StarMade Dev Blog 17 November 2017

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    Or perhaps we should be asking ourselves if the entire feature should be scrapped, since it seems to be completely worthless, either allowing for broken unshielded hull or by being indistinguishable from the current one, and being nothing but a waste of developer time?
    That's an entirely different issue from docked hull.

    I think localised shielding offers the possibility of far more interesting shield design than a single shield pool. It's too early to dismiss the entire system without seeing parameter values that are closer to final.

    One thing I personally used docked entities for previously was to break up sheilds into localised areas. This allows that without docked entities.
     

    Lecic

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    That's an entirely different issue from docked hull.

    I think localised shielding offers the possibility of far more interesting shield design than a single shield pool. It's too early to dismiss the entire system without seeing parameter values that are closer to final.

    One thing I personally used docked entities for previously was to break up sheilds into localised areas. This allows that without docked entities.
    But as we've covered, the current bubbles are so large that one can't "split shields up" and still have anything remotely resembling a reasonable amount of recharge, and if the bubbles were made small enough to allow for "splitting shields up," then they would also allow for easy unshielded hull.

    It's not a different issue from docked hull, the two are directly intertwined.
     
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    But as we've covered, the current bubbles are so large that one can't "split shields up" and still have anything remotely resembling a reasonable amount of recharge, and if the bubbles were made small enough to allow for "splitting shields up," then they would also allow for easy unshielded hull.

    It's not a different issue from docked hull, the two are directly intertwined.
    Not correct.
    Two "large" bubbles, say one fwd and one aft, will still be "large", docked hull will still be impractical, and they'll still provide completely separate shields for each end. Where they overlap one will be inactive.

    Parameter values are still changing. Just be patient before imagining problems you haven't even tested or checked, or writing off the entire system.
     

    Criss

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    Because pierce is useless if all it's doing is shaving some armor off. Pierce is good because it can penetrate through armor into systems. If there are shields in the way of that, then that just leaves punch and overdrive as the only viable weapon effect choices, because ion cannot get through the armor, pierce cannot get through the shields, and explosive has debuffs versus both.
    What would have been proposed solutions for docked hull before these shield changes? Is the current system salvageable?

    there is no chance of the second weapon going through the first one's hole
    You have a point in that, but wouldn't your next best course of action to just eliminate as much of that armor so that you can hit the shields, then the systems? If there is a sizable chunk you need to get through then why not chip away at it until you have a higher chance of taking out shields. The way you're framing the situation implies you're trying to take on two different defenses at once. This isn't a solution to the overall problem, but my first course of action would be to just eliminate as much armor in my way as I could before focusing on damaging shields.
     

    Lecic

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    What would have been proposed solutions for docked hull before these shield changes? Is the current system salvageable?
    Setting shield sharing to 100% instead of 75% would have fixed literally all of the issues with shield sharing. I have told Lancake this in PMs. I have told him this on discord. I have ranted to Schine about this in chat. I have talked about this in update threads probably at least a dozen times. I have made popular suggestion threads for this incredible simple fix multiple times. Schine has completely ignored a fix for docked hull that would take 2 seconds in the config files.

    Out of all the things that make me distrust Schine and feel that they never listen to us, this is the number one thing. The simplest fucking fix imaginable that was never done.

    Not only is it salvageable, it is salvageable with a single config option change. The only excuse at this point would be laziness or ineptitude on a scale never before seen, or that this is in fact an intended feature, in which case, you should fucking tell us that.
     
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    Setting shield sharing to 100% instead of 75% would have fixed literally all of the issues with shield sharing. I have told Lancake this in PMs. I have told him this on discord. I have ranted to Schine about this in chat. I have talked about this in update threads probably at least a dozen times. I have made popular suggestion threads for this incredible simple fix multiple times. Schine has completely ignored a fix for docked hull that would take 2 seconds in the config files.

    Out of all the things that make me distrust Schine and feel that they never listen to us, this is the number one thing. The simplest fucking fix imaginable that was never done.

    Not only is it salvageable, it is salvageable with a single config option change. The only excuse at this point would be laziness or ineptitude on a scale never before seen, or that this is in fact an intended feature, in which case, you should fucking tell us that.
    if its just a change of the config its more a thing you should talk to your server admins about than the devs isnt it?
    if this can be changed in the config any player can do it for himself and admins can do it for their server...
    and if you use a custom config shine can probably change anything in their config files without you noticing
     

    Lecic

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    if its just a change of the config its more a thing you should talk to your server admins about than the devs isnt it?
    if this can be changed in the config any player can do it for himself and admins can do it for their server...
    and if you use a custom config shine can probably change anything in their config files without you noticing
    The devs are responsible for balancing the vanilla game properly. I have discussed the matter with server owners in the past, but that doesn't matter here. Schine should fix their game.
     
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    You have a point in that, but wouldn't your next best course of action to just eliminate as much of that armor so that you can hit the shields, then the systems? If there is a sizable chunk you need to get through then why not chip away at it until you have a higher chance of taking out shields. The way you're framing the situation implies you're trying to take on two different defenses at once. This isn't a solution to the overall problem, but my first course of action would be to just eliminate as much armor in my way as I could before focusing on damaging shields.
    Because trying to batter through the main defenses of your opponent without having an overwhelming advantage is never a good idea. The whole reason specialised weapons and combat vehicles exist is to be able to take advantages of weaknesses of your opponent's design and to circumvent it's strengths.

    What you propose leads to boring slugfests where both sides just target each other and shoot for say 10 minutes until one of them finally drops dead. If there were proper AI controls with formations and so on it probably could be somewhat salvaged into line battles, like in Age of Sail, but not in its current state.
     
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    That's an entirely different issue from docked hull.

    I think localised shielding offers the possibility of far more interesting shield design than a single shield pool. It's too early to dismiss the entire system without seeing parameter values that are closer to final.

    One thing I personally used docked entities for previously was to break up sheilds into localised areas. This allows that without docked entities.
    Preach brother :D!
    I see it as part of a long evolution of ideas. This may not be the one true solution, however it is still on the way and the more ideas we go through the closer we will get.
     

    Criss

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    I have talked about this in update threads probably at least a dozen times.
    I have quite literally never heard of this suggestion before.

    I talked about these problems with Zyrr on their stream months ago. They demonstrated force field bubble shields with me. This was not mentioned at all when I asked for solutions.

    By forcing docked entities to accept 100% of shields, it basically renders them as "mechanically" a part of the ship, instead of additional layers of defense outside of shields, correct?
     

    Zyrr

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    I demonstrated what now to you?
     

    Criss

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    I demonstrated what now to you?
    I joined your stream and talked about balance a bit. You showcased various building techniques that maximized pvp potential. The number one thing you wanted changed was docked bubble shields. Another player had a rotating force field on their ship which prevented any major weapons fire from hitting their systems.
     
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    Zyrr

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    Well, the number one thing I wanted changed was docked hull, because at the time it disallowed EMP and stop from transferring down the chain + the performance issues, but since all of those are resolved or are nearly being resolved...

    I don't think 100% shield sharing fixes docked hull, esp with the new shield bubble system regardless of how large the bubbles end up being, but I suppose it's an improvement. I'd prefer alot of it to just be fixed period instead of a stopgap though, since it's nice to be able to shoot off turrets before main ship shields drop.
     

    Chckn Wildstyle

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    I have quite literally never heard of this suggestion before.

    I talked about these problems with Zyrr on their stream months ago. They demonstrated force field bubble shields with me. This was not mentioned at all when I asked for solutions.

    By forcing docked entities to accept 100% of shields, it basically renders them as "mechanically" a part of the ship, instead of additional layers of defense outside of shields, correct?
    Basically yes, of course it allows for some interesting things to be done with moving armor plates and rail rotators but in general it balances the system.

    At 75% shield share you have the parent ship drained to 25% shields by incoming Ion effect because of the propagation to docked entities, then it stops and suddenly all ion weapons impacting the hull become useless as they are now hitting unshielded blocks. This would be when you have to switch to non-ion weapons to blow a big enough hole in the docked hull to reliably use ion again. You also have to worry about the constant recharge of the parent ship that once it hits 26% cap will render your AP rounds useless and you have to juggle ion again back to 25% then switch back to AP in a vicious repeating cycle until a large enough hole in the armor is made, which is very hard to accomplish with the speed of ship movement, ship rotation, and bullets taken into account.

    At 100% shield share you will have the parent ship cap drained to 0% with ion weaponry hitting the docked hull and will induce the "under fire shields cannot recharge for a few seconds" penalty. This would mean that armor and system targeting weapon systems would then be useful and the shields would not be able to recharge if you are hit by AP weaponry.

    Graphically:
    75%: Ion -> AP -> Ion -> AP -> Ion -> AP -> Ion -> AP -> Ion -> AP -> Ion -> AP -> Ion -> AP -> Ion -> AP -> cycle until the battle is won
    OR
    100%: Ion -> AP

    *Note* AP means Armor Piercing, not a specific effect, just weapon systems that accomplish that task, meaning Piercing, Punch, Missiles, etc.
    [doublepost=1511076812,1511075927][/doublepost]To address the problem with floaty bits as well that has been debated for such a long time. Simply introduce a magnet block that must have another magnet block linked to it in the same axis the top is pointing to in order to have floaty bits. If the magnet gets shot then the section that is floating becomes debris, problem solved. This would allow intricate and cool alien looking ships and cool mechanics for rotating things and you know what I'm talking about cool stuff etc., and would also make spaghetti hard to accomplish en mass if the magnets were also viewable through the scanner features implemented in the next update. Of course you could make them a very hard system to scan, as in they need you to have a very good scanner to see, but it would allow floating things to become an interesting and interactive part of the game without embracing spaghetti.
     
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    What would have been proposed solutions for docked hull before these shield changes? Is the current system salvageable?


    You have a point in that, but wouldn't your next best course of action to just eliminate as much of that armor so that you can hit the shields, then the systems? If there is a sizable chunk you need to get through then why not chip away at it until you have a higher chance of taking out shields. The way you're framing the situation implies you're trying to take on two different defenses at once. This isn't a solution to the overall problem, but my first course of action would be to just eliminate as much armor in my way as I could before focusing on damaging shields.
    Make passive effects on docked entities not work, since docked hull allows for easy passive effects due to it being smaller than main entity.

    Also movement effects that hit docked entities should affect main entity since docked hull negates that.

    Docked hull becomes even more cancerous with the benefits of shield sharing and lag when undocking like previously discussed.
     
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    Bubble shields do sound fun though.

    Can a bomber squadron fly through a battleship's bubble and drop it's payload on unshielded hull? I'd love that.

    Also, if two or more bubbles completely overlap, do you have to pop them layer by layer? Because that's how it works in WH40K and I also love that.

    Can a popped buble regenerate while the next layer is under fire?
     
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    Bubble shields do sound fun though.
    It's not bubbles. They just protect the ship blocks in a certain radius.

    Can a bomber squadron fly through a battleship's bubble and drop it's payload on unshielded hull?
    No they can't.

    Also, if two or more bubbles completely overlap, do you have to pop them layer by layer?
    Shield rechargers must be out of each others radius for two groups to work at the same time. Though how shields work in the place where they overlap needs testing.

    Can a popped buble regenerate while the next layer is under fire?
    If you continue to shoot through the blocks protected by the first shield (the one that was brought down) it won't have a chance to regenerate.
     
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    Thanks for the info Zoolimar.

    And so my interest is lost. It's what I thought the first time I've read that point in the op post, but then I saw the screenshot with the spheres and started hoping.
    Serves me right.