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STO Combat - Are these star'ships', or star'dogfighters'?
ProPatria
Member Posts: 30
I have been watching the new Star Trek Online game for some time...even tried the beta. A lot of the game appeals to me, but I have to say that the combat feels WAY wrong.
I mean, here you are 'captaining' a huge starSHIP, and when you encounter an enemy ship, and combat ensues, you have two or more starships circling each other at close range akin to WW1 aircraft! And you can't even toggle an automatic 'circling'/'maintain chosen distance' option (a real nice feature in EVE)...you have to do this manually.
Yeah, I realize the distance represented is around 10 kilometres....but COME ON....starships!?...and they can't engage from more like 200 kilometres??
The whole 'feel' of circling around for the better firing position seems more like WW2 air combat than futuristic starship combat. Even aircraft today can engage from beyone 'visual' range.....and here we are in ships with crews of hundreds, dogfighting!!??
I realize for many, it is far from a 'deal breaker' in terms of subscription to the game, but for me....it just feels too wrong for the era the game is meant to represent.
And there you have it....MY main gripe with this game.
Not that I need to say this....but please feel free to comment...look forward to reading others opinions.
Comments
I have exactly the opposite opinion. It feels more like Star Trek ship combat to me then any other Star Trek game I have played. EVE Online is a different animal and it does not nor should it feel like EVE. The feel that the makers of STO were going for was not "WWI fighters dogfighting" but rather tall ships from the age of sail. That was the way Rodenberry envisioned Star Trek ship combat for the original TV series. While you can not do "loops and rolls" like some would like...the way it works now feels like you are flying a multi-ton vessel and attempting to manuver to get an open shield torp shot. Or attempting to prevent the same from happening to you. This is something EVE never did but STO does very nicely.
Regarding the range thing, well I sort of agree and sort of disagree. In most (not all) of the TV shows and movies the combat usually took place at a relatively short range, under 50,000 meters and in a lot of situations at or under 10,000 (50km and 10km respectively). Combat at 200,000km would not be "realistic" in terms of the shows/movies. However, a little more range abiltiy would not be a bad thing.
Let's party like it is 1863!
Ever tried to shoot at something that is 2km away?
I can bet you a WWI fighter pilot never did.
Can't help but notice that you didn't include which type of ship you flew. Cruisers seem to take some 10k just to turn around.
Folks like to gripe about scales in STO, and for good reason. But you know what was worse? STNG. In the episode "In Theory", they consider themselves "in the clear" of escaping a dangerous nebula when they hit "1 million kilometers away" from an exit point ...
That is friggin' ridiculous. Whoever came up with that number should have had some Doctor Who Weeping Angels zap them back to the 1950's so their sci-fi writing actually fit.
I came and left STO in its launch month. No fanboy, but I enjoyed my short time there, and got what I expected. And I gotta say, ALL combat scenes in Star Trek that I've ever seen occured AT LEAST within 50km.
We probably agree then, that EVE has the missile weapons down much better. But they have projectile weapons down far worse. Unless projectiles have homing technology or travel at 10km a second, you'll rarely hit a ship some 20km away.
Ever tried to shoot at something that is 2km away?
I can bet you a WWI fighter pilot never did.
Can't help but notice that you didn't include which type of ship you flew. Cruisers seem to take some 10k just to turn around.
Folks like to gripe about scales in STO, and for good reason. But you know what was worse? STNG. In the episode "In Theory", they consider themselves "in the clear" of escaping a dangerous nebula when they hit "1 million kilometers away" from an exit point ...
That is friggin' ridiculous. Whoever came up with that number should have had some Doctor Who Weeping Angels zap them back to the 1950's so their sci-fi writing actually fit.
I came and left STO in its launch month. No fanboy, but I enjoyed my short time there, and got what I expected. And I gotta say, ALL combat scenes in Star Trek that I've ever seen occured AT LEAST within 50km.
We probably agree then, that EVE has the missile weapons down much better. But they have projectile weapons down far worse. Unless projectiles have homing technology or travel at 10km a second, you'll rarely hit a ship some 20km away.
Considering the level technology in both Eve and Star Trek, it's actually ridiculous that they can't hit targets orders of a magnitude farther away than the lore has them hitting, at least when using laser-like weapons. I mean think about how much more advanced their weapons, scanning tech, and computers would have to be in those universes for them to develop the tech they have.
Point of fact the first German fighters in WWI were fitted with a MG08 machine gun which had an effective range of 2 km and a max range of 4 km.
What do I win?
I think OP is correct in that the space combat does feel more like dog fighting than long range tactical battles (which would be what you would expect technology to advance to). However I think STO's space combat is pretty representative of all the series/movies (they're almost always right on top of each other) but I also found it to be one of the more fun (tho not highly challenging) aspects of STO.
I think they could have implemented it better but the dog fighting style is very Star Trek.
STO is a type of game you aren't supposed to think about too much, I mean setting 10 km to be the firing range for ALL weapons in the game and respawning some 100 km behind upon death should tip you off.
Just play as intended, chill out, relax, enjoy the colorful pew pew and think you control an amazingly complex battle simulation by flying in circles and hitting the 'balance shields' button frantically.
- Shijeer
Point of fact the first German fighters in WWI were fitted with a MG08 machine gun which had an effective range of 2 km and a max range of 4 km.
What do I win?
I think OP is correct in that the space combat does feel more like dog fighting than long range tactical battles (which would be what you would expect technology to advance to). However I think STO's space combat is pretty representative of all the series/movies (they're almost always right on top of each other) but I also found it to be one of the more fun (tho not highly challenging) aspects of STO.
I think they could have implemented it better but the dog fighting style is very Star Trek.
Nothing. If you honestly think that WWI fighter pilots shot each other down from 2km away, there's nothing I can say to convince you otherwise.
When it comes to STO, I don't care what they call the numbers. And STNG fans(including myself) apparently cared less about the numbers than even the OP does. That's not to say there aren't issues with scale in STO. I'm just saying it's largely irrelevant.
Point of fact the first German fighters in WWI were fitted with a MG08 machine gun which had an effective range of 2 km and a max range of 4 km.
What do I win?
I think OP is correct in that the space combat does feel more like dog fighting than long range tactical battles (which would be what you would expect technology to advance to). However I think STO's space combat is pretty representative of all the series/movies (they're almost always right on top of each other) but I also found it to be one of the more fun (tho not highly challenging) aspects of STO.
I think they could have implemented it better but the dog fighting style is very Star Trek.
Nothing. If you honestly think that WWI fighter pilots shot each other down from 2km away, there's nothing I can say to convince you otherwise.
When it comes to STO, I don't care what they call the numbers. And STNG fans(including myself) apparently cared less about the numbers than even the OP does. That's not to say there aren't issues with scale in STO. I'm just saying it's largely irrelevant.
OP makes a valid point that given these events happen 400 years in the future you would think that they would be fighting in long range tactical battles. He is using the reasoning that dog fighting (regardless of scale) is the kind of thing that happened in WWI and WWII and that as technology has advanced we've moved on to the ability to fight long range battles. You're the one that made up the 2 km figure and misunderstood that the OP was talking about the fighting style and not literal scales.
As I've already said I think the style of space combat fits in the Star Trek genre (even if it doesn't make a lot of sense).
P.S. There is no need to get bent out of shape because I pointed out that base technology at the time of WWI made it _possible_ to do something that you said _never_ happened. But I'll tell you what.. You tell me the exact range of the longest kill in WWI and I'll admit that a 2 km never happened... Until you do there's no need to jump all over a guy (OP).
I see your points and agree with some of them. I wish weapons had varying range. A Phaser Beam bank should have a longer range than a Cannon. Photon Torpedeos should also be longer ranged with more of a chance to miss as range increases.
Part of the issue here though is to make an effect "game" not an effective simulation. I am old school SFC and would love to see the same features but know that is likely not going to happen.
As for auto circle at range please no. The one thing I have hated over the years about EVE is space combat is uber dumbed down. CNTRL Click, Lock Target; Right Click, Circle at Range, Hit fire and then sit and watch. There is no sense of the tactical element of ship combat, no facings for shields or weapons, no way to get into a ships blind side. I like and perfer the manual feel of the psace combat, in my opinion it adds a depth to it that EVE is sorely lacking.
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I have a soap box and I am not afraid to use it.
I see your points and agree with some of them. I wish weapons had varying range. A Phaser Beam bank should have a longer range than a Cannon. Photon Torpedeos should also be longer ranged with more of a chance to miss as range increases.
Part of the issue here though is to make an effect "game" not an effective simulation. I am old school SFC and would love to see the same features but know that is likely not going to happen.
As for auto circle at range please no. The one thing I have hated over the years about EVE is space combat is uber dumbed down. CNTRL Click, Lock Target; Right Click, Circle at Range, Hit fire and then sit and watch. There is no sense of the tactical element of ship combat, no facings for shields or weapons, no way to get into a ships blind side. I like and perfer the manual feel of the psace combat, in my opinion it adds a depth to it that EVE is sorely lacking.
Eve is a far more complete space combat simulator... probably why STO is failing so hard at the moment. as for Eve's space combat being dumbed down.. i can imagine there are several areas of the game that might warrant some criticism but the combat definitely isnt one of them, which makes your statement somewhat lacking in credibility, particularly as how you describe the method of actually entering combat... where tactics is incredibly important.
Well it's a minor issue but I have to agree.
Combat feels, especially in small ships, like dogfighting. That is mainly because of poorly implemented inertia and way too much focus on targeting arcs and firing angles.
But it's a small gripe really, compared to the black holes of missing content this game is suffering from.
M
The longest range hit in WWII against a moving target was 36,000 meters, or 36km, using a projectile weapon..
Today, our cruise missiles have a far longer range, perhaps in the 1,000km range.
For STO to have anything like realistic combat, it would have to change from a shallow shooter-type arcade game, to a thinking man's strategic game.
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