Mon Calamari Cruisers image - Yuuzhan Vong at War mod for Star Wars: Empire at War: Forces of Corruption
Behold the Yuuzhan Vong Army! This mod adds the Yuuzhan Vong Race as a playable faction and all units of this era. We are a community of modders working for the greater goal, so anyone who wants to help or support us is welcome!
So, we are constantly trying to keep everything in balance with this mod. It becomes laborious at times, for as the mod expands and grows to cover and showcase every element of the Star Wars Universe, we learn and test new things, which ultimately makes us return back to previous works and update and bring them into balance with the rest of the newer material.
One such case that came to our attention was the Mon Calamari fleet. The first group of ships we made, we were trying to be extremely careful with how detailed the ships were allowed to become. After significant testing, and seeing how ships like our MC85 could easily handle 65 rotating and elevating turrets, we started to take more liberties with adding weaponry to ships. With this however, the Mon Cals began to look a bit weak in design.
To rectify this, we have decided that since an MC80, while being smaller, was able to go head to head with an Imperial Star Destroyer, the MC80 needed to have some more visible weapons. We have decided that the gun blisters will house medium ion and light lasers (used for AA defense). We have given each mon calamari ship a sufficient number of medium dual turbos and heavy dual turbos where deemed appropriate, but not out numbering the star destroyers.
Star destroyers will still have more guns, but Mon Cal ships will have almost as many, but with their stronger shields and better equipped fighter now show as the true deadly warships they were designed to be.
Once again, we explain the use of turrets is to follow the trend first established by Fractal Sponge and his star destroyers. Keeping with the Mon Cal aesthetic of smooth hull designs, large weapons have been inserted into the ship rather than just placed onto the surface. All weapons are universal, so the same medium dual turbos on a mon calamari cruiser are the same on the Star Destroyer, due to weapon manufactures selling wholesale across the entire galaxy.
The first picture shows the old MC80 liberty class in between the ISDMK1 and an ARC. It becomes very apparent how out of place it looks without visible weapons systems.
We have updated the Naritus Hero ship, the MC80 Wingless, and the HomeOne Class Independence Hero ship.
Soon to follow will be the MC80 Liberty class, the MC80B class ships and the MC90. The larger class ships such as the Blue Diver, Mediator and Viscount will have gun blisters large enough to support light and medium weaponry, and thus will only show visible heavy weapons.
Actually if you look at what fractal did with his mon cal ship design, it looks very different from the internal weapons visible here. He used ballturrets, both integrated and in the end of the stretched spheres in the surface of the ship to make a really smooth and neat looking ship. Damn shame he never finished it. Anyway you probably wont (and shouldn't) go back to change all of the mon cal ship Models but it would've looked really Nice imo.
Was referring to only what he finished on his star destroyers. I have followed Fractal's attempts at the mon cal ship, and we did try it: a medium dual turbo actually can be inserted into the front and back of each blister, but we do not have a light ion sphere turret and it would not make sense to only have this turret on just a few ships instead of all.
My biggest complaint about Fractal's mon cal attempt is the size differential: if star destroyers and mon cal ships both have the same heavy turbos, then it just didn't make sense for Fractal to make a star destroyer's turret 5x larger than his mon cal turret. Maybe he also saw this mistake and that was why he never finished?
These images were the inspiration for the weapon placement. The original SW storyboard sketches show cut out gun cavities into the hull of the HomeOne. Also to note, the main arsenal of weaponry can be found along the flanks, with very little forward firing weaponry seen, which helps enforce the battle tactics seen in ROTJ where Mon Cals were seen doing broadside attacks to the ISD's, which I propose was a tactical maneuver to avoid the full force of the ISD's forward facing arsenal.
Theforce.net
Theforce.net
Well Fractal is actually pretty consistent with his turret sizes. Also not all the ball turrets are Ion cannons as those on his MC90 and Allegiance where TL. I like reading the descriptions he gives in his thread almost more than looking at the pictures cause he puts engineering thought into his models which I like. The MC90 TL is smaller than the SD turbo turret because he has power values assigned to each weapon. The MC90 is a single 70 teraton TL while the ISD II is an octuple 32 teraton turret. Basically the ISD II is a 256 teraton weapon or almost 4 times as powerful per turret so needs to be 4x the size. The ISD-1 TL turrets are dual 175 teraton so 350 total so 5x the size. His Mon cal design basically has the HTL spread out more than in 8 turrets so they can be smaller. The Nebula big dual turret is a twin 320 teraton TL while the triples are 70 teraton. 70 teraton he considers a standard HTL which is what the Venator uses. Those aren't canon numbers but they are the numbers he goes by when designing turrets.
As for the Mon Cals I think since all the Pre MC90 ships were modified to be fighting ships it makes sense to have weapon cut outs but then designated military ships would have them more integrated in the hull like the ball turrets Fractal uses. Just my .02 on that discussion.
It is a good point, but I think he still made his turrets a bit too large. The Octuple turrets were supposed to be some of the largest and most powerful turrets in existence i thought. I do like the design change, it works well for the Imperials, but I think it makes it much harder to justify the strength of Mon Calamari ships and Corellian which were almost just as strong, yet smaller in size.
I still wonder if this is the reason that Fractal never did a Corellian ship (aside from blockade runner) or finished his mon cals... Who wouldn't just love to see the Corellian Destroyer or the Liberty done by Fractal?
I think he just got busy in real life so who knows he may finish somethings. His thread was quiet for half a year or so which was right after he started on the MC90. It's finally picking back up though and he has some more transport type ships and even a tank on his website. Reading all the discussions I do know he prefers Imperial ships and everyone was surprised he even started the MC90 cause he was talking about how big of a pain it would be to model one. As for turret size actually the duals on his ISD-1 are smaller than the studio model. I think it makes sense where the ISD-1 had heavier guns but the octuples have a higher rate of fire so more damage output in the long run. For me I think about how the ISD-1 was made when fighting Lucrehulks was a thing but then against the Rebels with mostly frigate size ships fast firing yet still heavy turbolasers would be much more effective for hosing them down. If the octuples fired twice as fast that would be a lot more damage.
For those interested the big duals on like the Asserter are 720 teraton and so are the single balls on the Allegiance. The quads on the Asserter are 240 teraton and the quads on the Allegiance are 175. Basically those turrets are good against heavy ships maybe down to a destroyer sized ship but the octuples can still damage destroyers and up plus be useful and extremely deadly to frigates. After reading his notes and my own ideas that's just what makes sense. There is no canon explanation that I'm aware of so basically we just get to come up with what makes the most sense. Going by studio models though the octuples look like much smaller barrels than the duals.
Google.com
Google.com
The wingless and home one types were jaw dropping for me. Excellent Job.
Correct me, if i'm wrong, but i think ISD shoud be stronger than mon calamari cruiser?
it is, it has more weapons, and more fighters, but, the Mon Cal cruisers have better shields and further range on some of their weapons, while also carrying fewer, yet much more stronger fighters.
It would be a close battle, but the ISD would still be considered the victor, for its more massive size ultimately gives it more hit points for survival.
Great! Imperial inside me is happy)
Admiral Ackbar: "At that close range we wont last long against those Star Destroyers"
Calrissian: "We will last longer than we would against that Death Star"
- The Battle of Endor
From what I understand from the movies, the Star Destroyers have no equal. I can see the reason you have to make it that way for balancing purposes though.
That's actually depending on the MonCal Cruiser.
This mod takes place 25 ABY, way enough time to lift even the oldest MC80 (which were designed as passenger and exploration vessels) to quite formidable warship standards.
Newer MC series are designed with combat in mind and more often than not even outperform an ISD1, equalling (and due to better fighter equipment are even able to best) an ISD2 in one on one combat. What still makes ISDs dangerous is the will for battle shown by their commanders. They tend to go further, risk more lifes. In addition the Remnant simply lacks the money for really new or even refitting their older designs.
"At that close range...."
Key words ;)
In the words of the great late Dukat: "It's one (here many) big sick *****!" XD
Love what you're doing with all the ships. The mod is becoming more and more exciting both visually and gameplay wise.
Can't wait to see it under a "download" button :P
There's so much nerd in this comment thread and I love it. :D