"Married" Weapons

Jason Clearbrook

Jason Clearbrook
New engineer needed. One who "marries" weapons.

The idea is simple: Two small weapons can be "married" to create a medium one. Two mediums can be "married" to make a large one. Two larges can be "married" to make a huge one.

Weapons cannot be turreted, since they will cross each other. They can be gimballed or fixed, but not both. Fixed weapons will get a very limited gimbal capability. Certain weapons, such as mine launchers, can be "married" to anything. "Married" weapons can themselves be "married" to another, (either "married" or not) weapon system. "Married" weapons can only track the same target, they share one fire control and targeting scanner. "Married" weapons cannot be engineered after they are "married" and "unmarrying" them removes all engineering.

Strait up. Simple. Improves variety.

;'{P~~~
 

Jason Clearbrook

Jason Clearbrook
Sure. Making it possible to make your weapons mix just slightly more tailored to your specific needs. If you look at the payoffs, it would not be worth it to some. But, some may tinker with this, and it would give them new goals to be engaged in the game, and not just shelf it.

:'{P~~~
 
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Vedmo

Vedmo
So a Corvette could be flying around with 26 smalls filling all of its hard points, or 12 mediums and 2 smalls, or 4 large and 4 mediums with 2 smalls, and the list goes on. There is no denying that would increase the number of choices one could make, but I'm not sure I what you are trying to achieve either.

Weapon sizes aren't balanced by doubling with each increase, so 2 of one size will do more damage than one of the next higher size (not taking into account piercing and other handicaps of smalls), but I'm guessing that's why you put the no engineering clause on it?

4 small pulses do 31.6 dps. One large pulse does 18.1 dps. Overcharge/oversize that large pulse and it does 31.7 dps with about half the distributor draw of the 4 non-engineered smalls that could take it place. I'm thinking one could potentially bypass engineering to achieve the theoretical damage of fully engineered weapons with this, but completely handicap their ship in trying to do so as the relationships between power draw, supply, and distribution were not designed with anything like this in mind.
 

Jason Clearbrook

Jason Clearbrook
If the "married" weapons can be added to or not to specific fire groups, you can control heat and/or power usage more effectively. Again, some may not find this useful, but if you have played a certain configuration long enough, you realize that by taking half of one weapon system offline, you can improve power utilization for a certain situation, such as your shields running low and wanting to put a half a pip more to systems from weapons, and it can be noticably more flexible.

;'{P~~
 

Jason Clearbrook

Jason Clearbrook
Vedmo said:
So a Corvette could be flying around with 26 smalls filling all of its hard points, or 12 mediums and 2 smalls, or 4 large and 4 mediums with 2 smalls, and the list goes on. There is no denying that would increase the number of choices one could make, but I'm not sure I what you are trying to achieve either.

Weapon sizes aren't balanced by doubling with each increase, so 2 of one size will do more damage than one of the next higher size (not taking into account piercing and other handicaps of smalls), but I'm guessing that's why you put the no engineering clause on it?

4 small pulses do 31.6 dps. One large pulse does 18.1 dps. Overcharge/oversize that large pulse and it does 31.7 dps with about half the distributor draw of the 4 non-engineered smalls that could take it place. I'm thinking one could potentially bypass engineering to achieve the theoretical damage of fully engineered weapons with this, but completely handicap their ship in trying to do so as the relationships between power draw, supply, and distribution were not designed with anything like this in mind.
Click to expand...


Yup and yup. There are trade offs. What are you looking for? More penetration means don't marry. You will lose it. etc. BTW, I was not saying that the weapons could not be engineered. You can do so before marrying them, but you really have to know what you are looking to achieve, or you start over at square one, which for some, would be a worthwhile challenge, while for others, would be too much trouble. Variety in play styles is supported by this.

;'{P~~~
 

GoldenSilver484

GoldenSilver484
Vedmo said:
So a Corvette could be flying around with 26 smalls filling all of its hard points, or 12 mediums and 2 smalls, or 4 large and 4 mediums with 2 smalls, and the list goes on. There is no denying that would increase the number of choices one could make, but I'm not sure I what you are trying to achieve either.

Weapon sizes aren't balanced by doubling with each increase, so 2 of one size will do more damage than one of the next higher size (not taking into account piercing and other handicaps of smalls), but I'm guessing that's why you put the no engineering clause on it?

4 small pulses do 31.6 dps. One large pulse does 18.1 dps. Overcharge/oversize that large pulse and it does 31.7 dps with about half the distributor draw of the 4 non-engineered smalls that could take it place. I'm thinking one could potentially bypass engineering to achieve the theoretical damage of fully engineered weapons with this, but completely handicap their ship in trying to do so as the relationships between power draw, supply, and distribution were not designed with anything like this in mind.
Click to expand...
Pulse lasers? Pfft.

I would immediately equip my current 5 C2 railguned Anaconda with 26 C1 railguns. I would need to change the PP from armoured to overcharged and likely the PD from charge enhanced to WEP focused, but my once per second alpha strike would do 543.4 damage instead of 187.
Either at 6km or controlled by an aimbot equipped Elite ranked SLF pilot.

Or 26 high capacity advanced missile racks, with 144 missiles eqch, that do 1300 damage per salvo and can be further engineered to do either thermal damage or internal module damage.

Or 26 C1 frag cannons, only one of which would need corrosive to give them all an APV of 40 and 25% more damage.

Need I explain further why this would be a bad idea from a balancing standpoint?
 

Achtung-Goomba

Achtung-Goomba
GoldenSilver484 said:
I would immediately equip my current 5 C2 railguned Anaconda with 26 C1 railguns. I would need to change the PP from armoured to overcharged and likely the PD from charge enhanced to WEP focused, but my once per second alpha strike would do 543.4 damage instead of 187.
Either at 6km or controlled by an aimbot equipped Elite ranked SLF pilot.
Click to expand...

I’ve heard this has been tried, but the resulting catastrophic misfire launches the Anaconda at the target...
 

RamirezKurita

R
The problem with mounting 2 smalls onto a single medium hardpoint is that 2 smalls have roughly 50% higher DPS than a single medium. Obviously, they would have lower penetration, but weapons like railguns and plasma accelerators don't care about that and so everyone would just pair them up and up to maximise their DPS.

So I would counter with my own recommendation for this: you can mount 2 fixed weapons onto a gimbal that is 2 sizes larger. For example, 2 small fixed pulses onto a large gimbal mount, or 2 medium railguns onto a single gimbaled huge mount. 2 fixed weapons gives roughly the same damage output of a gimbal mount 2 sizes higher, trading penetration for extra flexibility (players could have different engineering mods on each weapon, or even entirely different weapons) and efficiency. This would also allow for a workaround to get gimbaled versions of the current fixed-only weapons. The special gimbal mount also functions as an MRP for the mount to prevent single hits trivially disabling both the included weapons.

Also, this isn't really the realms of engineers, as they simply engineer existing modules and tweak things, rather than developing entire hardpoint mounting systems. To me, this is more of a wholly separate ship modification method, although my amendment for adding in the special "gimbal mount" hardpoints could be implemented as a tech broker thing.
 

Jason Clearbrook

Jason Clearbrook
GoldenSilver484 said:
Pulse lasers? Pfft.

I would immediately equip my current 5 C2 railguned Anaconda with 26 C1 railguns. I would need to change the PP from armoured to overcharged and likely the PD from charge enhanced to WEP focused, but my once per second alpha strike would do 543.4 damage instead of 187.
Either at 6km or controlled by an aimbot equipped Elite ranked SLF pilot.

Or 26 high capacity advanced missile racks, with 144 missiles eqch, that do 1300 damage per salvo and can be further engineered to do either thermal damage or internal module damage.

Or 26 C1 frag cannons, only one of which would need corrosive to give them all an APV of 40 and 25% more damage.

Need I explain further why this would be a bad idea from a balancing standpoint?
Click to expand...


Yeah. I can see that. This idea does not seem to have legs. Oh, well.

;'{P~~~
 

Jason Clearbrook

Jason Clearbrook
RamirezKurita said:
The problem with mounting 2 smalls onto a single medium hardpoint is that 2 smalls have roughly 50% higher DPS than a single medium. Obviously, they would have lower penetration, but weapons like railguns and plasma accelerators don't care about that and so everyone would just pair them up and up to maximise their DPS.

So I would counter with my own recommendation for this: you can mount 2 fixed weapons onto a gimbal that is 2 sizes larger. For example, 2 small fixed pulses onto a large gimbal mount, or 2 medium railguns onto a single gimbaled huge mount. 2 fixed weapons gives roughly the same damage output of a gimbal mount 2 sizes higher, trading penetration for extra flexibility (players could have different engineering mods on each weapon, or even entirely different weapons) and efficiency. This would also allow for a workaround to get gimbaled versions of the current fixed-only weapons. The special gimbal mount also functions as an MRP for the mount to prevent single hits trivially disabling both the included weapons.

Also, this isn't really the realms of engineers, as they simply engineer existing modules and tweak things, rather than developing entire hardpoint mounting systems. To me, this is more of a wholly separate ship modification method, although my amendment for adding in the special "gimbal mount" hardpoints could be implemented as a tech broker thing.
Click to expand...


Your idea is better. Two for one two levels higher, adding gimbal or even turret makes fixed weapons more flexible. Maybe even three, although I should run the DPS numbers to see if that is too OP. But, if fixed could be made gimbaled and gimbaled made turreted, (no fixed could ever be made turreted this way, since you have to go up 2 levels) that increases flexibilty, which was the main idea I was pushing for.

And you could not double marry weapons...

Thanks!

;'{P~~~
 

RamirezKurita

R
Jason Clearbrook said:
Your idea is better. Two for one two levels higher, adding gimbal or even turret makes fixed weapons more flexible. Maybe even three, although I should run the DPS numbers to see if that is too OP. But, if fixed could be made gimbaled and gimbaled made turreted, (no fixed could ever be made turreted this way, since you have to go up 2 levels) that increases flexibilty, which was the main idea I was pushing for.

And you could not double marry weapons...

Thanks!

;'{P~~~
Click to expand...

In terms of numbers, it's actually remarkably close between 2x fixed vs a gimbal two sizes up. For example, a C2 fixed Pulse has 12.1 DPS, so 24.2 when paired, while a gimbaled C4 pulse scores 21.7 DPS. Granted, there's differences in efficiency as the fixed weapons have about 20% greater distro efficiency and lower power draw, but the single larger weapon also has greater penetration.

If there's further issues with regards to the advantage the ~20% greater energy efficiency and extra flexibility provides, then the gimbal mount could quite easily introduce some kind of extra inefficiency to the weapon, such as extra distro draw or power consumption in addition to whatever mass and/or power the mount requires.
 
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