Read by Council shield overcharge block

[starhaiden]

very basic description

• has 100x the storage of the shield capacitor. ( a lot higher capacity)
• Can be toggled off and on
• When on it acts like a second shield and it loses 1% of it's charge every 2 seconds
• When off it loses 1% of it's charge everyone minute
• The lose of charge is to prevent it from being too powerful
• It can only be recharged by another ship using shield resupply
• What do you think?

 

[Crimson-Artist]

so in other words a shield version of our new power batteries? From the way you describe it it reminds me of the way Zarya's Shields work in Overwatch, temporary damage buffers, except you need another ship to recharge them. sounds a bit complected

 

[starhaiden]

basically
[doublepost=1473552860,1473552591][/doublepost]The point of the idea is to make small ships last longer

 

[sayerulz]

I feel like "buff small ships" is just a trend in suggestions now. Small ships are already more efficient, so a fleet of them is already theoretically superior to a single large ship (and yes, I know, fleet AI sucks and they are buggy as hell, but those two things should not be balance concerns.)

Making them more durable seems especially silly. Since when are fighters tanks?

 

[Dr. Whammy]

I'm a small builder by default but I have to admit, this sounds a very over-powered and impractical for most applications. Also, it's important to remember, small ships have a much lower systems loss penalty than something big like a titan/battleship. The problem isn't small ship vulnerability. It's big ship near-INvulnerability. This game has become one of attrition. Take two pilots of equal skill, each flying a single combat optimized ship and the bigger ship invariably wins.

Fleets could make things more interesting but for that to happen we need AI that doesn't behave like a drunken toaster oven with Alzheimers and self confidence issues.

As it stands now, if you want to make a small ship last longer, you have a few options.

- Use advanced armor and as many shield capacitors/rechargers as you can fit.
- Don't skimp on your thrust, just to get some DPS.
- Use Ion beam weapons to scare the living shit out of your opponent when they realize that they no longer have shields.
- Get familiar with point defense. REAL familiar. Like, "19+ PD turrets on a 100 meter long frigate" familiar...


Conversely, if the dev team would like to really balance fights between ships of difference sizes.

- Make point defense A LOT more accurate AND intelligent. No more of that "firing all your PD turrets at one missile then getting whacked by the other 20" nonsense.
- Introduce a soft cap on shield recharge rate to discourage excessive gigantism and shield perma-tanking.
- Responsibly buff warheads... (Puts on flame retardent coveralls and grabs fire extinguisher, then arms 100x torpedo launcher...)

 

[Az14el]

fully agree that small ships don't need no buffs
every ship has the potential to be awful, smaller ships are easier to fuck up but pay off a lot more, it'd make some real monsters basically

 

[Crimson-Artist]

I'm a small builder by default but I have to admit, this sounds a very over-powered and impractical for most applications. Also, it's important to remember, small ships have a much lower systems loss penalty than something big like a titan/battleship. The problem isn't small ship vulnerability. It's big ship near-INvulnerability. This game has become one of attrition. Take two pilots of equal skill, each flying a single combat optimized ship and the bigger ship invariably wins.

Fleets could make things more interesting but for that to happen we need AI that doesn't behave like a drunken toaster oven with Alzheimers and self confidence issues.

As it stands now, if you want to make a small ship last longer, you have a few options.

- Use advanced armor and as many shield capacitors/rechargers as you can fit.
- Don't skimp on your thrust, just to get some DPS.
- Use Ion beam weapons to scare the living shit out of your opponent when they realize that they no longer have shields.
- Get familiar with point defense. REAL familiar. Like, "19+ PD turrets on a 100 meter long frigate" familiar...


Conversely, if the dev team would like to really balance fights between ships of difference sizes.

- Make point defense A LOT more accurate AND intelligent. No more of that "firing all your PD turrets at one missile then getting whacked by the other 20" nonsense.
- Introduce a soft cap on shield recharge rate to discourage excessive gigantism and shield perma-tanking.
- Responsibly buff warheads... (Puts on flame retardent coveralls and grabs fire extinguisher, then arms 100x torpedo launcher...)

what about making the AI have a harder time with targets that are smaller than it? for the longest time i thought that one thing that will make small ships more viable is if AI driven entities like drones and turrets have a harder time hitting you if your ship is small.

This would make having turrets of varying size practical cuz right now theres no down side to mounting the largest damage dealing turret your ship can reasonably fit.

 

[arci]

- Introduce a soft cap on shield recharge rate to discourage excessive gigantism and shield perma-tanking.

Agreed, shields which can regenerate fast than you can damage them isn't a good solution. However I don't like soft caps (like for power supply) because it limites the viability of large ships. In my opinion systems should have much more overlaping mechanincs like a certain amount of rechargers are only effective for a certain amount of capacitators (similar the master-slave weapon system works). In general it makes much more sence to have larger shields and lower regeneration (at least in combat).

It can only be recharged by another ship using shield resupply

A shield supply ship as you discribe it would make much more sense in combat since it would drastically increase your survivability. However the difference is that you have counterplay against this kind of mechinc because the source of the shields can be attacked.

has 100x the storage of the shield capacitor. ( a lot higher capacity)

I guess the general idea is the access to supershields for a short amount of time in order to tank heavy burst damage. Sounds good but the way you can use them should be more consistent, like the rechargeable jumpdrive computer. Maybe a system that forces certain kinds of weapons to attack you (heatseeking missles etc) would fit this idea.


An alternative way to implement actual overload shields would be a lower fix percentage (for ex. 50% of your max shields) that can only be applied by external shield supply ship, also. So if you are at 100% a shield supply beams can increase this value up to 150%. However it doesn't decay over time or something but can't be regenerated until you are at 100% again.

All together this would make true support and tank class ships in your fleet much more viable and adds tactical figths to fleet clashs.

 

[Malacodor]

This game has become one of attrition. Take two pilots of equal skill, each flying a single combat optimized ship and the bigger ship invariably wins.

If that's a problem for you, then you're in the wrong game.

Introduce a soft cap on shield recharge rate to discourage excessive gigantism and shield perma-tanking.

Some people never get enough. There are already so many nerfs for big ships in the game and you want even more. Why don't you just play on a server that doesn't allow big ships?

- Responsibly buff warheads... (Puts on flame retardent coveralls and grabs fire extinguisher, then arms 100x torpedo launcher...)

1. Make turret AI able to shoot at unfactioned torpedos.
2. Improve AI, so that 20 turrets shoot at 20 torpedos, instead of all firing at the same target.
3. Fix torpedos lagging through the hull.
4. THEN we can talk about buffing warheads.

 

[Dr. Whammy]

If that's a problem for you, then you're in the wrong game.

Don't come in here picking a fight with me. You play the game the way you want. I'll play it the way I want.

Some people never get enough. There are already so many nerfs for big ships in the game and you want even more. Why don't you just play on a server that doesn't allow big ships?

You say this and yet, you're a proponent of invincibility. Sounds more like you can't get enough.

Also, your "nerfs" are easily countered by the typical swarmer spam and docked reactors. You just don't want to lose your invincibility and the ability to one-shot smaller ships. Perhaps you don't possess the skills to do anything besides press a single button, but that's not our problem. Instead of you telling me to go play on another server/game, maybe you should go play eve online instead. There are a lot of players there who share your mindset.

1. Make turret AI able to shoot at unfactioned torpedos.
2. Improve AI, so that 20 turrets shoot at 20 torpedos, instead of all firing at the same target.
3. Fix torpedos lagging through the hull.
4. THEN we can talk about buffing warheads.

You obviously missed that thread... Hence the word "Responsibly". Everything you listed was already discussed and pretty much agreed on.

Edit: All I need is to finish my research to come up with realistic numbers that we can discuss.

Now that the pleasantries are out of the way, we can either continue this trollish exchange and accomplish nothing or you can add some substance to your arguments and the idea will naturally mold into something that is agreeable to most if not all players.

It's your call.

 

[Malacodor]

Also, your "nerfs" are easily countered by the typical swarmer spam and docked reactors.

Good morning, power injectors don't work anymore. And when they did, they never worked as good as normal reactors below the soft cap, not to mention the risk of undocking. Swarmers are completely useless for me.

You just don't want to lose your invincibility and the ability to one-shot smaller ships

If I spend lots of resources to build a 1 million mass ship, then yes, I want to be able to defeat a swarm of 3000 drones with 100 mass each. I don't want drone carriers to be the only viable ship type.

You obviously missed that thread... Hence the word "Responsibly". Everything you listed was already discussed and pretty much agreed on.

If you refer to another thread, you should write that, I can't read your mind.

 

[Dr. Whammy]

Good morning, power injectors don't work anymore. And when they did, they never worked as good as normal reactors below the soft cap, not to mention the risk of undocking.

Server config allows for docked reactors, if such things are still desired. The new auxiliary power system also serves the same function with less lag.

Swarmers are completely useless for me.

Explain.

If I spend lots of resources to build a 1 million mass ship, then yes, I want to be able to defeat a swarm of 3000 drones with 100 mass each. I don't want drone carriers to be the only viable ship type.

Have you ever encountered such a situation? Do you know what kind of lag would be generated by that many docked entities? Your statement is difficult to believe; considering how poorly the game performs in multi-player. I once lagged a server into quintuple digit pings for everyone by flying around in an 8000 mass frigate with only 145 entities on it. Your 1000-drone carrier would quite possibly crash the server the instant it left port.

If you refer to another thread, you should write that, I can't read your mind.

And yet you came at me; guns blazing as if I personally attacked you. ...and I'm not even the OP of this thread. Next time, don't jump in the Kool-Aid without knowing the flavor, unless you want to be seen as a trouble maker. ...in which case, by all means; go ahead and make an ass of yourself.

Your previous lack of tact and diplomacy suggests that you'll respond negatively to my pointing this out but that's ok since I've also highlighted a choice that you need to make. Join a rational discussion with us or start a flame war in which you will be seen as the instigator; which one do you prefer?

 

[terra mining corp.]

maybe with the new aux reactors they could make them charge shields by linking a shield supply beam to reactor and only allowing transfer when shields at 0%. The nerf would be getting the reactor online for transfer before they cut through your unshielded ship.

 

[Malacodor]

Server config allows for docked reactors, if such things are still desired.

Server config also allows for prohibiting big ships, if desired, so no changes are needed.

Swarmers hit allies, which prevents making friends as well as using drones or fleets.

Have you ever encountered such a situation? Do you know what kind of lag would be generated by that many docked entities?Your statement is difficult to believe; considering how poorly the game performs in multi-player. I once lagged a server into quintuple digit pings for everyone by flying around in an 8000 mass frigate with only 145 entities on it. Your 1000-drone carrier would quite possibly crash the server the instant it left port.

I was just using some numbers as an example.

 

[Comradecolonel]

I like the idea of overcharging your shields but this specific implementation doesn't work for me. Only being able to recharge it from friendlies would shift the meta into titan+support shield craft. I want there to be more need for support craft but I don't think that they should be necessary to win. There would only be one way to to use this new block and that is by having support ships. Seems limiting to me.

I'm more of fan of a power hungry system that boosts shields but make firing weapons more difficult. What I imagine is that you press a button and your shields get a buff to recharge or capacity. This would come at the cost of very high power usage. This would allow for tactical decisions regarding defense vs offense for a given ship.

 

[Pacific_Jim]

Swarmers aren't even that good at dealing with numbers tbh, they have a habit of grouping up on one or two targets and you can outrun them in most small ships. High regen and good turret placement work better. On the subject of regen, I'm against nerfing it really, as it stands now it's very good at dealing with a high number of weak ships, but you need a lot of regen for that, which leads you vulnerable to bigger ships that can alpha damage their way through your shields. In turn, those ships are usually vulnerable to groups. Any changes to the small/big balance should keep that rock/paper scissors dynamic imo.

I'm more of fan of a power hungry system that boosts shields but make firing weapons more difficult. What I imagine is that you press a button and your shields get a buff to recharge or capacity. This would come at the cost of very high power usage. This would allow for tactical decisions regarding defense vs offense for a given ship.

So Ion.

 

[NeonSturm]

If your ion-cannon does 20x damage to a shield and the shield has 100x hp, the tank will last 5 seconds.
With passive ion however, the tank may last 12.5 seconds.

Even if ships which shield-supply are put into combat-state, it shouldn't be different from having shields on the main ship, for example by alternating recharge+supply cycles within that 12.5 seconds.

If it were different, peoples would build laggy ships. Count power-soft-cap for the total of docked entities on the master-dock and what do you get? Ships undocked inside stations!

 

[Comradecolonel]

So Ion.

Similiar to Ion but more of the trade-offs of overdrive slaved to weapons. The idea is that a large chunk of your power goes to make the actually recharge go much faster. Ion doesn't use that much power so it isn't really something that is a tactical consideration. It is more something that is worked into the design.

 

[NeonSturm]

The idea is that a large chunk of your power goes to make the actually recharge go much faster.

Ion buffs shield capacity AND regeneration.
No ion buff might be considerable for civilian mining ships which are too lazy to dig for effect-module resources.

 

[Dr. Whammy]

You guys are bringing up some good points. I'll need to experiment with different versions of my frigates to see what works best. Back on the original topic...

My main ship is set up to accommodate multiple types of offensive, defensive and utility systems.

The first incarnation had only 300,000 shields with roughly 2,000 regen. It was built as a cargo transport and light miner. It had very limited combat ability but could take a few hits if things got ugly.

I gutted the cargo and utility systems to create a purely combat focused build and got 400,000 shields with 4,000 regen, better missiles and a butt-ton of point defense. It served as a front line patrol ship against Pirate NPC cruisers with over 1,000,000 shields. One frigate could go toe to toe with one of the pirate cruisers and actually win. The PD/AMS was what kept it alive. and the 400,000 damage ion cannon was made short work of the enemy's shields so my cannons and missiles could shred them like tin foil.

After multiple refits, the thrust was tripled, the armor was upgraded to advanced, the ion cannon strength was tripled and the shield strength is more than 3 times as strong as the original with 5 times the regen. There was minimal sacrifice of interior space ans aesthetics.

The "TL;DR" point of this is that you can cram a lot more fire power and defense into a small ship than one might expect as evidenced by my attempt to fight one of my older combat gunship designs...

Spoiler

Defender Class.

Mass: 1968
Dimensions: L 50, W 41, H,24
Shields: 56,009 (Recharge 1210/sec)
Structure HP: 792,650
Armor HP: 464,400
Power grid: 1,016,074 (Recharge 301,194/sec)
Thrust 2892

Armament:
- 12 auto-cannons - 6000 DPS
- 1 ion beam weapon - 66,000 shield damage
- 4 missile launchers - 24,000 damage per missile/96,000 total 22m blast radius
- 4 armor piercing Pulse cannon 12,750 per shell/ 51,000 total
- 4 point defense 'wings'
- 2 anti-shield laser turrets 24,750 damage per burst
- 2 guided missile turrets 4,800 damage per missile/9600 damage per salvo

Scanner: No

Warp Drive: Yes

.


...with one of my earlier pathfinder frigates

Spoiler

Pathfinder Light Assault Ship (combat refit)
- Mass: 3,000
- Thrust: 3,500
- Shield: 400,000 (15,000 regen/sec)
- Power grid: 6,000,000 (846,000 regen/sec
- Armament: dual autocannons, Light Ion cannon, low yield guided missiles (x2), heavy guided missiles (x2), light guided missile turret, 8 AMS turrets

Obviously, I won the fight but I took hull damage and started losing turrets when the little guy cut my shields in half with his ion cannon. It was hard to land any missiles on it due to its point defense. A skilled pilot in the defender might have handed me my ass.

Some of the best fights I've had; both online and offline were against small ships (>10,000 mass). Slugging it out with giant cannons and swarmers won't cut it at this size, as your opponent will attempt to out maneuver you and target your weak spots. Good flying and target acquisition are mandatory. Capitals are impressive to see but the whole concept of sitting there in a giant floating block and pressing the flashing red button once just doesn't do anything for me; hence why I build mostly frigates and destroyers.

I think the point of the thread is that some people are tired of these things showing up to bully them and would like to have a chance to fight back; which is more than reasonable. Picking a fight while sporting pure invincibility is just lame and trollish.