Oolite Bulletins

I installed the Missiles and Bombs OXP and also the Armoury OXP. I can more or less use the missiles. Unfortunately, I can't seem to use the mines at all, e.g. the Fragmentation Bomb from M&B, or the Buzz Bomb from Armoury.

In the case of the Fragmentation Bomb, I've tried dropping it while running away from an enemy. It seemed to successfully explode, but did not seem to do anything to the enemy. I've had more success with my aft Military Laser.

As for the Buzz Bomb, I tried using it as an alternative to the Energy Bomb, i.e. when the enemy ships manage to surround me, I drop it and run away. Unfortunately, it didn't work, and I died.

Does anyone have any advice on how to use these things effectively? I know that they are not cost-effective, just like missiles, especially if you are playing the role of a bounty hunter or pirate. But I'm hoping to find a way to use bombs and mines for emergencies when I play as a trader. Even if it is just for the atmosphere.

Having no experience with these mines myself, I'd nevertheless guess that they should be brought as close as possible to your enemies for maximum effect.

Commander McLane wrote:

Having no experience with these mines myself, I'd nevertheless guess that they should be brought as close as possible to your enemies for maximum effect.

In the case of the Frag Bomb, I tried to let the pirate close up to 5 km, but he kept on hammering me up my iron arse with his laser. I finally had to drop the bomb around 10 - 15 km away, IIRC. It seemed to blow up quite nicely, but he kept on chasing me, so I had to turn around and fight him face to face. Fortunately, I had already ditched the rest of his buddies.

Thargoid wrote:

The buzz-bomb is not a last-ditched use weapon, as it uses the ship's energy to make its effect. Hence it will drain your banks quite drastically, but the more it does so the more damage it does. It's to provide an alternative (and slightly more realistic weapon with balances) to the e-bomb

When I dropped the buzz-bomb, the enemies had just surrounded me (i.e. there was a sea of red lollipops in the scanner around me) after I used my injector to try and get behind them. My shields seemed alright then, so I guess I should have had enough energy. After I dropped the bomb, I ran away quickly. Unfortunately, I still got caught afterwards, and got shot to death by way too many pirates for me to count.

Thargoid wrote:

The use of such munitions is indeed very much a matter of personal tastes, and also something that should be researched in the OXP readme's.

Well, the flavour text in the OXPs were nice enough, I guess. But they were a bit short of details - no best practice instructions, no recommended tactics and strategies, etc.

That's why I'm asking here. The bombs and mines sound interesting, and I thought it was a shame to just install the OXPs and then just leave them (i.e. the bombs) to gather dust while only using the missiles. BTW, both Armoury and IronHide are yours, right? I don't know if IronHide actually helps me, but it sounds cool and I have it installed on all of my ships, cost be damned. Your interceptor missile racks are also great for finishing off the enemy when my laser overheats.

But I'm not sure what to think about your Anti Missile System. The concept sounds nice, but 3000 cr for each dart is way too expensive. The Welcome Mat does not give consistent information. When I first jump into a system, it will tell me one thing. But this sometimes changes when I visit, say, the Rock Hermit. And may change again when I visit the next Rock Hermit. I also stopped using the Combat Drone. Sounded cool, but I could never be sure if it was doing me any good, and it was a pain to find and scoop up after the battle. I also have your Target Autolock Plus, and it is helpful when it works. But I notice that it does not show up in the Manifest screen (F5). This reminds me: your AMS also does not show me the number of darts I have left in the manifest; It only tells me when I leave dock, if I'm not mistaken.

Wow, you're really prolific, aren't you? I'm slowly going through the list of special equipment you created. There are so many more that I have not tried out, yet.

lohwengk wrote:

Well, the flavour text in the OXPs were nice enough, I guess. But they were a bit short of details - no best practice instructions, no recommended tactics and strategies, etc.

That's why I'm asking here. The bombs and mines sound interesting, and I thought it was a shame to just install the OXPs and then just leave them (i.e. the bombs) to gather dust while only using the missiles. BTW, both Armoury and IronHide are yours, right? I don't know if IronHide actually helps me, but it sounds cool and I have it installed on all of my ships, cost be damned. Your interceptor missile racks are also great for finishing off the enemy when my laser overheats.

Yes there are no recommended tactics, as each player will use them differently (or indeed not at all) plus part of the "fun" is finding out the best tactics. Ironhide will now act as additional shielding, taking damage once your shielding is gone rather than the hits eating up your energy banks. You may still take some equipment damage whilst that happens, but that's done by trunk and cannot be changed easily by OXP.

lohwengk wrote:

But I'm not sure what to think about your Anti Missile System. The concept sounds nice, but 3000 cr for each dart is way too expensive. The Welcome Mat does not give consistent information. When I first jump into a system, it will tell me one thing. But this sometimes changes when I visit, say, the Rock Hermit. And may change again when I visit the next Rock Hermit. I also stopped using the Combat Drone. Sounded cool, but I could never be sure if it was doing me any good, and it was a pain to find and scoop up after the battle. I also have your Target Autolock Plus, and it is helpful when it works. But I notice that it does not show up in the Manifest screen (F5). This reminds me: your AMS also does not show me the number of darts I have left in the manifest; It only tells me when I leave dock, if I'm not mistaken.

It was designed to be expensive. If you want to change it, just edit the equipment.plist file and adjust the numbers (then restart with shift held down). As for WM - well the information is "live" so you may find that the system itself is changing in terms of the ships that are in it. The tech level etc should not change (unless another OXP is messing with it), but the safety level might if a number of pirates get splashed, or if something spawns a bunch of them for example.

And no, where it can be avoided most of my OXPs don't show up on the manifest screen. Simply because a lot of OXPs do that, so you can end up with a huge list on that screen which either makes it almost unusable to get any data quickly, or to the extreme case you end up with text wrapped around your feet.

lohwengk wrote:

Wow, you're really prolific, aren't you? I'm slowly going through the list of special equipment you created. There are so many more that I have not tried out, yet.

Yeah, I've written a few...

Thargoid wrote:

Ironhide will now act as additional shielding, taking damage once your shielding is gone rather than the hits eating up your energy banks. You may still take some equipment damage whilst that happens, but that's done by trunk and cannot be changed easily by OXP.

It makes sense, though, that some equipment damage would still occur. I usually think of the shields as an energy field that's a bit off the skin of the ship. They can act as a sort of a buffer to reduce impacts from explosions or concussive effects from beam weapon hits. Sure, lasers maybe be a non-projectile weapon, but when they hit they vaporise bits of the hull, which will rapidly expand so you basically have some explosive effect as well as the cut and possible hull breach situations from beam weapons.

Armour, on the other hand, adds toughness to the hull. Mostly it would help for avoiding hull breaches or fractures, but wouldn't do much to keep you from taking quite a shaking from direct hits and nearby explosions or concussive effects.

I'll have to try IronHide again. I took out the OXP back when the armour was being eaten up before the shields, since it seemed nonsensical and was being quite expensive with the way I tend to fight.

Thargoid wrote:

lohwengk wrote:

But I'm not sure what to think about your Anti Missile System. The concept sounds nice, but 3000 cr for each dart is way too expensive. The Welcome Mat does not give consistent information. When I first jump into a system, it will tell me one thing. But this sometimes changes when I visit, say, the Rock Hermit. And may change again when I visit the next Rock Hermit. I also stopped using the Combat Drone. Sounded cool, but I could never be sure if it was doing me any good, and it was a pain to find and scoop up after the battle. I also have your Target Autolock Plus, and it is helpful when it works. But I notice that it does not show up in the Manifest screen (F5). This reminds me: your AMS also does not show me the number of darts I have left in the manifest; It only tells me when I leave dock, if I'm not mistaken.

It was designed to be expensive. If you want to change it, just edit the equipment.plist file and adjust the numbers (then restart with shift held down).

I'll think about it. I still feel it is overpriced, especially in comparison with the Chaff Dispenser's chaff reloads, ACS chaff reloads, anti ballistic missile, and interceptor missile rack. OTOH, lots of things in real life are overpriced, so it is not something for me to feel surprised about in Oolite.

BTW, I just noticed that my number of AMS darts sometimes resets to 6 (according to the message). Does the AMS system automatically regenerate its darts, or is this a bug?

Thargoid wrote:

And no, where it can be avoided most of my OXPs don't show up on the manifest screen. Simply because a lot of OXPs do that, so you can end up with a huge list on that screen which either makes it almost unusable to get any data quickly, or to the extreme case you end up with text wrapped around your feet.

Ah! That makes sense.