Missiles as units (a.k.a microdrones)

[Lobo7922]

I read all about minidrones, missiles, etc. and I just remember how much I enjoy preparing my squadron before a battle when I play XCOM; do you remember?, armor, ammunition, weapons, etc.
that was very funny, it's micromanagement, all we love micromanagement, but how much it's enough?

[jimbob]

For starters, this would be great!! The design possiblities and introduction of resource management are a great great great idea!

You could make the "missiles" have all sorts of different modifiable attributes, like different speeds, different ranges, etc. by introducing different components. Combat only engines (ie various levels of afterburners) would keep the missiles from zooming through wormholes and across sectors. Higher speed engines/aftrerburners could use more supplies, giving a shorter range for example. Later technologies could allow for improved engines/afterburners and eventually very expensive (and gas guzzling?) engines that would have normal movement, letting missiles move across systems and through worm holes. This would allow a player to essentially enter combat without entering combat! Now missile cruisers have an entirely different value (I'm a missile freak, but I'm always disheartened by the strength of my enemy's PD weaponry. In the same breath, I wouldn't want missiles to become too strong).

Some players will design missiles with extra supply storage to reach across the entire combat screen, while others will let loose a volley of short range, high velocity missiles, while others will push slower, high yield "turtle missiles" out of the bomb-bay doors. Some will opt for the expensive missiles with normal movement Ratings, while others will go for the cheapest drives possible.

As far as the "fire em all at once" problem,
i) can't you limit the number of drones launched from a "drone bay"? (I don't know, cause I don't have gold... yet)
ii) if you can launch a swack of missiles (but not all) in one shot, I figure that's okay. The player will now have to deeply consider whether or not their ships will survive combat. If not, fire em all! If so, then they'll need to apply restraint.
iii) as to missiles taking out their primary target, and the extras going after secondary targets... I guess everyone will just have to be careful as to how many they drop over the side

Edit: oh, maybe you could make components that can fire only at certain targets. This way, you could design a missile that only attacks ships. Now you won't harpoon that planet by mistake. Sort of a hardcoded smart missile if you will.

My Last comment for the night. Missiles cannot attack satellites right now. To keep this important game balance, I think it would be important to only design weapons that can attack ships/bases/planets for these new missile types.

Ciao all
Good night

[ June 14, 2002, 07:42: Message edited by: jimbob ]

[jimbob]

Hi again,
I lied. Here are some more of my blatherings

As to the use of micro vs. macro drones.
I think (tho my brain is tired, so it's efficiency is pretty low right now) that careful planning can distinguish between the two.
i) macro drone components will be kept off the microdrones becaues the components for macro drones are probably going to be too large to fit on the micro drones/missiles.
ii) make the micro drone components undesirable for macro drones by introducing extreme limitations on the micro components. ie. cannot fire on satellites, cannot have more than one of the component (or two, three etc. with the next patch), undesirably short weapons firing ranges on micro components, other ideas???
iii) is it possible to help the AI out by pre-programing their design choices and weapon preferences? Just make the micro components a less prefered item by giving them lower roman numerals?

[ June 14, 2002, 07:44: Message edited by: jimbob ]

[MKSheppard]

Originally posted by jimbob:

My Last comment for the night. Missiles cannot attack satellites right now. To keep this important game balance, I think it would be important to only design weapons that can attack ships/bases/planets for these new missile types.

Ciao all
Good night

I tried making missile drones, but it won't work...
the damn drones like to RAM before firing their
weapons...and if I set it so they fire before
they ram, they won't ram.....

I have been trying to get a FA*($@&$&) drone
to attack using "attacks engines only" and it
does jack squat!

EDIT:

Here is what I have been using:

*****************

Name := Small Missile
Short Name := Small Missile
Description := Small Multi-Purpose Missile.
Code := SM
Primary Bitmap Name := Drone
Alternate Bitmap Name := Drone
Vehicle Type := Drone
Tonnage := 5
Cost Minerals := 100
Cost Organics := 0
Cost Radioactives := 50
Engines Per Move := 1
Number of Tech Req := 1
Tech Area Req 1 := Missiles
Tech Level Req 1 := 1
Number of Abilities := 2
Ability 1 Type := Extra Movement Generation
Ability 1 Descr := Small size and special materials increases speed of drone by 3.
Ability 1 Val 1 := 3
Ability 1 Val 2 := 999
Ability 2 Type := Combat To Hit Defense Plus
Ability 2 Descr := Small size makes missile 50% harder to hit in combat.
Ability 2 Val 1 := 50
Ability 2 Val 2 := 0
Requirement Must Have Bridge := False
Requirement Can Have Aux Con := False
Requirement Min Life Support := 0
Requirement Min Crew Quarters := 0
Requirement Uses Engines := True
Requirement Max Engines := 15
Requirement Pct Fighter Bays := 0
Requirement Pct Colony Mods := 0
Requirement Pct Cargo := 0

*********************

Name := Ionic Pulse Warhead V
Description := Warhead that disables enemy ship engines.
Pic Num := 670
Tonnage Space Taken := 2
Tonnage Structure := 2
Cost Minerals := 350
Cost Organics := 0
Cost Radioactives := 350
Vehicle Type := Drone
Supply Amount Used := 5
Restrictions := None
General Group := Weapons
Family := 2012
Roman Numeral := 5
Custom Group := 0
Number of Tech Req := 1
Tech Area Req 1 := Engine Overloading Weapons
Tech Level Req 1 := 10
Number of Abilities := 1
Ability 1 Type := Component Destroyed On Use
Ability 1 Descr := BOOM
Ability 1 Val 1 := 0
Ability 1 Val 2 := 0
Weapon Type := Warhead
Weapon Target := Ships
Weapon Damage At Rng := 100 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
Weapon Damage Type := Only Engines
Weapon Reload Rate := 2
Weapon Display Type := Torp
Weapon Display := 10
Weapon Modifier := 0
Weapon Sound := tpc.wav
Weapon Family := 12

*********************

Name := Neutron Warhead V
Description := Warhead which releases high intensity neutron radiation killing a planet's population.
Pic Num := 666
Tonnage Space Taken := 2
Tonnage Structure := 2
Cost Minerals := 500
Cost Organics := 0
Cost Radioactives := 150
Vehicle Type := Drone
Supply Amount Used := 5
Restrictions := None
General Group := Weapons
Family := 2014
Roman Numeral := 5
Custom Group := 0
Number of Tech Req := 1
Tech Area Req 1 := Planetary Weapons
Tech Level Req 1 := 10
Number of Abilities := 0
Weapon Type := Warhead
Weapon Target := Planets
Weapon Damage At Rng := 200 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
Weapon Damage Type := Only Planet Population
Weapon Reload Rate := 2
Weapon Display Type := Torp
Weapon Display := 19
Weapon Modifier := 0
Weapon Sound := neutbomb.wav
Weapon Family := 14

******************

The Neutron warhead.....I try making 6 of
them fit on a large missile....over 1,200 pts
worth of NEUTRON goodness, and when it attacks/rams a planet in the simulator,
it only kills 1m people.....

[ June 14, 2002, 08:18: Message edited by: MKSheppard ]

[Shadowstar]

Just reading this topic gave me all kinds of ideas.

Why stop at making missiles into units? What about making a kind of troop thats designed for space combat?

You could make Space Marines (or Space Troop): they behave like fighters and are designed to carry a boarding parties unit and possibly some other components. Very cheap and easy to destroy, but because they behave like fighters, they can be launched and carried on ships that otherwise wouldn't have boarding parties. Also, they could travel on thier own (using a jetpack - perhaps make different grades of jetpack available by researching so you could make faster marines), saving a ship from having to get dangerously close to its target. Send them in behind a wave of missiles designed to draw enemy point defenses so they dont get killed or just deploy them in large numbers. Hmm... You could even have Space Marines to fight other Space Marines...

Hmm... The only problem I can see with that is that when you grouped Space Marines (if you did it like fighters) you could end up having alot of boarding parties to use against an enemy ship, which could lead to balance issues. Perhaps doing something similar to the Smaller Weapons would work here. Have a miniaturized Version of the Boarding Parties component designed for the Space Marine to use. It would be less effective, but designed to work in large numbers. After all, you wouldn't want to send a single marine to capture an enemy ship! You'd want to have a team of marines, or maybe several teams of marines. Course this could lead to the development of Special Ops forces that you could deploy in space too. Special Ops would have some kind of cloaking or ecm that would make it harder for the enemy to see them in combat, but they would have much less boarding party value. They would be able to carry special equipment for sabotaging or subverting enemy ships...

Hmm this could be a fun idea to explore.

[MKSheppard]

Got it to work.....here's a workaorund.....
it attacks, causing proper damage with its
special attack skill (neutron) and then
kamikazis into target...


Name := Neutron Warhead V
Description := Warhead which releases high intensity neutron radiation killing a planet's population.
Pic Num := 666
Tonnage Space Taken := 2
Tonnage Structure := 2
Cost Minerals := 500
Cost Organics := 0
Cost Radioactives := 150
Vehicle Type := Drone
Supply Amount Used := 5
Restrictions := None
General Group := Weapons
Family := 2014
Roman Numeral := 5
Custom Group := 0
Number of Tech Req := 1
Tech Area Req 1 := Planetary Weapons
Tech Level Req 1 := 10
Number of Abilities := 0
Weapon Type := Direct Fire
Weapon Target := Planets
Weapon Damage At Rng := 300 200 100 50 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
Weapon Damage Type := Only Planet Population
Weapon Reload Rate := 1
Weapon Display Type := Torp
Weapon Display := 19
Weapon Modifier := 0
Weapon Sound := neutbomb.wav
Weapon Family := 14

[Baron Munchausen]

The problem with mounting a ranged weapon on a drone is twofold. First, as others have pointed out it tends to rush in and ram first, so it often doesn't get to fire. Second, in order to do a reasonable amount of damage with that ONE shot it has to be given insane damage levels. MM needs to fix drones so warheads with 'special' damage types work properly. The one ranged-weapon that is a good idea on drones is PDC because fighters are an excellent counter-measure against drones. They are also fast and can be even more numerous than an attacking wave of drones.

It would also be nice if some form of 'boarding attack' was possible at range. Boarding shuttles would be most logical, and could be doable with boarding parties on a fighter hull, but a simple range attack might be just as good. Call it 'transporter' if you like. This would have to be very high tech, of course.

[ June 14, 2002, 15:28: Message edited by: Baron Munchausen ]

[MKSheppard]

Originally posted by Baron Munchausen:
The problem with mounting a ranged weapon on a drone is twofold. First, as others have pointed out it tends to rush in and ram first, so it often doesn't get to fire. Second, in order to do a reasonable amount of damage with that ONE shot it has to be given insane damage levels. MM needs to fix drones so warheads with 'special' damage types work properly.

I finally had to figure out how to get it to work,
by doing a "workaround" to get unique types to
work properly.....I'll keep it this way
until MM fixes the warhead stuff in a future
patch....

just give it a 4 attack range, and it will
go BLAM BLAM BLAM and then kamikazi in, which
allows you to attack it successfully with your
special weapon, and kill itself, completing
the missile cycle...

[ June 14, 2002, 19:32: Message edited by: MKSheppard ]

[Mephisto]

Originally posted by Baron Munchausen:
First, as others have pointed out it tends to rush in and ram first, so it often doesn't get to fire.

Drones behave like every other ship in the game. Just don't give them a "Ram" strategy and they won't. All my AI races uses drones that do not ram but are armed with energy weapons. Works just fine.

[geoschmo]

Shadowstar,

Boarding parties don't work on any kind of unit, drone, fighter, etc. They have to be on a ship. That's a hardcoded restriction. Of course, if it were changed in a future patch...

Geoschmo