Shields and turrets

[hzzzln]

The jammer only worsens the accuracy. In any fight where fighters are close enough to pick targets, the enemy turrets will demolish them. Swarmers, too.

Well then, in my eyes, there should be a server config setting for how much the jammer worsens the accuracy.

Each of these directions involves many, many changes across the board, not just in one area.

I have to disagree with you here, too. In a game that is played competetively, any change to the balancing of said game can have drastic impacts on the meta game. To give you an example, in the game DotA 2 (which I enjoy when I'm not busy abandoning builds in Starmade) a hero recently got a small buff - a little bit more armor and damage. While he was not unpopular before, he is now the most played hero and in virtually every game, and you have to change your game to accomodate this fact. All because of a single, minor buff. I know it is a far stretch to compare DotA to Starmade, but on the other hand, changing turrets so that they have the shield of their mothership is not something I would call a minor buff. It's changing one of the core gameplay mechanics and I'm pretty sure that this would have significant impact on Starmade's meta game, in the way that small ships become even less viable than before. Which I think is a bad thing.

 

[Tobie]

Perhaps turrets could have a shield capacity based on their turret docks size, and they siphon off shield recharge from the mothership. This would make them less durable than the mothership, while also lowering the recharge efficiency of the mothership's shields. I imagine this would give turrets a comparable shield strength to what they typically end up with now, while not needing to add power blocks and shield blocks to the turret itself.

 

[Keptick]

I'd be fine to have the main shields absorb a percentage of damage towards the turrets with that percentage being determined by the size proportion between the turret and main ship. So that way PD turrets wouldn't all get blown to shit by single missile hitting the ship but bigger turrets would still be vulnerable to attack.

100% shielding from the mothership on all turrets tho? Oh hell no. I have to agree that it'd be nice but balance wise it wouldn't be good.

 

[Valiant70]

On one hand, I can see why it would be a bad thing. Having their own shields means you can destroy them and eliminate the ships threat without destroying the ship itself. But on the other hand, the turrets are part of the ship too, so why shouldn't at least some of the shields be shared?

So I would agree with them sharing to a point.

I'd like to see turret shields buffed by main-ship effects like at the very least. AIs are too stupid to use defensive effects, so let them share the main ship's effects. I think that's a reasonable compromise.

 

[Mered4]

Well then, in my eyes, there should be a server config setting for how much the jammer worsens the accuracy.



I have to disagree with you here, too. In a game that is played competetively, any change to the balancing of said game can have drastic impacts on the meta game. To give you an example, in the game DotA 2 (which I enjoy when I'm not busy abandoning builds in Starmade) a hero recently got a small buff - a little bit more armor and damage. While he was not unpopular before, he is now the most played hero and in virtually every game, and you have to change your game to accomodate this fact. All because of a single, minor buff. I know it is a far stretch to compare DotA to Starmade, but on the other hand, changing turrets so that they have the shield of their mothership is not something I would call a minor buff. It's changing one of the core gameplay mechanics and I'm pretty sure that this would have significant impact on Starmade's meta game, in the way that small ships become even less viable than before. Which I think is a bad thing.

Dude, the game is in alpha. No one plays this thing competitively without a lighthearted theme in mind. We all know the exploits and weird parts of the balance and we all use them.

It's better to make drastic changes sooner than to wait and have a public outcry because you altered their precious combat system. I've been playing Planetary Annihilation for almost two years now - and I can tell you that they are paying dearly for not fixing the balance problems back in beta.

Fix it now, and make it concrete with a specific vision in mind. It's the only way.

 

[lazarus78]

Dude, the game is in alpha. No one plays this thing competitively without a lighthearted theme in mind. We all know the exploits and weird parts of the balance and we all use them.

It's better to make drastic changes sooner than to wait and have a public outcry because you altered their precious combat system. I've been playing Planetary Annihilation for almost two years now - and I can tell you that they are paying dearly for not fixing the balance problems back in beta.

Fix it now, and make it concrete with a specific vision in mind. It's the only way.

So true. Too many people who fail to understand that the game isn't even fully released, let alone in beta even. Any big game changes should be done now while its still early.

 

[hzzzln]

Dude, the game is in alpha. No one plays this thing competitively without a lighthearted theme in mind. We all know the exploits and weird parts of the balance and we all use them.

It's better to make drastic changes sooner than to wait and have a public outcry because you altered their precious combat system. I've been playing Planetary Annihilation for almost two years now - and I can tell you that they are paying dearly for not fixing the balance problems back in beta.

Fix it now, and make it concrete with a specific vision in mind. It's the only way.

I know the game is in alpha, and I agree with making the big changes better now than later. I just don't think turret mechanics need fixing (at this point).

Btw, I did play some PA a while ago, but I never really got into the community. What problems do you mean?

 

[Mered4]

I know the game is in alpha, and I agree with making the big changes better now than later. I just don't think turret mechanics need fixing (at this point).

Btw, I did play some PA a while ago, but I never really got into the community. What problems do you mean?

It's complex, but the base problem was the guy assigned to balance never really took it seriously and considered what they had (the preliminary beta balance) as good enough. He also took advice from the community manager on balance decisions, which made many of us longstanding members of the community want to punch a wall. Now that they have hired a new guy to deal solely with balance issues, things have gotten much better.

 

[kobayashimaru]

Why make turrets use parent ship's shields? Well, because you invest a LOT of effort into big ship design and spend days building it and then you watch how several small fighters take it apart in the manner of seconds, one turret at a time...

Turrets get devastated or blown away immediately, even against AI pirates, except if you make gigantic ones that are more dedicated to shields than to weapons.

Either change how shields work or make turrets use parrent ship shields. Maybe make a parent ship module that extends part of its shields to nearby turret? Or maybe it could all be solved by actually making armor useful (which means buffing it a lot, or nerfing weapons a lot).

 

[Snk]

Why make turrets use parent ship's shields? Well, because you invest a LOT of effort into big ship design and spend days building it and then you watch how several small fighters take it apart in the manner of seconds, one turret at a time...

Turrets get devastated or blown away immediately, even against AI pirates, except if you make gigantic ones that are more dedicated to shields than to weapons.

Either change how shields work or make turrets use parrent ship shields. Maybe make a parent ship module that extends part of its shields to nearby turret? Or maybe it could all be solved by actually making armor useful (which means buffing it a lot, or nerfing weapons a lot).

What's wrong with several small fighters tearing off the weak points of your ship? If anyone is a good enough pilot to get close to a larger ship and destroy the turrets they deserve to do it. The effort you put in shipbuilding doesn't mean you should automatically win every fight.

 

[Mered4]

What's wrong with several small fighters tearing off the weak points of your ship? If anyone is a good enough pilot to get close to a larger ship and destroy the turrets they deserve to do it. The effort you put in shipbuilding doesn't mean you should automatically win every fight.

Think SW Battlefront 2 space battles. Yes, you could shoot off all the turrets, but even the small ones took some serious punishment before going down. Serious punishment as in multiple bombing runs.

Not single missiles to pop them.

And fighters couldn't kill a cap ship from the outside.

 

[sp33dfire]

I think covering a Turret with the Ship shield is just too much because with that there is no chance of fighting one big ships with a few smaller ones, smaller ships can´t reach the weapon power which are needed to go through a big shield, so it is necessary that focusing the turrets first is possible.
BUT I know the struggle and I think Turrets should have their own shield capacitors but like they get powered from the ship they should also get percentual shield recharge rate from the ship. Maybe depending on the blockcount of a turret the mothership contribute the turret with the same amount of recharge blocks (those contributed blocks should be subtracted from the mothership shield recharge rate)

 

[lazarus78]

What's wrong with several small fighters tearing off the weak points of your ship? If anyone is a good enough pilot to get close to a larger ship and destroy the turrets they deserve to do it. The effort you put in shipbuilding doesn't mean you should automatically win every fight.

Because getting close to a big ship is difficult... With the speeds on most servers, you can slam into a ship before your computer knows what happened.

 

[Mered4]

I think covering a Turret with the Ship shield is just too much because with that there is no chance of fighting one big ships with a few smaller ones, smaller ships can´t reach the weapon power which are needed to go through a big shield, so it is necessary that focusing the turrets first is possible.

This just simply not true.

Turrets should be handicapped by a turning speed. If the turret is tiny, then it should turn very quickly but have little firepower against fighters and frigates. However, if the turret is an anti-cap turret, and thus very large, it should turn slowly and thus be left vulnerable to smaller fighters.

Smaller ships shouldn't be viable against a much larger vessel unless you have tons and tons and tons of them. 5k mass vs two 2.5k mass is a good example - the 2.5k mass ships will win every time unless they can't hit the side of a barn.

On the other hand, 20 2.5k mass ships can also destroy a 50k mass ship. It's just that no one has the time to perform upkeep on twenty ships at the same time, much less throw them into a sector and hope for the best.

 

[Snk]

Think SW Battlefront 2 space battles. Yes, you could shoot off all the turrets, but even the small ones took some serious punishment before going down. Serious punishment as in multiple bombing runs.

Not single missiles to pop them.

And fighters couldn't kill a cap ship from the outside.

Whether or not they are difficult to take down is irrelevant, it is the idea that several fighters should be able to take out a turret without paying attention to the main ship is what we are discussing.

Because getting close to a big ship is difficult... With the speeds on most servers, you can slam into a ship before your computer knows what happened.

That is an optimization issue and has no place in this discussion.

 

[sp33dfire]

...
And fighters couldn't kill a cap ship from the outside.

So the Death Star hasn´t been destroyed by an X-Wing?

Fighters should be able to destroy at least the Turrets, so that they have a chance against big ships.
If a big ship contribute his shields to all of his turrets it would be impossible to take down a big ship without other big ships

 

[Snk]

So the Death Star hasn´t been destroyed by an X-Wing?

Fighters should be able to destroy at least the Turrets, so that they have a chance against big ships.
If a big ship contribute his shields to all of his turrets it would be impossible to take down a big ship without other big ships

Also, aircraft carriers are just for fun.

 

[max stripe]

So the Death Star hasn´t been destroyed by an X-Wing?

Fighters should be able to destroy at least the Turrets, so that they have a chance against big ships.
If a big ship contribute his shields to all of his turrets it would be impossible to take down a big ship without other big ships

if your using this as an excuse that a big ass titan should be able to be destroyed by a single guy in a lone fighter then im sorry to tell you this..... but by all logic a lone fighter shouldnt be able to take out a massive titan.

 

[Snk]

if your using this as an excuse that a big ass titan should be able to be destroyed by a single guy in a lone fighter then im sorry to tell you this..... but by all logic a lone fighter shouldnt be able to take out a massive titan.

What happened at the battle of Midway again?

 

[Mered4]

What happened at the battle of Midway again?

That's a completely different scenario. We didn't have the computational capacity that we do nowadays.