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Maneuvering in space combat
swampace145
Member Posts: 2 Arc User
I don't know if this is the right place to put this, but I would really like to see improvements made to the way ships move in STO. Particularly angling up and down. I sometimes feel like I can't angle up enough to get to an enemy ship. Several of the maps are quite 3 dimensional yet our ships maneuver mostly in two dimensions. I would really like to see the ability to turn 360 degrees in the up and down directions.
I would love to here what other people think about this issue.
I would love to here what other people think about this issue.
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I think this is a game engine limitation. I'd like to see this happen too, but unfortunately I don't see it being possible. Cryptic already has their hands full dealing with the fallout from DR.
Missing the good ol' days of PvP: Legacy of Romulus to Season 9
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Its either an oversight/mistake that can't be fixed easily now or its intentional (3d space is disorienting in combat and some people would be frustrated with it).
I stand corrected then. It's not an engine limitation, it's a Dev limitation.
I agree, it's unlikely we'll see the kind of 3D movement we saw in DS9, ENT, and Star Trek Nemesis. For one, it would mess up how Evasive spirals work, and two, I bet they would feel it breaks immersion or some silly reason like that. As if real spacecraft align themselves to the same solar plane and never EVER fly upside down...
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Funny how Champions players manage not to be. :rolleyes:
But they have the ground to orient to. In space there is no correct "up" or "down". I can see where it could be disorienting to some. Still, it would be cool. :cool:
"You were in a 4G negative dive with a Klingon Bird of Prey?"
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Well, considering space maps have the same limitations as ground maps, than it shouldn't be to difficult to get oriented at all.
Space maps in this game, are really no different than a ground maps, except in the space ones, you are not always stuck at the bottom of the map.
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I played X-Wing and Tie Fighters back in the day. It was open space and full 3d combat. But they had a good sensor/radar system, it was even better then what EVE online has. EVE has a list of targets, you click on targets and a set of cross hairs shows up on them that extends all the way from your vertical screen edges and horizontal screen edges. I think you get arrows pointing you in the direction you have to turn to. Or you can just click on the target in the list, right click and select one of several options like orbit at xxxxx meters, stay xxxxx meters away or fly to. X-Wing and Tie Fighters basically took a sphere and put you right in the center of it. Then they sliced that sphere into a rear half and front half. Even though the sphere was flat it still did a good job of showing you where stuff was. If you are looking at the rear sensor sphere/circle a blip in the center of it was a target directly behind you. If a blip was between the center and right edge then the target was behind you to the right. If the blip was between the center and the top edge then it was behind you and above you. It doesnt matter what outside references there are the orientation that matters was your ship.
The only way to mess that up is if they put outside references that are messed up. A good example of this is A Step Between Stars. You fight on the surface of a star and its the right orientation. But the next part you fight in the Jenolan sphere but the surface is sideways. For some people it can be a little disorienting. But dont feel so bad about it...i've been playing flight sims and space combat sim games for a while and even i get a little disoriented fighting that mission. The trick is to not focus on it, but its kinda hard when its right there in your face. IIRC even professional and military pilots get training for that kind of thing, but even with training there are crashed that have been attributed to this kind of thing. In certain situations pilots cannot rely on outside references or that "gut feeling". The horizon may be straight and level but the direction your aircraft is traveling may not. Your body might get the sensation that the aircraft is behaving a certain way but it actually is behaving differently from what you are feeling. Thats why pilots are trained to use instrumentation in certain situations and ignore outside references. But that can be a bit unsettling...which is probably why planes crash because of those reasons because even though they know they have to watch instruments they watch stuff they arent supposed to watch.
but yah...3d space combat in sto, thats what we were talking about right?
Sorry, which episodes had one ship moving "straight up" (or other extreme angle) in relation to other ships? In Nemesis I recall they pretty much came straight at each other.
Yes I think it part of it as well. Players were getting "lost" in Nebula, so...
Straight up as in Z +/- a couple thousand meters? or you mean actually "climbing" and going nose up until they are flying vertical?
The original Wrath of Khan in the battle of the Mutara Nebula Spock points out that Khan is smart but not experienced and that his pattern indicates 2 dimensional thinking. So Kirk told Sulu to go Z minus a few thousand meters. But the way they did it was like a submarine dive but without the pitching nose down/nose up.
There was also the final fight in Undiscovered Country when General Pointy McShakespeare just started to open fire on the Excelsior. But this isnt definitive because the camera angle shows his B'Rel firing the torpedo but it was at a normal orientation. But the torpedo that hits the Excelsior came from directly below them. One could say that the B'Rel was coming straight up at them. But one could also say that the B'Rel was shown firing that Excelsior torpedo because people would say 'wtf' if they had the B'Rel sideways or upside down, or in the actual orientation relative to Excelsior. But then again in the movies and shows if the plot requires it a torpedo will take a not so direct approach towards its target. And that actually happens when the Enterprise fires its modified torpedo.
(Yes in WoK the Enterprise moves "down and up" but it remains mostly parallel to the same plane the Reliant is on.)
This is just so much bs lol dont know where to start so i just explain the fact that a ship moving in euclidian 3-space (with the standard scalar product) is just a simple moving frame with nothing singular or even slightly complicated about it.
I know Id love to at least be able to pitch at more extreme angles. I hate having to stop what Im doing and do the toilet spiral to get into a fireing arc. As for full 3d Id not mind trying it. I do like the x series of games and enjoy elite dangerous so far. I will admit the system they came up with is fun though I do rather enjoy space combat in sto. Something I always thought would have been interesting to see and a way to test what can be done is make it so that shuttles had no gimble lock or at least only at a very extreme pitch with an ability to control your own roll. That way they would feel more like small fighters buzzing around the larger ships like what you see in old ww2 footage and movies.
ST:TNG "All Good Things..."
Riker in the modified Enterprise-D (Galaxy-X) spinal lances a Klingon Battlecruiser from below and flies through the debris.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P0R0mdEP5fc
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But it's not me you have to convince - it's Cryptic.
If I recall correctly the game engine comes from champions online originally and one of the limitation was 45 degree climb and dive and was originally put in for flying superheros. I wouldn't expect any changes anytime soon.
Star trek II The wrath of Khan also had 3d maneuvering (vertical)
You're not the first to ask for this. This has been asked for since STO was new and it comes up now and then. It would also be an interesting thing to have Ventral & Dorsal shield facings (top and bottom) to reflect the 360 degree nature this entails. It makes me think of the TNG alternate universe episode where the Gal-X Enterprise decloaks directly below a Negh'Var and destroys it with what STO calls its Phaser Lance.