Turrets with only one axis of rotation

[sayerulz]

I have chosen turrets with only horizontal rotation for the new ship I am making, because of asthetic reasons, and I would like to know if they are actually any use, or if I will just have to make some full turrets. The particular ones in question are standard cannons, with nothing slaved, on a frigate.

 

[Jaaskinal]

I'm fairly certain they're useless.

 

[Mork2]

It will suffer from the same issues that fixed weapons have which is it has a very small arc of fire no where near what a player can use so unless you line up pretty much on the same plane as the target the 1 axis turrets won't engage.

 

[sayerulz]

Hmmmm, so they won't use the weapons built-in adjustment?

 

[Comr4de]

Fairly certain that Planr played with this idea, he would know.

 

[karkinosz]

Hmmmm, so they won't use the weapons built-in adjustment?

From what I recall no they will not fire any direction except straight forward, mostly because we once had ai that could fire horizontally... you can imagine how that worked out.

 

[godmars]

edit: nevermind, misunderstood post

 

[Mork2]

The AI is set to engage targets set forward direction that the ship core is facing. But as long as you have it pointing in the right direction towards the front of the turret it will engage in front. Only thing is the angle it can engage targets from straight in front is like 5-10degrees or so not like 40degrees like the player can. So unless the target lines up to on the same plane the turret is rotating on then it won't be in an area where the AI can engage.

You can rotate the missile computer cores for homing missiles in other directions. Homing or FOF. If the AI finds a target in front of it, it will fire the missiles. The lock on missiles will arc around to target the forward target. The FOF ones will use the targeting criteria they normally use.

 

[sayerulz]

Ah, well, I suppose that I will have to make some new turrets then. Thanks for the info.

 

[Planr]

Fairly certain that Planr played with this idea, he would know.

Indeed. Thanks for mentioning this to me m80.

I tested single-axis turrets, OP, and can say that they're not a good idea unless your ship is engaging targets at very long ranges. Within 4 km of your ship, it's very difficult to hit anything unless your ship is angled just right for the target to come into the turret's field of view.

Stick to dual-axis turrets.