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[sean0fthedead]

Hi, sorry if this has been asked before but I have a few questions.

1. Do you keep dedicated AA ships in your fleet to combat fighter spam? For example, in simulation I used a lasher with 2x swarmers and 3x vulcans and it solo'd 10 wings of various fighters at once no problem (under my control). Do you do this, if so what ships and configs do you use?

2. Wolves in my fleet tend to run into giant groups of enemies, get flanked, and get smeared pretty predictably. I want them to chase down stragglers without pulling suicide missions. Note this even happens when I have them "escorting" other ships. Any thoughts/fixes for this?

Thanks.

[Bastion.Systems]

Command them to attack when the other fleet starts to run, otherwise keep them as escorts or defending an objective with some meatier ships.
Maybe assign officers with cautious or steady personality to ships you don't want to go in guns blazing, though it might make their pursuing abilities poorer.

[ANGRYABOUTELVES]

1. Sort of. I find that Wolves with 3x Tactical Lasers, 1x Graviton Beam, 2x Swarmer SRM are pretty good at clearing out fighters and put significant pressure on frigates and destroyers. They're not dedicated anti-fighter craft, but they do it pretty well.

2. Try giving them Cautious officers. I always give my previously-mentioned close-support Wolves cautious officers, and they stay alive well enough.

[Twogs]

Omen can be quite funny, too, as their EMP just deactivates any fighter which doesn't has a shield (so every non-hightech fighter + wasps)

[DeMatt]

1. Do you keep dedicated AA ships in your fleet to combat fighter spam? For example, in simulation I used a lasher with 2x swarmers and 3x vulcans and it solo'd 10 wings of various fighters at once no problem (under my control). Do you do this, if so what ships and configs do you use?

I don't, but then I tend to stall out of the game around the time I pick up cruisers.

2. Wolves in my fleet tend to run into giant groups of enemies, get flanked, and get smeared pretty predictably. I want them to chase down stragglers without pulling suicide missions. Note this even happens when I have them "escorting" other ships. Any thoughts/fixes for this?

As previously mentioned, Cautious officers.  You can try longer-ranged weaponry - Tac Lasers instead of IRPLs or Ions - to convince them to stay farther away.  Or you can try less flux-intensive weapons - Pulse Laser instead of Heavy Blaster - to give the AI more elbow room on its flux management.

The AI might also be taking clues from your choice of missile:  choosing a Strike missile might encourage the AI to try and get in for the kill shot, whereas a support missile like a Salamander might keep it at a safe distance.

Omen can be quite funny, too, as their EMP just deactivates any fighter which doesn't has a shield (so every non-hightech fighter + wasps)

I think the Shade's better than the Omen, because rather than having to shield against enemy capitals, it can phase.  Plus it's got more weapon mounts.

[Clockwork Owl]

1. Enforcer with 5 HMG and 4 harpoons. Not really a dedicated, but it eats fighter wings.

[Thaago]

Intercept works much better than previous versions - I have some SO lashers with 'Steady' officers and they will jump right on an enemy if I put intercept on it.

[Dri]

I think fighters are in a bad way right now due to the fact that they don't scale well (or at all?) with character skills and of course they can't have officers. The only fighter wing I fear is the Dagger wing and coming across a fleet with 5+ Dagger wings actually gives me pause. Every other wing en masse? Couldn't care less.

Remove the damn crew loss to start with, hate losing my elite crewmen due to fighter loss (and you will lose fighters). Also, how about an officer in a ship with a flight deck has all his skills apply to the fighters? Multiple officers in carriers wouldn't stack the same skills but if the officers have different skills than each other then your fighters could end up with max 10 in ALL the skills. Hell, I don't know, but fighters need something right now!

Anyways, a dedicated PD ship seems like waste to me what with fighters being such crap at the moment. Any sort of accurate weapon with a longer range can wreck them before they even get near you (H Mauler/HVD).

[gozer]

Hi, sorry if this has been asked before but I have a few questions.

1. Do you keep dedicated AA ships in your fleet to combat fighter spam? For example, in simulation I used a lasher with 2x swarmers and 3x vulcans and it solo'd 10 wings of various fighters at once no problem (under my control). Do you do this, if so what ships and configs do you use?

2. Wolves in my fleet tend to run into giant groups of enemies, get flanked, and get smeared pretty predictably. I want them to chase down stragglers without pulling suicide missions. Note this even happens when I have them "escorting" other ships. Any thoughts/fixes for this?

Thanks.

1. sort of, running full fleet of Wolf frigates with beam weapons (tactical lasers) and integrated PD hullmod and there is not enough fighters in the universe to punch through the defensive fire they can dish out when bunch of them stays together

2. Wolf with beam weapons and range upgrade hullmods. It is beyond ridiculous how deadly and effective they can be in group ... and AI is really good at keeping them out of harms way.

Spoiler

[close]

my ultimate Wolf setup (with maxed skills, so with extra OP and with weapons that take less OP). Graviton beam, 3x tactical laser, 2x harpoon single launcher (just because they need 0 OP, so why not). Get 10 of them. Give them to lvl20 steady officers with Combat aptitude + damage control + target analysis + power grid modulation + gunnery implants skills (maxed to 10). And then just sit back and watch the fireworks. These things completely roflstomp any frigate or destroyer fleet and have no problem fighting against cruisers (you just murder all the light ship first and then wolfpack the cruisers). Same against Onslaughts ... poor battleship can't do anything against bunch of frigates orbiting around it at 1000+ range and blasting graviton beams and tac lasers into it. Several Onslaughts grouped together would be a problem, but if they split up they are dead meat. I guess that the only thing that can fight against this wolfpack would be Paragon or Odyssey with tachyon lances and tactical lasers (and range upgrade hullmods).

Right now I run fleet where I have 10 of these Wolf frigates (plus my flagship Wolf that has phase lance instead of graviton beam) and two Cerberus freighters to haul all the looted stuff. I can easily outrun those few capital fleets I can't fight, I'm able to catch almost anything in pursuit, the fleet has cheap deployment cost, super cheap supply requirements and recovers CR fast. And the only time I lose a frigate is if it is during later stages of battle near the top of the map (enemy deployment area) and newly deployed cruiser or capital ship warps right on top of it.

[Igncom1]

I have kitted out my missile cruiser for such:


Seems to do rather well at dealing with most missiles and fighters, and can even spam enough of the anti-fighter missiles to overwhelm most larget targets as well with the medium missiles.

The MLRS I felt was kinda weak until she absolutely murdered a enemy eagle cruiser, macross missile massacre style.

[Dri]

Arn't you spending 9 OP to halve your 100 flux cost shield down to 50? Wouldn't it be better to spend 5 OP on 5 vents and save yourself 4 OP by not using Stabilized Shields?

[Igncom1]

Huh.....it's possible I might be, I'm not particularity great at reading the fine print.

So I just stuck on a bunch of the shield mods.

[Clockwork Owl]

Drop Stabilized Shields and strap 10 vents on the hull. If you have Integrated Targeting Unit available, use it instead of Dedicated Targeting Core.

[Dri]

I too have a Gryphon but gave it a Cyclone reaper launcher instead (the Cyclone is actually the only large missile weapon I can find at the moment, crazy) and near the dual flak I put two railguns. Shes got a lvl 20 officer with 10/10 missile specialization and damn those reapers just nuke things to bits. Though, I might remove the railguns as I think its causing my cautious officer to move in closer to use them...

Sadly, I don't have any points into my own character's missile specialization so I don't have any of the missile hullmods. =/

The only fighters that scare me are Daggers.

[Igncom1]

Drop Stabilized Shields and strap 10 vents on the hull. If you have Integrated Targeting Unit available, use it instead of Dedicated Targeting Core.

What is different about the Dedicated Targeting Core?