Player-Manned Turrets

So... ever since rotors were introduced, I've noticed a plethora of manned turret designs springing up. But here's my issue... since the missile turrets and gattling gun turrets on big ships are 5 times bigger than what a small ship carries, one would assume they are more powerful. Combine this with the fact that a manned turret requires a crew member to eject from their ship and hop into the turret's cockpit while the mothership is undergoing evasive combat maneuvers (a possibly difficult task). Now we're talking about a weak turret with a delayed reaction time that requires a player to even be useful) vs a more powerful turret that is automated. The idea of a manned turret is really cool... but is it really worth it?

 

Well designed, you don't have the problem in manning a turret in combat from the inside of your ship and get back in if you'll leave. Just put the cockpit upside down and leave a hole under it so you will be able to access it from the inside of your ship.

If they'll be a viable option - we'll only know once the other weapons are activated and working. Maybe those other turrets work more like a point defense, then your manned turret is THE option to go after other targets like the carrier which launched some assault crafts against you.

 

Maybe, and given that this is an engineering game is more than slightly possible, they are enjoying the challenge of making something unique to them and their needs and desires.

something other than a fixed in place stock system which has no personality or soul.

 

Also think of the manned turrets of additions, you'll still be placing automated turrets... so you'll just have an additional option how to fight.

 

Another interesting question... just HOW is an automated turret even supposed to know who the enemy is? How would it even go about determining that the ship/torpedo/astronaut to the right is bad, while the one to the left is good. And what if you capture an enemy ship? How do you protect it from being destroyed by your own turrets? I guess that might be a good argument for manned turrets....

 

I would like to know this too, I've been thinking about how MP would work and as far as I could tell unless they auto attack everything that shoots at the ship they would have to set hostiles on a menu, also a ship that sets itself to be hostile to another ship, the ship should also be considered hostile to the other ship so that griefers can't just surprise attack anyone..

 

I think it would be cool if we could "tab" between enemy ships or something to tell the automated turrets to shoot that ship.

 

I think because the game is called Space "Engineers" any well designed manned turret should be far better than any automated turret that anyone can just slap onto a ship.
The automated turrets should be mainly used as a point defense system that shoots at any small fighters and other incoming objects that are not identified by an IFF system as a friendly targets. This way they could help defend against torpedoes loaded with warheads that enemies could send sailing though space at your ship. The large ship turrets don't seem like they would be all that well armored and could be easily shoot by fighters maybe taking out with only 6-10 bullets from a small ships guns. The rockets on the other hand are ridiculously OP, as I said in one of my other replies to a post. ---See details about why I think they are OP here---> My thoughts on warheads and rockets But also I think the small ship blocks are a little too weak and it should take guns just a few more hits than it does now to break them. The small ship blocks are about 2 feet thick, why are they so weak? :confused: Having a layer of blocks around a manned turret should my it a lot tougher than the small automated turrets. Also with some of the designs I have seen with the manned turrets... People put like 4,6,8,+ guns onto 1 turret. With all those guns focused onto one target you would kill it much quicker than a few automated turrets that could
just be shooting at what ever is closest. Having a human in the turret picking out what is a bigger treat to the ship will make a big difference in a big multiplayer battle where things could be total chaos.

So I really hope a custom designed manned turret doesn't become worthless.

 

I dove into the concept of manned turrets myself, and I noticed large and small rotors have different properties; you can make a large rotor indented into a hole and have the blocks on the rotor nearly flush with a small gap, as well as positioning a motor on top of the arm and having the resulting turret platform nearly flush with the side.

Here's what a basic large turret base could look like, minimally;

It's big, yes. But the rotors are flush, it's compact and no space is wasted; you can fit a nice vertical small ship superturret onto this 3x1 base and still be able to rotate it around 360 without breaking anything off. Some counterweight is included in this design for the sake of crazy people who might mount too much weight to the front of the turret. I've run up some ludicrous designs to magnetize to the face of this rig and have amazing tracking speed by use of nothing but gyros and power sources and stupid amounts of guns like 15+ gatlings and 8+ missiles on this platform.

I've even used this platform as a basis to make a 5x hole in a ship and have a lift mechanism to pop the turret out. The compactness of the design allows the turret to spin around in a 3x3 area, so the lift was 5x5 to accomodate it as it will spin with a radius up to 4 blocks. This platform is about as simple as you can get, and a vertical turret design surpasses a wider one because of the ability to rotate 360 degrees vertically as well as horizontally.



For the best bang for your buck you can make a small ship turret with a 7-block base and then 5 blocks up, which will allow a 3-wide base to accomodate a cockpit, gyros, and generator.

A small turret has to allow for an extra block of height to apparently not collide with anything, as well as an extra block off the side of the turret's pitch pivot so there's an extra block of space there, which is why the base has to be so wide and tall.

To that extent I built the smallest turret I could make, one that can spin 360 degrees laterally and vertically using only 4 gyros and 2 generators (one's redundant in case it's shot off- you can add more if you wanted to but for a turret its size it's done if it gets shot at all.)

Considering the survivability for a turret as well, it made sense to just make it as simple and as compact as possible but also give it adequate weapons for defending itself. 4x gatlings and 2x rockets seemed to fit its sleek 3x3 frame and it has superior tracking agility, so any acutely aware turret operator should make short work of any approaching enemies trying to attack the ship he's attached to.

https://imgur.com/7ta9kE3


The 4 gyros are in the center, under the rocket launchers. A single generator sits at the back, and one hides within the armor of the protective U shaped harness.

This design could be improved with some form of side armor so that an operator could twist it over to the side if he had to soak up an incoming attack. Otherwise, frontal hits with gatlings will obliterate the turret very quickly regardless of armoring. It probably won't withstand missiles either, and adding armor would decrease its tracking rate anyway.

 

Yeah that is a tiny turret. I'm working on my own turret design, but it's much bigger and meant to be mounted on big battle ships and stations. Maybe I will post a picture when it's finished.

 

Tiny but deadly


I admit the minimal design was so that it could be mounted on lighter ships as a way to have a second crew member defend the rear of a ship during a dogfight, if the ship were a little on the heavy side or carrying cargo, the pilot will have his own eyes on where to go.
Nobody likes being chased or having that kind of battle stress of trying to dodge incoming fire from a potentially faster and more agile attacker, so having your bro on a rear turret could save your ship from the eyes of an incoming threat.

I've thought about what multiplayer could potentially hold, and for that affect it would calm my nerves as a pilot trying to deliver cargo if I knew someone had my back literally.

Pilot/gunner combinations should be frequent in multiplayer as opposed to single-seaters launching from hangars. Each has their own place, granted - single-seaters will be used as defense and interception, or as lowly tugs and miners too. Cooperative operations to transport and also perhaps to fight may use smaller ships with crew and turrets to get the job done. A turret on an offensive ship can work out threats and engage them while the pilot aims to do his job, whether it's launching torpedos or maneuvering into a boarding attack.

Turrets will always have a role in this game and building a strong or a fast turret will be just as crucial as building a fast ship or a gunboat, they will compliment the ships or stations they are attached to and fill their roles.

Plus, you have different gamer types to draw on; planners, engineers, architects, pilots, and guys who just really wanna be gunners for some reason :>

 

Speaking of manned turrets, this is my last prototype design (which has been abandoned now due to me not liking the ship design) from my R&D thread: https://forums.keenswh.com/post/shigesaki-heavy-industries-rd-6697936







Though the actual turret design is old and obsolete now (as I've improved it), the base is made to be attached to large ships:

 

And here we have the Alpha turret watching carefully over the flock of young, lesser turrets. ready to protect them and intimidate all rivals.

 

I would say its more of a taste thing. Some don't care if they aim and take the target down and will go with automated defenses. But I would guess most will get the kicks for every kill. Scene from Star Wars when Han and Luke were taking down TIE fighters comes to mind. Earlier In Mos Eisley, Falcon was using more what appeared to be automated guns. (Or was it Chewbacca firing them, been too long, need to watch it again.) Id say they will always be side by side.

I prefer using large blocks and landing gear my guns down. Mostly for the added armor value of large blocks. Like I did with my ES - C.O.R.T. (I Admit they could be done better but this was more of my prototype testing of manned turrets.)

 

Player made turrets have several advantages over the stock large ship turrets

-You can add armor to better protect the weapon system
-Have as many guns/rockets as you want in one single turret for better concentrated firepower
-Don't have to worry about potentially buggy AI shooting at friendlies or completely failing at hitting enemies
-And most importantly the satisfaction of actually building a working design rather than slapping on a stock turret

 

if i had the choice between a turret on my ship or an escort fighter, i would never take the turret.
a fighter may "park" in my hangar or even just on the ship .. if the party gets started, just dedock and fight.

if a attack an ship with an turret attached, its easy to stay on the other side of the ship in the blind spot of the turret.

and i bet my money that big-ship weapons have much greater range than small shipweapons .. therefore wont have much use, as soon these are activated.

 

That's your choice, of course - but in the game universe, we should plan for everything.

An escort fighter has the same weaknesses as the ship he's protecting; unless he's constantly scanning around with his external camera, he is flying and looking in the same direction for threats.

What a turret gunner provides, especially if the turret is on the rear of the ship, is a second set of eyes in the back; if the pilot and gunner have a clear communications channel with each other, they can more or less relax and take less caution when scanning their visible area of space knowing there really aren't any weak points and quickly prepare for battle if an incoming enemy is spotted.

A main ship + escort could do the same thing with external cameras but the escort might have worse reaction time if they are say, surprised by a ship who has tracked them with their own external camera and popped out from behind an asteroid. The escort would have to move quickly to engage, but if the attacker focused first on the escort and destroyed them, then the only remaining target is a ship fleeing with its back turned.

Same goes for a turret though, if the attack is focused first on the turret and it's destroyed, then the scenario is the same, but I just somehow think a turret might be able to react quicker and bear its guns directly at the threat in the shortest amount of time and potentially fire the first shots.

If I'm not piloting myself, I'd gladly throw in my chips as a turret gunner, as well as a turret designer. I've had a few concepts in my head for trying to increase the effectiveness and coverage of a turret, and my full-freedom design can cover up to a 45 degree forward angle towards front targets and complete coverage of the rear if it's mounted directly to the rear of a ship. Mounted on top towards the rear can cover about 45 degrees below-rear of the ship as well as anywhere above the ship. Communication to the pilot can have them roll the ship over to give the turret access to the threat, and if the pilot/gunner coordinate well, such as the gunner asking the pilot to "flip roll right" for example, the turret can anticipate the maneuver and keep their eyes on the threat by making a compensating adjustment of their own.

I'm sure everyone will have their own preferences in the end, and with enough training and experience pilots (and gunners) will be able to operate tight-knit units that can defend themselves.

And, if big-ship weapons are activated, then I'll just make big-ship turrets.

I develop turrets mainly for small ships that are not really built to be able to dogfight or defend themselves but still have important duties such as freight or delivering torpedo payloads. With the pilot focusing on flying and the ship simply not designed for combat, a turret could take up the role for only a minor addition of weight to handle any immediate threats; whether they're ambushes or interceptors coming from the large ship it's about to torpedo. There's insufficient data that could suggest either as the 'better' option, but should the decision come down to resources, it would be cheaper to install a turret onto a small ship for added protection than it would be to build a small escort fighter.

 

Don't forget that the devs may add in fixed guns for either spinal-mount or side mounted (or custom player turret mounts) weapons.
Those could easily be stronger than the existing large-ship turret (or just as effective), and would work fine in player-made turrets.

 

Imagine the kind of clusterfuck a manned turret with automatic sentry guns could accomplish if the AI guns had limited properties such as mechanical rotation and tracking speed? If they were more powerful than other weapon types it might be hilarious to just create a 360 degree motion turret that clustered a bunch of defensive systems together and had a human pilot to focus them all in the right direction..

What would actually be cool is if the automated turrets could have a manual override console, of course grouped with specific 'blocks' of them so that a gunner on a large ship could access a terminal that could display a crude computer visualization (crude compared to actually rendering from a camera mounted on the outside of a ship perhaps; instead the console is a battle system and the weapons are grouped to that system's targetting controls which can be automatic or manned) so the gunner could actually aim and fire the ship's concentrated firepower manually at whichever threat was of greatest priority. Splitting systems to different command centers could help the AI when facing multiple targets, so you could actually build different weapons groups on your ship to respond to the most immediate threats; otherwise imagine if people learned how to distract and manipulate a fixed system in which all defense turrets would focus on the nearest target... employing tactics like releasing multiple dummy decoys and then ramming a warhead kamikaze into the hull while taking minimal damage on the way in..

Of course, everything actually feasible for use in-game is limited by the actual tech, but never by imagination!

 

This is my sentiment as well...

I think very few players (if any) would choose to man a turret on someone else's large/small ship rather than fly their own ship into battle if given that option. I think it's a little naive to think players want to get in game and sit in a turret in the back of your ship the whole time, scanning for targets. They can just as well do the same from their own ship and they are not tied to your mistakes as a pilot.

For that reason I think automated turrets are the only way to go. Not to mention when you didn't have a player inside your turret, you will still want them to be useful. So AI will be a necessity anyhow.

However, there is an obvious demand to modify turret design and size as we can see here.

The developers should either give us several pre-made turret options that are different sizes and possibly weapon power OR allow us a turret hard-point and let us add blocks and guns to that and make our own style (like in star made).

The premade turrets we have now are great for small to medium sized large ships but anything larger than about 7 million kg needs a bigger turret. And personally I'd like to see some with more "heft".

To answer the question of how does it know who to shoot at, there are several ways to accomplish this but I thought Star Made did it well enough. Basically each ship equips a "faction module" and that is what determines friend/foe. In other words if you and your friends are in a faction, you are automatically ignored by each others turrets because of your faction....enemies of course will show a different faction and you can set your alignment to be at war with them and your turrets will fire on sight at any player and/or ship in that faction. Any player not part of a named faction is put into the (general neutral) faction by default. You can set yourself hostile to that general faction and you get a "shoot every other player not in your faction on site option" if you desire.

The faction module can be modeled as a "targeting computer" or something that is installed in your large ship as a requirement before your turrets will automate. This will allow you to set alignment to enemy factions (hostile, neutral, ally) as described above. I think it also a good idea that if a player is piloting a large ship another player (in same faction) can enter any additional cockpit on the ship and have access to control a particular turret (or group of turrets). This will give those few players that want to man something on larger ships that option and still allow the rest of us the automated turrets we will need when we don't have players to man them.

Small ships will not need a targeting computer or faction module because the player in the cockpit will indicate to the game whether to fire on it or not based on the players faction. Which of course works for players in open space without a ship as well. But I think large turrets should not attempt to target individual players in space at all...that's what the PD turrets are for.

Why do large ships need a faction module?

Because, in a small ship it is dependent on a player in the cockpit. When the player leaves the cockpit the small ship is dead in the water. In a large ship the player may leave the cockpit and walk around his ship to repair, defend etc....that should not effect the alignment of this ship so that it will stop firing in battle as you may very well still be in control of that ship. Thus the faction module allows your ship to continue fighting while you are outside the cockpit. It will also present the "objective" for boarding parties. They will want to destroy your faction computer to disable the AI to your turrets. At that point you could still pilot your ship somewhere (like into the enemy ship) but ultimately you've been boarded and disabled.

 

I addressed this in the Suggestions forum in the Sensors topic, actually.
https://forums.keenswh.com/post/show_single_post?pid=1281141953&postcount=25
as well as suggesting earlier that automated turrets could be grouped (the game needs the ability to group and group-name components anyways) and then manually controlled (via a heads-up display screen?) or left to hunt down 'enemy' or simply 'hostile' ships that approach without group recognition or clearance codes.

Whether or not automated large ship turrets will be effective or have enough firepower and intuitive target-leading to land a hit on a small ship is an entirely different discussion from whether manned turrets will be viable or effective.

While you think it's naive to assume players will want to actually sit in a turret and protect the payload with their life, at the very least a dedicated gunner who has some skill in their little rig can give the ship's pilot some confidence that someone has their back, though the same confidence has to go the other way too and the gunner has to have a line of communication or a natural trust in the pilot to not make mistakes and to make evasive maneuvers that still allow the turret gunner to make clear and consistent shots.

If I were to stealthily ambush a cargo ship and its escort(s) I'd know exactly who I'd shoot first and make it a 2fer or 3fer. If someone was turretting out the back and saw me, and started firing before the pilot even knew there was an ambush, I might have to veer away and if I doubled back they'd know I was out there. You can't make a line to attack if someone with a gun is aiming right at you.

That's really my point with a fighter escort, blunt as it is - the fighter is going to be using the external camera and flying more or less blindly alongside, and if he does detect a threat from above, below, or behind, he is going to have to maneuver to respond to it. In doing so, he breaks off from the ship he's protecting to engage the threat, who may already have had a few seconds more to steady his aim. While the turret is still attached to the ship, it also fires from the ship. (that almost qualifies as a pun for firing from the hip.) Even if there are two targets, the escort would be the first one to be blasted to bits and then the main ship would be hunted down with no defenses. The turret would be part of the ship, and so the target is the ship - this could be considered a drawback - and the turret would be the target, but it's already in motion and it's also likely already firing back.

Still, neither of these scenarios have been proven more effective than the other by data and evidence, so it's shocking that anyone would adamantly choose to not have a turret.
You'd never choose a turret?
Time and testing will tell.

 

The only time I would man a turret is if I had no other choice (all very unlikely):

• No other ships to pilot and no time to build even the simplest of fighters...
• All ships lost but 1 and somehow still have time to get to that 1 ship and man a turret and somehow kill the enemy before he disables said turret on said ship...you see what I mean? It's so unlikely

Just about any scenario I can think of there is a better option in piloting my own ship.

Hell, even in your scenario...1 fighter escort with gunner.....or 2 fighter escort? Personally, I'd go for a 2 fighter escort for a multitude of reasons, here's a few:

• Multiple vectors of attack on enemy
• Redundancy (one gets kills you still have another)
• 2 targets for the enemy to have to consider over one
• Pilots are free to control ship flight and bring weapons to bear themselves (better all-around control)
• Fighters will most likely be lighter and thus faster not having large manned turrets on them.

And of course the large ship you are escorting should have turrets on it as well...this isn't EVE you can have a mining ship with guns.

The underlying point for me is, I want turrets to primarily work on their own. If for whatever reason a player wants to jump in and work a turret on another players ship then they can have that option (as I stated in my post).

 

I have to ask WHY in a game called space ENGINEERS are people just asking the devs for a fixed "block" weapon system.

are they not willing or able to take the time to engineer a totally unique weapon system for themselves based on there own desires or combat styles? or is putting effort in only the resort of the few

Christ i have about 5 ( i think maybe 7) differnt weapons systems under way at the moment all for different things. i cant be the only one who is capable of creating unique items

 

There are good arguments to both sides. It just comes down to the situation. A fighter pilot will have to actively fly his ship, and engage in dogfights. Situational awareness + actual piloting skills becomes key to taking out the enemy.

For turrets, the gunner's field of vision is more restricted, but it also means less "sensoral overload" due to less things to multitask. Point and shoot, and the ship's actual pilot can easily point out targets for multiple gunner to focus fire.


At this moment however, Small crafts are more effective because of rockets, and how you can make a small craft with 50 rockets attached with no penalties. Current ship turrets will use maybe 4 rocket launchers (since you're using small ship blocks) so naturally you're at a disadvantage.

Once they...
1. Nerf/add proper logistics to rocket launchers with set numbers of munitions fired before having to go back to reload and/or use of conveyors
2. Add turret blocks or large-size player-controlled turret weaponry (say for example, a 280mm shell-firing gun)

...then turret popularity will go up, and cruisers/frigates will be just as viable for a solo or 3-player crew as opposed to a carrier that will be more beneficial to a group of multiple people.

 

This topic is strange. When primary Large Ship weapons are implemented, the ability to be able to turn and aim them (rather than relying on broadsides and nose guns) will be significant. What other incentive do you need?

 

If you watch any kind of space sci-fi movie or tv show you will see that at least 80% of all ships will have some type of turrets on them. Some may be manned and some may be automated. But what ever kind of crazy changes they make to the weapons in this game, I will still always try to have player made manned turrets, just because it's always better to have it and not need it, than to need it and not have it.

 

I'd like to know the scenario, when a player manned turret would be better option than remote controlled turrets that you can shoot huge volleys with from the cockpit all alone...

And that's most likely the system they WILL put on to the large turrets.
Remote control so the turrets will follow the mouse location when in shooting mode, and those turrets that don't have visual on the target will not shoot your own hull.

That's what I hope at least...

 

Well we don't yet know for sure if the large ship turrets will be automated, remote controlled, or what. But like I said before, "I think because the game is called Space "Engineers" any well designed manned turret should be far better than any automated turret that anyone can just slap onto a ship." If they made computers where you could remote control small ship designed objects from a large ship. Then you could replace the cockpit of the turret with a camera, then that would be better. This would also let players make remote controlled drones. Still a player made turret should be able to beat a large ship turret that anyone can just slap onto a ship. The game wouldn't be very "engineer" like if it wasn't possible to design a better one.

 

Fighters are in an advantage over turrets at the moment since;
A) cockpits are destroyed in a miniscule burst of gatling or machine gun fire. Being mobile goes above being static here.
B) since we don't have homing missile, turrets only have gatling guns. Before you actually hit someone with your gatling guns, your turret gets hit 10x more over in the same time.
I really hope they give man-made turrets some more advantage, as i'd love to see my own turret in action or use it myself against my enemy. ^_^

 

Like it was in freelancer :-D