Ship Grappler (or Harpoon)

[Lukwan]

Why should the astronaut have all the fun? This idea may be unworkable for technical reasons but I'll ask anyway.

Is it possible to make a ship based Grapple gun or Harpoon?

This would anchor a ship to a station or a planet and resist pull effects (of gravity and tertiary). It would usable to hunt Space-Whales, collect bounty on smaller ships. It could be used to help win races or keep up with a ship in combat. [The game Scrapland used a grapple-whip energy beam to great effect.]

-Strength of the cable would be dependent on # of modules to determine breaking point.
-Cable can be cut with torch or shot off (but not targeted). Beam weapons would get a bonus to damage.
-Being towed would leech some speed from the lead ship and add it to the follower.
-To make it challenging harpoon/grappler weapons would not be usable with AI, drones or turrets...manual fire only. Long reload time.

 

[Madman198237]

I'd say allow AI usage, but only on a ship. Not a turret. This would allow for some sort of boat-anchor drone that slows enemies down to make them vulnerable. Or just a drone that always has a perfect shot on the enemy.

 

[Edymnion]

I do kind of like the idea of basically attaching weights to enemy ships to increase their mass, making it much harder for them to move...

 

[MeRobo]

I'd say allow AI usage, but only on a ship. Not a turret.

I could be overseeing something but the only problem from attaching harpoons to turrets I can see would be that the user could attach to multiple ships at once which could leed to problems for the user (being pulled in opposite directions, therefor stopped between multipe enemies). If the harm is done to the user, there is no need to disable it, since no reasonable player woud do something to harm themselves.

 

[Madman198237]

Turreted grapple beams would be interesting....especially if it's more of a harpoon than anything else. Built to hold or even drag in enemy vessels. Perhaps even only working when shields are down/if it can pierce the shields (Shields at very low strength). Then you could make a dedicated fighter hunter-killer made to grapple the enemy and draw him to close range. Perhaps you could even use these as part of a capture/boarding operation, grabbing a small enemy vessel and literally dragging it into your titan's hangar bay.

 

[Pacific_Jim]

A weapon/tool that allows a ship to anchor itself to another ship would be great for boarding too, gives astronauts a bit more to do.

 

[NeonSturm]

push modules could break it

It would be op in some cases, compared to pull and push - or should pull's passive be reworked for that?

 

[HolyCookie]

Turreted grapple beams would be interesting....especially if it's more of a harpoon than anything else. Built to hold or even drag in enemy vessels. Perhaps even only working when shields are down/if it can pierce the shields (Shields at very low strength). Then you could make a dedicated fighter hunter-killer made to grapple the enemy and draw him to close range. Perhaps you could even use these as part of a capture/boarding operation, grabbing a small enemy vessel and literally dragging it into your titan's hangar bay.

Or you could use the fleet tracking system to make a tiny drone grapple onto a ship and use it as a tracking beacon.

Realistically, A big cable that can be destroyed in starmade is impossible (I think) as it would create a lot of lag. But a way to secretly dock to enemy/force dock to enemy without the need of rails would be amazing (as long as it can't be abused)
Reminds me of this:

 

[NeonSturm]

For this, Starmade lacks salvage-pulses.​

 

[Madman198237]

What I'm thinking is not a physical cable, but rather something more akin to a tractor beam, except one that can be broken. Although, the functionality is really already provided with pull-beams....I think.

 

[Lukwan]

What I'm thinking is not a physical cable, but rather something more akin to a tractor beam, except one that can be broken. Although, the functionality is really already provided with pull-beams....I think.

Yes, this neatly describes the grapple/tractor beam from Scrapland. The breaking point simply comes from the lead ship getting out of range or the follower ship losing it's 'lock' (target left the cross-hairs).

Come to think of it, this suggestion would work as a tweak to the Pull as you have pointed out. So this is what the additions would be:

-Allow pull beams to add speed to the puller (not just rob it from lead ship).
-Allow counter-measures for a pull beam: push away from it or cut it with weapons.
-Let pull beams work manually or, as an option, achieve a 'lock' like homing missiles.

 

[Lecic]

Realistically, A big cable that can be destroyed in starmade is impossible (I think) as it would create a lot of lag.

I think the idea is more to have a beam (probably like a thicker logic pipe) connect the two ships that "breaks" if it takes too much damage rather than a cable with rope physics.

 

[WeTitans3]

I agree with some of the things here. I would love to be able to design a ship that, when close enough to a target's hull, could latch on. The only way I could think of is just having a Drone with arms to loosely grab on then have a push effect push the drone into the target.