Shields and turrets

[lazarus78]

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

Its still a valid point. Getting up close to a big ship is extremely easy, so your point about "If anyone is a good enough pilot to get close to a larger ship and destroy the turrets they deserve to do it" is fundamentally, wrong. You do not need to be a good pilot to get close, so no, you do not "deserve" to be able to destroy the turrets easily.

Turrets are a structural part of a ship, and should be treated as such.

 

[sp33dfire]

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.

Well, if there had been only one Fighter the turrets would have shot him down but there were many fighters wich destroyed turrets and they only won with team work.
if a fighter isn´t able to destroy at least the turrets of a ship then why should anyone use carriers or fighters in battles?

Its still a valid point. Getting up close to a big ship is extremely easy, so your point about "If anyone is a good enough pilot to get close to a larger ship and destroy the turrets they deserve to do it" is fundamentally, wrong. You do not need to be a good pilot to get close, so no, you do not "deserve" to be able to destroy the turrets easily.

Turrets are a structural part of a ship, and should be treated as such.

Turrets are, as you say, a structural part of a ship but they should also be easier to destroy than the ship they are docked to. It´s not wrong that they should be contributed by the ship but not with the ships shields

 

[jayman38]

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

Well, let's assume that a -competent- engineer won't create such a glaring design flaw in their structures. And even if they do, they might fix it later by putting up some plywood or find a contractor at reasonable rates to fix the hole.... Unlike these guys. :p

 

[Mered4]

Turrets are, as you say, a structural part of a ship but they should also be easier to destroy than the ship they are docked to.

Why?

For realistic purposes I understand why this makes logical sense, of course, but as it relates to gameplay, why should turrets be destructable? I play Robocraft fairly often, and turret sniping is how you win as an SMG tank on almost any tier. It's not the sort of gameplay I want to wish upon Starmade - the game is so much bigger than that.

I'm assuming here that you people will use your brains and bring both capital ships and fighter craft to a fight once we get the tools to do so efficiently. They both have their uses and both are effective in their roles - or, they can be. The big turrets on cap ships should be focused on the enemy vessel. In my opinion, both sides should be looking to destroy critical systems such as weapons arrays, power reactors and weapons computers. Fighters should be distracting and useful for protection against bombers, while bombers (with oversized payloads and not as much protection) should be useful for taking down the enemy capital.

Remember, because of diminishing returns, drone fleets are much more effective than standalone ships. They lack the protection of those ships, however, which is why players will still fly around in them.

 

[lazarus78]

Turrets are, as you say, a structural part of a ship but they should also be easier to destroy than the ship they are docked to. It´s not wrong that they should be contributed by the ship but not with the ships shields

And why is that? What makes turrets different from any other part of the ship? The fact that they shoot back?

"Im a tiny fighter, so I should be able to destroy turrets easier otherwise they would destroy me."? Heaven forbid turrets, which are DESIGNED to protect the ship as a whole, actually benefit from the structure they are actually attaches to.

Please, name a SINGLE scifi universe where ship turrets are treated as basically being independent entities from the ship on which they are attached. Every scifi based thing ive seen, turrets were either protected behind a ship's bubble shield, or the ship had no shield at all. None of this split nonsense.

If I am making a big ass ship with a bigass turret, then I want my bigass turret to be protected equally with my bigass ship. The turret is a PART of the ship.

 

[Poofer]

compromise:
Turrets benefit from ship's shields but:
a) we divide turrets further into anti fighter and anti capital ship turrets
b) capital ship turrets cannot target fighters and vice versa

This approaches the following scenario:
- trying to take on a capital ship with a fighter is plain stupid, no matter what is done mechanics wise
- players keep going to the capital + escort vs capital + escort scenario.... assuming this will be feasible after optmizing the game, escorts focus on fighting amongst eachother while avoiding the capital ships AF turrets

 

[Snk]

Its still a valid point. Getting up close to a big ship is extremely easy, so your point about "If anyone is a good enough pilot to get close to a larger ship and destroy the turrets they deserve to do it" is fundamentally, wrong. You do not need to be a good pilot to get close, so no, you do not "deserve" to be able to destroy the turrets easily.

Turrets are a structural part of a ship, and should be treated as such.

Getting close to a big ship is difficult when it has turret support. Have you ever tried it? It's pretty hard. Getting close to pirate stations is hard, let alone a moving ship.

 

[lazarus78]

compromise:
Turrets benefit from ship's shields but:
a) we divide turrets further into anti fighter and anti capital ship turrets
b) capital ship turrets cannot target fighters and vice versa

Well this is kinda obvious. The heavier hitting turrets will be slower firing, so they would make terrible AA turrets even without the restriction.

I do thing the AI needs some ability to classify its role. AA turrets should be automatic while bigger anti-ship turrets would be "fire on target" kind of control. IMO

Getting close to a big ship is difficult when it has turret support. Have you ever tried it? It's pretty hard. Getting close to pirate stations is hard, let alone a moving ship.

Yes I have tried it. And it isn't that difficult, honestly. I play with 80 or 100 max speed and I can wiggle my way in and slam into a pirate station without taking much flack. Bigger ships are slower to accelerate and turn, so they are basically the same. Like anything, lead your target.

 

[Lecic]

Turrets are a structural part of a ship, and should be treated as such.

Turrets being destructible by smaller support craft is REQUIRED for smaller support craft to not be utterly useless except in massive swarms. This isn't about how "unrealistic" it is for turrets to not be protected because they move, this is about the GAMEPLAY aspect, and the GAMEPLAY aspect says it's boring as hell for smaller ships to be unable to do shit in battle.

Please, name a SINGLE scifi universe where ship turrets are treated as basically being independent entities from the ship on which they are attached. Every scifi based thing ive seen, turrets were either protected behind a ship's bubble shield, or the ship had no shield at all. None of this split nonsense.

Wow, have you considered having a game use an original concept for once? Starmade doesn't need to leech everything off of successful sci-fi films where gameplay doesn't matter because it's meant to look cool.

compromise:
Turrets benefit from ship's shields but:
a) we divide turrets further into anti fighter and anti capital ship turrets
b) capital ship turrets cannot target fighters and vice versa

This approaches the following scenario:
- trying to take on a capital ship with a fighter is plain stupid, no matter what is done mechanics wise
- players keep going to the capital + escort vs capital + escort scenario.... assuming this will be feasible after optmizing the game, escorts focus on fighting amongst eachother while avoiding the capital ships AF turrets

A collection of customizable settings for turrets would be nice. For example, a "target [higher] mass first, do not target below [100] mass" type option.

Yes I have tried it. And it isn't that difficult, honestly. I play with 80 or 100 max speed and I can wiggle my way in and slam into a pirate station without taking much flack. Bigger ships are slower to accelerate and turn, so they are basically the same. Like anything, lead your target.

And which AI setting where you playing with? Also, try doing that with a small ship on a moving battleship armed with lock on missile turrets.

 

[Snk]

I have nothing more to contribute to this discussion, Lecic has supported my posts adequately.

Whether or not it is difficult depends on the AI setting and pilot skill, beyond that there is nothing to argue.

Also, this whole thing would probably config editable anyways.

 

[Mike the Reaper 86]

Come on guys, this is so simple. Just have the turrets use their own shield capacitors as usual, but allow them to regen from their parent ship.

I really like Tobie's suggestion earlier in this thread but nobody seems to have even noticed it.

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.

I'm cool with his idea, my own idea runs on similar lines.

The way things are now, each turret needs its own self contained shield generation and storage system to defend itself. By allowing it to take a percentage of shield energy from the ship it is attached to, you could dedicate the extra space entirely to additional shield capacitors while still benefiting from the recharge of the ship. You would double the shields of the turrets and maybe even increase their regen rate without necessarily making them invincible.

Because the turrets would only be able to store x amount of shields, they could be overpowered by smaller weapons but the attacking craft would still have to deal with the parent ship shunting energy into the turret's shields. The turret regen rate could be a flat percentage of the parent ship's, or it could scale with the size of the turret somehow (all configurable of course); either way would be fine with me. Not pleased with the turret's siphoned regen? add more shield rechargers to the turret itself for a flat boost.

Or we could just go with Tobie's suggestion. Regardless, the turrets would be more vulnerable than the ship they are attached to, but they wouldn't be as vulnerable as they are right now. Seems a fair compromise.

 

[Mered4]

Getting close to a big ship is difficult when it has turret support. Have you ever tried it? It's pretty hard. Getting close to pirate stations is hard, let alone a moving ship.

We are not dealing with the current mechanics of the game - rather, we are hypothesizing if and when turret turning speed and AI accuracy problems are both fixed.

 

[Snk]

We are not dealing with the current mechanics of the game - rather, we are hypothesizing if and when turret turning speed and AI accuracy problems are both fixed.

That just gives my argument a little more power.

 

[Mike the Reaper 86]

We are not dealing with the current mechanics of the game - rather, we are hypothesizing if and when turret turning speed and AI accuracy problems are both fixed.

Guys, we're not dealing with those things at all here. This thread is about Azazil's suggestion of having turrets benefit from their parent ship's shields. Not how easy or difficult you think evading turret fire is. Let's stay on task and stop the arguing.

 

[Snk]

Guys, we're not dealing with those things at all here. This thread is about Azazil's suggestion of having turrets benefit from their parent ship's shields. Not how easy or difficult you think evading turret fire is. Let's stay on task and stop the arguing.

Actually, it has everything to do with the suggestion. Whether or not the turrets are difficult to evade or not determines whether or not they should be vulnerable.

 

[Mike the Reaper 86]

Actually, it has everything to do with the suggestion. Whether or not the turrets are difficult to evade or not determines whether or not they should be vulnerable.

No.
It shouldn't.

The vulnerability of turrets should depend on their armor and shielding, just like everything else in this game.

Unlike you and your ship, turrets can't get out of the way. Unlike the behemoth ships and stations they are attached to, they don't have thousands of shield points with insta-regen. The suggestion I'm giving is that they be limited by the amount of shield capacitors they have, but share some of the regen of the ship they are attached to. Would this really be so horrible?

If turrets can draw and store power from their parent ship, why not shield energy? They're supposed to be defensive structures, they're designed to keep enemies at bay. If they can't gain some defensive benefit from their parent ship, We might as well sever them from the ship entirely and make them into drones.

 

[Mered4]

Unlike you and your ship, turrets can't get out of the way. Unlike the behemoth ships and stations they are attached to, they don't have thousands of shield points with insta-regen. The suggestion I'm giving is that they be limited by the amount of shield capacitors they have, but share some of the regen of the ship they are attached to. Would this really be so horrible?.

No, it would be worse - a half measure.

Look, if you continue to force turrets to just be another ship attached to the mothership, and you don't make exceptions for that huge disadvantage, they will be worthless once turret turning is fixed. Past a certain weight class, turrets will turn too slowly to hit anything moving laterally at a respectable relative speed. Thus, people will make more numerous and smaller turrets - which is also stupid, because they get shot off much, much easier and come with a high maintenance cost. In other words, you are not only making the game more tedious, you would also be encouraging folks to not use turrets. If we get the Fleet AI system in place before turrets get fixed, I'll finish my drone carrier build and go to town on all the poor chaps who didn't make the switch.

Again, we cannot just change one variable here. Normally I wouldn't advocate for this, but as it is, we need to change multiple aspects and mechanics to get the system to a point that both makes rational sense and encourages fun, engaging gameplay.

 

[Mike the Reaper 86]

No, it would be worse - a half measure.

Look, if you continue to force turrets to just be another ship attached to the mothership, and you don't make exceptions for that huge disadvantage, they will be worthless once turret turning is fixed.

I am very confused here, I don't hate your ideas, why do you hate mine? What I'm saying is that turrets should be more integrated with their parent ships. I want turrets to be more useful and to reap more benefits. Having them rely entirely on their own complete shield regen and capacitor systems limits their survivability and makes them more like independent ships like you said. Any step in the other direction should please you.

What I'm suggesting would mitigate their shield limitations in a near identical fashion to the way power is handled. Think of it this way; the main ship pumps power and shield energy into the turret, the turret converts that power into damage with their weapons and the shield energy into a defense field with their capacitors. Even if the turret only had some of the regen the parent ship had, that could still amount to a much better recharge rate than you could ever stuff into a turret right now. Without the need for shield regenerators on the turret, you could double its shield capacity instead. Or add bigger weapons, whatever. This makes turrets better, not worse.

But folks (including you) still want smaller strike craft to have some meaning in large fleet battles. In Homeworld 2, bombers excel at disabling the big guns of heavy cruisers. My idea (and Tobie's) would make turrets significantly tougher, but still allow gutsy bombing squadrons to take down their shields and damage them while (hopefully) surviving defensive fire. People don't want invincible turrets any more than they want useless ones. It's called a "compromise", not a "half measure".

For the record, I'd be perfectly willing to try the extreme opposite of fully shielded turrets. It's just a suggestion, and I'd like to believe it has at least some merit. Geez.

 

[Batavium]

This should simply be an option that can be configured in the server settings. Then everybody is happy. I want my ships turrets to be within the ships protection shields and such. Putting them back on takes way to much of my time that i rather spend doing something else. That is my personal view and if it's configurable then different people can use whatever setting they want.

Example:

/set_entity_shareshield true/false

command should persist as a global server command effecting everything.

Would make Pirate Stations more fun to. As shooting the turrets off right now is really easy with a medium size ship. I can hang around a station all day and get shot at. Faction modules might need core breach to this way. With a long countdown if it happends to be your Home Base after loosing all faction points. Pirate Station clearing would work then. Maybe let the server spawn a new station at a random location within the Star System when the countdown reaches zero?

 

[Mered4]

I am very confused here, I don't hate your ideas, why do you hate mine? What I'm saying is that turrets should be more integrated with their parent ships. I want turrets to be more useful and to reap more benefits. Having them rely entirely on their own complete shield regen and capacitor systems limits their survivability and makes them more like independent ships like you said. Any step in the other direction should please you.

What I'm suggesting would mitigate their shield limitations in a near identical fashion to the way power is handled. Think of it this way; the main ship pumps power and shield energy into the turret, the turret converts that power into damage with their weapons and the shield energy into a defense field with their capacitors. Even if the turret only had some of the regen the parent ship had, that could still amount to a much better recharge rate than you could ever stuff into a turret right now. Without the need for shield regenerators on the turret, you could double its shield capacity instead. Or add bigger weapons, whatever. This makes turrets better, not worse.

But folks (including you) still want smaller strike craft to have some meaning in large fleet battles. In Homeworld 2, bombers excel at disabling the big guns of heavy cruisers. My idea (and Tobie's) would make turrets significantly tougher, but still allow gutsy bombing squadrons to take down their shields and damage them while (hopefully) surviving defensive fire. People don't want invincible turrets any more than they want useless ones. It's called a "compromise", not a "half measure".

For the record, I'd be perfectly willing to try the extreme opposite of fully shielded turrets. It's just a suggestion, and I'd like to believe it has at least some merit. Geez.

Your right, ofc - I'm being unreasonable.

Regardless, please understand that many compromises in game balance that I've seen just end up making the situation worse instead of better. From my perspective, giving turrets their mothership's shielding is the first step in a line of changes to both encourage fighter groups and diversify turret sizes. At the very least it should be given a chance before dismissing it altogether as *overpowered* or limiting.