| Author |
[SUGGESTION] ICC shield reworking |
Gejaheline
Fleet Admiral
Galactic Navy
Joined: March 19, 2005
Posts: 1127
From: UGTO MUNIN HQ, Mars
|  Posted: 2009-02-19 15:53
Okay, this followed from a recent chat in the lobby about how ICC ships have serious power issues when you hammer their shields, and how it removes their ability to shoot back.
As it is, the current system either forces you to have your shields turned on, which drains massive amounts of power, or you have to have them turned off, where you're relying on your weak armour to survive.
Now, draining massive amounts of power isn't a bad thing in itself, since it gives you a lot of recharge and gives you a very good defence, but it also utterly cripples ICC's offence, which seems odd for a "defensive" faction; in my opinion, this means they should be able to take a beating whilst still dishing out their damage. Railguns are technically low power drain, but when you have zero power that's no good.
So, a rethink:
Add a new module to ICC ships, a "main shield capacitor" (or some other cool name; I shall refer to this module as "capacitor" here).
This device will drain power from the main energy reserves at a modest rate, until it reaches maximum charge.
Shields themselves would have a much smaller reserve, and charge at a vastly increased rate; when they take damage, rather than draining energy from the main reserve, they draw power from the stored energy in the capacitor, which then draws power more slowly from the main reserve.
When the capacitor is drained, the shields would draw directly from the main reserve, which is the point where an ICC ship should be thinking about retreating. However, whilst the main capacitor has its reserve, the main power is still available for firing weapons. Turning off the capacitor increases one's offensive capability whilst stopping the capacitor from recharging, increasing the speed that it empties. Turning off individual emitters would function as now.
Rather than aux generators, this would also give the option of auxilliary capacitors: Generators would provide more power for weapons, capacitors would increase energy drain whilst reinforcing the shields.
This would adjust ICC's combat style somewhat: Their shields would remain at high percentage levels until their reserves are exhausted, whereupon their offensive power and defensive power would be greatly reduced, making them more "all-or-nothing" than UGTO, who don't need to worry about power, but similarly have no options to increase their defences by restricting their offence, or vice versa.
Thoughts?
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Rhiawhyn Zerinth
Fleet Admiral
Templar Knights
Joined: October 31, 2005
Posts: 257
From: I.C.C Deep space refueling station
| Posted: 2009-02-19 16:02
Agreed, this would make icc less of a "ugto with armor that drains power and weaker weapons" and more of an indavidual faction, managing your power would be more of a concern then killing the enamy, as when you run out of shield capacitor power, you die..
Alternativly, have the shields regen obscely quick, at the cost of a large ammount of hp, change the shield % on the targeting systems to reflect the main capacitor, ((anything more, ala aux caps, adds aditional % onto this)), this allows a hard enough hit, to punch PAST the shields, and hit the armor, while keeping the idea that the shields drain from the capacitor to recharge.
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Gejaheline
Fleet Admiral
Galactic Navy
Joined: March 19, 2005
Posts: 1127
From: UGTO MUNIN HQ, Mars
| Posted: 2009-02-19 16:05
Quote:
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On 2009-02-19 16:02, Rhiawhyn Zerinth wrote:
Alternativly, have the shields regen obscely quick, at the cost of a large ammount of hp... |
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I get it. So, for example, if an EAD popped up and used an alpha strike at point-blank, some damage would go through the shields without completely crippling the shielded ship's defences.
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Rhiawhyn Zerinth
Fleet Admiral
Templar Knights
Joined: October 31, 2005
Posts: 257
From: I.C.C Deep space refueling station
| Posted: 2009-02-19 16:11
Correct, this combined with less armor hp on the icc, means that surprise hard hits, will overload the shield facing, and thusly breach them for a short time, while they would regen back to full verry quickly, you still did damage to armor, at least a little
The entire time however, when the shields take damage, they drain power from the capacitor, the harder the hit, the more the drain adds up. getting hit on all four sides hard enough to breach each shield gen, for instance, means you will run out of power in less then a second flat.
These changes would give icc the defence feel back, smaller ships could eventualy whittle down the shields capacitor, where as larger ships, could potentaly break through with a beam or two ((not of a full volly for an ead, for example)) and hit the armor, while it wont be alot of damage, with the lower armor hp, it will hurt like hell to the icc ship.. as it should with an ead up yer tailpipe
[ This Message was edited by: Rhiawhyn Zerinth on 2009-02-19 16:15 ]
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Gejaheline
Fleet Admiral
Galactic Navy
Joined: March 19, 2005
Posts: 1127
From: UGTO MUNIN HQ, Mars
| Posted: 2009-02-19 16:24
Yes, essentially the two options for killing ICC ships would be to either whittle down their capacitor, which would also reduce their offensive capability, or deliver a series of powerful attacks which would go through the shield and damage the layers beneath in the brief period that the shield is down.
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BackSlash
Marshal
Galactic Navy
Joined: March 23, 2003
Posts: 11183
From: Bristol, England
| Posted: 2009-02-19 16:46
They already have power/shield options.
They're designed to not run around at full speed with shields on, firing weapons, so don't do that.
I fail to understand why they need a reworking when they're fine as they are. There's nothing wrong with them, they rotate as intended, they drain power as intended. It's just as simple as they're working as intended.
We also just don't have the time to rework how the shields work. They're very complicated, and we'd rather spend time working on more important things than reworking a perfectly fine system.
[ This Message was edited by: BackSlash *Jack* on 2009-02-19 17:02 ]
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Sens [R33]
Admiral
Joined: September 27, 2008
Posts: 1020
From: Edge of th...
| Posted: 2009-02-19 21:04
shields are fine, for defensive flexibility you sacarafice offensive power.
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Ulven Skyblade
Marshal
Non Omnis Moriar
Joined: March 04, 2007
Posts: 230
From: Timbo400
| Posted: 2009-02-20 06:20
i realy like these plans it would add more depth to the game.
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Winters Rapture
Fleet Admiral
United Nations Space Command
Joined: December 09, 2007
Posts: 355
| Posted: 2009-02-20 16:10
The sheilds work fine... is that why most of the ICC abandoned DS or switched sides? Because they work so great that everyone bailed and thats why ICC is ghost town now?
Anyway, i really would like to see this idea in the game, but i do pain my self and agree with jack that in the grand scheme of things, we have more pressing matters to deal with.
Dose this idea sound exactly what the doctor ordered to stop people from leaving ICC? Yes.
Are there bigger issues to mend before they can get to work on it? Yes, and some of them really need to be fixed (dictors, arc bug, ammunition on rain guns, ect)
So even though this idea is gold, it will haft to wait like the rest of them, Just hopfully not to long.
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Rhiawhyn Zerinth
Fleet Admiral
Templar Knights
Joined: October 31, 2005
Posts: 257
From: I.C.C Deep space refueling station
| Posted: 2009-02-21 11:09
knowing the way things work, after a dev says no, its never going to be added or looked at, even if gold.
While i understand that they have toher things to work on, i belive they cant ake a back seat to actualy keeping the playerbase, having 4 icc on at any given time compared to ugtos 20 or kluths 15 means, they are NOT fine, or people would be playing them.
unless the devs want to phase out icc, they need to change things. or take a look at them, spreadsheets do not make a game, regardless of how ballanced it looks on paper, it just dosent work.
There are SOME bugs, that need to be fixed asap, but all the little things added to ds, can wait, major changes that will make icc a fun and uniuqe faction to play, will hopefully get more people to play said faction, more people = more fun, more fun = more people, and as we all know, the more people that have fun, the more subs faust gets.
in otherwords, i would like a couple other devs to take a look at the idea, not JUST jack. people ((especaly icc)) seem to love the idea, it wouldint change that much in gameplay, aside from giving a new way to beat icc, it would make them a tactical defence faction ((should i stick all my power to one facing, leaving me vulnerable on all other facings? or should i keep my shields normal, so i can take a goodly pounding before having to retreat))
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MrSparkle
Marshal
Joined: August 13, 2001
Posts: 1912
From: mrsparkle
| Posted: 2009-02-21 12:06
It's an interesting idea, but the whole "defensive" faction thing has been thrown out the window with UGTO getting a choice of armors vs whatever faction they're fighting, rather than just standard light or heavy armor. UGTO is now the "defensive" faction. Don't believe me? A Nest can do little damage vs a battle dread with reflective armor, and if I'm not mistaken a Nest is the most offensive ship in the game, belonging to the "offensive" faction.
I say before shields get reworked, UGTO armor gets reworked, back to the old system of light and heavy armor. Then shields can maybe adjusted and ICC can again be the "defensive" faction.
Of course there's major bugs that need fixing before all this anyway.
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Fornax
Marshal
Raven Warriors
Joined: April 30, 2002
Posts: 906
From: Jacksonville, FL
| Posted: 2009-02-21 12:09
Just talking about it, as a long time ICC pilot...yes I've flown a little of everything but 80-90% of my flying has been as ICC...ICC ships are not broken.
They've always had a power problem - and the balance of how their ships work has changed. Quite obviously, it used to be that with significantly lower amounts of ammunition, a cruiser could smash another cruiser into rubble...or even a Dreadnought. I think a lot of the changes are great - we've migrated a little away from twitch and closer to battles between majestic capital ships.
Anyways, it's always been a design theme that the ICC are a little power limited. However, the Auxilliary Shield Generator represents an idea that sounds like it'd help with that problem, a little, with some targetted/focused help, yet oddly enough it doesn't. It actually requires even more power...even though that amount is less than other shield types.
To me, it's broken.
However, keep in mind that I still don't think the ICC units are, as a whole, overwhelmed by their opposition so changes to systems like this don't really have the kind of priority that other issues might.
Nax
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Fattierob
Vice Admiral
Joined: April 25, 2003
Posts: 4059
| Posted: 2009-02-21 12:11
Auxiliary Shield Generator should provide power to the shields, only. A lot of power.
Meanwhile, a regular auxiliary generator would provide power to everything but your shields.
a trade off.
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Rhiawhyn Zerinth
Fleet Admiral
Templar Knights
Joined: October 31, 2005
Posts: 257
From: I.C.C Deep space refueling station
| Posted: 2009-02-21 12:16
Agreed, while icc arent totaly broken, and this wont exactly fix the power issue, it just migitates it so you can at least fight while under fire, it would actualy make it worse when the shield capacitor runs out of power, because you not only have the cap drawing from your energy, you have the shields doing the same thing..
i also agree with mr sparkle, ugto shouldint really have armor types like they do, armor faction or not, it makes them into a defence powerhouse agaisnt a choise class, and dont say that "you can just shoot them with another weapon", because more often then not, they just run away, or you have a majority of one weapon, cds cant do jack against a bd with alblatives, if it closes to beam range, it gets shreaded verry quickly, and runs out of power before you can say "im dead", relfectives negate a vast majority of the damage of kluth ships...
Replace alblative and reflective with heavy and light, they still have more choises then icc in terms of what they pick, however, they need to chose between high hp, less mobility, to low hp, more mobility, or no advantage at all with standard.
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Fornax
Marshal
Raven Warriors
Joined: April 30, 2002
Posts: 906
From: Jacksonville, FL
| Posted: 2009-02-21 12:21
I don't know that I'd go that extreme.
Right now Aux Shield Generators have approximately 25% of the HP of the other shield systems. Making the cost to recharge/maintain that 25% as free would be a significant boost...very targetted...very focused without being overwhelming.
Allowing it to produce a lot of power - more than a regular power generator might run the risk of totally changing the ship dynamics.
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