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[Arcagnello]

A 100% increase was just a number I threw there but you're right actually. I used stabilized Shields on most of my high tech ships in my first campaign so I didn't really notice. Something like 20% more flux would be reasonable I think, for what the mod does.

The idea of making said shields weaker to Ions is a pretty neat idea tough!

[Aki]

Mk3s are great when doing early game Pirate playthroughs on Nex. I usually give them broadswords and Aug Drive + Mil Subsys. Never have to buy them as they are often found drifting in space. Ultra low supplies cost per battle with a few d-mods. Perfect for constant raiding pirate lifestyle.

[Locklave]

That 300 cargo space is also amazing for a fighting ship, that's as much as a Mule.

[si1foo]

i have not got a huge amount of experience but from what i have seen so far the drover is much better in a  fight because it is faster and can run away from  things that the  C MK3 just can't

That 300 cargo space is also amazing for a fighting ship, that's as much as a Mule.

i would rather take a gemini for that reason slightly less cargo space but better all round

[Tackywheat1]

i have not got a huge amount of experience but from what i have seen so far the drover is much better in a  fight because it is faster and can run away from  things that the  C MK3 just can't

That 300 cargo space is also amazing for a fighting ship, that's as much as a Mule.

i would rather take a gemini for that reason slightly less cargo space but better all round

Drover is currently OP because its ship system is very strong and it has tons of OP for a destroyer carrier

[Lucky33]

Not the system but the fighters. They break the DPS/Flux/Range curve. One fighter bay is equivalent of the Large mount weapon, capable of providing much DPS at great range with minimal flux costs. Just as a bonus they work like HP regeneration. From the optimal strat point of view, it makes no practical sense to use anything else in any role but the general support if even that.

Even Broadswords which were supposed to be strafers can just wait 8 seconds on top of the target and wait for the flux to dissipate. No problem.

To illustrate the problem you can just mod the LMG to have 4000 range and see that happens.

[Tackywheat1]

Not the system but the fighters. They break the DPS/Flux/Range curve. One fighter bay is equivalent of the Large mount weapon, capable of providing much DPS at great range with minimal flux costs. Just as a bonus they work like HP regeneration. From the optimal strat point of view, it makes no practical sense to use anything else in any role but the general support if even that.

Even Broadswords which were supposed to be strafers can just wait 8 seconds on top of the target and wait for the flux to dissipate. No problem.

To illustrate the problem you can just mod the LMG to have 4000 range and see that happens.

The system makes the fighters much stronger by allowing them to expand the squadron size and replenish fighter rates

[Lucky33]

They are already strong enough, system or not. As I said the problem is that fighters bring too much DPS at too long a range with too small flux cost.

[TaLaR]

Imo fighter dps is fine, but their tankiness may be not. Dropping a character-skilled Spark Drover's replenishment rate is near impossible. Neither it is easy to clear incoming fighter wave before they cause significant damage (need optimized capital with character skills AND it needs to be properly piloted, that is not dive into fighter clouds at full speed as AI does).

[Arcagnello]

Hp is only the half of it I'm afraid. Armor on planes is a real issue too, especially concerning broadsword and the chunky one with the double light mortars.

I also do not get why fighter squadrons are so small and why the models are so big. Decreasing the overall armor/HP and splitting fighters if they have multiple identical weapons would go a long way.

Most anti fighter weapons also kind of suck, mainly due to how bad their aiming is most of the time. You need to dump a lot, and I mean a lot of ordinance points to even be able to fend the smallest amount of fighters.

A lot of PD weapons should get increased range only when firing at enemy fighters and also be able to fire over allied ships to actually make dedicated PD units actually viable.

[Lucky33]

Game's balance is founded on the flux usage. Burst-defence balance.

Condor (no fancy carrier systems whatsoever) with its 110 dissipation and 2200 capacity, while equipped with two Thunder wings can create 400 dissipation and 3000 capacity out of thin air and for about 50 permaflux it can throw them at 8000 range where all that flux can be converted into 800 KE DPS plus some handy HE and EMP bonuses.

Condor's Fast Missile Racks cost ~500 for single use. Storm needler deals 750 DPS at 700 range for 650 flux/sec.

Not only fighters are worst case of a perpetuum mobile (why antimatter is even a thing!?) but they are a huge breach in the game's balance.

[Tackywheat1]

Game's balance is founded on the flux usage. Burst-defence balance.

Condor (no fancy carrier systems whatsoever) with its 110 dissipation and 2200 capacity, while equipped with two Thunder wings can create 400 dissipation and 3000 capacity out of thin air and for about 50 permaflux it can throw them at 8000 range where all that flux can be converted into 800 KE DPS plus some handy HE and EMP bonuses.

Condor's Fast Missile Racks cost ~500 for single use. Storm needler deals 750 DPS at 700 range for 650 flux/sec.

Not only fighters are worst case of a perpetuum mobile (why antimatter is even a thing!?) but they are a huge breach in the game's balance.

Storm needler will rarely miss its targets unlike missiles and can't be shot down like missiles and fighters and storm needler does 1500 shield dps (which is the reason why you use it to begin with).. Condors FMR isn't all that useful considering it only has 1 medium missile mount and Condor itself is too slow to really provide much support with its missiles anyway. Don't really know why you compared FMR to a storm needler.

Fighter wings are inconsistent in their DPS (because they take time to re engage and they WILL be shot down) The only fighter that is truly ridiculously strong is the Spark interceptor because they are durable (for an interceptor), come in large numbers per wing, and have a very strong PD weapon. Fighters also require other ships to be spotting targets for their long ranges to really come into play.

Hp is only the half of it I'm afraid. Armor on planes is a real issue too, especially concerning broadsword and the chunky one with the double light mortars.

I also do not get why fighter squadrons are so small and why the models are so big. Decreasing the overall armor/HP and splitting fighters if they have multiple identical weapons would go a long way.

Most anti fighter weapons also kind of suck, mainly due to how bad their aiming is most of the time. You need to dump a lot, and I mean a lot of ordinance points to even be able to fend the smallest amount of fighters.

A lot of PD weapons should get increased range only when firing at enemy fighters and also be able to fire over allied ships to actually make dedicated PD units actually viable.

PD weapons are weapons that can target missiles. ALL weapons can target fighters, not just PD weapons. Also Locusts and Swarmers exist to make a fighters existence hell but they are useless vs missiles

[Lucky33]

At 8000 su, Storm Needler has exactly zero hit ratio on the Condor. Whatever damage it deals to fighters will be regenerated back. Free of charge, obviously. All beyond shield damage to the Storm Needler carrier will be permanent.

And compare this to FMR and the missile balance as a whole.

[Thaago]

Condors are pretty weak. They pass the 'not useless' threshold, and can be an early game source of interceptors/bombers if you recover one without carrier D-mods, but they are about 2/3 as strong as a Drover offensively and about 1/3 as strong defensively because of their low speed, low OP, truly terrible flux/shields, and lack of fighter boosting ship system.

Fighters, especially fast ones like Thunders, have lower DPS than simply adding up the DPS of their weapons, because they spend a lot of time maneuvering around their target and not firing. As an example, look at Broadswords swarming a target - time on target firing guns is low. 2 Thunder wings has far lower DPS than a Storm Needler. Except for Sparks, which just store up the charges when not in range/facing and then dump them all at once, retaining near perfect DPS. Thanks Sparks.

With a few exceptions, fighters are balanced, with carriers being weaker than well built combat ships but capable of projecting force over allies. The issue of carriers is 3 fold: 1) AI is too scared of them, and will not go through fighters to kill the carriers (similar to a single Pilum or annihilator scaring off a cruiser and making it run far away) 2) Massed fighters can concentrate overwhelming force, and AoE weapons are a bit rare. Really only Devastators can handle true fighter death balls. 3) Carriers are very easy to build effectively, so people think they are stronger than they are.

[intrinsic_parity]

Fighters flux stats are absolutely not equivalent to adding them to the carrier itself. Each individual fighter can overload, and each individually dies, which is much much weaker than if the carrier was given a bunch of extra dissipation, capacity and weapons. You can kill all of the fighters in a wing with a few shots whereas if the carrier had extra flux stats/weapons, shooting it a few times would not remove those flux stats and weapons. Trying to compare a fighter bay to a weapon mount it silly, they work very differently.

Also, doom mines obliterate fighters, and are one of the best counters. The doom is probably the best single anti-fighter ship in the game.

I usually have a few carriers of my own to deal with the enemy fighters and let my warships fight freely. I really don't struggle with enemy fighters, and I only dedicate 1/3 of my fleet to carriers (and usually less than that to interceptors). I don't find them oppressive at all, and I also don't feel like there's any need to abuse them. In my experience, combat ships still do more damage than equivalently sized carriers on average (based on numbers from the combat analytics mod).