My biggest issue with most of them is just how close the animators show space ships fly near each other. It doesn't make much sense to be so close to your enemy or even fly in a massive tight cluster of ships towards each other.
If you are too close, there is no time for evasion - or rolling of the hull to disperse some of the laser energy.
If you fly in a tight cluster, super close to each other, there is not only not enough place to maneuver and issues with allied ships not getting a clear fire path, there is another huge oversight from my point of view: just think what kind of havoc the debris from the destruction of a single ship(probably featuring some super powerful energy source going boom, too, accelerating pieces of the hull to high speeds) will cause among its allied fleet. You destroy one and there is suddenly a huge chain reaction in the entire formation. Not even mentioning some smart weapon engineers coming up with proper AOE weapons in the first place.
If there are space battles in ME:A, I'd rather want Bioware to keep space fights small, like 3vs3, but in turn involve some tactics. Maybe good old trick with hiding behind a planet, or luring the enemy somewhere near a small planetoid then using it as a shrapnell bomb, or do some fancy tricks with the athmosphere of a gas giant while fighting in low orbit resulting in some gas eruption or a massive shockwave or influencing some interstellar gas cloud to disrupt enemy sensors totally wrecking hostile's weapon accuracy, or just baiting the ships into going into firing position and then giving the exact coordinates for your reinforcements with vastly superior firepower to jump right on top of them etc.
Just something more creative than a simple massive meatgrinder.
Realistic space battles are boring AF, and involve ships firing at enemies they can't visually see across vast expanses of nothing while trying to avoid being detected enough for the enemy to shoot back, and would take several hours, or days
My biggest issue with most of them is just how close the animators show space ships fly near each other. It doesn't make much sense to be so close to your enemy or even fly in a massive tight cluster of ships towards each other.
If you are too close, there is no time for evasion - or rolling of the hull to disperse some of the laser energy.
If you fly in a tight cluster, super close to each other, there is not only not enough place to maneuver and issues with allied ships not getting a clear fire path, there is another huge oversight from my point of view: just think what kind of havoc the debris from the destruction of a single ship(probably featuring some super powerful energy source going boom, too, accelerating pieces of the hull to high speeds) will cause among its allied fleet. You destroy one and there is suddenly a huge chain reaction in the entire formation. Not even mentioning some smart weapon engineers coming up with proper AOE weapons in the first place.
If there are space battles in ME:A, I'd rather want Bioware to keep space fights small, like 3vs3, but in turn involve some tactics. Maybe good old trick with hiding behind a planet, or luring the enemy somewhere near a small planetoid then using it as a shrapnell bomb, or do some fancy tricks with the athmosphere of a gas giant while fighting in low orbit resulting in some gas eruption or a massive shockwave or influencing some interstellar gas cloud to disrupt enemy sensors totally wrecking hostile's weapon accuracy, or just baiting the ships into going into firing position and then giving the exact coordinates for your reinforcements with vastly superior firepower to jump right on top of them etc.
Just something more creative than a simple massive meatgrinder.
Battle for Rannoch was a 10 kilometer or so engagement. Thats Queens to New Jersey distance.
As for "closeness" here are my thoughts:
The rounds are moving at a fraction of speed of light. You will never be able to evade a round. If it is fired it will hit unless it is poorly aimed. A well aimed round moving at such speeds cant be avoided.
As such ships relly on kinetic barriers to stop them rather than avoid.
As such, it is only natural to group up ships in tight formation, since if a barrier fails in ship A, you can move ship B in front of it so barriers absorb a hit instead of that vulnerable ship taking it.
As such, if you split ships in loose formation, you would be unable to do so. It would be a literal slugfest with ships unable to aid each other.
Massing ships closely, allows you to coordinate fire better. You could focus fire on one target to overwhelm it before enemy reacts, or similar to 1700's coordinate continous fire at the enemy.
Lone ships are exposed, alone and unable to be aided or to aid
That is my take on it of course you might have a different one.
As such, it is only natural to group up ships in tight formation, since if a barrier fails in ship A, you can move ship B in front of it so barriers absorb a hit instead of that vulnerable ship taking it.
That's unlikely to be a viable tactic in space warfare. It hasn't worked since the age of sail.
Massing ships closely, allows you to coordinate fire better. You could focus fire on one target to overwhelm it before enemy reacts, or similar to 1700's coordinate continous fire at the enemy.
Unless you're far enough apart for lightspeed lag to cause communications problems, the formation wouldn't be an issue here.
The rounds are moving at a fraction of speed of light. You will never be able to evade a round. If it is fired it will hit unless it is poorly aimed. A well aimed round moving at such speeds cant be avoided.
I agree about that. If ems is above 2300, ships avoid the beam of doom from the capital ship. Yeah right. If ems is below 2300, the ship is destroyed. Did having a higher ems give the ship psychic powers to avoid the beam of doom?
As such, it is only natural to group up ships in tight formation, since if a barrier fails in ship A, you can move ship B in front of it so barriers absorb a hit instead of that vulnerable ship taking it.
Against the reapers that won't work since the beam of doom cuts through anything.
As such, if you split ships in loose formation, you would be unable to do so. It would be a literal slugfest with ships unable to aid each other.
You want to aid the ship that is been fired upon? Have the other ships fire at the ship that's firing at that ship.
Massing ships closely, allows you to coordinate fire better. You could focus fire on one target to overwhelm it before enemy reacts, or similar to 1700's coordinate continous fire at the enemy.
Against the reapers? No.
When the fleets come through the relay heading to Earth, they're all bunched together. Take a few capital ships and have them pull a Sovereign. Remember what he did in ME1? He plowed through that turian ship with no problem. By the time the rest of the ships react, the other capital ships are firing on the other ships with very little resistance. Of course none of that happens.
What I would've done is have the Commanders of the fleets together to talk about fighting against the reapers before heading to Earth. I have no idea how many ships come through the relay, but it wouldn't of been hard to assign x numbers of ships to fire at this reaper, another x number of ships to fire at this reaper and so on instead of what was seen. I also would have the ships spread out a lot more instead of been bunched together.
ME space battles have to portray the ships as being much closer together than they would be according to the lore, because otherwise you'd only be able to have one ship on screen at a time. It would be rather dull visually. It is one of those instances where Rule of Cool trumps hard adherence to the lore.
It's sort of similar to how in every war movie soldiers are always grouped closely together, practically on top of one another, when in reality they would be spaced at least 10 to 15 meters apart to avoid mass casualties from a single grenade or machine gun burst. If filmmakers were to aim for strict realism, they'd either not be able to get all the characters into a single camera shot, or they'd have to be so distant that the viewers wouldn't be able to distinguish one character from another.
My biggest issue with most of them is just how close the animators show space ships fly near each other. It doesn't make much sense to be so close to your enemy or even fly in a massive tight cluster of ships towards each other.
If you are too close, there is no time for evasion - or rolling of the hull to disperse some of the laser energy.
If you fly in a tight cluster, super close to each other, there is not only not enough place to maneuver and issues with allied ships not getting a clear fire path, there is another huge oversight from my point of view: just think what kind of havoc the debris from the destruction of a single ship(probably featuring some super powerful energy source going boom, too, accelerating pieces of the hull to high speeds) will cause among its allied fleet. You destroy one and there is suddenly a huge chain reaction in the entire formation. Not even mentioning some smart weapon engineers coming up with proper AOE weapons in the first place.
If there are space battles in ME:A, I'd rather want Bioware to keep space fights small, like 3vs3, but in turn involve some tactics. Maybe good old trick with hiding behind a planet, or luring the enemy somewhere near a small planetoid then using it as a shrapnell bomb, or do some fancy tricks with the athmosphere of a gas giant while fighting in low orbit resulting in some gas eruption or a massive shockwave or influencing some interstellar gas cloud to disrupt enemy sensors totally wrecking hostile's weapon accuracy, or just baiting the ships into going into firing position and then giving the exact coordinates for your reinforcements with vastly superior firepower to jump right on top of them etc.
Just something more creative than a simple massive meatgrinder.
Well, flying close together does have a few advantages, too:
Mainly a concentration of firepower and ECM/CWIS-Systems (bigger ships protect smaller ones etc.), but also (if that's possible, haven't seen any evidence to the contrary!) a fleet-wide shield (kinetic-barrier)...I mean synchronizing those generators shouldn't be that hard for say a ship like the Destiny Ascension (can't tell me that massive ship doesn't have a massive computer I mean the thing is a fleet-flagship after all!) and such a barrier should be able to take more hits than individual ship's barriers (thus keeping smaller ships in the fight longer because they aren't taken out as fast!)
ps: I'd love larger starship fights (I would have loved to have more influence on the fight against Sovereign and also in the battle to clear the way to Earth...I'd have loved to have more ship-to-ship engagements (that's something I felt Mass Effect lacking in...it disconnected us from the larger fight IMHO (shouldn't there be ships/fleets calling for help all over the place and shouldn't we at least try to help (as in: Get into range but be ready to run if it's a lost cause or of the enemy has overwhelming numbers etc.?)) and it ruins the suspension of disbelieve if enemies only fire on the protagonist's ship when the plot demands it (I hated that reaper in the opening of ME3 totally ignoring the Normandy (despite the fact that it should know that that's Sheppard's ship, not to mention that the Normandy is the only thing in the area that's even remotely a danger to the Reaper!)...same for the scene prior to the beam-run - Why doesn't Harbinger blast the Normandy out of the sky? Damned that's not logical - that ship is more dangerous than all the people on foot, even Sheppard!)
I agree about that. If ems is above 2300, ships avoid the beam of doom from the capital ship. Yeah right. If ems is below 2300, the ship is destroyed. Did having a higher ems give the ship psychic powers to avoid the beam of doom?
Against the reapers that won't work since the beam of doom cuts through anything.
You want to aid the ship that is been fired upon? Have the other ships fire at the ship that's firing at that ship.
Against the reapers? No.
When the fleets come through the relay heading to Earth, they're all bunched together. Take a few capital ships and have them pull a Sovereign. Remember what he did in ME1? He plowed through that turian ship with no problem. By the time the rest of the ships react, the other capital ships are firing on the other ships with very little resistance. Of course none of that happens.
What I would've done is have the Commanders of the fleets together to talk about fighting against the reapers before heading to Earth. I have no idea how many ships come through the relay, but it wouldn't of been hard to assign x numbers of ships to fire at this reaper, another x number of ships to fire at this reaper and so on instead of what was seen. I also would have the ships spread out a lot more instead of been bunched together.
1. It doesnt avoid the beam either way. It hits. What happens, I believe is at lower EMS the ship took more damage to its shields.
2. This isnt just about reapers but combat in general. I used the Battle over Rannoch as a go to point.
3. GARDIAN's and other anti torpedo/anti fighter/bomber weaponry is short ranged. With more space between ships the smaller craft would be able to destroy any ship piecemeal trough sheer numbers. Disruptor torpedos would also be impossible to stop in lose formation, since they are launched in great numbers and GARDIAN bateries would be overwhelmed.
Also it wouldnt help in a space battle to simply fire. By placing yourself in front of damaged ship your kinetic barriers shield you and that ship allowing it to go back. It utilises the barriers to its fullest, instead of every ships barrier serving only one ship.
4. That level of micromanagment is impossible. We are talking about thousands of ships. Not all of them have same capabilities.
And if you spread out how would the ships have dealt with the reaper Oculi?
2. This isnt just about reapers but combat in general. I used the Battle over Rannoch as a go to point.
For ME3, it is about reapers. In Andromeda, don't know since we have no idea what the enemy is capable of doing and if your idea would even work.
3. GARDIAN's and other anti torpedo/anti fighter/bomber weaponry is short ranged. With more space between ships the smaller craft would be able to destroy any ship piecemeal trough sheer numbers. Disruptor torpedos would also be impossible to stop in lose formation, since they are launched in great numbers and GARDIAN bateries would be overwhelmed.
Also it wouldnt help in a space battle to simply fire. By placing yourself in front of damaged ship your kinetic barriers shield you and that ship allowing it to go back. It utilises the barriers to its fullest, instead of every ships barrier serving only one ship.
Still won't stop the beam of doom from destroying that ship or any other ship
4. That level of micromanagment is impossible. We are talking about thousands of ships. Not all of them have same capabilities.
Its not impossible. I never said all ships have the same capabilites. Utilize the ships to there strengths.
And if you spread out how would the ships have dealt with the reaper Oculi?
What I would've done is have the Commanders of the fleets together to talk about fighting against the reapers before heading to Earth. I have no idea how many ships come through the relay, but it wouldn't of been hard to assign x numbers of ships to fire at this reaper, another x number of ships to fire at this reaper and so on instead of what was seen. I also would have the ships spread out a lot more instead of been bunched together.
It's an interesting question -- does focus fire work in ME space warfare? It's typically considered to be a bad idea ITRW because you lose suppression effects, but I'm not sure those exist in the setting.
Well, Normandy seemed like it hasn't had too many difficulties to avoid a *laser* beam at very short ranges, so just going by this evasive maneuvers work very well in ME.
But in all seriousness - the most powerful weapons of ME ships shooting fastest projectiles that reach "fractions of speed of light" are their *fixed* main cannons, that are pointing straight to were the ship is also pointing. Want to aim, move your ship - this is much slower than to align smaller, less powerful cannons. IMO this also supports the viability of eavasive maneuvering. Even rolling helps to disperse some of the hits and helps to regenerate shields around the ship. Being further away might open the possibility to try and shoot some projectiles down with some sort of a laser system aimed by a VI with super fast reaction times.
- Defense systems being short ranged, thus clustering being good
You ever wondered where all the projectiles or even lasers shot at enemy fighters that are missing their target are going? So some enemy craft comes between your friendly ships and suddenly you are shooting at each other in close range. At higher ranges between friendly vessels this would be a lesser issue for laser systems at least.
Also, following scenario:
One fleet is clustered, the other warps in in a sphere formation around the first. Suddenly the second fleet can easily aim their main most powerful fixed guns at the entire first fleet, while the latter loses time aiming.
- Focus fire
IMO focus fire makes a lot of sense in ME scenario because of shields. You probably can't kill a ship with a single shot/volley due to powerful kinetic shields(unless you are a reaper) and depending on the power source shields could regenerate pretty fast(especially in case of Reapers, i'd guess). Therefore removing one enemy unit really fast from the field is more effective than just "suppressing" it, IMO.
- Space battles at hight ranges are boring
Somewhat true, yet i am primarily advocating for smaller battles, that are more intimate so to say and can also be fairly short ranged, especially if using environment as a tactical component.
Smaller battles still offer all sorts of eye candy, because they allow to focus on design and function of few unique and appearance-wise very different space ships and don't have to waste their graphics budget on animating many many different yet meaningless space vessels/objects. Smaller battles can focus on innovative tactics and environments, on interaction between crew members in the command center of your ship, on the relationship between the main protagonist and the enemy and often on some really cool gadgets your ship may contain. They are often more personal and for me at least are creating a lot more suspense than just mere graphics spectacles with little substance.
In another thread people showed the space battle at the beginning of SW: Episode 2 as an example for what they would like to see in ME:A. We had something like that in ME:3 - i found them visually impressive in both cases, but somewhat boring in the end.
On the other hand, the battle against the collector ship in ME2 seemed way more intense, as for example also in The Expanse sci-fi series when a Martian battleship fights some unidentified spacecraft. Same can be told for Battlestar Galactica(the new series) where it's mostly 1 ship against 2-3 enemy ones.
The video above is IMO very much in line with the strong points of ME series: the interaction between different characters with space as the background. In my opinion, keeping things small would allow ME to function according to its winning recipe by focusing on the characters and their decisions, where you'd be able to command your ship from its command center and choose the battle strategy during dialogues with your crew members, with cutscenes showing the results of your strategical/tactical command skills. Certainly more interesting than just a shootout between two large fleets.
Exactly what is one, and if someone has an idea, what is it based on? Actual experience? An actual battle?
Since none has ever happened, at least to my knowledge, then perhaps it should be based on hard or realistic physics?
If that is the case, then what about the entire lot not even being close to "realistic"? (Lots of YouTube vids making fun of ME over this)
The point is - since we are suspending belief and counting on space magic at a base level anyway, just make whatever scene semi plausible, and most importantly, enjoyable.
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