SE5 Demo Bug Reports & Annoyances/Requests

[dmm]

tmcc said:
As I watch combat it appears that missiles come in as a stream and the PD weapons target the first one and all fire at that one. I think it is necessary to re-work the targeting algorithm so that the PDC fire is spread out. Increasing fire rate would help but the problem of all firing at one missile would remain.

Also I do not know why PDCs from non targeted vehicles are exceptionaly useless. I have not seen one hit yet and I have seen many fire after the missile actually hits the target.

I have not seen either of these behaviors, but I have about twice as many PDC on my direct-fire ships as there are missiles on the missile ships. You seem to have about the same number of PDC as missiles.

What I see is that, at slow combat speed (either tactical or strategic), all of the missiles in the first salvo from the leading missile ship get destroyed by the PDC from the leading direct-fire ship. Unfortunately, the PDC from any other direct-fire ships ALSO fire at the first salvo (and of course they never hit because, in my situation, there is nothing to destroy). The problem is that, when the second missile ship comes into range and fires a salvo, there is no PDC left in the entire direct-fire fleet -- everyone is still reloading -- so the second salvo gets through untouched and does massive damage to its target.

Substituting PointDefenseBlasters (PDB, which are based on meson blasters) for PDC (based on DUCs) halves the reload time and eliminates the above problem (or at least substantially reduces it).

However, if I run combat at fast speeds, then I get substantial "leakage" through the PDC, even when I have twice as many PDC as missiles. Perhaps it is the behavior you describe; I can't tell for sure. But it seems to me to be more like 1 or 2 out of a 5-missile salvo getting through, rather than 4 out of 5.

[StarShadow]

Actually it quarters the reload time, going from 2 seconds to 1/2 second per shot. I think the PD problem may be another manifestation of a known problem. The problem being, that when only one target is availible (ie in range), *all* weapons will completely unload at it. Even though more targets may be in range shortly.

[jimbob]

that when only one target is availible (ie in range), *all* weapons will completely unload at it. Even though more targets may be in range shortly.

How was this handled in SEIV?

[StarShadow]

In SE4 all weapons except seekers hit their target instantly (in SE5 all weapon projectiles including beams have travel time), and fired sequentially (ie one after the other) until the target was destroyed.

[Phoenix-D]

And seekers did exibit the overkill effect, especially against planets.

[StarShadow]

I was hoping to see if increasing the beam/bolt projectile speed, in the hopes of making them basicly instant-hit, would help any. Unfortunately the demo won't allow it.

[Phoenix-D]

It helped in Starfury, except when you increased the speed too high the projectiles had a tendancy to randomly explode.

No, I have no idea why either.

[PvK]

Phoenix-D said:
And seekers did exibit the overkill effect, especially against planets.

Except:

* In the latest versions of SEIV, the targetting AI will distribute seeker fire to avoid overtargetting somewhat.

* Since there was a delay of a whole SEIV tactical combat turn before targetting opportunities, instead of once every 1/10th of a second or so in SE5, many targets could be in range at the same time, making the above decision more likely to be interesting. The "continuous action" of SE5 combat poses an extra challenge for the AI to figure out how to distribute targetting effectively, which evidently has not been solved for the demo.

Meanwhile, players missing the ability to munckin-abuse the tactical AI can use this by sending out decoys to draw fire and dodge while other ships move into range to engage. Tricky to do though with the slow turning rates etc.

PvK