The Barracuda Sky Torpedo

[Squidslinger Gilder]

Design and concept for a new medium weapon.

Had this idea come up the other day but I now want to type it up after its been in my mind awhile.

Weapon mount: Medium
Range: Long
Rate of fire: Slow
Reload: Very Slow
Ammo capacity: 4-6 shots
Primary damage: Piercing
Secondary damage: Explosive

Yes, thats right, it is a armor piercer. Now here is the concept behind it. You basically have a large revolver or clip fed weapon with a tube that fires one torpedo at a time. The torpedo will likely be rocket powered, not propeller so it can have a smoke trail effect. Like when a torpedo has a trail in the water, this would have one in the air. The ammo is long range ammo which you can shoot from afar but it will travel slow.

Another concept in the ammo I have been pondering is that it would have it's own balloon. A tiny one, just enough to keep it afloat. Considering that the ammo will be very heavy as well as long. Adding a small pop up balloon that carries it to it's destination might look rather unique and like something this world would design. Also this would mean the shot could be shot down before impacting. But picture this, a long slender torpedo with a small slender angular pointed balloon sitting on top. If you've seen old concept art for this game, think the one with that very pointed looking balloon. Not like a Pyra, but actual balloon shape.

Rate of fire is a question I toy with. I think making it slow would make the most sense as the weapon would have to be lifting another heavy torpedo into the barrel before firing. If the concept of a heavy gun works then it would also need a slow turn rate and not a whole lot of range of movement.

Balancing could be done a lot of ways. But the question of why use this when you have other guns and small mount armor piercers? Because simply, it would be something new. Folks get tired of mercs or gats on the side of Galleons. Also this could change up the weapon placement on Spires allowing them to put more hull killer weapons on the small mounts vs armor piercers. Also it would look neat seeing a streaking torpedo heading towards an enemy. They would have time to dodge if they caught it, but if not it would devastate a ship unaware. Specially if it had an aoe factor with burst ammo where multiple parts would get damaged at once like with mines. Plus you'd have a lot of call outs of "TORPEDO!!! LOOK OUT!!! HARD TO STARBOARD!!!" Come on, that would be awesome fun! On Zuka ships it would be Zukpedo so that works too.

Issues I see...could the game engine handle it? Would the smoke trail be a bit too much? Would it need an arming timer? Would it be even neater if the gunner could manually set the arming timer like old torpedoes did have? Lot of concepts, so I throw it before you all. Have at it!!

[Squidslinger Gilder]

Another concept would be adding some magnetization ability to the tip. Giving the torpedo some minimal tracking capability if it manages to get close to a ship. I kinda tossed this idea out as it I figured it might make it a bit too powerful. Also implementing such a system could be problematic because you don't want it to turn suddenly in the air and then plant itself into a ship. It would have to be a slow turn. I'm sure it is doable but it would be an extra addition that I don't think would be totally necessary.

[Pickle]

A long-range, self-powered mine with a restricted guidance mode?

Could be fun, as long as it's friendly-fire enabled.  Thinking of the final scene on THFRO between Red October, Dallas and the Alpha, where the Alpha becomes the target of his own torpedo.

[Squidslinger Gilder]

Kinda, that is when the concept really hit me. Playing with the mines in the dev app. Why not stop at mines? Make a form of aerial torpedo!

I had tossed around the idea of aerial torpedoes awhile back but I didn't know how it would work. The only concept I had to go on was the torpedoes in Skies of Arcadia which fire more like a boomer sub's missile. They fire upwards and then come in from high altitude down on a target. Actually makes it a long range artillery with guidance capability. Didn't see it ever working in Guns. Then playing with the mines, I saw a possibility.

Now, could go with a gun where all the torpedoes are already loaded. Which would make it not a single barrel but a quad or hex barrel. So you would have torpedo doors which would open and close. One would open when it was time to fire, and then close on reloading or on torpedoes not able to be fired yet. The weapon loading system would be more like the hwacha where it loads from underneath. But then you'd be cutting down torpedo sizes. Ideally need something big enough so it is visible aside from the telltale cloud streak behind it.

[Pickle]

A destroyer style mount would work..



Or something like an ASROC launcher.  Like the mine it's fired in an arc, with an arming time before the balloon deploys and the motor kicks in.  That way there's also the skill element of judging the altitude at which it deploys.  Can't have it too easy to use.

[Squidslinger Gilder]

Yep exactly, that was another idea I was pondering. That launcher is a simpler version of one I had in mind but basically that is it.

Now if you made something like that rotating and had at least one of the barrels always under the deck, then you could say the reload system is underneath. Which would mean to reload it would have to physically rotate one at a time for all the tubes. So hwacha you got about 14 sec reload. For a torpedo system like this it would be completely reasonable to give it a 15-20 second reload. Could go less but I wonder on the balancing.

[Echoez]

Anything that can possibly be a major threat to those damned Galleons camping spawn all day is welcome in my scope. This looks like an interesting idea too, plus since we have mines and ships, why not torpedoes right?

[Pickle]

Could be a good anti-sniper tool.. at least encouraging them to move rather than sit stationary as a stable gun platform.

Give it a clip of either 2 or 3 torpedoes (it doesn't need to rotate barrels) with a 10-30 rpm firing rate (2-6 seconds between shots) with the animation/sound indicating that compressed air pressure is being built up in the air reservoir in preparation for launch.  And give it a 15-20 second reload (or allow only 2 or 3 torpedoes in the air per launcher, i.e. one clip).  It shouldn't be torpedo spam.  I'm not sure if it should be damage scaled for a heavy/medium weapon or as a light weapon.  I favour making it less damaging and having it as a light weapon with a limited horizontal firing arc.

Perhaps it doesn't have to be guided.  For breaking up snipers it just needs a large AoE and proximity detonation, with shatter damage as the secondary.

[Sgt. Spoon]

I actually love the idea of this. I'd imagine it to have 1 or maybe two torpedoes in one clip, making them quite slow firing, low velocity, heavy hitters that'll rack your armor with a single heavy blow. Of course you need the arming time, and I'm also a fan of the stinger like (and a lot of other RPG's) launch mechanism to eject it and once it's armed it ejects the balloon and starts the rockets/propellers.

I can't help to want it with a propeller as the means to move it though, which would make it a bit different from just being a big missile. Though the only reason I can think of as to why they'd want to use a propeller instead of rockets would be the less noticeability of the propeller.

[Pickle]

You can still have a smoke trail with a prop-drive, it's just an oily, smokey engine driving it.

Just don't let the art department do anything silly, like a triple contra-rotating prop (as on the Galleon).

[James T. Kirk]

I just have this image of four Goldfish holding down B point on King of the Flayed Hills. Each captain is firing his torpedos one after another in a glorious act of teamwork and awesome.

[Mattilald Anguisad]

Nice Idea, but I'd replace either weapon types with something else, becouse Piercing Explosive combo on a single weapon would be too powrfull. Other alternative to make it a very slow destroyable object (no more than 40-45 m/s)

[naufrago]

Something that might be fun: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gyrojet

Basically, it accelerates after leaving the barrel, but after its fuel is burned up it continues at a fairly constant speed. Would make it hard to lead properly at close range, but could be fun at long range. They were technically developed in the 1960s, but eh, alternate history.

[Squidslinger Gilder]

Yeah I considered other damage types but then I considered what torpedoes were meant to do. Simply, sink ships. Having explosive/explosive would be just another flak cannon. We already have that on medium gun mounts. Same with shatter and flecette. Only one not used is piercing. Course it could be an Explosive/Piercing weapon since we don't have one of those. Now yes I considered it might get OP, which is why I thought of a slower traveling projectile along with slower loading/etc. This weapon wouldn't be meant to leap across the map. It would be meant to be visible and fill a captain with dread knowing they have to evade it at all cost or suffer a massive hit that would expose them.

If used in tandem with hwachas you could have a hwacha barrage go first. As the rockets streak, a torpedo fires behind them. With a ship's engines disabled they would have little means of avoiding the torpedo they suddenly see at the last second since they'd be busy repairing/rebuilding.

I would be all for a prop driven weapon delivery system if it satisfied the in visual effect of the device. Also, it would be extra moving parts on a weapon. Having the draw a tiny spinning propeller for ammo that will soon explode, I dunno if that would cause a whole new set of bugs/problems. Perhaps Muse will eventually chime in and let us know if this is any bit feasible.

The picture of goldfish firing torpedoes...exactly the thought I had in mind last night. Think they would look awesome firing from those. Like torpedo boats in the sky!

[Pickle]

You don't have to animate it rotating, just have it flip between two positions 60 degrees apart (three-bladed prop) and flash these positions up alternately every quarter second or so.  Just get the wagon wheels in the western movie effect.

I favour an AoE disabler, shatter and flechette.  Not a ship killer, but something that will disable a sniper long enough for you to close on them.  With a proximity fuse it will never actually hit the target, just detonate within a half-AoE radius of the first ship it encounters.