Firstly, I want to mention that the low damage and energy cost of Type 3/House turrets doesn't do so much good considering that every transport's core is balanced for using type 2 and type 4 turrets which cost twice as much energy per second. The energy efficiency of Type 3's is nice, but doesn't really come in handy.
What I suggest: Increase the energy cost of Type 3's per shot from 275 to 350 (from 550 per second to 700). They would still be costing a lot less energy than the other transport turrets, but they would at least have a realistic power drain, to make pilots feel like they can still take advantage of their power cores.
To compensate for the 27% increase in power cost, I suggest increasing the projectile speed from 800 m/s to 900 m/s.
For people who say "OMG 100 m/s PROJECTILE SPEED INCREASE OP!!" ... Well, let's compare:
Secondly, I would like to see some actual variety in the different house turrets which are based on the Type 3's. The exact numbers would be determined by developers, of course, but I'd like to see something along the lines of:
(I'm going to use Damage Per Second, Fire Rate, Projectile Speed, Range, and P u/s, but not Damage Per Shot, if you need to know that, just divide the DPS by the fire rate)
I will list the current turret stats first (except type 1, since none of these are similar to that), so you can compare them.
Type: DPS, Fire Rate, Projectile Speed, Range, Power Use Per Second
Type 2: 3,050, 1.00, 600 m/s, 1,098 m, 1,100 P u/s Type 3: 2,100, 2.00, 800 m/s, 1,098 m, 550 P u/s Type 4: 1,515, 3.03, 1,500 m/s, 798 m, 908 P u/s Belial Fighter Turret: 2,432, 8.33, 750 m/s, 750 m, 508 P u/s
New: Type 3: 2,100, 2.00, 900 m/s, 1,098 m, 650 P u/s Bretonian: 2,400, 1.50, 800 m/s, 1,098 m, 750 P u/s Liberty: 2,100, 2.00, 950 m/s, 1,098 m, 750 P u/s Kusari: 1,800, 2.50, 1,000 m/s, 1,050 m, 750 P u/s Rheinland: 2,200, 2.00, 900 m/s, 1098 m, 750 P u/s Gallic: 2,100, 2.50, 900 m/s, 1,098 m, 750 P u/s Bolter: 2,100, 2.00, 900 m/s, 1,200 m, 750 P u/s
Basically, house turrets would cost more energy, and be slightly different than normal Type 3's. Some would have a tiny bonus on one characteristic, while others would have a larger bonus on one characteristic and a weakening of another. These new house turrets would be costing about 36% more energy per second than the original Type 3's, and are generally about 15% more effective one way or another.
Anyway, I think this would add a bit of variety to the turrets people use. At the moment, you hardly ever see corporate transports using a pureloadout of house turrets because they are less effective than other turrets, and their low energy cost is useless on a transport's power core. Unlawful transports use type 3's or house turrets sometimes because of their balance between fighting larger transports or smaller freighters, and I myself use them for the same reason, but I would really love to see some diversity.
Lastly, this is just a random idea, might not be the best, but here goes: A power-hungry upgrade of the Type 4. What might this be used for? Weapon groups while using it with Type 2's which are also very power-hungry, possibly, so that you can still efficiently use your power core while firing half of your guns.
What would these Type 5 turrets be like? Here's what I'm thinking:
2000 DPS
1,500 m/s
4.00 Refire Rate
1,600 E u/s
They'd eat a transport core very quickly, but they'd be decent for weapon groups.
That idea above wasn't thought through as much as the other ideas, though, so don't condemn the whole post over that one small idea.
Totally agree that there should be more variety for transport turrets.
After all, transports are the most commonly used ship type, yet they have a very small selection of weaponry.
I also agree that Type 3's and house turrets in particular need some work. Almost no one currently uses them, since Type 4's are generally more useful against bombers, and Type 2's are better against- Well, okay, transports can't fight caps anyway. Type 2's are only really useful for pirate transports.
I like your specific suggestions for house turret stats, too. Bretonian and Rheinland turrets being slower and more powerful, and Liberty and Kusari turrets being faster fits the heavier turrets lines well.
However, while slight changes in refire rate, range, and damage may not be a huge re-balancing effort, changes in projectile speed would be. Still, I think it would be worthwhile to make transport combat a little more varied and interesting.
Something to note though: Your suggestions might be a bit too powerful. Keep in mind that more variation alone effectively makes transports more powerful. Having more variation, and having all the new varieties be more effective than previously seems like a bit much.
Edit: This particularly applies to the Liberty turret you propose. Same damage as Type 3's now, but 150 m/s faster? That can't be right, even with the increase in energy.
The Type 5 you mentioned definitely seems overpowered to me. A snub that's under attack by a transport tends to fall back when their shield goes down, which with a turret with that power and speed will happen very quickly, and this will give the transport some time to get its energy back.
I don't think a less energy efficient, more powerful variation of the Type 4 is really needed, honestly.
On a final note, what I WOULD like to see is a variation of the Type 1 (pulse) turret that matches the projectile speed of a Type 3 turret. The Type 1 is kinda weird now anyway, projectile speed matches Type 2's, but the refire rate matches Type 3's.
We have two different speeds for debs, why not transport pulses?
(03-22-2013, 01:44 PM)Karst Wrote: Totally agree that there should be more variety for transport turrets.
After all, transports are the most commonly used ship type, yet they have a very small selection of weaponry.
I also agree that Type 3's and house turrets in particular need some work. Almost no one currently uses them, since Type 4's are generally more useful against bombers, and Type 2's are better against- Well, okay, transports can't fight caps anyway. Type 2's are only really useful for pirate transports.
I like your specific suggestions for house turret stats, too. Bretonian and Rheinland turrets being slower and more powerful, and Liberty and Kusari turrets being faster fits the heavier turrets lines well.
However, while slight changes in refire rate, range, and damage may not be a huge re-balancing effort, changes in projectile speed would be. Still, I think it would be worthwhile to make transport combat a little more varied and interesting.
Something to note though: Your suggestions might be a bit too powerful. Keep in mind that more variation alone effectively makes transports more powerful. Having more variation, and having all the new varieties be more effective than previously seems like a bit much.
Edit: This particularly applies to the Liberty turret you propose. Same damage as Type 3's now, but 150 m/s faster? That can't be right, even with the increase in energy.
The Type 5 you mentioned definitely seems overpowered to me. A snub that's under attack by a transport tends to fall back when their shield goes down, which with a turret with that power and speed will happen very quickly, and this will give the transport some time to get its energy back.
I don't think a less energy efficient, more powerful variation of the Type 4 is really needed, honestly.
On a final note, what I WOULD like to see is a variation of the Type 1 (pulse) turret that matches the projectile speed of a Type 3 turret. The Type 1 is kinda weird now anyway, projectile speed matches Type 2's, but the refire rate matches Type 3's.
We have two different speeds for debs, why not transport pulses?
The projectile speed buff is very important to balancing them. The reason they're not used is because they are very weak. Their "power efficiency" compared to other transport turrets doesn't mean jack with a transport's power core.
Look at the Type 2: 3,050 DPS, 600 m/s. Clearly better than fighter guns.
Look at the Type 4: 1,515 DPS, 1,500 m/s. Clearly better than fighter guns.
Look at the Type 3: 2,100 DPS, 800 m/s. Worse than many fighter guns.
So yes, the Type 3's most definitely do need an increase in their projectile speed. Even with their new stats, they'll still be worse than other turrets, but I know people are less likely to accept the larger change that they really need.
And yes, a faster type 1 would be nice, but I think a type 4 shieldbuster would be OP, as it would kill fighter shields far too quickly allowing them to be ripped apart before they could get away.
As for the Type 5 being "OP". No, not really. It's only slightly better than the Type 4, but costs a crapload of power, to the point where most transports would actually run out of power and be unable to shoot during combat if they tried to use a full loadout of Type 5's.
1,500 x 12 = 18,000 p u/s. That's enough to drain the shire's core in only a few seconds. These Type 5's would be used for weapon groups, for example if somebody wanted to have 6x Type 2's and 6x Type 5's. They wouldn't be able to use them at the same time because of obvious projectile speed differences, but they'd be able to effectively drain their power core even while using weapon groups.
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The thing with type 3s is that they have quite a bit more range as well, which comes in useful as they can fire at a range SNACs cannot. At least, that's how I believe it is.
You can't ignore range when looking at transport turrets' stats.
Edit:
The issue with a power-hungry, but more powerful turret is that energy management is currently nonexistant in most transports. It would simply serve as a buff across the board because every transport could use a few and gain substantial firepower, while still having more than enough juice to fire for a long time. There's always a "rest period" somewhere in a fight, even moreso when you have more firepower to make a pirate back off.
(03-25-2013, 12:54 PM)Hasteric Wrote: The thing with type 3s is that they have quite a bit more range as well, which comes in useful as they can fire at a range SNACs cannot. At least, that's how I believe it is.
You can't ignore range when looking at transport turrets' stats.
Edit:
The issue with a power-hungry, but more powerful turret is that energy management is currently nonexistant in most transports. It would simply serve as a buff across the board because every transport could use a few and gain substantial firepower, while still having more than enough juice to fire for a long time. There's always a "rest period" somewhere in a fight, even moreso when you have more firepower to make a pirate back off.
With the "Type 5" turret costing as much energy as I proposed, energy management would indeed be an issue. 15x12 = 18,000. That's a huge drain for even the largest transport cores which have 90k capacity. So no, you wouldn't have to worry about a shire with 12 of these flying around killing everything while constantly firing.
(03-25-2013, 12:50 PM)TLI-Inferno Wrote: The projectile speed buff is very important to balancing them. The reason they're not used is because they are very weak. Their "power efficiency" compared to other transport turrets doesn't mean jack with a transport's power core.
Look at the Type 2: 3,050 DPS, 600 m/s. Clearly better than fighter guns.
Look at the Type 4: 1,515 DPS, 1,500 m/s. Clearly better than fighter guns.
Look at the Type 3: 2,100 DPS, 800 m/s. Worse than many fighter guns.
So yes, the Type 3's most definitely do need an increase in their projectile speed. Even with their new stats, they'll still be worse than other turrets, but I know people are less likely to accept the larger change that they really need.
Sure, I wasn't arguing against the basic thought that Type 3's could use a buff. And increasing projectile speed would be a good way to do this.
However, I think you're underestimating how much of a difference something like 150-200 extra m/s would make.
It's already not that difficult to hit bombers, especially slow ones, with them. You just don't hit as consistently as you would with Type 4s.
Your suggestions for, let's say, the Liberty turret, would lead to a turret that compared to the Type 4 does almost 40% more damage at 40% higher range, while using only 80% of the power.
And firing at a projectile speed that's good enough to fight bombers effectively, which let's face it, are the smallest and most agile targets transports commonly face.
Quote:And yes, a faster type 1 would be nice, but I think a type 4 shieldbuster would be OP, as it would kill fighter shields far too quickly allowing them to be ripped apart before they could get away.
I meant a Type 3 shieldbuster, a Type 4 variant would definitely be insane. And yes, it would have to deal significantly less damage than Type 1's now.
Not really something that's needed, just an idea.
Quote:As for the Type 5 being "OP". No, not really. It's only slightly better than the Type 4, but costs a crapload of power, to the point where most transports would actually run out of power and be unable to shoot during combat if they tried to use a full loadout of Type 5's.
1,500 x 12 = 18,000 p u/s. That's enough to drain the shire's core in only a few seconds. These Type 5's would be used for weapon groups, for example if somebody wanted to have 6x Type 2's and 6x Type 5's. They wouldn't be able to use them at the same time because of obvious projectile speed differences, but they'd be able to effectively drain their power core even while using weapon groups.
(03-25-2013, 03:22 PM)TLI-Inferno Wrote:
(03-25-2013, 12:54 PM)Hasteric Wrote: The thing with type 3s is that they have quite a bit more range as well, which comes in useful as they can fire at a range SNACs cannot. At least, that's how I believe it is.
You can't ignore range when looking at transport turrets' stats.
Edit:
The issue with a power-hungry, but more powerful turret is that energy management is currently nonexistant in most transports. It would simply serve as a buff across the board because every transport could use a few and gain substantial firepower, while still having more than enough juice to fire for a long time. There's always a "rest period" somewhere in a fight, even moreso when you have more firepower to make a pirate back off.
With the "Type 5" turret costing as much energy as I proposed, energy management would indeed be an issue. 15x12 = 18,000. That's a huge drain for even the largest transport cores which have 90k capacity. So no, you wouldn't have to worry about a shire with 12 of these flying around killing everything while constantly firing.
The issue isn't about a transport mounting 12 Type 5's. It's about a transport that normally has more energy than it knows what to do with (and that's the case with most) mounting just a few along with other turrets.
Since they sync with Type 4's, a transport could could simply replace a could of its Type 4's with the new Type 5's, as many as it can realistically support in a combat situation, and it would noticeably improve its combat capabilities without any drawback.
Or better yet: A transport could mount mostly Type 2's and maybe a Type 1 or two for fighting large targets, and just a couple Type 5's that would be enough to fight snubs pretty effectively, while energy drain wouldn't be an issue.
An example: A Bretonia Royal Cruise Liner has nine turrets, all of which can fire backward, and a 90 000 / 7 500 powercore like a typical battletransport.
It could mount four Type 2's and one Type 1 for heavy targets, along with four Type 5's for snubs.
Previously, using four Type 4's would have given it 6060 dps against snubs at the cost of 3632 e/s, well below recharge rate.
With Type 5's however, it would deal a respectable 8000 damage, while using 6000 e/s, which is still below the recharge rate but uses the core more effectively.
That's a third more power, not exactly what I'd call "only slightly better".
That's just an example and probably not the best, but the existence of such turrets would definitely allow big transports to use noticeably more effective anti-snub loadouts.