Helping larger ships to be more viable

Joined
May 21, 2020
Messages
1
#21
I think that even if the stability issues with larger ships are ever addressed, it's going to be a fine line balancing between small vs large ship combat/utility tradeoffs.
 
Joined
Nov 12, 2019
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576
#22
I think ultimately it will come down to making some devices just not viable on fighters in some manner. Similar to the respawn machine.
 

five

Master endo
Joined
Jun 15, 2020
Messages
293
#23
I'd like to preface this by saying that this is simply my opinion, and it may very well be that I am wrong. If you disagree with anything here, or have anything to say on things like formatting, please do tell me and I will gladly discuss the issue with you and if applicable, do my best to fix it. Now as for the post itself, the reason I write this is because I've been lately bugged by a lot of worries about Starbase's future; The devs have created an amazing game engine and I really want this game to succeed, so this is written in the best of intentions. I know quite a couple of players look forward to flying capital ships with large crews and menacing sizes, and as the leader of a scrapping faction I personally really want to go wreckdiving through the skeleton of an enormous and once glorious behemoth one day.
First of all:
Warp drives: I like the idea of having a fast travel tool independent of the big warp gates. Here is my problem: If you can simply jump away the second you get jumped on is a bad way to balance the game because then everybody would just have big ships and small fighters would become utterly useless. Here is my idea: Instead of pressing a button and whoosh, make it have a charge up time. Also: I would make it like star wars: You dont travel really really really REALLY fast but instead u travel in a seperate dimension, this would make for a nice gameplay element: Having to actually calculate ur route to not smash into Elysium when leaving hyper space. This would also be less stressfull on the physics engine, since it wouldnt have to load in every asteroid and ship in ur way and do math for the collision.
Secondly:
Shields: I would like to make the shields energy based (duh). Like SC u could make it so shields fully protect against energy weapons (Laser- and Plasmacannon, i think Railguns fire actual projectiles) and partly absorb the kinetic energy of physical weapons, main example auto cannon. Now i would like these shield modules (the device) to be dependant on their size, to big to fit in any parasite craft. Dependant on their size should be their shield capacity. Like a efficiency module for generators there would be modules to increase shield capacity and shield recharge rate (shield recharges only when completely down). For deploying shields u could make it so it automatically fits onto the outer hull, or you have shield projectors, which are unable to be mounted on rotatable surfaces. Shield projectors share their shield pool with other projectors. This would lead to interesting shield management gameplay
 
Joined
Jan 22, 2021
Messages
12
#24
I think big ships in general are used for tanking... so... lots of armor. They should be capable of being destroyed just as anything else but... fundamentally, large pvp ships need to tank, carry lots of weapons / ammo / armor with them, possibly support smaller fighers. That's really the only reason you'd build a large pvp ship.

If there's going to be org battles in this game, a large pvp ship should last the whole fight if it's built and supplied well. I think if you establish this baseline, then game changes that cater to this specific idea follow (if changes are necessary).
 
Joined
Nov 12, 2019
Messages
576
#25
It would be nice to be able to choose between many smaller weapons on a large ship, or a few larger weapons. There are pro's and cons to both.

When larger ships come, 24-48 sm thick plates may be necessary as well. Ya know, I guess a good differentiation is may just be the raw size of components. Say the large thrusters are just so large that it makes a fighter and easier to target enemy than one that has smaller thrusters. Components too large to move with just an endo.
 
Last edited:
Joined
Dec 19, 2020
Messages
2
#26
Shields and working armor are the way to go. General purpose weapons should not harm heavy ships in a healthy meta.
 
Joined
Dec 19, 2020
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#28
Logic i guess, I should've been more specific and stated that the weapons shouldn't harm armor, only modules. If everything under the sun can harm heavy armor(even through slow chip), its useless because you'd be better off smaller and more maneuverable. Having special weapons does nothing for survivability in a multi threat environment.
 
Joined
Nov 12, 2019
Messages
576
#29
Ok, I now find that interesting, but honestly, we don't have "heavy armor" We just have high armor score. I could see heavy armor being a thing when much larger ships become viable. Like when you can make 2-3 billion voxel volume ships. However, with the current limits, I think it best that armor be "chippable" as you put it.
 

CalenLoki

Master endo
Joined
Aug 9, 2019
Messages
741
#30
I agree with non-chippable armour idea.
But not through some magic shields.

Instead bullets should make small holes in armour, and leave rest of the plate intact and functional. So you'd want to either take slow-firing weapon that will penetrate it, or high rof and aim for unarmoured ships or parts.

So you'd have weapons/ammo dedicated to shoot unarmoured targets (HMG, Flak, frag missiles and torps), 1 layer of armour (LC), 2 layers (AC APHE), 3 layers (AC AP), ... , 6 layers (RC)

The only weapons really capable of chipping away armour layer after layer would be PC, and all the HE (missiles, torps, AC HE).

That way even 1 layer would matter, rather than having "all or nothing" mentality.

Also components should stop working with much less damage. 1-2 bullet holes should be enough to silence a thruster. So once you pass through armour, each hit matters.
"Easy to disable, hard to kill" is much nicer approach in a game where each ship is worth few hours of work.
It also makes it easier to fix ship components in battle, which is the domain of multi-crew ships with internal access.
 
Joined
Nov 12, 2019
Messages
576
#31
That way even 1 layer would matter, rather than having "all or nothing" mentality.
All or nothing is a legitimate method of armoring, and even with this idea, would be the case.

I can't agree with thrusters being so weak. Short battles are no fun.
 

CalenLoki

Master endo
Joined
Aug 9, 2019
Messages
741
#32
All or nothing is a legitimate method of armoring, and even with this idea, would be the case.
Maybe I phrased that wrong.
"All or nothing" as in armouring just the important bits, and leaving everything else much less protected will always work.

I meant "there should be more valid in-between choices than frontal main battle tank armour and thin aluminium sheet"

Thrusters would be weak, but only if you hit them directly. If they are all together in a big flat wall, then yeah, one good burst and you're crippled. But the same would happen if you place exposed tank next to your cockpit. We shouldn't balance around shitty design.
However, if they are all protected by baffles, ship geometry and are spaced around the ship, they'd live much longer.

IMO the same bullet that can remove 1000 voxels of armour, should be able to remove at least 10x more voxels of internal components.
Otherwise what's the point of armouring, if components are just as tough?
 
Joined
Nov 12, 2019
Messages
576
#33
I meant "there should be more valid in-between choices than frontal main battle tank armour and thin aluminium sheet"

IMO the same bullet that can remove 1000 voxels of armour, should be able to remove at least 10x more voxels of internal components.
Otherwise what's the point of armouring, if components are just as tough?
I can understand the annoyance of all or nothing armoring. In real life, it served a very meaningful purpose for warships.

However, on the weapons, I think the devices are literally made of the materials they list in the SSC for what is in them. Meaning they have those materials properties. Bastium is a crappy armor and most devices and machinery are bastium. So we already do get what you're asking for.

I got rodded at Robur through 4 layers of charodium. So I think we do have what you're looking for. What I think you would mean is likean AP round that pens and the detonated, which no current weapon does.
 
Joined
May 19, 2020
Messages
4
#34
I think Armour and turrets together are what Large ships need. It seems turret aiming is among the biggest problems to work around when it comes to viability. As well in combat if larger turret mounts capable of holding more that two guns and more armour, were implemented the effectiveness of turrets would i think increase. From what I've seen shooting using turrets is plain ineffective due to imput lag.
 
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