If money is no object, which ships are worthwhile?

Mon Feb 23, 2004 2:18 am by Yumiko

Okay, I've figured out how to read the ship's stats directly from the INI files. It's located in shiparch.ini, which is a compressed file that can be decompressed using the BINI utility.

In the mod forum, Victor explains:

steering force: how much power the ship puts into changing yaw, pitch and roll

drag: how hard it is to change the ships yaw, pitch and roll

inertia: how much inertia the ship builds up when rotated on an axis (yaw, pitch and roll).

For example, here are the Eagle's stats:

steering_torque = 55000.000000, 55000.000000, 48000.000000
angular_drag = 41000.000000, 41000.000000, 35000.000000
rotation_inertia = 8400.000000, 8400.000000, 1000.000000

The Falcon has the *exact* same stats. So, it turns no better than the Eagle, yet it has worse weapons and armor, so I think there may be no reason to fly a Falcon when you can fly an Eagle.

I also found that the Hammerhead, Centurion and Stiletto change their yaw and pitch at the same rate as the Eagle, but they roll better. The Valkyrie actually turns like a Titan!

Perhaps I should gather up all the steering_torque and angular_drag numbers, so that I can compare the steering of every ship. I think steering_torque divided by angular_drag would give an overall manueverability factor. (The reason there's those two vectors instead of just one manueverability vector is that when someone collides with you, only your angular_drag is used to determine how much you get knocked off course.)

BTW, is there any advantage in being able to roll faster? I think not really, since changing your roll won't affect where you move or where you can fire.

Edited by - Yumiko on 2/23/2004 2:20:35 AM

Mon Feb 23, 2004 3:40 am by H.Q. Victor

@Yumiko, you can change the steering that you posted above to

steering_torque = 18000.000000, 18000.000000, 58000.000000
angular_drag = 15000.000000, 15000.000000, 35000.000000
rotation_inertia = 2800.000000, 2800.000000, 1000.000000

And get better turning. A lot can be changed to ANY ship, so there is then just a choice of which ship you want to fly.

Finalday

Until that final day. /Keith Green\ (1953-1983)

Mon Feb 23, 2004 4:42 am by Yumiko

@Yumiko, you can change the steering that you posted above to

steering_torque = 18000.000000, 18000.000000, 58000.000000
angular_drag = 15000.000000, 15000.000000, 35000.000000
rotation_inertia = 2800.000000, 2800.000000, 1000.000000

Well, I was talking about comparisons between ships in the unmodded game. I haven't really gotten into mods yet.

Off the topic, wouldn't it be better to multiply all the above numbers by 10? I think that'll make the ship turn the same, but it won't be knocked off course as much when someone collides with it.

Mon Feb 23, 2004 6:34 pm by phantomewok

so, what exactly do those numbers mean?
im no good with data like that

so if i were to mod my titan to make it turn like a starflier or drake, would i LOWER those numbers or RAISE them?

@Neo_Kuja, this is not a best ship thread... read into the topics b4 making decisions. this is a good conversaton about finding data so people can make their own decisions. this might make me start moddin.

Orillion: So trent, will you help us with the mission?

Trent: Sure, as long as I'm not shot at, knocked out, held at gunpoint, electrocuted, skewered alive by giant alien shapeshifters, have to dive out windows, or fight off spindly nomad incubi.

Tue Feb 24, 2004 3:35 am by Yumiko

so if i were to mod my titan to make it turn like a starflier or drake, would i LOWER those numbers or RAISE them?

Here are the numbers of a Drake:

mass = 100.000000
steering_torque = 25000.000000, 25000.000000, 58000.000000
angular_drag = 15000.000000, 15000.000000, 35000.000000
rotation_inertia = 3800.000000, 3800.000000, 1000.000000

So you could just plug those numbers into your Titan and it would turn like a Drake. Note that it would also collide like a Drake, e.g. if a Starflier crashed into you your heading would be thrown off by a lot more than a normal Titan would.

As for how exactly those numbers work, I know that on each line, the first number is yaw, the second is pitch, and the third is roll. Also, steering_torque divided by angular_drag equals maximum angular velocity, so having a large steering_torque for an axis compared to the angular_drag for the same axis is good. But when you start turning, you won't reach your maximum angular velocity immediately; it takes time, and I'm not sure how that time is affected by those numbers.

Here is all I know about them so far:
How to compare the turn rates of two ships?

Tue Feb 24, 2004 3:53 am by Pinger

your figures dont factor in one thing, who uses engine power in a fight? If your not using Engine kill and slide your dead Very quickly, those figures change a lot for the VHF's under engine kill. Try under full thruster burn get to 200 then stop thrusting, then turn in the direction you want but Slide in the opposite direction and after about .5 of a second give a quick blast of thrusters and watch your ship turn alot faster.

In engine kill a Eagle/Sabre can almost match the Hammerhead NPC's in turn rate but not quite a Drake NPC. So using engine kill and slide gives definate faster turning

Tue Feb 24, 2004 5:29 am by Yumiko

your figures dont factor in one thing ... using engine kill and slide gives definate faster turning

Well, the purpose of my figures is just to see which ships turn faster. If you can use engine kill/slide to turn faster, wouldn't this be true of *all* ships? So that if ship A turns faster than ship B normally, wouldn't it still turn faster when both are using engine kill/slide?

Tue Feb 24, 2004 8:18 am by Pinger

Yes but some times its not worth using engine kill simply as some ships turn so fast. e.g. a Drake you use engine kill in a Drake it then becomes difficult to control, nullifying the advantaged gained in turning quicker. Only time I use engline kill in ship of that type is when chasing a ship trying to enter cruise but not in actual combat.

Tue Feb 24, 2004 9:42 am by DragonBreath

I read that the Eagle has a manueverability of 80. If my data is correct, then the only LFs that have higher manueverability than Eagle are Starflier (95), Patriot (90) and Drake (100).

this data is right, but must be readed on a div way, the most time u fly with engines on, this is maded when speed is 0 (this numbers are old and are way down in the spoiler forum). and the numbers are in degrees a second (so when speed is 0, the eagle turns as fast as the falcon, the sabre turns as fast as the titan.) but when accelrated to speed 80, the numbers are radically changed (the drake will still be the winer in agility, but the eagle will be outturned by all lf and hf's). that's y i asked in my topic i need a little info are also asking for thus numbers when flying with speed 80.

and about taking the dagger into extreme missions... i did 245k missions with it... and yup, i toke the bounty off the person i must kill and have less bats/nano left and mostly be destroyed by the remaining fighters (that doesn't care, co'z i succeeded a 245k mission

). i compleated capture specific person missions with payed up to 230k.

the legionaire is also a fighter with u must fly 1 time.... also the banshee (the highest leveled lf in the game).

_________________
Spamius Threadius

Tue Feb 24, 2004 12:32 pm by phantomewok

so, if im lookin to make my sabre turn into a drake and have the collision power of a titan, i would put mass at 300, turning power would go UP, and angular drag and rotation inertia would go down... right?

Orillion: So trent, will you help us with the mission?

Trent: Sure, as long as I'm not shot at, knocked out, held at gunpoint, electrocuted, skewered alive by giant alien shapeshifters, have to dive out windows, or fight off spindly nomad incubi.

Tue Feb 24, 2004 5:20 pm by Yumiko

so, if im lookin to make my sabre turn into a drake and have the collision power of a titan, i would put mass at 300, turning power would go UP, and angular drag and rotation inertia would go down... right?

Increasing steering_torque and decreasing angular_drag sounds right. Increasing mass also sounds right. I'm not sure how rotational_inertia works into this, though.

Tue Feb 24, 2004 5:46 pm by phantomewok

meh i think rotational inertia has somethin to do with how fast u roll (u know, after u have been fighting and u let go of the mouse button and ur ship does a barrel roll cuz ur upside down)... shouldnt matter too much.

OH I KNOW WHAT IT IS!!! so nevermind what i sed above

hard to explain tho... here goes

when u are rotating ur ship, i.e. turning, i think rotational inertia would be how much your vector of momentum is affected by the mass and speed of your ship... so if u are in a heavy ship going fast, you would turn slower because of your inertia is still carrying you forward... whereas in a light ship you turn faster because your ship has much less inertia because it has less mass.

the law of inertia is objects in motion tend to stay in motion unless acted upon by an external force... so that "force" would be "steering torque". the less your "rotational inertia" is, the less power you need to turn your ship, so with the same power, but less rotational inertia, you could turn the ship much faster

so to make a tank ship turn like a drake, you turn up steering torque and turn down rotational inertia and angular drag. if you want a ship to collide like a titan and still turn like a drake, put the mass at 300 (or higher), and the higher you put the mass, the more u hafta turn up torque and turn down drag and inertia.

im gonna make my drake into a ramming ship... 10000 mass oughta do it, with about 20 million steering torque and like 10 drag and inertia... cuz how much damage you do when u collide has to do with ur mass... if i put mass high enuff i could kill a vhf in 1 head on pass by killin its sheilds with pulses... then RAMMING into it! sweeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeet!

edit: does my theory sound correct?

Edited by - phantomewok on 2/24/2004 5:46:09 PM

Wed Feb 25, 2004 12:39 pm by Sh|ft

Oh no !. Not ANOTHER Best Ship Thread in the making.
I've seen over 100 of these, and they all turn into spamfests.
I'll summon a mod to shut this down.

Mustang
Mustang
Mustang
Mustang
Mustang

And no, I ain't evil, I'm just trying to protect innocent newbies who may be dragged into the fray, and will definately be flamed badly.

If this stays CIVIL however ....... I'll let the mods decide.
Good Day

Okay, this is far from a best ship thread. You didn't even read the posts from the look of your reply, and you added nothing useful to the topic. The only reason that this topic would turn into a spamfest is because of someone like you.

On the original topic, the statistics are almost self-explanatory. Torque is how fast a ship turns, mass is how heavy it is (related to how much damage it does when it rams), rotational inertia is how long it takes to start turning and stop turning, and drag is how much it slides. However, strafing does not make a turn faster, it just moves the cone of fire towards the enemy a bit faster, and you can shoot them sooner.

Fri Feb 27, 2004 5:26 pm by phantomewok

am i right about what i sed up top tho?

Orillion: So trent, will you help us with the mission?

Trent: Sure, as long as I'm not shot at, knocked out, held at gunpoint, electrocuted, skewered alive by giant alien shapeshifters, have to dive out windows, or fight off spindly nomad incubi.

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