Could Fighters Get a Buff?

[sayerulz]

In all of the 9999999999 threads saying "buff mah fighters" I have not seen ONE decent argument for why a ship with like 3% of it's mass should take out a titan. NOT ONE.

All it is is "but realisim, yamato, bismark, WWII, blah blah blah"

This is not WWII. This is not real life. You are not Luke Skywalker. You want to kill the death star with a single fighter? Have someone make a shieldless behemoth and put a big blob of aux. power in the middle, and a little hole leading to it. There, now you can be Luke Skywalker.

 

[kingreol]

The current state of the game it simply is not very viable.. We will have to wait for more fleet and ai updates before such balancing or fighter specific weapon or effects systems are put in place.. eventually it will happen. titans will eventually need support to fight of fighters. the omnihulk is simply a symptom of a incomplete game....

Cloak has been a popular block and is small ship specific with its power requirements. I would be fine if we get something like that. that would allow dammage to phase through the shields. but at the cost of constant energy draw, or more logical. would disable the use of shields on the ship. in order to allow weapons to phase through enemy shields. this would make fighters more a threat to turrets. and thus omnihulks would have to think about fighter support. or risk loosing ams etc.

 

[Lecic]

The current state of the game it simply is not very viable.. We will have to wait for more fleet and ai updates before such balancing or fighter specific weapon or effects systems are put in place.. eventually it will happen. titans will eventually need support to fight of fighters. the omnihulk is simply a symptom of a incomplete game....

Cloak has been a popular block and is small ship specific with its power requirements. I would be fine if we get something like that. that would allow dammage to phase through the shields. but at the cost of constant energy draw, or more logical. would disable the use of shields on the ship. in order to allow weapons to phase through enemy shields. this would make fighters more a threat to turrets. and thus omnihulks would have to think about fighter support. or risk loosing ams etc.

I mount a magic shield penetrator to my fighter and equip my fighter with cannon/pulse/pierce. I disable the enemy's reactors with a 50 mass ship.

 

[sayerulz]

I mount a magic shield penetrator to my fighter and equip my fighter with cannon/pulse/pierce. I disable the enemy's reactors with a 50 mass ship.

Then make 500 of them and crash the server. That's what would happen. Think titans are laggy? Try 1/3 of a titans mass in drones all colliding due to dumb AI. Your PC will probably end up looking like a nuclear test site.

The "omnihulk" is a thing only because the AI is dumb as a lobotomized box of rocks, to the point that you can easily shoot down fighters with heavy anti-capital cannon/pulse turrets, because they don't evade properly. I've done it before. All we need to make specialized anti-fighter craft a thing is for fighters to actually move like fighters, instead of slowly circle-strafing at their max weapons range. Then I think we would see anti-fighter escort ships, or at least dedicated anti-fighter turrets, become a thing.

The solution is not for fighters to magically pierce shields, or to make warheads into antimatter bombs, or to let fighters mount titan-DPS weapons. The ONLY thing we need is for fighters to be a bit harder to hit.

 

[Nickizzy]

warheads into antimatter bombs,

But mah warheads...


If their explosions were more realistic(say, not just either by default hilariously underpowered to changed to be hilariously overpowered) and actually had to punch through armor before damaging the systems inside, then you could plausibly make bombers that fly out, unload a few shots, and fly back for a reload.

 

[sayerulz]

But mah warheads...


If their explosions were more realistic(say, not just either by default hilariously underpowered to changed to be hilariously overpowered) and actually had to punch through armor before damaging the systems inside, then you could plausibly make bombers that fly out, unload a few shots, and fly back for a reload.

Warheads need a lot of changes, possibly including increasing their damage. Most suggestions regarding that have been utterly absurd, and would make them into THE weapon of choice. Adding 50 or even 100% to their damage might be ok, but some people seem to want something more like 5000% damage.

 

[Madman198237]

Well, Sayer, those proposals either include or are changed to include counters like:

PDTs and similar target warhead-bearing entities first (And if a WWII battleship COULD shoot down bombs and torpedoes mid-flight, it darn sure WOULD). Add a new option for warheads (And revamp turret AI so that players can assign a target priority list (Torpedoes>Missiles>Closest target>Heaviest target>Lightest target, something like that)

Warhead-bearing entities have zero shields, no defensives effects, perhaps no doors or armor, things like that. Basically, it makes the simplest torpedo the most effective (Push-drive plus one thruster for maximum speed, detonates outside armor, but is very vulnerable).

But anyway, to the OP: Warhead torpedoes already exist, no additional "fighter-empowering" measures are necessary. The battleship was an all-your-eggs-in-one-basket sort of thing. However, kill rates among aircraft and MUCH higher than kill rates among battleships (A lot more aircraft get destroyed trying to destroy a battleship than battleships destroying aircraft. The U.S. WWII designs were particularly effective at blowing aircraft out of the sky---one battleship [Iowa-class, I think] defended a carrier group, effectively, against air attack....mostly because those ships have a crap ton of AAA). The only reason planes were more effective is because they deliver the same ordinance as a battleship or destroyer (Anti-ship torpedoes and [In Pearl Harbor's case] 16-in armor-piercing naval shells with fins welded on) but they deliver it from a massively faster platform, in numbers, against a relatively stationary enemy).

Also, if I ever, EVER see anyone so badly represent Star Wars facts again, I will hunt them down, and shove a full-size SD through their station, and watch as the server (And, hopefully, the offender's GPU) burns.

So, even in SW, no lone fighter did ANYTHING. The only thing that did any damage were proton torpedoes and baradium bombs, and those were detonated in massive explosions on the focused shields of an enemy capital vessel (And it never, NEVER once did anything against a full-size Star Destroyer), followed by ANOTHER RUN to finish the shields and actually deal damage. And the baradium bombs were only ever used against basically-unshielded Yuuzhan Vong vessels, after their dovin basal-projected voids were tricked into protecting somewhere else.

 

[Panpiper]

So, even in SW, no lone fighter did ANYTHING. The only thing that did any damage were proton torpedoes and baradium bombs, and those were detonated in massive explosions on the focused shields of an enemy capital vessel (And it never, NEVER once did anything against a full-size Star Destroyer), followed by ANOTHER RUN to finish the shields and actually deal damage. And the baradium bombs were only ever used against basically-unshielded Yuuzhan Vong vessels, after their dovin basal-projected voids were tricked into protecting somewhere else.

Careful... Your nerd cred is showing. ;-)

 

[sayerulz]

If were talking about how fighters can take out capitals in Star Wars, we already have that damage wise. A dozen or so good-sized fighters with missile/pulse and perhaps a bit of ion firing at a big capital ship at once with do some serious damage to it's shields, possibly bringing them down.

Again, all we really need is for fighters to maneuver properly and then a squadron of bombers will be perfectly capable of posing a threat to a capital ship.

 

[StarWars1981]

I really dislike your references (original poster) to the Yamato and Bismarck. First, the Bismarck was sunk - not by those pesky biplanes, though they crippled her by nailing a neccessarily exposed piece of the ship (rudder was jammed by a near miss by a torpedo - probably warped the bulkheads around it or something similar) - by heavy warships. Two battleships, the Rodney and Prince of Wales, took several hours to shell her. Then they had to leave, and it was left to destroyers to sink the ship. At this point, it was a floating wreck - low in the water, engines dead, power dead, crew in disarray, weapons nonfunctional, and slowly flooding from 15in and 14in hits below the waterline. Destroyers torpedoed the vessel with WARSHIP torpedoes - not aircraft torps, these are SERIOUS business. Usually, at least, they're bigger.
It was NOT scuttled.
Yes, I'm a history nerd. But I like my history .

The Yamato was sunk by aircraft, yes.
After a multiple-hour aerial armageddon by 500 US carrier aircraft. And this ONLY because the Yamato had few escorts and NO escorting fighters - those make a huge difference. After approx. 40 total hits by divebombers and torpedoes, she capsized, and a fire reached her magazines, killing 2,500 IJN sailors. Divebombing drops bombs THROUGH the deck, to explode inside. Occasionally, it breaches the hull, but usually just wrecks internal workings. Torpedoes, though - they blow in armor plates, shatter welds, break open hulls, and create giant holes where water can enter the ship. THAT'S why a ship sinks. Not because it was hit 40 times - because it filled with water and sank (blew up, but that's rare, if you look at it).

Ok, on topic. Fighters don't NEED a buff - they need better control AI and more interface options so that players can USE them, rather than just pray they make themselves useful. Yes, strafing action would be EPIC - but unless you have dozens it's pointless against large foes. Fleets are an advantage, because it's harder and takes longer to eliminate 5 50k mass warships (well-built) than 1 250k mass warship. Why?
1. Maneuverability. Duh, if you can't hit it, you can't kill it. On this scale it's rather minute, but, it's there.
2. Survivability. Only because of hitpoints. In reality, if it's huge, it has crewers that can take shelter deeper in the vessel, and so you have to depressurize more of it to make it combat-ineffective. Also, it takes more hits to disable the myriad of secondary and backup systems in place to prevent you from doing -just- that. However, in the HP system, those destroyers have to individually be reduced to 50% HP, rather than taking a couple big nukes in the system-filled centers and going bye-bye starship.
3. Teamwork. Only with players, but if you have a central weapon, you can only keep ONE vessel in line at a time. Oh by the way, if it's fast enough, you cannot reacquire once it's behind you. Not a CHANCE. You're dead the slow way. With intelligent players, you're basically doomed unless you're a turret-machine and have POWERFUL turrets too.
4. I'm a favorite of wolfpack tactics and I hate going slow, so I like smaller-ship tactics, so clearly, it's the best .

Also, the ISDs suffered from, in the SW universe, what is known as Trench Run Disease. Small fighter flies in close where main weapons emplacements cannot track it (harder cause SM builders are not constrained by -LOTS- of real-world issues i.e. powerlines, crewer access, hydraulics, concern for those same crewers being placed in a tin can that can be vaporized upon shield drop, etc.) and proceeds to eliminate some shield projector or put a missile into the command bay - cause XWing novels had to have a way to succeed. Also, because there ARE weaknesses in every design. The Hood, for example: it is now theorized that she was sunk by a set of torpedo tubes atop her hull; the warheads stored there could have produced a blast powerful enough to crack the ship in two, and the improved magazine protection and main battery charges made it unlikely that her magazines would've been set off. Especially given that the German shells performed poorly in that battle. In SM, that could be poorly planned auxiliary power system placements, exposed turret bases (WITH capital ship support downing shields, or a heck of a lot of frigates/millions of fighters), docked stuff, visible computers BEGGING for a missile, and of course, armor weakspots begging for a spar torpedo assault.. It doesn't NEED to be reusable, right?

 

[Ithirahad]

But... shields...

 

[Nickizzy]

But... shields...

But... Config Warheads...

 

[kingreol]

I mount a magic shield penetrator to my fighter and equip my fighter with cannon/pulse/pierce. I disable the enemy's reactors with a 50 mass ship.

design me a 50 mass ship that could do this against a unshielded say 200k target. also put cloak on the ship.... The suggestion was simply a alternative to OPs sentiment. and fighters should be of more immediate threat to say turrets on a titan. Starmade itself is not there. outside large swarms. i do not think we have much incentive in PVP to employ a smaller fleet of fighters in combat.

anywho this whole thread might as well be a complaint against gigantism, titan vrs titan. computer melting combat.

 

[Nickizzy]

design me a 50 mass ship that could do this against a unshielded say 200k target. also put cloak on the ship.... The suggestion was simply a alternative to OPs sentiment. and fighters should be of more immediate threat to say turrets on a titan. Starmade itself is not there. outside large swarms. i do not think we have much incentive in PVP to employ a smaller fleet of fighters in combat.

anywho this whole thread might as well be a complaint against gigantism, titan vrs titan. computer melting combat.

Mah Warheads...
:D I'll stop okay.

If you go thrust power dockers shipremotes, docked entities only weigh like 1/10th their actual mass. Especially if it's not moving and you have a reloading station, you could do the same to a ship, shielded or unshielded. I bet you could even manage cloaking if you tried.

 

[DrTarDIS]

Fighters are balanced by their high power:mass. A frigate or titan can NOT maintain 2.5:1 thrust:mass, full ion&piercing&punch&overdrive&momentum&gravity&cloak&jam. A fighter can maintain ALL those, and probably still have extra power left.
I think the OVERDRIVE system needs a buff, change the power and damage profile from +3* & +2* to +10* & +9* @100%
That would deal with 90% of the "problems" with fighters, drones, and turrets.

 

[Lecic]

design me a 50 mass ship that could do this against a unshielded say 200k target. also put cloak on the ship....

OFL Light Penetrator Cloaker/Bomber

 

[AtraUnam]

Space fighters could realistically be mounting nuclear warheads for their armament.

VERY delayed reply because I'm not reading another Luke vs Vader thread in terms of fighter balance. A space fighter COULD realistically mount a few nuclear warheads just a space battleship COULD mount a dozen nuclear warhead firing miniguns.

 

[Edymnion]

Actually, nuclear warheads are crap in space.

Virtually all of their destructive power comes from being in an atmosphere where the radiation they cause creates a blast wave. In space, no atmosphere means no blast wave means a nuclear bomb is nothing but an EMP weapon with some radiation.

 

[Nickizzy]

Actually, nuclear warheads are crap in space.

Virtually all of their destructive power comes from being in an atmosphere where the radiation they cause creates a blast wave. In space, no atmosphere means no blast wave means a nuclear bomb is nothing but an EMP weapon with some radiation.

And results in a giant cloud of radiation that makes EVAs a pain to even attempt to design.

 

[AtraUnam]

Actually, nuclear warheads are crap in space.

Virtually all of their destructive power comes from being in an atmosphere where the radiation they cause creates a blast wave. In space, no atmosphere means no blast wave means a nuclear bomb is nothing but an EMP weapon with some radiation.

If they detonate within a few hundred meters then your hull plating becomes that atmosphere.