Star Conflict OBT v. 0.9.0 Discussion

Mercenary Center Patch Discussion
1041

Yes, but it does not feel OP, it’s more some other weapons feeling to underpowered. I do not use it on my Tackler, lack of Overdrive really removes a lot in efficiency, since once you start bubbling, you might have to finish the job, or die. After all, the range is limited, and the farther away the ball is, the more you can actually avoid it.

 

So long range weapons are another threat, which is easier to counter with an attack if you got engine overcharge modules, than cloak, which is better to get away or get in position.

 

Another strategy I saw, was slowing the balls down with the extra damage module. That probably needs a speed fit on the ship itself, and I am not sure, if it’s really worth it. But since they are still used like that, you gotta ask them pilots.

 

I hardly GET killed by it tho. Which is hard to know anyway because of the lack of damage animation and my negligence to look at kill cause, if it was a usual backstab kill, instead of a dogfight.

 

Actually, I hardly look at that in the Deagle, because my mind gets Arnolded if I sit in that thing. It feels like a hammer.

1042

the trend in modern fighters is multi-role… f-16, f-18, f-22, f-35, ef2000, su-33, mig-35. well technically, f22 isnt a true multi-role, but it can still carry the same range of armament.

 

certain aircraft are better suited for given missions, but in general any of those aircraft could complete the same mission.

 

furthermore, infantry aren’t thought of as individual units, but as fireteams of 4 men. and are all equipped with a capable assault weapon… either M16/M4 or some AR. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fireteam

 

if you want to get into mortar/sniper teams, those are different. they’re specialist units, usually operating as a squad of 2 men. but again, it’s not a single man.

 

the best analogy to mortars/snipers in star conflict are LRFs. and they operate on a similar principle.

 

anyways, you can’t always apply these mechanics to space. since space is mostly empty, it requires a slightly different approach, like aircraft, which are meant to handle a variety of situations these days. it’s easier to build a single aircraft and have many of them, since you never know which role you will be called upon to fulfill at a given moment.

 

 

actually, most of the quotes are references to various philosophical texts and well-known literature. it’s similar to ‘ergo proxy’ in that sense. allegorical in nature.

 

i can’t remember what the references are to any more, the one about the pale reflection in the mirror just skipped my mind…

Fun detail: all these planes look nice. In real life however, the machines that do the actual work instead of looking pretty are Panavia Tornadoes (specialized in attack roles), Mirage-2000 (specialized in attack roles), F-15E (specialized in attack roles) and one of the most successful aircraft of all times, A-10 which is ultra specialized as close range attack aircraft and has been a thorn in US Airforce’s eye for decades as they want to relocate the money to their more expensive multirole jets.

 

They have been trying to replace A-10 for several decades now. It was supposed to be retired in favor of multirole fighter-bombers something around 20 years ago. It’s still the main close fire support and attack plane instrumental in all ground operations in Iraq and Afghan conflicts. The latest advert is that F-35 will replace it. Specs say it has a snowball’s chance in hell of ever coming even close to replacing it, and ultra specialized A-10 seems to be paving the way into the next couple of decades as the premier attack aircraft alongside the downright ancient Tornadoes and Mirage-2000s.

 

Because new multirole fighter/attack planes are expensive, inefficient and simply unnecessary. Hell, remember Libya? Do you know what those ultra expensive new multirole Typhoons did? Worked as overpriced spotters for Tornadoes who did the actual bombing. The only marginally successful modern aircraft has actually been Rafale, and that is mostly because it’s ultra specialized in self support ECM and ECCM role with its SPECTRA system meaning it didn’t need an ultra specialized electronic warfare aircraft to hold its hand while doing bombing runs.

 

And the uber multirole F-22? Not a single combat deployment. Not a single one. That’s a modern multirole for you, fit for everything on paper, fit for nothing in real life. Overspecialize and you become functional. Be a generalist and be an overpriced piece of uselessness.

 

Same thing exists all the way down to infantry squads. Every single infrantryman in a modern infantry group is specialized. I got my training from FDF and we have a standard 7 man team. All of them are specialized in a certain task and geared appropriately for the task. SAW guy has his gun, SAW’s pair has the extra SAW ammo as well as his personal weapon, anti tank pair have their anti tank weaponry, radio guy has his radio and so on. All of them are ultimately specialists, and it’s the combination of specialists that each focus on their own task that makes the squad work.

 

As for GITS, take a look at their later movies. It dropped all pretense an went straight into moralistic discussion of robot torture porn.

1043

Personally, I’m starting to think that singularity cannon may need slow barrels. Or maybe it will be enough if they just add the hit animation. The hardest part about avoiding the bubbles is not getting any kind of visual indication of actually being hit by them.

1044

Personally, I’m starting to think that singularity cannon may need slow barrels. Or maybe it will be enough if they just add the hit animation. The hardest part about avoiding the bubbles is not getting any kind of visual indication of actually being hit by them.

Luckyo really? really?!

The hard part is not knowing whether you’ve been hit?! That is freaking easy! 

-Am I missing all my shields and half my armor after that ball flew past? yes? then you got hit!-

1045

Let s start from weapons?

 

So:

 

Pulse Laser  is basically the same weapon we had before patch (but worst couse it overheat faster). Few People loved it before patch and few people love it now. Short Range anyway.

 

RF Blaster  should be the old Rapid Fire Plasma. But LOT worst considering it overheats and it can’t be turned into kinetic damage abymore. Short Range too.

 

Shrapnel Cannon  was the only really great weapon for ceptors after patch. WAS becouse while i think it could be considered a little bit Op immediatly after patch, it should has been nerfed in rate of fire not in spread. At the moment it laks in                                accuracy and become worst than Rapid Fire Railggun we used to have before patch. And once again : Short Range (very short after spread nerf… if u wanna hit for more than 300~400 or so).

 

Plasma Gun let’s talk about this baby. I think none with a little knowledge of the game ever used an Assault Wepon on en interceptor before patch…expecially a plasma one with its slow projectiles speed. 

                     Now this is the Only bloody option u have if you want to play a little more ranged as a ceptor pilot. And offcourse it suks.

 

What is missed here is a serious mid range option… an hight accuracy, low fire rate, decent damage weapon u can propley user on an interceptor (read: whtout have to stop moving).

 

 

 

Rhis is about weapons.

 

Before write down what i think about interceptors roles… let me ask you guys something… is anyone able to play a Cov Ops as a “cov ops” anymore after patch? 

I don’t play CO as a CO at all anymore.  I tried tanking it up, wiping out the Eagle-B’s speed, but still can’t do much.  RFR had the benefit of increasing spread, not constant shotgun.  I could get 2k crits at around 2500m on the first shot with a max range of over 3000m.  Now by the time you get into a good range, you’ve been in their weapon range for 4 or 5 seconds.  I tried the plasma gun, for one match.  I’ve seen more engineers warping to beacons and to the EMP just because they know they can more easily take on interceptors trying for a beacon capture.

 

Nor ECMs do what cov ops should do actually… 

 

Covert Ops ships are lone fighters in battle, which use “hit and run” tactics - their modules allow them to sneak behind enemy line and inflict a big amount of damage before sneaking back. In groups these ships are perfect for taking down the enemy defense. Their role is based on inflicting as many critical damage as possible.

 

So again… is anyone able to play cov ops as they should be after patch? 

It can’t, it can’t deal damage quickly except for a nerfed plasma arc or nukes.  Plasma arc isn’t easy to get the full two seconds on the target, and nukes get taken out be guards.  Then you have to wait 3 minutes!  It gets killed so fast, three seconds from a ship with good accuracy and you’re dead, and that’s when it’s not a double team.

 

Back to interceptors.

 

So, a t5 ful blue/gold COV Ops dies in 3~4 hits or 2 missiles.

U need long time to kill most of other ships (i could say  every  ships exept others interceptors) … and u have to stay so close to ur target a$s that u can sniff the bad smell.

 

 

Let me know how should i play it as it is presumed to be flown.

I have to stay stick to the main group… but if i have to do that… so ECM is really better.

 

*Edited*

And with an ECM you’re still just follow the leader.

 

Well for the PVE, its so easy with the black wood ship yard. And yes sometimes you get the dumb pilots that don’t notice there shields and Hull go down in LARGE CHUNKS, so its easy to kill.

I have noticed that this synergy grind is nothing short of <censored rant> and its really hurt me. As a GM, I want to help people progress, but these changes make me feel like saying “Hey, just wait till you get to T3, that is, IF you get to T3…”

The synergy’s bullshit when you even look at the ship tree. Look at the number of ships to get an R10 Empire gunship compared to a R10 Empire engineer! That’s what I’m working on right now, and by getting one ship two ranks higher, you get access to two new implants! I had full synergy on several ships before, mainly T1 and T2, now only the new ones do.

 

As for PvE, if you want a challenge on the shipyard go back to T1, it’s actually harder than T3!  Teams affect that of course.

 

You need to buy a rank 12 ship to get it.

This is the first “official” answer that’s been given.  It’s something I’m still pissed about because I was working on getting R12 instead of switching factions.

1046

Because new multirole fighter/attack planes are expensive, inefficient and simply unnecessary.

 

Same thing exists all the way down to infantry squads. Every single infrantryman in a modern infantry group is specialized. I got my training from FDF and we have a standard 7 man team. All of them are specialized in a certain task and geared appropriately for the task. SAW guy has his gun, SAW’s pair has the extra SAW ammo as well as his personal weapon, anti tank pair have their anti tank weaponry, radio guy has his radio and so on. All of them are ultimately specialists, and it’s the combination of specialists that each focus on their own task that makes the squad work.

 

As for GITS, take a look at their later movies. It dropped all pretense an went straight into moralistic discussion of robot torture porn.

 

you didn’t listen to a single thing i said… F-15s don’t do most of the work as you describe (in fact, they can’t even fill some roles)… sure, there is a plethora of other planes capable of doing the job… it doesn’t mean they are better at it… it just means there have been more of them built… in fact, all of the planes you listed are ancient… and that’s a fact… there are more of them simply because of that… then you go add a-10 in the mix, when it has CAS role… we don’t have infantry in this game… just other planes if you haven’t realized that already.

 

also, the reason new planes don’t do the actual dirty work is because it is more costly to replace one, so you send the cannon fodder in… this is basic military startegy that is simply lost on you…

 

btw, the rafale is a multirole, and so is the tornado (edit, forgot the mirage)… :\ out of all the planes you mentioned… just older… and cheaper… well, not that old… but still some 25-35 years…

 

thanks for proving my point.

 

as for your point about specialization in the forces… it doesn’t exist to the extent you think it does. every infantryman carries an assault rifle.

 

specialist units are usually part of a fireteam which include 2 infantrymen… this isn’t company of heroes lol… you don’t see 2man mortar squads IRL…

 

and machinegunners are usually 1 or 2 men attached to a fireteam of 4-6 men.

 

snipers are pretty much the only specialist units who operate on their own.

 

also, obviously you havent even seen or bothered to read into GITS: SAC or SAC2. they weren’t movies… the only movie after the first was ‘innocence’ and it was garbage. 95% of the community agree on that.

1047

Tactics? Having 1 of every ship type in your team is one tactic.

1048

Tactics? Having 1 of every ship type in your team is one tactic.

 

lol… nah, what i mean is tactics are what they are for a reason. ie:

 

if you could shut down any enemy fighter (say f-15) with this magic ‘ecm’ thing, don’t you think the enemy would develop fighters that can’t be disabled?.. or if you both had ‘ecms’ and noone had a counter… and planes started falling out of the sky… you think people would want to fly them for long? hell nah… chain cc, stunlock bs, im going home see you guys later…

 

or… if the enemy are using missiles, don’t you think you’d develop a electronic warfare plane to jam their guidance systems?? aka ECM

 

or… if they’re using bombers, aka frigates, you’d make something called an ‘interceptor’… light, fast, with a loadout of capable missiles to do the job (aka torpedoes).

 

necessity is the mother of all invention after all…

 

it seems like the engineers inhabiting this universe are oblivious to basic ship design principles…

 

the ships are not ‘evolved’ to properly counter other aspects of the game or the tactics involved.

 

instead, we’re designing ‘OP’ weapons just to break what was already broken once more…

 

ie: well this is supposed ‘op’ for this role or that role… but nothing really works multi-role…

 

so we’ve travelled 5000 years back into the past… yet we’re flying spaceships… great. all tactics out the window.

 

i know, let’s use infrared flares, because obviously, future guidance systems will all be based on infrared ;o

 

you’re kidding yourselves… the engine for this game probably came from gaijin’s other flight sims. and half the ideas cough*IRflares*cough*

1049

I’d like to have the electrical currents floating over the ship as hit animation, already mentioned that. Just remember in the Descent series, before the bots exploded, something like that. Even some distortion effect would work. But at least something.

 

I really think the lack of a hit animation is the biggest bummer. I usually see my targets only getting aware of what I am doing until I am deep in their hull.

 

However a bit of teamplay, and that gun becomes less dominant, because of its relatively low reach. I dont think it would need slow barrels, that would probably make it useless, because most of the time you dont want to fire them straight in a line. It should do a bit less (10-20%) damage on ceptors, if the hit animation does not work out.

1050

Something to consider here folks… We’re not dealing with military. Well, T4 and T5 could be, but my research suggests T1 ships are a thousand year old designs, T2 and T3 being 400 or more years old, etc.

Moreover, look at their costs. Assuming the credit is comparable to the Pound, Dollar, Euro or other currency of your choice, you can pick up a military spec machine for pocket change. It may cost several million to get a T3 ship, but how much does it cost to repair? About 40,000. The big cost is acquiring the legal documentation to fly the thing and sourcing providers for your ship’s gear. Once you’ve got that the running costs are laughable; 2-3,000 for half a dozen EM homing missiles, 40k as mentioned to take a wreck and make it airworthy. Hell, if you stick with the really old designs you can get a ship for buttons!

That says a lot about who we’re dealing with in Sector 1337. We’ve got a scenario where hardware is cheap to build and easy to replace. At least, it is if you’ve got the paperwork. At 50k a pop the Empire can afford to hurl overspecialised ships into a fray. Sod the pilots - for all we know they’re clonestock implanted with the memories of the original. A one-up in a can.

1051

I’d like to have the electrical currents floating over the ship as hit animation, already mentioned that. Just remember in the Descent series, before the bots exploded, something like that. Even some distortion effect would work. But at least something.

 

I really think the lack of a hit animation is the biggest bummer. I usually see my targets only getting aware of what I am doing until I am deep in their hull.

 

However a bit of teamplay, and that gun becomes less dominant, because of its relatively low reach. I dont think it would need slow barrels, that would probably make it useless, because most of the time you dont want to fire them straight in a line. It should do a bit less (10-20%) damage on ceptors, if the hit animation does not work out.

I think they could just add something similar to current rails hit animation, i.e. sparks flying alongside the current assault plasma sounds. Essentially reuse assets so we get those animations sooner rather than later.

 

I’d also take slower barrels and increased damage, because it feels that it takes too long to kill T5 guards and engies. Especially ESB empire engines with hilariously thick hulls that take forever to kill with singularity spam that are currently getting maniac medals from every game with hails. That way we could have a true anti frigate weapon in singularity cannon, just like we currently have a true anti interceptor weapon in new frigate hails. But we’ll see how it goes.

1052

g4borg - Slow barrels would make any weapon an anti-frigate only gun. Which singularity needs to be. Right now it’s killing interceptors, even at range given the right pilot behind the mouse.
 

Sod the pilots - for all we know they’re clonestock implanted with the memories of the original. A one-up in a can.

 
I’m a one up in a can lmao hahahahahahhahahahhaha

 

the ships are not ‘evolved’ to properly counter other aspects of the game or the tactics involved.
instead, we’re designing ‘OP’ weapons just to break what was already broken once more…
so we’ve travelled 5000 years back into the past…

 

This one is a good post so imma comment on it. Most games I’ve played actually do utterly fail at evolving their mechanics backstory. how things ended up becoming the way they are. very few do it right and most of the ones that do are japanese and almost all of them single player. and that’s the core to it really, the price you pay in terms of realism vs multiplayer gameplay which you astutely ignore in your posts.

 

over-specializing goes both ways. you can bounce back and forth on it. many generals do from ancient times to the dark ages and right up to today. but whatever, and like sabre commented, “srsly rly lol”

 

this “being good at one thing and fail in two others” is a proven formula to make multiplayer games work. and it does in SCon. I mean read back to frigateball topics. In any age, an over-powered tactic always existed. from Phalanxes to Anti-heavy cav regulars to longbows to dismounted knights to light cavalry to anti-infantry tanks to aircraft bombers to nuclear bombs to unconventional infantry warfare to snipers to remote guided tactical missiles. if you wanted realism in SCon then frigate balls is the way to go. With limited number of combatants per engagement and an inexhaustible supply of resources why field anything else but the tankiest ship with the most turrets dishing out the highest DPS?

 

But were players happy with that form of realism? No.

 

So we are here.

1053

But were players happy with that form of realism? No.

 

i’m not advocating realism… just some sense of cohesion…

 

everything seems just thrown together at random in the hope that it works for ‘some’ purpose… what that purpose is, nobody knows…

 

it’s not being thought out. instead, items/features are just being added at random in the hope that it will satiate the user’s content addiction…

 

i’ve seen countless F2P games fail because all they do is release new content, never balance, never bugfixes…

 

you can only sell users so many broken items before they get bored…

 

as for overspecializing, it’s never a good idea… you can aim for a certain unit composition or strategy, but when tactics are involved you need to be flexible…

 

in ancient times it was much easier to gauge your enemy’s force composition and react accordingly: strategy.

 

however, these days, units/squads are built for multiple roles. there is no more such thing as the ‘lone soldier’…

 

so you can’t counter them quite so easily as you could back in the days. you need to take a broader approach.

 

ie: today’s tanks can be equipped with anti-vehicle weaponry, anti-infantry, and even anti-air defenses… good luck finding a tank from the previous era that could fulfill all 3 roles. the earliest tanks were simply a forward firing cannon mounted on a tractor chassis :\ not very accurate at that…

 

they fulfill 2 roles at a minimum, and a 3rd with reduced efficiency… modern tanks even have countermeasures…

 

of course, you can have specialized anti-air units… but realize… those units are never allowed to engage other enemt forces. they are balanced for anti-air battles, not vs ground units… if you compare their capabilities to the aircraft they are meant to counter, their performance characteristics are similar/sufficient. likewise, there are air-to-surface weapons that can knock one out from over 150km as well… so the field is level… if ever the enemy develope a air-to-surface weapon capable of longer ranges, you would adapt by developing longer range surface-to-air missiles… that’s ‘evolution’…

 

but even in ancient times, units were equipped for multiple roles. take roman infantry. they were armed with shields for defense, shortswords for thrusting/slashing and pillums for throwing in ranged engagements… pretty much the mainstay of the roman army.

 

when riflemen came around, horseback riders pretty much became extinct. because the rifles could now perform 2 roles: anti-infantry and anti-cavalry…

 

so instead of now needing swordsmen, archers and pikemen… all you need are riflemen…

 

likewise, early airplanes had just forward-firing machineguns mounted… these days they can arm/launch most ordinance there is to be acquired.

 

likewise, with ships… you no longer see battleships being built… the most common type of ship these days is a frigate. armed with anti-ship missiles, multiple layers of anti-aircraft and anti-missile defences, a helicopter, torpedoes, decoys, pretty much the works, communications equipment, etc… the only other thing you see floating these days are aircraft carriers, which have no combat capabilities of their own, they’re simply aircraft ‘transports’. oh and submarines, but frigates these days are meant to kill subs… subs have been relegated to nuclear launch duties pretty much…

1054

Cavalry died a death long before the emergence of the rifle. Arrowproof armour is heavy, and bulletproof armour even moreso. Heavy armour means tired horses - despite what movies and games claim, horses can’t ride flat out forever. However, the rifle isn’t what killed cavalry; the machinegun did. Heavy cav died once the musket became common, but light cav remained powerful for hundreds of years.

It’s not just specialisation, but application.

Cavalry began as infantry that rode to a fight and dismounted. Then they rode to a fight and fought using spears, then they became knights with loads of armour and formed stupidly powerful regiments (the real world “frigball”).

But then gunpowder took off and knights could fall more easily. They stopped wearing armour and barding and became light cavalry again. Others became Dragoons - infantry who rode into position and dismounted. Same tactics apply at their beginning and their end. Cavalry adapted to fit the roles of the armies of their time, and vanished only because the horse is too primitive an instrument on the modern field of battle, and we can do much better. We ditched horses in favour of trucks and tanks. Abrams and Challenger II are the modern knights and cataphracts.

Don’t forget that modern ways of fighting are often, frankly, crap compared to their predecessors. The M-4 carbine favoured by US troops probably has an effective range of a hundred yards at most. The British Lee Enfield can put a 303 round through your skull from 400 to 600 yards away. Hell, most modern sniper rifles are based on WW1 firearms. Why? Because modern thinking says you fire a thousand rounds to score a single kill. You suppress, demoralise and defeat via a storm of lead. The Enfield was built differently - you shot to kill, not to upset.

When comparing SC ships to real world military, try to visualise the role the ship is trying to fill, and the environment in which that role is filled. Extreme specialisation happens when there is only one or two ways to solve a problem, or when people can only see one or two ways to solve a problem.

And I have no idea if this made any sense, because it’s 4am and I am insomniac…

1055

anyone try out the heavy blaster? its really powerful, i think it needs to get rid of the slow barrels though, otherwise its very powerful

1056

no i’m not. i’m comparing tactics as used by aircraft.

 

MOBA? LoL is a MOBA, this a third person shooter…

SC is a MOBA. Unless you don’t know what “MOBA” stands for…

 

anyone try out the heavy blaster? its really powerful, i think it needs to get rid of the slow barrels though, otherwise its very powerful

So… you want to make it more powerful? And no, it really isn’t. I kept getting shot multiple times by those things whilst being in a Guard… Nothing happened. My shields kept getting 50-100 hits all the time, which is nothing an Engineer couldn’t rep back to full.

1057

This is a patch discussion thread and not a general game discussion.

Everything that is not directly related to the patch stays out!

1058

I’ve got Blue modules in warehouse that are restricted by loyalty level? What happened? They did not change subfaction affiliation of those, did they? Or am I missing a huge chunk of loyalty compared to pre 0.9?

1059

For the next patch i wish me MOAR weapon-variety. :slight_smile:

1060

In which case: why not old weapons?