[Dev Build] 0.201.004 - Weapons Update Current Early State and Discussion

[Mork2]

It is true its hard to use armour to completely block shots from things like cannon/beams (My main turrets were doing 3 x 1.8mil damage a shot) but those very powerful shots are once every 30 seconds.... You should however be able to get enough armour to stop cannon/cannon combinations and maybe cannon from doing acid damage and removing blocks to fast.

But assuming the dev write up about armour is correct if someone uses a 1.8mil damage shot against you they should just get a punch through your entire ship, its only one to two blocks wide it won't get acid damage. If I setup my system blocks to be vertical thin slabs and engage so my target is mostly in front or behind me and on an slight angle my oversized chambers of 50k blocks will only lose 5 blocks each 30 seconds from those shots. Assuming I can rotate fast enough to keep the angle.

Between that heavy core armour and if you can angle the ship to use the sloped armour effect you might be able to block smaller cannon/beam shots but yeah its not going to help with the big ones.

With the current setup of armour which is still subject to change I don't see anyone with enough armour to stop large cannon/beams but you should be able to minimize the damage from those slow firing weapons and your ship should last a long time if you can keep the cannons and cannon/cannon combos from stripping of your systems.

I've read a number of posts saying that you can't really shield regen in combat so I'm guessing with a one on one with similar sized capital ships the shields are both going to eventually go down from the cannon/beam weapons since shields absorb all the damage. Then it should come down to how well your ship can avoid critical damage after the shields are down. The danger of the full penetrating shots is if it hits the reactor stream on the way through, computers etc.

Good armour should also vastly reduce the damage you take from swarms of smaller ships.

Well that theory just got blown up the punch right through shots do acid damage as well currently.

 

[Nosajimiki]

yeah, they do acid. Also, if you know your weapon is strong enough to risk punch through, you can make it wider to create a shallower/wider hole... or at least that is the plan.

 

[petlahk]

With the current setup of armour which is still subject to change I don't see anyone with enough armour to stop large cannon/beams but you should be able to minimize the damage from those slow firing weapons and your ship should last a long time if you can keep the cannons and cannon/cannon combos from stripping of your systems.

Well. I just spent way too much time writing this up. Also, shameless plug #2.
[Weapons Update] Comprehensive Suggestions for Weapon Balance, Armor, and Shields

 

[MacThule]

Lol no. Armor still useless compared to weapons. No needs to nerf it anymore.

I was agreeing with Nosajimiki regarding an increase to armor efficiency. Would scaling armor value on a log curve instead of a flat line would result in an overall decrease somehow? I admit I could be missing something - a log curve would certainly flatten armor value increase beyond a certain thickness but since it is possible to space-layer armor, I don't think it would actually nerf larger ships that could support several layers of heavy armor. It's just speculation though - speculation about how to improve armor balance (while the devs are still focused on it), so maybe there are repercussions that no one has brought up yet. I would be open to enlightenment.

 

[petlahk]

I was agreeing with Nosajimiki regarding an increase to armor efficiency. Would scaling armor value on a log curve instead of a flat line would result in an overall decrease somehow? I admit I could be missing something - a log curve would certainly flatten armor value increase beyond a certain thickness but since it is possible to space-layer armor, I don't think it would actually nerf larger ships that could support several layers of heavy armor. It's just speculation though - speculation about how to improve armor balance (while the devs are still focused on it), so maybe there are repercussions that no one has brought up yet. I would be open to enlightenment.

Yeah. Nosa stuck his calculations in more detail on the new suggestions post.

 

[Scypio]

I was agreeing with Nosajimiki regarding an increase to armor efficiency. Would scaling armor value on a log curve instead of a flat line would result in an overall decrease somehow?

Armor already scales on a logarithmic curve because you need to protect a volume. Do i really need to explain that or what ?

 

[MacThule]

Armor already scales on a logarithmic curve because you need to protect a volume. Do i really need to explain that or what ?

I see. You mean the cost of armor. That makes sense.

So, we were talking about armor values from layering. Armor layers only scale linearly. So, as you say, because of the need to protect volume (as well as because weapons scale logarithmically and outpace armor value, even before considerations of area to volume pressure on the cost of armor are considered, as Nosa mentioned earlier), it would improve balance for the armor value increase of armor layering to mount logarithmically (much faster than a linear increase).

I don't know... Perhaps go back read the comment I was responding to if my explanation isn't clear - everyone seemed to understand Nosa's comment pretty well. Apologies if my treatment of the subject was less clear and somehow led you to mis-understand the idea as being to reduce armor function when it is exactly the opposite.

 

[God mode]

I see. You mean the cost of armor. That makes sense.

No.

So, we were talking about armor values from layering. Armor layers only scale linearly. So, as you say, because of the need to protect volume (as well as because weapons scale logarithmically and outpace armor value, even before considerations of area to volume pressure on the cost of armor are considered, as Nosa mentioned earlier), it would improve balance for the armor value increase of armor layering to mount logarithmically (much faster than a linear increase).

I don't know... Perhaps go back read the comment I was responding to if my explanation isn't clear - everyone seemed to understand Nosa's comment pretty well. Apologies if my treatment of the subject was less clear and somehow led you to mis-understand the idea as being to reduce armor function when it is exactly the opposite.

Logarithmic is slower than linear. Exponential is faster.

 

[MacThule]

Rising from zero it is slower, yes. It was made clear that the intent was to improve armor's scaling in relation to weapon scaling, so I assumed the suggestion was including the negative side of the curve in my consideration. Using an offset value with the result can do that. Why assume that? Because of the stated intent and because it's possible.

At any rate, the proposal was and is - very clearly so - to increase the rate of armor value increase. It's well and good to debate about how, but certainly there is more than one way to effectively accomplish this, non? Well I am not attached to any particular approach, but the new armor formulae are not meeting the stated goals of being more useful and could use improvement. Do you disagree?

 

[petlahk]

No no. God mode is right. Logarithmic is slower, it's just that everyone has tricked me into getting them confused. xD

 

[Scypio]

the new armor formulae are not meeting the stated goals of being more useful and could use improvement.

Depending on what you say about being useful. Armor is and has always been used in meta build, except spageth because spageth.

Using armor to protect certain aera of your ship, baffled armor, all of theses were already used and will be with the new armor mechanics. But using armor as a real system on your outer hull to protect your ship ? Will never happen unless Schine start to look at armor as a system and no more as a block. But not gonna happen.

But the goal of being more useful ? Armor is. The goal to be finally useful ? Debatable.

 

[petlahk]

Will never happen unless Schine start to look at armor as a system and no more as a block

They already see armor as a system and not just a block. First, the dev notes talk about how armor can completely stop a cannon shot from breaking more than one block based on the armor stacked behind that armor block. Secondly, the armor defensive tree now cares a lot more about defensive effects.

However, while the system of completely stopping shots is actually *great*, the values still need adjusting, which is why we're for Nosa's exponent armor system, in one form or another.

See the suggestions thread for Nosa's comment better explaining his thoughts.

 

[Scypio]

They already see armor as a system and not just a block.

Nope. That is not the case. Armor doesn't get stronger the more blocs you put on your ship, the damage weapons do is just mitigated if by chance you have enough blocs in a straight line. Which is not gonna happen unless you're fighting with ships doing less than 1k mass. You can do whatever you want with current mechanics schine implemented, armor will never be balanced because :
-either it's too strong because you don't have a weapon big enough to pierce it
-or you'll have a weapon strong enough and then armor will melt like it's made out of paper

Don't take your magic word "adjusting" or "fine tuning". It will never happen because the blocs themselves do not scale along the ship while weapons do scale with their size. Same problem as before and same answer from myself. Treat armor as a system that scale with the ship and not as separate blocs.

 

[MacThule]

It will never happen because the blocs themselves do not scale along the ship while weapons do scale with their size.

Yep.

This literally exactly what Nosajimiki was saying and we were all agreeing with.

 

[petlahk]

Yep.

This literally exactly what Nosajimiki was saying and we were all agreeing with.

It will never happen because the blocs themselves do not scale along the ship while weapons do scale with their size.

Yeah. Again, Nosa details it in the long suggestions compilation here:
[Weapons Update] Comprehensive Suggestions for Weapon Balance, Armor, and Shields

Sorry for all the maths-related argument with God Mode. I'd actually really appreciate other feedback than just nitpicking over numbers! :D

 

[MacThule]

Honestly, I think that the situation with armor is so straightforward that there isn't much to do other than nitpick the numbers used to buff it at this point. I haven't heard anyone say that a buff risks making armor OP and at this point even the devs are saying they want armor to be substantial and effective.

Still - I am with you on generally staying out of the fine details on that point. All that matters is making armor stack aggressively enough to repel most damage from weapons that are not primary capital weapons on similarly sized ships, and at least partially moderate the effect of weapons that substantially outclass the target ship.

 

[GnomeKing]

Eggshell + Hammer ...

 

[Scypio]

Yeah. Again, Nosa details it in the long suggestions compilation here:
[Weapons Update] Comprehensive Suggestions for Weapon Balance, Armor, and Shields

And i've read it again, twice, so unless if i misunderstood something you don't correct the simple fact that the blocs individual HP is the same no matter what is the size of the ship. Thus armor blocs are the same on a 1k mass fighter or a 300k mass battlecruiser. But i need way less armor blocs to protect one than the other.

 

[petlahk]

And i've read it again, twice, so unless if i misunderstood something you don't correct the simple fact that the blocs individual HP is the same no matter what is the size of the ship. Thus armor blocs are the same on a 1k mass fighter or a 300k mass battlecruiser. But i need way less armor blocs to protect one than the other.

But fighters aren't supposed to be the epitome of survivability, are they? They just need to survive long enough to get a few bombs off.
Also, larger ships with layered and gapped armor are already more survivable if you build it right. The issue is that it isn't quite survivable enough.

Nosa's true layout is in the comments. I got it wrong in two ways in the original post. And the first way (the block way) is much more my interpretation of it than his. I think I'm gonna edit it to make it clearer.

 

[Pacific_Jim]

Haven't really played around with the weapons too much, all my actual Starmade time is spent refitting. How does armour hold up on smaller ships?