"Shield Armor"

[Valiant70]

I came up with this crazy idea while discussing the impact of interiors on ship performance. The main problem I see is that there is extra weight that only adds armor and hull HP, and nothing else of any use. This leads to ships with interiors being forced into an armor tank meta, where they tend to be slower and have less firepower than undecorated ships of the same mass.

More empty space inside = more surface area = more armor mass = slower or more thrusters.
More thrusters = less shield or less firepower.

This could easily be solved by adding a fourth type of armor that provides shield capacity instead of armor HP. Yes, I know it sounds silly, but instead of thinking of it as "armor that adds shields," think of it as a pretty shield capacitor that you can use for decoration in or outside of your ship.

Now, there is still the issue of decoration blocks adding extraneous weight, and nothing useful aside from hull HP. This could be most easily solved by making the blocks almost weightless. How light? How much does a computer weigh compared to a solid piece of metal the same volume? Not much. For game mechanics, I'd say make the decoration blocks weight about 1/100 as much as hull, and provide a proportional amount of HP. That's trivial enough not to matter even if you use a great many of them as I like to.

 

[Neon_42]

I think there might be some merit to this idea but it should be brainstormed more. I like the idea of a shield tank at the expense of armor or ship hp, but maybe work it differently. Using this block would add an shield modifier like the armor modifier reducing incoming damage at the sacrifice of ship and armor hp? Maybe call it Conductive Hull or Energized hull or something like that. I don't think either of those are good but maybe someone else can think of a better name.

 

[EricBlank]

This doesnt seem like such a bad idea; shield capacitors themselves are indeed hideous to behold exposed, but itd be nice to get more function out of decorations and not have to cut back on them. I wouldnt be miffed if the capacity they added was quite miniscule either.

 

[Valiant70]

This doesnt seem like such a bad idea; shield capacitors themselves are indeed hideous to behold exposed, but itd be nice to get more function out of decorations and not have to cut back on them. I wouldnt be miffed if the capacity they added was quite miniscule either.

As long as the mass is also small proportional to the capacity, I'd be fine with that.

 

[Nickizzy]

shield capacity instead of armor HP

proportional amount of HP

So what you mean is to have decorative blocks be superlightweight and have 5 shield cap each? Wouldn't this need to make an entire new set of hull blocks? Thats my only problem with it. And cost. Would these by proportionally cheap too?

 

[Valiant70]

Wouldn't this need to make an entire new set of hull blocks?

Yes.

And cost. Would these by proportionally cheap too?

To be perfectly honest, I don't care. It'd be nice though.

 

[EricBlank]

A fair balance might be to keep them around the same cost as standard armor, or something in-between standard armor and basic hull. I guess another fair question is whether they count as armor in terms of taking reduced damage or shifting some of the damage they take to armor HP

Another quick, stupid idea I had: decoration blocks like computers also add to power, shield, structure, and armor capacity. Like a tiny power capacity per block with no scaling bonus, a small shield capacity bonus from some things like IDK, crystals, small structure and/or armor HP bonus for things like girders and grates. They provide more of a function, then, though inherently less than anything dedicated as a systems or armor block. But this does help make up for missing systems from including decorated interiors. It would obviously be a pain in the ass to make them linkable to anything, so I'd suggest not letting them mesh with effects or weapons, and not have them increase power, shield or thrust generation anywhere. So they help improve your capacity, but not production, and on a scale such that they only make up for including an RP interior by a fraction of what the space could have been used for if it were dedicated to systems.
I still use hull for the majority of the lining of interior spaces on my craft, but including things like computer gizmos does make it less bland.

 

[Valiant70]

I guess another fair question is whether they count as armor in terms of taking reduced damage or shifting some of the damage they take to armor HP

No. They're shield capacitators, and they do not have armor HP.
[doublepost=1492722834,1492722775][/doublepost]

A fair balance might be to keep them around the same cost as standard armor, or something in-between standard armor and basic hull. I guess another fair question is whether they count as armor in terms of taking reduced damage or shifting some of the damage they take to armor HP

Another quick, stupid idea I had: decoration blocks like computers also add to power, shield, structure, and armor capacity. Like a tiny power capacity per block with no scaling bonus, a small shield capacity bonus from some things like IDK, crystals, small structure and/or armor HP bonus for things like girders and grates. They provide more of a function, then, though inherently less than anything dedicated as a systems or armor block. But this does help make up for missing systems from including decorated interiors. It would obviously be a pain in the ass to make them linkable to anything, so I'd suggest not letting them mesh with effects or weapons, and not have them increase power, shield or thrust generation anywhere. So they help improve your capacity, but not production, and on a scale such that they only make up for including an RP interior by a fraction of what the space could have been used for if it were dedicated to systems.
I still use hull for the majority of the lining of interior spaces on my craft, but including things like computer gizmos does make it less bland.

Well, you could just make all deco-blocks into pretty shield capacitators.

 

[Shaker]

Sorry to say but the shield armor has been thought up before, i cant remember what schines stance was on it though.

Instead of adding a block, what about changing the system blocks so they weigh more than the armor?
RP ships will be generally alot lighter than a solid filled ship

 

[Extholious]

Sorry to say but the shield armor has been thought up before, i cant remember what schines stance was on it though.

Instead of adding a block, what about changing the system blocks so they weigh more than the armor?
RP ships will be generally alot lighter than a solid filled ship

the problem with that is that we want to be able to put interiors in ships that have a large amount of systems without messing too much with the function of the ship.

I think that there should be a set of blocks for interior that has almost no mass but provides nothing to the ship, this would allow you to jus kinda push everything out of the way and add a little bit of normal armor to cover the extended section

 

[Valiant70]

Sorry to say but the shield armor has been thought up before, i cant remember what schines stance was on it though.

Instead of adding a block, what about changing the system blocks so they weigh more than the armor?
RP ships will be generally alot lighter than a solid filled ship

This would make performance costs of interior more negligible, but would not solve the problem perfectly.

 

[Shaker]

I think that there should be a set of blocks for interior that has almost no mass but provides nothing to the ship

Whats stopping someone from using it on the outside of their ship? Then they have a superfast ship, yes they will be weaker, But the ship is cheaper so there will be more of them.
Got to look at basic ways your idea can be exploited, and stop it from happening

 

[Valiant70]

Whats stopping someone from using it on the outside of their ship? Then they have a superfast ship, yes they will be weaker, But the ship is cheaper so there will be more of them.
Got to look at basic ways your idea can be exploited, and stop it from happening

That would be fine IMO. You could do the same thing now by leaving the hull off of the ship. It's butt-ugly but it works.

 

[MacThule]

Interior adds way more to a ship's defense than armor & system HP. It's awesomely helpful for combat ships. It's all about design & location.

If you build around interior spaces, then it's typically pretty useless except as decoration and a few extra HP. True.

On the other hand, if you build around your systems as a tight-knit component core, wrap that in armor as a bulkhead, then wrap your interiors around that, then wrap external armor & exterior detail around that wrap of interior spaces, then the interior becomes exactly the space gap and cheap block fill a combat ship actually benefits from to soak down powerful AOE attacks like missiles or weapons using explosive effect.

Two layers of interior wrap with armored bulkheads can space-soak a shitload of potential damage from many of the most popular weapon systems.

The more interior the better, when applied as a form of armor for systems, as long as your goal is durability rather than maneuverability (I know we'd all love a ship as tough as neutronium with the DPS of an assault cruiser, maneuverability of a fighter, and enough interior space to put the Death Star to shame, but the reality is we make choices about ship focus, or we build a mediocre generalist ship - which is also good in its own way).

Yes, using interior as armor means your interior will be damaged frequently, but that's what BPs and shipyards are for. If damage to interior spaces is unacceptable, you should play on a build or RP only server or in SP; I don't think the whole game should be bent around providing a balance that specifically protects interior spaces & decor more than systems when they are generally so easy to repair after a battle (also, few things are cooler than grabbing your flashlight and touring the devastation of a beautiful interior in person as an astronaut).
[doublepost=1492806046,1492805850][/doublepost]Ok.. the uploads are acting weird, but here are the other shots from my demo brick after hitting it with 3 successive barrages of 3K block Mb in the same area...

The outer armor is 3ply standard, bulkheads are standard. Had the systems been wrapped only with 5 ply standard this 'ship' would have certainly suffered system damage.

 

[Valiant70]

Interior adds way more to a ship's defense than armor & system HP. It's awesomely helpful for combat ships. It's all about design & location.

If you build around interior spaces, then it's typically pretty useless except as decoration and a few extra HP. True.

On the other hand, if you build around your systems as a tight-knit component core, wrap that in armor as a bulkhead, then wrap your interiors around that, then wrap external armor & exterior detail around that wrap of interior spaces, then the interior becomes exactly the space gap and cheap block fill a combat ship actually benefits from to soak down powerful AOE attacks like missiles or weapons using explosive effect.

Two layers of interior wrap with armored bulkheads can space-soak a shitload of potential damage from many of the most popular weapon systems.

The more interior the better, when applied as a form of armor for systems, as long as your goal is durability rather than maneuverability (I know we'd all love a ship as tough as neutronium with the DPS of an assault cruiser, maneuverability of a fighter, and enough interior space to put the Death Star to shame, but the reality is we make choices about ship focus, or we build a mediocre generalist ship - which is also good in its own way).

Yes, using interior as armor means your interior will be damaged frequently, but that's what BPs and shipyards are for. If damage to interior spaces is unacceptable, you should play on a build or RP only server or in SP; I don't think the whole game should be bent around providing a balance that specifically protects interior spaces & decor more than systems when they are generally so easy to repair after a battle (also, few things are cooler than grabbing your flashlight and touring the devastation of a beautiful interior in person as an astronaut).
[doublepost=1492806046,1492805850][/doublepost]Ok.. the uploads are acting weird, but here are the other shots from my demo brick after hitting it with 3 successive barrages of 3K block Mb in the same area...

The outer armor is 3ply standard, bulkheads are standard. Had the systems been wrapped only with 5 ply standard this 'ship' would have certainly suffered system damage.

I think the main reason people consider ships without interior more effective is because they have more options. Don't get me wrong. Pretty ships have been beating the crap out of everything ever since the HP/armor update. However, they are more or less limited to one kind of specialization.

Yes, in practice you *can* force a ship with interior to be a glass cannon or a fast strike ship. However, the glass cannon will be slow and the speedster will lack firepower. It's hard to combine speed, firepower, and interiors. It's also hard to have any decent amount of speed or firepower and also have good shields. In general, it's just more difficult to make a well-rounded ship if there's a lot of interior in it. I'm not saying it can't be done. I know I can do it. It's just really tedious to get right, which is why I hardly ever finish a ship.

 

[Shaker]

Id like to point out that it is a pain when your mega cannon of doom hits 4 plants, a display block then and an advanced armor block instead of a bunch of system blocks.
One of the side effects to putting your interior upfront.

 

[Extholious]

Whats stopping someone from using it on the outside of their ship? Then they have a superfast ship, yes they will be weaker, But the ship is cheaper so there will be more of them.
Got to look at basic ways your idea can be exploited, and stop it from happening

it would be a glass cannon when the shoelds go down you would start loosing systems since the blocks would not hold up against fire and would block no damage as well as wouldnt count as penetration since how im looking at it, ts basiclly just drywalling where you have structure but just about everything can go through it

 

[Shaker]

glass cannon ... drywalling

It weights less so it requires less thrust = block advantage

Drywalling still takes the damage away from shots as the blocks will still require at least 1hp