Pilot Archive
Thread: Firing Patterns: Truth or Myth?
Maudee wrote:
I mean obviously its less coding to use pinpoint locations. But seriously.... the X's hitbox IS bigger than a JSF's.... why isn't its... uhh... laser attack box? (lol)
Well, for simply the reason you pointed out: much easier to code. Though... I suppose it wouldn't be much harder to make it as if the fighters were shooting out rectangles instead of points. At least in firing. The collision detection would be a bit harder...
More to the point, though: why (if this is true for all ships) didn't they let the game track a vector for each 'visual' gun? If the b-wing, for instance, instantiates weapon fire along four different vectors, why wouldn't the game allow for individualized vector instantiation for each linked weapon?
Damage calculation is the only answer that I can come up with... Though, really... how often do you expect to hit with both bolts from a single blaster shot? Or more than two bolts coming from an interceptor? Heck, increased damage potential by separate damage calculations with each bolt from an interceptor would make it into a much nicer ship to fly--competitive with the rotw ships, even.
Time to outfit my T/A.I'm getting weird result when shooting at a target in cycle fire mode and alpha strike(all shots fired at the same time) mode.
I disable a target and alpha strike it...miss...all bolts go around a target.
I don't move but switch to cycle fire and the individual shots hit...
it may be 2 bolts per mount, but i bet the end result would be the same if that was the case, a point in between both bolts that scores damage. gun 1 definately fires 2 bolts though. it is kind of a bummer in regards to the interceptor. however, there may be something very real to the fact that some graphics make it more difficult to score a hit visually. i personally can't hit anything in an interceptor, and my aim in an x-wing/b-wing/z95 is pretty horrible as well. but lot's of people say they do more damage in an interceptor and attributed it to the spread. maybe they aren't exactly wrong, maybe the way it's set up visually helps some people land shots more frequently. if you think about it, the bolts can kind of make a 2nd recticle framing the kill zone, in a way.
small consolation, i know. i'm not sure why they did it this way either, aside from simplicity. possibly they did it to reduce server side calculation? gotta get the performance we see in space somewhere. that's just an off the wall guess.
Phizuol wrote:
Woah, sorry to stir up such a nest of bees. I'm not trying to rock anyone's world, its just a question I had to answer as an ARC pilot (where spread is REALLY an issue.) Now that I use the bolts as merely a guidline for lead and use my crosshair to aim my accuracy has gone up a lot.
I'm sure you didn't, but it is a very interesting issue now that it's been brought up. Special thanks to Meeuki for expanding the testing (and for Leaph and Duc for making Meeuki explain it over and over again
)It explains a lot of experiences that a lot of people have had for most of a year:
*Trying to get the stupid Z95 to hit a slow moving target as a low level Alliance Pilot
and
*Sitting in front of the Bridge of the ISD in an X-Wing and being able to hit it with all three weapons when the outside ones are obviously missing.
in particular (but there are plenty of others)
While not exactly galaxy-shattering, it's enough to make a bunch of us re-evaluate how we fly a significant number of the ships out there... Z95, X-Wing, ARC, B-Wing (because this is also confirmation of that spread), Rihk, Krayt, and most of the TIEs are all obvious ones, but ideas about most ships should be affected in one way or another.
Shona
that's a good test. i'm not doing it though! lol
i'll take bets on the outcome though, i bet all dmg boxes are the same size.
quadpers0n wrote:
i'll take bets on the outcome though, i bet all dmg boxes are the same size.
Rhu wrote:But if they are already doing four shots for the b-wing, that shouldn't be that much more of a load. It isn't like it is adding an order of complexity to hit calculations or anything.
Hell, I don't seem to recall much server-side lag when going up against the Star Destroyer (before the client-side horror), or from charging into a nest of six friendly gunboats with a dozen interceptors on my tail...
Well the real irony is that they already ARE doing collision detection on the graphical bolts. Where your graphical bolts land cause shield flare and the red X when you shoot friendlies. This is independant of actual damage.
Hitting a ship with your graphical bolts but not your "line of effect" causes shield flare but causes no damage. Alternatively, hitting a ship with your line of effect but not the bolts (like in my 2nd screenshot where the bolts go around the A-wing) causes no shield flare but does cause damage. The conclusion here is that the game does pay attention to where your lasers land.
So now we know the cause of shield flare.. its a representation of the graphical bolts hitting the hitbox. Shield flare may or may not accompany a damage hit.
So then the question again, why did they do it this way? Why does damage (from some ships) come from the center of the ship? I believe its because of the AI. How hard would it be to program the AI to understand the firing box of every ship? Wouldn't it just be a lot easier on the AI if every ship fired from the center? Well, that's my guess anyway.
Phizuol wrote:
Rhu wrote:
But if they are already doing four shots for the b-wing, that shouldn't be that much more of a load. It isn't like it is adding an order of complexity to hit calculations or anything.
Hell, I don't seem to recall much server-side lag when going up against the Star Destroyer (before the client-side horror), or from charging into a nest of six friendly gunboats with a dozen interceptors on my tail...
Hitting a ship with your graphical bolts but not your "line of effect" causes shield flare but causes no damage. Alternatively, hitting a ship with your line of effect but not the bolts (like in my 2nd screenshot where the bolts go around the A-wing) causes no shield flare but does cause damage. The conclusion here is that the game does pay attention to where your lasers land.
So now we know the cause of shield flare.. its a representation of the graphical bolts hitting the hitbox. Shield flare may or may not accompany a damage hit.
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This is my experience as well. Tried the ARC 170 out last night concentrating on centering the shot and not were the bolts hit the target. Shots that did not appear to hit the target did register full dammage as long as the target was in center. I think dammage may be adjusted depending on how far off center you are when you hit which mayexplain less dammage or different dammage weapons hitting independantly of one another. Not every hit had shield flare and not every flare had dammage to go with it but dead center shots did register. Off center shots registered less. WAY off center with graphic "hits" often did nothing.