Artemis Spaceship Bridge Simulator

Oh, definitely - a text-based system through the Comms Officer would be more realistic. Even better if it could be dumped directly to the Comms screen, rather than a Skype tab.

USS ILLUSTRIOUS PROCEED IMMEDIATELY TO SECTOR D3 AND INVESTIGATE UNKNOWN CONTACT.

USS RELENTLESS PROCEED TO AND DOCK WITH DS2 AND REMAIN DOCKED UNTIL DIRECTED OTHERWISE.

...and so on.

edited 18th Jun '12 11:16:14 AM by pvtnum11

Oh, or another idea. What if the game had a mobile version that you could use on an iPad or Xoom or something? Captain or other bridge officers could tap into the feeds for each station and get a firsthand look at the screens, and even take control if they wanted? Of course, you could do that with a regular laptop anyway.

But also on the issue of fleet coordination, what about using a mobile device or computer with a chat program so each Captain could communicate directly with each other? The capability is already out there.

Now I'm imagining coordinating a battle like a MMORPG raid, where groups of players agree to log on to a server from across the country to play one massive game.

The Admiral could either be on the Flagship, or pretend that he/she was on board one of the stations and commanding from the rear.

edited 18th Jun '12 11:23:15 AM by Lawyerdude

AFAIK, once someone has logged into a station, it's locked out from someone else logging into it. So the Captain has to either get up and stand over the shoulder of the station he wants to micro-manage, or simply let the crew do their jobs to the best of their ability.

Which is why it pays to get a solid core group of players together, so they can all learn their jobs and learn to work as a team.

The Status Screen is the closest thing you can get to an overview of the ship. That and Tactical, so you have a melding of Weapons and Helm screens. I flew my ship in Tactical view the entire time, so I could see more information and make better-informed decisions, than if I had been in Front View or whatever.

I could go for a larger playing area, myself. Say, 1000x1000 kilometers, but that's a hundred times more area than what it has now. 100x100 is absurdly easy to traverse at warp.

edited 18th Jun '12 12:18:18 PM by pvtnum11

You're right. The stations that don't lock out once they're claimed are Main Screen, Captain's Map and Observer.

Also if I remember correctly, I don't think you can log in to multiple ships from one station. It's one ship per one screen.

BUT if you have multiple monitor capability, you can activate the program multiple times and run different windows for different ships. Assuming your computer and network can handle the traffic.

OK, so imagine a multi-monitor setup for Fleet Command where you get access to each ship's Main Screen and Captain's Map (and maybe Observer if you want). So you get to see what every other Captain sees. Then all you'd need is a way to relay orders to each ship. It would be pretty costly to do that, but awesome as well.

I can confirm that it's possible to do the multiple monitors thing. It's a big drain on resources, and you cannot do fullscreen on either screen, but it does work if you're short on computers.

Well, first you need a good crew... After that, one can begin to think about doing co-op or Bridge versus Bridge actions. When I mentioned that the game supports versus play, I saw a lot of fiendish grins as a reply.

I think you can do a multi-window setup, too. Get a suitably large monitor and run six instances at once, logged into each game as Captain's Map, maybe.

I've run an HDMI from my laptop to my home TV and run a splitscreen like that, using the TV as Main Screen and my laptop as helm/weapons. Has anybody tried to do a true multi-monitor setup? I thought the program might allow for multiple fullscreen displays if you have that, but I'm not actually sure.

Bridge vs. Bridge: Dreadnought vs. Scout!

Although seriously, I'm not sure how well Pv P would work. Would there really be much more involved tactically than: "Load all torpedo bays with nukes and fire when in range?"

edited 18th Jun '12 1:15:33 PM by Lawyerdude

problem with nukes is that they're slow to track, so by warping away, you can dodge the missiles. PVP would consist of hit-and-run battles between ships, using beam weapons to weaken shields and mines to set traps.

Tactics may include baiting the enemey into terrain favorable to yourself. Nebulas may be a good example. Draw them past some placed mines so they have enough of a gap to risk following you in, but once you lock on and fire a nuke at them, running away becomes a rather dicey proposition - coming about might leave you running smack dab into one of those mines you delicately avoided running into, and if you don't end up wiht a tail-chase scenario, by the time you realize what's going on and change course in an attempt to escape.

Of course, the cost to set up an ambush may make it not worth the effort.

I've done the mine trap against AI enemies before. Get their attention and make them follow you while dropping mines. They're usually not smart enough to evade the mines before getting blown up. I've also mined chokepoints in the map to delay enemies. Of coursse, sometimes an enemy fleet will just run right into a minefield or singularity.

edited 19th Jun '12 8:24:25 AM by Lawyerdude

The AI's in Star Fleet Command tended to swerve wildly if you popped mines like that. Which is good if you want to flat-out escape, or (best use) obliterate a pack of pursuing drones.

I might have to try out the Missile boat in Artemis to practice long-range fire support. Torps have the advantage of standoff range, so you can sit back at five klicks and toss firepower at the target at will. Four tubes, and if you bump power to the tubes, you'll have your magazines emptied in no time.

(then you can either run away or buy torps with energy)

Missile Cruisers are pretty badass. Since they don't have beams or much need for maneuverability, you can pump TONS of power into the launchers. One time I tried just running a missile cruiser with 250% power to the launchers. (Plus all 8 coolant units) It was beautiful.

Another thing I just found out; apparently if you run multiple ships, you have to choose a single class of ship for everybody. In other words, everybody plays the same kind of ship.

Oh, bummers. Well, one way to have a good knife-fight is to assign scouts to everyone...

All hands aboard the USS Imacuttabitch!

Scouts have one missile tube, so a nuke-fight is a riskier proposition.

Although I had a thought, after remembering some Romulan tactics from SFB and SFC: When a torpedo is fired, there is no real way of knowing if it's a real one or a dummy. Cue frantic wild maneuvering when one is fired, only for it to be a pseudo-torpedo, or in the case of Artemis, a simple Homing Torp.

An inexperienced crew would fire the Nuke first, probably at or near the limitations of the torpedo's engagement range. A simple matter of turning away and jumping to warp for a bit, thus placing yourself outside the fuel range of the torp.

An experienced crew would simply fire a bog-standard torpedo, and see what the other crew does to react to it.

which shot is the Nuke? Is it the first of two shots, or the second one? If a crew is constantly reacting to each shot as being The Big One, eventually, they'll make a tactical mistake, and the more-calm crew can then exploit it.

It's a battle of deception, really.

edited 20th Jun '12 12:18:59 PM by pvtnum11

Scouts can't carry nukes.

I don't know if there's a way to determine what an incoming missile is until it hits. Also, we've used beams to shoot down what I think are enemy missiles. If you can do that to PC ship missiles, then that creates an interesting situation.

If that's the case, then I can see torpedos being used as a sort of sensor baffle. Keep launching missiles at the enemy while at close range to confuse them and force them to target either the incoming missiles or the enemy ship itself.

Ah, so it IS like SFB and SFC, where you can target drones and plasma torpedoes.

Very interesting. Good way to spoof them is to fire two torps - one regular, the other a nuke (or ECM if you wish), and see if they get the right one. Keeping in mind the refire rate of beam weaponry, you could make them waste shots on the wrong torpedo. The Weapons Officer will have his hands full trying to target incoming weapons.

To eliminate that chance, it might be a valid tactic to barrel past them at warp, firing off a nuke or mine right when you get on top of them or something - a bombing run, basically. Gives them no time to target the torp, although they could see this coming and drop a mine, so you run over it as you pass them, or they can simply blip into warp briefly and not be where you thought they would be.

Incidentally, after fiddling with the Engineering settings, I think I've got down the maximum safe power allocations per unit of coolant:

0 - 100% 1 - 125% 2 - 150% 3 - 169% 4 - 189% 5 - 204% 6 - 220% 7 - 235% 8 - 250%

I like to overclock multiple systems, particularly Maneuvering. The way I see it, if you're not overpowering a couple systems, you're wasting power.

Good stuff - but doesn't over-driving burn up your energy reserves faster... Worth it if it means out-running, out-gunning, out-tanking or out-flying an opponent, though.

Also, we need ECM capabilities. To degrade enemey fire-control lock, might even give you a chance to evade torpedo terminal-homing lock, so they end up flying past you and missing altogether or something. Dumping power into this may make the enemey lose weapons lock, so they have to either manually target you, or attempt to retarget.

Of course, if you include ECM, you then have to provide ECCM, so you can burn through sensor interference. We have that capability already, yes?

Finally, cloaking devices would be neat. (one faction has them, why can't we?)

Yes, overclocking does burn through energy much faster, especially if you increase power to impulse or warp drive. But when I run a simulation, I usually return directly to a starbase after each engagement to reload and recharge.

Another protip: Use your energy to missile conversion while docked to reload faster.

Including ECMS would be pretty cool. Perhaps they could be dropped like mines and create an area of interference, like the nebulae do. If you want to see through them, you'd need to boost sensor power.

edited 21st Jun '12 2:31:46 PM by Lawyerdude

ECM mines? Awesome idea. They'd probably only stay active until they either deplete their on-board energy supply or are targeted and blown up.

I could see parking one in a minefield for additional evil-points. "Hey guys, say hi to my little speedbumps...!"

That or simply hang out in one for a bit.

I'd imagine the sensor-reduction abilities would stack with nebula effects, maybe to the point in which your sensors can't even see out of the ECM'd nebula at all. Visual only.

I just recently found out about this. What an amazing idea for a game. If I knew enough people IRL who would enjoy this, I'd set a game up in a heartbeat.

We had an instant LAN-party Saturday, and managed to scrape up a full crew. In the beginning, it was just me, the missus and the guy who invited us over (his first time playing). I did Engineering, Command and Comms, she did Science and Weapons, and our host did Helm. Went pretty well, we did two games in about an hour at difficulty 2.

Then more people show up, so we move our crap downstairs to his dining room and spend an hour setting up stations. Played two more games, first was diffuculty 2 with two brand new crewmembers, second game was difficulty 4.

Why hello there, cloaked ship... We swapped out a crewmember for another new player, who initially thought this was the stupidest thing ever, but really got into being an Engineer. Second game took us over an hour, and we lost two bases. Had to ferry back and forth between the last two surviving bases for energy and torps. Nukes do precious little to Behemoths, by the way. They just sort of laugh as their 400-strength shields shrug it off like it tickled. Fortunately, our helmsman knew better than to charge straight at enemey ships until after our torps had gotten through shields. Then we would charge in for a gun run or two.

I'm wondering why we don't get those Energizer Bunny Torpedos. They have amazing endurance. Can't target them, but they are quite stupid and run into asteroids.

The enemey trolled us one time by launching fighters at us, so we wasted a nuke on a fighter flight before realizing that they weren't the main body of the enemey task force. We learned our lesson and made it a priority to target any carriers spotted in task forces after that. Only to find one of our nukes did a circular run and started to chase us.

Tried to drop mines amongst a cluster of ships (basically, a bombing run), but mine placement is something we've yet to nail down the timing of when to fire it off.

All in all, a good time to be had by all involved, new players and veterans alike. They all got a kick out of me, as I morphed into some sort of command persona, with my hands clasped behind my back and all.

I'm wondering if boosting power to sensors will reveal a cloaked ship.

edited 26th Jun '12 11:54:20 AM by pvtnum11

Sounds great. No, I don't think boosting sensor power reveals cloaked ships, it only speeds up scanning and increases range. It does let you see into nebulae, though.

I played several games with a full crew on Saturday, mainly with a Battleship. We got up to about level 9 or 10, and managed to do pretty well. I've noticed that the "Siege" configuration is one of the most difficult. When we tried it with a Battleship on level 8 or 9, we lost 3 out of 4 starbases within the space of a few minutes. It seemed like we never got the chance to get our bearings before they all came under attack by cloaked ships at once.

2 Front is probably my favorite. It gives you time to actually think and refuel before going out again.

I also tried commanding a Light Cruiser on difficulty 8 in Siege mode. We managed to take out most of the enemy fleet before losing all the starbases, all our weapons and batteries, and self destructing.

Yes, you can self destruct. Turn all the power to 0%, then turn Warp up to 100%. Once the engine overheats, engage warp and you blow up.

I also got a real kick out of playing Engineer. I worked out a few good configurations that seemed to improve our performance immensely. Also, I think that the key to operating a station is a certain degree of initiative. As the Engineer, the Captain almost never had to give me an order, and when he did, it was already done.

edited 26th Jun '12 1:48:36 PM by Lawyerdude

I suppose the hard part is finding out what station works best with you. Our host seems to be pretty proactive in maneuvering the ship, and my wife is keen on developing a good situational awareness of everything in the area, so she can provide information as requested. Our new Weapons guy, being a hardcore micromanager RTS player, sought to maximize damage by figuring out how much beams and torps did, then fired off only what we needed to do destroy ships as quickly as possible.

We still need a capable Engineer, though. I might step down as Captain and tinker with presets. Energy management will become more and more critical as we up the difficulty.