Convergeing weapons make smaller ships useless.

[sayerulz]

The fact that weapons can be aimed at any point on the screen means that a smaller, more nimble ship will always lose to a larger one. Now, naturally, a fighter SHOULD lose to a cruiser, but a light fighter against a heavy fighter/gunship, both should have advantages and disadvantages. At the moment, the heavier craft has all the advantages, because speed is not important in combat. The larger ship just needs to get the small one on its screen to destroy it. I feel that the gimbal of the mounted weapons should be reduced considerably. To balance this a little, it would be good to allow one to make turrets that will attempt to track ones mouse and fire on click. But being able to shoot anywhere on the screen puts a smaller ship at a disadvantage every time, when maneuverability should be an asset, rather than a waste of space for thrusters.

 

[Lecic]

I think the convergence should be reduced drastically. Currently, if something is infront of you, you can hit it, which is... ridiculous, to say the least.

To balance this a little, it would be good to allow one to make turrets that will attempt to track ones mouse and fire on click.

I would like this feature a lot.

 

[Rokiyo]

To balance this a little, it would be good to allow one to make turrets that will attempt to track ones mouse and fire on click.

Oh... Now that would be cool: It'd open up the possibility for people to recreate the convergence system with rail rotators: It becomes a player-solvable problem instead.

I'm all for removing default mechanics and giving players the tools to figure things out themselves.

 

[Ithirahad]

No, "converging weapons" (The system where weapons will fire in the direction of a block you're aiming at rather than just out parallel to the crosshair) of never did, never do, and never will make small ships useless, it just allows for more creative designs regarding weapon placement. What does make small ships useless, and should definitely be changed, is the massive targeting arc. The targeting radius should probably be only a bit bigger than the circle in the center of the HUD.

 

[CyberTao]

It'd open up the possibility for people to recreate the convergence system with rail rotators: It becomes a player-solvable problem instead.

I dont know what game you are playing, but rotors way too stiff to ever be used for that. It's not even remotely possible unless we get finer controls or someone is skilled enough to time shots as the arms close.

 

[MeRobo]

Maybe Rokiyo ment Turret Axis.

 

[Rokiyo]

I dont know what game you are playing, but rotors way too stiff to ever be used for that. It's not even remotely possible unless we get finer controls or someone is skilled enough to time shots as the arms close.

Sorry, yeah, I meant rail turret axis... Idea being you could make a normal turret that has something like a 5 degree cone of fire, and instead of putting a Bobby AI into it, you could choose to wirelessly slave it to the core of your mothership instead.

If you do this, weapon convergence continues to work as usual, as the turret can handle the fine motor movements for you. If you don't bother with the turret, then you can only fire straight.

Why would anyone make a forward firing turret with such a low firing angle? Well, because would allow them to continue making super-weapons that span the length of the ship, with only a minimal amount of internal clearance needed to make room for the rotation of the barrel.

 

[hunterRAE]

I just want to throw out that this is a cool idea, but it is not needed and is overkill. Let me explain what I mean. If you had a normal mothership like it is now, which they are becoming more prevalent by the day, which has probably at the least 20 turrets, which span the length and covers all outside areas, it would be able lock onto ships passing by and hit the target pretty well with rail upgraded systems. Now depending on the strength, the single turret will probably take out the ships of equal mass to the turret. Now with convergence, the turrets will just pure obliterate that ship and most likely obliterate things equal to all the turrets combined. Seems nice, but in practicality, this might be not necessary. In a real battle with a fleet versus fleet, the turrets are not focused on one particular fighter or face the wrath of a strafe run. No logical person would focus on one fighter unless that is the only one, and unless the ship is the same size as yours, this would be overkill. Again, I would like the idea, but it needs to be balanced so that fighters are just even more obsolete than they are currently. If it was me, I would have a damage nerf for systems that are linked to a convergence system, making it beneficial for the weapon spread, but each shot on its own is not as damaging, making it slightly possible for a small fighter to survive a second.

 

[nightwalker_007]

I can see beam weapons tracking the mouse as these do have short ranges anyway. But cannons and missiles being fixed makes sense.

 

[sayerulz]

I just want to throw out that this is a cool idea, but it is not needed and is overkill. Let me explain what I mean. If you had a normal mothership like it is now, which they are becoming more prevalent by the day, which has probably at the least 20 turrets, which span the length and covers all outside areas, it would be able lock onto ships passing by and hit the target pretty well with rail upgraded systems. Now depending on the strength, the single turret will probably take out the ships of equal mass to the turret. Now with convergence, the turrets will just pure obliterate that ship and most likely obliterate things equal to all the turrets combined. Seems nice, but in practicality, this might be not necessary. In a real battle with a fleet versus fleet, the turrets are not focused on one particular fighter or face the wrath of a strafe run. No logical person would focus on one fighter unless that is the only one, and unless the ship is the same size as yours, this would be overkill. Again, I would like the idea, but it needs to be balanced so that fighters are just even more obsolete than they are currently. If it was me, I would have a damage nerf for systems that are linked to a convergence system, making it beneficial for the weapon spread, but each shot on its own is not as damaging, making it slightly possible for a small fighter to survive a second.

I meant that there would be an option to make a particular turret fire at the mouse, not that every turret would by default. That would make point defense impossible.

 

[bohric]

Idea being you could make a normal turret that has something like a 5 degree cone of fire, and instead of putting a Bobby AI into it, you could choose to wirelessly slave it to the core of your mothership instead.

If you do this, weapon convergence continues to work as usual, as the turret can handle the fine motor movements for you. If you don't bother with the turret, then you can only fire straight.

I like this idea. It becomes something that the player has to work into the design – if you want a better targeting area, you have to make turrets with better rotation axes. Plus, you have to compensate for the little bit of extra power that the turrets' movements require. And you can still have the giant beam cannon superweapon that everyone likes to put on the front of their mothership; it'll just only be able to fire straight ahead.