Amount other issues, very long lifetime aspect missiles, such as long range ship to ship missiles, can end up looking weird if their target dies. This is particularly true when used at close ranges. Early on when working with Warmachine we tried to use the 'die on lost lock' flag to make missiles die when the thing they're locked onto dies. Turns out, that flag actually means 'die when decoyed'!
We still want that though, and a few other related things, so I propose to retire that flag and build a more configurable behavior for these situations.
My ideal is that you could define separate behaviors for what happens when...
The lock is broken by countermeasure
The target leaves the view cone
The target dies
And on those events the missile could...
Self-destruct, after a configurable range of time, maybe with dinky/no dinky option.
Fly straight
Wander
Reacquire the target if it returns to view(if applicable)
Pick up a new target (obeying any lock restrictions)
And any combination thereof that makes sense. Fly a wobbly path for 10 seconds looking for new targets and then self destruct sometime between 10 and 12 seconds later, for random example.
Some features could improve that:
lose lock on target death flag: The die on lost lock flag doesn't work on these missiles as apparently locks aren't lost when the target dies.
free-acquire targets on target loss flag: Allow aspect missiles to try to pick up new valid targets in their view cone after losing their primary target.
Configurable min and max lifetime on target loss: In addition to the obvious allows the above two to be combined, so for example a missile without a lock has 5 seconds to pick up new target, and if it doesn't it dies sometime between then and 5 seconds later. Allowing a range means not all missiles in a big volley will pop at once when their target dies, which could look unsightly
[edited because I forgot I made this FR and wrote a new one, but and kinda like the new text more.]
Tracking a new target for aspect seekers would require multi changes for full compatibility, since the server would need to communicate to the client who the new target is.
Amount other issues, very long lifetime aspect missiles, such as long range ship to ship missiles, can end up looking weird if their target dies. This is particularly true when used at close ranges. Early on when working with Warmachine we tried to use the 'die on lost lock' flag to make missiles die when the thing they're locked onto dies. Turns out, that flag actually means 'die when decoyed'!
We still want that though, and a few other related things, so I propose to retire that flag and build a more configurable behavior for these situations.
My ideal is that you could define separate behaviors for what happens when...
And on those events the missile could...
Some features could improve that:lose lock on target death flag: The die on lost lock flag doesn't work on these missiles as apparently locks aren't lost when the target dies.free-acquire targets on target loss flag: Allow aspect missiles to try to pick up new valid targets in their view cone after losing their primary target.Configurable min and max lifetime on target loss: In addition to the obvious allows the above two to be combined, so for example a missile without a lock has 5 seconds to pick up new target, and if it doesn't it dies sometime between then and 5 seconds later. Allowing a range means not all missiles in a big volley will pop at once when their target dies, which could look unsightly[edited because I forgot I made this FR and wrote a new one, but and kinda like the new text more.]