Emissive Armor
 

How does "emissive armor" work ?

- If for example the emissive armor is said to reflect up to 10 points of damage and can take 30 points of damage before being destroyed, what happens if the damage exceeds 10 points ? Are 10 points reflected and the rest damages the armor ? Or is nothing reflected and all the damage counts towards the armor component's "hit points" ?

- What if there are emissive and non-emissive armor components ? Which is hit first ? If the non-emissive are hit first, does the emissive armor nevertheless reduce damage ?

- Are emissive armors cumulative, i.e. do 3 of the above described emissive armors reflect up to thirty damage points ?

Re: Emissive Armor
 

The way I understand it, first you get the "emissivity" protection from emissive armor, then you lower shield strength. Once shields go to zero, you start destroying armor. Once armor goes to zero, you start randomly destroying whatever components are left (including but not limited to emissive armor or shield generators). Am I right, everyone?

But I never use anything but regular ArmorIII. Emissive Armor is too heavy, not worth it. Ditto for Shields, unless I also had the Shield Regenerator, which might make it worthwhile (haven't tried yet).

Re: Emissive Armor
 

Shields are reduced first unless you are using a weapon that ignores shields. Only when your shields are gone will the armor be hit, IF you are not using a weapon that ignores armor. Armor is hit randomly just like inner components, so if you have several components of different types some of the hits will go to the emissive armor and some will go to the other components. It's likely that ordinary armor will be destroyed even if you have one emissive armor.

Re: Emissive Armor
 

Thanks for the first answers. Two questions are still open:
- Does emissive armor reduce damages even of hits which exceed its "reflection" capacity ? Or is it a "all or nothing" attribute, i.e. hits which exceed the reflection capacity of the emissive armor are not reduced at all ?

- Are emissive armors cumulative ?

Re: Emissive Armor
 

I haven't been able to determine if they 'absorb' up to their limit and then break of if they just break.

No, emissive armors are not cumulative, but they are 'serial' -- if one is destroyed the next will just take over and must be hit with greater than it's emissive protection value. So it's still worthwhile to have more than one.

Re: Emissive Armor
 

As the Baron said, the emissive armors are serial, not cumulative.

How work an emissive armor? First the armor absorb the points, and if the weapon is more powerful than the points that can abosrb, then the emissive armor work like an standard armor.

For example:
You have a ship with one emissive armor that can deflect 10 points of damage and can take 30 points of damage.

a) IF your ship is fighting against 20 ships that have one weapon that can inflict 8 points of damage, then, your ship will not take damage during the combat: everytime that your ship receive one shot for 8 points, the emissive armor will abosrb everything. Then, your ship could destroy all the others ships without receive any damage.

b) If your ship is fighting against other ship that have one weapon that can inflict 40 points. Well, at the first shot, your emissive armor will be destroyed (10 points that can absorb + 30 points damage resistance)

Re: Emissive Armor
 

Thanks for clearing that up. I hadn't noticed that emissive armor also has a good amount of regular damage-taking ability. That makes it better than I thought, but still too heavy IMHO. 'Course I stopped in disgust at level II, so maybe it gets more competitive.
Consider: 1x emissiveII gives 20+40=60 protection, while 2x armorIII gives 140 protection. Yet the weight is the same, the cost is MORE for the emissive (1x500 vs. 2x50), and you had to research two more tech levels for it. Emissive is only worth it if your opponents are fitting out their ships with large numbers of wimpy weapons (and well into the game, too).

Re: Emissive Armor
 

dmm --

Look into Crystalline for a GOOD armor. ;-)

Re: Emissive Armor
 

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by dmm:
Thanks for clearing that up. I hadn't noticed that emissive armor also has a good amount of regular damage-taking ability. That makes it better than I thought, but still too heavy IMHO. 'Course I stopped in disgust at level II, so maybe it gets more competitive.
Consider: 1x emissiveII gives 20+40=60 protection, while 2x armorIII gives 140 protection. Yet the weight is the same, the cost is MORE for the emissive (1x500 vs. 2x50), and you had to research two more tech levels for it. Emissive is only worth it if your opponents are fitting out their ships with large numbers of wimpy weapons (and well into the game, too).<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

If you're getting 70kt of damage for regular armor you must be using demo .51 still? The .56 demo reduced the value of armor somewhat. Besides the difference in armor values, I think that the 'emissive armor' ability just plain doesn't WORK in the current public demos -- either of them. The next demo will have it working properly and you'll see what its worth. Lots of things are getting fixed and adjusted for the next release.

Re: Emissive Armor
 

Also, if damage to armor is random (or from left to right [is it ?] and the emissive armor is to the right), the value of emissive armor increases dramatically for heavily armored ships. The reason is that it reduces each hit by its "reflection" capacity. If hit damage exceeds that capacity, only the remainder is deducted from the "hit points" of the armor components. Now, if that damage is attributed randomly, there is a fair probability that the "normal" armor will be damaged, not the emissive one. The emissive armor will survive to again reduce damage from the next hit. This way, on ships with one single emissive armor and lots of normal armor, the expected (!) hit absorbing capacity of emissive armor may be well above its cost-equivalent in normal armor.

Re: Emissive Armor
 

No, if I understood B. Munch. correctly, emissive armor mixed with regular armor will only reflect damage away if it gets hit. It's not like a mini-shield. One piece of emissive doesn't make the whole ship emissive. So if you have 9 regular armors and 1 emissive, the emissive will only protect you 1/10 of the time, on average. As the British say, "In for a penny, in for a pound." Either use just emissive or don't use it at all.

Re: Emissive Armor
 

p.s. I do have the .56 demo. My damage resistance numbers were for ArmorIII.

(In case anyone out there is as unobservant as I am, I will point out that the demo tells you the Version number in the lower left corner when you start it up. Took me a while to find that.)

Re: Emissive Armor
 

No, emissive armor is not a "blanket" protection for your ship. It only protects itself. Damage distribution is random. The only control on damage distribution is 'armor' or 'not armor'. While you have armor, damage is distributed randomly among armor components - except when a weapon that skips armor is being used. When armor is gone or an armor ignoring weapon is being used, damage is distributed randomly among non-armor components. So, mixing emissive and standard armor is likely to result in a lot of your standard armor getting destroyed just like it would without any emissive armor.

I would point out, though, that what you described is an interesting concept that might be added as a special component. It's what I would call a "damper field" and would make a fascinating alternative to shields. If all direct-fire weapons firing on your ship were reduced by say 25 percent off the top, AND you had good emissive armor, would you need shields? http://www.shrapnelgames.com/ubb/images/icons/icon7.gif If you have good weapons yourself, the other guy could be toasted long before your armor is gone. Ever play Master of Orion II and tangle with the Antareans? They had damper fields on their ships.

[This message has been edited by Baron Munchausen (edited 26 September 2000).]

Re: Emissive Armor
 

While we're at it, another question: is each weapon on a ship counted as a separate attack, or is the whole volley considered one attack? In other words, say I have a cruiser with 10 meson bLasters that do 10 points of damage each. Does emissive armor treat that as 10 (harmless) 10 point attacks, or as one 100 point attack?

If it treats each attack separately, maybe there could be a new component that makes all of a ship's attacks count as one volley. The datalink in "Starfire" worked something like this, and it would be a lot more useful than that ancient tech component that's in the game now allowing ships in a fleet to share experience.

Re: Emissive Armor
 

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Jeb:
While we're at it, another question: is each weapon on a ship counted as a separate attack, or is the whole volley considered one attack? In other words, say I have a cruiser with 10 meson bLasters that do 10 points of damage each. Does emissive armor treat that as 10 (harmless) 10 point attacks, or as one 100 point attack?

If it treats each attack separately, maybe there could be a new component that makes all of a ship's attacks count as one volley. The datalink in "Starfire" worked something like this, and it would be a lot more useful than that ancient tech component that's in the game now allowing ships in a fleet to share experience. <HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

With a ship each weapon is a seperate attack. With most units (satellites, weapon platforms) each weapon is a seperate attack. With FIGHTERS I think that all units fire together in a single attack, which is really interesting because looking at the damage power of 'small' components you'd think they would be helpless against emissive armor. I've not seen fighters attack a ship with emissive armor yet - I have barely used fighters. Maybe someone else has.

The attack 'consolidator' idea is an interesting one. Would be a good addition to the ancient ruins tech fields.

Re: Emissive Armor
 

From: His Imperial Majesty, Emperor DMM
To: General Kargazgh, Fleet Materiel Command
Emissive armor most definitely does NOT work in the .56 demo simulator. I have just personally tested it. A single shot from a level V depleted uranium cannon (15 damage) put 15 damage on a ship with level II emissive armor even though that is supposed to reflect away anything 20 or below. Who is overseeing the armor R&D program? He is to be immediately interrogated as a spy, then found guilty of treason and executed!!

Re: Emissive Armor
 

It has been my experience with fighters that they do not fire as one. Weapons that they use are listed and fired one at a time just as they are for Weapon Platforms. They are listed as a single ship but each one fires independently.

Re: Emissive Armor
 

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Baron Munchausen:
While you have armor, damage is distributed randomly among armor components - except when a weapon that skips armor is being used. When armor is gone or an armor ignoring weapon is being used, damage is distributed randomly among non-armor components.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

There are a couple of points I've read about that I'd be interested in seeing confirmed or denied, if anybody can do either.

First, I've been told that once a component is damaged, all additional damage taken by the ship is applied to the same component until it is destroyed. IOW, if you fire and strike a particular piece of armour, additional hits will be applied to that same piece until it finally gives way.

This makes sense to me, in terms of saving runtime. It isn't all that realistic but it isn't all that obvious either, and it would take a *lot* more memory to track the exact status of every single component on every single ship, fighter, satellite, WP, etc., as opposed to just if they are operative or destroyed.

Secondly, I've also seen it stated that if a single shot destroys an armour component and has some damage left to do, that damage is applied to the non-armour components. Subsequent shots would be taken by the remaining armour, unless those rounds too are strong enough to destroy an armour component with a single bLast.

This doesn't make sense to me. These two seem contradictory, considering one shot could pierce armour and damage the interior, and then the next could only damage another piece of armour, leading to two seperate damaged components being tracked.

I've never seen the second in action and rather doubt it is really in play, but I thought I'd pass it on in case anybody knows anything about it. Perhaps it was a concept that got tossed out in early development?

Re: Emissive Armor
 

Quote: I've also seen it stated that if a single shot destroys an armour component and has some damage left to do, that damage is applied to the non-armour components. Subsequent shots would be taken by the remaining armour, unless those rounds too are strong enough to destroy an armour component with a single bLast.

Reply: I've never noticed that happen. I have the .56 demo. As far as I can tell, my heavily armored ships never take non-armor damage until all the armor is gone. (That's a bit unrealistic, but to make things realistic you'd have to model the ships in 2D, place the armor around the ship, keep track of orientations, allow for aiming at soft points, etc. Even purely tactical games are rarely that realistic.) Maybe some of the wierd armors (crystal, organic) work as you describe??

Re: Emissive Armor
 

[quote]Originally posted by Baron Munchausen:
[b] With FIGHTERS I think that all units fire together in a single attack, which is really interesting because looking at the damage power of 'small' components you'd think they would be helpless against emissive armor. I've not seen fighters attack a ship with emissive armor yet - I have barely used fighters. Maybe someone else has.


Yes. When fighters fire it registers as a single massive attack.
Because of this (and the ship size requirment for weapons mounts)I have started using almost exclusively Light Carriers. I make 3-4 different ones using a huge mount for at least one each , shield depleter, ionic disruptor, and enveloping acid globe. Put a couple PDs on each and then a normal sized plasma bolt. Two shields, 2-3 organic armor, an ecm, and 14-20 fighter bays.
Then I make a fighter with small shield depleter and an electric discharge.
Move the carrier to point blank and launch the fighters. 14 X 20 on the shield depleter is 280 ie 2 shield generators then 14 X 30 on the electric discharge is 420 damage. Even crystaline armor is taken out unless it is in amounts large enough to limit the weapons space.
Then hit the enemy with the huge mount on the LC and it usually leaves an immoble/weaponless hulk that can be ignored.

50 of those fighters will take out everything except a super shielded/armored cruiser in one shot.


------------------
Wingte

Re: Emissive Armor
 

*Double checks self*

Yep they are right.

It counts as single massive strike.
*bonks self for not checking first time and basing on faulty human memory*