Forums » Suggestions
More "Permanent" Mines? Minefield?
Maybe a silly idea.. but here goes:
A different type of mine with IFF (I'm thinking similar to the conquerable station keys)
Being able to set a mine field that would persist would be useful.
To stop abuse of said mine field, you'd have to:
- Allow targeting of mines
- Make them some what difficult / tedious to deploy individually.. so perhaps a Trident can deploy them only and has 50 mines at a time?
- Have them blow each other up if they are deployed too close (chain reaction)
(idea of DS9 mine field pops to mind..except those replicated... dont do that.)
- Have them work like concussion mines? no so much damage, but knock you around. Could then plan the field to knock target into a cluster of other ones.. etc etc...
This could allow certain area's to be set up as a maze requiring tricky maneuvering.
Just an idea. Begin shooting down this post with the obvious things I overlooked...
/me ducks and waits
A different type of mine with IFF (I'm thinking similar to the conquerable station keys)
Being able to set a mine field that would persist would be useful.
To stop abuse of said mine field, you'd have to:
- Allow targeting of mines
- Make them some what difficult / tedious to deploy individually.. so perhaps a Trident can deploy them only and has 50 mines at a time?
- Have them blow each other up if they are deployed too close (chain reaction)
(idea of DS9 mine field pops to mind..except those replicated... dont do that.)
- Have them work like concussion mines? no so much damage, but knock you around. Could then plan the field to knock target into a cluster of other ones.. etc etc...
This could allow certain area's to be set up as a maze requiring tricky maneuvering.
Just an idea. Begin shooting down this post with the obvious things I overlooked...
/me ducks and waits
This has been posted a million times.
They should persist for a long time, but not forever. Like maybe 28 hours (so they don't have to be replanted at exactly the same time every day).
Trident requirement is simply retarded.
Chain reactions might already work, not sure.
Targetability is a good thing, though it might also be nice to have mines that do not show up on radar and either are not targetable or are only targetable by carefully using "target-in-front", not by cycling targets or by target-in-front-ing random areas. Mines are supposed to be sneaky. But if they appear on radar, they should be easy to target.
Mines with IFF should be expensive to reload and maybe have other drawbacks as well. Mines are normally very simple devices that can blow you up as well as the enemy if you aren't careful.
They should persist for a long time, but not forever. Like maybe 28 hours (so they don't have to be replanted at exactly the same time every day).
Trident requirement is simply retarded.
Chain reactions might already work, not sure.
Targetability is a good thing, though it might also be nice to have mines that do not show up on radar and either are not targetable or are only targetable by carefully using "target-in-front", not by cycling targets or by target-in-front-ing random areas. Mines are supposed to be sneaky. But if they appear on radar, they should be easy to target.
Mines with IFF should be expensive to reload and maybe have other drawbacks as well. Mines are normally very simple devices that can blow you up as well as the enemy if you aren't careful.
I wouldn't give them to Tridents, but now that we have Tridents which can be used as staging platforms, this is needed more than ever. I'd extend the life of a mine to between 1 & 2 hours. 28 is just excessive.
Chain reaction used to be loads of fun with concussion mines. Pile them up, get close enough to set one off or shoot one and sit back, enjoy the ride.
There used to be a way you could target mines. I forget what the bind was though, or if it was disabled. I"d say though that they should be targetable, but that they should have a very limited display on ones radar- say 500 m max or less.
Chain reaction used to be loads of fun with concussion mines. Pile them up, get close enough to set one off or shoot one and sit back, enjoy the ride.
There used to be a way you could target mines. I forget what the bind was though, or if it was disabled. I"d say though that they should be targetable, but that they should have a very limited display on ones radar- say 500 m max or less.
IFF mines aren't out of the realm of reality.. we already have som.... I mean... um, theoretically the technology already exists.
No reason to think in the year 4000 they wouldnt.
hmm.. thinking.... <iff spoofer module......sneaky spy mission to get the device....iff code lasts 24 hours....allows access to stations/bypass turrets and mines... attacking turrets/station voids it>
No reason to think in the year 4000 they wouldnt.
hmm.. thinking.... <iff spoofer module......sneaky spy mission to get the device....iff code lasts 24 hours....allows access to stations/bypass turrets and mines... attacking turrets/station voids it>
I never said IFF mines were unrealistic. They're just lame, the same as launching an ICBM from thousands of miles away is, or having fighter jets fight at distances beyond visual range.
A mine field that you can pass directly through but your enemies cannot is lame.
As a gameplay mechanic, mines work better without IFF. The should even lose the current pilot-immunity that they have within a minute of being deployed, so that a minefield is equally dangerous to everybody.
If you want a massive minefield around a station that your enemies can't pass but you can, design it like a maze so that there is one route through that does not trigger any mines. Disclose that route to your allies. To make it easier to initially construct and memorize, you could mark it out by dropping a line of ore or free guns or something before placing the mines. Once you have it memorized, scoop them up so the enemy can't find them.
It would be okay for some kind of IFF-based determination of whether the mines show up on radar though. Because mines really should be sneakier than they are now, but it would make sense for your allies to at least see where the mines are.
As for targeting them currently Fluffy, you can do it via lua functions. All objects are targetable via lua, even station parts, wormholes, and jump points. It's just an ugly way to work. Target-in-front should be corrected to work automatically on mines, at least within some proximity anyway. Close enough to not hurt their sneakiness, but far enough to let you take advantage of AA for shooting the mines. 700m maybe.
A mine field that you can pass directly through but your enemies cannot is lame.
As a gameplay mechanic, mines work better without IFF. The should even lose the current pilot-immunity that they have within a minute of being deployed, so that a minefield is equally dangerous to everybody.
If you want a massive minefield around a station that your enemies can't pass but you can, design it like a maze so that there is one route through that does not trigger any mines. Disclose that route to your allies. To make it easier to initially construct and memorize, you could mark it out by dropping a line of ore or free guns or something before placing the mines. Once you have it memorized, scoop them up so the enemy can't find them.
It would be okay for some kind of IFF-based determination of whether the mines show up on radar though. Because mines really should be sneakier than they are now, but it would make sense for your allies to at least see where the mines are.
As for targeting them currently Fluffy, you can do it via lua functions. All objects are targetable via lua, even station parts, wormholes, and jump points. It's just an ugly way to work. Target-in-front should be corrected to work automatically on mines, at least within some proximity anyway. Close enough to not hurt their sneakiness, but far enough to let you take advantage of AA for shooting the mines. 700m maybe.
woah wait are you serious rin? what's the function for that so I can build a plugin to target mines. I am having to deal with mines increasingly so targeting them would be super handy.
I haven't actually set up a plugin for targeting mines, but play around with the radar table, particularly radar.SetRadarSelection(). You might have to loop through a bunch of IDs searching for something interesting.
Also try Game.GetObjectAtScreenPos() - I haven't tried it with mines, but theoretically it should let you make a "target in front" that works on mines.
Also try Game.GetObjectAtScreenPos() - I haven't tried it with mines, but theoretically it should let you make a "target in front" that works on mines.
I can see having a device that would allow mines to show on radar. All mines within a given range would show up (say 50% chance since they ARE small). It would force people to move circumspectly when in the presence of a minefield. You'd have to mount the device like a scanner.
VO is based in a universe with advanced enough electronics that some detection of mines should be possible.
VO is based in a universe with advanced enough electronics that some detection of mines should be possible.
okay rin I made this:
Targetmines = function()
radar.SetRadarSelection(Game.GetObjectAtScreenPos(0.5, 0.5))
end
RegisterUserCommand('targetmines', Targetmines)
that will let you select mines and other things, but it doesn't work very will because unlike the normal RadarNextFront command, you have to be super precise in your targeting, any way to expand the range on it?
Also, I assume if I could extract the objectid from the Game.GetObjectAtScreenPos() function we could make a 'target next mine' function, but my lua isn't good enough to figure that one out..
Targetmines = function()
radar.SetRadarSelection(Game.GetObjectAtScreenPos(0.5, 0.5))
end
RegisterUserCommand('targetmines', Targetmines)
that will let you select mines and other things, but it doesn't work very will because unlike the normal RadarNextFront command, you have to be super precise in your targeting, any way to expand the range on it?
Also, I assume if I could extract the objectid from the Game.GetObjectAtScreenPos() function we could make a 'target next mine' function, but my lua isn't good enough to figure that one out..
okay slime answered the latter questions, it seems that without dev intervention proper mine targeting isn't possible. Also mines are named after the player, which seems a little silly.
local nodeid, objectid = Game.GetObjectAtScreenPos(0.5, 0.5)
You could deal with precision by attempting points near the center if dead-center doesn't yield anything.
And yeah, a good clean way to target them is lacking, which is why people keep suggesting it instead of just adding another list to targetless and giving the devs the finger.
You could deal with precision by attempting points near the center if dead-center doesn't yield anything.
And yeah, a good clean way to target them is lacking, which is why people keep suggesting it instead of just adding another list to targetless and giving the devs the finger.
We have to architecturally de-couple mines from the user's presence before we can make them more persistent. Right now they function like any other weapon (missile, rocket, shot, etc).. they're attached to the player, and are removed when the player goes away. Mines were kind of abused at certain points in alpha, so we didn't think this was too terrible of a tradeoff at the time.
But, yes, giving them purely time-based persistence, like the newer cargo, and making them targetable are all good thoughts. I'm sure this will lead to all kinds of other challenges, but that's ok :).
But, yes, giving them purely time-based persistence, like the newer cargo, and making them targetable are all good thoughts. I'm sure this will lead to all kinds of other challenges, but that's ok :).
Inc... I'm certain that I speak for everyone who matters (me) when I say to hell with the challenges, full speed ahead and damn the torpedoes (which kinda suck).