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XL Turret Tracking - Theory and Practice
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Mankiota
Private Reserve
Gentlemen's Agreement
#1 - 2012-06-26 19:48:53 UTC
I am interested in hearing some reports from the field as to the ability of XL turrets (particularly Ion Siege Blasters and Giga Pulse Lasers) to track battleship and battlecruiser targets when fitted on a titan. Is it possible for titans to track battleships and if so do they suffer any damage penalties due to signature values?

I would be very interested in learning how the math breaks down and how it can be applied in practice. It is my understanding that CCP's design philosophy is to have supercapitals be used primarily against structures, capitals, and other supercapitals. Bu there is theory, and then there is practice. Do titans (aside from their logistical functions) only get used in capital fleets these days or are they also getting deployed in more creative ways?
Soon Shin
Scarlet Weather Rhapsody
#2 - 2012-06-26 20:23:00 UTC
Mankiota wrote:
I am interested in hearing some reports from the field as to the ability of XL turrets (particularly Ion Siege Blasters and Giga Pulse Lasers) to track battleship and battlecruiser targets when fitted on a titan. Is it possible for titans to track battleships and if so do they suffer any damage penalties due to signature values?

I would be very interested in learning how the math breaks down and how it can be applied in practice. It is my understanding that CCP's design philosophy is to have supercapitals be used primarily against structures, capitals, and other supercapitals. Bu there is theory, and then there is practice. Do titans (aside from their logistical functions) only get used in capital fleets these days or are they also getting deployed in more creative ways?


Titan's get a damage reduction against targets smaller than the signature resolution of its guns (2000m). Tracking on XL turrets fairly poor and cannot hit battleships moving 100m/s at 45 km away.
Mankiota
Private Reserve
Gentlemen's Agreement
#3 - 2012-06-26 21:05:01 UTC
Do you think this reality has affected the relative desirability of the titans? Are the armor titans still the most desirable? And has the Avatar gained any ground on the Erebus since neither can fit for max tracking and blap supcaps any longer?
Mankiota
Private Reserve
Gentlemen's Agreement
#4 - 2012-06-28 15:12:15 UTC
Or to phrase things in a more direct and more shameless way, is there a "most desirable" titan and if so which one is it?
Hatsumi Kobayashi
Perkone
Caldari State
#5 - 2012-06-28 23:08:01 UTC
Avatar and Erebus are both on par and have been for a while even during the titan blapping age. It's really up to the skills you have on the would-be pilot, availability of hulls and your preference.

Ragnarok and Leviathan are in no ways undesirable, however. Titans are still titans and there is always a use for one.

No sig.
Noisrevbus
#6 - 2012-06-29 03:04:32 UTC  |  Edited by: Noisrevbus
I think the last bit that Hatsumi infer answers all your questions.

The most simple way to explain it is to just look at the hierarchy of things. XL guns to BS? If you run an MWD on a BS, just as on any other ship it's sig will bloom to the next magnitude. If you apply painters you can achieve something similar and if you apply webs you make something stop and thereby affect accuracies. An XL gun can blap a BS by the same logic an L gun can blap a Cruiser. If you understand accuracy mechanics you can do far more than that. It's not unheard of that L guns kill frigates even without stacking application of MWD, painters and webs.

Carriers have a 3000 sig and an MWD'ing Drake have a 2200 sig, see the relation?

The guns are essentially hitting a Carrier-sized signature, so the XL guns of Dreads and Titans are shooting what they are actually meant to shoot. Apply a Painter and Webs and that Drake will have the equal 3000 sig and next to no movement to the Carrier. Apply a stack of Painters and that Drake still have 1000 sig should he turn off his MWD. A 12000 DPS Moros is still likely to apply a good 6000 DPS to that by blunt logic. Throw some Tracking modules into the mix. The Blap is natural and appear throughout all tiers of size.

Something similar can be said about the racial choices. Titans are the top of the food chain, apply any other ship to something lower in the hierarchy and you are likely to see the class dominate over race (unless there are specific limitations or advantages that shuffle the balance in either direction; ships like bombers, for example, are an exception in both regards - their class always supercede their race and their class defy their size restrictions). The Hound and Purifier have the better slot layout and most appealing damage-type bonuses, yet all Bombers are Bombers. It's not until they are put to the mettle that the racial quirks come into play.

All Carriers are Carriers when applied to any field they can dominate, but once your control is put to the test the Archon will begin to shine. The Dreads are the same, and as is the Titans.
Exploited Engineer
Creatively Applied Violence Inc.
#7 - 2012-06-29 06:19:00 UTC
Noisrevbus wrote:
The most simple way to explain it is to just look at the hierarchy of things. XL guns to BS? If you run an MWD on a BS, just as on any other ship it's sig will bloom to the next magnitude. If you apply painters you can achieve something similar and if you apply webs you make something stop and thereby affect accuracies. An XL gun can blap a BS by the same logic an L gun can blap a Cruiser. If you understand accuracy mechanics you can do far more than that. It's not unheard of that L guns kill frigates even without stacking application of MWD, painters and webs.


If I understand the turret damage formula correctly, then turrets can fully compensate for small target signatures (below the turrets signature resolution) by either increasing tracking or decreasing angular velocity. In the extreme case of zero angular velocity, the targets signature radius does not affect the turrets chance to hit or damage.

This is different from missiles, which will never hit a target for full damage that has a signature radius smaller than the missiles explosion radius.
Hatsumi Kobayashi
Perkone
Caldari State
#8 - 2012-06-29 08:40:14 UTC
Exploited Engineer wrote:
In the extreme case of zero angular velocity, the targets signature radius does not affect the turrets chance to hit or damage.


Your chance is lowered if the signature radius of the target is inferior to your turret's signature resolution, but it is still possible to get a hit for full damage.

Missiles will always hit what they can reach, but lack this random factor and damage variance.

It's worth noting that said random factor usually ends up working in favor of turrets rather than against them, because of the possibility of a wrecking hit.

No sig.
Maeltstome
Ten Thousand Days
#9 - 2012-06-29 10:50:02 UTC
The signature difference between your guns and the targets sig is a multiplier on the hit chance %. Therefore a stationary target will still take full damage from a gun. This is why tornado's can alpha strike a frigate with no MWD.

Titan's however have a damage reduction on targets with a smaller sig than the guns they fire. This was because titans where literally decimating BS gangs. most large fleet fights are either stationary or <100ms aligning to an object while a long distance away - remote repping requires fleets to be much less mobile when not operating a small nano gang - the end result being BS's getting insta-popped by titans.

This thing you have to remember about titans though is that they can also 1-shot a capital ship once every 10 minutes and can output massive capital+ DPS, as well as jump bridge entire fleets - there usefulness is not in the damage they do: That's just a nice bonus.
Exploited Engineer
Creatively Applied Violence Inc.
#10 - 2012-06-29 16:02:25 UTC
Hatsumi Kobayashi wrote:
Exploited Engineer wrote:
In the extreme case of zero angular velocity, the targets signature radius does not affect the turrets chance to hit or damage.


Your chance is lowered if the signature radius of the target is inferior to your turret's signature resolution, but it is still possible to get a hit for full damage.


Err, no. That's the point. If the angular velocity is zero, then the targets signature radius does not matter.

http://wiki.eveonline.com/en/wiki/Turret_damage

If a target is within optimal and the angular velocity is zero, the chance to hit is 100% regardless of the targets signature radius.

And this is the big difference between turrets and missiles. Missiles can never fully compensate for a target signature radius that is below their explosion radius, while turrets can (by increasing their tracking or decreasing angular velocity).
Exploited Engineer
Creatively Applied Violence Inc.
#11 - 2012-06-29 16:06:51 UTC
Maeltstome wrote:
The signature difference between your guns and the targets sig is a multiplier on the hit chance %. Therefore a stationary target will still take full damage from a gun. This is why tornado's can alpha strike a frigate with no MWD.


MWDs increase maximum velocity and signature radius by the same factor (unless affected by hull-specific sig bloom reduction bonuses). The net effect on turret chance to hit is zero.
Mankiota
Private Reserve
Gentlemen's Agreement
#12 - 2012-06-29 19:50:33 UTC
Thank-you for all the insightful comments thus far, I was woefully ignorant of many of these fundamental game mechanics.

Noisrevbus wrote:
Something similar can be said about the racial choices.


This is a good comparison overall I think with two important exceptions: cost and flexibility. It is pretty easy to simply purchase all 4 of the racial bombers and hop from one to the other to suit a particular situation (and perhaps resell ones later that are not used as much). This is true of all subcaps. The cost variance between subcap ships and titans, however, is exponential (25-250mil for subcaps and 85-100bil for titans). In addition to this, it is much more difficult to swap between titans as they cannot be docked. When you purchase a titan, you are pretty much locked in.

Is there a way to somehow practice or experiment with titans and their mechanics before purchasing one (perhaps on singularity or something)?