Remove Cruise Power Drain

[The Joker]

I voted no. This way it's more realistic.

When a vessel wants to power up cruise engine it seems logical that it drains energy of every other systems aboard that vessel, because it requires huge amount of energy to do that. Not only that now it is more realistic and hard to those who wants to escape, but it is also exactly the same realistic and hard to those who are chasing the target.

This way, I think more room is left for each individual to actually think more of how to defend, when to attack and where to go in order to evade/intercept.

In general, it's more interesting, at least to me.

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[mjolnir]

It seems that the primary motivation for implementing this change was to eventually remove the cruising-in-combat rule, and to stop battleships from cruising into weapons range or cruising to catch up. Personally, I prefer the rules and the occasional sanction where needed over this power drain mechanic.

That's one of the reason yes. Another and much more important one is to stop bigger ships from cruising to 0 distance to a smaller ship at the start of the fight, which seriously affects any BS, Cruiser and GB combat.

Most notably you might remember how your carrier fared when a BHG BS started the fight by cruising next to it... yes it was dead before you could do anything.

The power drain hurts every class of ships, not just caps. Bombers have to wait a good 20 seconds to regen enough power to fire a single supernova after leaving cruise, and unlike some ships, bombers cannot fire their basic guns and regen energy at the same time.

What does force bombers (or fighters) to start the fight from 0 distance? This way with dropping from cruise a bit away at least they have more time to roleplay?


Transports

There are 2 places where pirating occurs:

a) Trade Lanes - travelling in them doesn't drain powerplant, so no change there

b) Open space - here the trader sees pirate from a distance and can stop cruising 9k off without problems, pirate can then cruise to him (loosing energy) or thrusting which will take quite some time If pirate and traders are both in cruise the neither of then has energy to fire guns.

Anti-cap missions in a cap - yes they harder to do with caps now, don't see that as a huge problem.

Heavy CM/Reinforced CD - yes those can't be fired when cruising now,they should like be changed over time. That said Heavy CM was never meant to be used on Transports, and mostly not on GBs either. It's only advantage is that it survives Nova/Cruiser missile hits. A transport hit by those looses all turrets anyway.

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

[Tenacity]

Oh, Mjolnir, why am I not surprised to see you defending this crap.

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[Stefan]

While you would maybe prefer to spend 15 minutes of your time on writing the sanction, the admins would probably prefer not to spend their time on dealing with the accumulated sanctions for that rule. Think about that for a moment.

That's not a really good point, mind you. We're talking about something that may disrupt player experience. If that's what we're talking about, not only sanction reports will go down but the number of players will do as well...

Honestly I do not like the idea of having all energy drained. It makes piracy a lot easier and fighting in caps a lot harder. I'd find it more acceptable if somewhat 30% of power get drained. That way - if the reason for this is rule-enforcing - you got 2~3 CD's and so long Charging in Combat.

But for those talking about not being able to cruise INTO combat with a capship before starting to shoot... You are forgetting about inertia... Remember the Z button, people.

[Doom]

Everyone should know what the title and poll refers to - right now, with the recent update, going into cruise mode completely drains your powerplant. I've also experienced a 5-10 second delay on any energy regen after dropping out of cruise and sitting still.

It seems that the primary motivation for implementing this change was to eventually remove the cruising-in-combat rule, and to stop battleships from cruising into weapons range or cruising to catch up. Personally, I prefer the rules and the occasional sanction where needed over this power drain mechanic.

That delay is on purpose. Goal is to eradicate cruise catching up. Along with some changes on caps it prevents starting a battle at point blank. Now slowly coming into battle and "evasive" maneuvers will mean more in battles. It also gives better chances for small caps against big ones.

Capships and transports are likely the most effected craft - Heavy Countermeasure Flares can no longer be used while cruising, and these are the primary CM type used by capships and transports.

CMs can be changed.

This alone has ruined transports against pirates entirely.

How? Trader can see a pirate at 14k distance if cruising. If pirate stops trader in trade lane, trader has full power of his ship at his disposal.

When attempting capship missions in a capship, the enemy npc's can only be seen/targeted at less than 2.5k distance. The standard method of doing these missions was to cruise up to 1k range and then start firing, but this is no longer possible. Now you either have to sit there with your thumb up your ass while your energy regenerates before you can defend yourself - all while 5 destroyers are pounding your hull with missiles, razors, and pulse turrets - or you have to stop outside of npc spawn range, regen energy, then proceed to the waypoint on thruster speed (which, again, leaves you travelling 2.5k at low speed while NPC's spam razors and pulses against you).

I see how this can be a problem.

Overall, this is meant to solve many problems and abuses. And it does. No more cruise catch up. No more cruising in and shooting from point blank. By that it provides better balance to ALL ship classes and now agility and size finally matter for larger vessels. And it does one great thing too...Cap fights last longer...

However i can understand that this will be hard to get used to.

EDIT: Mjolnir beat me to it.

[Montezuma/Kukulcan]

That's one of the reason yes. Another and much more important one is to stop bigger ships from cruising to 0 distance to a smaller ship at the start of the fight, which seriously affects any BS, Cruiser and GB combat.

Most notably you might remember how your carrier fared when a BHG BS started the fight by cruising next to it... yes it was dead before you could do anything.

Just to say something, having been on both ends of this technique, it can actually be rather enjoyable to have a BS get close to you, then thrusting your ship in the opposite direction while he cluelessly fires about in an attempt to hit you. Notice how firing aimlessly at a dodging cruiser/GB requires power?

Though it does have an effect on BS v BS combat, in that if a dreadnought stops 3k from a light BS, which in turn would either turn and shoot (if the dread is the agressor), or cruise to medium speed (lets say about 170 - 200) and kite by it, all the while being nigh unhittable. Seeing as there are so many ways range can be employed by light BS captains the inability of large BSs to close in on them (previously done by cruising up to them at the start of the fight), they become quite literally sitting ducks, totally unable to hit a lighter BS, and unable to catch them. In short, anything above the Bretonian BS is now almost useless against anything below it.

What im saying is that cruising in and shooting at point blank is not only fun for small ships (at least it is for me), but about all dreadnought captains have against small, hard-to-hit-at-more-than-2k BSs.

In short, no, can we please have this killed, if possible with fire.

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[Sly]

I think lucad is right. You just breaking all the fun and experience by one simple thing that admins don't wish to do.

[MarvinCZ]

That's not a really good point, mind you. We're talking about something that may disrupt player experience. If that's what we're talking about, not only sanction reports will go down but the number of players will do as well...

Honestly I do not like the idea of having all energy drained. It makes piracy a lot easier and fighting in caps a lot harder. I'd find it more acceptable if somewhat 30% of power get drained. That way - if the reason for this is rule-enforcing - you got 2~3 CD's and so long Charging in Combat.

But for those talking about not being able to cruise INTO combat with a capship before starting to shoot... You are forgetting about inertia... Remember the Z button, people.

1) It's not a good point? So the admins working their collective backsides off has no bearing on the topic? Nice approach. "It may disrupt player experience." - nice sentence... So it could do something, you know, maybe ...

2) How exactly does it make piracy easier? Say some way in which it does that. I see none.

3) E-kill from cruise keeps your energy down while your speed is higher than thrust speed. No help there.

[Tenacity]

No, it wont be 'hard to get used to', because we're going to get it removed.

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[masternerdguy]

keep it, it's more realistic. Based on the "scale" of Freelancer that trade lanes ar 1000u/s are FTL, then you are going about 350/1000 so lets say 35% the speed of light. That requires a LOT of power!

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Send the fat kid in to see if its a trap