Yeah the X2 = broadside weapons was usually a bad spot for homing missiles if you did anything other than long range combat only, but you could easily slap those expensive weapons on the top having them fire on route.

(due to a bug last i played i wonder if they worked at any range back then, but that's not the point :p)

I feel the combat lost some of it's "depth?"

Edit:

Not to mention the fact that the X2 combo slots gave you double armor/HP/shields/speed if you chose to sacrifice a weapon, making it almost a viable option.... Now it's not really at all....

It really helped distinct the different races ships from each other, nowadays they all feel the same.

Romeo wrote:

...I don't ever recall that being a thing? As far back as I can remember, individual locations had absolutely no bearing on the output, unless it had a descriptor listed for that slot (Such as the X2 one).

Back and double posting as I wanted to reply to this in more detail.

It was most certainty a thing pre. Riftborn. I did a lot of testing on this when Lumeris got released, as I discovered their Protector class "Junk" ship had 2 forward weapons, I figured i would try to make a close combat flotilla by having 2xupgraded "Junk" ships softening up the opposition on route while the 2xbrigs when't in for the kill at close range.

Worked like a charm early game, and you could clearly see the "Junk" ships fire on route without their broadside shown and the enemy taking damage during the visual simulation. Sadly the whole plan fell to bits at later stages as I vastly underestimated the power of "attacker" ships skill to Focus Fire. It became quite clear that singling out ships 1 by 1 is way more valuable than the protectors ability to fire all their weapons on route.

Anyway the opposite was also true, If I ran 4 x "Brigs" and sent them to close range, only the single forward (the one on the top) weapon would fire on route, and the opposition would suffer lot less damage overall.

Update:

Found a old video on YouTube where the player are using laser and missile Forward weapons, and kinetic broadside weapons. If your still in doubt, take note on when the kinetic weapons starts firing.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p5RyuDG-eLg

Sublustris wrote:

It was a thing, I once had a Horatio flotilla destroyed before it could shoot, 'cause it had no forward and only broadside weapons.

As trajectories are now paired side-by-side, broadside weapons work at all times, unless they have to shoot another unpaired flotilla.

Honestly I believe they use a much much simpler formula now, have you ever noticed during the visual simulation that the weapons will always fire simultaneously if loaded with the same ammunition type now. never by itself like before. I honestly think they nerfed it big time.

On a end note, I'm not writing this post to argue for argue sake with any of you (And I'm sorry as it's clearly the way it appears), but more so to promote the complexity of the game that I sorely miss.

Sincerly

     Moofasa.