Forums » Suggestions

combat development suggestion

Mar 09, 2010 rkerst link
I would like to suggest a Combat Development mission with a dial-an-opponent feature.

The idea is that a player may want to work against a specific type of bot or NPC opponent. If NPC, the player may want to specify the opponent's setup. In either case, the player may want to specify the number of opponents faced.

For example, I may want to practice some energy-on-energy combat in a light ship. So I dial up an opponent that flies vult with neuts, and I fly the same. If I want a sterner test, I ask for two or three of them.

Or, I may want to find out what is the best distance to fight against AGT. So I dial up a hog opponent with AGT mounted.

And on and on. I might want to work with flares, or dodge gems and swarms. Or see how many proms I can fight at once with a valk. Or find out how many rockets it takes to kill an XC. The possibilities are endless.

If the flexibility is there to do it, the player might also dial up AI parameters of the opponent. Passive vs. aggressive. More or less roll, more or less strafe, etc. I don't know enough about VO AI to be real specific on this aspect.

To be sure, VO already has a number of good missions where players fight AI opponents. My interest is in a greater degree of player selectability.

For me personally, it wouldn't be a big deal if there are significant monetary or xp awards for kills. Ditto whether the opponent drops anything. My personal interest is in testing my skill (such as it is) against a variety of opponents of my choosing, to work on specific aspects of combat.

Thanks for listening.
Mar 09, 2010 Alloh link
This could be done in a limited way via PCC mission.

It could be a Hired Combat Training, and charge some credits instead of paying. Like you have to pay for what you destroy...
Mar 09, 2010 Snax_28 link
Ideally, it's a good idea. Realistically though, fighting NPC's will ultimately only teach you how to fight NPC's. Fighting a Sunny/AGT SCP NPC, for instance, will teach you very little about fighting a real person flying that same loadout.

That reason alone makes me think this would be best left until more realistic/variable AI is implemented. Either that or pare it down to a set list of currently configured and implemented NPC's. Then at least the experience gained will be somewhat useful. As Alloh said, something like that might be obtainable through the PCC editor.