Projectile Lifespan

[OneViGOR]

From my time on Retro Lave, I have played several games where projectiles (lasers, bullets, etc.) simply disappear a short period of time after being fired. They normally have a range, so a certain weapon might have a range of 1km. This would mean it is perfectly possible to hit anything within 1km from you, but after that, poof, it's magically gone. Often this is visual, and you'll see a stream of laser beams refusing to go past a certain point.

I find this really immersion breaking. Scientifically, we know light, such as lasers, can go on for light years, in fact infinitely, assuming nothing obstructs it. There is also no/negligible friction in space, so bullets are still going to be effective even hours after they've been fired.

My question is, do you think Elite: Dangerous should have a lifespan for weapons? If it does, how should it be made seamless and immersive, and if it doesn't, how can the game track each and every projectile that misses its target, heading into deep space?

 

[Kerrash]

I would say that at least technically this would be near impossible to achieve, mainly as there would be many millions more projectiles to track than players. The more interesting question would be, for how much time should weapons fire should be tracked?

For example, once combat is over between two ships; does anyone really care about the shrapnel floating about? Worse still if someone shot at Earth from a few million miles out, would you be happy to be randomly hit a few hours later out of seemingly nowhere?

 

[OneViGOR]

I would say that at least technically this would be near impossible to achieve, mainly as there would be many millions more projectiles to track than players. The more interesting question would be, for how much time should weapons fire should be tracked?

For example, once combat is over between two ships; does anyone really care about the shrapnel floating about? Worse still if someone shot at Earth from a few million miles out, would you be happy to be randomly hit a few hours later out of seemingly nowhere?

I imagine that if a projectile hits something, it's probably going to be within just a couple of second of being fired, but there are exceptions. What if you're trying to hit someone from a long way away?

Perhaps weapons with a shorter range could be tracked for less time than a long-ranged weapon. I doubt anyone's going to care if a shotgun pellet is tracked for more than a second, as it's not going to do anything serious to anything that far away. You might complain is your sniper shell did the same thing though.

 

[Steph]

My question is, do you think Elite: Dangerous should have a lifespan for weapons?

That's a scary thought from a software perspective! Don't forget also all those cargo cannisters of radioactives orbiting around Slough - thousands and thousands of them; drifting around, bumping into each other, entering the atmosphere.... ;-)

 

[Kerrash]

That's a scary thought from a software perspective! Don't forget also all those cargo cannisters of radioactives orbiting around Slough - thousands and thousands of them; drifting around, bumping into each other, entering the atmosphere.... ;-)

Lol. See now that I am not ruling out. After all, each dump event could increment a density value so that the correct number of radioactive containers will be instanced in orbit when you visit Slough

 

[Cody]

Health and Safety: all projectile ammunition automagically self-destructs at pre-determined distances/times in pretty, sparkly displays. Using non-standard, illegal projectile ammunition is strictly banned, and leads to harsh punishment.

 

[jabokai]

To the edge of the instance, logic would suggest. Beyond that, there's no point in it.

 

[Kerrash]

I imagine that if a projectile hits something, it's probably going to be within just a couple of second of being fired, but there are exceptions. What if you're trying to hit someone from a long way away?

Perhaps weapons with a shorter range could be tracked for less time than a long-ranged weapon. I doubt anyone's going to care if a shotgun pellet is tracked for more than a second, as it's not going to do anything serious to anything that far away. You might complain is your sniper shell did the same thing though.

You are absolutely right, there is no reason that different types of weapons couldn't be tracked for different lengths of time; just not forever

 

[warbaby2]

Ha... I dunno. I mean, missiles will most likely detonate as soon as they run out of fuel, lasers will loose power, projectiles will loose speed... there could be sniper/long range versions of certain weapons, but other then that, they should have a pretty short range, all in all.

 

[Cosmos]

Health and Safety: all projectile ammunition automagically self-destructs at pre-determined distances/times in pretty, sparkly displays. Using non-standard, illegal projectile ammunition is strictly banned, and leads to harsh punishment.

Wouldn't that be a nice concept to have employed in landmines and cluster bombs.

I think the OP raises a very good point. For the sake of combat in a particular event its perfectly plausible to have projectiles continue on their trajectory until they meet with something. I'm not sure if it would improve the game but it would certainly add to the skill levels if its possible that my fire, missing intended target, accidentally hits a friendly ship and does the correct amount of damage.

Perhaps for the ironman mode?

 

[jan]

I think in frontier Version missiles lasted 1 min before they blew them self up and i belive it stil be similar lifespan on ammo in ED.

 

[insanephoton]

To the edge of the instance, logic would suggest. Beyond that, there's no point in it.

Indeed I think many of us would find it very annoying to be hit by a random stray shot from a battle that we aren't even aware of. If we tracked every shot until it interacted with something you may eventually manage to shoot yourself

 

[OneViGOR]

Indeed I think many of us would find it very annoying to be hit by a random stray shot from a battle that we aren't even aware of. If we tracked every shot until it interacted with something you may eventually manage to shoot yourself

That's a scary, but interesting thought!

Could you imagine missing a target with a long-range dumbfire missile, then a couple of hours later when chasing a bounty target, he mysteriously blows up, and you still get credit for it?

However interesting the possibilities are, it seems like a bad idea to have the shots continue indefinitely.

 

[insanephoton]

Getting a random credit isn't the worst possibility, you could get a bounty for hitting something that wasn't even there when you fired potentially even years later.

 

[Dr Wookie]

Never fear, the Space Doctor is here!

Space is really big, and empty. The probability of you hitting anything of note by accident will be very small. For example, if I fired a laser in a random direction in the sky, I would have a 1 in ~55000 chance of hitting the Moon or Sun, and 1 in >20,000,000 chance of hitting Mars. And they are all pretty huge! Stations and space craft are far smaller, and harder to hit.

I can definitely see a point in tracking munitions for a while at least within a given instance to see if it hits a ship, but if not, it's safe to assume that they won't hit anything except space grus ! Never mind what this guy says

If you're in orbit round a planet or something, then you are more likely to hit something, but lasers and/or bullets could be absorbed in the atmosphere (if there is one)

 

[Sparticus]

I'd hate to be on the edge of a Galaxy at war - with all those missiles and lasers coming out - not a very friendly welcome for visitors.

Would be a sight to see - a Galaxy turning into a Space Porcupine

 

[Voyager_NL]

Simple solution:
- Missile selfdestructs when out of range
- Laser goes out of focus at long range so the concentrated light loses it's destructive effect
- Plasma disperses and loses temperature

Coding millions of these items to exist for very long times is nigh on impossible for the servers to maintain.

 

[Asp Explorer]

Just out of interest, will projectiles / lasers be affected by gravity?

Say your target has gone behind a small black hole. Can you fire into it's gravitational well and bend their trajectory to hit the target?

Probably just a tiny amount of bend for lasers, but I can really see projectiles being fired, accelerated, and arriving on target with no line of sight.

 

[Gimi]

For lasers and plasma weapons, I would like to see them fade out, but the maximum range should be quite extensive. Effective range is something else and needs to be adjusted to support best possible game play.

For projectile based weapons (bullets, missiles, torpedoes, etc), the answer is easy. Like Cody says, they self destruct after a certain distance. This is common in RL weapons of today, and in some countries this is mandatory by law for all projectiles over a certain calibre in peace time.

You don't want these things flying around in your combat zone, especially when you have ships that can go much faster than the weapons.

Would be nice to see a very tiny flash if you are up close when they self-destruct.

 

[Ian Doncaster]

For the autocannon type of weapon, where the individual shells might be too small to include an effective auto-destruct, the power is going to come from having lots of them packed in a small space. Modern day cannons of that sort tend to have drift of about 1m in every 100m when firing: even if the ED ones are ten times better that's still 1m in every 1km, so at 100km range the storm of dense metals will be spread over a circle 100m in radius. Rather than a concentrated hail locally penetrating shields and armour, there'll be the occasional shell bouncing off the shields, no worse than the routine micrometeorites.