Damage Pulse as anti-missile defense

    alterintel

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    So I had this idea as an anti-missile defense. So I tested it. I rigged an array of damage pulses to be constantly triggering and then I shot a couple of missiles at it. The idea was that the waves of the damage pulse would kill the missile before it struck it's target. Well, as evidence of this post... it didn't work.

    But wouldn't it be cool if it did? I'm not sure why it didn't work, but I suspect that the damage pulse radius doesn't affect missiles at all.

    Is this a bug? or if not, could this be implemented?

    Thanks :)
     

    TheOmega

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    Im guessing the bubble doesn't actually expand, and hits everything at once. It should work, because all weapons do damage, and iv'e been able to hit a missile with a missile before. try using a turret with a pulse, unless that hits your own ship. I'm going to test this now to confirm or deny.
     

    Valiant70

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    Im guessing the bubble doesn't actually expand, and hits everything at once. It should work, because all weapons do damage, and iv'e been able to hit a missile with a missile before. try using a turret with a pulse, unless that hits your own ship. I'm going to test this now to confirm or deny.
    Wait, does that mean beams work for PD turrets? I didn't think they worked. Please test that while you're at it.
     

    AtraUnam

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    As far as I know pulse does not shoot down missiles, much to the disappointment of pretty much everyone who thinks of it. Also some general info about pulse that may prove useful, damage is dealt to the entire pulse-aoe at once, after the animation has finished. This means there is a fairly large delay between firing and damage being dealt.
     
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    Yeah, I cried over this in a little thread which happend to be named "Anti missile thread" .... this would be awsome, and would add some usefullness to the damage pulse, and we all know it would not hurt for it to have some more uses
     

    Crimson-Artist

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    this was the first thing i tried to do when they first announced that missiles were gonna be destructible. sadly came to the same conclusion. Though after some time i realized that some major changes to the way damage pulses work in order for this to work.

    As AtraUnam said. Damage is only applied after the bubble has disappeared. It would take some unbelievable timing and luck to be able to guess when a missile is going to hit and activate the pulse accordingly.

    The pulse itself does not move with the ship. meaning that even if they did take out missiles they you would have to bring your ship to a complete halt for it even to have a chance of working. If the pulse traveled along with its point of fire then it would be a lot better.

    The range is still abysmal, that would need to get buffed. Rather have PD turrets take out missiles from about 1000m away rather than have a Damage pulse shield do it at 50m. As an alternative i had suggested before that Damage pulses be able to reverse polarity on missiles, shooting them back at the person who fired them or at least deflect them back from their point of contact.
     
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    I hate to resurrect a dead thread, but what about a DamagePulse-Cannon system, with the pulse modules placed all over the exterior of the hull and set to fire constantly via logic blocks? Essentially providing a constant barrier of explosives? I'd imagine it also effective against boarding from players and small unshielded ramming ships?
     

    Lecic

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    No. Overpowered as fuck. Can't be targeted and taken out by cannons/beams like PD turrets, and can be set up with logic and numerous pulses to provide an unending missile shield.

    that risks killing you if u get out and forget to turn it off
    That's as simple as "not having the pulses hit your core room."

    Wait, does that mean beams work for PD turrets? I didn't think they worked. Please test that while you're at it.
    No, they don't work, as of my last testing. There's been no updates since I did that, so...

    The pulse itself does not move with the ship. meaning that even if they did take out missiles they you would have to bring your ship to a complete halt for it even to have a chance of working. If the pulse traveled along with its point of fire then it would be a lot better.


    You were saying? That was changed a couple updates back.
     
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    Yeah, reviving a necro thread was my bad, but it was something I really wanted discussed and this thread seemed to have brought it up and discussed at least a little bit.

    Anyway, in regards to damaging and killing the player there'd be some ways to reduce the risk on that greatly. First, very careful spacing and the player not forgetting to deactivate the logic. Second, cannon slaves reduce damage, as do EMP modules. Missiles (unless devs intend to change this) only have 1 hp, so we'd only need one damage per pulse minimum.

    Overpowered? yes. Absolutely. But so is it to have missiles swarms launched at you and your flak turrets can't nail them all out fast enough. You wouldn't need anymore flak turrets for missile defense which would free up hull space for other turrets, and you'd be considerably more defended against swarms (possibly including bayonet attacks? if done with a weakly shielded cloaked ship?
     

    Lecic

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    But so is it to have missiles swarms launched at you and your flak turrets can't nail them all out fast enough.
    Oh, yes, not being able to completely, 100% nullify missile weapons. That's definitely underpowered. Totally. Yup.
     
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    Oh, yes, not being able to completely, 100% nullify missile weapons. That's definitely underpowered. Totally. Yup.
    Aren't said weapon systems pretty useless against shields as-is? I thought I recalled reading that missiles do less damage against them? If shields go down, it wouldn't be hard to take out the pulse emitters and free up some areas to blast holes in.

    By the way, this isn't so much a suggestion to new content, but rather even I can already, and very quickly, retrofit my ship to be missile-immune. I'm honestly just surprised people haven't already done this?
     

    Lecic

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    Aren't said weapon systems pretty useless against shields as-is? I thought I recalled reading that missiles do less damage against them? If shields go down, it wouldn't be hard to take out the pulse emitters and free up some areas to blast holes in.
    Missiles do 20 DPS/block, which is effectively halved since ~50% of the damage will dissipate into space. Cannons and beams both do 10 DPS/block, so no- Missiles are not weaker against shields than anything else.

    As for taking out the pulse emitters- good luck hitting a huge number of emitters under multiple layers of armor.

    By the way, this isn't so much a suggestion to new content, but rather even I can already, and very quickly, retrofit my ship to be missile-immune. I'm honestly just surprised people haven't already done this?
    PD turrets are extremely easy to get rid of compared to a large number of 1 block structures under numerous layers of armor and under full shield protection instead of just 50%.

    Plus, that many pulses? Talk about a lagfest.