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Author Topic: Shields and flux  (Read 3186 times)

Lopunny Zen

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Shields and flux
« on: October 26, 2011, 07:42:18 AM »

I was looking at the shields on your website to one of your massive ships and saw how massive the bubble of the shield was. The problem is i dont think the weapons will be able to fire far enough to defend that wide of a circle and the enemies can shoot from far away to hit it without trouble and plz forgive me if im wrong about the weapons ranges being too short to defend it. I sent a picture of the ship to show you the size of the bubble. My suggestion is a what i like to call a wrap shield which is a shield that protect the ships by taking the outside of the ships shape or at least make kind of an oval shield. Im wondering also about the flux. It seems it makes it so you cant use all the weapons at once but what about the auto defences...do these take flux and if so why? It seems like a system thats a hinder and slows down the game a bit but thats my oppinion

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Alex

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Re: Shields and flux
« Reply #1 on: October 26, 2011, 09:23:41 AM »

Hi!

As far as weapon ranges, most weapons have much more range than those shields. Some (not all) of point-defense weapons don't, so in that case it's a choice you have to make - to rely on PD to take down an incoming missile cheaply but risk getting hit, or to play it self and take the hit on the shields - at the cost of more flux.

As far as flux, well, making it so that you can't fire everything at once is the point :) You have to make a choice - which weapons to use in any given situation to use your flux capacity most effectively. Without a system like that, you wouldn't have nearly as many interesting choices - firing everything, all the time would be a very good strategy. That's fine for an action-oriented game, but Starfarer is a bit more tactical than that, and the flux mechanic creates deeper gameplay.
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Thana

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Re: Shields and flux
« Reply #2 on: October 26, 2011, 09:32:52 AM »

I agree with this. Most of the time, shields on space ships bore me, but the shields in Starfarer are much more interesting because they're not just automatic damage sponges but their use actually has an element of tactics involved, making them an interesting gameplay element instead.
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Zarcon

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Re: Shields and flux
« Reply #3 on: October 26, 2011, 09:33:54 AM »

I agree with this. Most of the time, shields on space ships bore me, but the shields in Starfarer are much more interesting because they're not just automatic damage sponges but their use actually has an element of tactics involved, making them an interesting gameplay element instead.

Quoted for Truth.  :)
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Lopunny Zen

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Re: Shields and flux
« Reply #4 on: October 26, 2011, 09:58:41 AM »

Then can the bigger ships hold more flux then the smaller ones?
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CommComms

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Re: Shields and flux
« Reply #5 on: October 26, 2011, 12:08:40 PM »

In general, yes.  But it depends a lot on the ship and, once outfitting is in the release version, how many components it has to increase it's flux capacity.  Not all weapons build up much or any flux when firing, so for certain ship variants it's not so much of a concern.
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