Better Ace style Thread - Vector Thrust

A long time ago I read a suggestion on acecombat skies for a new ace style. I don't remember the exact workings, just that the 3 styles were called "soldier," "marauder" and I think the last one was either defender or guardian. But something about that gave me an idea, which I did post there, but since that wasn't vector thrust specific I've been meaning to post it here too.

Instead of a sliding scale with "evil civilian killer" at one end and "Chivarlic knight of the skies that Pixy hates" on the other end, with the whole thing being tied to neutral targets, it could work like the color picker in a paint program:

The red dot is your ace style at the given moment and can be anywhere in the circle (Neutral is the center.) As you play missions you will score points toward all three ace styles, that will shift your marker towards the three points on the edge of the circle.

Marauder: Destroy as many neutral targets as possible. May seem evil but it also helped General Grant end the civil war more quickly.

Soldier: Complete your primary objectives under par time to earn soldier points. Doesn't reflect neutrality so much as loyalty to the brass.

Guardian: Points are awarded based on the number of friendlies that survive the mission. Don't get too carried away, completing the mission is your primary responsibility!

Secondary objectives could also award points for any of the three ace styles. Ideally you wouldn't need too many points to shift from one extreme to another-that would encourage minmaxing instead of trying different things.

Edited by: bornloser

To make things more interesting:

bornloser wrote:
Marauder: Destroy as many neutral targets as possible. May seem evil but it also helped General Grant end the civil war more quickly.

However, some other pilots/soldiers/neutral faction (civilian?) will either fear/hate you more. Even some wingmen begins to disobey your commands more often (depends on wingmen's personality, obviously), while the similarly insane wingmen will be more loyal with you.

Soldier: Complete your primary objectives under par time to earn soldier points. Doesn't reflect neutrality so much as loyalty to the brass.

Bare-bones, nothing special. You're just a soldier doing normal works and stuff.

Guardian: Points are awarded based on the number of friendlies that survive the mission. Don't get too carried away, completing the mission is your primary responsibility!

The surviving friendlies will obviously help you in future operations, depending on what units are they, it completely depends on mission structure.

In the end, this system could be used for branching storylines, get 100% of the following ace style and the plot will change (unlike ACZ where only dialogues are different), i.e your commanding general is defecting your faction, seeing you're loyal with him (marauder side), he convince you to join his force and fight for his cause until the end of the war. Moreover, those pilots with the most dislike towards you will obviously target you first (while constantly taunting you all the time) if you encounter them. If you're not in marauder style, you'll end up fight him and his force instead eventually.

Edited by: Nergal01

I'm not sure requiring 100% would be the best way to do it. Maybe 80%. Also, I don't really think your wingmen will get upset with you for following marauder style if it means they get to go home sooner, but pure soldier style (scoring points with the brass at all costs) might piss them off.

I like the idea and the game would only require a few tweaks to make it possible.
But I have some questions,

Your display seems a bit misleading because the players can me a marauder, soldier and guardian all at the same time.
I’m stretching a bit, but if the player dashes to the enemy base and drops a nuke, it kill everything in the zone (Marauder++), finish quickly (Soldier++) and all the allies survive (Guardian++)
If is this what you intended, then there is more situations that can be explored in a branching story.

The other question is when do you thing this display should be visible, only in the debriefing or in other situations?

timeSymmetry wrote: I like the idea and the game would only require a few tweaks to make it possible.
But I have some questions,

Your display seems a bit misleading because the players can me a marauder, soldier and guardian all at the same time.
I’m stretching a bit, but if the player dashes to the enemy base and drops a nuke, it kill everything in the zone (Marauder++), finish quickly (Soldier++) and all the allies survive (Guardian++)
If is this what you intended, then there is more situations that can be explored in a branching story.

The other question is when do you thing this display should be visible, only in the debriefing or in other situations?

You actually wouldn't be able to be soldier, marauder, or guardian at the same time. Your ace style is the red dot and if it's too close to the center then you would have a neutral ace style (and no one would pay attention to you in the story). As for the nuke scenario it would really be more like soldier++, guardian++, and marauder+++++, so the marker would move towards the marauder side of the circle no matter how many allies you saved or how quickly you completed the mission (unless you just used conventional weapons to destroy the base. If nukes are going to affect ace style then they should be optional.)

The ace style would be shown during the debriefing, just like in zero.