How does the plasma shield work?

[psusi]

Does it block certain kinds of fire ( what kinds? ), or just provide an overall damage reduction?

[klapmongool]

It blocks plasma fire :p So all the yellow balls. It doesnt block lasers or missiles.

edit: when plasma is fired at the shield it diminishes in strenght a bit (check the counter on the shield). When it gets too weak plasma may go through.

[psusi]

If it only blocks the yellow balls, how is that very useful? It seems like only peawees fire those. I thought in the original TA the shield had a certain HP and either blocked everything or took half of the damage until it ran out of HP, then shut down until it regenerated to like half way or something, and sucked a lot of energy whenever it was regenerating.

[SanadaUjiosan]

Lots of units shoot plasma in BA.

[smoth]

If it only blocks the yellow balls

I don't like yellow balls flying at my face!

and no the original TA didn't have sheilds.

[klapmongool]

Indeed. Plasma is kinda the normal ammo type.

[Forboding Angel]

Yellow balls are Cannons, peewees and flash tanks fire emgs. Pretty big difference.

[PicassoCT]

well, the phyics are complicated. But beeing a BA Player you sure have a physics major.

In case you are not: Its basically a microwave Oven.. it drains the movement out of the plasmaball, the energy is stored by making the field stronger on that point. Then at some point, when all inertia is drained, the field reintroduces a small channel... and basically all the stored energy wents into that.. sort of like a plasma rocket.

DO NOT TRY THIS AT HOME! THERE IS A HOLE IN THE GALAXY CENTER FOR A REASON!

[Google_Frog]

I suspect no one knows quite how they work but basically the plasma shield shields an area from plasma projectiles. It does this by spending some unknown amount of energy per frame to apply some acceleration away from the central generator. The magnitude of the acceleration may or may not be dependant on many things such as shot velocity, shot damage and shield charge.

[klapmongool]

Yellow balls are Cannons, peewees and flash tanks fire emgs. Pretty big difference.

hmm? So yellow stuff is split up in plasma and emgs? And both get bounced by plasma shields?

[Johannes]

It's pretty irrelevant against flashes in any case, they can just drive to inside the shield. Mostly they're useful against artillery like berthas or vanguards.

[klapmongool]

It's pretty irrelevant against flashes in any case, they can just drive to inside the shield. Mostly they're useful against artillery like berthas or vanguards.

Hmmm, last time I checked (which I don't do often in the case of shields, could have been a couple of versions ago) enemy units firing inside the shield still have their fire bounced out. That is not the case anymore?

[very_bad_soldier]

It's pretty irrelevant against flashes in any case, they can just drive to inside the shield. Mostly they're useful against artillery like berthas or vanguards.

That is so? I am pretty sure that a shield also reflects shots from units that are inside the shield...

[psusi]

I'm pretty sure that original TA did add the shield generator as a downloadable unit.

It seems to me that most of the units either use lasers, missiles, or lightning. What specific units does the shield actually work against and does anyone actually bother using it in practice?

[qray]

What specific units does the shield actually work against and does anyone actually bother using it in practice?

Works well against Berthas/Intimidators and helps against the Krogoth plasma cannons, Goliaths, Tremor etc. ... so yes: I regularly use it to protect fusions (from long range artillery) and expensive stationary defense line units (like Annihilator).
And if you build a fortification wall around it, it is -at least a bit- protected from laser cannons. Of course, it can still be damaged. Would be boring otherwise...

[Wombat]

It's pretty irrelevant against flashes in any case, they can just drive to inside the shield. Mostly they're useful against artillery like berthas or vanguards.

That is so? I am pretty sure that a shield also reflects shots from units that are inside the shield...

not when unit is almost touching shield generator

[zwzsg]

I'm pretty sure that original TA did add the shield generator as a downloadable unit.

You're pretty wrong.

The closest would be fan made units with a custom HitByWeapon animation, and fan made units exploiting a bug with anti to delete all shots in an area.