Ship Designs (Moving turrets)

from Sins Forums
Hi, hope you're all well. First time I've posted here; I was going to wait for the Beta 3 before I started giving my thoughts on the game, but this one's been bugging me a little!
So far I think the mechanics of the game work well. My most pressing concerns have already been brought up in other posts so I won't bother going into those.

I've a few issues with some of the ship designs. Some of them are fugly (as has been brought up before) but it's more the small things that are getting on my nerves. To start, the flack frigate. It has 4 turrets, but they only cover the top half of the ship making it look a lot like a boat. Pretty much any and all recent space RTS, Sims or shooter games feature capital ships (I.E anything bigger than a bomber or corvette) that have full 360 circular weapons coverage. An example: this is a stock destroyer modded by a fan in homeworld 2.
Which brings me onto the turreted weapons. I'm assuming that that in the full version the turrets will move and track their targets?
This leads onto some of the static weapons, like the front beam / laser cannons on the Kol battleship. For a start they just look poor (in the shadowed picture on the top banner of this page they look good, but not in game) and they also fire like a turret. On several occasions the ship has been at a 90 degree angle to it's target, and yet the lasers still fire with 2 beams even going through the ship itself.

Your thoughts on this?
15,201 views 70 replies
Reply #1 from Sins Forums Top

Your thoughts on this?


eh
Reply #2 from Sins Forums Top
Which brings me onto the turreted weapons. I'm assuming that that in the full version the turrets will move and track their targets?

They have no plans on doing that unless the devs have changed there minds, we wont see trackable turrets.

Personally i feel its a shame if they dont add it, looking at the ship models i dont think we are going to see it
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Reply #3 from Sins Forums Top
Not going to add tracking turrets? The turrets are going to fire radically off-bore or the ship itself will have to turn to shoot with TURRETS? Homeworld had tracking turrets and it is now like, what 8-9 years old? It can't be that hard (and now I will get crucified by the people who actually know about programming   )
Reply #4 from Sins Forums Top
i want tracking turrets also... but who knows if we will ever see it...
Reply #5 from Sins Forums Top
Not that it's hard, just expensive for the CPU
Reply #6 from Sins Forums Top
ohh so what! it looks cool
Reply #7 from Sins Forums Top
Not that it's hard, just expensive for the CPU


Which is why this option can be placed under "effects" in the option menu, like the space elevators, etc.

But not having tracking turrets in the final would be a big letdown.

It just looks silly if your Kol fires its autocannons in a 90° arc to the guns barrel.
Reply #8 from Sins Forums Top
Well, I can live without tracking turrets, remember that we have tens of times more large ships then in homeworld.

I do agree that the flak firgate should have better firearcs on it's turrets though.
Reply #9 from Sins Forums Top
I like the TEC designs as pirate ships more than regular military... the pirates simply use outdated and jurry rigged designs, such as the current flak frigate and the Kodiak space tank of stupid.

The TEC ships should be very similar but more intelligent, the Flak frigate should be changed to reflect this its just too boat like now. Notably the Kodiak should really have that big top turret move... it could be the only tracking turret and I'd forgive it all of its ugliness.
Reply #10 from Sins Forums Top
They have no plans on doing that unless the devs have changed there minds, we wont see trackable turrets.

Personally i feel its a shame if they dont add it, looking at the ship models i dont think we are going to see it


Really big cannons will rotate, really small ones will not.

Not going to add tracking turrets? The turrets are going to fire radically off-bore or the ship itself will have to turn to shoot with TURRETS? Homeworld had tracking turrets and it is now like, what 8-9 years old? It can't be that hard (and now I will get crucified by the people who actually know about programming )


Correction, homeworld had really big tracking turrets, they did not have small tracking, rapid firing turrets. Nor did Homeworld have such large fleets.


The TEC ships should be very similar but more intelligent, the Flak frigate should be changed to reflect this its just too boat like now. Notably the Kodiak should really have that big top turret move... it could be the only tracking turret and I'd forgive it all of its ugliness.


The TEC have only been at war for ten years, they dont have much time to go through to make sure things look good. I think we have had this discussion already.
Reply #11 from Sins Forums Top

They have no plans on doing that unless the devs have changed there minds, we wont see trackable turrets.

Personally i feel its a shame if they dont add it, looking at the ship models i dont think we are going to see it


Really big cannons will rotate, really small ones will not.


well sins dont have either
Reply #12 from Sins Forums Top
well sins dont have either


That we know of.
Reply #13 from Sins Forums Top
Then way say "Really big cannons will rotate, really small ones will not." ?
Reply #14 from Sins Forums Top
Because that is what the devs said. Unless that has changed. They said that the full game will have some ships with big enough turrets that making them rotate once in a while wont eat up a bunch of CPU.
Reply #15 from Sins Forums Top
oooh i see, hmm dont remember that, but i hope it will happen then

its not like if we dont get trackable turrets, it will kill the game, but for visual effect it would be cool
Reply #16 from Sins Forums Top
trackable turrets when shooting at Multianna's ships would please me more, so it MUST be implemented!
Reply #17 from Sins Forums Top
I think they should implement moveable turrets in Sins. Reasons and rebuttals.

- This game is waaaaaaaay off supcom for being cpu intensive. People too paranoid!. Moveable turrets is not going to make this game need a quadro core ffs! and tbh by Feb 2008 people will have better PCs. my celeron 1.6ghz can run sins!

- StarWars EaW didnt do moveable turrets but people still bought that game because its starwars. Sins hasnt got that same luxury.

- Average consumers are very superficial. Turrets that dont move is the sort of thing that superficial scrubs will complain about in the game even if the gameplay is topnotch. Y'know on stuff like metacritic. I could write a thesis on why sins gameplay is awesome and unique , just takes a 10 year old to go "OH MY FUCKING GOD , TURRETS DONT EVEN MOVE!!11shift1" , then replies will go "omg im not getting this junk if it cant do what a 5 year old game can still manage to do"...ecetera.

- SOTS did it.

- Homeworld 2 did it. the Battleship had pulsar turrets that tracked. Tbh, the turrets on the kol are scaled the same size as the ones on the bc so theres no excuse really.



Reply #18 from Sins Forums Top
As long as the big turrets track, I don't mind if the small turrets don't.
Reply #19 from Sins Forums Top
the Battleship had pulsar turrets that tracked


First off those things fired slowly, and they also stayed. Second that gun could miss, guns in sins can not. Thirdly the turret itself didnt move, the laser beam thing did.

Reply #20 from Sins Forums Top
How small of turrets are we talking here? (I haven't played the beta show I have no clue) Are the frigates with turrets close to the equivalent size of Homeworld frigates? Because assualt frigate and support frigates had tracking turrets (though I never used assualt frigate...why when ion beam friagtes are so godly?). For those of you who didn't play homeworld...first of all shame on you. Second of all, frigates were basically minor capital ships and a frigate was about (correct me if I'm wrong) half the size of the next biggest capital ship the destroyer, and a third or fourth the size of a heavy crusier (the biggest capital ship). You do have a point about the smaller fleets (I never really had more than 20-25 frigates and no more than like 12 capital ships and that was in REALLY long games). But processing power has gone up enormusely since 1999 (remember More's law?) Processing power will double every 18 months...that means today's machines are nine times as fast as when homeworld came out (I hope I got that math right). Are there nine times as many frigates (per person, a homeworld game with a bunch of players/bits could have well over a hundred frigates) in Sins? Can you get fleets of 180-225 frigates? If you can then god damn that's a lot of ships and I immediately withdraw my objection   .
Reply #21 from Sins Forums Top
Are the frigates with turrets close to the equivalent size of Homeworld frigates?


No a frigate is a bit smaller. About 1/10th of a Kol cap Id say. And only a few frigates have turrets, most just have guns strapped to the front.

You do have a point about the smaller fleets (I never really had more than 20-25 frigates and no more than like 12 capital ships and that was in REALLY long games). But processing power has gone up enormusely since 1999


Yes, but so have graphics. The graphics of HW2 dont compare so well with Sins. Plus the scalling of all the units, planets and stars take up a lot of CPU as it is. Plus not to mention that once trade and culture start thats also an add on. HW2 may have had tracking turrets but Sins has a lot more features and a lot more going on in the background aside from the battling.
Reply #22 from Sins Forums Top
Very true...but how large can your fleets get in say...a two system, 60 planet game?
Reply #23 from Sins Forums Top

Very true...but how large can your fleets get in say...a two system, 60 planet game?


depending on how many planets you have, but if we say you got 30 planets with fully upgraded fleet support, id guess:

8 capships
50 cruisers
400 frigats
Reply #24 from Sins Forums Top
the Battleship had pulsar turrets that tracked


First off those things fired slowly, and they also stayed. Second that gun could miss, guns in sins can not. Thirdly the turret itself didnt move, the laser beam thing did.



No you are completely wrong on all accounts. Firstly They DO track and move , try playing homeworld 2 and testing it rather then just guess. I just played it for the 10zillionth time and saw moving pulsar turrets.

Secondly , Turret movement animation is independant of the direction and creation of projectile fire. Just like it is now, projectile fire moves one way , turret stays stationary. This is because they are two different entities.. Its better to have the turret point towards the enemy so it looks like the projectile fire actually comes out of the turret , and thats all I want.

And thirdly I can mod the pulsar to fire rapidly , I can mod the pulsar to hit 100%. . doesnt mean they cant code turrets to point towards a target.





Reply #25 from Sins Forums Top
trackable turrets when shooting at Multianna's ships would please me more, so it MUST be implemented!


yah, he needs to look at SOMETHING besides his entire fleet going boom