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[Megas]

With a small fleet I often exceed cargo capacity (and lose burn speed) after a few fights.  At that point, I look at all of my ships (aside from flagship) and proceed to remove Augmented Engines from them (and maybe replace with Unstable Injector).  Once I make it back to base and deposit loot, I put Augmented Engines back on my ships.  I do this first, jettisoning ingots afterwards only if stripping Augmented Engines from my ships was not enough.

While the cargo penalty makes sense, it encourages people who overload on cargo after a big fight to cycle through their ships and strip Augmented Engines for more cargo space.  After all, player gets slower (and hemorrhaging supplies) while overburdened, might as well remove Augmented Engines to fix the problem.

The cargo penalty should be removed, if micromanagement is a problem.  Maybe bring back the engine penalty if there needs to be a penalty.  Alternatively, maybe tone down the burn bonus down to +1, maybe reduce combat speed bonus to match Unstable Injector's (liked the extra speed since we cannot stack both engine mods anymore as before, though), and remove the penalties altogether.

[SafariJohn]

I would assume you're running a small fleet of frigates, since I've had no problems with this in my large Falcons/destroyers/frigates fleet.

I think you're creating a problem where there isn't one. Just bring an extra Cerberus or Hound, or even some cargo shuttles, and you should have enough cargo space.

[Megas]

If I bring more ships, enemy starts to run away.  I cannot pursue enemies without sending relations to Vengeful and losing access to their bases.

EDIT:  I use frigates because destroyers or bigger without Navigation are painfully slow, and I still use less frigates than my Logistics can support because I do not want to scare away the enemy.

EDIT #2:  I can kill any pirate fleet with a single ship.  The few other ships I have are for cargo hauling.  It is a delicate balancing act.  Bring too many DPs worth of ships and the enemy runs away and I miss out on bounties, XP, and loot (Vengeful relations is not worth it).  Bring too few and I overload on cargo.

[Histidine]

The cargo penalty is there to stop Augmented Engines being "this has basically no downsides for a non-combat vessel so I'll slap it on, it's not like I have anything better to put on it." I can't think of a good alternative penalty that reliably avoids the micromanagement issue, though. (The ones that came to mind were: increased fuel to travel in hyper; sucking up supplies passively like Hyperion does)

Would it be too punitive if refitting (or at least changing hullmods) could only be done at a station? (But then you'd realistically have to let a Construction Rig do it as well, at which point the problem crops up again.)

[Megas]

Maybe tone down the burn bonus to +1 (or remove it), remove the penalties (or restore 125% repair time), and call it a day.  Augmented Engines is supposed to be an upgrade over Unstable Injector.

Engines hullmods will always be a no-brainer for characters who build for extra OP.  The extra speed is critical in combat.

Sucking up fuel faster or adding high maintenance would be more micromanagement.  For fuel, take it off for hyperspace, then put it back on in system.  High maintenance, take it off when supplies run low.

[SafariJohn]

Oh hey! If you harry an enemy fleet over and over, they will eventually stand and fight, no matter how big your fleet is.

[Kipcha]

take a look at running a cerberus.
I dont have the best cerby. but i find the build works
10/10 in both+Ordinance points skills;
Augmented engines
Front Shield Generator
Extended shields
7 Caps,
4 vents.
3 vulcan PD's
1 Assault chaingun

It has a reasonable ammount of armour and HP, shield certainly helps. it goes toe to toe with lashers pretty easy and thanks to the Medium Ballistic having such a huge arc you can (if you need) set all weapon groups to autofire and focus on positioning.

its kinda like if a Lasher and a Hound had a strange child.

[Nanao-kun]

I've never put Augmented Engines on a frigate.

[Kipcha]

I've never put Augmented Engines on a frigate.

whassa matta? scared of goin fast?

[Megas]

Harrying enemies is good if the player has nothing better to do at the time (i.e., no more targets) and the target has fighting ships.  Otherwise, it is tedious even with a burn speed of 10+.

@ Kipcha:  Cerberus is not very good at fighting (big ships or whole fleets) without serious optimization, and I dislike ships with no defense system (i.e., shields or phase cloak) because there is much less margin for error.  Cerberus also has burn 6 which, while not too slow, is slower than the Wolf pack I use.  I rather optimize a ship I enjoy piloting.  Also, I do not fight merely frigates, I fight everything.  As I post elsewhere, I often use a single Wolf to solo most pirate fleets, and bring in the three or so extras for really troublesome fights.  So far, I have only seen a single non-D Hound, which I promptly bought.  My game has been stingy with them.  I have seen plenty of (D) Hounds (with Degraded Engines), which were useful early in the game when I needed the slow starter Hammerhead; but late game, I do not need slow frigates anymore except as emergency cargo transport during an event (namely food shortage).

Also, small fleets are good for access to enemy non-pirate bases.  I plan to upgrade to a Medusa (which can solo everything), declare war on some factions, then farm defense fleets to accelerate XP gain.


My overall point on this topic is for some fleets and playstyles, carefully management/toggling of Augmented Engines is optimal.  Add hullmod, remove it when overburdened, add it back once the burden is gone.

[Kipcha]

@ Kipcha:  Cerberus is not very good at fighting (big ships or whole fleets) without serious optimization, and I dislike ships with no defense system (i.e., shields or phase cloak) because there is much less margin for error.  Cerberus also has burn 6 which, while not too slow, is slower than the Wolf pack I use.  I rather optimize a ship I enjoy piloting.  Also, I do not fight merely frigates, I fight everything.

Define "serious optimization"
if its just a cargo *** you dont need to optimize it, hell you dont even need to arm it, just throw augmented engines on it.
As for the burn speed, Yes it will be 1 burns speed slower, while at the same time would actually be 1 burn speed faster than the medusa you plan to get.
It does have shields (see the build)
And yes, i know everyone fights everything too not just frigates. Ive put several fleets down featuring hammerheads and/or Sunders with just myself in the Cerberus + Lasher. which is a significant downgrade to a wolf.

it was simply an answer to your problem of needing more speedy cargo space that is easily available though if you have your heart set on hounds then youll just have to keep chipping away checking the military markets.

[Megas]

Define "serious optimization"

If I want to use a Cerberus instead of two Hermes or a Shepherd (which have better cargo to logistics ratio, not to mention more common), it is because I want it to fight.  Without shields and enough speed to outrun all threats, the Cerberus will take damage.  Eventually, damage will kill it, unless it has hull regeneration, which Damage Control 10 provides if it is my flagship.  (I do not like to pilot the Cerberus.)  It also needs an excellent weapons loadout, which include light needlers and a heavy mauler, so it can kite somewhat.  Entoptic Rangefinder perk (along with Integrated Targeting Unit) is required for any frigate that wants to kite bigger ships.  I want Optimized Assembly and max Technology for all of the OP I can get to afford all of the weapons and hullmods I want.  I also want Helmsmanship 10 (and Augmented Engines) for maximum top speed, and the Evasion perk for much better maneuverability.  In other words, an endgame max Combat and Technology character.

I will not use Medusa until I get Navigation 6+ (currently at 2 in my game) and I am ready to hunt non-pirate defense fleets.  Medusa is too slow (and not enough cargo) for the pirate hunting and revenue/XP generation I am still busy with.

[CrashToDesktop]

I'm fairly certain that the game is designed without the thought of running around, destroying entire fleets of ships with a single frigate by abusing the way the AI deploys it's ships.  So the way that it's mean to be played currently justifies the downsides IMO.

[Megas]

So far, the only downside is the extra micromanagement for optimal play.  I could not care less about the cargo penalty, per se, but the extra micromanagement is annoying.  I will tolerate the extra micromanagement for optimal play.  Not ideal, but I love the power.

As for single frigate killing everything, the game is designed exactly for it even if Alex did not intend to thanks to the CR system and much reduced supply drops.  I noticed that a small frigate fleet can sustain itself from combat alone, if player does not take too much damage.  The more traditional fleet configurations (i.e., cruiser, destroyer, frigates and fighters) cannot loot enough supplies from combat alone to sustain itself, but a small frigate fleet can.

[SafariJohn]

I have 20+ ships including cruisers and I am easily able to fund my fleet through bounties. Fuel and supplies are so cheap compared to my income that I can do whatever I want. I have max Technology and Leadership, and I'm working on Combat. Nothing in this part of the Sector can beat my fleet whether or not I even pilot my flagship. Any losses I sustain are easily replaced. Even my cruisers are replaceable. My fleet is so fast with the help of Augmented Engines, no vanilla fleet can run away from it. And even though my cargo space is reduced, I haven't had any problems. I have fun with my setup, no micromanaging required.

But you want the challenge of taking on everything with as little as possible. Well, there's only so much optimization you can do. At some point, one ship just can't get any more powerful. There will be things not even the most overpowered ship will be able to take on alone.

I suspect as the campaign expands we'll see bigger AI fleets to the point where it is completely impossible for a single ship to solo something like a system defense fleet. One Medusa can't beat 100+ ships that can just keep coming and cover the whole battle area.

If I can run 20+ ships off of bounties, then by scaling alone any government's military fleets would have dozens and dozens of ships each.


I feel the best response to your original post is: if you don't like it the way it is, mod it. It's fine for everyone else; you are citing an edge case and trying to use it to justify a major change to Augmented Engines' balance.

Edit: You can't have the best of all worlds. You either get good cargo capacity, or you can go really fast. You can't have both, at least not without sacrificing elsewhere. Like firepower.