Ramming Damage

[couslee]

I tried to find an answer and couldn't, so here it is.

How is ramming damage calculated?

The inspiration for this question has the following set-ups.
Both races have standard B,LS,CQ,6ion engines, no shields.
My ship: Frigate with 1 Cobalt3, 3 PDC2, 260HP
Enemy ship: Destroyer with 3 CSM2, 1 supply, 305HP

1> With no previous damage to either, both get destroyed. Why? the 300 damage from the warhead should almost completly destroy his ship leaving 5 HP. My 260 HP Frigate should have survived imo.

2> After a different ship of mine destroyed all of his components but his B, LS, CQ. (30hp total), I rammed with my undamaged ramming ship. Again both were destroyed. WTF?WHY? My ship certainly should have survived, as he only had 30 HP before ramming.

So I am obviously thinking this should work a different way than the programmers set it up. Cobalt warheads are expensive, they should work better than they do.

I know in a ramming situation, I will take some damage. But given the two above situations, total loss seems wrong to me.

[ February 03, 2003, 18:13: Message edited by: couslee ]

[Ed Kolis]

If your ship has a warhead, IIRC it will automatically be destroyed when it rams, whether the enemy is or not - warheads kind of blow up you know and they're not fun to be around

[geoschmo]

First of all, a ramming ship has a certain amount of damage it can generate. This is based I believe on the structure of the ramming ship. In the stock game, the target ship takes 100% of this damage amount, and the ramming ship takes 60% of the damage amount. These two numbers can be modified in the settings.txt file.

Putting on a warhead greatly increases the damage amount you ship does to the target. But it also increases the amount of damage done to your own ship if you remember your ship takes 60% of that number. With a warhead you can very easily give more damage than your own ship can sustain, especially a small ship like a frigate. 60% of a Cobalt Warhead 3 by itslef is enough to kill your frigate, without even counting 60% of the structure of your own ship.

Even if 100% of the damage your ramming ship can do is way more than the total comps left of the enemy ship, your ship still does the total amount of damage. It's just that the extra damage is wasted. And your ship still takes 60% of the total damage, It doesn't take the amount of damage that it takes to kill the enemy. As far as I know the size of the enemy ship or the structure of the remaining components have no effect on the ammount of damage your ship sustains. Only the size of your own ship and whether or not it has a warhead on board.

Geoschmo

Originally posted by Ed Kolis:
If your ship has a warhead, IIRC it will automatically be destroyed when it rams, whether the enemy is or not - warheads kind of blow up you know and they're not fun to be around

I am not sure that is neccesariy true. For a small ship it would be, but I believe a large enough ramming ship with warhead can survive the impact. Although much more heavily damaged than it would be without the warhead to be sure.

[ February 03, 2003, 18:51: Message edited by: geoschmo ]

[Slick]

Not really sure what these mean, but from settings.txt:

Ram Ship Source Modifier := 60
Ram Ship Target Modifier := 100

I think it means that the ramming ship sums up its mass and warhead (if any) strength and compares it to the target's mass and then the source ship takes 60% of damage from the mass of the target while the target takes 100% of the damage from the source.

Or does it mean something else entirely?

[edit: Whoops, Geo already described this. ]

Slick.

[ February 03, 2003, 18:53: Message edited by: Slick ]

[couslee]

Thanks Geo. So the warhead damage is not calculated first, then the mass vs mass. Kind of like how shields were added to unit HP (pre 1.84).
See, I thought the warhead damage calculated first. I would rather see the warhead with a .5 or 1 range with only one use allowed. (MOD?)
Captain: Ramming speed
Con: Speed attained Sir
Captain: Release warhead coasting clamps and prepare to alter course.
Weapons: The ship was not destoryed Sir.
Captain: Do not alter course and proceed with the ramming. This beast must not reach the fleet.

That is how I kinda pictured it going down. Oh well.

So based on the numbers, the AI took 560 damage, and I took 336 damage.

What about if I had damaged components. Is the mass from those deducted from the ramming damage done? I assume it is, but not 100% sure. That goes for a lot of things in this game.

[ February 03, 2003, 19:39: Message edited by: couslee ]

[tbontob]

Geo

Recently, I had my colony ship ram another. Mine was set on "kamakazi" and was destroyed but the other survived to colonize a planet. It was a surprise to me as I thought "All things being equal, if a ship should survive, it should be the attacker based on the 100/60). I can't remember if the other colony ship tried to run away or not, but it didn't try to ram.

So, could it be the other way around? Like the attacker takes more damage. Or could there something that changes the algorithym of damage so that the attacker is occasionally destroyed.