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Author Topic: Overrated (overpriced) ships  (Read 43053 times)

Igncom1

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Re: Overrated (overpriced) ships
« Reply #105 on: August 29, 2019, 01:51:39 PM »

I rarely even use ITU any more myself. If you just pick up the EW perk so all your ships produce the range debuff, then you basically have a fleet wide range upgrade anyway.

Sometimes you want your ships to be short ranged so they don't waste time firing artillery at mining drones. Which annoys me to no end, even when they do hit!
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Megas

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Re: Overrated (overpriced) ships
« Reply #106 on: August 29, 2019, 02:12:43 PM »

Why not both (aside from annoying potshots at insignificant targets)?  Electronic Warfare 1 is probably the most important skill in the game for everyone, mainly to prevent range penalty if the enemy has ECM.  If anything, more EW beyond first level is dubious since the enemy may have ECM as well and, being evenly matched or superior to your fleet, will offset your ECM unless you put ECM Package on multiple ships to ensure range advantage despite two evenly matched (or disadvantage for the player) having EW.

If enemy does not have EW, you have an advantage.  If enemy has EW, and enough ships to match yours, you will probably be more-or-less at zero regardless of ECM maximum, unless you kill their ships, which by that point, the fight is decided and just a matter of time before you win.
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Plantissue

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Re: Overrated (overpriced) ships
« Reply #107 on: August 29, 2019, 02:21:16 PM »

Why not both. If one is such an advatange, then why not get both and get even more of an advantage? Is there a point where you just stop and say there are limited returns, that it isn't worth it to get that skill/hullmod just because you already have a hullmod/skill? There isn't one, not in this case. In fact the two combined is synergistic and even more advantageous.
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FooF

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Re: Overrated (overpriced) ships
« Reply #108 on: August 29, 2019, 02:32:01 PM »

The "point" of ITC/DTC is to give bigger ships an offset for their poor mobility. They might have more guns and more concentrated firepower but they can't catch anything so the range increase makes up for their inability to close gaps. DTC being available at all times gives them a natural advantage that can't be just replaced by adding another Destroyer/Frigate.

Now, one could argue that DTC is therefore an OP-tax on cruisers/capitals and should be baked-in, so to speak. Or to put it another way, if the default is greater range, than the option to take it off for a special build should add OP. I've always been a fan of Cruisers/Capitals inherently having greater range given equivalent hardpoints on a Destroyer/Frigate. If that's the normal case, than a hull mod could be added that increases OP or increases vents/capacity or something. Basically, you're trading the range for a different playstyle instead of adding a hull mod for the intended playstyle.

But this really off-topic...
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Plantissue

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Re: Overrated (overpriced) ships
« Reply #109 on: August 29, 2019, 02:41:36 PM »

I am writing that there is no need for both to exist in the game. At the same time. One or the other is OK. I'm not saying that range increasing hullmods should exist at all.
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SCC

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Re: Overrated (overpriced) ships
« Reply #110 on: August 30, 2019, 12:05:23 AM »

Range is such an important stat, cruisers and capitals need it. On the other hand, if that was built-in for them, it would be impossible to give it up for other benefits, unless you're okay with negative cost hullmod. If ITU didn't exist, then it would be weird that it's impossible to upgrade such an important statistic, even though you can upgrade almost everything else.

Igncom1

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Re: Overrated (overpriced) ships
« Reply #111 on: August 30, 2019, 03:27:28 AM »

Yeah to be fair, without range the Hammerhead is the best ship in the game for all round stats. Barring drover madness.

I do feel like range is only an advantage so long as the AI is afraid of it. A lot of good range does my cruisers when mighty ludd stuffs 30 torpedo boats down my throat. So these day's I make my cruisers short-er ranged defensive bricks and leave the long range bombardment to the carriers and capitals. Basically treating them like stronger destroyers, which are still faster then my capitals so they still sorta fill the role.

But back on the topic, all energy weapon ships. Energy weapons are just not that great and they bring all high tech ships down with them. The Paragon is good in SPITE of their energy mounts.
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Grievous69

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Re: Overrated (overpriced) ships
« Reply #112 on: August 30, 2019, 03:43:30 AM »

But back on the topic, all energy weapon ships. Energy weapons are just not that great and they bring all high tech ships down with them. The Paragon is good in SPITE of their energy mounts.

I don't really count Paragon here since every single imaginable build puts kinetics in universals, either Needlers or HVD. Just like the pirate Shrike makes a big difference for only having ONE small ballistic mount. And here lies the most frustrating part, every single all energy weapon ship is absolutely useless vs shields, unless you spam Sabots. Regular Shrike, Aurora, Odyssey. That's why I don't like them. We really need something that's decent vs shields that's not a Graviton beam. Right now you spend so much flux firing inefficient flux weapons at shields that you can't really capitalize on that. That's why I call those 3 ''Pirate killers'', in real fights they die first.
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FooF

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Re: Overrated (overpriced) ships
« Reply #113 on: August 30, 2019, 01:19:09 PM »

I love the Aurora and think it's the best pound-for-pound ship in the game so I think it funny that a lot of people here think it's overrated/overpriced. I can do things with it that I can't come close to with anything else (except maybe the Doom but for different reasons) and it's so dang versatile that the only thing I can't do with it is take down a Paragon solo.

All-energy notwithstanding, what a lot of the high-tech ships can do relatively well is approach being flux-neutral while firing, which wins them most flux battles by default. Yes, their time-to-kill isn't great but when the enemy is flux-capped, it's not like they're firing much anyway. I've embraced the opportunistic nature of high-tech ships and I think they are superior in many ways to the low-tech bricks and even the mid-line all-rounders.

Most Aurora's I pilot simply don't take hull damage in a fight so I understand why it costs so much: all the cost is front-loaded. An equivalent Low-tech cruiser will be cheaper to deploy but you're going to end up taking armor damage and that adds to the overall cost to deploy. If the deployment cost of some high-tech ships were reduced, I'd be ok with it but I get why they're at where their at, for the most part.
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Grievous69

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Re: Overrated (overpriced) ships
« Reply #114 on: August 30, 2019, 01:32:34 PM »

I can do things with it

Exactly. It's in such a weird spot being so super rare and hard to get, that by the time you have one in your fleet, you'll be piloting something more worthwhile. And having AI pilot it is just a waste of DP. There's such a huge difference in deploying a Medusa + Apogee than a single Aurora (both being 30 DP).

EDIT: Lemme just share a story I already said on the subreddit: ''In a huge fight vs a low tech battlestation and some ludd ships, guess which ship died first. Bingo bango bongo it was an Aurora with a steady lvl 20 officer, given no eliminate orders and wasn't close to the battlestation. My fleet was a Conquest, Onslaught, Legion, Dominator, Aurora, Heron, Apogee, Falcon and 2 Shrikes. Even the *** Shrikes lasted longer. It's just sad seeing that since it takes an effort to acquire one without a blueprint.''
« Last Edit: August 30, 2019, 01:35:09 PM by Grievous69 »
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Plantissue

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Re: Overrated (overpriced) ships
« Reply #115 on: August 30, 2019, 01:38:29 PM »

It's the problem with "player" ships. How do you fix their DP cost? Take for example most phase ships. They are already only ever used by the player and rarely as an AI ship in actual battles. You can't even set to their actual worth as a player ship, for as battle size increases, the higher the DP cost the player is willing to take.
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Grievous69

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Re: Overrated (overpriced) ships
« Reply #116 on: August 30, 2019, 01:42:45 PM »

Tbh I'd take AI Doom over AI Aurora any day of the week. And yeah I get the difference in skill piloting fast ships, it's just sad having more than half of the high tech ships fail miserably in fights.
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TaLaR

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Re: Overrated (overpriced) ships
« Reply #117 on: August 30, 2019, 01:43:46 PM »

EDIT: Lemme just share a story I already said on the subreddit: ''In a huge fight vs a low tech battlestation and some ludd ships, guess which ship died first. Bingo bango bongo it was an Aurora with a steady lvl 20 officer, given no eliminate orders and wasn't close to the battlestation. My fleet was a Conquest, Onslaught, Legion, Dominator, Aurora, Heron, Apogee, Falcon and 2 Shrikes. Even the *** Shrikes lasted longer. It's just sad seeing that since it takes an effort to acquire one without a blueprint.''

Right, AI is incredibly stupid with them (well, as it is with ANY mobility systems. It's just much harder to catastrophically misuse maneuvering jets).
1) I'm at 0 flux, far from enemies -> let's charge with system ahead of the allied fleet and get focused by whole enemy fleet.
2) My flux is quickly rising and there are Reapers incoming, but system is on cooldown -> dead.
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Grievous69

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Re: Overrated (overpriced) ships
« Reply #118 on: August 30, 2019, 01:49:29 PM »

I mean it has Hardened front shields with a lot of caps and vents. What am I supposed to do? Only deploy when I need to clean up weak fleets?
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TaLaR

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Re: Overrated (overpriced) ships
« Reply #119 on: August 30, 2019, 01:53:53 PM »

I think the only safe way to deploy an AI Aurora against significant opponents would be a beam boat. But that's not worth 30 DP.
AI simply can't pilot some ships. And there are much worse cases of this, like Hyperion.
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