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IDProjectCategoryLast Update
0015200The Last FederationBalance IssueMay 18, 2014 5:41 am
ReporterMisery Assigned To 
Severityminor 
Status newResolutionopen 
Product Version1.019 (Solar Wind) 
Summary0015200: Missiles have negative effects (including extending battle length dramatically) in combat
DescriptionThis one I've rather noticed for awhile, but it got to it's worst when I was testing out that "joint" mission. One of the big reasons why that mission was taking so long (though definitely not the only reason) is the missiles. I had to CONSTANTLY wait them out, and I couldnt go aggressive against the enemy at all because they essentially form a wall, and waiting really is the only way to deal with them. If I wanted to properly attack effectively, normally aggression is what I'd use, but in this case I had to use a cloaking ability to do decent damage over the course of a few turns... and of course, I only had so many uses.

The problem is that missiles in general seriously just dont add much, if anything, to any battle, except tedium. They're terribly damaging, but... I never get hit by them. I just get annoyed, because they form a wall, and I either wait, or have to do a huge irritating circle to go around them. I end up taking the missile jamming ability into most every fight, so that I can fire it off and just ignore the things.

In all honesty, I dont think the missiles are even really necessary. And I'm not sure how they could be better balanced... if sped up, they'd be a really irritating homing attack, and considering the game mechanics, homing attacks would be a balance nightmare if they had any real speed to them. It can make sense in a normal shmup, but here it rather doesnt. Removing them would actually improve the combat in an overall sense... lowers the tedium, makes aggression less obnoxious to do against ships that use the things, and just makes it so that the player can at least get into weapons range without having to wait the things out first every time.
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related to 0015123 new MLRS Turrets are overpowered 

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Drak

May 16, 2014 4:30 pm

reporter   ~0038149

Last edited: May 16, 2014 4:31 pm

Missiles need to be faster, but have wide turning arcs, and be DESTRUCTABLE! Serriously, I can shoot down a MASS DRIVER shot, but NOT a stupidly slow missile that's probably 20 times larger? Something is just not right with that. Shoot missiles = happiness. (also gives spreadshot - once the RoF has been fixed - more relevence... )

Alternatively missiles could do almost no shield damage - which frankly, they should be anyways... Assuming they are explosive, they cause damage through sharp sheering forces, and since shields would make them explode prematurely - and space is a vaccuum - meaning there is no medium to convey the concussive force - if they hit shields the only "damage" is the power spent by the shield incinerating the missile's shell...

(Of course, missiles don't necessarily have to be explossive, and shields can have any number of implementations, so all the above is just fantasy anyways... ;)

timfortress

May 16, 2014 5:27 pm

reporter   ~0038152

Last edited: May 16, 2014 5:28 pm

Missiles need to be faster (first slow then accelerate ),they got more speed they can do a bit tracking towards player but its easy to predict so player could still dodge the rocket, but hard to dodge when there are mutiple missile in different direction.

or fast, but damage to shield is smaller but when hitting player Hull(with out shield) it cause more damage

Misery

May 16, 2014 8:45 pm

reporter   ~0038153

@Drak

Missiles are destructible if you use your own Mass Driver, like any other bullet, so there's that at least.

Winge

May 17, 2014 2:06 am

reporter   ~0038154

Definitely agree here. Missiles should about the same speed as bullets, but have limited tracking ability. And they really shouldn't be able to do a ton of damage to shields (though they could still do the disruptor-style shield+hull damage). That would make the player missiles useful against targets smaller than a frigate, but not overpowered for either side.

Drak

May 17, 2014 3:35 am

reporter   ~0038156

@Misery

"Missiles are destructible if you use your own Mass Driver, like any other bullet, so there's that at least."

True, and I played around with using Mass Driver in this manner, however, what I found was that the tracking nature of the missile wall meant that it was always between myself and my target, and since they move slowly, the other bullets launched by the craft were between myself and the missile wall. Therefore, it became nearly impossible to get mass driver shots to actually hit any of the (usually MANY MANY) missiles all clumped together in the same spot. So I quickly abandoned this tactic and swapped to EB and Minigun to attack the launcher (fairly unreliably - especially if moving), then run away until the missiles expired or Special, and repeat... which quickly felt pointless.

Misery

May 17, 2014 9:53 am

reporter   ~0038158

@Drak

Actually, there seems to be something weird going on with the Mass Driver itself.

Typically when I'm playing, often using the Evuck ship, the core reason I use that weapon is because it will typically hit bullets.... and just keep going, deleting many in a line. This isnt a new thing... it's been doing it since alpha/beta.

Trying it out again, Evuck ship on Misery, it is still... mostly... doing this.

Trying it out with the Peltian ship, it's mostly NOT doing this.... yet still sometimes it will.

This, of course, makes no sense. And this isnt like, hitting against different shot types... like, deleting the purple shots, but not the monitor bolts, or something like that. If fighting cutters with the Evuck ship, most of the time the mass driver shots will plow through entire long lines of those purple shots they fire, but every now and then, the mass shots will hit ONE purple bolt, and delete itself. When I tried it with the Peltians, they most of the time could not pierce the Cutter bullet lines.

So.... I'm not sure what's going on here. The whole reason I even mentioned it up in my post is that usually for me using the Mass shots is very effective at clearing out even big blobs of missiles at once, because it just plows right through them. I use the Mass Driver for bullet/missile clearing very frequently much of the time, depending on the situation.

Yet it seems that now something about it is off. I have no idea just what it is.

ptarth

May 17, 2014 4:37 pm

reporter   ~0038160

I believe what you are seeing is an effect of explosive bullets. Peltian ships have a special trait, Explosive Bullets. It is also the trait that makes some of their weapons pierce shields. I've noticed that Mass Drivers shots detonate against missiles and against Explosive Bullets. I think what you are seeing is not a difference between the Evuck and the Peltian Flagship, but of the type of ships you are fighting.

Misery

May 17, 2014 8:39 pm

reporter   ~0038162

I had thought of that, but when I said it "sometimes happens, sometimes doesnt", I mean that in the same battle, not different ones. In the course of one fight, one shot may pierce and delete 20 bullets, travelling it's full length, the next may just blink out when touching exactly one of the same bullet. Havent actually had to go up against the Peltians with the Evuck ship at any point anyway, usually they end up on my side quickly. So typically, this is VS other Evuck ships most commonly, or maybe Burlusk/Acutian.

Even when just testing the Peltian ship against other Peltians, it still goes that way, just alot less frequently with the piercing, but still with the random "may or may not actually do it" bit.

ptarth

May 18, 2014 12:26 am

reporter   ~0038164

I just loaded a couple of games and didn't find any evidence of your claims. Can you post two saves, one where the Peltian ship doesn't blow up shots and another where it does?

Drak

May 18, 2014 5:41 am

reporter   ~0038167

@Misery

I see what you mean, it does seem to destroy multiple shots now. I have no idea how it decides when to stop from the testing I did.

I've also noticed that asteroids and scrap seem to be completely stopping alot of bullets that used to mutually destroy each other before, so I have no idea what's going on.

Issue History

Date Modified Username Field Change
May 16, 2014 2:38 am Misery New Issue
May 16, 2014 4:30 pm Drak Note Added: 0038149
May 16, 2014 4:31 pm Drak Note Edited: 0038149
May 16, 2014 5:27 pm timfortress Note Added: 0038152
May 16, 2014 5:28 pm timfortress Note Edited: 0038152
May 16, 2014 8:45 pm Misery Note Added: 0038153
May 17, 2014 2:06 am Winge Note Added: 0038154
May 17, 2014 3:35 am Drak Note Added: 0038156
May 17, 2014 4:01 am Ragwortshire Relationship added related to 0015123
May 17, 2014 9:53 am Misery Note Added: 0038158
May 17, 2014 4:37 pm ptarth Note Added: 0038160
May 17, 2014 8:39 pm Misery Note Added: 0038162
May 18, 2014 12:26 am ptarth Note Added: 0038164
May 18, 2014 5:41 am Drak Note Added: 0038167