Ships "Funny Hull" - a commonly known phenomenon?

[Morbad]

Some more documentation on this bug:

Wrong resistances on alloys · Issue #483 · EDCD/coriolis

This build has a wrong value as armour thermal resistance. Correct stats:

github.com

Issue Tracker

issues.frontierstore.net

I have. I can't find any English definition that calls out intent as anything to do with the definition of a cheat (noun). The verb has plenty of intent, but it's not the word in using. The closest i can find is the definition of a (person) who is a cheat, one who cheats... which is one of many covered by the same source that also includes my use.

So what next? I cite a reference to the definition, you claim its not authoritative for whatever reason... this all gets dead-ended if we're not going to acknowledge the meaning of words.

I literally just put "cheat definition" into a search engine and clicked the first mainstream dictionary website (Merriam-Webster) that came up. It lists five noun definitions, four of them clearly feature intent, including the first.

Definition of CHEAT

to deprive of something valuable by the use of deceit or fraud; to influence or lead by deceit, trick, or artifice; to elude or thwart by or as if by outwitting… See the full definition

www.merriam-webster.com

If Merriam-Webster is too American for some, well the very next dictionary destination on my search was Cambridge and their first two definition of the noun 'cheat' also implicitly feature intent.

cheat

1. to behave in a dishonest way in order to get what you want: 2. to have a…

dictionary.cambridge.org

These are some of the largest print and online English language dictionaries that exist. So, I'm certainly not cherry picking definitions. The definition I use is the definition I most often encounter as native English speaker residing among other native English speakers. If I say someone is a cheat, pretty much everyone knows that implies dishonesty...someone with an intent to deceive or defraud.

Dictionaries aren't often authoritative, language being a dynamic thing, but up to date ones are usually representative of the way words have been and are used. If you are separating intent from cheat, cheats, cheating, or cheaters, then we are not speaking the same language and I do not believe that Frontier means what you mean when they say "cheat".

And they seem to do it iteratively for every module added, rather than calculating all the multipliers then applying the diminishing returns at the end. If they did the softcap last in the calculation then Funny Hull wouldn't work.

That said, it's really only useful for station ganking since station defences are thermal reverb lasers. It's less useful than more conventional builds against absolute damage (ie. most meta pvp builds with plasma) and since most funny hull builds are shieldless their modules are extremely vulnerable to missiles.

Part of the issue is that hull resistance was given a different baseline than shields for diminishing returns. The baseline for shields is an offset from whatever the shield generator provides. The halving on hull resistances starts at a fixed value, one which some bulkheads can start out exceeding. There still should not be this roll-over effect.

But yes, the utility of this bug, even with malicious intent, is quite small. The only advantage over other non-bugged builds is the ability to reach a level of thermal resistance that roughly doubles effective thermic hull integrity at a cost to raw effective integrity in every other damage category. As you say, the main use for this balance would be to absorb station laser fire...a use that I would certainly consider as evidence of intent to exploit a bug.

 

[Morbad]

Was playing around with Coriolis some more and I can confirm they don't perfectly match the in-game resistances...which isn't surprising since the issue is still open on the Coriolis github tracker.

Still, I'm convinced the nature of the issue is the same; any bulkheads that start far enough into the resistance soft cap seems to cause further resistances of that type to invert. The contribution of negative resistances from bulkheads is halved, but it's positive, rather than negative. The other bulkheads can't quite reach a base resistance value high enough to trigger this inversion, at least not any more (there may have been exceedingly rare 'god rolls' in the old system extreme enough to get kinetic resistance on reactive to the critical point). You can get all resistances near the intended 65% cap, but you can't trigger this bug without mirrored.

So yeah, Frontier made a system more than seven years ago where the fundamental math was broken then barely acknowledged nearly as many years of bug reports.

 

[Quaero]

.....then barely acknowledged nearly as many years of bug reports.

By 2024 this shouldn't really be a surprise

 

[Northpin]

As you say, the main use for this balance would be to absorb station laser fire...a use that I would certainly consider as evidence of intent to exploit a bug.

I'd say building this type of ship is the main evidence of intending to exploit a bug, no matter the way it's being used.

It's not a common build that someone can stumble upon by mistake, but something that was looked for / researched
Not to mention the average joe is not into pvp and not into min-maxing (not like there's anything in this build about min as much is about max) - so whoever is building and using it is doing it while being well aware of its effects (even tho they may decide to play stupid by saying "i didn't know" )

Sure, using it for in-station ganking instead of open space combat may increase the gravity of the offense, but again, it's still bug exploit no matter the use case scenario.

Also, limited use scenario?
This Conda looks like a perfectly workable combat ship - half decent fast-charging shields, the "funny" hull with 50+50+80 resists (so no weak spot), 3x HRP + AFMU, a weapon assortment that should go easy on the PD to allow recharging broken shields - but basically that's fully customizable, 2 open utility slots to be used for either extra skill boosters or for other stuff like maybe a dual chaff or heatsinks or whatever.

 

[Ozric]

Right let's knock it off please. Stop with the semantics arguments and calm down

 

[Frankymole]

The creator (CrimsonGamer99) links to the build:
Linky

It relies on 10 internal slots like what the Cobra Mk IV has; so this manifestation of the issue will only affect players with a Mk IV. Since that's a reward ship it seems unlikely it will be nerfed tbh.

The Cobra Mk IV is widely derided as being "not really an improvement on the Mk III" so it's nice if it has something uniquely "good" about it.

 

[Helmut Grokenberger]

As you say, the main use for this balance would be to absorb station laser fire...a use that I would certainly consider as evidence of intent to exploit a bug.

this isn't exactly a new concept, and I've first learned about it exactly in that context: Station gankers and other trolls building Anacondas that are more or less immune to station laser fire, and making funny videos about it how long they were able to survive inside a station under fire. You know, to "make a point for Frontier to fix that bug". Totally not to abuse an exploit for the lolz.

 

[Morbad]

It's not a common build that someone can stumble upon by mistake, but something that was looked for / researched

I'm quite sure it's been independently stumbled upon many times. All one has to do is slap thermal resistant reflective bulkheads and a few blast or kinetic HRPs on a ship before thermal resistance climbs to levels that aren't supposed to be possible.

The first time I saw this bug myself was an accident, because I tend to fly hybrid/hull focused vessels and have generally averaged something like four dozen G5 HRPs between my CMR's ships and storage since the second month of 2.1. Of course, I tossed pretty much all of the kinetic and blast resistant ones when it became clear that they were wasted on non-bugged builds. I still have a set of mirrored composites or two from when I was blockade running against RoA's wings of rail boats, but it's been years since I put them on a ship.

Not to mention the average joe is not into pvp and not into min-maxing (not like there's anything in this build about min as much is about max) - so whoever is building and using it is doing it while being well aware of its effects (even tho they may decide to play stupid by saying "i didn't know" )

PvP isn't/wasn't uncommon and min-maxing is par for the course among experienced players, even ones that rarely engage in PvP. What else are they going to do with piles of materials that fall on them?

Also, limited use scenario?
This Conda looks like a perfectly workable combat ship - half decent fast-charging shields, the "funny" hull with 50+50+80 resists (so no weak spot), 3x HRP + AFMU, a weapon assortment that should go easy on the PD to allow recharging broken shields - but basically that's fully customizable, 2 open utility slots to be used for either extra skill boosters or for other stuff like maybe a dual chaff or heatsinks or whatever.

No sane armor scheme has a particular weak spot because the game makes it so easy to legitamately plug any holes. The only advantage your build has is double the effective thermic damage resistance, which means relatively little against most PvP builds (it's moderately useful against rails, and would have been nice against the three people who used to not suck with SRB thermal conduit beam laser boats, but most ships have enough non-thermic damage sources to negate the advantage of a resistance focused hull setup) and is totally irrelevant against NPCs (who are either never going to drop anyone's shields anyway, or are Thargoids and don't do thermic damage).

I took your build and switched it to the de faco to big ship armor scheme that is entirely rule kosher:

Coriolis EDCD Edition

A ship builder, outfitting and comparison tool for Elite Dangerous

coriolis.io

Significantly better effective hull integrity in every area except thermic, most especially with regard to absolute, caustic, and kinetic damage. It's not always better than the exploit build, but it's definitely not worse, overall.

I did toss the third MRP as more than two D rated MRPs is total overkill for a ship with an AMFU. Damage being diverted to the MRPs faster than can be repaired is as bad as the opposite as it means more frequent trips to the module pane in a tense situation, usually just to have the ship blow up from reaching zero hull well before critical modules are in jeopardy.

Essentially everyone with a hull focused ship and sufficient internals is running something that looks like this; reactive bulkheads and heavy duty HRPs, with a single small thermal resistant HRP to balance resistances. This is the best all-round setup that only narrowly loses to other non-bugged setups in extremely niche scenarios when you know for a fact your opponents have specific loadouts. Engineering...a million options, but usually only one real choice.

this isn't exactly a new concept, and I've first learned about it exactly in that context: Station gankers and other trolls building Anacondas that are more or less immune to station laser fire, and making funny videos about it how long they were able to survive inside a station under fire. You know, to "make a point for Frontier to fix that bug". Totally not to abuse an exploit for the lolz.

Most of them are absolutely abusing an exploit 'for the lolz'.

However, I also think it's worth putting those setups in perspective. Station weapons have been buffed no less than three times (quite possibly more) and all previous incarnations of station weapons took longer to kill non-exploit builds than the current ones take to bring down the exploited builds. That doesn't justify or excuse using exploits to linger in the slot or docking tube twice as long as otherwise, but this exploit most certainly did not enable anything new.

 

[Elpapo]

Also, limited use scenario?
This Conda looks like a perfectly workable combat ship - half decent fast-charging shields, the "funny" hull with 50+50+80 resists (so no weak spot), 3x HRP + AFMU, a weapon assortment that should go easy on the PD to allow recharging broken shields - but basically that's fully customizable, 2 open utility slots to be used for either extra skill boosters or for other stuff like maybe a dual chaff or heatsinks or whatever.

Its still conda. There is reasons why its not that much popular in PVP, and its preety rare to see anyone using at it. Whenever "PVP" conda shows up, it only loiter around not long before its get ganked by usual meta flybois, unless its backed up by wing, or its user being a good friend of these flybois.

Its too slow to keep up with medium ships, and also it wont be able to secure kills by itself either if used for gank, unless camping next to station, because most things will simply outrun it before it can do any meaningfull damage to them. Hence, thats why its "limited use scenario" case for such bulid.

This bulid would also having problems with dealing with meta FDL's, either full PA or PA+rails bulids, due that these can orbit it with ease and not really be able evade thier attacks, while having problems on its own, to deliver damage back at them.

And if more than one of such would attack at it, it wont hold long either (the most likely scenario). Just few volleys of PA with some ramming and its shields are gone... It would not hold long enough to regen its shields 2 maybe 3 times, before it would be rekt.

 

[Elpapo]

This is the best all-round setup that only narrowly loses to other non-bugged setups in extremely niche scenarios when you know for a fact your opponents have specific loadouts.

Yep, I assume that "niche" setup You mention is nothing else than missiles + emissive. The ultimate bane vs any hull tank bulids.

Still, plently of these are around though, but almost all of them wont bother attacking anything that got more than single missile rack... until last update, thats it.

What I mean, by last update, due of missile rack bug on certain hardpoints at many ships (wich stops fire soon after first lock-on is over or few salvos if dumb - so its basically waste of hardpoints for many ships atm) does indeed seriously limits a lot variety for bulids that would use missiles, and worse part if that specific hardpoints that are being affected, are ones that was viable to put missiles on it.

I got feel that almost its sole reason why I noticed an surge on hull tank bulids, in numbers Ive not seen in years, since that last update, and thier readiness to attack bulids that they otherwise didnt bother attack before.

 

[BackToTheMud]

If indeed it is replicable in game (and it's not only a coriolis bug - which probably it isnt), then it is an exploit (check the linked post, post #20 in the same thread, eventually the entire thread)
A bug exploit, to be more specific, that can be used to gain unfair advantages - which is cheating, which is a punishable offense

And if you get reported for using that, you may endanger your account.

If something has been in the game for years, and pointed out to the devs on numerous occasions, it can no longer be concidered a bug or an exploit. At this point it's a feature.