A new battle to ponder

[Locklyn]

Your statement is based upon the assumption (a false assumption, I believe) that one point of firepower is sufficient to destroy 1 point of integrety. 

 

From all the battles I have seen, this cannot be the case.  My analysis indicatest that it takes at least 2, but not more than 4 points of offensive firepower to destroy each point of ship's integrety.  This means that it would take multiple hits for you destroy one of his screens.

 

If this theory is correct, then there should be a large number of damaged Corvettes in his fleet after the battle.  I do not see that point of information in your initial battle description.  How many damaged ships did he end up having?

 

Could it be that your assumption of several hits needed for one integrity is in fact defences degrading the incoming damage before being applied to the integrity?

 

While we all can guess and ramble and conjecture our heads off in the end this is Petes business to explain, we shouldn't be guessing almost three years into the game, even those of us in alliances with lots of battle and analytical number heads still don't have a complete clue and Pete isn't letting on either so we can never know if there is an actual error in a combat or not. This is a problem throughout the game where it has become a chore to fact check every turn, to have spreadsheets checking the numbers and still end up with errors that Pete fixes manually between the turns.

 

The information flow is also not optimum, for example how many of you knew that certain weapon types are degraded by atmophere ie firing into (orbital fleet BOMBarding or attacking a surface fort) or out of (Surface fort defending) Pete has said in emails that "some weapon types are degraded" Why not just tell everyone how that works and which systems are affected so you build your defenses accordingly and not wake up 60 turns later with the wrong tech researched and ships built.

 

How many of you understand how boarding combat works or if at all, especially those that bought high close combat modifiers.

 

How many of you understand ground combat? How Bombardment works and how defending against works? How you stage different versions of fighters on different options in the same fleet? I could go on but I just don't have the energy for it I've been waiting for the new Naval Combat document since the draft was presented two years ago and I'm starting to feel that I am waiting in wain and I build my fleets around a lot of theories and guesses and experiences of my friends since I have no solid rules to go on. I am lucky in having smart friends and allies that have helped out massively but I pity the solo player without those resources at his disposal...

 

Not so cheery

 

/Locklyn

[TErnest]

My analysis indicatest that it takes at least 2, but not more than 4 points of offensive firepower to destroy each point of ship's integrety.

 

Would Pete design in this confusion factor?

So we need up to 4 times the weapon strength to ship integrity to destroy it?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

 

Maybe not as such. But as Locklin points out in his (immediatly preceeding) rant, there is a great deal we do not know about the combat system. His strong feelings on the matter notwithstanding, that is the way things are.

 

There could be more than the known factors of offensive and defensive deployement location degrading firepower. Racial modifiers could degrade weapon strength below what appears on the battle results. Likewise, ship's crew quality, experience, and moral. Racial modifiers may also upwardly modify the effectiveness of armor, shields, or weapon-specific defensive systems.

 

Any of these factors, and many more that nobody may have thought of yet, could make it appear as though it takes multiple weapon strength points (as appearing on the printout) to take down one point of integrety.

 

The bottom line is that you can expect to have to shoot a ship with somewhere between two to four times its integrety in (unmodified) firepower points before it dies.

 

TErnest

[octagon999]

I find myself in odd disagreement with Bo, but, while he is correct that shots to the screens of the big ship would absorb any damage, would only one corvette be shot at, given the numbers?

 

I'm through guessing. Good luck.

[SargonKingOfSlith]

First of all - Thanks for posting this information. It is the only information that some of us have available.

 

I think I support TErnest' statements about Racial Modifier, Morale, etc.

 

It may be that 29 of the shots were spread out among 29 targets, and 2 shots hit a single target. Racial Modifiers may have affected this battle in such a way that a single hit wouldn't destroy 1 ship, but 2 hits would. Although now that I think about it, the battle report should have shown 29 ships were damaged.

 

On the other hand. Maybe none of us has the faintest clue how combat works.

[Lord Uriel]

First of all - Thanks for posting this information.  It is the only information that some of us have available.

 

I think I support TErnest' statements about Racial Modifier, Morale, etc.

 

It may be that 29 of the shots were spread out among 29 targets, and 2 shots hit a single target.  Racial Modifiers may have affected this battle in such a way that a single hit wouldn't destroy 1 ship, but 2 hits would.  Although now that I think about it, the battle report should have shown 29 ships were damaged. 

 

On the other hand.  Maybe none of us has the faintest clue how combat works.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Sargon,

My money is on your last statement. Of course, I'm also interested in hearing from all those who believe they have figured things out.

[WKE235]

First of all - Thanks for posting this information.  It is the only information that some of us have available.

 

I think I support TErnest' statements about Racial Modifier, Morale, etc.

 

It may be that 29 of the shots were spread out among 29 targets, and 2 shots hit a single target.  Racial Modifiers may have affected this battle in such a way that a single hit wouldn't destroy 1 ship, but 2 hits would.  Although now that I think about it, the battle report should have shown 29 ships were damaged. 

 

On the other hand.  Maybe none of us has the faintest clue how combat works.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Sargon,

My money is on your last statement. Of course, I'm also interested in hearing from all those who believe they have figured things out.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

Nice guess ... but no other ships in the NSI fleet showed any damage. Not even Minor damage. The only damage was the one destroyed ship.

 

As to the whole ratio of Firepower versus Integrity (and is 1 FP = 1 Int when a target is hit) ... one reason for this ship and some others like it (being built for more tests) was to try and determine this. Notice how the fire pulse is 1589 ... JUST under 1600 (or twice the integrity of the enemy corvettes). If the ratio was something like 2 FP = 1 Int I was hoping to see some random destroyed ships (hit by multiple fire or blew up due to critical hits) and then some others laying about crippled. If 1 to 1 I was expecting to see lots of blown up ships.

 

Any thoughts on what I should send in next for my experiments in combat terror/tactics? Don't worry about the NSI. NSI has two fleets in the system consisting of 500 Corvettes + 4 Cruisers. So he has a lot of ships I can experiment on (along with this minor fleet from this turn).

[hobknob]

It sure is nice of NSI to volunteer his fleet for space trials.

 

Suggestion for fleet.

 

Build a small fleet with about the same fire power per glob as you just mentioned and the same type of FC, but do it with more ships. I think 10 is a nice round number. I would also send them in at Deploc 2 so we can eliminate the variable of range degredation from the equation.

 

[Hughestrog]

It sure is nice of NSI to volunteer his fleet for space trials. 

 

Suggestion for fleet. 

 

Build a small fleet with about the same fire power per glob as you just mentioned and the same type of FC, but do it with more ships.  I think 10 is a nice round number.  I would also send them in at Deploc 2 so we can eliminate the variable of range degredation from the equation.

 

 

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

Wouldn't keeping them at Deploc 7 make for a better comparrison?

 

After that try a different Deploc.

[RTGPete]

Leaving to the airport in a few minutes - this battle might have worked perfectly, or it could have had a problem of some sort - I'll take a closer look at the battle when I get back. At first glance it does seem odd that the firepower globs didn't get distributed all over the place, which is what I would have expected on first glance. However, a more in depth look at every facet of the battle in question is needed to make a full determination.

[WKE235]

Leaving to the airport in a few minutes - this battle might have worked perfectly, or it could have had a problem of some sort - I'll take a closer look at the battle when I get back.  At first glance it does seem odd that the firepower globs didn't get distributed all over the place, which is what I would have expected on first glance.  However, a more in depth look at every facet of the battle in question is needed to make a full determination.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

We are all eagerly awaiting any information.

[T'Lariss]

If targetting is based solely on number of targets one would expect to see more corvettes destroyed.

 

If targetting is based on tonnage/deploc formula then you have to throw in the 10 other ships in DepLoc 2, each of which has more tonnage than all 45 corvettes.

 

It also appears that, even though the ship may be able to fire 31 times, each glob that fires is targeted independently and not necessarily at 31 different targets.

 

Basic answer is no one really knows.

 

 

Hmm, I also noticed that even though your Fire Rating is over 123,000 you actually only have 7 weapons involved.  It could be that even though your FC rating was 31 you actually only fired 7 globs.  With 6 spread out over the big boys and 1 against a minnow.  Also do we know for sure whether each shot actually hits?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

 

One other assumption is that every shot hits it's target. It is probably not the entire answer but I am willing to bet a some of the shots simply missed thier target

[Dr.0]

Hi,

 

This battle is disturbing. But the question that should be asked is this outcome an average result ot is the outcome or an extreme result?

 

I hope that there is randomness in the combat system. That is, if the same battle was fought 100 times there would be a range of possible results. I hope that "Midways" are possible in the game.

 

Now if these battle results are average, then the combat system does not work as advertised. A possible extreme result would be 1 hit and all misses on the one round of combat. Seems unlikely?!

 

One concern I have goes back to Victory. I am convinced that the random number generator in Victory was not very random. Too many consectutive identical (low probablility) results occur (for example in experience gain). So, is it possible that the random number generation is the problem here?

 

Jack

[WKE235]

Well, we know there is some randomness in battles. For example, we know you can sometime capture an enemy ship (having lost one this way myself, I can confirm). Also, I have seen a few examples where a battle resulted in no victors (two ships, virtually no weapons, one faster than the other, and the faster weaker ship eventually runs). And, in one of my battles, the narative put together by Pete implied that ships could ram other ships in battle as well as part of random action. No proof. But...

 

The question here is, shooting from Deploy Location 7 versus ships in Deploy Location 1, could I have missed 30 of 31 shots? Is there some set of factors (ship speed? ship size? Location vs Location? Sensors?) that may play into a "chance to hit" process? We know that bridge items increase fire control. But do sensors play a role in a battle?

 

So many questions to still experiment with.

[RTGPete]

Well, we know there is some randomness in battles.  For example, we know you can sometime capture an enemy ship (having lost one this way myself, I can confirm).  Also, I have seen a few examples where a battle resulted in no victors (two ships, virtually no weapons, one faster than the other, and the faster weaker ship eventually runs).  And, in one of my battles, the narative put together by Pete implied that ships could ram other ships in battle as well as part of random action.  No proof.  But...

 

The question here is, shooting from Deploy Location 7 versus ships in Deploy Location 1, could I have missed 30 of 31 shots?  Is there some set of factors (ship speed?  ship size?  Location vs Location?  Sensors?) that may play into a "chance to hit" process?  We know that bridge items increase fire control.  But do sensors play a role in a battle? 

 

So many questions to still experiment with.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

Shouldn't have missed like that - having just gotten back from vacation I'm not able to dig into the code with great enough detail to determine the exact issue as this turn cycle needs to run today, but it just doesn't look right. I've eliminated the additional non-targeted ships on the NSI side of this engagement as it seems pretty clear that they should have been destroyed. As I continue work on the combat routines I'll focus on this important section of the code.

[WKE235]

Well, we know there is some randomness in battles.  For example, we know you can sometime capture an enemy ship (having lost one this way myself, I can confirm).  Also, I have seen a few examples where a battle resulted in no victors (two ships, virtually no weapons, one faster than the other, and the faster weaker ship eventually runs).  And, in one of my battles, the narative put together by Pete implied that ships could ram other ships in battle as well as part of random action.  No proof.  But...

 

The question here is, shooting from Deploy Location 7 versus ships in Deploy Location 1, could I have missed 30 of 31 shots?  Is there some set of factors (ship speed?  ship size?  Location vs Location?  Sensors?) that may play into a "chance to hit" process?  We know that bridge items increase fire control.  But do sensors play a role in a battle? 

 

So many questions to still experiment with.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

Shouldn't have missed like that - having just gotten back from vacation I'm not able to dig into the code with great enough detail to determine the exact issue as this turn cycle needs to run today, but it just doesn't look right. I've eliminated the additional non-targeted ships on the NSI side of this engagement as it seems pretty clear that they should have been destroyed. As I continue work on the combat routines I'll focus on this important section of the code.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

Hopefully once the turns run you can dig into this section and squeeze out what happened. I didn't really care about the ships which were / weren't destroyed as this was a small battle and I was testing. But having a few dozen (give or take a bit) other NSI corvettes disappear into the ether does bring a tear to Admiral Jones eyes.

 

OH .. and I sent small fleet of Corvettes and another Medusa ship into another WP for additional testing. The results should be .. enlightening. (or quite embaressing if I failed to do the NUD order correctly to adjust a ship class. Would be horrible stick the Corvettes in Dep Loc 5 and the Medusa in Dep Loc 1 .. ouch!).