Hi all , i had a question (maybe a feature request too ) about the glide mode.
Is it possible to have different turn rate (i mean different rotation time ) when your ships switch to glide mode?
i'm looking to speed it up to give a better advantage to players when they engage gliding.
i didn't saw any kind of option in the ships.tbl wiki page, would it be doable in the future to add such option?
Actually I would like a possibility to have the flight mode mechanical but so that you can turn vector-heading equalizer assist on at the cost of maneuverability at higher velocities.
Here's how it works: In space, maneuverability is not just the turn rate of the ship but also how fast you can change the vector of the ship, or direction you're flying at. When you yaw right for example you'll end up going in the same direction and you need to manually adjust the vector with your port and main thrusters so that the vector eventually equalizes with your heading (at selected velocity).
Now, of course based onbasic physics I hope you know, the faster you go, the higher your turn radius will be. With the vector-heading equalizer fully engaged, it would keep the heading matching your vector at all times, and that would mean that the faster you go, the slower your (assisted) turn rate would be because the automated direction changes would take more time to complete.
This kind of system would result in flight model that would be very similar to FreeSpace's familiar "on tracks" model, but with a key difference - velocity would have adverse effect on maneuverability. The faster you go, the slower you could change your vector so your turn rate would end up slower because the assisted flight mode would try to keep your heading equal to the vector.
Of course, a seasoned pilot could turn the assisted mode off and manually control both the attitude and vector. This would be more difficult, but it would give the advantage of having full rate of attitude control (pitch, roll and yaw) at all velocities; however it would make it far more difficult to accurately control the vector of the ship if you're not really good at it.
Relative velocity limits enforced by flight safety computers could be used to prevent overthrusting (for gameplay reasons and preserving collision detection unlimited speed would be bad...)
Of course, this kind of setups would mainly be useful for total conversions like Babylon Project, BtRL and Diaspora, where a semi-newtonian flight model is already available.
