I would say that as a goal "armor piercing" should be eliminated+1
I would say that as a goal "armor piercing" should be eliminated
about armor
For the record, high-ROF ships with armor piercing should have a valid niche.I'd prefer Laser Gatlings to have better-than-average DPS, insane RoF and no armor piercing. If armor is less common (reserved only to actually armored units), they would be (very?) good against all unarmored units and terribad against even slightly armored units. (Making them powerful against unarmored units is just a question of DPS. Making them bad against armored units is a question of RoF.)
In fact, I think that's where the laser gatlings should be. Their damage is so abysmally low that it's almost meaningless unless there's a huge blob of them. Add in the armor piercing and they can harry even the "bomber" high-impact armored types. But they'd be less good at the no-armor "fighter" types, as the fighters would simply out-DPS them.
The current armor mechanic though... Does anyone know what 800 armor means ?It means the damage will be reduced by 800 but by 80% at most. Armor can not reduce the incoming damage by more than 80%.
The current armor mechanic though... Does anyone know what 800 armor means ?It means the damage will be reduced by 800 but by 80% at most. Armor can not reduce the incoming damage by more than 80%.
The current armor mechanic though... Does anyone know what 800 armor means ?It means the damage will be reduced by 800 but by 80% at most. Armor can not reduce the incoming damage by more than 80%.
I will say that the fact there is an 80% cut off is just one many examples of just how arbitrary it the armor system is. I am not discussing balancing or anything like that. I am just saying it is arbitrary, it follows an obscure set of rules that make no sense in a big picture way.
Is it truly neccesarily? don't hull types accomplish the goal already? can you really make armor a thing with 4x to 10x damage multipliers floating around?While I agree armor could be removed, I think its problem is it has not enough impact on the game. Technically, -80% precisely counters a x5 multiplier. (Am I wrong?) My "case study" shows that armor, as it is currently distributed, can show stuff like -10% damage on high RoF units. I would like to see situations like "my swarmer/high-RoF unit has no bonus against that enemy unit but I still can send them in the fight." BUT the enemy unit had armor and the swarmer/RoF unit do -50% ~ -80% (or even less if we remove the artificial 80% limit) and the player is punished for bad game lecture. The player is also rewarded for more-than-shallow knowledge of the game (I can't say deep for knowing armor > high RoF) if he uses armored units against swarmers.
I thought a lot of people already agreed that attack multipliers (not necessarily hull types) need to be removed.If the armor system is kept, sure, it will be reworked. I, if nobody else, would do it.
Attack multiplier system could be replaced with x weapon type is good vs y hull type.
Armor could be reworked.
The main problem with the armor system as it is right now, as I see it, is that things fall into two categories:Strange. I have an opposite point of view. I think there are only middle ground, there are small values of armor everywhere. I wish to see this stat more rarely and, when I see it, with more impact.
1) Things with no armor
2) Things with so much armor, it may as well be infinite.
The origin of the problem (IMO):
* Small armors were widely spread.
* (...)
But maybe we disagree on the scale. Maybe when you say "no armor", you mean "less than 30" or something.
Personally, it's yes: keep the armor. I think the armor/armor piercing system is something that we (devz and moders) can play with. I think it's a system with a large design potential (there is also the RoF/Impact system behind that get rather insignificant without armor). But you may disagree... Let's discuss that instead of numbers and balance, shall we?
Dammit! I can't resist! Let's see. We're going to study change in DPS for MkI and MkV fighter and frigate (both ends of RoF for the triangle).But maybe we disagree on the scale. Maybe when you say "no armor", you mean "less than 30" or something.
We probably disagree on scale. "No armor" is "less than 100" for me. Yeah, there's a fair few ships that are effected heavily by 75 armor, but in the general case, I don't think its true.
Thanks for digging up some of the numbers. There's definite a point at which "more armor" doesn't mean anything. I was just wrong about where that threshold was.My pleasure. But the numbers I dug weren't very precious. I'm sure there is a vein nearby; we'll need to do some probing when the mod season will come. Then we'll start the true excavation and setup the number refinement industry. (Wait, are we playing
Point still stands that it feels like there are some armor values that are just pointless.Sure. But I believe there is also a balance, somewhere. We'll see where soon. (I must admit, I'm pretty excited with soon being able to test numbers and stuff by ourself.)
Since my opinion has been sought out on this particular topic at this particular time: I have no opinion yet. ;)
I am leaning toward not having hull types... kinda-sorta. I want to get substantially more involved ship designs in a way that is fun, and not in a way that requires memorization. To some extent what this discussion is about is combat roles, and how to differentiate ships. The fact that this argument is happening at all is, to me, a sign that ship mechanics themselves are not robust enough to provide interesting variations in battle roles.
In an ideal world, there would be no hull types and no ship to ship bonuses or penalties at all. Nothing artificial like that. Or if there are hull types, keeping it very broad and a bit more scientific-seeming (on the surface at least), versus having too many categories of it. Aka having something like 3-5 types, and leaving it at that.
This is just my current working set of thinking at the moment, since it was solicited via PM. :) In no way is this the plan yet.
Overall I am working from the bottom-up, and you guys are talking about some mechanics that are much higher-level than I am right now,and there are a lot of good points being made. However, I'm still focusing on things at the lowest possible level and building up from there. I want for the ship designs to be a lot more interesting in terms of their mechanics and roles in the game than AI War Classic remotely allowed.
because all of the AP of the explosve bypassed all of the armor protection the wall hadKinda like how high powered rifles can fire through thin walls, and you managed to create explosives made of sniper rifles.
When it comes to armor, I'd rather wrap that into the same sort of system, or else make armor into something like a secondary health amount that can be worn down by ships in general, yet bypassed by armor piercing.
Having armor act as a secondary health bar, which armor piercing bypasses, sounds as a far simpler method to use. It really gets down to the core of what armor is. Of course there can be variations on how it is implemented but on the big picture I like that idea best.Did you just described Shields?