Registered: Jul 2000
Location: The Cold Northland!
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Okay, this is the deal.

Phalanx pods are very short range (about 900 meters), rapid firing, low damage pulse cannons. The point of the low range is to discourage the AI from making broadside attacks. It does anyways, but its nearly useless. Once again, scripting in the mission overcomes this very easily. Most people do it with FS2 standard capital ships anyways.

Rear pulse cannons are the same as the foreward ones. They are not the same as the Phalanx pods because of the aformentioned short range which is neccessary.

Rear beam cannons are weaker. Forward we have two standard X-Ray Laser beams and two Heavy pulse cannons. We've divided the turret into two so the beams and pulses come from roughly the same area. Not a big deal.

Overall, the front is more powerful than the back because of increased fire arcs. Of the 4 heavy pulse cannons at the back, the best I've seen is maybe 2 of those firing sporadically. The same goes for the rear beams. So the target HAS to be coming straight up the retreating Omega's stern to even move into the firing arc much less get hit.

The forward second has a fair amount more arc so it fires more often with more devastating results.

That should make everyone happy and if it doesn't, you can go to hell because it balances quite nicely.

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Registered: Oct 2001
Location: Nottingham, England
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I think that it sounds very nice, both in terms of balance and canonicity (is that a word? it is now).

Aren't the front and aft pulse cannons yellow/orange and the phalanx pod guns white/blue? (just asking)

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Registered: Jul 2000
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According to No Surrender, No Retreat, they are all a orange color. We may try and distinguish them with different shades....but the orange color remains.

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Registered: Jul 2001
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Icefire hath spoken!

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It should also be noted that the 4 turrets in front of the rotational section of the Omega also fire both particle beams and pulse cannons (same as the 2 forward turrets beside the launch bays (the main forward cannons). The Agamemnon fired beams from the lower front turrets when it followed the White Star after it disposed of the Shadow Battlecrab that destroyed the Ganymede outpost. Obviously the 2 top turrets can fire beams as well. You don't need to make the Omegas fire from those points as in the series they were barely seen firing but it would be more realistic and better in my opinion if the Omega actually used all of its weapons in combat and didn't have turrets along the hull just for show as it usually appears.

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Registered: Feb 2001
Location: Finland
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Oh damn it... if you really want Omega to have beams on those Phalanx turrets as well... then make a mission and replace weapon, there you go.

We have made decision on this matter.
Pulse or beam, not both.

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Registered: Oct 2001
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It really isn't a common phenomenon, but if you want to try it then by all means have a go

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Tables are accounting for our base setup...just like in FS2. You want varients, change them on a mission by mission basis.

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You don' t have to get so touchy about it jeez.

I was merely poiting out that the Phalanx turrets fire both pulse cannons and beams not that you had to make them do so. As long as all the turrets actually fire and not just the two forward ones that's fine, it's up to you guys to decide what they fire. It was only and observation and possible suggestion that's all.

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Last edited by Ghost Rider on 12-24-2001 at 11:16 PM

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quote:

---

I was merely poiting out that the Phalanx turrets fire both pulse cannons and beams not that you had to make them do so. As long as all the turrets actually fire and not just the two forward ones that's fine, it's up to you guys to decide what they fire. It was only and observation and possible suggestion that's all.

---

They all fire . You could script them to be off-line tho...not a problem there either. Most of the time when people suggest something, it means they are trying to drive me insane by suggesting stuff thats balance destroying, impossible, or both

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I suggest that you add 7 shadow beams to the rear of the omega... i mean wtf man, the omega is just too weak the way you have it set up

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Registered: Nov 2001
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Maybe that's because the Omega isn't such a strong ship in the show...

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Registered: Jun 2001
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I say the omega should be replaced with that 200 mile long star destroyer we all know and loath.

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Registered: Jul 2000
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quote:

---

Originally posted by IceFire
Okay, this is the deal.


Rear beam cannons are weaker. Forward we have two standard X-Ray Laser beams and two Heavy pulse cannons. We've divided the turret into two so the beams and pulses come from roughly the same area. Not a big deal.

---

Sounds cool. I noticed in the pics that were posted that the Omega seemed to be emitting both the red beam and a greenish (?) pulse from its forward sections, so I was curious as to how the heck that was being done.

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Registered: Jul 2000
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Two turrets.

Thats Orange, not green

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RE: Omega Armament

For those of us who have seen the entire series we know that the armament of the ships varies from show to show; overall the technical aspects of the show are ripe with inconsistencies and contradictions.

Yes, we see beams fired at the whitestar from the Agamemnon but so what? We also see the Omega called a Cruiser and firing slow moving Plasma rounds in season 2.

Sometimes the turrets fire pulses; sometimes beams. Sometimes the forward lasers fire for a sustained amount of time, and other times for only a split second. We see beams and pulses out the back.

Personally, I'd like it if TBP took an approach similar to what AoG has done. With two variants of the Omega, like this:

Alpha Version
2 X-Ray Lasers [fore]
2 Heavy Pulse Cannons [fore]
12 AA-Pulse Turrets
2 X-Ray Lasers [aft]

Beta Version
4 Heavy Pulse Cannons [fore]
12 AA-Pulse Turrets
4 Less powerful Pulse Cannons [aft]

But having not played Freespace 2 in a while; nor having tried modifying ships I'm not sure what TBP has to play around with. Obviously if they want the inclusion of many races then they cant devote too many ships to one particular race. It may be cool to allow for, in the future, packs of races. Where basically you could swap out say Earth-Minbari for Narn-Centauri or something. Then consequently have a host of ships for either side of the conflict. Or even something like Earth-Dilgar. But for the moment it's best not to get ahead of things and stick to the current plan I'm sure.

One area of note; regarding the Nova Dreadnought. The Agents of Gaming version has it listed with the first model having a host of less powerful beams, and the second version with beam/pulse turrets. Now, obviously due to the strength of FS2 beams and the inability to make a gun fire two different weapons out the same turret make both designs infeasible. I should however note that during the movie In the Beginning we do see Nova Dreadnoughts firing beams from their forward section. It may be prudent to modify the existing hull so that the forward two turrets on the head of the ship have say the light x-ray lasers you previously mentioned. If you need a specific screen reference of what I've mentioned then feel free to ask and I'll direct you to it.

Now for just a last note; I played the demo missions as well as some others and I'm for the most part impressed. Obviously there's a long way to go but what's been do so far is top notch considering. I've considered designing missions but due to the limited variety of ships I feel it wouldnt really be worth my time right now; I dont have any experience with FS2 mission designer as I gave up early on. But did make a multitude of missions for TIE and X-Wing. I should however note for those designers, that PLEASE, when you make an FS2 mission, include a lightsource. I believe that the Demo missions are fine, but some of the other missions I've played are sorely lacking a light source of strong variety. I'm going to get a brain tumour squinting at the screen .

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Registered: Feb 2001
Location: Finland
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There will not be two variants of an Omega.
We need all available space to have all canon ships and the best non-canon ships. If there is space available after that, then we can include variants.

But keep in mind that you can modify ships easily in FRED2, so we'll include only variants that cannot be done in FRED2.

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Last edited by Mr. Fury on 12-26-2001 at 12:22 PM

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Registered: Oct 2001
Location: Nottingham, England
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If anybody actually wanted to do this (the team is unlikely to do so) then putting beams on the Nova (as well as pulses) should be dead simple. They have two barrels per turret and one weapon can fire from each barrel (as I see it that is the situation with the Novas having two barrels in the first place). I don't know much about making the models so I don't know how much modification to the ship is required to allow this (if having two weapons on the same turret is at all possible in FS2).

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Registered: Feb 2001
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I have been thinking... I shouldn't, but I have... The Omegas two front turrets are pretty quickly destroyed. But in the aft you have twice as much turrets to destroy. So going against his arse is not so attractive idea anymore.
So the front turrets should be made strong enought that they indeed make a diffrence.

Just making sure you remember that.

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