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- Nov 15, 2012
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First off, I'd like to say that I thoroughly enjoy StarMade, and believe that it has wonderful potential. Anyway, here's my spiel...
Problem 1: Missiles
Having been building medium - sized ships and weapons systems for some time, it's my opinion that the current scaling of missile power with launcher size is unbalanced. A single 1*3*5 d1000 pod, by default, outputs missiles with 179.2 Damage in a 13.8 block radius. That's a huge, spherical crater in the hull of your unshielded capital ship dealt by a measly 5-block-long fighter!
Solution 1: Greatly reduce the damage and radius that can be produced by smaller launchers. Ideally, damage, radius, and range would increase based on the total volume of the launcher, and reload and speed would decrease accordingly. Smaller launchers would do far less damage and within a smaller radius, as well as a more limited range, but would have fast reload speeds, and have a faster missile speed.
I also think the explosive damage done should decrease based on the distance from the explosion's center. The center point would do the highest damage, and decrease to 0 at the very edge of the explosion. The amount of damage done could also be somewhat randomized, leading to irregularly shaped explosions and craters.
Problem 2: Antimatter Cannons
Similarly to the problems I discussed with missiles, I found that Antimatter Cannons (I'll abbreviate them as AMCs) were also overpowered, but in a different way. Though I felt that the damage and range were good, the reload time seemed uncharacteristically short for such a powerful weapon. A 3*3*50 (approximately) cannon will recharge in 1/20th of a second (50), despite outputting over 5000 damage per shot, with a range of over 6000 blocks and a speed of almost 250.
The ridiculous rate of large AMCs also results in a serious problem for ships with smaller power supplies - the entire power bank can be drained in a matter of seconds by a set of cannons firing at high speeds, leaving no power for thrusters, shields, and other weapons.
The solution, as I see it, is to scale back the firing rate for larger cannons. This makes sense (in the way that video game logic does) because a larger cannon would exert more energy per shot, and take longer to cool down. So, larger cannons have high damage and rage but have a slow rate of fire, and small cannons have low damage and range, but a fast rate of fire.
Velocity presents another problem. I would suggest that all cannons fire bolts at the same speed, since they appear to be energy weapons, but it's not absolutely crucial that this is the case.
A complete alternative to the current system would be and AMC that acts as a beam weapon, shooting a continuous energy stream at ships, useful for overloading shields.
Problem 3: Limited choice of weapons.
If you'd like to ignore this section, go ahead. This is my suggestion for additional weapons in StarMade, and I don't expect them to be taken too seriously. But if you do like them, or if the StarMade team likes them, then great!
Being a lover of science fiction, spaceships, and futuristic warfare, I'd like to mention the sore lack of a particular class of weapons: Mass Drivers.
So, currently there are two classes of weapons: Missiles and Energy Weapons (Antimatter Cannons). I'd like for there to be a third class, Mass Drivers, which would fire some sort of projectile at their targets. The two subclasses I'll suggest are Railguns and Machine Guns, each with a specialized role.
Railguns would be powerful, slow-firing weapons that fired a projectile meant to penetrate shields and armor. There would be four weapons stats: Damage, Penetration Power, Speed, and Reload Time. Penetration Power would refer to how many blocks of armor it can pierce in a single shot. A substantial amount of ship energy would be required to charge the railgun prior to firing.
Machine Guns would be fairly weak, rapid-fire weapons designed for shooting at smaller craft or shooting down missiles. Instead of using system power, they would have a heat overload bar: after firing for so many seconds, the weapon stops firing and takes time to cool.
In my system, Antimatter Cannons would be beam lasers used to overload shields; Railguns and Missiles would break through armor; and Machine guns would be used for point-defense.
Anyway, that's all folks. Thanks, StarMade team!
Problem 1: Missiles
Having been building medium - sized ships and weapons systems for some time, it's my opinion that the current scaling of missile power with launcher size is unbalanced. A single 1*3*5 d1000 pod, by default, outputs missiles with 179.2 Damage in a 13.8 block radius. That's a huge, spherical crater in the hull of your unshielded capital ship dealt by a measly 5-block-long fighter!
Solution 1: Greatly reduce the damage and radius that can be produced by smaller launchers. Ideally, damage, radius, and range would increase based on the total volume of the launcher, and reload and speed would decrease accordingly. Smaller launchers would do far less damage and within a smaller radius, as well as a more limited range, but would have fast reload speeds, and have a faster missile speed.
I also think the explosive damage done should decrease based on the distance from the explosion's center. The center point would do the highest damage, and decrease to 0 at the very edge of the explosion. The amount of damage done could also be somewhat randomized, leading to irregularly shaped explosions and craters.
Problem 2: Antimatter Cannons
Similarly to the problems I discussed with missiles, I found that Antimatter Cannons (I'll abbreviate them as AMCs) were also overpowered, but in a different way. Though I felt that the damage and range were good, the reload time seemed uncharacteristically short for such a powerful weapon. A 3*3*50 (approximately) cannon will recharge in 1/20th of a second (50), despite outputting over 5000 damage per shot, with a range of over 6000 blocks and a speed of almost 250.
The ridiculous rate of large AMCs also results in a serious problem for ships with smaller power supplies - the entire power bank can be drained in a matter of seconds by a set of cannons firing at high speeds, leaving no power for thrusters, shields, and other weapons.
The solution, as I see it, is to scale back the firing rate for larger cannons. This makes sense (in the way that video game logic does) because a larger cannon would exert more energy per shot, and take longer to cool down. So, larger cannons have high damage and rage but have a slow rate of fire, and small cannons have low damage and range, but a fast rate of fire.
Velocity presents another problem. I would suggest that all cannons fire bolts at the same speed, since they appear to be energy weapons, but it's not absolutely crucial that this is the case.
A complete alternative to the current system would be and AMC that acts as a beam weapon, shooting a continuous energy stream at ships, useful for overloading shields.
Problem 3: Limited choice of weapons.
If you'd like to ignore this section, go ahead. This is my suggestion for additional weapons in StarMade, and I don't expect them to be taken too seriously. But if you do like them, or if the StarMade team likes them, then great!
Being a lover of science fiction, spaceships, and futuristic warfare, I'd like to mention the sore lack of a particular class of weapons: Mass Drivers.
So, currently there are two classes of weapons: Missiles and Energy Weapons (Antimatter Cannons). I'd like for there to be a third class, Mass Drivers, which would fire some sort of projectile at their targets. The two subclasses I'll suggest are Railguns and Machine Guns, each with a specialized role.
Railguns would be powerful, slow-firing weapons that fired a projectile meant to penetrate shields and armor. There would be four weapons stats: Damage, Penetration Power, Speed, and Reload Time. Penetration Power would refer to how many blocks of armor it can pierce in a single shot. A substantial amount of ship energy would be required to charge the railgun prior to firing.
Machine Guns would be fairly weak, rapid-fire weapons designed for shooting at smaller craft or shooting down missiles. Instead of using system power, they would have a heat overload bar: after firing for so many seconds, the weapon stops firing and takes time to cool.
In my system, Antimatter Cannons would be beam lasers used to overload shields; Railguns and Missiles would break through armor; and Machine guns would be used for point-defense.
Anyway, that's all folks. Thanks, StarMade team!
