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[sqrt(-1)]

Frigates and destroyers become increasingly less viable with game progression unfortunately since their combat rating goes down much quicker than on larger ships and because larger ships are simply so overpowering due to their flux/armor/hull capacity that is much harder to be popped compared to smaller ships.

I think it would be great to have the ability to dock frigates and destroyers to logistic ships during combat for crew rotation and ammo restocking. Not only would this maintain the viability of early game content, but also add an interesting game play mechanic.

Such a mechanic could be balanced easily via resource expenditure costs like additional crew requirements,  etc.
The usefulness of the logistic ships can go down with their own combat rating, so it wouldn't break CR mechanics.

[Grievous69]

Restoring their PPT and CR sounds like a neat idea but I'm not so sure about ammo restocking. This would make phase ships with limited ammo a nightmare to deal with. And maybe some other builds too.

[sqrt(-1)]

Restoring their PPT and CR sounds like a neat idea but I'm not so sure about ammo restocking. This would make phase ships with limited ammo a nightmare to deal with. And maybe some other builds too.

• CR and ammo regeneration can be limited for ships with Delicate Machinery.
• Ammo restocking could be limited according to the weapon hardpoint value or similar.
• Logistic ships would be limited by their own CR, which goes down per resupply.

I think Logistic Ships can be balanced quite easily in a quite straightforward manner.

[BringerofBabies]

Perhaps only restore PPT and ammo, not CR, so that you can keep small vessels in the fight if you are active about pulling them back once PPT runs out, but ships with rapidly dropping CR like phase ships can still only stay in for so long.

[Megas]

Ammo restocking would be great for abusing missile loadouts.  It would certainly be a loophole for Reaper Afflictor who will have two universals changed to hybrid next release to limit Reaper abuse with Entropy Amplifier.  Ammo restocking was only removed since last release.

Ammo restocking during combat was considered very early.  There was few old sprites for that, and part of Odyssey's design has a mini-ammo refill.

[SafariJohn]

I don't think this idea will come to pass, but I'll ground it mechanically a bit more:

A ship within a small radius of a logistic ship at least 2 sizes larger than it has its CR and PPT rapidly restored, but no higher than the logistic ship's current CR and PPT. If the logistic ship is threatened (losing PPT), it can't provide this benefit.

I only have the CR restoration in there because I expect the AI would always run out of PPT before it manages (or even decides) to go back for recovery.

Concurring with Grievous, ammo restocking seems too noodly. Onslaught with infinite Annihilators, anyone?

[Coprolithe]

Sounds neat.
That would make it viable to send in civilian ships to battle.

[CommandoDude]

I would like to see more value for logistics ships. Something like base CR out of combat being lower if you're doing field repairs, and a repair ship could boost deep space CR replenishment to normal levels.

[Plantissue]

If combat rating goes down is the problem, a simpler and more elegant solution would be to simply change how Peak Active Performance Time is calculated, or how quickly Combat Readiness is decayed when it is reached.

[Reshy]

The problem is that the game, originally, had issues where larger ships couldn't catch up to frigates and thus combats were long and drawn out in many instances without your own frigates.  With the CR changes, this has lead to the inverse problem, with the frigate effectiveness taking a nose dive over time, making skirmisher tactics they used to be pretty good at now impossible to pull off.

[SonnaBanana]

Add a Frigate carrier/tender (capital) ship, which reduces the CR decay rate and fuel use of frigates.

[Igncom1]

The problem as I see it is that later on in the game the player is naturally drawn to these bigger battles with the most suitable ships. Namely cruisers/capitals/carriers where the jobs of the smaller destroyers and frigates simply get replaced with fast cruisers. Which in it's self isn't too much of an issue, as for big scale battles smaller gunboats are never going to be as effective against bigger and longer ranged opponents where a numerical advantage no longer matters or is possible.

So what are they for and do? As gunboats they get beat out of the water by the bigger craft in a direct fight and are simply less useful then strikecraft.

So suggestions from me:

Frigates are the only ships that can pursue an enemy at the end of a battle: Gives frigates the role of hounds that mop up weaker opponents that could otherwise escape relatively well from slower and recovering battleships.

Frigate/destroyer off map buffs: allow these ships on a fleet to essentially screen the off map flanks of the battle so that outnumbering bonuses or penalties apply. Allowing the main gunboat battle to focus on the major ships any any purposely deployed small ships.

Frigate intelligence: Make radar detection dependant on the smaller ships leaving the bigger battleships more blind without their smaller compatriots.

Pre-battle skirmishes: Give smaller ships in the fleet a chance to raid or pre-emptively attack small portions of the enemy fleet before the main battle begins. Like small 5v5 attacks between frigates to try and gain an early advantage or to aim to cripple exposed enemy heavies before backup arrives.

Small ship utility mods: fleet wide buffs or support mods that can only be applied to smaller ships like emergency hospitals for crew recovery or repair arms for cheaper repairs.

[Plantissue]

It's the 30 ship limit and weapon range increase of hullmods which deters frigates. In the end, even destroyers are to be avoided because you want to simply have as big a slice of the deployment points available as possible. Player ships like afflictor excepted.

The suggestions seem kind of strange and forced. What is this maine gunboat battle business? Why would a Mudskipper or Shepherd for instance be able to do any of these things, whilst a Harbinger or Shrike cannot? Why would 5v5 frigate wars matter? I could choose to deploy none at no detriment. Don't shift the problem to Destroyers being the unwanted ships. Why wouldn't larger ships be better at being a hospital or repairer?

[Wyvern]

I still feel the game lost something when deployment limits were changed to be fixed rather than based on control of locations.  Now that was a good reason to have a decent handful of fast frigates around, even in an endgame fleet.

[Igncom1]

It's the 30 ship limit and weapon range increase of hullmods which deters frigates. In the end, even destroyers are to be avoided because you want to simply have as big a slice of the deployment points available as possible. Player ships like afflictor excepted.

The suggestions seem kind of strange and forced. What is this maine gunboat battle business? Why would a Mudskipper or Shepherd for instance be able to do any of these things, whilst a Harbinger or Shrike cannot? Why would 5v5 frigate wars matter? I could choose to deploy none at no detriment. Don't shift the problem to Destroyers being the unwanted ships. Why wouldn't larger ships be better at being a hospital or repairer?

More of a suggestion then a 100% pre determined thing my dude.