Commits on GitHub:

• engine#49469d4
• engine#c2d73df
• engine#29e6714
• common#560c393

Changes:

• Introduced new method StructureLab.unboostCreep. It removes all boosts from a creep and drops 50% of the mineral resources spent on boosting. The difference between this method and StructureSpawn.recycleCreep is that unboosting always returns 15 units of each boosted body part's mineral regardless the creep's remaining time to live. You can use it to take boosts off an old creep and reapply 50% of them to a new creep.

• StructureSpawn.renewCreep now shows a message in console if you try to call it on a creep with boosts. In future, it will throw an error. Use StructureLab.unboostCreep to remove boosts before you renew a creep.

This feature is supported in private server ptr branch:

npm install screeps@ptr

• Repair/harvest/upgrade boosts are effectively half mineral/lab time cost. Pretty rare you'll not get them home.
• Carry boosts for high TTL uses are half mineral/lab time costs. One-way carry or carry for power/convoys won't really benefit as you would recylce these anyway
• Short range boosted attacks get a big buff and are nearly half mineral/lab time cost. Medium may get a bit, long range is unchanged.

Is the large buff to upgrade/repair boosts intentional? They're already very strong boosts and were previously nerfed a bit by lab reaction time. Now they've been buffed to be significantly better than they were before the reaciton time nerf (IMO).

Now that power creeps are nearly out, with a daunting cliff face of power to climb, it's not unreasonable to make GCL a little easier to get, so that newer guys can catch up with older vets.

I'm not sure about the effect this change will have on ramparts though - I predict it will make bunkers overall stronger and harder to crack. If this is a goal of the change then that's fine, but if it's not an intended impact then I'm a little worried about the change.

I suspect this change is intended to make it more viable to use base economy boosts such as harvest/carry boosts. I think it would do this a little, but the impact on these would be overshadowed by the impact on GCL/ramparts boosts. That is, I think if right now a lot of people think it is sensible to use boosts for ramparts and GCL, while not many people think it's sensible to use harvest/carry boosts for their economy, then I think this calculation would still largely hold true even if GCL/repair/heal/carry boosts all become effectively cheaper.

Attacking people further away becomes relatively more expensive, while defences become stronger, so there will effectively be a shrinking pool of targets to attack. I wonder if the net effect of this change would be tougher bases and perhaps less combat overall, due to the smaller target pool.

But perhaps the intention of this change is different than I am inferring, and these effects are intended?

The biggest issue this game (MMO wise) has right now is the difference in power from a new player to even a semi decent one month old player. To allow that older player to get returns on his boosts just widens that gap. (not even considering the older players as the gap between them and a newbro is so horribly broken at this point that this change is merely a drop in the bucket)

We're going to launch a whole new game concept (Screeps Arena) that will be built around session matches and personal PVP rating, and game mechanics will be equal for any player regardless of his time played, but in this MMO game the time played should be directly (not exactly linearly, but still directly) converted to in-game power projection, otherwise we'll start losng veteran players.

It makes this mechanic more difficult to code properly (different creeps must go to different labs, probably even in different rooms) which is a good thing for such a powerful feature.

It's a MMO after all. It means players have constant persistent progress, and the game mechanics should make it possible to have progress for years. If we try to equalize new and veteran players, then we eliminate incentives to grow and apply efforts in this game world.

I respectfully disagree. There are many games that make the gap between players who played the game for years and those who are pretty new to it very small, and the games are no worse for it. EVE Online is one of those examples, and probably the best. The key is making the progression less linear and more parallel/alternative. Older players just get the benefit of being better at more places, while a newbro specializing in one area can get good in it rather quickly.

On the side note, I am not sure Screeps would work like that easily. But there surely could be things done to ease on the gap w/o making old players bored.

Update: unboosting now requires cooldown time equal to the total sum of the reactions needed to produce all the compounds being returned.

It makes this mechanic more difficult to code properly (different creeps must go to different labs, probably even in different rooms) which is a good thing for such a powerful feature.

Assuming it is done efficiently, I guess this change means that whereas before we'd save lab time and minerals by unboosting, now we just save minerals. I think that's an interesting change.

• For people who aren't reaction time limited, it's no change to the original unboost. Just harder to implement.
• For people who are reaction time limited sending far away creeps home to unboost is much less worthwhile: sending them home means you save minerals but costs you lab time (assuming the same total time on target is covered by multiple waves).
• Furthermore, if people are currently reaction time limited they're not going to majorly start using new types of boosts as unboost doesn't reduce the critical path. They'll unboost current economic boosts, and maybe those extra minerals can go via the market to free up some lab time, but it's not a clear shift.

For me this new change makes unboost pretty useless. I'll use it on my repair creeps, but that's it. I may be a special case though given I spend more than the average player on attacks.

However, now I can use the two central labs for unboosting since they're never in cooldown otherwise. In theory that should net me 20% created boosts.

A small gap between a new player and an old player, in EVE, really?

Yes, but for EVE "old" player is 5-8 years. You can essentially master a ship class in a year or two for initial + core skills, then less for each subsequent ship, unless you're going capital/supercapital. Once you have all skills for specific ship to 5, there is absolutely no matter how much SP you have invested in other ships, and two players, say a 2y/o vs 10 y/o would be perfectly equal and down to players actual skill rather than how much sp they have. And the gap is even less so once industry parts are concerned, except that old player will likely have accummulated a vast collection of their own blueprints, while new one would have to rely on purchasable pre-researched copies.

Or a T1 BC/BS vs a T2 BC/BS?

There are perfectly valid situations for where a T1 BC could outmatch a T2 one, and same goes for T1 BS vs T2 one. Fitting, for one, matters. I've taken down T2 faction fit frigates with a T1 one with T2 fit.

I could go on and on on this, but don't want to derail the thread any more than we already have.

Once you have all skills for specific ship to 5, there is absolutely no matter how much SP you have invested in other ships, and two players, say a 2y/o vs 10 y/o would be perfectly equal and down to players actual skill rather than how much sp they have.

A GCL10 player (~1 y/o) in Screeps can successfully compete with a GCL30 (~3 y/o) player for particular rooms/territory. There are many examples when such players outperformed more developed players both economically and military. Higher GCL helps to control larger territory, but it doesn't give an advantage in direct PvP starting from some point.

Fitting, for one, matters. I've taken down T2 faction fit frigates with a T1 one with T2 fit.

Fitting also requires skills.

I never take this argument about "old / new players" as valid. It's a MMO after all. It means players have constant persistent progress, and the game mechanics should make it possible to have progress for years.

Personally I think in this case @Shibdib is reaching here- it reminds me of jokingly arguing that energy should be removed because it gives older players a greater advantage. Let's be honest though- letting people recover some of their boosts is going to benefit pretty much anyone using boosts relatively equally, and boosts are already a major stepping stone for newbies.

That being said, @artch your previous actions don't really agree with the sentiment you express here. In the power creeps PTR you provided a shield against downward abuse by requiring that powers explicitly be enabled in a room by touching the controller before they can be used.

@artch @Shibdib It's important to differentiate between types of advantages- Boosts are, I think, one of the easier advantages to equalize- code is the problem, access to war material not so much.

I want to stress the difference between advantages- Veterans have an advantage in raw war materials, income, cpu management, etc. that yes, they've earned. These can also be overcome, but don't extend this to a blanket statement that it's OK to shaft new players to preserve old ones.

A player should be able to overcome issues with enough skill- veteran players have more skill (and code, which I'd argue is an extension of skill).

I still remember when this was on the website:

I guess we've come a long way since then.

EDIT:

In the interests of olive branching and not going full @tedivm on this, I do like the idea of unboosting. I'm not so certain that killing lab time is really the solution. I feel like some sort of middle ground would be useful- eat some lab time, but not just shutting down the lab entirely.