Read by Council Knife to a Gun Fight

    Edymnion

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    Silly as it might sound, I rather like the idea of small fighters having, for lack of a better phrase, laser swords for melee combat.

    The image of a small fighter with plasma blades running across it's belly that fly in close to larger ships and literally slide across their hulls tearing stuff up as they zip under turret firing arcs sounds like fun to me.

    Kind of like a death star trench run.

    Perhaps set it up so that they ignore shields (since you have to be physically touching the target). Death by a thousand cuts, and I can already see some drill bit torpedo builds...
     
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    Death by a thousand cuts, and I can already see some drill bit torpedo builds...
    Forget drill torpedoes, put a big bow mounted drill on your cruiser a la Super Atragon and put some REALLY BIG holes in titans and stations.
     
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    Edymnion

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    damage pulse?
    Still affected by shields, which makes it pretty worthless. Plus you have to keep triggering it or set up logic and area sensors to trigger it with, and you still end up with giant swaths of damage that look like missile strikes.

    If I wanted missile damage to the target ship, I'd just shoot missiles at it.
     
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    Edymnion

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    wouldn't "lazer swords" be affected by shields also?
    What about warheads logically makes sense that they ignore shields?

    Missiles are explosives, beams are energy, cannon shot is physical, and shields stop all of that. What possible function of a warhead allows them to bypass shields that isn't covered by anything else?

    Don't try to apply real world logic here, it doesn't even really work with what we already have.
     
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    no kidding about the warheads,i wasn't knocking your suggestion I think it would be great for gameplay,maybe even as a personal weapon,or a drone mounted system.i would hate to be in the opposing ship!
     

    Edymnion

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    no kidding about the warheads,i wasn't knocking your suggestion I think it would be great for gameplay,maybe even as a personal weapon,or a drone mounted system.i would hate to be in the opposing ship!
    Man, just imagine a swarm of drone bees each with a little one block stinger. Hundreds of them swarming all over a titan. Too small and too fast for big anti-ship turrets to take out.

    Literally stings it to death.
     
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    Edymnion

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    Ooh, or what about small fighters with plasma blade "wings" that slide across a larger ship's hull to lop off turrets?
    [DOUBLEPOST=1455563080,1455562510][/DOUBLEPOST]You know, the more I think about this, the more I like it for one big reason. It gives a downward pressure on ship size, something we don't really have right now.

    If small fighters could get in close to attack turrets directly, thats incentive to have ships that don't have enough room to get in at the turrets. If moderate sized ships had trireme style ramming blades on the front that could bypass shields to do some high end ramming damage, then large and immobile titans would be at a much bigger disadvantage against smaller battleships and destroyers, which would be more capable of dodging out of the way of being rammed.

    It would give smaller ships a real meaningful advantage again over the "whoever brings the biggest ship, wins" status quo we have now.
     
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    What about warheads logically makes sense that they ignore shields?

    Missiles are explosives, beams are energy, cannon shot is physical, and shields stop all of that. What possible function of a warhead allows them to bypass shields that isn't covered by anything else?

    Don't try to apply real world logic here, it doesn't even really work with what we already have.
    There's also the fact that collisions also bypass shields, assuming you have that server setting turned on. Had to turn that setting off on my server since undocking was considered a high speed collision for some reason, and got tired of having to rebuild my USD-1 docks.
    [DOUBLEPOST=1455564295,1455563314][/DOUBLEPOST]
    Ooh, or what about small fighters with plasma blade "wings" that slide across a larger ship's hull to lop off turrets?
    [DOUBLEPOST=1455563080,1455562510][/DOUBLEPOST]You know, the more I think about this, the more I like it for one big reason. It gives a downward pressure on ship size, something we don't really have right now.

    If small fighters could get in close to attack turrets directly, thats incentive to have ships that don't have enough room to get in at the turrets. If moderate sized ships had trireme style ramming blades on the front that could bypass shields to do some high end ramming damage, then large and immobile titans would be at a much bigger disadvantage against smaller battleships and destroyers, which would be more capable of dodging out of the way of being rammed.

    It would give smaller ships a real meaningful advantage again over the "whoever brings the biggest ship, wins" status quo we have now.
    I've been trying to point that out for ages now! "Bigger is better" has been the mantra in SM for as long as I've been playing, but why is that? Why is it that if I build a torpedo bomber capable of blowing a frigate sized hole in a much larger ship, or suggest anything that might make smaller ships more viable, I get called the troll and a griefer?

    The reason for that is simple; Everyone is basically playing "single player" even when they're on a server, there's no incentive to rely on other players to manage systems like weapons, shields, jump drives, etc. What I see that's wrong with this picture is big ships like titans only need 1 player to control everything, so why bother making and fighting in anything else? If you can fly an gigantic, invulnerable, death machine all by yourself then there's little point in doing anything else. If big ships were required to have more than one crew member (player or NPC) and had to deal with strategies that could cause them a lot of damage using smaller ships in greater numbers then you'd see average ship sizes shrinking pretty damn fast.

    That's why I love this idea, anything to even the odds against those behemoths is a good thing. They might even consider jumping away if they see 2 dozen drones with plasma blades extended and closing fast, but I suspect they'll just get ripped to shreds and complain to have them nerfed like they always do when something takes their advantage away.

    Anyway, enough bitching from me :p.
     

    Edymnion

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    Heck, I'm even seeing counter blade fighter builds for larger ships.

    Laser spiked hulls designed specifically to tear up anything coming in with their own blades. No more death cubes, we'd have... death sea urchins?

     

    Lecic

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    Warheads are balanced in that they are single use. If these ignore shields and aren't single use, they will be OP. If they ARE single use, what's the point of having them over warheads?

    I can only see these being overpowered. There's a reason collision lag isn't on be default, you know.
     
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    Oh, I can Already think of a planetary quarry system :cool: oh yeah, space mining made cool!
     
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    Edymnion

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    Warheads are balanced in that they are single use. If these ignore shields and aren't single use, they will be OP. If they ARE single use, what's the point of having them over warheads?
    Now really, if we want to use warheads as the gauge of effectiveness, then we aren't going to have any weapon systems at all left over. A bare naked astronaut with a cutting torch is more effective than a warhead.

    And come on, you know you want to build a Giga Drill Breaker ship:
     
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    Lecic

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    Now really, if we want to use warheads as the gauge of effectiveness, then we aren't going to have any weapon systems at all left over. A bare naked astronaut with a cutting torch is more effective than a warhead.
    I'm referring to the concept of warheads, not their current stats. What does this add when we already have warheads?

    And come on, you know you want to build a Giga Drill Breaker ship:
    No, I want a properly balanced game.
     

    Edymnion

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    I'm referring to the concept of warheads, not their current stats. What does this add when we already have warheads?
    War heads are large blast radius explosions, plasma blades are scalpels?

    If a warhead worked properly, its the explosive missile to a blade's cannon fire. One is good for brute force, one is good for surgical strikes.
     
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    I'm referring to the concept of warheads, not their current stats. What does this add when we already have warheads?



    No, I want a properly balanced game.
    How about this: They use a minimal amount of power, but when they hit another block they use up a shit ton of power, and they don't turn back on for like, I dunno, 5 minutes or so?
     
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    Lecic

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    War heads are large blast radius explosions, plasma blades are scalpels?

    If a warhead worked properly, its the explosive missile to a blade's cannon fire. One is good for brute force, one is good for surgical strikes.
    I can guarantee you that this will not be used for "surgical strikes." It's going to be used for nothing but drill ships and massive melee plates that vaporize entire ships in an instant. You cannot have a shield ignoring weapon that is constant.
     

    Zyrr

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    A weapon that makes small ships blatantly overpowered?

    Man, what could possibly go wrong?