Agreed. A fighter's weapons shouldn't even scratch capital class shields, let alone armor. At most, fighters should be able to disable turrets and such that are exposed.
I also agree, but Star Wars ... They Cry ! I can hear the whale tears falling like rain ... When a couple of Light fighters, take out their $ 1,000 + Cap. ship.
You bring up a very good point that many forget: In MMOs, the real point of balance is what you can do with a given number of players. In-game cost simply won't matter, long term. Given time, active players would have access to most anything they'd like, so for long term balance, you have to assume they're available. If you have 10 players in your group, you have a lot of choices.. all get on one Idris, could crew a couple Redeemers, a Hammerhead and an escort or three, 10 Eclipse torpedo bombers.. 5 heavy fighters such as the Scorpius, 10 mediums, etc... Depending on the scenario you're facing, each of those options should be more or less valuable. The goal would be each option is a good choice for at least one scenario players commonly face. Ideally, each scenario has several good options to choose from, so players can go with something that fits their play style or aesthetics. So if you really like being the gunner on a ship, there would be an option that lets you hop in a ship's turret.. be it a heavy fighter or a frigate. If any of those options start to get so poor (I'm looking at you, Retaliator) for the scenarios players engage in that you'd never consider it a good option, then that's when that vehicle needs addressing. It could be because it's a reasonable ship, like the Retaliator, but it requires more people to achieve the same level of success as other options, then no one would really use it unless something forced them to. Why take a Hammerhead if you can crew 2 Redeemers for the same number of people, and end up with even more firepower and durability? In the future, range and logistics will start to play a bigger role for ships like the Retaliator and Hammerhead, but for the game as it is now, there's nothing they can do that can't be done better in other ships, given the same number of crew. In the end, any vehicle people don't use is wasted development time on the part of CIG, and they really don't want to be wasting the 6-12 months of several devs and artists' time required for each ship. So not only is it in the player's best interest to see balance and many options to solve a problem, but it's really in CIG's interest, given the investment the company made into producing each ship. They really need every ship to be useful.
I can't wait to see that. Honestly, I just imagine spawning into a bunk onboard a cap ship and running to my station or the flight deck and getting to work to defend the ship and fleet.
I believe that the first thing that would make Combat a Pleasure, is weapon balancing. For example: Ballistic weapons will be overall slower, as they are Physical Projectiles traveling in space. However they will carry with them a explosive inside that does damage, can cause a fire & more to a ship that for example, has its shields down. Laser weapons - will be energy hungry, prone to overheat & overall travel faster than ballistics. But not faster than lets say a Rail Gun shot. Lasers will be able to make the hull of a Ship start melting away, due to the energy & heat produced - the ship with lets say Light armor would start glowing & disintegrate over time - causing death by fire, suffocation,vacuum of space & Etc to the crew. Effectively disabling the ship. Distortion based weapons will be the ones you need to take with you - to disable enemy shields! And perhaps an E.M.P. like component to them that can cause them to disable ship parts (we already have something similar to this in-game) - They will fire SLOWLY but when they hit the shields - they will distort the shield and damage it faster, than it would with other munitions. Missiles / Explosives / Torpedoes - will need to be balanced exactly like Farrister Said, i fully agree with his point on those. FLAK Cannons, turrets, guns & overall FLAK Munition and types like it will need to be added. Perhaps a dedicated Type of weapon that does low damage to ship hull & shields, but can easily destroy incoming death of missiles & etc. RAIL Gun type weapons will need to fire like a fast projectile that can Still, incredibly difficult - be intercepted. But that projectile would have the ability to "Pierce" a large amount of a ship`s hull & cause More damage to Internal Components. For example in the popular TV Series - "The Expanse" I believe that the RailGun weapons are well represented there & What they can cause to a ship out in the vacuum of Space. I also believe that the only thing a "Shield" Can do to "Slow down" the railgun hit is to do exactly that, slow down the projectile so it would not pierce as MUCH of the ship! It would bend the shield & eventually pierce. (Ballistic Cannon Shot - It hits shields, they dissipate the explosive power of the shot & absorb the damage. If it hits ship Hull -> Then it explodes on that hull, based on the type of shot fired - it explodes on the inside causing potential fire, damage to crew & components. - RailGun Shot - does similar to the above, but instead is treated like a Sniper shot - Projectile hits a Shield - it slows down, hits 1 section of the ship for example - the part that was hit, can cause random damage to a Component in THAT Section in a point of impact area. - However if it directly attacks a ship`s Hull - it can potentially pierce the entire ship & go through it, causing damage to Multiple components along the way, crew, hull breach that needs to be sealed & Causing damage to the ships Life Support capabilities.) -> Armor can work in lets say for example this fashion: Light hull armor, can absorb the impact of a Flak ammo, Ballistic rounds - such as Minigun style rounds will do reduced damage due to the armor sloping for example. But to be very vulnerable to Laser Ammunition due to being made out of lightweight materials. Or Distortion to be Highly effective on lightly armored ships. A ship with light armor should be fast, agile & maneuverable, in order to avoid catastrophic damage from Powerful Explosives! Medium Hull Armor - can Fully absorb the impact of Standard Ballistic rounds, making a need for Armor Piercing shots in order to do effective damage. Medium armor can also take reduced damage from Explosives & The component placement is done in such a way that the Medium Armor plating PROTECTS said components! Reducing Rail Gun, lasers doing reduced damage to the Medium armor, as well as reduced effectiveness for Distortion & Missiles/Explosives on the ship. Not impeding the speed of a ship too much, but definitely adding weight, loosing top speed, agility. Heavy Ship Hull Armor - Would fully absorb: Laser weapons, Distortion weapons would be with severely reduced effectiveness, Explosives would not be able to expose large chunks of the ships interior when they explode & eventually go through the tough layer of defense. Only the large caliber weapons would be effective against this type of armor & would need to have special properties in order to do damage, however with reduced effectiveness! Rail Gun effectiveness to be reduced at least by half by such heavy armor. Standard ballistic rounds would not penetrate. All of the above protection coming with a big loss in Mobility, Agility & overall top speed. Such ships would need to be able to accelerate slower, turn slower, reach their top speed slower than Light or Medium armored ships! They need to be slower & cumbersome. But take increased damage from Internal damage such as: Fire, depressurization, depending on where the damage to the ship is done to make whole SECTIONS of a ship inoperable until Life Support is fixed. Capital Ship Armor - Is a very difficult topic. It would be a lot like heavy armor, but with even more issues. Cost, Speed, Agility, Severely Reduced Top Speed, Ability to fully stop small, medium & Large caliber rounds. Completely absorb conventional explosives. I Think Capital Ship armor should come with the least amount of Weak Spots, to cover as much of the ship as possible. But to have a weakness to being completely stopped in its tracks - due to being prone to hit & run tactics. Only the largest of caliber weapons can damage such ships & all with reduced effectiveness! Cap ships need to be like the Reclaimer, slow to move, difficult to damage & to come with VERY high Costs to Operate! Refuel, Resupply, Crew requirements, Repair will all be expensive to run on such ships. Capital ships should come with plentiful storage on board, rec rooms, ability to make long distance jumps & etc. They will come with a lot of benefits, but speed & time will make them costly to operate! They will also require a lot of workers on different ship systems, to work in tandem. Such ships will have other issues that most others won`t be facing. Some would even say that Capital Ships should not be able to Land Planet side...... I will leave this one to you guys, its a game after all. Too much realism would ruin the fun of it! They will need their own tier of weapons that can be equipped only by the bigger ships, dedicated platforms & weaponry to damage these titans! But overall - a Capital ship would be worth it it can be crewed & operated effectively! If you read the above, thanks your a cool cracker! Yours truly, a humble space trucker~
Cool cracker! Really interesting notes, I love how passionate people are about developing ideas for this game. I suppose let's wait and see what we get!
I haven't really used the proximity chat too much, but it would be great if these capital ships had some kind of proximity chat that worked like radio. Things that would allow the crew to communicate in a realistic manor. I think building in features to allow a crew of random people to work together would really increase the capital ship potency, which would allow them to be a better option than the same 10 people all flying solo ships.
IMO, voice chat needs proximity, and a radio type system. just make the mobiGlas system better, let people be in multiple voice chats at one [this one might already work], and let people set different hotkeys for the mic for them. If voice worked in game, and doesnt have janky UI, a good portion of the community would use it. Including stuff like hailing and radio ranges (which could be a drawback ultimately and I could see adjusted/removed) makes it ingrained into the game and a better choice than out of game solutions. Just make voice in game on par/better than teamspeak/discord and give it a quirky interactive feature (proximy, hailing, multiple "channels") and people will naturally want to use it.
I would be absolutely ecstatic if they added point defense cannons (PDCs). As someone who started playing because they're favorite show is "The Expanse" I absolutely loved their take on space combat, and i feel as though it's the most realistic too. I like how you can already shoot missiles with your guns to destroy them and i feel as though it would affect balance too much because they can make it where they can only target missiles, ground vehicles, and players outside their ship. And then have it where you can have the PDCs on automatic or manual. On automatic mode accuracy escalates as the the missile gets closer, but the PDC will automatically start shooting at the missile as soon as it enters its maximum engagement range. On manual mode you target missiles like you would a ship in missile operator mode, and the more you let it target the missile before firing the more aim assist you get. You can also have it where they can be ballistic or laser. Ballistics work excellent for close range because they have escalating accuracy, some manufacturers as high as 100 percent, but with significant downsides. And of course they're are limited on ammo too. Lasers work excellent for mid range because they instead have a flat accuracy in automatic mode but it'll significantly higher than the base accuracy of ballistics, and the flat accuracy of the PDC will be different amongst the different manufacturers, and aren't capped on ammo, but can overheat.
There's another element of balance that SC fans often seem to forget - the balance of combat ships vs non-combat ships. I think a lot of people, like myself, feel like a freighter just SHOULDN'T win most encounters with a space superiority fighter. And yet there's always people saying "bro the guns on this cargo ship have so many blind spots!" or "this mining ship should have at least size 2 missiles for it to have a chance of winning." Unfortunately, while many people can agree in principle that neither fighters nor capital ships should dominate, its harder to reach a consensus on how a 100m long civilian vessel should fare against a military interceptor
I've always thought that civilians ships should have more shield generators for running as they should be under gunned compared to a military ship. To go along with that though, I'd say a civilian ship with a powerful tractor beam for moving heavy weight should be able to at least shove or yank on small ships, even with shields up. Maybe not drag them, but like a slippery grip if that makes sense. Would open up some fun options for defense
There are many factors that should determine the outcome of pirate vs freighter. More than just role and size. 100m freighter can mean a wide range of ships. On one hand you have the cheap and modular 111m Caterpillar at 960t of mass. On the other you have the durable "military-grade spaceframe" 3,139t C2 Hercules measuring just 94m. Then there is the Hull C with an exposed structure at 125m weighing just 887t. If it's a C2 Hercules, it should hardly be threatened by a single Hornet. If it's a 1v1 situation with one player in the Hornet and one player in the Hercules with guns manned by AI blades/NPCs, the Hercules should be able to fend off a single Hornet. If it's a 2v1 situation with two Hornet pilots and one Hercules pilot, the Hercules should still be able to fend them off. If it's a 2v1 situation with two fighter-bomber pilots carrying size 5 torpedoes and one Hercules pilot, the Hercules should lose the extended fight, because the fighter-bombers are carrying large munitions. However the Hercules should still have a method of escape. If it's a 2v1 situation with an interdiction ship pilot that has caught the Hercules unaware, and a fighter-bomber pilot, the Hercules pilot should have very limited chance of survival, because the pirates have brought a ship that can tackle and a ship that carries large munitions. If it's a 1v1 with an Eclipse, which carries size 9 torpedoes, a Caterpillar or Hull C should just explode. The Hercules' odds should be debatable.
So much to say... On the different types of damage, I totally agree. A Damage Control (DC) crew could run around patching holes created by ballistic or laser type weapons keeping the internal integrity of the ship. While that same DC crew would have a harder time of it when hit by contact explosion that rips a larger section away. It still can be done, more mitigation than repair though. Keep the ship alive as it were. Large ships should never operate alone though, they should be part of a battle group that provides the layers of protection that were mentioned. That being said, while there are plenty of players and orgs in SC, creating the penalties that would be associated operating a large ship independently (without a battle group) is not in the games interest, at least not a this time. Unfortunately, the 'respawn' model that most MMOs take on to enable the 'fun' factor does create a devil may care attitude, which may or may not be addressed by 'death of a spaceman'. Since SC is still in design and testing, we shall see. I really do not think that once released that much will change, but I would prefer that you cannot instantly be revived "cloned" at your facility of preference to join the same fight once again. Sorry for the long comment. Thanks for the subject of the video though... thought provoking.
Love this post Farrister. If they can nail Battlestar Galactica battles I’ll be a happy Pheebs. I do think missile play needs a rework. Firing missiles should be an investment in the game. They are too cheap and compliment gunplay but really they should be expensive and change the game. Torps would really benefit from being AOE and missiles and in general should look amazing when they go off. Lighting up the entire shield. Eve really nailed the wraparound visual effect on a hit which Cig would do well to check and replicate.
I think that one way to deal with fragility of big ships is that shots from lower caliber weaponry will only soft-kill the ship and knock out components, allowing the crew inside to essentially keep repairing the thing as long as supplies last. You might lose engines, all guns, life support and even power, but the thing doesn't blow up if you don't slam a torpedo or a missile big enough to knock it out for good or board it set the reactors to blow. Alternatively, something with really big guns shows up and finishes you off.
I do feel like deploying a capital ship to a theatre or conflict should almost be an automatic "I win" button, requiring the other side to deploy either a capital ship of their own, or dedicate a significant amount of anti-capital ship firepower such as Retaliators or multiple sub-capital class vessels. For their expected cost to operate, a capital ship arriving on station should equal to an apocalyptic event that can singlehandedly turn the tide of battle if the enemy is ill equipped to deal with the threat *immediately*.
That can be the case, whilst also simultaneously being a vulnerable platform. Deploying a capital ship should require an element of planning, or for everybody aboard to be on their A game, rather than an instant click to win. A ship like the Javelin, with a good crew, should be an immense combat powerhouse; but only insofar as the crew can work together to keep it safe.
I've played enough MMOs in my life that I know that respawning too easily and quickly turns the players' behavior into kamikaze attackers. And that can ruin a lot of fun. Of course there shouldn't be overly difficult hurdles, but you also shouldn't be able to get back into the fight too quickly.
Initially I thought this video would be taking the position I have heard stated many times in several places over the last year, that big ships - and, yes, even capital ships - should absolutely be threatened by single seat fighters. I'm glad you pointed out the different types of damage that can be done, and how they differ in important ways, though you did leave out the limited supply of the missiles/torpedoes that would realistically present any kind of danger to something with any serious amount of armor. Great video per usual. :-)
Thanks, glad you enjoyed! And good point on limited munitions, although that may also apply to ballistics! (Incidentally, one of the reasons I think ships like the Javelin could be very strong, with lots of internal storage for re-stocking those hungry guns!)
Very well put together, Farrister. I am very interested in seeing how gameplay will change once these capital class ships are introduced to the PU. And how the servers will manage with the added load.
I’d definitely say that it should get to a point where small craft can define the course of a battle if done right. Ideally, mixed squadrons of fighters and bombers would be capable of doing something to a cap ship, with light/heavy fighters possibly being able to divert or possibly disrupt the fire of anti fighter weapons on a cap ship (albeit with severe balancing to avoid creating a loop hole of endless disruption) while bombers do actual tangible damage to a capital ship. Ofc take what I say w a pinch of salt as I may have tried to convey one thing but it came across as something else. that being said, if an Org is limited to the light fighters/light bombers they have they shouldn’t be able to do absolutely nothing at all, maybe light fighters with missiles could possibly do damage to relatively small and exposed sub systems or even some smaller turrets which could even add an extra layer of depth to engineering and damage control on something like a cap ship.
Would love to see the armour to protect the internal systems rather then just being hit points. An idea of this could be that a ship has multiple armour parts which block certain sizes of munitions completely, until the armour part gets worn down and then can’t stop rounds from penetrating into the internal components damaging and taking them offline, which is where the engineering role comes in to repair these damaged or broken parts to get the ship back to fighting. Would require fights to rely on much more precise firing on certain parts to bring a ship down rather then being able to spray all over.
Yes fleet composition is a vital component of any strategic plan. Terms such as defence in depth spring to mind. Balance will be a subject of many conversations at CIG.
MKultrapdx mentioned a Phalanx CIWS type gun, I totally agree with this type of countermeasure for any ship that has a turret that could be armed with this instead of an offensive weaponry, make the ship defensive to avoid the damage,most of the transport ships just need time to plot a course and jump and this could buy that time and even smaller the arrow or Hornet any ship that can have a turret,and of coarse larger ships like the entire Freelancer line rear turret converted just for torpedo and missile countermeasures and any small fighters that stray to close,you would still have your main guns as well as standard countermeasures or possible allow for equipping two of these gun one on the opposing sides to cover 360 degrees or one front nose and one rear tail.As always great topic thanks again keep it up you are doing great work, I enjoy every episode you put out.Inciteful,educational and opens the mind to contemplating many possibilities and just a good time watching and listening it makes my day better.
Yup, it's kinda what I was thinking of too. Lots of ships mention "point defence" turrets, I kinda imagine a Phalanx type thing for that. Glad you enjoyed the video!
With the right countermeasures I think it should be near impossible for ordinance smaller fighters carry to inflict catastrophic damage on capital or larger ships. Instead I like the idea of ships designated as ‘destroyers’ at different levels of accessibility. I think the ion and retaliator are great examples, but I think some slight tweaks may be required for balancing. For the ion I would like to see the weapon or ammo be expensive to replace and limited so it would be difficult to spam many of them. There should be a real investment for the individual to deploy them. The same goes for the retaliator, but I also think it would be interesting if the torpedoes were TV guided or dumb fire to add an extra layer of skill to their potential. I think Mastermodes will give us our first glimpse at the RPS of ship roles, but I think the economy is going to play a major role in balancing as well. I had caught wind of this, when I heard the info runners talking about the intended cost for retaliator torps. From what they were saying they would cost somewhere in the range of a starter ship to restock.
I agree - although there are fighter-sized threats that I think would qualify, depending on the size of the target. Gladiator, and Eclipse, for example. I like the idea of TV guided munitions - makes me think of my DCS days!
I really enjoyed this video, I can't wait to see how capital combat is handled when it finally comes out. Can't wait to pilot your javelin in an org event. - Fallen
I like the idea of additional combat mechanics on a missile and counter-measures "battlefield", and I believe that's what CIG have planned, at least to some degree. I also wonder if they still plan on adding PDSs like the one the Phoenix was supposed to get. But I really hope we get EWAR and ECM with skill-based control systems, such as manually matching modulations, manually aiming with prediction assist systems etc...
Ramming speed require almost no piloting skill to take out or glitching inside large ships in the PU, however it is not that effective in Arena Commander. What I want to say is that if CIG and Community want the combat to be ritualized in some way, most fightings have to be taken out of the normal space of PU.
I think a capital ship should be practically invulnerable to smaller arms fire and torpedos due to the PDS systems and I think those systems should take quite a few minutes to repair. That way small squadrons or smaller ships will have to stop the cap from running, disable some or most of the manned turrets and then fight their way onboard to take over the ship as destruction would take too long (say 40 minutes+) and runs the risk of backup arriving. With that a capital ship should only really be afraid of capital killers and other capital class ships. And with that the game becomes who can take out the PDS system long enough to get the torpedo shot to connect. This would be a reason for the fighters on board to exist as they could brave the battlefield to get close and shoot out the PDS systems for that shot while having to fear manned turrets. That should create a skill chain something like this: Capital torpedoes > capital ship hull/shields > manned cap turrets > smaller ship fighters > PDS > capital torpedoes
*You are wrong about the risk of sinking.* We do get equivalent mechanics to this in the form loss of life support systems and/or loss of breathable atmosphere. Those even propagate similarly through rooms.
I'm not wrong, nor am I right - these are just some ideas and theory crafting! That said, life support can be managed to some extent through players donning space suits, so I think it's a bit different
CIG has already gone on record by stating that they plan for any Size 3 or below weapons to not make a dent in a Cap ships armour, once it's physicalised. And the bigger the weapon size, the slower it will be to track smaller targets. That's why only certain heavy Fighters and Bombers will be effective against larger targets, and why only certain sized smaller weapons will be effective against smaller targets. That means no light fighters swarming cap ships, regardless of numbers. That particular meta will be gone, thankfully. So no, 10 or 20 Arrows or similar light fighters against say a 10-20 crewed Idiris, won't be a thing. The Idris will simply shrug them off and may just be swatting at flies themselves. Kind of like how in WWII, only bombers and torpedo planes could damage a ship. (Sans kamikazes). Machine guns alone were largely ineffective, save for sniping crew exposed on deck. That's the start of the balance. That's why torps and heavy weapons will be the counter as you mentioned. And of course, not taking out a cap ship alone. That's why we have ships like the Hammerhead, Polaris, etc to fill out such roles in escort and gaps. As well as other fighters/interceptors. Mind you no one plays that way, since we have no cap ships and most of the interior gameplay isn't around, like engineering and not all of the ship's abilities. Tearing through ERT's+ with a single Hammerhead may also not be a thing then. So, CIG has a clue at least. They know that just letting (just an example) 20 players fly around in lightly armed and armoured fighters won't win any battle against every ship. Nor will chugging alone in a single fully crewed cap ship win every battle, against every other ship. But that'll be worked on more when it's live. Some year. *sigh* As a side note: The whole flak thing has been mentioned/suggested quite a few times on Spectrum. But CIG may just be going the route of point defence weapons (that aren't currently on any ship), but are mum on what they may entail, besides being small, light weapons. Flak would be interesting, but could cause some 'friendly fire' issues, if the PvE server options is never a thing. Flak hits everything, regardless of IFF signatures. :P And that's a headache in itself to players who just seem to 'fire everything' and aren't professional or disciplined like the BSG reboot displayed.
Really interesting notes - I'm gonna watch with interest how it all plays out. I guess at least some of these concepts have been considered for Squadron (albeit easier to balance/predict)
The issue is solved with armour. Capital ship have too much armour to be vulnerable to small size weapons. (Let’s say size 3 and under). That way, you need a heavy fighter to kill with size 4+ guns to kill a capital ship.
You're right, this was an enjoyable video. The thing is that Star Citizen is not inherently Mahanian. (so-called) Capital ships are not the only threat to capital ships, which brings rise to questions about the validity of a new Jeune Ecole. I think the real question is how CIG is going to balance (SC) Capital Ships with torpedo craft with fighters.
While I am very excited for the introduction to player owned capital ships, I still have a couple concerns. When the Ares came out and it was shown that the size 7 cannon could destroy light fighters in a couple shots, there was a very vocal minority that convinced CIG that this was bad. The game tends to be geared towards the light fighter meta however, in my opinion no amount of light fighters should be able to damage an Idris or Javelin with ballistic or laser weapons, maybe with large enough missiles. Second, I hope the introduction to ai crew won't be too far behind, it would suck to own an idris and you and your 10 friends aren't enough to crew it including the fighters you would need for protection.
Well, balancing will be a huge pain in the ass for CIG because the most effective tactic against real life ships also applies to SC, and that is saturation. Let's say a javelin has 30 people on it. Instead of deploying another javelin to counter it, the most likely thing that's going to happen is that 30 people will jump in eclipses and fire 90 torps at it. Why? Because it's most likely cheaper and has higher chances of success while being less risky. Even if half of the eclipses are lost it probably wouldn't be nearly as expensive as deploying, maintaining and maybe losing a cap ship. Imo there's no way for CIG to properly balance this. Either the large ship is screwed or bombers like the eclipse get nerfed so hard to the point of being useless.
But then if those torpedoes are easily shot down by the co-ordinated crew, it becomes pointless. And that's where the co-ordination and skill check is important. In a 30v30 engagement like that, having somebody purely to keep an eye on the 'battlefield', identify and prioritise threats is a big plus. Also, the Eclipse torpedoes are huge in game right now, but smaller than those launched by the Polaris and the Javelin...
@@Farrister it only takes 8 torpedos to kill an idris rn (and sure those numbers may change) which means it should be very easy to overwhelm the defensive capabilities of a cap ship. However, like you said, if it's too easy to shoot those torpedos down no one will use them and that's why I believe it will be next to impossible to balance this without screwing over certain ships or ship roles. And it'll become even harder the more ships they add.
Personally I think that capital and sub capital ships should be MUCH weaker with 1-2 players in them. With a full or semi-full compliment of players engineering should come in to play in order to repair shield and armour, meaning that even with several size nines hitting, the cap and sub cap ship can survive.
Agreed - 1-2 players really shouldn't be the model for these massive ships. But a full crew complement should be able to deal with incoming threats effectively through teamwork and skill.
The fact that capitalships doesn't have CWIS+ against torpedos and light/medium fighters is just stupid. It should take several torpedos to overwhelm a capitalships CWIS , and able to hit a capitalship. Also , light/medium fighters should not possess enough firepower to take down shields of ships like Andromeda 1v1 , the regen of the shield should be higher then the fighters ability to apply damage. I think Capitalships shields should be of a certain shieldstrength that lesser sized weapons simply don't have the strength to even affect the capitalshields , and no fighters should carry weapons of a size enough to affect capitalshields. At the very minimum, Size 4 weapons should be requires to affect capitalshields, and all types of fighters should be limited to S3 max.
Some of them do - they mention "point defence turrets". On the Javelin, it's not CWIS per se, but the topside turrets also carry smaller guns for shooting down faster moving targets
When attacking a large ship with torpedoes/missiles, both tactics and saturation are going to be vital. Attackers will need to know their weapons range, especially minimum range, as firing from as close as possible minimizes the time the big ship has to maneuver or shoot down incoming projectiles, Also all torpedo bombers attacking from a single side will aid with saturation as fewer guns will be able to attack the incoming ordnance.
@@Farrister Also coordination is key, you want as many torpedoes as possible enroute at once in order to saturate their defenses, one or two dribbling in over time only means more chance they'll ne evaded, spoofed, or destroyed.
Large shields are paper. One Corsair can chew through 3xs3 L shields and soft death a reclaimer in under 30 seconds. That’s pretty wild. That same Corsair can chew through the cap shield of 890 in no time either.
Light fighters should never have a chance of beating a capital ship 1v1. If you want to take on a capital ship, bring bombers. Light fighters fight bombers and escort them. That is their role
10 light fighters vs a 10 crew ship should be fairly balanced, more skill required for the fighters but that is offset by cost of the capital ship. The eclipse will always be the bane of capital ships so long as it can fire and disappear. Perfectly balance will never exist but it should be believable. A lone light fighter should never be able to Duke it out with a ship 3 or 4 times its size.
Yes I agree, as long as by fighters we're also including some fighter-bombers in there, like a Gladius or Eclipse - the ones who can actually do the big damage!
I’ve blown Idris, in previous patches, with a four torpedo salvo that repeatedly hit the same hull spot. Have not done so in the current patch as I prefer 200k high threat beacons, which I can chain with my Corsair. I’ve rammed multiple ships in SC because it’s faster to respawn than fly back and reload.. a Retaliator will usually crack open anything, including a heavily damaged Idris…
I feel like there is a gap in players that want to do npc combat in a large ship without having to harass other players to man their turrets. This is why npc gunners are important! Though I'm not sure why CIG is taking so long to implement them...
If you could hire AI crew right now, 9/10 would be standing on the mess room table in your ship and the last one would probably be stuck blocking the cockpit. We need replication layer and server meshing first
I think the difference is in regularity. I wouldn't man a gun turret 7 days a week. But if you invited me aboard a Javelin today and asked me to gun for you, I'd be there in a heartbeat. These huge ships aren't necessarily for running 24/7, in my mind they're for those weekly raid type schedules, for which getting gunners should be achievable.
On the point of ordinance, I do wonder how the Polaris' missile boat identity will be balanced. For such a popular ship it would be a real feelsbad if it's wildly imbalanced one way or the other.
Probably wont one volley an Idris, but IMO 3+ could Alpha Strike one. If all the torps hit. But also iirc you'd have to hit an explosive component on the ship with you torpedo to cause an explosion, and even then it might only be about half the ship max. Once component parts are introduced into the combat system, your QD exploding might only kill half the people on your ship (capitals only are really big enough for this), while the rest rush off before the power plants explode and take the rest of them. Just my take on how the components will help with some of the combat questions people have
@@mhmm4840 On the other hand, a single Polaris torp should be capable of crippling a Javelin or Idris. Really depends entirely on how likely it is to hit a torp, and if any skill will exist with them. The Polaris is popular, but so is the Idris. (really wish we could see ship sale #'s) I'm entirely expecting to see both spammed out until they add proper costs & maintenance.
The balancing has to be the skill check on the part of the defender, I think. Polaris in my mind is more of a hit and run type ship when facing larger capitals, and by its very nature, that means that in my mind, there's a high chance of the strike being ineffective if the defenders are playing properly. The 'fun' of the Polaris would therefore be in knowing how potent a threat you are, and delivering a decisive blow in those times when the enemy isn't ready. Lions are fierce creatures. Many animals rightly fear the lion. But its success rate is 20-30% - most hunts are failures.
@@Farrister yeah I would really enjoy that. My hope is that it’s a pretty tough ship to operate effectively, but if you learn it well and have a good crew then it can deliver devastating blows in ambushes or in tandem with other capital ships occupying the target’s attention, similar to how torpedo-focused destroyers play in World of Warships. My concern is that if it’s the only cap ship out there for a while they’ll mostly be lone wolves spamming torpedoes into chaff clouds and not much else 😂
And then you have the Iron and Inferno LOL I think they made a big unbalanced mistake with them the rule of cool over balance . I do look forward to the day with server meshing working and we have 3-5 cap ships fighting it out and 30 - 40 fighters buzzing around them then an Eclipse turns up to reck someone's day LOL or a Polaris pops in to the fight and all guns turn on to it in a mad panic. As unlike sea battles which it took time to sail tot he fight and no extra help unless you had a Sub. but in space help can just jump in from either side so you will need to keep an eye on fresh ship turning up. OH god I hope Server meshing works
I don't know, I think the Ion and Inferno have the potential to be fine. They might be able to threaten the big boys with the conventional weaponry, but they'll also be very much at risk of being shot down. A fully crewed Idris, in my mind, should have no problem dealing with a single Ares fighter. The more interesting question is a 12 person Idris crew versus a mix of 12 fighters, bombers, including some Ares. And that feels like it should be a fairly balanced fight?
Capital ships should be hard to kill or conquer and so dangerous you'd have to think twice before engaging even with a small group of fighters. That's the definition of big capital ships. If they aren't hard, they aren't capital and game balance means nothing. Then they should have their field of fight. Like multimission like (Idris, kraken) , dangerous torpedoe boat (Polaris), masterfield ship (javelin). Each with their pros and cons. But against small fighters unless there is a large group of them... Caps should be a very complicated target. Life is unbalanced, ships has to be in proportion of their size, fighting types/mission type etc... That how a game and life works. A wooden stick has less impact than a machine gun.
Eather they go back to being realistic and bolster the shields and then make layers of multiple shields so that the ships with 2-5+ shields actually have more than one shield, or the game will tank and die the moment everyone jumps over from eve online. As a former eve player I can tell you exactly what is going to happen when you undock an idris or jav etc, you are going to have a 200 man mixed fleet of medium and heavy fighters defend on you and if they feel the need or just want to get more people having fun they will drop an additional 100 man eclipsing fleet on you which will all launch a mistle and immediately jump out to a safe and then jump back in and hit you again if your not dead from the first volley. If you have a cargo ship they will jump in with enough eclipse to one shot you give times over and dip out before your escort fleet can do more than target them then their buddies will come in in ships that are NOT in trouble with the law and grab the loot and jump out lightning fast. Eather this game gets real about defence or the players that are here will leave and newer players that are not part of the ranking guilds will also leave. I have watched games roll over and play dead for pathetic gankers that never want a real battle just to pick on the weak and profit off of hours and weeks of other people's work in a matter minutes slowly destroy world of Warcraft and eve online. The dada is there to look at. Make the game bent only to PVP and in favor of lazy cowards and you game will die. It's that simple. Starting out star cit showed it had the balls and spine to make things realistic. The moment you pull away from that and "balance" the game, your game does. As it stands if they keep shields going offline unrealistically and imbecilicaly as you speed up to run away, or jump out to safety. . . The game will die anyways. If you don't want to fight you have every right to run. Traveling at ftl you encounter just enough random atoms that you receive a lethal dose of radiation every one second and no one would EVER take off their armor or other defences in order to move away from a battle saying here free shots please kill me. . . There is no argument for what they have done that is not riddled with stupidity! "Balancing a game" is a scam that goes back to D&D and it stems from not having accurate information and mechanics to begin with and "balancing" ALWAYS makes it worse, not better. Go full realistic and where it is science that does not yet exist go with what it would become before any navy would willingly deploy it. There is our entire history of battle tactics, make people use their GOD given brains and study and use those tactics or creat other ones new ones that also work. Metra in it's self is broken and the direct result of laziness and ignorance. Willful ignorance. I am proud of them for being bold enough to be realistic, but they are starting down a road that leaves their morals in the mud and bows to bullies and lazy cowards. Given a realistic system I'll take a fight any day. I will likely lose but it will be fun and it will be a learning experience. Star cit has a chance to set an amazing example here and I hope they go back to taking that chance.
It'll be interesting to see how it all works out - some of the Idris or Javelin launched may be NPCs, not players. At some point there was a suggestion that players and NPCs may be almost indistinguishable.
@@Farrister that is also needed lol both in star cit and in eve. Being able to have competent hired help you could take out anything up to and including a Bengal and all its escort variants and do so as a solo player. But you would still need to spend time going to UEE training courses and spending time training every NPC both individually and as small squads and then the squads in larger groups. But done properly there's some good game play to be had there. And when we can upgrade the insides of the ships in addition to newer types of armor etc, then you can get a higher score with your crew. If you have them sleeping and eating in origin jump works levels of luxury, they will be far more loyal and in addition to higher pay, word will spread who is a good captain and who is bad and if you offer luxury and lots of good work and money and you use good solid tactics and while a grunt may ocationally die it is rare and you do not spend their lives lightly and when they need a long recovery time you move them to a plush med ship for the duration instead of firing them and keep giving them their cut of the bounties their ship is bringing in lol. There needs to be bonuses to crew intelligence and growth and performance for doing those things, also a greater likelihood that they get married and have kids. Start teaching kids young in language math etc you get a shockingly smarter and more capable adult. Raise every crew kid to be a grand fleet admiral and a sharp businessman/woman and your next generation will be the most elite in the game. A case of do things the right and realistic way and get massive reward instead of having to put up with random people like we do in WoW dungeons lol.
Honestly, I hope they throw realism out the window. I'd rather have a heroic WW2 in space with guns blazing, than modern Naval conflict of wondering if that angry blip on the sensor completes their kill chain first and vampires are already inbound.
That's another thing, the origin ships should have better armor and shields than the UEE ships, that's what happens in real live when billion eres commission a mega yacht to be build and know they will be traveling through dangerous waters, the people that pay for an 890 jump are paying to know that when an enemy flat of medium and smaller ships ambushes them, they will survive it not only without having to run, but knowing there will never be so much as a ripple in their martini glass. Their pampered life can go on with a battle raging outside and eather watch it as entertainment, or hit a button causing the windows to opaque so that they are not distracted from whatever function they are attending. So the whole origin ships are made of paper thing? Ya would literally never happen. Having less weapons yes absolutely but having less than the absolute best armor and shield that frankly the UEE just can not afford? Never going to happen. Those ships are billionaire play toys of ludicrous price for a reason.
Balance is hardly ever a problem if you just add lore. With the existence of such powerful shield systems comes the UEE's control of the markets. While the UEE may not be able to afford (unlikely, just look at the US military) installing the cream of the crop on every ship of the line, they do control the manufacturing and export of the companies capable of making such components. Otherwise there would be no military or society, because just as in real life, if all it takes to have military-grade weapons and armor is a lot of money, then the universe would just be lawless and run by pirates. Those companies would only be allowed to sell their best shield/weapons/propulsion/scanning/logistics components to the UEE/law enforcement, and only the most trusted ultra-wealthy who are in amazing standing with the UEE would be able to obtain them. Obviously the UEE doesn't want pirates (NPC or player) just buying components off an 890J/Idris' owner and plopping them onto a Kraken, so those components would be hull-locked to the ship with which they were purchased. Think Apple with their serialized parts, except military-grade. Not something anyone could just hack with an off-the-shelf 'cryptokey'. Thus it would be nearly impossible for a pirate organization to have those OP god-tier near-invincibility shields that you speak of on their Kraken. They would have to reverse-engineer the tech themselves. Even if they managed to reverse-engineer UEE controlled tech, they would still need to obtain the ultra-refined materials and build the manufacturing technology required to make it. So just like with nukes in real-life, it would take a massive effort to make, which the UEE would work to prevent every step of the way. As an example, the way that CIG emulates this is by having Origin sell this OP 890 Jump variant only to players or organizations with top 1% UEE standing, at a price of 800,000,000 UEC. The scarcity and price numbers here are completely up to CIG of course, since they are the ones who can see the market/playerbase data, and will balance it accordingly to keep it ultra-rare. It's worth noting that not every 890J/luxury yacht needs to be unkillable. If you are just a retired CEO spending your last days with your family on Terra, then there is no need to purchase the billionaire explorer 800,000,000 UEC cutting-edge shield tech variant. As far as the current 890J pledge owners, that would be the base variant. Capable of fending off a squad of fighters as shown in the ship commercial, but nothing too serious.
@@Di-Ferr in the main I agree with you, although as a soldier while I do not know about our navy ships, I do know that all branches get their supplies by lowest bidder and what we have in gear and training is bargon brand compared to what the high price soldiers of fortune have so yes there is much better tech than what we pay to equip our troops and ships with although it is absolutely highly regulated as you said. And personal body guards for the extremely wealthy buy the same equipment and are given similar training. This my point of the origin ships being of that quality. I absolutely agree that they would only be allowed to those who the UEE trusts and are something that would need to be earned which leaves open for some fun long term PVE with an amazing pay off and a lot of fun earning it. And I can see your point that there would be two variants of origin ships, the soldier of fortune ones and the ones that are like a Ferrari super fast and plush but made of fiberglass. And no matter how much money and standing you have, of the Ferrari is all you need then why get the one a fleet admiral would be entertaining guests in in a war zone? I had not thought of that point and it gives me a lot of food for thought thank you ;~)
Would be cool to see and hear a Phalanx CIWS type gun spool up and take down incoming munitions aboard these larger ships.
I think they explained it to be too straining for the game performance. Wheen Inferno was made, so the rpm was relatively low on it too.
Yes, that would be cool!
Personally i dont think a single fighter should ever be able to destroy a capital ship. A combination of fighters and bombers though absolutely
Agreed. A fighter's weapons shouldn't even scratch capital class shields, let alone armor. At most, fighters should be able to disable turrets and such that are exposed.
@@XShadowAngel I'm reminded of the Robot Chicken Star Wars skit where Dak decided to take on the whole Empire himself 🤣
I also agree, but Star Wars ... They Cry !
I can hear the whale tears falling like rain ... When a couple of Light fighters, take out their $ 1,000 + Cap. ship.
Agreed
I haven't watched the video yet. But correct me if I'm wrong please. There are not capital ships in game yet. Just sub-cap.
You bring up a very good point that many forget: In MMOs, the real point of balance is what you can do with a given number of players. In-game cost simply won't matter, long term. Given time, active players would have access to most anything they'd like, so for long term balance, you have to assume they're available. If you have 10 players in your group, you have a lot of choices.. all get on one Idris, could crew a couple Redeemers, a Hammerhead and an escort or three, 10 Eclipse torpedo bombers.. 5 heavy fighters such as the Scorpius, 10 mediums, etc... Depending on the scenario you're facing, each of those options should be more or less valuable. The goal would be each option is a good choice for at least one scenario players commonly face. Ideally, each scenario has several good options to choose from, so players can go with something that fits their play style or aesthetics. So if you really like being the gunner on a ship, there would be an option that lets you hop in a ship's turret.. be it a heavy fighter or a frigate.
If any of those options start to get so poor (I'm looking at you, Retaliator) for the scenarios players engage in that you'd never consider it a good option, then that's when that vehicle needs addressing. It could be because it's a reasonable ship, like the Retaliator, but it requires more people to achieve the same level of success as other options, then no one would really use it unless something forced them to. Why take a Hammerhead if you can crew 2 Redeemers for the same number of people, and end up with even more firepower and durability? In the future, range and logistics will start to play a bigger role for ships like the Retaliator and Hammerhead, but for the game as it is now, there's nothing they can do that can't be done better in other ships, given the same number of crew.
In the end, any vehicle people don't use is wasted development time on the part of CIG, and they really don't want to be wasting the 6-12 months of several devs and artists' time required for each ship. So not only is it in the player's best interest to see balance and many options to solve a problem, but it's really in CIG's interest, given the investment the company made into producing each ship. They really need every ship to be useful.
Really interesting notes, and agree entirely about making every ship a valid choice.
Kraken, scramble fighters to protect the fleet!
I can't wait to see that. Honestly, I just imagine spawning into a bunk onboard a cap ship and running to my station or the flight deck and getting to work to defend the ship and fleet.
A ping goes out on the discord,
GET IN HERE BOIS OOOOOO SHIIIIIIET
@@---uc8sx You know how it goes lol😂
Idris open back door hangar and poop 24 furies.
I believe that the first thing that would make Combat a Pleasure, is weapon balancing.
For example:
Ballistic weapons will be overall slower, as they are Physical Projectiles traveling in space. However they will carry with them a explosive inside that does damage, can cause a fire & more to a ship that for example, has its shields down.
Laser weapons - will be energy hungry, prone to overheat & overall travel faster than ballistics. But not faster than lets say a Rail Gun shot. Lasers will be able to make the hull of a Ship start melting away, due to the energy & heat produced - the ship with lets say Light armor would start glowing & disintegrate over time - causing death by fire, suffocation,vacuum of space & Etc to the crew. Effectively disabling the ship.
Distortion based weapons will be the ones you need to take with you - to disable enemy shields! And perhaps an E.M.P. like component to them that can cause them to disable ship parts (we already have something similar to this in-game) - They will fire SLOWLY but when they hit the shields - they will distort the shield and damage it faster, than it would with other munitions.
Missiles / Explosives / Torpedoes - will need to be balanced exactly like Farrister Said, i fully agree with his point on those.
FLAK Cannons, turrets, guns & overall FLAK Munition and types like it will need to be added. Perhaps a dedicated Type of weapon that does low damage to ship hull & shields, but can easily destroy incoming death of missiles & etc.
RAIL Gun type weapons will need to fire like a fast projectile that can Still, incredibly difficult - be intercepted. But that projectile would have the ability to "Pierce" a large amount of a ship`s hull & cause More damage to Internal Components. For example in the popular TV Series - "The Expanse" I believe that the RailGun weapons are well represented there & What they can cause to a ship out in the vacuum of Space. I also believe that the only thing a "Shield" Can do to "Slow down" the railgun hit is to do exactly that, slow down the projectile so it would not pierce as MUCH of the ship! It would bend the shield & eventually pierce.
(Ballistic Cannon Shot - It hits shields, they dissipate the explosive power of the shot & absorb the damage. If it hits ship Hull -> Then it explodes on that hull, based on the type of shot fired - it explodes on the inside causing potential fire, damage to crew & components.
- RailGun Shot - does similar to the above, but instead is treated like a Sniper shot - Projectile hits a Shield - it slows down, hits 1 section of the ship for example - the part that was hit, can cause random damage to a Component in THAT Section in a point of impact area. - However if it directly attacks a ship`s Hull - it can potentially pierce the entire ship & go through it, causing damage to Multiple components along the way, crew, hull breach that needs to be sealed & Causing damage to the ships Life Support capabilities.)
-> Armor can work in lets say for example this fashion:
Light hull armor, can absorb the impact of a Flak ammo, Ballistic rounds - such as Minigun style rounds will do reduced damage due to the armor sloping for example.
But to be very vulnerable to Laser Ammunition due to being made out of lightweight materials. Or Distortion to be Highly effective on lightly armored ships.
A ship with light armor should be fast, agile & maneuverable, in order to avoid catastrophic damage from Powerful Explosives!
Medium Hull Armor - can Fully absorb the impact of Standard Ballistic rounds, making a need for Armor Piercing shots in order to do effective damage. Medium armor can also take reduced damage from Explosives & The component placement is done in such a way that the Medium Armor plating PROTECTS said components! Reducing Rail Gun, lasers doing reduced damage to the Medium armor, as well as reduced effectiveness for Distortion & Missiles/Explosives on the ship. Not impeding the speed of a ship too much, but definitely adding weight, loosing top speed, agility.
Heavy Ship Hull Armor - Would fully absorb: Laser weapons, Distortion weapons would be with severely reduced effectiveness, Explosives would not be able to expose large chunks of the ships interior when they explode & eventually go through the tough layer of defense. Only the large caliber weapons would be effective against this type of armor & would need to have special properties in order to do damage, however with reduced effectiveness! Rail Gun effectiveness to be reduced at least by half by such heavy armor. Standard ballistic rounds would not penetrate.
All of the above protection coming with a big loss in Mobility, Agility & overall top speed. Such ships would need to be able to accelerate slower, turn slower, reach their top speed slower than Light or Medium armored ships! They need to be slower & cumbersome. But take increased damage from Internal damage such as: Fire, depressurization, depending on where the damage to the ship is done to make whole SECTIONS of a ship inoperable until Life Support is fixed.
Capital Ship Armor - Is a very difficult topic. It would be a lot like heavy armor, but with even more issues.
Cost, Speed, Agility, Severely Reduced Top Speed, Ability to fully stop small, medium & Large caliber rounds. Completely absorb conventional explosives.
I Think Capital Ship armor should come with the least amount of Weak Spots, to cover as much of the ship as possible. But to have a weakness to being completely stopped in its tracks - due to being prone to hit & run tactics. Only the largest of caliber weapons can damage such ships & all with reduced effectiveness!
Cap ships need to be like the Reclaimer, slow to move, difficult to damage & to come with VERY high Costs to Operate! Refuel, Resupply, Crew requirements, Repair will all be expensive to run on such ships.
Capital ships should come with plentiful storage on board, rec rooms, ability to make long distance jumps & etc. They will come with a lot of benefits, but speed & time will make them costly to operate!
They will also require a lot of workers on different ship systems, to work in tandem. Such ships will have other issues that most others won`t be facing.
Some would even say that Capital Ships should not be able to Land Planet side...... I will leave this one to you guys, its a game after all. Too much realism would ruin the fun of it!
They will need their own tier of weapons that can be equipped only by the bigger ships, dedicated platforms & weaponry to damage these titans!
But overall - a Capital ship would be worth it it can be crewed & operated effectively!
If you read the above, thanks your a cool cracker!
Yours truly, a humble space trucker~
Cool cracker! Really interesting notes, I love how passionate people are about developing ideas for this game. I suppose let's wait and see what we get!
@@Farrister Could not have said it better, i am excited to see what SC brings to us in the future. Lets hope they listen to player feedback.
I love using my 890 Jump to carry a fleet of snub fighters and its even better when i have 10 people to use them
Yes!
I haven't really used the proximity chat too much, but it would be great if these capital ships had some kind of proximity chat that worked like radio. Things that would allow the crew to communicate in a realistic manor. I think building in features to allow a crew of random people to work together would really increase the capital ship potency, which would allow them to be a better option than the same 10 people all flying solo ships.
Also people playing not to be afraid to use a microphone lol 🙂
IMO, voice chat needs proximity, and a radio type system. just make the mobiGlas system better, let people be in multiple voice chats at one [this one might already work], and let people set different hotkeys for the mic for them. If voice worked in game, and doesnt have janky UI, a good portion of the community would use it. Including stuff like hailing and radio ranges (which could be a drawback ultimately and I could see adjusted/removed) makes it ingrained into the game and a better choice than out of game solutions.
Just make voice in game on par/better than teamspeak/discord and give it a quirky interactive feature (proximy, hailing, multiple "channels") and people will naturally want to use it.
Or like if the captain had access to a PA system that projected their voice to every room inside the ship.
There will be places that do this. I usually run team ops with voice chat
@@mhmm4840 it's much too tedious to take the mobi out look for comms and find the channel you wanna speak to, when you can just use chat.
I would be absolutely ecstatic if they added point defense cannons (PDCs). As someone who started playing because they're favorite show is "The Expanse" I absolutely loved their take on space combat, and i feel as though it's the most realistic too. I like how you can already shoot missiles with your guns to destroy them and i feel as though it would affect balance too much because they can make it where they can only target missiles, ground vehicles, and players outside their ship. And then have it where you can have the PDCs on automatic or manual. On automatic mode accuracy escalates as the the missile gets closer, but the PDC will automatically start shooting at the missile as soon as it enters its maximum engagement range. On manual mode you target missiles like you would a ship in missile operator mode, and the more you let it target the missile before firing the more aim assist you get. You can also have it where they can be ballistic or laser. Ballistics work excellent for close range because they have escalating accuracy, some manufacturers as high as 100 percent, but with significant downsides. And of course they're are limited on ammo too. Lasers work excellent for mid range because they instead have a flat accuracy in automatic mode but it'll significantly higher than the base accuracy of ballistics, and the flat accuracy of the PDC will be different amongst the different manufacturers, and aren't capped on ammo, but can overheat.
Some ships even have point defence turrets listed on their eventual armament!
There's another element of balance that SC fans often seem to forget - the balance of combat ships vs non-combat ships. I think a lot of people, like myself, feel like a freighter just SHOULDN'T win most encounters with a space superiority fighter. And yet there's always people saying "bro the guns on this cargo ship have so many blind spots!" or "this mining ship should have at least size 2 missiles for it to have a chance of winning."
Unfortunately, while many people can agree in principle that neither fighters nor capital ships should dominate, its harder to reach a consensus on how a 100m long civilian vessel should fare against a military interceptor
I've always thought that civilians ships should have more shield generators for running as they should be under gunned compared to a military ship. To go along with that though, I'd say a civilian ship with a powerful tractor beam for moving heavy weight should be able to at least shove or yank on small ships, even with shields up. Maybe not drag them, but like a slippery grip if that makes sense. Would open up some fun options for defense
It's a good point
There are many factors that should determine the outcome of pirate vs freighter.
More than just role and size.
100m freighter can mean a wide range of ships.
On one hand you have the cheap and modular 111m Caterpillar at 960t of mass.
On the other you have the durable "military-grade spaceframe" 3,139t C2 Hercules measuring just 94m.
Then there is the Hull C with an exposed structure at 125m weighing just 887t.
If it's a C2 Hercules, it should hardly be threatened by a single Hornet.
If it's a 1v1 situation with one player in the Hornet and one player in the Hercules with guns manned by AI blades/NPCs, the Hercules should be able to fend off a single Hornet.
If it's a 2v1 situation with two Hornet pilots and one Hercules pilot, the Hercules should still be able to fend them off.
If it's a 2v1 situation with two fighter-bomber pilots carrying size 5 torpedoes and one Hercules pilot, the Hercules should lose the extended fight, because the fighter-bombers are carrying large munitions. However the Hercules should still have a method of escape.
If it's a 2v1 situation with an interdiction ship pilot that has caught the Hercules unaware, and a fighter-bomber pilot, the Hercules pilot should have very limited chance of survival, because the pirates have brought a ship that can tackle and a ship that carries large munitions.
If it's a 1v1 with an Eclipse, which carries size 9 torpedoes, a Caterpillar or Hull C should just explode. The Hercules' odds should be debatable.
So much to say... On the different types of damage, I totally agree. A Damage Control (DC) crew could run around patching holes created by ballistic or laser type weapons keeping the internal integrity of the ship. While that same DC crew would have a harder time of it when hit by contact explosion that rips a larger section away. It still can be done, more mitigation than repair though. Keep the ship alive as it were. Large ships should never operate alone though, they should be part of a battle group that provides the layers of protection that were mentioned. That being said, while there are plenty of players and orgs in SC, creating the penalties that would be associated operating a large ship independently (without a battle group) is not in the games interest, at least not a this time. Unfortunately, the 'respawn' model that most MMOs take on to enable the 'fun' factor does create a devil may care attitude, which may or may not be addressed by 'death of a spaceman'. Since SC is still in design and testing, we shall see. I really do not think that once released that much will change, but I would prefer that you cannot instantly be revived "cloned" at your facility of preference to join the same fight once again. Sorry for the long comment. Thanks for the subject of the video though... thought provoking.
Great comment - really interesting to read!
Love this post Farrister. If they can nail Battlestar Galactica battles I’ll be a happy Pheebs. I do think missile play needs a rework. Firing missiles should be an investment in the game. They are too cheap and compliment gunplay but really they should be expensive and change the game. Torps would really benefit from being AOE and missiles and in general should look amazing when they go off. Lighting up the entire shield. Eve really nailed the wraparound visual effect on a hit which Cig would do well to check and replicate.
Sounds great Pheebs!
I think that one way to deal with fragility of big ships is that shots from lower caliber weaponry will only soft-kill the ship and knock out components, allowing the crew inside to essentially keep repairing the thing as long as supplies last.
You might lose engines, all guns, life support and even power, but the thing doesn't blow up if you don't slam a torpedo or a missile big enough to knock it out for good or board it set the reactors to blow.
Alternatively, something with really big guns shows up and finishes you off.
Can’t wait for them to implement armor and stealth into the game
Armour, yes please! To a lesser extent we kinda have stealth now
I do feel like deploying a capital ship to a theatre or conflict should almost be an automatic "I win" button, requiring the other side to deploy either a capital ship of their own, or dedicate a significant amount of anti-capital ship firepower such as Retaliators or multiple sub-capital class vessels.
For their expected cost to operate, a capital ship arriving on station should equal to an apocalyptic event that can singlehandedly turn the tide of battle if the enemy is ill equipped to deal with the threat *immediately*.
That can be the case, whilst also simultaneously being a vulnerable platform. Deploying a capital ship should require an element of planning, or for everybody aboard to be on their A game, rather than an instant click to win. A ship like the Javelin, with a good crew, should be an immense combat powerhouse; but only insofar as the crew can work together to keep it safe.
I've played enough MMOs in my life that I know that respawning too easily and quickly turns the players' behavior into kamikaze attackers. And that can ruin a lot of fun. Of course there shouldn't be overly difficult hurdles, but you also shouldn't be able to get back into the fight too quickly.
It's a factor, for sure
Initially I thought this video would be taking the position I have heard stated many times in several places over the last year, that big ships - and, yes, even capital ships - should absolutely be threatened by single seat fighters. I'm glad you pointed out the different types of damage that can be done, and how they differ in important ways, though you did leave out the limited supply of the missiles/torpedoes that would realistically present any kind of danger to something with any serious amount of armor.
Great video per usual. :-)
Thanks, glad you enjoyed! And good point on limited munitions, although that may also apply to ballistics! (Incidentally, one of the reasons I think ships like the Javelin could be very strong, with lots of internal storage for re-stocking those hungry guns!)
Very well put together, Farrister. I am very interested in seeing how gameplay will change once these capital class ships are introduced to the PU. And how the servers will manage with the added load.
Thanks Snaggletoof
I’d definitely say that it should get to a point where small craft can define the course of a battle if done right. Ideally, mixed squadrons of fighters and bombers would be capable of doing something to a cap ship, with light/heavy fighters possibly being able to divert or possibly disrupt the fire of anti fighter weapons on a cap ship (albeit with severe balancing to avoid creating a loop hole of endless disruption) while bombers do actual tangible damage to a capital ship.
Ofc take what I say w a pinch of salt as I may have tried to convey one thing but it came across as something else.
that being said, if an Org is limited to the light fighters/light bombers they have they shouldn’t be able to do absolutely nothing at all, maybe light fighters with missiles could possibly do damage to relatively small and exposed sub systems or even some smaller turrets which could even add an extra layer of depth to engineering and damage control on something like a cap ship.
Now I'm imagining really cool Star Wars type battles!
Would love to see the armour to protect the internal systems rather then just being hit points. An idea of this could be that a ship has multiple armour parts which block certain sizes of munitions completely, until the armour part gets worn down and then can’t stop rounds from penetrating into the internal components damaging and taking them offline, which is where the engineering role comes in to repair these damaged or broken parts to get the ship back to fighting. Would require fights to rely on much more precise firing on certain parts to bring a ship down rather then being able to spray all over.
Supposedly those armour mechanics are planned for the future - time will tell
Yes fleet composition is a vital component of any strategic plan. Terms such as defence in depth spring to mind. Balance will be a subject of many conversations at CIG.
MKultrapdx mentioned a Phalanx CIWS type gun, I totally agree with this type of countermeasure for any ship that has a turret that could be armed with this instead of an offensive weaponry, make the ship defensive to avoid the damage,most of the transport ships just need time to plot a course and jump and this could buy that time and even smaller the arrow or Hornet any ship that can have a turret,and of coarse larger ships like the entire Freelancer line rear turret converted just for torpedo and missile countermeasures and any small fighters that stray to close,you would still have your main guns as well as standard countermeasures or possible allow for equipping two of these gun one on the opposing sides to cover 360 degrees or one front nose and one rear tail.As always great topic thanks again keep it up you are doing great work, I enjoy every episode you put out.Inciteful,educational and opens the mind to contemplating many possibilities and just a good time watching and listening it makes my day better.
Yup, it's kinda what I was thinking of too. Lots of ships mention "point defence" turrets, I kinda imagine a Phalanx type thing for that. Glad you enjoyed the video!
I really enjoy these vids brother, hope to see you in the verse for years to come
Thanks, I hope so too!
With the right countermeasures I think it should be near impossible for ordinance smaller fighters carry to inflict catastrophic damage on capital or larger ships. Instead I like the idea of ships designated as ‘destroyers’ at different levels of accessibility. I think the ion and retaliator are great examples, but I think some slight tweaks may be required for balancing. For the ion I would like to see the weapon or ammo be expensive to replace and limited so it would be difficult to spam many of them. There should be a real investment for the individual to deploy them.
The same goes for the retaliator, but I also think it would be interesting if the torpedoes were TV guided or dumb fire to add an extra layer of skill to their potential. I think Mastermodes will give us our first glimpse at the RPS of ship roles, but I think the economy is going to play a major role in balancing as well. I had caught wind of this, when I heard the info runners talking about the intended cost for retaliator torps. From what they were saying they would cost somewhere in the range of a starter ship to restock.
I agree - although there are fighter-sized threats that I think would qualify, depending on the size of the target. Gladiator, and Eclipse, for example. I like the idea of TV guided munitions - makes me think of my DCS days!
I really enjoyed this video, I can't wait to see how capital combat is handled when it finally comes out. Can't wait to pilot your javelin in an org event. - Fallen
I'll bring mine too and we can have a fleet of Javelins. - Source Control o7
It'll happen!
My good sir Farrister, this is your best of many videos I always grateful appreciate … but this one chef’s kiss !
Glad you enjoyed it!
I think they said there will be minimum weapon sizes to do damage to certain armour sizes which makes sense
It does make sense
I like the idea of additional combat mechanics on a missile and counter-measures "battlefield", and I believe that's what CIG have planned, at least to some degree.
I also wonder if they still plan on adding PDSs like the one the Phoenix was supposed to get.
But I really hope we get EWAR and ECM with skill-based control systems, such as manually matching modulations, manually aiming with prediction assist systems etc...
Lots of ships do note "point defence turret" as a feature, so let's hope!
“Both attackers and defenders in naval combat attach at least some value to their own lives in naval combat *
*1940s Japan entered the chat*
Usually, at least
Ramming speed require almost no piloting skill to take out or glitching inside large ships in the PU, however it is not that effective in Arena Commander. What I want to say is that if CIG and Community want the combat to be ritualized in some way, most fightings have to be taken out of the normal space of PU.
Perhaps more consequences might help
I remember hearing that they might change it from egg shells with hammer to reinforced Damascus steel bricks with fully automatic anti-tank cannons
Haha
I can hear the whale tears falling like rain ... When a couple of Light fighters, take out their $ 1,000 + Cap. ship.
That should only happen if they are playing badly. A properly crewed cap ship should be fine ( if I was a game designer, which I'm not :D )
Nice video, I like the questions you posed here. It will be interesting to see how CIG decides to roll this out
Thanks, it will be interesting to see!
I think a capital ship should be practically invulnerable to smaller arms fire and torpedos due to the PDS systems and I think those systems should take quite a few minutes to repair. That way small squadrons or smaller ships will have to stop the cap from running, disable some or most of the manned turrets and then fight their way onboard to take over the ship as destruction would take too long (say 40 minutes+) and runs the risk of backup arriving. With that a capital ship should only really be afraid of capital killers and other capital class ships. And with that the game becomes who can take out the PDS system long enough to get the torpedo shot to connect. This would be a reason for the fighters on board to exist as they could brave the battlefield to get close and shoot out the PDS systems for that shot while having to fear manned turrets. That should create a skill chain something like this: Capital torpedoes > capital ship hull/shields > manned cap turrets > smaller ship fighters > PDS > capital torpedoes
*You are wrong about the risk of sinking.*
We do get equivalent mechanics to this in the form loss of life support systems and/or loss of breathable atmosphere.
Those even propagate similarly through rooms.
I'm not wrong, nor am I right - these are just some ideas and theory crafting! That said, life support can be managed to some extent through players donning space suits, so I think it's a bit different
CIG has already gone on record by stating that they plan for any Size 3 or below weapons to not make a dent in a Cap ships armour, once it's physicalised. And the bigger the weapon size, the slower it will be to track smaller targets. That's why only certain heavy Fighters and Bombers will be effective against larger targets, and why only certain sized smaller weapons will be effective against smaller targets.
That means no light fighters swarming cap ships, regardless of numbers. That particular meta will be gone, thankfully. So no, 10 or 20 Arrows or similar light fighters against say a 10-20 crewed Idiris, won't be a thing. The Idris will simply shrug them off and may just be swatting at flies themselves. Kind of like how in WWII, only bombers and torpedo planes could damage a ship. (Sans kamikazes). Machine guns alone were largely ineffective, save for sniping crew exposed on deck.
That's the start of the balance. That's why torps and heavy weapons will be the counter as you mentioned. And of course, not taking out a cap ship alone. That's why we have ships like the Hammerhead, Polaris, etc to fill out such roles in escort and gaps. As well as other fighters/interceptors. Mind you no one plays that way, since we have no cap ships and most of the interior gameplay isn't around, like engineering and not all of the ship's abilities. Tearing through ERT's+ with a single Hammerhead may also not be a thing then.
So, CIG has a clue at least. They know that just letting (just an example) 20 players fly around in lightly armed and armoured fighters won't win any battle against every ship. Nor will chugging alone in a single fully crewed cap ship win every battle, against every other ship. But that'll be worked on more when it's live. Some year. *sigh*
As a side note: The whole flak thing has been mentioned/suggested quite a few times on Spectrum. But CIG may just be going the route of point defence weapons (that aren't currently on any ship), but are mum on what they may entail, besides being small, light weapons. Flak would be interesting, but could cause some 'friendly fire' issues, if the PvE server options is never a thing. Flak hits everything, regardless of IFF signatures. :P And that's a headache in itself to players who just seem to 'fire everything' and aren't professional or disciplined like the BSG reboot displayed.
Really interesting notes - I'm gonna watch with interest how it all plays out. I guess at least some of these concepts have been considered for Squadron (albeit easier to balance/predict)
The issue is solved with armour. Capital ship have too much armour to be vulnerable to small size weapons. (Let’s say size 3 and under). That way, you need a heavy fighter to kill with size 4+ guns to kill a capital ship.
That's where the torpedoes come in...
@@Farrister yeah… I wonder how S12 torpedoes will cost. The Javelin will be a terror.
You're right, this was an enjoyable video. The thing is that Star Citizen is not inherently Mahanian. (so-called) Capital ships are not the only threat to capital ships, which brings rise to questions about the validity of a new Jeune Ecole. I think the real question is how CIG is going to balance (SC) Capital Ships with torpedo craft with fighters.
Eclipse could be a threat Ogi, if left unchecked...
Really hoping that once more capital ships come in, the Ares series becomes exactly what its meant to be, capital ship killers.
While I am very excited for the introduction to player owned capital ships, I still have a couple concerns.
When the Ares came out and it was shown that the size 7 cannon could destroy light fighters in a couple shots, there was a very vocal minority that convinced CIG that this was bad. The game tends to be geared towards the light fighter meta however, in my opinion no amount of light fighters should be able to damage an Idris or Javelin with ballistic or laser weapons, maybe with large enough missiles.
Second, I hope the introduction to ai crew won't be too far behind, it would suck to own an idris and you and your 10 friends aren't enough to crew it including the fighters you would need for protection.
Single seat fighters shouldn't even annoy a size 3 shield when alone.
With gunfire, perhaps not, but maybe with missiles/torpedoes/bombs if not shot down?
Great video. With all the talk and drama around Master Modes rn it's these kinds of topics the community as a whole need to be looking at seriously.
Well, balancing will be a huge pain in the ass for CIG because the most effective tactic against real life ships also applies to SC, and that is saturation. Let's say a javelin has 30 people on it. Instead of deploying another javelin to counter it, the most likely thing that's going to happen is that 30 people will jump in eclipses and fire 90 torps at it. Why? Because it's most likely cheaper and has higher chances of success while being less risky. Even if half of the eclipses are lost it probably wouldn't be nearly as expensive as deploying, maintaining and maybe losing a cap ship. Imo there's no way for CIG to properly balance this. Either the large ship is screwed or bombers like the eclipse get nerfed so hard to the point of being useless.
But then if those torpedoes are easily shot down by the co-ordinated crew, it becomes pointless. And that's where the co-ordination and skill check is important. In a 30v30 engagement like that, having somebody purely to keep an eye on the 'battlefield', identify and prioritise threats is a big plus. Also, the Eclipse torpedoes are huge in game right now, but smaller than those launched by the Polaris and the Javelin...
@@Farrister it only takes 8 torpedos to kill an idris rn (and sure those numbers may change) which means it should be very easy to overwhelm the defensive capabilities of a cap ship. However, like you said, if it's too easy to shoot those torpedos down no one will use them and that's why I believe it will be next to impossible to balance this without screwing over certain ships or ship roles. And it'll become even harder the more ships they add.
As a SC day-dreamer myself, I love it.
I'm a bit of a day-dreamer myself :D
Personally I think that capital and sub capital ships should be MUCH weaker with 1-2 players in them. With a full or semi-full compliment of players engineering should come in to play in order to repair shield and armour, meaning that even with several size nines hitting, the cap and sub cap ship can survive.
Agreed - 1-2 players really shouldn't be the model for these massive ships. But a full crew complement should be able to deal with incoming threats effectively through teamwork and skill.
The fact that capitalships doesn't have CWIS+ against torpedos and light/medium fighters is just stupid.
It should take several torpedos to overwhelm a capitalships CWIS , and able to hit a capitalship.
Also , light/medium fighters should not possess enough firepower to take down shields of ships like Andromeda 1v1 , the regen of the shield
should be higher then the fighters ability to apply damage.
I think Capitalships shields should be of a certain shieldstrength that lesser sized weapons simply don't have the strength to
even affect the capitalshields , and no fighters should carry weapons of a size enough to affect capitalshields.
At the very minimum, Size 4 weapons should be requires to affect capitalshields, and all types of fighters should be limited to S3 max.
Some of them do - they mention "point defence turrets". On the Javelin, it's not CWIS per se, but the topside turrets also carry smaller guns for shooting down faster moving targets
When attacking a large ship with torpedoes/missiles, both tactics and saturation are going to be vital. Attackers will need to know their weapons range, especially minimum range, as firing from as close as possible minimizes the time the big ship has to maneuver or shoot down incoming projectiles, Also all torpedo bombers attacking from a single side will aid with saturation as fewer guns will be able to attack the incoming ordnance.
I like your way of thinking
@@Farrister Also coordination is key, you want as many torpedoes as possible enroute at once in order to saturate their defenses, one or two dribbling in over time only means more chance they'll ne evaded, spoofed, or destroyed.
Interested to see how they manage making multi-crew ships more viable than multiple single player ships.
Or as viable
Large shields are paper. One Corsair can chew through 3xs3 L shields and soft death a reclaimer in under 30 seconds. That’s pretty wild. That same Corsair can chew through the cap shield of 890 in no time either.
You realize the Corsair has the most pilot DPS in the game right?
They are right now, but I imagine further balancing will be needed
Light fighters should never have a chance of beating a capital ship 1v1. If you want to take on a capital ship, bring bombers. Light fighters fight bombers and escort them. That is their role
Yes, but there are bombers that are fighter sized - like the Gladiator, or Eclipse, for example :)
I don't want my fighter to be able to defeat a capital, but it would be cool if you can do significant damage, like take out a gun or a thruster.
10 light fighters vs a 10 crew ship should be fairly balanced, more skill required for the fighters but that is offset by cost of the capital ship. The eclipse will always be the bane of capital ships so long as it can fire and disappear.
Perfectly balance will never exist but it should be believable. A lone light fighter should never be able to Duke it out with a ship 3 or 4 times its size.
Yes I agree, as long as by fighters we're also including some fighter-bombers in there, like a Gladius or Eclipse - the ones who can actually do the big damage!
I’ve blown Idris, in previous patches, with a four torpedo salvo that repeatedly hit the same hull spot. Have not done so in the current patch as I prefer 200k high threat beacons, which I can chain with my Corsair.
I’ve rammed multiple ships in SC because it’s faster to respawn than fly back and reload.. a Retaliator will usually crack open anything, including a heavily damaged Idris…
Yeah, how it works now may not be how it ends up working though!
@@Farrister yep, which would be better? One Polaris with ten crew.. or ten piloted Auroras on a one way trip?
@@shawnc5188 poor Aurorae...
I like the speculation. Multicrew is so much more interesting!
Agreed!
I feel like there is a gap in players that want to do npc combat in a large ship without having to harass other players to man their turrets. This is why npc gunners are important! Though I'm not sure why CIG is taking so long to implement them...
If you could hire AI crew right now, 9/10 would be standing on the mess room table in your ship and the last one would probably be stuck blocking the cockpit. We need replication layer and server meshing first
@@theMedicatedCitizen Agreed! I wish they would offer an upgrade to just replace manned turrets with automated turrets like in Elite Dangerous.
I think the difference is in regularity. I wouldn't man a gun turret 7 days a week. But if you invited me aboard a Javelin today and asked me to gun for you, I'd be there in a heartbeat. These huge ships aren't necessarily for running 24/7, in my mind they're for those weekly raid type schedules, for which getting gunners should be achievable.
On the point of ordinance, I do wonder how the Polaris' missile boat identity will be balanced. For such a popular ship it would be a real feelsbad if it's wildly imbalanced one way or the other.
Probably wont one volley an Idris, but IMO 3+ could Alpha Strike one. If all the torps hit. But also iirc you'd have to hit an explosive component on the ship with you torpedo to cause an explosion, and even then it might only be about half the ship max. Once component parts are introduced into the combat system, your QD exploding might only kill half the people on your ship (capitals only are really big enough for this), while the rest rush off before the power plants explode and take the rest of them.
Just my take on how the components will help with some of the combat questions people have
@@mhmm4840 On the other hand, a single Polaris torp should be capable of crippling a Javelin or Idris. Really depends entirely on how likely it is to hit a torp, and if any skill will exist with them.
The Polaris is popular, but so is the Idris. (really wish we could see ship sale #'s) I'm entirely expecting to see both spammed out until they add proper costs & maintenance.
The balancing has to be the skill check on the part of the defender, I think. Polaris in my mind is more of a hit and run type ship when facing larger capitals, and by its very nature, that means that in my mind, there's a high chance of the strike being ineffective if the defenders are playing properly. The 'fun' of the Polaris would therefore be in knowing how potent a threat you are, and delivering a decisive blow in those times when the enemy isn't ready.
Lions are fierce creatures. Many animals rightly fear the lion. But its success rate is 20-30% - most hunts are failures.
@@Farrister yeah I would really enjoy that. My hope is that it’s a pretty tough ship to operate effectively, but if you learn it well and have a good crew then it can deliver devastating blows in ambushes or in tandem with other capital ships occupying the target’s attention, similar to how torpedo-focused destroyers play in World of Warships. My concern is that if it’s the only cap ship out there for a while they’ll mostly be lone wolves spamming torpedoes into chaff clouds and not much else 😂
Great video
Thanks!
I don't think you mentioned EMP and distortion tactics.
And then you have the Iron and Inferno LOL I think they made a big unbalanced mistake with them the rule of cool over balance . I do look forward to the day with server meshing working and we have 3-5 cap ships fighting it out and 30 - 40 fighters buzzing around them then an Eclipse turns up to reck someone's day LOL or a Polaris pops in to the fight and all guns turn on to it in a mad panic.
As unlike sea battles which it took time to sail tot he fight and no extra help unless you had a Sub. but in space help can just jump in from either side so you will need to keep an eye on fresh ship turning up.
OH god I hope Server meshing works
I don't know, I think the Ion and Inferno have the potential to be fine. They might be able to threaten the big boys with the conventional weaponry, but they'll also be very much at risk of being shot down. A fully crewed Idris, in my mind, should have no problem dealing with a single Ares fighter. The more interesting question is a 12 person Idris crew versus a mix of 12 fighters, bombers, including some Ares. And that feels like it should be a fairly balanced fight?
Capital ships should be hard to kill or conquer and so dangerous you'd have to think twice before engaging even with a small group of fighters. That's the definition of big capital ships. If they aren't hard, they aren't capital and game balance means nothing.
Then they should have their field of fight. Like multimission like (Idris, kraken) , dangerous torpedoe boat (Polaris), masterfield ship (javelin). Each with their pros and cons.
But against small fighters unless there is a large group of them... Caps should be a very complicated target.
Life is unbalanced, ships has to be in proportion of their size, fighting types/mission type etc...
That how a game and life works. A wooden stick has less impact than a machine gun.
I guess "Eggshells with Hammers" is the same as glass cannons. I look forward to capitals, though
No capital ships are even in the game yet. CiG calling a frigate or corvette "capital ships" is a joke
go back to star wars or sum shit @@sorincaladera936
Similar idea, yeah
The 890 is a capital, isn't it?
well yea, a lone fighter with pew pew lasers wont scare a capital ship
a stealth bomber with multiple anti-capital torpedoes... should
Yes - although those anti-capital torpedoes should be relatively easy for a skilled crew to shoot down or evade.
What a good video!
Thank you!
Fighters should not be able to pen heavy shields or armour, but torpedo fighterbomber should. And topedoes can be shot down..
Problem is we have had a Light Fighter meta in Star Citizen for far too long and i agree about a fighter shouldnt be able to just take out an Idris.
Eather they go back to being realistic and bolster the shields and then make layers of multiple shields so that the ships with 2-5+ shields actually have more than one shield, or the game will tank and die the moment everyone jumps over from eve online. As a former eve player I can tell you exactly what is going to happen when you undock an idris or jav etc, you are going to have a 200 man mixed fleet of medium and heavy fighters defend on you and if they feel the need or just want to get more people having fun they will drop an additional 100 man eclipsing fleet on you which will all launch a mistle and immediately jump out to a safe and then jump back in and hit you again if your not dead from the first volley. If you have a cargo ship they will jump in with enough eclipse to one shot you give times over and dip out before your escort fleet can do more than target them then their buddies will come in in ships that are NOT in trouble with the law and grab the loot and jump out lightning fast. Eather this game gets real about defence or the players that are here will leave and newer players that are not part of the ranking guilds will also leave. I have watched games roll over and play dead for pathetic gankers that never want a real battle just to pick on the weak and profit off of hours and weeks of other people's work in a matter minutes slowly destroy world of Warcraft and eve online. The dada is there to look at. Make the game bent only to PVP and in favor of lazy cowards and you game will die. It's that simple. Starting out star cit showed it had the balls and spine to make things realistic. The moment you pull away from that and "balance" the game, your game does. As it stands if they keep shields going offline unrealistically and imbecilicaly as you speed up to run away, or jump out to safety. . . The game will die anyways. If you don't want to fight you have every right to run. Traveling at ftl you encounter just enough random atoms that you receive a lethal dose of radiation every one second and no one would EVER take off their armor or other defences in order to move away from a battle saying here free shots please kill me. . . There is no argument for what they have done that is not riddled with stupidity! "Balancing a game" is a scam that goes back to D&D and it stems from not having accurate information and mechanics to begin with and "balancing" ALWAYS makes it worse, not better. Go full realistic and where it is science that does not yet exist go with what it would become before any navy would willingly deploy it. There is our entire history of battle tactics, make people use their GOD given brains and study and use those tactics or creat other ones new ones that also work. Metra in it's self is broken and the direct result of laziness and ignorance. Willful ignorance.
I am proud of them for being bold enough to be realistic, but they are starting down a road that leaves their morals in the mud and bows to bullies and lazy cowards. Given a realistic system I'll take a fight any day. I will likely lose but it will be fun and it will be a learning experience. Star cit has a chance to set an amazing example here and I hope they go back to taking that chance.
It'll be interesting to see how it all works out - some of the Idris or Javelin launched may be NPCs, not players. At some point there was a suggestion that players and NPCs may be almost indistinguishable.
@@Farrister that is also needed lol both in star cit and in eve. Being able to have competent hired help you could take out anything up to and including a Bengal and all its escort variants and do so as a solo player. But you would still need to spend time going to UEE training courses and spending time training every NPC both individually and as small squads and then the squads in larger groups. But done properly there's some good game play to be had there. And when we can upgrade the insides of the ships in addition to newer types of armor etc, then you can get a higher score with your crew. If you have them sleeping and eating in origin jump works levels of luxury, they will be far more loyal and in addition to higher pay, word will spread who is a good captain and who is bad and if you offer luxury and lots of good work and money and you use good solid tactics and while a grunt may ocationally die it is rare and you do not spend their lives lightly and when they need a long recovery time you move them to a plush med ship for the duration instead of firing them and keep giving them their cut of the bounties their ship is bringing in lol. There needs to be bonuses to crew intelligence and growth and performance for doing those things, also a greater likelihood that they get married and have kids. Start teaching kids young in language math etc you get a shockingly smarter and more capable adult. Raise every crew kid to be a grand fleet admiral and a sharp businessman/woman and your next generation will be the most elite in the game. A case of do things the right and realistic way and get massive reward instead of having to put up with random people like we do in WoW dungeons lol.
I agree with what you say, but maybe learn to space it out into paragraphs 👍 wall of text is not so easy to read
@@Di-Ferr ;~) my apologies for wall of text. I need to work on that
Capital ships sre MEANT to discourage idiots in single-seater ships from engaging them solo. Lol.
For sure!
Honestly, I hope they throw realism out the window. I'd rather have a heroic WW2 in space with guns blazing, than modern Naval conflict of wondering if that angry blip on the sensor completes their kill chain first and vampires are already inbound.
It's a tough balancing act. Lots of sailors in WW2 thought that planes were too OP!
TTK is comically high in this game. If thet ever want pvp or pva to be taken seriously they need to drop TTK.
Especially for the lightest fighters, they're supposed to dodge fire, not tank it!
@Farrister dropping TTK across the board helps this of course. The jump from size 2 to size 3 shields is a joke. Along with over weapon damage output.
That's another thing, the origin ships should have better armor and shields than the UEE ships, that's what happens in real live when billion eres commission a mega yacht to be build and know they will be traveling through dangerous waters, the people that pay for an 890 jump are paying to know that when an enemy flat of medium and smaller ships ambushes them, they will survive it not only without having to run, but knowing there will never be so much as a ripple in their martini glass. Their pampered life can go on with a battle raging outside and eather watch it as entertainment, or hit a button causing the windows to opaque so that they are not distracted from whatever function they are attending. So the whole origin ships are made of paper thing? Ya would literally never happen. Having less weapons yes absolutely but having less than the absolute best armor and shield that frankly the UEE just can not afford? Never going to happen. Those ships are billionaire play toys of ludicrous price for a reason.
Interesting idea - not sure how I feel about it though :D
Balance is hardly ever a problem if you just add lore.
With the existence of such powerful shield systems comes the UEE's control of the markets. While the UEE may not be able to afford (unlikely, just look at the US military) installing the cream of the crop on every ship of the line, they do control the manufacturing and export of the companies capable of making such components. Otherwise there would be no military or society, because just as in real life, if all it takes to have military-grade weapons and armor is a lot of money, then the universe would just be lawless and run by pirates.
Those companies would only be allowed to sell their best shield/weapons/propulsion/scanning/logistics components to the UEE/law enforcement, and only the most trusted ultra-wealthy who are in amazing standing with the UEE would be able to obtain them. Obviously the UEE doesn't want pirates (NPC or player) just buying components off an 890J/Idris' owner and plopping them onto a Kraken, so those components would be hull-locked to the ship with which they were purchased. Think Apple with their serialized parts, except military-grade. Not something anyone could just hack with an off-the-shelf 'cryptokey'.
Thus it would be nearly impossible for a pirate organization to have those OP god-tier near-invincibility shields that you speak of on their Kraken. They would have to reverse-engineer the tech themselves. Even if they managed to reverse-engineer UEE controlled tech, they would still need to obtain the ultra-refined materials and build the manufacturing technology required to make it. So just like with nukes in real-life, it would take a massive effort to make, which the UEE would work to prevent every step of the way.
As an example, the way that CIG emulates this is by having Origin sell this OP 890 Jump variant only to players or organizations with top 1% UEE standing, at a price of 800,000,000 UEC. The scarcity and price numbers here are completely up to CIG of course, since they are the ones who can see the market/playerbase data, and will balance it accordingly to keep it ultra-rare.
It's worth noting that not every 890J/luxury yacht needs to be unkillable. If you are just a retired CEO spending your last days with your family on Terra, then there is no need to purchase the billionaire explorer 800,000,000 UEC cutting-edge shield tech variant. As far as the current 890J pledge owners, that would be the base variant. Capable of fending off a squad of fighters as shown in the ship commercial, but nothing too serious.
@@Di-Ferr in the main I agree with you, although as a soldier while I do not know about our navy ships, I do know that all branches get their supplies by lowest bidder and what we have in gear and training is bargon brand compared to what the high price soldiers of fortune have so yes there is much better tech than what we pay to equip our troops and ships with although it is absolutely highly regulated as you said. And personal body guards for the extremely wealthy buy the same equipment and are given similar training. This my point of the origin ships being of that quality. I absolutely agree that they would only be allowed to those who the UEE trusts and are something that would need to be earned which leaves open for some fun long term PVE with an amazing pay off and a lot of fun earning it. And I can see your point that there would be two variants of origin ships, the soldier of fortune ones and the ones that are like a Ferrari super fast and plush but made of fiberglass. And no matter how much money and standing you have, of the Ferrari is all you need then why get the one a fleet admiral would be entertaining guests in in a war zone? I had not thought of that point and it gives me a lot of food for thought thank you ;~)
First here again 😊
Congrats, you beat like 5 other people.
Got those notifications queued :D
@@Farrister now way he replied, yessir :)
boring
Fair enough!
i found this video very thoughtprovoking and would like to see more videos like this in the future.
and as always, thank you for uploading.
🛁
Glad you enjoyed it!