Turret (and other) Questions

[Stratovarius]

Been poking around this game for a couple days now (and congrats on updating a classic very nicely), and I have a couple questions/comments so far.

1) I'm currently flying a Galaxy while my Centurion sits at Perry and is being upgraded with the cash I make. My problem though is that once I get into a fight of any kind and I turn on the turrets, they basically can't hit unless its either a head to head attack or the target stuck his afterburners in my cockpit. This might be a function of the speed of the Plasma projectile (my Galaxy has two Plasma Turrets and two Plasma guns), but, they still can't aim very well. Is there any way to upgrade the turrets so their accuracy is improved?

2) I've actually forgotten where to go to start the campaign. I want to say Palan Bar, but its been long enough that I don't remember.

3) Is there a place with complete ship readouts of all the ones you can purchase in the game? I'm just looking ahead to what I could get after I start the campaign.

4) Is there a Confed military presence in Perry? Cause I've seen far more Kilrathi space fighters than Confeds there, and its their main base.

5) What combat tactics do you recommend when in a Dogfight? Mostly I tend to go head to head, use my much heavier weapon outfit to kill them, and pull a roll/afterburner dodge to get out of the way of their shots, since that tends to be the only way I can aim well. Playing with a Mouse/KB combo btw, since I don't have a joystick.

[spiritplumber]

In my experience turrets in Priv were pretty much useless except as a spot to put a trac beam in on a Centurion... in PR, the fact that they autofire makes them a lot nicer to have. However, with the current PR gun values and reactor values, the best turret you can get is a laser -- fast projectile and low energy consumption.

[Stratovarius]

I had noticed that the turrets tended to run out of energy rather quickly (I turned on AI pilot while I was in the turret, otherwise there was no way I could have fun there). I'll give that a try, see how it does.

[Charlie Whiskey]

A Galaxy with 6 fusion cannons, a dumbfire launcher and a repulser is very lethal head on as I found out. But I'd prefer the turrets to do some lead calculation.

[JonathanD]

I'm messing with the capacitance and regcharge values for the turrets so the heavier guns have at least a little more time before they run out of energy... anyone interested in this data? Could these changes be put in the game? (Worried though that this might make the cap ships even harder to kill... but it would be great on a players galaxy.)

[Stratovarius]

A Galaxy with 6 fusion cannons, a dumbfire launcher and a repulser is very lethal head on as I found out. But I'd prefer the turrets to do some lead calculation.

Haven't actually tried using the Repulsor or Tractor in combat, so I'm not certain of the effects. Guess that'll be the next thing to do.

[Fireskull]

1) Get used to dumbfire missiles, they are the best ones when you have a good aim with them. With enough practice you will be using them in other situations than just head ons

2) Make your shoots count. Most pilots end up using low energy weapons, that do less damage, because they cant aim, that lowers your damage potential.

3) Roll, yaw, pitch, use whatever movemetns you are able to, all the time. Just because a galaxy is big, doesnt means it should be a easy target.

[Stratovarius]

Couple more things: Been playing around with the 3 ships (fully upgraded Orion/Cent/Galaxy, no autotrackers yet). Galaxy actually seems to have the most firepower (6 plasmas vs the 4 for the Cent), and the Galaxy has more energy cause 4 of his Plasmas draw off of the turret (this does mean they shoot less).

Is there a way to tweak the AI on the Turrets a little? So they at least try and lead? It seems a little odd that I'd have a B&S Omni with its ITTS and the turrets ignore it completely.

Couple Bugs:

The Cent and Orion rear turret is shooting through the body of my ship straight forward, which, while providing some additional firepower, is probably not intended.

If you fire a repulsor beam and then hit the "G" key to swap to a weapon set without it, it appears to continue firing, but no longer takes energy and doesn't turn off. You can even land and take off and the beam is still there.

[Stratovarius]

Something that doesn't seem right to me: Gothri's keeping up with a Centurion on full afterburner, and perfectly capable of firing their entire gun compliment at once. Either they have the engines double the capability of mine plus a nice generator, or they just flat out cheat. Which is it?

[JonathanD]

Stratovarius, the turrets on the galaxy (or any turrets) don't draw from your reactor... they are "free" from an energy perspective. They've got they're own (junky) reactor.

[Duke Derek]

i've been test flying a lot of the ships that i captured with my drayman (Gothri, Drathri mainly) and i can say that Gothris have a top speed of 1200kps (i think, it's higher than a Cenution anyway) so it's nearly believable that it could keep up, just keep getting it with your rear turret.

i've recently been playing with a fully upgraded Galaxy (in RF so i have 2 Fusion and 2 Tachyon turrets) and im loving the fact that i can vapourise pretty much anything if it's coming at me head on, im going to look for a capship now. hehe.

i disagree with the "get better at shooting and get some massive guns" school of thought, Tachyons do less damage per hit but if you can hit with all your shots you do a hell of a lot of damage. i keep meaning to do a table with weapon efficiencies, damage per second per kJ drained or something. and then another with some sort of factor for projectile speed also. might do that now while im thinking about it.

[Stratovarius]

Stratovarius, the turrets on the galaxy (or any turrets) don't draw from your reactor... they are "free" from an energy perspective. They've got they're own (junky) reactor.

Yah, I knew that much. Tis why I use a laser turret on the rear of my Centurion and Orion rather than the Plasmas on the Galaxy, they do a better job of actually protecting the rear.

[z30]

i disagree with the "get better at shooting and get some massive guns" school of thought, Tachyons do less damage per hit but if you can hit with all your shots you do a hell of a lot of damage. i keep meaning to do a table with weapon efficiencies, damage per second per kJ drained or something. and then another with some sort of factor for projectile speed also. might do that now while im thinking about it.

Some people are good at big guns, some are better with fast firing weapons - it seems to hold true no matter which game one plays

FireSkull, for example, gets good results with neutron guns - i can barely manage them. Prefer Tachyons, mesons and the like.

[Charlie Whiskey]

What's a good strategy for capturing ships in a Drayman? I think this is cheating but heck it is interesting! All I've been able to capture was a single Drathri after days at it because they never get close enough it seems. Also does using a pair of tractor beams help?

[Duke Derek]

um, i just stuck an autotracked tractor on the front and reaped, the best plan is to fire up the beam well in advance (but not too far so it doesnt run out) and then you can usually get them when they're doing that annoying circling thing

[Fireskull]

Duke: There is much more to flying than just cold numbers. I would -never- place tachyon canons on the front of a galaxy if I had better options. They just dont have enough punch.

[blue_paladin42]

Without autotrackers, I almost have to use tachyons, or light guns, simply because i can't AIM. With autotrackers aiming for me.... well, two fusion and two plasma really work well on a centurion. And on a Orion, with the biggest reactor, it doesn't matter, cuz it powers even plasma guns to the point that you can just keep shooting and shooting and shooting....
On a side note, I finally got an Orion in PR, and I actually like it, unlike in the original privateer, especially versus Kamekhs.

[Stratovarius]

I still tend to just run when I see Kamekhs, I can deal with packs of fighters moderately well, but cap ships I'm dead. Need to work on getting behind them and circling away more.

[Greate Pier]

Running away was my first instinct as well when I had to face Kamekhs, until I had to clear 2 Nav Points on an RF mission.... Boy, was I glad I had a couple of Fusions alongside of my trusty Tachyons. Don't think I'd ever have made it without those Fusions

[Stratovarius]

Just noticed a deprecated Talon in a Pirate base, but none of them I know of has a Shipyard. Is there any way to buy them besides the tractoring?

[Duke Derek]

Duke: There is much more to flying than just cold numbers. I would -never- place tachyon canons on the front of a galaxy if I had better options. They just dont have enough punch.

i see it as probability also, if i miss one shot using Tachyons then i still have many more further shots, if i miss one shot with an Ion then it's more of a bad thing because i've wasted a shot. however, if i get all my Tachyon fire on target then it does the same amount of damage. and if you're using a more "efficient" weapon (see damage/drain in here http://vegastrike.sourceforge.net/forum ... 153c93dca6) then you get more shots until you run out your capacitor banks

2 further points:
- this is a computer game, thus is based somewhat upon numbers
- it doesn't take into account reactor size and personal style, it's simply a measure of efficiency and probability. i just happen to like efficient and reliable methods

[z30]

Duke: There is much more to flying than just cold numbers. I would -never- place tachyon canons on the front of a galaxy if I had better options. They just dont have enough punch.

Tachyon guns on the Galaxy's front don't have enough punch if you're on an escort mission, agreed. Tried defending a Drayman against Kilrathi's , and the fact that they're friendly worked against me - my turrets wouldn't fire. That left me with 2 Tachyons and dual missiles, chose guided ones since the Gothri's are pretty hard to hit with DF unless they're headon or you get lucky.

On Cargo runs, tachyons are good enough since the only ones who intercept you are hostiles - turrets have no problem firing against that

[z30]

Update : I was able to do the Drayman escort run with dual FF missiles. You need to build enough threat fast to turn the Kilrathi ship against you. After that the turret/hull guns will do the rest.

Relying on missiles that require 2-3 seconds for missile lock doesn't work, that delay plus missile recycle times results in a dead cago ship.

One FF missile isn't enough, but relying on dual FF launchers consumes a lot of ammo - fired 2-3 salvos (6 missiles) before the cat pilot turned on me. Will see how the tactic fares against multiple raiders.

[edit] Ok, I got jumped by 3 Gothri's while defending the merchant - the mission computer lied, it only said one Did it but my armor was swiss cheese after. It was actually easier to draw their attention since the cats are hostile against me now. Problem is finding enough FF's to load at one time..

[Stratovarius]

*sigh* Doing the blockade breaking missions out in Palan. Have decided that they suck majorly, mostly cause spaceships randomly appear at sub-750 meter distances already strafing you. And of course, you can't save, even if you go back to the base. And you get jumped by random kilrathi in the middle of the fight, after the hike out there around that frigging astroid field. This mission alone has made me more frustrated than the rest of the game in total. Just seems designed to waste the player's time and slaughter them, rather than provide an actual challenge.

[Fireskull]

Equip up your ships with the best damage/sec gun all you guys want These tables dont work in practice. I dont know how to explain it, I just know it from experiece.