Player Features and Ideas Discussion

Algorithm
Make warp disruption probability-based, i.e.

• Every scrambled ship will have base chance to avoid scrambling (0% for most ships, 75% for deep transports and so on)
• Every warp scrambler/disruptor will act as EWAR module, so it will have a chance to warp scramble/disrupt hostile ship during activation cycle.
• Warp core stabilizers will increase chance to avoid disruption.
• More advanced versions of warp scramblers/disruptors will have more chance to scramble/disrupt hostile ship.
• Ships can have bonuses to disruption chance (mostly interceptors) and disruption avoid chance (mostly transports and different kinds of spec ops)
• To prevent warp by spamming warp button there can be only one warp attempt per fixed amount of time (warp core needs recalibration time, because it is complex procedure). Say, 1 warp attempt per 5 seconds. Server will ignore any warp attempt during cooldown from that client. This time can be affected by skills, implants, boosters and modules (maybe warp core stabilizer itself, maybe new item).
• If several ships try to warp disrupt target, victim checks every warp avoidance chance from every enemy. If any warp disruption succeeds warp is prevented.

Examples

Example 1
Interceptor has warp disruptor with efficient disruption chance of 95%.
Hostile ship has 0% chance to avoid disruption.
We divide (1 - 0.95) / (1 - 0) = 0.05 * 100% = 5% chance to avoid warp disruption in current cycle.

Example 2
Interceptor has warp disruptor with efficient disruption chance of 95%.
Hostile ship has 50% chance to avoid disruption.
We divide (1 - 0.95) / (1 - 0.5) = 0.1 * 100% = 10% chance to avoid warp disruption in current cycle.

Example 3
Interceptor has warp disruptor with efficient disruption chance of 90%.
Hostile ship has 75% chance to avoid disruption.
We divide (1 - 0.9) / (1 - 0.75) = 0.1 * 100% = 40% chance to avoid warp disruption in current cycle.

Reasons

• Warp disruption mechanics is not intuitive. I cannot understand why EWAR module has only two probabilities to warp scramble/disrupt: 0 or 100%
• Warp Core Stabilizer II offers no more defence than T1 versions, so why use them? I always hope to see "Warp Scramble Strength -2", but my dreams fail.
• As I said before, warp disrupt mechanics seems to be pure EWAR, so targets will always have a chance to escape. So disrupting ship/gang will have two options - increase their DPS to finish off their victim until it escapes or increase disrupt strength. Right now if you were caught by a gang and they all warp disrupt you, you have no chance to escape. I think this is unfair as there is no physical interaction with you warp engine.

Why in the world would you want to remove skill and agency from the game?! If anything, do the opposite; change the chance-based things we already have to some factor other than chance. For example, make ECM break target lock (make you untarget anything you are targeting) upon activation, and then do nothing for the duration of the cycle. That way you have to choose when to "spend" your ECM, and then wait for it to "reload" before you could break target again.

You didn't explain very well the problem you are trying to solve with this change, and I think there's nothing wrong with the fundamental way warp scrambling works currently.

Yay! More clickfest on the warp button on the select item window for a stabbed ship What an amazing gameplay that clickfest is!

... Or not.

Yep. That is worse. That is one breathtakingly stupid idea.

The proposal does nothing to solve it's stated problem, that of either being tackled or not being tackled with no middle ground.

I would suggest a different approach. I agree that infinite duration hard tackle is an issue. I would like to see a warp timer that counts down, with each ship having a set time to warp. Scramblers and Disruptors would slow this clock, stabs would speed it up.

No more instawarping when aligned and at speed, but no more holding tackle infinitely either.

warp and scram don't touch the core, they disrupt the navigational computer that controls it iirc.

And this is already chance based kind of. Look up the fw whine threads about stabbed plex runners. More stabs they fit, less likely they will be tackled.

If you're confused about the absence of a linear fall-off in effect, you'll have heaps of fun reading about the properties of whatever, and how it just about spontaneously changes state from solid to liquid, liquid to gas, at specific temperatures, no warning, no gradual progression.

If you're confused about how a device can affect another device without touching it... wifi? Radios? Loudspeakers? Any of this ring a bell?

Heck, it wouldn't be much of a stretch simply to say the required transfer of energy takes a form similar to a voltaic arc, momentarily turning the jell-o space between the offending and defending ships into plasma.

So there you have it. If this is the great question that keeps you up at night, the answer is that the ability of a warp core to warp space around your ship is a Boolean state because warp scramblers shoot electricity through the super-heated jam that surrounds you. Happy?

Ok. Someone shoots electricity through the super-heated jam that surrounds me and disrupts my navigational computer. I place warp core between him and my computer. He cannot warp disrupt me as I fully negate it effect. Another enemy applies warp disruptor. I cannot warp again.
The question is - if warp disruptor does not send material particles to my ship which can be bounced off with layered warp core stabilizers (I believe there are no particles, as particle weapon can miss, look at the lasers) then it sends some kind of wave.
As you know, radiation can be absorbed with materia, so according to Buger's law doubling amount of radiosity form warp disruptors does not implies it will reach needed amount of energy to disrupt navigational computer.

Because it makes for good gameplay.