Pilot Tool: Directional Armor

[Milevan Faent]

Pretty simple concept. There would be one for each possible direction. Damage taken to that side of the ship is halved, but damage from guns on that side of the ship is reduced by 25%.

[Hoja Lateralus]

How do you imagine it UI-wise and fluff (logic?)-wise?

I think it's OP because:
-On galleon when you're a good pilot you have always on of your sides pointing at enemy. The galleon would be almost invincible.
-Similar with the junker, spire (front = kind of side?), mobula (?) and squid.

Fluff-wise I think it's simply silly. Only thing I can imagine are additional armour plates (which can be somehow set up and down in matter of seconds) which....er... somehow decrease damage of the weapon. I don't know how, actually.

Game-wise it may be considered if it's more like "Damage taken to the (side of?) the ship is halved and no gun (at the side) can be shot". Then it could be somehow balanced tool allowing to tank-up the hard moment. If we do this I'd also add time effect such is in hydrogene - hydrogene works around 5 seconds after turning it off - I'd say we could make it even 10 in this case (or 5 to activate and 5 to deactivate).

[Milevan Faent]

How do you imagine it UI-wise and fluff (logic?)-wise?

I think it's OP because:
-On galleon when you're a good pilot you have always on of your sides pointing at enemy. The galleon would be almost invincible.
-Similar with the junker, spire (front = kind of side?), mobula (?) and squid.

Fluff-wise I think it's simply silly. Only thing I can imagine are additional armour plates (which can be somehow set up and down in matter of seconds) which....er... somehow decrease damage of the weapon. I don't know how, actually.

Game-wise it may be considered if it's more like "Damage taken to the (side of?) the ship is halved and no gun (at the side) can be shot". Then it could be somehow balanced tool allowing to tank-up the hard moment. If we do this I'd also add time effect such is in hydrogene - hydrogene works around 5 seconds after turning it off - I'd say we could make it even 10 in this case (or 5 to activate and 5 to deactivate).

This is a Pilot Tool, so UI-wise, it's like any other Pilot Tool. It takes up a slot to use it for one side only. It's not like I can take this one tool and say "oh, they're on the right, so i'm gonna make my right side tanky", then as they go around you, changing that. No, it's more like "okay, they're behind me, but my only shield item is for my right side. Oh well, gotta take the damage." So you would have to take 3 Directional Armor items to shield all the normal sides, but that doesn't do anything for attacks above/below. There are 6 sides to any ship, after all.

The reason I made it weaken damage is 1) it needs SOME sort of downside, and 2) armor can get in the way of the weapons working properly, thus reducing their effectiveness. Beyond that, I don't need to apply any logic for how it works. I really don't. Why? Because hitting a boxy thing on my ship with a mallet shouldn't magically fix my balloon or hull. As that doesn't make sense, nothing else really has to make absolute sense either.

Working for a few seconds after it's turned off is fine. But Hydrogen lasts for THREE seconds, not five.

Balance wise, the Galleon that only has 1 side facing the enemy all the time, thus making it an easy choice which item to bring, also makes it so while it can tank damage, it's not dishing out nearly as much damage as normal. There are also multiple other sides that a faster ship like a Squid or Goldfish could get to, thus getting around the armor. Perhaps the effect only works on ARMOR and has no effect on damage to Hull.

The damage reduction and weapon reduction can both obviously be scaled to whatever is balanced. I simply threw out numbers for example purposes.

[Hoja Lateralus]

This is a Pilot Tool, so UI-wise, it's like any other Pilot Tool. It takes up a slot to use it for one side only. It's not like I can take this one tool and say "oh, they're on the right, so i'm gonna make my right side tanky", then as they go around you, changing that. No, it's more like "okay, they're behind me, but my only shield item is for my right side. Oh well, gotta take the damage." So you would have to take 3 Directional Armor items to shield all the normal sides, but that doesn't do anything for attacks above/below. There are 6 sides to any ship, after all.

This is my bad I guess for missunderstanding you (not reading good enough).

The reason I made it weaken damage is 1) it needs SOME sort of downside, and 2) armor can get in the way of the weapons working properly, thus reducing their effectiveness. Beyond that, I don't need to apply any logic for how it works. I really don't. Why? Because hitting a boxy thing on my ship with a mallet shouldn't magically fix my balloon or hull. As that doesn't make sense, nothing else really has to make absolute sense either.

Then I'd rather say it reduces the arcs of the weapons instead of reducing damage.
About the "making sense" thing I'd disagree. Although some things are highly simplified (this is how I see repairing components) or completely abandoned (the argument that gunner could drop under the weight of all the ammo he's carrying) the most things are made to more or less make sense. There are ideas that are turned-down because people can't see it working.

Balance wise, the Galleon that only has 1 side facing the enemy all the time, thus making it an easy choice which item to bring, also makes it so while it can tank damage, it's not dishing out nearly as much damage as normal. There are also multiple other sides that a faster ship like a Squid or Goldfish could get to, thus getting around the armor. Perhaps the effect only works on ARMOR and has no effect on damage to Hull.

Even then - you get double hwacha on your "tank side" and use a lot of phoenix claw. Even then you can easily disable the enemies and either wait for your ally to take them out or turn off the tool and do it yourself. There are faster ships but galleon has 2 heavy wepons at each side - which with good piloting and crew allow you to disable your enemy pretty quickly (hwacha / carronade / lumberjack - meaning not only on short range).
With squid you basically HAVE to always turn your right side to the enemy to be useful. With junker I'd see long-range side with 2-3 artemises and short-range side with directional armour.
On the spire and mobula you also HAVE TO be front-sided to your enemy and since both of those ship are fragile the 50% damage reduction could've made them extremely overpowered.

As I mentioned before - I think the acceptable trade-off would be -50% dmg and no gun can be shot.

[Milevan Faent]

This is a Pilot Tool, so UI-wise, it's like any other Pilot Tool. It takes up a slot to use it for one side only. It's not like I can take this one tool and say "oh, they're on the right, so i'm gonna make my right side tanky", then as they go around you, changing that. No, it's more like "okay, they're behind me, but my only shield item is for my right side. Oh well, gotta take the damage." So you would have to take 3 Directional Armor items to shield all the normal sides, but that doesn't do anything for attacks above/below. There are 6 sides to any ship, after all.

This is my bad I guess for missunderstanding you (not reading good enough).

The reason I made it weaken damage is 1) it needs SOME sort of downside, and 2) armor can get in the way of the weapons working properly, thus reducing their effectiveness. Beyond that, I don't need to apply any logic for how it works. I really don't. Why? Because hitting a boxy thing on my ship with a mallet shouldn't magically fix my balloon or hull. As that doesn't make sense, nothing else really has to make absolute sense either.

Then I'd rather say it reduces the arcs of the weapons instead of reducing damage.
About the "making sense" thing I'd disagree. Although some things are highly simplified (this is how I see repairing components) or completely abandoned (the argument that gunner could drop under the weight of all the ammo he's carrying) the most things are made to more or less make sense. There are ideas that are turned-down because people can't see it working.

Balance wise, the Galleon that only has 1 side facing the enemy all the time, thus making it an easy choice which item to bring, also makes it so while it can tank damage, it's not dishing out nearly as much damage as normal. There are also multiple other sides that a faster ship like a Squid or Goldfish could get to, thus getting around the armor. Perhaps the effect only works on ARMOR and has no effect on damage to Hull.

Even then - you get double hwacha on your "tank side" and use a lot of phoenix claw. Even then you can easily disable the enemies and either wait for your ally to take them out or turn off the tool and do it yourself. There are faster ships but galleon has 2 heavy wepons at each side - which with good piloting and crew allow you to disable your enemy pretty quickly (hwacha / carronade / lumberjack - meaning not only on short range).
With squid you basically HAVE to always turn your right side to the enemy to be useful. With junker I'd see long-range side with 2-3 artemises and short-range side with directional armour.
On the spire and mobula you also HAVE TO be front-sided to your enemy and since both of those ship are fragile the 50% damage reduction could've made them extremely overpowered.

As I mentioned before - I think the acceptable trade-off would be -50% dmg and no gun can be shot.

You seem to be forgetting that there is no reason for a Phoenix Claw to make a ship turn faster ;p

But that argument aside, certainly disabling the weapons is a possible option. I'm just not entirely convinced it would be necessary to go so far as to disable the weapons, but again that's on the side of balance, which I obviously can't really work on. Balance needs testing to determine how far is too far. Go too far in either direction, and something is either worthless or makes you God. Kind of like the Phoenix Claw actually. Reducing arcs, reducing damage, disabling guns, there are quite a few options for balance, but as I can't test it, it's impossible to figure out what would work right.

[Sprayer]

The phoenix claw is described as a lucky talisman. So it increases your luck in a way that winds just happen to support your ships turning.

[Richard LeMoon]

Basically a pilot's personal buff for one side of the ship.

50% damage reduction may be a bit high with just a debuff to guns, especially if you have a buffed hull as well (that would be a 95% armor increase, I think). Maybe reduce armor on all other sides to boot. I would give the tool a 30% increase in directional armor (69% increase when used with buffkit), -10% on all other sides. Damages your armor for 10% upon activation. Effect lasts for 5 seconds after tool is inactive, possibly giving another 10% damage to armor. This is to force the engineers to hit the hull in simulation of moving the armor around. In addition, reduce engine power on the armored side by 25%. I would not have it effect the guns at all.

[Milevan Faent]

Basically a pilot's personal buff for one side of the ship.

50% damage reduction may be a bit high with just a debuff to guns, especially if you have a buffed hull as well (that would be a 95% armor increase, I think). Maybe reduce armor on all other sides to boot. I would give the tool a 30% increase in directional armor (69% increase when used with buffkit), -10% on all other sides. Damages your armor for 10% upon activation. Effect lasts for 5 seconds after tool is inactive, possibly giving another 10% damage to armor. This is to force the engineers to hit the hull in simulation of moving the armor around. In addition, reduce engine power on the armored side by 25%. I would not have it effect the guns at all.

Hmm... this is actually a pretty good idea. I like it.