Ship Builds & Load Outs [1.4] Planned changes to powerplant damage

[MrFuddyDuddy]

All I got out of these changes is that instead of dieing instantly when your power plant goes, you instead are humiliated by whatever killed you as you drift in space until you suffocate to death as you will have 0MW of power presumable upon its destruction.
Changes in PvP will follow, you get your plant shot out and the player who shoots it out will just wait for you in your blind spot for you to repair to shoot it out again(that is if they don't just outright finish you off).
They going to change anything how about better weapon balance so more than just lasers are viable for sustainable combat against more than a small handful of ships, or make Gimballed and Turreted weapons get accuracy bonuses from better sensors(like they should, if you read the description of what Sensors do).
That and make Shield Cell banks non-stackable so fights with players in Anaconda's FDL's and Pythons doesn't take an extra 15 minutes of chasing them down.(I get it your ship is worth 800 mil, but that doesn't mean you can cheese everything with 21 shield cell bank charges)

 

[Mephane]

Take star wars as an example: The death star is a huge killing machine, but his has only one weak spot: Its power plant. Luke shot that and the thing exploded. Big ships can already mow down smaller ones with the immense firepower they have, but people complain it's too easy for the little vessels to kill them. I could pass damage dropoff from wrong angles, nice idea, but if I blow the reactor bay of your ship you go boom. And so do I if you aim at mine.

That would make sense if it weren't so easy to destroy the power plant. If you'd have to align your shots very well, from very limited angles, in order to do any significant damage to the power plant, then yes, that would work as a reasonable weak spot. At the moment, you can destroy the power plant shooting from any direction where no other module is in the way to soak up the damage instead (e.g. thrusters), and some ships, like the Asp have the powerplant even in the very spot where NPCs, gimbals and turrets aim for, so even without trying to, you sometimes score accidental powerplant kills against these ships.

Also, the current status quo is not in favour of small ships anyway. It is also much faster to kill an Anaconda by targetting a power plant, when you are flying, like, a Python yourself. If hitting the power plant (or any non-expose module) would require careful positioning, then that would become tricky for anything but the smaller, more agile ships, and yes, then I would agree that power plant kills should stay in order to give the small ships a chance.

Max 5 priorities, tested yesterday.
10 would be nice.

If the power plant's output diminishes as its health decreases, 10 would never suffice for a ship with lots of hardpoints. As I said in the OP, if my ship loses power, I don't want half a dozen modules to shut off when a single one would suffice, if only we could set up power priorities more precisely.

 

[EdzUp]

TLDR

I dont tend to go for Power plant as its to easy I tend to go for life support if I can get it nothing more hairy than fighting another ship and watching ya life ticking away

 

[CMDR Shane Kannigan]

That would make sense if it weren't so easy to destroy the power plant. If you'd have to align your shots very well, from very limited angles, in order to do any significant damage to the power plant, then yes, that would work as a reasonable weak spot. At the moment, you can destroy the power plant shooting from any direction where no other module is in the way to soak up the damage instead (e.g. thrusters), and some ships, like the Asp have the powerplant even in the very spot where NPCs, gimbals and turrets aim for, so even without trying to, you sometimes score accidental powerplant kills against these ships.

Also, the current status quo is not in favour of small ships anyway. It is also much faster to kill an Anaconda by targetting a power plant, when you are flying, like, a Python yourself. If hitting the power plant (or any non-expose module) would require careful positioning, then that would become tricky for anything but the smaller, more agile ships, and yes, then I would agree that power plant kills should stay in order to give the small ships a chance.



If the power plant's output diminishes as its health decreases, 10 would never suffice for a ship with lots of hardpoints. As I said in the OP, if my ship loses power, I don't want half a dozen modules to shut off when a single one would suffice, if only we could set up power priorities more precisely.

You sir, got my point. PP kills remain, but they should tighten the attack window/implement damage dropoff from wrong angles.

 

[Lucky Dice]

I think reduced power output with a damaged power plant does make sense, but not right away, perhaps if it gets below a certain percentage. Let's assume the manufacturer did build some redundancy in, so a 95% health power plant behaves as normal, below say 75% you start to lose some power, and below 50% it really starts to hurt. Also, power plants should be placed well armoured compartments as ship designers would know it's a vulnerable component. Due to it's need to radiate heat their would always be a soft spot however, I think that soft spot shouldn't be the power plant compartment itself, but the radiators as those have a direct open link to the power plant to dispense the heat. Closing the radiators would protect your power plant. You should be able to do without going into silent running, although you wouldn't do it as long as your shields are up, you shield could recharge even though your radiators are closed. Obviously this means heat would build up even faster than in silent running mode because of this, so it's only something you want do that as last resort.

 

[Frenotx]

Honestly I think the powerplant should just be removed from the sub targets list. I can't think of a way things could possibly be balanced such that the powerplant would be a viable target, without being the only viable target. Since the powerplant is required for EVERYTHING ELSE to function, it's too all-or-nothing. Make it too durable or not ever reduce its power output? Why bother ever shooting it. Make its destruction lead to the destruction of the ship, or completely crippled it? Why ever bother shooting anything else.

 

[lysan]

I would like to be able to shut down the power plant again, just as we could in BETA. I don't understand why this was changed?

 

[bbqsamich]

Honestly I think the powerplant should just be removed from the sub targets list. I can't think of a way things could possibly be balanced such that the powerplant would be a viable target, without being the only viable target. Since the powerplant is required for EVERYTHING ELSE to function, it's too all-or-nothing. Make it too durable or not ever reduce its power output? Why bother ever shooting it. Make its destruction lead to the destruction of the ship, or completely crippled it? Why ever bother shooting anything else.

I think this is probably the best option. Something of such vital importance is unlikely to ever feel balanced fully. People hate dying.

I'd like to see a benefit to shooting the power distribution system to make systems malfunction (yes, this probably happens, but why shoot that when I can shoot the powerplant). I can also see the benefit of shooting the heat regulation system for the powerplant so that the ship starts to overheat (perhaps this is what should actually happen to the powerplant as it slowly loses integrity; hell it might even give heat sinks another reason to exist...emergency recovery). I can see balance available in making some systems very hazardous to lose without telling people they are going to die in an instant or die when some troll is done messing with them long enough.

However, in all honesty, I think if they fix the penetration bugs and make hull reinforcements work, we'll probably reach a reasonable point even with "powerplant failure means explosion" mechanics.

 

[Frenotx]

It will certainly be a big step in the right direction.

 

[MrFuddyDuddy]

Yes, I briefly mentioned it; the combat earning power must be addresses across the board to factor into it this, but it needs so also because of the upcoming AI changes, so I hope they get another rebalance in 1.4 (read: buff).

I would still hope that unless the NPC ships have an Auto Field Repair Unit on board that they just decide to self destruct granting you the kill when there power plant hits 0% simply because at that point they are essentially dead in the water.

 

[Henri]

lol like it is possible to take out any module before the target blowing up

 

[Quantum Fluke]

I like the change. If I recall correctly you lose 50% power when destroyed, so that wouldn't leave you dead in the water. Just set your priorities so you always have power in drives and FSD.

If they add armour and hull reinforcement to modules, it would be nice if it didn't penalize smaller ships. The dmg drop is already high when targeting hull, so I would like to see smaller class weaponry always punch above their class when targeting modules.

It would solve larger ships fast TTK when targeting PP while small ships would get more of the specialized module targeting role so they aren't at such massive disadvantage.

 

[nathdixon92]

I'm off two minds for the powerplant change. While I do think some changes are needed, only having a small chance of ship destruction is a bit preposterous as we are talking about nuclear fusion device whereby, them going off line is going to cause one or two problems. Perhaps have a countdown timer when the powerplant goes off line until the reactor goes into meltdown and detonates?

As the OP says, larger more expensive ships are going to benefit more as they have more power to spare than combat focused ships so introducing a further risk ie exit battle now or face inevitable destruction might be worth looking into.

As for a few of your suggestions of removing the powerplant from targeting completely, that's just plain stupid and ridiculous. If you start fiddling with things too much it becomes less a simulation and more arcade. People should learn when to run.

 

[CATPAIN KIRK]

TLDR

I dont tend to go for Power plant as its to easy I tend to go for life support if I can get it nothing more hairy than fighting another ship and watching ya life ticking away

You get used to it.

 

[Mephane]

Now that we know how powerplant damage will function (flat 50% power loss the moment it reaches 0%) I want to reiterate one of my initial thoughts:

We need more power priorities. 5 is just about adequate for the current situation for me, but the new situation would let me to much more finely tune my settings. Currently, my setups typically work like this, with small variations depending on the particular ship or loadout:

1: Thrusters, Life Support
2: Shields, Sensors, Power Dist, Shield Boosters
3: Weapons
4: Active utilities (KWS, Chaff, Heat Sink Launcher)
5: Equipment not used in normal flight: FSD, Fuel Scoop, Interditor, Cargo Hatch (usually turned off entirely anyway)

(Priority 5 goes offline when weapons are deployed.)

In a scenario that my power plant is shot down and I suffer from that 50% power loss, I'd naturally want to bug out. Since stowing weapons to get the FSD operational won't work directly, I would have to manually move the FSD up in the power priorities. If the ship has enough power to regularly keep the FSD active with weapons deployed, I would permanently move it into its own, separate priority between the old 1 and 2. If the ship cannot, I would keep a priority between 1 and 2 empty and move the FSD into it in flight when I need that, in order to ensure I can jump out.

That makes it 6 priorities already.


Also, depending on the ship, the precise point of 50% power can vary greatly. If the 50% cutoff is somewhere in the middle of priority 3, I lose weapons, active utilities, and the supercruise toolset. If it is in 2, I also all shields, sensors, and power distributor functionality. Now, say I want to keep sensors and shields at least, but give up shield boosters and if necessary the power distributor, I'd have to shuffle multiple modules around in flight, AND this still would mean my shields would have to start anew to reinitialize, because the generator had been turned off in the meantime. Very bad.

This leads me to my ideal setup for 1.4, if we would get a sufficient number of priorities to assign (again, I suggest a simple and round 100):

1: Thrusters
2: Empty, reserved for manually reshuffled FSD in case of power loss.
3: Life Support
4: Sensors
5: Shield Generator
6: Power Distributor
7-15: Shield Boosters, one per priority, maximum 8 (no ship could have more), leave positions empty if unneeded
16: Cargo Hatch. Disabled generally, manually enabling it would temporarily turn off something further down, stuff like KWS and maybe a single gun.
17-25: Weapons, one per priority, maximum 8 (again, no ship currently can have more than 8)
26-34: Active utilities, one per priority, maximum 8 (you now the drill now)
35: FSD
36: Fuel Scoop
37: Interdictor

This may seem excessive, but consider that when your powerplant gets to 0%, it can be the deciding factor between life and death whether shields come back online in a few seconds with at least some of your boosters, or you just have thrusters and life support and not even sensors, and moving the shield generator up would have to start the shield reinitialization from scratch.

 

[nathdixon92]

How about just running when you start to malfunction?

 

[CyFur]

I'm wondering about explorer anaconda's .. stripped down for weight and jump range. Suffering some careless 30% power plant damage(s) .. no way to repair and suddenly when the 1.4 update comes .. they find them selves 50,000 ly from home with not enough power for thrusters and detailed surface scanner at the same time without turning off the fuel scoop.

 

[TruffleSnout]

I'm wondering about explorer anaconda's .. stripped down for weight and jump range. Suffering some careless 30% power plant damage(s) .. no way to repair and suddenly when the 1.4 update comes .. they find them selves 50,000 ly from home with not enough power for thrusters and detailed surface scanner at the same time without turning off the fuel scoop.

That won't happen. The power drop doesn't happen on a curve - it's one time thing. You have 100% power until the moment your power plant reaches 0% health. Then it switches to 50% power.

 

[parry]

My current issue with the whole power plant thing is that on something as large as the Conda, it's about as durable as a sheet of wet paper.

combine this with the boosters (Drives), you have a recipe for disaster.