Ramming

Been running a Full Metal FAS since they came out, but took a while to switch to B modules (MOAR MASS!). Using Military Grade bulkheads, no shields and all internals are HRM.

While it is very, very good at ramming, its actually built as a shield breaker, where the twin medium lasers wear the target down on approach and the twin large Frag Cannons rip the target to pieces after the ram.

I tried something similar on the Conda but.. simply too slow, to clumsy. I'd like to try it out on an Orca but I reckon the loss in agility, along with losing a Large Frag, won't make it worth the while. Plus the running costs are significantly higher than the FAS, which again doesn't lend it readily to the ram & bam styşe of play.
 
Right. Close enough. The acceleration process is how you gain that energy after all. Integrate that force (single impact) and voilà, it's energy. Conveniently equivalent to shield damage.

So not close enough it is kinda scary.

Lets do a little thought experiment:

We are both in ships weighing 100 tons headed for an asteroid. In 10 seconds, we will both impact. According to the terms of the two equations:

My VELOCITY is 100mps
You are ACCELERATING at 100mps.

My damage: 100/2 * 100^2 = 500,000
Your Damage: 100 * 100 = 10000.

Oh look, I probably lost my shields, maybe even died, and you are alive and maybe lost half a ring of shields, right? 50x the damage! Physics is cool!

Well, not exactly. See, you were ACCELERATING for 10 seconds at 100 mps, so that means your VELOCITY was actually 100 * 10, or 1000.
That means, using the right math and physics, you took
100/2 X 1000^2 = 50,000,000.

Ooops. Apply the confetti rule. They saw the flash half way across the system. We can't even scrape a few atoms off the asteroid to send home for burial.

So using the right math and physics is important.
 
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Physics is cool!
[...]
So using the right math and physics is important.
Yes, and neither force nor kinetic energy are outright equal to damage. Chill.
(especially considering all you see is a damage % - without knowing your shield/hull strength as an energy value it can sustain you can't really determine damage)
 
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Yes, and neither force nor kinetic energy are outright equal to damage. Chill.
(especially considering all you see is a damage % - without knowing your shield/hull strength as an energy value it can sustain you can't really determine damage)

I don't need to know the damage model, I know the physics. The formula used correctly gives output in Joules, and guess how our shields are rated? Yep. MegaJoules.

I know you are using the wrong formula and I know that is how bad programming gets done, someone THINKS they know how the math works because they sorta paid attention in physics class, but not really. Maybe they "googled it."


Then they code a bunch of crap around the original mistake because the model "Doesn't work".
 
So not close enough it is kinda scary.

Lets do a little thought experiment:

We are both in ships weighing 100 tons headed for an asteroid. In 10 seconds, we will both impact. According to the terms of the two equations:

My VELOCITY is 100mps
You are ACCELERATING at 100mps.

My damage: 100/2 * 100^2 = 500,000
Your Damage: 100 * 100 = 10000.

Oh look, I probably lost my shields, maybe even died, and you are alive and maybe lost half a ring of shields, right? 50x the damage! Physics is cool!

Well, not exactly. See, you were ACCELERATING for 10 seconds at 100 mps, so that means your VELOCITY was actually 100 * 10, or 1000.
That means, using the right math and physics, you took
100/2 X 1000^2 = 50,000,000.

Ooops. Apply the confetti rule. They saw the flash half way across the system. We can't even scrape a few atoms off the asteroid to send home for burial.

So using the right math and physics is important.

Except that his result is in Newtons and your result is in Joules.
 
Anyway there is a topic somewhere on the forum where a kind guy made some trial&error with ramming damage. cannot find it atm...
 
A little advice for the OP:-

1. Always have ship insurance.
2. Ramming is a legitimate part of the game... NPCs use it, and so do we.
3. Getting killed is also part of the game... get used to it, it will happen from time to time.
4. Never leave a station without ship insurance.
5. Did I mention ship insurance?
 
A little advice for the OP:-

1. Always have ship insurance.
2. Ramming is a legitimate part of the game... NPCs use it, and so do we.
3. Getting killed is also part of the game... get used to it, it will happen from time to time.
4. Never leave a station without ship insurance.
5. Did I mention ship insurance?

Great advice, Quasar. Hopefully the OP will read it and take it on board once the salty rage-quittiness has ebbed away. I sorta know how he feels. We were all like that at the beginning when we got utterly creamed into noobness paté, weren't we, if we're honest?

Oh - did you mention insurance, btw? Always with the insurance. Even Rain Man has it, and he's a very good driver...
 
Except that his result is in Newtons and your result is in Joules.
Doesn't really matter what his is in, it is the wrong formula anyway. It could be in bananas, for all the relevance it has.

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I feel like talking to a wall.

Thanks for the condescending tone.
You are talking to a wall?

It is one thing to be wrong, it is another to insist on continuing to be wrong and learning nothing.

I award you no points, and may God have mercy on your soul.
 
Not too much to add other than, the pain will lessen with time and....

There are 2 aspects - how much damage caused which is speed and mass based and how well you take the damage.
Armour and hull re-re-enforced hull makes a huge difference once shields are depleted (4 pips helps).

Also avoiding rams in a Pythons is actually quite hard with crap thrusters. Lovely ship but a little awkward and hard to use with cheaper load out, best used as trading vessel.

Simon

Simon
 
You are talking to a wall?

It is one thing to be wrong, it is another to insist on continuing to be wrong and learning nothing.

I award you no points, and may God have mercy on your soul.

No, I'm not talking to a wall. I said it feels like it, because you aren't acknowledging anything I say and calling things outright wrong and rant about people only "sorta [paying] attention in physics class", claiming that I'm learning nothing and only you are right.
And while I'm trying to have enough respect and not reply in the same condescending tone I still can't let it sit on me.

Doesn't really matter what his is in, it is the wrong formula anyway. It could be in bananas, for all the relevance it has.

It is extremely important, because your example is effectively comparing bananas with apples (just like you consider it extremely important to better start with your equation - and I agree with you). You claim the resulting values of our equations equal damage, when really they only equal force and kinetic energy - both of which are important to arrive at ramming damage from two non intercepting objects. They use different units, thus you cannot compare their values in your example to prove anything wrong.

So here is how I see it, maybe you'll accept that as any learning on my side - if there is anything wrong, correct me on it so I do actually learn anything:

At least one of two non intercepting objects needs to accelerate towards the other for a ram. That's the acceleration force I was on about that creates the kinetic energy. If you were to only accelerate in an infinitely small interval of time (an impulse if I'm not mistaken), that force would create all the kinetic energy at an instant. Easy conversion, the numbers should add up.

At constant velocity (moment of impact being the crucial one as a ramming ship often accelerates all the way) the objects have their respective kinetic energy from the previous acceleration. Conveniently shields use energy as their health value as I've pointed out before and you did then as well.

However that still doesn't take into account that possibly not all kinetic energy will turn into damage (my Orca kept moving at slightly less speed last time I wrecked an Eagle instead of coming to a full stop) and after that still comes more to the damage model that will in most cases change the effectively visible damage on both shields an hull.

Shields, as you know, get powered via the distributor - put more pips into the systems capacitor and they will effectively take less damage. Do you know the formula for that?

And hull, while conveniently also energy equivalent health points, also has a modifier on it: hull integrity. If you had not just repaired it, hull damage will be higher at lower hull integrity. Do you know the formula for that?

And all that still doesn't help the player as he only sees percentages and rings of each.


I'd love to hear more about how you think the whole process calculates through. I hope you know more on the details of energy conversion (the whole thing not being an elastic collision as some of the energy has to go towards damage?)
but if anyone has links/info to insights on the shield/hull modifiers that'd be great too.

(please don't interpret any of this as "insist on continuing to be wrong and learning nothing" :c)
 
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