Maneuvering Thrusters

[LoBlo]

I've yet to find any reason to sacrafice ship speed for extra maneuvering Thrusters. Have any of you seen any reason to choose thrusters or more engines?

Maybe a better mechanic would be to have engine slots sized like weapon slots, so that the ship doesn't trade off engines for thrusters.

lb

[Lunalis]

it could be good to add thrusters to ships that have more limited weapon arcs... so they can turn around quicker and get their good weapons on the enemy.

or to turn around quickly to escape (start jumoing away) from a station attack or such.

[WiZz]

Personally, I don't see reasons to add Maneuvering Thrusters into designs. Most weapons have turrets, missiles don't care.
Engines are needed if an enemy uses stand-off weapons and kiting.

[Jorgen_CAB]

In most situation I agree that thrusters are not really all that useful given that engine slots are too restrictive. I think that thrusters should be slotted in both engine and general slots to be more useful. More engine speed is almost always more important and most weapon slots have very good fire arcs, at least 180 degrees or more. If weapon arcs were more restrictive then thrusters might have been more important.

I think the game would be better with more restrictive fire arcs and limited supplies of 360 degree missile fires.

I also would like the option of weapons able to fire on either side if the ship as one weapon system for true broad side engagement. That is a system that can concentrate all the firepower to one side of a ship.

This would also make thrusters a bit more interesting.

If missiles also was more limited but potentially more powerful then kiting would not be so damn effective.

[LoBlo]

They could probably be presented in the same way weapons are presented with size slots. It doesn't make sense to have a "engine slot" but then state that the ship has its maximal engines.

Why did the model have 3 engine slots and then you only allow 2 engines then? What sense does that make?

It would be better for engine slots to have size designations like weapons so its obvious which slots are engines and which are thrusters. The option to forgo large engines for smaller thrusters still exist, just like the option to place small weapons in slots that could have held larger ones.

lb

[Nightskies]

"Why did the model have 3 engine slots and then you only allow 2 engines then? What sense does that make?"

Weeeeellll, the ships place the engines in certain positions based on the number of engines, 'for balance'. So in the case of the 3 slot ship that can only have 2 engines max, if it had 1 engine, it would be in the center slot. AFAIK, this is just a cosmetic thing that can determine the ship's engine trail(s).

"I've yet to find any reason to sacrafice ship speed for extra maneuvering Thrusters."

Extra maneuvering thrusters? As in, more than one? Can't imagine that being worthwhile.

Then, sacrifice speed? Absolutely not worth it. Some ships need every engine slot they have for conventional engines, but a lot do not. In the common case that all engine slots aren't taken to reach desired speed, the ~5 space required for ~5% countermeasures isn't a bad deal. The extra maneuverability is just icing.

[LoBlo]

"Why did the model have 3 engine slots and then you only allow 2 engines then? What sense does that make?"

Weeeeellll, the ships place the engines in certain positions based on the number of engines, 'for balance'. So in the case of the 3 slot ship that can only have 2 engines max, if it had 1 engine, it would be in the center slot. AFAIK, this is just a cosmetic thing that can determine the ship's engine trail(s).

That doesn't require a unfilled, empty slot to do.

[Nightskies]

Each engine slot has a unique position on the ship, like weapon slots do. The designer automatically selects what slot the engines/thrusters use based on the number of engines/thrusters, unlike weapons. The resulting empty slots are merely the positions that are left out- such as in the example given.

*Expanding on that a little more, in the same example, if that ship that can have 2 engines had 2 slots instead of 3, if the ship only had one engine for whatever reason, it would look unbalanced as the engine would be showing thrust on one side of the ship. So the ships have that 3rd slot for just that occasion.

[Thineboot]

I have to come up with a reason for vectoring engines, too. At least while you have to decide between engines and vectoring engines.

Broadsides are a well known feature of water based vessels. They operate on a (more or less) flat surface. Beware of a spaceship that could simply rotate around its longitudinal axis... oh, right, we are in space, it could be easily done, it just doesn't happen Up, down, left, right, who cares, we are in space, up is were those dirt eaters have to look to see the vast empty space, we just have to spi...crap, who the heated inner core has forgotten to add some thrusters to our ships...

Seriously, 360° firing arcs in space is just spinning turrets without hitting your own ship targeting anything in the hemisphere pointing away from the ship. Yes, most iconic spaceships shown on the silver screen or on tv are based on naval vessels like any good flat earther could imagine. For Shakturis sake, start thinking in 3D, spaceships operate in space, not in water. Since they are build in space and not fit for landing on planets, who cares about up and down, left and right. They are not planes either, at least they don't roll when they wanna yaw since they are just turning the steering wheel.

I know, this may come over a decade too late, but maybe porting DWU into 3D may inspire someone to start thinking in 3D instead of 2½D... and making sense out of Maneuvering Thrusters

[Lunalis]

it would be funny if adding a thruster to your ship would extend all weapon arcs by 20°... 2 thrusters +40% etc...
so your 180° weapons become 220° ones with 2 thrusters.
ofcourse just would make sense for the not already 360° ones.

[mordachai]

I totally modded them out.

They're a total waste of time, mental-space, and energy.

I've never missed them in the 25+ games since I got rid of them.

[Jorgen_CAB]

The way the game works there should just be alternative engines with better vectoring included at some other negative effect. There are some engines in there that does this. But the vectoring engines in and of themselves are pretty much useless.

Normal engines probably should get even less vectoring thrust and then you have to choose between lower vectoring or more depending on the engine you put on the ship. You also could then combine these different engines. Have each major engine a branching technology with a better vectoring engine with slightly less thrust or perhaps worse fuel efficiency and more static energy usage or a combination of those things. Then at least it becomes a choice... hardly any turning capability or some other penalties to forward thrust.

The other way is to give every ship separate engine and vectoring slots, engines give more or less no vectoring thrust at all, you then can add some vectoring engines to increase the turning rates.

[mordachai]

The way the game works there should just be alternative engines with better vectoring included at some other negative effect. There are some engines in there that does this. But the vectoring engines in and of themselves are pretty much useless.

Normal engines probably should get even less vectoring thrust and then you have to choose between lower vectoring or more depending on the engine you put on the ship. You also could then combine these different engines. Have each major engine a branching technology with a better vectoring engine with slightly less thrust or perhaps worse fuel efficiency and more static energy usage or a combination of those things. Then at least it becomes a choice... hardly any turning capability or some other penalties to forward thrust.

The other way is to give every ship separate engine and vectoring slots, engines give more or less no vectoring thrust at all, you then can add some vectoring engines to increase the turning rates.

All good thoughts, IMO.

I figure at some point I'll add more engine-lines that do offer exactly those trade-offs.

I don't generally like the "middle" options in general - seems like you start a line, it should bifurcate towards different potentials - speed v. maneuver, or efficiency vs. power at cost.

But the nice thing about separate slots - that would fit their original design nicely - of having two whole tech trees for thrust and maneuver. But as-is, with a single set of slots - maneuver is essentially useless -- and by taking it out of the mod, AI's waste research effort that much less.

[rxnnxs]

You have very good ideas, hopefully they are taken care of.
Good to hear that much is moddable and already done!!!

I remember some threads concerning exactly those design woes.
Also I really do not understand why there is still a speed for ships at slow with 10 (no engine installed) and on sprint and such it is now 0...

For an interesting read:
https://www.matrixgames.com/forums/view ... 9#p4980789

https://www.matrixgames.com/forums/view ... &start=100

[Jorgen_CAB]

While we are on the subject of engines... energy efficient engines as they are in the game does not make much sense at all.

Engines are such small amount of energy used on the ship that you don't care about that at all. Energy efficient engines should instead have a much better cruising speed for the same energy usage. The difference should then be about sprinting speed.

This would make energy efficient engines very good for none warships... currently they are not good for anyone unless you are for some reason on the edge of energy usage for some reason which you basically never will be for almost all none military ships.

To be honest I'm not sure what the developer though when balancing these technologies and the validity of them.

I also think engines probably should have much higher energy usage in general, especially at sprint level. Energy efficient engines could also be a bit smaller and have much less sprint thrust and lower energy draw at sprint speeds.

[rxnnxs]

I would begin a game with rocket engines that can not be moved in any directions.
Implement a second place for the vectoring engines.
Thrusters do only thrust forward, vector is for steeering.
Right now, they all can do everything.

Well.. that is not logical nor helpful.

And later on in research, better engines could also give the thrusters a movable option, so they can fly a big radius so to speak.
But if you want to fine tune the rotation speed, you could have, lets say, 1 to 5 possible places for vector engines.
And 1 to 5 possible places for engine, or whatsoever.

[Thineboot]

Since I've started comparing physics between DW2's and our universe, it's just getting weirder and weirder.

Why do cars and planes need fuel?
To keep a constant speed they have to constantly accelerate because of drag and friction (cars).

Now spaceships operate in space, and besides a few particles here and there, it's vastly empty. Drag becomes nearly zero and since they don't drive on any surface, there is no friction.
Unfortunately DW2 universe doesn't know about Newton or Einstein, there was a nice Teekan Scientist called Einton Newstein, but that's another story. DW2 spaceships have to accelerate constantly and thus use up fuel. And when they wanna decelerate Erika just hit's the breaks. So DW2 is more like a movie or game than a space simulation.
WarpBubble and HyperDrive is a complete other thing, we don't have any knowledge about them in our universe, at least not to my knowledge, who knows what they are hiding in area 51

If at least some physics of our universe would apply to DW2 universe, maneuvering thrusters would have a real impact on the game play. But since we're more or less driving on the milky way, spaceships are just fancy spacomobiles.

[rxnnxs]

Come on it is not rocket science!
Forward is thrust, steering is left and right!

[Thineboot]

Come on it is not rocket science!
Forward is thrust, steering is left and right!

Exactly, it's not rocket science, it's steering