Category:Defenses

From SOTS

This page lists the capabilities of ships to limit or avoid damage in combat.

Point Defenses

Point defenses are small turreted weapons used to destroy incoming Mine, Missile, Torpedo and Drone weapons. After researching Point Defense Tracking, ships can mount point defenses via a new turret class that can be fitted in light mount positions. The following weapons can be fitted in dedicated point defense mounts:

Standard Weapon	Point Defense Variant
Red Lasers	Laser Point Defense
Gauss Cannons	Gauss Point Defense
Phasers	Point Defense Phasers
Missiles	Interceptors

The point defense section is specifically designed with many light turret mounts with a good lines of sight for maximum protection. Point Defense ships engage ALL ordinance in range and are specifically designed to protect other ships.

Shields

Shields are energy fields designed to absorb or deflect weapon fire before it reaches the ship's hull. Shields require specialized generators that are within particular ship sections. Dedicated mission sections provide shielding for destroyers, whereas Command sections are used on cruisers and dreadnoughts. Shields may cover the entire ship or only the front.

Shields – Begining with Shields Mk. 1, shields absorb all damage and protect the whole ship. They have limited hit points, and once they have been depleted they remain non-operational until they recharge, allowing the ship itself to take damage. So long as a shield remains operational, no amount of damage can penetrate and damage the ship.
Energy Absorbers – are a form-fitting screen that cover an entire ship. Energy Absorbers reduce a percentage amount of damage from all types of energy weapons and remain effective as long as the field generation section survives.
Deflectors – project a cone over the front half of a ship, protecting it from ballistic weapons, reflecting rounds away and detonating explosive ordinance. Deflectors remain effective as long as the field generation section survives.
Disruptor Shield – project a cone over the front half of a ship, protecting it from most energy weapons, reflecting rounds away and detonating most torpedo weapons. Disruptors remain effective as long as the field generation section survives.

Armor

Armor provides a chance that a weapon will bounces off of a ship's hull instead of damaging it. The family of kinetic armors provide a percentage hit point increase vs all weapons and provides a low chance of ricocheting kinetic weapons. The reflective armor family, which is basically a coating, provides no hit point bonus but has a relatively high chance of causing laser class weapons to ricochet. This includes Pulse Phasers but does not include sustained fire beam weapons such as Phasers and the Particle Beam.
Armor can only be added to sections once the technology is available. Each section may have one layer of kinetic armor and one reflective coating. Some sections are restricted to lighter armors. Armor that has been added to one section will not provide additional protection to the other sections; those sections must also have the armor added to them to benefit from it. It will increase the ship's build cost.

Reflective Armor	Base Reflection Chance	Increased Cost (Per Section)
Reflective Coating	+ 100%	+ 20%
Improved Reflective Coating	+ 150%	+ 50%

Kinetic Armor	Base Ricochet Chance	Increased Cost (Per Section)	HP Bonus (Per Section)
Polysilicate Alloys	+ 80%	+ 20%	+ 15%
MagnoCeramic Lattices	+ 110%	+ 40%	+ 35%
Quark Resonators	+ 130%	+ 60%	+ 60%
Adamantite Alloys	+ 150%	+ 80%	+ 100%

Calculating Ricochet or Reflection

To calculate whether a ballistic round will ricochet from Kinetic Armor or a laser round will be reflected from Reflective Armor, the game uses the following calculation:

Base Ricochet or Reflection Chance + Weapon Ricochet or Reflection Chance + A Unknown Variable 
Chance Based on Angle

The flatter the target surface (or more perpendicular the angle) the lower the chance based on angle, while the more curved the target surface (or the steeper the angle) the higher the chance based on angle. The exact calculation of this chance based on angle is unknown currently, but we can illustrate how the first two parts of the above formula works. So, for example, any ship with Polysilicate Alloys being shot with Mass Drivers has a ricochet chance of:

80% + (-100%) + Unknown Variable Chance = -20% + Unknown Variable Chance

This means that if the variable based on angle is smaller than +20%, the Mass Driver round will not ricochet from the ship. This also means as armors get better, the usefulness of these same Mass Drivers decreases. For example, any ship with Adamantite Alloys being shot with Mass Drivers has a ricochet chance of:

150% + (-100%) + Unknown Variable Chance = 50% + Unknown Variable Chance

This means that even if the variable based on angle is 0%, the Mass Driver round will ricochet from the ship 50% of the time. Add to that any additional chance from the angle, and you find that you are going to see most Mass Driver rounds bouncing harmlessly off those targets.