[Aesaar]

A big antimatter explosion outside the ship would do very little.  Ramming doesn't work in FS.

Plus UEF subspace capability isn't reliable enough to make Custos#SSM a viable tactic.

[crizza]

And yet they can jump into the Kuiper belt without ending inside an asteroid^^

[FrikgFeek]

The asteroid density in the Kuiper belt isn't really that big. It's definitely no star-warsy asteroid field that a ship can't fly through. And really, jumping into it is a hell of a lot easier than precisely vectoring in a custos to the front beam array of the Titan.

And per BP lore big dumb 'splosions don't do much to modern warships. All the bombs are designed to penetrate and have complex scanning systems that analyse the surface for maximum effect combined with very concentrated force. That's the lore reason dumbfiring bombs doesn't work, without the scanning process they would simply be big dumb explosions.

[Dark Hunter]

Frankly, any asteroid field doesn't have the density to actually pose a navigational threat to a ship.

[FrikgFeek]

Well, in our 'verse, yes. In FSverse there are massive asteroid fields with kamikaze asteroids who really want to **** up whatever you're escorting.

But as shown in One Future the Kuiper belt isn't too dense per BP lore.

[crizza]

But too dense for an Karuna or how was it phrased?
Ah, well "distance from any large gravity wells makes plotting safe subspace routes difficult and time-consuming"

[The E]

But too dense for an Karuna or how was it phrased?
Ah, well "distance from any large gravity wells makes plotting safe subspace routes difficult and time-consuming"

The way Subspace drives work in BP is that you need gravity wells to navigate in. Jumping from one grav well to another is simple, jumping within a grav well as deep as the Sun's is reasonably safe, but going into its shallow ends (like the Kuiper belt) introduces an error factor that becomes harder to deal with the more massive a ship is. The navigational equipment on a Frigate usually cannot handle it with the accuracy required for military operations, but smaller vessels like the Custos can work in that environment.

[-Norbert-]

Speaking of subspace and gravity: In BP canon do the subspace windows usually have any tendency to attract or push away objects?

To be more specific, can objects be "sucked into" a subspace window when a ship jumps out, or in reverse is a subspace window going to push small objects out of the way within a certain radius around itself when a ship jumps in?

[Homura]

I have some trouble with the mission "Eyes in the Storm"

I cant enter the top down view. No matter what key i press. Someone with the same problem or a solution?

[FrikgFeek]

Have you tried checking the controls menu? AFAIK the button bound to the turret control script is the "top down view" button from miscellaneous controls. Check if that's bound to anything.

[Homura]

Sry i dont find it.

What do you mean with turret controll script?

On default there is no use for the Enter key. At least on the german version.

[Axem]

The controls used for the turret defense are special scripted controls, they don't use the same bound game keys.

I will look into this though!

[Rheavatarin]

The way Subspace drives work in BP is that you need gravity wells to navigate in. Jumping from one grav well to another is simple, jumping within a grav well as deep as the Sun's is reasonably safe, but going into its shallow ends (like the Kuiper belt) introduces an error factor that becomes harder to deal with the more massive a ship is. The navigational equipment on a Frigate usually cannot handle it with the accuracy required for military operations, but smaller vessels like the Custos can work in that environment.

Weren't frigates designed and built during a time when the Gaian Effort was the major known threat? It seems a pretty fatal design flaw to build a ship that cannot handle working in the environment of a known enemy, or was the UEF committed to merely defending supply lanes and outposts, rather than the strategic elimination of the hostile Gef cells? Even if that were true, strategic imperatives are subject to change, and a forward looking admiralty would anticipate the possibility of working within the Kuiper belt.

OTOH, if it isn't simply a matter of increasing the navigational computational ability of the ship, but that increasing ship mass adds uncertainty to navigational calculations then it isn't so much a equipment capability issue of the frigate, but that a frigate can no more navigate the Kuiper belt through subspace than a battleship could navigate the Mekong.

[The E]

OTOH, if it isn't simply a matter of increasing the navigational computational ability of the ship, but that increasing ship mass adds uncertainty to navigational calculations then it isn't so much a equipment capability issue of the frigate, but that a frigate can no more navigate the Kuiper belt through subspace than a battleship could navigate the Mekong.

It's this more than anything. Well, not quite: A Karuna could make the jump out to the Kuiper and engage a GEF colony, but it would almost certainly have to travel several hours if not days on sublight drives to get to its target due to jump inaccuracy. This gives the defenders a massive advantage, as neither a subspace emergence nor a ship accelerating are particularly hard to miss against the interstellar backdrop.

As for anticipating the possibility of having to fly missions in the Kuiper: Well, that's what the Custos class is for.

[-Norbert-]

While I don't have the full fluff in my head, I doubt that any of the frigates were made to battle Gefs or other criminals as such.

Remember that the Morena McDuff is a unique ship. For the most part the Gef have just converted freighters and fighters, something that Custos and Sanctus are more than capable of handling without any frigate support.

[Darius]

Current-gen frigates were designed at a time when the gefs were still marauding around the core planets. They were meant for system security rather than kuiper belt hunting.

[GhylTarvoke]

I'm consistently getting the "tanks fly in circles" bug during "Eyes in the Storm". (On my most recent attempt, seven tanks failed to deploy.) So if someone wants me to test something, I'm ready.

[Axem]

Can you take a video of it happening from mission start? I may have some debug things for you later.

[GhylTarvoke]

This bug is infuriating. I'll get back to you when (if) I've reproduced it on camera.

[Neptune]

I did a quick search and found a few bits and pieces of discussion scattered here and there, but nothing really solid, I believe.

I went searching through the VPs the other day...and I found this:

Code: [Select]

#Mission Info

$Version: 0.10
$Name:  XSTR("COLD STEELE", -1)
$Author: Joshua Nelson/Seth Dickinson
$Created: 10/03/15 at 19:44:03
$Modified: 09/24/16 at 23:07:41
$Notes:
This is a FRED2_OPEN created mission.
$End Notes:

$Mission Desc:
 XSTR("Command the Atreus.
", -1)
$end_multi_text

Now, Steele is my favourite character, so I was really excited to see this. I booted up the mission and gave it a go - and it was understandably incomplete, though there was some really cool features.

A few questions:

-There's an option when messing with the beam controls to turn everything in the target box into red wireframes. How is this done?
-What exactly is the ISN BACKBREAKER ability supposed to do? I don't believe it does anything but say "Hey we're using backbreaker" and add a bunch of Heat, at least in the version i've got.
-Is the Atreus's anti-fighter doctrine actually dousing the enemy in a Steele Rehn of trebuchets?

Most importantly, is it ever going to be released?


On a side note, when firing the BFBlue, it says "WINTER KING Pattern 2." How does this work from a Lore POV? In the table entry for the HBlue, it mentions "This advanced beam weapon uses metric tons of slurry coolant and consumes the full power output of a dedicated meson reactor", implying that (the main beam is) somewhat standalone, but the entry for the Erebus mentions "[Its] heart is an integrated power system fed by redundant meson reactors. Her overengineered grid can safely surge combat systems ranging from sensors to main beam weapons by orders of magnitude. Slurry heat sinks and generous thermal tolerances permit tactical overloads in emergency situations."

There isn't really much of a downside to spamming the overload in mission apart from generating a bit of heat - it's not really an 'emergency situation' - which leads me to wonder: is the 'Pattern 2' something inherent to all Erebus class destroyers, or is it something that Steele has requested as a modification/a result of him pushing the boundaries again? Or is it just one of those times where you have to nod and go "Yup, we're doing it because it's cool to fire an even bigger beam"?