capital ship gravity draft removes combat challenge

[PowerPC603]

I usually destroy the engines first and the jumpdrive, so it cannot jump out or boost away from me at high speeds.
So the dragging along isn't really an issue for me.

But I like the addition of that feature.

Besides that, it could also help when small ships would be docking onto a XL ship, which is moving.
The closer they get, the more they're dragged along with the XL ship and they can dock alot easier without bumping into the sides of the hangar bay.

AFAIK, right now, when a ship docks at an XL ship, the XL ship will come to a halt before the small ship can dock.
Using that system, the XL ship shouldn't need to come to a complete halt, making itself a sittiing duck while some fighter is docking.

[ZaphodBeeblebrox]

As a counter to misinformation.

Making of X Rebirth - Matthias on Pathing

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dt4B4e3i5_0

[Edit] As opposed to X3 that does not have any pathing calculations when ships are crossing sectors.

[vkerinav]

Is there really much pathfinding involved at that range? There is a need to navigate around a capital ship, in order to target specific surface elements, but otherwise it's simply an attack run followed by evasion, then repeat. Due to the gravity draft, the capital ship is always stationary relative to attacking fighters, so there should be no collisions. Or maybe only low-skilled pilots crash into things.

[Killjaeden]

[Edit] As opposed to X3 that does not have any pathing calculations

There may be rudimentary path planning, but collision avoidance and everything that requires reacting on dynamic state certainly is just as bad as it was in X3. As evidenced by a significant occurance of ships bumping into the capitalship they are attacking and similar stuff.

it's simply an attack run followed by evasion, then repeat

It's the evasion part that is critically lacking in X3 and XR. Otherwise they wouldnt have felt the need to turn off collision damage.
Same was seen in one of the first X4 presentation, where fighters that either started or landed (can't remember) bumped into the carrier ship several times.

[Beermachine]

Agree completely with the original post.

While I can certainly understand the reasoning for it's development, and support having it as an option for players, being able to disable this feature would be very welcome.

I personally hate anything that takes away from the 1:1 control of games, be it aim assists, movement assists etc, as they both remove the challenge and satisfaction of mastering movement and aiming, as well as ruin the experience by taking away or temporarily changing the control dynamic for the player.

@GCU Grey Area The fact that it only kicks in when slowing down to the same speed as the capital ship is not ideal as it then removes the option of any low speed manoeuvers without assists, and provides a disconnect when the control mechanic suddenly changes when at those speeds.

An option is far better and should take next to no development time when the code is already in place for it to be enabled / disabled in game via a speed switch.

[GCU Grey Area]

@GCU Grey Area The fact that it only kicks in when slowing down to the same speed as the capital ship is not ideal as it then removes the option of any low speed manoeuvers without assists, and provides a disconnect when the control mechanic suddenly changes when at those speeds.

Not sure what you mean by "disconnect". What sort of manoeuvres are you doing to generate these sudden changes to control mechanics? I've experienced nothing of the sort, though this sort of slow flight is something I generally only do near friendly capitals (very idea of low speed manoeuvres seems insanely risky if the other ship's doing it's best to kill me).

[Stoats not Goats]

The feature would be far more sensible (in my opinion) if blind spots were more heavily shielded than other positions (so its a tad bit more balanced) but the implementation nightmare would be extreme and not worth it. The combat system from X3 was good enough, this drafting mechanism is unnecessary without severe overhauling

[Gorelab]

I don't think that the drift along with the capital ship was what made it easy, generally you wanted to take out the engines pretty quickly anyways, the main thing is a lot of bigger ships had major blind spots anyways, and were probably a bit too vulnerable without escorts.

In general though I do like the idea of a corvetteish sized ship being able to take on capital ships that aren't properly escorted but it should be harder.

[Kittens David]

Simple solution is to a make only avalaible for friendly or even ally shio. So that you can not use that gravity with neutral /hostile.

[Tomonor]

I don't think that the drift along with the capital ship was what made it easy, generally you wanted to take out the engines pretty quickly anyways, the main thing is a lot of bigger ships had major blind spots anyways, and were probably a bit too vulnerable without escorts.

In general though I do like the idea of a corvetteish sized ship being able to take on capital ships that aren't properly escorted but it should be harder.

+1 to this.

The main problem was that the cap ships didn't show much resistance when you were attacking their hardpoints. Back in ye olde X games, the third shot triggered an entire sector's police force on your back, plus the escort fighters, plus the fighter drones. But in XR, it just waited there for you to finish.

A tactical layout and order would be necessary to make small-to-capship combat fun. For example, if you would take out the sensor dish quick enough, they couldn't call for help, but could still get away with a quickly initiated boost. If you would take out the engines first, they would be sitting ducks alright, but they would still make your day harder with every little dirty trick they can come up with, like jamming your sensors to make you believe that they dropped some precious loot, or fire their missiles in every possible directions so you would back off a bit.

It's the small things. They do require work, time, and manpower, but the XR way was bland.

[A5PECT]

Another reason blind spots were easily exploited was because it was very easy to create them. Turrets and local generators had too little health, and the player ship had very powerful guns and missiles.

The Skunk being overpowered was mostly caused by the player being restricted to it: the Skunk had to be able to do everything because the player was always in it. Now that different ships are usable by the player, there's no reason to have a single S ship capable of single-handedly destroying a capital ship hundreds of times its size.

Turret hardpoints not being hard is a balance issue that I hope Egosoft recognizes and sorts out.