IRL CIWS are moving away from the silliness of phalanx etc with their limited firing time and significant magazine reloading time, to dual purpose cannon that are mounted much like conventional ship turrets that have magazine internal to the ship, that just are much more efficient, have much longer firing times etc etc. most of the projectiles from a phalanx are doing nothing and are just missing the target, and the only reason they hit things is the volume of fire put into an area of sky, modern cannon in modern CIWS are just highly accurate, like some of the Rheinmetall and others offerings.
@@b101uk9 don't tell me. tell CIG. tell them to make programmable amunations and compatible calibration system my opinion is just a quick fix base on what we already have
@@jml348 that is a big part of the problem, as they have not fully moved to server authoritative, so there are still more parts that are reliant on the two clients, which is why PvE works better, as half the problem is removed
Projectiles flying through space in huge streaming arcs, are just generally cooler than almost all the lasers you see elsewhere... let alone when SCs lasers sound like 1 minute of me F'in around on a synth, in my first week as a sound engineer in uni lmao I mean it's an obvious example, but if you aren't atleast gonna try for star wars levels of laser SFX, then may as well have them make no noise whatsoever, like it would be IRL :') & if anyone from CIG is reading this, please pay attention to how the foley work for Star Wars was done, given there's hours of documentaries on that subject alone.
The counter to PDCs should be overwhelming them with income fire, ewarefare, stealth. but not because PDCs have bad placement location and track/hit rate.
You can always look at test results and boost up damage, accuracy, range or fire rate. Everything devs need to do to make it work is to change 4 numbers. That's not a big deal. The question is will it be on live like that or they'll fix it?
I think these PD are being modeled for intended use on the Polaris first, which it’s common threats going to be size 9 and above torpedos which it seems to handle very well. I would like to see it improve at least against s5 torps too.
well it kinda did and the real test on the PDCs working is when the polaris is out since i think its gonna have 7 PDC emplacements so we cant say something does not work when CIG puts it in the worst spot on the ship.
having a PDC shouldn't mean you are invulnerable to torpedoes so I think the blind spots are appropriate. But I do think it shouldn't be missing so many wide open line of sight shots.
Well that was a bit disappointing, I was hoping that it would do a better job. One thing I was curious about is if it has any target priority built in would be interesting to use a firebird to fire off 6 small missile to cover a size 9 coming in at the same time. However at this point seems irrelevant.
It seems clear that the greatest weakness of PDC's is target saturation, though we won't know how well they work until we've got a ship with multiple like the Polaris. Seems like the PDC waits a bit too long to start firing, despite being able to track missiles from like 2KM out.
Well Care bears and white knights are saying the placement is perfect and makes sense since you are more likely to be fire from the back only or you should only run when fighting lol
@@StoneCooldsit's a VIP transport, "realistically" it would be running from every fight in an effort to protect the VIP. No VIP would want to see the pilot ask them to hold their beer while they deal with some pirates they will want the pilot to egress out of hostile space as quickly as possible. Which leaves the point defense defending the rear. The Connie is just poorly designed for rear facing turrets with the engines the way they are designed. Personally I'd prefer if the Phoenix lost the p72 in favor of replacing it with another point defense just to make the ship stand out more compared to other connies.
@WildAce001 realistically a VIP transport would have the best possible PDC with the best angles possible to insure the max chance of scaping. And yeah, you could get ride of the snub, but that would cause massive outcry, it needs a mount that puts it over the engines to have better cover,
It’s simple fellow citizens. You defend this crap PDS turret by claiming it should be running etc. ok well enjoy blowing up to a missile while picking up your VIP or dropping them off, better PDS placement will save you more often why argue against it lmao
yeah its tier Zero and people expecting it to just work perfectly day zero this is the PTU not live as well wtf Avenger you should know better. It takes like those that made me stop watching or listening to anything he has to say now.
Desync is likely a huge contributor that will HOPEFULLY be addressed with all the other issues the savior that server meshing needs to be. CIG could also tighten the spread on the PDCs and reduce missile health. At least until we can see what server meshing does to missiles and respective systems.
How are you going to sit in one spot and call something useless when your a sitting duck as well as shoot from the closest you can lock a target and the closer you are the harder something will be to dodge or have a chance to lock and shoot it out the sky not only that this is not the only video testing pdt cannons so for all you know you got a bug and it has nothing to do with the pdt.
definitely the worst spot for a PDC to ever be in. They need to increase the fire rate, tracking and put it on the engine, mirror it and have two on top of each engine. That way it can actually have unfettered views to actually engage in missiles.
The MFD and HUD rework has been a real sticking point with me. They flout every tenet of sound design, colour use, and information presentation. Infuriating.
I prefer the new layout but hate the vastly reduced control I have over individual system, now if I loose an engine i can't just shot off the next engine to prevent rolling around
@@nicholascoker7212 Some people may prefer the new layout; that's well and good. I personally detest the removal of flight and combat information from the HUD. The GUI was made to be appealing, not USEFUL. That's the crux of my beef with it. A useful GUI can be made appealing to many with personalization options whereas the current mess is a challenge to actually USE.
Just my opinion they could put the pdc at sides of connies or sides of engines in place of pilot guns. They should move those pilot guns somewhere more optimal like in front, beside cockpit. I wouldn't mind if it they reduce it to 2 size 5 or I would be very happy if they turn it to 2 size 6. Edit: just finished the vid yup you're exactly right. Same as i imagined more optimal if they put it at the sides. Also wanna add they really need to rework the landing gear. Gun placement in the engines looks really weird.
Yep, especially since you can't individually control one of the small turrets, they've got a weird thing going on with them. Man that ship is desperate for some TLC.
This seems like a difficult thing to balance in a way anyone will be happy with it. If it becomes too strong missles are pointless, if it is too weak then the defending pilots will complain about how pointless they are. Different peoples perception of what is balanced will be will be drastically different too.
call me crazy, but I'd say the Connie, or any ship for that matter, needs more speed to create actually meaningfull deflection angles and ranges. Either that or torps need to be brought down to walking speeds. Though I actually kinda think the result is interessting in creating, intended or not, a sweetspot for effective weapon sizes, as the size 5 seems effective against the Connie, while the S9 seems to slow and sluggish to be effective against this type of ship.
Not only is the placing more than stupid, no ship would ever be created this way. It also cant hit anything. Also CIGs manned turrets approach makes the inner layout of Ships so damn stupid, even remote turrets wouldve been better, but CIG knows how NOT to make things the proper way.
I'm shocked it worked once. I was beginning to think maybe the missiles are immune to it from some glitch. But I think it is mainly because it can't track the missiles at their speed properly. They should just increase the quantity of small fire at torpedos to make it more effective. It can shoot like 3 times the speed, but in short bursts to save energy for capacitors to recharge or something. Either way they do it, its close and thats awesome
Thanks for the constructive feedback and suggestion at the end. Thats a good recommendation - adding 2 front PDC's (that could add opportunities for hardpoint upgrades). I'm curious to see this same test if CIG buff's the damage or rate of fire. I hope we get to swap out with variants (kinetic high damage/low rate of fire, low damage/high rate of fire, a tight beam energy variant, or blinding ammo, etc). I would love to see a balance where pilot skill increases saturation or buys a little more time to reduce damage from clusters of multiple missiles.
I was testing the Polaris PDCs yesterday in AC yesterday. Missiles from a Hammerhead. It stopped 100% unless I fired in pairs, in which case one in every 5th pair would hit. Basically they were awesome.
I think the blindspots are intentional so pilots will learn weaknesses in the field of fire coverage. But since this system doesn't seem to work, it looks like all spots are vulnerable spots.
I think it sorta makes sense that smaller missiles would be harder for the PDC to hit, though that would be like S1 or S2 that could more reliably get through PDCs, methinks. The system will 100% see refinement, considering this is just the first implementation of it. They'll improve tracking and ballistics and such, but for the sake of gameplay balancing, they probably shouldn't be an absolute hard counter to all missiles. They should be susceptible to a saturation attack, for instance.
Hm, feels like an easy dirty somewhat fix, least for the firing angle, would be to place the PDC on the angular plate so it would be blocked less by the engines, or increase the amount by an extra 3 and place a single one on each engine giving a much better protection overall.... ofc that doesn't count for much if they're basically useless in themselves, so that needs to be fixed first.
As I mentioned on FoxyLoxy's video, pretty much _every_ S4+ ship needs at least one of these - terrible performance aside. Particular flaws here include range that is too short, fire volume/damage is too low to defeat missiles, velocity is potentially too low to meaningfully affect the missiles, and just bad hit registry potentially serverside on anything smaller than S9 torps. If the PDCs can work consistently, the C2 and M2 need two, the A2 and Hammerhead need four, the Reclaimer needs four to six, the corsair needs at least one, and all of the connies need one. The Hull C could use at least two of these, if not four. To make the Phoenix's selling point of PDCs more suitable, the Phoenix should have two of them with better coverage. These things should be defeating smaller missiles with relative ease unless they are launched from extreme close range or in large numbers, and should be handling 1-2 S5 torpedoes just fine. S9s might prove a little more of a challenge, but maneuvering and decoys should be able to handle them in single numbers just fine as well.
I'd like to see these tests but with a pilot flying defensively knowing the angles to point the ship to compensate for blind spots. A good pilot would not fly in the manner in which these tests were conducted but the information is still good to know so that others know how to adjust.
I don't know if it is fixed in the PTU, but bombs, missiles, and torpedoes are invincible in the PU, so that may be the issue. If there aren't notes on it, i would try some testing to see if that glitch is present.
They really need to let the orgin 600i get some bespoke designer point defense turrets because the military ones completely ruin the clean lines on the ship.
I'd like to see point defence on anything Carrack sized and up, with few exceptions. The server blade system might take care of some of this work, but the PDS is more specific.
I think in this iteration is obvious that only size 9 torpedoes are affected by the PDC weapons. Can you shoot down torpedoes with regular weapons. If not, they are probably invulnerable except for the size 9 as probably first test case for the PDC. I am sure CIG will work on it.
Maybe add an elevated dorsal segment between the engines to get the pdc up out of that canyon. Have the platform canted slightly aft to allow it to engage targets below and behind.
I still not understand why on the basis of "balance ship" a "real" ship builder would add some drawback and blind spot on the ship they produce. It would be like making the car weak on a specific thing to be sure the driver kill himself one day or later. No brand would do the turrets as they are on most multicrew ship, because they are just ineffective and useless with less than 80° angle on one side of the ship. Worst is corsair where side turret are nearly to useless. Who, but a fool, would in real life do that ? I know it is a game, but it is a simulation, and even old WWII bombers had turret created this the biggest angle to defend their occupant life...
yeah still, wasn't expecting a whole new combat feature to be added anytime soon. It usually seems like the whole ship combat team is out to lunch. PDCs are cool tho and this is just the beginning
They gotta just get rid of the bespoke docking mechanic on the connie and just throw a small hangar box on the back. Square out the geometry between the 4 engines. The Taurus can just have that be a radar protected area that opens and you can tractor cargo into the back. Andy can be upgunned with a merlin you can park there, sensors on the Acquy and also can park one on the back miniature hangar. I get the engine design is cool, but its too much fidly geometry to aim around. Give it a squared off, phat a$$, maybe bump the shields a bit, and you can slap a PD turret on both top and bottom of that with full 360/180 arcs.
i feel like pdcs should also target fighters and stuff but so far it cant hit the broadside of a barn from inside the barn so idk if it'll matter anyway
current effectiveness aside im really dumbfounded why they chose to go with energy weapons for PDC besides looking WAY cooler when its shooting it gives you a path to nerf it if they get too good by having the player need to manually reload them
It's a lose lose situation since it's automated with no skill involved. You either have a good system and people complain or makes missiles pointless, or you have a bad system and it's pointless to have.
Imagine if we had missiles that could shoot down other missiles that could work like the agis system so that the PDC's arent the only thing youre relying on
They're surprisingly realistic in being useless, because intercepting missiles using stuff like CIWS is still incredibly hard, even with their extremely high fire rates, so of course the laser repeaters SC uses are entirely useless. Also the spread of the turret, lol.
07! Yall are amazing! Thank You for the behind the scenes look at how I would imagine military testing is done! Always love your vids, regardless of the nay-sayers out there! Keep it up A1!
Its not useless at all, it shoot down 2 to all 3 torps fired at it it only shoots down 1 missile due to their speed. Its a decent extra defense its not supposed to make you Invulnerable. Just like missiles shouldn't be 1 shot 1 kill. It still needs to be worked on tweaked but its a good start from ZERO.
Hmm, wondered if cig thought that adding pdcs to old ships would be a quick way to sell more of the old existing flyable ships like taurus. But with pdc not working and in silly positions. Can't see CIGs money woes being saved by these :-(
I don't know why they thought putting a CANON on a turret that is intended for missile screening was a good idea. You need fire rate. Also, fat chance the server is ever operating at a fast enough FPS for these to ever work any time soon anyway.
Great video and a solid approach to testing that took only 11 minutes... so Why does CIG not perform these types of tests prior to releasing "art" into a fire fight??
Excellent point on rule of cool and how it cripples the viability of the very multi crew ships CIG demands are flown multi crew. So much for Chris' Pacific War in Space 🙂 The takeaway seems to be "don't use S9" so the swam of Rattlers remains viable, I guess the PDC would fail there, did you try? It would be A Good Thing if these were eventually craftable and could be retrofitted, I could see folk binning some manned turrets in favour...if they work ofc!
.. did you try to perhaps shoot it from behind, where it's located? it's a luxury ship, not a combat ship so it would likely be running from any indication of a fight.
20 year EvE player checking in. Star Citizen is looking more like EvE every day, and will end up with the same dynamics. The only thing that will matter is mass and the skills of a few "commanders". Bring more numbers than the other guy, and you win. If a large org doesn't want to lose and they have the mass, they'll always have the option of overloading and shutting down the server. I have been through fights like that. It's completely demoralizing and demotivating. We all bought into the dream, folks, but at some point we're going to have to realize that it was just a dream, and Star Citizen in the end will be just a game, if they can drag it across the finish line in 5 more years at all.
Most videos I've seen with the Phoenix PDCs, they suck. Then I see videos with 890 PDCs, and they're taking out missiles, ships, everything. I think it's a issue with the Connie specifically.
The issue seems to be the spread on the weapon and the physical size of the torpedoes. The s9 was intercepted successfully, but not a single s5 was taken out, and you can see how much spread the weapon has in some parts of this video. The PDC should be ballistic gatling, or let us choose between laser and ballistic. Also have to keep in mind this is still only the first iteration of PDCs, they will likely get lots of attention during the PTU cycle.
lots of attention once they are in? its been my experience that the opposite is usually the case. once its in, that is the state that it will remain in for years on end. take mfd for example. finally updated even though they have been talking about an update since like 2016.
I don´t really see the point of a "defense" system in close ranged space combat, why not also use it offensively, too, all the time you have no torpedoes around?
![BLACK BAG - Official Trailer [HD] - Only in Theaters March 14](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/Du0Xp8WX_7I/mqdefault.jpg)
Pointless Defense Cannon
Lmao 😂😂😂
🤣
This is the greatest missed opportunity for a video title lol, I've failed you all. I totally......
Missed the point
@@Avenger__One Get out LOL
lol to funny 😂😂😂
i think the problem is the fire rate
single cannon and only about 500rpm sure won't do a great job
irl ones usually have over 3000rpm
Needs phalanx ciws for sure
IRL CIWS are moving away from the silliness of phalanx etc with their limited firing time and significant magazine reloading time, to dual purpose cannon that are mounted much like conventional ship turrets that have magazine internal to the ship, that just are much more efficient, have much longer firing times etc etc.
most of the projectiles from a phalanx are doing nothing and are just missing the target, and the only reason they hit things is the volume of fire put into an area of sky, modern cannon in modern CIWS are just highly accurate, like some of the Rheinmetall and others offerings.
@@b101uk9 don't tell me. tell CIG.
tell them to make programmable amunations and compatible calibration system
my opinion is just a quick fix base on what we already have
Problem is the netcode
@@jml348 that is a big part of the problem, as they have not fully moved to server authoritative, so there are still more parts that are reliant on the two clients, which is why PvE works better, as half the problem is removed
Failing to match that "The Expanse" awesomeness.
Projectiles flying through space in huge streaming arcs, are just generally cooler than almost all the lasers you see elsewhere... let alone when SCs lasers sound like 1 minute of me F'in around on a synth, in my first week as a sound engineer in uni lmao
I mean it's an obvious example, but if you aren't atleast gonna try for star wars levels of laser SFX, then may as well have them make no noise whatsoever, like it would be IRL :')
& if anyone from CIG is reading this, please pay attention to how the foley work for Star Wars was done, given there's hours of documentaries on that subject alone.
The counter to PDCs should be overwhelming them with income fire, ewarefare, stealth. but not because PDCs have bad placement location and track/hit rate.
RSI's engineers are their own enemy. It's company policy from Roberts himself.
You can always look at test results and boost up damage, accuracy, range or fire rate. Everything devs need to do to make it work is to change 4 numbers. That's not a big deal. The question is will it be on live like that or they'll fix it?
I think these PD are being modeled for intended use on the Polaris first, which it’s common threats going to be size 9 and above torpedos which it seems to handle very well. I would like to see it improve at least against s5 torps too.
I am shocked to learn that a gameplay feature introduced to SC doesn't work...😂
well it kinda did and the real test on the PDCs working is when the polaris is out since i think its gonna have 7 PDC emplacements so we cant say something does not work when CIG puts it in the worst spot on the ship.
It works fine. People’s understanding of PDC’s and game balance is what doesn’t work.
@@TrevTheMan00 That doesn't help the Phoenix owners does it. Jeez some of you people are so emotionally invested you'll defend anything :)
@@Bad-wolfeThis 👏
The placement of the PDC could not be worse lol
That's cig balance for ya
"But NoOoOoOoooooo we can't ruin our ships aesthetics, by making PDCs, countermeasures, or turrets actually useful in any way, shape, or form"
don't say that, next patch they'll put it in the cargo bay!
@@SadmanHusseinthey did it to the worst looking ship
@@Dumb-Comment they unironically put it in the ugliest place for it to be, on that ship also, lmao
having a PDC shouldn't mean you are invulnerable to torpedoes so I think the blind spots are appropriate. But I do think it shouldn't be missing so many wide open line of sight shots.
Agreed, I made a similar comment. It also gives a ton of room to upgrade those PDC and config.
It feels underpowered on this ship. Better than no PDC but it doesn’t look like it does much. Maybe it works best if you are flying away to escape.
Well that was a bit disappointing, I was hoping that it would do a better job.
One thing I was curious about is if it has any target priority built in would be interesting to use a firebird to fire off 6 small missile to cover a size 9 coming in at the same time. However at this point seems irrelevant.
It seems clear that the greatest weakness of PDC's is target saturation, though we won't know how well they work until we've got a ship with multiple like the Polaris. Seems like the PDC waits a bit too long to start firing, despite being able to track missiles from like 2KM out.
"That was a bit disappointing" on the first iteration that hasn't even made it to the PU yet, lol.
@@harabecswurveweathers If you look at any Polaris vs Polaris fight on youtube the PDCs look like they work decently
Cool that they are starting to bring them in. That Connie placement seems pretty bad to me but.
Well Care bears and white knights are saying the placement is perfect and makes sense since you are more likely to be fire from the back only or you should only run when fighting lol
@@StoneCooldsit's a VIP transport, "realistically" it would be running from every fight in an effort to protect the VIP.
No VIP would want to see the pilot ask them to hold their beer while they deal with some pirates they will want the pilot to egress out of hostile space as quickly as possible. Which leaves the point defense defending the rear.
The Connie is just poorly designed for rear facing turrets with the engines the way they are designed.
Personally I'd prefer if the Phoenix lost the p72 in favor of replacing it with another point defense just to make the ship stand out more compared to other connies.
Pdcs on the rear of the engine nacelles should have been the call.
@WildAce001 realistically a VIP transport would have the best possible PDC with the best angles possible to insure the max chance of scaping. And yeah, you could get ride of the snub, but that would cause massive outcry, it needs a mount that puts it over the engines to have better cover,
It’s simple fellow citizens. You defend this crap PDS turret by claiming it should be running etc. ok well enjoy blowing up to a missile while picking up your VIP or dropping them off, better PDS placement will save you more often why argue against it lmao
Gladiator spotted! It's not a myth!
It will be a great addition to the game when these are more polished
yeah its tier Zero and people expecting it to just work perfectly day zero this is the PTU not live as well wtf Avenger you should know better. It takes like those that made me stop watching or listening to anything he has to say now.
Like every other implementation so far.
1:21 They are capable of firing, they are not capable of hitting, shortest video ever lol
Desync is likely a huge contributor that will HOPEFULLY be addressed with all the other issues the savior that server meshing needs to be. CIG could also tighten the spread on the PDCs and reduce missile health. At least until we can see what server meshing does to missiles and respective systems.
Apparently the 890J is suppose to have them too
How are you going to sit in one spot and call something useless when your a sitting duck as well as shoot from the closest you can lock a target and the closer you are the harder something will be to dodge or have a chance to lock and shoot it out the sky not only that this is not the only video testing pdt cannons so for all you know you got a bug and it has nothing to do with the pdt.
its actually the PDCs and the blindspots. The Polaris recently got them and it shoots down Torps and missiles like something from the expanse.
Typical CIG thinking, logic, testing and execution that we've come to expect
what did you expect? YOU are the testers.
Work great on the polaris.
CIG for some reason loves the put turret in unrealistic and awful positions. No ship design in IRL would follow their failures.
definitely the worst spot for a PDC to ever be in.
They need to increase the fire rate, tracking and put it on the engine, mirror it and have two on top of each engine. That way it can actually have unfettered views to actually engage in missiles.
Polaris PDCs work way too well, you gotta spam torps to hit it… they definitely work, dunno what happened in this vid
At least they didnt get you to pay extra for PDC
The MFD and HUD rework has been a real sticking point with me.
They flout every tenet of sound design, colour use, and information presentation.
Infuriating.
I prefer the new layout but hate the vastly reduced control I have over individual system, now if I loose an engine i can't just shot off the next engine to prevent rolling around
@@nicholascoker7212 Some people may prefer the new layout; that's well and good. I personally detest the removal of flight and combat information from the HUD.
The GUI was made to be appealing, not USEFUL. That's the crux of my beef with it.
A useful GUI can be made appealing to many with personalization options whereas the current mess is a challenge to actually USE.
Why would I need a Point Defense System? I have NEVER been attacked by a point in my life. 😜
Just my opinion they could put the pdc at sides of connies or sides of engines in place of pilot guns.
They should move those pilot guns somewhere more optimal like in front, beside cockpit. I wouldn't mind if it they reduce it to 2 size 5 or I would be very happy if they turn it to 2 size 6.
Edit: just finished the vid yup you're exactly right. Same as i imagined more optimal if they put it at the sides.
Also wanna add they really need to rework the landing gear. Gun placement in the engines looks really weird.
What about 890j PDCs???
Yep, especially since you can't individually control one of the small turrets, they've got a weird thing going on with them. Man that ship is desperate for some TLC.
@@rhadiemWhat is TLC?
for food: Tomato, Lettuce and Cheese
for items and things: Tender Loving Care
This seems like a difficult thing to balance in a way anyone will be happy with it. If it becomes too strong missles are pointless, if it is too weak then the defending pilots will complain about how pointless they are. Different peoples perception of what is balanced will be will be drastically different too.
Excited for an increased rate of fire on these.
Quite exciting you got it to work.
call me crazy, but I'd say the Connie, or any ship for that matter, needs more speed to create actually meaningfull deflection angles and ranges. Either that or torps need to be brought down to walking speeds.
Though I actually kinda think the result is interessting in creating, intended or not, a sweetspot for effective weapon sizes, as the size 5 seems effective against the Connie, while the S9 seems to slow and sluggish to be effective against this type of ship.
Not only is the placing more than stupid, no ship would ever be created this way. It also cant hit anything. Also CIGs manned turrets approach makes the inner layout of Ships so damn stupid, even remote turrets wouldve been better, but CIG knows how NOT to make things the proper way.
I'm shocked it worked once. I was beginning to think maybe the missiles are immune to it from some glitch. But I think it is mainly because it can't track the missiles at their speed properly. They should just increase the quantity of small fire at torpedos to make it more effective. It can shoot like 3 times the speed, but in short bursts to save energy for capacitors to recharge or something. Either way they do it, its close and thats awesome
Thanks for the constructive feedback and suggestion at the end. Thats a good recommendation - adding 2 front PDC's (that could add opportunities for hardpoint upgrades). I'm curious to see this same test if CIG buff's the damage or rate of fire. I hope we get to swap out with variants (kinetic high damage/low rate of fire, low damage/high rate of fire, a tight beam energy variant, or blinding ammo, etc). I would love to see a balance where pilot skill increases saturation or buys a little more time to reduce damage from clusters of multiple missiles.
I was testing the Polaris PDCs yesterday in AC yesterday. Missiles from a Hammerhead. It stopped 100% unless I fired in pairs, in which case one in every 5th pair would hit. Basically they were awesome.
I think the blindspots are intentional so pilots will learn weaknesses in the field of fire coverage. But since this system doesn't seem to work, it looks like all spots are vulnerable spots.
3:28 thats a defense clear as day, intercepted the missile and stopped it from hitting lol.
I think it sorta makes sense that smaller missiles would be harder for the PDC to hit, though that would be like S1 or S2 that could more reliably get through PDCs, methinks. The system will 100% see refinement, considering this is just the first implementation of it. They'll improve tracking and ballistics and such, but for the sake of gameplay balancing, they probably shouldn't be an absolute hard counter to all missiles. They should be susceptible to a saturation attack, for instance.
Hm, feels like an easy dirty somewhat fix, least for the firing angle, would be to place the PDC on the angular plate so it would be blocked less by the engines, or increase the amount by an extra 3 and place a single one on each engine giving a much better protection overall.... ofc that doesn't count for much if they're basically useless in themselves, so that needs to be fixed first.
As I mentioned on FoxyLoxy's video, pretty much _every_ S4+ ship needs at least one of these - terrible performance aside.
Particular flaws here include range that is too short, fire volume/damage is too low to defeat missiles, velocity is potentially too low to meaningfully affect the missiles, and just bad hit registry potentially serverside on anything smaller than S9 torps.
If the PDCs can work consistently, the C2 and M2 need two, the A2 and Hammerhead need four, the Reclaimer needs four to six, the corsair needs at least one, and all of the connies need one. The Hull C could use at least two of these, if not four. To make the Phoenix's selling point of PDCs more suitable, the Phoenix should have two of them with better coverage.
These things should be defeating smaller missiles with relative ease unless they are launched from extreme close range or in large numbers, and should be handling 1-2 S5 torpedoes just fine. S9s might prove a little more of a challenge, but maneuvering and decoys should be able to handle them in single numbers just fine as well.
I'd like to see these tests but with a pilot flying defensively knowing the angles to point the ship to compensate for blind spots. A good pilot would not fly in the manner in which these tests were conducted but the information is still good to know so that others know how to adjust.
I don't know if it is fixed in the PTU, but bombs, missiles, and torpedoes are invincible in the PU, so that may be the issue. If there aren't notes on it, i would try some testing to see if that glitch is present.
THANK YOU, for testing variables… The first video I saw only tested a single type of missile at a single range.
3:28 it hit ? I'm not sure... It seem to have have explode in space.
Yeah that looked like a successful interception to me.
You might consider redoing these tests with an 890 Jump, which has a more extensive point defense system.
They really need to let the orgin 600i get some bespoke designer point defense turrets because the military ones completely ruin the clean lines on the ship.
I'd like to see point defence on anything Carrack sized and up, with few exceptions. The server blade system might take care of some of this work, but the PDS is more specific.
The Pheonix was supposed to run away from combat, so missiles should typically be behind you. The placement is appropriate for the role of the ship.
The Polaris PTU PDCs are fantastic. Arguably too good.
I think in this iteration is obvious that only size 9 torpedoes are affected by the PDC weapons. Can you shoot down torpedoes with regular weapons. If not, they are probably invulnerable except for the size 9 as probably first test case for the PDC. I am sure CIG will work on it.
Nice, now my Eclipse is way worse than it was anyway...
Man I feel you. I've been sitting on original concept editions of the Retaliator and Eclipse, both of which seem to lose more and more appeal.
5:04 This sort of thing always makes me wonder if the designer assumed the user had a good chance of being completely illiterate.
Or that they know their load out they are using and already knows the min/max and that is just a visual aid?
That PDC could not seem more out of place on that ship. Why Is it in such a terrible position and why does it look like it belongs on another ship
It's just pathetic how it fails to connect due to so many obstructions like you pointed out.
I wonder how it would preform if they tripled fire rate of the PDC
Maybe add an elevated dorsal segment between the engines to get the pdc up out of that canyon. Have the platform canted slightly aft to allow it to engage targets below and behind.
I still not understand why on the basis of "balance ship" a "real" ship builder would add some drawback and blind spot on the ship they produce. It would be like making the car weak on a specific thing to be sure the driver kill himself one day or later.
No brand would do the turrets as they are on most multicrew ship, because they are just ineffective and useless with less than 80° angle on one side of the ship. Worst is corsair where side turret are nearly to useless. Who, but a fool, would in real life do that ? I know it is a game, but it is a simulation, and even old WWII bombers had turret created this the biggest angle to defend their occupant life...
I'm surprised they made the pdc lasers and no ballistic/reload needed for balance reasons
yeah still, wasn't expecting a whole new combat feature to be added anytime soon. It usually seems like the whole ship combat team is out to lunch. PDCs are cool tho and this is just the beginning
They gotta just get rid of the bespoke docking mechanic on the connie and just throw a small hangar box on the back.
Square out the geometry between the 4 engines.
The Taurus can just have that be a radar protected area that opens and you can tractor cargo into the back. Andy can be upgunned with a merlin you can park there, sensors on the Acquy and also can park one on the back miniature hangar.
I get the engine design is cool, but its too much fidly geometry to aim around. Give it a squared off, phat a$$, maybe bump the shields a bit, and you can slap a PD turret on both top and bottom of that with full 360/180 arcs.
Looks to me like the size 3 missile from behind was successfully shot down.
I like the mindset behind the point defense system. Just needs some tuning, keep up the good ideas CIG!
i feel like pdcs should also target fighters and stuff but so far it cant hit the broadside of a barn from inside the barn so idk if it'll matter anyway
current effectiveness aside im really dumbfounded why they chose to go with energy weapons for PDC besides looking WAY cooler when its shooting it gives you a path to nerf it if they get too good by having the player need to manually reload them
arent these only in the PTU or have i missed something?
Consider repeating test with use of other countermeasures?
It's a lose lose situation since it's automated with no skill involved. You either have a good system and people complain or makes missiles pointless, or you have a bad system and it's pointless to have.
Imagine if we had missiles that could shoot down other missiles that could work like the agis system so that the PDC's arent the only thing youre relying on
They're surprisingly realistic in being useless, because intercepting missiles using stuff like CIWS is still incredibly hard, even with their extremely high fire rates, so of course the laser repeaters SC uses are entirely useless.
Also the spread of the turret, lol.
It's a tuning / server performance issue more than anything else. Blind spots make sense.
07! Yall are amazing! Thank You for the behind the scenes look at how I would imagine military testing is done! Always love your vids, regardless of the nay-sayers out there! Keep it up A1!
Its not useless at all, it shoot down 2 to all 3 torps fired at it it only shoots down 1 missile due to their speed. Its a decent extra defense its not supposed to make you Invulnerable. Just like missiles shouldn't be 1 shot 1 kill. It still needs to be worked on tweaked but its a good start from ZERO.
i heard the point defense turrets are made by RSI's sister company 30K ...
Hmm, wondered if cig thought that adding pdcs to old ships would be a quick way to sell more of the old existing flyable ships like taurus. But with pdc not working and in silly positions. Can't see CIGs money woes being saved by these :-(
PDS (point defence system) not all point defense are cannons
this was such a nice cinematic experience.
It was working amazingly well back in 2021 during the over tuned xenothreat missions. (Anything that got close was ripped apart)
I don't know why they thought putting a CANON on a turret that is intended for missile screening was a good idea. You need fire rate.
Also, fat chance the server is ever operating at a fast enough FPS for these to ever work any time soon anyway.
Its not a military ship. I dont want civilian ships to be perfectly fitted for combat. This is good to have and not perfect I like it.
Cinematic camera if you want to do it from the aggressors perspective.
That Size 3 missle got intercepted - you got that one wrong.
Great video and a solid approach to testing that took only 11 minutes... so Why does CIG not perform these types of tests prior to releasing "art" into a fire fight??
Because they want us to test it so they can gather the data and adjust. Don't forget we are the tester in this alpha
Looks like it has quite a bit of dispersion. If they increased ita accuracy then it would be a lot more useful all around.
Nice video... i like your unbiased coverage of CIG !!!!!
Does the PDC work in Quantum mode? Maybe of you were moving faster it would have more time to engage.
It seems like the PDC isn't doing damage. Looks like it hits but no dmg
Wonder if they're is some reg issues on some of the shots
don't need it for the smaller torps, just launch one flare or use boost and it'll never connect.... WTB missile rework
Considering the desync always going on with the servers, did you honestly expect it to work?
Very interesting info. Thanks for the tests.
Excellent point on rule of cool and how it cripples the viability of the very multi crew ships CIG demands are flown multi crew. So much for Chris' Pacific War in Space 🙂 The takeaway seems to be "don't use S9" so the swam of Rattlers remains viable, I guess the PDC would fail there, did you try? It would be A Good Thing if these were eventually craftable and could be retrofitted, I could see folk binning some manned turrets in favour...if they work ofc!
Horrible placement for a single PDC. Whoever at CIG did that never played Space Engineers.
.. did you try to perhaps shoot it from behind, where it's located? it's a luxury ship, not a combat ship so it would likely be running from any indication of a fight.
20 year EvE player checking in. Star Citizen is looking more like EvE every day, and will end up with the same dynamics. The only thing that will matter is mass and the skills of a few "commanders". Bring more numbers than the other guy, and you win. If a large org doesn't want to lose and they have the mass, they'll always have the option of overloading and shutting down the server. I have been through fights like that. It's completely demoralizing and demotivating.
We all bought into the dream, folks, but at some point we're going to have to realize that it was just a dream, and Star Citizen in the end will be just a game, if they can drag it across the finish line in 5 more years at all.
Most videos I've seen with the Phoenix PDCs, they suck. Then I see videos with 890 PDCs, and they're taking out missiles, ships, everything. I think it's a issue with the Connie specifically.
they seams to be pointless defense cannons rn
The issue seems to be the spread on the weapon and the physical size of the torpedoes. The s9 was intercepted successfully, but not a single s5 was taken out, and you can see how much spread the weapon has in some parts of this video. The PDC should be ballistic gatling, or let us choose between laser and ballistic. Also have to keep in mind this is still only the first iteration of PDCs, they will likely get lots of attention during the PTU cycle.
lots of attention once they are in? its been my experience that the opposite is usually the case. once its in, that is the state that it will remain in for years on end.
take mfd for example. finally updated even though they have been talking about an update since like 2016.
As with NPC manned turrets they at least hit the niners
Do they only fire on missiles and Torpedos or also other threats like hostile ships / vehicles?
lol far from useless. They wreck anything and everything now.
That's a great place to out the PDC. *sarcasm. I bet it has all of 20 degrees of arc and maybe that in depression angle.
I don´t really see the point of a "defense" system in close ranged space combat, why not also use it offensively, too, all the time you have no torpedoes around?
This was a great video A1 very informative and usable test data
I would love to see Ballistic Gatling PDC's
PDT Point Defense Turret
why isn't it shooting at ships?