Messages

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General Discussion / Re: Nexus 1 Balance issues

« on: September 01, 2011, 05:22:15 »

GAMEPLAY ELEMENTS

1. Device Disabling

On a whole, certain devices are too centralized to make military or engineering sense (prudence requires that you have backups of every critical system that are hard to shut down). It is too easy to cripple a capital ship's engines/weapon power generators/shield generators etc. permanently with enough laser fire/gunboats/etc. Only the Angelwing can regenerate devices that have been completely destroyed.

Possible Solutions (in any combination):

-Certain devices are now indestructible and therefore can only be disabled, not destroyed.  This list should include shield generators (since they are the only way many ships can restore at least some of their strength), backup weapon power generators (a component that for some reason cannot be mounted on anything larger than a destroyer in the original game, so it needs to be mountable on more ship classes), flak systems, normal class weapons, etc. This would allow a ship to be hobbled (until repairs are done) but no longer permanently crippled as is the case right now.

-Increasing power allocation to suppport devices will decrease the damage all devices (by a moderate amount at 150%, and a greater amount at 200%) take as long as that power rate is maintained, but this power allocation by itself won't repair damaged devices.

-Assigning a greater repair priority to a device will reduce the damage it takes from anti-device attacks (because the engineers are where they are needed most to deal with problems), as well as the usual repair rate increase.

-A balanced version might cause devices to gradually lose effectiveness as they are damaged (weapons become less accurate, engines become slower, shields take more damage, etc.)--they are considered disabled at 25% health, destroyed at 0% health, and cannot return to operation until they repair themselves to 50% health. 

2. Focus Fire

The eventual bane of almost any ship, Focus Fire needs to be toned down a bit. Enemy AI on weaker ships don't handle focus fire very well. Battleships don't have much recourse (given their lack of maneuverability) other than to turn on ECM, Combat Engines, and set shields to 200%. The Combat Engines of Battleships are more for evading anti-device fire rather than anti-shield or anti-hull fire, so enough focus fire will take them out in very short order.

Possible Solutions (in any combination):

-Adjust AI routines on enemy destroyers/frigates to get them to turn on Deflection Engines, ECM, and 200% power on shields or engines to make them less like pushovers (since these measures make them harder to hit and more resilient). This would in turn make device destroying attacks or small craft more valuable in order to weaken them sufficiently for outright destruction, or in the case of small craft attacks, their increase maneuverability would not be very useful against small craft.
-Give battleships a boost to their maximum shield HP levels and support energy ratings to really let them absorb a beating and remain operational.
-Introduce a new gameplay element to let friendly ships transfer support energy/shield HP between each other, via new ship components at an efficiency rate that depends on the quality of the energy/shield HP transfer components.
-Add a new "Defend Ship" command that is applicable only to allied or neutral ships. This command will make a ship that has been issued this command attack the targeted allied ship's attackers, and if it has the shield strength, even block shots fired from enemies at that targeted ally by positioning itself in the path of those shots. Its own flak systems will also prioritize interceptible attacks targeting the ship its defending, rather than itself.

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Mod Development / Released Mods / Re: Nexus BSG 4.5 teaser!! Woot!!! Woot!

« on: August 31, 2011, 19:23:16 »

So amazing, in fact, I'm amazed Ronald D. Moore hasn't contacted the Nexus team to make a better game for his TV series rather than that awful browser-based game Battlestar Galactica Online.  Nexus' gameplay elements and engine could really make for a very close emulation of BSG's Newtonian-physics-based space combat.

However, this trailer isn't as new as it might seem.  Isn't the trailer posted on the moddb website for this mod group the newest one right now, the one that uses Bob Dylan's version of "All Along the Watchtower"?

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General Discussion / Nexus 1's Small Craft Issues

« on: August 31, 2011, 07:28:51 »

SMALL CRAFT

1. General Issues

As a whole, many small craft are too vulnerable, especially when docking onto a ship or taking off. This is largely due to the fact that flak lasers (which shouldn't be limited to just green flashes when hitting small craft the camera can lock onto) can penetrate any form of shield. They are also too easily shot down by flak weapons from enemy ships, and carry too much ammunition for their weaponry in almost every case.

Possible Solutions (in any combination):

-Make (capital ship) flak weapons unable to penetrate any shield type. This would be the most important solution.
-Speed up the docking/take-off process.
-Squadrons of small craft should consolidate into new squadrons if they have suffered casualties. For example, if the max small craft per squadron for a specific class is 3, and a squadron of that class with 2 members docks on a capital ship with another squadron of its class with 1 member, the two squadrons will combine into a single 3-member squadron.  The aim of the algorithm controlling this should be to create as many full-strength squadrons as possible.
-Small craft should take a period of time to be repaired and reloaded. The stronger they are, the more time this takes, reduced appropriately for the crew's engineering stat. The vanilla game repairs and reloads small craft instantly. 
-Reduce the effectiveness of capital ship flak weapons, possibly replacing them with projectile weapons rather than hitscan beams.
-Small craft should have lower maximum ammunition reserves.
-Change their AI routines to take full advantage of Newtonian physics, such as jinking using their vernier thrusters while staying on target, using Babylon 5 style strafing runs, or the "moving away while shooting at a target" tactic. This would allow them many more attack opportunities rather than just closing straight on with their targets.

2. Space Fighters

These small craft are the most limited in the game. Their weapons cannot penetrate shields, and many capital ship weapons can't be intercepted by fighter weapons. Even deploying them against incoming enemy gunboats or bombers can't interfere with their attacks short of destroying them, which makes them not very useful against huge amounts of bombers or gunboats. Many capital ship attacks cannot be intercepted either.

Possible Solutions (in any combination):

-Make their flak weapons (which should not be hitscan weapons) more effective than capital ship flak weapons, which would make them more valuable for interception and small craft defense.
-Fighters should have a low-ammunition-capacity (probably no more than 4 shots), secondary weapon that fires slowly but can damage devices through shields.
-Change the AI routines of Gunboats or Bombers, so that when they are under attack by fighters, the attacked Gunboats/Bombers must take evasive maneuvers and can't attack their targets as often.
-See other solutions for making more capital ship weapons interceptible.

3. Space Gunships

Gunships are too effective (when spammed) at destroying enemy devices for too little cost. They are also one-dimensional, unlike fighters and bombers.

Possible Solutions (in any combination):

-Gunships should carry less maximum ammo, be less able to penetrate shields with anti-small craft components, fire shorter bursts, and be less accurate (they should fire in a cone-shaped pattern or a strafing line rather than a straight line that always homes in on the targeted device).
-Gunships should also carry a slower-firing, less accurate version of fighter main guns, but it should be a version that cannot be targeted, so they can only defend themselves, not take the fight to an enemy, and thus would also be useless for intercepting capital ship weapons.

4. Space Bombers

These small craft are usually more of an annoyance than an actual threat, due to their somewhat low hull DPS (this is most likely due to how effective shields with anti-bomber/gunboat components are against their weapons). They are also somewhat overpriced in resource points for their utility, and their self-defense flak lasers are a little too effective against attacking fighters.

Possible Solutions (in any combination):

-Make them fire a conical spray of anti-hull projectiles for their primary attacks to increase their chance of some getting through the shields.
-Decrease maximum ammunition load for bombers and increase reload and repair times for them, since they are the toughest class of small craft.
-Decrease their hangar bay space requirement and resource point mounting costs by a moderate amount.
-Make Noah bombers look less like flying moon-shaped biscuits. 
-Decrease the effectiveness of their rear-firing flak lasers.
-If bombers had specialty loads to inflict status effects on capital ships they attack, they would increase in tactical value immensely. These specialty bomber loads would be delivered by bombers and attach themselves to capital ships, where they would stay until removed by the ship's engineers, or their batteries run out of power, or (depending on the type) get shot off by friendly fighters (which is the fastest method, but of course would require lowering the afflicted ship's shields).
-Some specialty bomber loads could include "mass augmenters" which decrease an afflicted ship's maximum speed or maneuverability (this effect increases with more of them attached to a ship), "power drainers" which interfere with a ship's weapon power generators and lower its rate of fire, or a "Sensor Scrambler" pod that causes non-homing weapons on the afflicted ships to be less accurate, etc.

5. Commando Ferries

These are pretty much useless for general combat given their fragility, inability to bypass/penetrate shields, and very limited window of usefulness (since the commandos get killed so quickly), outside of achieving certain bonus objectives.

Possible Solutions (in any combination):

-Improve their resilience to flak weapons, and possibly let them replenish their commando members whenever they dock onto a friendly capital ship.
-Consider replacing them with boarding pods (detailed below).
-Consider letting AI ships controlled by factions with an overabundance of fanatical or easily-replaced soldiers (such as the Vardrags with their cybernetically-controlled Raptors, the Gorgs, or the Sibling) become common users of commandos whenever an enemy ship's shields are down. Like the Raptor Carrier-class ship or the Locust Queen, AI ships of these factions could continually respawn commando ferries or boarding pods so that they always remain a threat.

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General Discussion / Nexus 1 Balance issues

« on: August 31, 2011, 07:22:02 »

I've compiled a list of balance issues for Nexus 1 that should be resolved by Nexus 2, or if they decide to release an "enhanced" version of Nexus 1 to the public.  As excellent as the battle system in Nexus 1 was, there were a fair number of exploits that would be real problem in multiplayer (or a badly-programmed AI).  I would hate to see these rear their ugly heads again in Nexus 2, so for the benefit of the devs I'll send this list to them once the users on this forum give the list a good look.  Constructive criticism will be appreciated.

First up are capital ship weapons that can be exploited or abused in Nexus 1.

CAPITAL SHIP WEAPONS

1. Energy Bomb Spamming

Energy Bombs, when spammed, can strip the shields of entire enemy fleets, and they have unlimited ammunition. Even if the targeted fleet attempts to close with the ships using Energy Bombs to catch the users in their own blast radius, this does nothing to stop the combat into degenerating into a very fast exercise about who can spam the most direct-fire hull weapons, especially since railguns are so accurate.

Possible Solutions (in any combination):

-Make E-bombs interceptible, or else make them have a smaller blast radius when intercepted.
-Give them limited ammo with no more than one launcher per ship.
-Make them non-cumulative (in other words either only one launcher per ship, or ones from the same side cancel each other out so the shield damage of only one detonation is counted).
-Give them a minimum range, explained as a "safe distance" they must travel before arming themselves.

2. Laser Spamming

Lots of lasers trained on a single target can disable or destroy many devices on a ship before its devices are even identified. The Ghost faction's ships are pretty much restricted to this tactic.

Possible Solutions (in any combination):

-Change lasers so they fire at random hull points on a ship that has not had any of its devices identified, or else can't fire at all ("unable to complete task").
-Give Ghost ships access to more weapon types (the simplest would be access to Plasma Guns).
-See the "Device Disabling" subsection in the "Gameplay Elements" section for further details.

3. Missiles

These weapons are too difficult to use for too little payoff (all you get is a moderate reduction in hull integrity in ships caught in the explosion, and that is IF all the ships in question have no functioning flak weaponry or fighters to intercept the missiles). If they are really spammed (as in the "Fight for Earth" mission in Nexus 1), then they can destroy entire fleets. They also fry small craft caught in the blast radius.

Possible Solutions (in any combination):

-Give missiles some flak damage resistance.
-Remove their shield-piercing abilities.
-Let them detonate in a smaller radius when intercepted.
-Remove their small craft damage.
-Give them a minimum range before the warhead arms.
-Change their gameplay role--instead of area-effect weapons, they are now turned into "super-torpedos" like real-life anti-ship missiles are. They cannot pierce shields (though they do moderate anti-shield damage upon a hit), but deal a great deal of hull damage to an unshielded ship if they hit and are not intercepted. To balance this you wouldn't be able to carry more than one launcher.

4. Torpedo Spamming

Torpedoes penetrate shields and can deal hull damage right through shields.  A ship can be crippled or destroyed by torpedo spam even if its shields never went down.

Possible Solution:

-Make torpedoes interceptible by flak weapons on capital ships or fighter weapons, or make torpedoes completely blocked by shields. This would reduce or eliminate the problem of torpedo spam.

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Mod Development / Released Mods / Re: Modular Ships? = "Breaking of ships, piece by piece?"

« on: August 31, 2011, 06:53:16 »

As I said in my comment on the games-plant.com website for Nexus 2, modular space stations have already been featured in Nexus 1.  Noah battlestations had modular parts that could be destroyed piece-by-piece, and so could the Vardrag Starportal space stations such as that from the "Mechanoid Invasion" level.  Modular ships, however, have not been in the game thus far.  The only example of a ship splitting into smaller, independently moving and fighting pieces, are the Mechanoids, and that was only in the "Back to Earth" level.  Mechanoids can hardly be called ships anyhow.

In any case, ships that have parts that can be dismembered (though not ships that can split into pieces that can independently move and fight) is a feature that has already been done with Digital Reality's Haegemonia: Legions of Iron and Haegemonia: The Solon Heritage games.  Battlestations, Battleships, cruisers, and some other large ships in that game had parts that could be blown off from the rest of the ship (and those parts had their own individual HP counters).  Sometimes this would cause a ship to lose weaponry, and at other times a blown-off part was just for show.  Given enough time, however, those missing parts would regenerate (you didn't even have to go to a planet or support ship to get a replacement attached).  This meant that larger ships or stations could have their weapons targeted in order to soften them up for a big assault.  It didn't hurt that the Haegemonia used an engine with a much better particle system (at least when it came to blowing things up) so blasting ships apart looked much better than doing so in Nexus 1.

Modders of Star Trek: Bridge Commander (released in 2002) managed to get the "Multi-Vector Assault mode" on the USS Prometheus to work as well.  That ship possessed the ability to split into three parts that could move and fight independently--I believe a similar ability can be found on similar ships in the recent Star Trek Online MMORPG.

Regardless, if Nexus 2 does support sections of a ship that can be blasted away, it would be a nice new gameplay element since the ship's hull integrity may not be too bad, but now it's missing a chunk of weaponry and devices that were originally on the part that was severed.  Being able to control which modular parts of a ship or station actually get attached would also be nice for configuring them pre-mission as well.

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General Discussion / Re: Things to ask the devs about Nexus 2

« on: August 30, 2011, 01:53:11 »

Oh, and there's another reason why I wanted to ask whether or not there is still a link to the Imperium Galactica series for Nexus 2.  If you watch the following trailer for Imperium Galactica 3, you'll see many parts of that game eventually ended up in Nexus: TJI, such as the Angelwing, the Shukenja Beta base, the old school Earth fleet ships, the Noah cruisers, etc.

http://youtu.be/8dmfncYyxu8

I wonder what originally happened to sever Nexus: TJI from the Imperium Galactica series.

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General Discussion / Re: About the Mechanoid Angelwing's energy absorption ability

« on: August 29, 2011, 04:52:43 »

Absorb <num>: It charges the ship’s reserve pool with the ’num’ percent of the shots that hit the ship.

This can be added to any shipclass, so it should not be problem to add it anywhere.

Well, what's the default value for this ability for the Mechanoid Angelwing in vanilla Nexus? 

Furthermore, how is the percentage value calculated?  Is it "add percentage of hull damage removed by anti-hull weapons to the ship's support energy pool?" A capital ship's maximum hull integrity never increases throughout the course of the vanilla game, but its maximum support energy capacity can increase by installing  better batteries on the ship, so if this system were used, better batteries would get more power with every hull hit.

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General Discussion / Re: Things to ask the devs about Nexus 2

« on: August 27, 2011, 06:04:22 »

I can imagine the source code to stay protected if core stuff like the graphics engine falls under it. I suppose the Black Sun engine is even to this day quite the thing in the gaming scene.

If I was more knowledgeable about coding engines, I'd agree with you in an instant.  However, about this one I'm not very sure.  Space games have the luxury of better textures and polycounts for ships and the like because space is well, empty.  There is nothing much in terms of an environment to render aside from a (very pretty) skybox, the ships and small craft plying the void, and occasionally, asteroids/space stations, so engine and computer resources can be spent instead on the ships.  Sometimes having the background being composed largely of sprites can be a bit jarring, such as when you win the "Back to Earth" level and the camera zooms out on all your ships--your ships get smaller very fast but the Black Moon and the Earth's moon don't really decrease in size much at all.

Or are you referring to the scaleability of the engine, as the original Nexus 2 Tech Demo implied?  The Nexus 1 engine wouldn't have been able to handle those features without a serious upgrade, unless such scaleability was put in there in the first place.  Even so, compared to the famous "no PC can run this" engine of Crysis 1, I'm still not sure just how advanced the Black Sun engine is compared to that one.

Nexus:TJI/N2 are a niche genre, as well as the feasabliity of working in viable Multiplayer play, it doesn't matter if we (by we I mean us, community, Dev's and all) even sold 2.5+ million copies...

Space-Sims, don't work.. Money wise.

Not even EA was willing to pull the trigger. Plus all those damned concessions, frak that!

What kind of concessions are you referring to?  And Space Sims have worked; nothing's really stopping Relic Entertainment from springing a Homeworld 3 on their PC audience, except for the gravy train that the Dawn of War series is providing them right now.

I am still of the opinion that since it's unlikely that MWE will have publicity-building interviews or the like while the funding is still building up, then a set of fan-approved questions like these would be great for building hype. 

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General Discussion / Re: About the Mechanoid Angelwing's energy absorption ability

« on: August 27, 2011, 04:57:34 »

I should have been more specific; I'm not talking about capital ships restoring their hull integrity during combat, but rather their support energy reserves (the blue bar underneath the Hull Integrity and Shield Integrity bars) increasing specifically when hit by enemy fire on their hulls.

I think this new ability was mentioned in Marcus' log just before you take on "The Siege of Avalon" mission.  I also remember reading an FAQ that mentioned this ability, but it may be a cut feature.  Again, I would like someone with access to the appropriate bits of code to confirm whether or not this is an actual ability possessed by the Mechanoid version of the Angelwing cruiser.

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General Discussion / Things to ask the devs about Nexus 2

« on: August 25, 2011, 01:16:59 »

I was thinking about sending the wonderful developers at MWE a set of 10 questions the fans are burning to know.  I've already made a list of some, but I'd like to get some input over what should be changed or added.  During the production process of most games interviews between gaming magazines/websites and the developers are held both to inform the public about what is going on and to build hype.  Since that right now seems unlikely for Nexus 2, I thought we the fans might come up with a consensus on 10 questions the fans would like answers to, and then get the "interview" posted up on the MWE main website.

1. How many copies of Nexus 1 sold?  Will it be offered on other digital distribution services in the foreseeable future?

-This is important because according to bluenews the "high numbers sold" for Nexus 1 was the impetus for MWE to survive and get a chance to make Nexus 2.  Making Nexus 1 available on more digital distribution services other than Steam could increase its popularity and get more press for Nexus 2.

2. Will Nexus 1 be released in a patched-up, more complete form, along with its source code?

-This is important given how buggy the original release of Nexus 1 was (including such glaringly obvious such as some planets in our own solar system in the Galaxy Viewer turning the wrong way).  There are also a few features and unanswered plot points that the original game could be expanded upon--for example, why don't we perform a mission to disable an angry Vardrag's vessels who don't like the Angelwing's AI helper, or find out who the original users of the "White Ships" seen in the "Beachhead" mission were?

-The roleplaying stat upgrade system was largely for show too since you don't actually gain XP for killing enemy ships, and ships gain experience only at specific missions, not through killing enemies.  Fully implementing that in Nexus 1 would be great.  So would giving us the ability to do optional missions via choosing them in the galaxy viewer, which would give us more XP to use.

-The source code would obviously be a great boon to the modders of this game, so if enough people ask for it (and pledge money for the new game) we could really get our mods going.

3. Will we be able to control Angelwing straight away, and will it still have its assimilated Mechanoid body or not this time around?

-Not as important, but since it's our beloved "signature ship" (unless it was impounded by the Vardrags after Nexus 1 given their understandable fear of its capabilities) it'll be interesting to see whether we can use the Angelwing right away or if Marcus Cromwell has "upgraded" to a Noah Battleship (or even the Vardrag-Noah hybrid Super Dreadnought seen in the tech demo for Nexus 2 I posted) or the like in the meantime. 

4. Is our favourite "Anal Retentive Ignoramus," Angel, going to be making an appearance this episode or not?

-Note: Angel the AI was called that by Commander Sweetwater in Nexus 1.

5. Will you be reusing the services of Outsource Media so the voice actors for reappearing characters can reprise their roles?

-Outsource Media did a great job with almost all the voice acting (with the notable exception of the Vardrag voices), though I wish they hadn't bungled the syllable count on Angel's haiku at the end of "The Mechanoid" level.  A haiku has three lines, first with 5, then 7, and then 5 syllables--Angel's haiku at the end of that mission doesn't follow that formula.  Marcus Cromwell's haiku at the beginning of "The Siege of Avalon" mission doesn't make much sense either.  It'd be nice if MWE got the voice actors to return.

6. Will the new engine allow for features such as fixed-axis weaponry (other than Siege Lasers) for capital ships and fighters, and ramming by capital ships against other capital ships, which are features needed to create mods that emulate the space combat of certain sci-fi franchises? If not, will the capability to modify ships and the AI attack routines necessary to use these new features be present in Nexus 2's engine?

-This is obviously important to quite a few modders here.

7. Has the AI been made smarter this time around, rather than just given boosted stats or weapon spamming for higher difficulty levels?

-This was most obvious in the original game how you could order your own weaker ships to activate ECM, turn on Deflection Engines and increase Engine Power Allocation to let them dodge fire more efficiently when they were being focussed on, but the enemy destroyer-or-smaller class ships couldn't.  The AI controlling your ships in the game sometimes wouldn't do what you told them to, and never gave you a reason either--fixing this would cut down on the frustration experienced by players who don't know why their ships aren't obeying their commands.

8. Will there be better tutorials this time around to help new players adjust better?

-The lack of easy and accessible tutorials was a real problem in the original game, especially given the transition to shielded capital ship combat in Act 2.  Better tutorials (probably based around the premise of being a new captain in the Noah Defense Forces undergoing new training) covering every important aspect could go a long way towards fixing this problem.  Certain small but crucial aspects such as how to recharge your support energy or how Defensive Stance means your ships won't leave the area covered by a friendly fortress shield were not mentioned in the game or manual, and should have been explained in an ingame tutorial.

9. Is the Nexus franchise still part of the Imperium Galactica series, or has that link been severed entirely?

-This would be something good to know for fans of Imperium Galactica who want to know whether Nexus 1 was still Imperium Galactica III: Genesis in terms of plot.

10. Will you be approaching the IP (intellectual property) holders of any sci-fi franchises involving space combat to make an official game based on their IP?

-As evidenced by the numerous mods for Nexus 1, the engine and setup allowing for full-3D combat, Newtonian physics, individually-configurable/independently-targetable devices, and an excellent blend of micromanagement and fleet control capabilities has made it very suitable for mods using ships from different  sci-fi franchises (especially those that have combat based on Newtonian mechanics).  I think there's a lot of money to be made if MWE got to develop an official game for Games Workshops' Battlefleet Gothic line--witness the great success Relic Entertainment has had with its Dawn of War RTS series.  Babylon 5 hasn't had an official space combat game in a long time, nor has Andromeda or the like, and I'm sure MWE could do a better job with them or the Battlestar Galactica IP.

Does anyone have any questions that might displace those on this list?  I thought I might ask something like "Is the gameplay simpler this time around?" but that would likely open a very large can of worms.  If, for example, they removed full-3D combat in exchange for the "stack of vertical pancakes" (where every ship returns to the same vertical plane, just on different heights) seen in recent space combat games like Star Trek Online, or if they removed the distinction between Anti-Hull and Anti-Shield weapons (instead sticking with a class that did both functions effectively), then there would be an enormous backlash by the fans.  Maybe right now we should trust them not to remove such core elements of gameplay.

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General Discussion / About the Mechanoid Angelwing's energy absorption ability

« on: August 24, 2011, 19:00:31 »

According to ingame help-text, after Angel assimilates the inactive Mechanoid's body into the Angelwing, it gains a new passive ability to recharge its support energy with every hit that impacts the hull.  Unfortunately in my experience it doesn't seem like this ability works; I've purposely dropped the Angelwing's shields to get a right good pounding by enemy anti-hull weaponry and the support energy doesn't seem to increase beyond what it normally does from the Angelwing's support generator rating.

Can anyone with access to the game's data files clarify for me whether or not this "recharge support energy when the hull is hit" ability actually works or not in the game?  If it does, does it only activate against anti-hull weaponry like Railguns, Plasma Guns and the primary attacks of Bombers?  Does it also activate against laser weapons and anti-shield weapons that strike a ship's hull as well?

If this ability restored more energy with each hit against the hull, it'd make the Angelwing much more resilient, since as soon as the shields dropped the support energy would increase with every hull hit, allowing it to kick power allocation to Shields (to increase the recharge rate) and Engines (to increase its evasion abilities) to allow it to restore its shields and minimize the hull damage it takes while its shields are down.  I'd like to see a fan patch for this.