Hard Light Productions Forums
General FreeSpace => FreeSpace Discussion => Topic started by: Mars on August 11, 2006, 11:49:54 pm
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Working on part of a larger Shivan theory, and I was told a while back that I had a good excuse for the absence of beam weapons in FS2, so tell me what y'all think. Grammar inquisition is encouraged.
The Shivans have no need for technological advancement. Their vast numbers ensure that, even if a race emerged with more advanced technology, they would not be a threat to the Shivans. The Shivan's did not have all the ships and technologies (namely beam cannons) during the Great War that was observed in the Second Shivan Incursion, because the artifacts in question (certain advanced ship designs and beam cannons) were detrimental to subspace, and were unable to traverse the unstable jump nodes that the Shivans used to gain a foothold in the Great War. The Shivan super-destroyer Lucifer is apparently an exception to this rule, but upon closer analysis subtle differences in the weapon technologies in the Lucifer and those present on most warships of the reconstruction era. During the Allied liberation of Cygnus Prime, Admiral Khafre clearly referred to his ships main guns as “photon beam cannons” but the Lucifer's primary weapons are referred to as “flux cannons” in the technical room's database, and therefore are not apparently not based on the same technologies.
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Do You mean FS1 :wtf:
Makes perfect sense to me though
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Do You mean FS1 :wtf:
Makes perfect sense to me though
Oops, edited. :D
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Really cool, that really is a good theory. :yes:
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i havent play fs1 but i think demon is in it and it has 2 Lred and 1 Sred. lucifer has 2 Sred, orion has 3 Bgreen and 4 Tslash. or are you telling me they changed it...
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The only ship w/ beam cannons in fs1 is the lucy
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Which actually were just a super huge red turret with a really ugly trail.
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I ahve already talked about this in a other thread,I'm sure V inserted them in FS2 considering them an excellent idea.
On the other hand,the Colony Wars serie used beams for the first 2 epsiodes(in 1997 and 1998)one year before FS2.In Colony Wars 3,you don't see bemas but more advanced laser turrets,similar but much more effective to the GTVA Rapid Lasers in Inferno.
Game developers can make decisions without wondering about their precedent works.
When a new effect is avaiable,programmers put it in.FS2 is what it actually is thanks to beam cannons.
In FS1 there weren't beams except the Lucifer,ok,but if a Lilith can crush a destroyer by herself,the Lucifer losses it's role of feared superdestroyer.A Lilith is a challenge even for warships retrofitted with beams....
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All I know is I played FS2 first and when I finally got my hands on FS1 I spent the whole game just waiting for the Shivans to start pounding away with their beams. Went through several stages;
"Oh its a Cain. You're boned my dear Fenris."
"Wow, this is a really good idea for building suspense. Who knows when they'll fire their beams?"
"Where the hell are those ****ing beams?!!?"
"Those are the Lucifer's beams? Well thats goddamned disappointing".
I was disappointed.
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And then if you FRED2 a mission with the Lucifer in it, it has a ton of beams...
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You know, that's really interesting. If there were beam cannons on FS1, the 14 year war would've been far more destructive but both sides could have fought against the shivans better, maybe with that there would never had a need for an alliance with the vasudans just a temporary cease fire till the shivans are dealt with then the war would continue, Vasuda Prime would still be habitable, since the Lucifer is the only shivan ship with beam weaponry the shivans could have been slaugthered and that could prompt them sending FS2 era shivan ship against the GTA and PVN, another idea for another campaign. :)
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Beam technology was taken from the Shivans, or at least, presumabley
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I don't get it - are you saying they didn't bring their most powerful weapons because it would restrict their ability to use unstable nodes?
Absurd as it sounds, at least it handwaves away the 'can use uncharted unstable nodes' from FS1 with 'lol we blew up the main nodes, the Shivans are stopped' from FS2.
However, basing any argument on the laughable techroom descriptions is never a good start. :)
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I'll point out that Admiral Petrarch told that Capella is unusual in that it has no jump nodes, unstable or otherwise, other than the main three, two of which were blown up.
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I don't get it - are you saying they didn't bring their most powerful weapons because it would restrict their ability to use unstable nodes?
It makes as much sense as not using an M-16 in a jungle, and not using an M-4 Sherman in a swamp. The only way the Shivans got into GTA / PVN space in the Great War was through unstable nodes, as far as I know this makes perfect sense.
Absurd as it sounds, at least it handwaves away the 'can use uncharted unstable nodes' from FS1 with 'lol we blew up the main nodes, the Shivans are stopped' from FS2.
I don't quite understand what your trying to say here.
However, basing any argument on the laughable techroom descriptions is never a good start. :)
Where would you prefer I get my information, if I wanted to I could say "the Lucifer's beams are orange, and most Shivan beams are red, this points to a fundimental difference in technology" but that obviously wouldn't make sense, the tech descriptions I consider accurate unless there's a specific ingame statment that says otherwise
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I'll point out that Admiral Petrarch told that Capella is unusual in that it has no jump nodes, unstable or otherwise, other than the main three, two of which were blown up.
Petrarch never said that.
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Isn't Petrarch delivering the command briefs at that point in the game (when the player takes command of the 70th Blue Lions). I am absolutely certain one of the command briefs said something like that.
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Isn't Petrarch delivering the command briefs at that point in the game (when the player takes command of the 70th Blue Lions). I am absolutely certain one of the command briefs said something like that.
Petrarch almost always gives the Command Briefs, but starts giving the Mission Briefs as well when you get command of the 70th.
Beam technology was taken from the Shivans, or at least, presumabley
The Lucifer hulk, or what was left of it, is in the Sol system. The rest of the Lucifer was obliterated in Subspace. Granted, the GTVA most likely worked beams out from scans taken of the Lucifer while it was still on the war-path, but it can still be argued that the technology was entirely home-grown.
It makes as much sense as not using an M-16 in a jungle, and not using an M-4 Sherman in a swamp. The only way the Shivans got into GTA / PVN space in the Great War was through unstable nodes, as far as I know this makes perfect sense.
That's not true. We don't know they came through 'unstable nodes', the game merely mentions the Shivans can use nodes too unstable for allied ships, not that they entered Terran-Vasudan space via one of them. Until canon says otherwise, there is as big a chance as any the Shivans came through a stable node that was simply uncharted.
Where would you prefer I get my information, if I wanted to I could say "the Lucifer's beams are orange, and most Shivan beams are red, this points to a fundimental difference in technology" but that obviously wouldn't make sense, the tech descriptions I consider accurate unless there's a specific ingame statment that says otherwise
Pnakotus makes a good point. The tech entries, while canon at their core, are riddled with inaccuracies and factual errors. One must always back up ones idea primarily from ingame chatter or briefings with support from tech entries, as theories constructed the other way around tend to be a little off-kilter.
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I'll point out that Admiral Petrarch told that Capella is unusual in that it has no jump nodes, unstable or otherwise, other than the main three, two of which were blown up.
I seem to remember someone saying that line too
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The Lucifer hulk, or what was left of it, is in the Sol system. The rest of the Lucifer was obliterated in Subspace. Granted, the GTVA most likely worked beams out from scans taken of the Lucifer while it was still on the war-path, but it can still be argued that the technology was entirely home-grown.
That made sense to me at the time I said it, but now I don't know why I did, it's bad for my argument, and I think thay photon beam cannons are home grown.
It makes as much sense as not using an M-16 in a jungle, and not using an M-4 Sherman in a swamp. The only way the Shivans got into GTA / PVN space in the Great War was through unstable nodes, as far as I know this makes perfect sense.
That's not true. We don't know they came through 'unstable nodes', the game merely mentions the Shivans can use nodes too unstable for allied ships, not that they entered Terran-Vasudan space via one of them. Until canon says otherwise, there is as big a chance as any the Shivans came through a stable node that was simply uncharted.
Yes it does say it in game.
I'll work on references
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This is the extent of Petrarch's commentary on jump nodes. He never says the Capella system is unusual in any way.
Will the Strategy Work?
Skeptics have argued the Shivans made intersystem jumps without using nodes in Ross 128, Ikeya, Vega, and other systems at the outbreak of the Great War. However, scientists assure us this plan will work. Though Shivans have used uncharted nodes and nodes too unstable for Terran and Vasudan vessels, they are as dependent on jump nodes as we are. Nevertheless, we must accept this strategy as nothing more than a temporary measure.
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Uncharted jump nodes?!?
In the FS1 command brief Wolf says "There's just one node out from Ikeya and we intend to blockade it"!!
The Taranis could return back or resupplying,but it tried to jump in a contested system instead.
Petrach said that the Shivans used interstellar drives to reach Ross 128 and Ikeya.The destruction of the nodes to Capella wouldn't finish the Shivan invasion...the Shivans could return.
And the Sathanas fleet?How did they escape?Interstellar drives!
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The game never mentions any kind of interstellar travel apart from jump drives.
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That's not true. We don't know they came through 'unstable nodes', the game merely mentions the Shivans can use nodes too unstable for allied ships, not that they entered Terran-Vasudan space via one of them. Until canon says otherwise, there is as big a chance as any the Shivans came through a stable node that was simply uncharted.
Even the conclusion they're using unstable nodes is somewhat suspect, since, being unstable, nobody would be watching them when the Shivans came through. All the times we actually saw Shivans jump into or out of a system they came through stable nodes. It's possible they simply made use of stable nodes the GTA/PVN did not know about or either could not detect or could not reach somehow.
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Now, now, let's not get ahead of ourselves, the Shivans using one or two uncharted nodes is fair, but it's pushing it a little to say that all flanking maneuvers made by Shivan forces [of which it's safe to assume there were at least several] strong, and yet uncharted nodes. Command in both games has made mention of the Shivan's ability to move through uncharted nodes, which they wouldn't push if they didn't at least catch the bastards in the act.
And anyway, coupled with the subspace-induced supernova thing, the whole 'Shivans are able to use nodes too unstable for regular travel' line of thought is practically at the core of the 'Shivans are masters of subspace' conclusion taken almost as fact around here. Correct?
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humans must have built there own beams. human beams are green and cant shoot fast, shivan beams are red and shoot really fast. also human got slash beam which suck but shivans dont have. and yea to the guy above me a lilith can take on a colossus with ease and even sathana if its not head on
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Actually, the whole Lilith thing is actually true. I died once in 'Their Finest Hour', and the SC Hela (the Lilith) destroyed all the beams on the Colossus and destroyed it. I was like :wtf:
**** happens.
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Okay, A: the LRed the Lilith carries cannot destroy ships with the supercap flag and B: The Colossus isn't initially beam freed in that mission, so that's why the Lilith wasn't vaporized on the spot.
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There seems to be more then one "edition" of the tables, I think.
Mine allows the Helios to destroy the Sathanas, because I managed to disable the Sathanas in the same mission and let the bomber wing you get Helios it to death.
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Wanna see screenshot?
Yes, actually, Mars. I checked my tables and it seems that I still had my BoE tables installed (all ships are Corvettes except cruisers and I removed the 'big damage' tag from all ships). With them, the Lilith can fry the Colossus, but when I deactivate MODs it just sits there shooting with the Colossus at 10%. Looks like Command really is dependant on Alpha 1.
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That's probably the most screwed up mission in the game, wish they had finished it the way they had initially planned
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What way had they initially planned?? I aint never heard anything about that.
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If you open the mission in FRED you'll notice that the Colossus has all manner of waypoint orders given.
At some point the guy FREDding the mission decided to simply disable the Colossus rather than have it move around but the orders are still present and if you simply undisable the Colossus it should start following whatever path was intended for it.
The mission probably won't work that well though as the Colossus is likely to be in the wrong place when the Sathanas jumps in.
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Okay, A: the LRed the Lilith carries cannot destroy ships with the supercap flag and B: The Colossus isn't initially beam freed in that mission, so that's why the Lilith wasn't vaporized on the spot.
all anti cap beams from the weakest LTerslash (1800 damage full charge) to the strongest BFred (82000 damage full charge) can destroy any cap ships, and lilith has 75000 hp a typical destroyer only has 100000 so consider it with the hp of a destroyer and much better weaponary than all destryoers except ravana and demon (1 Lred=6Bgreen=14Sred, if the damage is taken over a period of time), basically a lilith is more powerful than hades (which is the third best anticap destroyer after ravana and demon), colossus cant kill it fast it only has one forward Terslash (4000 damage full charge). onto damage reduction of super capitals sathana and colossus take around 30% damage reduction to hull from cyclops helios and rebel bomb, immune to your primary weap shots (not non capital allies but the last time i tested the sathanas seems to become immune to even allies once its hull is at 74%), and almost immune to semibombs that can kill corvettes (infryno, piranha, emp and trebechet)
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Okay, A: the LRed the Lilith carries cannot destroy ships with the supercap flag and B: The Colossus isn't initially beam freed in that mission, so that's why the Lilith wasn't vaporized on the spot.
all anti cap beams from the weakest LTerslash (1800 damage full charge) to the strongest BFred (82000 damage full charge) can destroy any cap ships, and lilith has 75000 hp a typical destroyer only has 100000 so consider it with the hp of a destroyer and much better weaponary than all destryoers except ravana and demon (1 Lred=6Bgreen=14Sred, if the damage is taken over a period of time), basically a lilith is more powerful than hades (which is the third best anticap destroyer after ravana and demon), colossus cant kill it fast it only has one forward Terslash (4000 damage full charge). onto damage reduction of super capitals sathana and colossus take around 30% damage reduction to hull from cyclops helios and rebel bomb, immune to your primary weap shots (not non capital allies but the last time i tested the sathanas seems to become immune to even allies once its hull is at 74%), and almost immune to semibombs that can kill corvettes (infryno, piranha, emp and trebechet)
Actually, that's not so. I tried to re-create the scenario for a screenshot, but what happend is that the Hela got blown up, and a Ravana (SD Beast) came in and began shooting at the Colossus, which was at 10%. After about 10 minutes, when the Beast went down (Colossus had only 1 TerSlash remaining on that flank), the Colossus was at 10% and holding. It wasn't going down. When the Sathanas came, it fried the Colossus, no question about it. However, with the BoE tables installed (all battleships except cruisers and below have the corvette flag so I can order them around, most ships have more beam cannons for more beam-frenzied fights) the Lilith can blow up the Colosssus easily (while being hurt to around 15-50%).
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Uncharted jump nodes?!?
In the FS1 command brief Wolf says "There's just one node out from Ikeya and we intend to blockade it"!!
The Taranis could return back or resupplying,but it tried to jump in a contested system instead.
The GTA likely didn't know at the time that the Shivans were using unstable jump nodes, so blockading the Ribos-Ikeya node was probably the best strategy the GTA could've used. The GTA had probably intended to blockade the node once the Taranis had been taken care of, and then isolate whatever Shivans were still in Ikeya from the rest.
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The game never mentions any kind of interstellar travel apart from jump drives.
No,Petrarch says this when he introduces the fully-Meson-Bastion strategy.I'm sure of it.
Then,the survived Juggenrauts that have destroyed Capella jumped to...?
Is there a node inside the star?Or the disturbance created it?Or the disturbance allows interstellar drives?
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The game never mentions any kind of interstellar travel apart from jump drives.
No,Petrarch says this when he introduces the fully-Meson-Bastion strategy.I'm sure of it.
You mean during the cutscene? That's pure speculation. Anyway, that's a special case, and could refer to intergalactic or even interuniversal travel. It's not relevant.
Then,the survived Juggenrauts that have destroyed Capella jumped to...?
Is there a node inside the star?Or the disturbance created it?Or the disturbance allows interstellar drives?
They could have jumped to the Gamma Draconis node...
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With over one hundred thousand casualties and more Shivans incoming, we have no hope of holding Capella. Our only real chance is to seal off the system and prevent the invasion from spreading to other Terran-Vasudan worlds. If we fail to contain the Shivan advance, we will unleash the second Great War, a conflict we have virtually no chance of surviving. The Lucifer fleet we defeated 32 years ago is nothing compared to the strength of this armada. Command is committed to getting every last Terran out of the system.
Over 80 Shivan Juggernauts are now in position around the Capella sun. Science vessels monitoring their activity have detected an anomalous subspace field rippling from the Juggernaut fleet. Though we can barely detect the field with our instruments, its intensity has been increasing slowly over the past seventy-two hours. We have known since the Great War that the Shivans possess advanced subspace technologies, but this field goes beyond our wildest speculations. The Shivans may be powering up a new kind of weapon, the likes of which we have never before encountered.
Preparations are now underway to collapse the Epsilon Pegasi jump node. A Great-War-era destroyer, the GTD Bastion, will contain multiple meson warheads that will detonate inside the node. Scientists believe an explosion of sufficient magnitude will cause this node to collapse, as evidenced by the destruction of the Lucifer 32 years ago. The detonation of the Lucifer's reactors sealed off the Sol jump node in Delta Serpentis and severed all contact with Earth. The Bastion has completed its modifications in the Vega system and is now entering Capella.
Skeptics have argued the Shivans made intersystem jumps without using nodes in Ross 128, Ikeya, Vega, and other systems at the outbreak of the Great War. However, scientists assure us this plan will work. Though Shivans have used uncharted nodes and nodes too unstable for Terran and Vasudan vessels, they are as dependent on jump nodes as we are. Nevertheless, we must accept this strategy as nothing more than a temporary measure.
Once we have evacuated all civilian and military personnel from the Capella system, we will send a second destroyer, also carrying meson warheads, through the Capella jump node in Vega. If we succeed in sealing off both nodes, the Alliance will have trapped the Shivans in this system. If we fail, we face certain annihilation.
This is our Alamo, pilots. We hold them here, or we die trying.
That's the entire Command Brief. The part in bold is probably what you're referring to; Petrarch says that the Shivans are just as dependent on jump nodes as the GTVA. He also says that the collapse will be purely temporary in holding the Shivans, probably referring to fluctuating areas where jump nodes could eventually form. However, the present nodes detected by the GTVA were already decided to be too unstable for travel by even the Shivans, and so destroying the two reliable nodes to GTVA space was an intelligent course of action.
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As an aside, does anyone know [approximately] how long the Battle of Capella had been going on when the Vega Node was collapsed?
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The GTVA lost most of its fleet but never directly engaged the Sathanas groups...it takes awhile to lose all those warships. From start to finish I'd guess Capella lasted a week, maybe two.
IIRC there's a timeline in the wiki you could check.
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*twitch*
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The GTVA lost most of its fleet but never directly engaged the Sathanas groups...it takes awhile to lose all those warships. From start to finish I'd guess Capella lasted a week, maybe two.
IIRC there's a timeline in the wiki you could check.
It must have been faster then that, they engaged the first Sathanas and since that with one shot a Sathanas already kills a cruiser, with 3 or 4 it already takes down a destroyer. But is was fast, well, the whole FS2 campaign occurs at a really fast pace, hurried even I might say.
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I was under the impression the Battle was stretched over mere days, not weeks. For the sake of storytelling in my own project, i'm planning on going with an estimation that the battle was waged [from the first Shivan unit appearing in Capella after the evacuation of the Nebula & Gamma Draconis] over a mere 144 hours, ending with the supernova. Any major facts contradict that estimate?
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Point to remeber about unchated nodes... We don't know how difficult it is to detect these things. Is a stable node more visible than a more unstable one? IMO one cannot detect a node from the other side of a system. More likely you have to get close (close in astronomical sense) to see it.
Another thing to remeber is that nodes form and collapse all the time. The stable nodes that are used by the GTVA are only small percentage of all nodes. When they destroyed the Knossos, Petrach said that "it could be years before it (the node) collapses again". To me this is clear indication that the life expectancy of a node is couple of decades at best (as it was mentioned in the tech room IIRC).
My conclusions. Since nodes form and collapse all the time, and their life is short at best (less than your life time), there is a danger that at any moment a new node might appear linking shivan infested system to GTVA. That's the reason why sealing Capella was a temporary measure. It is also likley that some of the main node lines in GTVA space have collapsed and a now node(s) has formed or has been found and no important system has been isolated.
Furthermore. In case of Gamma Draconis. Didn't Petrach say that GTSC Erikson visited the system some 30 years ago? So theres a good reason to assume that GTVA doesn't really have resources to find a node right after it was formed. Granted that there was a war with the NTF that propably drained some resources. But I still think that theres at least 10 years between complete survey of all remote areas in a given system.
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Pnakotus makes a good point. The tech entries, while canon at their core, are riddled with inaccuracies and factual errors.
Like how it says that the Boanerges is the most manueverable bomber ever?
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It doesn't.
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...One test pilot observed that the Boanerges handles better than any other kind of bomber and has enough firepower to make it a formidable anti-cap weapon.
And, as anyone who has ever flown it can tell you, that's just complete bullocks.
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Dear God, I never noticed that, that's... so stupid,
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It was true at the time that was written, though. The Artemis had not yet been introduced. You must consider the time at which each tech entry appeared. (At that time the only bombers we'd heard of were the FS1 escapees.)
Sarafan: You miss the part about they didn't engage the Sathanas group in Capella? They were busy trying to defend the evac efforts.
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The Athena is more maneuverable than the Boanerges (I checked tables).
And that tech description is probably referring to the test pilot as one of Alpha 1's wingmen.
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It was true at the time that was written, though. The Artemis had not yet been introduced. You must consider the time at which each tech entry appeared. (At that time the only bombers we'd heard of were the FS1 escapees.)
Sarafan: You miss the part about they didn't engage the Sathanas group in Capella? They were busy trying to defend the evac efforts.
The Medusa was also a bit more manueverable, IIRC. The Zues was for certain.
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They are both. Whoever wrote that description was probably drunk.
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Technically, the Valk and Zeus are strike bombers, an entirely different sub-class of bomber. They are designed to be quick bombers, and are the equivalent of the Artemis. The Boanerges can only be rightfully compared to the Medusa, which very-well may or may not be more maneuverable, but the fact that the Boanerges isn't noticably more maneuverable than the venerable old bird means that the tech-description is utter tosh.
That's not to say the tech-description are all complete tosh, but it does mean one should take all information given in the tech database with a grain of salt when making an assumption in the FS Universe. In-game chatter and command/tactical briefings were quite obviously scrutinized far more thoroughly, and hence can be better relied upon to hold steady as a strong reference.
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Strike / Light / Standard / Heavy / Assault
RE: TItle question. . . . .
If every ship had beams the Lucy would seem less special (apart from the infinty shield it had)
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Vasudans finally cracked beam technology during reconstruction. It is presumed during Silent Threat that the GTI was attempting, but there is no evidence to confirm or deny that they were successful.
*insert FS1 ranting here*
And FS1 sure as hell had beams, you just have to be really good at making them...
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Dude, where have you been? Didn't mean that in a sarcastic way, I just haven't seen you in like....forever.
That's not to say the tech-description are all complete tosh,
Didn't it also say the MEntu has heavy beam cannons?
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That's not to say the tech-description are all complete tosh,
Didn't it also say the MEntu has heavy beam cannons?
My point exactly.
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I have a super-up gunned Mentu in my BoE table. :)
But attack it from below and it's dead. The firing arcs on that thing are complete and utter stupidity. However, to counter this, :v: has a turret that shoots right through itself. :lol:
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Dude, where have you been? Didn't mean that in a sarcastic way, I just haven't seen you in like....forever.
Grazing here, grazing there, playing lots of EVE. I didnt play FS1 or 2 in almost 2 years untill about a month ago when i did both in 2 days :p ... Much to my suprise, both of my recent posts here have been followed by 'HE LIVES' or the sort.
/me looks over in the corner and sees the Inferno people staring at him *
*hides*
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Sarafan: You miss the part about they didn't engage the Sathanas group in Capella? They were busy trying to defend the evac efforts.
They did engaged the first Sathanas and that one alone already pulverized a good chunk of the fleet.
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Vasudans finally cracked beam technology during reconstruction. It is presumed during Silent Threat that the GTI was attempting, but there is no evidence to confirm or deny that they were successful.
So why is it the Hades was armed with Shivan Super Lasers?
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Strike / Light / Standard / Heavy / Assault
RE: TItle question. . . . .
If every ship had beams the Lucy would seem less special (apart from the infinty shield it had)
I've already told this.
Sarafan: You miss the part about they didn't engage the Sathanas group in Capella? They were busy trying to defend the evac efforts.
They did engaged the first Sathanas and that one alone already pulverized a good chunk of the fleet.
No,if you destroy its forwars beams in bearbaiting ;)
Vasudans finally cracked beam technology during reconstruction. It is presumed during Silent Threat that the GTI was attempting, but there is no evidence to confirm or deny that they were successful.
So why is it the Hades was armed with Shivan Super Lasers?
Because V boys used a time machine,checked which weanonry the Hades has in The SouthernCross, then returned and inserted it in Silent Threat. :D
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Actually the sath destroys a good portion of the fleet before Bearbaiting.
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Poor 3rd fleet, they tooks some pretty horrendus losses.
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Yeah, maybe... but if you think about it the GTVA losses weren't all that high, when compared to the Great War.
The 3rd Fleet, the 13th Vasudan Battlegroup (is that the right number?), and the Colossus. They were the only fleets that took heavy losses, the rest weren't involved at all. Also, the death of several million Capellans is absolutely nothing compared to Vasuda Prime.
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What about... what was it... the 6th fleet in Epsilon Pegasi, and I imagine the 4th fleet in Vega took significant losses. 12th of Wolf 359 was pretty safe though :D
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The impression one gets is that the GTVA, once they discovered how many juggernauts were coming, threw in everything (including the kitchen sink) in the hopes they would be able to at least delay long enough to evac some civilians. Certainly they implied that there was nothing left to stop them if you let anybody in red through the Vega node.
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I think the implication was that nothing would be able to stop the Sathanases, the main Shivan armada would still admittedly be difficult. They never give numbers, but they say the Shivans are "pouring into Gamma Draconis". If we figure that each of the 80 juggernauts has a sizable accompanying fleet, then we're talking over a hundred destroyers, many more corvettes and cruisers, and possibly millions of fighters and bombers.
I seem to have contradicted my own argument. :P
You're right nothing the GTVA had could possibly have stopped that force.
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Except Alpha 1 or possibly the Giant Subspace chicken of old spacelore............
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Anybody have 1 million kills yet?
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Sweet grud, That was random........I miss the PXO stats, i swear i was one Ulysses kill away from going up a rank when Squadwar went deadded.....
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sathanas is quite easy if you've got a lilith and a bomber wing with stilleto and aketon (dont make the sathanas go head on with lilith and see for yourself). if only gtva ships are to be used then go with sobek, although im not sure if it can survive
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Better than a Lilith, use Axem's Lamia-class cruiser. That thing has waaay too powerful a forward gun, it'll put the Sathanas to rest!
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ive just returned from my lastest damage reduction (dr) tests, this time more technical. each ship has a thing called flag which determines its dr, if we consider only fighting capital ships, theres cruiser corvette capital and supercap. cruiser corvette capital flags dont take any dr watever weap you use, and you can kill it with any weap too. supercap takes about 50% dr from your weaps, and becomes immune to primary once its hp is below 75%. then theres a thing called big damage. basically it mass reduce damage (something like reducing 99% of your proper damage) from primary and non bomb missiles (not including semibomb outlined below) and the dr approaches 100% as the hp of the ship approach 10%, then it become immune. however bombs and semi bombs (infryno piranha emp and trebechet) can kill ships with big damage, but semibombs cant harm ships with supercap once its hp is below 75%. sathanas (which has supercap + big damage) takes exactly 40% dr from your bombs (cyclops helios and rebel bomb) confirmed this time. all beams that cant be fired at a fighter can kill any combination of flags
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We know that already :p ...
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sathanas is quite easy if you've got a lilith and a bomber wing with stilleto and aketon (dont make the sathanas go head on with lilith and see for yourself). if only gtva ships are to be used then go with sobek, although im not sure if it can survive
A person in a spacesuit with a handgun can destroy the Sath if he/she attacks from the the right vector.
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sathanas is quite easy if you've got a lilith and a bomber wing with stilleto and aketon (dont make the sathanas go head on with lilith and see for yourself). if only gtva ships are to be used then go with sobek, although im not sure if it can survive
A person in a spacesuit with a handgun can destroy the Sath if he/she attacks from the the right vector.
That's fun. :D
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Granted, if he/she had a gun that fires rounds which have the "huge" flag, then the Jug would be destroyed, even if it does take a rapeload of bullets and time.
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A person in a spacesuit with a handgun can destroy the Sath if he/she attacks from the the right vector.
Nah, Shivans don't need spacesuits or guns, and I have a feeling that there are a fair number on a Sathanas. The guy in the space suit would lose royaly.
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yea the whole thing about ships being powerful is just because their beams dont get dr like maxim can inflict tons more damage than BFgreen (or LRBgreen) overtime if theres no flags
We know that already :p ...
hey im doing my best...
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Granted, if he/she had a gun that fires rounds which have the "huge" flag, then the Jug would be destroyed, even if it does take a rapeload of bullets and time.
Wouldn't be enough. You actually need the supercap flag to get a Juggernaut below 75%
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Granted, if he/she had a gun that fires rounds which have the "huge" flag, then the Jug would be destroyed, even if it does take a rapeload of bullets and time.
Wouldn't be enough. You actually need the supercap flag to get a Juggernaut below 75%
That's what I hate of weapons.
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It wouldn't makes sense that a person, or a fighter for that matter, could destroy a Sathanas, that's why there's a supercap flag
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Played Inferno? :lol:
A Notus (heavy bomber) equipped with Apocalypse bombs can take out a Sathanas on its own!
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Which is why I'm "Meh" towards Inferno... as far as I can tell it's the ultimate in "me ship bigger than yours, I blow you up.... ugh! you have big ship... me run fast..."
The next version seems to hold more promise however
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It wouldn't makes sense that a person, or a fighter for that matter, could destroy a Sathanas, that's why there's a supercap flag
With its hitpoints value is impossible to me to destroy it. It could be more realistic if,for example,the damage inflicted by conventional laser weapons is reduced by 9/10. Destroying a Sathanas with lasers would be difficult but still possible. At least making it possible with destroyer size warship would be a step ahead.
Played Inferno? :lol:
A Notus (heavy bomber) equipped with Apocalypse bombs can take out a Sathanas on its own!
In Inferno there are HUGE ships and of course atomic torpedoes to take them down.
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With its hitpoints value is impossible to me to destroy it. It could be more realistic if,for example,the damage inflicted by conventional laser weapons is reduced by 9/10. Destroying a Sathanas with lasers would be difficult but still possible. At least making it possible with destroyer size warship would be a step ahead.
Armor.tbl (http://www.hard-light.net/wiki/index.php/Armor.tbl) anyone?
I have no idea why people complain about the damage system and don't use the solution that's been in for ages.
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The Apocalypse/Armageddon is not an atom bomb, it is a mini black hole.
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I was under the impression that black holes are kind of permanent things, and that even micro-black holes can suck up everything within light years of them selves, even if they are moving away at relativistic speeds.
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We know next to nothing about black holes. We believe they are formed by supernovas, and we know they have intense gravity, but other than that.... who ever said they don't collapse?
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We know about black holes because of the General Theory of Relativity, otherwise we would have never known what to look for. Black holes are formed when a neutron star becomes so massive collapses further, and its gravity pulls in even light. I personally know little about them, but as far as I know, they are kind of permanent things.
Why not read up (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_holes) I'm doing that right now.
Man that's complicated...
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nice!!! mini black hole bombs. when you shoot it does it suck the ship it explodes on into it? that would so cool, 1 hit kill anything, even the invincible volition bravos...
please give me inferno i really want it and i checked in the section inferno and no link to dowload
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The Apocalypse/Armageddon is not an atom bomb, it is a mini black hole.
I was kidding on that matter,I said "atomic" after HUGE ships.
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On the subject of stupid tech descriptions, how is the crappy Tsunami an Anti-Matter bomb? :doubt:
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On the subject of stupid tech descriptions, how is the crappy Tsunami an Anti-Matter bomb? :doubt:
It was a good warhead in FS1,and V boys chose the anti matter thing bla bla to make it look cooler.
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nice!!! mini black hole bombs. when you shoot it does it suck the ship it explodes on into it? that would so cool, 1 hit kill anything, even the invincible volition bravos...
please give me inferno i really want it and i checked in the section inferno and no link to dowload
Don't get too excited. :lol: I've played with the Apocalypse bombs, they have no special explosion effects, and it still takes several hits to destroy a supersdestroyer with them. They're about as effective against a Sathanas as a Helios against a destroyer.
But Inferno can be downloaded from here (http://inferno.hard-light.net).
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Yeah, for mini black holes, Apocalypse/Armageddon bombs are complete ****.
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Maybe someone could do a palette-swap of Bobbaou's (sp?) Trinity bomb effect from ITDOH. Make it darker, and it could be a believable black hole effect.
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Maybe someone could do a palette-swap of Bobbaou's (sp?) Trinity bomb effect from ITDOH. Make it darker, and it could be a believable black hole effect.
This is an excellent idea. Making it bigger(like and explosion blue shockwave)will also be a nice thing.
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A black hole near any source of matter would be extremely bright
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In that case leave the effect as is, though possibly making it bigger. Apocalypse bombs are far more powerful than Trinities after all.
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A black hole near any source of matter would be extremely bright
No.
Matter near a black hole is extremely radiant - in all areas of electromagnetic spectrum. Even theoretically, the event horizon can only let Hawking's radiation to transfer energy from inside to outside, and that effect is really, really dim. So the hole itself is very very dark... but matter falling through event horizon is... well, completely different matter. It stratches and heatens and starts to emit radiation as it falls closer to the horizon. That's what makes active black holes "bright". This kind of active black holes can be seen from billions of light years away. As we do, actually. The quasars are exactly this.
:p
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In that case leave the effect as is, though possibly making it bigger. Apocalypse bombs are far more powerful than Trinities after all.
Yep.Trinities have "only" twice the power of a Helios if I remember well.
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i find these nuclear/antimatter bombs very unsatisfying. like a fission bomb can kill anything within 16km of its blast and antimatter should be even better (so torpedos should have 16km+ blast radius. but the helios only does like 100m blast raduis, lol
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They probably utilize shaped charge technique with nukes, so most of the energy is directed towards the hull of a poor craft they hit. And if the warhead is destroyed in-flight, it probably actually self-destructs without detonating the actual payload.
Though they are still underpowered to be nukes/anti-matter bombs.
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yeah they look more like smart bombs to me
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They probably utilize shaped charge technique with nukes, so most of the energy is directed towards the hull of a poor craft they hit. And if the warhead is destroyed in-flight, it probably actually self-destructs without detonating the actual payload.
Though they are still underpowered to be nukes/anti-matter bombs.
5 Gigatons of TNT ain't any small potatoes, especially out of a Fission / Fusion Bomb combo
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i find these nuclear/antimatter bombs very unsatisfying. like a fission bomb can kill anything within 16km of its blast and antimatter should be even better (so torpedos should have 16km+ blast radius. but the helios only does like 100m blast raduis, lol
It's a game.You can't launch a warhead 50 clicks away and wait,you need to be under enemy fire :lol:
They probably utilize shaped charge technique with nukes, so most of the energy is directed towards the hull of a poor craft they hit. And if the warhead is destroyed in-flight, it probably actually self-destructs without detonating the actual payload.
Yep,like a WWII dive bomb.
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No, it's not. It's a huge amount of energy in real world, but I meant that the bombs (or actually their effects) in the game are ridiculously small compared to their claimed massive yields.
There's no way in universe that 5 Gigatons of TNT equvalent amount of energy released in small spot in very little time only has such pitiful effects as the Meson bomb... if that was where you referred to, I have a faint memory that it was claimed to yield 5 GT of TNT...
Anyway, if some don't know what a shaped charge is, it basically directs the explosive energy mainly into one direction - forwards throgh the unlucky hull that stopped the missile. This can be achieved by many means, but when we're talking about nukes using this effect, the system that directs the yield must be the most expensive and advanced part of the bomb.
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yea the meson bomb is actually bigger than a fenris and it cant even kill a lilith or mentu (default damage is 50k)
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You're not meant to use the Meson bomb for anything other than plot purposes so it only needs to have enough power to kill any fighters nearby when it goes off.
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No, it's not. It's a huge amount of energy in real world, but I meant that the bombs (or actually their effects) in the game are ridiculously small compared to their claimed massive yields.
There's no way in universe that 5 Gigatons of TNT equvalent amount of energy released in small spot in very little time only has such pitiful effects as the Meson bomb... if that was where you referred to, I have a faint memory that it was claimed to yield 5 GT of TNT...
Anyway, if some don't know what a shaped charge is, it basically directs the explosive energy mainly into one direction - forwards throgh the unlucky hull that stopped the missile. This can be achieved by many means, but when we're talking about nukes using this effect, the system that directs the yield must be the most expensive and advanced part of the bomb.
I was refering to the Harbinger, the warhead is only as powerful compared to an unarmored object. Take the Deimos, it survived the initial blast wave from a supernova, so it's no wonder that 5GT can't take it out.
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That supernova cutscene is highly unrealistic. The light would hit the objects first, not... whatever that was.
Still cool, though.
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I think the beams in that cutscene were disgusting. :ick:
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No, it's not. It's a huge amount of energy in real world, but I meant that the bombs (or actually their effects) in the game are ridiculously small compared to their claimed massive yields.
There's no way in universe that 5 Gigatons of TNT equvalent amount of energy released in small spot in very little time only has such pitiful effects as the Meson bomb... if that was where you referred to, I have a faint memory that it was claimed to yield 5 GT of TNT...
Anyway, if some don't know what a shaped charge is, it basically directs the explosive energy mainly into one direction - forwards throgh the unlucky hull that stopped the missile. This can be achieved by many means, but when we're talking about nukes using this effect, the system that directs the yield must be the most expensive and advanced part of the bomb.
Most of the destruction that is caused by a bomb in real life is caused by the shockwave, not the actual explosion. In space there is no atmosphere to carry to blast wave.
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Indeed, most energy would stay as radiation, which is rather pointless in space where you've already shielded your ship up the ying-yang to protect yourselve from cosmic radiation.
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This is what I think. Volition probably intended beams to be on shivan cap ships, but didn't have the technology to render the graphics for it properly. What I think they did was rewrite history with FS2. To imply that both the shivans and the alliance simultaneouly and independantly developed beam weapons and flak guns and then equiped all their ships with them before encountering eachother again is ludicrous. What they do is have the player imagines that the shivans had beam cannons and flak guns in FS1, even though they didn't in the game. Evidence of this is in the FS2 into cutscene. The Lucifer there fires what obvioulsly is a beam cannon that we're familiar with in FS2, not a flux cannon animation typical in FS1. Now, it doesn't show any of the other ships having beam cannons, but I think they were supposed to.
What I want to do is reinsert this back into the FSport (unless it's already been done, I'm not that far into playing the port yet). I've never done modding, but I want to pick it up. Basically, I'd just leave the shivan ships as they are in their FS2 iteration, with all their beam cannons and flak guns, but the Terran and Vasudan capital ships would use conventional laser cannons. To make the Terran and Vasudan ships capable of surviving prolonged engagements with Shivan warships, I'd modify the Terran and Vasudan turrets slightly. I'd designate the turrets that in the FS2 iteration were set asaide as anti-fighter beams or flak guns as anti-fighter lasers. They'd have a faster rate of fire and better tracking abilities as conventional lasers but each bolt would do less individual damage. The turrets that in FS2 were beam cannons would be heavy anti-cap lasers. These would be slow firing, but would do tremendous damage on hit. Not nearly as much as a beam cannon, but if you got hit by one you're pretty much toast. The good thing is that these cap ship lasers wouldn't track fighters, but would only fire on capital ships. The anti-fighter lasers could and would be employed against cap ships, though. These new lasers would be like the anti-ship guns in Starlancer. I've never done a mod before, and I have very little time on my hands, so don't hold your breath. If anyone wants to help me with this (Goober, please?) that'd be awesome.
As far as the shivans ability to use unchartered nodes, well that has a lot to do with what happened in Cappella. A big clue is when Admiral Petrarch says "Perhaps the explosion of a star is a bridge between this universe and their own." In the dying moments of the star, it must of created some sort of subspace phenomena that allowed the Shivans to warp directly from where they were to some other location in the universe, or some other univers. This might be what allowed them to discover us in the first place. The go around exploding stars jumping to random locations. They send exploratory task forces into these unknown regions (the Lucifer fleet) to exterminate any life and look for new candidate stars whose explosions create powerful enough subspace phenomena so they can warp to new unchartered locations.
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I agree with the first two points. I wonder though if adding beam cannons to FS1 would create balance issues. Clash of the Titans for instance. Arm the Tantalus with beams and that mission would become very, very, very difficult.
I always thought that Capella going kaput was a mistake on the part of the Shivans. It's implied that they had hundreds of ships in-system at that moment, seems a massive waste. I think the Sathanases slipped up, and the star was never supposed to explode at all.
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I agree with the first two points. I wonder though if adding beam cannons to FS1 would create balance issues. Clash of the Titans for instance. Arm the Tantalus with beams and that mission would become very, very, very difficult.
I always thought that Capella going kaput was a mistake on the part of the Shivans. It's implied that they had hundreds of ships in-system at that moment, seems a massive waste. I think the Sathanases slipped up, and the star was never supposed to explode at all.
Balance would be an issue, that is true, this is why I'd have to tweak the missions a bit. Maybe keep the cap ships further apart from eachother, and give Alpha 1 and his fighter wings time to take out the heavy beam turrets on the enemy ship before it comes within firing range. Other balance issues can be cleared by converting many of the terran and vasudan turrets into heavy laser cannons that inflict much heavier damage than the original FS1 iterations. Have you ever seen how long it would take two cap ships to destroy eachother in FS1 without the aid of fighters? Tweaking the laser cannons would allow two non-shivan ships to actually be a threat to eachother. Also, by making the anti-fighter turrets less powerful, but have better tracking and a higher rate of fire, these ships actually become a threat to fighters as well. At this point, cap ships in FS1 are simply big targets that aren't really scary. The Beam cannons brang them to life in FS2, but by tweaking the laser cannons in FS1, we can bring the Terran and Vasudan ships to life as well, they just won't be as 'lively' (scary) as the shivan ships.
As far as Capella, I do think they clearly intended it. We may not know what they were trying to do, but they obviously planned it out by the numbers. Creating a supernova had a purpose besides just blowing up a star, and they were willing to sacrifice a great number of their comrades in the process.
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I agree with the first two points. I wonder though if adding beam cannons to FS1 would create balance issues. Clash of the Titans for instance. Arm the Tantalus with beams and that mission would become very, very, very difficult.
I always thought that Capella going kaput was a mistake on the part of the Shivans. It's implied that they had hundreds of ships in-system at that moment, seems a massive waste. I think the Sathanases slipped up, and the star was never supposed to explode at all.
Balance would be an issue, that is true, this is why I'd have to tweak the missions a bit. Maybe keep the cap ships further apart from eachother, and give Alpha 1 and his fighter wings time to take out the heavy beam turrets on the enemy ship before it comes within firing range. Other balance issues can be cleared by converting many of the terran and vasudan turrets into heavy laser cannons that inflict much heavier damage than the original FS1 iterations. Have you ever seen how long it would take two cap ships to destroy eachother in FS1 without the aid of fighters? Tweaking the laser cannons would allow two non-shivan ships to actually be a threat to eachother. Also, by making the anti-fighter turrets less powerful, but have better tracking and a higher rate of fire, these ships actually become a threat to fighters as well. At this point, cap ships in FS1 are simply big targets that aren't really scary. The Beam cannons brang them to life in FS2, but by tweaking the laser cannons in FS1, we can bring the Terran and Vasudan ships to life as well, they just won't be as 'lively' (scary) as the shivan ships.
As far as Capella, I do think they clearly intended it. We may not know what they were trying to do, but they obviously planned it out by the numbers. Creating a supernova had a purpose besides just blowing up a star, and they were willing to sacrifice a great number of their comrades in the process.
BRANG = BROUGHT :hopping:
eachother = each other...
terran = Terran
vasudan = Vasudan
The Beams = The beams
Other than the few mistakes in that post, I quite agree with you. I didn't see the reason for Shivan ships being so terrifying if their only advantage was their shields. Bigger ships such as, cruisers, transports, freighters, and destroyers (not Lucifer) had absolutely no advantage over their Terran and Vasudan counterparts. In FS1, the Typhon could wipe the floor with the Demon, but with beam cannons, the Typhon stands no chance. I believe adding beam cannons to FS1 would be good, but it should be an addition as some people don't have FS1 and just want to play it as it was, with no tweaks (except for bug fixes, of course).
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A person in a spacesuit with a handgun can destroy the Sath if he/she attacks from the the right vector.
:wakka:
Are you serious? A handgun wouldn't even make a scratch in the kind of armor a Sathanas has. An AAAh would barely make a scratch, while a destroyer-class beam would probably make a small hole. Vectors, yes. But what are you going to do when the Sathanas decides to turn around and obliterate you with either its flak, beam, or laser cannons?
On the subject of stupid tech descriptions, how is the crappy Tsunami an Anti-Matter bomb? :doubt:
It was a good warhead in FS1,and V boys chose the anti matter thing bla bla to make it look cooler.
Um, no? Think of this for a minute: most science fiction games and shows have shown antimatter as a so-called "superpowerful" substance. Maybe in the Freespace universe it's not as powerful as we think it should be? And besides, the Tsunami is an anti-CRUISER bomb. The Harbinger is the one that's more of an anti-all-capital-ship-bomb. :)
They could have jumped to the Gamma Draconis node...
I agree. In the Freespace 1 era, scientists argued that the Shivans actually had no need for the jump nodes themselves. Those jump drives the Sathani were using were probably what aggravated the Capellan sun enough to make it go supernova. I was thinking that those so-called "weapons" that the Sathani were using were nothing more than some kind of vortex that may have enabled the Shivans to jump halfway across the galaxy into Gamma Draconis or some other obscure star system. Or, the devices were used to actually draw power from the Capellan sun for a long range jump to said star systems.
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Oh no! :eek: Not another forum grammar Nazi! Correcting me while I'm posting while looking over my shoulder at work. :hopping:
Anyway, what I was thinking is, if I have the time, or if somepeople want to help me (preferrable) just make an optional add-on the the Freespace port. You can have it original style or this style, where the Shivans have Beam cannon, anti-fighter beams, and flak guns. The Terrans' and the Vasudans' ships will have their stats changed, too. The anti-fighter laser turrets would have an increased rate of fire, but each bolt would have a lower damage value. The AI on these turrets would be increased, too, to allow it to track fast moving fighters better.
Let's take the Orion, for example, FS2 version. All of the Beam Cannons would be replaced by heavy laser cannons. Possibly the animations would be changed a bit to show a big huge plasma bolt. The damage value of this bolt would be enormous. Not nearly as enormous as a beam cannon, but enough to probably instantly destroy a fighter and seriously damage even a heavy bomber if hit. These heavy laser cannons would have very slow rates of fire, and I imagine the bolt itself traveling relatively slowly so wouldn't be used against fighters. I picture a large explosion animation when it hits an object. The flak guns would be replaced by anti-fighter turrets that would have the faster rate of fire and better tracking I just talked about, and the anti-fighter lasers would become the generic lasers we're used to in FS1. All the other laser turrets that are left would stay as they are. The reason I'd convert the anti-fighter turrets to generic lasers is because both are used against both fighters and capital ships in both games.
Now we look at a shivan ship, like the Lilith. It would stay just like it's FS2 iteration except for I'd make all the beam weapons a bit less powerful to look like these weapons were a bit 'upgraded' since the Great War. Also, I'd make the armor on all the turrets more weak. Other than that, I'd make the FS1 Lilith identical to the FS2 one. Now, all we'd have to do for balance is possibly set the ships farther apart to give the player enough time to take out the heavy beams on a Shivan ship, so critical allied warships aren't destroyed to easily. The player would now be forced to focus on shivan beam turrets, but we're used to that in FS2. Also, we might have to throw more wings on the players side to make it possible to assault these Shivan ships and survive.
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Heil Herr Grammar!
I don't think that there were supposed to be beam weapons in FS1 at all. The only ships in FS1 with beam cannons were the SD Lucifer and the GTD Hades. I like it that way, but if the Shivans had all those beam weapons, they would be far more terrifying.
I may be able to help for about an hour each day, actually. However, I think that the Railgun and AF weapon is a bad idea. I think it would just be better if the fire rate, velocity and damage is raised, I have tried it for my TV war mod and it works well. An Orion - Typhon battle takes about 1 minute. It works and would require no changing of the weapons for the T/V ships. It also makes Cap Ships dangerous to fighters and bombers, while not being a complete and utter terror to them.
When INF:A comes out I'm going to make the Shivans evil.... :drevil:
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Oh no! :eek: Not another forum grammar Nazi! Correcting me while I'm posting while looking over my shoulder at work. :hopping:
Then install aspellfox and check your grammer.
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Heil Herr Grammar!
I don't think that there were supposed to be beam weapons in FS1 at all. The only ships in FS1 with beam cannons were the SD Lucifer and the GTD Hades. I like it that way, but if the Shivans had all those beam weapons, they would be far more terrifying.
I may be able to help for about an hour each day, actually. However, I think that the Railgun and AF weapon is a bad idea. I think it would just be better if the fire rate, velocity and damage is raised, I have tried it for my TV war mod and it works well. An Orion - Typhon battle takes about 1 minute. It works and would require no changing of the weapons for the T/V ships. It also makes Cap Ships dangerous to fighters and bombers, while not being a complete and utter terror to them.
When INF:A comes out I'm going to make the Shivans evil.... :drevil:
That would help. I could only do about an hour myself, but since I have no experience in modding, except for the occasional dabble in FRED or the TES Construction Set, it'll take me awhile, and your help would be appreciated.
What I think is there's no continuity between FS1 and FS2. If they had the rendering technology, I think they would have had beam cannons and flak guns in FS1. There's no way it makes sense for both sides to be isolated from each other, but somehow independantly develop beam and flak technology and retrofit it on all their old ships and install it on their new ones just in the nick of time to reencounter each other is a bit far fetched. Okay, it's not a bit far fetched, it's completly whacko. By making FS1 Shivan ships have flak guns and beam cannons, it makes the whole story more continuous.
I think you're right about the how to do the Vasudan and Terran ships. FS1 ships already have heavy lasers that are supposed to be primarily anti-cap ship weapons. If we just increase their damage rate a bit, and increase the damage rating and fire rating of the other lesser turrets, it'll make the Vasudan and Terran ships more formidable.
For the Shivan warships, we can make them just like their FS2 counterparts, but we should make both the anti-fighter beams and the main beam cannons a bit less powerful and make the armor surrounding the turrets a bit more weak, and maybe do the same for the flak guns. The reasoning for this is that the FS2 ships are upgraded with more effecient weapons and better armor.
From what I understand from Karajorma's FAQ, we could do most of this stuff as a table edit, and then hammer the balancing issues out by altering the missions slightly in FRED. PM me on how you want to go about this and what you want me to do. I'll basically let you be in charge since I'm the newbest of the newbs when it comes to modding.
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No, it's not. It's a huge amount of energy in real world, but I meant that the bombs (or actually their effects) in the game are ridiculously small compared to their claimed massive yields.
There's no way in universe that 5 Gigatons of TNT equvalent amount of energy released in small spot in very little time only has such pitiful effects as the Meson bomb... if that was where you referred to, I have a faint memory that it was claimed to yield 5 GT of TNT...
Anyway, if some don't know what a shaped charge is, it basically directs the explosive energy mainly into one direction - forwards throgh the unlucky hull that stopped the missile. This can be achieved by many means, but when we're talking about nukes using this effect, the system that directs the yield must be the most expensive and advanced part of the bomb.
Most of the destruction that is caused by a bomb in real life is caused by the shockwave, not the actual explosion. In space there is no atmosphere to carry to blast wave.
nope. things like the frag grenades kill by using sharpenels when they explode, and pierce people's flesh. its most effective because of its wide range. for anti vehicle artillery platforms its the explosions that kills, since tank armor barely take any notice to shockwaves. most anti tank guns are just armor piercing tracer guns that kill the crew inside the tank, explosives are difficult to use
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Excactly, when we are talking about conventional explosives.
Flashbangs are effective inside closed space, where the shockwave and the light can effectively... distract... enemies and make them temporarily unable to fight back. Outside, the effects of a shockwave itself are limited to very very limited area, and shockwaves in general do nothing against armored hulls of war machines.
Against living enemy, shrapnel is the most effective because it has a wide area of effect (120 mm mortar grenades have an effective kill radius of 100 metres if I remember right, and artillery grenades have even larger but elliptical area of effect). However, shrapnel, like shockwave, can't do much agains armored targets, so unless it's a direct hit even artillery can't do much against panzers.... direct hit on the roof *will* destroy a tank for sure, but that's quite far-fetched and nigh impossible to achieve.
Against armor, shaped charges are the way to go. Instead of releasing shrapnel they have a copper cone ahead of the charge, the open side of the cone pointing towards the targed. When the charge goes off, the explosion starts from the point of the cone, sending the point of the cone on its way forward at very high speed, and when the explosion proceeds towards outer edges of the cone, the cone becomes a sharp tipped piercing cloud of extra-hot fast copper particles that go very deep into RHA armour steel. This technique is used in every AT weapon there is - AT missiles like Javelin and Eurospike, and recoilless rifles.
When we talk about nuclear detonations, the shockwave indeed causes most destruction on wide area. On ground zero, however, the shockwave doesn't matter the slightest bit because it is formed there. The radiation heats everything around it into very high temperatures, melting and even vaporizing much of the matter near it. In the very center of the explosion, there even exists matter in plasma state, at least if it's a fusion bomb we're talking about.
This super-heated matter expands very rapidly, which creates the huge shockwave.
In space, the only matter the bomb has to heat is itself, and while it still would form an impressive shockwave of superheaded gaseous radioactive metal, that shockwave would disperse quite soon.
The most destructive part of a nuke in space would be the intense radiation that would vaporize warships' surfaces quite measurably, of course depending of the distance. But I guess FS and FS2 era ships are so hevaily shielded against radiation forms that it just has no effect.
So, I conclude that Freespace nukes and anti-matter bombs utilize one form of shaped charges, but instead of having a simple copper cone in the front of the charge, they probably consist of three parts:
1. The back portion of the missile, behind the payload. Contains propulsion and trajectory units.
2. The charge, either a nuke or anti-matter one.
3. Front cone, containing the piercing matter - possibly it even contains some anti-matter in itself. Also contains guidance systems.
When the missile reaches a point where it's still perhaps less than metre away from the target, the charge(s) detonate. The back portion of the missile is probalby constructed to reflect a big part of the detonation. One way to achieve this is to make the back portion very heavy, so that the detonation can't easily push it backwards, and thus more energy can be directed forwards, where the target is.
The lighter part in front of the actual charge plunges forward, becames a fastly deteorating cloud of superheated mass, and plunges through any hull structure imaginable.
If the front cone of the missile contains anti-matter in magnetic stasis, the magnetic stasis is destroyed when the cone hits the target at high speed. The anti-matter, though, still has momentum forwards, and it continues to go through the parts of the cone it meets, and eventually the hull of the target. On its way, it would react with ordinary matter in quite a destructive way.
Either standard piercing or anti-matter piercing would work, but AM has the advantage that ordinary matter just cannot be protected against it. It just destroys any kind of hull it touches, so only way to protect against AM is to get more width and mass onto hull, so it lasts longer under anti-matter attack, and the anti-matter cones can't penetrate deep enough to actually get through the hull.
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Anti matter is a hole :nod: It's true.
If i wanted to blow a hole in a hull.... rail gun, + rail of anti matter, = not bad...
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Nothing beats ship-vanish. Pop, gone. :P
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Ship vanish?When do you use it?
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It's a FRED sexp. It causes a ship to just... vanish.... without explosions or subspace jumping. I've only seen it used in one campaign: Transcend. Although there it was accompanied by one of Ransom's fade-in/fade-out flashes.
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I've only seen it used in one campaign: Transcend.
Follow Kappa Wing in Mystery of the Trinity next time :)
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It's a FRED sexp. It causes a ship to just... vanish.... without explosions or subspace jumping. I've only seen it used in one campaign: Transcend. Although there it was accompanied by one of Ransom's fade-in/fade-out flashes.
:lol: Do you want to teach ME Fred? :lol:
I mean with that post,sometimes I prefer setting a departure cue with no warp effect.
I've only seen it used in one campaign: Transcend.
Follow Kappa Wing in Mystery of the Trinity next time :)
And Kappa 3 during the Pegasus field testing...