Oolite Bulletins

[*]blows off dust[*]

Tried this out again yesterday in light of recent discussions.
Seemed to work quite well but I realised I'd inherited a restriction that would no longer be necessary.

The player does not have to begin with the weakest laser

Sounds crazy maybe but traditionally there are only 2 combat upgrades and the first of those is already pretty useful, wheras here there are several more.

For example, suppose your ship is too slow to recommend a beam laser (explained up-thread), and you start instead with the weakest pulse laser (of 3 varieties). Under such circumstances there would be at least 5 possible upgrades that would be beneficial (the 2 other pulse lasers and the 3 military lasers).

If however you started with the medium pulse laser then there would still be a minimum of 4 posible upgrades; and in a ship as fast as the mk 3 or as large as a python it could be as many as 7 (beam lasers for mk 3, bolt lasers for python).

If granted a medium pulse laser to begin with then the player could expect to occasionally outgun a single pirate and stand a slightly better chance against a pack of them. Hardly an earth shattering difference but combined with the proposed pulse laser's range advantage over the beam... not entirely insignificant either.

Once I've tested some more and given the code a tidy, if all's well then I'll ready an update.

v 0.4 uploaded.

Changes:

• Cobra 3 no longer has the worst pulse laser - it has the best
• Shuffled around the other lasers to produce flavourful (rather than obviously logical) combinations
• Altered progression path for laser types. e.g. Pulse lasers now improve their cooling rather than their power
• Gecko, Mamba & Sidewinder have all lost approx. one energy bank (now down to the same as the larger Cobra I)

The last change is probably the most contoversial as it isn't strictly laser related. However it does relate strongly to laser combat.
I spared the Krait on account of its larger size.

Still needs plenty of testing, so if you feel inclined then feedback will be welcomed.
Thanks.

Had another rethink (that's why it's only v0.4 folks ...)

I think that the first post does a pretty good job of identifying the problem but unfortunately then goes on to replace rather than to fix it. Range is is tricky customer to tinker with becasue it is so influenced by speed...

So, if the problem is that lasers upgrade too steeply (doubling damage at each step and also doubling range for the last) then isn't the simple answer just to cover the same progression with more steps? That way you'd no longer need to double each time.

Having identified the potential of cyan as a colour that would both be easy to differentiate from the other lasers, then that would allow one more step from pulse to military.

If a further issue is that the player starts with the weakest laser (and being nearly always outnumbered rarely gets to use it successfully) then why not give bigger ships more powerful lasers (and conversely, smaller ships weaker lasers)? Then the typical player starting ship will at least be able to take on some opponents whilst learning (likely painfully) to avoid others.

So, if instead of my imagined 'Bolt' lasers I were to go with the more canonical 'Burst' laser (associated with the Navy Asp Mk II) then there are now three laser upgrades available instead of just two. I can still tweak the ranges but no need to be as drastic as before.

The below chart shows all the in game lasers and how they would look (note spacing between colours in order for each to be clearly recognisable).




For a clearer comparison of the combat progression of each laser upgrade (fading representing increase in weapon size)...




A few things to note:

• A Gecko's beam laser (small ship) would be no more powerful than a Cobra 3's pulse laser (medium ship)
• The typical (medium size) beam laser is slightly weaker in order to accommodate the new 'step' along the progression
• No upgrade doubles either power nor range
• Ranges are now more similar with the miltary laser dropping from 30,000 (off scanner) to a maximum of 20,000 (about 6,000 short of the scanner edge)

No update yet as I want to spend a bit longer thinking about it. However this should represent something much more recognisable when compared to the original model, whilst still providing a clear, uncomplicated progression path.

• EDIT: A little more about the advantages of adding the size category element...
  
  There is the option for slight advantage between opponents instead of the x2 or even x4 advantage presented by the current game e.g.
  • A large pulse laser lies half way between a medium pulse and a medium beam laser
  • A small beam laser is actually slightly inferior to a large pulse laser
  • A medium burst laser is only fractionally more powerful than a large beam laser
  
  Although larger ships have a clear advantage in this regard they are also the slowest of the three groups. So instead of a good strategy for beginners being to run every time then (with a bit of practice) it could become more like this:
  • Vs large ships, RUN
    - they will have more poweful weapons than your pulse laser but you will have the higher speed
  • Vs medium ships, DROP
    - you might be able to win but you might not be able to escape if it starts to go badly
  • Vs small ships, THINK
    - you have the power advantage but sometimes won't be able to escape, if outnumbered then run to thin them out, if you have spare missiles then be ready to use them (they're less likely to have ECM)
  
  I think that's all pretty good

With only one laser being reallocated, here's what the power distribution among ships could look like.

On the left we have the current model (note how common beam lasers are) and on the right the proposed model.
The boxed numbers are the power levels that a cobra 3 would have as it progresssed through the combat laser (pulse --> beam --> burst --> military)




The info was pulled from shipdata.plist and so I made have made a mistake or two but it's at least representative.

In the new model I've given the viper interceptor a burst laser rather than a military one. That leaves the constrictor way out in front (as it probably should be) whilst the pack hunting interceptor still has a better armament than all of the other (non- thargoid) ships.

By comparison, the old model is simple and tidy but also brutal: there simply aren't many options for power distribution. It's either the same, x2 or x4 - in other words an order of difference rather than a spectrum. Although the new model isn't a true spectrum either (after all, each number is a discrete value anyway) the potential difference is much more varied and especially useful as it can be less than x2.

For example, cobra 3 with a pulse laser vs...

Old Model

• Mamba - 100% (no advantage)
• Mamba escort - 50% (significant disadvantage)
• Anaconda - 100%
• Asp mk II - 50%
• Python - 50%

New Model

• Mamba - 150% (significant advantage)
• Mamba escort - 100%
• Anaconda - 75%
• Asp mk II - 66%
• Python - 43%

The differences are less severe with the new model, and by adding the size element it is no longer necessary for some ships to have a beam laser in order to outgun a stock mk3.

Generally speaking, where it's easier (vs small ships) it's significantly easier and yet the model can also present increased difficulty (both vs large ships and less advantage when equipping a beam laser. With greater spread of difficulty however it is easier some of the time rather than all of the time. Should be more fun for the beginner without necessarily being less challenging overall.

Best of all there are superior options. Want a fighter to be better armed? Give it a burst laser and then it's as if it has a beam laser without the size penalty. Some of those freighters a bit too tough? Maybe downgrade them to a pulse laser and they'll still lie halfway between a pulse and a beam when compared with the mk3.

Sow how to make use of such options? I think I'll be keeping the interceptor change. Perhaps the python (but not the blackdog) and maybe boa downgraded to pulse (from 7 down to 4). Maybe that's enough.

A lot less testing required than with earlier versions of this oxp, especially as ranges are much closer to the numbers that the AI typically expects.

The easiest way to make use of this new model (in terms of making combat viable) throughout the game, would probably be to...

Start the player with a beam laser.


The Case Against

• Non canonical: the stock mk 3 came with a pulse laser in elite
• Anti-premise: not starting with the worst or minimum equipment
• Give-away: isn't it better if the player has to earn it?
• Player-centric: why don't the other ships get to start with a beam laser too?

The Case For

• Compatibility of design:
  • Elite had 1 vs 1 combats in 'safe' systems, Oolite rarely so.
  • Still have 2 upgrades (beam to burst, burst to military).
  • There would still be common opponents with more powerful lasers
• Actually useful: best value from a pulse laser is almost certainly to sell it, buy a full cargo and just drop whenever threatened. Neither an obvious strategy nor a fun choice.
• LESS of a short cut: starting with no laser and 500Cr is arguably more of a fast track than starting with a beam and 100Cr (assuming one doesn't sell the laser *).
• Rebalanced: Beam laser is no longer twice as powerful as the pulse laser

* To better balance this, start the beam laser at 400Cr (burst can be at 1,000Cr) and the pulse 150Cr (closer to its true value in the game - it was much more effective in elite)


To be clear, I don't think it necessary that the player start with a beam laser in order for this new model to be viable. Further, I think that starting with a beam laser within the old model would probably be a bad idea. Within the new model however, I think it could be a good idea.

There are at least two good questions to be asked when considering the case against, so I'll try to answer them here:


Isn't it better if the player has to earn it?

On the face of it, yes but then this could apply to everything.

Ignoring the obvious one of starting with the cobra 3 itself, what about the 3 missiles? Some ships can't even equip missiles. Given that many will sell the pulse laser anyway and still play the game, what about the pulse laser itself?

The player should start with the minimum to be playable and fun I think and combat (fun) with a pulse laser isn't currently playable within Oolite IMHO (whereas it was within Elite).


Why don't the other ships get to start with a beam laser too?

This relates to a different issue (player-centricism) and the simple answer would be that most of them do! They don't typically get to advance up to a military laser however so how is this fair? Again, a simple answer: numbers.

While it's true that the player could be rescued by police or hunters it remains far more likely that they won't. With the new model even 2 pulse lasers will out-score a beam laser of the same size, so in that sense advantage doesn't lie with the player.

This may seem rather player-centric but is it really any more player-centric than the current model? When's the last time you faced a cobra that had a military laser (without using an oxp)?... It's already player-centric and this wouldn't change that, it would only change the player's start conditions.


What would be the point of the pulse laser then?

Well, besides equipping some of the non-player traders or fighters, why not pick up a rear facing pulse laser when you get the chance (at only 150Cr). Useless? Well if that's true then just what WAS the point of the pulse laser???

Update/re-write likely over the next few days...

A few significant changes to the tables posted recently...

• No range difference for ship size - mainly because if you're seeing bigger ships further away then it won't be obvious that they're bigger
• Greater damage difference for ship size - this gives greater flexibility in damage potential of opponents as shown below

• Damage options are more common at the low end - where it's most useful: equal to or below the beam laser
• Superior options at higher end too - all 3 size categories can surpass the player's beam without getting too close to the military laser

Likng this very much so far.

Depending on how one allocates the lasers, there is the potential to both make combat significantly harder or significantly easier. More fine tuning is possible with this version too.

So it seems likely that I now have the model determined, I just need to think carefully about individual allocation of lasers. That's easier to change of course so a version 0.5 should be forthcoming very soon.

If the wiki is up to date, the damage for forward NPC lasers today are much higher than their definitions in equipment.plist:
I've looked at the shipdata info for all the usable derelicts I've gathered (to find out all their roles so I could include them in a shipdata-overrides with player role and ride them) and the only one that didn't have the default weapon_energy was the Renegade Viper (that one defined weapon_energy=15).

I put traces in EscortDeck to tell me the equipment status of the equipments in all derelicts I targeted (after they are turned into derelicts ) and it's very rare for them to have ANY equipment damaged, while I, in an iron-ass with naval energy unit, naval grid, shield booster, shield capacitors and shield equalizer get plenty of equipment damage in any fight if I don't keep an eye on my shield levels and break and run when they get red (even if I still have 2 or 3 energy banks full). EscortDeck forces the target to abandon ship when it's energy get bellow 23 (look at the weapon_energy default for Military laser quoted above ), so even with only 1/3 of the last energy bank available the NPCs are still taking no internal damage.

So things today are much more stacked against the player than just the laser types distribution... (the Ooniverse isn't even remotely fair, and it IS out to get you )

That said, I survived as a beginner (ran ALL the time and used Energy Bombs a lot when running wasn't enough), and now I like it hard...

Hi dybal, thanks for bringing this up.

dybal wrote: ↑Mon Apr 27, 2020 11:53 am

Default values are: WEAPON_PLASMA_CANNON = 6.0; WEAPON_PULSE_LASER = 15.0; WEAPON_BEAM_LASER = 15.0; WEAPON_MINING_LASER = 50.0; WEAPON_THARGOID_LASER = 12.5; WEAPON_MILITARY_LASER = 23.0

If I'm reading this right then that would make the NPC beam laser 5 times more powerful than the pulse (same damage but 5 times the firing rate).

Either way it looks like I'll need to set the values for the individual templates.

As I said, I don't know if the core game deals with shipdata.plist weapon_energy property as the wiki says (I didn't try to find the code that deals with it to verify), but the empirical evidence from my combat experience suggests it does.

It would be interesting to also add damage before overheat and/or time to overheat (assuming every shot hits) to the graphs... with a damage of 3 units/shot a pulse laser would need 43 hits to take down a standard 128 units shield, not taking into account the shield recharging... at 2 shots/s (0.5 s/shot) that would be 22s of hitting every single shot, if it doesn't overheat... so, to be _possible_ to take anyone down with that laser it would have to have a sufficiently large damage before overheat value and it would still depend on the shield recharge being slower than 6 units/s that a _perfect_ shooter (shoots continually, hits every time, for 22s - Jedi?) would inflict...

My feeling is that with a 3 units/hit (<10 units/s) laser the player would no be able to take down anybody in combat...

dybal wrote: ↑Mon Apr 27, 2020 3:24 pm

It would be interesting to also add damage before overheat and/or time to overheat (assuming every shot hits) to the graphs...

You're correct that such data is significant however I intend to tweak (where necessary) in order for the graphs displayed recently to be sufficiently representative.

dybal wrote: ↑Mon Apr 27, 2020 3:24 pm

My feeling is that with a 3 units/hit (<10 units/s) laser the player would no be able to take down anybody in combat...

The lowest damage proposed is recorded as 1 on the graphs but that would only be directly comparable to a weapon that also had a recharge rate of 0.1.
For example:

• Weakest proposed pulse laser has a damage of 5 per hit and weapon recharge of 0.5 = (5/5) 1
• Weakest beam laser has a damage of 2 per hit and recharge of 0.1 = (2/1) 2
• Traditional pulse laser start for player has a damage of 15 per hit and a recharge of 0.5 = (15/5) 3
• Proposed starting player beam laser has a damage of 5 per hit and recharge of 0.1 = (5/1) 5

So I'd be granting the player a boost and some of his/her adversaries would be worse off.

The player doesn't start in a fighter without oxp and this makes a lot of sense as they don't have a hyperdrive. So by penalising the fighters the player benefits. Regarding balance, the freighters are less common as pirates and their weapons have been boosted. They're more robust and so significantly tougher but they're also slower and so easier to escape from allowing the starting player a good chance to run (and not just in a mk3).


It is important (I would argue from the beginning but certainly at some stage) that the player can take down other ships but the opposite need not be true. A solitary fighter need not be able to take down the player because...

• The player is unlikely to encounter a solitary fighter in the first place
• A single fighter can remain very effective in helping other ships to take down the player

Redspear wrote: ↑Mon Apr 27, 2020 5:56 pm

dybal wrote: ↑Mon Apr 27, 2020 3:24 pm

My feeling is that with a 3 units/hit (<10 units/s) laser the player would no be able to take down anybody in combat...

I'm not sure it came across as I intended, so let me re-write:

A laser to be effective in combat has to at minimum:

• impart more damage during a sustained burst where all shots hit than the shield recharge during that time;

• sustain such a sustained burst long enough to wear the shield down before shutting down because of overheating, or cool down faster than the target's shield recharge, so the next burst starts with the target shield's at a lower level

PlayerShip has a property [forward|aft]ShieldRechargeRate with value 2 for all NPCs I looked at (more traces)... assuming that it means 2 units/s and that it applies both to NPCs and player, that means that a laser that inflicts 2 damage units/s would not lower that shield level even if the target sat still for a loooooong sustained burst. Even without any enhancements that shield would not be worn down by such a laser even by a perfect Jedi pilot who could keep the target centred in the cross-hairs during the whole dogfight.

The proposed starting player laser at 5 damage units/s means that for each 10s (10x2=20 units of shield recharge) of dogfight the player has to hit during more than 4s (4x5=20 units of damage) to wear that shield down - 40% of the elapsed time, not impossible, but more than I can do...

The lasers with 2 damage units/s and lower would be useless for combat (if those parameters are correct), at 3 damage units/s it would require hitting 66% of the time (not 66% accuracy, but something like 100% accuracy while shooting during 66% of the elapsed dogfight time)...

dybal wrote: ↑Mon Apr 27, 2020 7:33 pm

I'm not sure it came across as I intended, so let me re-write:

I think I got/get it and rather it might be my reply that was sloppy...

dybal wrote: ↑Mon Apr 27, 2020 7:33 pm

The proposed starting player laser at 5 damage units/s means that for each 10s (10x2=20 units of shield recharge) of dogfight the player has to hit during more than 4s (4x5=20 units of damage) to wear that shield down - 40% of the elapsed time, not impossible, but more than I can do...

A starting damage of 5 is significantly higher than the current starting value of 3 (15 at 0.5 = 3 at 0.1) and only slightly inferior to starting with the current beam laser (6 at 0.1). If each 0.1 represents 1/10th of a second (not sure but it's certainly a very short ammount of time) then there's theoreticaly the chance of 100 hits (ignoring overheating and the like foer the moment) over a 10 second period, meaning that a hit rate of only 2% would be required to cause the 20 damage that you suggest.

Do you see that I've converted all damage to damage per 0.1 seconds (or whatever it is)?
So it's damage/time rather than damage/hit and specifically damage per 0.1 seconds not damage per second.

dybal wrote: ↑Mon Apr 27, 2020 7:33 pm

The lasers with 2 damage units/s and lower would be useless for combat (if those parameters are correct), at 3 damage units/s it would require hitting 66% of the time (not 66% accuracy, but something like 100% accuracy while shooting during 66% of the elapsed dogfight time)...

The laser with a damage of 1 is actually a damage of 10 when converted to your damage units/second.
So, if I have it correctly, you would score the default pulse laser at 30 (15 damage per 0.5 seconds), whereas I would score it at 3 (3 damage per 0.1 seconds). Different units, same result.

You are right... I didn't stop to cross-check the numbers and didn't realize your final numbers where for 0.1s, my bad

That means that even the weakest pulse would do 10 damage unit/s against a 2 units/s shield recharge (when this exchange started I didn't remember that I saw that number in my traces...), which would require hitting the target during 20% of the time - something I can do when sniping slow (or dumb) ships.

And the weakest beam would require hitting during 10% of the time at close quarters, which isn't easy but doable.

The only point that could spoil it is if it overheats before wearing the shield down in a single sustained burst AND in the time it takes to cool down the shield is full again... if the numbers I saw are correct, it takes 64s to for a normal shield to recharge to 100%.

dybal wrote: ↑Mon Apr 27, 2020 8:44 pm

You are right... I didn't stop to cross-check the numbers and didn't realize your final numbers where for 0.1s, my bad

No problem Maths is pretty unforgiving in terms of even the simplest mistakes.

dybal wrote: ↑Mon Apr 27, 2020 8:44 pm

The only point that could spoil it is if it overheats before wearing the shield down in a single sustained burst AND in the time it takes to cool down the shield is full again... if the numbers I saw are correct, it takes 64s to for a normal shield to recharge to 100%.

Again, this is more critical for the player - an opponent likely has allies to harrass the player while they recharge.

Even without the proposed beam laser start, there is no version of this oxp where the player would have anything less than the standard pulse laser. Therfore from the player's pont of view at least, this should be a non-issue.

Update to v 0.5 and available from the manager.

Changes:

• Remodeled to include burst lasers as a beam-laser intermediary
• Ship size alters power rather than range
• Rarification of Asps and Fer de Lances (both equipped with burst lasers by default)
• Removed conflict with New Lasers but this will be dependant upon upcoming New Lasers update

To do:

• Create hunter/assassin shipdata variants on account of disabling auto weapons
• Potentially reassign weapon_energy value for standard beam laser
• Rebalancing after further tests, most likely with regards to burst lasers