Multi targeting phaser idea

posted on January 17th, 2012, 5:06 pm

I was thinking...What if a chain reaction replace weapon function was made for a more realistic way for multi targeting phasers? It would work something like this.

The weapon would switch five times during it's cycle.

-First weapon would be only hp01
-Second weapon hp03
-Third weapon hp05
-Fourth weapon hp02
-Fifth weapon hp04

In theory, these phasers would only be able to strike a target with a certain arc, and if no target is in the arc, it moves to the next cycle. Also, it would prevent a target from being struck multiple times by the weapon without first firing on another vessel.


What do ya'll think? Could this potentially work?

posted on January 17th, 2012, 6:26 pm

it'd work without the replaceweapon, just use the:

Rotateprimary (to multi-switch-targets after every shot)
ignoreprimary (to be non-maneul-targetable)
rotateharpoint (to make it just hard points)

the only problem i for see is that the rotate command only uses the two cloest hard points to the target, but that is not really a big deal.

commands,

note: those might not be the actual commands but, these functions exist

posted on January 17th, 2012, 7:02 pm

You can add several phasers but rotate the HPs and give restricted firing arch. Why wuold you use replaceweapoN?

posted on January 17th, 2012, 7:46 pm

You can add several phasers but rotate the HPs and give restricted firing arch. Why wuold you use replaceweapoN?

This is a almost satisfactory solution, but it still would not complete the required behavoir of a switching multi-target, and even if it did, the ship would fire as many arays as possible at every target (because of them all being different weapons),  makeing it spew out phasers at an ungodly rate. on top of that, the experence need to rotate hardpooints and the tools to do it are somewhat of a speciality. therefore, the most logical way to implement the would be to use the commands i sugjested, and i'm sure that dom would agree.

however your version would serve lots of purpose in a mod that focused on movement, making you constantly move your ships to atain max damage output.

posted on January 17th, 2012, 9:24 pm

Yes, you can use the following CannonImp commands to make such a weapon.

hitmode = 4 //Target only enemies
targetloop = 1 //cycles to find a new target
useprimarytarget = 0 //doesn't obey your choices

You can use either a replaceWeapon (not recommended) or an extraWeapon (recommended) to create such a weapon.

For instance:

You click the weapon's button, causing it to fire a replaceWeapon which drops a GameObject u-ball, which targets the owner vessel and grants it an extraWeapon with the above characteristics .

In future patches extraWeapons will be able to use other hardpoints. If you really badly want your weapon to use different hardpoints now, then yup, a replaceweapon is how you'd do it. 

posted on January 17th, 2012, 9:41 pm

They solve the firing arc  problem and true multitargeting yet?

posted on January 17th, 2012, 9:47 pm

I'm not sure what you mean by "true multitargeting" 

For "firing arc problem", I presume it's the same one as we discussed last time, where you can't give one hardpoint a limited forward and back arc, and instead have to use two. That feature has not been added so far

posted on January 17th, 2012, 11:14 pm

The issue with multi-targeting is one of practicality; generally, it's better to concentrate firepower on a single target and eliminate it than it is to spread that same firepower around, as there are no real incremental decreases in combat capability to aim for. Outside of a handful of special weapons, there's simply no need for multi-targeting at all. Case in point: who the hell builds a beam sphere?

posted on January 17th, 2012, 11:27 pm

Anybody who wants -48 (3x beam moduls) or -32% (2x beam modules, 2x regen) from beam weaponry? Say against a gaggle of Bugs, Sabers, K'beajQ, Ktinga, B5 and so on

Multi-targeting has some specific uses as well - it can take care of multiple weak ships faster, as well as cause enough area damage that your opponent doesn't know which ships to retreat first -> and thereby your fleet clears out a whole bunch of stuff faster.

posted on January 17th, 2012, 11:31 pm

Case in point: who the hell builds a beam sphere?

I tested that one actually. in most cases i wouldnt recommend it. but against carriers it pwns.

b5: has a beam itself, and most damage comes from the fighters, which are beam armed. so the sphere takes waaay less damage, and the fighters are weak and don't have repair options, so the mutli target damage is not wasted, in fact a 3 beam sphere cleans out the fighters in a hurry. leaving just the weaker armed b5.

avalon: avalon does all its own damage via beam, and the fighters have pulses, which do 40% reduced against the large sphere. and the fighters die just as painfully.

those are the 2 main uses for beam sphere.

maybe against sabre spam there would be a case, as the sabres are weak and do all damage via beams. but then again if the fed player sabre spams you as borg, then you'll lose because you will be laughing too hard to micro.

maybe if a klink player kbq/vorcha spams you, then you can tank the beams. but if they have vorchas they can easily switch to add sangs, which will hurt.

Maybe against leahval/griffin spam too due to the beam reduction.

these last 3 i haven't tested, as they don't happen as much. feds like torps rather than sabres against borg, klinks also like torps, and i just haven't played the rom matchup yet.

in nearly all other cases the multi target is wasted, as the second beam jumps from ship to ship, barely damaging any of them. it would take several beam spheres before you get a noticeable ability to force a whole fleet of intreps to run. fleetops can be greatly influenced by keeping your ships alive, the player who keeps ships alive best usually wins. that contributes to the feds being easy to play, since their ships are defensively strong for the money, they don't die easily. then you just wait til you have loads of ships and battles get too big to micro ships away properly. multi target doesn't kill most ships, it just damages them.

ninjad by dom, although i'd like to say that no dominion player is crazy enough to field any serious number of bugs against borg, dodes would shut them down much better than a beam sphere.

posted on January 17th, 2012, 11:34 pm

Beam spheres have limited uses, yes, but they lack both the resiliency of a prime-regen sphere and the damage potential of a 3xprime-torpedo sphere. Unless you're facing an opponent who refuses to tech out of destroyers, the choice is clear.

(Hm, didn't think about the carrier counter. That's a good call.)

[Anonymous]

posted on January 17th, 2012, 11:40 pm

Last edited by Anonymous on January 17th, 2012, 11:42 pm, edited 1 time in total.

i think if you can get more than 1 beam sphere out against small ships then the spread damage could cause chaos and inability to get ships repaired, but you risk a lot with that first beam sphere. because the one extra beam isn't gonna confuse a good player (unless they're really drunk). they can retreat 2 ships and not lose any, and your sphere will stay damaged longer. i wouldn't want any less than 2 beam spheres to get the job done.

obviously if you manage to get several beam spheres then things are looking up as you'll be able to regularly get kills from anything less tough than a vorcha. getting the spheres will be difficult, though.

when i tested b5 and the main sphere loadouts, 3beam spheres performed much better than 3regen spheres, taking the fighters out in a flash. without their fighters those carriers aren't much threat. and the taking out of fighters is offensive, meaning if they mix carriers into a fleet, you can mix a beam sphere into a fleet, the main beam will follow your orders for your whole fleet, maybe going after a b8 or something, while the second beam will jump around keeping the fighters away, meaning you don't have to waste your whole fleet's firepower overkilling a fighter.

posted on January 18th, 2012, 12:04 am

Hm. I wonder what the most useless sphere configuration is?

posted on January 18th, 2012, 1:24 am

The borg have yet again assimilated a thread  lol.

Thanks for the feedback, I thought I might have actually had something there, but I guess not. Back to the drawing board.

posted on January 18th, 2012, 8:19 am

Sorry for derelling your thread