[MOD] Terran PSP improvement. Fusion beam modification.

[Vivicector]

Have you ever mentioned that terran PSP has a really small damage per second and makes terran M2 barely useable.

I have changed PSP's stats so that now it is practically similar to PPC in damage per second. As other terran weapons, this is more effective against hull, less - against shields. I have run some calculations using matcad and found values that give a maximum difference in killing time from PPC's one of about 5%, while saving PSP's speciality.

New PSP stats:
Shiled damage per shot: 349111
Hull damage per shot: 142059
Rate of fire: 7 rpm, 0,117 rounds per second
Sield damage per second: 40845.987
Hull damage per second: 16620.903

Now some timing. It is calculated for ideal conditions, for ONE weapon, in seconds:
Time to kill Xenon K (most hull):
With PSP: 231
With PPC: 244
Time to kill Xha'ak Destroyer (least hull):
With PSP: 254
With PPC: 234


Also modified Fusion Beam Cannon. This weapon now deals damage through shields (but they still got some) and hit the hull mainly, "Nexus" style. Serious energy consumption (press the fire button from time to time instead of holding it). Range about 5 km. IMHO, this may be terran M7 main weapon (with compatible ship). Too bad, it is impossible to get this one in vanilla game.

Can't give the stats, because they will say nothing about the weapon. However, Hiroshima from Cadius's X-tra ship pack kill Khaaks really fast and Xenon K - in 1.5-2 firing runs, if you shoot in proper way.
Going to balance it a bit more, but donno, whether it is useful for anyone...

So, all in all it improves PSP and FBC without fully changing game balance (like CMOD do)

I have uploaded this small mod on filefront, feel free to download it. .

Installation is simple, see readme. Incompatible with anything, that changes TLaser and TBullets.

Version 1.1 . Download link in the same place.

Tried to balance Fusion Beam Cannon. This weapon burn through shields and hit armour of the target. Comparing to the previous version, damage was lowered, energy consumption was lowered, distance was lowered, beam lifetime was lowered (to prevent energy exploit), beam hitbox is much slower so that it can hardy instantkill fighters for 4.2 km (in fact, it can hardy hit one from much smaller distances). This makes weapon more balanced, but still lethal.

By the way, on autopilot control weapon now looks more Nexus style.

However, effectiveness depend greatly on target, because M2 hull strength differs in about 500% through the class. So, it is less useful against Xenon K, but kill Xhaak Destroyer at ease.

No changes for PSP, no reason to update if you can't use FBC in game.

[EmperorJon]

Have you ever mentioned that terran PSP has a really small damage per second and makes terran M2 barely useable.

Have you ever used the PSP

I'm guessing you've just seen the stats.

The fact is, the PSP has a really low damage per second because the rate of fire is really low, but that doesn't matter, because a charged blast of 8 of them will easily eliminate an enemy with a bit more than 3,000,000 health, eg. 3Gjs of shield and a few 100k units of hull.

Charge up 8 of them and you can kill a Q before it even has a chance to fire back.

[Nafensoriel]

(Very abstract analogy incoming!)

PPC= "American cowboy" style weapon.. fire like crazy and hope some of the bullets hit the target. If you miss 50% of the time..eh it's ok you are still using big arsed bullets.

PSP= Marksman weapon. Precision artillery. "Canadian Sniper" grade weapon. A skilled person with one of these doesn't need more than one good shot. Ever.

[Juwell Bowman]

I constantly hear this debate and am still on the fence about this issue. Most of the responses are similar to what Nafensoriel stated, and are true. However, the problem I have with PSP's is that the NPC doesn't charge the weapons like the player would. Leave an Osaka alone for too long and it will come-up missing! The Osaka requires lots of assistance. It's great in the hands of a player, but lets be honest, its not really built to be a players main ship. With that said, I would like the weapon to fire fully charged always or more frequent when controlled by the NPC.

[Sam L.R. Griffiths]

My AWRM mod adds two PSP variants (without changing any existing weapons):-

• Enhanced PSP - Removes charging capability and doubles refire rate (in effect allowing the AI to do "charged" levels of damage)
  Advanced PSP - An Enhanced PSP with refire rate doubled again (allowing the Vanilla Tyr to do 32 "uncharged" PSPs worth of damage with 8 guns while leaving room for other stuff.

[Vivicector]

Have you ever used the PSP Wink

I'm guessing you've just seen the stats.

Yes, I have. And it is great, while you personally shoot. However, as Juwell Bowman have mentioned, NPCs don't charge. If you want to build a fleet or simply don't like sitting in that sluggish bigship, then PSP-armed ships were not an option.

By the way, PSP charge ability still lives in my small mod. Damage from charged shots is not the same as it was, but very near to it.

My AWRM mod adds two PSP variants (without changing any existing weapons):-

What I personally don't like in this is changing DPS with firerate. It makes PSP look like PPC (not fully, but the concept). Also, many people (I too) like charging their PSPs...
Also, I do not see any reason not to change existing weapons - we will still have to edit the same files and get the same incompatibility. Or not? I'm not a skilled modder (even average one) and may not know some things.
However, there is a choice: people could select that variant of PSP balance, which they like most.
P.S. Added some calculations and digits in the first post.

[EmperorJon]

Yes but the point is, the Osaka is the best player destroyer.
Make it the best non-player one too and you've suceeded in basically ruining every other M2 in the game.

[Vivicector]

Make it not and it will be Boreas, who ruins every other M2 in the game...

In fact, this was made to give Cadius's ships a better use. And of course, this is my personal view...

[Sam L.R. Griffiths]

Have you ever used the PSP Wink

I'm guessing you've just seen the stats.

Yes, I have. And it is great, while you personally shoot. However, as Juwell Bowman have mentioned, NPCs don't charge. If you want to build a fleet or simply don't like sitting in that sluggish bigship, then PSP-armed ships were not an option.

By the way, PSP charge ability still lives in my small mod. Damage from charged shots is not the same as it was, but very near to it.

My AWRM mod adds two PSP variants (without changing any existing weapons):-

What I personally don't like in this is changing DPS with firerate. It makes PSP look like PPC (not fully, but the concept). Also, many people (I too) like charging their PSPs...
Also, I do not see any reason not to change existing weapons - we will still have to edit the same files and get the same incompatibility. Or not? I'm not a skilled modder (even average one) and may not know some things.
However, there is a choice: people could select that variant of PSP balance, which they like most.
P.S. Added some calculations and digits in the first post.

I like charging my PSPs too, but as the other poster points out the AI does not charge weapons under their control. Given this, there is only three ways to increase AI controlled damage - increase the damage of the weapons, increase the refire rate, or modify both to suit your view of balance.

Charging of "vanilla" PSPs is not inhibited with my mod (they are powerful enough as is IMHO), but the new versions of the PSP were introduced with the Vanilla weapon balance in mind and the premise is that the improved rate of fire was achieved through modifying the weapon charging mechanism (thus why the added versions are not chargable). I did not believe it would be appropriate to adjust the damage of the PSP without introducing new and bigger bullet models (and possibly new shaders), in addition it made more sense lore wise (Terrans updating their battlefield capability/tactics relative to the Commonwealth) to increase the refire rate in the newer weapons rather than increase the damage of a single bullet.

Weapon balance is a tricky and personal thing, what one person considers unbalanced another may not (or visa versa) thus why my focus was on "Adding stuff" rather than changing what is already there. There is already a few rebalance mods out and my hope is that if people like my ideas but not the balance that they will be able to integrate my ideas with their favourite rebalance mod (by appending what I have added and tweaking the values to suit).

I wish you luck in your rebalance endeavours and will watch with interest

[Vivicector]

Weapon balance is a tricky and personal thing

Yea, you got a point here. But, what is good with mods - you can do what you think is right. And everyone can be right simultaneously.

[Sam L.R. Griffiths]

Weapon balance is a tricky and personal thing

Yea, you got a point here. But, what is good with mods - you can do what you think is right. And everyone can be right simultaneously.

nah... everyone is wrong simultaneously ... Bear in mind that changing existing stuff means that you are making a new baseline for mods to be added to... integrating changes from performance/rebalance mods becomes more complicated using your approach (as the two mods are likely to be changing the same entries in the same datafiles).

If your intention is to allow your mod to be integrated easily with other mods, you may want to create new variants of the weapons instead of changing the existing ones (c/f my AWRM mod).

Given your comment about charging PSPs above, I am considering options wrt either introducing charging capability into the weapons I have added (balance/lore issues to consider) or adding more versions of the PSP (or something similar).

[Vivicector]

If your intention is to allow your mod to be integrated easily with other mods, you may want to create new variants of the weapons instead of changing the existing ones (c/f my AWRM mod).

Yes, I got your idea. May be I will try to create 2nd entry, if I will have time to. However, I hope that other weapon mods have already dealed with the same problem.[/quote]

[Vivicector]

Version 1.1 out. FBC cannon changed and balanced.

[Bobucles]

Creating a new weapon entry may be... tricky. The game uses a 32 bit mask for all its weapons, which are all used. In order to make a new weapon, you must either push one weapon aside, or overlap an existing weapon but have a different cargo class.

[Sam L.R. Griffiths]

Creating a new weapon entry may be... tricky. The game uses a 32 bit mask for all its weapons, which are all used. In order to make a new weapon, you must either push one weapon aside, or overlap an existing weapon but have a different cargo class.

In X3:TC the overlap problem from X3:R was cured so multiple weapons can share the same mounting class regardless of Cargo class (c/f my AWRM mod). As such it is no longer a problem adding new weapons providing you are happy for them to share the same mounting class.