[Scuddie]

Would it be relatively easy to implement a missile defense system against bombs?  Kind of like a point defense system?  Right now, I never see any AI behavior to intercept bombs using missiles.  I think it would be nice to see a "point defense" weapon flag, so that capital ships have an intercept system.  I think this would work exceptionally well with gunships or escort ships that have orders to protect a target.  It would work in the same sense as the "Bomber+" flag, except targetting bombs, and only bombs.  Thoughts?

[Mars]

I second that, that's an excellent idea.

(Provided of course it won't be hell to implement)

[Nuke]

thirded

[Wanderer]

AFAIK AI does (or rather tries to) intercept bombs with missiles... I have seen it trying to intercept approaching helios by firing another helios at it . And that was attempt to save another modified fenris.

[Goober5000]

Yes, the AI already fires missiles at bombs.

[Mars]

Um... I don't suppose it would be easy to make a flag for weapons.tbl like "AI_fire_at_bomb"?

[karajorma]

I think the point was to have missiles that only fired at bombs.

[jr2]

...a bomb-killing missile.  Great idea.  There should be a version for Intercept fighters, too; I've always wanted to just lock on to and kiss a bomb good-bye, instead of riding up its butt and getting my front shields creamed when the lasers finally hit.

On the flip side, then there'd probably be bombs that split into multiple sub-bombs & decoys, like they have in ICBMs now.

[Wanderer]

I think the point was to have missiles that only fired at bombs.

That would be kinda odd... AFAIK even these days there arent any of those. All are more or less dual purpose missiles with capability to engage both missiles and aircrafts.

[WMCoolmon]

The best method would be a SEXP that allows you to set the object priority of turrets "weapon" "ship" "asteroid" and so forth (I don't think turrets shoot anything else though )

At least IMHO. AFAIK, it hasn't been implemented, though.

Or maybe it has. Now this is embarassing...I actually implemented the SEXP(s), but forgot about it.

There are two SEXPs - turret-set-target-order, and ship-turret-target-order. The default is, bombs, ships, asteroids. So given that, what you could do, is use this:

Code: [Select]

turret-set-target-order
--(ship)
--(turret)
--"bombs"
That will cause the turret to target bombs only. For the rest of the turrets, you could throw out

Code: [Select]

turret-set-target-order
--(ship)
--(turret)
--"ships"
--"asteroids"
And if you only had a few point-defense-turrets, you could use ship-turret-target-order:

Code: [Select]

ship-turret-target-order
--(ship)
--"ships"
--"asteroids"

turret-set-target-order
--(ship)
--(point-defense turret 1)
--"bombs"

turret-set-target-order
--(ship)
--(point-defense turret 2)
--"bombs"

turret-set-target-order
--(ship)
--(point-defense turret ...)
--"bombs"

[Scuddie]

The issue is not with the missiles, but with the AI.  I have never seen a missile take out a bomb, primarily because the AI almost never targets bombs exclusively.  With programming a point defense system, there can be ways for the AI to not worry about all the fighters, ships, and everything else before a bomb is targeted.  This introduces a factor of game balance to the equation, but that's where the missile specs come in.  Since AI cannot determine relative threat like people can, it seems logical to create this special case solution to fit the needs.

POST EDIT:  WMC, if you can do that for an SEXP, you should be able to do that for a weapon flag, no?

[WMCoolmon]

That'd actually be a whole nother ballgame, unless you just wanted limited auto-application of the targeting order for turrets. Plus it raises the question of what to do if weapons on a turret have conflicting target orders.

So, yes it is possible, but a weapon flag would only be useful on fighters and for dual-purpose turrets, although the latter don't generally make a whole lot of sense. I can't say how hard it would be - it depends on how the AI goes about picking which weapon to us, and which target to pick, and how convoluted that path is.

[Scuddie]

Well, as I said, the application would most likely be for point-defense on gunships and escort ships.  If you're saying it's controlled by turret, is it possible or feasable to have a ship flag, or even a turret flag that would put bomb precedence as top or only priority for the missiles?  For dedicated turrets, it should be no problem if I understand you correctly.

[Nuke]

ive been wanting to make a small long range missile with a light warhead to kill bombs. interceptors could carry a lot of them and it would allow them to cover a wider area. id just want to make it so the ai wouldnt chew em up on ships, which it would totally be useless against. perhaps put a target compatability flag in each weapon. the ai would check this when using its weapons. it would help it decide what weapons to use against a target, how many missiles to fire at once, and weather to group primary banks or fire just one weapon. it would probibly be best if it was a string list, where you put in a ship class or bomb (maybe shields as well to indiate the weapon is suited to attack shielded targets. make the ai smart enough to use its circie when shilds are up and maxim only when something's shields are down) or any other object, turret or subsystem for example. so if you list "bomb" "turret" "fighter", then the ai will only use that weapon for those items, so if its target is a bomb it will use that weapon, if its a fighter it knows that weapon is a poor choice and will use another. this idea wouldnt just make ams weapons possible, but it would make the ai smarter with weapon usage.

[NGTM-1R]

The issue is not with the missiles, but with the AI.  I have never seen a missile take out a bomb, primarily because the AI almost never targets bombs exclusively.  With programming a point defense system, there can be ways for the AI to not worry about all the fighters, ships, and everything else before a bomb is targeted.  This introduces a factor of game balance to the equation, but that's where the missile specs come in.  Since AI cannot determine relative threat like people can, it seems logical to create this special case solution to fit the needs.

The AI will engage targets with the bomb tag in preference to all others already. Including in some builds even firing anti-capital beams at them, which looks rather strange.

[Wanderer]

That beam thing should happen with all the builds... I once suggested fixing it by default but that was dropped to keep backwards compatibility. That particular problem and other such 'huge weapon targets bomb' can be fixed with proper ai_profiles.tbl usage.

[Scuddie]

If bombs are the first thing to be targetted, why do I never see a missile intercept a bomb?  I know that a capship will fire its gun turrets at incoming bombs, so why wont it fire its missile turrets at them?

[Prophet]

Perhaps you have just been unfortunate. Perhaps the turnents just haven't got a lock on the bomb. Perhaps the crew is changing a fresh magazine.

IRRELEVANT

Overhul the weapons to make them intercept blobs so we get interceptors on TBP. Now! I command you in the name of the allmight sweating bottle of cold beer!

(Interesting thing I realized... Why havent there been a space sim that has interceptors? Or anything similar?)

[NGTM-1R]

Well...IFH might have them. Or, for that matter, the never-released official B5 flight sim might have.

[phreak]

The ROF on missile turrets on capitals is often slow, so when its time to fire again, the bombs may have already been downed by fighter cover/blob turrets/flak/AAA beams

A way to test if missile turrets go for bombs is to modify a ship so all of its turrets are missiles.  Then you probably want to set the missile type to something more rapid fire, like Harpoons.  Create a test mission and have the target ship invulnerable and see if the missiles go for the bombs.

One thing to note is that if the Weapons subsystem has been destroyed, bombs won't be targeted by the turrets.  This behavior could probably be modified if we have a special "interceptor" weapon flag, so that bombs are still targeted by just "interceptor" weapons and not other things.