Fractal Softworks Forum
Starsector => Suggestions => Topic started by: goduranus on October 14, 2019, 07:10:25 PM
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Sometimes 5 weapons groups is not enough for bigger capital ship, would be great if a tech or combat skill allows more weapon groups to be added, or for a hullmod, built into Integrated Targeting System.
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+1
We were just having a discussion in the onslaught thread and my current build, ideally, wants 7 groups in order for the AI to correctly control its weapons. I'm getting by with 5 by having the TPCs in the same group (bad) and linking salamanders to a gauss cannon, both to get them to fire correctly and for the flux calculation.
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I agree with needing more weapon groups, but why bind it to skills/hullmods? It's basic usability stuff.
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Five groups are not enough. There should be more groups, and it should not be locked behind skills as it is a UI issue.
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Well if it affects gameplay for some people (as we can clearly see), then it's more than just a UI issue.
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How many weapon groups does a player really need? I make ample use of 3:
- Manual fire (primary)
- Hold fire (missiles)
- Everything else on auto fire.
Is there any particular benefit to having more?
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How many weapon groups does a player really need? I make ample use of 3:
- Manual fire (primary)
- Hold fire (missiles)
- Everything else on auto fire.
Is there any particular benefit to having more?
Take Onslaught (7+ groups):
- 1 & 2 for separate TPCs (in same group they'll miss a lot against anything smaller than a capital under AI control, though it may be more convenient to keep single group for player)
- 3 for missiles (typically Annihilators)
- 4 for frontal Kinetics (if Needlers, the must be alternating as well, to be able to fire when low on flux. May need 2 groups if it's Gauss + something else, due to different range)
- 5 for frontal HE guns (HE and Kinetics separation, also likely different range, needed to manage them properly both for player and AI)
- 6 for rear-facing anti-frigate non-pd guns (if any).
- 7 for PD (it needs to be separate from everything else for proper flux management, both for player and AI). I'd add extra group for Devastators, if any, since they are too flux-expensive and may potentially lead to AI disabling whole PD group.
Aside from PD you should avoid different range weapons in same group. If AI chooses to manually fire it, shorter range weapon will waste flux at long range. AI can't figure out that some groups simply can't be manually fired efficiently.
Similar problem with non-PD guns with non-overlapping arcs, if AI decides to manually control them (which can't be prevented) one side is wasted.
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I see no reason why you shouldn't be able to have 10 control groups, with the ability to have the same weapons being in different control groups. I also see no reason why this should be tied to a skill or hullmod.
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with the ability to have the same weapons being in different control groups
Can be convenient for player in some cases (most of which are covered by in-combat switching between linked and alternating fire mode, there is a mod for it), but would likely confuse AI.
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I think that doing this via a skill is not that practical in that it would presumably require the commanding officer to have that skill, wich wouldn't really make sense. What if you pull the officer of the ship? Do the Weapon Groups revert to auto? This is obviously not ideal.
What the skill could do would be the ability to use multiple "manual" groups at once. Sometimes I see the AI disabling the autofire on some groups, e.g. the forward facing slots on a Paragon, and then it won't use them at all, even if enemies run into the firing arc.
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Take Onslaught (7+ groups):
- 1 & 2 for separate TPCs (in same group they'll miss a lot against anything smaller than a capital under AI control, though it may be more convenient to keep single group for player)
- 3 for missiles (typically Annihilators)
- 4 for frontal Kinetics (if Needlers, the must be alternating as well, to be able to fire when low on flux. May need 2 groups if it's Gauss + something else, due to different range)
- 5 for frontal HE guns (HE and Kinetics separation, also likely different range, needed to manage them properly both for player and AI)
- 6 for rear-facing anti-frigate non-pd guns (if any).
- 7 for PD (it needs to be separate from everything else for proper flux management, both for player and AI). I'd add extra group for Devastators, if any, since they are too flux-expensive and may potentially lead to AI disabling whole PD group.
Do not forget another, 8, empty in case player is piloting it but wants AI to control all weapons, 1-7 in this case.
Probably should have 8 groups, with 9 being no group selected (for full AI control of all groups when player pilots his ship). Could be 9 groups plus zero for full AI control.
It is annoying when I have that fifth group filled, yet I want it empty because I like being able to let AI control all weapons while I pilot a ship.
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@Megas
http://fractalsoftworks.com/forum/index.php?topic=13431.0 - mod to that adds 'no group' selection and in-combat fire mode switch.
Though I see no reason, why this shouldn't be part of base game.
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Something like that should be in the base game and not in a mod.
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There's still something I'm not getting here. Does a weapon NEED to have its own weapon group to have independent tracking? Because as it stands, there's little reason you'd ever need precise control over your "fire at will" turret mounts. If anything, an excessive amount of turret groupings will only clutter the interface and get in the way of more essential high level decisions.
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There's still something I'm not getting here. Does a weapon NEED to have its own weapon group to have independent tracking? Because as it stands, there's little reason you'd ever need precise control over your "fire at will" turret mounts. If anything, an excessive amount of turret groupings will only clutter the interface and get in the way of more essential high level decisions.
- AI needs weapons separate to manage flux properly rather than just disabling everything (disable low efficiency guns first, etc, leave PD for last - I'm not saying AI doesn't have problems with how it manages groups, but without groups it can't even try).
- AI sometimes takes manual control of weapons, during which they can't attack different targets, obviously. This manual control is very harmful behavior if you just dump all capital's guns into one group, and even properly setting all 5 groups may be not always enough as demonstrated by Onslaught breakdown.
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But you don't need a billion weapon groups to do that. You just need one, "Fire at will". As long as independent weapons follow the rules you expect them to, they'll perform their appropriate behavior accordingly. Low efficiency guns will shut down at high flux, PD will stay active until the last, and anti shields will target anti shields etc.
Weapon groupings are best off a player convenience so that you don't need to scroll through a heap of menus to fire your own guns.
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Independent weapons don't follow any complex rules. Autofire behaviour is just to shoot any available targets, without any prioritization or flux management.
Making it too smart (without extensive configuration) can backfire by making player unable to control what happens.
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I wouldn't mind having 10 weapon groups for myself, considering that capital ship gameplay isn't about choosing which weapons to fire and where, but to choose which weapon groups are firing and when. For AI, I wouldn't mind it having every weapon in its own weapon group, with such functionality unavailable to the player, just so it can handle flux hog guns better.
Autofire behaviour is just to shoot any available targets, without any prioritization
This depends on the weapon in question. Some might shoot ships first, fighters second, some might do it the other way, some also target missiles if there's nothing else, and point defence guns go after missiles first, fighters second, ships third.
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I'm pretty sure auto fire also prioritizes the ship you have targeted.
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Right, there is this much.
But in-depth smart prioritization would also filter missiles by type/viability/etc: Sabot is obviously more important than a Swarmer, shooting tanky Squalls only makes sense if you actually have enough combined damage output to destroy it before impact, etc.
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Agree, currently i have 4 groups for paragon, and one free for autofireing other groups, i need at least 6.
1 for rotating large mounts,
2 for kinetics,
3 for large hardpoints,
4 for frontal medium energy,
5 for pd...
If player use missiles then 6 for missiles,
7th if player use different missiles then one more to separate them,
If player use rear medium mounts then for it we need 8-th group...
And one more to free all groups for autofireing ar some other option to make it so.
Perfectly there should be 10 groups and one key to turn them all free for autofireing.
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If players need to set 10 different weapon groups to make a ship's autofire AI behave properly the problem isn't that we only have 5 weapon groups.....
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If players need to set 10 different weapon groups to make a ship's autofire AI behave properly the problem isn't that we only have 5 weapon groups.....
10 groups is not for AI, i explained why 10 (game of limits, limited skills, limited ships in fleet, limited peak permormance, limited deployment, limited officer count, limited industry count, limited weapon groups, and so no :-\). For me is enough 6 groups. My Ai needs just 5 groups.
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game of limits, limited skills, limited ships in fleet, limited peak permormance, limited deployment, limited officer count, limited industry count, limited weapon groups,
I don't even want to ask, but I will anyway. What the heck does the number of ships in your fleet have to do with weapon groups? How do ANY of these things involve weapon groups whatsoever? I don't even.
The game engine does not support the player having direct control of more than one weapon group at a time. In general a player does not use a weapon group to aim their PD, or take random pot shots with any random turret at any time. That is dumb and it is dumb to even ask for it. The player sticks their attention between 2 major classes of player weapons: Main guns and consumables(missiles). All the rest of the weapons do whatever, and there is no need (nor should there be any need) of player intervention on them. As long as the other guns are utilized according to fairly appropriate AI rules, they'll do a good job.
Players may have certain tendencies towards conservative or aggressive firing schemes. That type of interface doesn't really have anything to do with weapon groups, it is more about allocating your ship resources. For example a conservative ship should always use PD, but not pressure its own flux with excessive weapon fire. An aggressive ship should push its flux all the way to the edge in pursuit of a kill. Steady ships should try to use their best weapons for a situation. Things like that don't really necessitate a million weapon groups, they're just taking the various flavors of captain and creating useful schemes to control the player's own ship. So if you want your ship to cool down, you set weapons to conservative and they'll only worry about defense. Stuff like that.
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game of limits, limited skills, limited ships in fleet, limited peak permormance, limited deployment, limited officer count, limited industry count, limited weapon groups,
I don't even want to ask, but I will anyway. What the heck does the number of ships in your fleet have to do with weapon groups? How do ANY of these things involve weapon groups whatsoever? I don't even.
The game engine does not support the player having direct control of more than one weapon group at a time. In general a player does not use a weapon group to aim their PD, or take random pot shots with any random turret at any time. That is dumb and it is dumb to even ask for it. The player sticks their attention between 2 major classes of player weapons: Main guns and consumables(missiles). All the rest of the weapons do whatever, and there is no need (nor should there be any need) of player intervention on them. As long as the other guns are utilized according to fairly appropriate AI rules, they'll do a good job.
Players may have certain tendencies towards conservative or aggressive firing schemes. That type of interface doesn't really have anything to do with weapon groups, it is more about allocating your ship resources. For example a conservative ship should always use PD, but not pressure its own flux with excessive weapon fire. An aggressive ship should push its flux all the way to the edge in pursuit of a kill. Steady ships should try to use their best weapons for a situation. Things like that don't really necessitate a million weapon groups, they're just taking the various flavors of captain and creating useful schemes to control the player's own ship. So if you want your ship to cool down, you set weapons to conservative and they'll only worry about defense. Stuff like that.
I need microcontrol of my weapons, i need separate 2 plasmas, 2 needlers, 2 hils, 2 pulse lasers and pd, and 6-th group i need to turn all my weapons in autofireing mode, but i do not need to turn them all at one time, sometimes i need just plasmas or hils, or pulses, now i have pulses in group with pd, and 5-th group i use to turn autofire to all my weapons. Do not understand?
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If players need to set 10 different weapon groups to make a ship's autofire AI behave properly the problem isn't that we only have 5 weapon groups.....
This is unfortunately rather true... while the game's AI is extremely good in general, flux management is still a weak point. I could get by with very few weapon groups, but by making sure that the low flux groups are the efficient ones I can significantly boost performance.
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If players need to set 10 different weapon groups to make a ship's autofire AI behave properly the problem isn't that we only have 5 weapon groups.....
while the game's AI is extremely good in general
good AI, eah, say it to that paragon, it can smash that onslaught like a paper box, but it does not. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=171I9ZnMAbI&t=0s
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That clip is completely meaningless to AI behavior. What are you even trying to show?
Its a player piloting with an OP boosted Onslaught specifically built to apply hard flux at max range, against the default Paragon that has no hard flux at that range. Paragons have speed 30 while the Onslaught has speed 25 - the only way its going to meaningfully catch up is if it uses a zero flux boost with shields down to get into range. That is VERY specific behavior that is almost always suicidal, and the kind of judgement call that I don't really want AI ships to make, because when they get it wrong they will be suiciding a ship shields down into the enemy.
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There's still something I'm not getting here. Does a weapon NEED to have its own weapon group to have independent tracking? Because as it stands, there's little reason you'd ever need precise control over your "fire at will" turret mounts. If anything, an excessive amount of turret groupings will only clutter the interface and get in the way of more essential high level decisions.
This can be fixed by COLLAPSING the weapon groups. Basically, only show the weapon data and ammo of the currently active weapon group. This way you can fit a lot more weapon groups without any extra space, and you improve the UI clutter issue by removing the display of unnecessary data
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UI-wise I don't see a major problem with an additional 5 control groups appearing on the right of where the control groups are currently, other than clutter, but it is clutter that you want.. Though it might look a bit odd to have a full 1-5 weapon group on the left and a single weapon group 6 jutting out to the right of weapon group 1 with empty space beneath it.
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Is there a concrete reason there is only 5 groups? Or is this Starsector's "640k should be enough for everybody" moment?
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This can be fixed by COLLAPSING the weapon groups. Basically, only show the weapon data and ammo of the currently active weapon group. This way you can fit a lot more weapon groups without any extra space, and you improve the UI clutter issue by removing the display of unnecessary data
Okay, so we're going to add weapon groups, so that we can stop displaying weapon groups, so that we can avoid making a mess from there being too many weapon groups. Sounds good. No, wait, it sounds like the other thing. Bad.
I don't think a single person in this thread has expressed an interest in manually targeting and shooting more than a few selections of weapons. That's the main purpose of weapon groups, if you aren't grouping them to shoot them, then why do you need more groups? No one activates broadside group 4c because they have more fun firing a flak broadside instead of beam broadside. They want control of it because the ship has too many weapons, the flux is overloading and something needs to shut down before the autofire kills your ship.
Adding dozens of weapon groups is a micro solution to a macro problem. Individual weapon control is the micro solution, where players look for the least important weapons in their current situation to turn offline. The macro problem is with managing the flux budget of the player ship. Flux management concerns the entire ship and is directly linked to weapon control. There may need to be a complex set of underlying rules but the intents of the flux budget are clear. Players want options to push their ship limits, squeezing every last ounce of flux to force a kill. They want options to be efficient, trying to get the best flux efficiency in a situation. They want options to be defensive, keeping flux low and prioritizing point defense. Finally they may want to hold fire all together, to force the zero flux speed bonus. Those are all viable ship stances to have, and you don't need to twiddle with a dozen weapon groups to make them happen.
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Is there a concrete reason there is only 5 groups? Or is this Starsector's "640k should be enough for everybody" moment?
Increasing weapon group amount is not the answer to the problem. 5 Groups is more than enough for everybody. Making the autofiring weapons smarter is the answer to the problem.
Giving the player more control over their behaviour pre-battle is frankly, another bandaid, but considering how hard it is to make AI that works in every situation might be what's needed in the interim.
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5 groups is not enough for bigger ships. For example, on Onslaught you'd want 1 groups for TPCs (2 for AI), 1-2 for larges, 2-3 for mediums, 1 for PD and 0-1 for smalls, giving you the range of 5 to 9 weapon groups you would want. At this point, I am not shooting any of those weapons or weapons groups — the thing I'm controlling is which groups are firing in the first place.
I doubt autofire could discern whether, say, a Mjolnir is there for high damage per shot, or for EMP, or for energy damage utility. Same weapons can be used for different purposes in different loadouts. I know that ship AI knows how much flux per second does a weapon group use, though I don't know if it knows its overall efficiency.
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I know that ship AI knows how much flux per second does a weapon group use, though I don't know if it knows its overall efficiency.
Hard to say how it prioritizes. Gauss + Railguns AI ship will prefer Gauss to Railguns despite both lower efficiency and higher cost to fire (both in range, enemy is shielded).
It will manually fire Gauss, while disabling Railguns autofire (as soon as flux builds up). So manual firing mode may be additional complication here.
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No, 5 groups is not more than enough. You can easily have 6 different weapon types on a cap ship or an Apogee.
The problem is two-fold:
- AI does not handle different weapons in a single group as well as it could. AI switches groups, decides to fire and turns autofire on/off at an almost human speed, which to my mind is simply not fast enough. Let the AI react at machine speed. Autofire control in particular is very slow.
- Players have this to shoehorn different weapon types into single groups and then are required to use autofire. This is a limitation. Why assume we're always going to want to limit ourselves just so the problematic weapon group limit is less problematic?
Just add more groups. Hell, make 5 the default and just put '+' and '-' icons there so the player can add as many as he wants and kill those he doesn't need.
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Why assume we're always going to want to limit ourselves just so the problematic weapon group limit is less problematic?
Just add more groups. Hell, make 5 the default and just put '+' and '-' icons there so the player can add as many as he wants and kill those he doesn't need.
The reason that's a bad idea is because not fixing the underlying autofire issues and instead just slapping more weapon groups on it just creates huge gaps between players know how to game the weapon grouping system and the ones that don't as well as the AI and the players. Both of these are obviously bad.
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Why assume we're always going to want to limit ourselves just so the problematic weapon group limit is less problematic?
Just add more groups. Hell, make 5 the default and just put '+' and '-' icons there so the player can add as many as he wants and kill those he doesn't need.
The reason that's a bad idea is because not fixing the underlying autofire issues and instead just slapping more weapon groups on it just creates huge gaps between players know how to game the weapon grouping system and the ones that don't as well as the AI and the players. Both of these are obviously bad.
Both easy to solve. Player can 'git gud', automatic group generation can be improved to avoid bad groups (different range or non-overlapping arcs on non-PD, non-missile weapons. And preferably divide by damage type too).
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Player can 'git gud'
Demanding weapon grouping chores from the player is not a particularly fun idea.
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What's up with people here recently telling other people to "git good" or implying they are bad players. It's nasty and doesn't help anybody.
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What's up with people here recently telling other people to "git good" or implying they are bad players. It's nasty and doesn't help anybody.
Well boys, we did it. Cyberbullying is no more.
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Or you know, you can speak up against it instead of supporting it? Give advice instead of insulting someone?
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Or you know, you can speak up against it instead of supporting it? Give advice instead of insulting someone?
Ok I get that ''git gud'' became a meme and people just ignore that, but it's a legit thing to say when someone already has enough information about the game, and the only thing that's left is to get better. There's only so much advice that can be given. Like what the hell should you say when someone is stuck in a bullet hell or a hack and slash game? Cheat the game? Tweak the game's files? People are so used to easy games that when they actually play something that requires skill, they immediately go complain ''bad game design hurr durr''. Also if you consider git gud a personal insult you probably shouldn't spend free time on the internet.
Now in case someone gets mad this is too off topic, I'm also in favor of having more weapons groups. Personally I've never needed more than 6-7 but might as well have the option for those crazy mod ships or something.
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If some players are imaginative and skilled enough to want to use 6 control groups, there is nothing to "git gud" from. We are all playing under the limitiation of 5 weapon groups; it is only those who more capable than you that want to use more.
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Because of AI handles weapon groups, it could get better with that change, too, since it would have a more granular choice. An example is the Onslaught and its TPCs. There's a difference between putting both of them in one group, and in two separate groups. Though, admittedly, in this particular example it might be an issue with autofire AI...
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Check it out, I can fix the weapon grouping AI but with only FOUR weapon groups. They aren't real weapon groups but are rather AI directives to utilize the weapons in the way you expect them to be used.
Primary weapons
are the guns that the ship is expected to use in most engagements. They define the ideal "combat range" of the craft and the AI will attempt to utilize all its primary weapons, against a main target, as part of its main attack. Short range primary weapons will force the ship into melee. This is kind of like the "weapon group" system that you have now, with all the primary guns slaved to a single goal.
Secondary weapons
are situational weapons that excel in some situations but suffer in others. The default weapon AI is to hold fire until it "seems good" to use them. The conditions are fairly broad and generous, for example kinetic weapons fire "against shields" and anti armor weapons fire "when it's cheap or when enemy shields are stressed". Secondary weapons include things like limited missile racks, inefficient guns, aggressive PD, or extreme range artillery that might fare poorly up close. For a ship with limited frontal focus, secondary weapons would attempt to hit the "best targets" around them. For something like a Conquest using a kinetic broadside/anti armor broadside, both sides might be considered secondary and it'll attempt to attack with the best side. The downside of using too many secondary weapons is the ship won't focus fire and "alpha strike" all its weapons, when primary weapons would.
Tertiary weapons
are guns that get used in extremely rare conditions. It is fitting for 1-shots like reapers or antimatter blasters. They only shoot at a main target when a full aggression routine asks for it, such as against an overloaded ship, or for a jousting Phase ship. Generally the purpose of a tertiary weapon is to score a killing blow and is otherwise not useful in a direct slugging match. A ship with only tertiary weapons will not force itself to stay in combat range and only looks for lopsided opportunities to attack.
Defense weapons
are almost exhaustively not used to engage larger ships. This grouping is basically for PD and they only like to target missiles/fighters. Against larger targets they will only be used opportunistically. They will not attempt to stress their own ship's flux to deal damage, except on the most aggressive settings.
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I mean it's easy to come up with general/abstract rules for weapon behavior, but it's not so easy to make an AI that actually behaves reasonably based on that. Whether to fire a weapon or not is very situational/contextual and humans make the decision based on a lot of factors that are difficult to represent for an AI. There are plenty of places where simple rules like 'fire kinetics into shields', or 'fire an anti matter blaster into an overloaded ship' fall short in very serious ways. Feel free to make your own AI and demonstrate how effective it is though.
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Not to mention his theory only makes categories for weapons, it doesn't change the problem of only 5 weapon groups. Sure it sounds nice on paper but you missed a ton of scenarios which would be a royal pain to implement with the primary, secondary and so on rules.
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Not to mention his theory only makes categories for weapons, it doesn't change the problem of only 5 weapon groups. Sure it sounds nice on paper but you missed a ton of scenarios which would be a royal pain to implement with the primary, secondary and so on rules.
It changes the problem from tweaking the AI with weapon groups, to using weapon groups as the player convenience they should be. The player doesn't need more than 5 weapon groups to perform player actions, so there is no weapon group problem that needs solving.
Weapon groups can't even solve the problem to begin with. The weapon issue is an AI issue. You solve AI issues with AI solutions. The AI doesn't understand player intent with weapons, and there's no clear way to define that intent. This weapon system defines broad brush attitudes towards its weapons. I stuck to AI features that are not very difficult to define, and which the game already attempts to discover on its own (sometimes failing in the process).
- Primary weapons define a very clear representation of the ship's combat range. The current AI system essentially tries to guess the combat range where a ship wants fight, and a ship with multiple weapon ranges typically causes a lot of problems for the AI. Let the player set the range. For carriers, their primary weapons tend to be strike craft. Primary weapons also help to define focus fire, all the main weapons should attempt to engage the primary target. Since primary weapons concern themselves with a ship's range and weapon arcs, they would dramatically affect how a ship chooses to move.
- Secondary weapons copy many aspects of the current AI system, I.E. what if every weapon behaved like its own weapon group and tried to be a smart weapon. There's nothing groundbreaking here, there's already a ton of rules for weapons trying to be the best they can be. The target behavior is more opportunistic, rather than actively pushing the ship into range like with primary weapons.
- The PD group basically flags a weapon as yes/no being PD, which is a behavior that already exists for PD weapons. However, sometimes you want a small weapon to be used very aggressively as well, such as PDs on a wolf or maybe you want a Dominator to get all in there. You can do that by upgrading PD to primary or secondary weapon behaviors, transforming a PD weapon into the main method of attack.
- The only feature that is really difficult to grasp is the tertiary group. It exists to classify rare, strategic power weapons that are very difficult to build an AI for. Generally it stops trying to fire the weapon as an immediate first action, trying to reserve it for a key turning point later in battle. Torpedoes already attempt to perform this behavior, by of holding themselves until a "killing blow" opportunity shows up. The "lunging phase ship" behavior doesn't even exist, that is legitimately breaking new ground on ideas for AI behavior. That might be more of a generic phase ship issue where they don't really understand how to fight, rather than a weapon grouping issue. But if you want a ship to dunk all its reaper torpedoes in the first 10 seconds, set it as a primary weapon. Maybe that's a thing you want, just a nightmare barrage of torpedoes sounds like fun.
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The player doesn't need more than 5 weapon groups to perform player actions
I would very much want to have 7 or 8 weapon groups on the Onslaught for myself. You must remember that most non-high tech ships need basically twice as many weapon groups, since they have primary, secondary and tertiary kinetic and high-explosive weapons. This case alone needs 6 weapon groups, plus point defence. It could work on frigates, destroyers and certain cruisers, where you have just primary, missiles and PD, or primary, secondary and PD, but it doesn't work out for bigger ships.
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Nothing should need that many weapon groups is the point. And you really don't.
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Even if you cannot imagine using more than 5 weapon groups, other can. Why say that you don't need 5? Why not any other number? You might be happy with 5, whereas plenty others see the opportunity to use more, so why try to deny it to others?
There was an example of the Onslaught. You can also imagine a Conquest with its two sides. Or Paragon. Or for a non-Capital example, even simply wanting Kinetics, High Explosive, missiles, Ion weapons, beam, PD weapons and an empty weapon group to pilot without bothering to aim weapons on something like an Eagle. It is a restriction, and an unnecessary restriction.
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For reasons already explained earlier in the thread. You only need lots of weapon groups when the weapon autofire AI is not good enough. If you can make ships wildly more effective with more weapon groups and specific weapon group tricks, that's bad because it opens up a huge gap between player ship performance and AI ship performance, as well as between players that known the exploits and players that don't.
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Mate if AI could manage certain weapons WITHIN a weapon group while we do something else with the ship then ok. As is it now, I could give at least 4-5 examples in only vanilla where more than 5 groups would be nice. Let's say your ship has 6 kinetic weapons, 3 with high dmg per shot and 3 with just fast fire rate. I'd have to disable all of them if I don't want to ''waste'' flux on armor. Feel free to remain a masochist but you've already seen that for some it's just not enough. Why make their life harder jeez. One thing is a suggestion that changes something, the other is some convenience that won't even *** affect you since you're fine with 5.
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I don't see why the player being able to improve ship performance by understanding how auto fire AI work is a problem. Isn't the point of the game for the player to learn the mechanics of the game and improve their performance? Weapon grouping is a skill the player has to learn: it's just another part of outfitting. You can always improve the AI performance at weapon grouping to make the game more difficult, although I don't think that really a problem right now.
I think the AI interacts with weapons in the way it does to mimic the player so the AI doesn't have an advantage over the player by controlling all the weapons individually. Also, the current AI definitely doesn't know how to manage each individual weapon separately and intelligently. It pretty much just autofires everything until flux is high and only manually fires strike weapons. I think unless there are weapon level target priorities (like PD) the target prioritization is just a high level main target (like the player does) and weapons either shoot at that or whatever is closest. There's no decisions being made based on what damage type is shooting at what or anything like that as far as I know. I think some people think the AI is much more advanced than it actually is. It's decent at turning auto fire on/off to manage flux, but it doesn't make decisions like the player does as far as I can tell. I could be wrong, someone with actual knowledge of the code please correct me.
I think it would be a ton of work to change that, and much less to add more weapon groups. The amount of work is like 'make an advanced AI' vs. 'make some changes to the UI'. I think it's unlikely the AI will be getting reworked at this stage of development, but changing the number of weapon groups seems plausible.
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For reasons already explained earlier in the thread. You only need lots of weapon groups when the weapon autofire AI is not good enough. If you can make ships wildly more effective with more weapon groups and specific weapon group tricks, that's bad because it opens up a huge gap between player ship performance and AI ship performance, as well as between players that known the exploits and players that don't.
First example was for AI. The other examples could be for AI but is for personally piloting. Not that it matters. It's not an exploit to play more intelligently and observantly than another player. The game is single player. Not that it matters. There's no reason to drag everyone else down in performance just because you don't see the need for more weapon groups.
I would like to have fun personally piloting a ship, making use of different weapons better, even if the AI themselves cannot. I would like to be able to separate KE from HE. I would like to be able to toggle on and off beams if I feel they aren't being helpful. I would like to choose to fire different large missile mounts. I would like the option to steer a ship whilst leaving all/some weapons on autofire. I would like to be able to toggle flux hungry ion weapons. I would like weapons with different arcs to be able to shoot one side and the other side to be AI controlled.
To make a statement that nobody needs more than 5 weapon groups as you cannot imagine to make use of it, and that anymore would be an exploit is selfish. Why drag everyone else to your level?
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It should be obvious - if there's a massive gap in player ships performance based on obscure weapon grouping mechanics, it's impossible to balance the game to a baseline.
As for you list of things you want, I want to be able to set omni-shields to AI control. I want a dock order for fighters. Everyone wants their own set of features - not all of them are good design and would improve things.
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It's not a massive gap, it's a convenience thing. This is why I usually make loadouts that work fine with 5 groups, instead of doing whatever the hell I want (which is the point of customisation). Also you're plain dumb if you're comparing a QoL change with an ability to completely cover fighters from fire. Stop trolling pls.
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@DatonKallandor
Well, obviously grouping already matters. Try dumping all weapons into 1 group and compare that to anything more intelligent.
Imo: increase group amount, improve auto-assignment, and if player assigns wildly sub-optimal groups, that's his problem.
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One issue with "improving autofire AI" is that at some point it would have to step outside its bounds to become better. It would have to guess whether you want to fire only kinetics against shields & only HE against armour, or if you want a mix to break the enemy's shields faster, or if you're firing everything in a panic mode, or when do you want to turn on a mixed damage types anti-fighter group. On the other hand, ship AI & the player already do these estimations and can take these decisions — if they have enough weapon groups. This is how it works already. Extending is going to be less cumbersome, than making autofire AI "helpful".
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It's not about obscure weapon group mechanics, its about making my ships do what I want them to do when I am personally piloting them. I don't particular care about AI weapon usage. I choose weapon groupings on all my ships on what I would be using when I would be directly controlling them. I like to bounce between ships when as needed. But since I am restricted to 5 weapon groupings I am restricted in my options. A sacrifice has to be made in options. Perhaps I will have to place autofire missiles instead of the missiles I really want. Perhaps I cannot toggle Ion weapon on and off or forgo having them altogether. Perhaps I always have to fire KE and HE together. Perhaps two different large weapon missiles cannot be controlled seperately. Perhaps I cannot concentrate on only moving the ship. Ship loadout is constrained due to the restriction.
If you are worried about balancing the game to a baseline, you should be worried about being able to change battle size which is a significant game changer rather than something that shouldn't change AI balance at all. You call it obscure weapon group mechanics, but is it a problem if suddenly the AI on both sides can choose which TPC on an onslaught to shoot? Just because it is something you don't understand it doesn't make it a problem. If the player pilot gains more ability to choose which weapons to fire on the battlefield is it a problem for game balance? It is not.
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I don't see why the player being able to improve ship performance by understanding how auto fire AI work is a problem. Isn't the point of the game for the player to learn the mechanics of the game and improve their performance? Weapon grouping is a skill the player has to learn: it's just another part of outfitting. You can always improve the AI performance at weapon grouping to make the game more difficult, although I don't think that really a problem right now.
The main reason it's a problem is because the link between "switching weapon groups" and "altering ship behavior" is essentially black magic. There is no intuitive way to understand this and if you can explain it in less than 5 sentences you're probably explaining it wrong. I've been checking out veterans with years of experience, and they still spend hours twiddling with weapon groups because even they don't know how the AI will respond. They add weapons, remove weapons and play with weapon groups, because those are the player levers to interact with ship AI.
Changing AI with weapon groups is like trying to drive a car with a drum set. You can still drive, but you're driving with a drum set.
Even if you cannot imagine using more than 5 weapon groups, other can. Why say that you don't need 5? Why not any other number? You might be happy with 5, whereas plenty others see the opportunity to use more, so why try to deny it to others?
There was an example of the Onslaught. You can also imagine a Conquest with its two sides. Or Paragon. Or for a non-Capital example, even simply wanting Kinetics, High Explosive, missiles, Ion weapons, beam, PD weapons and an empty weapon group to pilot without bothering to aim weapons on something like an Eagle. It is a restriction, and an unnecessary restriction.
Weapon groups don't solve AI problems. It is also crazy to expect players to solve their AI problems at all, no one expects their player base to be made out of AI designers. If there is a player solution, it needs to be a clear system that provides easily understood AI levers.
Commanding Officers are a good example of a useful player lever. An aggressive officer vs. a cautious officer changes ship behavior in a dramatic way, but it is still easily to understand. So for example if I want my ship to hold back, be conservative with its weapons and stick mostly to using PD, I pick up a cautious officer. If I want a ship to get close, fire ALL its primary weapons and generally run hot on flux, I pick an aggressive officer. That's not a very arcane topic to teach players.
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@bobucles
You are over-complicating it. If some weapon grouping is unusable for player, it is unusable for AI that has same degree of control as well.
5 groups are not enough to setup anywhere near optimal control scheme for Onslaught and some builds of other capitals, player piloted or not.
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But if neither side can make it "optimal" and "optimal" requires a ridiculous number of weapon groups and manual control.....then it doesn't matter if it's "optimal" or not. In that case "optimal" is neither a desireable goal, nor a balancing factor (because of neither side can reach "optimal", it's an even playing field).
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You are over-complicating it. If some weapon grouping is unusable for player, it is unusable for AI that has same degree of control as well.
5 groups are not enough to setup anywhere near optimal control scheme for Onslaught and some builds of other capitals, player piloted or not.
But weapon groups don't actually work that way. All PD guns can be placed on the same weapon group, and they will all act as independent defense turrets. That feat is not possible with a player controlled weapon group, the player has only one mouse cursor to play with. The AI already has a native ability to treat all weapons as independent actors, regardless of whether or not they're in a group. So if weapons can behave independently, why are weapon groupings changing AI behavior to begin with?
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All PD guns can be placed on the same weapon group, and they will all act as independent defense turrets. That feat is not possible with a player controlled weapon group, the player has only one mouse cursor to play with. The AI already has a native ability to treat all weapons as independent actors, regardless of whether or not they're in a group. So if weapons can behave independently, why are weapon groupings changing AI behavior to begin with?
What a terrible example. You'll never want to disable half of your PD weapons since they barely use any flux. You either have everything disabled (just hold fire) or all PD weapons active. With every other weapon type that's not the case. For example if you have 4 missiles in one weapon group, do you really consider it normal having to press the same exact button 4 *** times just to fire the last one? Please stop with these nonsensical arguments, you won't be forced to use ALL weapon groups if you don't feel like it, get that fact to your head finally.
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It's not about obscure weapon group mechanics, its about making my ships do what I want them to do when I am personally piloting them.
I think this guys comment here got completely ignored, so im going to bring some attention to it.
I don't think more weapon groups are going to fix the ai, or make it better. but, it would be nice for the weapons on my ship, to do what i want them to do.
For example, i've run into a problem on my onslaught, where i cant have two different missiles, as i don't have enough weapon groups, to toggle my PD, KE/HE, TPCs and the large mount point, along with two different types of missiles.
i don't think most of us want to fix the ai with this, we just want more player control over our weapons.
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Holy necro, but yeah.. I think every player meets the dreaded weapon group limit sooner or later. Maybe we'll see it increased. It shouldn't be tied to an already powerful skill though, this is basically the definition of an UX feature.
Groups are not just for autofire and AI, they're also for granular on-offs, or broadsides, or...
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IMPORTANT NEW VANILLA DEVELOPMENT affecting this proposal!
Info here:
http://fractalsoftworks.com/forum/index.php?topic=19331.msg301629#msg301629 (http://fractalsoftworks.com/forum/index.php?topic=19331.msg301629#msg301629)