Missiles are one of the most widely used weapon types in New Eden. Interchangeable damage across all four types, lack of transversal dependence, high DPS, immunity to tracking disruption, and no need for capacitor are all significant benefits to the pilots of ships equipped with launchers. These punishing offensive tools, whether they be lights, rockets, heavies, torpedoes, or cruise missiles, represent a serious threat to all capsuleers.
They also represent a serious challenge when it comes to client performance. The previous implantation of missile graphics code did not treat these popular weapons quite the same as other assets in space. Insufficient optimization for the nature of the objects has left them using more resources than other similarly sized, frequently encountered objects and because missiles stay in space until detonation or fuel exhaustion, they had the potential to become a drag on client resources in scenes where launchers abound.
With the Triglavian Deviant Automata Suppressors as inspiration (they are remarkably good at cleaning up missiles, after all), the Audio & Graphics Group decided to take a look at missile graphics and make some improvements in order to improve the performance of clients running missile heavy scenes.
Please be aware that these changes do not affect the application of missile damage, or the related code for calculating velocity, flight time, explosion speed, and other related values. Only the visual appearance of missiles and missile explosions in the space scene are affected.
To read the full dev blog, please follow this link » CCP’s Dev Blog on Improvements to the missile system
Credits:
Images by: CCP