Forums » Suggestions

New weapon TYPE. Auto locking "Laser" austin powers style

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Aug 30, 2008 Jim Kirk link
Okay, this Laser Turret is an Auto locking, charge type weapon. It has a 5 second charge time, and during this time the player cannot cancel the firing sequence, the target cannot even be changed. The energy is being dumped, transferred instantly from the battery and into the weapon's capacitor and will fire when the capacitor reaches 100 energy units.

The target can be targeted at any distance visible to the player, but at 400m the beam fades and becomes wider. It disburses and becomes useless other than a colorful light show, if you like red... The range will diminish the damage exponentially, and the damage won't be much to begin with anyway at 50 HP/s at point blank range, 100m and below. But if the target enters the reach of 400m from the shooter, the target can be damaged, and the chances of being damaged farther away are actually somewhat the same since the beam gets wider, but much less damage will ensue from the latter. The chances of hitting a target in the first place require a certain variables to be considered. Relative target velocity, a substantial change in relative velocity, and firing ships stillness. Moving the mouse like a madman will not help your cause, you must somehow predict the general area the target will be in, and try to be as still as possible for the most accuracy and damage. Obviously, by looking at the figures below, this is a very weak version, but it would be better to over-estimate how much people can abuse it, than under-estimate.

Small Port
Ineubis Defensive Laser Turret
MkI
License: 4/3/4/4/1
Damage: 50/s (Point Blank, 100m and >)
Velocity: Light (hmm ehh I forget what that is though, something like 6^ee7, whatever...)
Energy: 100/blast
Charge Delay: 5 seconds
Firing Time: 1 second
Grid Usage: 8
Mass: 1200 kg
Volume as cargo: 3 cu. (long and telescopic in nature, it needs room...)
Excellent auto-targeting (Average 95% accurate)
Maximum Range: 400m (doing damage at only 1 HP per second)
Price: 15,000cr. (Because it's in it's experimental stages, it can only be obtained from Ineubis Stations.)

Obviously by looking at this everyone can assume it will work much like a mining beam, only with greater range. Also, although the auto-targeting is excellent, it is not necessarily guaranteed. The effectiveness and damage will depend on the target's relative speed to the player, and AOT (angle of attack).

Now I know that many people will probably be opposed to this only because it takes little skill to operate. But that's the beauty of it, it's a weapon designed for pilots who aren't great fighters, and it's a completely unique form of weaponry in VO.

This weapon would be better used in packs though, and firing multiple lasers at a time. Hornets, like with Rails, would be preferable, as would Marauders.
Aug 30, 2008 Jim Kirk link
Or not...
Aug 30, 2008 Surbius link
Not every idea is a golden egg.
Aug 30, 2008 Jim Kirk link
Well I still think it could be very interesting to see in action.
Aug 30, 2008 SuperMegaMynt link
It's possible to dance around an opponent who is heavier than you, and never take a hit. Any weapon that has improved accuracy over another weapon in the game runs the risk of creating a strategy where you can choose to never be hit by an opponent, and yet always hit them. (Even for 1 damage.) It creates a situation where one ship setup has no counter, except to not fight in the first place, or to use that exact same setup. Basically, as long as you can deal finite damage, without taking finite damage, a group of you can kill anything, without being killed. I think it'd be very boring to see in action. If you've played EvE, think nano cloakers.
Aug 30, 2008 Jim Kirk link
No I've never played Eve, what are nano-cloakers?

The sheer mass of the weapon + firing once every 6 seconds or so, only doing a maximum of 50 damage each time on a 6000 HP ship would take 120 shots. 10 shots per minute, if locked and fired instantly, 12 minutes... This is assuming the distance these fighters are fighting at is less than 100m. Also, if the fighter has 4 Lasers, it'll be quarter the time 3 minutes.

Anyone stupid enough to be within 100m of the shooter for more than 3 minutes deserves it IMHO.

As hornets are relatively slow, I wouldn't be too worried about it. Being within 100m of a hornet would be a dumb thing to do anyway. Being within 100m of any ship is dangerous actually.

But as we all know, this doesn't happen too often. Most fights are 150m+ to about 300m. Anything farther than that would require missiles, or Rails. But this gun has the range, it just isn't very dangerous.

Now lets look at a gang of 5 ships. Each having four lasers Equipped. Hornets. A ship within 100m of all of them would last 24 seconds. Now, I think I wouldn't let myself into that kind of situation, but if I did, I would be much more afraid of rockets...
Sep 01, 2008 Jim Kirk link
bump ^^
Sep 02, 2008 bojansplash link
I can imagine the worst kind of VO pilots who fight by back-rolling to oblivion using this kind of weapon.
Sadly you would not be able to score PKs like that.
Experienced player would just stop in place and let you back-roll to the end of universe so you have 2 choices:
1. turbo back and die
2. go away
Sep 03, 2008 Jim Kirk link
It really doesn't matter that it's an auto locking weapon, but if a person with energy weapons wants to be a pussy and stay a far distance away, they will eventually have to leave, unless they have decent aim.

This weapon is little more than an annoyance if used by anything but the hornet. The hornet might actually be able to rise from the ashes as a decent fighter if this weapon is implemented.

I propose a test. There's no way to really know how it would compare to other weapons/ships combinations until it is tested out. Maybe even stations will be able to use it...
Sep 03, 2008 SuperMegaMynt link
In EvE, 'nano' ships came to mean ships which were so fast that they couldn't be caught, except of course by faster nanos, but this often resulted in mutual destruction. They could orbit you outside your range, and snipe at you. They did pathetic damage... times twenty, which was easily enough to pop the enemy ships one, by one. Yes it took time, but they had all the time in the universe at their disposal. The only way to catch these ships was at gates, the equivalent of WH's, and only if you were lucky enough to appear on the other side relatively close to them, at which point you could hit them with a tractor beam stylish weapon. But VO doesn't have any tractor beams.

Imagine a Valkyrie. Imagine trying to catch this ship, and worse, kill it. Now imagine a group of these ships dancing around you at 200m's, doing say 37.5 damage every second, simply turboing away if danger ever got within firing range. Can you imagine a way of defeating these ships without using them yourself? As a brilliant, but much loathed Guomindong pointed out, it creates a situation where (if you play smart) you can sometimes win, and never lose. It's just a matter of numbers.

This weapon is little more than an annoyance if used by anything but the hornet.

One bee sting is an annoyance. Tell me then, how did they earn the name, "Killer Bees"?
Sep 05, 2008 Jim Kirk link
Well maybe it will encourage more pirates to join forces. With their powers combined they are Captain Laser Pie-rat!
Sep 06, 2008 SuperMegaMynt link
That's the EvE player base defense; 'nanoing' is the cure to 'blobbing', which is just getting a whole great bunch of people. Essentially, game strategy degenerates when more is always better, or when there's one obvious best tactic. In EvE, there were both these things which supposedly canceled each other out... except they weren't mutually exclusive. Groups that had nano blobs of course, were the undisputed kingpins. And no, they weren't just pirates.
Sep 10, 2008 Jim Kirk link
No idea what that is but, OKAY!

I still feel like rockets or Turrets would be more effective than lasers used in a group, but whatever...
Sep 10, 2008 Dr. Lecter link
VO TO NANO-BLOBS!
Sep 10, 2008 LeberMac link
Anything that AUTO-LOCKS is bad bad bad bad bad.
Make the player use their own twitch skill to hit you.
Aug 26, 2012 redotter link
cool idea. overpowered. What if it just shot straight like a rail gun... laser effect. straight laser, move you ship to 'slice' the opponent. kinda like the VUX in starcontrol....
Aug 26, 2012 tarenty link
Necromanceeeee...
Aug 26, 2012 Death Fluffy link
/me zombies on...

Nonsense! Just allow mining beams to do damage. It might make awesome close up combat fights even more fun than they already are.
Aug 26, 2012 redotter link
Doh. another 2008 reply. Sorry guys.

Yah, mining beams should do dmg. I mean a nail gun isnt a weapon but still would hurt...right?
Aug 26, 2012 ryan reign link
"Nonsense! Just allow mining beams to do damage. It might make awesome close up combat fights even more fun than they already are."

As good an idea now as it was when I (and likely others) came up with it. And not really far fetched... most ships are made of Xith, we have a Xith mining beam... thus the beam basically rips the plating off a ships hull.

+ a lot