Spinal-Mount Cannons (Super weapons)

[Abyssal_Warrior]

I propose a super weapon should be put into this game. Though extremely strong, they would be very expensive, require many different parts, lots of energy (special ammunition maybe?), and a ton of room.

I say there should be three different types, a deathbeam of sorts. This would be a laser based weapon, extremely lethal to shields, not as much to hull though. It would require a large space, in which it would have coolant for faster and more firing time (Ice), ammo (lava), and the main barrel. This weapon would consume massive amounts of energy, and can not be operated while the ship is in movement. Also would require a charge up time.

The next super weapon would be like a railgun of sorts. Capable of doing large amount of physical (armor) damage, but little damage to shields though, and can be fired at long ranges. It would as the others require, lots of room, but it would need a lot more energy (railguns are guns using electromagnets so it makes sense), and it would fire any sort of hull you put into it, the more hull the more damage. (or it could require a special refined ore) and as the other one, it could not be fired while moving. like the laser it would require a charge time.

The final super weapon would be a sort of pulsar type weapon (no not like the one already in the game), it would release an EMP, that would spread out like a bubble, which would pass through shields and armor, temporarily damaging energy production, energy storage, and shield regeneration and shield max. Unlike the others, it could be placed inside the hull, unable to be seen from the outside. It would require insane amounts of energy, and the shields would need to go down for a short amount of time. This weapon would also have a very long reload time, in order to nerf it's abilities. and as all the others it can not be operated while moving.

 

[BeefBacon]

I like this. Feels kind of weird that a capital ship fires the same projectiles as a fighter or a corvette. The turrets should be a big ship\'s primary means of offence and defence against smaller ships, with the death beam or whatever acting as a weapon to take out other larger ships.

These superwapons wouldn\'t be viable on smaller ships due to their size and energy consumption, so from there more AMC balancing can be done, for example making hugely diminishing returns the larger an AMC gets, making big, slow weapons the best option for massive ships.

Or something. I don\'t know.

 

[Florrible]

I like the idea. And as previously said, we need some features that put a difference between the tech small ship use compared to the tech of capitas

 

[Achriel]

Perhaps we could allow larger ships to \'charge\' thier weapons when of sufficient size (larger weapon = longer charge = larger discharge). Require a minimum of 1000 weapon blocks and a minimum weapon to ship ration of say 20% (Smallest spinal mount would be a ship of 5K block in this case). A single control block enables the spinal mount function (no block to \'charging your weapon\')

The charge/discharge function would be a two step process.. step one diverts all power to charging, everything else must run on batteries during charging (this means shields could fail during weapon charging unless the ship is defended or powered from an outside source). Once maximum power is reached it can fire.. but ONLY when maximum power is reached so a really large weapon can be very vulnerable during the 1st phase. The discharge is much like any other weapon but probably more dramatic and exponentially more damaging.

It shouldn\'t be too awesomely hard to code, one control block per weapon type and a routine to disable the power supply system (battery only) for a countdown to charge the weapon. The control block can calculate the devastation when fired. The trick is a balance between minimum wepaon size and % of ships total blocks, it has to be enough to mkae it a planned ship not an afterthough (needing massive batteries will help this though as they\'ll probably use 20% of the ship as well).

 

[Commodore]

Instead of balancing these weapons with cost or ammo, i think it would be more appropriate to have them only fire directly forwards, as you would expect from a weapon. This would stop them being used against small ships (non stationary).

 

[Imperial_Gold]

If you are in a big ship, it turns very, very slow. To have the beam fire directly in front of you would make it very bad to use. Your opponent will most certainly strafe, making it impossible to hit. Sure you might get a hit from the beginning if you make a head on pass, but other than that, it won\'t hit any ship.

 

[Curithwin]

That is the beauty of the weapon they tend to only be used as an ambush tactic where you come in bow to bow or bow to side. Once fired you then resort back to more conventional weaponry to finish off the, now crippled, vessel.

 

[Achriel]

I would think this type of weapon is uni-directional (one direction only). A very specialized weapon for a specialized ship.

If implemented I believe these would be used as planet and station attack vessels and maybe for crippling capital ships or knocking down obscenely large shields. They would be useless agains smaller maneuverable vessels but that is as it should be.. the main weapon of the deathstar wasn\'t for knocking off piddly fighters.

 

[mtech47]

Instead of being totaly uni-driectional perhaps having a very limited firing arc and a very fast projectile speed?

Makes it possable to counter the large ships strafifng, but also still protects the smaller ships as the superweapon can still only fire fowards

 

[Imperial_Gold]

I can see that.