Torps without Locks?

Somehow, that just wouldn't be the same. If you fire the torp, it will home normally. When fired without locking, it ought to act like a dumbfire missile with greater yield. My suggestion would be, if you remove the locking aspect, lower the turn ratios. At least you'd have a more realistic feel rather than just firing them off without waiting for a lock.
 
But a torp without a lock will miss nine out of ten times. The lock is there to get the trop through the phase shield, jaming and counter measures that capships give out. What would be the point of firing a torp without waiting for a lock if it wouldn't accomplish anything?
 
DH, it's dead easy to remove the locking aspect altogether. However, this causes an unwanted side effect. Namely, your torpedoes will be able to destroy components even before you take out the shield generator. Or at least that's what happened the last time I tried anything like this.
 
Yes it will, because the torps won't lock until the generators are disabled, this is true. However, if I recall, wingmen will still target the generators until their all out, if you did the same, i.e., play by the rules, you'd have an acceptable way of doing this kind of "hotdogging". Wasn't the whole idea of making an editor the means of playing the game in a different way than intended by the games?

The matter of torpedoes missing due to lack of turn ratios is iffy. Many people fire off the torps at medium to long range, doing that allows for turrets to gun them down, fighters to run into them (strange that actually happens, but it does), and one other obstruction to come into play. Those alien ships have many protrusions that sometimes, even for me, detonate torpedoes before they reach the intended target. As I've pointed out before, SO ship parts aren't always bright as day. The way I see it, having a less maneuverable torpedo launched at close range is the way to go. Removing the locking aspect may not be the best option for the average player, but it sure as hell improved my torpedo launch/target impact-ratios.
 
The way I see it if you fly in close then fire your torps you'll never miss. Regardless of how maneuverable the torps are.
 
The problam is that WCP wasn't "realistic" with torps in the first place: No matter where a torp would hit, it should make damage to the hull (and destroy the ship), yet, that's not the case in Proph. Since (as I see it) the point of the lock in the torps (WPC's) is to make them hit the right spot (bridge or engines), there isn't really a point in removing their lock (IMO). Ofcoure you can fire them directly at these parts, but that would require a really short distance between you and the cap ship.
 
I'm not sure I'd go that far, ships are not only protected by force fields and armor plating, but also by the hull design itself. The ongoing battle between fielding better protection and more effective weapons has lasted centuries and presumably into the time of WC. Prophecy is in a sense more realistic because torpedoes will kill the capitol ship more quickly by overloading the powerplant through destroying engines and ship control, i.e., the bridge rather than outright blowing the ship apart with high-yield explosives. Prophecy ships on average are huge, torpedoes can destroy smaller ships like corvettes outright-probably one reason they aren't used when less expensive missiles and gunfire can do the same job. However, large ships will be merely "punctured" by typical torpedoes. Many familar ship designs include emergency bulkheads that fall in place during, or proir to hull breach, several armored decks, and thick armor plating.

So I like what the designers did when they rethought capship killing by forcing torpedoes to lock on components. It's true that showing a ship's total damage as it's hammered by torpedoes to the point when brute force itself tears the ship apart would have been cute. But much was sacrificed to meet hasty deadlines. You have to admit, though, despite all the compromises, they still managed to put out a product worth the 50 bucks. On top of this we get editors developed by fellow fans that can talor the game further to idividual preferances. Experiment, play around with things like torpedoes. I replace my torpedoes with component-damaging Dumbfires. I still take out shield emmiters first, but you know what? I haven't wasted a single missile on a component by missing it because or a tracking mechanism which may allow the missile to inadvertantly detonating prematurely. Smart missiles aren't always as what they're cracked up to be. I remember all those times my torpedoes missed the bridge on a kilrathi station when my retooled DFs did the job right every time.
 
heh... could you imagine if there were FF torps? You fire it at a cap ship, but a fighter comes along and drags the torp with it...

Also, I remember one time I was sitting behind a capships engines, and got pelted by a torpedo. Man, they sting.
 
Yeah, I learnt the hard way trying to kill those blasted Tritons. Sat on the tail, evading that blasted turret, waiting for a lock... not realising my wingman had already launched his torp...

Anyway, I see the lock times as being a mechanism to make the game more 'realistic'. It started in WC2 with the phase shields, but I didn't see any point in having torp locks in WC3/4. Hence I didn't use the torp much unless there was something I had to kill fast.

I agree with DH about the components, and how it would be nice to have a 'brute force' detonation, but overall, the component idea was better than the capships in WC3/4, I think.

Eh? I think I just restated the whole thread. Oh well.
 
everyone has talked about stopping the locks in WCP and SO, i suppose its poss in wc4 and 3 as well, even if it isnt i could just mod a DF, but what about wc2, such as the last miss on the main game, that starbase was a bastard to kill, on then it always took down the torp darn
 
Mmm... no, I don't think anybody ever figured out how (or, for that matter, why) to edit WC2 weaponry. But if you could figure that out, then it would probably be just a matter of cutting its lock time.

...Or you could just grab a Mace instead. Better still, a Leech.
 
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