Research to boost Gun Turret range

[Peter34]

Why isn't there any Research in the vanilla game to do this?

Range 1, costs SP1 only, +1 range (to 18).
Range 2, costs SP1+2, +1 more range (to 19).
Range 3, costs SP1+2+3, +2 more range (to 21).
Range 4, costs SP1+2+3+4, +2 more range (to 23).

That still lets Laser Turrets have superior range (25), while giving Gun Turrets a much needed boost.

Or is there a simple mod that implements this already?

The game lets me boost the Damage and RoF of Gun Turrets... Why not Range as well?

Come to think of it, Laser Turrets might benefit from a small boost to Range too, say SP1+2+3 for +2 range, and SP1+2+3+4 for +2 more range (total 29).

[ssilk]

Moved from suggestions

[Peter34]

While we're at it, why not add an option for Armour added to Gun Turrets too?

Currently, Laser Turrets are just superior to Gun Turrets in every regard.

That ought to change, especially if the devs (and this is my impression) are going to make Gun Turrets larger, with a 2x2 foot print instead of the current 1x2 one, to fix the rotation issue.



Gun Turrets currently are cheap to make (don't require any advanced resources), but that's their only benefit.

Laser Turrets have many benefits:
Don't require ammo
Smaller footprint (1x1 compared to 1x2, probably soon to change to an even bigger 2x2), meaning you can pack them very cloesly
Much longer Range (17 vs 25!)
Do a type of damage that the Biters (not sure about the Spitters) are not very resistant against. Biters evolve to the point where even AP ammo from a Gun Turret only do a tiny amount of damage and only if almost fully upgraded, because of their high numerical (not percentage) Physcial resist. On the other hand, even the biggest Biters have little or no Resist to Laser type damage.

Above, in the previous post, my proposal was simply to allow for a ladder of Researches to improve the range of Gun Turrets to eventually (after the Purple Science one) give them a Range almost as good, almost but not quite, as Laser Turrets.

But why not take it one step further?

First of all, nerf the Range of Laser Turrets from 25 to 21 tiles. This means that ultimately, Gun Turrets become better in this regard, as with maxed Research they have a range of 17+1+1+2+2=23 tiles, 2 tiles more than the nerfed Laser Turrets.

Secondly, take the principle of Laser Turrets being fragile high-tech thingues vs Gun Turrets being big brutal iron beasts, somewhat unsophisticated but of reknowned sturdiness (keep in mind, this makes sense given the larger size of Gun Turrets - soon to becomea much larger size), and start by giving Gun Turrets more HP than Laser Turrets have. Right now, i's the other way around, 200 for Gun Turrets and 250 for Laser Turrets. Change that to 400 for Gun Turrets (fitting for a 2x2 footprint) and 200 for Laser Turrets.

Also allow for just 2 tiers of Research to give Gun Turrets +1 physical Resist and +10% Physical Resist. Or three:

1. Red Only, say 50 packs. Gives +10% Physical Resist.
2. Red+Green, say 100 or 150 packs each. Give both +1 and +10% Physical Resist, for a total of 1/20%.
3. Red+Green+Blue, say 200 or 300 packs each. Gives another +1 and +10% Physical Resist, for a total of 2/30%.

There you go!

Gun Turrets are now a viable defenfe-strategic alternative to Laser Turrets, or more likely a complement to them, all throughout the game, instead of being superseded completely and in every way.

Gun Turrets still require ammo. Keep that in mind. But they're cheap to build, and once loaded don't rely on Electrical Power to function (although with an ammo capacity of 10, or possibly 12 with Inserter Stack bonus, they'll quickly run out if not served by electrical Inserters or Burner Inserters).

(Also, this is posited as Techs that affects a change upon existing Gun Turrets, rather than opening up a new and improved model that you can replace the old Gun Turrets with.)

[aka13]

I think that issue is as old as there are laser turrets existing. IMHO, that IS and issue, since since the laser turrets were added, I just Ignore biters attacks and deal with them manually while I rush for lasers. The gun turrets right now have sadly no place in my base, while the idea of delivering munitions to remote oil pumping outposts with a few solars instead of pulling the main powerline and spamming lasers sounds really fun.

[indjev99]

I made a separate topic because it is not about the turrets, but about the evolution but it is strongly related so I suggest checking it out.

[ssilk]

Gun turrets are weaker, because it makes sense. Gun turrets are THE weapon for everything, which comes through your laser fence, because they are just faster, can kill more small biters in shorter time.

The devs stated that and I think they won't change it, because they have changed them in the past some times.

I think also that would be the way it should go: much more enemies in shorter time instead of stronger enemies.

[aka13]

Well then, ssilk, i know you have solid experience in factorio, I think I am going to enjoy the discussion with you.
Can you suggest a situation, where the said setup would actually be useful, and not just a justification of existance? The turrets have no priority setup, so you can not use gun turrets to kill the small biters.

[ssilk]

Ahhh. Yes! Priorities....

Now we come to the real problem: The turrets fire like "First come, first serve".

I see two options:
1. The fire area of the turrets can be shrinked. Laser fire only to the far away objects (spitters), gun turrets target the near biters, that come through the fence.

2. Change the priorities of the different turret types. Maybe they have vanilla defaults. But eventually also by the players: some kind of useful mechanism (like the modules in the assemblies...? - eventually automatically switchable by some nifty circuit/cabling), instead of just making weapons stronger.

[aka13]

I can also imagine that laser "projectiles" could miss fast targets - so at some point, massing laser is not efficient anymore, but a combo of laser + gun deals with all thinkable biter attack force composition - laser turrets for the long-ranged spitters and the bigger, slower biters, and the gun turrets for the smaller and faster ones on close-range combat.

I can imagine having switches and unit types which the turrets do attack - players, spawners, biter types, vehicles? But that could not rely on on team targeting anymore, it would require type-specific targeting.

I agree with you on the point that a +xy% damage boost is boring and not really adding value to the gameplay.

[starholme]

Another possibility would be to skew the fire rate/damage even farther, to the point that the low firing rate of lasers is a real disadvantage.

Make the laser only fire once per second. Or once every 2 seconds. Buff up the damage per shot to get the same dps. So a laser can nearly one-hit most enemies. But most of the firepower is wasted on small biters.

Skew the laser even farther: Don't let it charge unless there is an enemy in range. Now the biters can almost touch it before it gets it's first shot off. Allow it to change targets while charging, to prioritize certain enemies(spitters! big ones first, then medium, then small. Then the biters, big, medium, small)

So in the end the total DPS stays the same, but lasers are really only effective against targets with a lot of health.
And our gun turrets remain useful against the swarms of lower health enemies.

[ssilk]

I would really LOVE to have lasers, that also behave like lasers. Not those stupid laser riffles.

[orzelek]

I was kind of looking at this thread and trying to figure out what can be done as a mod.

Sadly actual research upgrades for things like range and armor are not possible currently - those would need to be implemented in code first.

We can improve towers only by adding higher marks of towers currently which I might try at some point soon and post a small mod with it.
I do think we could make lasers with almost "instant" (1 tick?) travel time. Not sure how that would work but it's something to consider.