Greetings comrades!
I am reposting here some suggestions that a fellow comrade of communism interstellar posted this morning, but unfortunatly in an unvisited part of these forums...
Original thread: https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php?t=221657
All rights to CMDR Dreamstate. I take no responsibility of what is written here. Please do not rep me for this.
PS: Moderators, please, please don't move this thread.
I am reposting here some suggestions that a fellow comrade of communism interstellar posted this morning, but unfortunatly in an unvisited part of these forums...
Original thread: https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php?t=221657
All rights to CMDR Dreamstate. I take no responsibility of what is written here. Please do not rep me for this.
PS: Moderators, please, please don't move this thread.
Comprehensive Improvements List
I have been playing this game more and more most recently - bought it roughly when it came out, but then dropped off to play ESO (Elder Scrolls Online). However, now that I'm back, and have spent more time getting into the game, there are many things that are bugging the hell out of me... things in this game that can be improved on to make this game EVEN BETTER AND AWESOME! I have written, below, my main gripes at the moment - stuff that, I believe, could make a vast difference to the entire player-base in Elite.
So, without further ado, read on, if you dare...
Kinetic Weapons and Lasers
Burst Lasers, Beam Lasers, Pulse LasersAs far as I can throw them, these weapons are the only reliable weapons in the game that produce decent damage to shields - and based on any other armour penetration factors per laser and grade, can be pretty decent against any ship without shields. Due to their ability to shoot at the speed of light, these weapons are also the most reliable to hit their targets from short to long range. They do not use ammo, so therefore no downtime, aside from allowing the modules to cool and your weapon systems to recharge - Most ships have enough fuel to keep lasers going for hours without reloading and refueling so, as such, I will not count that in this thread and factor it because it is a ridiculous argument (just... please don't).
Cannons, Multi-Cannons
Totally (almost) worthless - unless they are gimbled. The fixed weapon mounts, whilst having the potential to substantially provide more damage, are completely worthless against A.I. opponents that can predict the trajectory of your slow shots, in real-time, in which to totally avoid your one round per shot. However, even when using cannons with gimbles and at a moderate distance (2KM-3KM), the A.I. of ship opponents can easily predict, in real-time, and without looking over their shoulder, how best to avoid your shots at the 'last second' - an unreal amount of piloting that no human could perform, even with an Oculus headset complete with joystick and throttle control - with flight assist turned off. It is just too easy for the projectiles not to be dodged by A.I. opponents.
Okay, so you have five rounds in the chamber - and 90 rounds to reload. Whilst this may sound like a decent amount, it truly is pitiful - because it does not count for the shots that will miss small to medium targets, let alone large targets (like pythons), masterfully dodging the rounds deliberately at the last second - because it just so happens your gimbles are being controlled by A.I. to shoot at A.I., so... yeah, you can see the link here. Not only does a full compliment of Pulse or Burst lasers (armour penetration) out-compete the highly powerful kinetic ammunition, the lasers never run out of ammunition - so, with only 95 rounds per cannon (with a high probably of missing your target if you are greater than 2KM away due to the slow speed of the shells) your to-hit-rate will not only be dreadful 50% of the time, but by the time you have racked up a decent amount of bounty kills, you are already out of ammo. Therefore, the time you spend leaving a Hazard Zone to rearm, and by the time you travel five to ten minutes to reach a station, reload, and then head back to start killing bounties again, the chances are that if you were to use an all-laser compliment instead, your damage (DPS) will probably be way higher on the miles-per-gallon - and you will have already racked up many more bounties because no time is wasted going from A to B to reload.
With gimbles, these weapons are, probably hands-down, the best kinetic weapons in the game. Depending on gimbles, turrets, and grade, these weapons are known collectively as "ch3353 gr4t3r5" against non-shielded ships. The power-draw is minimal (like their bigger brother, Cannons), and the speed at which the rounds can reach their targets means that even the A.I. has a hard time trying to avoid being shot. In my experience, the A.I. doesn't even bother trying to avoid the long stretch of tracers with "last second" dodge attempts that Cannons suffer from. Coupled with decent speed of barrel-to-target ratios, and gimbles, you are getting your investment, easily, over any other kinetic armament in the game. With 90 rounds in the chamber and 2,100 rounds to reload, you aren't TOO short on ammunition. However, just because these weapons out-perform the other contenders for kinetic damage due to their projectile speed, okay armour penetration, and high ammunition, these weapons, in all grades, could be a lot better right now to even compete with lasers. Again, if you were to have an all-laser compliment with low power draw and high armour penetration, why even use Multi-Cannons that use finite ammunition opposed to infinite? Travel time, like with most kinetic-based weapons in this game, is the true enemy to ship armament and customization right now.
What is there more to say? Like Cannons and ANY type of missile launcher in this game, the base amount of rounds right now is crippling long-term game-play. No one wants to feel like their spending every 15 minutes heading out for 10 minutes to reload. Again, why bother with ammunition when lasers never run out? The time spent traveling to and from any space port on planet or to a space station to reload does not make up for the reduced damage against non-shielded ships with lasers. In fact, you would probably still have higher DPS than ships using a mix of lasers and any sort of cannons simply because you aren't leaving the battle.
Conclusion
So, what needs to be done? Well, rather than balance out the rather dubious (and potentially controversial) way of changing anything with nerfs or buffs with the weapons themselves, I will just say what I think really needs to be done to make players happier with the armaments they want to use more often without being forced to stop enjoyment of their game-play, especially in wings.
Much needed Cannon & Multi-Cannon Changes:
Potential Module Additions:
Standard Ammunitions Hold:
Replaces a Cargo Hold slot or equivalent - Increase the amount of Cannon, Multi-Cannon ammunition stored in the ship by 100%/200%/400%/800%/1600%... etc. respectively (larger ships can store more ammo - makes perfect logical sense). Only one Ammunitions Hold module to be safely allowed per ship. Disabling of this module through use of targeting will render the extra ammo inert (not cause an explosion - this would be exploited by extremely sad players, without any doubt). Module can be repaired like any other module to continue normal use.
Potential Ammunition Additions for both Cannon and Multi-Cannon:
Note: Each of the special ammunition holds would also benefit from the increased ammunition storage based on the size you would install.
Reasoning:
This is a pure increase in the amount of ammunition your ship can store. It means players can feel they can be liberal with their shots without feeling the dreaded "tense-trigger-syndrome" or TTS - the inability to shoot for fear of wasting your ammunition because you are not certain your shots will connect - because that would mean massive downtime, a real catch-22 for the pilot. This means that pilots are worrying more about their ammunition than about the enemies they are dog-fighting against - and this is a real problem, especially in wings when you need everyone to listen out for targets, tactics, etc.
Also, considering the shells travel much slower (other than missiles, rockets, or plasma), there is an increased risk of friendly fire. What was once a "Free-Fire" zone has now got a random ship flying in-between your shell's trajectory and the enemy ship. The chance of this happening is massively reduced when using weapons that; a) travel at light speed, or b) travel like multi-cannon rounds.
The risk of something going wrong with cannon shells, and how easily these shots can be avoided so easily by the current A.I., means there is little reward to using a powerful weapon than can barely hit their marked targets - even with gimbles.
Fact is, Cannons in this game are a joke to what we have in real life. I will paste a snippet here about the A-10 Thunderbolt's nose cannon: "Using the cannon, the A-10 is capable of disabling a main battle tank from a range of over 6,500m. The cannon can fire a range of ammunition, including armour-piercing incendiary rounds (API) weighing up to 0.75kg, or uranium-depleted 0.43kg API rounds. The magazine can hold 1,350 rounds of ammunition. The pilot can select a firing rate of 2,100 or 4,200 rounds a minute."
Now, I believe both a new module and a substantial increase to ammo storage would make these weapons extremely playable and enjoyable - and I am not saying we should get an A-10's Thunderbolt cannon - but it would be nice for our Multi-Cannons and Cannons to have a large stock of ammo so we can feel as if our weapons are important. Many will prefer lasers, both, or kinetic weapons as a whole (despite wasting a ton of ammo on shields first - but that's ultimately up to the player), and indeed, many players only use full-laser setups so they have no down-time in ship combat zones - however, options should exist to make an all kinetic build viable and enjoyable.
Considering Multi-Cannons only exist for small and medium hard-points, it isn't as if an Anaconda or larger ships or different ships can take advantage with large and huge hard-points for these weapons. When it comes to Cannons, they fire one shot and are much slower - and only have five rounds in the magazine. Spitfires and Messerschmidts, I can guarantee, had more ammo stocked inside them - and they are 1/10 of the size of many ships.
Now, if we got these ammunition storage changes for Kinetic weapons, then lets further improve our lasers - and the steps are really quite simple, following closely behind the Ammunition storage's steps...
Special note: As with the ammunition storage idea, only one CSD can be active on a ship at any one time - however, I would suggest these CSD's can be mounted in any module slot as they do not use ammunition, so, therefore, more room to hook it up wherever in the ship.
As we can all see from this idea, especially with the last CSD entry, the Emerald Matrix, it would open up an entirely new build to piloting captains - especially in wings. The Amethyst and Ruby Matrix's just give laser pilots more options to enhance their builds and play-style - always a plus.
I won't touch these puppies. They are simple: fixed weaponry, huge damage, low ammo. I consider these the only weapons that should remain untouched because they are deadly enough as it is.
Other ideas?...
I will list one more module that Frontier could add to the game to make our lives in this galaxy more interesting...
Module: Utility
Used by Miners to slow the rate at which an asteroid spins. This module will be able to allow you, the player, to target an asteroid body (currently, you cannot target asteroids), then calculate its spin rate and best axis placement - once fired at the designated location that the scanner suggests, your ship will be able to go into full reverse to slow down the asteroid by a good margin - enough so that your limpets will have a better chance of survival...
So, there we go - some of my ideas.
I will be happy to add other people's ideas into the mix, just let me know on this thread and, above all, leave only constructive comments below!
Thank you!
CMDR Dreamstate.
Greetings all...I have been playing this game more and more most recently - bought it roughly when it came out, but then dropped off to play ESO (Elder Scrolls Online). However, now that I'm back, and have spent more time getting into the game, there are many things that are bugging the hell out of me... things in this game that can be improved on to make this game EVEN BETTER AND AWESOME! I have written, below, my main gripes at the moment - stuff that, I believe, could make a vast difference to the entire player-base in Elite.
So, without further ado, read on, if you dare...
Kinetic Weapons and Lasers
Burst Lasers, Beam Lasers, Pulse Lasers
Cannons, Multi-Cannons
- Cannons:
Totally (almost) worthless - unless they are gimbled. The fixed weapon mounts, whilst having the potential to substantially provide more damage, are completely worthless against A.I. opponents that can predict the trajectory of your slow shots, in real-time, in which to totally avoid your one round per shot. However, even when using cannons with gimbles and at a moderate distance (2KM-3KM), the A.I. of ship opponents can easily predict, in real-time, and without looking over their shoulder, how best to avoid your shots at the 'last second' - an unreal amount of piloting that no human could perform, even with an Oculus headset complete with joystick and throttle control - with flight assist turned off. It is just too easy for the projectiles not to be dodged by A.I. opponents.
- Cannon Ammunition.
Okay, so you have five rounds in the chamber - and 90 rounds to reload. Whilst this may sound like a decent amount, it truly is pitiful - because it does not count for the shots that will miss small to medium targets, let alone large targets (like pythons), masterfully dodging the rounds deliberately at the last second - because it just so happens your gimbles are being controlled by A.I. to shoot at A.I., so... yeah, you can see the link here. Not only does a full compliment of Pulse or Burst lasers (armour penetration) out-compete the highly powerful kinetic ammunition, the lasers never run out of ammunition - so, with only 95 rounds per cannon (with a high probably of missing your target if you are greater than 2KM away due to the slow speed of the shells) your to-hit-rate will not only be dreadful 50% of the time, but by the time you have racked up a decent amount of bounty kills, you are already out of ammo. Therefore, the time you spend leaving a Hazard Zone to rearm, and by the time you travel five to ten minutes to reach a station, reload, and then head back to start killing bounties again, the chances are that if you were to use an all-laser compliment instead, your damage (DPS) will probably be way higher on the miles-per-gallon - and you will have already racked up many more bounties because no time is wasted going from A to B to reload.
- Multi-Cannons:
With gimbles, these weapons are, probably hands-down, the best kinetic weapons in the game. Depending on gimbles, turrets, and grade, these weapons are known collectively as "ch3353 gr4t3r5" against non-shielded ships. The power-draw is minimal (like their bigger brother, Cannons), and the speed at which the rounds can reach their targets means that even the A.I. has a hard time trying to avoid being shot. In my experience, the A.I. doesn't even bother trying to avoid the long stretch of tracers with "last second" dodge attempts that Cannons suffer from. Coupled with decent speed of barrel-to-target ratios, and gimbles, you are getting your investment, easily, over any other kinetic armament in the game. With 90 rounds in the chamber and 2,100 rounds to reload, you aren't TOO short on ammunition. However, just because these weapons out-perform the other contenders for kinetic damage due to their projectile speed, okay armour penetration, and high ammunition, these weapons, in all grades, could be a lot better right now to even compete with lasers. Again, if you were to have an all-laser compliment with low power draw and high armour penetration, why even use Multi-Cannons that use finite ammunition opposed to infinite? Travel time, like with most kinetic-based weapons in this game, is the true enemy to ship armament and customization right now.
- Multi-Cannon Ammunition.
What is there more to say? Like Cannons and ANY type of missile launcher in this game, the base amount of rounds right now is crippling long-term game-play. No one wants to feel like their spending every 15 minutes heading out for 10 minutes to reload. Again, why bother with ammunition when lasers never run out? The time spent traveling to and from any space port on planet or to a space station to reload does not make up for the reduced damage against non-shielded ships with lasers. In fact, you would probably still have higher DPS than ships using a mix of lasers and any sort of cannons simply because you aren't leaving the battle.
Conclusion
So, what needs to be done? Well, rather than balance out the rather dubious (and potentially controversial) way of changing anything with nerfs or buffs with the weapons themselves, I will just say what I think really needs to be done to make players happier with the armaments they want to use more often without being forced to stop enjoyment of their game-play, especially in wings.
Much needed Cannon & Multi-Cannon Changes:
- Increase stock Cannon ammunition from 90 to 900.
- Increase stock Multi-Cannon ammo from 2,100 to 6,300
Potential Module Additions:
Standard Ammunitions Hold:
Replaces a Cargo Hold slot or equivalent - Increase the amount of Cannon, Multi-Cannon ammunition stored in the ship by 100%/200%/400%/800%/1600%... etc. respectively (larger ships can store more ammo - makes perfect logical sense). Only one Ammunitions Hold module to be safely allowed per ship. Disabling of this module through use of targeting will render the extra ammo inert (not cause an explosion - this would be exploited by extremely sad players, without any doubt). Module can be repaired like any other module to continue normal use.
Potential Ammunition Additions for both Cannon and Multi-Cannon:
- Ammunitions Hold: Depleted-Uranium
- Decreases flight speed of projectiles by 25%
- Increases Armour Penetration by one rank (So, if it was an A- rated weapon, it would now be an A). Armour Penetration cannot exceed A+.
- Power Draw increased by 10%.
- This special ammunition hold can only be replenished on planet or on station - cannot be replicated by the player. Replaces normal ammunition for all Cannons and/or Multi-Cannons if moduled.
- Special note: more useful on small ships with small power-plants that need more punch against larger, tougher opponents.
- Ammunitions Hold: Anti-Matter
- Decreases Rate-of-Fire by 50%
- Increases Armour Penetration by two ranks. Armour Penetration cannot exceed A+.
- Power Draw increased by 33%.
- This special ammunition hold can only be replenished on planet or on station - cannot be replicated by the player. Replaces normal ammunition for all Cannons and/or Multi-Cannons if moduled.
- Special note: more useful on mid-range ships capable of supporting larger power-plants to deal with larger, tougher opponents.
- Ammunitions Hold: Thorium-Laced
- Increase flight speed of projectiles by 100% and Rate-of-Fire by 50%.
- Decrease Amour Penetration by one rank.
- Heat increased by 50%.
- Power Draw increased by 125%.
- This special ammunition hold can only be replenished on-planet or on-station - cannot be replicated by the player. Replaces normal ammunition for all Cannons and/or Multi-Cannons if moduled.
- Special note: more useful on larger ships capable of broadsiding with a lack of turn speed, but with more than capable power-plants, to drive away any small to mid-range ships under a hail of Cannon or Multi-Cannon fire. The increased heat may require heat sinks if one is using a heavy-shield build.
Note: Each of the special ammunition holds would also benefit from the increased ammunition storage based on the size you would install.
Reasoning:
This is a pure increase in the amount of ammunition your ship can store. It means players can feel they can be liberal with their shots without feeling the dreaded "tense-trigger-syndrome" or TTS - the inability to shoot for fear of wasting your ammunition because you are not certain your shots will connect - because that would mean massive downtime, a real catch-22 for the pilot. This means that pilots are worrying more about their ammunition than about the enemies they are dog-fighting against - and this is a real problem, especially in wings when you need everyone to listen out for targets, tactics, etc.
Also, considering the shells travel much slower (other than missiles, rockets, or plasma), there is an increased risk of friendly fire. What was once a "Free-Fire" zone has now got a random ship flying in-between your shell's trajectory and the enemy ship. The chance of this happening is massively reduced when using weapons that; a) travel at light speed, or b) travel like multi-cannon rounds.
The risk of something going wrong with cannon shells, and how easily these shots can be avoided so easily by the current A.I., means there is little reward to using a powerful weapon than can barely hit their marked targets - even with gimbles.
Fact is, Cannons in this game are a joke to what we have in real life. I will paste a snippet here about the A-10 Thunderbolt's nose cannon: "Using the cannon, the A-10 is capable of disabling a main battle tank from a range of over 6,500m. The cannon can fire a range of ammunition, including armour-piercing incendiary rounds (API) weighing up to 0.75kg, or uranium-depleted 0.43kg API rounds. The magazine can hold 1,350 rounds of ammunition. The pilot can select a firing rate of 2,100 or 4,200 rounds a minute."
Now, I believe both a new module and a substantial increase to ammo storage would make these weapons extremely playable and enjoyable - and I am not saying we should get an A-10's Thunderbolt cannon - but it would be nice for our Multi-Cannons and Cannons to have a large stock of ammo so we can feel as if our weapons are important. Many will prefer lasers, both, or kinetic weapons as a whole (despite wasting a ton of ammo on shields first - but that's ultimately up to the player), and indeed, many players only use full-laser setups so they have no down-time in ship combat zones - however, options should exist to make an all kinetic build viable and enjoyable.
Considering Multi-Cannons only exist for small and medium hard-points, it isn't as if an Anaconda or larger ships or different ships can take advantage with large and huge hard-points for these weapons. When it comes to Cannons, they fire one shot and are much slower - and only have five rounds in the magazine. Spitfires and Messerschmidts, I can guarantee, had more ammo stocked inside them - and they are 1/10 of the size of many ships.
However, lets also make lasers a little more interesting, too...
Now, if we got these ammunition storage changes for Kinetic weapons, then lets further improve our lasers - and the steps are really quite simple, following closely behind the Ammunition storage's steps...
Potential Module Additions:
Crystalline-State Drive or CSD:
Crystalline-State Drive or CSD:
- Crystalline-State Drive: Amethyst Matrix
- Decrease heat generation of all beam weapons by 25%.
- Degrade one rank of armour penetration
- Reduce damage by 25%.
- Gain 100% range.
- All laser and beam weapons colours are changed to violet, and look double-helix when they fire.
- Crystalline-State Drive: Ruby Matrix
- Increase heat generation of all beam weapons by 50%.
- Upgrade two ranks of armour penetration.
- Lose 66% range.
- All laser and beam weapons colours are changed to crimson, and look triple-helix when they fire.
- Crystalline-State Drive: Emerald Matrix
- Increase heat generation of all beam weapons by 150%.
- Increase power-draw by 75%.
- Lose all ranks of armour penetration.
- Lose all ranks of damage.
- Gain 125% range.
- All laser types (or just Beams) now transfer power to a target's shields, replenishing them by 1.400 per tick (provides faster regeneration of shields). Does not work on collapsed shields. ((note: instead of recharging, this module could have the effect of acting as a shield hardener instead)).
- All laser and beam weapons colours are changed to green, and look quad-helix-like (if such a thing is possible) when they fire.
- (Not a good idea to target your enemy's active shields...)
Special note: As with the ammunition storage idea, only one CSD can be active on a ship at any one time - however, I would suggest these CSD's can be mounted in any module slot as they do not use ammunition, so, therefore, more room to hook it up wherever in the ship.
As we can all see from this idea, especially with the last CSD entry, the Emerald Matrix, it would open up an entirely new build to piloting captains - especially in wings. The Amethyst and Ruby Matrix's just give laser pilots more options to enhance their builds and play-style - always a plus.
Railguns? Plasma-cannons?...
I won't touch these puppies. They are simple: fixed weaponry, huge damage, low ammo. I consider these the only weapons that should remain untouched because they are deadly enough as it is.
Other ideas?...
I will list one more module that Frontier could add to the game to make our lives in this galaxy more interesting...
Module: Utility
- Industrial Grappling Hooks
Used by Miners to slow the rate at which an asteroid spins. This module will be able to allow you, the player, to target an asteroid body (currently, you cannot target asteroids), then calculate its spin rate and best axis placement - once fired at the designated location that the scanner suggests, your ship will be able to go into full reverse to slow down the asteroid by a good margin - enough so that your limpets will have a better chance of survival...
So, there we go - some of my ideas.
I will be happy to add other people's ideas into the mix, just let me know on this thread and, above all, leave only constructive comments below!
Thank you!
CMDR Dreamstate.
