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Do people really have fun with this game trading with absolutley no risk? It bores me after an hour, max... how the hell can you do it for years on end?
Or are you going to quit the game after you make 100mil credits?
All these arguments: "People who don't want to fight shouldn't have to." What the hell else can they DO? If you tell me trading in Vendetta is fun I'm going to back away slowly, because you are clearly insane. Woohoo, I got another 1mil [insert FAKE MONEY UNIT] here. Do you really get a sense of accomplishment from going from point A to point B with zero chance of failing that transit? That's like hopping in the car and driving from your house to the food store.
Starfisher docks at Wegmans.
Starfisher purchases 10cu of Foodstuffs.
Starfisher undocks.
Starfisher docks at house. Sells 10cu of foodstuffs to starving roomates.
Repeat.
Do you really think that will keep people entertained for YEARS? Hell, or even the six monthes needed to get to the content patch? I highly doubt it.
Or are you going to quit the game after you make 100mil credits?
All these arguments: "People who don't want to fight shouldn't have to." What the hell else can they DO? If you tell me trading in Vendetta is fun I'm going to back away slowly, because you are clearly insane. Woohoo, I got another 1mil [insert FAKE MONEY UNIT] here. Do you really get a sense of accomplishment from going from point A to point B with zero chance of failing that transit? That's like hopping in the car and driving from your house to the food store.
Starfisher docks at Wegmans.
Starfisher purchases 10cu of Foodstuffs.
Starfisher undocks.
Starfisher docks at house. Sells 10cu of foodstuffs to starving roomates.
Repeat.
Do you really think that will keep people entertained for YEARS? Hell, or even the six monthes needed to get to the content patch? I highly doubt it.
what the hell is wegmans?
Spellcast: Wegman's is a grocery store. A really good one, actually... I rather miss them. They're in western NY, though I imagine they're in more places than that. Unfortunately, they're not in the Capital District... we've got Hannaford's here, and it's a poor imitation.
*cough* Back on topic *cough*
I had my first PvP combat a week or so ago (with one early exception). I jumped into a system... a group of pirates were camping a wormhole. They fired a swarm off at me... I made a half-@$$ed attempt at dodging them. It was really pathetic, actually... five explosions later, I was watching itty bitty parts of my ship expand through space.
I bought my ship back, proclaimed my need for revenge, and headec back to the sector. The next group of swarm's, I nearly dodged... they just clipped me. Same with the next... each time, I learned to dodge them just a little bit better. using the same tactics I use for pretty much any modern air combat sim. Figure out what direction the missiles are coming from, time it right, and turn 90 degrees abeam of their track, then turbo. Once you get the hang of it, you can change the timing and angle a bit as necessary.
The problem that I see is this: the fight ends up being turbo, launch, turbo, turn, repeat. Once you're wounded bad enough, you continue turboing and leave the sector. You get blown up if you misjudge a swarm of missiles badly enough to take them in the face, or there's a group of enemies with good enough location & timing to nail you as you're trying to run.
Now that I think of it, there's a second problem... these missiles keep coming back, even if you've successfully dodged them. They don't seem to break lock.
Now, here's the good stuff :o)... how would I fix it?
I'd change the missiles to more of an air combat model. Fast missiles that retain some/most of their agility, but don't have this 360 degree lock/view. Allow the missiles to be able to catch up to someone who's turboing in a straight line. Drop the burn time/range of the missile down, so an agressor has to time it correctly to hit a target who's attempting to turbo his way out. Cut that agility down, so that if someone's twisting around in a typical dogfight, they're going to have to work to dodge that missile. Remove the majority of that "360 degree lock", so that once the target passes out of view of the missile (by overshooting, out maneuvering, etc.), the missile loses lock, and goes ballistic.
The desired result:
In a long range fight, you now have a way to "catch up to" targets that are turboing away, as long as the missile will have time to catch them before it burns out. Escaping them becomes a matter of either timing your turbo early enough to outrange the missile, or slowing and outmaneuvering it (allowing the attacker to close in).
In a short range fight: The increased speed allows the missile to close on the target, preventing the target from just turboing away. The decreased agility means the target has a chance to dodge it. The short burn time and lock limitations prevent the missiles from circling in a spamfest.
Anybody see any holes in this theory?
*cough* Back on topic *cough*
I had my first PvP combat a week or so ago (with one early exception). I jumped into a system... a group of pirates were camping a wormhole. They fired a swarm off at me... I made a half-@$$ed attempt at dodging them. It was really pathetic, actually... five explosions later, I was watching itty bitty parts of my ship expand through space.
I bought my ship back, proclaimed my need for revenge, and headec back to the sector. The next group of swarm's, I nearly dodged... they just clipped me. Same with the next... each time, I learned to dodge them just a little bit better. using the same tactics I use for pretty much any modern air combat sim. Figure out what direction the missiles are coming from, time it right, and turn 90 degrees abeam of their track, then turbo. Once you get the hang of it, you can change the timing and angle a bit as necessary.
The problem that I see is this: the fight ends up being turbo, launch, turbo, turn, repeat. Once you're wounded bad enough, you continue turboing and leave the sector. You get blown up if you misjudge a swarm of missiles badly enough to take them in the face, or there's a group of enemies with good enough location & timing to nail you as you're trying to run.
Now that I think of it, there's a second problem... these missiles keep coming back, even if you've successfully dodged them. They don't seem to break lock.
Now, here's the good stuff :o)... how would I fix it?
I'd change the missiles to more of an air combat model. Fast missiles that retain some/most of their agility, but don't have this 360 degree lock/view. Allow the missiles to be able to catch up to someone who's turboing in a straight line. Drop the burn time/range of the missile down, so an agressor has to time it correctly to hit a target who's attempting to turbo his way out. Cut that agility down, so that if someone's twisting around in a typical dogfight, they're going to have to work to dodge that missile. Remove the majority of that "360 degree lock", so that once the target passes out of view of the missile (by overshooting, out maneuvering, etc.), the missile loses lock, and goes ballistic.
The desired result:
In a long range fight, you now have a way to "catch up to" targets that are turboing away, as long as the missile will have time to catch them before it burns out. Escaping them becomes a matter of either timing your turbo early enough to outrange the missile, or slowing and outmaneuvering it (allowing the attacker to close in).
In a short range fight: The increased speed allows the missile to close on the target, preventing the target from just turboing away. The decreased agility means the target has a chance to dodge it. The short burn time and lock limitations prevent the missiles from circling in a spamfest.
Anybody see any holes in this theory?
Interesting.
One of the main problems with homing missles is that for botting they have to hit pretty much 75% of the time or so to be worthwhile. Otherwise why use them other than to level heavy weapons? You just run out too quickly.
For PvP however, with no method to dodge them other than the above posted, they quickly become tiresome. It's going to be tricky to reconcile the two situations.
One of the main problems with homing missles is that for botting they have to hit pretty much 75% of the time or so to be worthwhile. Otherwise why use them other than to level heavy weapons? You just run out too quickly.
For PvP however, with no method to dodge them other than the above posted, they quickly become tiresome. It's going to be tricky to reconcile the two situations.
magus you will always be able to waltz in on people that do pirate or attempt to pirate outside of the missionboundary. I just state that we should not encourage this, in the sake of general gameplay and fun for all.
My point was that as soon as you had a group of people, either guild or group, you should be able to take a special mission called piratemission in which you choose your character/role "pirate, piratehunter, trader". And then you will have consensual combat. And considering this is a roleplaying game and not an FPS you expect the story to drive you on together with the mission, which will not mean that some actions within game cant have an influence on the development of the game. But if you go out from the base that missions should not be part of this game then I suggest that you chose an FPS game instead.
I also never stated that I liked trading. I stated that I dont mind getting pirated if I can afford to loose a ship or to loose the time. But if I cant afford it and possibly even be unable to play more then a couple hours a day (2-3), then my fun will be broken by this act. And when you are paying to have fun, this is considered a breakingpoint in customers retention. Not to mention that normally the majority of the userbase in a successfull MMORPG will be people that can play around this amount "mmorpg consumer studies". So you need to keep these happy, if you only have people that play 12/24+ then expect to go out of business soon or have a superproduct"actuality depending on total userbase". Not to mention that if you incorperate the missionsystem you could reward all in stead of only the pirate as it is now. Since a trader has no chance in hell to fend off a decent pirate(note: fending off != running).
Like I stated if people successfully pirate me in the same ship or only slightly different from mine, then I dont mind that much, since they then deserve their cargo. But using a vulture to take down a centaur is like taking candy from a baby. And ships like that(vulture) should only be used for ships that can afford a group of escorts and still make a great profit. Where in reality you are not using a vulture to kill the tradeship but to counter the escorts who will be in vulture typed ships also. And that was the only reason why I proposed a quick fix to establish this, but I am pretty sure that the devs would have found a better solution.
If you havent noticed, it have always been the newbies and the fools that flew a centaur for trading. Everybody else always took either an atlas(or even a vult) or tried obtaining the marauder. And this only because no mather what tradeship you used you had no chance to counter the other ship. Which in a skill based game should not be the case.
And like I said, I agree that the homers are unbalanced at the moment, and that they require an adjustment. I however dont agree that they should be nerfed to the point they were before. I do however think that their effect on big ships should be minimal(so less damage then base, example 0.6 * base) while on small ships their effect should be higher(base). And I also dont agree that a centaur should just be a sitting duck or have to launch spamming type missiles just to have a small chance to survive.
My point was that as soon as you had a group of people, either guild or group, you should be able to take a special mission called piratemission in which you choose your character/role "pirate, piratehunter, trader". And then you will have consensual combat. And considering this is a roleplaying game and not an FPS you expect the story to drive you on together with the mission, which will not mean that some actions within game cant have an influence on the development of the game. But if you go out from the base that missions should not be part of this game then I suggest that you chose an FPS game instead.
I also never stated that I liked trading. I stated that I dont mind getting pirated if I can afford to loose a ship or to loose the time. But if I cant afford it and possibly even be unable to play more then a couple hours a day (2-3), then my fun will be broken by this act. And when you are paying to have fun, this is considered a breakingpoint in customers retention. Not to mention that normally the majority of the userbase in a successfull MMORPG will be people that can play around this amount "mmorpg consumer studies". So you need to keep these happy, if you only have people that play 12/24+ then expect to go out of business soon or have a superproduct"actuality depending on total userbase". Not to mention that if you incorperate the missionsystem you could reward all in stead of only the pirate as it is now. Since a trader has no chance in hell to fend off a decent pirate(note: fending off != running).
Like I stated if people successfully pirate me in the same ship or only slightly different from mine, then I dont mind that much, since they then deserve their cargo. But using a vulture to take down a centaur is like taking candy from a baby. And ships like that(vulture) should only be used for ships that can afford a group of escorts and still make a great profit. Where in reality you are not using a vulture to kill the tradeship but to counter the escorts who will be in vulture typed ships also. And that was the only reason why I proposed a quick fix to establish this, but I am pretty sure that the devs would have found a better solution.
If you havent noticed, it have always been the newbies and the fools that flew a centaur for trading. Everybody else always took either an atlas(or even a vult) or tried obtaining the marauder. And this only because no mather what tradeship you used you had no chance to counter the other ship. Which in a skill based game should not be the case.
And like I said, I agree that the homers are unbalanced at the moment, and that they require an adjustment. I however dont agree that they should be nerfed to the point they were before. I do however think that their effect on big ships should be minimal(so less damage then base, example 0.6 * base) while on small ships their effect should be higher(base). And I also dont agree that a centaur should just be a sitting duck or have to launch spamming type missiles just to have a small chance to survive.
Briefly on topic:
theluckyone,
I like your missile idea a lot. Missiles could be very accurate within thier zone of vision but you could still 'lose' them with some effort. It sounds like a pretty good compromise to me.
Off topic land, lock soon?:
Rene,
I only play a few hours a week and I have the opposite (nearly) opinion of you on missions. I like to spend my few hours of play time doing what I want when I want, not what the mission computer says I should be doing.
I don't RP a trader or a pirate hunter, I RP Hoax who has many facets.
There is another breaking point for customers and that's boredom. Your way appears boring to me and I imagine to others like me. Don't keep suggesting that they will lose all there customers unless they do it your way. There are all kinds of people who like all kinds of game play and all kinds of ways to lose and keep customers. I don't tell you to go play a pure RPG game because you don't like the FPS part of Vendetta, do me the same courtesy please. Magus didn't say missions have no part in Vendetta he just thinks we should be able to RP outside of them as well.
I think it's clear that Vendetta is not pure RPG. We aren't roleing dice to see who wins fights. We have a first person view and our ships can shoot. That is by definition a FPS is it not?
Non-consensual PvP ... where did this term even come from? You give your consent by playing a game that is in part based on PvP.
ONE good trade run in the much maligned Centaur can easily pay for a NEW Centaur or MORE. Is losing a ship now and then such a big a deal that you need to radically alter the games PvP? It doesn't even take that long to get a Centaur from scratch with a brand new character. Don't like that it can't defend itself then fly a ship with less cargo capacity or do some missions to get a maud.
To me a good RP'ing environment is one that is filled with natural consequences. For instance, kill a Serco and the Serco defense bots come after you. As opposed to: Kill a Serco, oh you can't you didn't take the 'I hate Serco' mission and find a Serco who took the 'You can kill me' mission.
theluckyone,
I like your missile idea a lot. Missiles could be very accurate within thier zone of vision but you could still 'lose' them with some effort. It sounds like a pretty good compromise to me.
Off topic land, lock soon?:
Rene,
I only play a few hours a week and I have the opposite (nearly) opinion of you on missions. I like to spend my few hours of play time doing what I want when I want, not what the mission computer says I should be doing.
I don't RP a trader or a pirate hunter, I RP Hoax who has many facets.
There is another breaking point for customers and that's boredom. Your way appears boring to me and I imagine to others like me. Don't keep suggesting that they will lose all there customers unless they do it your way. There are all kinds of people who like all kinds of game play and all kinds of ways to lose and keep customers. I don't tell you to go play a pure RPG game because you don't like the FPS part of Vendetta, do me the same courtesy please. Magus didn't say missions have no part in Vendetta he just thinks we should be able to RP outside of them as well.
I think it's clear that Vendetta is not pure RPG. We aren't roleing dice to see who wins fights. We have a first person view and our ships can shoot. That is by definition a FPS is it not?
Non-consensual PvP ... where did this term even come from? You give your consent by playing a game that is in part based on PvP.
ONE good trade run in the much maligned Centaur can easily pay for a NEW Centaur or MORE. Is losing a ship now and then such a big a deal that you need to radically alter the games PvP? It doesn't even take that long to get a Centaur from scratch with a brand new character. Don't like that it can't defend itself then fly a ship with less cargo capacity or do some missions to get a maud.
To me a good RP'ing environment is one that is filled with natural consequences. For instance, kill a Serco and the Serco defense bots come after you. As opposed to: Kill a Serco, oh you can't you didn't take the 'I hate Serco' mission and find a Serco who took the 'You can kill me' mission.
^ I agree with this guy ^
I don't like doing missions. The way I see it, doing missions is my ingame job to pay the bills and advance along the corporate ladder (or military heirarchy or religious organization) while my, not-on-a-mission ingame time is spent doing community service (protecting traders,) and advancing my private interests (trading on the side to get money, exploring the universe, looking for bugs, etc.)
Now, if you want to make a centaur less of a flying coffin, it makes more sense to give it weapons that allow it to have a fighting chance rather than reorganizing the entire game's combat system to compensate for one poorly designed ship.
I don't like doing missions. The way I see it, doing missions is my ingame job to pay the bills and advance along the corporate ladder (or military heirarchy or religious organization) while my, not-on-a-mission ingame time is spent doing community service (protecting traders,) and advancing my private interests (trading on the side to get money, exploring the universe, looking for bugs, etc.)
Now, if you want to make a centaur less of a flying coffin, it makes more sense to give it weapons that allow it to have a fighting chance rather than reorganizing the entire game's combat system to compensate for one poorly designed ship.
Hoax,
That is not roleplaying, but just wandering about. Roleplaying is exactly following the story that the GM puts before you and react on the changes. And missions are an integral part of it. Roleplaying outside of these missions "aka little stories" is like trying to find excuses for your behaviour. We had a lot of examples of these roleplayers which went out of controll and harmed more people then they amused... "cembandit being one,..."
I never stated that I dont like the fps part. Considering I loved the fighting part. I only didnt like it that you dont have a freaking chance to escape in any tradeship from a moderate pirate with the exception of the marauder. What I propose is to keep your pirating part but not in a vulture... but rather in the same or somewhat more agile or stronger ship then the trader. Example: wraith - wraith or wraith - hornet. Atlas - wraith, atlas - warthog, atlas - atlas. Centaur - ragnarok, centaur - hornet. centaur - centaur. At least we would get some fun fights again in stead of the muahahaha fear my ship boom boom dead, and game over... Or the shoot - run - shoot - run tactic that have always been predominant as a piratingtactic and against which anything besides a marauder has trouble protecting itself "although a wraith manages this also".
And only make it feasable to use a vulturetype to pirate if you are targetting a convoy "so with escorts flying the same type of ships". But convoys should only start when the frig or a bigger freighter gets created with around 60 - 80 of the old cargospaces, so you can pay your escorts more easilly from the profit. (like get 4 escorts and still be able to make more profit then with 2 runs with a centaur)
Anyway, I never stated that you should not be ABLE to go and pirate people, but at least make it like not the trend to be considered 1337. Since otherwise as soon as the game will open up to the bigger crowd, we will see a lot of 1337 speak from the previous counterstrike boys, and we will hear a lot more complaints then we had in the space quake era.
I have never given my consent for pvp to act as a victim for anybody else. I however gave my consent to have fun. And I can only have fun when fighting a person or loosing a couple ships will not mather to my cashbudget, meaning that ill have a decent savings on which I can rely in dear necessity or from which I can extract without worry from. And that is the reason why it used to not mather if you got killed or not. You always had some reserve..., at least that was in my case.
well that one good traderun in a centaur will cost me another 20 minutes which if there are to many pirates will be impossible to pull off safely "this happened also within the space quake era". Not to mention the standing and possibly any other consequences that this may have in game and for which ill have to quest and do missions for another 2 hours "like 1 day worth of play wasted" since I expect to see a lot more consequences to actions and more storydriven elements, considering that is what an RPG is revolving around. Not the rolling the dice part since that just gives you the winner from the gamble that roll the dice was.
And once again, I never stated that you cant kill a serco if it pleases you, I only stated that doing so should be disencouraged and tried to be more directed towards the missions. Since I expect the missions to announce the places of battlement and anyone going in that piece of space will suffer from the consequences. But getting killed just because some idiot thinks that it would be fun to consider a part of the universe to be warterritory is considered to be non fun for me. As long as the the missionpc or a dev doesnt state anything about warterritory shift then I will only consider the itani - serco border to have a stressed peace with some militaristic intrusions from both sides consider this is what the background states. But anything else is considered for me as wishfull thinking or exagerated fantasm or excuses hunt.
But nothing needs to change, considering I cant play the game anyway. And if people enjoy the game as it is then who am I to say otherwise. And even if I could play, it should only change if the devs shared the same opinion, considering im just postulating an idea and the possible consequence of not doing what I propose. Not all consequences, but only the ones I thought off and on which im sure that is not considered to be a complete list.
cheers
That is not roleplaying, but just wandering about. Roleplaying is exactly following the story that the GM puts before you and react on the changes. And missions are an integral part of it. Roleplaying outside of these missions "aka little stories" is like trying to find excuses for your behaviour. We had a lot of examples of these roleplayers which went out of controll and harmed more people then they amused... "cembandit being one,..."
I never stated that I dont like the fps part. Considering I loved the fighting part. I only didnt like it that you dont have a freaking chance to escape in any tradeship from a moderate pirate with the exception of the marauder. What I propose is to keep your pirating part but not in a vulture... but rather in the same or somewhat more agile or stronger ship then the trader. Example: wraith - wraith or wraith - hornet. Atlas - wraith, atlas - warthog, atlas - atlas. Centaur - ragnarok, centaur - hornet. centaur - centaur. At least we would get some fun fights again in stead of the muahahaha fear my ship boom boom dead, and game over... Or the shoot - run - shoot - run tactic that have always been predominant as a piratingtactic and against which anything besides a marauder has trouble protecting itself "although a wraith manages this also".
And only make it feasable to use a vulturetype to pirate if you are targetting a convoy "so with escorts flying the same type of ships". But convoys should only start when the frig or a bigger freighter gets created with around 60 - 80 of the old cargospaces, so you can pay your escorts more easilly from the profit. (like get 4 escorts and still be able to make more profit then with 2 runs with a centaur)
Anyway, I never stated that you should not be ABLE to go and pirate people, but at least make it like not the trend to be considered 1337. Since otherwise as soon as the game will open up to the bigger crowd, we will see a lot of 1337 speak from the previous counterstrike boys, and we will hear a lot more complaints then we had in the space quake era.
I have never given my consent for pvp to act as a victim for anybody else. I however gave my consent to have fun. And I can only have fun when fighting a person or loosing a couple ships will not mather to my cashbudget, meaning that ill have a decent savings on which I can rely in dear necessity or from which I can extract without worry from. And that is the reason why it used to not mather if you got killed or not. You always had some reserve..., at least that was in my case.
well that one good traderun in a centaur will cost me another 20 minutes which if there are to many pirates will be impossible to pull off safely "this happened also within the space quake era". Not to mention the standing and possibly any other consequences that this may have in game and for which ill have to quest and do missions for another 2 hours "like 1 day worth of play wasted" since I expect to see a lot more consequences to actions and more storydriven elements, considering that is what an RPG is revolving around. Not the rolling the dice part since that just gives you the winner from the gamble that roll the dice was.
And once again, I never stated that you cant kill a serco if it pleases you, I only stated that doing so should be disencouraged and tried to be more directed towards the missions. Since I expect the missions to announce the places of battlement and anyone going in that piece of space will suffer from the consequences. But getting killed just because some idiot thinks that it would be fun to consider a part of the universe to be warterritory is considered to be non fun for me. As long as the the missionpc or a dev doesnt state anything about warterritory shift then I will only consider the itani - serco border to have a stressed peace with some militaristic intrusions from both sides consider this is what the background states. But anything else is considered for me as wishfull thinking or exagerated fantasm or excuses hunt.
But nothing needs to change, considering I cant play the game anyway. And if people enjoy the game as it is then who am I to say otherwise. And even if I could play, it should only change if the devs shared the same opinion, considering im just postulating an idea and the possible consequence of not doing what I propose. Not all consequences, but only the ones I thought off and on which im sure that is not considered to be a complete list.
cheers
I already replied to that.
Now, if you want to make a centaur less of a flying coffin, it makes more sense to give it weapons that allow it to have a fighting chance rather than reorganizing the entire game's combat system to compensate for one poorly designed ship.
Now, if you want to make a centaur less of a flying coffin, it makes more sense to give it weapons that allow it to have a fighting chance rather than reorganizing the entire game's combat system to compensate for one poorly designed ship.
Here's a couple other thoughts, concerning missile defense. Some of 'em require the missile model described in my earlier post.
1. Create a chaff/flare/jamming system. Each would attempt to break the lock that a missile had, depending on the method that each missile used to lock on to a target (radar, thermal, visual, etc) (if desired). Each method could have different probabilities of success and limitations. E.g., the jamming system could have a lower chance of succeeding, but would not have any physical requirements, whereas a chaff or flare would have a better chance, but would be limited by the amount that could be carried by the target.
2. Provide a system similiar to the "Phalanx" system carried by large naval ships... a stream of high velocity projectiles are fired towards the missile, in order to down it. Balls of some plasma material or particles could be fired, also... the idea being that the weapon is rather short range, and physically destroys the missile. The projectiles would be limited by ammo, particles or plasma possibly limited by energy.
3. An EMP device that destroys all missiles within a given (short) range. This might have a limited number of uses, require charging, be limited to a specific angle, or a combination of these (or more).
It'd be interesting if we could set up a turret system... allow multiple weapons on a given ship, each having different fields of fire/view. Using the above phalanx system as an example, a heavy freighter/transport could mount a phalanx on a rear facing turrent, allowing it to be either AI or player controlled. This would give a fleeing transport a chance to destroy any missiles behind it.
1. Create a chaff/flare/jamming system. Each would attempt to break the lock that a missile had, depending on the method that each missile used to lock on to a target (radar, thermal, visual, etc) (if desired). Each method could have different probabilities of success and limitations. E.g., the jamming system could have a lower chance of succeeding, but would not have any physical requirements, whereas a chaff or flare would have a better chance, but would be limited by the amount that could be carried by the target.
2. Provide a system similiar to the "Phalanx" system carried by large naval ships... a stream of high velocity projectiles are fired towards the missile, in order to down it. Balls of some plasma material or particles could be fired, also... the idea being that the weapon is rather short range, and physically destroys the missile. The projectiles would be limited by ammo, particles or plasma possibly limited by energy.
3. An EMP device that destroys all missiles within a given (short) range. This might have a limited number of uses, require charging, be limited to a specific angle, or a combination of these (or more).
It'd be interesting if we could set up a turret system... allow multiple weapons on a given ship, each having different fields of fire/view. Using the above phalanx system as an example, a heavy freighter/transport could mount a phalanx on a rear facing turrent, allowing it to be either AI or player controlled. This would give a fleeing transport a chance to destroy any missiles behind it.
I would support a system which required people to get locks before they fired weapons. Make a 3-second lock-on time during which the target must stay within a special circle in the middle of the HUD. Once one missile is fired, the lock must be re-established for the next missile. Different missile types can have different lock times and differently-sized "fields of visibility".
Bump for katarn..