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Modding / Re: [0.96a] Support Ships Pack 0.6.1
« on: May 22, 2023, 07:45:33 AM »
Update 0.6.1
-Updated to 0.96a (finally)
-Updated to 0.96a (finally)
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- June 06, 2023, 05:06:15 AM
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News:
Starsector 0.96a is out! (05/05/23); Blog post: Narrative in 0.96 aka Movie Night With David (06/02/23)
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Suggestions / Re: Disabled Ship = Escape Pods, not Boom
« on: January 26, 2023, 11:05:49 AM »bad sort of crowd?Hoi4 players
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Suggestions / Re: Disabled Ship = Escape Pods, not Boom
« on: January 25, 2023, 02:32:03 PM »
Yeah, lets keep in mind the basic assumptions of Starsector's setting.
Otherwise you get to the question of "why isn't every weapon a nuke in some way?"
As for my take on the central topic, escape pods should be an almost entirely visual effect, and maybe some post-battle events could pop up every once and a while.
They are non-combatants with no way of escaping. Unlike a logi ship that might be able to flee, they are entirely dependent on the outcome of the battle.
Adding them as targetable, in-battle effects would cause some AI-related shenaniganry and would also begin to do the awkward thing of there inevitably being a war crime metagame.
That is stupid and is just going to attract a bad sort of crowd, while doing little else.
Otherwise you get to the question of "why isn't every weapon a nuke in some way?"
As for my take on the central topic, escape pods should be an almost entirely visual effect, and maybe some post-battle events could pop up every once and a while.
They are non-combatants with no way of escaping. Unlike a logi ship that might be able to flee, they are entirely dependent on the outcome of the battle.
Adding them as targetable, in-battle effects would cause some AI-related shenaniganry and would also begin to do the awkward thing of there inevitably being a war crime metagame.
That is stupid and is just going to attract a bad sort of crowd, while doing little else.
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Suggestions / Re: Disabled Ship = Escape Pods, not Boom
« on: January 24, 2023, 10:08:26 AM »
The value of human life, ignoring the player's view, pathers, and pirates, is at an all-time high in the sector.
The sector's population is very low, under a billion, and certainly not growing particularly fast with all that is going on.
Mindlessly gunning down escape pods for no reason other than "war crime funny" is stupid. It is a waste of time, ammo, and focus on a battlefield.
False flagging missiles and fighters as escape pods is just going to mean your pods will be indiscriminately targeted. It is a simple thing, don't do it and your pods are safe against normal opponents. It is just the same as false identifying medics IRL.
The only factions that are going to be intentionally targeting escape pods are the pathers and tri-tachyon's phase fleets.
Even pirates understand the value of a good ransom.
The sector's population is very low, under a billion, and certainly not growing particularly fast with all that is going on.
Mindlessly gunning down escape pods for no reason other than "war crime funny" is stupid. It is a waste of time, ammo, and focus on a battlefield.
False flagging missiles and fighters as escape pods is just going to mean your pods will be indiscriminately targeted. It is a simple thing, don't do it and your pods are safe against normal opponents. It is just the same as false identifying medics IRL.
The only factions that are going to be intentionally targeting escape pods are the pathers and tri-tachyon's phase fleets.
Even pirates understand the value of a good ransom.
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Suggestions / Re: Buff the Medium Energy Slot
« on: January 12, 2023, 04:35:11 PM »TT brawler with coherer would be good. It’s easily the worst of the variants.
Hopefully the TT version gets coherer just as the LG one does.
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General Discussion / Re: I don't like the idea of build-in hull mods debuffs
« on: January 07, 2023, 09:39:28 PM »This is an interesting idea. S-mods being a permanent addition to ships has always been too good and they need some sort of rework. I'd be down to try it.
That being said...
Personally I like the idea of S-mods staying as they are BUT being temporary instead, lasting only a month or two. You can view it as taking very special preparations before a big station assault or other decisive battle. It brings S-mods more inline with some other current story point uses, like making special maneuvers or negotiating trade deals; They'll be one time decisions focused around a singular event in your character's "story" rather than flat upgrades forever.
You would need to significantly increase the story point gain to make that work.
It would also run a serious risk of making S-mods basically unused, because of the "save it for when I really need it" mentality, in addition to it being such a worse trade than before.
This also lowers the power level of player fleets by quite a bit.
Also, any ship with poor burn speed just gets screwed. All capitals would basically have a -40 OP budget or force your fleet to be super slow. There is a very real chance that most story points being repeatedly used just to keep your fleet moving at decent speed, which is just awful and nullifies the whole point. Ships that really want to S-mod Heavy Armor would also be screwed.
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General Discussion / Re: Pick three ship 1excellent/1enjoyable/1disapointing. and tell us why?
« on: January 06, 2023, 12:43:07 PM »
Excellent: Falcon. Just an overall excellent budget cruiser, ideal as a first buy. It can easily chase down and bully destroyers and frigates while still being able to do some work against ships its own size. It also can run away from anything threatening which means it basically always does something even in large fleets, as I do not have to worry about it getting killed.
Enjoyable: Luddic Path Kite. Speedy hammer delivery service is the ideal role for these suckers. Slap some hammers and EMR on these and they basically become bombers that require no carrier and are (mostly) immune to PD and fighters. You don't even really need to get rid of Ill-Advised modifications, as the hammers basically never malfunction.
Dissapointing: Gemini. Costs more maintenance than a Mule while being both a worse combat ship and dead even on cargo, while still requiring more crew. It is also slow as hell and not durable in any way. A Mule with converted hangars is probably just straight up better than this.
Enjoyable: Luddic Path Kite. Speedy hammer delivery service is the ideal role for these suckers. Slap some hammers and EMR on these and they basically become bombers that require no carrier and are (mostly) immune to PD and fighters. You don't even really need to get rid of Ill-Advised modifications, as the hammers basically never malfunction.
Dissapointing: Gemini. Costs more maintenance than a Mule while being both a worse combat ship and dead even on cargo, while still requiring more crew. It is also slow as hell and not durable in any way. A Mule with converted hangars is probably just straight up better than this.
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Suggestions / Re: Give the pulse laser a bonus vs shields
« on: January 03, 2023, 10:50:37 AM »
At least the mining blaster does the "budget low-tier option" in an interesting way.
Having the pulse laser just be an underwhelming and bad generalist just means it will never be seen on anything but AI ships. Why even bother?
The heavy blaster and plasma cannon get away with bad efficiency and high cost because they just kill things quickly, no questions asked.
If you have the flux capacitors and speed to make them work, they will tear through things
Having the pulse laser just be an underwhelming and bad generalist just means it will never be seen on anything but AI ships. Why even bother?
The heavy blaster and plasma cannon get away with bad efficiency and high cost because they just kill things quickly, no questions asked.
If you have the flux capacitors and speed to make them work, they will tear through things
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General Discussion / Re: How giga is the Gigacannon?
« on: December 29, 2022, 07:38:30 PM »Heavy blaster only does 500 damage? This would be way better against armor and way more alpha damage. Also whose to say this isn’t quite similar to the heavy blaster. The new kinetic blaster looks like a hybrid between the heavy blaster and pulse laser. There’s definitely going to be some resemblance to other energy weapons.
The only upside of this over the heavy blaster is that it crunches armor more and has more alpha. Otherwise, it has identical DPS, Range, and similar Flux/s. But it is a heavy mount, and costs 16! more OP. Why would anyone every use this? Such a minor upgrade for over double the OP cost.
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General Discussion / Re: How giga is the Gigacannon?
« on: December 29, 2022, 02:40:44 PM »My guess isWhat you have described there is literally just a heavy blaster for 28 DP.
Damage 1500
Flux efficiency 1.3
DPS 500
Range 600
DP 28
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Suggestions / Re: Give the pulse laser a bonus vs shields
« on: December 28, 2022, 11:40:23 AM »I agree with this, but I suspect Pulse Laser costs 10 DP as part of the "energy is inferior to ballistics" idea.Weapon types should be tradeoffs, not just flat stronger or weaker. (Obviously excluding size)
Medium slot-wise:
Ballistics have excellent specialized options at every range but have no true general-purpose weapons (of course, kinetics basically fill that role).
Missiles are extremely powerful but have limited ammo.
And energy has beams that all have a good niche now with the graviton buff (excluding the HBL), and very strong short-range options that specifically focus on pressing flux advantages.
The pulse laser cannot push flux advantages like the sheer burst power of the Heavy Blaster or Ion Pulser and doesn't really do what beams do.
It wants to be a generalist medium range option, but that is such a good type of weapon that energy slots really want that it has been made very weak to prevent it from being super optimal on everything.
Making it actually a budget option lets it keep that role while still being able to be relatively weak, because at least it will be priced appropriately.
At least then it can actually fill the "filler weapon" role well.
Phase Lance is a burst or strike weapon. Pulse Laser is a steady-firing stream. The ships I want to use Phase Lance on would not work well with Pulse Laser because of either Advanced Optics or (in case of phase ships with eFM) Phase Anchor.Yeah, the Pulse Laser + Phase Lance combo is very much one that only exists when you look at it in a vacuum.
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Suggestions / Re: Give the pulse laser a bonus vs shields
« on: December 27, 2022, 10:18:34 PM »
300 dps just isn't that good, especially on a weapon with short range and unimpressive efficiency.
More range or a decent efficiency boost would definitely help the pulse laser have a niche other than: "underwhelming general purpose weapon that is mostly for AI filler ships".
Giving it longer range might be an interesting option, making it still a generalist with mediocre stats, but at least one exceptional thing when compared to the other medium energies, which are either short ranged, or support beams. (and the phase lance, which is perfect where it is)
With its current range bracket, it is just an unappealing option when compared to the other short ranged medium energies.
Speaking of the phase lance, they share the same range bracket, and on the surface they would pair together well, with the pulse laser building hard flux and the lance bursting and tearing up hull.
Problem is, just grabbing one of each is 561 flux/s total, and 20 OP. You could get a single heavy blaster for only 12 OP. Yes, it is more flux, but you also have more OP to use for vents and caps and it is 100% hard flux anti-armor. And you get a free medium energy slot to put one of the many support options on. If the pulse laser was to keep it's current stats with no changes, it should probably have a decent OP cost drop to at least make it a budget option.
More range or a decent efficiency boost would definitely help the pulse laser have a niche other than: "underwhelming general purpose weapon that is mostly for AI filler ships".
Giving it longer range might be an interesting option, making it still a generalist with mediocre stats, but at least one exceptional thing when compared to the other medium energies, which are either short ranged, or support beams. (and the phase lance, which is perfect where it is)
With its current range bracket, it is just an unappealing option when compared to the other short ranged medium energies.
Speaking of the phase lance, they share the same range bracket, and on the surface they would pair together well, with the pulse laser building hard flux and the lance bursting and tearing up hull.
Problem is, just grabbing one of each is 561 flux/s total, and 20 OP. You could get a single heavy blaster for only 12 OP. Yes, it is more flux, but you also have more OP to use for vents and caps and it is 100% hard flux anti-armor. And you get a free medium energy slot to put one of the many support options on. If the pulse laser was to keep it's current stats with no changes, it should probably have a decent OP cost drop to at least make it a budget option.
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Suggestions / Re: Give the pulse laser a bonus vs shields
« on: December 26, 2022, 11:17:07 PM »
I think it the 1:1 flux is seen as a problem because the kinds of ships that want to use a pulse laser are mostly midline. High tech ships have the flux vents for better stuff like HBs and Ion Pulsers which have the burst DPS to punch through shields and then do something to the ship they hit, and take advantage of those ships' streigths.
Midline can't do that, and 1:1 trading against shields at shortish range with the pulse laser on ships that also have kinetic ballistic options that are at worst 0.66 (HVD) vs shields just isn't worth it. As anti-armor it is just not a good option, and anti-hull is most of the times not particularly important. Most ballistics are not generalist weapons, which means mixing them with pulse lasers just doesn't work that well.
300 DPS just isn't a whole lot vs shields, even the Arbalest does more than that while being cheaper OP and flux-wise. And just like kinetics, the pulse laser is not good at armor striping, although it is definitely better.
Midline can't do that, and 1:1 trading against shields at shortish range with the pulse laser on ships that also have kinetic ballistic options that are at worst 0.66 (HVD) vs shields just isn't worth it. As anti-armor it is just not a good option, and anti-hull is most of the times not particularly important. Most ballistics are not generalist weapons, which means mixing them with pulse lasers just doesn't work that well.
300 DPS just isn't a whole lot vs shields, even the Arbalest does more than that while being cheaper OP and flux-wise. And just like kinetics, the pulse laser is not good at armor striping, although it is definitely better.
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Suggestions / Re: Give the pulse laser a bonus vs shields
« on: December 22, 2022, 11:44:40 AM »Yes, that's how you balance things without powercreep. "Only good" is just another way of saying overpowered.
Or all the other medium energies suck.
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Suggestions / Re: Eagle and (base) Falcon remain anemic
« on: December 19, 2022, 06:28:18 PM »
That will definitely make the Graviton on Eagles less of a "I have slots to spare" kind of weapon.