Just thinking in terms of the EV engine...

@erikthered, on Feb 17 2007, 02:50 PM, said in Should Fighters Be Able to Kill Capitol Ships?:

Realism may not be the best word, and modern naval analogies are not necessarily accurate. I personally have always felt that the capital ships need to be stronger. EV was slightly more balanced than Nova, but Nova is too focused on a close gap. In EV, it was possible to take out a a Confed Cruiser with the most powerful fighter, the Rapier, but it took a lot of skill and a lot of time. The thing about Nova is that there are so many powerful medium ships. I have problems with the idea of a Mod Starbridge being able to take down a Pirate Carrier or Fed Carrier, or even Destroyer. I think there are a few things that need to be done when developing.

1. Define what fighters, medium ships, heavy ships, and capital ships are. There should be a bit of a noticeable difference, in my opinion, between the role and armament of a fighter and, say, a medium ship and the relative strength. Fighters should truly only be effective in swarms and group attacks and quick strikes. That is their role. I hate the idea of Thunderheads being labelled "Light Destroyer Class" or the fact that two or three Pirate Thunderheads can fairly easily take down a Carrier. An AI medium ship (Valkyrie or Starbridge) should have no problem taking out an AI fighter (Thunderhead). An AI Heavy ship (destroyer) should have no problem taking out an AI Medium ship. An AI capital ship (Carrier) should have no problem taking out a heavy ship. There are a few ways to correct that.

2. Make the defensive differences in overall classes greater. If a normal fighter has, say, 150 shields, then a normal capital ship should have well over 3000. A medium ship might have something like 600, and a heavy ship should have 1500.

3. Make the space on larger classes of ships bigger, and make weapons heavier. If possible in the game, limit access to heavy weapons by smaller ships. Just like there is no way to put 16 inch guns on a PT boat or even a destroyer, you should never be able to fit heavy blaster turrets or 200mm railguns on a fighter or medium ship. It may be necessary to reduce the empty space on some fighters as well. Also, anyone want to tell me why the Pirate Thunderhead can carry only 1 less gun than a Fed Carrier? Sure, it can't use turrets, but my point is that the capital and heavy ships need to be able to actually carry more weapons than smaller ships.

4. Scale back the power of some weapons. The thunderhead cannon is rather overpowered.

This is making me want to do a modified version of the ship data.

In my opinion, the point of fighters is to attack smaller ships and fight larger ships in groups with the aid of a larger ship. A single fighter really shouldn't be that effective in the big picture.

Perhaps capital ships should have weapons that are very good at taking down shields, but not as good at taking care of armor? Then you can have fighters that are best at attacking armor, but not so good at attacking shields. Then give capital ships heavy shielding, and fighters almost none. So a group of fighters may be able to take down a capital ship, after some time, but they're really only best at doing so after a another capital ship has taken out the shields of another capital ship first. And then capital ships can fight each other at roughly the same level, and fighters can fight each other at roughly the same level. So why make both? Well a capital ship could use launched fighters as the method of killing other capital ships.

Perhaps the weapons fighters use is missiles capable of exploding against armor to breach it, while larger ships use energy weapons that can overload shields but are not so good against metal hulls that can simply deflect or spread out the energy. Capital ships may also have sophisticated PD systems, so rather than a single ship shooting missiles at it from a single direction, many smaller missile platforms (fighters) could deploy their ordinance from all directions, overwhelming a shieldless capital ship.

Perhaps the medium class of ship between these would have both types of weapons, in smaller numbers, but better shields.

@joshtigerheart, on Feb 17 2007, 08:21 PM, said in Should Fighters Be Able to Kill Capitol Ships?:

This probably isn't helpful for EV, but I'm going to say it anyways, its an interesting view point.

I suppose in the shield argument, it depends on how shields work. Theres what I'm going to call the 'EV style', where you have to take down the enemy's shields all together, regardless of where you're shooting. Theres also the idea where instead of one single barrier, theres multiple generators responsible for various sections. For example, in Master of Orion 2, all ships had four shields: front, left, right, and rear. If you shot the front of the ship enough, the front shields would fall and the armor would be vulnerable, but hitting it from any other direction would still strike shields.

In the latter style, this also give the possibility if the shiel isn't simply a "skin tight" layer around the ship, but rather a bubble or other shape that gives enough space between it and the hull, a hole could be made in the shields and fighters could slip through and be free to attack the surface of the ship.
But basically, I see capital ships as mobile command bases. They probably generally carry an army around with them to deploy for surface invasions, since you're not going to want to blow up every single world you attack, some may have valuable resources. They are also slower and more ponderous, which in open space isn't too big of a deal, but its not always a big expanse. Should a fight occur in a dense asteroid field, capital ships, should it even be safe for them there, would have highly restricted mobility whereas fighters and smaller craft could dart between rocks rather easily. Fighters could also slip through minefields much easier.

Then theres atmospheric combat, which introduces a planet's gravity to the capital ship. Unlike space, it would take a great deal more energy to keep it flying, since it is no doubt very large and very heavy. A fighter, on the other hand, would hardly notice the difference much unless the gravity is unusually strong. They'd also have a far easier time navigating the terrain and would be able to slip into canyons and such to attack specific targets. Plus, since in my example capital ships carry an army, they'd need to be deploying it for an invasion, making them vulnerable. Fighters could attack/defend vulnerable capital ships in the process of deploying their army.

Also to note is any planetary defense systems, which can be even bigger than what a capital ship can mount. And ships that big aren't known for their agility (at least as far as I know) and would have a great deal of trouble avoiding planetary based weapons designed to blast cap ships, whereas fighters wouldn't have the same trouble. Another possible use would be for bombing surface installations, assuming orbital bombardment isn't very accurate, if even possible.

Fighters might also be ideal for stealth operations. They're smaller and probably harder to detect due to that. It'd be much easier for a fighter to slip in somewhere than a huge vessel.
The problem with EV is that it is really only concerned with open space slug matches. The player is the only one who would consider taking cover behind asteroids, actively evading shots, etc.

I think a mobile command base is appropriate. A large ship may have medical bays, barracks for ground troops, logistical support, everything a mobile military force would need. A bunch of fighters floating around may not be so great in any of those things. There's also the fact that a larger ship may carry a large number of fighters too... so any benefit of fighters is also a benefit of carriers, with the additional benefit of being able to rearm and refuel on the go.

On the other hand, a medium ship could arm more Proton Torpedos than a fighter, with more launchers...

Edit: In response to Eugene...

This post has been edited by JoshTigerheart : 18 February 2007 - 09:26 PM

Xak: the problem with giving fighters weapons that do things that "capital ship weapons" can't do is that the capital ships, if they were halfway smart, would just arm fighter-class weapons and use them in addition to the shield-breaking weapons. You need some other reason in addition to the simple game balance one for why capital ships can't use the fighter weapons, or else your universe lacks coherency. Some that I can think of off the top of my head:

• Missiles have either long range or stopping power, but not both; this means that only fighters can mount powerful missiles (more realistically, rockets). In-game reasoning is simply that there are limits to what can be achieved in a given fuselage size for the missiles, especially when cost considerations are taken into account (nobody wants to manufacture a missile that has both long range and stopping power, but costs 1m credits per shot).

• Missiles require continual telemetry updates from the firing ship's fire control to be remotely accurate; at long ranges, lightspeed delays cause missiles to be unacceptably inaccurate. I don't know how you'd go about making this distinct from the previous option, except maybe by having the missile submunition into a rocket after a while.

• Missiles simply lack the maneuverability to be used from a slow firing platform. The problem here is that a slow firing platform fighting another slow firing platform shouldn't have any difficulties hitting its target once it gets lined up, and it will get lined up, eventually. UE destroyers in EVO mounted rockets, and with deadly effect. This would explain, however, why capital ships might not carry enough weapons to protect themselves from fightercraft, because ponderous missiles would be no good against agile opponents.

@joshtigerheart, on Feb 18 2007, 09:21 PM, said in Should Fighters Be Able to Kill Capitol Ships?:

On the other hand, a medium ship could arm more Proton Torpedos than a fighter, with more launchers...

Edit: In response to Eugene...

Not to mention better shields, armour, and defensive technology because they can hold more. If a missile can take out a fighter (which isn't really the case in EV), then a Medium ship would be able to to take 2 or 3. Take a trip back to the 40's and think of it like this:

A PT boat (let's consider that a heavy fighter class ship) could carry a few torpedoes and machine guns, usually .50 Cal. Now, a single torpedo could easily take out a PT boat, but would not really be able take out a destroyer escort (let's say that's a medium ship). It would take a few to take that out, and a single PT boat would pretty much have to deplete its entire arsenal to have a chance. Now, a few PT boats would make it much more of a fair fight. (Even today, a speed boat packed with explosives didn't take down a destroyer--See USS Cole.) A heavy ship (like a cruiser) could take even more, and even a destroyer would have a problem taking out a cruiser which is more heavily armed and armoured. When it comes to capital ships like Carriers and Battleships...well, you can read stories about how many hits they could take before going down. Look at the battle involving the Yamato. Granted, a lucky shot could take out a big ship (see the battlecruiser HMS Hood), but let's assume that the EV-style shielding would provide fuller coverage making lucky shots pretty much impossible.

@derakon, on Feb 18 2007, 09:35 PM, said in Should Fighters Be Able to Kill Capitol Ships?:

Xak: the problem with giving fighters weapons that do things that "capital ship weapons" can't do is that the capital ships, if they were halfway smart, would just arm fighter-class weapons and use them in addition to the shield-breaking weapons. You need some other reason in addition to the simple game balance one for why capital ships can't use the fighter weapons, or else your universe lacks coherency. Some that I can think of off the top of my head:

That don't make sense at all. Since when did a tank mount an AK-47 as their main gun? How many Fed Carriers do you see charging into battle with Light Cannons blazing? You don't. A capital ship is not going to want a bunch of little fighter weapons, its going to want big guns. The only use it might have for smaller weapons would be purely point-defense purposes, such as the Quad Light Blaster Turret or Storm Chaingun. You really don't see Fed Carrers armed with Light Blaster Turrets, Aurora Carriers arming Hail Chainguns, and Ravens using Wrathii.

If I was the capitan of a capital ship and my opponent capital ship was coming at me with fighter-grade weapons, I'd just laugh and proceed to pound him into oblivion.

Though one thing EVN did past EVs didn't was more distinguish fighter-grade and warship-grade weapons. After all, Vipers and other fighters generally use the Light Blasters with an occasional Medium Blaster. Medium ships usually use Medium Blasters with the occasional Light or, in rare cases, the HBT. Capital ships usually use HBTs and sometimes Medium Blasters. QLBTs don't count in this example, since its a defensive instead of offensive weapon.

@joshtigerheart, on Feb 19 2007, 09:13 PM, said in Should Fighters Be Able to Kill Capitol Ships?:

That don't make sense at all. Since when did a tank mount an AK-47 as their main gun? How many Fed Carriers do you see charging into battle with Light Cannons blazing? You don't. A capital ship is not going to want a bunch of little fighter weapons, its going to want big guns. The only use it might have for smaller weapons would be purely point-defense purposes, such as the Quad Light Blaster Turret or Storm Chaingun. You really don't see Fed Carrers armed with Light Blaster Turrets, Aurora Carriers arming Hail Chainguns, and Ravens using Wrathii.

If I was the capitan of a capital ship and my opponent capital ship was coming at me with fighter-grade weapons, I'd just laugh and proceed to pound him into oblivion.

I think you might have missed the previous poster's "in addition".

That is, his question is, if lighter weapons are important, why carry fighters which launch them, when you could just fire the lighter weapons yourself (as well as the heavier weapons you're carrying in any case)? Cutting out the middleman, if you like.

But this thread has produced many answers to that question already in any case.

I'm reminded of the Defenders in EV and the torpedoes used by heavy ships in that game. You could blow away a Defender with one shot, but they were so fast that they could easily outrun them.

@mrxak, on Feb 19 2007, 04:42 PM, said in Should Fighters Be Able to Kill Capitol Ships?:

I'm reminded of the Defenders in EV and the torpedoes used by heavy ships in that game. You could blow away a Defender with one shot, but they were so fast that they could easily outrun them.

On a similar note, a Lightning carried a few heavy rockets, missiles and Javelin rockets, but it only took one heavy to disable. I think one of the things Nova lacks is a weapon like the Heavy that could easily take out little ships. That way, you can have fighters that pack a punch, but are easily taken out.

Right, Pac. Thanks for clarifying. I think my point can be summed up as: if there is something that fighters can do which capital ships cannot, that thing must be inherent to the design of the fighters, because otherwise capital ships, with their increased potential for adaptability, will simply co-opt that thing and add it to their own abilities.

A ship like the Tachyonic Fighter from Frozen Heart is a good example where capital ships can't get what fighters have - the ship is purpose-built around its primary weapon. In that kind of situation, you can't simply install a similar weapon around a capital ship, so the fighter gets an ability that capships don't. Other common examples include better speed and maneuverability; because standard sci-fi universes require that engine capabilities don't scale as well as ship size do, large ships are slower and clumsier than small ships. Ordinary weapon outfits are not good examples, because anything that can be equipped on a fighter can be equipped on a capship, and not necessarily to the exclusion of the capship's normal armament, either.

Put another way, would you rather have a capship that can take down shields well but armor not at all, or a capship that can take down shields decently well and armor as well, if it has to? Now, assuming that the former state is the default, what's preventing you from achieving the latter state? If all you can come up with is game-balance reasons, then your universe is internally inconsistent.

It comes down to tactics, I think. Having a diverse fleet make-up allows many more possible tactics, and the capability to deal with different kinds of threats.

I have to agree that fighters achive over capital ships because their size. Chances are you'll land 20 shots on a cap ship and they will only land about 1 on you. This isn't always the case of course, but in EV nova, if the player's in the fighter, the cap ships are done for. Of course, AI fighters are pathetic, and a capital ship would have a better chance of killing them.

I remember when I had a thunderhead with twin biorelays... Aah. I killed 5 kresels and 10 thunder heads off a plugin with it.

Targetting problems are a fair point. To get a better sense of how this could work, play ReVisited with the Large Ships models, and then go fight some Hawk-class fighters. They're tiny! While you can kill them, hitting them with forward-firing weaponry is much more difficult than for ships in the "normal" model sizes that we typically see in EVN. It's important to remember that, outside of game mechanics, fighters are typically orders of magnitude smaller than capital ships, making attack runs much more feasible.

Now, there's still the question of what kinds of weapons a fighter would be carrying that would do any good against capships, but that's a matter of your universe.

@derakon, on Feb 26 2007, 06:02 PM, said in Should Fighters Be Able to Kill Capitol Ships?:

Targetting problems are a fair point. To get a better sense of how this could work, play ReVisited with the Large Ships models, and then go fight some Hawk-class fighters. They're tiny! While you can kill them, hitting them with forward-firing weaponry is much more difficult than for ships in the "normal" model sizes that we typically see in EVN. It's important to remember that, outside of game mechanics, fighters are typically orders of magnitude smaller than capital ships, making attack runs much more feasible.

Now, there's still the question of what kinds of weapons a fighter would be carrying that would do any good against capships, but that's a matter of your universe.

The thing about rEVisited thta I love is that capital ships are much stronger than fighters, which is not the case in Nova. The Graphics scaling is more accurate than that of Nova, but what that allows for is a better sense of realism. Yeah, a bunny might be able to run faster and be more agile than a bear and hide where bears can't get to, but if the bear catches the bunny, there shouldn't be any question that the bunny won't be able to beat the the bear because bears are better armed and stronger than bunnies.

This post has been edited by erikthered : 26 February 2007 - 06:10 PM

(Archon switches from lurking to actually posting for a change)

In a plug I was developing that got temporarily canned so I could actually get my school work done on time, I addressed the fighter/capital/medium ship by introducing three new ships: a fighter, a battleship (no fighters), and a gunship in an extention to the Fed storyline. The battleship sports ultra-heavy blaster turrets, which due to volume of fire, can tear fighters to shreds in seconds. It is also incredibly slow and, of course, has huge amounts of shields and armor along with an ionizing PD weapon. The gunship is nearly as slow as the battleship with defenses about equivalent to a Fed Destroyer, but absolutely loaded with missiles, rockets, torpedos, and a few forward-firing beam weapons. This makes it incredibly powerful against battleships, but leaves it vulnerable to fighter attacks since its smaller size and huge missile payload leave no room for turrets or anti-fighter PD weapons. The fighter then has an easy time taking down the gunship since it has great spead and manuverability and an ionizing beam weapon that renders the gunship nearly immobile. Of course, because this weapon is short range, the fighter has great difficulty getting close enough to the battleship without being blasted to pieces by PD tractor weapons and super-heavy blaster turrets. I got the idea for this setup from Starcraft mentioning that most space battles took place between gunships and capitals before the invention of the Wraith fighter made gunships obsolete due to their vulnerability to manuverable fighter craft.

Another sci-fi book that details capital-fighter combat is The Mote in God's Eye. In this universe, there are not really fighters, but the capital ships occasionally deploy a patrol-boat-esque ship that essentially sits off to the side and tries to score a lucky torpedo hit. So in essence, fighters are ignored due to their relatively low power, but do manage to contribute some supplemental damange to the parent ship or fleet.

For an entirely universe-specific approach to fighters, you could take a page from Star Trek among others, in which it is mentioned that ships' shields are not form-fitting, but rather a large bubble around the ship that a small vessel can puncture. Holding with this idea, one could create fighters that use weapons that are small but have the shield-piercing flag, since they can fly within the shield bubble and strike directly at the ship's hull. Depending on the shield/armor ratio of the specific universe, this could be incredibly devastating and also entirely overpowered in use against AI who would not prioritize destroying the flimsy-yet-deadly fighters as a human pilot would.

I personally believe that Fed and Auroran carried fighters are pretty well-balanced; you have your high-powered Phoenix/Anaconda which can prove to be deadly against enemy capital ships, and then your Firebird/Viper which can tear the heavy fighters to shreds due to their manuverability advantage. (However, I believe that the anti-fighter fighters should have some sort of ECM system to better counter the anti-capital fighters). It's the medium ships and some fighters such as Mantas and T-Heads that are poorly balanced.

In a general sense, I think that capital ships should have little trouble dealing with fighters at close range, since a ship that is, say, a kilometer long can probably spare a few tons of space for an accurate anti-fighter point defense. (Sure, Star Destroyers had a hard time hitting A-Wings, but if the Imperial shiprights would have seen the potential danger of fighters, they could have easily swapped out a turbolaser for something more accurate). This means that in a universe with battleships, carriers, and fighters with no gunships in-between, fighters would survive by firing a salvo of long-range weaons, staying out of blaster range, and then reloading on the parentship. Since the fighter has superior manuverability and presumably some sort of ECM, it could dodge any missiles fired out by the target capital ship. In a universe where slower gunships play a large part, fighters can rely on strong blaster or beam weapons and focus on taking down gunships. And, of course, in a game in which you don't have such a low ship and blast cap, you could just have large ships launch say 40+ fighters and attempty to overwhelm their enemies.

@archon, on Feb 28 2007, 10:31 PM, said in Should Fighters Be Able to Kill Capitol Ships?:

And, of course, in a game in which you don't have such a low ship and blast cap, you could just have large ships launch say 40+ fighters and attempty to overwhelm their enemies.

Again: if you do this, fighters become so feeble that no player - the likes of Josh and Qaanol aside - would ever want to fly one. Then all anyone ever wants to have are bigger and tougher ships, and the game becomes less varied, and less interesting.

Really, don't knock the status quo - things do work remarkably well. (Fleets aside. :()

@pac, on Feb 28 2007, 06:14 PM, said in Should Fighters Be Able to Kill Capitol Ships?:

Again: if you do this, fighters become so feeble that no player - the likes of Josh and Qaanol aside - would ever want to fly one. Then all anyone ever wants to have are bigger and tougher ships, and the game becomes less varied, and less interesting.

Really, don't knock the status quo - things do work remarkably well. (Fleets aside. :()

I'm sorry, but "Don't know the status quo" is a pretty lame way of dealing with things and never leads to change. Heck, if no one did, even in gaming, we wouldn't have plug-ins, new versions, or bug fixes.

This post has been edited by erikthered : 28 February 2007 - 07:27 PM

In general, it's pretty lame, I agree. In this specific case, though, he has a very good point. If your two goals in designing your universe's ships are 1) the player should be able to enjoy the game in any class of ship, and 2) you need many fightercraft to make a dent in capships, then you have a serious problem. Most people don't enjoy the game when they can't accomplish much in combat, so fightercraft are no longer available from that perspective. In other words, fightercraft must be, individually, a significant threat to capships or else nobody will want to play them. This is true regardless of what game system or universe you're talking about.

Well, I don't think that being feeble to the point of uselessness to a lone player is really that bad of a thing in the EV universe. Just put the fighters in the shipyard on the offchance that someone decides to buy one, and provide better alternatives. Not every ship in the game needs to be designed specifically for player use.

@archon, on Feb 28 2007, 07:48 PM, said in Should Fighters Be Able to Kill Capitol Ships?:

Well, I don't think that being feeble to the point of uselessness to a lone player is really that bad of a thing in the EV universe. Just put the fighters in the shipyard on the offchance that someone decides to buy one, and provide better alternatives. Not every ship in the game needs to be designed specifically for player use.

Also, just because a fighter may be considerably weaker than a capital ship, that doesn't mean it is worthless. I always like to upgrade from a shuttlecraft to give myself a little more protection. In EV, and in rEVisited, my first stop is almost always a scoutship, even with the incredible power of the capital ships in rEVisited. While not exactly a true fighter, it's good enough to evade most bigger ships and can help you defend yourself against smaller ships. Also, should you get blown up, you don't lose a whole lot in terms of investment (if you don't play strict play, it doesn't really matter). If you feel like you need a capital ship to survive, you should probably work on your piloting skills. You may need the strength of a capital ship to perform certain missions, or take on certain other ships (assuming the game is balanced well enough), but there is something to be said about the rush of trying to survive in a weaker ship anyway. That being said, I still don't like the idea of fighters being nearly as strong as capital ships because it eliminates one of the most interesting aspects of the EV series: evolution. If you're set from the start in a small cheap ship, why continue?

Basically, it boils down to this: Why design "capital ships" if they can be taken out by a fighter or two? Why not just create a universe of all fighters? Some of you may like that, but I like the variations of different classes, and, in my opinion, it's better when the gap from the biggest ships to the smallest one is very large. It's fine to have ships in between, but I like it when there is a very broad spectrum of ships as opposed to a narrow one.

By the way, this post was actually more of a response to Derakon than Archon.

This post has been edited by erikthered : 01 March 2007 - 12:36 AM

@erikthered, on Mar 1 2007, 12:26 AM, said in Should Fighters Be Able to Kill Capitol Ships?:

I'm sorry, but "Don't know the status quo" is a pretty lame way of dealing with things and never leads to change. Heck, if no one did, even in gaming, we wouldn't have plug-ins, new versions, or bug fixes.

Let me put it another way then: no one has proposed anything in this thread which appears to me to represent an improvement on the status quo. In fact, many of them would make the game actively worse - or just be impossible in the first place.

People ask: how can we find a good balance between capital ships and fighters? Well, nothing radical is required, is my answer. Good balances have been achieved already in both EVC and EVO, in my opinion.

@erikthered, on Mar 1 2007, 05:32 AM, said in Should Fighters Be Able to Kill Capitol Ships?:

Basically, it boils down to this: Why design "capital ships" if they can be taken out by a fighter or two? Why not just create a universe of all fighters? Some of you may like that, but I like the variations of different classes, and, in my opinion, it's better when the gap from the biggest ships to the smallest one is very large. It's fine to have ships in between, but I like it when there is a very broad spectrum of ships as opposed to a narrow one.

What example are you taking here? My reference points for the 'status quo' are EVC and EVO. In these, capital ships can't be taken out by 'a fighter or two'! I would say it's pretty uncommon in EVN too. Nor was anyone proposing a system where they could be!

To have variations between ship classes is good - but they have to be ships that the player would want to use (otherwise it's pointless). If that gap's too big, then all players will ultimately converge on using the same type of ship. Look at the range of answers you get when you ask, "What's your favourite ship in EVC/O/N?". Clearly, they each got a few things right.

This post has been edited by pac : 01 March 2007 - 06:34 AM