Designing Procedural Nova Weapons

    TL;DR: The Tech Generator is now generating all of Nova's weapons, and myriad variations thereof. Next steps will be generating Nova's outfits, then I'll polish it up for version 1.0.

 

Progress Update

   Since the last blog post, two major milestones have been achieved:

1. A lot of "cleanup" work has been done to make the Tech Generator more intuitive and user-friendly.
2. It is now actually generating all of the weapons in Nova (and many variations on them!).

   Next steps will include the following:

1. Adding Nova's outfits.
2. Adding a few fields that are supported by the Nova engine but unused in the Nova scenario.
3. Cleaning up the generator some more to make it as intuitive & user-friendly as possible.
4. Adding how-to-use documentation.
   
5. "Releasing" the Generator at Version 1.0. :)

 

Weapon-by-Weapon Commentary

    I'd like to spend the rest of this blog post commenting on each type of weapon in Nova, and how the Tech Generator is currently set up to handle them.

   Please note that I set these up primarily as a way to stress-test the generator and prove that it works, without any plans to actually use them... so a lot of my decisions were a bit arbitrary.

   Additionally, it's worth noting that the Tech Generator is designed to be flexible and easy to adjust, so any changes that someone might be interested in making, should be readily doable when actually using the Tech Generator to make a Nova expansion plug-in:

Blasters:

   These are what I started with, as there are enough of them in Nova to establish strong patterns. However, based on their progressions and lore, they don't always fit neatly into their own pattern! Fortunately the Tech Generator is able to introduce truly random variance, which I made considerable use of here to enable Blasters to, overall, follow the expected pattern, while allowing each individual Blaster weapon to have enough random deviation that all of Nova's actual blaster weapon stats are possible. I included fixed-cannon Blasters, swivel-mounted Blasters, Blaster turrets, and Point-Defense Blaster Turrets. Each of those ranges in caliber from being equivalent to a Light Blaster to somewhat above a Heavy Blaster, and everywhere in-between.

Basic Missiles:

   I decided to lump IR Missiles, Radar Missiles, Gravimetric Missiles, and Etheric Wake Missiles into one category, as their stats are pretty consistent with a linear size & power progression, and their guidance/jam type is the biggest feature difference between them. So now there is a whole family of missiles within each guidance type, with the size, cost, damage, and speed/turn stats building up from those of IR Missiles to those of Etheric Wake Missiles, within each guidance family.

 

Fusion Pulse Weapons:

   There are three types of these in Nova: Cannons, Turrets, and Batteries. Additionally, they vary from each other in two ways: slight differences in caliber, and dramatic differences in Damage Per Second. For the Tech Generator's setup, I kept the three basic "types" of Fusion Pulse weapons, and each one comes in the full range of calibers and damage outputs.

Chainguns:

   Similarly to Blasters, I decided to create a few different types of Chainguns: Fixed, Swivel, Turreted, and Point-Defense. For each, I wanted to have a progression of power, so I set them up with a "caliber" of sorts – they all use the same ammunition, but the more powerful variants fire it at a higher velocity, causing more damage upon impact; also, they simultaneously increase their overall Rate of Fire somewhat for a significantly increased Damage Per Second compared to the base versions we see in Nova. As I mentioned in the last blog post, it was a challenge to get the balance elements working right while factoring in the Burst Fire system, but it's all working smoothly now. :)

 

Railguns:

   I also treated these similarly to Blasters – there are Fixed*, Swivel, and Turreted versions, each ranging in caliber. (The railguns in Nova are called "fixed" but they swivel; I set up some truly-fixed versions in the Tech Generator.) Infamously, in Nova the 200mm railgun actually deals the least DPS of the three! I made sure to include enough random variation that that can still happen in the Tech Generator's output, but also sometimes the highest-caliber railguns will truly outperform their smaller counterparts.

Raven Rockets:

   These are an interesting case in Nova because there are two different launchers – the Raven Pod and the Raven Turret – that clearly use the same ammo, yet the projectile speed, range, and damage per rocket is different! For the Tech Generator, I kept that difference in per-rocket performance, and added more powerful versions of the launchers that fire the exact same rockets but with higher Rate of Fire & Damage Per Second. As with all the other variations from the Generator, those power differences exist along a spectrum with an element of randomness, so you can get endless variations of possible Raven Pods.

 

Polaron Cannon:

   In Nova's lore, the Polaron Cannon is an experimental weapon. So rather than giving it a progression into larger calibers, I instead gave it a progression of increasing developmental refinement. The more "developed" versions of the Polaron Cannon are improved in almost every way: damage output, fuel efficiency, range, reduced Burst Reload time, and miniaturization.

Polaron Torpedoes:

   In base Nova, there are two versions of this: a one-shot-at-a-time launcher, and a five-shots-at-a-time launcher. For the Tech Generator, I created a progression from 1 to 5 shots at a time, and everywhere in between. There's some variation to the Rate of Fire (and thereby the Damage Per Second), but for the most part it's just a progression of how many submunitions it creates.

Biorelay Lasers:

   These come in Cannon and Turret forms. I added "calibers" here, ranging from much smaller, to moderately larger, than the ones in base Nova. Their mass, damage output, and range all increase proportionally with higher calibers.

Space Bombs:

   Personally, I've never actually used the "Stellar Grenades" in Nova – perhaps I'm missing out! – so I wanted to include some that are bigger & more powerful to incentivize their use. Similar to other weapons, I set up a progression of bomb sizes, with the biggest ones being 5 times the size and damage of the base "Stellar Grenade", and with a moderately increased Area Of Effect.

Ion Cannon:

   Digging around in Nova's data files, I discovered that the Ion Cannon actually has Burst Fire, but its Burst Reload time is 0, so it fires continuously anyway. I decided to embrace that as I created "calibers" of the Ion Cannon, with the one we all know and love from base Nova being the highest caliber in the range. My thinking was that smaller versions could be used by smaller ships, even fighters, to partially ionize other ships in battle. In the progression I created, the smallest Ion Cannons take 4 tons, deal one-sixth the overall DPS of the full-sized Ion Cannon, have roughly half the range, and fire in short bursts with long Burst Reload times. They exist in a smooth progression of size & power from that small version up to the continuous-fire full-sized Ion Cannon from base Nova, with some randomness applied to all of the stats along the way.

Wraith Cannon:

   The Wraithii are a very distinctive projectile, so I wanted to keep the projectiles consistent between different versions of the Wraith Cannon. Doing that, I set up a range of Wraith Cannons that vary only in price and Rate of Fire, with the most powerful versions firing four times as fast as the original, doing roughly 280 Damage Per Second, which is quite high– but, they cost 2 million credits per launcher! As with the other weapons here, the Generator produces Wraith Cannons along the full spectrum from the original version to the rapid-fire version, with some amount of actual randomness applied to the size, price, and Rate of Fire along the way.

Capacitor Pulse Laser:

   Implemented "calibers" again here, using the base Nova version as the "basic" version and getting moderately more powerful from there. I didn't want to make smaller wimpier versions because this weapon's power is so iconic, and I didn't want to push the power too far beyond what it already has.

 

 

EMP Torpedoes:

   For these, I thought it would be really neat if there were smaller ones available, with enough speed & accuracy to be a little better at hitting the target, and with reduced ionization but still enough to briefly incapacitate a target. You could fire one off to "stun" a ship while you come in with guns blazing, or use it to buy time to escape from an attacking ship, etc. In any case, I set the Generator up to create these on a range of sizes, with the smaller ones being more accurate and the larger ones being more powerful, with the biggest ones being the ones we see in stock Nova.

 

Thunderhead Lance:

   The base version of this deals a lot of Damage Per Second, especially for its size; I set up a progression where the size and DPS both increase, with "diminishing returns" – the biggest version of the Thunderhead Lance deals double the DPS, but it's quadruple the size. Even with that disproportionate size increase, it's super powerful, actually dealing slightly more DPS than the Capacitor Pulse Laser! I set those to cost roughly 500,000 credits each, making it a relatively affordable way to achieve massive DPS values on your ship– although the range is still very short, only slightly longer than the base Thunderhead Lance. As with the other weapons, this is generated as a progression with the basic version, the "heavy" version, and everything in between, along with some random variance for good measure.

 

Mining Lasers:

   I set up a whole range of these in size and damage output, some much smaller than the base Mining Laser in Nova, and some much larger. They scale from 1 ton to ~7 tons, with a bit of random variance. They all fire the same laser projectile, just with different Rates of Fire and thereby different Damage Per Second. They're all really terrible at damaging other ships, but deal 10x the damage to asteroids.

 

Special Missiles:

   I decided to treat the Hellhound Missile as one example of "unique missiles" that could exist in Nova's universe, and set the Generator up to try to produce a variety of them. The launchers all take roughly 10 tons, and the missiles themselves may be either 0 tons or 1 ton each. They make heavy use of random variation in their stats, with wildly varying: 1) damage per missile; 2) Damage Per Second; 3) missile speed; 4) maximum range; 5) Area of Effect size; 6) impact/knockback of the target; 7) ionization; 8) missile turn rate; 9) durability vs point-defense; and 10) vulnerability vs jamming. Each of those stats varies independently of the others, so you can get a massive number of truly unique combinations. The larger missiles have the potential to achieve greater power per missile, if the randomness permits.

 

Light Cannons:

   I wanted to do a power range for these, but felt it was important to the essence of being a "light cannon" for their projectiles to stay the same, and for their mass to stay extremely low– so I set some up that are the same size, but simply have a higher Rate of Fire and therefore a higher Damage Per Second. These rapid-fire ones also have slightly longer range, a higher projectile speed, and better accuracy. The more powerful ones cost more than the basic versions we have in the base Nova scenario. As with the other weapons, the Generator will create more powerful ones, less powerful ones, and everything in between, with some random variance thrown in. Additionally, I decided to create 3 base forms: Light Cannons, Swivel Light Cannons, and Turreted Light Cannons, with the same range of firing properties across all three types.

 

Triphammer:

   Given that this is a special weapon installed on a unique ship, my approach for it was to consider the idea of having your Thunderforge's Triphammers "modified" to operate differently. I set the Tech Generator up so that some Triphammer variants do lots of extra damage with greatly reduced ionization, whereas others cause lots of extra ionization with greatly reduced damage output, and they can fall anywhere on that Damage-vs-Ionization spectrum; the Triphammer we see in the base Nova scenario falls right in the middle. As with everything else, random variation is thrown into the mix– including some random variation to the bonuses the Triphammers give you for Armor, Acceleration, and Turn Rate.

Conclusion

   ...and, that's it! If anyone has any thoughts on a better system for any of the weapons above, I'd definitely be interested in hearing about it; I really enjoy thinking about this kind of thing. :)

    And if anyone is interested in using the Tech Generator to actually make a plug-in for any of the EV games, I'd certainly love to hear about it!

    For myself, I plan to get Version 1.0 finished, then set it aside until I'm ready to use it for Orion Skies.

    Have a great day, all, and happy modding!