Tracker cannon

[Shaker]

A weapon that fires a non damaging entity at an unshielded ship. the tracker then displays on the galaxy map just like fleets do.

To remove the tracker from the block an astrotech beam must be used

Thoughts?

 

[Lone_Puppy]

Like Batman.

 

[Shaker]

Scanners could do the same but only works for that galaxy system

 

[Lukwan]

Nah, give that tracker to the astronaut to be placed...by hand. That will give boarding parties something to do if they are unable to commandeer the ship. (cue 007 theme music)

 

[jayman38]

In addition to astrotech beams, let it "time out" after a short time period.

I agree with Lukwan. A tracker probably needs to be an additional block, place-able through shields to become part of the target ship.

Maybe if it's an actual block, it could have a "sticky" effect, so that if it is launched from a rail launcher, it can do some things on impact with the target. (I.e. the tracker entity that is launched actually disappears on impact, and the point of impact has a new tracker block added, so the net result is the hunter entity is down a tracker block and a ship core, while the target entity is plus one tracker block that is transmitting to the hunting faction.

Varying levels of "detectability" on either side would be fun. It probably needs to be a matter of how many scanner antenna to determine range and accuracy of detection. So if the target has only a few antenna blocks, the tracker's nav beacon is bouncing all over the place in a 80-block radius. I imagine if the random bouncing is random enough, a player could simply watch the nav beacon for a while and get a good idea for the "center", where the tracker is actually located. However, this takes time, and would give the enemy time to track them, for whatever use it would be.

It would be worth discussing what would happen to fleet orders or anything else that is affected by the tracker: What happens when the tracker expires, is destroyed, or otherwise turns off in the middle of an operation focused on tracking the target? Is the last absolute position of the tracker stored when it goes off, and fleet (or whatever is tracking the tracker) continues to that spot in the universe, regardless of where the actual target has gone? That would probably be the most logical way to handle it.

 

[Edymnion]

Problem I see is that if someone is jumping out of battle, they're likely going to head home and dock. If they're heading home, were this a thing, they'd likely always dock the ship in a shipyard and deconstruct it then reconstruct it from the original design, meaning all you've really done is give them a free block.

Only way to really stop them from doing that would be to say they couldn't edit the ship while its on board, and a single block that can completely disable all ability to modify a ship is pretty danged strong, too strong IMO.

 

[jayman38]

Problem I see is that if someone is jumping out of battle, they're likely going to head home and dock. If they're heading home, were this a thing, they'd likely always dock the ship in a shipyard and deconstruct it then reconstruct it from the original design, meaning all you've really done is give them a free block.

Only way to really stop them from doing that would be to say they couldn't edit the ship while its on board, and a single block that can completely disable all ability to modify a ship is pretty danged strong, too strong IMO.

Well, you will have tracked them home. What else do you expect a tracker signal to do? I agree that this kind of thing should not disable build modifications.

There might be ways to use stealth to attach a tracker to a target without them knowing (assuming they don't have the scanner hardware necessary to detect the tracker.) Then you can hunt their movements.

More likely than deconstruct and reconstruct, they'll probably just get close enough to a friendly dedicated scanner ship, so that they can find and eliminate or salvage the tracker block without having to bother with reconstruction. Otherwise, if the battle has damaged them, they need to rebuild anyway.

Plus, there is the gameplay mechanic where the target knows he has been tagged, but doesn't let on, leading the hunter into a trap, which could be interesting gameplay.

 

[Edymnion]

Well, you will have tracked them home. What else do you expect a tracker signal to do?

If you were firing on them, you could see their faction name. You can already look up the exact coordinates of their home base on the Diplomacy tab...

 

[djthekiller]

maybe we can hide the homebases and this would be used for finding a faction's home base
as this would play into the new update on NPC factions

 

[Shaker]

What if they dont dock to there homebase? what if it was an ai fleet moving to its waypoint?

The shot doesnt have to be an actual block, it could be the block it hits gets an additional tag in its info. i suggested astrotech due to it being pretty useless, it could even stop the ship from being deconstructed by saying it is bugged.

It would make shipyards look cool with a carwash style astrotech beam remover on rails

 

[djthekiller]

what if the thing is inside?
or where you cant reach with the beams
such as behind a door, which also would it pass through open doors or hit them and stay?

 

[Shaker]

Well if it got inside then its a bloody good shot!

 

[Edymnion]

What if they dont dock to there homebase? what if it was an ai fleet moving to its waypoint?

And if trackers were a thing, why would they stop hanging vulnerable in space after nearly being destroyed, when they know its possible you were tracking them and coming after them?

If you were that intent on destroying them, running back to base and docking is the only smart move.

And if it were an AI fleet, it wouldn't have been able to jump out in the first place (and even if/when fleets do get jump capability, I doubt the AI will ever be smart enough to run like that without a human calling the shots on it).

 

[Shaker]

Edymnion
What about if the player was hit in the thruster/jumpdrive in combat and was making a slow trip back home, or the fleet was in transit and you happen to fly past it?

Its has its uses, can make the astrotech have an additional use. seems so far that deconstructing ships after each fight would be the way to counter it