Effect of engine pips on agility

Neilski

Neilski
I just decided to mix things up and take my AspEx to a fight (for the first time).

I ended up having to run away because it was sooo different to my Vulture.

I had used Coriolis to spec it out and ensure that it wasn't too horribly compromised wrt my Vulture. So it had better DPS but somewhat weaker hull and shields. I had checked the agility figures and they were slightly worse than the Vulture but not enormously so.

However, in combat, once I diverted pips to shields and weapons... OMG the AspEx was a total pig.

I then went back to Coriolis to see if I had had some kind of brain fart while comparing the specs, and no. But when I varied the ENG pips within Coriolis, the effect on the Vulture pitch rate was negligible and the effect on the AspEx was massive.

I haven't yet drilled down into the data underneath the Coriolis calcs (but given my experience the results seem plausible) but I did a bit of Googling instead. I found a thread here (locked tho) at https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php/367675-Engine-pips which @Morbad refers to the Vulture as being affected in a "subtle" way by ENG pips while others are more extreme (e.g. Python).

Is there a comprehensive list anywhere of how ships are affected by this?

Another, slightly more exotic question: how on earth can this behaviour be "explained"? :) The two ships in question both have 5A Thrusters and fairly similar mass (tho fair enough, the AspEx has a lower class PD).
 
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bicarbon8

B
Neilski said:
I just decided to mix things up and take my AspEx to a fight (for the first time).

I ended up having to run away because it was sooo different to my Vulture.

I had used Coriolis to spec it out and ensure that it wasn't too horribly compromised wrt my Vulture. So it had better DPS but somewhat weaker hull and shields. I had checked the agility figures and they were slightly worse than the Vulture but not enormously so.

However, in combat, once I diverted pips to shields and weapons... OMG the AspEx was a total pig.

I then went back to Coriolis to see if I had had some kind of brain fart while comparing the specs, and no. But when I varied the ENG pips within Coriolis, the effect on the Vulture pitch rate was negligible and the effect on the AspEx was massive.

I haven't yet drilled down into the data underneath the Coriolis calcs (but given my experience the results seem plausible) but I did a bit of Googling instead. I found a thread here (locked tho) at https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php/367675-Engine-pips which @Morbad refers to the Vulture as being affected in a "subtle" way by ENG pips while others are more extreme (e.g. Python).

Is there a comprehensive list anywhere of how ships are affected by this?

Another, slightly more exotic question: how on earth can this behaviour be "explained"? :) The two ships in question both have 5A Thrusters and fairly similar mass (tho fair enough, the AspEx has a lower class PD).
Click to expand...

Front vs Rear thrust is very offset in the Asp X as compared to the Vulture. Also, the vertical and lateral thrusters on the Asp X are less powerful than the Vulture. Add to that the fact that the Asp X is a medium ship (so a bigger target) and the Acceleration multiplier on the Vulture is higher (if I recall) and you get a significantly different flight profile even if the top speeds are similar
 

Neilski

Neilski
Well OK but it's the variation of behaviour with ENG pips that shocked me.

To be quantitative, on the two loadouts in question with 4 ENG pips the pitch rates are 42 vs 49 deg/s (AspEx, Vulture) and with 0 ENG pips the rates are 20 vs 44.
So the AspEx has 86% of the Vulture's pitch rate with 4 pips, and 45% (!!!) with 0 pips... Pretty eyebrow-raising stuff, at least for me ;)
 

Morbad

Morbad
Every ship has a unique flight profile with varying cruise and boost speeds, acceleration, rotation, sensitivity to blue zone, and pip slope.

Some ships are quite similar, while others can be a night and day difference, even with the same thruster module.

Neilski said:
Another, slightly more exotic question: how on earth can this behaviour be "explained"? :) The two ships in question both have 5A Thrusters and fairly similar mass (tho fair enough, the AspEx has a lower class PD).
Click to expand...

The thruster module doesn't include any thrust ducting/vectoring or the exhaust nozzles. Just as with the shield gen vs. shield emitters, this is a property of the ship itself.

Think of the thruster module as the engine, with the ship hull containing the transmission, wheels, and tires.
 
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Old Duck

Old Duck
Neilski said:
I then went back to Coriolis to see if I had had some kind of brain fart while comparing the specs, and no. But when I varied the ENG pips within Coriolis, the effect on the Vulture pitch rate was negligible and the effect on the AspEx was massive.
Click to expand...

The Vulture is a unique ship in my experience. I notice it more with top speed, in that pips don't change the top speed of my Vulture much at all compared to the rest of my fleet. I actually like it this way, as it makes pip management a bit easier, as I just need to focus on shields and weapons (making sure I always have enough stored energy in the cap for a boost).
 

Morbad

Morbad
Old Duck said:
The Vulture is a unique ship in my experience. I notice it more with top speed, in that pips don't change the top speed of my Vulture much at all compared to the rest of my fleet. I actually like it this way, as it makes pip management a bit easier, as I just need to focus on shields and weapons (making sure I always have enough stored energy in the cap for a boost).
Click to expand...

The vulture has the most favorable pip slope in the game, but most of the dedicated combat craft are better than multi-purpose ships, and Core Dynamics vessels tend to be pretty good in general.
 

Krash

Krash
This confused me until I got a handle on it (ship notwithstanding):
Throttle in the blue
thrust down, pitch up (meh)

Now do the same thing but boost right before:
Throttle in the blue
-Boost-
thrust down, pitch up (Weeeee)

You'll notice, even with FAon, you can make 180deg turns much faster in any ship, even the dreaded cutter.
 

Urbanski101

Urbanski101
dekot said:
Vulture is easy mode, now you have to actually worry about pips.
Click to expand...

This ^^

The Vulture is possibly the simplest ship in ED to fly, there is almost no need to alter pips (especially with my uber easy Pulse set up) and even when you do the effect is minimal compared to changing pips in other vessels.

You simply can't compare the two ships. One of the best parts of ED is the fact that each ship has it's own flight characteristics and 'personality' for want of a better word that can't be explained or predicted with numbers on a spreadsheet.
 
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JetsonRING

JetsonRING
Neilski said:
how on earth can this behaviour be "explained"?
Click to expand...

The Vulture is optimized for combat while an Asp-X is a multi-role ship, an all-arounder. Any combat optimized ship can be expected to outmaneuver almost any multi-role ship of similar mass but the stock Asp-X is 14% less maneuverable than a stock Vulture right out of the gate and masses (weighs) 21% more. In addition, the Asp-X is physically larger which means its moment-arm when rotating/turning will have greater inertia making it somewhat more difficult to initiate turning/rotating maneuvers as well as stopping rotating/turning maneuvers.

Picture two bicycle wheels, one large and one small and both with a mark at the rim. The small wheel is easy to start turning, will turn fairly quickly and is easy to stop turning. The large wheel on the other hand will require more energy to get a point (the mark) on its rim to move at the same speed as a point (the mark) on the smaller wheel's rim. It will also require more energy to stop the rotation than did the smaller wheel because of the greater inertia carried by the larger wheels rim.

Another thing to consider is that pips to ENG will increase a ship's top speed on thrusters and the faster an object moves, the more inertia it carries making maneuvers involving Delta-V (changing direction) even more difficult to initiate.

o7
 
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Feros-da-Grundig

Feros-da-Grundig
As others have said, Vulture is the most forgiving about pips. But different considerations apply for various ships. Consider Vette vs. Conda:

- At 0 eng pips, Vette has ~16% better pitch rate and ~30% better roll rate, while Conda has ~16% better yaw

- At 4 eng pips, Vetta only has ~5% advantage on pitch and ~16% on roll, while Conda has ~33% yaw advantage

So good pip management very much helps the conda to keep up with the modestly more agile Vette.

A conda pilot who manages pips well and leverages yaw can probably use fixed weapons more effectively than a Vette, due to Condas moderately better hardpoint convergence

But then Vette pilot might counter with good sys pips management when hit. Vette has better shields.

And so forth.

Pip management is one of a few things that separate decent pilots from very good ones. I try to practice it diligently, even against opponents I don't need to (e.g. NPCs) because it will make the difference whether I can compete with a good pilot in combat. A tough fight should have pip adjustment beeps going almost constantly. If I'm not hearing "beep beep boop" a lot I consider it a sign I am being lazy sub-optimal in combat.
 
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Feros-da-Grundig

Feros-da-Grundig
Spacecat said:
Pips mainly seem to effect boost frequency. Ship maneuverability is sort of baked into the ship from the start.
Click to expand...

Definitely not true. Just go to Coriolis and compare effects of eng pips on the agility (look at "profile" tab towards bottom) of the asp, challenger and the vulture (which are examples of large effect (asp) medium effect (chally) and small effect(vulture)).

With both at 4 pips Asp is more maneuverable than Challenger. At zero pips asp is less maneuverable than Challenger. At 2 pips they are roughly equal. Meanwhile vulture loses relatively little agility from 4 to 0 pips, compared to the others.
 
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Neilski

Neilski
Thanks for all of the replies folks.
I must dig into the data underneath Coriolis to find the slopes etc, just for fun.

As for the origins of the effect (so as to try and maintain some level of immersion ;)), well with regard to physics & moments of inertia etc., I totally get that the two ships in question have different physical layout but that would not produce a non-linearity (i.e. the slower one would be slower by the same ratio regardless of pips). I am going to go with the "different thrust vectoring/nozzles" argument as I can see in a hand-wavy way how that at least offers the possibility of introducing some non-linear behaviour :D

And of course, I've just gotta git gud and learn how to fight in some other ships, and get slicker at tweaking my pips. Slightly disheartening to learn that the Vulture is essentially the easiest wrt pips management! LOL...
 

Krash

Krash
Neilski said:
Thanks for all of the replies folks.
I must dig into the data underneath Coriolis to find the slopes etc, just for fun.

As for the origins of the effect (so as to try and maintain some level of immersion ;)), well with regard to physics & moments of inertia etc., I totally get that the two ships in question have different physical layout but that would not produce a non-linearity (i.e. the slower one would be slower by the same ratio regardless of pips). I am going to go with the "different thrust vectoring/nozzles" argument as I can see in a hand-wavy way how that at least offers the possibility of introducing some non-linear behaviour :D

And of course, I've just gotta git gud and learn how to fight in some other ships, and get slicker at tweaking my pips. Slightly disheartening to learn that the Vulture is essentially the easiest wrt pips management! LOL...
Click to expand...

I agree pip management is easy in the vulture, but is it easier than the phantom? Consider the superior power and heat management of the Krait ships.
 

Neilski

Neilski
Neilski said:
I must dig into the data underneath Coriolis to find the slopes etc, just for fun.
Click to expand...

OK, I reckon I just found it, rather more readily than expected.
Here's the pipSpeed setting for each ship, sorted with smallest first, in case anyone else is curious. (If this is in fact the wrong ship-data field for the pip-sensitivity effect, please lemme know and I'll wipe it! :))

NB: this list uses the ship's internal name (an FD thing, not a Coriolis thing, I believe), so my AspEx is just called "asp" below.
Clearly it's at the "sensitive" end of the scale, with very few combat ships having significantly higher values. And yes indeed the Vulture is way out on its own with the FDL and (bizarrely?) the T10 in 2nd and 3rd places.
Having built myself a Python combat ship, I might now sell it off and finally try the FDL instead...

EDIT: MAJOR HEALTH WARNING ON THIS DATA, AS OF 24/2/2021: The ship handling characteristics appear to have been changed since this data was created. I have no idea when or why, but the effect of having fewer pips to ENG seems to have been dramatically reduced for at least some ships if not all.
Code: 
vulture: 0.023809523809524
fer_de_lance: 0.038461538461538
type_10_defender: 0.041666666666667
imperial_cutter: 0.05
imperial_courier: 0.053571428571429
mamba: 0.056451612903226
eagle: 0.0625
federal_assault_ship: 0.071428571428571
imperial_eagle: 0.075
orca: 0.083333333333333
alliance_chieftain: 0.08695652173913
viper_mk_iv: 0.087962962962963
alliance_challenger: 0.088709677419355
krait_phantom: 0.09
krait_mkii: 0.09375
viper: 0.09375
diamondback_scout: 0.096153846153846
python: 0.097826086956522
diamondback_explorer: 0.098214285714286
imperial_clipper: 0.1
federal_gunship: 0.10294117647059
federal_dropship: 0.11111111111111
beluga: 0.1125
asp_scout: 0.125
cobra_mk_iii: 0.125
cobra_mk_iv: 0.125
federal_corvette: 0.125
asp: 0.13
dolphin: 0.13
adder: 0.13636363636364
sidewinder: 0.13636363636364
keelback: 0.1375
anaconda: 0.13888888888889
type_6_transporter: 0.14772727272727
alliance_crusader: 0.15833333333333
hauler: 0.1625
type_7_transport: 0.16666666666667
type_9_heavy: 0.17307692307692
 
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Neilski

Neilski
Krash said:
I agree pip management is easy in the vulture, but is it easier than the phantom? Consider the superior power and heat management of the Krait ships.
Click to expand...
Good point about heat - I'm still learning how important that is. (Among other things I'm slightly stunned that it's pretty vital to pop a heatsink after an SCB. And rail guns get hot!)

The Phantom is a ship I've not seriously looked at but will do so now. (It does have a much higher "pipSpeed" value than the Vulture though.)
 
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