Nasar Vyron
S0utherN Comfort
DARKNESS.
13
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Posted - 2015.03.12 18:48:18 -
[1] - Quote
Just gonna throw my 2 cents on cit. missiles so you get an idea on them.
Torps:
Are they stationary and a capital/painted within ~55km? They're going to feel it.
Are they moving? Forget about it.
Cruises:
Are they stationary and a capital/painted within lock range? This will tickle.
Are they moving? Forget about it.
Basically, there's a reason nobody wants to really fly a Phoenix or Leviathan aside from them being shield capitals. They can't hit anything moving without major assistance. Even capitals move faster than their explosion velocity which means a massive reduction in damage in most all warfare situations except against other sieged dreads. Add to that, other class of dreads can gain greater range by swapping ammo types, while the Phoenix (and levi) would have to switch weapon systems entirely which are heavy and will not fit in its cargo hold.
When flying a capital you always have to plan for the chance of being hot dropped. As such fielding ships with like-tanks and ability to track moving targets at variable ranges is key. And is a large reason why you don't, and likely never will, see missile capitals aside from the token Phoenix at a POS bash.
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That aside, in general there are several major downsides to this weapon system which lead to why you don't see them used in large scale combat, which is why stats on their damage in pvp is so low.
1) Damage application: instant vs delayed makes for wasted cycles. Smaller ships can outrun missiles entirely where turrets will eventually hit even the smallest of targets (while cool looking, is very annoying esp with new t3 destroyers).
-Can be helped, not solved, by giving them the "Garmur" treatment by vastly increase all missile velocities and decreasing flight times to compensate.
2) Firewalling: Smartbombs, which are meant to handle close orbit tackle and drones, can make this entire weapon system obsolete by destroying the missiles before they have a chance to hit their target.
-Can be solved by not allowing missiles to be damaged at all. Resist with tank, not offensive weapons.
3) ECM: loss of lock on a target while missiles are in flight cause them to deal no damage. I still don't understand why this is even a thing. I'm jammed, not my missiles, which I would assume have their own guidance system.
-Solved by fixing what has obviously been a long standing bug in the game.
4) Lack of versatility in range. As I stated with citadel torps/cruise in order to change the range of a missile weapons system outside of t2 precision vs rage. The only way to change your range is to change the entire weapon system currently installed on your ship.
-The only acceptable solution to this would be to finally add a mid slot module that allows for the range to be modified against something like explosion velocity (buffs range but lowers exp velocity, scripting can increase range further or lower the penalty). Adding more missile types just makes things far too convoluted.
-As far as citadel launchers are concerned, all they need is a massive size reduction in the modules themselves so they can be carried within the hold to allow for the weapon system to be swapped between since they cant just switch to a longer range ammo. |