Guns Of Icarus Online

Main => Gameplay => Topic started by: Plasmarobo on August 12, 2013, 01:04:11 pm

Title: Ghost ships
Post by: Plasmarobo on August 12, 2013, 01:04:11 pm
On the subject of rounds no longer colliding with your own ship:

I feel that this change takes a little bit away from the gunner-pilot coordination, as well as a little bit of the authenticity of the game.
I understand that it's frustrating as a new player to be taking shots and suddenly start hitting your own ship, but in my opinion that's when you should start talking to your captain, so you can coordinate the swift death of your enemies!

It also changes the balance of ships like the Pyra. You can fling bullets through your nose cones, but you deny the enemy the opportunity to destroy those guns. You can shoot them, and they have no chance to prevent it. This takes a great deal of the positioning requirements for the Pyra away. I know it's supposed to be one of the easier ships to learn, but those guns are difficult enough to destroy and can put a lot of damage on a target.

Perhaps it's not as big of a deal to the rest of you, in which case I will be a bit heartbroken but ultimately change my tactics to shoot up at people. I do feel rather strongly that if the ship is in the way, then the ship should be in the way. I can't shoot through my ally, so why am I able to shoot through myself? It just feels wrong to me (and allows really strange and possibly unbalanced tactics with the already powerful pyra).
Title: Re: Ghost ships
Post by: Mill Wilkinson on August 12, 2013, 01:11:33 pm
I agree with Plasma. Even if it adds a more open firing arc on the guns, I find the immersion lessened when I don't have to yell the captain that Pyra's nose is in the way.
Title: Re: Ghost ships
Post by: N-Sunderland on August 12, 2013, 01:28:20 pm
Fully agreed. I don't think anybody was really asking for it to be changed, and it makes very little sense.
Title: Re: Ghost ships
Post by: Captain Smollett on August 12, 2013, 01:31:09 pm
Even I agree.  Not sure why they changed it.
Title: Re: Ghost ships
Post by: Queso on August 12, 2013, 01:31:26 pm
As annoying as it was to mess up a mine on the back of a squid, I still feel it helped with ships like the pyramidion having slightly reduced upwards arc. Additionally it doesn't particularly confuse new players in my experience.
Title: Re: Ghost ships
Post by: Surette on August 12, 2013, 01:31:32 pm
Yeah, the fact that you're now able to shoot through the pyramidion nose really bothers me. As an enemy pilot, that's one of the drawbacks of the pyramidion you can take advantage of; stay a little above him so his gun arcs can't quite get on you because of his nose. Now the pyramidion's arcs are even better, which I don't think was ever an issue to begin with.
Title: Re: Ghost ships
Post by: JaegerDelta on August 12, 2013, 02:18:27 pm
i havent played the new release yet, but yeah i dont understand that change.  its not like projectiles were hitting invisible walls on the ship or anything like that.
Title: Re: Ghost ships
Post by: Pickle on August 12, 2013, 02:43:05 pm
Agreed.
Title: Re: Ghost ships
Post by: Imagine on August 12, 2013, 02:50:55 pm
As annoying as it was to mess up a mine on the back of a squid, I still feel it helped with ships like the pyramidion having slightly reduced upwards arc. Additionally it doesn't particularly confuse new players in my experience.
I don't know about other players, but when I realized that oh, if I hit the nose of the ship if I fire at it, I stopped trying to fire through it. Shouldn't be all that confusing to newer players.
Title: Re: Ghost ships
Post by: Mill Wilkinson on August 12, 2013, 02:58:43 pm
As annoying as it was to mess up a mine on the back of a squid, I still feel it helped with ships like the pyramidion having slightly reduced upwards arc. Additionally it doesn't particularly confuse new players in my experience.
I don't know about other players, but when I realized that oh, if I hit the nose of the ship if I fire at it, I stopped trying to fire through it. Shouldn't be all that confusing to newer players.
Yeah, especially with the mortar. A blast right in front of your eyes instead of, optimally, the enemy's stripped hull should make some synapses pop.
Title: Re: Ghost ships
Post by: awkm on August 12, 2013, 03:30:57 pm
Sorry everyone, you're just going to have to live with this.

Projectiles colliding with your own ship was a HUGE cause for misfire or dbl shots.  Due to the way that our guns are set up, there is no easy way to do this other than projectile not colliding with your ship.  Other solutions would require an entire reworking of gun logic or require each gun to not be able to point at your own ship, which is all time that is not going into Adventure Mode and other cool little features.  To us, this is a small sacrifice.

And yes, this includes colliding with things that you cannot see.  Again, this was one of many things that caused misfires.
Title: Re: Ghost ships
Post by: Queso on August 12, 2013, 03:39:56 pm
Okay, that makes sense. Small sacrifice for a pretty important bug fix.
Title: Re: Ghost ships
Post by: Sammy B. T. on August 12, 2013, 06:12:06 pm
It also changes the balance of ships like the Pyra. You can fling bullets through your nose cones, but you deny the enemy the opportunity to destroy those guns. You can shoot them, and they have no chance to prevent it. This takes a great deal of the positioning requirements for the Pyra away. I know it's supposed to be one of the easier ships to learn, but those guns are difficult enough to destroy and can put a lot of damage on a target.

This doesn't strike me as a small sacrifice.
Title: Re: Ghost ships
Post by: N-Sunderland on August 12, 2013, 06:13:35 pm
It may not be optimal, but honestly it's worth fixing misfiring (a.k.a. the bug we were stuck with since beta)
Title: Re: Ghost ships
Post by: Echoez on August 12, 2013, 07:16:39 pm
So basically there is no avoiding their gun arcs now if they are facing you unless you are a Squid or something.

I prefer ghost shotting.  o _o
Title: Re: Ghost ships
Post by: N-Sunderland on August 12, 2013, 08:44:34 pm
So I just got a ghost shot. Gonna send my log in...
Title: Re: Ghost ships
Post by: Crafeksterty on August 12, 2013, 10:08:09 pm
I disagree because it never was authentic, and was always annoying in terms of gameplay.

The bullets never did hurt your own ship, then how was it authentic?

Regarding the gameplay i always thought it was annoying. The only ship that has this is the pyra. And that must be fixed because next to none other ships have this.
The spire had this where you had the mine on slot 2 (Upper right) and try to shoot it infront of the spire, and high, you would hit either the cord or the front ram.
Title: Re: Ghost ships
Post by: RearAdmiralZill on August 12, 2013, 11:44:58 pm
So I just got a ghost shot. Gonna send my log in...

I too got ghost shots on the merc...
Title: Re: Ghost ships
Post by: N-Sunderland on August 12, 2013, 11:55:34 pm
So I just got a ghost shot. Gonna send my log in...

I too got ghost shots on the merc...

At least I only got one today. In the past I swear the ghost shots per minute was higher than my DPS...
Title: Re: Ghost ships
Post by: Gambrill on August 13, 2013, 02:58:50 am
Am i right in guessing that a ghost shot means a gun appearing to fire when it really hasn't? i've had that ONCE in this game. And that was after the most recent update.

Being able to shoot through my ship makes me feel as if my ship is made of paper.. And i'm not comfortable flying a paper plane against FLAK and Gattling Gun Rounds
Title: Re: Ghost ships
Post by: Alistair MacBain on August 13, 2013, 08:44:57 am
Well if that solved other problems then im fine with this.

And Ganbrill ur worried of flak and gatling on paper? I will only use flamers gainst ur paper :P.
Title: Re: Ghost ships
Post by: Gambrill on August 13, 2013, 09:03:33 am
Well if that solved other problems then im fine with this.

And Ganbrill ur worried of flak and gatling on paper? I will only use flamers gainst ur paper :P.

you Sound just like anyone in Cake :P :D
Title: Re: Ghost ships
Post by: Serenum on August 13, 2013, 09:14:41 am
Fully agreed. I don't think anybody was really asking for it to be changed, and it makes very little sense.

Indeed.
It was unecessary.
Title: Re: Ghost ships
Post by: Surette on August 13, 2013, 03:39:19 pm
Am i right in guessing that a ghost shot means a gun appearing to fire when it really hasn't? i've had that ONCE in this game. And that was after the most recent update.
Weird, I got it pretty much every time I fired a gun.

If this change fixed that issue, I'd say it's a fair tradeoff. It doesn't seem like it has, though.
Title: Re: Ghost ships
Post by: awkm on August 13, 2013, 06:53:03 pm
Ghost shots still occur.  Ship collisions was just one thing causing them.  There are other still out there, namely networking.

And from our standpoint, this change was necessary.  We're continuing to remove all ghost shots, which means the next step is to redo how we handle client and server shot verification.  This is no simple task.
Title: Re: Ghost ships
Post by: N-Sunderland on August 13, 2013, 08:14:49 pm
Well I did see a significant reduction in their frequency, so I'm pretty happy overall.