Quadruple armor without cheating

[GRHayes]

4 times the armor per block. you could use this also with adding individual power and shields to each group.
See my 2x armor post for more details on that.

 

[Ezekial Alexander]

What happens if one if these get traumatically undocked?

Collision lag issues?

 

[alterintel]

What happens if one if these get traumatically undocked?

Collision lag issues?

yes

But this is pretty cool. The idea has been around for a while. I forget who it was but they called it tetra-weave. Very good illustration :D

 

[Jaaskinal]

I want to say Furb was the first to come up with this, but I doubt that. Was a thing way back when, but spectre was better for a similar purpose.

 

[MacThule]

This would make a great shock plate for a tank ship. I'd love to see some damage testing on one.

 

[Az14el]

Should also be able to slot slabs together into a "full block" in the same way, so just wait until wedge slabs come out ;D

 

[GRHayes]

This would make a great shock plate for a tank ship. I'd love to see some damage testing on one.

If you look at the 2x armor post I did before it you can see the armor and shield values used and I fired a 750K damage missile at that with no damage other than a small shield drop. Adding shields to all the docked sections or using more docked sections and adding shields to them should even further disperse damage.

You are right though it would be nice to figure out the extent the armor can be used.

 

[NeonSturm]

If you look at the 2x armor post I did before it you can see the armor and shield values used and I fired a 750K damage missile at that with no damage other than a small shield drop. Adding shields to all the docked sections or using more docked sections and adding shields to them should even further disperse damage.

You are right though it would be nice to figure out the extent the armor can be used.

Agree. But currently the rotations of non-full blocks lag any indicator before being placed - I am not gonna try putting that into some complex shapes until this critical bug is fixed.

But as much as I like the concept, I hate the missing build-mode support for it.
It forces you to do work of a mindless bot for having competitive ships which also look nicer than a Borg/Doom-Cube.

I could live with it as long as it is only about 20% (110%^3 = 133%, so ships would not even be 10% bigger in all directions).
BUT this raises the question (again) whether full cubes should be allowed to have more armour so that their volume counts!

 

[Az14el]

Well it really crushes missiles, until they have the numbers to just chomp right through all of it at once or hit the occasional calculations jackpot.
And obviously beams as they can only destroy one armored block per tick, meaning this wall would need 4 ticks minimum against any size beam.

And not really much use against cannons, I've never been able to make docked armor stand up to high pen cannon weapons even going into the realm of passive supported & shield injected armor. It's an extra couple layers of wet t-shirt in these cases at best.

But you know I just think armors underpowered against larger weapons in general, both the way HP works and the blocks themselves, so I've never had any problem with using or been particularly annoyed at facing fancy docked armor features. Unless they're combined with something else nasty.

 

[NeonSturm]

But you know I just think armors underpowered against larger weapons in general, both the way HP works and the blocks themselves, so I've never had any problem with using or been particularly annoyed at facing fancy docked armor features. Unless they're combined with something else nasty.

You've got a good point here: The bigger ships and cannons get, the smaller blocks get (in relation to them). Blocks decrease in relative size!

But is this not solved with structural hp? (with armor working a bit like shield capacity)

 

[GRHayes]

Well it really crushes missiles, until they have the numbers to just chomp right through all of it at once or hit the occasional calculations jackpot.
And obviously beams as they can only destroy one armored block per tick, meaning this wall would need 4 ticks minimum against any size beam.

And not really much use against cannons, I've never been able to make docked armor stand up to high pen cannon weapons even going into the realm of passive supported & shield injected armor. It's an extra couple layers of wet t-shirt in these cases at best.

But you know I just think armors underpowered against larger weapons in general, both the way HP works and the blocks themselves, so I've never had any problem with using or been particularly annoyed at facing fancy docked armor features. Unless they're combined with something else nasty.

Docked armor can also be individual powered. Meaning not only can it have its own shields but that of the main ships. Plus it can power weapons and even provided added power to the ship. If you are going to dock a power module why not get the extra out of it as well.
I tend to notice a lot of damage tends to end up at the forward end of ships. Probably because most manual fired weapons are counted on firing from the front. Don't see to many ships firing broadsides in this game. Consider what 4 layers of this type of armor at the front of a ship would offer in protection plus the added shield strength.

 

[Az14el]

You've got a good point here: The bigger ships and cannons get, the smaller blocks get (in relation to them). Blocks decrease in relative size!

But is this not solved with structural hp? (with armor working a bit like shield capacity)

Technically yes, but heavy per shot weapons can deal ridiculous amounts of damage relative to the armor blocks they destroy right now, which I think nerfs armor HP unfairly. While Armor HP is up (and especially with defensive pierce), armor blocks are ridiculously durable against mid-largeish weapons, but the armor HP itself takes way too much of a beating per block destroyed depending on the output size that's hitting it.
Beam-Pulse-Punch or Missile-Beam-Punch certainly come to mind here. (Very high difficult to avoid alpha, & 25% bonus Armor HP damage via Punch)

Docked armor can also be individual powered. Meaning not only can it have its own shields but that of the main ships. Plus it can power weapons and even provided added power to the ship. If you are going to dock a power module why not get the extra out of it as well.
I tend to notice a lot of damage tends to end up at the forward end of ships. Probably because most manual fired weapons are counted on firing from the front. Don't see to many ships firing broadsides in this game. Consider what 4 layers of this type of armor at the front of a ship would offer in protection plus the added shield strength.

I Admit the moving armor plates idea sounds interesting, though I wouldn't count on it as the game is right now & during multiplayer combat :p
Docked parts being self powerable is the main reason why modular building is so viable right now, even despite ending up with technically lower main ship HP and more key rail parts to protect. But honestly this is useful for offense so much more than it is for defence, not counting shield injection which still only takes so many reactors/capacitors to self power, docked defensive elements are very cheap unless you plan to have them hold jam/cloak via fleet AI.

 

[GRHayes]

Technically yes, but heavy per shot weapons can deal ridiculous amounts of damage relative to the armor blocks they destroy right now, which I think nerfs armor HP unfairly. While Armor HP is up (and especially with defensive pierce), armor blocks are ridiculously durable against mid-largeish weapons, but the armor HP itself takes way too much of a beating per block destroyed depending on the output size that's hitting it.
Beam-Pulse-Punch or Missile-Beam-Punch certainly come to mind here. (Very high difficult to avoid alpha, & 25% bonus Armor HP damage via Punch)




I Admit the moving armor plates idea sounds interesting, though I wouldn't count on it as the game is right now & during multiplayer combat :p
Docked parts being self powerable is the main reason why modular building is so viable right now, even despite ending up with technically lower main ship HP and more key rail parts to protect. But honestly this is useful for offense so much more than it is for defence, not counting shield injection which still only takes so many reactors/capacitors to self power, docked defensive elements are very cheap unless you plan to have them hold jam/cloak via fleet AI.

If you use the distributed pathern system combined with the quadruple armor layer shown in both the posts. It would give you 4 times the armor but you could technically have 4, 8 or more times the shielding per block.
If you do it several layers thick you could technically have an armor rating equal to ships massively larger than itself. Granted you get the weight with that but you also get the ability to turn and maneuver with the short ship.

In short this just gives some options and ideas that people might find fun to try out.

 

[NeonSturm]

Ok, just one noob-question here (because the game is currently unplayable because I can place wedges only blindly now):

If you have a docked armour plate and it is killed not by killing all blocks but by killing it's individual structural hp, do the blocks remain as an obstacle?

The shielding part I don't understand. Is there a soft-cap on shield capacity or recharge introduced lately?

 

[Az14el]

smaller ships come with their own disadvantages, mostly less system HP, in practise you're just making a heavier ship with the guns of a lighter ship, I agree it looks pretty powerful and should be effective, but since it relies on armor blocks it's limited, because armor is just awful for its weight once the grey bar drops. I still don't see any actual problem with its use, the more you split it up into segments the fewer armor blocks need to be destroyed to render each docked part useless. It will still play hell with missile calculations and beam ticks, but thats an issue inherent in missiles & beams and can't be relied on forever.

Armor just runs into a cap as to what it can stop effectively in terms of weapon group size, which is pretty small for some combinations. I'm a real armor enthusiast but you do need to consider your mass compared what you can fire, not just what you can take. Thats about the biggest downside to multiple very heavy blocks in one small space I can think of.

 

[NeonSturm]

Az14el , I agree, but you speak too generally.
Armour can be detached once depleted thus buying you time to recharge power and giving you a more agile ship afterwards.

Also, Imagine strong hull in a doom-cube and then light hull put around that doom-cube to give it the shape of a well-looking ship.
Maybe the ratio or weight difference between light and heavy armour is too small for your purpose.

The longer you live, the more damage you can dish out. Sometimes you want to put strong fighters in a small hangar of a carrier-ship - again, not weight but volume is the issue.
The more damage your fighters can take, the bigger the enemy anti-fighter guns must be and the less guns he has against your capital vessel.

Bombers might hit the speed limit and do not need much rotation against a stationary target. But they need to survive the bomb run so that you can salvage their damaged hulls.

 

[Mariux]

This is so oddly satisfying to look at.

 

[kiddan]

Hmm, I might try making some ships with this! However, I'd research a self-destruct mechanism for the docked entities first, so that if a rail gets destroyed the plates won't stick around. I guess the docked armour could all be on the outside and get shot off a launch rail if some activators get shot down.

Also, 10/10 best new terrain for cars with spinning wheels!

 

[NeonSturm]

Hmm, I might try making some ships with this! However, I'd research a self-destruct mechanism for the docked entities first, so that if a rail gets destroyed the plates won't stick around. I guess the docked armour could all be on the outside and get shot off a launch rail if some activators get shot down.

Also, 10/10 best new terrain for cars with spinning wheels!

Better use area triggers - they also trigger when nearby blocks get added or removed the last time I tested it.

 

[kiddan]

Better use area triggers - they also trigger when nearby blocks get added or removed the last time I tested it.

Ooh, didn't know you could do that! Sounds like I've got some experimentation to do. =)