Devs: Why do mines and drones have infinite ammo?

[Armonddd]

and mines are limited by a CD and argueably not as strong as things like Target telem.

 

Anyone who makes that argument needs to play GSF more.

 

Every other secondary weapon in the game, except railguns and rocket pods, is limited by a CD. That's because they're really, really powerful. They're also, with the exception of railguns (which are really a primary weapon), limited by ammo -- because the devs decided that they were powerful enough that they needed two limiting factors instead of one.

 

Either all munitions should have infinite ammo, or none of them should. Picking and choosing certain munitions to be "more equal" by having infinite ammo, longer CD, and stronger effect -- or, conversely, "less equal" by having the opposite traits -- is ridiculous.

Edited April 25, 2014 by Armonddd

[Verain]

Blasters have short term limits to their use. That's the equivalent of a cooldown (in this case, a cooldown with multiple charges). A missile is limited both by the cooldown of the missile and the ammo count, a mine just the cooldown, a blaster just the "cooldown" (the pool).

[Kuciwalker]

Either all munitions should have infinite ammo, or none of them should. Picking and choosing certain munitions to be "more equal" by having infinite ammo, longer CD, and stronger effect -- or, conversely, "less equal" by having the opposite traits -- is ridiculous.

 

All munitions should have infinite ammo, with the possible exception of rocket pods (you'd need SOMETHING to disincentivize spamming them constantly).

 

In the imperfect game we have, we should not apply ammo restrictions to more weapons purely for the sake of making them all equally broken.

[Gavin_Kelvar]

and mines are limited by a CD and argueably not as strong as things like Target telem.

 

yet seismic mines do nearly as much damage as a single proton torpedo (265 damage short or roughly 1 shot from a single laser cannon, that's not a lot) and a concussion mine deals close to the same damage as an unupgraded concussion missile (I think it's just 150 damage shy of doing the exact same damage) with the bonus of having an AOE too. Like it or not mines do damage comparable to other ships secondary missiles and for a system ability to basically be able to do a concussion missile's worth of damage as an AOE is pretty darn powerful.

[Verain]

yet seismic mines do nearly as much damage as a single proton torpedo

 

I keep seeing this lie.

 

A fully upgraded seismic mine does 678 damage to hull, reduced by armor. Almost every ship can reduce this damage by 29%, but chose instead to be better at dogfighting defenses versus mine defenses. This is a choice: you CHOOSE to take full damage for the mine. The mine doesn't deserve to be balanced around your choice of pretending it'll never happen and instead picking your upgrades versus flashfires and railguns. If you take the DR defensive companion and the 20% hull, you take 481 from the mine.

 

 

A fully upgraded proton torp does 872 damage with a 10% crit chance, around 35% more. It also ignore armor completely- the damage just happens. You can't take a hull that reduces the damage.

 

 

Protorps have very little in common with seismic mines. One is super long range, the other you have to go kiss. One ignores hull, the other does not. One can be broken with engine maneuvers, the other just happens if you get very close. One has an arming time and the other has a lock on time. They both have cooldowns and ignore shields- that's about it!

[Kuciwalker]

I keep seeing this lie.

 

A fully upgraded seismic mine does 678 damage to hull, reduced by armor. Almost every ship can reduce this damage by 29%, but chose instead to be better at dogfighting defenses versus mine defenses. This is a choice: you CHOOSE to take full damage for the mine.

 

See, here's the difference between you and me. When I make arguments like this, they're actually correct. Secondarily, the difference is that I understand how the game works, while you obsess over a recycle bin.

 

People don't avoid DR because they want to be better dogfighters. It has nothing whatsoever to d with dogfighting. People avoid DR because armor penetration is ubiquitous and so DR is basically worthless except versus one specific weapon in the meta. Every other major source of damage in the meta pierces DR.

 

If it weren't for that, DR would be a perfectly reasonable dogfighting build.

 

The fact is, this meta, while crappy, was reasonable so long as all the damage was armor penetrating. You could just ignore that DR existed, and the game was slightly poorer for it, but not a huge deal. Suddenly though, a single ship delivers huge amounts of damage that can be mitigated by DR - which means that now instead of a useless component we have a ****** RPS game that funnels ever more of the game's outcomes into the ship selection screen.

[tunewalker]

See, here's the difference between you and me. When I make arguments like this, they're actually correct. Secondarily, the difference is that I understand how the game works, while you obsess over a recycle bin.

 

People don't avoid DR because they want to be better dogfighters. It has nothing whatsoever to d with dogfighting. People avoid DR because armor penetration is ubiquitous and so DR is basically worthless except versus one specific weapon in the meta. Every other major source of damage in the meta pierces DR.

 

If it weren't for that, DR would be a perfectly reasonable dogfighting build.

 

The fact is, this meta, while crappy, was reasonable so long as all the damage was armor penetrating. You could just ignore that DR existed, and the game was slightly poorer for it, but not a huge deal. Suddenly though, a single ship delivers huge amounts of damage that can be mitigated by DR - which means that now instead of a useless component we have a ****** RPS game that funnels ever more of the game's outcomes into the ship selection screen.

 

you can load 5 ships. The ability to have 5 ships and multiple load outs is the way to deal with this. You can see what your team is flying and what the enemy is flying, you can fly what the situation demands.

[Pilgrim_Grey]

you can load 5 ships. The ability to have 5 ships and multiple load outs is the way to deal with this. You can see what your team is flying and what the enemy is flying, you can fly what the situation demands.

 

As he said, damage reduction would be not all that smart of a pick on all five ships--it's that bad because of how many weapons ignore armor. I suppose you can argue for having a bomber buster somewhere in there (particularly if you are flying a bomber), but that does mean you're getting pretty focused on just taking mine damage.

 

As for the OP, I don't know if making some kind of ammo restriction is the answer, but something to lower the mine spam you see on satellites would be lovely. It's fairly trivial to keep a mine field going on a satellite, no matter how how a pilot is going after a bomber. It's not to say you don't occasionally have gaps if you have a lot of people attacking a satellite, but it's not hard for a bomber to keep circling and and just keeping out of range until they're up again very shortly.

 

I'd also like to argue for drones not having shield piercing, but that'd be another thread.

[Ramalina]

The problem with ammo limits in GSF is that the weapons that contain warheads, are FAR too weak to be reasonable with limited ammo.

 

Quick quiz: how many proton torpedoes does a standard X-Wing carry?

Answer: Six.

 

In a game with genuine hard targets, no respawns, and proton torpedoes that do a lot of damage, that's enough proton torpedoes to change the outcome of an entire battle.

 

GSF is not that game. GSF is not going to become that game, or anything even remotely like it.

 

With effectively infinite respawns, absurd ease of breaking missile locks, and very weak output from warhead based ordnance, if you introduced reasonable ammo limits to GSF (like what would actually fit inside the ship), the missile family (in the loose sense) of weapons would be almost completely useless.

 

A bunch of ships are heavily reliant on missile based damage (we're including torps and mines here), and without Arcade style ammo capacity and refills, would have to be entirely reworked from a balance perspective.

 

As noted by other posters, the only weapon with a meaningful ammo limit is rocket pods (with clusters if you run out it's because you chose an absurdly wasteful upgrade option for the sake of increased burst damage). Combine the mine launching cooldowns and the fact that mines typically take a lot less volume than missiles of equivalent yield, and if we stick with the same fantasy arcade logic that governs every other warhead carrying weapon in GSF a mine ammo limit in GSF will be effectively infinite, just like all the other missiles.

 

So cool from a lore perspective I suppose, but from a game balancing perspective it they're consistent with other weapons systems a mine ammo limit would be effectively meaningless in terms of game balance.

[Armonddd]

I keep seeing this lie.

 

Reading comprehension. He said seismics do almost as much damage as protorps, and then he provided the math to prove that seismics do almost as much damage as protorps. If you are claiming that seismics do not do almost as much damage as protorps, you are wrong. Otherwise, you are not addressing his claim.

 

Take your pick, really. I'll wait.

 

A fully upgraded seismic mine does 678 damage to hull, reduced by armor. Almost every ship can reduce this damage by 29%, but chose instead to be better at dogfighting defenses versus mine defenses.

 

Let's talk about what actually happens: Seismic does 678 damage, immediately followed by interdiction doing 429 damage. That's 1107 damage before damage reduction, 786 after.

 

Scouts have 950 hull. Strikes have 1450 hull. Gunships have 1250 hull.

 

Your suggestion of taking 29% damage reduction does literally nothing to prevent a two-round kill (though it does turn a one-round scout kill into a two-round scout kill, because scouts are supposed to be one-shot, amirite), and meanwhile massively increases the amount of damage you take from almost everything else in the game.

 

It's not that we're choosing to be better at dogfighting -- it's that we're choosing to take components that have any effect whatsoever on our survivability.

 

(with clusters if you run out it's because you chose an absurdly wasteful upgrade option for the sake of increased burst damage)

 

That still makes for a meaningful ammo limit, though.

 

So cool from a lore perspective I suppose, but from a game balancing perspective it they're consistent with other weapons systems a mine ammo limit would be effectively meaningless in terms of game balance.

 

I honestly don't care which they choose. If they want to abstract away ammo limitations, that's cool. If they want to impose realistic restrictions on how many missiles you can fling all over the place, that's cool too. I just wish they'd pick one and represent it logically.

Edited April 25, 2014 by Armonddd

[Kuciwalker]

Gunships have 1250 hull.

 

To quibble: 1350.

[Armonddd]

To quibble: 1350.

 

1250 without t0 reinforced armor (which dulfy shows the Mangler/Quarrel with by default, since that's their stock component).

 

Also, I derped scouts. 1026 hull is also with t0 reinforced (which, again, is stock). 950 is baseline. Which I guess means scouts with deflection armor "only" get three-shot (two-rounded) by mines... which is totally fair, right.

Edited April 25, 2014 by Armonddd

[Zoom_VI]

you can load 5 ships. The ability to have 5 ships and multiple load outs is the way to deal with this. You can see what your team is flying and what the enemy is flying, you can fly what the situation demands.

 

If you could actually buy multiple of the same ship this might actually be a valid argument. Some of us own all ships but play only one because we do not find enjoyment in other classes. Just like in the ground game.

[Kuciwalker]

Huh, you're right. Guess it's been a while since I looked at my gunship's stats screen.

[Armonddd]

Huh, you're right. Guess it's been a while since I looked at my gunship's stats screen.

 

I just find it amusing that I got the numbers right for gunships but not scouts.

[Altheran]

I just find it amusing that I got the numbers right for gunships but not scouts.

 

Know your opponents more than yourself, they said...

[MasterPromithes]

I keep seeing this lie.

 

A fully upgraded seismic mine does 678 damage to hull, reduced by armor. Almost every ship can reduce this damage by 29%, but chose instead to be better at dogfighting defenses versus mine defenses. This is a choice: you CHOOSE to take full damage for the mine. The mine doesn't deserve to be balanced around your choice of pretending it'll never happen and instead picking your upgrades versus flashfires and railguns. If you take the DR defensive companion and the 20% hull, you take 481 from the mine.

 

 

A fully upgraded proton torp does 872 damage with a 10% crit chance, around 35% more. It also ignore armor completely- the damage just happens. You can't take a hull that reduces the damage.

 

 

Protorps have very little in common with seismic mines. One is super long range, the other you have to go kiss. One ignores hull, the other does not. One can be broken with engine maneuvers, the other just happens if you get very close. One has an arming time and the other has a lock on time. They both have cooldowns and ignore shields- that's about it!

 

Verain fly something other than a bomber. Do Bombers need to be balanced: YES! no one here can deny that bombers are op in Domination and underpowered in TDM. Bombers are the only ship in which the SECONDARY weapons have an unlimited use.The "Mines have CDs"argument is not valid because all secondary weapons (i am excluding railguns as they require the shooter to remain stationary AND charge their weapon to fire) have CDS, on top of which other ships also have ammo restrictions. I personally am in favour of ammo restriction on mines. I also realizes that most people complaining about this purposed restrictions are bomber pilots who dont want their advantage (However, slight it is) to be removed.

Edited April 26, 2014 by MasterPromithes

[-Streven-]

Giving mines an ammo restriction would be a perfectly reasonable change. I run out of missiles (not just clusters) fairly often when I'm having a good round. Often enough that I hate the fact that there are so few people who carry repair probes/drones with ammo refills. I actually think there should be less ammo on many things to make ammo refill components more significant.

 

(/rant) I'm also a huge fan of giving railguns ammo because if there is any ship that needs to suck some more it's gunships. I don't mind snipers in fps games but when I'm in the middle of a good dogfight, getting sniped is a buzzkill of the worst kind. Gunships are to team deathmatch what bombers are to domination. (/end rant)

 

Verain, your arguments are pretty much always emotionally based and quite often completely lacking in logic or reason. Sort of like saying anyone who didn't vote for Obama is a racist. These types of arguments serve to stir up like-minded individuals and are effective on emotionally charged people but don't hold up under any real rational analysis.

[Zoom_VI]

Personally I don't think ammo should exist as a mechanic at all. There is no good reason for its existence other than to motivate people to look for yellow powerups. Appling ammo to bombers would not do anything since it wold still leave them overpowered while they have ammo.

[Altheran]

Appling ammo to bombers would not do anything since it wold still leave them overpowered while they have ammo.

 

That's also what I think.

[Vid-szhite]

Giving mines an ammo restriction would be a perfectly reasonable change. I run out of missiles (not just clusters) fairly often when I'm having a good round. Often enough that I hate the fact that there are so few people who carry repair probes/drones with ammo refills. I actually think there should be less ammo on many things to make ammo refill components more significant.

 

(/rant) I'm also a huge fan of giving railguns ammo because if there is any ship that needs to suck some more it's gunships. I don't mind snipers in fps games but when I'm in the middle of a good dogfight, getting sniped is a buzzkill of the worst kind. Gunships are to team deathmatch what bombers are to domination. (/end rant)

 

Verain, your arguments are pretty much always emotionally based and quite often completely lacking in logic or reason. Sort of like saying anyone who didn't vote for Obama is a racist. These types of arguments serve to stir up like-minded individuals and are effective on emotionally charged people but don't hold up under any real rational analysis.

 

I agree with everything here. TDM has ammo refill yellow power ups, so they wouldn't be totally screwed if they ran out. Would also give more value to fully charged shots.

 

Also, Verain, your doom and gloom isn't convincing anyone that wasn't already convinced. I fly nothing but bomber in Domination and I think an ammo limit is perfectly acceptable. Oh, and PS, 80% of my kills as a bomber are with my heavy lasers, and I don't feel helpless at all because I'm in a flying tank with twice the health and shields of everything else, on top of an engine component that restores my shields every 5 seconds. I can facetank anything that doesn't have 100% shield piercing in my Razorwire. My mines are just an insurance policy.

 

Another thing, out of curiosity... why the hell are minelayers "boy bombers" and the dronecarriers "girl bombers"? That terminology is really off-putting to me.

Edited April 27, 2014 by Vid-szhite

[FridgeLM]

Oh, and PS, 80% of my kills as a bomber are with my heavy lasers

 

You fly against really bad pilots, or you aren't great at mine placement.

[Gavin_Kelvar]

Personally I don't think ammo should exist as a mechanic at all. There is no good reason for its existence other than to motivate people to look for yellow powerups. Appling ammo to bombers would not do anything since it would still leave them overpowered while they have ammo.

 

For me I think the main plus is that it would be an indirect buff to things like EMP (suddenly wiping out all those mines in one shot presents the very real possibility of causing a bomber to run out of ammo without netting a kill rather than just being an inconvenience); it would mean that clustering mines tightly together would still be powerful but might also make it easier to destroy and deplete the bomber's ammo, they'd have to weigh the pros/cons of clustering close together vs more spread out (and if they have a strong motivation to stop clustering it also indirectly solves some of the issues of stacking damage from multiple mines); and most importantly it would mean in domination you could eventually take a sat from a bomber by depleting their ammo.

 

Currently I think one of the biggest problems of infinite ammo for bombers is that, as long as they can survive long enough for mines to come off CD, they can keep a sat locked down with mines. By making it a finite resource eventually a team could take a sat away from a bomber through ammo attrition if they couldn't do it any other way.

 

Not saying it's an all encompassing fix and that the balance issues shouldn't be looked into beyond ammo, just that it would have many benefits that might help bring bombers into line.

[Armonddd]

Well, this got cleared out.

 

I like how my entire post was deleted because of one line. Quality moderation, there.

 

Anyway, I was agreeing with Crinn that ammo shouldn't be limited, but pointing out that it's an in-universe expectation because of all the history Star Wars has.

 

And then probably a bunch of other stuff, that's just the one I got an Official Forums Warning for.

Edited April 29, 2014 by Armonddd

[Zoom_VI]

Well, this got cleared out.

 

I like how my entire post was deleted because of one line (and then I'm told "don't make posts specifically to do X", ignoring the entire rest of the post). Quality moderation, there.

 

Anyway, I was agreeing with Crinn that ammo shouldn't be limited, but pointing out that it's an in-universe expectation because of all the history Star Wars has.

 

And then probably a bunch of other stuff, that's just the one I got an Official Forums Warning for.

 

Wait this forum has moderators?

O.o