Given the issues that have always surrounded bounty hunting (AKA, its next to impossible to catch someone that doesn't want to be caught)

I got to thinking about the fighting in general, and just how long it takes, and how much ammo you have to use, to destroy another ship, even a light fighter.

Watching the Sci-fi movies that invented the space-fighter genre, and what you notice is how little it takes to blast a fighter. No more than 3-4 hits in general (For a light fighter).

Lets consider what would happen if we dropped the armor of ALL ships by a considerable amount.

An IBG Centurion might have 2000 armor. While the slower vulture would have around 3000.

What this would result in, is VASTLY reduced engagement time, where a few good tactics would win a duel. This would make ambushes FAR more effective, and thus allow for deeper strategy to the game. Getting hit would be a far more dangerous proposition, but the ability to hit would remain the same.

Of course, a few things would need to be balanced. The things that come to mind are Wormhole vulnerability, and flares.

WH vulnerability could be dealt with by making someone entering a Wormhole only take a 5th of normal damage. Which would keep the current situation.

Flares could be dealt with by reducing the ammo to half of what it is right now. They'd still be incredibly dangerous, but light fighters would be able to counter with fewer blaster shots to destroy flare-users.

Furthermore, this would allow Armor upgrades, up to the level we have now. But it would take mass.

So a Rag might start out with 5000 armor, but weigh a good deal less than it does now. And could be upgraded (at the cost of cu) up to about 13000, with a mass greater than it does now.

Suddenly, things get faster, and people don't tire out going 1v1

I think there is an excellent opportunity in regards to armor to make combat more fun and more realistic, and to add more variety into the game at the same time. I may have a longer post with more ideas in the future, but basically I agree with Shapenaji. Less armor all-around, with upgrades available. This could work with the new economy with different types of armor of various qualities made from different materials based on supply. Adding armor wouldn't take cargo or weapon space, but would add significant mass to the ship and good armor would be expensive.

In addition, a shield device could be developed to be installed in a device port (when we have more than just two kinds of weapon ports). This would provide regenerating protection (charging from the battery), while armor would not regenerate until you dock and repair (for a fee).

Far into the future, I hope that hits to different parts of the ship would have different effects. Engine hits could disable an engine, bad engine hits or hits to the powerplant could potentially destroy the ship, hits to the sensor array would wipe out sensors, etc. I know this would probably mean a new game engine, or massive reworking, but eventually I think this is an important feature to implement.

YES YES YEEEES!!!

At the very least, how about a week with 20% armor/mass for every ship, and we see how it works?

In reference to the sci-fi shows that created the space sim genre: most people here will remember the BSG episode (first season) where StarBuck and Apollo are sent out to head off a civilian liner that, after a prolonged absence, shows up and will not communicate with Battlestar Galactica. Nukes are detected, and Apollo is ordered to destroy it.

It takes one volley of ordinance based light weaponry directed towards the rear engines to entirely destroy the ship. Yes, it was a civilian ship, but still.

It would be cool if it was possible to take out a Moth or some similiarly civilian type ship with one or two well placed shots. This would of course lead to some sort of defensive weapon to counter attack this, such as more effective mines perhaps.

Anyway, I like it. Would make things MUCH more interesting.

Well, the other thing it does, which I just thought of,

Is that it makes it possible to defend ships. Normally, when a light
fighter is heading for one of your comrades, you just have to pray your comrade in the heavy trading vessel gets lucky and escapes blaster fire.

With reduced armor, you could actually take out the light fighter before it attacked your mate, rather than just dropping them to 80%

I'm all for it. However, I think the analogy with movies is a little bit flawed, since movies mostly employ some sort of shield technology, and it is mostly after said shields are down that ships can be destroyed with just a few shots.

I guess the best way to test it would be to implement it and have as much people as possible try it out to see how well it works.

tosh: well for larger ships, yes, but small fighters in movies almost always take only a few shots to kill

Atm it takes 12 neut shots /6 dual neut shots/ or 9 aap shots /5 dual aap shots/ to kill an IBG. Imho small blaster fire punches holes in your hull and this sounds realistic.
Its not like we are using some uber desintegrator beams that annihilate parts of your ship so small fighter disintegrates from 1 shot.
Cutting armor on cents to 2000 would be an overkill.
Reducing armor on all ships by 20-30% would make things more interesting but drastic cuts like giving rag only 5000 armor or centaur 4000 would make it a one shot kill with dual adv rails. Im not so sure players would enjoy in new tactics and quick 2 sec. fights like they do enjoy now.
Also, fighting hive bots or queen hunting would become a real pain, imagine 5 dentek assaults and 2-3 ornes or arklans ganking your 2000 armor cent...sure Shape would prolly get out victorious but what about rest of us that doesnt have his reflexes and skill?

Tosh: Yeah, like I said, it was a civilian liner. Not something that would be equipped with Shields. I wouldn't think acap would go down this easy.

And Boj: Personally, I think that it would be cool is 6 flechette shots took out an IBG. And while you are correct it only takes 9 aap hits to take one out, it takes quite a long time to land those. And even if you manage to catch your target unawares, it still rarely results in a kill like it would if this was implemented. And yes, everything would have to be rebalanced.... the only reason I don't see it happening.

Basically the biggest reason I think it would be great is that it would bring back that edge of your seat feeling. Right now, you can sit around in a dangerous area, and be pretty sure that if you get caught flat footed (not typing, that's a different story) you're can still get away and repair. I would love to have to be constantly alert while flying a light fighter, always in danger of being popped in one pass.

Re: bots

Well, those would have their armor cut as well. You're not going to be fighting queens with the same armor as now... but yeah, if you want to fight a leviathan, bring a bomber, something that can take a lil punishment.

The idea is that EVERYTHING gets the defect if its small enough.

This also means that AI can be made more interesting, since you only need to land a couple shots.

Sure, a cent won't have much, but it only needs to pull off a couple hits on its target to be safe again. Unlike now, where, if you're fighting 20 bots, you'll die because you spend so much bloody time trying to pull off 10 hits.

Im still not sure it would be a good thing.
PVP would prolly become a quick one shot tactics thing but with the introduction of player owned cappies imho everyone will abandon light & medium ships and sit comfortably in their armored cappies blasting at passing small ships and scoring pks.

How would that be any different than what people are already going to do with cappies?

And picture, instead of just a short bout between 2 players.

A wing of 6 SKV fighters vs a wing of 6 ST6 fighters. They fly toward one another, get into a dogfight lasting perhaps 45 seconds,
3 ST6 down, 2 SKV down. ST6 flees. SKV takes down another 2 down as they turn to run.

We've got to wean ourselves off 1v1 combat, but there's no way to do that when it takes so bloody long to kill someone that you HAVE to focus on them for a good 2 minutes to kill them.

And in the scheme of things, what role should fighters play?

What role could we actually imagine them playing in the 43rd century?

If they are made entirely useless by the presence of more heavily armored ships, such that maneuverability is moot, then we have a worse problem on our hands.

However, if there are weak points to be attacked, diversions, etc.. a fighter squadron is what you're after. And you don't need armor for that.

I agree, you have a point there Shape.
However....if you take in consideration quick deaths in small fighters and our players that are not too keen on dying every 45 secs. I see playerbase moving strictly to using cappies.
What role cound we imagine light fighter playing in the 43rd century?
Exactly, why fly light fighter when you can instead buy a big carrier with squadrons of light fighter bots, bomber bots etc. that will do that 45 sec dying thing for you or win battles for you. Why even leave station after all when you can send your automated carrier with its death squadrons of bots into battle. Pilots will become obsolete in VO and will be replaced by tacticians.

One word (ok more than one): Remove the death stat.

I would love to lead a squadron of light fighter out of a cap if this situation was to happen. But only if when somone looked at my stats they did not see 1700 pks/8012 deaths. And if no one knows how many times you've died, then who cares how many times you've died!

I think there will always be those who prefer to be a tactician, and those who prefer to be in the thick of things.

Armor goes on the OUTSIDE of the ship, therefore it should not take up any internal space. Equipment, the pilot, engines, weapons, etc. all go on the INSIDE of the ship, therefore adding them should take up space (e.g. currently by filling slots).

Note, people, that having ships that die in 3-4 hits makes it nearly absolutely pointless to have those same ships able to take damage to parts (i.e. engine or sensor damage).

No, Smittens, on the 20% mass. That would be ridiculous.

Snax_28, try to just forget about the death stat and just have fun. (Yes, I know it is hard sometimes)

Overall, I think I like this idea - sort of. I think there is an important middleground to find which is this - there needs to be more variety in the fightercraft stats available. (I'm thinking X-Wing v.s. TIE Fighter here) The smallest, fastest, lightest fighters [i.e. Cent] SHOULD only take a few hits to kill; true medium fighters [i.e. Hornet] should take more than several hits to kill; The heaviest heavy assault ships [i.e. Prom] should take significant punishment.
Where the current situation breaks down is that nothing then fits into the ultra-light category; we have no TIE Fighter. For example, the basic models could have the following HP:
Cent: 2400 _ Vult: 3600
Hog: 6000 _ Horn/Wraith: 9000
Rag: 18000
The nation ships are a bit of a problem here because the Valk currently takes hits like a medium ship while it is light, and the Prom manuevers like a medium ship while it is heavy.
However, I also like the game as-is, so I think this is more an indication of where new ships should be added stat-wise (i.e. low-end) more than how current ships should have their stats changed.

idk.
Half the time I go down to 20% while my enemy is still at 100 and then I win.
Soooooo this would be bad for me.
But yea I guess its an okay idea as long as we can equip some additional armor for a cost of mass.
Then again the cent can already die instantly against some heavy ships.
So what's the big deal?
Fights don't take that long.
That's the only thing that differentiates us from any other First Person Shooter.

Hmm, this may be interesting to try. It could be really fun. I only see two issues:

1. People who have to home far away to get ships they like may become frusturated. It's the same as skiing in Michigan. You spend 5 minutes on the chairlift and only 20 seconds on the actual slope each time.

2. Cap ships. As soon as you get in range of one you'll be toast. The fun of cap ship battles is not staying away from them, but rather dodging and weaving in-between their fire, strafing runs, etc. That and their explosions will nuke everything.

It might be fun to try though. Maybe they could do it on the test server for a while to play around with it. It would change the game from Space Quake to more of a Space Counter Strike.

One thought:

Everything the devs have been doing and saying was their vision was to slow down combat, not speed it up. Food for thought.

How So Moldy?

LostCommander: On engine and sensor damage, a light fighter doesn't really have much more than engines, blasters and a cockpit. Engine damage likely WOULD be fatal.

Kix: Heh, You'd adapt. You're too good of a shot not to. But it takes a crack shot to even kill a ship at 20% that decides to run from an engagement. And fights between 2 players that last longer than a minute is absurd, unless both are masters.

Ghost:

#1 Well, ships will be transportable in the near future, so we'll have ship delivery, much as mecha delivers AAPS.

#2 That would still be fun, especially since it opens the door for much more powerful weapons. When you already know that most weapons on a cap are a one hit kill, you can make Cap weapons as strong as you like.

Furthermore, if a cap focuses on you right now, its still fairly easy to dodge. and if it hits, you really only get one extra chance.

A wing of 6 SKV fighters vs a wing of 6 ST6 fighters. They fly toward one another, get into a dogfight lasting perhaps 45 seconds,
3 ST6 down, 2 SKV down. ST6 flees. SKV takes down another 2 down as they turn to run.

Right... Un-re-a-lis-tic scenario, even IF (and thats a big if) SKV should destroy 3 ST6 ships, ST6 never runs! :P hehe

Back on topic, was thinking of something like this for a long time. That would make VO more filmy, you know. It doesn't speed up combat Moldy, it just makes the engagement time shorter. The ships would fly and shoot just as fast or slow as now. I like the idea!