Airships V

Baneblade · 2004-10-25, 08:06 PM

Well after several large posts on the OF over a year ago, I think I'll make a post here for brainstorming. It has undergone many evolutions, from simply Galaxy gunships to continent impacting Star Wars scale Destroyers.

I think though I have the basic idea of what would work best overall.

I'll first introduce them.

In the Terran Republic's corner is the Foxtrot. For the New Conglomerate we have the Arcadia. And for the Vanu Sovereignty, there is the Scythe.

The Foxtrot's original incarnation was of a massive carrier mobile base. It is apparent that such a monster isn't appropriate for PlanetSide. The original Arcadia was a veritable battleship with more guns than usefulness, the main problem with that is it would dominate any engagement relatively easily. The original Scythe had a cloaking shield rather than a protective shield.

These Airships no longer contain spawn rooms, nor do they have extensive internal space. The effective crew is at least a squad. That is not including air based personnel. In this incarnation, these Airships are carriers. Not as imposing as the original Foxtrot, and certainly not as overpowering as the Arcadia, and lacking the stealth of the original Scythe.

The aspects that remain unchanged however are numerous.

The rules that Airships abide by:

They cannot fly lower than 250 meters.
They cannot fly higher than 350 meters.
They run on NTU, which they can only get from a Warpgate.
The crew boards via a routerlike teleporter. When 'landed' this is active and anyone can board (any empire)
The only other way someone can board is from the air.
The Airships have flight decks that can accomodate about 15 Aircraft (based on Airpad sizes, it will not be hard to be more efficient).
None of the Airship weapons are particularly effective against the ground (that is what the aircraft are for).
There are no generation facilities for vehicles, but there are equipment terminals.
The Airships will rearm and repair friendly vehicles* like normal airpads.
Docking an Airship is simply a matter of parking it on a token ring in sanc.
Airships are owned by Outfits, only the OL can authorize an Airship's undocking. However the actual controller is not important.

The Foxtrot has superior Damage over Time. The Arcadia has superior Range. The Scythe has less Range than Arcadia and less Damage over Time than Foxtrot.

Top Speeds
Foxtrot: 30 kph
Arcadia: 25 kph
Scythe: 35 kph

Acceleration
Foxtrot: 30 seconds
Arcadia: 35 seconds
Scythe: 25 seconds

Armor and Shield Values
Foxtrot: 100,000 Armor, 200,000 Shield (1,000/sec recharge)
Arcadia: 110,000 Armor, 240,000 Shield (600/sec recharge)
Scythe: 90,000 Armor, 160,000 Shield (1400/sec recharge)

NOTE: Keep in mind when looking at those values that the weapons on these Airships do upwards of 20k in 60 seconds...each. Note though that they aren't too useful against ground targets.

Fully recharging a shield from 0 takes 10% of total NTU capacity.

Weapon Systems - Energy Long
Foxtrot: 2x Dual 160mm Neutron Cannons
Arcadia: 2x Single 200mm Neutron Cannons
Scythe: 2x Single 180mm Neutron Cannons

Weapon Systems - Energy Short
Foxtrot: 3x Quad 40mm Ion Beams
Arcadia: 3x Dual 60mm Ion Beams
Scythe: 3x Dual 50mm Ion Beams

Weapon Systems - Conventional Long/Short
Foxtrot: 1x Locking Torpedo Launcher (1000 meter range)
Arcadia: 1x Guided Torpedo Launcher (800 meter range)
Scythe: 1x Locking and Guided Torpedo Launcher (600 meter range)

Weapon Systems - Other
All Three: AA Flak turrets (like Skyguard)

The Flight Deck on all three is a through deck design. Imagine it to be one long garage with openings on both ends so that you can fly through nonstop. They are designed to be long enough that a damaged aircraft can fly though and come out the other side full repaired and rearmed without any complicated maneuvers.

Landing on the flight deck is not permitted. There will be Landing pads outside the Flight Deck that are like the ones bases and towers use right now. Those pads are protected by the Airship's shield, but not the armor.

I'll post the weapon details soon.

Peacemaker · 2004-10-25, 08:17 PM

As a flyer that would fucking own in my book.

Psy · 2004-10-25, 08:38 PM

/agree, i think that would be awesome

lapaz · 2004-10-25, 09:04 PM

ok that has to be the best idear i ever heard

Baneblade · 2004-10-25, 09:27 PM

Now for the weaponry and crew.

The Single [barrel] 200mm Neutron Cannon has a 2000 meter range, 10 second RoF, 2000 Damage per shot, and does 12,000 Dmg/min.

The Single 180mm Neutron Cannon has an 1800 meter range, 9 second RoF, 1800 Dmg/shot, and does 12,000 Dmg/min.

The Dual 160mm Neutron Cannon has a 1600 meter range, 6.4 second RoF, 1440 Dmg/shot, and does 13,500 Dmg/min.

DoT: TR, NC/VS
Range: NC, VS, TR
DPS: NC, VS, TR
RoF: TR, VS. NC

The Dual 60mm Ion Beam has a 500 meter range, 2 second RoF, 600 DPS, and does 18,000 Dmg/min.

The Dual 50mm Ion Beam has a 450 meter range, 1.5 second RoF, 500 DPS, and does 20,000 Dmg/min.

The Quad 40mm Ion Beam has a 400 meter range, 1 second RoF, 360 DPS, and does 21,600 Dmg/min.

DoT: TR, VS, NC
Range: NC, VS, TR
DPS: NC, VS, TR
RoF: TR, VS, NC

Neutron Cannons are Dorsal and Ventral respectively, they all have 360 deg rotation, but can only pivot 20 deg (10 up, 10 down). They are located at the topmost and bottommost points of the Airship.

Ion Beams are situated a bit different. Two are oriented to the Bow (Dorsal and Ventral) with 270 deg of rotation (145 deg to each side). The third one is oriented to the Stern (Ventral) and has 270 deg of rotation (145 to each side). All three of them have 30 deg of pivot (15 up, 15 down).

Airships won't be effective close in unless at similar altitudes.

Energy Weapon DoT Totals
Arcadia: 78,000
Scythe: 84,000
Foxtrot: 91,800

Crew

There are 7 Gunner places, 5 Energy weapons, and 2 Flak turrets.
There are three bridge positions: Helm, Command, and Tactical

Helm is the driver of the Airship.

The Tactical station is where the Torpedo systems are controlled from, this station also acts as gunnery control. This person can designate targets for the gunners.

The Command station is filled by the Captain, from here the Captain can plot a navigation course for the Helm (the only waypoints seen by the Helm are plotted for the Helm by the Captain), talk to other Airship Captains on a secure command channel, and control the other two bridge stations if needed.

Captain determination: You must be in the Airship's Outfit and empowered to command one (the Captain is the only person who can order the Airship to undock in sanc). If there are multiple able outfit members on the bridge, the Command goes to the OL, PL, SL in that order.

NOTE: You must form a squad to crew an Airship.

Kam · 2004-10-25, 09:46 PM

Too bad it would take the devs a year to make that happen... modders have already done that in Tribes 3, and it is fucking awsome.

Baneblade · 2004-10-25, 09:49 PM

What really sucks is that I'm just a numbers guy, I can't show ya'll any visual depictions of what these look like. Well I could spend an hour with graphing paper...hehe.

Zorg · 2004-10-25, 09:52 PM

That's an awesome idea. My only (personal) beef with it is that I'd want the VS one should be the *best* at something. Not because I don't think it would be any less awesome - just that most of us are goddamn tired of getting things with less armor and more maneuverability.

Also, if you ARE going to stick us in the middle, then at least give us middling armor/shields, too. No matter what you say, when you're dealing with something that huge, maneuverability would mean dick all, unless it was extremely substantial.

Awesome concept, though. Me outfit would LOVE to get our hands on any one of these. And it beats out the 'bases' idea.

EDIT: Props. Tribes 3 Assault ships do indeed rock.

EDIT EDIT: "Locking AND guided?" (torpedo launchers) How would that work?

Baneblade · 2004-10-25, 09:59 PM

Well I am still not convinced the Scythe wouldn't be better with a cloaking shield. Would that be enough of an advantage?

Baneblade · 2004-10-25, 10:01 PM

The VS Torpedos can be either Locking like the TR or Guided like the NC. It's more of that Versatility thing.

Making an Airship version of the Lancer made no sense, since that is what Neutron Cannons are.

Zorg · 2004-10-25, 10:10 PM

Ah. Thanks for the clear on the torpedoes.

Cloaking shield would rock out, but it's hard to tell how much of an advantage it would really be. It might even be too much of an advantage - if those cannons do the damage you say they do, and you can fire them while cloaked...

If you can't though, and have to decloak, partially or totally, I think it would actually balance. That would require genuine playtesting, though. And you'd always get some whiners.

Baneblade · 2004-10-25, 10:20 PM

The thing about that though is that the shield is the main defense. A cloaking Scythe could shadow a Foxtrot and never enter range, but the long range weapons aren't going to kill the Foxtrot. And the Arcadia simply outranges the Scythe.

So if the cloak is to be effective, they need to be able to survive the retaliation fire long enough to win. Or travel in wolfpacks.

I play NC, but I would love to see a cloaking VS Airship.

Armor doesn't self repair, it has to be repaired in the Engineering room with glueguns. And that can be very slow. The other option is to repair in sanc at the token ring.

Anyway, my point is that after the shield is down, the armor isn't going to last.

A cloaked Scythe just supporting an Air Wing could be devastating in a ground battle. And since nobody can see it, that would be an amazing tactical advantage.

Kam · 2004-10-25, 10:28 PM

Originally Posted by Zorg

EDIT: Props. Tribes 3 Assault ships do indeed rock.

No, I'm talking about the giant flagship you start in in the single player scenario in Tribes 3. Im beta testing a mod an o boy they rock. Huge deck cannons, armor that is impregnable to regular rockets and rounds, 10 or 20 levels, a fleet of space fighters in the bay(not those pod fighters) and regular assault ships in the bay too. The deck cannons actually work and when a Phoenix and an Imperial ship meet in the upper atmosphere, you better stay clear cause one of them is going down in a ball of fire. God I love it. and everything within the ship is destructable too, ie the walls and doors. They can't be repaired either, only the invos can. They can also air drop ground vehs out of the bottom. Mwahahahaa, off to play.

Baneblade · 2004-10-25, 10:30 PM

That sounds awesome

Zorg · 2004-10-25, 10:31 PM

"A cloaked Scythe just supporting an Air Wing could be devastating in a ground battle. And since nobody can see it, that would be an amazing tactical advantage."

Only problem with that is that, pretty quickly, people are going to see where the flyers are going, call in another carrier, and within minutes, the VS advantage is lost. An AMS is a great tactical advantage, too, but then...ah, you've probably figured this all out already. I'm going to keep thinking on it and let somebody else step up to the plate.

One last thing that you didn't specify - what do you think the projected outfit point cost / time between pulls would be? If the VS carrier's was lesser, that might be a significant advantage in itself...