Arena walls/gate system need to go

[Aury]

They have always been rather glitchy (known to trap custom playerships that dont use backcolor= values) and dont make much in-universe sense anyways (2D walls that resist any known weapon and somehow block 3D motion of ships around them? Perfect for blocking gates). It would be better to have a special system that the player is placed in and removed from at the start/end of each match.

Sutaa got stuck in a wall and could not thrust out, eventually dying from running out of fuel.

[george moromisato]

They have always been rather glitchy (known to trap custom playerships that dont use backcolor= values) and dont make much in-universe sense anyways (2D walls that resist any known weapon and somehow block 3D motion of ships around them? Perfect for blocking gates). It would be better to have a special system that the player is placed in and removed from at the start/end of each match.

Sutaa got stuck in a wall and could not thrust out, eventually dying from running out of fuel.

I was thinking something similar, but wouldn't we need walls in the new system also?

[Aury]

In the new system you could have wide 'walls' that force an automatic turn-around to prevent running away (sort of like the quarantine zone effect, but reversing the player's velocity and direction rather than coordinates (ie, not teleporting them, but bouncing them instead, perhaps with the same 'shield effect' that the current walls use)) - the playable region of the arena could also be bigger as a result.

[sun1404]

It'll be impossible to beat a wolfen in such arena. He'll just fly away to the edge. When we catch him, he'll just fly away to the OTHER edge.

[RPC]

Alternatively you could send messages to the player that they will forfeit the match if they travel too far and start giving these warnings when they're ~300-500ls away from the edge of the combat area.

[sun1404]

You'll need to rework the gladiator's AI, too.

[Bruno]

Seems to me it is a lot easier/fewer chances of exploits with the system today: a small area closed off by walls.

I look at it like MadMax Thunderdome! (Not really 2d walls but an enclosed sphere/ellipse)

Two ships enter! One ship leave! MasterBlaster!

This would be a spectator-sport, a gladiator-arena for the gritty spacefaring ships to cheer on.
Teleporting to other systems with rebounding edges, arcane rules etc seems way over the top for me. Much more fun to watch the fight in your ship/on the nearby buildings than on a monitor magically viweing an entire sector... Keep it simple.

(Playing only with sapphire/wolfen/EI500, have never had problems with arena walls.)

[FourFire]

I don't personally have an issue with the walls, but the entrance gaps should be at least 20% wider, and a bigger internal arena space wouldn't go amiss.

As for reversed velocity boundary fields, I believe part of PD_Mod has a device which does this with projectiles: the decrease acceleration at a rate proportionate to the object's proximity to the barrier and correspondingly increase the objects acceleration in the opposite direction. You might be able to have an elliptic barrier based on two points in the centre of the arena the edge of which projects this field (because I imagine that two objects projecting such fields which are at angles to each other will induce buggy physics borks)

[Atarlost]

I'd say just have a large ring of nav beacons. Give some of the more heavily armored or desperate gladiators the noretreat flag and let ringouts be a valid victory condition. This nicely lets you fight without all fights being death matches, which seems at odds with the CW ethos and makes the ready supply of veteran gladiators with expensive ships dubious.

It's technologically viable and shouldn't be too hard to implement.

[Aury]

The walls are too glitchy to keep IMO, they need a replacement with something.
Atarlost's suggestion works too, though it would probably require some heftier scripting for edge cases and ways to deal with ring-outs being full DQ's as the current system would imply, or just major losses to popularity (which might be exploitable if you got to repeat battles from it)

[PM]

If walls are replaced by a soft ring, what will protect the spectators and vendors from getting shot at (and angry at player if he is the source) and taking collateral damage?

[Atarlost]

If walls are replaced by a soft ring, what will protect the spectators and vendors from getting shot at (and angry at player if he is the source) and taking collateral damage?

There are no direct spectators. Space battles are too large and individual ships too small for them to be worth viewing. They'd take feeds from the ships' gun cameras and use a few fast tracking telescopes to get external images. Those can probably be pretty cheap to replace and are small enough they probably won't be hit by accident very frequently.

[TVR]

Does anyone remember the show Battle Bots, Robot Wars in the US?

They had really cool arenas, filled with hazards and these other robots called Cornermasters I think, which would automatically attack any 'Bot that got too close to the boundaries. We could take a page from them and have Corporate Cruisers, autons, turrets, mines, etc. lining the edge of the arena(s), all of which would be much more consistent to lore than forcefields, teleportation, or anti-gravity repulsors.

Also, Battle Arena Maximus could be reimagined as a futuristic version of Battle Bots, with tele-operated ships rather than mortal combat, which would allow corporate sponsorships, CW representation (military showcasing), 3DV footage, Black Market match-fixing, and epic feuds and rematches to actually make sense.

[sun1404]

I think PM was referring to the stations around the arena. There's about twenty CW stations surrounding the arena, and if the walls got removed, in each fight you'd need to aim precisely, and take shots only when there's no risk of missing the opponent, and hitting the stations behind. It'd take the fun out of the rampaging battles we have right now. Also, This might make the battle very easy. You just dodge a few of the opponent's shots, and armies of civilian ships will come alpha-striking him.

[PM]

You just dodge a few of the opponent's shots, and armies of civilian ships will come alpha-striking him.

Only the player can aggravate friendly stations in this manner. NPCs get a pass - their collateral damage can kill as many friendlies as they can without drawing aggro.