i just want that big shield thing on the front to take less damage. we know it can be done because the boss ships have the mechanic already, where the hits to non-vital parts of the ship don't receive their damage type bonuses. this is the perfect balance between getting hits and doing damage in THIS case i think. it's a huge shield on the front of the ship, what else is it supposed to be, if not protection? the long range fighting capabilities would increase, as precision at 1200 yards is a rare gunner indeed, but shunting off a percentage of hits would be a huge boon in long range combat, which is supposed to be the forte of the spire. conversely, a gunner can hit ANYWHERE but there off the front of a charging metamidion without difficulty, making it largely unchanged against its counters but stronger at the things we want it to be strong at. it might also give a VERY good spire pilot at least SOMETHING to do when being charged by a metamidion: hydrogen that shield up into the beak so teh ram isnt a instant kill. getting flanking positions against spires becomes much more important, and isnt that what we wanted it to be in the first place?
