Forums » Suggestions
Better border skirmish npc ship setups!
A few criticisms of the current border skirmish npc weapons setup system that have been bubbling in my head for ages:
1) SkyProms: Who was the genius that put neutrons and a gatling turret on the sky proms? The energy use is way too high and they just end up spamming a single neutron ports. Besides, neutrons and GTs are on two different spectrums of ship setups... if one planned on aiming with neutrons, why would they bother to put a GT on their ship under the same port?
Now... I understand the fear of giving an overpowered setup to an NPC sky prom, but there are many more alternatives to a flare-GT setup. Perhaps you can throw popcorn on it for kicks, or you could give it a gauss/plasma setup... however, if I would suggest a well balances, role-worthy setup for an NPC BS Sky Prom I would probably say Screamers and G3... Yes, I know, screamers do a shitload of damage... but here are a few reasons why they would be less annoying than all the npcs with iceflares:
a) they use a significant amount of energy, this will ensure that the screamer will not be spammed...
b) it is much more fun, relatively, to get hit by one, high damage flare than it is to get spammed in the face with ice flares by light-as-fuck valks
c) again, the energy consumption will allow people to counter attack if the prom misses the first couple flares
d) screamers are a bit easier to dodge because of a small prox fuse, this will balance with the high-precision aiming of npcs
2) WTDs: I don't know who complained about the sunflares... but they obviously never attacked a heavily defended convoy. Drop the iceflares, you're only every going to see WTD npcs in Medium to Large skirmishes, anyways...
3) the IDF valks: These ones are specifically annoying to fight... I mean... the lightest fighters in the game with the lightest neutrons and the lightest flares? Normally, valk fights are fun because, if they have flares, you can coax your enemy into missing then you can drive within 50m and have an epic fight... or if they've got energy you can drive into 50m and have an even more epic fight. Well, npcs are a bit better at aiming flares and aren't so mindful of ammo... their high acceleration also means that, unlike usual npc fights, they usually decide the range - usually a boring 300m... not to say that they aren't easy to take down, they're just boring.
Give them a nice cocktail of energy or go all out on the heavy weapons. For these guys I might specifically suggest:
1xRaven 1xN2 and 1xPositron
or
2xG3 1xStarflare
Edit: just a little tidbit on the AI (not the main point of this thread but I'd just like to throw this out there, again, anyways):
-Vulture respawn time should be 5 seconds, WTD respawn time should be 10 seconds, specialty ship respawn time should be 15 seconds
-idle npcs should target the nearest hostile, fighting them one at a time is boring...
1) SkyProms: Who was the genius that put neutrons and a gatling turret on the sky proms? The energy use is way too high and they just end up spamming a single neutron ports. Besides, neutrons and GTs are on two different spectrums of ship setups... if one planned on aiming with neutrons, why would they bother to put a GT on their ship under the same port?
Now... I understand the fear of giving an overpowered setup to an NPC sky prom, but there are many more alternatives to a flare-GT setup. Perhaps you can throw popcorn on it for kicks, or you could give it a gauss/plasma setup... however, if I would suggest a well balances, role-worthy setup for an NPC BS Sky Prom I would probably say Screamers and G3... Yes, I know, screamers do a shitload of damage... but here are a few reasons why they would be less annoying than all the npcs with iceflares:
a) they use a significant amount of energy, this will ensure that the screamer will not be spammed...
b) it is much more fun, relatively, to get hit by one, high damage flare than it is to get spammed in the face with ice flares by light-as-fuck valks
c) again, the energy consumption will allow people to counter attack if the prom misses the first couple flares
d) screamers are a bit easier to dodge because of a small prox fuse, this will balance with the high-precision aiming of npcs
2) WTDs: I don't know who complained about the sunflares... but they obviously never attacked a heavily defended convoy. Drop the iceflares, you're only every going to see WTD npcs in Medium to Large skirmishes, anyways...
3) the IDF valks: These ones are specifically annoying to fight... I mean... the lightest fighters in the game with the lightest neutrons and the lightest flares? Normally, valk fights are fun because, if they have flares, you can coax your enemy into missing then you can drive within 50m and have an epic fight... or if they've got energy you can drive into 50m and have an even more epic fight. Well, npcs are a bit better at aiming flares and aren't so mindful of ammo... their high acceleration also means that, unlike usual npc fights, they usually decide the range - usually a boring 300m... not to say that they aren't easy to take down, they're just boring.
Give them a nice cocktail of energy or go all out on the heavy weapons. For these guys I might specifically suggest:
1xRaven 1xN2 and 1xPositron
or
2xG3 1xStarflare
Edit: just a little tidbit on the AI (not the main point of this thread but I'd just like to throw this out there, again, anyways):
-Vulture respawn time should be 5 seconds, WTD respawn time should be 10 seconds, specialty ship respawn time should be 15 seconds
-idle npcs should target the nearest hostile, fighting them one at a time is boring...