My take on the upcoming ship HP system

[Lecic]

I've been thinking over the planned HP system for a while and have decided to offer my own take on the matter. For those unaware, combat is planned to shift away from a core based system to an HP based system. Not much is known beyond that.

Here's how I think it should work. ships will have three tiers of health. Shields, Hull, and Block.

Shields
These are your first line of defense. They work like they currently do, functioning as a recharging barrier against damage.

Hull
Hull is your second line of defense. Your enemies broke through your energy shields, but don't worry! Good old hull integrity will still stave away the cannon fire, for a little while.
Your ship will have a "hull integrity" HP bar, which will be the total health of all non-system blocks on your ship. While you have hull integrity, no non-system block can be destroyed by weapons. However, exposed system blocks can still take damage. Missiles will only damage system blocks if a direct hit occurs to prevent system blocks being destroyed by explosives through walls.
Your hull integrity will also block a certain percentage of incoming fire with its armor rating, which is the average armor rating of all non-system blocks that have an armor rating.
For example, the XxEliteNoobslayer has 10 non-system blocks. It has 3 hardened hull (200 HP, 50% armor), 2 normal hull (100 HP, 25% armor), and 5 rocks (25 HP). This would give the XxEliteNoobslayer 925 hull integrity with 40% armor rating.
Hull integrity does not regenerate, but it can be repaired by astrotechno beams. There could also be a passive effect that would slowly repair hull integrity for large power cost. Not sure what the offensive ability would be, if any, like how cloak and jam have no offensive, only passive effect.

Block
Block HP is your final line of defense, and to be honest, if this is reached, you're probably screwed. Once Hull integrity reaches 0, all blocks can be destroyed by weapons fire. The position of these blocks will be saved so you can readd them with astrotechno beams, at the cost of a the block from the pilot's or a linked plexstorage's inventory.
Beyond that, the block destruction works the same as it currently does when something loses shields.
Since cores will no longer matter, ships with less than 20% of blocks remaining should under go a count down to self destruct like ships currently do when the core receives too much damage.

I'd also like to suggest a few tweaks.

• Lights, Metal Mesh, Metal Grill, and Crystals should have the same HP and armor as light hull
• Ship HUD diamonds focus on the center of mass of the ship instead of core
• Planets have a layer a few blocks thick of strong bedrock (max allowed HP and armor) at the bottom of the plate, to make it more resistant to immediate destruction.
• Planet plates have shared shields, power, hull integrity, and faction owner/home base status.

All additions will be bolded, all removals struck-through.

Edit 1

Spoiler: Edit 1

• Only blocks with an armor rating contribute to the average armor rating stat.
• Crystals, Meshes, Grills added to having same HP & Armor as light hull
• Added idea for a passive hull repair effect.

 

[Criss]

Wouldn't this system require all non system blocks to be destroyed before effectively attacking system blocks? I'm thinking a percentage of total hull would be better.

 

[Valiant70]

What he's described is more of a non-regenerating HP pool based on the number of non-system blocks that must be depleted before systems may be damaged. Think of it as a non-regenerating second shield.

From a balancing point of view, this sounds like a fairly good idea, and gives piercing more purpose as it could inflict some system damage through armor. However, for me to really like this idea, it needs to include some visual cue to show damage/destruction of armor blocks as the armor HP depletes.

 

[WaffulMann]

>shield
>armor
>hull
ISWYDT

So basically the more hull you have the more hull hp points you have? Okay.
What about when you hit a hull block with a lot of hull block adjacent to it the damage gets nullified a bit?

 

[Reilly Reese]

If we got this sort of setup it just makes making an EVE Server easier

+1

 

[Criss]

What he's described is more of a non-regenerating HP pool based on the number of non-system blocks that must be depleted before systems may be damaged. Think of it as a non-regenerating second shield.

From a balancing point of view, this sounds like a fairly good idea, and gives piercing more purpose as it could inflict some system damage through armor. However, for me to really like this idea, it needs to include some visual cue to show damage/destruction of armor blocks as the armor HP depletes.

So deplete the integrity before damaging the actual armor blocks? Would that then give essentially two health values for the hull as a whole? In the end that equates to a second shield really, just based on varying armor values on the non-system blocks you place. Also he states that exposed system blocks can still take damage if they are hit, which essentially bypasses both of those hull health values, the integrity and armor rating. I like the idea of incorporating hull as an actual armor, but I am seeing some problems with this.

Instead I think a better solution would to create a value based on total non-system amount. The more non-system blocks the better your defensive rating is. Different blocks have different values as they would which contribute to the total value. As this value lowers because of hull loss, your attacks on systems inside the ship are more effective, dealing more damage. After a certain point the hull would be too damaged to offer any protection at all, (20% or something) and the full damage of your weapons is applied to systems inside. Same thing would happen to the system where it will completely overheat after a minimum limit is met.

Idk, I'm not really a fan of shooting at armor and not damaging it because its still got an integrity of some sort. Shields already prevent that.

 

[Reilly Reese]

It should simply be

Shield = shield

Hardened Hull = Armor

Hull = Hull

 

[SgtBeanz]

What I think it should be is a shield should be more of a temporary power up. Let's say you are going into battle and you want an extra boost. You should be able to enable a shield with the click of a button in your ship. As for hull I believe it should be the armor and it should be up-gradable through experience, leveling, etc. Two layers of permanent defense is a bit much.

 

[Criss]

What I think it should be is a shield should be more of a temporary power up. Let's say you are going into battle and you want an extra boost. You should be able to enable a shield with the click of a button in your ship. As for hull I believe it should be the armor and it should be up-gradable through experience, leveling, etc. Two layers of permanent defense is a bit much.

Not really sure how armor, which is a static object can be upgraded by experience, which is intangible. That would apply more to turrets.

 

[SgtBeanz]

Not really sure how armor, which is a static object can be upgraded by experience, which is intangible. That would apply more to turrets.

Not really experience you're right, I don't know, but in some way it should be up-gradable. I do like your idea though, that would work pretty well.

 

[starhaiden]

I have a plan to make my ships better if that is going to be how the new Hp system is going to be.

 

[ToyotaSupra]

What about...

New ship HP version is swappable in the server configs with old block based version?

 

[Byamarro]

I'm not fan of HP system.


What do You think to instead add chance of explosion while You're destroying power generators.
And to make navigation pointer show center of ship instead of core.

 

[Theck]

As far as I can imagine, the point to change the current per block system to an HP system is related to performance. I can imagine how many calculations you need to do now to determine the effect of a single shot (does it damaged this block, and if there's piercing effect, does damage or destroy the next one? and so on).

We all want great battles with lots of fighers, carriers and titans, but I think we need to simplify things to achieve more players at the same time.

 

[Byamarro]

We need to calculate it anyway. How will u check where to make hole without that kind of calculations?

As far as I know. Schema want to introduce HP system to don't make players shoot only into Cores.

 

[Theck]

Don't know what will become the HP system, but I think I prefer a simpler system where your HP points are calculated only in build mode when you add/remove blocks and then you'll have a "hp bar".

Yes It's not as awesome as the current system, but it'll be a lot cheaper in resources, leting Schema the possibility to make battles funnier and smoother.

 

[Byamarro]

I still don't understeand how it could require less resources.

If missile will hit Your ship it will make hole anyway. If not it would suck like hell.

 

[Theck]

Sorry if not explained enought well. Do not make any holes, when hit you lose HP, if your HP is 0, your ship it's destroyed, then break it semi-randomly to allow salvaging and you're dead.

 

[ToyotaSupra]

Another thing I'd like to add. When this HP system is added...

Happens with every major game, with every major update that changes something.

 

[WaffulMann]

Another thing I'd like to add. When this HP system is added...

Happens with every major game, with every major update that changes something.

Just look at the planets update. People still be bitchin today wanting the old ones back.