Another Borg solution?

posted on July 21st, 2010, 7:25 pm

I've never seen someone use either of the minelayers in FO (except the time I tried out the Mixed-tech Defiant and was sorely disappointed I wasted energy that could be used on critical shot instead.) It's understandable people wouldn't even know FO had mines. I think the big reasons for people not using them are that Shield regenerating is much more powerful in fleet engagements and Klingon Mixed-tech Defiants take so long to get for something that can only lower the shields of a B'rel (that info is likely outdated, now a mine probably won't even be able to do that! Even worse the Romulan mine does exactly half the damage of the Defiant mine, so it can only take half the shield of a B'rel away!)

posted on July 21st, 2010, 7:38 pm

I am just a casual single-player... player (huh?)... So yes, I missed them... it's actually quite unlikely to have mines in space. It is unpleasantly three-dimensional and extremely vast. Moreover, there is the vacuum issue - if you detonate a 100 megaton bomb in space... it is as if you take a photo here on Earth. no shockwave, the radiation dissipates fairly quickly... so you have to be quite close to be in danger. So the mines would have to be very close to one another and cover extremely vast regions in space (cubic lightyears) and very densely.

Generalised doesn't refer to the shape, it's the interior layout. The ship's large enough to fill the requirements fine, with each section including decentralized versions of the others.

Of course, but the layout has to have a reason as well. If the parts are more or less the same, there is no reason to separate them by weakpoints. There are no obvious weakpoints on a compact geometrical shape.
The only reason for the appendages that I can envision is that there is some special device potentially harmful to the rest of the ship (for example a weapon that emits dangerous radiation upon discharge, which would kill the drones), so it is more convenient to place it outside the rather compact hull. The Adaptor in Fleet Ops does not have any such special weapons (only the adaption modules for which I see no reason to be outside the main hull)´, only torpedos, so... it seems quite off as a Borg ship nd that is why I don't like it at all.

The thinner parts are no easier to cut through than the rest of the ship because of the structural Integrity.

They are just because they are thinner = less steel to cut through. Otherwise, they would have to be specially fortified which is I think very unborgishly (at last the right adjective!).

It would take more firepower than an entire task force can put out to get through them.

Wonderful, but we are still discussing the Adaptor from Fleet Ops, which is, as I happen to recall, destroyed quite easily

[Tyler]

posted on July 21st, 2010, 7:50 pm

Last edited by Tyler on July 21st, 2010, 7:54 pm, edited 1 time in total.

it's actually quite unlikely to have mines in space. It is unpleasantly three-dimensional and extremely vast. Moreover, there is the vacuum issue - if you detonate a 100 megaton bomb in space... it is as if you take a photo here on Earth. no shockwave, the radiation dissipates fairly quickly... so you have to be quite close to be in danger. So the mines would have to be very close to

This is Star Trek we're talking about, 'realism' has no say here.

Of course, but the layout has to have a reason as well. If the parts are more or less the same, there is no reason to separate them by weakpoints. There are no obvious weakpoints on a compact geometrical shape.
The only reason for the appendages that I can envision is that there is some special device potentially harmful to the rest of the ship (for example a weapon that emits dangerous radiation upon discharge, which would kill the drones), so it is more convenient to place it outside the rather compact hull. The Adaptor in Fleet Ops does not have any such special weapons (only the adaption modules for which I see no reason to be outside the main hull)´, only torpedos, so... it seems quite off as a Borg ship nd that is why I don't like it at all.

When the design doesn't fit the ship, the role is changed. The design stays the same. The adaptor-type is probably going to get a new role at some point.

They are just because they are thinner = less steel to cut through. Otherwise, they would have to be specially fortified which is I think very unborgishly (at last the right adjective!).

Thinner doesn't matter, the Structural Integrity field amplifies the strength of the hull to the point that it can withstand weapons. You may have forgotten that almost every Federation, Klingon, Romulan, Dominion ship and ships from many other races have waifer-thin pylons which have never been shown as a weakness (only hit once, I think. Everyone goes for the more valuable body). 'UnBorgishly' is inefficient, nothing makes the design that.

It's only a weakness if every weapon or main system in on the pod. Decentralized means the loss of a pod is nothing.

Wonderful, but we are still discussing the Adaptor from Fleet Ops, which is, as I happen to recall, destroyed quite easily

The thin part has no effect on the game at all, therefore your concern is off-topic. You pretty much said that it's not relevent there.

[Nebula_Class_Ftw]

posted on July 21st, 2010, 7:52 pm

Last edited by Nebula_Class_Ftw on July 21st, 2010, 8:00 pm, edited 1 time in total.

I am just a casual single-player... player (huh?)... So yes, I missed them... it's actually quite unlikely to have mines in space. It is unpleasantly three-dimensional and extremely vast. Moreover, there is the vacuum issue - if you detonate a 100 megaton bomb in space... it is as if you take a photo here on Earth. no shockwave, the radiation dissipates fairly quickly... so you have to be quite close to be in danger. So the mines would have to be very close to one another and cover extremely vast regions in space (cubic lightyears) and very densely.

Mines in space can be done, an episode of Enterprise actually showed a quite believable use for them (put a ridiculous number of them cloaked in orbit and make sure they dont bump into each other.) Really a mine would need to either detonate quickly (before enemy can react to it) or be cloaked so they don't spot it. Also if a mine was equipped with sensors it could intercept a ship that comes close enuff to deal with the issue of vastness.

An explosion in space still releases the same amount of energy, it's just that the energy is contained in the pieces of whatever exploded rather than those pieces bumping into the atmosphere to transmit the energy. Because the energy stays with what originally exploded instead of being constantly transferred between pieces of matter (no energy transfer is 100% efficient), it would actually be more powerful as the only dissipation before hitting something would be from covering a larger area.
It's like getting smacked in the face by the inside of a speaker flying out of its box rather than the audio waves going thru a bunch of air before hitting you. Of course a household speaker won't show that effect much, but the one the Mythbusters made out of a car would certainly not be something you want to get smacked in the face by. And even that isn't quite correct as a comparison because there would be air resistance to slow it down. No air resistance way outside of an atmosphere.
You are right, however, that the energy would dissipate pretty quickly. That's why you cloak the mine and have it get up close.

[Eleshar]

posted on July 21st, 2010, 8:07 pm

Last edited by Eleshar on July 21st, 2010, 8:12 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Yep, with ships being thousands of kilometres from one another, the explosion would dissipate very fast. That is why it has to be concentrated in beams or torpedoes or things. A homing mine could be feasible but still it does not look as a very efficient way to me.

But to more relevant issues:

The thin part has no effect on the game at all, therefore your concern is off-topic. You pretty much said that it's not relevent there.

No, of course it does not have an effect in game. Only it looks unborgishlike to me because of the reasons I mentioned earlier: it is a weakpoint and has no real purpose at all - so either it should have a purpose, that is two special weapons or something, or the ship should be redesigned - or completely scrapped after extending the assimiltion/adaption experience system on other ships.

Thinner doesn't matter, the Structural Integrity field amplifies the strength of the hull to the point that it can withstand weapons

OK... my trek-fu is still in its development (read: never heard of that and always thought the rules of logic apply:)). But I still don't like the Adaptor

[Tyler]

posted on July 21st, 2010, 8:11 pm

Last edited by Tyler on July 21st, 2010, 8:12 pm, edited 1 time in total.

As I already mentioned, thin sections aren't a weakpoint in Star Trek and aren't usually used as targets in battle.

posted on July 21st, 2010, 8:30 pm

Good, so... to conclude - I would like to see some strongly assimilation based type of Borg "experience" - that was the unifying motive behind both my propositions. But if there are any other ideas, let's gather them here... could be useful.

posted on July 21st, 2010, 8:43 pm

The Borg will get some kind of experience system like that in future patches, tho the details remain unknown.

posted on July 23rd, 2010, 4:05 am

How about nanite mines?????? or a nanite atack probe????Or assimulation turret???

posted on July 23rd, 2010, 4:18 pm

Hard to say which race would use it, (probably Romulans) but I wonder what sort of strategies would evolve out of being able to build a ... bear with me ...  deployable minefield. (a big ball of prefabricated mines wrapped around a disposable warp nacelle!)

Granted, if one didn't want it to become a fire & forget super-weapon, not unlike a certain race's ability to warp in a bunch of tanks...  It might have to be expensive, slow, and probably not cloak-able.  (Not to mention needing a shiny new explosion graphic)

The borg might think that mines are stupid, or imperfect or something...  but here are some prototypes for other races

1)  Evil Romulan mobile Minefield deployment system.
2)  Fed Mix-Tech (With Added Graviton/Tachyon Slingin' Deflector Dish!)
3)  Klingon Mix-Tech (Pic is Kinda Self-Explanatory)
4)  Dominion Mix-Tech (With Disposable Crew-Cabin!)

Attachments

posted on July 27th, 2010, 4:03 am

Nice try, Maybe  bring back a Dominion Dreadnaught missle  styled craft as the launch vehicle  to deploy the mine feild . I remember  one  seeing  a mod on  a Armada 2 website. Feds and  Dominoin were  If I rember correctly the only ones to get  them . But I 'de  like to see  only the Borg get  this ability.  Think of it  a Heavly armored  ship  that  will shower its target with  multiple  Packets of assimulation  nanites and  other  nasty  destructive  nanites . Since the  Dreadnaught  had a specfic spot you could designate  it to go to after it was  built, the codeing should be there in the game to    designate  where to  sent it . Right after it gets there you should have to manually deploy it  for balancing purposes. Unit  cost should be  just below , or  right at  the cost of a cube .  Just a thought  for  you to think on.

posted on July 27th, 2010, 6:59 am

I agree with you on not liking the adaptor, but that's because it's a bit overpowered. I mean 50% reduction from a certain race. I don't think that's very balanced...

posted on July 27th, 2010, 9:22 am

Well, I like the idea of assimilating ships and adapt to them. But I dont see any need for a limidet pool. Lets say, that when you assimilate 20 (!!!) ships, you get your (1/sqrt{2}) = 70,7% bonus and thats it. So every ship will bring you about 3,5% resistance.

Just to be fair: In an online game, you may need days in order to get a perfect assimilation, so you will never see it, only get little bonus thing. Against the AI this might come in handy, because it already spams and cheats.

To the adaptor: Well, the borg dont really have many support ships. We have the dodeca and... maybe the borg queen ship, that will do some work. But the borg dont have repair yards, (let me say this straight, this is a HUGE disadvantage) they dont have cloak, the cloak detection is bad, they have no special stations and if you want to "turtle" a bit in order to build you massive fleet out of the back, your turrets and bases will cost so much room, that you wont be able to do a tight defensive grid, like the feds or the dominion can. (The klingon turrets are a little bit too large for a tight grid)

But they have nice specials like assimilating, pwn smaller ships with a single shot, cut through stations, assimilate ships with one transport and assimilate a ship that is near your base.

What would be cooler than that? Here a suggestion:
You have your borg technology-center, where you explore borg technology with a limited amount of slot. I want to be honest: I dont like "limited things" when you play borg.

Borg should be unlimited, in every case. So make small steps, high costs, whatever, but dont limit them.

Example:
You have you partial adaption, that will increase the weapon outload from borg ships by 10%. I took a little glitch, build two centers and researched it twice. While one was in progress, i clicked the other one. I dont know, if I got 20% out of this, but it took slots away.

I think, this may be a thing to handle thing: Every technology center got a certain amount on slots it may support. For every center you build, you get extra slots. The amount on centers you can build is limited by space. They need much space.

Also, they cost a bunch of ressources. So you may research all modules. One reason, I play borg on "free tech" I cant stand a limited amount of abilities when I play borg.

So, we are back to the borg technology. It is a little unrealistic, to increase the weapon strength of borg ships by 100% when building enough technology centers. I dont know, how to solve that problem :-( But I like the idea behind it.

posted on July 27th, 2010, 10:38 am

only the dode is classified as a support ship (does extra damage to adai etc) no other ships are supports.
the diamond is used mostly in the approximate role of support ship but it does base damage to adai units.
if u want u can give the diamond some weapons modules and use it in combat.

they dont need other support ships, the diamond and dode fulfill the role and the dode can be used to stop adai rushes.