Experimental Weapons

[dawn tendon]

Not the first specific to faction thing, to which I'd ask, what about multiplayer pvp

You see, multiplayer will and should have access to all modules, to which means you cannot just have each faction with a very big strong module for a specific thing, else in multiplayer you just use all of them at once

There are no factions in pvp, there are no steps, if something requires a lot of energy it will do so in career too

And I wouldn't recommend something that would for example require more than 1 lr to be used at minimum

The idea you have isn't terrible, I'd just advise that it is moreso, regular things such as a rebranded ion with slightly different stats or something, something that wouldn't be exceedingly powerful

[hazy idol]

I like the powerful weapon but big downside idea

In career maybe you'd need faction affinity but in pvp it's just available

Say a powerful surface laser but it emps the stuff around it when it fires

I'd like to propose that whatever weapon is aligned with the fringe lights itself on fire as the downside 😆

The only weapon with a notable downside right now is the DC with crew stun, right?

Hmm yeah, so I guess downsides do exist, but the experimental weapons would have especially large fun downsides

[dawn tendon]

I was more thinking of something less extreme

For example, the ' Experimental Ion Emitter™ ', where it has a base cost of it's own being 30000 credits, it uses 3.75 energy/ second with a capacity of 15,
it deals 3750 damage near and deals 2062.5 damage far, the blueprint will cost 40000 credits, and will require maximum cabal reputation, if it lowers you lose access to the module and the modules on the ship will be disabled until you return to maximum reputation,
It will require 3 crew to pilot and costs 15 command points, while taking up the exact same area as the current ion emitter.
It has the same range as the ion emitter but is coloured blue

[hazy idol]

I feel like we're discussing two different ideas at once now

1: powerful weapons you need faction affinity to access, 2: Powerful weapons with big downsides

[foggy quarry]

The main limitation of faction end gear like this could be absurd cost in credits and resources to use alongside maybe making it so 2 different faction specific techs can't be used on the same ship.

[hazy idol]

Yeah I think so! Just noting that fact

[foggy quarry]

This would prevent PvP devolving into a mess worse than it is.

[dawn tendon]

In multiplayer there are no faction limitations

Else you just do a combiner, similar to the railfan alpha from the PvP tournament

[hazy idol]

An idea for better faction rewards could also be perks

Not as fun as weapons

But say stat boosts to lasers, etc

[dawn tendon]

The career mode currently is exceedingly easy, stat boosts just make it moreso

[foggy quarry]

Was thinking of doing something similar with super weapons I was rattling the idea of around making itself that 2 different ones can't be on the same ship. So maybe that kind of restriction could be used on these.

[hazy idol]

Perks would be like the difficulty modifiers and hence just not exist in multiplayer

[hazy idol]

That is true

[dawn tendon]

There are no level 20 ships, the most expensive is the 3m category at level 18

And 3m is by far not what a player uses at a level 18 system,

Normally you'd have 4 times that amount

Career is just win from bigger budget

A space problem, for space solutions

[hazy idol]

Yeah if you go above level 18 you're gonna start hitting the ship size limit

[dawn tendon]

In space

You can always just design an illegal ship

Or use a railfan kite

[hazy idol]

I think Walt is working on optimizations to be able to increase ship size? But until then you're stuck with 18

[dawn tendon]

Walt isn't

He has the roadmap to go through first

Even the ship competitions for adding ships into the game are maxxed at 3m

As I do not think he wants bigger

[hazy idol]

Well I don't think your experimental or faction specific weapons have to be that big

[dawn tendon]

With some optimisations, you can get yourself a nice 6m TB railfan orbiter box

[hazy idol]

Let's say we want it to fit in the 1.5 mil pvp

You're usually talking 6 rail guns, 20 ions, 8-11 DC, etc

A weapon with equivalent dps to those armaments is already huge

[dawn tendon]

Why not just an experimental weapon such as a knife launcher, with a range of 200 making it unable to kite

Something more akin to what you see in Birmingham

6 rails?

I was thinking for the knife to get stuck in the enemy ship, blocking access routes and such

Indeed

But a knife would be more British

[hazy idol]

Cannon with nuclear rounds for the big ass cannon?

[dawn tendon]

We already have three cannons

[violet crag]

^^

[hazy idol]

Ah true

[dawn tendon]

I was recently thinking of miniature ions, that use their own set of prisms and such, being incompatible with the regular ions, something with 150m range, being very cheap, similar to the sl

More of just a regular scaled down ion

[hazy idol]

I think somebody mentioned flamethrower earlier would be a unique one

That one would be a good one to light itself on fire 😆

[dawn tendon]

plasma throwers are already on the roadmap

[hazy idol]

Yep I'm aware, so im saying would be fun to make those very powerful and with a notable downside

[dawn tendon]

It's been 10 years to get the dc

[hazy idol]

I think a giant laser buzzsaw is also on the road map?

Sounds a lot like an experimental thing

[paper raven]

Please check out the Early Access Roadmap! http://roadmap.cosmoteer.net/

[hazy idol]

I think it's under melee weapons

Sorry it's under transforming ships

[dawn tendon]

Except that it will not be faction locked

Generally I like to think of it in a way where the bigger things cost more for less damage than an equal amount coastwise of smaller things, with the smaller ones taking more space in comparison

We'd want a reason for both things being used

[bronze needle]

like missiles

4 missile types isn't much

nukes and HE

strafes

[dawn tendon]

I see it moreso as
A blaster deals 30 dps, taking 2 spaces, costing 10
A big blaster deals 70 dps and takes 5 spaces, costing 25,
The benefits are defensibility and such

[dawn tendon]

Could be worse

Railfans are all we need

We do that when we make it into a box

[bronze needle]

we have 5 ballistic weapons, 4 laser weapons (7 if we count the plasma thrower and the gatling gun and mining laser) we even have 4 auxiliary parts

[dawn tendon]

You mean pd?

[bronze needle]

i forgot pd

[dawn tendon]

Pd is the antithesis of railfan kind

Why not

[bronze needle]

crew gun

[dawn tendon]

Do both at the same time

[bronze needle]

reactor ejector

offensive thruster

[left birch]

cosmoteer is very light on the useless fluff

[naive briar]

Me making plasma weaponry that is pure energy weapon and a missile in the work: Looks away

[left birch]

mods r fine

if u want fluff there's mods :D

[naive briar]

i'm personally trying to not make over the top stuff

my own stuff isn't over powered all things considered. they eat a lot of power, slow fire rate, decent piercing to not be useless, expensive.
fire is a strong mechanic

[rapid iron]

the weapon diversity is terrible because of that

imagine of cosmoteer had terratech's selection of weaponry, that would be awsome

[left birch]

it would also have a lot of useless stuff

each "thing" has its own, mostly irreplacable role for what u want it to do

[rapid iron]

the idea is that you have a bunch of things with the same function, but they do said function in different ways
yeah sure you have 2 different lasers that function almost the same, but one of them is smaller and had a tonna arc while the other could have faster firerate and less damage or so, somewhere along those lines, and they both would be used because they do the same thing in a different way
i fail to see how this could be an issue if they would both be used due to something like that, except for in mp where one could seem outright stronger than the other, but even then, the extra options in every non-pvp mode would be excellent

as for the laser and heavy laser, they do feel quite literally the same :/
they could certainly be pushed to be different in some good way though

[hazy idol]

The problem with throwing in a lot of weapons is you have to make sure they're balanced so people actually use them

So I don't think we can expect a super excess of slightly different weapons

[hazy idol]

I've heard of pvp ships still using sls but I don't play pvp, just watch tournament videos, so I'm not actually sure

I can tell you having recently started a new career that hls missing is actually pretty noticeable with small ships

[rapid iron]

they are incredibly niche, and could use a small boost

[rapid iron]

this 90% applies to only the pvp, casual players aren't gonna take "omg this weapon is 5% more effective than other weapon in almost all situations!!!" into account

[hazy idol]

Unless you accidentally make a weapon super op

Then it might wipe out all the other weapon types in pvp

Also some weapons are bad enough they're not even that useful in career

Ie mines lol

Not to say more weapons wouldn't be fun

Just to say we can't expect say triple the current weapon selection or really fast new weapon rollout

[rapid iron]

this could be solved with some testing, i don't think this would be an issue when it should be clear that a weapon is op in RC testing (unless it had some really weird method like nuke flings, but that was more of a bug/oversight)

[rapid iron]

for some reason these aren't being touched at all despite how useless they are, maybe walt is planning to change them later after the 1st stage

[dawn tendon]

there are only 2 non-pvp options, creative and career while we have multiple pvp options

[left birch]

w/ higher piloting skill ther eis some difference

[left birch]

if they do both more or less the same thing and they're the same effectiveness then what's the point

mines should be very very effective in career bc ai can't see mines and can't cope w/ tb but they're not for some reason

[rapid iron]

this doesn't mean that a majority of the player base does pvp

[rapid iron]

for more ways to do one task!!
if i want small swarm missiles then i want small swarm missiles, vice versa for bigger, fewer missiles with a larger punch.
even though they are more or less about the same, its still really good to have these options

[left birch]

but they do the same thing

there's no point

[dawn tendon]

1x1 deck cannon

it is moreso, do you want something that is practically as effective as what we already have with almost no differences, or do you first want the stuff on the roadmap

personally, i think i'd rather get those plasma throwers before '' missile but smaller ''

[hazy idol]

Going back to the idea, I think a lot of even stuff on the road map are good candidates for "experimental weapons"

Experimental meaning weird and/or are very powerful but with a very significant downside

[dawn tendon]

Being more unique

Although the transforming ships is sure to create a plethora of crazy shenanigans

[hazy idol]

Yep! I think the laser buzz saw and plasma thrower are both great candidates

And that

[dawn tendon]

Grabbing the buz saw and hinging it and another onto another ship

[hazy idol]

Buzz saw crab 🦀 🤩

[dawn tendon]

A true eater ship

Perhaps even another way to phase ships together into a lock

[rapid iron]

yeah that would be really nice for both the base game and mods

tho the example you provided is more like choosing the color of your weapons lol

[dawn tendon]

||which has been asked before many times||

[left birch]

eb kinda fits that

[hazy idol]

A little? Just because it's not very strong against anything other than shields?

I think most the existing weapons do have downsides, they're just not super extreme

[naive briar]

thanks god no

[outer narwhal]

There seems to be a worry that the powerful weapons would be combined in a single ship in pvp. However, that is very easy to fix, you just allow only one.

[naive briar]

while it is a valid way to do it, it is also a shame

[outer narwhal]

Oh, I mean in contest rules, not hardwired into the game.

Also beeg gun should have beeg expenses when firing.

I see Fringe having a scrap launcher, just shredding a bunch of steel plates into space to make a debris field. Doubles as a melee armour shredder? Delivering the required amount of steel should be the nightmare for this gun, a logistical nightmare.

Monolith are rich boys, they can afford to fire a rocket with hyperium and a whole ass computer chip in it right? an economic nightmare

Centauri evoke that cruel war nation vibe well. Maybe a cannon that throws out molten metal to melt through your armour? a friendly fire nightmare

Cabal is quite into the idea of stellar radiation, something about a giant flashlight that damages anything short of a sun diver sounds fun. an energy demand nightmare

The four horsemen of Cosmoteer

[hazy idol]

I like all five of the ideas you all just sent

[outer narwhal]

The Monolith rocket should definitely work as a "peasant deterrent" :D

[bronze needle]

in centauri imperium : "friendly fire doesn't exist"

imperium should have a big undodgeable nuke that has a blast radius larger than the build grid and use 10000 nuke parts also infinite damage, a geneva convention violation

[dawn tendon]

If it is undodgeable and deals " infinite damage", than in multiplayer you just spend everything on 1 and have it instantly kill the opponent

[rapid iron]

it is possible to design them in such a way where useing them like that would not be helpful, like how you cant use your missile ammo system for your cannons or lasers so it isn't helpful to mix and merge all sorta of weapons all over your ship

[outer narwhal]

CE, creating suns before Cabal thought it was cool. :D

But I like the idea of the vulkan cannon, it's something else than a bigger version of what they already have.

I guess I like AoD weapons, we could just make mines better tho.