Fighting Gigantism in Starmade

[Nootau]

Yes, larger vessels made of more units will have more mass and require more thrust. Though in true zero g, this would not matter as there would not be a difference, which is why I said near zero g. I also did not say it was going to be the same, simply very similar. A large scale vessel is similar thrust to mass ratio will have similar acceleration.

Now for the comment about missiles, the size of a vessel would not matter for the missiles speed for hitting not not. It would only matter for the type of missile explosion being coded to damage X radius of blocks and a small ship will simply not have the same surface area and thus not take as much damage. The size of the ship will not increase not decrease the chance to hit if both vessels have the thrust to out run the incoming missile.

It wouldn\'t make sense for a vessel\'s size to effect acceleration, only the ratio of thrust to counter the pull of gravity of near by celestial objects. Why would it accellerate to a higher maxiumum speed with the same ratio of mass to thrust using the same thrust producers?

Gravity is constant within limited variations, the range of the celestrial object\'s range of influence. The range of gravity is not endless, it weakens over distance as well. If it did not, then nothing would stay within orbit and everything would be pulled out and towards the largest black hole. So no, gravity does not effect vessels a distance away from it, such as within lunar orbit, the same way as if the object was close to its surface.

As for the comment about the corpse, let it turn freely. Few would care, less would notice.

 

[The_Onion]

yea, i meant slower missiles, not slower ships. And yes, I meant that since large ships are bigger targets, they will be easier to hit with the missiles.

 

[33Cav]

I dont think that lowering the servers speed based on mass is the 1 shot solution that you think it is. Rather I would see a system where servers have a lower starting speed with a pecentage increase based on Thrust Ratio and decreasing mass classes. Perhaps this could tie in with your frame idea to manage equitable classes?

 

[Nootau]

If the missile is slow, how will it hit the faster moving ship? Being a big planet size target doesn\'t matter if the weapon can never hit you.

 

[Moph]

More mass requiring more thrust is about the only correct statement in this reply.

Can you explain why there would not be a difference? Also, a difference between what and what?
Do you mean that if gravity isn\'t present, it doesn\'t matter how much thrust you have to counter the mass in the ship as it will all be the same? If so, that\'s completely wrong and you are confusing mass for weight.

Firing missiles towards a larger target are clearly more likely to hit than firing them towards a smaller target. I understand your point about both sized ships being able to outrun the missiles, but that wasn\'t what the poster was referring to with that statement. Also, as a re-cap, he did say dummy missiles, not heat seeking.

\"It wouldn\'t make sense for a vessel\'s size to effect acceleration, only the ratio of thrust to counter the pull of gravity of near by celestial objects.\"

Again, your physics is very confused. The mass, which is not size, realistically, does affect acceleration. The more mass, the more inertia the ship has which needs to be overcome by having more thrust (force). Again, you are confusing mass with weight.


\"Why would it accellerate to a higher maxiumum speed with the same ratio of mass to thrust using the same thrust producers?\"

Are you aware that acceleration is the rate of change of velocity? It does not determine your speed, much less your maximum speed.

You are correct saying that gravity weakens with distance, this is described precisely by the inverse square law I mentioned above, thank you for confirming. And as a result of this law of physics, as far as we are currently aware, the range of gravity IS in fact endless, it\'s just negligible at great distances. i.e. only at an infinite distance away from an object would it\'s gravity be zero.


\"As for the comment about the corpse, let it turn freely. Few would care, less would notice.\"

Shame, although the level of ignorance is profoundly appropriate for the content of your posts.

 

[Nootau]

More mass requiring more thrust is about the only correct statement in this reply.



You are correct saying that gravity weakens with distance, this is described precisely by the inverse square law I mentioned above, thank you for confirming.


You have already contradicted yourself with your absolute, but I\'ll play ball and continue with this retort.


Do you mean that if gravity isn\'t present, it doesn\'t matter how much thrust you have to counter the mass in the ship as it will all be the same? If so, that\'s completely wrong and you are confusing mass for weight.


Nice strawman. I never said remove gravity for one, I said it is effected differently depending on distance. I also did not say the amount of thrust did not matter. I said the ratio. Does that seem like the same thing to you?


Firing missiles towards a larger target are clearly more likely to hit than firing them towards a smaller target.


This is not true. If the targets are both moving and trying to avoid being struck and are more swift and agile than the missile, then the missile will not hit in either case. If the targets are both stationary then the missile will hit both equally as easy. Just because one is a larger target it does not decrease the difficulty to strike it.


The mass, which is not size, realistically, does affect acceleration. The more mass, the more inertia the ship has which needs to be overcome by having more thrust (force). Again, you are confusing mass with weight.


No I am not mistaken. The ratio is what matters. The radio is not \'+5 thrust more than mass\', it is percentages. If the percentages match, so should the accelleration.


Are you aware that acceleration is the rate of change of velocity? It does not determine your speed, much less your maximum speed.


It determins how quickly you reach your maxium speed. Simply having larger engines offering more thrust at the same ratio as a smaller vessel will not change this. Different technology, different methods and styles can change the maxium speed between one vessel and another of similar mass though this is a question of scale not design.


Shame, although the level of ignorance is profoundly appropriate for the content of your posts.


I question why it matters what a corpses does. He gave an idea and a way of thinking when he was alive. He isn\'t now. What it corpse does matters to those who are interested in corpses and those interested in animating them. It does not matter what his corpse does here, in this topic.

 

[Terramort]

This is why big ships should have awful acceleration. Play any other space-based combat game with captial ships. Only in StarMade can large ships accelerate as fast as fighters. Yes, it\'s fun. But it create *so* many issues. A. Server lag attempting to process a capship accelerating+turning would be significantly decresed. B. Fighters could actually target critical systems on a big ship. As it is now, a player just has to mob the W, A, S, D keys, and they flit around like a hummingbird. C. It would finally keep every player from just cruising shop to shop with their capships, causing even more server lag.

Bringing out the capital ship means you know where you are going, and you need the firepower to do it. Seriously. Big things move slow (not necessairly top speed, just accel+turning). Jumbo Jet vs. F-16. Hummer vs. a sports car. Aircraft carriers vs. tugboats. Torpedoes vs. submarines. There isn\'t a magical constant of thrust vs. mass you need to keep acceleration rate the same, it isn\'t a linear equation. The ratio needed goes up exponentially faster than the mass increases.

 

[Moph]

You\'re nitpicking now, and it doesn\'t help this conversation at all. The first statement was not an absolute anyway; the word \'about\' saw to that.
I didn\'t mean to offend you with that question, it was because I couldn\'t understand your reasoning, I was not implying that you were thinking one way or the other. My question an attempt at working out what you meant.

\"Just because one is a larger target it does not decrease the difficulty to strike it.\"
A larger dart board is easier to score on than a smaller dart board. I\'m sure you\'re aware of this already though. This is pointless to continue with as the origins of this was simply a suggestion of something to improve in the game, and I\'m sure the idea was to reinforce that missiles should be easier to use against larger targets who shouldn\'t be able to dodge out of the way of them as easily as smaller, nimbler ships.

\"The mass, which is not size, realistically, does affect acceleration. The more mass, the more inertia the ship has which needs to be overcome by having more thrust (force). Again, you are confusing mass with weight.\"

This was nothing to do with your talk of ratios. It was your inclusion of gravity which seemed to imply that you thought that gravity had to be present in order for the mass of the ship to affect it\'s acceleration, and therefore requiring more thrusters to overcome. The idea that gravity needs to be present in order to make the mass of a ship resistant to movement is incorrect. Adding gravity into the equation gives the ship\'s mass weight, which is a force, which does also need to be dealt with. It is not inertia (or momentum if you prefer) which is what Terramort was referring to which you wrote off.

\"It determins how quickly you reach your maxium speed.\"
Loosely put, yes. I\'m not disputing the relationship between mass and thrust, yet you keep bringing it up for some reason.

The ending comment was more a metaphor for an ignorant student not paying attention to his master\'s (Newton) lessons, then trying to pass on his poorly understood teachings to those around him.

 

[spacemarine658]

this should be implemented

 

[LazerusKI]

nothing against big ships - they are the most funny thing to build

also shields have a really hard cap because of the calculation (my ship with 80k shields has 1,5M, to reach the next million would take a huge amount of additional shields), and its not that hard to break. My smaller cruiser with 120 AMCs can break them in unter 60s, not to mention what multiple cruisers could do, i mean...capitals are huge targets.
damaging blocks under the shield is stupid in my opinion, protection is what shields are made for.
I would quit if everyone could damage my ship without killing the shield first, and without me having the ability to repair missing blocks. I could build a core with a single AMC and camp near the enemy capital then, good luck to find me, while i shoot through the shield to the core...
BUT: If (special) rockets could bypass a small amout of shield to hit the hull, it would make sense to build hardened hull again, not only shields.
Or like the X way: Ammo based Gauss Cannons.
Also i agree with AMCs - the RoF is just crazy on large arrays, i would want to see slower, more powerfull AMCs with impact radius for larger arrays instead of more powerfull nearly beamlike AMCs.

 

[The_Onion]

its called leading your target. its much easier to lead a bigger target than a smaller one, especially up close.

 

[Directfix]

One speed boat armed with one anti-ship missile can take out a Cruiser, Destroyer or badly damage a Carrier, this is a real threat in the real world. But this is a space game and one thing that stands out that would even things out - life support or fuel. Size = penalty. Small ship - small usage and travel is limited as your ship can store so much. Big ships - massive usage and massive storage.

 

[Malkadir]

Really guys, stop doing that. Of course the blueprint system will change, the economy will be balanced, etc; there\'s probably going to be new ways to repair your ship, new ways to build it, etc.

So trying to fight gigantism like it\'s the only thing in the game to change is pointless and you cant balance the game only around giant ships because \"everyone wants a big one\", no thank you, I don\'t want a giant ship, I\'m very happy with my small ones. Once we get a better economy, better factions system, etc it won\'t be as much of a problem, if a problem at all. We won\'t be able to design ships tomorrow the way we do it today.



Also guys, there\'s gravity in space, and air, and resistance. And sound does propagate in space but not always enough for anyone to hear. If the game was more realistic you wouldn\'t be able to fly at 100000mph with a core and a thruster only, your ship would be shred to pieces; you wouldn\'t be able to just fly around with your capital ship because the gravity would require that you adjust your alignement all the time; small fighters would run out of oxygen, etc.

 

[bobodamonkey]

Quick thought, how about some sort of short-ranged bomb/torpedo type weapon? This way, you could actually make bombers and go on bombing runs. There could also be a EMP varient for taking down shields faster. The bombs should be limited to a few and you would have to replenish ammo. Take Star Wars Battlefront:2\'s bombers for example.

 

[Alpha_Squad]

Whelp, even after the shield change big ships are still nye indestructible to smaller ships, if flown with half a brain. If the turn rates are nerfed even further it would make capital cruisers obsolete as turrets can\'t hit anything and manually aiming is the best thing you can do.



I would suggest making engines of (x+y+z) length start overheating and burn out for a few seconds if it is heated too much(like the shields are). It could increase the rate it overheated exponetially to the number engines connected in a single group, this would encourage finding a niche for each player in their preference of thrust to overheating ratio . This is a logical way to make giant ships less invulnerable.

 

[Stakhanov]

The simplest fix to ship mobility is to tie maximum speed to mass - which would allow bearable turning speeds for capital ships while making blind spots more reliable to exploit.

The other solution is a complex revamp of thrusters. In order to give ships roles , there would have to be different thruster specialties tied to power usage , lateral thrust , acceleration , max speed and sustained use.

 

[z1967]

Ok, This thread has been around for quite a while and whenever I see the word \"realistic\" I want to punch a space bear. TL;DR at bottom of wall of text.

Maybe that is a bit excessive. But, my point stands. Right now, the game is a hit and run game style where the best ship usually wins. Wait, I Just said BEST ship, not biggest... Because I have executed 2 held tech brigadiers and multiple other big ships. How? I built, tested and fought with a destroyer. Meant as a support ship originally, this little prick of a ship can maneuver and carries some decent guns. I can disable all the turrets and then leave it on bobby AI and go get another ship. If your ship is versatile, you can win against almost any ship. I plan on building a frigate with jamming so missle won\'t bother me and I can stalk and evade enemy radar.

To me, a big ship is just cannon fodder. It can\'t maneuver, it can\'t defend it\'s flank, and it gets torn to shit when you fire on its engines. Cores are easy pickings, disable the shields from anywhere and then just wear down the hulls. I could do a ship to ship building, practicing, and fighting tutorial. Most People will assume bigger is better. That is why I can get rich easily. Something bigger than 5000 mass is gonna turn like a dead whale. A corvette or frigate could annihilate it from the back. It can run, but you can follow. It can try to hide, but anyone can wait outside a base. It can fight, but it won\'t live to tell its battle stories.

Now to the part where I quote people, well, I am not gonna do that. I see the idea that fighter taking down a capital ship is pretty popular and unpopular... Well regardless, it\'s not gonna happen. A fighter does not possess the weapons for taking down a larger ship. Good luck trying. A real threat, as stated above, is the corvette or frigate. Maneuverable enough for escape from cannon fire. Fast enough to run from any fight it can\'t win. And all the more deadly with each update. Problem is, what happens when the predator, becomes the prey to another equally sized predator? What happens when a battleship and another battleship go toe to toe in a massive slug fest? Simply saying, assuming that the same ship is piloted by the same pilot using same maneuvers, both would destroy each other. But that\'s not economical or fun at all... What destroys the destroyer? A food chain of ships needs to be established and tested. So you can say in your frigate \"he\'ll yeah, mother ship, LLOOOTTT\" but also say \"ah hells no, heavy turrets and picket ships. Nope.\" See? A mothership is spared and a new tactic is developed, pickets.

a picket is a medium sized ship, frigates and destroyers mainly, used to stop fighters and other enemy pickets form harming the central capital ship. Ta da, I just saved your Titan ship\'s hull from being shot to pieces form behind. But wait, how do I carry these pickets? Dock them dipshit. It\'s a freakin MOTHERSHIP. It\'s meant to carry your ships from point a to b. But how do I counter Pickets? Stand off heavy weapon ships. Aka, giant cobble of hulls, shields, and guns. Sending fire from 3000 m away takes resources but is totally worth it. But how do I destroy stand offs? Corvettes, which are stopped by pickets, which are stopped by stand offs and so on and so on etc.

well, hers the tl;dr

TL;DR

Fighters are overated, frigates and corvettes for the win. Rock, paper, scissors with ships, and common sense for 0300 in the morning.

have a smashing good day

-z1967

 

[LazerusKI]

good post, think that is true

 

[ShadowHunter12]

I find it interesting that some of these ideas are sort of already in use, powerdrain beams stop a ship for a few seconds on a full drain.

Another thing that is interesting is this post is made by the maker of the most common ship classification, and the biggest ship bears his name.

 

[z1967]

Typed in mobile at 2345... So release your butt clenches of grammar and spelling also, TL;DR at bottom

So on the resentment industries server, we have an event every Friday called boss battle Friday. Basically, admins spawn in a big ship and then a literal shit ton of fighters. It\'s full if lasers, dogfights, and friendly fire. On accident of course. Anyways, I used the same ship, and quite literally the same ship, that I use for every fight, even my sorties against larger ships. And for the first time, I actually took hull damage. One guy got his ship shot to pieces by a held tech brigadier because he charged head on. His was a big ol\'battlewagon with turrets and the like on it. I easily flanked around and just shot at the core with another guy who\'s ship looked like a flying wang. So cockfighting (heh heh, wang ship jokes) and shredding ships later, a mass of about 50 odd fighters joined in. The dick boat\'s captain was either afk or offline, and the rest were shot to pieces or fixing their ships. So I tackled about 10 fighters before my shields went down. No biggy, heavy armor with double thickness would keep me safe. Then the wang mobile guy came back online and we scattered the fighters into little packs of 5, which were easily destroyed. But I would like to take what I learned form this, and apply it here.

I present, the Swarm. A mass of 50 odd fighters controlled by AI meant to either pummel large floating space stations or pick off at your sanity. It\'s hard to imagine how ridiculous it\'s is to kill something you can\'t hit. And once the turrets are down, anything goes. I was lucky the wangmobile started up again and shredded a few into smaller ranks. In a true Rock Paper Scissors action, something needs to counter the new guy. Corvettes can barely manage themselves, pickets are already tied up with corvettes, and good luck hitting one with a stand-off ship. So, the anti-fighter gunboat is born. Maneuverable enough to keep up with fighters but deadly enough to blow them to hell, hey can make a great addition to an \"inner picket\" a group of ships closer to the main ship. An a carrier could easily carry them. And of course a corvette\'s job could also be a gunboat blaster too.

also, I noticed everyone so judging a ship by its mass. I build ships and stations that go up to tens of thousands in mass. And fighters that can go up to 100, cause I hate to be killed easily.

TL;DR

personal experience, swarms of fighters, gunboats, and a critical point on judgement