The Novelty Weapon Collection

[Danny420Dale]

Most KKWs can get close to enemy ships as almost all of their pieces have extremely high health to ensure they inflict considerable amounts of damage to their target.

In fact, the only concern is point beams, which are the only real defense capable of stopping a ship from taking damage from a KKW.

Very high speed and maneuverability also helps. I remember trying to hit Danny420's Waverider with the Kinetic Missile and his ship kept dodging the damn thing...

And such is exactly why I made the EKM. Waveriders are great dodgers as it is anyway.

[Arcalane]

Railguns = the bane of most KKW's.

Depends on how you build them. KKWs are either railgun immune (such as the Caretaker - it used to be railgun vulnerable, but this lead to ineffective assaults on ships with tweaked railguns) or not.

[Himura.Kenshin]

Are they supposed to be built AI controllable, or completely user controlled?

[TormakSaber]

I just slap them on Kamikaze AI and let them beeline for stuff.

[Himura.Kenshin]

Oh. I was always under the assumption they were made to be blown up by incoming fire.

[TormakSaber]

They are, but with the advent of Kamikaze AI, everything gets easier.

[Anna]

Oh. I was always under the assumption they were made to be blown up by incoming fire.

They were. But setting them to kamikaze AI means that if enemy fire somehow misses them, they'll still detonate, and at point blank range at that, meaning that there's less opportunity for point defenses to stop their destruction...

[Arcalane]

Oh. I was always under the assumption they were made to be blown up by incoming fire.

In some cases they are, but this can actually hinder their destructiveness. I tested this with the Caretaker against a ship with modified railguns; the core and spinal sections would be destroyed too soon, and a majority of the payload would scatter out to either side and never hit the target.

Also, point blank range doesn't necessarily mean the missile hits better. The AI ranges of ships can often cause them to take evasive maneuvers as they see the missile coming, thus they dodge the missile when it explodes (when the core touches the edge of the target's selection circle, in kamikaze mode) unlike a long range strike - though this reduces the effective damage due to HP lost in flight, it greatly increases accuracy and damage as the AI can't dodge properly.

[Normandy]

Oh. I was always under the assumption they were made to be blown up by incoming fire.

Originally, yes they were. However, people found the "ctrl-D" to be far easier. I didn't like it since I found it too easy to blow up huge ships that way.

[Water_and_Wind]

Our scientists in an undisclosed location have informed us that their new WMD prototype is ready for the testing. An initial picture of the schematics is shown below.



It appears that the scientists have taken the crude but effective terrorist-developed Kinetic Missile (but is now used by all factions) and increased its payload by a significant factor. As our simulations have shown that six Kinetic Missiles launched from six different directions around a Ragnarok-class superdreadnought barely scratch the paint of that monster of a ship, I am sure you will agree that we are in need of more advanced weaponry.

The second Kinetic Missile is not simply a beefed up version of its predecessor, however. Our technicians have installed an advanced self-destruct mechanism that detonates the missile at its optimal range; that is, just before reaching the ship, heading at full speed. We are told that the first time the self-destruct device was installed, the missile would explode too late, causing it to explode while deccelerating and reducing its potency. The problem was later solved by increasing the scan range of the self-destruct device.

As a last note, it has recently come to our attention that the blueprint we have shown you is, in fact, outdated. The damage rating of the second Kinetic Missile is actually 3000, or 1.5 times the carnage. We sincerely hope this weapon will be put to good use in your hands. Good day, captain.


http://www.wyrdysm.com/battleshipsforev ... sile_2.shp

[Aralonia]

...3000 HP on the KEM2? Isn't a KE warhead supposed to have low core HP so that it can be broken by long distance guns? You can set part HP yourself.

[Water_and_Wind]

Yes, but the KM2 is a uber wank weapon designed to destroy uber wank ships. And with increasing sandbox sizes comes increasingy long-ranged weapons, and with increasing range comes decreased KM efficiency. And the real reason is of course setting each part HP individually would be horrible (actually I think cloning sections clones HP data now as well so it won't be as bad as when the concept first started).

[Aralonia]

It always cloned part HP. I made my KE warhead at around the same time the first wave of KE weapons came out, and it had a core of 30 while the surrounding flechettes had a sectional HP of 1250 each.

[Lizzie]

Yes, but the KM2 is a uber wank weapon designed to destroy uber wank ships.

Well it failed in that aspect. Ragnarok took 3 (That was as much as my FPS would allow) and still was combat worthy.

[Water_and_Wind]

Yeah, I know. The Ragnarok can take much more than 3 KM2's. I guess a general rule of thumb is to set the section HP as least as high (twice as high is better) as the ship you are pitting it against. Which is easy to do with the KM2 but not with the KM1.

EDIT: Actually, against stuff with 5k HP or more, the standard KKW design probably isn't going to cut it anymore. I tried 10k HP KM2's (with 0.2 accel) against the Ragnarok and the damage was not that substantial.