X4 - important question about missiles

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Nikola515
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Post by Nikola515 » Mon, 8. Jan 18, 23:19

I would love to see some missiles like Nova torpedo.... Problem in XR that they or drones wore leaving skunk vulnerable to attack do to it being sitting duck. It would be fine if we fire and control them from inside of our capital ship :wink:
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Post by csaba » Tue, 9. Jan 18, 00:15

Nikola515 wrote:I would love to see some missiles like Nova torpedo.... Problem in XR that they or drones wore leaving skunk vulnerable to attack do to it being sitting duck. It would be fine if we fire and control them from inside of our capital ship :wink:
Novadrones kinda need that tradeoff since they blow half the cannons off a ship.

Stripped a Taranis almost completely clean just with 6 the other day. Just need to kill the escorts before trying then bombard the target from 10 km.

Drones are another issue. Assault ones are practically useless if you control them since you are a sitting duck as you said. The traitor drone also needs some sort of a stealth mode to be useful.

The hacker one I like since it can disable the cap shield if you already stripped a ship from other elements. However hacking a station for reduced production for the little amount of time it gives is really useless if you are playing the economy game.

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Post by Nikola515 » Tue, 9. Jan 18, 20:27

This is probably why they are so powerful in XR(or ships surface elements week). If you take look at Hellbuster or even Sunstalker missiles can take small number of turrets if they are clustered together in same area. I was boarding Sucellus and it took me 3 or 4 Sunstlker missiles to take all engines out. I think this is more balancing issue than design. If ship could counter missiles like in X3 or if they make modules stronger this would work.

But this is probably why one ships can do all is bad idea. I'm hoping they do more specialized ships in X4. Hacking ships that are hard to detect or things like that.
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Post by Slashman » Thu, 11. Jan 18, 17:47

It would be nice if we had some kind of missile counter-measure system like decoy launchers or ECM systems. Something apart from just turrets.
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Post by Requiemfang » Thu, 11. Jan 18, 18:45

Slashman wrote:It would be nice if we had some kind of missile counter-measure system like decoy launchers or ECM systems. Something apart from just turrets.
I think this is why so many people liked the MARS mod Gazz made in the X3 series of games. When you had that mod running 80% of the missiles were usually shot down by the targeted ship and it's escorts if it had turrets. It basically fixed the press the IWIN button which was fire missiles enmasse and expect everything to blow up which took the challenge out of ship fights.

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Post by Gazz » Fri, 12. Jan 18, 11:56

Yeah, but... while MARS was effective I wouldn't call it balanced.
It was more of a curiosity project to see how turrets (and missile defense in particular) could work if those ships really really meant it.

For a balanced approach you have to start with a design that makes it possible to balance these things.

I talked about it a bit here
https://forum.egosoft.com/viewtopic.php ... 93#4696393
but you definitely can't just make missile defense better... which then only works for situations where missiles would be way OP to begin with.
Just pushing defense will never fix the absence of a solid design.
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Post by JSDD » Fri, 12. Jan 18, 12:53

a more balanced way would be to diversify offensive and defensive capabilities. for example, in x3 there was only "shield" and "hull" (both just integers) you had to eliminate to destroy an object. a better way would be to replace "int shield" with a "struct shield" which has several upgradable components, electromagnetic shield, mechanical shield (hull), thermo shield, chemical protection, reflective ship hull against lasers etc ... and all the available weapon systems in the game target a specific type of protection, once 1 protection is down to zero, you can damage/destroy "surface components" and the actual ship/station/object ... the same could be done with missiles: give them different "charge types", chemical bomb, EMP bomb, nuclear/thermo bomb or the like to target a certain protection component
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Post by gbjbaanb » Fri, 12. Jan 18, 16:25

I suppose the idea of turrets as missile defence is that you choose - set them to defend or attack, so if you have them set to shoot down missiles, they're not contributing to attacking the enemy.

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Post by Killjaeden » Fri, 12. Jan 18, 19:37

JSDD wrote:a better way would be to replace "int shield" with a "struct shield" which has several upgradable components, electromagnetic shield, mechanical shield (hull), thermo shield, chemical protection, reflective ship hull against lasers etc
That would do little benefit to the balance - That's mostly just introducing even more parameters and complexity. After you added all that you still need to go in and balance (which is now even more work).

Adding more combat utilities that do not serve as offensive weapons helps to increase specific defenses without increasing offense. Chaff, Flares, Counter-missiles, EMP charges for disabling of incoming missiles and so on. Being usables they dont represent "just another shield".
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Post by Gazz » Sat, 13. Jan 18, 12:46

It doesn't really matter what you use but at the core, balancing is about having an attack and a counter for it.

Missiles do fall squarely into that but... the problem is in other game systems.
When you achieve "infinite funds" you are adding another element to the situation: All The Missiles.

Missile defense means can be set up to have a certain efficiency but if the player can casually fire 20x as many missiles then the intended balance will break.

That's one of the bits I had suggested above. Organically making spam attacks less effective than ones of ahh... reasonable magnitude. =)
But this is really just a low hanging fruit issue and cannot be seen in isolation. (because that's how this started...)

Killjaeden wrote:That would do little benefit to the balance - That's mostly just introducing even more parameters and complexity. After you added all that you still need to go in and balance (which is now even more work).

Adding more combat utilities that do not serve as offensive weapons helps to increase specific defenses without increasing offense. Chaff, Flares, Counter-missiles, EMP charges for disabling of incoming missiles and so on. Being usables they dont represent "just another shield".

So you would suggest adding more parameters and complexity instead of adding more parameters and complexity? =P

Consumeables are quite comparable to a shield because you have limited availability of an item vs limited (by recharge time) power of a shield.

The details don't even matter. All I'm saying is that you can't just "fix the balance" in beta.
You have to plan for a system that allows you to do so and then stick to your uhh... launchers without messing it up with "wouldn't it be cool".
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Post by Killjaeden » Sun, 14. Jan 18, 20:12

So you would suggest adding more parameters and complexity instead of adding more parameters and complexity? =P
I was expecting this reply :P
Adding resistances/damage types to weapons, shields and hulls leads to a very large amount of new parameters. Adding missile countermeasures adds fewer parameters.
Gazz wrote:Consumeables are quite comparable to a shield because you have limited availability of an item vs limited (by recharge time) power of a shield.
Limited quantity (of uses) vs. limited available strength. But the available strength regenerates up to maximum capacity infinitely for no additional cost or logistical work, while availability of countermeasures does the opposite. The difference is quite large in that aspect (maintenance and running cost for the most part).
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Post by Gazz » Mon, 15. Jan 18, 11:00

Killjaeden wrote:Adding resistances/damage types to weapons, shields and hulls leads to a very large amount of new parameters. Adding missile countermeasures adds fewer parameters.

That resistances/damage types for guns, shields and hulls means more parameters than resistances/damage types and countermeasures for missiles, shields and hulls is just something you said.
Also, the number of parameters is less important than them noticeably affecting gameplay.

Limited quantity (of uses) vs. limited available strength. But the available strength regenerates up to maximum capacity infinitely for no additional cost or logistical work, while availability of countermeasures does the opposite. The difference is quite large in that aspect (maintenance and running cost for the most part).
On an abstract design level there is no difference.
Consumeables are limited until you stock up from a nearby freighter/carrier.
Shields recharge over time.

Both have the effect of temporarily limited ability.
It's why games have stamina/energy bars.
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Post by Killjaeden » Mon, 15. Jan 18, 13:27

Gazz wrote:Also, the number of parameters is less important than them noticeably affecting gameplay.
Wouldn't you agree that for the topic at hand, "Elemental type damage" vs. "common damage" has quite a noticeable effect on combat gameplay ?
And it adds as the more parameters the more different elemtents there are. Plus i raise the point that 10 poorly balanced parameters that each mildly affect gameplay still make for one big mess...
Limited quantity (of uses) vs. limited available strength. But the available strength regenerates up to maximum capacity infinitely for no additional cost or logistical work, while availability of countermeasures does the opposite. The difference is quite large in that aspect (maintenance and running cost for the most part).
On an abstract design level there is no difference.
Consumeables are limited until you stock up from a nearby freighter/carrier.
Shields recharge over time.
On an abstract design level, an asteroid is the same as a space station - but that doesnt say much. Specifics are important. What if you can't stock up on countermeasures just by teleporting them into your cargo bay? What if you can only requip them when you land on a ship or station with the tools or facilities to reequip consumables ?
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Post by Slashman » Mon, 15. Jan 18, 14:24

Personally (and this is just me), I would first limit the number of missiles each ship could carry by separating cargo space from missile racks. This means you can't carry a gazillion missiles in your regular cargo that you can just offload into your launchers and keep firing.

This does a couple things:

1) Makes you think about a load-out to suit what you will be fighting

2) Reduces spam of missiles making them something to use at the right time instead of just all the time. (Want to reload from your cargo bay? Dock somewhere first.)

3) It makes more room in your cargo for other stuff to trade instead of sharing that with ordinance space.

The other thing I would do is introduce a countermeasure system similar to Evochron Legacy. In that game, missiles have a lock on system which requires some time to build a profile of the target ship. It takes several decoys to spoof a missile and they do this by literally beaming disrupting signals at the incoming missile until it detonates prematurely. So each counter measure adds to the chance of a successful disruption of the missile.
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Post by Gazz » Mon, 15. Jan 18, 18:05

Killjaeden wrote:Specifics are important. What if you can't stock up on countermeasures just by teleporting them into your cargo bay? What if you can only requip them when you land on a ship or station with the tools or facilities to reequip consumables ?
Completely agree.

If you limit the means of resupplying you increase the opportunity cost of those.

If you limit shield recharge to something like "can't have taken damage in 10 seconds" or "incremental recharge speed over time" then shield energy is worth more.

That's how balancing works. =)
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Post by JSDD » Mon, 15. Jan 18, 21:47

Killjaeden wrote:Adding more combat utilities that do not serve as offensive weapons helps to increase specific defenses without increasing offense. Chaff, Flares, Counter-missiles, EMP charges for disabling of incoming missiles and so on. Being usables they dont represent "just another shield".
it all depends ...

flares, for example, serve as defensive items, but not all missiles are / have to be "stupid" (= having IR/heat sensors). which brings me to another topic: modular build missiles, allowing YOU (& not egosoft) to change "charge" and "seeking device". for example, a silkworm-type missile comes with these stats:
-- speed = 250m/s
-- range < 20km
-- charge volume = 0.2m^3
(different types of missiles have different stats)

you can fit either emp charge, chemical charge, or usual explosives, each damages certain protection capabilities. then the seeking device (= missile "head"):
-- seek heat (countermeasure: flare)
-- seek radar (countermeasure: "WW2-like" strewed metal pieces)
-- seek gravity or whatever / other physical principles (or combinations of those), (countermeasure: none, but seeking device works only against capital ships / stations)

one thing i agree on is that in X3 things were very unbalanced, to resupply M7M / M8 ships you had to build large (self-sustained) station complex, but once your resupply-chain worked it was not even a question anymore if you'd win a battle, just spam a bunch of autonomously target-seeking missiles (hammer torpedo) and wait 1 or 2 minute(s).

countermeasures:
-- moskito missile defense
-- up to 6 "intelligent" turrets (MARS + goblins / MDMK2)
-- high enough frames-per-second so that those scripts work as intended

flare would REALLY help so that you dont have to destroy them, distracting their seeking device would have lead them away ..

another aspect: in case the missiles "forward/look-at" direction points away from the target, it would be better to let the missile NOT (as if by magic) turn around and re-engage the target, BUT just fly straight ahead until another random object is in the missile's flight path / view angle (= maybe another type-specific stat, or just const 60°) ...
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Post by OrderFromChaos » Tue, 30. Jan 18, 05:30

Long time lurker, first post.

In place of suggesting fixes to things for the new game is it possible instead to make recommendations that will allow easier modification by the player community post release?

For instance instead of trying to define how best to improve missile performance from several unique perspectives, can we find ways to define what missiles do currently, how the game treats the missile feature before/during/after use, and the parameters by which the game defines missiles and missile like objects?

It just seems like there are millions of things we'd all like to see day one, of which the dev team might only have the capability of addressing several hundred before they end beta. I'd rather have them not change anything missile related in game (and soak up all that time rebalancing it as well) and instead have a clearly defined set of rules, functions, and modularity so that we (the community) can risk what the company cannot (resources, time, bugs, ect...)

Just my viewpoint.

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Post by Nanook » Tue, 30. Jan 18, 20:04

OrderFromChaos wrote:...
It just seems like there are millions of things we'd all like to see day one, of which the dev team might only have the capability of addressing several hundred before they end beta.....
We propose ideas from which the devs can pick and choose as they see fit. I doubt anyone here expects them to add in all, or even very many, of our ideas. But who knows, someone might have an idea that the devs hadn't thought of but they like enough to add. If we don't make suggestions, then we aren't being very helpful as fans, are we? :wink:
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Post by OrderFromChaos » Tue, 30. Jan 18, 20:17

We propose ideas from which the devs can pick and choose as they see fit. I doubt anyone here expects them to add in all, or even very many, of our ideas. But who knows, someone might have an idea that the devs hadn't thought of but they like enough to add. If we don't make suggestions, then we aren't being very helpful as fans, are we? :wink:
I understand your perspective, better to ask and not receive than to not ask at all. I guess I'd just rather do the work myself, and earn the glory and accolades of having a mod added to the first expansion (or the scorn of writing a terrible mod) than to imagine how things could be and be disappointed if they get cut due to deadlines.

Then again, I'm not in the trenches slinging code at ES so I really don't know how things are. Maybe this is something they've already addressed and they aren't sharing because they want some surprises come release day.

If anyone at the company is reading this, can we get confirmation if any changes to missiles or other weapon functions are going to change, or are planned too? Perhaps some elucidation on how weapons modules will work with the new modular hard point system?

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