CompEnhancement Discussion.

[Deathstalker]

The one problem with mimicing ROF with mounts reducing size is unintended weapon usages. Mainly the Unique Massive weapons. Create a gatling mount of 10% size/damage/cost/etc and just imagine a ship with 10 Massive Ionic Dispersers with Gatling mounts. Instead of a 100kt weapon with one chance of hitting in 30 rounds you get 10 weapons doing 10 points damage each, more chances to hit. That and the cost of repairing a ship with 60 gatling mounted Anti-Matter torps is horrendous for a race with a low repair rate (or even a high one).

"Gatling weapons wear out after significant use (how to accomplish this; I don't know)"

Could be done with a MechWarrior Heat/Heat sink type of system but IMO this would make micro management even more tedious. They could always have a seperate 'Supply System', ie once it is depleted it must regenerate from the ships supplies before it can fire multiple times per round again. (kinda like shields and shield regerators I guess).

[ May 26, 2002, 04:37: Message edited by: Deathstalker ]

[Andrés]

I'd like to see component mods able to boost an ability. eg a heavy engine mount gives them more standard movs or heavy shield mount more shield points.
Probably would have to make them specific for a comp family.

[Baron Munchausen]

Originally posted by PvK:
You can effectively increase ROF by reducing component size, which you can do with mounts. Lowering ROF can already be done with mounts. The suggestion for tech requirements for mounts is already in MM's suggestion box (it would be really nice).

PvK

How do you lower ROF with a mount?

And yes, mounts restricted by technology requirements would be a fantastic addition to the system. That and add shield/armor specific mounts and the customizations possible would finally equal MOO II.

[Baron Munchausen]

Originally posted by Deathstalker:

"Gatling weapons wear out after significant use (how to accomplish this; I don't know)"

This is simulated in the game by maintenance cost. It's true that military hardware of all sorts 'wears out' very quickly and is replaced. A jet engine is only good for a few hundred hours, for example, even at normal (non combat) performance and with perfect maintenance record. I've heard that the planes on a carrier end up costing many times as much as the carrier itself.

Anyway, gatling mounts should have a much, much higher than normal increase in cost/peformance ratio if you want to simulate a technology pushed to its limits.

[capnq]

I read this in a review that damage is inflicted right to left?

That only applies to mixed Groups of satellites, IIRC. (Mixed troops go left to right). Ship damage (after shields and armor) is random, with the chance of a component being hit a function of its size.

[Baron Munchausen]

Damage is random in ships and bases, in satellite stacks, and in WPs on planets. It used to be you put components into your ship 'left to right' and they were destroyed 'right to left' in SE II, NOT III or IV at any time! In the earlier Version of IV you did indeed see WP stacks and satellite stacks destroyed in a certain order. That has been changed. There is a tendency for smaller units to be destroyed first but even that is not absolutely predictable.

[Suicide Junkie]

destroyed 'right to left' in SE II, NOT III or IV at any time!

Actually, in SE3, the damage from each shot started at a random spot, and from there procceded left-to-right. A good strategy was to space out your weapons so they would not all be destroyed by a single hit.

In SE4, the components are hit randomly every point along the way.
HOWEVER:
- For Armor, the ones with FEWER hitpoints are hit more often, though not exclusively.
- For internals, the ones with MORE hitpoints are hit more often. This seems to approach a "one lottery ticket per hitpoint" type scheme, but the larger components absorb slightly more than their fair share.

And that's probably more than you wanted to know