Fractal Softworks Forum
Starsector => General Discussion => Topic started by: Kanjejou on June 11, 2022, 08:10:14 AM
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Do fixed guns get any buff? because I feel like a lot of fixed gun design on frigate and estroyer suffer from having fixed guns like:
Muskipper MK2, Brawler and Wolf,
Hammerhead(saved by its module), Sunder,
Apoge, Aurora, Falcon and Eagle, Dominator
and to a lesser extent the Onslaught twin energy canon
all struggle abit to make their fixed gun really interesting even when its medium or large slots because they don't have enough flux and capacitor anyway to use such guns reliably thus make those fixed gun a bit of a OP waste
but since the gun are fixed a lot of space isnt used for the turret the rotation rings ect... why not make those guns a bit less flux intensiv since the ship is build around those medium/large slots, or give them increased range, thus brawler won't be so pushed into using SO
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They get 50% lower recoil, that's it.
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That a bit weak sinc e alot of wepaons doint have much spread anyway...
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Potential buff to Wolf, make the hardpoint a turret? It's not like it gets anything from lower recoil.
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I like the fact that often those fixed medium and large gun are a way to "upgun" the ship but with no extra OP or bonus stats its pretty hard to use them effectively
Manticore is a upgunned ship and even if it struggle in the flux/capacitor departement it get extra range thus stay relevant after early game
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I want a Wolf that can support (have flux neutrality with) a hard flux medium energy weapon. It is very hard or almost impossible to be flux neutral with a normal Pulse Laser. Wolf should be more like a Glimmer or have its DP cost lowered to 4.
As for OP, lower recoil is good for autocannons. For medium mounts, HAC has more range than Arbalest or Heavy Needler but its inaccuracy hurts. For large mounts, Gauss is a specialist sniper weapon, and Storm Needler has terrible range, which leaves Mark IX as the only workhorse option with sufficient range, but accuracy without recoil reduction is terrible. With maximum recoil reduction, Mark IX is a solid assault weapon. HE ballistics that are normally inaccurate benefit too.
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(They also have twice the hitpoints for purposes of getting disabled!)
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(They also have twice the hitpoints for purposes of getting disabled!)
This is the one thing in game that gets mentioned here on forums and I always forget it's a thing when playing. Non that it would change how I play but still.
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(They also have twice the hitpoints for purposes of getting disabled!)
by the way how much HP does a weapon slot have??
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(They also have twice the hitpoints for purposes of getting disabled!)
This is the one thing in game that gets mentioned here on forums and I always forget it's a thing when playing. Non that it would change how I play but still.
I guess it can be useful if you plan to shield shunt?
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Weapon HP is always useful, it just isn't as noticeable an effect as the recoil reduction.
As to the OP, most of those ships can fire their weapons effectively. The plasma cannon as a large energy on non-SO sunders/apogees is flux hungry enough to be tough, but the other large energies all work. Dominators can sometimes run into trouble depending on their medium and small mounts (it just has lots of gun slots), but it has enough to run 2 larges. Most of the others run their up-sized guns just fine.
And then there's the Wolf. A full 100 extra base flux would bring it more in line with its weapon slots and still leave it with its current design weaknesses (no kinetic weapon + fixed narrow shield + paper armor and hull + poor point defense is just a brutally bad combination). 100 extra flux + flux distributor would still leave the ship overfluxed by a single pulse laser and stressed when using its small slots for point defense, but it would at least make it so the ship isn't outfluxed by non-high tech ships with lower deployment costs! Its a useful early game anti-pirate ship thanks to its decent speed and ability to mount twin swarmers + an ion cannon, but its obsolete the instant enemy fighters, even talons, hit the field. If a Kite had 2 ballistic slots instead of 1 they would be very close to outclassing Wolves.
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Weapon hp is a big deal against Ordos. Almost every ship in an Ordos fleet has elite Target Analysis, which makes any hit almost like EMP. I consider Impact Mitigation almost must-have just for the extra weapon hp. Then, either Armored Turret Mounts and/or Solar Shielding. I guess Damage Control plus Automated Repair Unit for very fast repair times might work instead too.
And then there's the Wolf. A full 100 extra base flux would bring it more in line with its weapon slots and still leave it with its current design weaknesses (no kinetic weapon + fixed narrow shield + paper armor and hull + poor point defense
This is a case where I want an LG kinetic blaster on it... except it cannot support the weapon. 400 flux/sec is more than Pulse Laser, and Wolf cannot support that. The best I can do with it is two ePD+IPDAI IR PLs. That is a better Pulse Laser substitute with more range and 0.8 efficiency.
My weapon loadout for Wolf is Ion Pulser (hardpoint), two IR PLs (side turrets), and burst PD (center turret). I use a similar loadout for Glimmer. Ion Pulser is the finisher. Main attack weapon is the IR PLs. The ships have ePD+IPDAI to make IR PL good enough to use. ePD+IPDAI IR PL is better than any medium energy weapon if the ship has enough of them. More range than medium energy bolt weapons and 0.8 efficiency? Yes, please!
For Wolf, burst PD is decent enough PD, and does not tax flux much, but it is expensive for its OP budget, especially with two.
I miss Wolf's omni-shield. If it had fixed shield, I hoped it would have a bigger shield, but Wolf has been nerfed from what it used to be. Glimmer feels more like the old Wolf, but with HEF instead of skimmer.
Anytime I want Wolf, and I have automated ships, I use Glimmer instead. Glimmer is better than Wolf in almost every way for the same DP cost.
but its obsolete the instant enemy fighters, even talons, hit the field. If a Kite had 2 ballistic slots instead of 1 they would be very close to outclassing Wolves.
Wolf is obsolete the moment any shielded frigate hits the field. Any of the 4 DP frigates with shields and ballistics will kill Wolf in a duel if Wolf tries to use hard-flux energy weapons (and even beams is a slow kill at best), or at least win through PPT timeout if a stalemate otherwise. (They have 240 PPT over Wolf's 180 PPT).
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Going off the wiki so someone shout at me if the numbers are wrong:
Wolf has poor flux dissipation for a high-tech frigate at 150. A Lasher has 140, costs 20% less DP, and uses more efficient ballistics. Brawler is the same cost and has 250 dissipation, 30% more shield health and, 200% more armor. Wolf's big advantage is its mobility and ability to out speed pretty much any other ship at 150 speed + phase skimmer, which is countered by carriers and bigger ships range. I think Wolf's dissipation can be buffed without it becoming overwhelming, as it still has poor defenses.
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Thats pretty much my opinion as well Hatter. Wolves do have good mobility, especially with Unstable Injector, and can harass/double team isolated enemies pretty effectively. They struggle vs shields, but that's an easy problem to fix as the player because you can pair them up with something carrying kinetics - a Kite with a single autocannon or a railgun for the H variant goes really well.
Its just that anomalously low flux! (Plus narrow forward shields with energy pd and very low armor/hull.)
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Since the Wolf is the topic right now:
If you were a dev, what would you change about the Hegemony variant to make it more than a cosmetic recolor?
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Since the Wolf is the topic right now:
If you were a dev, what would you change about the Hegemony variant to make it more than a cosmetic recolor?
Give it the XIV hullmod and 3-5 more OP, probably. Different system/mounts don't make sense for a hegemony skin. And different from other ships, it would be a lot less of a strict upgrade on a Wolf. The speed penalty is a lot more crippling, while the armor bonus is irrelevant.
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That would work - as long as it doesn't get a ballistic mount than the usual XIV adjustments wouldn't be revolutionary. The extra flux would be a good upgrade, but I agree with Amoebka that the speed penalty would be more important than on other XIV ships.
Or if going less a XIV route and more the usual H route as applied to for example the Kite: build in a hullmod that works with the Hegemony style of things. Reinforced Hull for example would be a decent one: its very useful on Wolves just to get their hull a _little_ stronger and guarantee recovery, but the low base hull value means that the total power boost is not too high. Reinforced Hull seems to me to be Heg themed from a flavor perspective, but that could just be me.
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I like to see pirate Wolf get a ballistic for its sole turret, maybe change its system to plasma burn too.
Hegemony Wolf can have Armored Turret Mounts for free like the Hound.
I just want to see the good old standard blue Wolf get better.
They struggle vs shields, but that's an easy problem to fix as the player because you can pair them up with something carrying kinetics - a Kite with a single autocannon or a railgun for the H variant goes really well.
Wolf is not the only ship the gets better when paired up with something else.
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I don't like giving Wolf access to ballistics, because it both dilutes the ship identity and futher masks the underlying issue of energy weapons being complete garbage on their own.
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I don't like giving Wolf access to ballistics, because it both dilutes the ship identity and futher masks the underlying issue of energy weapons being complete garbage on their own.
For normal Wolf, yes. But pirate Wolf? Pirate Shrike already has it, and pirate Wolf is a downgrade while other pirate ships that are not phasers are sidegrades. Pirates have evolved and moved on from being strictly inferior to standard to weird, quirky sidegrades (or simply a red paint job). At this point, pirate Wolf should have some advantage to use beyond standard Wolf aside from costing one less DP.
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I don't like giving Wolf access to ballistics, because it both dilutes the ship identity and futher masks the underlying issue of energy weapons being complete garbage on their own.
They aren't garbage, especially for ships with mobility systems that can close the range. Its mainly an issue with the Wolf and its poor flux. If a Wolf could run an IR Pulse + a Pulse laser, that would be ~450 DPS which is a fine amount of shield DPS for a frigate. The "standard" Pulse Laser + Ion Cannon is 350, which while slightly on the low side is also not bad for a frigate. A mixed armament lasher with 1 railgun, 1 LAG (or 2 light mortars) has ~410 anti-shield DPS before its system for comparison. Regular Shrikes with something like Pulse laser + IR Pulse + AM Blaster (or just 2 IR Pulses if using missiles for the armor breaking) are decently armed for a light destroyer (without counting the excellent medium missiles) with ~600 anti shield DPS, and they could support more than that if they are willing to give up forward PD as their "default" dissipation before skills or hullmods is 550. A mortar + railgun hammerhead is doing ~860 antishield DPS without its system: a bunch more, but its a slower full gunship destroyer (with worse missiles) that costs more OP and has a lower burn, so it better be.
For anti-armor/hull, energy is excellent. AM blasters in the small slots are short ranged and OP expensive, but best in class. Phase Lances are general purpose anti-armor/anti-hull with a 500 hit strength, while heavy blasters are incredible DPS and also 500 hit strength, just at a heavy flux cost. For lockdown, energy has ion cannon/pulser/beam; ballistic just doesn't have that role, though some weapons carry a bit of EMP as a secondary bonus.
The only ship that medium energies are really bad on is imo the Eagle, because its too slow really use the 600 range weapons effectively.
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All energy weapons have appaling flux efficiency and range compared to ballistic counterparts. The only reason it's "fair" is high-tech warships having almost double (!) the flux stats of low-tech ships in the same class.
When you have a high-tech that doesn't have the doubled flux stats (i.e. Wolf), you can't do much with it. DPS numbers are only relevant when the ship has enough dissipation to fire continuosly, which isn't the case for most high-tech loadouts.
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Seems like the obvious solution here is to throw 50-100 extra dissipation on the base Wolf and see what happens with a couple of these fits in the simulator.
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I didn't even know there was a hegemony wolf. Never saw one.
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If you were a dev, what would you change about the Hegemony variant to make it more than a cosmetic recolor?
Hmm.
I don't think giving the Wolf a ballistic or hybrid mount is a good idea, and while making the missile mounts composites without actually giving it any more flux sounds hilariously stupid, it's probably not a good idea, either.
The Hegemony militarized civvie ships all get a free Militarized Systems, which is neat, but that's a hull mod with mixed benefits and penalties, and assigned to ships that are mostly for logistics use. Unless we're going to do something real dumb like building in Shield Shunt, there's not a lot of comparable mods that seem appropriate for a Heg Wolf.
... Probably I'd just stick "Efficiency Overhaul" on them and call it a day; it makes them strictly superior to other Wolves, but not in a high-impact way, and it's the kind of upgrade the Hegemony is both fond of and doesn't imply they've got better ability with technology when compared to their rivals still using baseline Wolves. Maybe cut a point off their OP, so the mod is discounted rather than free.
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I would not use Hegemony Wolf if it lost OP for built-in Efficiency Overhaul. Hound has built-in Armored Weapon Mounts and +4 OP.
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Since the Wolf is the topic right now:
If you were a dev, what would you change about the Hegemony variant to make it more than a cosmetic recolor?
Give it the XIV hullmod and 3-5 more OP, probably. Different system/mounts don't make sense for a hegemony skin. And different from other ships, it would be a lot less of a strict upgrade on a Wolf. The speed penalty is a lot more crippling, while the armor bonus is irrelevant.
but hegemony ships are not necessarily XIV ships