Armor, Shields and Damage (FAQ)

[Seawolf]

While I understand the concept here I wonder then do we want a damaged components to have any penalty assigned to them? Or are all these changes only for destruction of components?

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Seawolf on the prowl

[Zanthis]

I don't want partially damaged components to have penalties. It would require a lot more coding than the benefits it would create. Especially since you'd almost have to make it so the modders could decide what the effects of partial damage were on an individual component basis as well as at what point those effects occured (20 damage out of 40? 30 out of 40?).

Can you image what changes would have to be made to Components.txt to make, say PPB's "-1 range when this weapon has taken 5+ damage, +1 reload when this weapon has taken 15+ damage". Yucky.

Not worth it IMHO. The damage system present now is workable, just contains a few oddities that, when cleared up, will be just fine.

[This message has been edited by Zanthis (edited 08 February 2001).]

[E. Albright]

Bump.

[Mark Walton]

Could the way damage is handled just change slightly to (not real code of couse)

Damage -= shields;
Damage -= armour;
If ((Damage + Retained_Damage) >= component.structure)
{
component.destroyed;
Retained_Damage -= (component.structure - Damage); // not less than 0 of course!
}
else
{
Retained_Damage += Damage
}


So, retained damage is never added to the damage score as such; it just waits until there is enough of it, when added to current damage, to actually destroy a component.

[PurpleRhino]

I would have to agree with Sinapus about how to apply damage to armor and internals. The way I see armor is not as individual pieces, but as a single one... Think of each piece as a layer around the whole ship... not like patch work. Damage should take out a 'piece' at a time... representing the layers being bLasted away.
Also, I think it should work the same for multiple components... group them together, and just track damage for the group... so when you do enough damage to the group that would destroy a single piece, it does. It takes some of the 'randomness' out, but is simplistic, but I think, effective. Maybe this is how it works now... does anybody know?

[Suicide Junkie]

I think that just having a separate "retained damage" for armor vs internals would work well.

Then you only add the retained damage when you hit a component of that type.

This will prevent armor-skipping weapons from using the retained damage that a WMG did to armor, to blow away internals.

[The Finn]

First, Zanthis.. wow.. thanks a bunch for this info. Nice to know HOW the bugs affect the game.

I'm new here. This is my first post and I'm still playing the demo - awesome game!! I'm ordering it this month - I figure my bills can wait a little. <grin>

What about this as a stopgap solution until they do a fix?

Divide armor into smaller chunks - say by 5. Tonnage required, tonnage structure and all effects. This would cause more armor destruction and less 'carry-over' damage effects.

I *think* to do this you'd have to do it for ALL armor and modify all the races build designs to put 5 times as much armor on. If you didn't do it for all armor, I think you'd get weirdness where AI ships piled on loads of standard armor until the better types were researched.

The only other possible problem I see with it - How many components can you shove on a ship without causing problems for the program?

[dumbluck]

An excellent thread that definately deserves to be bumped up.

[Aristoi]

I'm curious if anyone heard back from MM about this. Is it on the fix list somewhere?

[Suicide Junkie]

A recent addition to the damage info:

-Small/Weak armor segments will be hit FIRST, 9 times out of 10, with the occasional large segment dying before a small.
-Large/Tough internals will be hit first, most of the time, but most internals tend to be similar size/strength, so its more randomized. Heavy-mount weapons are still the most likely to be hit first.