Suggestion on the weapon system

[Ikaruga]

I had an idea today while going to work to replace the weapon "width/depth/height" system which, while being very original, is not always practical when it comes to ship building.

Here's my idea : when you build your ship, you place a weapon module, a controller, you link it all and you have a new weapon in your weapon list. instead of its characteristics depending on how many weapons are stuck to each other, each weapon on your ship gives you 30 weapon points which you can spend in three sliders :

• 
  reload speed
• 
  damage
• 
  bullet speed.

Default is you have 10 points in each slider per weapon present on your ship. This way, you can configure your weapon according to your needs without having a strange weapon shape on your ship.
Or, instead of the weapon giving you weapon points, you could have a new module called "Weapon charger" which would give the points instead. Thus allowing multiple firing points for one weapon slot.
What do you think about it ?

 

[jmeyer2k]

I vote for that, it could be pretty cool. What do you think schema?

 

[Elladan]

I think this is weird.
We can already have multiple fire points for 1 controller. ( Each entity of weapon is a firepoint )
I agree on the fact that the shape of the canon could be replace by the number of blocks that composes him.
( But as for 1block = 1point, to spend on either speed, damages or reload time - maybe new things like for 10 points damages to the blocks behind the one hitted also that couldn't be done with a reload time that is upgraded )
It could be done through a pannel for each entities with kind of abilities tree for each weapon.
In fact, i agree with the idea at the condition that the size of a weapon still determines its overall power ( speed, damages etc... )

 

[schema]

I like the basic idea.

I'm thinking about this. On one side, the effects should probably not dictate the shape of the weapon. On the other, the interface must be as easy to use as possible. I like Elladan's resolution, as it seems a nice compromise. There should be some kind of default distribution though to make it a little easier to get started.

Also, if that system is implemented, there should be some kind of limit on how easy you get to redistribute points. If it were too easy, people would just use one gun for every purpose.

 

[VulpesCursor]

The current system makes for some awkward ship design issues so implementing a point-based rather than shape-based might make the ship weapons a little more natural in appearance.
Just my two cents.

 

[Elladan]

This is a more detailed explication of how i would see this :

The 3 first boxes would be :
- Damage : Add damages
- Reload Speed : Add reload speed
- Speed : Add Speed

And the 3 others that depends on connexions with the first ones would be for example :
- Ion canon : Requires X Reload, X Speed
Transforms the weapon into a weapon that does no damages but
makes the modules in a zone around the hitted block unusable ( thrusters don't work, battery don't provide energy, weapons can't shoot etc ... )
The zone and the duration would depend on how many points are spend in it.

- Machine Gun : Requires X Speed, X Damage
Transforms the weapon into a weapon that does small damages but
fires a lot of projectiles at the same time. It hits multiple blocks
( The most efficient against non-hulled ship )
Damages and Zone of Damage would depend on the points spend in.

- Lasers : X Reload X Damage
Transforms the weapon into a laser that does good damages and that
damages the blocks behind the hitted block in the direction of the hit
( Would be a bit like the harvest beam but for damages to ships )
Damages and %of damages transmitted to the block behind depend on the points spend in.

Remark : I also added 'Dock 1,2' that refers to the docking modules of the ship. It might give the possibilty to access the docked ships module's IA for exemple, or change the key to dock/undock the Docking Module at the given location. Another possibilty would be to have the list of the core module, then below, ( separated by a "Docked Module 1 ( x,y,z) : " the list of the modules of the docked ship etc ... We would scroll if the module list is too long.

 

[Elladan]

Image didn't went through ( seems the image link has a problem )
so here is it's link : http://img15.hostingpics.net/pics/361410weaponassignpanel.png

 

[schema]

I like this concept very much!

The only problem I see is, if a weapon has blocks, that got taken out, would it then automatically downgrade? What about if two groups are connected by one block, and that block that happens to get taken out (leaving two separate groups)?

I think automatically taking away effects of weapons as they loose points would be the best approach. To make it more accessible to new players, or players that are not so much into micro management, I could add a default option (checkbox) that automatically spends and redistributes the points.