Why small ship maneuverability is useless Pt.1

[Slack]

Any ship, no matter how slow or lumbering can effectively counter the agility of smaller ships by using FAoff + reverse. Hence agility is meaningless.

Not sure i agree and could be wrong, but I do believe an experienced pilot in an eagle (and other smaller ships) maximizing vertical/lateral thrust combined with main thrusters/FA off, should be able to get behind a Conda/Corvette and stay there indefinitely.

So i think "agility" is far from meaningless, because if an experienced eagle pilot could do this vs an experienced Conda pilot, agility would infact be a viable strategy vs big ships. I've honestly never tried using an eagle vs a large ship (as common sense told me it would probably end very badly for me), but based on how well it handles i think it could be in the "safe zone" for the majority of the fight. In PvE its certainly easy to do and a very viable strategy vs big ships.. PvP is always a different story.

 

[Slack]

FYI
Chaffs don't work as intended against turrets - there is open bug
https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php?t=230087
and a small/med unshielded hull tanking target can't survive for long flying circles around a multi cannon turreted cutter/vette/conda

Ok I think i need to stop talking as im spamming up this thread, but just a quick answer. Bugs aside (these are things not intended to be in the game) A small low/med shielded target cant survive long vs a large ship like a Conda for a reason. Its a small low/med shielded ship attacking something with 10x its size and firepower. It should go down, and quick.

However you might be surprised to know that a Large turreted pulse only does as much damage as a Small fixed pulse. So getting hit with 3 large turrets at the same time from a Conda, does no more damage than an eagle attacking you with 3 small hardpoints. And if you stay in the right spot 3 turrets should never be hitting you at the same time, plus you have heat sinks and chaff. So a smaller more maneuverable ship does have its countermeasures vs turrets. Now turn that Eagle into a Vulture and you have a real problem on your hands, as turrets arent going to do squat vs its large shields and you will be forced to try and shake a very maneuverable ship off your tail as its constantly hitting you with 2 large hardpoints (probably fixed ones)

 

[Arkantes]

Solution 1: change the flight mechanics so that larger ships that are flying in reverse have a slightly longer turning time. Maybe 33% longer than if they are facing forward.

Solution 2: change boost so that it is more efficient for smaller ships. I.e. smaller ships boost a bit faster and for longer periods.

I really doubt the first solution is going to change much.
As for the second one, boosting needs a complete overhaul, longer and stronger boost isn't really going to help imo, as small ships will just overshoot in this case, and by the time their nose is pointed towards the big ship again they'll be toasted.
The whole "fixed impulse" of boosting needs to go (who even thought of that awful idea?), to have controlled boost instead, like in any decent arcade space shooter (to those who pretend ED is a sim, stop kidding yourself, any more arcadish than that and it'd be Asteroids).

But anyway, the culprit is the same as usual, multiplayer. Decent speed caps for small ships have been sacrificed on its altar.

 

[Ralph Vargr]

Something went *really* wrong tonight.

I beat an Imperial Eagle NPC (fully armed and shielded), with a T-6 (also fully shielded, no armor, 2 small pulses, full cargo hold).

I had Mootilda in full reverse almost the entire interdiction.

I think Mr. Z has a point.

 

[Bortas]

Solution 1: change the flight mechanics so that larger ships that are flying in reverse have a slightly longer turning time. Maybe 33% longer than if they are facing forward.

Solution 2: change boost so that it is more efficient for smaller ships. I.e. smaller ships boost a bit faster and for longer periods.

The problem is that the game is balanced around dog fighting only. As long as dog fighting with fixed weapons is the only way to fight, every ship - including the largest ones - need to be able to turn fast enough somehow.

Before your suggestions can even be considered, alternative ways to defend themselves need to be implemented for large ships... i.e. turrets, which aren't rendered completely useless by chaff and/or silent running.

 

[Slack]

Something went *really* wrong tonight.

I beat an Imperial Eagle NPC (fully armed and shielded), with a T-6 (also fully shielded, no armor, 2 small pulses, full cargo hold).

I had Mootilda in full reverse almost the entire interdiction.

I think Mr. Z has a point.

Was it an Elite npc? Also you are talking npc here... In the same token I could say I took an eagle to a REZ and killed a Clipper with it (which I have done). Nothing wrong here, its was only a novice npc. I would like to see what would happen if the would be attacker was an Eagle with a cmdr at the controls. I have a feeling it would be a much different result.

 

[Ralph Vargr]

Was it an Elite npc? Also you are talking npc here... In the same token I could say I took an eagle to a REZ and killed a Clipper with it (which I have done). Nothing wrong here, its was only a novice npc. I would like to see what would happen if the would be attacker was an Eagle with a cmdr at the controls. I have a feeling it would be a much different result.

Yes, the human opponent would have killed me much more quickly.

I am inferior to even the lowest ranked NPC's.

 

[snadge]

Just nerf reversing speed on all ships 50%.

to those people that say smaller ships should not be able to kill bigger ships, of course they should, if you are a better pilot.

Just make the only large weapons that can hit a smaller ship fixed variety, then skill comes into play, gimballed and turrets should also hit but at a far reduced damage, due to ~tracking~ like in most sim games and guess what, in real life as well.

In EvE I have absolutely no problem taking out battleships with a Curse or no problem taking out a pack of frigates with a Sliepnir, just fit the right modules, that is PVP I am talking about, not dumb NPCs.

real life war games scenario, US carrier group sent to Davy Jones locker by a pack of PT boats.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Millennium_Challenge_2002

 

[nosleepdemon]

All this arguing and not one mention of the number one killer of anything that's flying backward... Maybe if Elite had some more complex environments, flying backward might be a little more risky?

 

[CMDR Byr Goefin]

Answer:
You can't keep your back to more than one ship at a time if they are any kind of decent pilot, and you can't effectively target more than one ship.

Get a wing and the large ship has to deal with 3 ships shooting him, while the one he wants to shoot flies out of range until the big dog tries to change targets.

Rinse, repeat, until the large ship explodes or leaves.

 

[Kezha]

1 small vs 1 large = large in favor and will likely win
x small ships vs 1 latge ship = small ships in favor and can win more easily


kinda how it should be ino, and large ships are awfull to fly (personal opinion) you truly feel your commanding a whale and i personally love smaller ships regardless because of it, i like to dance, i dont much like to float.

 

[Hooplah]

Again it's all about PVP whining because someone figured out a way to effectively use a ship in the game. The balance also has to take in the considerations of PvE players but that usually isn't part of their discussion. The balance works as others have solutions which the promoters seem to disregard as unacceptable. But that is the singular focus that so many posts have wanting specific changes without regards to the overall game play. Nothing new here.

 

[CoreHaven]

I'm not seeing the problem. Small does not always mean faster.

These small ships are dirt cheap, chunks of junk you buy when starting out. They should not ever be able to compete with the more expensive ships, which right now just happen to be larger.

You know what would be nice? If there were some 15 million credit small ships. A 50 million credit small ship. Something that just FLIES. Something that zips around like crazy. But that might be a balance nightmare for the devs so I understand if we never see that kind of thing.

 

[Agony_Aunt]

Part 1??? Part 1??? How many of these are you planning Zil? :O

 

[TheGrimCorsair]

Part 1??? Part 1??? How many of these are you planning Zil? :O

Hopefully he fills the whole front page up.

Maybe setup a half million zombies or so to just keep posting them to General Discussion 'til it's the only thing there. All moderators would have time for is trying (and failing) to keep up with them.

0: )

 

[paulca]

The whole fixed speed anti-mechanic strikes.

If you have to keep the fixed top speed, ships should have inertia and thus larger ships should take a lot longer to get to their top speed. Small ships should get there is under a second. Large ships like the python should take closer to a minute.

 

[OMIKRONXI]

I have a Corvette, Anaconda, Python - and I think reverse flying simply ruins the fun of the ED flight model.

Agreed. But it seems to me that most people prefer playing effectively. Always keep in mind: This isn't a game. ED is hard work.

/ironic mode disabled

 

[Gimmename]

I never notice any problems with getting on the tail of big NPC ships. I love to fight in Eagle or Viper from time to time.

Don't know much about PVP, because I use bigger ships for that purpose.

 

[faluc]

This reads like the OP wants to defeat large ships with small ships, in one on one PvP duels.

Current scenario: Large ship loses in turning battle vs small ship in forward flight - large ship flies backwards to be able to hit small ship - small ship has no chance now and leaves the fight - big ship "wins"

Let's assume the suggestions are implemented. What happens then?
Large ship loses in turning battle in forward flight - large ship tries flying backwards and still loses in turning battle - large ship leaves the fight - small ship "wins"

Apart from the small ship pilot getting an ego boost for making the big ship run away, I fail to see why the second scenario is any better than the first.

 

[Apos]

Meaningless without assessment of risk/reward equation.

As I said...

What risk is there in flying 2000 MJ shield behemoths?

Small ships can't even ram you which is the only plausible way to get those shields down in time at present.

You have already bought safety+firepower with those millions. There's already a reward. I don't understand why you keep pretending that buffs to ship handling in smaller ships would have them chew over big player ships. You'd just have to use more turrets at best. Turrets suck? Well, get friends as turret crew when the feature is here.