Read by Council Prevent Turrets from being Built Incorrectly

[Zekester81]

Well and now I have to take this forum off the "no a**holes here" list. It was a good run, but someone just had to stop by to be that person.

Look I made my suggestion, asked why it is this way, and everyone is just being a bunch of d***s. I thought this was a mature community but I guess that's asking for too much these days. Have fun in Starmade, I think I'll wait another year for it to....."mature"

Sorry, I don't mean to sound like an asshole, but I am, so it comes out that way. I still stand by what I said that it's literally a couple minutes of work to sort out the problem. SM shouldn't have to fix something that it takes a player a couple minutes of trial and error to figure out.

 

[Gunseng]

Sorry, I don't mean to sound like an asshole, but I am, so it comes out that way. I still stand by what I said that it's literally a couple minutes of work to sort out the problem. SM shouldn't have to fix something that it takes a player a couple minutes of trial and error to figure out.

What's with the obsession with being an asshole here? Does it make your internet dick bigger or something?

This IS something that is holding new players back. My other two friends don't even want to mess with turrets, they just keep asking me for blueprints of them. I'm trying to look out for the new people coming in. Maybe the tutorial video will be enough, maybe not. Until then I guess I'm the only one building turrets in my faction for a while......

 

[Lord_Greyscale]

For me, the biggest challenge with Turrets isn't remembering to align the goddamn cores to Galactic North, (1) its deciding both what shape I want the turret to be, and how much bigger I'll have to build it to get the DPS output I'm after. (and that's with me refusing to make 1-1 can/can systems larger than 20 blocks, so I'm starting with some space saved versus "similar" intent designs)

The "oversizing" only gets worse if I want an effect added in. Let's say EMP, to make a Star Wars type Ion-cannon. I'll have to build the gun-barrels a minimum of 50% larger than I'd originally imagined them, just to fit the EMP system. (since I cannot have those be in the turret base, and still actually work with the gun-barrel, due to "insurmountable" game-engine limitations)

And then if I want said gun-barrels to survive a drive-by from a machine-gunner, I have to add in at least a dozen shield capacitors, and one or two rechargers, 'cause 220 shields from the core itself don't do a damn thing. (2)

By the time I'm done making the Gun-barrel a viable combatant, I'll have to design an entirely new housing (gun-base) for the monster, since that part will allso need the shields, and whilst it won't need the weapons, it will need a rather large number of Rail Mass Enhancers just to counteract the rather significant (about heavy-drone fighter) mass of the gun-barrel.
(Otherwise said gun barrel will elevate/turn juuuust about as quickly as anything stuck in hardened Tar, or that mosquito in amber from the first Jurassic Park. AKA not a damn bit of combat usefull speed)


TL;DR : Building a turret is a design headache I don't need, when designing the ship it will be attached to is allso a headache.

(1) Any manually spawned core (by pressing X for example) will cock-up and NOT be aiming North, so best to align the little bastard no matter what I'll be making out of it.

(2) In ever single test I've ever done, the shield sharing trick will not work unless the docked entity possessed charged shields (meaning it must have a recharger), and would only block the first 220 points of damage per-second. Not per-shot, as one would presume it should, per-second. (I am willing to admit, the dev-builds might be functioning differently, but I don't play those)
This means that the core-as-shields strategy I've seen so many others being in favor of/building doesn't work.
Yes, I've even run the test from a clean install.


NOTE: I'm aware some of you have no difficulty keeping turrets in the size you really wanted.
You're all either more familiar with the game than I am. (which I'll slowly get more familiar with)
Or using a cheat-sheet to determine how big the bastard's gonna end up. I do not and cannot design that way, it is (to me) the equivalent of sitting down to eat a sammich, and then having to solve trigonometry in order to eat the damnned sammich.

I do not play video games for the purpose of doing math problems. (the power system is bad enough in this regard) I play them to take my mind off of real life.

 

[Madman198237]

I agree that turrets are a pain, but mostly from a design aspect.

 

[PLIX]

well were surrounded by a**holes

 

[Madman198237]

Hahaha, someone would bring that up.

 

[Lukwan]

NOTE: I'm aware some of you have no difficulty keeping turrets in the size you really wanted.
You're all either more familiar with the game than I am. (which I'll slowly get more familiar with)
Or using a cheat-sheet to determine how big the bastard's gonna end up. I do not and cannot design that way, it is (to me) the equivalent of sitting down to eat a sammich, and then having to solve trigonometry in order to eat the damnned sammich.

I do not play video games for the purpose of doing math problems. (the power system is bad enough in this regard) I play them to take my mind off of real life.

Could not agree more with that last line LG. I would find building tedious if I predetermined my stats before starting to build. I just 'wing it' and use intuition and analysis to modify my build.

I am 1300 hours in SM and my turrets are the most popular thing on my Community Content page. This is probably because a lot of people find turrets frustrating. My turrets are not super efficient but they all do a job and I like their looks. My only real guideline is that I try to maintain good proportion within each entity and between entities. If the barrel is too long I shorten it, if the rate of fire is too slow I knock off a couple modules from the main (or boost the secondary if that would look better). The map is not the terrain, so I don't get married to any plans or ideas. I encourage other builders who are struggling with this to choose testing & adaptation over planning. More freedom is more fun.

 

[Jeryu]

I think that maybe an option in advanced build mode could solve most of the problems.

You click it to align to galactic North whilst in build mode (maybe make the normal align option work whilst in build mode).

Another option could be to have a toggle options for turret base & Turret Barrel depending on which is ticked the orientation of dockers and rails will be limited to left Side turrets and right side turrets, if these are left unticked it will not affect normal ship building and docker blocks.

Better option may be a Turret helper option like the builder helper, you choose the width length etc of your turret and it limits building to main turret components.(including the placing of cores the limit being two per structure). This turret helper would be something better maybe in a shipyard. which could do all the aligning for you.

I know that for some people the act of trial and error can be fun, but for most who want to explore the universe and not worry about whether there turrets are aligned correctly. It can become quite tedious. Thank Goodness for Blueprints, because I'd have gone crazy building them one by one.

This game has come a long way since I started playing and I'm sure Schine have got loads more to offer too.

 

[MacThule]

Maybe we need a Turrets sub-section in community content just like there is a Space Station subsection. Then public resource turrets will be available to all new people to download and add to their ships without worrying about the intricacies of turret design.

 

[TheMadKraken2297]

Ok, I can't figure out how to build a turret at ALL. I build the base, barrels, do everything the tutorial and website tells me, put in AI and spawn an Isanith. Turret sits there and does abso-friggin-lutely nothing. What th heck.
[doublepost=1473285418,1473285385][/doublepost]And I turn on the AI
[doublepost=1473285862][/doublepost]Oh, and I did 30 mins of trial and error. Brush, everyone here was a noob once.
[doublepost=1473285909][/doublepost]I meant bruh*

 

[MeRobo]

What kind of target setting did you use?

 

[Calhoun]

Got screenshots?

 

[TheMadKraken2297]

No I don't have screenshots. I'm posting from my phone right now. I put the "aim at human" setting on, and put meself in front of the barrel.

 

[Sgtwisky]

it will not shoot if your not an enemy. It also requires a faction block in order to determine what is an enemy. it has to be a pirate or another player you are at war with.

 

[Vvolodymyr]

I spent a couple hours building turrets today and guess how many of them work correctly right now?

Just 1 of 2. The 2nd one moves in reverse, so it seemed to be working until I put bobby AI on it then turned out to be a useless piece of junk the AI can't use.

I hate coming back to Starmade and having to watch a tutorial video (over a year old now) on which way a ship core has to be aligned with the rail docker just to build a turret and even then still hoping it's correct!

I'm shocked nothing has really been done with this by now. I'd like the experience of building a turret to actually be enjoyable.

Please either make it so any orientation will work or limit it so I can only build the correct options.

This happens every time I try to get back into Starmade and it is just making it more and more difficult to come back to. You guys do a lot of good work, which is why I'm surprised something hasn't been done about this. Is this something that can't currently be fixed?

Sorry if this subject has been brought up before, but the little time I have to put into Starmade today was all for nothing. Now I don't know if I want to put that time in again.

The Arbitrary rule to core orientation on turrets is still an issue. "Wrong" core orientation can cause:
-lack of rotation along one or more axes
-backwards rotation confusing Bobby AI
-barrel flat surface sticking to base flat surface

If you happen to be lucky to guess the "correct" arbitrary core orientation - all these issues disappear without any other change.

P.S. "Please either make it so any [Turret Barrel & Base Core] orientation will work" - only docker's orientation should matter.
As to core orientation, it determines all default block orientation on that entity (and block orientation can also be changed manually on entities as desired). People place depending on what they want the entity's "front" and "top" to be.
Docking blocks however determine planes of rotation.
Easy, simple and intuitive segregation of function.
Why mix up these two separate things to begin with, is puzzling.

P.P.S.
+ Community tutorials are not always up to date, are not always complete or in-depth, and are not always accurate.
+ Trial and Error may be an unnecessarily long process (even combined with sifting through community tutorials of varying age, relevance, accuracy) - Before anything, a new user has to guess that core orientation ha anything to do with turret rotation. Then go through permutations of Base & Barrel core orientation. And then chance upon a working set-up.
+Tutorials & Trial and Error are solutions here, but solutions to an unnecessary difficulty. (Power rechargers, for example, have their rules, they have internal logical consistency, they don't cause bug-like problems, and relatively easy to slowly figure out for anyone without any outside help. This turret thing is a different matter entirely).

By the way as of now, both base and barrel core orientations don't need to have the same orientation for everything to work perfectly fine - there is simply a more obscure arbitrary rule to that. You can look at tutorials or trial and error to confirm this. There are plenty of "wrong" core orientations, of course, hence the problem.

CheerZ

 

[Madman198237]

....Never had an issue with turrets. It's the same way with building ships---know which way your core is facing! If your weapons point forwards in a turret, you're fine. Otherwise, maybe it's an issue. I don't know, I pay attention when I build. Yes, turrets should function even when sideways, but to some extent that's an issue with the game engine, which seems to depend a lot on core orientation being "correct" or at least systems working with the core's facing in certain ways.

So, in order to "Prevent turrets from being built incorrectly", put a harder-to-miss arrow somewhere on-screen, in the ship or something else so that you know what direction your core is facing without needing to do any actual work. Yes, I'm being sarcastic, no, I have no empathy for those of you confused over what the direction of "relative forwards" is. Relative to the core. Meaning where you're looking when in the core in flight mode. Have a nice day. Quit necroing threads.

 

[GRHayes]

There is a very simple way to get it right every single time.

I set my first turret dock down facing the direction I want.
I then grab a rail docked and spawn a core. Once in the core I go to build mode.
On a new ship you always come out in build mode a the back of the ship. When you target the core you get an arrow pointing which way is forward. I then put the docker under the core aiming forward.
I dock it and then put another turret rail dock on top of it aiming again the direction I want.
I then grab another core spawn it. Again at the back of the core I can see which way is forward by putting the yellow build indicator against the core to see the arrow. If the arrow is on the right side of the block docked lower section which is my standard I put a hull section down to the right of the core. I then grab another docker and ensure it is facing left and the direction indicated by the turret docker I just place on the lower turret section. Once I have that correct I put it on opposite side of the hull from the core. I then remove that section of hull switch to flight mode and dock.
I doesn't fail.

That said if you are using the shipyard I haven't put a turret on yet using it. So it could be different.

 

[Vvolodymyr]

So this is a suggestion for a change - that is still very much relevant.

Solutions exist (Rivet Turret : AMS & flak missile defence)

But as it was written:

P.S. "Please either make it so any [Turret Barrel & Base Core] orientation will work" - only docker's orientation should matter.
...
Docking blocks however determine planes of rotation.

Easy, simple and intuitive segregation of function.
Why mix up these two separate things to begin with, is puzzling.

+ Trial and Error may be an unnecessarily long process (even combined with sifting through community tutorials of varying age, relevance, accuracy) - Before anything, a new user has to guess that core orientation ha anything to do with turret rotation. Then go through permutations of Base & Barrel core orientation. And then chance upon a working set-up.
+Tutorials & Trial and Error are solutions here, but solutions to an unnecessary difficulty. (Power rechargers, for example, have their rules, they have internal logical consistency, they don't cause bug-like problems, and relatively easy to slowly figure out for anyone without any outside help. This turret thing is a different matter entirely).
CheerZ

Dockers orientation is enough to determine axes of rotation.
Getting rid of the unnecessary arbitrary rules to core orientation - takes away frustration of for newer players still keeping the "Figuring Out" part of gameplay.

Spoiler: What Frustrations?

1. guessing that the orientation of 2 cores has anything to do with turret functionality (Anyone here remembers their first time with this? I still do)
2. going through permutations of docker and core orientation and their respective locations - where cores are located relative to dockers and which way dockers and cores are oriented - how many permutations is that?
3. Either Slowly figuring out by themselves (like I did - since figuring out how stuff works is part of the fun for me, and frankly the game has to have everything in it for the player to learn by themselves) or searching online - both these options right now are not convenient.

EDIT:

4. There are other issues - for example the one described in my post - where barrel's flat surface sticks to base's flat surface if core orientation is not guessed "correctly" - this problem goes away with changing the barrel's core orientation. No one would guess right away that that issue has anything to do with core orientation. There are other similar bug-like problems.

Hence, this strange and illogical decision to tie core orientation in addition to docking block orientation to the functionality of turrets, adds nothing to the gameplay and takes away time.

P.P.S. Everything is already addressed and laid out in OP and My post.
P.S. I randomly read threads and chip in once in a while.

 

[jayman38]

In short, this is a suggestion to always spawn in cores facing universal "North". (Or to re-orient the spawned core immediately after it spawns, as if the player had entered the core and pressed "C" manually.) It's an important, quality-of-life update that the game could obviously benefit from.

If someone absolutely needs the core facing a different direction, it is up to them to change it, and those builders probably have to re-orient the core from whatever direction it spawns in now.