Idea for ablative armor change

[Nebula_Class_Ftw]

posted on July 22nd, 2010, 6:01 pm

Last edited by Nebula_Class_Ftw on July 26th, 2010, 2:13 am, edited 1 time in total.

Me with an idea again, I'm just kind of never completely happy with status quo and really full of ideas.

Ablative armor right now protects only from short ranged attacks, but in the shows it was a more general boost to the defense of a ship. I think an interesting change would be to make it reduce damage taken from beam weaponry (by 30%), but increase damage taken from torpedoes (by 20%.)
The Memory Alpha page on says that it only better protected against Disruptors (and Phasers): http://memory-alpha.org/wiki/Ablative_armor
I think some rationalization could be made up to make it weaker to torpedoes for game balancing.
As for damage reduction from pulses, I think that might be too much and would make it too strong overall, unless it was only 10-15% damage reduction and torpedoes were a 25% damage increase on it.

The Vorcha and Sovereign could still counter short range if given a new short range counter passive, or they could be given fast-tracking weapons (tho having only one short-range countering passive might make the game a little less interesting in countering options.) I think the Defiant is better off not countering short range as right now it is such an ubership.

I suggest this idea as it would allow the game to get closer to canon, while adding another option that affects damage based on weapon type (I think EPS control nodes and oversized shields are cool because you don't have to worry much about checking the arbitrary weapon ranges on every enemy ship and they cut down on the amount of memorization needed), and still allowing things to be balanced.

And another idea that iis rather related: I think it would be cool if the Generix Spectre Refit's oversized shields made it weak to pulses so it has at least some downside. Maybe making the shields too large puts a strain on the shield generations so they are weaker to more intense fluctuations such as pulses. Giving the Spectre EPS Control nodes would be another nice change with similar results.

EDIT: and another idea for a potential change to ablative, from Tryptic. In addition to being strong vs. beams and weak vs. torps, make it still counter shorts, just not as much (maybe 30% reduced damage) and hav it still weak to long.

EDIT2:While watching part of the episode where the Defiant and Lakota fight each other, I noticed that it Ablative armor was considered a huge deal, but the captain of the Lakota thought quantum torpedoes would completely destroy the Defiant while phasers would only do enuff damage to maybe disable it. So canon implies that ablative is either weak to, or just doesn't protect against, torpedoes. Also it is implied to have reduced the damage recieved from an Excelsior-class, which is long-range.

posted on July 22nd, 2010, 9:16 pm

Please, if it's somehow, for some reason, made into a penalty if you get hit by torps, rename it.

Ablative Armor isn't a Treknobabble.  We use it today, and it doesn't make you more vulnerable to anything until it's all used up.  It's not very good for extended use, but that's not it's purpose.  It provides no additional protection from AP ammo, however.  We have Reactive armor for that.

posted on July 22nd, 2010, 9:29 pm

Actually it is treknobabble, just based off of a real-world premise, similar to Enterprise hull-polarization (polarizing ceramics does not work the way we see it used in Enterprise, writers either didn't care or did not do the research.)
The weakness to torps is for game balancing reasons only. Unless you want fast-tracking computers passive to be renamed because real fast-tracking computers wouldn't have a weakness to long range.
Ablative armor for a starship would have major differences from ablative armor for a tank.

posted on July 22nd, 2010, 10:04 pm

Ablative armor for a starship would have major differences from ablative armor for a tank.

That's wrong. 
Ablative armor is exactly the same in each case (it's used by the Nasa to get Spaceshuttles back to earth without being burned in the atmosphere and not popular on tanks): It's just a plating layed over the outer hull to protect from everything that generates enormous heat. The ablative armor just melts and burns down until its used up. That's why it's not suited for extended use. And that's why it does not add protection or weakness from armorbreaking thingies.

posted on July 22nd, 2010, 10:06 pm

Two words, once again: Star Trek

Realism is often, but not always, separate 

posted on July 22nd, 2010, 10:09 pm

That's wrong. 
Ablative armor is exactly the same in each case (it's used by the Nasa to get Spaceshuttles back to earth without being burned in the atmosphere and not popular on tanks): It's just a plating layed over the outer hull to protect from everything that generates enormous heat. The ablative armor just melts and burns down until its used up. That's why it's not suited for extended use. And that's why it does not add protection or weakness from armorbreaking thingies.

This isn't a heat-shield we're talking about, it's something to protect from phaser beams, that contain like a bunch of scary particles and such.

[RedEyedRaven]

posted on July 22nd, 2010, 10:09 pm

Last edited by RedEyedRaven on July 22nd, 2010, 10:11 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Two words, once again: Star Trek

Realism is often, but not always, separate 

In case of ablative Armore, the principle and the way it works is as near to realism as the paycheck in your mailbox.

Edit:

This isn't a heat-shield we're talking about, it's something to protect from phaser beams, that contain like a bunch of scary particles and such.

No heat-shield?  Phasers and Disruptors don't melt outer hulls by generating high temperatures? Look at the wrath of Khan... didn't the Enterprise look like a little molten and burned on the outside?

posted on July 22nd, 2010, 10:11 pm

HAH! When the ablative armor is made up of fictional materials I don't think we can even begin to say what their properties will be 

[Tyler]

posted on July 22nd, 2010, 10:13 pm

Last edited by Tyler on July 22nd, 2010, 10:15 pm, edited 1 time in total.

According to Memory Alpha (and DS9), the Trek-one protects against directed-energy by dissipating the energy as it melts.

It also call the modern version a rather crude version of what Trek uses.

posted on July 23rd, 2010, 5:42 am

It's just the name of the passive .

  The passive is a logical variable of the others (long range, medium range ...)

posted on July 23rd, 2010, 8:14 am

Maybe the ablative armor is more than just a heat shield? Just imagine:
Shields from level one to level 6 generators. Armor that may compensate anti-matter-detonations, ecm devices and polarisation (borg show it). If you take it all into a bag, shuffle it and pick you ablative armor, then you may get a little more that a heat-shield. It seemed to me, that the armor on the defiant was more like a reactive one, than only a heat shield.

posted on July 23rd, 2010, 10:08 am

the defiant had thick plot armour too remember. stronger than adamantium

posted on July 23rd, 2010, 4:38 pm

Well now that we're done discussing realism and such, can we discuss what this thread is supposed to be about (whether you guys like the ideas or not, which idea is best, and perhaps suggest better ideas)?

posted on July 23rd, 2010, 5:02 pm

I suggest...no change.

Ablative armor isn't broken, and doesn't need fixed.

posted on July 23rd, 2010, 5:09 pm

I suggest...no change.

Ablative armor isn't broken, and doesn't need fixed.

I agree. It's a fine ability as is, and people are already confused enough with the current passives apparently.