Metsys

What immediately comes to mind is a "maliscious" move someone could do with that, namely we already have auto-triggering scripts that go off when anybody comes close at the markets. If anyone can "force" my camera view to look at their "ad" on the markets, then I would very much hate any such change.

If you could read you'd see it's 138m² for an M core. As far as I know most currently aim their L cores at ~400m². Again, LOGIC! IT MAKES SENSE Also if with that M core I target an L core nano I still get at least 40% hit probs, if not more. An L core trying to hit said small cross section M core will have a difficult time, which gives M core the niche to be able to counter L nanos. If my M core would max out the space of an M core construct it might become larger than the INTENTIONALLY SMALL L core and SHOULD get hit equally as easily or take even more hits. In return a 2seater L core with cannons (and maybe some voxel) will shred the M core regardless, as the far higher dps and rate of fire of cannons at same/similar range as M rails will completely obliterate any advantage the small M core cross section ship might have. There is a system in this and asking for the removal defies any sense of logic.

That sounds more like a voxel problem rather than a cross section issue. Speaking of Scifi, Expanse ship designs play SPECIFICALLY into that cross section niche. Military vessels are sleek, longer and thin. Reason for that is obviously that you want to give as little surface to get shot at as possible. A difference in that show is haulers, big carrier-style war ships (even those go with a sleek design) and guerilla style pirating vessels (because realistically if you don't expect to be shot back then your ship can be as clunky and big as you want, you wont have to worry about taking shots). Even in star wars, if you wanna go more with a space opera kinda scifi, the big ships have a hard time hitting the smaller, nimble vessels. They need to deploy small ships of their own that get pretty close in a dog fight to be able to hit eachother. From a military standpoint it makes sense to put as much functionality and firepower into a small-as-possible frame. I am not sure what you expect here. Anything else defies logic. Like, yes, you CAN build a big L core ship but unless you intentionally want to bathe yourself in enemy fire to act as a sort of "tank" in a fleet fight then you always SHOULD try to give as little surface for enemy hits as possible. Also, again, main reason we don't see that in action frequently right now is the added weight adds warp cell cost and makes it very expensive and difficult to move such a heavy tanky ship into a spontaneous combat situation on the fly. But if you do bring a ship that can also voxel tank when the shields are down, then said ship can vent the shields to bring them back at 50% (10mil HP), even possibly multiple times in battle, getting even far more value out of the shield as now effectively your shield has 30mil+ HP in a battle where smaller ships will get cored guaranteed the moment their shields drop

Well, I strongly disagree with you here on multiple points of yours, but I accept people have different views on matters so I only will inquire about the cross section. I am a bit surprised that it suddenly is such a point of discussion and discontent, when cross section has always mattered one way or another and if anything people were happy with the change to cross section importance. What had held the impact of a lower cross section back before was the strength of voxel. You could easily just power through with whatever shape and size simply because a bigger cross section meant more voxel and elements to easily tank shots with. Smaller cross section meant you'd get cored easier once you do get hit. And cross section from a core 1 size smaller is not THAT impactful that you would miss EVERY shot. (Example: we tested targeting my 138m² frontal cross section ship and we would still get a 22% hit chance even at best angle for said ship) When voxel tankiness got nerfed so hard that one direct hit would cause a massive hole in the ship, that is when cross section became more impactful. And now somehow it is twisted so that cross section is the issue and not the change that happened to voxel and the resulting consequence in ship building philosophy. I cannot really follow that train of thought. And I mean realistically it just makes SENSE. If the target is smaller you have a harder time hitting it. Why wouldn't that be a thing...

I think linking and limiting max speed to construct weight is the way to go. Going by core sizes is the easy way, but would also [filtered]-punch L cores completely across the board, as they would not be able to keep up with smaller cores no matter how fast or small you build your L core, you also get a significant hit chance malus with your L weapons against smaller core enemies and L cores and elements are also more expensive and heavier by nature. It would over-shift the balance and ruin any incentive to ever strive to be able to build bigger core ships, making the longer training time requirement of being able to use L cores a ridiculous notion. So going by construct mass seems the way to go here. That way a big and heavy and size-maxed S core would not be able to outrun a super light M or L core. However, I do like the idea of this only coming into effect once pvp is involved. Otherwise any (mission) haulers will have their slowboating times INSANELY increased, making an already 3-5h slowboat to the outter planets into an all-day procedure. That is a no-go

Bruh, as long as HUMANS play this game the human nature of greed and conflict will prevent your utopian hippie vision. When 1 faction is oppressively controlling space there will always pop up factions to rage against that machine. And that is good. I am fairly certain there are PvPers in the community that would quit such an all-in-one alliance just to form a front against it to get some PvP content out of it. Really silly post there, bud. This game isn't a John Lennon song.

not to toot my own horn, but I have built low cross section ships that do not look like element-only shoeboxes. There is a certain challenge in building pretty low cross section ships, I agree. But that doesn't mean it's impossible. And I do NOT want to see cross section become irrelevant again for any reason, simply because it makes logical sense that it gets harder to shoot something that is smaller. As mentioned before, you can still rock LARGE ships because with enough voxel you have more than plenty of HP to your CCS to tank long enough. Also once your shields are depleted you can VENT your shields. During that process you can tank and survive with such big tanky ships perfectly fine (all the while you might get a few brand-new windows aka holes) and your shields come back with 50% hp. If your ship is tanky enough it can do that very process multiple times during battle, actually. It's just that large ships are expensive to warp, so the easier method right now is to make a lighter, smaller ship and add tankiness through damage evasion. And that is good! Examples of low cross section ships I built, all of which are M core - btw I love how M cores are now relevant due to current shield tanking situations, the ability to squeeze out 1.2-1.4su range with M rails and the dps increase to smaller weapon sizes a while back (exo precision M rails do 130k damage with talents) and giving larger cores a hit probs malus for targeting a smaller core. 1 of them has 138m² frontal cross section, so when you point your nose (and guns) at the target they have a hard time hitting you at all, especially since it rocks an L shield. Means it's practically even tankier. Uses 3 M rails and 1 M Laser. The other one has 158m² frontal cross section and is a pvp-fitted replica of a "The Expanse" ship (Morrigan-Class Patrol Destroyer), could only fit a M shield though but rocks 16.8g of thrust with 2 Lasers and 2 Rails. Both work perfectly well as fleet support or intercept ships for piracy needs. And even my Rocinante PvP-fit replica has 220m² frontal cross section, which makes her useful enough with her L shield and 2 Lasers + 2 Rails. Ship building ALWAYS comes with compromises, more noticable with PvP ships and haulers than with anything else. If you want PRETTY then you have to accept you will always perform (at least slightly) worse than an element-only shoebox or an element-only "hauler". Builders have quit over MANY other reasons than a shift to small cross section meta...

Completely missed the actual content of the post just to talk shit. Get outta here, troll elsewhere

It has been clear from the very start that combat would be the way it is right now. Elite Dangerous, Star Wars or Star Citizen space combat is not at all feasible with the game's infrastructure, with voxel technology already devouring most processing and server performance. The pvp ad videos of NQ are scripted little things that wont realistically happen in ordinary happenstance. Carriers deploying fighters that dogfight around the big battleships that slug it out, Star Wars style, does look intriguing and is an eye catcher, but simply not a thing that happens outside of dedicated community events. The best comparison you should draw your PvP expectations from is The Expanse franchise. Combat there happens through 3 (or 4 if you count flinging asteroids) weapons: -railguns for long distance, but they are dodgable the further away the target is, -torpedoes with practically unlimited distance, and -PDC (point-defense cannons) which are for close quarter battle (CQB) or to actively take out torpedoes. There you have 3 modes of range: torpedoes for far up to unlimited range, railgun for effective middle range upon moving targets and PDC as close range. And most every single fight is decided in the long ranges by torpedoes and railguns. We are talking hundreds of kilometers. PDCs take out the torpedo threats but otherwise chances that ships even get close enough to riddle eachother with bullet holes of PDCs instead of already blowing up from the other 2 weapon types is very small. In DU you have a similar concept, but 4 weapon types: -Railguns for max range, high damage per shot but low dps -laser for medium to long range, higher rate of fire and dps -missiles for medium range, high damage per salvo, kinda like a "shotgun" to quote NQ themselves -cannons for close to medium range, low damage per shot but high rate of fire for strong dps Currently, and for the foreseeable future, PvP combat engagements will happen at rather large ranges, taking out targets at hundreds of kilometers before you would even be able make out a target with your eyes alone. Chances a ship with XS or S weaponry (being an XS or S core) getting close enough to an L ship to effectively use something like cannons is very slim. With ships all maxing out at 30.000 km/h they wouldn't be able to close the distance anyway, unless the approached L core wills it so. I like the idea of long-range combat like this and am comfortable with it. IMHO we'd need small core vessels to be able to slot L or M weaponry to their S gunner seats (even if 1 L weapon completely maxes out the capacity of the chair) to make smaller core ships fill a niche and make them viable as being near impossible to hit by L cores while being able to meaningfully engage them at THEIR ranges. Then they could in return be countered by dedicated gun platforms with smaller caliber weapons to take out these niche S ships due to hit probs. Lots of balancing and math involved with that concept idea, but worth thinking about. Otherwise pvp could maybe benefit some visual improvements. If you shoot something and go into third person you should see a little light flicker in the distance from the impact of your shot, not just having a hole appear on the enemy ship in the telescope. PS: damn, look at me monologuing

with Capacity nerfs to rails and lasers I feel like it would be interesting to be able to mix weapon sizes one can attach to a gunner chair. Having 2 L rails and a bunch of smaller weapons (like S or M cannons) to fill the left-over capacity of an L chair sounds like it would bring all sorts of interesting variety builds to ships. You could make L-core ships true weapon platforms with a vast amount of smaller guns but less effective against larger vessels, whose large weapons would still outgun the smaller range of the smaller weapons. M gunner chairs would still be relevant (as would S gunner chairs) as these are still restricted by the ship core size. This way an M-core ship would still logically not be a good match in a 1v1 against a larger vessel, as it has smaller capacity for weaponry. However, I do understand that this might become a little tough to balance. Just my 2 cents though. Otherwise FuriousPuppy has brought up a lot of good points already.