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Mines
Arolte: Under normal circumstances, a single Tachyon shot doing 600 damage pops a lightning mine. I don't believe that gemini's or gatling fire is failing to pop the lightning mines because they have too much hull points. I'd be a little bit surprised if they have hull points, but I don't believe for a second that they have more than 400 or so hull points and that's why gatling fire doesn't destroy them. That would be stupid, and I've never known the Devs to be that stupid. Granted, there is a first time for everything, but my experience is that sometimes the mine pops the first time it is hit and sometimes you can put a stream of 10 tachyons into one and it doesn't notice and that tells me that this isn't the desired behavior of the mine.
I don't know what the problem is exactly (I haven't seen the code), but I suspect it is something like this: the lighting mines are ran client side by the player that drops them. When an enemy updates its position such that it is in the radius of a lightning mine, the client signals to the server that an enemy is in range (the client 'shoots' the enemy with the mine) and the server sends to the enemies client that he has been shot. The victim then moves out of the range of the lightning mine by sending an update of his vector and position to the server (he moves) which then relays the new position and vector to the client of the guy with the lightning mine. The client with the lightning mine then notices that the new ship is out of range, so it signals the server that it is no longer shooting the victem, which in turn signals the client of the victim that its no longer being damaged by the lightning mine. The problem is of course is that all this message passing can take a half-second or more, which means that the victim might well be 100m or more out of range of the mine before the mine actually lets go. And if packets get delayed, or acknowledgements get lost the mine simply won't stop shooting you until you are dead. If you had a way of clogging the pipe between the you and the server by filling it with traffic, then you could all but gaurantee that anyone that strayed within range of a lightning mine would be dead no matter what they did because they (or the server) would never recieve acknowledgement that they were no longer being shot. I'm personally not convinced that some miners haven't found a way of doing exactly that, since I know some players have found a way of generating lag in such a way that there position updates just infrequently enough that you are always shooting at a 'ghost' rather than thier actual position and thus they never get hit. Its not so much that the lightning mine causes lag the way that the old non-optimized swarms did, its that if there is lag, once they grab you, you won't be able to escape _and_ that it is probably possible to exploit this.
As for the 'EMP shield' you are pushing, the single purpose I can think of for such a weapon is to prevent small fighters from hiding out down in the 'armpits' of capital ships and calmly blasting capital ships at essentially range 0 which completely safe from any weapon on the ship because none of the turrets have arcs which can fire down into the area that the fighter is hiding in (because to do so normally means having the capital ship shoot itself).
I don't know what the problem is exactly (I haven't seen the code), but I suspect it is something like this: the lighting mines are ran client side by the player that drops them. When an enemy updates its position such that it is in the radius of a lightning mine, the client signals to the server that an enemy is in range (the client 'shoots' the enemy with the mine) and the server sends to the enemies client that he has been shot. The victim then moves out of the range of the lightning mine by sending an update of his vector and position to the server (he moves) which then relays the new position and vector to the client of the guy with the lightning mine. The client with the lightning mine then notices that the new ship is out of range, so it signals the server that it is no longer shooting the victem, which in turn signals the client of the victim that its no longer being damaged by the lightning mine. The problem is of course is that all this message passing can take a half-second or more, which means that the victim might well be 100m or more out of range of the mine before the mine actually lets go. And if packets get delayed, or acknowledgements get lost the mine simply won't stop shooting you until you are dead. If you had a way of clogging the pipe between the you and the server by filling it with traffic, then you could all but gaurantee that anyone that strayed within range of a lightning mine would be dead no matter what they did because they (or the server) would never recieve acknowledgement that they were no longer being shot. I'm personally not convinced that some miners haven't found a way of doing exactly that, since I know some players have found a way of generating lag in such a way that there position updates just infrequently enough that you are always shooting at a 'ghost' rather than thier actual position and thus they never get hit. Its not so much that the lightning mine causes lag the way that the old non-optimized swarms did, its that if there is lag, once they grab you, you won't be able to escape _and_ that it is probably possible to exploit this.
As for the 'EMP shield' you are pushing, the single purpose I can think of for such a weapon is to prevent small fighters from hiding out down in the 'armpits' of capital ships and calmly blasting capital ships at essentially range 0 which completely safe from any weapon on the ship because none of the turrets have arcs which can fire down into the area that the fighter is hiding in (because to do so normally means having the capital ship shoot itself).
That seems consistent with the mine behavior I have noticed Celebrim.
Maybe the mines should be made completely server side to prevent the bottleneck problems. Although that could bring about more problems, I'm not sure. I'll leave that up to you technical whizzes. But all we would need is to give mines a nationality based on the person who layed them. That way, any mine layed by a gold shows up as blue on all gold radars and yellow on all enemy ones. Once the mine is layed, it essentially becomes and independant entity completely detatched from the person who layed it. Unfortunately, this would mean that a miner wouldn't get kills for his/her mines nor would he/she be able to destroy his/her own mines. To avert that problem they may be able to put a tag on the mine to say who layed it so that all kills by the mine automatically get transferred to the miner. A remote switch to destroy all mines would be nice to take out a minefield that has served its purpose as well. That way, since you can't demine your own mines with your weapons, you can hit a button to take out whichever mine you are pointed at.
Maybe the mines should be made completely server side to prevent the bottleneck problems. Although that could bring about more problems, I'm not sure. I'll leave that up to you technical whizzes. But all we would need is to give mines a nationality based on the person who layed them. That way, any mine layed by a gold shows up as blue on all gold radars and yellow on all enemy ones. Once the mine is layed, it essentially becomes and independant entity completely detatched from the person who layed it. Unfortunately, this would mean that a miner wouldn't get kills for his/her mines nor would he/she be able to destroy his/her own mines. To avert that problem they may be able to put a tag on the mine to say who layed it so that all kills by the mine automatically get transferred to the miner. A remote switch to destroy all mines would be nice to take out a minefield that has served its purpose as well. That way, since you can't demine your own mines with your weapons, you can hit a button to take out whichever mine you are pointed at.
Making the proximity mine launcher a small slot weapon is a bad idea. A fleet of 4 hornets can have 160 proximity mines. That's scary.
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no I think that thats a good idea! just think............you jump in 7 and you see... A MINE FILDE! it be graate!!!
heh
2003-11-22 01:03:51 Arolte
Get rid of lightning mines altogether and add EMP shielding on heavy ships instead. When a fighter attempts to get too close to a heavy ship, it will zap them slowly. No more lightning mine spamming. No more station mining. No more fighters getting easy kills on heavy ships. Multiple problems solved at once.
Arolte, you'd be pretty screwed if this happened, why are you suggesting it? And the EMP for large ships? That'd have to be a large port weapon, and need to be limited, but it's not a bad idea.
2003-11-22 01:03:51 Arolte
Get rid of lightning mines altogether and add EMP shielding on heavy ships instead. When a fighter attempts to get too close to a heavy ship, it will zap them slowly. No more lightning mine spamming. No more station mining. No more fighters getting easy kills on heavy ships. Multiple problems solved at once.
Arolte, you'd be pretty screwed if this happened, why are you suggesting it? And the EMP for large ships? That'd have to be a large port weapon, and need to be limited, but it's not a bad idea.
I think it's completely retarded that a single lightning mine can kill me. A single mine. That's just absurd, and you all know it.
The other thing is when people are actually fighting using l mines, I'd like to be able to destroy them before they can hurt me. I took the time to notice it and shoot it, I think that dealing 2400 F-ING DAMAGE to a mine should destroy it, no matter what.
Definitely yes on the colored mines though? I'd like that, please a1k0n?
The other thing is when people are actually fighting using l mines, I'd like to be able to destroy them before they can hurt me. I took the time to notice it and shoot it, I think that dealing 2400 F-ING DAMAGE to a mine should destroy it, no matter what.
Definitely yes on the colored mines though? I'd like that, please a1k0n?
Well, the issue with lightning mines surviving gemini and gatling fire isn't really lag. They simply have too much "hull points." Their strength should be like ten hull points or something so they can be easier to kill.
As for the EMP shield, it won't be as strong as most people think. It's not double l-mines, like most station miners use. It's just a single l-mine that shoots a single bolt at each player that comes close to your heavy ship. Meaning it won't insta-kill or lag you or anything like that. A single l-mine bolt is enough to tell the enemy to back off, but not kill 'em.
And one of the things that's lacking in Vendetta right now are blockade ships. Imagine a fleet of heavy ships blockading a station or wormhole with their EMP shields. It would work the same way as police road blocks. You get too close and you die. You need to attack from afar so you don't get zapped by the EMP shields. When missions are implemented this will make more sense, since you may be asked to hold a base or infiltrate a base that's defended by a blockade.
As for the EMP shield, it won't be as strong as most people think. It's not double l-mines, like most station miners use. It's just a single l-mine that shoots a single bolt at each player that comes close to your heavy ship. Meaning it won't insta-kill or lag you or anything like that. A single l-mine bolt is enough to tell the enemy to back off, but not kill 'em.
And one of the things that's lacking in Vendetta right now are blockade ships. Imagine a fleet of heavy ships blockading a station or wormhole with their EMP shields. It would work the same way as police road blocks. You get too close and you die. You need to attack from afar so you don't get zapped by the EMP shields. When missions are implemented this will make more sense, since you may be asked to hold a base or infiltrate a base that's defended by a blockade.
I don't like the select nearest mine idea because mines are pretty useless as it is. I like the nation coloured mines though. Also I don't like the fact that lightning mines don't let go of me even though I've gone 3000m+ it's stupid.
Arolte: I'm convinced that the reason lightning mines are sometimes indestructible is the same bug that makes them sometimes have infinite range once they get ahold of you. There is absolutely nothing wrong with the lightning mine IMO that doesn't have to do with the buggy, lag dependent, client side(?) implementation of them.
The EMP shielding you describe would be great (maybe even essential) on capital ships, but would be abusable on anything smaller.
Proximity mines are weak enough that they could be moved to the small slot without causing too much problem.
Giving the mines a coloration depending on who dropped them isn't a bad idea though.
The EMP shielding you describe would be great (maybe even essential) on capital ships, but would be abusable on anything smaller.
Proximity mines are weak enough that they could be moved to the small slot without causing too much problem.
Giving the mines a coloration depending on who dropped them isn't a bad idea though.
Alright, I have a couple suggestions involving mines.
First off: Destroying them. I would like a key that would select specifically the closest mine, and nothing else. It would also be nice if that while they were inactive, you could still blow them up. I think it's highly unfair that you can see a mine, shoot it, have it be invincible, then explode on you because you can't move fast enough out of the blast radius.
Secondly: Mines created by different nations should be different colors. It's frustrating to think that that's your friends mine only to have it shock you to death. I don't think it would be that hard to implement this one.
Just a request from a guy who really hates station miners.
First off: Destroying them. I would like a key that would select specifically the closest mine, and nothing else. It would also be nice if that while they were inactive, you could still blow them up. I think it's highly unfair that you can see a mine, shoot it, have it be invincible, then explode on you because you can't move fast enough out of the blast radius.
Secondly: Mines created by different nations should be different colors. It's frustrating to think that that's your friends mine only to have it shock you to death. I don't think it would be that hard to implement this one.
Just a request from a guy who really hates station miners.
I would suggest lowering the damage of Lmines and do something about a max number per player.
Get rid of lightning mines altogether and add EMP shielding on heavy ships instead. When a fighter attempts to get too close to a heavy ship, it will zap them slowly. No more lightning mine spamming. No more station mining. No more fighters getting easy kills on heavy ships. Multiple problems solved at once.
Proximity mines I have no problem with. They're not abused in any way and they're not too strong. But there's enough damage there to tell the follower to back off. They're also higher in numbers, meaning they'll actually last through most of the trip that a trader is taking, unlike lightning mines which are wasted too fast to be helpful.
If lightning mines are going to remain, I'd like to suggest fixing their "hull points." Right now two geminis are needed to take out some mines. Heck, I even had a whole swarm blow up in front of a lightning mine without detonating it. It takes more than two or three gatling bolts to take one out also. I mean c'mon, as if the spread wasn't high enough.
But ultimately I'd like to see an EMP shield replace lightning mines.
Proximity mines I have no problem with. They're not abused in any way and they're not too strong. But there's enough damage there to tell the follower to back off. They're also higher in numbers, meaning they'll actually last through most of the trip that a trader is taking, unlike lightning mines which are wasted too fast to be helpful.
If lightning mines are going to remain, I'd like to suggest fixing their "hull points." Right now two geminis are needed to take out some mines. Heck, I even had a whole swarm blow up in front of a lightning mine without detonating it. It takes more than two or three gatling bolts to take one out also. I mean c'mon, as if the spread wasn't high enough.
But ultimately I'd like to see an EMP shield replace lightning mines.
W00T, two thread replys in one day!!!
OK why not just make it impossible to mine within say 200m of a station, that way you can keep the l/mines ( cos i quite like em )
OR
get rid of the docking / exit only ports and allow 2 way traffic. Its too easy to just mine the docking ports 'cos there are so few of them.
Minimus
OK why not just make it impossible to mine within say 200m of a station, that way you can keep the l/mines ( cos i quite like em )
OR
get rid of the docking / exit only ports and allow 2 way traffic. Its too easy to just mine the docking ports 'cos there are so few of them.
Minimus