Suicide Junkie: pls read, about b5 armor system
 

Hey SJ,

i just spend a few hours with modding the B5 mod. While i was at it i finally took a quite intensive look at the armor system you invented and which was heavily defended by you and Fyron when i told you i wanted to abandon it.
Anyways, now that i finally understood the entire system and stuff, i have a questions. If you could be so kind to answer them, i would most appreciate it.

First, i guess the 3 armor components (Primary, Alternate and Additional) are just like the sensors and ecm in the mod, you can pack one of each which will increase the overall performance. It still stack, and increase effiency when used together. That part wasnt hard to figure out.
Unlike the ECM and Sensor system it will always be smart to use all 3 "layers" of the armor, since their cost is not that big at all, unlike ecm and sensor you dont have to decide if the costs are worth it.

I got that part right, did i ?

Now each armor "Layer" offers 5 different "technologies", Scattering, Refractive, Channeling, Conductive, Emmisive.
Different from stock, those names have actually no other difference than increased ability to decrease damage.

Obviously thats pretty strange, i think the names cant be left the way they are, because they confused me quite a lot, and i guess/know players of the mod agree.

Anyways, im still right with my thoughts, am i ?


Ok, now lets go even further. Each TYPE of armor (scattering - emmisive) offers 6 levels to research, which will ONLY decrease the cost of the component.
Since the cost goes down 10 points per level, what is actually the point in research and developing "better" armor of one "name" ?

Obviously it is FAR smarter to just research the next "TYPE" of armor, i.e. skip levels 2-6 from scattering armor and research refractive armor.

Now i havent fiddled with the techtree too much, so it could be possible that one is actually forced to fully develop scattering armor to even get access to refractive armor, in that point, my above question/thought is wrong.

At ANY rate, its still to confusing.
Im willing to go with your armor system in the basics, but it needs to be simplified. I.E. no more different "TYPES" of armor for one layer which actually give no benefit except better abilites.
All armors of one LAYER need to have the same name, for example "Emisive Armor I-X (Primary)", Emisive Armor I-X (Secondary) and "Emisive Armor I-X (Additionally).
Or for another example, there will still be different names, but only 3, one for each layer. So the Primary Armors is all named "Emmisive", the secondary armor is named §Refractive§ and the third layer is named "Conductive".

Well, thats basicly what this thread is about. I would like to hear your thoughts on this, as well as arguments. The armor system, as it is, cant be kept within further revision of the Babylon5 mod, not under -any- circumstances.
I will offer SJ the chance to "redo" his system for use with the mod, else i will rehaul it.
Lastly, i dont meant to offend anyone. Im glad im allowed to post on this forum and find the support i need/want. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

In addition, and thats already clear, i already deleted a few armors. Midrange and Heavy armor, with 3kT and 7kT size respectivly have been deleted.
From now on, there will only be light armor, with 1kT size (in order to fill up empty space) and the 3 layers of damage-reducing armor. I actually saw no need for armors with 3kT and 7kT size, even if they provide better resistance and stuff.

Alright, now its time for you guys http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif


btw. Engines, Vehiclesizes (ships) and Reactors have been completed http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Re: Suicide Junkie: pls read, about b5 armor syste
 

No.

*cringes* Congratulations, you have just ruined the armor system. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/frown.gif The heavier armors provide fewer overall hitpoints, but better protection because more shots will hit the armor components instead of internals (since the calculations that determine which component is hit are biased towards components with more hit points). There is most certainly a purpose to the heavy armor.

Re: Suicide Junkie: pls read, about b5 armor syste
 

Have you considered making armor race specific something similiar to the star trek mod. As in B5 most races the armor wasnt the same would add more b5 feel.

Re: Suicide Junkie: pls read, about b5 armor syste
 

First, i guess the 3 armor components (Primary, Alternate and Additional) are just like the sensors and ecm in the mod, you can pack one of each which will increase the overall performance. It still stack, and increase effiency when used together. That part wasnt hard to figure out.
Unlike the ECM and Sensor system it will always be smart to use all 3 "layers" of the armor, since their cost is not that big at all, unlike ecm and sensor you dont have to decide if the costs are worth it.
- Sort of, but not really.

The primary is big, powerful, and one-per-ship.
The secondary lets you add a piece of weaker, stacking ability. (one-per-ship again)
The Additional replaces the secondary. It is exactly the same, except there is no limit on the number you can add.

---

Now each armor "Layer" offers 5 different "technologies", Scattering, Refractive, Channeling, Conductive, Emmisive.
Different from stock, those names have actually no other difference than increased ability to decrease damage.
- Yes.

Obviously thats pretty strange, i think the names cant be left the way they are, because they confused me quite a lot, and i guess/know players of the mod agree.
- They were named as such in order to give them a B5 flavour.
The name really isn't important to me, although IMO it does sound good.

Ok, now lets go even further. Each TYPE of armor (scattering - emmisive) offers 6 levels to research, which will ONLY decrease the cost of the component.
Since the cost goes down 10 points per level, what is actually the point in research and developing "better" armor of one "name" ?

Obviously it is FAR smarter to just research the next "TYPE" of armor, i.e. skip levels 2-6 from scattering armor and research refractive armor.
- Going up a level in the ability direction is VERY expensive, though. The price tech and HP tech are much cheaper to research.
The thing to do is go up in ability as much as you can afford, then squeeze the other two techs in between your weapon/other research.

Now i havent fiddled with the techtree too much, so it could be possible that one is actually forced to fully develop scattering armor to even get access to refractive armor, in that point, my above question/thought is wrong.
- Nope. Just the cost. Which rises exponentially with tech level, or so.

At ANY rate, its still to confusing.
Im willing to go with your armor system in the basics, but it needs to be simplified. I.E. no more different "TYPES" of armor for one layer which actually give no benefit except better abilites.
All armors of one LAYER need to have the same name, for example "Emisive Armor I-X (Primary)", Emisive Armor I-X (Secondary) and "Emisive Armor I-X (Additionally).
Or for another example, there will still be different names, but only 3, one for each layer. So the Primary Armors is all named "Emmisive", the secondary armor is named §Refractive§ and the third layer is named "Conductive".
- That dosen't make any sense, really. Those three things don't work together.
If you look at the component portraits, you should see what I was getting at.
The Primary is the big toughie in the middle.
The secondary/additional is the add-on pieces which provide some fringe support to the primary.

In addition, and thats already clear, i already deleted a few armors. Midrange and Heavy armor, with 3kT and 7kT size respectivly have been deleted.
From now on, there will only be light armor, with 1kT size (in order to fill up empty space) and the 3 layers of damage-reducing armor. I actually saw no need for armors with 3kT and 7kT size, even if they provide better resistance and stuff.
- As fyron said, boo - hiss.
Toss out the structural supports, no prob. They never got seriously used in the PBW game.
But, sheesh, man. Light and Heavy armor are key. Midrange is a nice alternative to mixing grades. Not so much against the ancients, with their insta-death weapons, but absolutely critical against the young races.

Light armor only will also mean the shadow battlecrabs get crippled by the E.A. way too easy.

---

Look:

Light armor: bulk. Absolutely nessesary in big fleet combat.
Midrange: Happy medium option.
Heavy armor: protection. Nessesary for small to medium fleets and ships loaded with advanced armor.

Advanced armor: High tech addons to reduce incoming damage. 3D grid tech.
dimension 1) increase ability amount (mega pricey)
dimension 2) increase hp (real cheap)
dimension 3) decrease cost (real cheap)

Its not that hard, dangit!

And armor is NOT the ignorable "fill-in-the-empty-space" crap it is in stock. There are no magic shields; this is THE protection mechanism for ships.
You NEED to put a healthy pile on your ships for optimum effectiveness.
If you don't have hitpoints, you're gonna get your *** handed to you. If you don't have the proper amount of heavy armor, you're going to be breathing vaccuum through the sieve that was your hull before your ship is even half-destroyed.

Re: Suicide Junkie: pls read, about b5 armor syste
 

Oh dear RagsX, you managed to anger "them" again... hahaha LOL!!! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...es/biggrin.gif

Re: Suicide Junkie: pls read, about b5 armor syste
 

Hopefully Ragnarok-X (and you Timstone) will finally realize he is wrong about the armor and leave it alone...

Re: Suicide Junkie: pls read, about b5 armor syste
 

Hehehe....

*wissles a innocent tune while walikng away towards his timetraveling gearbox*

I must admit you guys (You, SJ and other supporters) have some good points. Maybe the armor system improves when the descriptions are modified and just maybe the names too. But you guys have convinced me of the use of this armor system. But I'll keep myself in the background and see what you guys are going to do. I'm going to focus on other stuff.

Re: Suicide Junkie: pls read, about b5 armor syste
 

Oh well. Actually the point is that im participating in the Last and only babylon 5 pbw game, which is played by 7 players. I have yet to see a ship using the armor system either to effect or in a way described by SJ and Fyron. People simply do not REALIZE how it should work, even if i see your point.
Right now all ships i have seen just use 1kT component to fill the ships space (i.e. you have 8kT space left, so you pack 8x1kT armors), 3kT and 7kT are not used at all.
In addition people pack one "main" armor each of damage-reducing armor, thats about it.


About your
"Light armor only will also mean the shadow battlecrabs get crippled by the E.A. way too easy. "
Well, simple as it is, Shadows and first ones in general will of course get special armors which have a high damage-reduction-ability.
Since all of the armors dont have the "armor" ability, they will not destroyed first. Due to the massive size-resistance relation, they will most probably be destroyed at Last. Since they will Last that long, the damage reduction will be provided until the end, so even more damage resistance through light/normal/heavy armor is not even needed, it will already take quite long to just destroy one ship, given average armor vs average weapon, where the damage decreasement will be about 25% (or whatever).


I would so like to hear more opinions on this, apart from SJ, Fyron, Timstone and me. People who actually played the mod.

Re: Suicide Junkie: pls read, about b5 armor syste
 

Well from what I can tell with all this verbal going on http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif
and my crude knowlege of the similar but simpler Adamant armour -

If you use mostly 1kt (smaller) armour:

Your ships will take More hits before being destroyed BUT they will also take More internal non-armour damage early (i.e. bridges, sensors, & weapons will be much more likely to be destroyed early in combat)

If you use mostly 7kt? (larger) armour (10kt in Adamant, more intuitive since we use base 10 numbers http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif):

Your ships will take Less hits before being destroyed BUT they will also take Less internal non-armour damage early (i.e. bridges, sensors, & weapons will be stay functional untill later in the combat)


I hope I got that right and it was understandable! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...es/biggrin.gif

Re: Suicide Junkie: pls read, about b5 armor syste
 

Just because people are horribly misusing it doesn't mean the armor system is flawed. It just needs better explanation...

Re: Suicide Junkie: pls read, about b5 armor syste
 

Fyron:
No not always are the players the bad side of the equation.
The players have decided (or better yet, found out) that:
- The armor is too big to use in the way it was intended
- The hulls are too small
- The other components are too big
- Or a nice mix between the three foregoing options

Kosh said:
"Truth is a three-edged sword, your side, their side and the truth." http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...es/biggrin.gif

Re: Suicide Junkie: pls read, about b5 armor syste
 

The basic armors are about the right size...

Re: Suicide Junkie: pls read, about b5 armor syste
 

Well the game has decided different.
But it never hurts to try and change the description. Maybe that was the faulty thing after all.

Re: Suicide Junkie: pls read, about b5 armor syste
 

By basic armors I mean the ones without abilities...

Re: Suicide Junkie: pls read, about b5 armor syste
 

I'm afreed I haven't played the B5 Mod for a long, long time and I never used more than light armor on my ships because of the huge researchcosts involved. I always used light armor and late game medium. Despite the fact I knew more or less how the armor worked.
I used the bulk heads quite a lot actually. I used then to fill up a hull untill it was just under the maximum resource limit for my constructionyard. This allowed for a maximum used buildingtime and a stronger ship. Although it had a higher maintenance rate.

Well at least we´re getting somewhere with this discussion. I´m sure we´re able to work our something for the armor. Some adjustments to this system.

For this night I say: Good night gentlemen, sleep well! And watch out for the http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...ies/stupid.gif.

Re: Suicide Junkie: pls read, about b5 armor syste
 

Adjustments to the basic armor would be bad.

Re: Suicide Junkie: pls read, about b5 armor syste
 

Do scale the costs down to be balanced with the other techs.
Just keep it in proportion.

The costs were really only balanced with other armor, since the other techs weren't well defined at the time.

Re: Suicide Junkie: pls read, about b5 armor syste
 

I will take a look at it once again, most probably tomorrow. Now if just Timstone would finish weapons for one race so i could test combat :p :p :p http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

Re: Suicide Junkie: pls read, about b5 armor syste
 

[img]/threads/images/Graemlins/Grenade.gif[/img]Just an idea but this mod has 175 component levels of armour with abilities. If this were reduced to 100 component levels, we could give primary, secondary and grid armour their own component family with 20 levels of components:
4, 4, 4, 4, 4
4, 4, 4, 4, 4
4, 4, 4, 4, 4
Instead of:
7, 7, 7, 7, 7
7, 7, 7, 7, 7
7, 7, 7, 7, 7

Also, I suggest adding a new armour component that would represent a ship’s ability to take a hit.[img]/threads/images/Graemlins/Flag_NewZeland.gif[/img]

Re: Suicide Junkie: pls read, about b5 armor syste
 

It is there. Heavy armor.

Re: Suicide Junkie: pls read, about b5 armor syste
 

In any game, you will only see 13-15 levels of the basic armor. (Light/mid/heavy combined)

The advanced armors see up to 10 minor-upgrade levels in each major ability level.

---

Your opponents may see a different set of 13-15 levels than you, if they research in a different order, but each player only researches 13-15 levels.

There are hundreds of components, yes. Almost all of them will never be seen due to the order of research.
That's how grid techs work.

Re: Suicide Junkie: pls read, about b5 armor syste
 

Perhaps if your going to go with your 1kt armor.

A solution to keep armor working properly would be to create a mount system where you can mount on different armor sizes and their respective kt at that cost and size.

This way you will have your cheap armor and the ability to have the armor that the bab5 system was based around.

Just tie in the different mounts with armor research and ship sizes.

Re: Suicide Junkie: pls read, about b5 armor syste
 

I thought about mounts as well and already played it. The only problem is that mounts can only change the size, cost and damage resistance of a certain component. Since the B5 armor system is mostly about damage reduction (thats my opinion), you cant really scale it. I would like to create a system where an escort armor reduces damage by 10% while a cruiser armor reduces damage by 25%, but unfortunally thats not possibly at all.
I for one still like the idea of 1kT armor components which can be scaled to anything from 1kT to 10kT and which only absorb damage, and one additional layer of armor representing the current primary, damage-reducing armor. Anyway, more opinions are welcome !

Re: Suicide Junkie: pls read, about b5 armor syste
 

That kind of thing would make small ships even more useless, though.
The point of the primary armor is to give every ship a half-decent amount of ability points.
Big ships can add a few more ability points, and get more heavy armor too.

A ship's value in combat is on the order of (Weapon power) x (expected hitpoints)

IMO, its not about damage reduction ability. Its about Keeping your ship operational as long as possible:
- For individual ships, that means using lots of the heaviest armor available, along with a strategically decided amount of advanced armor (the smaller the enemy weapons, the more you want)
- In big fleets, you want the other allied ships to have light armor, so they draw more fire away from your important ships ... at their own expense of course http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif.

That's assuming the enemy targets the high-hitpoint ships first.
If they're targetting the low-hitpoint ships first, then you've got to adjust your strategy... Lots of smaller ships with light armor, and your bigger important ships with medium armor so they have decent protection for the end of the battle and enough hitpoints to not be targetted first.

Now, if you're attacking in overwhelming force, you might decide to just go with heavy armor all around. That way you lose a few ships, but the survivors aren't crippled, and are quickly repaired.

---

The advanced armor is just icing on that cake to multiply the effect of having lots of heavy armor.

Re: Suicide Junkie: pls read, about b5 armor syste
 

Yeah indeed, repairations are the point as well. Comparing 1kT, 3kT and 7kT components to each other, it should take 7 times or 3 times the time to repair them compared to 7kT component. This is a major point imho, especially considering the unconventional repair-system of the B5 mod (special hulls with component repair ability).

Re: Suicide Junkie: pls read, about b5 armor syste
 

This is a major feature of the armor system... Tradeoffs between raw hit points, penetration rates, and repair times are crucial to the well being of the armor system. More strategic design decisions are a good thing, no? The system is quite simple as it is, once you understand it. All that is needed is better documentation.