firing frequency of NPC mining laser

[Commander McLane]

While following an NPC-miner I just noticed that the firing frequency of its mining laser is far too high, roughly at the rate of a beam laser.

This has probably always been the case. And now I'm thinking about it, it could even be that NPC lasers generally don't have different firing rates, only different ranges and energy.

Still, it strikes me as wrong. If possible, NPC lasers should have the same visible specs as player lasers, and the firing rate is very visible.

[Eric Walch]

Npc ships have a random heat up, so it is likely that mining lasers have the same delay as other lasers. But, cim added a calculated laser heat for npc in trunk, so I think this should already be the same as the player now.

On the mac you see in the target inspector the random laser heat for npc. In trunk this heat value in the inspector looks much more realistic.

[cim]

There seem to be two separate parameters for laser frequency: weapon_recharge_rate (NPC) and weapon_reload_time (player).

Code: Select all

Weapon    NPC       Player
Pulse     0.33      0.50
Beam      0.25      0.10
Military  0.20      0.10
Mining    0.50      2.50

So, the player's beam weapons fire a fair bit faster, and their pulse weapons fire a fair bit slower.

Unifying the mining laser to 2.50 would not have a significant effect on gameplay. Changing the others probably would, though (having been doing some Jameson vs pirate testing recently, the player's slower pulse laser is also very noticeable in combat)

Beam and military lasers are already more dangerous in trunk than in 1.76 (the old NPC pseudo-overheating algorithm significantly penalised them, especially the military), so unifying them to the player spec would make them extremely deadly indeed, if they were hitting. I suppose it also makes them more likely to overheat quicker if they miss.

[Commander McLane]

I have nothing against leaving the combat lasers as they are.

It just struck me as odd that when cracking asteroids alongside an NPC miner, the NPC had—well, almost continuous fire compared to my 2.5 secs between shots. So, in case of the mining laser the difference is extremely noticeable, probably more so than with the combat lasers. Having said that, the standard miners (in this case it was a Transporter Miner) also have a quite crappy aim. It took the ship more than ten shots to hit a boulder. So, if their fire rate was cut to one shot per 2.5 seconds, at the same time their accuracy would have to be increased, or else miners wouldn't hit anything anymore while watched for a minute or so.

[cim]

Miners tend to have accuracy=8, which in trunk should give them a very precise aim - good enough to hit a relatively large and slow moving target at about 10km, anyway.

[Commander McLane]

Miners tend to have accuracy=8, which in trunk should give them a very precise aim - good enough to hit a relatively large and slow moving target at about 10km, anyway.

In 1.76 an prior it's not the asteroids, but the boulders that are frequently missed.

[cim]

Well, testing in trunk, at extreme range it can sometimes take 2-3 shots to hit the boulder, but often they get it first time. That seems okay, so equalised for mining lasers to 2.5 in r5370.

[cim]

I've been trying out unified laser times over the last few days. It doesn't seem to make that much difference:
- in a well-equipped ship, you have a military laser. Ships without that, it doesn't matter that they fire faster. Ships with one generally can't hit you reliably at 20km, unless they have accuracy set high in shipdata, so firing twice as fast doesn't make them hit twice as much.
- in a Jameson Cobra, it doesn't make much difference for the opposite reason: anything that can kill you with a faster beam laser could probably kill you anyway. In several fights, I've died quite often, but to the usual 1.76 causes of "my opponent had a missile but no ECM" and "outnumbered five to one with no injectors and one pulse laser" rather than specifically because of the faster beam lasers.

It would have advantages too, if the NPC and player laser specification was unified, and it's quite nice to be able to see a real difference between an NPC pulse laser and NPC beam laser when they're shooting at you. Before they basically looked the same unless you were paying a lot of attention to the 0.08 second difference in cycle time...

Conversely, while the balance for routine flight is not significantly changed, it could have an effect on OXPs.
But: NPC beam weapons overheat considerably slower in 1.77, the energy bomb is no longer guaranteed to be available, and there have been other combat AI changes too, so combat-intensive OXPs might need to look at their balance in 1.77 anyway, and so it might make sense to do this now.

Any opinions, or should I just push this experimentally to trunk so you can try it out more easily?

[Commander McLane]

Any opinions, or should I just push this experimentally to trunk so you can try it out more easily?

I'd say, do it.

[Cody]

Any opinions, or should I just push this experimentally to trunk so you can try it out more easily?

I'd say, do it.

<nods>

[Switeck]

Go for it. As for balance, most OXPs didn't specify accuracy, so they're probably still straight from the Stormtrooper Academy for accuracy anyway.

[Cody]

An early impression (r5390): I seem to be taking more hits, more rapidly. Rather good fun... but definitely a little tougher, I reckon.

[Tricky]

Been following miners around and they now shoot more slowly. Not been in combat yet as I have been testing my OXP.

[CommonSenseOTB]

I like the idea of unified laser firing rates since this will make npc equipped lasers from my customlasers oxp easier to implement. Provided the npcs laser fire rates are made to be the same as the players laser fire rates and not vice-versa as I use the beam lasers 0.1 fire rate to simulate weapons with higher fire rate but shorter range. As long as the ability of multiple npcs to inflict alot of damage in a short time with beam lasers does not destabilize the core game then, please do. And if the npc pulse lasers fire at 0.5 like the players pulse laser then this might rebalance the other way as well. Kudos for attempting this cim, but I think alot of playtesting is in order to insure balance in the core game. I've been hesitating to update to the latest trunk until I'm ready to use some of the latest features, so I haven't tested this latest trunk, but I thought I'd throw 2 cents in from my perspective.

[cim]

An early impression (r5390): I seem to be taking more hits, more rapidly. Rather good fun... but definitely a little tougher, I reckon.

Certainly in terms of damage per second, the NPC beam laser is now 2.5 times more powerful (and the military 2.0 times as powerful). In terms of damage per minute, it's no more powerful than it was before, of course. Still, definitely a bit more scary when they're hammering your shields away in seconds.

If they're getting a good firing lock on you on their initial attack run, or when their laser has had some chance to cool, you're going to take a lot of hits quickly. Possibly I need to make the circle in which they think they're on target a little wider, so that they waste a few more shots - or a lot more, if your evasive action is good - on near misses.

I think alot of playtesting is in order to insure balance in the core game

That goes for all of the changes to combat between 1.76 and 1.77/8, too. The problem is finding genuine Jamesons to test with. I can test with an unequipped ship, but I can't test with the (lack of!) piloting skill I had a year ago...