Brainstorm This Adding some excitement to combat - Small Ships - DOT Weapons - Hacking and more!

[Benevolent27]

sounds good to me

I went ahead and expanded on the idea a bit, to introduce a "Charge-Up Module," which would have the sort of effect I discussed with you on damage beam, but would also introduce a new game mechanic for other weapon types too.
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Yes, and I must agree with your point, but what if they are human-piloted turrets? It would destroy the purpose of using a turret on someone else's ship to shoot. You could still affect the Bobby AI though.

I can see your point and I certainly don't want to discourage human piloted turrets. The whole point of my idea is to more involve player skill in combat.

Here are a few of my thoughts on this though. As it is presently, human-controlled turrets do NOT rely on mass enhancers for turn speed, so there would be no effect if they are shot with a turret discombobulator. However, I don't see this as realistic and I believe this should be patched. But, that aside, I believe the Turret Discombobulator effect weapon would actually provide benefits to a turret controlled by a human rather than AI, as I will detail below,
Players, whom are manning a turret, can:
A. Call on friendly fighter pilots to assist them if they need help.
B. Inform the pilot of the ship they are attached to to take evasive maneuvers, to make them harder to hit.
C. More intelligently target the ship that is attempting to disable them, whereas an AI would more randomly attack nearby enemies.

Now, I think every effect I suggested would 100% require testing and balancing. How powerful would the effect be? Might secondary effects needed to be added? For example, perhaps a bobby AI is forced into a "reboot mode" for 10 seconds, being unable to move or fire, if the rail mass enhancer level reaches 0 (or maybe 50%) if the status effect caused this. If the turret is controlled by a player, however, then they can still shoot within their field of view, even if they cannot move (or move quickly).

 

[Benevolent27]

Ok, so I've brainstormed the heck out of this. If some feedback could be given on what might need expanding on (or shrinking) for it to be given further consideration, it would be much appreciated.

 

[Gunseng]

I see Hacking more like a debuff that fires a beam of nano hacking bots with timed affects and recharge.

• If set to Sensor Hacks you can "blind" the target or/and targets in range making getaways easier
• If set to Turret Hacks all AI turrets on target or/and targets in range have a higher "miss" chance
• If set to Shield Hacks the target's or/and targets' in area shields are unable to recharge
• If set to Energy Hacks the target's or/and targets' in area power regen is reduced (but not stopped)

Then for DoT weapons 2 ideas:

• Plasma Damage Support Module - This changes a weapon to leave a plasma "residue" on the shield of the ship that changes the damage to damage over time but is less effective against Hulls.
• Chemical Damage Support Module - This changes a weapon to leave highly acidic "residue" on the hull of the ship that changes the damage to over time but is less effective against Shields.

Here's an idea for a "bomber weapon" I'm still trying to figure out a "cost" for the weapon though.

• DiPhasing (Dimensional Phasing) Damage Support Module - This makes it so the linked weapon can "phase" through shields possibly at the cost of an entire system being shutdown temporarily (like shields or the power grid) or the recharge time could be insanely high.

 

[Wolverines527]

For hacking have the mini game be based off of rampart the hacker controls a slow moving dinky raft that needs to touch land as close to the fort as possible

The more mass a ship has the more cannons it has a titan would have 25 cannons to punish a hacker in this mini game and the closer to land the hacker gets the faster the cannon balls land and destroy them

The closer to the fortress you land the better bonus your going to get if you get destroyed then your hack fails

 

[Benevolent27]

I see Hacking more like a debuff that fires a beam of nano hacking bots with timed affects and recharge.

• If set to Sensor Hacks you can "blind" the target or/and targets in range making getaways easier
• If set to Turret Hacks all AI turrets on target or/and targets in range have a higher "miss" chance
• If set to Shield Hacks the target's or/and targets' in area shields are unable to recharge
• If set to Energy Hacks the target's or/and targets' in area power regen is reduced (but not stopped)

Then for DoT weapons 2 ideas:

• Plasma Damage Support Module - This changes a weapon to leave a plasma "residue" on the shield of the ship that changes the damage to damage over time but is less effective against Hulls.
• Chemical Damage Support Module - This changes a weapon to leave highly acidic "residue" on the hull of the ship that changes the damage to over time but is less effective against Shields.

Here's an idea for a "bomber weapon" I'm still trying to figure out a "cost" for the weapon though.

• DiPhasing (Dimensional Phasing) Damage Support Module - This makes it so the linked weapon can "phase" through shields possibly at the cost of an entire system being shutdown temporarily (like shields or the power grid) or the recharge time could be insanely high.

Hmm.. Nano hacking bots. That's interesting! Though, for the sake of avoiding confusion, I feel it should be noted that this is an idea for a status effect, nanobots "hacking" being the delivery system. What do you think about the nanobots basically sticking to the outside of the ships, and would wear out after a while. Also, a person could shoot the nanobots with Astrotech modules to destroy them.

For the DoT weapon ideas, sure. To me, the more variability in weapon types, the better. I like the idea of having more visual representations of attacks on a ship as well. I can imagine a large titan ship with patches of plasma or chemical residue everywhere as a swarm of fighters engages.

For your idea of a bomber weapon, currently the warhead block bypasses shields. However, I really don't like the drawbacks, so I don't use them, personally. I feel that if a weapon could simply bypass shields though, it may be a bit overpowered. Consider a titan ship constantly taking damage, needing repairs, every battle. Here's are my thoughts on how to balance such a tertiary effect module. How about having shields use a modulation frequency, which can be manually changed by players. An attacker would use a support beam, a shield analyzer, to ascertain that frequency (taking time to do so). To use it, you connect the shield analyzer computer to the DiPhasing Damage Support computer to feed it the information once it retrieves it. This would allow different weapons to operate at different frequencies. I'll give an example of using it in combat.
A swarm of fighters enters the battlefield, one of them immediately starts shooting it's analyzer beam at a titan. It takes one minute to determine the frequency, so long as it keeps hitting the target - it will lose it's progress somewhat quickly if the attack stops. After the minute, the frequency was obtained, and now the fighter has a set of cannons set to bypass the shields, and starts making runs. The pilot also yells out the code on teamspeak to their allies, who manually remodulate their weapons to that frequency. It takes maybe 30 seconds for the weapon's frequency to be remodulated, once the code is put in (either automatically or manually). They manage to damage some of the turrets on the capital ship and tear into the hull a bit. Noticing this, the capital ship captain remodulates their shields to stop the onslaught. What do you think?

 

[Gunseng]

"Benevolent27, post: 268304, member: 668030"]Hmm.. Nano hacking bots. That's interesting! Though, for the sake of avoiding confusion, I feel it should be noted that this is an idea for a status effect, nanobots "hacking" being the delivery system. What do you think about the nanobots basically sticking to the outside of the ships, and would wear out after a while. Also, a person could shoot the nanobots with Astrotech modules to destroy them.

For the DoT weapon ideas, sure. To me, the more variability in weapon types, the better. I like the idea of having more visual representations of attacks on a ship as well. I can imagine a large titan ship with patches of plasma or chemical residue everywhere as a swarm of fighters engages.

That's a good idea with the nano hacking bots, and could use the same mechanic the chemical and plasma DoT weapons just with different affects to the enemy ships.

"For your idea of a bomber weapon, currently the warhead block bypasses shields. However, I really don't like the drawbacks, so I don't use them, personally. I feel that if a weapon could simply bypass shields though, it may be a bit overpowered. Consider a titan ship constantly taking damage, needing repairs, every battle. Here's are my thoughts on how to balance such a tertiary effect module. How about having shields use a modulation frequency, which can be manually changed by players. An attacker would use a support beam, a shield analyzer, to ascertain that frequency (taking time to do so). To use it, you connect the shield analyzer computer to the DiPhasing Damage Support computer to feed it the information once it retrieves it. This would allow different weapons to operate at different frequencies. I'll give an example of using it in combat.
A swarm of fighters enters the battlefield, one of them immediately starts shooting it's analyzer beam at a titan. It takes one minute to determine the frequency, so long as it keeps hitting the target - it will lose it's progress somewhat quickly if the attack stops. After the minute, the frequency was obtained, and now the fighter has a set of cannons set to bypass the shields, and starts making runs. The pilot also yells out the code on teamspeak to their allies, who manually remodulate their weapons to that frequency. It takes maybe 30 seconds for the weapon's frequency to be remodulated, once the code is put in (either automatically or manually). They manage to damage some of the turrets on the capital ship and tear into the hull a bit. Noticing this, the capital ship captain remodulates their shields to stop the onslaught. What do you think?

I personally don't like the idea of bombers in Starmade since it doesn't translate well in resources. Think of how much energy/resources are spent to make bombs to then be added to a delivery mechanism where Starmade has more instant "production" of the weapons on the delivery mechanism. I do think Torpedo AI would be better and would encourage complex docking systems to reload with.

As for Shield Modulating that would be very complex to implement (but I love the idea). Maybe instead just have a Shield Modulater Computer and Module that acts similar to the Jammer (on and consumes power, off) but instead gives your projectiles a small chance to pass through shields, which the defending ship can use as well to defend from it. With a high power drain/recharge this could encourage "bombing runs" that a large ship could still defend against but could be in serious trouble if they ignore it or are caught off guard.

 

[Lecic]

Yeah, no, this is massively overpowered. A lone fighter can't and SHOULDN'T be able to do anything to a big ship. If you want your small ships to damage a large ship, fly with friends or allies.

but instead of doing flat bonus damage (by 2x) and increasing power usage (by 5x),

Overdrive does 3x damage for 6x power, jsyk.

 

[Benevolent27]

Yeah, no, this is massively overpowered. A lone fighter can't and SHOULDN'T be able to do anything to a big ship. If you want your small ships to damage a large ship, fly with friends or allies.



Overdrive does 3x damage for 6x power, jsyk.

I'm not saying a small fighter should be able to kill a titan, and I don't think my suggestions here would allow that. What part do you think is "massively overpowered"? What I am saying is that the game needs balancing to encourage players to use smaller ships and develop fighter skills. Right now, the biggest and best designed ship always wins. Though this is cool and all, there is not enough skill in combat. It also is detrimental to the game, because it encourages players to build ships that are so large, they lag and ultimately takes the fun out of combat. My suggestions would require balancing, of course, but they would allow piloting and aiming skill to play a bigger part in winning, thus encouraging smaller ships to take part in a battle. Titan ships would still be useful, but people would also want to have smaller fighters helping to protect them. Right now a titan, with turrets, has no trouble taking out a fleet of fighters. What I am suggesting is that we allow that fleet of fighters to win the battle against an unprotected titan, if they possess the skill and firepower to do so. Flying with friends is what this suggestion is all about.

Edit: About overdrive, I read back to what you were referring to in my post. I was speaking about how much damage is ADDED, not the total amount multiplier. 1X + 2X = 3X. 1X + 5X = 6X. So 2X damage is ADDED, and 5X power requirement is ADDED. I hope that clarifies things for you.

 

[Lecic]

What part do you think is "massively overpowered"?

Primarily this.

Spoiler: OP Bits

4. Implement DOT (Damage Over Time) and status effect weapons. The purpose of this in most games is that it introduces a play style of hit and run. This is an important tactic of nimble fighters. For all of these types of weapons, the projectiles need to be slow enough for smaller ships to dodge, but larger ships would have a much harder time since they are bigger, slower moving targets. Here are a few examples of new weapons I propose:
A. The Shield Disruptor.
This slow-moving projectile crackles and glows as it moves forward and when it hits, hit damages shield regeneration. It would stack and last a certain amount of time, perhaps five seconds. If you keep hitting the same spot, over and over, it would do a slight exponential amount of damage for each additional hit, so long as the effect does not wear off before the next hit happens. The downside of this effect is that it is a rather slow projectile with a short range. They would also be dumb-fire. No lock-on. This weapon would NOT be very useful against small fighters (even if equipped on a turret), but small fighters could use it well on a large ship.
B. Energy Distruptor
Each module does 5 energy damage per second, over 5 seconds. The hits stacks with the previous amount of disruption and lengthens the time of the effect from previous hits. The difference between this and a shield disruptor is that it doesn't matter where you hit the enemy, it works the same. So a small fighter could actually completely disable a large ship's power regeneration if they kept hitting them long enough and does not allow the status to come off.
C. Thruster Disruptor
This works the same as an energy disruptor, except it affects thrusters. It could be strengthened with a push/pull/stop module as a tertiary effect, which would affect what TYPE of thrust it affects. A push module oriented forward as a tertiary effect would affect the forward/backward thrust of a ship. A stop module would make it affect the ability of a ship to brake. A push module facing backwards would make it affect the ability of a ship to rotate.
D. Turret Discombobulator
What it does is damages the ability of turrets to turn on their axis, by reducing the effectiveness of the rail mass enhancers. The shots would HAVE TO hit a turret, not the main ship to be efffective. These shots would also be a bit faster than the disruptor varieties, since turrets tend to move around a bit. It could also be modified with a push or pull module (facing a certain direction), which would change the effect to make a turret spaz out, turning in that direction involuntarily and disrupting it's aim. With this, I would also suggest a change in how rail mass enhancers work. Turrets would have a move speed proportionate to the amount of mass enhancers provided. So if there is 50% of the required mass enhancers, it turns at 50% speed, not 1% speed as it is now. The effect stays for as long as the turret keeps getting hit, and the effect grows larger and larger. If the DOT comes off however.. the turret regains full functionality.

5. Implement hacking.
This could basically be a series of mini-games - or simply a hack requiring time. You have to get very close to an enemy ship and then start hacking them. You can also be counter-hacked by a person on the ship you are attempting to hack. It would work fastest while in astronaut mode and touching the ship. While you are hacking, you are unaware of the outside world (unless you die). The larger a ship is, the harder it is to hack. You can hack their shields, energy regen, thrusters, open all doors on the ship, or disable all AI turrets - you choose. If you succeed, shields/energy/thrusters are brought down entirely for 30 seconds, all the doors on the ship open, or all turrets are turned off for 30 seconds (and then reset to their previous state). If you fail, you lose nothing. However if the enemy ship being hacked had a "Feedback Computer" installed, it sends a power arc toward the hacker upon an unsuccessful hack. It would do significant damage to shields and power if the hacker was in a ship and would do significant damage to an astronaut, possibly killing them. It only affects the person who attempted the hack, not everyone else nearby. The more modules attached to this feedback computer, the stronger the effect would be. This would encourage smaller ships and boarding parties with the intent of hacking! Also, a combat scanner would tell a pilot if someone is attempting to hack them.

Hacking Mini-Game Ideas (New! 01-20-16):
There are so many possibilities. Many games throughout the years have introduced mini-games for such things as lock picking, hacking, etc. So, what would be appropriate for StarMade? I am definitely curious to know other player's thoughts on this, but here's what I have so far for some thoughts.
A. Matrix-style
Hacking:
This is arguably the most complicated route to go, but I think it would be pretty cool. You plug in and enter an alternative world that has three dimensional properties. This "world" would be procedurally generated, with a virtual base being the target. Weapon systems, shields, doors, and turret AI systems would have physical counterparts which would need to be disabled by the hacker. The larger these systems are on the real ship, the more difficult it would be. Perhaps the virtual manifistation could be a modular base that is like a maze. You have to navigate through it to find the system you want to affect. The larger the mass of the ship, the larger the maze is. When you find the system you want to affect, the hacker holds down their right mouse button to initiate deactivation. The larger the system is, the longer it takes. Perhaps the virtual base could also be player designed, being docked segments that HAVE TO comply with certain rules (such as being a certain size, have a docking port on different edges and docking modules on the edges. It could be configured that players also start in a small fighter ship in this universe (which they cannot exit) and instead of right clicking on systems, they have to destroy them. More than one hacker can join this virtual world at a time, but when all hackers have left, it resets to it's default state.
Counter-Hacking:
To banish the hacker, a member of the ship being hacked plugs into the virtual world equipped with a weapon, and has to kill the hacker.

B. 2-D Asteroids Style
Hacking:
A 2-dimensional game opens up and a person is piloting a simple 2-d ship that shoots straight shots. They have to fly around and find the systems floating around. The larger the ship they are hacking, the more asteroids are around to impede their traveling and the farther apart the different ship systems are. There might also be somewhat dumb AI controlled ships flying around, working as the ship's natural self-defense system. Once the hacker finds the ship system they want, they have to destroy it.
Counter-Hacking:
A member of the ship being hacked enters the world with their own ship and a pointer directing them to where the hacker is.

C. A Simple Hacking Console
Hacking:
This would not be a mini-game at all. The hacker simply selects the system they want and starts the hack. The larger the ship is and vitality of the system, the longer it takes. For example, how long it takes to hack the doors would simply rely on the mass of the ship for the calculation. Shields would rely on the amount of shields, shield rechargers, AND mass - it should probably take longer than opening doors. Disabling turrets would rely on the number and mass of attached turrets, not taking into account the main ship size. Etc.
Counter-Hacking:
To counter hack, a member of the ship being hacked has to respond within a certain timeframe and initiate the counter hack. If they don't respond fast enough, however, there will be nothing they can do. Perhaps it could show an animated progress as it "searches for the hacker." When the hacker is found, they are booted from the system (and punished if a Feedback Computer is installed on the ship).

D. A memory game - One Example
Hacking:
A ship would have a certain amount of points necessary for each system to be disabled, calculated based on the strength of the system. For example, disabling shields may take 10,000 points on a particularly strong ship, 2,500 to open the doors, 6,000 for disabling turrets, etc. The hacker has to play a memory game, where they flip over different panels which have symbols on them. They have to match them up to other ones of the same type, getting points for each successful try. When they reach the number they need, options to hack the different systems open up.
Counter-Hacking:
The counter-hacker could initiate a counter-hack, which would "search for the hacker," (like the simple console hacking), but with a twist. They can change the order the panels are in to further twart the hacker, there perhaps being a cooldown time per change they make before they can make another change.

Small ships can already dominate a large ship in groups with just 30% of that large ship's mass. I'm having extreme difficulty seeing how these could NOT be overpowered, especially with just an AI fleet.

Right now, the biggest and best designed ship always wins.

We may be getting fleet control very soon, next update even, which, for reasons I stated earlier, is going to be a death knell for any lone titan flying around.

 

[Benevolent27]

Primarily this.

Small ships can already dominate a large ship in groups with just 30% of that large ship's mass. I'm having extreme difficulty seeing how these could NOT be overpowered, especially with just an AI fleet.



We may be getting fleet control very soon, next update even, which, for reasons I stated earlier, is going to be a death knell for any lone titan flying around.

First, let me say, thank you for your feedback. And now, let me make a few points.
1. Balancing is important for any weapon and ANY weapon can be under or overpowered. I'll give an example of a ridiculously underpowered implementation. Let's say the shield disruptor adds a DOT, and that DOT prevents a certain amount of shield recharge. Each module does 0.0000001 shield recharge damage, and the DOT lasts for 10 seconds. The DOT can stack up to 5 times. The weapon has an 8 second cool time. Now you go and attack a titan with this weapon. You have 2,000 modules on your fighter, so at first your DOT only prevents 0.0002 shield recharge per second. After 5 hits of sustaining the DOT, 0.001 shield recharge per second has been prevented on the titan ship. Now, would be overpowered or underpowered? And next question, do you see that the weapon can be balanced?

2. I disagree that small AI ships dominate large ships. I can give an easy example of why I believe this. When I went pirate hunting, on the last server I was on, I could handle 50 pirate ships easily in my large ship. It had 92 million shields. The pirates had 500k, 1.2m, and 6m shields, and the the distribution of deployment was about equal for each type. This added up to about 115,500,000 shields for the group of 50 (in total). Now, my ship had 0 armor and 4 large turrets. Their ships were heavily armored. I had NO anti-missile turrets, and their ships had cannons that would shoot at my missiles. By what you said, I should be completely overpowered. But in reality, I would just sit there as they flew around till they all died and then collected everything. Now, if you think you can build a fleet using merely 30% of a titan ships parts and fight against my titan. I welcome you to try.

3. Even if what you said were true, about titans being vulnerable against smaller ships, is there any advantage to having a mixed fleet, instead of everyone just bringing their largest, laggiest ships? No, they bring their biggest, baddest ships, and lag the heck out of the server. What I am suggesting is we create drawbacks to this sort of strategy and make it a advantageous to use a mixed fleet, with players having to pilot some of the smaller fighters. I believe that DOT and status effect weapons would do just that.

About fleet control. I think that will be awesome and I think it will help change the dynamic of warring. But.. For the reasons above, I don't see it working out too well for players who create a lot of small fighter ships. A well designed titan should immediately destroy several of the ships on the first hits. Every hit, more of the fighter ships will die. Fleets of fighter ships will almost ALWAYS lose at least something. And titans can simply jump away if things start getting too dangerous. Now, I don't know about you, but I wouldn't feel too safe piloting a fighter ship in this fight. Though I do think fleet control will be a great addition to the game, I don't think it does enough to encourage players to fight in smaller ships. In a best case scenario, I still see players being stuck in their large, laggy titans, but now they also bring their fleets with them too.. causing even MORE lag. Thought it might be a bit more fun, since they can control their fleet a bit during combat.. Meh. It's not really "exciting" combat to be macroing their fleet, is it?

 

[Lecic]

2. I disagree that small AI ships dominate large ships. I can give an easy example of why I believe this. When I went pirate hunting, on the last server I was on, I could handle 50 pirate ships easily in my large ship. It had 92 million shields. The pirates had 500k, 1.2m, and 6m shields, and the the distribution of deployment was about equal for each type. This added up to about 115,500,000 shields for the group of 50 (in total). Now, my ship had 0 armor and 4 large turrets. Their ships were heavily armored. I had NO anti-missile turrets, and their ships had cannons that would shoot at my missiles. By what you said, I should be completely overpowered. But in reality, I would just sit there as they flew around till they all died and then collected everything. Now, if you think you can build a fleet using merely 30% of a titan ships parts and fight against my titan. I welcome you to try.

Pirates are morons with horrible AI. You also said they were using cannons, which means they're likely to miss, especially if the server has low difficulty settings. If you have looked in general discussion, like... ever? You might notice an absolutely MASSIVE DRONE THREAD showing that all drones need to become the dominating force of the battlefield is a way to properly control them. The 30% thing is pretty well established.

3. Even if what you said were true, about titans being vulnerable against smaller ships, is there any advantage to having a mixed fleet, instead of everyone just bringing their largest, laggiest ships? No, they bring their biggest, baddest ships, and lag the heck out of the server. What I am suggesting is we create drawbacks to this sort of strategy and make it a advantageous to use a mixed fleet, with players having to pilot some of the smaller fighters. I believe that DOT and status effect weapons would do just that.

Yes, there is a huge advantage to a mixed fleet- COST. I've heard of far too many people flat out quitting the game after they lose their jumbo titan that contains 95% of all the resources they've ever collected on that server.

About fleet control. I think that will be awesome and I think it will help change the dynamic of warring. But.. For the reasons above, I don't see it working out too well for players who create a lot of small fighter ships. A well designed titan should immediately destroy several of the ships on the first hits. Every hit, more of the fighter ships will die. Fleets of fighter ships will almost ALWAYS lose at least something. And titans can simply jump away if things start getting too dangerous. Now, I don't know about you, but I wouldn't feel too safe piloting a fighter ship in this fight. Though I do think fleet control will be a great addition to the game, I don't think it does enough to encourage players to fight in smaller ships. In a best case scenario, I still see players being stuck in their large, laggy titans, but now they also bring their fleets with them too.. causing even MORE lag. Thought it might be a bit more fun, since they can control their fleet a bit during combat.. Meh. It's not really "exciting" combat to be macroing their fleet, is it?

Again, cost- it's cheaper AND more effective to bring 5 100k block ships than 1 1mil block ship. Lots of fighters are cheaper. Once we get a proper way to spawn on ships, I'm sure player controlled fighter squadrons will become more common, since people don't have to worry about getting wiped out of the battle early on.

 

[Benevolent27]

Pirates are morons with horrible AI. You also said they were using cannons, which means they're likely to miss, especially if the server has low difficulty settings. If you have looked in general discussion, like... ever? You might notice an absolutely MASSIVE DRONE THREAD showing that all drones need to become the dominating force of the battlefield is a way to properly control them. The 30% thing is pretty well established.



Yes, there is a huge advantage to a mixed fleet- COST. I've heard of far too many people flat out quitting the game after they lose their jumbo titan that contains 95% of all the resources they've ever collected on that server.



Again, cost- it's cheaper AND more effective to bring 5 100k block ships than 1 1mil block ship. Lots of fighters are cheaper. Once we get a proper way to spawn on ships, I'm sure player controlled fighter squadrons will become more common, since people don't have to worry about getting wiped out of the battle early on.

Alright, so you think combat is exciting and smaller ships have the upper hand, and nothing needs to be done to help make combat more exciting and to encourage people to use smaller ships. You say it is "crappy pirate AI" in my comparison. But you fail to realize that a "fleet" someone makes, as opposed to a titan, would ALSO be crappy AI modules.. Which is exactly the same as a pirate fleet..

But.. Let's test this, shall we? You have made a direct claim here. So, with 30% of the materials, I challenge you to make a fleet of AI controlled ships that will kill the titan ship I designed. It is 3 million blocks large. You can use up to 1 million blocks to make your AI fleet in any combination you wish. But you can only have 1 human pilot. I will create a server in creative mode using vanilla settings (but larger sectors), and we will spawn your ships in. I will need to check and verify the block count of your blueprints before the battle commences. You can also pilot whatever ship in your fleet you would like, I and I will pilot the titan. If you choose not to partake in this competition, and you have someone else in mind to take your place, I welcome you to have someone else take part. (or anybody who reads this, you can accept this challenge)

Now, if there is someone who doesn't know what they are doing and they build a crappy, wasteful titan, and they lose it and complain on the general forums, then I don't see why that is my problem. But if you want to test this, I'm all for that. On the servers I have played on, it is suicidal to pilot a smaller ship in a war. I have yet to see any faction or person win a battle by merit of skill, as opposed to having the larger, better designed ship (with turrets doing most of the damage). When it comes to a war, the battles are typically just sitting there watching the battle happen, the server lags immensely, and there is little player engagement. Normally a battle is won when one person's titan starts taking damage and they jump away. I have also seen where players attempt to bring in their smaller fighters, and they are immediately killed and their ships are lost. Now, I am 100% sure that someone can have a somewhat smaller, better designed ship that kills a larger ship, but it is not by merit of their piloting and aiming skill that they do so, it is because larger ship was poorly designed. What my suggestion is about is introducing weapons, where player skill in piloting and accuracy will trump AI turrets.

About it being cheaper to have smaller fighters. This is true, but you also stand a much greater chance of losing them. It is a calculated risk a person needs to make. And I think that is a good thing, because it IS a factor that encourages players to make smaller ships. But, in my opinion, it isn't good enough. I have about a thousand hours logged in StarMade, and I have yet to see any fleet of smaller ships bring down even a single titan. I have heard so many people complain about battle being so boring, and I got fed up with it, and I came up with these ideas, to help favor a more exciting and less laggy combat.

 

[Nickizzy]

Ooh! A challenge!

Yes to DoT, lightning balls are awsome!
About hacking, I like the matrix style one best, anything thats not a chargeup thing or a seperate universe type thing with the same starmade style as regular(except for some cool lighting and texture and stuff), I would HATE having a candycrush like hacking screen or something like that, it just wouldn't be starmade.

Flares should be the ship loses it's signal, although you can still see it, and it's signal should go to a "flare" entity like a missile that could be destroied by anything(or should they stick to blocks!? Shoot at that guy!). Until the flare is destroied all ai after that ship would target the flare, and all lockon and swarm missiles would go after the flare. Onece the flare is destroied or 40 seconds passes the ship regains it's signal, and has a 2 minute recharge. You can only have one flare system.

I only like the chargeup effect for lasers, make that the effect for all of them. If you shoot in one spot determined by the ship's size (if less than 100 volume, 1 block, <500 2 by 2,<1000 3by 3, <2000 4by4, ect.)with every shot fired and within x* seconds of the last hit you would deal more and more damage and eventually (after a certain amount of concentrated fire) deal a very slight(.1-1%) shield penitration.
Certain weapons have to be faster or slower, depending on their reload time. Beams would stack as they did damage, and would only be able to stack on multible charges with cannon and regular fire(beam-pulse would deal more and more damage if it hit the same spot in one fire, but the multiplier would reset after each recharge.

It reminds me of the inferno towers in clash of clans.

 

[Benevolent27]

Ooh! A challenge!

Yes to DoT, lightning balls are awsome!
About hacking, I like the matrix style one best, anything thats not a chargeup thing or a seperate universe type thing with the same starmade style as regular(except for some cool lighting and texture and stuff), I would HATE having a candycrush like hacking screen or something like that, it just wouldn't be starmade.

Flares should be the ship loses it's signal, although you can still see it, and it's signal should go to a "flare" entity like a missile that could be destroied by anything(or should they stick to blocks!? Shoot at that guy!). Until the flare is destroied all ai after that ship would target the flare, and all lockon and swarm missiles would go after the flare. Onece the flare is destroied or 40 seconds passes the ship regains it's signal, and has a 2 minute recharge. You can only have one flare system.

I only like the chargeup effect for lasers, make that the effect for all of them. If you shoot in one spot determined by the ship's size (if less than 100 volume, 1 block, <500 2 by 2,<1000 3by 3, <2000 4by4, ect.)with every shot fired and within x* seconds of the last hit you would deal more and more damage and eventually (after a certain amount of concentrated fire) deal a very slight(.1-1%) shield penitration.
Certain weapons have to be faster or slower, depending on their reload time. Beams would stack as they did damage, and would only be able to stack on multible charges with cannon and regular fire(beam-pulse would deal more and more damage if it hit the same spot in one fire, but the multiplier would reset after each recharge.

It reminds me of the inferno towers in clash of clans.

Sticky flares! That would be HILARIOUS! I love it!

As for the charge-up effects, my idea is just an example! I think there are so many ways to implement DOT, charge-up, and status effect weapons. My ideas are not the only way to do em. I do like to throw ideas against the wall though and see what sticks! So far I've heard lots of great suggestions, from acid clouds, nano-bots, plasma residue, ooooh. I just thought of another! How about a status-effect type weapon that creates a hole in a person's shielding? You shoot it at the hull enough times and a hole in the shielding appears. All fighters target the starboard nacelle!

I think for a lot of the ideas I propose, they will eventually get implemented via the modding API, but I would not mind at least basic forms of them being implemented into the game (especially if the modding API takes forever to implement). I have some scripting knowledge myself, and I will create them if Schine ever releases this functionality. I would then give permission to anyone to modify them however they please, so people would have options. Your way is just as valid as my way. I put a lot of thought into my reasoning, but I think testing to see what is most fun is what ultimately determines the winner.

 

[Lecic]

Alright, so you think combat is exciting and smaller ships have the upper hand, and nothing needs to be done to help make combat more exciting and to encourage people to use smaller ships. You say it is "crappy pirate AI" in my comparison. But you fail to realize that a "fleet" someone makes, as opposed to a titan, would ALSO be crappy AI modules.. Which is exactly the same as a pirate fleet..

AI is getting fixed in the future.

ut.. Let's test this, shall we? You have made a direct claim here. So, with 30% of the materials, I challenge you to make a fleet of AI controlled ships that will kill the titan ship I designed. It is 3 million blocks large. You can use up to 1 million blocks to make your AI fleet in any combination you wish. But you can only have 1 human pilot. I will create a server in creative mode using vanilla settings (but larger sectors), and we will spawn your ships in. I will need to check and verify the block count of your blueprints before the battle commences. You can also pilot whatever ship in your fleet you would like, I and I will pilot the titan. If you choose not to partake in this competition, and you have someone else in mind to take your place, I welcome you to have someone else take part. (or anybody who reads this, you can accept this challenge)

Now, if there is someone who doesn't know what they are doing and they build a crappy, wasteful titan, and they lose it and complain on the general forums, then I don't see why that is my problem. But if you want to test this, I'm all for that. On the servers I have played on, it is suicidal to pilot a smaller ship in a war. I have yet to see any faction or person win a battle by merit of skill, as opposed to having the larger, better designed ship (with turrets doing most of the damage). When it comes to a war, the battles are typically just sitting there watching the battle happen, the server lags immensely, and there is little player engagement. Normally a battle is won when one person's titan starts taking damage and they jump away. I have also seen where players attempt to bring in their smaller fighters, and they are immediately killed and their ships are lost. Now, I am 100% sure that someone can have a somewhat smaller, better designed ship that kills a larger ship, but it is not by merit of their piloting and aiming skill that they do so, it is because larger ship was poorly designed. What my suggestion is about is introducing weapons, where player skill in piloting and accuracy will trump AI turrets.

About it being cheaper to have smaller fighters. This is true, but you also stand a much greater chance of losing them. It is a calculated risk a person needs to make. And I think that is a good thing, because it IS a factor that encourages players to make smaller ships. But, in my opinion, it isn't good enough. I have about a thousand hours logged in StarMade, and I have yet to see any fleet of smaller ships bring down even a single titan. I have heard so many people complain about battle being so boring, and I got fed up with it, and I came up with these ideas, to help favor a more exciting and less laggy combat.

Sure.

 

[banks456]

If you add these things to the small ships then you will have to give larger ships counter measures because in reality a large ship would have ways to prevent most of these type of attacks maybe not all but most. If you add the ability to hack in this game then you must add a firewall system and larger ships are going to have access to a powerful firewall system.
I think its a good idea but I hope it doesn't make a fun game extremely too complex. Larger ships are usually going to be taken down by larger ships but I see no issue with giving a smaller ship or a group of smaller ships a realistic small chance to take down a bigger ship because it does happen in every single SCI FI movie or TV show. I would love to see more weapon systems in this game . The ore weapons systems the better the battle will be.
I would love to have the ability to ram ships into one another in this game. That would make having a smaller ship pretty fun as well. If you're getting ready to be destroyed and you just run your ship into a larger ship causing enough damage to put a hole in the large ship. Smaller ships should be extremely fast and maneuverable. I should see somebody in a small ship flying over me like a Jet fighter or something. I hardly see it.

Also smaller AI ships should act like smaller ships and fly faster and perform maneuvers. The smaller AI ships in this game move like large ships.

 

[Malacodor]

Also smaller AI ships should act like smaller ships and fly faster

Why? There's no water or air resistance in space.

 

[Nickizzy]

Why? There's no water or air resistance in space.

I think he's saying AI in smaller and more manuverable ships should have a more evasive AI than slower, larger ships. Maybe switch over on a combonation of turning speed and thrust-mass ratio, or make it a setting in the AI menu.

 

[banks456]

I think he's saying AI in smaller and more manuverable ships should have a more evasive AI than slower, larger ships. Maybe switch over on a combonation of turning speed and thrust-mass ratio, or make it a setting in the AI menu.

Yes that's what I meant to say.. Thanks.

 

[Benevolent27]

If you add these things to the small ships then you will have to give larger ships counter measures because in reality a large ship would have ways to prevent most of these type of attacks maybe not all but most. If you add the ability to hack in this game then you must add a firewall system and larger ships are going to have access to a powerful firewall system.
I think its a good idea but I hope it doesn't make a fun game extremely too complex. Larger ships are usually going to be taken down by larger ships but I see no issue with giving a smaller ship or a group of smaller ships a realistic small chance to take down a bigger ship because it does happen in every single SCI FI movie or TV show. I would love to see more weapon systems in this game . The ore weapons systems the better the battle will be.
I would love to have the ability to ram ships into one another in this game. That would make having a smaller ship pretty fun as well. If you're getting ready to be destroyed and you just run your ship into a larger ship causing enough damage to put a hole in the large ship. Smaller ships should be extremely fast and maneuverable. I should see somebody in a small ship flying over me like a Jet fighter or something. I hardly see it.

Also smaller AI ships should act like smaller ships and fly faster and perform maneuvers. The smaller AI ships in this game move like large ships.

Regarding hacking, the counter I proposed was that the larger a ship is, the harder or longer it takes, and the ship owner being hacked also has the option to actively thwart the attack. Then if the hacker is thwarted, they can be punished with a feedback computer. I think a firewall is an interesting concept too though. How about being able to configure the firewall differently, so it introduces different challenges to a would-be hacker? I understand how certain changes may create more complexity than some people would like. But, don't get me wrong, I think all the ideas I suggest would add something to the game. (I wouldn't suggest them otherwise) However, I don't expect all my ideas to get implemented (or any, but I can hope!), but I do think combat could use some more depth and factors that allow more variability and "out of the box" type thinking. I am fully with you about having more weapon types. I am also a strong believer in giving full control to server owners, so they can turn on or off certain features, and I think the same would go for these experimental weapon types. I'd say release them as a "beta" feature that allows players to test them.

About ramming, there is already is a feature in game that allows block damage to occur upon collision, but most servers have it off. If you want this form of gameplay, I suggest finding a more hardcore server that might have it on. Most servers turn it off though because it's problematic when people accidentally bump into bases and other people.

The reason why you generally don't see people flying around in smaller fighters during attacks is because they die too easy. They lose faction points, credits, items, etc. (whatever the server has as the penalty). I don't feel there is enough incentive for them to be used presently.

I agree with you about smaller AI ships being kind of derpy. lol They kind of float around sideways at top speeds. But even if they did try to move around a lot, my turrets would still take em out quickly. I think making AI move around a bit more realistically would be cool though.
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If you add these things to the small ships then you will have to give larger ships counter measures because in reality a large ship would have ways to prevent most of these type of attacks maybe not all but most. If you add the ability to hack in this game then you must add a firewall system and larger ships are going to have access to a powerful firewall system.
I think its a good idea but I hope it doesn't make a fun game extremely too complex. Larger ships are usually going to be taken down by larger ships but I see no issue with giving a smaller ship or a group of smaller ships a realistic small chance to take down a bigger ship because it does happen in every single SCI FI movie or TV show. I would love to see more weapon systems in this game . The ore weapons systems the better the battle will be.
I would love to have the ability to ram ships into one another in this game. That would make having a smaller ship pretty fun as well. If you're getting ready to be destroyed and you just run your ship into a larger ship causing enough damage to put a hole in the large ship. Smaller ships should be extremely fast and maneuverable. I should see somebody in a small ship flying over me like a Jet fighter or something. I hardly see it.

Also smaller AI ships should act like smaller ships and fly faster and perform maneuvers. The smaller AI ships in this game move like large ships.

Well yeah, I think that the larger a ship is, the harder it should be to hack. And no matter what, any ship should have counters. I think the ship owner should have an active ability to combat the hacking, and the would-be hacker should be punished if they fail. Perhaps a "firewall" type block with modules could be used to bolster the defenses even more. I understand though the worry about complexity. I think these types of features should be optional for servers. My methodology of throwing ideas out there is to see what sticks. I don't really expect all my ideas to get implemented, but I do think combat could use some more depth in StarMade, so I have attempted to add that in my ideas.

Yeah, the smaller AI ships are kind of derpy. lol They kind of float around sideways at top speeds. But even if they did try to move around a lot, my turrets would still take em out quickly.