Top ace TIE fighters too accurate

[J. King]

Playing Escape from Mytus VII:

1. Start mission
2. Dump cannon power to shields
3. Set cannon recharge to lowest (zero lights)
4. Make straight pass to the left of the freighter, with no evasion whatsoever

In X-Wing the TIEs get a number of hits in, but usually don't get my forward shield down. In XWVM, on the other hand, the TIEs land many more hits, always at least getting my shields down, and often destroying me outright.

[David Esparza Guerrero]

This is very, very, very good feedback. The AI is hard to get right because there are not stats or specifications for the different ranks, and we can only approximate it from empirical evidence.

[J. King]

Upon further testing, there appear to be (at least) four factors in play here:

1. The TIEs' attack range should be closer than it is (see issue #31)
2. The first volley from the TIEs is originally aimed too far forward (see screenshot below), after which they adjust and all shots hit
3. My wingman would normally (and without being ordered) attack and quickly destroy Alpha 2 (and often Alpha 1), but seems less apt to attack in XWVM
4. T/F Beta would normally target Red 2 rather than me, presumably because he's doing damage to other TIEs.

[David Esparza Guerrero]

Put on hold until new combat rebalance is tested.

[Justagai]

I just want to add that all Imperial starfighters (As well as neutral starfighters) in the original X-Wing could only fire WEAK lasers. They later changed this in TIE Fighter for obvious reasons. This should be kept in mind with the combat rebalancing.

[J. King]

Notably, while this mission in build 170810 is more consistent in many ways with the original, the TIEs still destroy me consistently.

Yesterday I had begun to suspect that TIEs should only fire weak lasers, after seeing how hard TIEs hit, particularly in this mission even after the last round of adjustments. I have not experimentally confirmed Justagai's assertion, but it seems right.

I had earlier noted that Rebel starfighters do fire supercharged lasers (a rebel A-Wing would consistently destroy a TIE Fighter in two hits), so this would not apply to friendly craft.

[David Esparza Guerrero]

This was solved as part of commit 4a90f51 .