More constricted firing arcs

from Stardock Forums
Sins currently has three types of firing arcs with varying amounts of "tolerance":

1) Weapon systems (front, back, left, right) with 180 degree arcs
2) Abilities with the "needsToFaceTarget" flag set -- like the Kol's Gauss Blast -- with 0 degree arcs
3) Abilities without the "needsToFaceTarget" flag set -- like the Kol's Gauss Blast -- with full 360 degree coverage

We really need more flexibility in setting weapon arcs for both weapons and abilities.

Visually, we've all seen how the Kol's beams can emerge at practically a 90 degree angle to the barrels of the guns. This reduces their feeling of power, because they no longer seem like massive, spinal-mounted cannon (like Homeworld's Ion Cannon), but merely "turrets on poles."

This also has critical gameplay impacts. The combination of weapon arc size and turn rate dramatically affects how vulnerable a ship is to getting swarmed. Imagine if the Ion Cannon Frigates from Homeworld or the Vaygr battlecruiser from Homeworld 2 had Sins-style 180 arcs for their forward weapons. It would completely remove those ships' sole weakness: vulnerability against small mobile strike craft.

If Sins capital ships had smaller firing arcs, their actual damage output could be boosted so that they actually feel significantly more powerful than other ships. With the current arcs, increasing their power is infeasible, since it would make them too effective against frigates, as in the Homeworld examples above.
7,300 views 10 replies
Reply #1 from Sins Forums Top
I like the idea. Would make a nice difference between the big ships and the little ones, and encourage more evasive movement during fighting.
Reply #2 from Stardock Forums Top
Correction to 3) above: I meant to mention the "Flak Burst" as an example of a 360 degree ability. Hooray for copy-and-paste!
Sins of a Solar Empire: Rebellion
Reply #3 from Sins Forums Top
Sounds good also in this could we get the frigates firing arcs changed since I would think that a frigate would not have the same firing arc as a lowly fighter/bomber like the cobalts do currently.
Reply #4 from Sins Forums Top
I would especially like it if we could set the firing arc in the ship files.

It would imho greatly benefit modding, if this would be possible.
Reply #5 from Sins Forums Top
Would be an interesting addition, I always wondered about how it made sense that the beams could emerge at such angels.

Can we also maybe improve some of the firing graphics, at least make lasser look a little different from auto cannons or whatever they all look the like the same color.
Reply #6 from Stardock Forums Top
Just wanted to bump this now that Beta "2.5" (0.78[b]) is out. This is far and away the biggest missing feature for me in Sins, both from a game balance point of view and a "feel" / visual flair point of view.

Certainly I want to see this in place before Beta 3 and multiplayer balancing begins, since (as I describe) it's a huge factor in balancing different ships.
Reply #7 from Sins Forums Top

It's on the list but multiplayer balancing/gameplay won't be starting until beta 4. Beta 3 is to deal with the myriad of inevitable multiplayer technical problems. (This isn't to say we won't do the weapon arcs before then.)

Reply #8 from Stardock Forums Top
Thanks for the response Blair, and for the clarification on the difference in purposes between beta 3 and beta 4.
Reply #9 from Sins Forums Top
I hate to resurrect this thread, but it's been two months, and given that Beta 4 is the feature-complete point for Sins, can we expect to see firing arcs make it in?
Reply #10 from Sins Forums Top

The public beta 4 is not feature complete and firing arcs are not in it. They may make it in before release but unfortunately they aren't high priority. We'll do our best.