Fractal Softworks Forum

Starsector => General Discussion => Topic started by: Euphytose on December 23, 2018, 09:25:44 PM

Title: Your best Paragon loadout(s).
Post by: Euphytose on December 23, 2018, 09:25:44 PM: Here's mine:

Spoiler
(https://i.imgur.com/cqMf4CX.png)
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Title: Re: Your best Paragon loadout(s).
Post by: Megas on December 24, 2018, 09:50:04 AM: I would replace Phase Lance with HVDs so it can put hard flux on distant targets and enable lances to pierce shields. Otherwise, four lances and two HVDs is all Paragon really needs to earn its 60 DP price tag. Beyond that, I probably would use either nine burst PD and four heavy blasters, or nine IPDAI IR Pulse Lasers and four heavy burst lasers. Missiles left empty. I probably would leave capacitors at base and squeeze campaign mods like Augmented Engines and Efficiency Overhaul somewhere.
Title: Re: Your best Paragon loadout(s).
Post by: Goumindong on December 24, 2018, 10:02:17 AM: 4 phase lances and Autopulse or plasma cannon in the large (TL is OK). Pulse lasers in the rear. Swarmers in the small missiles. Ion or regular PD in the smalls. RFC, Hardened Shields, heavy armor I like as well if there is space

4 phase lances one shot any frigate on CD and frigates are your most dangerous foe because you’re so slow. Autopulse or PC takes care of any destroyer well enough. In total I prefer PC on the side so you can kill flanking destroyers without having to wait for charges.
Title: Re: Your best Paragon loadout(s).
Post by: Cyan Leader on December 24, 2018, 10:59:37 AM: The benefit of using Phase Lances is that they combo with Optics, and they are great at sniping frigates and other vessels trying to flank you. I think they are a good choice.

For the big slots I really don't know why you'd equip anything other than 4 TLs. It just eats through anything in the game and the range is absurd. Plus, unlike most other weapons, it's a beam so the travel time is instantaneous, allowing for perfect precision even at large distances. Don't settle for 2, the damage difference between 2 and 4 is a really big deal and a deal breaker in piercing shields.

Besides a hullmod or two, my last run Paragon looked pretty much exactly like Euphytose's.
Title: Re: Your best Paragon loadout(s).
Post by: intrinsic_parity on December 24, 2018, 12:06:07 PM: I prefer kinetics in the universals for hard flux. The one weakness of the 4x tach lance setup is a lack of hard flux, and kinetics are also super good in general. I don't like phase lances in general, but I could see how they might be useful. I usually just put graviton beams and tac lasers in the small/medium slots with IPDAI to kill fighters and missiles and provide extra damage against larger targets. I can see how the above load out would be effective though, I might try it out.
Title: Re: Your best Paragon loadout(s).
Post by: Megas on December 24, 2018, 12:20:48 PM: Quote from: intrinsic_parity on December 24, 2018, 12:06:07 PM
I prefer kinetics in the universals for hard flux. The one weakness of the 4x tach lance setup is a lack of hard flux
That is why I have two HVDs in the universals for lance Paragon. There can be times when critically injured enemy ship will refuse to drop shields, and Paragon needs the HVDs to put hard flux on the shield and let lances pierce. Lances need hard flux on shields to pierce.

Smaller slots can deal with missiles, fighters, and anything else that gets close. It probably does not matter too much what the weapons are as long as they get the job done. So far, I tried combinations of blasters, pulse lasers, and/or various beams, and they seem to work.

Quote from: Cyan Leader on December 24, 2018, 10:59:37 AM
For the big slots I really don't know why you'd equip anything other than 4 TLs.
Perhaps availability? Perhaps player finds Paragon blueprint early in tech cache reward and nothing else good, and needs to make due with whatever he finds or can build from the inevitable high-tech pack drop? That said, I probably would sideline lance-less Paragon if I find or recover Onslaught or Conquest before I find the proper weapons. Paragon without lances (or HIL and Ion Beam combo) feels much like an overpriced Onslaught or Conquest without a mobility system.
Title: Re: Your best Paragon loadout(s).
Post by: intrinsic_parity on December 24, 2018, 12:31:52 PM: Other weapons, particularly the new auto pulse can make the paragon a brawling beast, but I still think the quad TL loadout is best because of the insane range. Paragon is too slow to brawl, most stuff can run away and the range lets it kill stuff trying to run away. I want to experiment more with plasma cannon loadouts.
Title: Re: Your best Paragon loadout(s).
Post by: Megas on December 24, 2018, 12:40:43 PM: Plasma cannon loadouts are kind of fun, but nothing that Onslaught or Conquest cannot replicate in their own way for less DP, and those two have better mobility. Paragon's lack of mobility is a problem for non-beam loadouts.

Paragon costs 60 DP. If I need a close to medium range brawler, I prefer to bring Onslaught/Conquest (40 DP) plus Heron/Mora (20 DP) for fleet battles.
Title: Re: Your best Paragon loadout(s).
Post by: Goumindong on December 24, 2018, 02:34:44 PM: Tachyon lances are overrated and Autopulse and plasma cannon on a Paragon are not medium range weapons. The hard flux build up from medium kinetics with the exception of needlers is pretty small and the range is pointless as you can’t hit anything beside big ships out there. They have 1400 range. Only Gauss Cannons significantly outranges you (1.6 x 900 = 1440)

Moreover the conquest and onslaught cannot come close to replicating the raw power of 4 large energy slots all dumping on the same target. Each Autopulse does 9900 damage in 3 seconds when it’s fully charged. Plasma cannons are one of the best anti-armor weapons in the game and still put out better shield damage Mark IX autocannons!

The main advantage of TL is that it’s really easy to rapidly toggle fortress shield and still get all the damage. But you’re probably going to be surrounded if you need to do that that that is when you need as much hard hard flux damage as you can get.
Title: Re: Your best Paragon loadout(s).
Post by: Euphytose on December 24, 2018, 02:41:18 PM: This is actually my first time piloting one myself, I had always left it to the AI and used something like a Medusa. The range is, as said above, completely insane.

Spoiler
I fought my first Red Planet yesterday, their battleship used its phase skimmer to move away, not towards me. Didn't stand a chance.
[close]

I can get behind using HVDs, but I got other ships for that. Mostly Enforcers with two of them that can snipe pretty well with implants officers and integrated targeting.

And that shield... Boy oh boy. I almost never drop it, they can't even dent the armour, and if the flux is too high you just pop the fortress and wait a bit for the soft flux to go down.

In my opinion the shield skill (maxed at 3) is the biggest boost to piloting a Paragon, as well as implants of course.

Like Megas said, I found the blueprint pretty early, but didn't have any TL. I kept going back to Tri-Tachyon's markets (I got a commission with them for this game), and eventually got four. Still don't have the TL blueprint unfortunately.

I'll probably build another Paragon and use a completely different loadout, see how the AI handles something with closer range.
Title: Re: Your best Paragon loadout(s).
Post by: Megas on December 24, 2018, 03:14:00 PM: 900 range ballistics heavy weapons (anything not Gauss, Storm Needler, or TPCs) on capitals outrange non-beams on Paragon (900 * 1.6) > (700 * 2). I would consider that medium range as capital weapons go. Would be long-range compared to what smaller ships can do. Sure, Paragon can do a lot of damage with plasma or autopulse, but lack of mobility and high DP cost work against it, especially against cowardly enemies. Also, Paragon would probably need to vent spam for quad plasma cannon. In fleet battles, it is not a choice between just deploying Paragon or another capital, it is Paragon or another capital and cruiser. 60 DP is a lot even with 500 map size.

The main advantages of Tachyon Lance are extreme range, hitscan, good burst damage, and shield pierce. If enemies get very close to attack Paragon, your smaller weapons (blasters, pulse lasers, or whatever) should be enough to deal with them. If not, then Paragon will likely die no matter what heavy weapons it had.

If I use shorter-ranged heavy weapons on Paragon, I like to use dual flak in the universals for better anti-missile and to chew up weak enemies.
Title: Re: Your best Paragon loadout(s).
Post by: Euphytose on December 24, 2018, 03:45:48 PM: Quote from: Megas on December 24, 2018, 03:14:00 PM
I like to use dual flak in the universals for better anti-missile and to chew up weak enemies.

I had settled on using two standard flak but for the build I'm using I realized that everything would be vaporized before it even has the chance to come close. :D

(Also to be perfectly honest, having non high-tech weapons on a Paragon kind of ruins the look for me. I put those two Mining Lasers because I had 4 OP left, and non symmetrical loadouts on a symmetrical ship is a big no-no.)
Title: Re: Your best Paragon loadout(s).
Post by: intrinsic_parity on December 24, 2018, 06:06:48 PM: Paragon DP should probably be reduced by 5 or so, it's not that good compared to other capitals. The other place it really outperforms other capitals for me is as a tank vs stations.
Title: Re: Your best Paragon loadout(s).
Post by: Megas on December 25, 2018, 05:54:48 AM: Quote from: intrinsic_parity on December 24, 2018, 06:06:48 PM
Paragon DP should probably be reduced by 5 or so, it's not that good compared to other capitals. The other place it really outperforms other capitals for me is as a tank vs stations.
If not for Tachyon Lances, its old DP cost of 50 would have been fine. Tachyon Lances make it the monster that it is. It does not need mobility when it has extreme range. Without that range, Onslaught and Conquest seem more practical.

I guess tanking would be useful against stations. Against ships, they tend to play coward and avoid it, and there is not much Paragon can do about it without long range weapons.
Title: Re: Your best Paragon loadout(s).
Post by: Goumindong on December 25, 2018, 09:50:53 AM: One of the reasons ships play cowards is you have too much range of too many deployment points out. (Or both)

PD is pointless because you’re almost always flux negative anyway with primary guns so anything you’re spending gets stacked... when you could just pop fortress shield and tank it and not even bother.

A reaper torpedo will do between 120 and 34 damage depending on skills and fit. You don’t need to spend Flux to kill it.
Title: Re: Your best Paragon loadout(s).
Post by: intrinsic_parity on December 25, 2018, 10:33:48 AM: Paragon has really high shield upkeep so paying flux in PD to drop shields is actually a good deal a lot of the time, plus you can dissipate hard flux with shields down.
Title: Re: Your best Paragon loadout(s).
Post by: Megas on December 25, 2018, 10:39:27 AM: PD is also good for killing small fry, especially IPDAI IR Pulse Lasers.

Fortress Shield often builds up hard flux faster than tanking most of whatever gets thrown at. It is useful for exchanging lots of soft flux for a little bit of hard flux before venting.
Title: Re: Your best Paragon loadout(s).
Post by: Goumindong on December 25, 2018, 10:40:53 AM: Only two missiles have fire range outside of Autopulse range, piliums, and harpoons...
If your shields are down you can just bring them up or shoot them down manually.
Title: Re: Your best Paragon loadout(s).
Post by: Baxter on December 26, 2018, 04:20:22 AM: 4 Tachyon lances, 2 ion beams+2 heavy needlers (needler bursts work better for rapidly overloading shields and also for flicking fortress shield on+off), 4 tactical lasers on the forward small mounts, 6 burst lasers for the rear mounts just in case something annoying comes to poke with torpedoes (i could probably swap them out for something else), don't bother with the missile slots. Take the hullmods that make sense (hardened shields, advanced optics, advanced gyros etc.) and fill with max vents and the rest into capacitors.
It's just a boringly OP ship. ludicrous range, perfect hitscan accuracy with its beams that can shred frigate/destroyer shields, bully down cruisers, anything. Fortress shield allows you to either withdraw from combat safely if you've overextended, or trade soft flux for hard flux (basically) during prolonged combat. If you're trading with another capital ship you will always have more flux so all you need to do is trade until the enemy has to start dropping their shields and your tachyon lances and ion beams can disable every single weapon on the enemy ship due to EMP, leaving you free to drop shields for better flux dissapation and more damage dealing.

In the vanilla game the paragon is the only choice for an endgame battleship which is kind of a shame because ballistics are more satisfying to use. Its slow speed isn't a weakness even, it just means that you spend more time slowly crawling forwards before you reach weapons range to wipe out whatever you're fighting.
Title: Re: Your best Paragon loadout(s).
Post by: Thaago on December 26, 2018, 01:25:19 PM: 4 Lance Paragon is a more powerful ship, but Onslaught it a better player ship. Being able to get to the fight quicker means less time wasted and less allies damaged/destroyed. Very few enemies can actually get away from an Onslaught that points at them and burn drives, so its good for hunting. Not to mention 2/3 the deploy costs.
Title: Re: Your best Paragon loadout(s).
Post by: FooF on December 26, 2018, 05:49:39 PM: 4 TL Paragon is incredibly powerful. I don't think there's another loudout in the game that has the "erase this ship" potential of 4 TL with pinpoint accuracy from a mile away. They're great station and capital killers.

All that being said, I prefer my Paragons to be brawlers. The new Plasma Cannons are actually flux efficient now and hit really hard and Autopulse is good out-of-the-box now. The only weapon I tend not to put on a Paragon are Paladin PD because I think they're overkill. HIL are also pretty good but I prefer Autopulse in most situations.
Title: Re: Your best Paragon loadout(s).
Post by: Euphytose on December 27, 2018, 05:05:53 AM: I haven't used the Paladin or that large ballistic flak yet, I really don't think they're necessary.

On the topic of Onslaught being a better player ship I agree, burn driving into the fray and drawing all the fire on you is really good, especially since a lot of people tend to fit both "arms" with flak, so you're pretty much immune to missiles and fighters, the only things threatening that godly armour.
Title: Re: Your best Paragon loadout(s).
Post by: PizzaInSpace on March 26, 2022, 07:35:29 AM: Just need advice now knowing the omega redacted are here, are there any weapons that they have that are any good on the paragon? or is 4 TC Lance still the better contendor?
Title: Re: Your best Paragon loadout(s).
Post by: Daynen on March 26, 2022, 08:45:44 AM: I'm a fan of the four autopulse build with extended mags. It's energy damage so it's never useless, it recharges quickly and it gives you fine control over exactly how much ordnance you dish out with each volley. It's also a fantastic fighter killer; just hold the button down and sweep your reticle over the cloud for instant popcorn. If memory serves, I THINK autopulsers still count as beams too, so optics still helps them. It's just a wonderful dakka setup that can pound whatever you point it at into a finely grated cloud of debris.

Four high intensity lasers will absolutely evaporate remnant derelicts since they're unshielded. Four Tachyons is much the same. Pretty much anything works thanks to the paragon's range boost but for my money, 4xautopulse is just maximum carnage and maximum fun.
Title: Re: Your best Paragon loadout(s).
Post by: PizzaInSpace on April 02, 2022, 10:10:36 PM: might do that as I used a 2 autopulse and 2 plasma cannon build and it has helped me eradicate pirate and path fleets effectively but does somewhat poorly against remnant ordos
Title: Re: Your best Paragon loadout(s).
Post by: Daynen on April 03, 2022, 09:57:15 AM: I find if you're going to use weapons that use extended mags, you may as well stack them so you get maximum benefit out of the hullmod. 4 plasma cannons DOES give you some serious burst, but I like the control you get with 4 autopulsers. You can practice with them to learn exactly how many shots you need to finish off a ship so you spend less time waiting on reload, plus the low flux per shot also gives you finer control over your flux meter--AND your enemy's. On an AI paragon, tackies, plasmas or beams are probably the simpler and more reliable choice but if I'm in the cockpit, pulsers are my go-to.
Title: Re: Your best Paragon loadout(s).
Post by: tariq111 on April 04, 2022, 03:28:00 AM: One of my finest remnant build, 4 plasma cannon paragon, about 6 point defense and rest of points go to vents and capacitors. Anything that comes into contact with its demonic stare is instantly fried.