As of writing this post, here's how accuracy works in this game: Each weapon has 2 important numbers (aside from damage), namely Accuracy and Range, but what do these mean? Range is fairly common sense. This is the maximum distance that you can attempt to fire the weapon at with any prayer of a chance of the shot finding its target. Ok, great. Now what about Accuracy? This is the confusing part, so pay attention all you rookie and veteran Captains alike! The Accuracy listed for a given weapon is its base chance to hit at its given MEDIAN range. For you math minded people, this all makes perfect sense so far, but I will explain further for others. This means that if you have a weapon with Range 6, it has the possible values of 1 2 3 4 5 6. It's median range (the number in the middle or the average of the two numbers in the middle if it is an even array of numbers) in this case would be 3.5! That's where things get confusing, because internally, your accuracy is based off of this number, but your distance to a target can never be anything but an integer (no decimals). So at 3 range, you would see better than your listed accuracy/chance to hit, and at 4 range, you would see worse (likely much worse) than your listed accuracy. Why? good question. Suppose the weapon has a 60% chance to hit at 6 range. Keeping in mind that we are not considering any officer upgrades at this point (oh but we will *heh heh*, we will). The chance to hit breakdown looks something (exactly) like this: Range - %Chance to Hit 1 - 95 2 - 81 3 - 67 3.5 - 60 (Mathematically, this is how the game works, practically, you can never be at range 3.5) 4 - 50 5 - 30 6 - 10 After probing several ships and weapons and observing the trends in accuracy, it became clear to me that this was a 2-slope system (which both slopes can be the same if your median accuracy is 52.5%) for determining accuracy as an offset from median based on distance to the extreme and the arbitrated hit chances (95% maximum, guaranteed hit chance with any weapon at point blank 1 hex, 10% minimum chance to hit when firing a max range shot under normal conditions). How it works: Take the difference between 1-Range accuracy (Again, always 95% under normal conditions) and subtract from that your Median-Range accuracy. In this case we get 95-60 = 35. So there is a spread of 35% chance to hit across that range, now what? Take that spread in chance to hit and divide it by the number of steps from median to the end point. 3.5-1 = 2.5, simple. Now 35/2.5 = a slightly mind bending request at first.. if you do it in your head, I recommend doing 350/25 for simplification, which is 14! Great, so the near-range (less than median) slope is 14% chance to hit per tile. So we are starting at the median and taking 1/2 of a step to 3 range, so 1/2 of 14 = 7% change in chance to hit. Add that to your Median accuracy value of 60 and you get the listed 67% chance to hit at 3 hex. From there, it is 1 full step to 2 range, so add the full 14 and you get 81% chance to hit. 1 more full step to point blank range, and... you guessed it, we are at 95% hit chance! It works the same figuring out the slope for the far ranges (greater than median) as well. 60 - 10 arbitrated minimum hit chance at max range = 50. 6-3.5 = 2.5 steps again (the steps will always be the same for near and far range slopes due to the nature of a median). So we are looking at 50% chance to hit change across 2.5 steps. 50/2.5 or 500/25, Blamo, 20! 1/2 step to 4 = change of 10%, so we see a listed 50. 1 step further out from median, -20% accuracy, final value of 30.... and then at max range 10% chance to hit! What's all the fuss about how accuracy works? Well for one, you now understand how the game works a bit better and can make some informed decisions. *Wink Wink* "Do I get Range Boost or Accuracy or what guys?" Do the math! I'll do this one for you operating under the assumption that you are taking this 6-range 60% acc weapon to the max possible using a Sol Weapons Officer (Rank 5), with 1 point obviously being spent towards Damage Boost, so you have 4 to decide what to do with. Ok, so you made the decision that Accuracy is what you want, and not Overload, so we proceed: Your choice then becomes 3 ranks of accuracy (15% bonus) and +1 range bonus OR 4 ranks of accuracy (20% bonus) as an end point. The question becomes "Is Range boost worth it on weapon X over accuracy?" Here's the numbers 6 Range and 60% Accuracy + 20% increased accuracy (multiplicative, not additive), 60% * 1.2 = 72% 1 - 95 2 - 85.8 3 - 76.6 3.5 - 72 4 - 59.6 5 - 34.8 6 - 10 OR 6+1 Range and 60% + 15%, 60% * 1.15 = 69% 1 - 95 2 - 86 1/3 3 - 77 2/3 4 - 69 5 - 39 1/3 6 - 29 2/3 7 - 10 In THIS case (because the median was an irrational number as a result of an even base range), getting range boost is considerably more effective because it offers increased accuracy at every range AND extends your range by 1! Now if you had an odd base range, things would be different (or would they? You do the math, literally!! Do it, it will benefit you) Some other considerations, you may well want to take an 80% accurate weapon and add 20% accuracy to it to achieve 96% accuracy at median instead of extending its range by 1. But how can accuracy be greater than 95%? Well.. it can, and oddly enough, this will cause a NEGATIVE slope, which means you will LOSE chance to hit as you approach the arbitrated 95% chance at 1 hex! Keep in mind that losing 1% hit chance is well worth gaining your damage bonus Enjoy that tidbit. [Edit: Plasma damage bonus ranges were updated, and you can now fire from much further out while retaining damage bonuses, hooray! But plasma weapons are much more expensive to operate than lasers, seems fair]
Very useful insight on the relationship between range n accuracy, and thus, real ranged damage. Thks.
yw! Practical Application: I've been using this knowledge to formulate attack plans vs stations, basically take the chance to hit at a given range (you have to know how to do what I did above) * number of attacks/round * damage of each attack to determine expected dmg received per round (on average). Then you can plan to have like that much + 10% more shield or so ready and know what range to fight from, what you need to do the job, all sorts of things. There are a few more tricks up my sleeves too! For example, when fighting a Sanethi defense platform with 8 beams that will deal 10 dmg apiece at 10 range with a 76% hit chance, I expect to receive 80 * 0.76 dmg/round (60.8) from the beams and 10% of 24 dmg (4 x 6 rockets) = 2.4 dmg/round, totalling 63.2 dmg expected. 66 shield minimum recommended. Either I have to figure out how to muster that much shield power (can be done on a variety of ships in multiple ways) or figure out how to mitigate more damage or avoid damage altogether.
I am trying to do this for the nagara 2. Just having a issue trying to do the math. 95-90 = 5 to get the difference i think between hex 1 and hex 9 9-1 = 8 bit confused on this part already a bit 5/8 = 0.625 totally confused now but i am kinda stuck how to apply this. What i wanted to calculate was how much i would get was 6 scenario's overload 4, +1 range, overload 3, accuracy 1(5%), overload 3, +1 range, accuracy 3(15%), +1 range, accuracy 4(20%), accuracy 4(20%), accuracy 5(30%) I understand those are many scenario's that's why i wanted to know how to do it. base 90% accuracy, 18 range.
Ok, so you definitely want Damage boost 1 (it's useful on ships with more weapons, but still good here) leaving you with 4 points, right? For starters, you shouldn't really ever get more than 2 ranks of accuracy bonus. 10% more than 90 is 99% accuracy at median range. There may be an exception to this rule concerning evasion mechanics, but I haven't been able to test that yet for lack of reaching that point in the game on both sides and cooperating players. The Nagara has an EVEN base range, so you would want to get range boost to make it 19 total range with a median of 10 (99% chance to hit moves from 9.5 hex out to 10 full hex, which is right where your max damage bonus ends I think on that ship/weapon). Overload is nice, but you are talking about a 1-time double up of +10 dmg (for all 4 ranks) vs always-on accuracy and range. Tough call. I'd rather almost-never miss a shot on that amazing sniper ship vs take a chance at doubling up one shot and missing others (miss ONE shot over the course of the battle = value of the one-off double dmg from overload, which you probably wouldnt have missed with proper accuracy mods instead, see what I mean?) I strongly suggest on a Nagara: 1 rank dmg boost 1 rank range boost 2 ranks accuracy 3rd rank accuracy to overcap at 104% (will say 100 at median) or Lucky Shot (for that one REALLY long range shot, you could probably land a hit from 16 hex with near perfect accuracy using it) With 1 boost and 2 accuracy, you look like roughly like this (didn't calculate acc at each range, I can rough it in my head): 99% median accuracy, median range 10, max range 19 1-95 2- 3- 4-96 5- 6-97 7- 8-98 9- 10-99 11-90 12-80 13-70 14-60 15-50 16-40 17-30 18-20 19-10% In-slope = 4% change in accurace/9 hexes (about 1/2% per hex as you go in from median) Out-slope = 89/9 (about 10 per hex as you go out from median) You could totally go with 1 rank of accuracy boost to put you at 94.5% median and sloping up that 0.5% across 9 hexes Assuming damage boost and range boost, spend the other 2 points in overload for ~4 extra damage one time or what I like to refer to as the 'Lucky-Load' combo. Mmmm soon I will be dropping Lucky Loads off from my HunterKiller ship, the Victory III 'Toxic'. Oh and your accuracy 1 overload 4, sounds good, almost, but you are giving up 3 dmg/round to gain a 1-off of 10 that way. Over 2 rounds (typical PK) you might net 4 damage as a result of +10 but missing out on 6. If you can ALWAYS get close to your target, then accuracy isn't a concern (95% limit regardless of being 100 or even overcapped), so you could do 4 overload and 1 dmg boost and just use the 90% accuracy as is. but 99% accuracy = miss 90% less than 90 accuracy assuming you use it properly at near-median range. If you go to point blank, 95% is still 50% less misses than 90%.
So do you guys work in the shipyards when your not serving as science officers on your ships? lol, that hurt my head, good thing I was sober or I could not have read it all, thanks for your insight
