It is mandatory that Aurora has a combat system to enable the rest of the game. I am asking if it has any secondary purpose to you. I.e. I am asking a hypothetical question, if somehow, when two hostile races enter a system a super accurate autoresolve system automatically gave you the result of the battle in the format of an After Action Report, and set the forces to the resultant conditions, how would that be different from the way Aurora’s combat is right now?

Do you find Aurora’s combat fun? If so, how? And how much would you value if it was made more fun?

Do you find Aurora’s combat immersive? If so, how? And how much more would you value if it was made more immersive?

What I am not looking for are answers like “Aurora’s combat gives me satisfaction when succeeding in selecting the correct doctrine and design, therefore it is fun to me” or “Aurora’s combat is immersive because the design process uses components consistent with Aurora’s physics.” Don’t talk about design, doctrinal, or strategic gameplay. By itself, is Aurora’s combat fun or immersive? Think of it like: would it ever make sense to hypothetically create a “fleet scenario” gamemode where pre-made fleets have to fight a battle with objectives?

Please answer the questions within the spirit of the premise first. Then you can poke holes in my premise. I would encourage all players to answer. Even new players who don’t know much about the game yet. Thanks.

Edit: Oh, also, please note your level of play experience in your reply somewhere.

2

Let me start. I’ve played Aurora on and off for about 10 years. I’ve been mostly a lurker on the forum till now tho.

Personally, I don’t find the combat itself in Aurora fun. With any given ship design, there is only one optimal way to fight a battle with it. And if a ship wins or loses, it’s already mostly set in stone (with the exception of minor randomness) There is no player agency or any decision making involved in a battle. You assign your best officers, identify the optimal play, and hope for the best, that’s it. Personally, I would like if there were some choices a player can make in the middle of battle, that might make some difference. This would make the combat more fun for me, and it is something that I would value a lot if it was added.

As for immersion, I can’t lie that the setup and realism of the combat is great. There are few immersion breaking things in Aurora and it also carries through to space combat. The problem is that I have a hard time imagining the cool battles the ships and crews are fighting. They are over so quickly, and crew actions rarely feel like they decide the fate of a ship. It’s hard for me to feel the desperation of crew in hopeless situations, or the elation when they win an engagement. Its hard for me to imagine how crew can react so fast to prevent damage to components instantly, and how officers can make an impact on a ship’s performance when everything is so fast. In fact, it’s hard for me to imagine why any component requires a crew, other than engineering spaces and the bridge. Personally, I find it hard to care about my ships, other than the fact that they cost resources. I would enjoy it if more immersion for the crew and officers were added to the game. I would value it a lot.

As for holes in my premise, I won’t give you any ideas. Though there are many holes to be found, and it can be attacked from many angles.

Also, if you disagree with my opinion. I’d encourage just post your own contradicting opinion instead. Unless its something that can only make sense as a reply. I want to keep the thread on-topic as possible.

1 Like
3

I don’t want to be rude, but just reading your question makes me uncomfortable for some reason.

The agency I find in combat is in the targeting selection, and the weapon systems I choose to fire at each target. Much of the outcome of battles depend on that. Maybe my ships are just too complicated?

8 Likes
4

I agree. It seems to me like OP is more interested in controlling the parameters of the discussion to prove their point than in having a real discussion.

To wit:

I vehemently disagree with this premise. Aurora’s combat is intended to complement the strategic, operational, and logistical aspects of the gameplay, and divorcing it from these other layers of the game is not a meaningful assessment.

For me at least, Aurora’s combat can often be mechanically tedious (so many fire controls …), but it’s fun because it pits my doctrine and designs (the results of past decisions made for various reasons, including “sub-optimal” decisions made for roleplay reasons) against an opponent who is often to some degree unknown, often revealing weaknesses in those doctrines and designs which force me to find a tactical solution. I believe this personal experience is backed up by the wealth of AARs recounting exciting ship-to-ship battles, although sadly many of those are lost due to the demise of the old forums.

My observation has been that usually the people who find the tactical system boring are the ones who relentlessly optimize everything, and never engage in a battle unless they have 5% more speed, 5% more range, 5% more point defense than the enemy missiles can defeat, and 5% more shields or armor than the enemy can penetrate. Aurora is not a game designed for relentless optimization unless it is player-versus-player. Frankly, I don’t see the point in doing so, winning all the time is boring and knowing you’ll always win before any battle takes place is even more boring.

At the risk of shameful self-promotion, I believe that my Duranium Legion campaign is a good illustration of this. That is despite the fact that a fast, railgun-based fleet doctrine is hardly the most complex and features relatively little in the way of tactical decision-making:

  • The first battle fought, due to an underestimate of how much point defense was needed, featured heavy losses and uncertainty about whether my fleet could close through enemy missile fire. Exciting despite a lack of moment-to-moment decisions and poor writing. :slight_smile:
  • Most battles were against a standard NPR against which I had a significant tech advantage, including a large speed advantage. Despite this, several of the battles were still interesting as ongoing doctrinal development (both ship designs and tactical guidance) led to a “learning how to fight” tactical experience including some losses. Against an NPR with comparable tech I am sure the battles would have been far closer.
  • This led to a overwrought and melodramatic thrilling and exciting Naval Conference to address the doctrinal deficiencies of the Navy. The tactical battles therefore fed back into the strategic gameplay and decision-making through the magic of roleplay.

I think ship combat, like everything else in Aurora, is what you make of it. If you are willing to roleplay events and use “sub-optimal” doctrine, then there is a lot of fun to be had and many great stories to be written. :slight_smile: If you only care about relentlessly optimizing so your ships are invincible, then that is up to you but I think Aurora has a very limited shelf life for this approach to gameplay.

12 Likes
5

While I don’t particularly agree with the structure of your question I do have an answer to it as posed.

Ship Combat gives my Empire evolutionary impulse. It rewards continuing to research engine technology and hostile powers provide the necessary friction within the game to be a challenge to overcome.

The granular level of controlled ship combat (as opposed to a After Action Report) allows my fleets, designs, and doctrine to evolve to meet the particular enemy that we are fighting. It gives character to the commanders of the ship, some of whom I write flash fiction about to give my game that certain spice.

You say not to talk about design, doctrine, or strategic gameplay and I am not saying that the granular ship combat we have now is good because of design, doctrine, or strategy. I am saying that without design, doctrine, or strategy Aurora as a whole would not be the game that I so love and enjoy and ship level combat is an essential enabler.

A fleet scenario game mode would be wildly out of scope for the 4x game that Aurora4x is but you can also make one easily within the game currently. SM in a new hostile NPR and fleets. Your objectives are colonies. If ship combat isn’t currently fun in your game, it might be simply due to the setting you’ve made (its single player after all). Combats that I’ve had in Wolf 359 against early spoilers going after the fifty Orbital Mining Stations required both larger strategic thinking but also the ship level combat made each successive fight all the more meaningful. I felt it when the survey ship that was the first responder lost one of its engines. It was a wonderful story when a fleet support vessel happened to be in the system and diverted to rescue survivors and transfer maintenance parts to the survey vessel. The QRF from one system over rushing to the scene while smaller FACs in system desperately tried to blind the enemy with their High Power Microwaves.

Those stories simply wouldn’t be possible without the current granular level.

After Action Reports are cultural technologies; like financial markets and censuses. They take the messy and confusing mass of wants and needs and distill it down into something more digestible. They aren’t a bad thing. But they are the map and not the territory. I want to know when Captain-Sergeant Ernest Couturier’s FAC was attacked while trying to rescue pods from another FAC. I want to see the the crew of the OMS using their commercial damage control lockers reactivating destroyed CIWS systems before the next wave of missiles hits.

Wolf 359 AAR: Losses: FAC x4, OMS x2

That doesn’t cut it for me.

3 Likes
6

Aurora is a game that challenges me to manage the logistics of interstellar expansion for a budding space empire.

Combat is an optional gameplay element that adds interesting and meaningful choices to the core challenge.
How careful should I be about expanding into new systems?
How much consideration should I give to system defense?
What kind of ship design doctrines best support my approach to expansion?

I don’t need combat to be fun by itself, or immersive.
I welcome any reduction in per-battle tedium, but complex battles are exceedingly rare in my games–easily less than 0.1% of gameplay time.

I would probably only use an auto-resolve option for trivial encounters.
Battles are the tactical proving grounds for my design doctrines. I want to see how that plays out organically, not with just a report of losses sustained and inflicted, no matter how accurately derived.

3 Likes
7

I find combat (ship to ship and ground forces) in Aurora to be exhilarating and exceedingly stress inducing.

The Fun (capital F) is because I disagree with your premise that things are set in stone. I have no idea what weapons my opponents use until the engagement is at its peak. I have no idea if my sortie is large enough. I have no idea if there’s a connection I missed and enemy reinforcements are about to obliterated my resupply and refueling ships. I have no idea if I brought enough missiles, or if my armor is thick enough for the length of the battle - which itself could be seconds, minutes, or hours.

Furthermore, it doesn’t end there. I’m not fighting static enemies (outside of spoilers I suppose). They will deploy new tools I’ll have to counter and new fleets I’ll have to plan for.

Much like real life combat there is always an element of uncertainty, mitigated only by what truly amounts to wishful and hopeful thinking. I can try to engage on my terms, but they’re only my terms from my perspective.

As for stress inducing, that’s partially from roleplay/investment in the lives of my crews and also from my real life investment. That expeditionary fleet that just got routed with 80% casualties may have taken me real life days to plan and deploy how I wanted. The hours spent designing all of the OOB for my troops was for naught when I forgot to make sure the STOs were fully destroyed as my transports get picked out of orbit.

The stress plays into the Fun for me.

5 Likes
8

This entire argument makes no sense.

Tactics win battles, logistics win wars.

Aurora4X is a logistics game, first, second and third. Tactical gameplay is in distant fourth place. You want engaging tactical gameplay? Go play Star Citizen, X4 foundations, or other space games.

I’ll take this to the real world. When two opposing militaries fight each other, the most significant variables when determining who would win include technological superiority and accuracy, manpower availability, manufactured material availability, logistical ease and coverage, political resolve, and such.

Rarely would a single tactical battle determine the fate of the war. Aurora4X’s battle element could equivalent to real world naval battles, where the main variables are, including the aforementioned, doctrine, number of ships in region and placements. There is no terrain or obstacles to speak of in space.

Aurora is no different. I, like you fellow ‘friend’, don’t draw fun out of lore making or imagination, but the logistics behind preparing a campaign.

Planning a doctrine, designing fitting ships, budgeting resources and building those ships, organizing picket fleets, patrol fleets, and main battle groups. Preparing logistical chains, forward operating bases, stockpiling ordanance and fighters, developing a radar network, spy ships, etc.

The resulting campaign/battle is simply the result of these preparatory actions, and simply a single element in this complex ecosystem.

That is assuming you blob your entire fleet and fight the other fleet as a blob too.

If you simply tolerate the logistical aspect, and hyper focus on the battle aspect, then maybe this game isn’t for you, with all due respect.

Additionally, I cannot think of a better system. A more comfortable UI would be great, but the core system of choosing a ship, choosing an fc, choosing a target, firing, reload; remains.

Targeting specific systems? Ehhhh, maybe after repeated skirmishes with a specific class that would be viable.

Can’t think of another idea, though.

Edit: In my opinion, a fleet battle scenario would be nonsensical and devoid of any meaning. If you aren’t invested in that particular space for strategic purposes, winning or losing make no difference. The ‘battle’ itself, suppose you blob your entire force, would simply resolve by retargeting and refiring every ship until one side gives up. Where’s the fun in that? Go watch paint dry instead, your time would be better invested there.

4 Likes
9

I really like your point here about targeting specific systems.

Spaceships are basically black boxes full of stuff, how would you even know where to hit? I think the FC and crew are always trying to hit the most vital components of a vessel but even if they miss, they hit something else which is already well modeled within the DAC% tables.

10

The OP asked me about this in a private message, so I will post the same response here.

"People have different views on what is fun for them. That’s why there are so many different games appealing to different people.

If I want tactical space combat, I would play Star Fleet Battles, or Babylon 5 Wars. However, they don’t have a campaign layer. What Aurora does is give a battle meaning within a much wider context. How you prepare your Empire to fight battles, to support its forces, secure resources, achieve strategic objectives, gain control of choke points, etc. is the point of the game. The battles are a means to that end - not an end in themselves.

You are thinking of the tactical battle as the core of the game and therefore it should be more detailed. However, many Aurora battles are won or lost before they are fought because of the preparation, the strategic situation and the balance of forces. The impact of good tactics on a battle is usually far less than the impact of the strategic preparation and operational manoeuvring that took place before that battle.

The battle is a way of resolving which of the two sides put themselves in a better position to fight. Tactics can help offset the balances of forces, but strategy creates the imbalance in the first place (hopefully in your favour) and operational manoeuvres (getting your forces in the right place) puts you in the best position before the shooting starts. Adding a lot more detail to a battle where the outcome is often pre-determined (or at least greatly affected) by those factors doesn’t enhance the operational and strategic levels of the game"

For example, if you read the Delta Eridani battles in my latest campaign, it is a long series of tactical engagements between my forces and the Precursors. The challenge in the campaign was ensuring sufficient forces were available, sufficient supplies and ordnance were available and that the battles took place in an operational situation that was favourable to the Empire. In this case, the battles were about attrition of the enemy, using my limited resources in smaller-scale engagements until I could confront them in a final decisive battle.

Designing, building and supplying those forces, while limiting Precursor intelligence data so they didn’t counter-attack my vulnerable forward base, was the challenge. The battles were the culmination of that strategic and operational effort."

As I tried to explain to the OP in previous messages, he is struggling with the concept that there is no absolute truth about what is correct or fun. There are only the opinions and perspectives of different people.

"You made the following assertions:

  1. The lack excitement and human (ships’ crew) struggle in aurora’s combat.
  2. The disproportional advantage that a minor, e.g. 5%, speed advantage gives to ships in combat.
  3. The lack of any kind of combat other than “decisive battle” in aurora.

People disagreed with your opinions. Then you listed mechanics that would fix your perceived problems, such as ships fleeing taking less damage, but didn’t explain how that could be justified in game. You can’t just create a rule that says ships running away take less damage without some basis in game reality, or it results in a breakdown in the suspension of disbelief.

So you state something people disagree with, then suggest ‘magic’ mechanics to fix it. They are not going to be persuaded.

Lets assume you are right and the existing players are wrong. Before worrying about detailed mechanics, you need to change their minds about the problem you think exists. Once they accept the principle that something needs to change, you can then debate detailed mechanics.

If you just throw solutions at people for a problem they don’t believe needs solving, you won’t get anywhere. That is true in real life as much as Aurora. You need to put yourself in the position of the person you are trying to persude.

“Finally, since Aurora forum members don’t generally value making combat more fun”

That plainly isn’t true. People play the game for fun. If they are rejecting your suggestions, then they don’t share your view on what makes something fun. That isn’t an attack on you. They just have a different perspective and you can’t change someone’s mind until you understand their perspective.

There isn’t one ‘truth’ about what is fun or what makes a good game. People like different things. 95%+ of people will not enjoy Aurora for example. I am making it for the 5% who do want that type of game - especially me :slight_smile:"

12 Likes
11

I get where you’re coming from in your question. If you are coming at A4X from the perspective of Elite Dangerous, Wing Commander (dating myself), Eve Online, or some other game where there are tons of minute details, there is likely to be a measure of disappointment in combat outcomes - the combat is going to feel like it goes quickly and there is little decision making.

Now, as a guy that has been playing A4X on and off again since 2010, I will tell you that I find this game fascinating and the ship combat is a big part of it. The enjoyment for me personally comes in fleet composition, positioning of forces, the unknowns of what I am up against and what is behind the next gate, and building up industry to support the doctrine. I know that is the answer you said you didn’t want - but I enjoy A4X the way I enjoy it and there you go.

But I would also disagree about the individual fleet engagements not being exciting - yes, there are engagements where individual ships of mine get run down and erased (usually exploration vessels), but I have had plenty of fleet engagements that were tactically interesting and presented admiral level decisions. I’ll give you two of my favorites from the past couple of years:

A. The first was a defense of Earth from an NPR that outclassed me and had already destroyed the fleet I sent after it. All I had left was about 50 fighters with gauss cannons, 5 ancient corvettes with popgun lasers, 20 missile FACs with one and done box launchers, 4 orbital stations with massive armor and 30cm lasers, and a bunch of STO. The enemy fleet came in and it clearly had troops ships trailing and they engaged my orbital stations and began knocking them out one my one. While this was happening, my STO was chewing up the enemy ships one by one. I was losing the race and then my FACs came in and launched an alpha strike on damaged enemy ships to reduce the rate my stations were getting knocked out and that turned the tide. After I unleashed my fighters on the fleeing troops ships and mopped up all of them. I lost all but one of my stations and my five corvettes but I saved the Earth.

B. The second was another engagement where I had an a spoiler squad jump one of my CV task forces and destroy it (1 CV, 1 CA, 2 DDs, 1 RS). I had another CV task force in system and I was accosted by the same spoiler TF but this time instead of keeping my squadron together, I detached my CA and DDs to close with and engage. I lost one of my DDs but the enemy TF had been damaged before and my CA took out their main ship, they actually retreated and ran right smack into the fighter screen I had put in their retreat path (I had guessed correctly). I got my revenge in that scenario.

The point being, those engagements involved making some decisions, choosing what to sacrifice, choosing the order you target enemy vessels, and then rolling the dice. Also with the added changes to missiles, you can actually pull off some pretty complex firing salvos that can negate technological advantages. One additional fact was that I was outclassed technology and speed wise in both instances but I was able to make effective decisions to negate that advantage that allowed me to prevail - exactly what I would want from a game like this.

I don’t think A4X is perfect - I have argued for some more ‘vertical’ play in colony development and political structure for years and I happen to think ground combat needs some work because right now I do feel like the ground game really is more of a math problem that higher tech ALWAYS wins in my experience; it is frustrating when you drop three Divisions of troops on to a world and watch them get wiped by essentially an unsupported battalion level force - but I think what keeps people coming back is the expansion game and the Fleet combat and I would argue there is a lot more nuance and decision making than you are stating.

8 Likes
12

As a short example, I really don’t like losing my ships, so I try to make them bigger and stronger. But gradually, as I felt more confident, I started doing it in more inefficient ways to make my game more fun. For example, now I’m trying to go into space with earlier technologies, my empire uses shields T1 only, and the armor of my flagship has not upgraded since its launch. And I even don’t use HPM.

1 Like
13

About 8 years of gameplay - dozens of campaigns, and I prefer long campaigns, rolling for centuries.

I don’t exactly like Aurora combat mechanics, yet I think I do understand why it was made this way, and so my frustration lays primary in some details I’d like to see less conservative (i.e. built on a set of well-known SciFi narratives) and more designed with purpose (to be more immersive and self-consistent then these known narratives).

I do agree with the statement, that crew-related mechanics is one the most frustrating ones.

I do value this side of the gameplay quite high, it’s one of the key aspects in Aurora for me; combat is somewhere inside my reflective need for play and I think I do understand why it is so (set by the evolution), and the very ability to command during combat is very much valuable, even if I don’t like this combat system much.

1 Like
14

I’ve been playing Aurora since the VB6 days, around version 4 or so. That puts me somewhere close to 20 years with the game now, certainly more than 15.

After reading through all the comments, I wanted to highlight a few things. This isn’t really a direct reply to any single post, but more of a response to the discussion as a whole.

The first thing I think is worth addressing is: What is Aurora to you?

Looking at the replies, the answer seems very different from player to player. For some, Aurora is primarily a 4X game. For others, it’s a logistics simulator. Some see it as a grand engineering challenge focused on optimising and designing fictional spacecraft. For others, and I fall firmly into this category, it’s a story generator and role-playing platform.

The second thing worth addressing is: How do you play Aurora?

One of Aurora’s greatest strengths, in my opinion, is its customisation. I have run campaigns where, believe it or not, I generated absolutely no enemies. Everything was set to zero, with no spoilers or surprises. All I did was create a challenge or scenario, define a goal, and then play it out.

Maybe the objective was to perfect a logistics network. Maybe it was to evacuate Earth’s entire population to another planet with a 1.00 colonisation cost within 100 years because Earth was dying, whether from natural disasters or self-inflicted mistakes.

My point is that Aurora allows you to tailor the experience to your preferences. If you don’t like crew mechanics, you can disable them. If you don’t like spoilers, you can remove them. If you don’t enjoy maintenance mechanics, you can turn those off as well. To my knowledge, very few games offer that level of flexibility.

I felt compelled to respond because the discussion has drifted off-topic several times, which tells me that different players value very different aspects of Aurora. Those perspectives are important, and I wanted to share mine as well.

Now, to answer the original question.

Personally, I love Aurora’s combat mechanics. What I don’t particularly enjoy is the actual execution phase of combat, especially when large fleets are involved.

The problem is probably me.

I’m a huge fan of games such as War in the Pacific: Admiral’s Edition, War in the East, and similar titles. I’m also a big fan of CMANO.

Using CMANO as an example, I sometimes feel that the one thing Aurora is missing is the ability to let your commanders and crews actually fight the battle themselves.

The AI clearly has the logic to make combat decisions because enemy forces already react, engage, and prioritise targets. Why not provide an optional command that allows the AI, taking into account commanders, crew quality, doctrine, and other factors, to assign targets, choose tactics, and execute engagements on the player’s behalf?

Of course, Steve has already done a tremendous amount of work over the years to reduce repetitive tasks and automate routine actions. I am only wondering whether there is room to go a little further.

Importantly, this would only be an optional feature. Players who enjoy directing every engagement manually could continue doing so exactly as they do now. Meanwhile, other players could focus on different aspects of the game, or enjoy the anticipation of discovering that their incompetent admirals just lost a war against a bunch of puny bugs and now need to be “relieved” of command.

8 Likes
15

I honestly don’t even remember when I started. I think the jump gates needed components for construction or that had just changed but I can’t go back and check what version that was exactly. It’s been a long time, in any case. And yeah, like the other posters, I disagree with your premise, Spookyfam. The combat cannot be divorced from the rest of the game though of course it can be analyzed and dissected.

Interestingly, this reminds me of the flame wars between the two camps of World of Warcraft players when Blizzard finally made Classic, in essence a remake of the original, ‘vanilla’ version of World of Warcraft. The players who were playing the ‘modern’ version could not understand why so many people were super excited to play something that, to them, looked boring and slow, with boss battles that were simple and easy. And conversely, the ‘vanilla’ fans had nothing but scorn for the fans of the ‘modern’ version of the game, that to them appeared as a soulless, over-designed product that lacked community, with boss battles that were bloated messes that forced players to run an endless hamster wheel for crap loot. And both camps are correct, to some extent at least. Anyway, I won’t get into it any further, as it’s a bit complicated and not relevant to the topic at hand. My point is that WoW evolved over the years into a very different game than it was back in 2004 when it launched. People who preferred the old style obviously quit playing the game and were replaced with new players who prefer the new style. While there are some players who genuinely enjoy both styles, they are few and far between and most people are just one or the other, and often seem genuinely perplexed by the fact that other people can enjoy a version of WoW that they don’t.

So yeah, I saw that you already another thread revolving around the main issue - is Aurora a game for you or not, so I guess this is pointless but whatever. I do find the combat in Aurora engaging and exciting, and I do not find it “set in stone” nor are ships able to fight in only one way. If Aurora isn’t for you, then it isn’t for you and that’s fine. Personally I hate (survival) horror games and have no need to play them despite their massive popularity. I don’t try to force myself to play Resident Evil or Silent Hill. You shouldn’t force yourself to play Aurora either if it’s not fun for you. It’s hard to believe you’ve been playing it for a decade since it seems that you really don’t like it much, based on your posts.

3 Likes
16

I’m a roleplay gamer too, and from my perspective, disabling order delays (the only crew-related mechanics that is switchable, AFAIK) makes no good, because roleplaing always-instantly-reacting beings is quite a weird thing.

More generally, “switch it off if you don’t like it” is not a reasoned answer during possible feature improving discussion, it’s just a hiden presupposition that this feature must not be changed, period, no reasoning expected or possible. We cannot and must not dictate Steve what to do, yet it doesn’t mean the discussion and reasoning about possible feature change suggestions is impossible if there is a switch-off checkbox there already.

And another thing is, this discussion is not about rating Aurora between other games by some criteries. It’s about ideas for Steve. Sone Aurora feature can be much better then it’s analogues in other games, and yet if you think it’s easy to make it even better - it can be discussed.

1 Like
17

I’ve deleted the ‘what kind of person’ thread, which is effectively a copy of this and really just a long diatribe by the OP because he can’t comprehend why some people like Aurora.

4 Likes
18

Thanks, Serge, appreciated.

I think you may have misunderstood my point. I was referring to mechanics that, in many other games, players simply have to live with, whether they like them or not. In contrast, in Aurora, many of those mechanics can be enabled or disabled depending on your preferred playstyle, roleplay choices, or simply personal taste.

Can such mechanics be improved? I’m not sure, and it will always depend on who you ask. As noted above, everyone approaches Aurora with different goals and expectations, so opinions on what constitutes an improvement will naturally vary.

Regarding comparing Aurora to other games, I haven’t actually rated Aurora against anything. The question was, “What is the purpose of Aurora ship combat?” I answered that question by drawing on examples from another game I enjoy, which has mechanics that are similar to Aurora’s and, in some cases, are even more complex during the combat phase.

I don’t think it’s reasonable for anyone to place themselves above others and dictate what references or comparisons someone is allowed to use when expressing an opinion on a topic.

Steve has demonstrated over many years that he is perfectly capable of evaluating ideas on their own merits. If he sees value in a suggestion, I am sure he can decide that for himself. As long as discussions remain respectful and are made in good faith, without hostility or malicious intent, I don’t see why people should be discouraged from sharing perspectives simply because they draw comparisons from outside Aurora.

1 Like
19

Yes, Aurora has shamelessly stolen ideas from other games for the last twenty years :slight_smile:

Genre is from Starfire, ship volume is from Traveller, minerals concept from Stars!, mineral names from Star Trek, wrecks from Eve Online, armour system from FASA Interceptor, etc.

And I should credit Tyge Sjostrand for the amazing work he did on star system generation mechanics (you can find his PDF online) which I used as the basis for Aurora system generation back in the early 2000s.

7 Likes
20

Stars! mentioned!

That game had a non-trivial impact on my undergraduate GPA.
Not in a good way.

Aurora multiplayer AutoHost when?