Spoiler
Arc EmittersRole: Point Defense
Fires arcs at random hostile targets in a wide cone. Inefficient, but unavoidable hard flux damage with a side of EMP.
The medium version has a chance to produce a chaining arc, and the large has a ramp-up mechanic that can produce multiple chaining arcs.
Because of their random nature, Improved Point Defense AI does not cause them to ignore flares, but it will still improve damage to missiles. (Flares also count as missiles.)
The small and medium versions will refund most of their flux cost and reset their cooldown if they fail to produce an arc. The large will not, due to its ramp-up mechanic.
Toroidal Plasma RailgunsRole: General
An ancient weapon design, these fire tiny rings of plasma at significant fractions of lightspeed. They have lackluster DPS, but excellent range and good per-shot damage.
Plasma Lens ProjectorRole: Anti-Armor/Strike
Fires a homing projectile that produces an explosive lensing effect on contact with hull or armor, punching deep inside the target.
Benefits from Expanded Magazines, and synergizes well with Autopulse Lasers.
Tawa Standoff TorpedoesRole: Torpedo
Comes in small (not pictured), medium, and large. Explodes into an inaccurate burst of three plasma projectiles when it nears its target, (hopefully) avoiding point defenses.
Atropos-class TorpedoesRole: Torpedo
Two additional launchers to round out the selection of torpedo weapons. Mediocre damage compared to Reapers, but they have guidance, good ammo reserves and a decent fire rate.
Ahab Harpoon BarrageRole: Finisher
A big ol' box launcher full of Harpoon missiles. Fires a salvo of 9 missiles, with ammo reserves for 6 salvos.
Around 202 post-collapse, a secret Tri-Tachyon vault holding blueprints for the elite Fourth Domain Battlegroup was broken into, and various blueprints quickly made their way into the hands of independent shipbuilders.
In response, Tri-Tachyon began open production of IV Battlegroup hulls, though only in very limited numbers.
This mod includes support for Industrial Evolution (everything in it can be reverse engineered or printed), Vesperon Combine (all blueprints show up in Vesperon caches), and Version Checker.
Spoiler
17JAN2021: 1.1.5 release
New:
- Scarab (IV). Two energy mounts replaced with universals, in addition to the IV hullmod. It's *very* good, but good luck finding one.
- Fourth Battlegroup Blueprint Package. Much rarer than other blueprint packages; you have about a 50% chance of finding one in a vanilla game with no other mods if you visit every blueprint drop source.
- Fourteenth Battlegroup Blueprint Package. Same rarity as the Fourth Battlegroup package.
Changes:
- Fixed some descriptions being long as *** in certain contexts.
- Aphelion: Added a rear turret slot to match up with the sprite. Adjusted turret arcs. Reduced OP by 5. Omni shield converted to front shield. Variants adjusted.
- Gila: Shield arc increased (110->120). Previous nerf was a little bit heavy-handed; now you can reasonably choose between stabilized and extended shields.
- Kingfisher: Sprite adjusted to match turret arcs and directions.
- Peregrine: Adjusted turret arcs. This is a buff.
- Khanjali: Shield HP increased (425->500). Plasma Catapult damage increased (250->350), mag size decreased (4->3), and it now reloads one projectile every 3 seconds, instead of the entire mag every 10 seconds.
- Heavy Arc Emitter: Decreased ramp time (10s->6s) and increased the time needed for the ramp to fully decay (3.3s->4s).
- Plasma Lens Projector: Improved visual effects a little bit.
- Toroidal Plasma Railguns: Now create a small secondary explosion when hitting armor, and have improved visual effects on impact. Sprites adjusted so that the barrels don't look quite as flat.
- Tawa torpedoes: Removed friendly-fire on secondary projectiles. The AI would occasionally try to fire them through allied ships, which would die when the torpedoes split inside of them.
- Reduced the rarity of several weapons. They're still in the same blueprint categories, but some of the rarer ones should show up more often in markets.
- Added 10 simulation opponents.
- Added two variants for [REDACTED]. I hope you haven't been relying on swarms of unshielded fighters.
- Reduced cost multiplier for IV variants (1.75->1.6). Lorewise, IV hulls are in active (though extremely limited) production around the sector, so they shouldn't be quite as expensive as XIV stuff.
- Adjusted some weapon descriptions to account for numerical reality.
- Actually remembered to update the version number this time.
- Added one new loading tip. Do you like focaccia bread?
11JAN2021: 1.1.4 release
- New weapon: Light Arc Emitter (small energy), Arc Emitter (medium energy), and Heavy Arc Emitter (large energy). They fire arcs at random hostile targets within a 120 degree cone, dealing decent energy and EMP damage with a relatively low firerate. The medium emitter has a chance to create a secondary chain, and the large has a chance to create multiple chains that increases as long as it's firing. The small and medium are in the hightech blueprint package, the large is rare and known by Tritachyon and Remnants.
- Remnant fleets will now occasionally use the Plasma Lens Projector, Nyx Atropos Salvo, and Tawa Standoff Torpedo Battery.
8JAN2021: 1.1.3 release
- Added some variants of vanilla ships that use the new weapons.
- Actually added the Ahab to the vanilla missile blueprint package this time. For sure.
- New sprite for the Khanjali Strike Fighter.
- New weapon: Toroidal Plasma Railgun (medium energy, 12 OP) and Twin Toroidal Plasma Railgun (large energy, 26 OP). One of the oldest types of energy weapon, they use electric fields to accelerate a tiny ring of plasma to extreme velocities. It has great range (for an energy weapon, anyway) and good per-shot damage with a side of EMP, but poor DPS and efficiency. It has relatively low flux usage when compared to other energy guns, so it's a good choice for ships that have energy slots but not high-tech flux stats. The medium is in the base blueprint package, and the large is in the hightech package.
Buffs:
- Tawa Standoff Torpedoes: Second-stage spread reduced (35->30) and EMP damage increased (50->75). Ammo on medium and large launchers increased (8->10 and 30->36). Large launcher OP reduced (30->28). Large launcher reload time increased (12->13).
- Plasma Lens Projector: Homing improved (23 deg/sec -> 28 deg/sec).
- Kukri Bomber Wing: OP cost reduced (28->27).
Changes:
- Plasma Lens Projector: Now deals 1000 damage on initial hit and 3x 500 damage in a line. (Combining the first hit of the original 4x 500 line with the initial projectile). This is numerically a buff, but in reality it makes the AI catch the projectile on its shields much more often, so it's more of a nerf (and intended as such).
- Persean League now knows the blueprints for the large Tawa and large Atropos, though they won't use them very often.
- Tigershark sprite lightened up a bit
Nerfs:
- Gila shield efficiency reduced 0.6->0.8, changed omni shield to front shield, arc reduced (180->110), armor reduced (950->800), and turn speed reduced (22->12). Still very tanky from the front, but much more vulnerable to flanking, and you can't catch shots on armor quite as much.
2JAN2021: 1.1.2 release
Now requires MagicLib.
New:
- Weapon: Plasma Lens Projector. Large energy. Fires a slow, weakly-guided projectile that deals significant HE damage in a line if it connects with the target's hull. Holds two charges, and reloads one every 10 seconds. Nearly unusable against small, fast targets. Synergizes extremely well with autopulses. Known by Tritachyon.
Changes:
- Name changes to deconflict with other mods and adhere better to vanilla naming patterns.
- Invader -> Aggressor
- Wyvern -> Khanjali
- Name changes are display-name only, hull and weapon IDs won't change until a future patch. No sense in breaking saves if I don't have to.
- Wyvern (now Khanjali): Weapons no longer generate flux. Its Plasma Catapult now has a slow-reloading four-shot magazine and a fast rate of fire. Active flares are now shot forwards instead of to the sides, but the total number of flares has been reduced. Added two IR Pulse Lasers (high-delay). Speed reduced slightly. Shield is now frontal instead of omni, and arc has been reduced.
- Variants modified to account for changes and additions.
- New ships and items added to whitelists for Industrial Evolution and Vesperon Combine.
Nerfs:
- Incursion: Synergy slots converted to missile slots and turret arcs adjusted to reduce forward convergence. Maximum convergence is now 3 large energies, 3 medium energies, and 5 small energies. No more 9 graviton beams on a single target. System changed to Plasma Burn instead of Plasma Thrusters to reduce its ability to escape sticky situations. Maneuverability and flux capacity increased to compensate somewhat. It should now be significantly more dangerous to over-commit. Cleaned up the sprite a bit.
Buffs:
- Persephone: OP increased by 12.
- Moray: DP decreased to 9 (from 10).
- Iris: Has now been released from the PD jail. PD specialization no longer penalizes non-PD weapons and is compatible with DTC/ITU, but caps maximum weapon range at 1200 units. OP increased by 10.
- Kingfisher: Improved the AI's usage of Targeting Overclock. Arc of the large energy turret slightly reduced (this is a buff, it helps the AI)
27DEC2020: 1.1.1 release
Fixed an error that made the Ahab, Nyx, and Tawa Battery rare exploration drops only. Now the Ahab is part of the missile blueprint package, and the Nyx and Tawa Battery are known by Tritachyon.
27DEC2020: 1.1.0 release
New:
- Forums: Download tracker added. Nifty!
- Ship: Inequality-class battlecruiser, and its Battlegroup IV variant. It has a funky diagonal broadside and a built-in unique hullmod.
- Weapon: Alecto Atropos Launcher. Medium missile. Holds 6 shots of 2 torpedoes. Good choice when reliability is more important than sheer damage. Reload time is just barely fast enough to hit a target with a follow-up salvo if your first overloads it.
- Weapon: Nyx Atropos Salvo. Large missile. Has a very good fire rate, though not quite as good as the Hammer Barrage. Holds 8 shots of 4 torpedoes. Good choice if you're willing to sacrifice the damage and speed of a Hammer Barrage for homing projectiles and more ammo.
- Weapon: Ahab Harpoon Barrage. Large missile. Has a slow fire rate. Holds 6 shots of 9 missiles. It's 9 harpoons every 18 seconds. What more do you want?
- Weapon: Tawa Standoff Torpedoes. These torpedoes detonate into a trio of unstable plasma spheroids at the edge of point defense range, making them extremely difficult to intercept. Comes in a dual rack (small), dual launcher (medium, 4 shots of 2 torpedos), and triple launcher (large, 10 shots of 3 torpedos) variant. A good general-purpose weapon, but inefficient compared to anti-shield or anti-armor missiles. Struggles against small, fast, or narrow targets. Costs 5/12/30 OP.
- Fighter: Kukri Bomber Wing. A Trident bomber wing rebuilt to carry Tawa torpedoes. Generally better than Tridents by themselves, but not better than a Trident/Longbow combo, especially against heavily armored targets. Costs 28 OP.
- Fighter: Wyvern Strike Fighter. Carries a Plasma Catapult (a short-range, low-damage version of the Plasma Cannon) and two active flares. Great armor penetration (for a fighter) and a decent shield, but it will quickly stress its flux when firing. Costs 20 OP.
Nerfs:
- Overall: Most ships had their shield upkeep slightly increased to match vanilla values.
- Tigershark: Now has practically identical stats to the Aurora, instead of being better in most regards, and got a builtin hullmod that gives it a penalty to ballistic range, rof, and efficiency. Large ballistics should remain a good choice, but shouldn't be the optimal choice in all scenarios. Shield radius has been increased to prevent clipping with the forward large hardpoint.
- Kingfisher: Lost its two medium missile hardpoints, lost 20 OP, had its flux stats reduced, and has been given a new ship system, Targeting Overclock. This system is a toggle (though it cannot be immediately reactivated), and doubles the range of all energy weapons while active (up to a cap), but generates significant amounts of hard flux and reduces speed by two-thirds. DP reduced to 30. Turn speed increased, though it's still the slowest-turning cruiser in the mod.
- Aphelion: Fuel capacity and fuel/ly reduced; range is the same. Shield ratio increased to 0.7 to match the Apogee.
- Incursion: Max turn speed, top speed, and turn acceleration reduced. OP reduced by 20.
- Iris: Speed and flux stats reduced. DP increased to 12. Removed prior builtin hullmods. OP reduced by 5. Now has a builtin hullmod that increases PD range significantly, but blocks ITU/DTC and has a hefty penalty for mounting non-missile and non-PD weapons. PPT reduced to 300 seconds, but now has Hardened Subsystems built in. Shield radius increased slightly. You can still use it for things other than point defense, but it won't be nearly as good at it.
- Invader: Apparently only cost 30 DP to deploy. This was a mistake, and it has been increased to the intended 36 DP. Speed slightly reduced. The XIV variant got 5 extra OP.
- Spire: DP increased to 50, flux stats reduced, turn speed reduced, OP reduced, builtin hullmods removed and replaced with a weaker custom builtin hullmod.
- Gila: OP reduced by 12, flux capacity and shield radius increased slightly, speed reduced slightly.
- Bombardier: Shield arc increased a smidge, since it's such a wide boy. Reduced OP by 10 and adjusted turret arcs. This is a buff. (It's not)
Changes:
- Overall: Fleet point changes to balance AI usage. Cargo, crew, and fuel capacity have been adjusted on most ships.
- Overall: Changes to PPT and CR recovery. "Line" ships (Kingfisher, Gila) get an extra minute of PPT to make up for their slow speed, and lose less CR from deployment (and thus recover faster). Other ships have been normalized to standard values for their size and tech level.
- Sprites: Lightened up the Battlegroup IV sprites a bit to improve contrast against dark backgrounds.
- Spawning: The Tigershark has been removed from the high-tech BP pool and made a rare BP; independents will still use it, but very rarely. The chance of Battlegroup IV ships spawning in independent fleets has been reduced, and they will no longer use Spires. Tri-Tachyon will use Spires and Incursions less frequently, and has a better chance of spawning IV variants of all ships. (though they don't use direct-fire warships much so they'll still be fairly rare)
- Moray: Mild flux nerfs, 2 more OP. Has slightly less shield upkeep than the Persephone, and loses less CR from deployment. Increased rear small turret arc by a lot.
- Persephone: Mild flux nerfs, 2 more OP. Costs 11 DP (from 10).
- Peregrine: Has been given a new ship system, Flux Compressor. When activated, it instantly vents a sizeable fraction of your soft flux and a small fraction of your hard flux, and gives you a brief movement bonus that decays over time. Disposing of more flux with the system increases the bonus significantly, but not the duration. Dissipation has been slightly reduced to make it more reliant on its system. Integrated Supercapacitors has had its damage bonus reduced slightly to 66%, and now has a significantly weaker effect on beams. Base speed, acceleration, and shield arc slightly increased.
- Many updates to variants.
- Added some loading tips. Only one of them is threatening.
Buffs:
- Spire sprite redone a bit. It's still a flat wide boy, but the shading isn't as horrific. This is a buff.
- Fourth Battlegroup had its hullmod values adjusted. Now provides 7% reduced shield damage taken (from 5%) and -5% hull and armor (from -7%).
19DEC2020: 1.0.0 release
