0.14.5 Tractor Beams Proposal

Walt

Brank I cant wait, but I think that mabey we could have separate beams, a Push, and a Pull, to make it a bit less OP

That would mean no "auto" mode.

Lafiel

Walt Uhm, the tractor beam from Abh has two beams and can use and hold ships just fine but I suppose one single beam for all is better.
What I would like to address is will it cause material stress! If so it has to go both ways. To counter this people will have to mount it to armor for example.

Dalas120

Walt Would you consider making the tractor beam cosmoteer's first top-turret-mounted "super weapon"?

I think this would fit well for a couple of reasons:

First of all, the tractor beam's main purpose (which I assume is helping slow brawlers force an engagement with fast kiters/strafers/hit-and-run ships) works a lot better with a 360 degree turret arc.
Also, I don't think that tractor beams should be a common thing that you can put on any ship. Making the tractor beam a big, expensive super-weapon-turret means that it's a deliberate decision if you want to include one (and even one would be really powerful).
Bigger weapons add interest to both design and battle by clustering value (similarly to engine room).
A big downside of ordinary turreted weapons is that placement isn't as important. But since tractor beams follow newton's third law (I assume), builders will need to carefully consider where they put tractor beams on their ships to manage the reactive force.
And also, having a tractor beam as the first turreted weapon doesn't risk "cheesy" ships that just stick a turret inside a giant block of armor (since tractor beams can't deal damage on their own).
And finally, I think that more part diversity is almost always a good thing. We already have a bunch of small-ish energy-consuming LOS weapons, but no top-mounted turrets.

Walt

Dalas120 Would you consider making the tractor beam cosmoteer's first top-turret-mounted "super weapon"?

This is certainly an interesting idea! I'd love to have more interior parts. Maybe 3x3, even 4x4, could work. It'd have to be a lot more powerful and expensive than I was originally thinking, but that's fine. I worry a little bit about tractor beams being OP if you can so easily protect them, but honestly that probably won't be a huge issue.

Dalas120 First of all, the tractor beam's main purpose (which I assume is helping slow brawlers force an engagement with fast kiters/strafers/hit-and-run ships) works a lot better with a 360 degree turret arc.

Something about a 360-degree tractor beam bothers me from a fiction/lore perspective, for no reason I can justify. When I read your first sentence, the first image in my head was a roof-mounted tractor beam with about a 90-degree arc. In general, I prefer orientation to matter since that's another decision the player has to make. But yeah, maybe a tractor beam should be 360, especially if it's as big and expensive as a roof-mounted one should be.

Dalas120 Also, I don't think that tractor beams should be a common thing that you can put on any ship. Making the tractor beam a big, expensive super-weapon-turret means that it's a deliberate decision if you want to include one (and even one would be really powerful).

Yeah I completely agree, this is a huge point in favor of roof-mounted tractor beams.

Dalas120 But since tractor beams follow newton's third law (I assume), builders will need to carefully consider where they put tractor beams on their ships to manage the reactive force.

Yeah they will definitely follow newton's 3rd law. Of course, you'd also have to consider that with edge-mounted tractor beams, but your original point still stands.

nop

Dalas120 Would you consider making the tractor beam cosmoteer's first top-turret-mounted "super weapon"?

This sounds completely broken. The turret should need LOS like every other. Being able to hide it behind stacks of armor and shields makes it an obvious pick. Imagine cannon walls with invincible tractor beam emitters pulling in their targets, fighting railguns with invincible tractor beam emitters pushing away their targets. Does this sound interesting? Does it encourage creative design? Does it have interesting counter-play?

If you watch much Star Trek, especially Next Gen, you'll notice that targeting the tractor beam emitter is the first response to being caught in a tractor beam..

Tobi-wan_Kenobi

Walt The player can also right-click on a specific part on another ship to focus the push/pull effect on that specific part. This could potentially create advanced strategies such as pulling one side and pushing another to force a ship to rotate.

Nice. 😉 I think this will emphasize good rotational and lateral thruster placement for players. If they neglect having turn thrusters on one end of their ship, they could be easier to rotate for the TB user.

Dalas120 First of all, the tractor beam's main purpose (which I assume is helping slow brawlers force an engagement with fast kiters/strafers/hit-and-run ships) works a lot better with a 360 degree turret arc.

One of the things we discussed in a previous tractor beam thread is that it could be an option for a targeted ship to escape the TB by side-strafing out of the beam arc. This wouldn't be possible with 360 rotation.

Dalas120 Also, I don't think that tractor beams should be a common thing that you can put on any ship. Making the tractor beam a big, expensive super-weapon-turret means that it's a deliberate decision if you want to include one (and even one would be really powerful).

I think having them as a top-mounted part would make them more ubiquitous. Forward surface area is the most valuable real-estate on a ship. It will be a tough decision for a player to decide whether he wants weapons, shields, or a tractor beam on their front tiles. If TB is a part that can be placed on the interior like that, then I think every big ship would have them.

Moreover, if TBs are a large, expensive part, they will be less of an option for smaller resource-collection vessels when that aspect of the game is introduced, or tugboat vessels.

Additionally, having these TBs on the interior will make it difficult for a targeted ship to break the lock by destroying the parts or by draining them with electrobolts or EMP missiles.

Walt Yeah they will definitely follow newton's 3rd law.

Curious to see how this plays. Wonder if we could target a huge ship or asteroid with TBs and slingshot past them and away.

Walt In pull mode, the tractor beam's strength gets stronger the farther away the other ship is.

Walt In push mode, the tractor beam gets stronger the closer the other ship is.

What is your reasoning behind this? Having it stronger at greater range in pull mode seems strange to me. Is it to keep TBs less useful for kiters?

Walt energy drain

Will TBs continue to drain a base amount of power once they achieve their desired target range but still have a lock? Just like active boosters have a base drain rate even when not thrusting.

Will TBs drain so much power that they will be likely to shut down after extended use? Will a single reactor be enough to keep one on permanently?

Walt This raises a good question, should shields have any effect on tractor beams? (I think so?) If so, do tractor beams drain shields?

If TBs drain shields at any reasonable rate, it would make it less of a difficult decision to put a TB where a weapon could go. I think that's a bad thing. TBs should be totally a utility part, like a thruster - not a weapon. They should be really good at their purpose (improving relative combat positioning), but only at their purpose.

If shields block TB influence, then TBs would have to drain shields at a considerable rate to ever be able to influence a target that the weapons aren't in range of. It TBs can drain shields that fast, they would be a potent anti-shield weapon, which ruins their purpose.

Walt There could be a "charge-up" time or a very slow turret rotation speed, but I'm not sure how a player should respond when seeing a tractor beam charging up or taking aim.

I previously suggested a charge-up time for TBs so that a ship could strafe through a TB arc and not get immediately locked, but I think the charge-up time would have to be excessively long for a targeted ship to have any chance of dodging the lock from an opponent-relative stationary position. Even the most maneuverable ships in Cosmoteer would have trouble out-thrusting the rotation of the TB ship sufficiently to dodge the lock unless they were at extreme close range.

I think the most utilizable option for making TBs 'dodge-able' is to make their targeting arc tight enough that it can be strafed out of. A smart player will know that to escape a TB, they shouldn't blindly thrust away, they should thrust sideways out of TB alignment. But again, ships in Cosmoteer rotate so quick that idk if this would work out either.

Walt If you push/pull different sides then the ship turns and now those sides aren't where they used to be and you're no longer turning the ship in the direction you originally were and now need to change sides -- that's a lot of micro that I'm not a fan of.

With respect, why are you against micro-intensive tactics? If a player can pull off something that takes skill and be rewarded for it, I think that's great. That's what makes combat games fun imo: rewarding skill. I think depth of skill ranges should be encouraged for wider audience attraction. Skill ceilings turn away players who want something difficult to master.

I really hope push mode is kept. We need to think beyond combat conditions and wonder how TBs might be used in resource collection and non-combat mass manipulation. Maybe sometimes I want to be able to push an asteroid out of the way to get through to another one.

Walt The problem with having a super-powerful edge-mounted weapon is that then obviously you target that first, there's no interesting decision for the player fighting a ship with a tractor beam. Whereas if the tractor beam (or super-weapon) is protected further inside the ship, then it becomes a more interesting decision of whether to spend the firepower trying to take it out.

If a TB is protected by 3-layer shields and multiple layers of armor, that just isn't likely to be broken any time soon. I think making TBs able to be that protected actually removes the targeting decision entirely. It will be an obvious choice to target enemy weapons first to solve the problem. After all, it's not the TB that's the threat - it's the weapons the TB is assisting.

I don't think it's impossible to balance around an internal TB, but it does seem less interesting for gameplay. And not just from a combat perspective, but also from a design perspective. It will be way easier to place a TB if it can be internalized.

Again, if they can be internalized I think almost every large ship would carry TBs. That detracts from ship variety.

Kroom

Will it be used with the FTL / jump drive to transport ships?

Walt

Kroom Will it be used with the FTL / jump drive to transport ships?

I think that's probably something that should be reserved for docking.

As an aside, back when we were discussing the blink drive, there was an idea that tractor beams could inhibit ships trying to make FTL jumps and blinks. I am still planning to do this when I get around to adding the blink drive.

Dalas120

Walt I'm looking forward to having a turreted part!

Some more questions/thoughts then:

Can beams pull on any part, or only external ones that it has direct LOS to? Not sure what makes the most sense here. Though since the beam is roof-mounted and can pass over your own ship parts, it might be good for it to work the same way on enemy ship parts.

Should beams push and pull, or just pull? On one hand, pushing and pulling with a 360 degree turret hard-counters clinging ships, unless there is significant counterplay, and that may not be a good thing. On the other hand, only pulling hurts or removes of a lot of cool uses for tractor beams, like spinning enemies around.

How is energy drain going to work? It would probably make sense to have energy drain vary proportional to beam force. This would both discourage excessive compartmentalization (since tractor beams would drain varying amounts of energy), and offer a form of counterplay ("stretch" the beam enough and you'll drain all the power).

How much range should they have? If tractor beams are going to counter kiters, then they'll need more range than any other weapon in the game (at least to function in singleplayer, without the RoD). But for that to happen, they need significant counterplay or else they're too oppressive.

So speaking of counterplay - what should it be? I was thinking some combination of a lock-on/ramp-up mechanic (possibly more lock-on time/energy drain with more distance), shields blocking/reducing the effect, and "stretching" the beam like was described in the energy drain section. But tractor beams definitely need solid counterplay (and counter-counterplay), or they risk being very un-fun to play against.

GodoftheGrove

Walt Yeah they will definitely follow newton's 3rd law.

There have been some attempts to make a real tractor beam using lasers:

The main challenge to building a tractor beam is pretty intuitive.
When a stream of light hits an object, it tends to move in the
direction that the light is. However, some recent research has shown
that with the right geometries, small microparticles can move in the
opposite direction of the stream of photons.

See: https://www.forbes.com/sites/alexknapp/2013/01/27/scientists-build-a-working-tractor-beam/#334e2065725f

If it worked this way, either Newtons 3rd law doesn't apply, or it works in reverse (like firing a laser would work as a thruster, but a minimal one at that.)

Atarlost

Walt This is certainly an interesting idea! I'd love to have more interior parts. Maybe 3x3, even 4x4, could work. It'd have to be a lot more powerful and expensive than I was originally thinking, but that's fine. I worry a little bit about tractor beams being OP if you can so easily protect them, but honestly that probably won't be a huge issue.

If they provide enough force at enough range to have any use at all it would be immensely overpowered for them to be internal.

Frankly, I think any tractor beam is a terrible idea. Boost thrusters -- because of their huge exclusion zone -- enable brawlers or clingers far more than kites. Including tractor beams will just eliminate movement from the game or force kites to mount tractors to counter tractors.

Abilities that take control away are bad as a general rule. The longer the effect lasts the less control it must take. Movement is most of the control the player has in Cosmoteer. Taking it away indefinitely is far too powerful an ability to be fun. Any tractor capable enough uptime to counter kites has too much uptime to be fun.

Dalas120 Honestly... that doesn't sound too scary. I could build my own cannon wall but spend money on guns/engines/shields instead of tractor beams. Or build a railgun ship, or a laser ship, or a missile barge, or use 2 ships, etc. etc. As walt said, railguns and especially ion beams can already be bunkered up behind layers of armor without being OP, and they can actually deal damage. All tractor beams can do is pull you in.

This means that everything but brawlers or ships that ourtange tractors by far enough to safely kite (if any can with the RoD) goes extinct. This reduces the variety in the game.

Walt First of all, 3 layers of shields and armor adds a ton to the cost of the tractor beam, I'm not sure that will actually be a common strategy.Second, having a tractor beam that you should obviously not target because it's so well protected still has more targeting decisions than one you obviously should target. Take these two cases:

10 external weapons with 1 external tractor beam. Obviously you target the tractor beam, there's one clear best choice, that's not interesting.

10 external weapons with 1 internal tractor beam. Targeting the tractor beam may not be a viable option, but you still have 10 other options you have to choose between, there's still an interesting choice there.

If it's internal they aren't adding to the cost of the tractor beam. They're there already to protect the weapons and explodey bits that serve them and to protect the engine compartment from run away fires in the weapon compartment. Internal turrets would just go in the engine compartment. where they benefit from all the defensive layers that are already there.

You have your two cases backwards. 10 weapons are not 10 options. Choosing which of 10 laser blasters to shoot is a non-choice. Even choosing which of 5 laser blasters and 5 cannons to target is a non-choice. A large railgun or electrobolt may take priority, but it's still so obvious as to not be a real choice.

If the tractor beam is external it may be more or less urgent to remove it than to remove high priority weapons. Unlike choosing between weapons it is a real choice because it does something other than damage.

mleise

jbox1 Dunno. Since Walt already confirmed 3rd law behavior, I thought maybe it needed some clarification for anyone who 😴 through physics class.

Anyways I second the idea to keep the amount of micromanagement low with only pulling beams. I think there is a sweet spot where you can leave a ship unattended for a few seconds and it will not perform a lot worse than when targeting everything manually. I.e. right now the game automatically turns the side with the most potent weapons towards the enemy and targets weapons and reactors with priority over, say quarters. I could imagine this extended to tractor beams, so that when you attack and the enemy moves out of weapon range, the tractor beam would target its center of mass.

Oneye

I am really looking forward to the tractor beam, and I agree that it should probably be a 4 by 4 and roof mounted. Also how much range would it have? I would like to see it being used to pull ships in from a long ways away.

Walt

Oneye Also how much range would it have? I would like to see it being used to pull ships in from a long ways away.

Not sure. I was thinking somewhere between ion and missile range, but I'm persuadable.

ImNotLaffng

Having the beam only pull would make it much more simple, and would make it a good anti-kiter/ swarmer tool. The beam being able to push would make kiting more powerful and would make small ships be able to bully bigger ships easier. There are advantages to both I guess. Maybe the mean having equal force on both ships? Also, I really don't want it to be roof-mounted, I think it would be cool to finally have a really wide weapon. Maybe 2 tall and 4 wide?

Oneye

Walt Maybe they could have rail range but have a sudden decrease in power, or maybe they could get stronger as you get closer (aka the opposite of what you said in your original post).

Walt

Dalas120 Can beams pull on any part, or only external ones that it has direct LOS to?

I think you can target any part but only actually pulls on the point on the edge of the other ship that lies in direct LOS. Though there's probably not a big difference in the actual outcome between the two options anyway.

Dalas120 Though since the beam is roof-mounted and can pass over your own ship parts, it might be good for it to work the same way on enemy ship parts.

My current thinking (and I'm pretty sure about this) is that roof-mounted weapons will not be able to pass over any other ships. Allowing the tractor beam to do so would be inconsistent with that.

Dalas120 Should beams push and pull, or just pull? On one hand, pushing and pulling with a 360 degree turret hard-counters clinging ships, unless there is significant counterplay, and that may not be a good thing. On the other hand, only pulling hurts or removes of a lot of cool uses for tractor beams, like spinning enemies around.

If necessary, push and pull could have different ranges or different strengths to make push not useful for kiters. But I'm not convinced that will be necessary since push and pull have opposite strength curves over distance. (As an aside, I think push won't be very useful for kiters since at kiting range the push will be very weak.)

But yeah, the big reason I want push is to do fun things like spin enemies.

Dalas120 How is energy drain going to work? It would probably make sense to have energy drain vary proportional to beam force. This would both discourage excessive compartmentalization (since tractor beams would drain varying amounts of energy), and offer a form of counterplay ("stretch" the beam enough and you'll drain all the power).

You mean have energy drain proportional to the beam's force as determined by distance? I think that probably makes sense, that way thrusters are a less binary counter to tractor beams -- even if you don't have enough thrusters to escape entirely, more thrusters will drain their power faster.

Dalas120 How much range should they have? If tractor beams are going to counter kiters, then they'll need more range than any other weapon in the game (at least to function in singleplayer, without the RoD). But for that to happen, they need significant counterplay or else they're too oppressive.

Not sure how much this'll help. but potentially tractor beams could have a much shorter lock-on range than the distance they can actually stretch to, so you have to get close before locking on.

Dalas120 shields blocking/reducing the effect

This raises a good question, should shields have any effect on tractor beams? (I think so?) If so, do tractor beams drain shields?

Walt

SpaceCat so how would tageting between these layers work? can you ever target the rooflayer directly without hitting the lower layer?

No, that's a key mechanic of Cosmoteer, and I don't think roof weapons should be exempt.

SpaceCat and how would "holes" in ships work when a projectile flies over them? Would projectiles fired from the roof layer fly over a friendly ship or hit it?

My current thinking (and this is how tractor beams work) is that roof weapons ignore collisions with their own ship but not any other friendly ships.

SpaceCat Sometimes drops out when very close to the connected ship and then activates again after ships have a certain orientation.

I believe this is because of their relatively low turret turn speed, though would need to see an example to be sure it's not a bug.

SpaceCat considering to add more tractor or forcefield systems?

Maybe! I'll think about it, not likely happening anytime soon though.

Namek I think push mode should be added.

These are good arguments in favor of push mode, I may be leaning that way myself, largely because it creates more possibilities for creative ship designs. But here are some arguments against push mode from the earlier tractor beam thread:

Dalas120 pushing and pulling with a 360 degree turret hard-counters clinging ships, unless there is significant counterplay, and that may not be a good thing.
Dalas120 It seems like it would make fleet play very difficult, and IMO fleet play is definitely something to be encouraged. Turning would still be doable with pulling-only, just more difficult (which might be a good thing anyway - I suspect it's a lot easier to turn an enemy than to pull them in from afar).
Walt Yeah you may be right here. If you push/pull different sides then the ship turns and now those sides aren't where they used to be and you're no longer turning the ship in the direction you originally were and now need to change sides -- that's a lot of micro that I'm not a fan of. I'll have to test it in the actual physics engine, but I bet pulling alone is good enough to "yank" a side of a ship toward you, and that'll be way easier to control than multiple beams in different push/pull modes.

Timmy I mean a push would REALLY help spinners because it could be used as a spaceship suspension system.

A VERY expensive suspension system.

Dalas120

Walt Not sure how much this'll help. but potentially tractor beams could have a much shorter lock-on range than the distance they can actually stretch to, so you have to get close before locking on.

That's an interesting idea. With scaling energy drain, tractor beams could potentially even have infinite range after locking on - but the farther away the more absurd the energy drain gets (at past a certain point crew wouldn't be able to deliver energy fast enough).

Tractor beams would need 250+ lock-on range to help vs single-player kiting, but I'm not sure if that's a priority or not.

Walt This raises a good question, should shields have any effect on tractor beams? (I think so?) If so, do tractor beams drain shields?

I hadn't thought of shield drain, but now that you mention it it seems like a good idea. I like the idea of shields blocking the push/pull effect (on both ships) but getting drained by it. That would make shields still good vs tractor beams without them turning a ship invulnerable.

How do you think lock-on would work? I feel like it's really important for ships to have a shot at dodging/blocking a tractor lock, but I'm not sure what exactly that means.

Dalas120

Walt If necessary, push and pull could have different ranges or different strengths to make push not useful for kiters. But I'm not convinced that will be necessary since push and pull have opposite strength curves over distance. (As an aside, I think push won't be very useful for kiters since at kiting range the push will be very weak.)

I agree with you about push not being very useful for kiters. I'm more worried about push being overly-strong vs clinger ships, like an armadillo or most of nop's cannon designs. One of the best uses for fighters is to ram them up against an enemy, which would be hard-countered by pushing tractor beams.

Actually, the more I think about it, the more I'm starting to dislike pushing. It seems like it would make fleet play very difficult, and IMO fleet play is definitely something to be encouraged. Turning would still be doable with pulling-only, just more difficult (which might be a good thing anyway - I suspect it's a lot easier to turn an enemy than to pull them in from afar).

thatPolarBear

Walt you should make it so the total cost of the beam+crew+reactors is a bit more than the cost of enough thrusters+crew+reactors to moderately overpower the beam.
I like the idea of a roof mount, as it does no damage, I think it should have a pretty wide arc close to 180 degrees (maybe it could only turn super slowly)

Walt

Dalas120 Tractor beams would need 250+ lock-on range to help vs single-player kiting, but I'm not sure if that's a priority or not.

Not really, to "solve" kiting in SP I think there needs to be a variety of mechanisms to counter kiting. (Long-range missile bases, enemies that will flee and repair, cloaking, blink, mission types that discourage kiting, etc...)

Dalas120 How do you think lock-on would work? I feel like it's really important for ships to have a shot at dodging/blocking a tractor lock, but I'm not sure what exactly that means.

I'm not either. There could be a "charge-up" time or a very slow turret rotation speed, but I'm not sure how a player should respond when seeing a tractor beam charging up or taking aim.

Dalas120 Actually, the more I think about it, the more I'm starting to dislike pushing. It seems like it would make fleet play very difficult, and IMO fleet play is definitely something to be encouraged. Turning would still be doable with pulling-only, just more difficult (which might be a good thing anyway - I suspect it's a lot easier to turn an enemy than to pull them in from afar).

Yeah you may be right here. If you push/pull different sides then the ship turns and now those sides aren't where they used to be and you're no longer turning the ship in the direction you originally were and now need to change sides -- that's a lot of micro that I'm not a fan of. I'll have to test it in the actual physics engine, but I bet pulling alone is good enough to "yank" a side of a ship toward you, and that'll be way easier to control than multiple beams in different push/pull modes.

nop This sounds completely broken. The turret should need LOS like every other. Being able to hide it behind stacks of armor and shields makes it an obvious pick. Imagine cannon walls with invincible tractor beam emitters pulling in their targets, fighting railguns with invincible tractor beam emitters pushing away their targets. Does this sound interesting? Does it encourage creative design? Does it have interesting counter-play?

I'm not convinced this can't be balanced for. A ship large enough to support a tractor beam buried behind several layers of armor will probably need several to be able to lock down another ship its same size. That's probably like 1/4-1/3 its total cost in tractor beams, armor, crew, and power that could be spent on weapons.

nop If you watch much Star Trek, especially Next Gen, you'll notice that targeting the tractor beam emitter is the first response to being caught in a tractor beam..

Actually I think this is an argument in favor of roof-mounted tractor beams (and powerful roof-mounted weapons in general). The problem with having a super-powerful edge-mounted weapon is that then obviously you target that first, there's no interesting decision for the player fighting a ship with a tractor beam. Whereas if the tractor beam (or super-weapon) is protected further inside the ship, then it becomes a more interesting decision of whether to spend the firepower trying to take it out.

Also, if you think about it, we actually already have one super-weapon that is relatively easy to protect deep inside a ship: railguns. And they haven't really been a problem. (I'll grant you it's not a 1-to-1 comparison since railguns are very long, fixed-direction, and still need a tiny opening to shoot from, but still.)

Dalas120

nop Being able to hide it behind stacks of armor and shields makes it an obvious pick. Imagine cannon walls with invincible tractor beam emitters pulling in their targets

Honestly... that doesn't sound too scary. I could build my own cannon wall but spend money on guns/engines/shields instead of tractor beams. Or build a railgun ship, or a laser ship, or a missile barge, or use 2 ships, etc. etc. As walt said, railguns and especially ion beams can already be bunkered up behind layers of armor without being OP, and they can actually deal damage. All tractor beams can do is pull you in.

nop often your opponent won't bother even trying to focus down weapons, instead trying to go after weak points in the sides or rear. A swarm build often won't be able to focus enough fire to take down a frontal tractor beam without taking severe damage themselves.

How would tractor beams hurt this? I think walt and I are both in favor of making tractor beams only pull (not push), and pulling isn't going to do much vs flanking, clinging swarms.

nop

Walt Actually I think this is an argument in favor of roof-mounted tractor beams (and powerful roof-mounted weapons in general). The problem with having a super-powerful edge-mounted weapon is that then obviously you target that first, there's no interesting decision for the player fighting a ship with a tractor beam.

You're talking about "1v1" specifically, when fighting a "swarm" or multi-ship build, often your opponent won't bother even trying to focus down weapons, instead trying to go after weak points in the sides or rear. A swarm build often won't be able to focus enough fire to take down a frontal tractor beam without taking severe damage themselves.

Being able to "tunnel" the tractor beam to some extent or layer shields in front of it should be possible. When this happens the opponent has to choose whether or not to use their valuable firepower on the most defended part of the enemy ship. Ions and railguns already present this kind of choice, and it's a good thing.

nop

Dalas120 Honestly... that doesn't sound too scary.

Walls are already good, it would make them even better by reducing opportunity cost and giving them more power over kiters/multi-ships.

Dalas120 pulling isn't going to do much vs flanking, clinging swarms.

It will do a lot against multi-ship play by making "pincer" kiting setups much more risky. When you have a single ship and are fighting multiple ships, you want to get a smaller ship in your kill zone and finish it off as quickly as possible with your superior firepower. Tractor beam helps to keep it in the kill zone.