AI Controlled Weapons (Alternative To Turrets)

[Koloss_Meshuggah]

I know this has been suggested before. I don’t remember where and I don’t care. It’s getting suggested again.


In my opinion, turrets don’t work in a game like this. They add to the server’s entity count, they fall off or glitch out, they are a pain to attach to the ship one by one, they cause all sorts of bugs and balance problems…. I’ve lost count of how many times my worlds were corrupted because two turrets were somehow given the same name.


I’m just tired of dealing with turrets. For about a year now I’ve been exclusively building ships with no turrets and just putting up with manual forward facing weapons.


For simplicity’s sake, a ship and it’s turrets need to be one entity, with each turret weapon having it’s own AI. I’m not necessarily asking to get rid of docked turrets, and docked entities in general are definitely necessary, I just want an option to make AI weapons part of the base entity.


Here’s my idea: You place either a bobby AI or some new block in the desired direction (six would be necessary to cover all sides of the ship), then link weapon groups to the AI block. All weapon groups will be given a 90* firing arch in the direction of their AI block and will fire on the AI’s target. You could of coarse have multiple AI blocks in the same direction so that the ship can fire on multiple targets, making it possible to build destroyers designed to shoot at a swarm of fighters.


It would probably look something like this:





Now of coarse the main issue is: Does Starmade’s code allow one entity to have multiple AIs ? I don’t know, someone please tell me how that works.


Also, would this be overpowered in some way ? Does this trivialize the building process ? Does Schema not want his game to work this way ? Please discuss.

 

[Dire Venom]

I don't see why an entity couldn't have multiple AI's.
For turrets atm to get them to shoot at multiple targets you have to dock weapon tubes with their own AI onto the turret barrell.
If the game simply still treats each AI as seperate and not a blanket cover per entity I'm sure it could work, would just require some coding work arounds.

Certiantly better AI would be fantastic, and more entities per ship causes all sorts of problems.
At the same time just having Lasers and rounds appear from tiny, non rotating points in a hull doens't make much sense either.
Also, on a seperate note Schema never shares how he wants the game to work. Many great suggestions have been thrown out becuase they violate some tiny rule in his book which only he knows out. Fair enough since he's the programmer, but it would be appreciated if he could at least share what he's looking for so we aren't wasting our time.

 

[OfficialCoding]

This would be nice. I don't do turrets because they are a pain.

 

[Koloss_Meshuggah]

Also, this would lay to rest the debate of turrets having their own reactor.

At the same time just having Lasers and rounds appear from tiny, non rotating points in a hull doens't make much sense either.

It's more of a futuristic thing, like startrek's fasers. That's why I said that docked turrets shouldn't be completely removed, for people who are into that sort of thing. Although i'm not sure if traditional turrets and built-in weapons can co-exist balance wise.

 

[Spartan-228]

They might be able to, but the biger question would be how to balance this with fixed ship mounted weapons. Seams a little op if yours spinal mounted laser of doom decided to just appear frome the ships engine section. And zap that fighter that got into your blind spot.

 

[Antikristianos]

In my opinion, turrets don’t work in a game like this. They add to the server’s entity count, they fall off or glitch out, they are a pain to attach to the ship one by one, they cause all sorts of bugs and balance problems…. I’ve lost count of how many times my worlds were corrupted because two turrets were somehow given the same name.

Nope they don't fall of anymore.

 

[EricBlank]

This would be nice to have in many cases, especially with very small craft that ought to have a small turret but cant mount one without looking absolutely ridiculous (because the minimum size of a turret that functions as ai for your faction is like 18 blocks).
The question of balance wouldnt be in regards to firepower output but vulnerability, as you can easily shoot off turrets at the moment (but it sounds like that is projected to change in future updates to prevent the issue with rails coming off mid fight and lagging everything out with collisions). Perhaps if the hard-mounted turrets cease to function if 30% or something of their blocks or the turret control unit itself are destroyed?

 

[Valiant70]

Does Starmade’s code allow one entity to have multiple AIs ?

As far as I'm aware, not currently. I don't know how deeply Schema has coded the "one AI per entity" thing into the code but given the age of the BOBBY AI block (really frickin old), I'd guess it's one of those annoying things like ship cores that make no sense on the outer gameplay surface, but are deeply rooted in the code.

Also, would this be overpowered in some way ?

Probably, although it depends on how it's done. For turrets to be balanced (they're currently not), larger guns need to take more time to track and aim. This gives very small and maneuverable ships at least a chance to evade weapons that would simply one-shot them. You would have to replicate this behavior in the shipboard AI weapons.

Now, although I'm a trekkie, I'm still not terribly fond of the "phaser bank" style turrets in Starmade. I've always hated the odd "firing arc" mechanic that lets you shoot off 45 degrees from the direction a gun is facing. That mechanic, in my opinion, should always have been the center of the gigantism discussions. It is the primary reason gargantuan ships are able to one-shot almost anything, i.e. they can hit anything in front of them. Instead they should be able to hit slow or klutzy things in front of them. I have always believed, and still do, that removing the firing arc from mounted guns is the gateway to having real size roles in battle, for ships and turrets alike.

TL;DR: Two balance problems:
1. All turrets rotate the same speed, making smaller turrets pointless.
2. All sizes of everything track/aim just as quickly, making evasive action pointless.
If you can add phaser banks along with fixes for these balance issues without creating MORE balance issues, okay. I just don't see that happening.

 

[Nosajimiki]

This seems like i would be a fair trade-off. These "hull-turrets" would be less laggy and less vulnerable than rail mounted turrets, but have a smaller range of motion.

 

[GnomeKing]

"1. All turrets rotate the same speed, making smaller turrets pointless.
2. All sizes of everything track/aim just as quickly, making evasive action pointless. "