Fri Sep 12, 2003 10:02 pm
Entirely new Capship Combat System
The summary of the concept for those of you who do not wish to read all of the technical aspects of my idea to understand what I'm trying to achieve here:
I want to make capship battles involve strategy of some kind, and I figured we could do that by making them only able to fire when their shields were down. Of course, you wouldn't want to just be able to fire when you're shields went offline from damage, so we would have to think of a way for the you to be able to lower your shields so you can fire, and then be able to bring them back up for protection. The shields would be uber, thus encouraging timely combat and the taking up of positions. In short, capship combat would be about strategy and timing rather than just lobbing everything you have at the other ship. Below I have outlined ways of how I intend to go about this.
Original Post:
I was thinking of taking an entirely different approach to Battleship/Dreadnaught and Cruiser/Destroyer shields and their uses in combat. This is meant for flyable capital ships, most likely in MP, because I doubt the computer would know how to use this system effectively. I was thinking, wouldn't it be cool to be able to activate and deactivate your shields to fire? You could restrict the firing of weapons by making the constant draw of power for the shields to be exactly that of the recharge rate on the powerplant! The rebuild power draw, which would take effect when the shields were turned back on (I hope) would sap exactly the same amount as the max energy of the power plant. So, if this happened, the shields being activated would drain the powerplant, and then continue to drain it just being turned on, keeping the amount of energy available to fire weapons at zero! Turning off the shields, would then allow the powerplant to recharge, thus allowing weapon fire to resume.
Now, about the shield, it wouldn't just be any shield. No, no. It would have a certain max capacity that would be set fairly high, and a recharge rate that would allow it to get back to full shields in three or four seconds. The key to breaking the shields, then, would be to slam it with everything one has. Naturally, bigger ships would have a bigger advantage at this, but thats the way the world works. Of course, the shields aren't necessarily supposed to drop. Like I said, the key to fighting in capships would be STRATEEGERY! Timing with dropping the shields and firing would be of utmost importance. That would be difficult to master though, as to re-activate one's shields, one would have to wait for the powerplant to completely recharge (remember, the reactivation takes ALL of the energy). This wouldn't necessarily take very long, probably about a few seconds, but it would be long enough for your opponent to squeeze off a few shots. Like I said, strategy would be incredibly important, but so would positioning in combat, which is difficult to do in capships.
Some may argue that the role of fighters would be greatly diminished in this kind of environment, to which I say WRONG! I was thinking that, for fighter weapons to be extra effective against capships, I could make a new type of shield for them, and have capship weapons do less damage to each other while fighters do a lot more, thus making them able to bring down the shields a bit easier. If that doesn't pan out, I can always mod the torpedos to fire a rather straightforward, no lock-on, type projectile that does massive damage but travels slowly. The chance always remains that the torp won't make it to the capship, but ah, therein lies the challenge for the fighter. All in all, I think it would balance out nicely.
One little problem that has stopped me from pursuing this further: I don't know how to get a shield equipped so that it can be turned on or off at will. I have two ideas, but they are just that. Number one: Use the same method as the cloaking device and make it into some sort of mountable weapon that you can enable and disable. I think, though, that the possibility for abuse is great, and the weapon can be made into some sort of uber weapon. But those are prevalent on MP servers anyway. Number two: Devise some way to use the jettison cargo command to bring down the shields and then bring them back up when used again. I'm not too sure how this would work, but I think it has promise.
In addition to being able to toggle shields on and off, it would be imperative that they reactivate in the same way as they are rebuilt, so that it takes all the energy out of the powerplant. This is integral to the system of capship combat I've devised. Actually, now that I think about it, perhaps the method I described before about being able to make the shields a weapon could work. What if it was a weapon that did damage to yourself? The exact amount of damage that your shields can take? Or more, it really doesn't matter, actually. Then there's the matter of getting the shields back up, like an early recharge... even if the shields just came back online but we could just find some way to drain the powerplant simulatenously. I'd actually prefer it to not be something that can be exploited, but there are always arses that do that no matter what, it seems. Anyway, the idea still has bugs, but I believe they can be worked out. Just tell me what you guys think, because personally, I believe it would make battleship combat a lot more fun, and not just about how much you can shoot at the other guy and who has the bigger ship.
I am Alpha and Omega
The beginning and the end
The first and the last
Edited by - xenogear_0001 on 20-09-2003 20:02:22
I want to make capship battles involve strategy of some kind, and I figured we could do that by making them only able to fire when their shields were down. Of course, you wouldn't want to just be able to fire when you're shields went offline from damage, so we would have to think of a way for the you to be able to lower your shields so you can fire, and then be able to bring them back up for protection. The shields would be uber, thus encouraging timely combat and the taking up of positions. In short, capship combat would be about strategy and timing rather than just lobbing everything you have at the other ship. Below I have outlined ways of how I intend to go about this.
Original Post:
I was thinking of taking an entirely different approach to Battleship/Dreadnaught and Cruiser/Destroyer shields and their uses in combat. This is meant for flyable capital ships, most likely in MP, because I doubt the computer would know how to use this system effectively. I was thinking, wouldn't it be cool to be able to activate and deactivate your shields to fire? You could restrict the firing of weapons by making the constant draw of power for the shields to be exactly that of the recharge rate on the powerplant! The rebuild power draw, which would take effect when the shields were turned back on (I hope) would sap exactly the same amount as the max energy of the power plant. So, if this happened, the shields being activated would drain the powerplant, and then continue to drain it just being turned on, keeping the amount of energy available to fire weapons at zero! Turning off the shields, would then allow the powerplant to recharge, thus allowing weapon fire to resume.
Now, about the shield, it wouldn't just be any shield. No, no. It would have a certain max capacity that would be set fairly high, and a recharge rate that would allow it to get back to full shields in three or four seconds. The key to breaking the shields, then, would be to slam it with everything one has. Naturally, bigger ships would have a bigger advantage at this, but thats the way the world works. Of course, the shields aren't necessarily supposed to drop. Like I said, the key to fighting in capships would be STRATEEGERY! Timing with dropping the shields and firing would be of utmost importance. That would be difficult to master though, as to re-activate one's shields, one would have to wait for the powerplant to completely recharge (remember, the reactivation takes ALL of the energy). This wouldn't necessarily take very long, probably about a few seconds, but it would be long enough for your opponent to squeeze off a few shots. Like I said, strategy would be incredibly important, but so would positioning in combat, which is difficult to do in capships.
Some may argue that the role of fighters would be greatly diminished in this kind of environment, to which I say WRONG! I was thinking that, for fighter weapons to be extra effective against capships, I could make a new type of shield for them, and have capship weapons do less damage to each other while fighters do a lot more, thus making them able to bring down the shields a bit easier. If that doesn't pan out, I can always mod the torpedos to fire a rather straightforward, no lock-on, type projectile that does massive damage but travels slowly. The chance always remains that the torp won't make it to the capship, but ah, therein lies the challenge for the fighter. All in all, I think it would balance out nicely.
One little problem that has stopped me from pursuing this further: I don't know how to get a shield equipped so that it can be turned on or off at will. I have two ideas, but they are just that. Number one: Use the same method as the cloaking device and make it into some sort of mountable weapon that you can enable and disable. I think, though, that the possibility for abuse is great, and the weapon can be made into some sort of uber weapon. But those are prevalent on MP servers anyway. Number two: Devise some way to use the jettison cargo command to bring down the shields and then bring them back up when used again. I'm not too sure how this would work, but I think it has promise.
In addition to being able to toggle shields on and off, it would be imperative that they reactivate in the same way as they are rebuilt, so that it takes all the energy out of the powerplant. This is integral to the system of capship combat I've devised. Actually, now that I think about it, perhaps the method I described before about being able to make the shields a weapon could work. What if it was a weapon that did damage to yourself? The exact amount of damage that your shields can take? Or more, it really doesn't matter, actually. Then there's the matter of getting the shields back up, like an early recharge... even if the shields just came back online but we could just find some way to drain the powerplant simulatenously. I'd actually prefer it to not be something that can be exploited, but there are always arses that do that no matter what, it seems. Anyway, the idea still has bugs, but I believe they can be worked out. Just tell me what you guys think, because personally, I believe it would make battleship combat a lot more fun, and not just about how much you can shoot at the other guy and who has the bigger ship.
I am Alpha and Omega
The beginning and the end
The first and the last
Edited by - xenogear_0001 on 20-09-2003 20:02:22