WAR - over empty space makes no sense

[Henri]

Would it not be feaseable and interesting to have warring factions attack eachothers stations??
Instead of ships endlessly spawning in and fighting over empty space they could jump in at the enemies station and start attacking traders and the defence force.
Docked commanders can then help the attackers by taking out the station's shields making boarding possible or just fight the defenders which jump in and launch from the station.
Reinforcements in the form of cap ships could get involved and maybe selective destruction of parts of the station.

There could be several stages, like blockade where trade ships are attacked
or bombing the crap out of stuff, I dunno but having the station there as well could
make for some interesting flying.

 

[Temple604]

I'm guessing maybe in season 3

 

[Sapyx]

Actually attacking stations is not in plans at the moment. Primarily because stations do not currently have hit points/damage points - they're indestructible. And likely to stay that way, because once something is destructible, the sociopaths in the game will want to try to find a way to destroy one.

Warzones in empty space makes sense, if that space happens to be the point where two opposing fleets decide to meet for battle. What doesn't make sense is the neverending stream of combatants that arrive at one to replenish each side's losses. Which would also have to be resolved if your "battle for a station" scenario is to come to fruition. Because, right now, conflict zones are "unwinnable" - you just keep fighting and fighting an infinite number of enemies and helpoed by an infinite number of friends, until you either are destroyed yourself or voluntarily withdraw. It would be much more satisfying if conflict zones could be "won".

 

[Deathwatch]

Stations have ridiculous firepower you would have to be foolish to get in weapons range

 

[FiddenUK]

Wars have been fought over much less than empty space... People just like to fight!

Attacking other stations would be great to see, but I doubt the mechanics are ready for that, yet. I'd like to see some capital class ships taking on a space station/outpost.

 

[Deathwatch]

Wars have been fought over much less than empty space... People just like to fight!

Attacking other stations would be great to see, but I doubt the mechanics are ready for that, yet. I'd like to see some capital class ships taking on a space station/outpost.

What we really need is npc frigates etc large npc only ships that can go do actual battle with a capital class.

 

[Bomba Luigi]

Because the stations outgun everything the attacker could bring to the table.

 

[[VR] Mad Mike]

What we really need is npc frigates etc large npc only ships that can go do actual battle with a capital class.

back in beta there was actually a "defend the battleship whilst it makes repairs" mission.
Also one of the training mission irrc has you flying with npc wingmates

it boggles me that in some ways the content from back then is actually more interesting that what we have now. I am hoping this mission type comes back at some point.

 

[insanephoton]

The closest thing to this we have in lore is the conflict in Lugh. The story on GalNet suggests that the battle for control was fought by 'ground troops' within the station. Crimson State was eventually victorious when the Federation Marines wee forced to withdraw due to logistical problems despite the Federal Navy having 'air superiority'.

 

[Bacalao]

It would be nice, but I don't think most computers could handle it. We already get frame rate drops at stations. Add in 40 fighting ships and the crash rate will be through the roof. Maybe one day. As far as "empty space", those patches of empty space are closer (by travel time) than the waters the Spanish, French, English, etc fought in. Their locations are a little stale, I'd like to see them be more strategic than just "around planets", along common supercruise routes, near valuable assets (asteroid belts) etc. More than anything I'd like to see the conflict zones be dynamic than just an endless slugfest, I'd like to be able to win them.

 

[ShimEnki]

back in beta there was actually a "defend the battleship whilst it makes repairs" mission.
Also one of the training mission irrc has you flying with npc wingmates

it boggles me that in some ways the content from back then is actually more interesting that what we have now. I am hoping this mission type comes back at some point.

It does make one go ...hmmmm--well, maybe a tad more than that actually.

 

[Ian Skippy]

back in beta there was actually a "defend the battleship whilst it makes repairs" mission.
Also one of the training mission irrc has you flying with npc wingmates

it boggles me that in some ways the content from back then is actually more interesting that what we have now. I am hoping this mission type comes back at some point.

Pretty sure beta was partly a proving ground for future planned content; for example 'special weapons', the asteroid GFX etc. The NPC wingmen in the older training mission (not sure if it still exist) only works in normal space, so it needs to be able to follow you in SC/jumps to be of real use. But I am convinced it will come, espescially considering David say end of last year that they would definitely come.

 

[MDFification]

In war, the goal is not to capture territory but to eliminate your opponents capacity to resist.

Stations are not fortresses. They're vital for logistics and economic functions of whoever controls them - they're a massive revenue source, enable you to operate in a certain area for a predictable cost, and are immensely costly to build in terms of time, resources and know-how.

Stations are not valuable military targets unless their sole purpose is hosting hostile military forces; otherwise they're not worth the resources or social capital (wars need to be accepted by the population to be funded in the age of mass media) to capture, protect or destroy them. What decides things is your fleet. Think of governments in ED as hoardes on the Russian steppe; it wasn't specific holdings that determined their power, it was the size, location and leadership of their respective armies. When you can bypass any static defense with a big enough fuel tank, capturing territory becomes meaningless; all that matters is pinning down and destroying the opposing faction's fleet, at which point they are unable to refuse your demands because they can't threaten any of your assets while you can threaten theirs.

So, with the exception of military outposts, I don't think it makes sense for warring factions to attack one another's stations. Additionally seeing as as of now you need a CG for a station to get constructed; since none of the pvp or bgs players can readily decide where a station should be or if one gets built, it just isn't a good game mechanic at the moment.

 

[Lobstris]

back in beta there was actually a "defend the battleship whilst it makes repairs" mission.
Also one of the training mission irrc has you flying with npc wingmates

it boggles me that in some ways the content from back then is actually more interesting that what we have now. I am hoping this mission type comes back at some point.

That 'defend the battleship' mission never actually worked properly though did it? Most of the time it just ended up with multiple 'mating' battleships stacked on top of each other and horrendous frame rate lag - which is why I think everything is a lot simpler now (server doing more and clients not mediating object existence and ownership so much?). And the wingmen you flew with in the single player mission just did their own thing, rather than being amenable to commands from you - which is what I presume we're waiting for in the main game?

 

[Sentenza]

The closest thing to this we have in lore is the conflict in Lugh. The story on GalNet suggests that the battle for control was fought by 'ground troops' within the station. Crimson State was eventually victorious when the Federation Marines wee forced to withdraw due to logistical problems despite the Federal Navy having 'air superiority'.

Mmm, this could work along with passenger capability. I remember the old Harpoon game having some "assault team" loadout for certain aircraft, that you were supposed to deliver on target. So, an assault on a station might involve several ships unloading assault troops in the station at once, with a chance of success depending on how many troops you can bring.

 

[who?]

A simple change that Should Be Fairly Easy To Implement (tm)...

If two factions to to war in a system, a combat zone spawns in between the two stations/planets. When one side reaches a certain threshold of kills, that CZ ends and a new CZ spawns closer to the losing side's station. Repeat these battles until one side or other reaches the opposition station, and then the war is over.

At least this way, sides are advancing and retreating, rather than fighting infinite streams of enemies in the middle of nowhere.

 

[[VR] Mad Mike]

That 'defend the battleship' mission never actually worked properly though did it? Most of the time it just ended up with multiple 'mating' battleships stacked on top of each other and horrendous frame rate lag - which is why I think everything is a lot simpler now (server doing more and clients not mediating object existence and ownership so much?). And the wingmen you flew with in the single player mission just did their own thing, rather than being amenable to commands from you - which is what I presume we're waiting for in the main game?

oh sure... it was indeed a mess..... but I hoped that at the time the beta process was meant to FIX these issues and not just say, to hell with it and dump it on the cutting room floor (as the unfortunate quote from DB went iirc).

 

[Hydrino]

Would it not be feaseable and interesting to have warring factions attack eachothers stations??
Instead of ships endlessly spawning in and fighting over empty space they could jump in at the enemies station and start attacking traders and the defence force.
Docked commanders can then help the attackers by taking out the station's shields making boarding possible or just fight the defenders which jump in and launch from the station.
Reinforcements in the form of cap ships could get involved and maybe selective destruction of parts of the station.

There could be several stages, like blockade where trade ships are attacked
or bombing the crap out of stuff, I dunno but having the station there as well could
make for some interesting flying.

There are certainly many opportunities for this type of gameplay. I would imagine FD has this on their big "list of things we want to do", but probably not a priority for another year. MB has already said Military "Career" missions are something he wants to see. But the work for this will be extensive, and does not seem to be room in Season 2 for the focus required. Maybe the ground-work will be started but I don't expect to see anything substantial on it for a while.

Another legacy item not mentioned yet by other posters, and even bigger to me, is the early promo video FD made a splash about where a wing of Sidewinders accepted a mission/ distress call in space (not from a station mission board), to assist a Federation Cap ship. Surely that video figures big into some future update plan as something FD wants to enable. If not, would be daft.

 

[Mr_sukebe]

As attacking a station is genuinely not a viable tactic, maybe factions at war should be interdicting each other's trade ships?

 

[Henri]

The closest thing to this we have in lore is the conflict in Lugh. The story on GalNet suggests that the battle for control was fought by 'ground troops' within the station. Crimson State was eventually victorious when the Federation Marines wee forced to withdraw due to logistical problems despite the Federal Navy having 'air superiority'.

there could be something like take out the defence ships so assault ships can land troops to take over the station, something like that, break a defence, break a blockade....in the promo video there is fighting around a station too it looks quite interesting.
can you imagine cqc in empty space?
or a space nation just meeting a fleet at some arbitrary place in empty space to duke it out? then what?
they then just hand over the station/system/planet????
it could be made much more realistic/interesting/exciting
nav beacon farm zones, rez farm zones and conflict farmzones are all so the same well except the rez farm zone which has some objects but are still kinda small

As attacking a station is genuinely not a viable tactic, maybe factions at war should be interdicting each other's trade ships?

or blockading the station just outside of the firezone, I mean we can hit cap ships why not stations? the aim would be to take them over ofcourse.