I'm late to this lmao
Missiles become super-agile and only the most agile fighters can evade them. But they do little damage.
So you just went from "aim at your target and shoot" to "look in the general direction of your target, fire and forget".
Cannons become very heavy
what the hecc is a cannon
As a result - there's no optimal meta build
this is just not true. this just shifts the balance around. creates a different meta.
The only way to reduce the meta, is if a player recieves randomized tools, to face randomized problems. So they'll just take what they get and make it work. Here, you can literally build your spaceship down to the single bolt. That is the polar opposite of randomized tools.
Now that we know we have capital ships, and station sieges, that however does a lot in adding diversity. There are multiple metas. Multiple jobs, each having a different tool. And a battlefield that combines multiple of these jobs together. That works. You just have to pick what role you want to play as.
Also, about fighter maneuvers, DCS, whatever: do you seriously expect the average player to learn that? That's literally like learning a martial art. I personally find that stuff incredibly cool. But cool =/= fun. That doesn't mean it can't be, but it also doesn't mean it is implicitly good for the game.
Starbase space combat is more like Call Of Duty, but with no obstacles or cover.
That, i 100% agree with. FPS combat works due to the nuanced interactions between players and the map they're in. How to solve that in empty space, is a huge question.
There's maneuvering complexity: in Elite Dangerous, your ship has strong roll, medium pitch, and weak yaw, forcing you to reorientate constantly, and a "Boost" that briefly accelerates your speed and maneuverability, eating from one of 3 power capacitors. So that works pretty decently. With planes, well, you have to deal with their limited movement capabilities, having to stay above stall speed, not being able to move in any direction, which creates the whole set of basic fighter maneuvers. But that's a bit too complex to learn for the average player.
Then there's positioning... FPS can rely on this heavily, since you're just walking. A big chunk of metal traveling several hundreds of km/h, however, is naturally less able to move closely and precisely around obstacles. In Elite or that new EA star wars spaceship pvp game, you could count flying behind obstacles as some sort of positioning, even if very temporary. In plane combat, there's mountains you can get behind to hide yourself from radar, loose lock, hide and maneuver in the direction they don't expect you from. But that relies on radar, locks and missiles, whatever, to have sense.
So really, i have no idea. I always thought it would be nice if we had different environments with different flying characteristics, so people can go to the one they prefer: empty space, being what we have now, and atmospheres / gas clouds, with some amount of simple aerodynamics... but yeah that's not being developed in the next 10 years.
Maybe some sort of limited "boost" could work. I heard at some point Star Citizen had an "afterburner", that would accelerate you but limit your maneuvering. That sounds interesting. But then how do you actually implement it, when people can build the ships however they like? No idea.
Edit: also yeah current combat isn't a tragedy. It's just fine. It could be fancier, but the game won't die or whatever if it stays like this.
edit2: I should also make it clear that "space combat is more like Call Of Duty, but with no obstacles" is only partially true: remember piloting a ship is much more mechanically challenging than WASD walking with instantaneous response and moving a mouse to look, again with instantaneous and 1:1 response.
Skill isnt replaced, just more diverse!
