Supernovas!

[Robert.Fitzgerald]

Nope, the infocards state otherwise. Balancing will hopefully be sorted soon, tests will be started and there is 4.85 beta when Igiss is ready...

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[Treewyrm]

An option, to maintain balance, would have all use the same stats, but with different sounds, names and graphics. A wee bit boring, but it would work, I think.

Balance does not mean equation as in plain numbers. Equation of numbers is the simplest form, but not the only. Weights and counterweights. Chaos by sheer amounts of combinations. Let's not turn it into classic old school shooters where everyone had same guns, same everything, just different skins/player models, a pure PvP fest and nothing else. We already have player classes, as in form of ships. Freelancer has initially been between the latter two, no way back I'm afraid. With Discovery following Freelancer trends it's impossible to turn everything upside down, it was late already even before the mod itself has appeared.

[mjolnir]

*sigh* you still don't see the mess comming with shield-specific damage on this magnitude ?

So let's take Rheinland gun...

with +20% against graviton it will take Graviton GB shield down in 2 shots.. (not counting recharge)

Cruiser in 3!!!!

BS in 6.

Next one.. Kusari one..

against Graviton shield:

GB... 4 shots.

Cruiser 6

BS in 11.

Now one bomber has bigger powerplant so they will fire at about the same speed.... Kusari one needing twice as many shots.. so basicaly twice as long time...
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Capship owners in the area will mount shields that are best against SNs of the local factions... so a pirate with different type will have a huge advantage => it will be abused..

or people would change shield for every encounter... I almost do it now with some ships...because I don't see a point in taking LH Sabre with Graviton shield against SA who have 5-6 Buckshots on every fighter.... Should I use RP shield... to get raped by "slightly ooRP weaponry" ? Same with SA mounting gravitons shields when Rogues come with full Krakens.

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Igiss says: Martin, you give them a finger, they bite off your arm.

[Treewyrm]

Mjolnir, it's all fun but rather pointless. Why? Because there are many other factors playing important roles, and like you noted yourself that you don't even take recharging into consideration (shield passive regen and re-activation), but that's quite important one. If you want to have at least some accuracy use time line, calculate recharging, throw in some randomization representing misses (or shall we say that everyone is 100% accurate? or all opponents are sitting ducks? gunboat maneuvering anyone?) and so on. That at least will have some feeling of authenticity in it, of course if you really want to go in-depth for it.

I don't see big mess made out of it. You say you are changing shields. Not telling that you shouldn't, because that's ultimately your choice, but simply saying that I don't do that (or, to be more precise, I can't due to rather limited equipment sold on bases my characters are allowed to dock), even so I don't really see mess out of it. And nobody forces you to do that, it's something that you do voluntarily, for what reasons there be. We already have different weapon types, it's a legacy of original game, we already have faction-specific weapons, again something that has been there already and simple being continued on, and much more. How is that a problem and where exactly it creates a problem that affects gameplay on noticeably negative level.

If bringing any variety is a mess, well, that's a whole different perspective then.

[Jihadjoe]

I think Mjolnir is actualy simply saying that the math is a tad complicated. If you throw in misses and the suchlike it just gets more complex.

When you get to this level of damage, 20% is an awful lot more. I am rather glad that we are getting new guns in game (if this gets implemented *crosses fingers and prays to igiss*) but I would also like to see some new graphics for these guns. If they are new and fancy weapons developed recently with new shiny tech, then perhaps they should look a little bit different.

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[Clayph]

If you mean the outer model which you can see mounted on the ship,
I couldn't model a dung, so I will keep the old one cannon-like.. :P

If you mean the projectile, explosion effect, firing sound, firing flash and trail..
Of course it will be modified! Look at the pictures for example.. :)

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[mjolnir]

I can make it with misses and everything... how do you think it would change? The RH one would still use less then half shots/time than the Kusari one. IF you count say 40% miss it would be even more, since you need more shots with the Kusari one...

When you get to this level of damage, 20% is an awful lot more.

Exactly

Remember that we are talking 40% here.. one is 20% down the other 20% up against one shield type.

One or 10 more shots with 4.00 refire guns take like two seconds? One more shot with SN takes some 25seconds? Now if you get into one SN needing twice as many shots.... that really is a long time and huge disadvantage.

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Igiss says: Martin, you give them a finger, they bite off your arm.

[Treewyrm]

I don't think that weapon type should be thrown off. It does might need more thinking about, but throwing it up entirely... I think there can be done something interesting about it. Right now people use all kind of shields. You can kit capital ship against specific weapon type but that'll also put disadvantage for the other weapon type. If we can carefully arrange those types then it could become very interesting twist to gameplay I think. Where there is 20% increase there is also 20% decrease, so it's both advantage and disadvantage. Plus who says that only one type can be used per faction? Might have say two variants of the same gun (same stats) but different technology its based on. I think this feature can be used positively to enhance gameplay with variety. Knowing your enemy might get a name then as well as recon to be actually useful to figure out what enemy uses and counter it. Little tactics thrown in.

Instead of throwing out feature I think we can put into use.

[mjolnir]

I'm not saying I'm completely against it... but it needs more thinking and much more balancing. Right now it's not even tested how it will do without shield-specific damage... I'd say small steps first.

EDIT: And with tested I mean in more encounters and many situations... basically you either need 10 people that test for a week or two... or a beta on the disco server. Testing and balancing both at the same time might be a problem.

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Igiss says: Martin, you give them a finger, they bite off your arm.

[Jinx]

ahh, clayph - while you are at it.... is it possible to add a nicely BIG explosion to most of those torps? - the old supernova simply never looked like 140k damage. - - it would be great to get a satisfactory big explosion for a hit. - i know its only cosmetics, but its part of it, imo. - dunno about the sound. ( that means, if there are any good explosion sounds in FL at all )

is it possible to add several explosions? and or a shockwave ( like the ones when the liberty cruiser explodes ( these rings )

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