Introduce fixed Weapon Systems to promote Fighters and Superweapons

[Gandrac]

Fixed weapon systems that can only be aimed with the ships movement could help to improve the viability of fighters and would promote the construction of highly effective but limited capital class weapon systems.
While agile, fighters would barely feel a difference in using this new option over the current system. It could be used to make them carry highly power-efficient weapon systems that fit inside the small hull. This would automatically restrict more power-efficient weapons systems, maybe even without the 10% group penalty, to either small agile ships or big, but restricted weapons systems.

Fixed weapon systems can already be achieved by firing Computers with logic. This is of course is a bug rather than a feature but could be build upon.

 

[Zaphord]

The only thing I don't like about using logic to fire weapons is the inner ship remote block acts as a toggle, so you have to double click to keep shooting.

I love the idea of fixed, interchangeable weapons. It gives me another option to build things that I can share on this site, but unless they make it more effective to fire those weapons it's not really worth it right now.

 

[Knack]

You are able to build this right now, even with AI support.
Just mount your weapons on normal rails and use Wireless-Logic and maybe clocks to fire/auto-fire the weapons or place a Bobby-AI on it so it will fire independent.

I'm doing this for months now.

 

[Zaphord]

Using clocks works to some extent, but slows the rate of fire for canon/canon weapons somewhat.

As for the bobby AI, even if you set it to fire at the target your pointing at it's sometimes better to hold fire until you get the shot lined up properly. The AI just holds the trigger down like a madman with a machine gun while it's pointed at something and within range, ruining the element of surprise and wasting energy firing at the hardened parts of the ship.

I'd like a way to build different types of weapons I could mount on my ship that I could swap out depending on the situation without having to rebuild my entire ship. Shipyards helped a lot with this, I can build variants that I can just refit as needed, but you need a shipyard and time to do this.

 

[Gandrac]

Like i already said, i am aware that logic could be used to build fixed weapons, but this is broken (at least for me) and pretty useless for fast firing stuff like cannon/cannon or beam/cannon. Using a logic beam/cannon array for example can drop the shields of a target, but after that i only see red numbers pop up without doing actual hull- or system damage (orange numbers).

Furthermore, using this kind of method only makes sense if you want to build a large array without suffering the 10% group penalty.
For small crafts like fighters, logic, bobby AI's and rail-systems remain pretty useless because of the additional space needed. Not to mention that bypassing the 10% group penalty would not be a desirable feat for such crafts. Other bonuses would be needed to accomplish that.

That's why i envisioned it to work like a bobby AI option for weapon computers, which would lower the accuracy (for big ships) but raise the power efficiency.

 

[Edymnion]

The only thing I don't like about using logic to fire weapons is the inner ship remote block acts as a toggle, so you have to double click to keep shooting.

So put a delay block on it. Remote <-> Delay. You turn remote on, half a second later the delay ticks on, toggles the remote back off, which turns the delay off. Everything should now be reset for you.

 

[sayerulz]

I honestly think that all mounted weapons should be fixed, or at least have their arc massively reduced. It just doesn't seem right that we can shoot into the very corners of our screens with super weapons. And it is quite unfair to smaller craft.

 

[StormWing0]

I think there is a way to turn a rail turret axis into a fixed weapon platform if you use a rail speed controller to set the speed to 0. Not sure if it'll work but it'd be a good thing to test.

 

[Gandrac]

I honestly think that all mounted weapons should be fixed, or at least have their arc massively reduced. It just doesn't seem right that we can shoot into the very corners of our screens with super weapons. And it is quite unfair to smaller craft.

Would be fine with me.
That might actually be a better, less complicated solution

On a side note I think that the 10% penalty for additional groups should be dropped or at least start at 5 groups. Otherwise cannons and beams will never be truly used for block destruction.