More realism

[RAZLESS]

Now my last idea for the moment...

 

I want to see my spaceship going to battle for long time... Firing long distances battles up to 40 km depending on each weapon types... Seeing fighters fighting for their life.... Seeing ennemy ship not having only 1 type of turret on his hull and having more turrets depending of the ship size... I don t really like to have 100 cards on my ship just for turret just having like a bonus (+ 1 turret on each card if volume > 0.1 M of m3...)

[Reviire]

Personally, I wouldn't mind this being an option. I love the cool looking style of ships trading fire over massive distances. After Battlefleet Gothic: Armada, just god. I need more of that in my life.

[Doc Savage NDMF]

So much time to dodge/change course unexpectedly. Guns at 10 km in the game have trouble hitting a target, even with burst fire spreading the salvo out for improved hit chances.

 

Rail guns would have a better chance, but at 40 KM away...

 

In a primitive setting with no tech/sensors I could see it being done. With all the tech and sensors we *should* have, I'd have evasive maneuvers preprogrammed the second the first shot was fired and would have decent odds to to dodge the shots. I'd keep maneuvering to make sure you had a heck of a time trying to get a decent hit.

 

There's a LOT of dead space to be in where you're not shooting...

 

So, the question for me becomes "how does adding this make for more realism"..? It's impracticable and has lower chances of blowing you out of the sky. What's more realistic is me using guided weapons, closer range weapons where I can put a premium on accuracy and using fighters. Pretty much what we have in game now and the same things that killed the use of super huge, big gun battleships IRL IIRC...

 

I have a couple long range cannon I mounted for fun to try this out. I was able to pick off ships between 9 and 10 km. It takes awhile, the enemy has to sit still like a dufuss and let it happen. It was satisfying in a way to be able to do it, but I didn't particularly find this to be as much fun as active strafing runs and up close combat. If the enemy ship moved and forced me to constantly fire, re-position and fire again in a cat and mouse sort of way, maybe. My mileage varied I guess...

 

Cheers..!

[RAZLESS]

Hello,

 

Thanks for all your responses.

"So much time to dodge/change course unexpectedly" => Yeah currently that's a bug I think...

 

With the cannon, we can also consider than the shell is too slow. More the time to travell between you and the target, more chance you miss the target... I don't know actually the speed of cannon's shells.

 

For me the realism is, like the exemple you cote of the big guns of the battleships, is like human would do in sky :

Capital ship suppoting fire by firing on far ennemy ships. If you're too close, you will be damaged more rapidly because of the gun's accuracy too high (depending on distance). The bombers will try to bomb the ennemy ships. If they have too many loses, they retreat. The fighters will try to attack ennemy bombers, and will try to destroy the ennemy fighters too...

 

That's the realism for me. We can also speak on how the ships blocks are destroyed, and if it may be realism, the ship would be a single block (but have the form of your ship) when you finish your construction, and this block will be deformable depending on impact on it... I don't know what you think for this, but I wait your responses !!

 

RAZLESS

[Reviire]

I think there's good real world analogies for this. Your cannons, i.e weapons fired with propellant, would be your cheap, easy and slow weapons. They're good for up close combat, i.e point defense or ships designed to be all up in your face. But then you have railguns, they're much more expensive to use, and tend to degrade faster than a cannon, but are capable of speeds upwards of several km/s, and would be viable for long range combat.

 

Aside from that, the use of torpedoes can work at long range.

[Spacefaring_Guy]

'Simply' link damage, range, accuracy, projectile speed and power requirements for turrets, then add more serious weight and thrust penalties for armour and thrust blocks to ensure only large ships can be properly armoured AND they move like cows.  Now you're encouraging players to make small, nimble ships that fire light weapons but die quickly on taking a hit, and giant monstrosities that maneuver like they're at anchor but wear a thick layer of armour and can fire station-busting weaponry at other slow targets.  You'd more or less end up with two layers of combat in the same theatre.

 

Maybe that's what the devs were thinking with hanger blocks, fighters, and pilots?  It makes sense that way since the game already rewards larger builds, and nobody wants to micro-manage a fleet of fighters (and you can't actually pilot more than one at a time anyway).  <i>We're already flying the capital ships!</i>

 

Perhaps what's really needed is to make it easier to load up on pilots and ships, to which I say separate the two... have the fighters flown remotely by pilots who stay on the capital ship, so they don't die when their fighter bites it.  Then add a new block type, Fighter Manufacturer, that turns out fighters (at a reasonable rate per block volume, and so long as you have raw materials) until your hangers are all at capacity.

 

Err... I think I've drifted off topic a bit, so let me conclude with, "and also adjust the main ship turret parameters so 'bigger, badder, further, slower' is a thing".

 

[Doc Savage NDMF]

Actually Remote Piloted Fighters and large Rail Guns would likely be reality for actual factual combat in space. So would Guided Missiles and Chain Guns. Lasers, Shields, Plasma Cannons.

 

But also Grape Shot/Ball Bearings similar to the nails/glass in a suicide vest. I'm not going to sit back and just shoot at you with whatever. I'm going to move. Very fast. I'm going to have the targeting computers launch everything I've got at precisely the right time and then fly by to a safe distance. There will be no sitting still and standing around in my world; that's just a recipe for getting shot.

 

While we're on the subject of fighters, pilots, crew and all that... AI would control so many things. The whole "Star Trek" level of crew for ships is ludicrous. If there were more than 10 or 12 actual people on board I'd be shocked. Two or three people for each department, a 2nd in command and a captain. AI and Bots would handle everything by this time in the future, people would be off at the beach or learning to paint with Interactive Bob Ross. (...such a happy little star there...)

 

Ships won't be built in shipyards like they are now either. They'll be 3D printed. Some crews to add in electronics, most of them bots. Just compare an auto plant from the 70's to one now. Look at how many items are being prototyped and extend that to 3D printing getting the age old Bigger, Better, Faster More treatment. It won't be long before we're printing everything from sneakers to car parts to bird cages.

 

Fighters would be stupid cheap and easy to assemble aboard ship. A 3D printed hull, some components and weapons bolted in. Those would be made on board as well, printed and machined by bots. We wouldn't need Turret Foundries if our ship is big enough, and that wouldn't be a massive thing at all for small or medium sized weapons. Really big guns, sure... Specialized or intricate guns, maybe. But not for run of the mill mid sized stuff.

 

One pilot would handle a squadron of fighters or bombers, AI handling the heavy lifting, plotting course, flying. Heck, Drones should be a real option here. Who needs pilots when I can point to a spot and click and let loose a hundred advanced AI fighter/bomber Drones to go get 'em..? Seriously, why are Pilots even a thing..?

 

No gunners either. Intelligent computer AI can find, aim and maintain cool downs for any target better than any gun crew. So for what then..? Ammo loading..? Hardly. Maybe you need old Gus to change out the Semi Truck Trailer sized Ammo cans once or twice a battle, but more than likely that's already covered by Wall-E. Or Mo...

 

This thing we're playing isn't the future. It's old timey sailing ships and cannons and broadsides and pirates with lasers and aliens thrown in.

 

I like it, I do... I like the whole space opera approach where men/women/other and machine work together for the common goal and where we have some sort of job or importance.

 

But if we're going to go the realism route, there's a lot of stale, heartless AI in our future. And a lot of correction for how space battles would really be fought.

 

I mean seriously, if you think I'm actually going to sit there and swap big gun stories with you and your fleet, you have another thing coming.

 

Cheers..!