Fractal Softworks Forum
Starsector => General Discussion => Topic started by: sotanaht on April 02, 2015, 11:14:08 AM
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A trend I'm pretty sure started in the base game with the Venture, most moderately-armed carriers lack the "Carrier" help tag. This means that they cannot be given carrier waypoints, they charge into battle whether you want them to or not, and any mod functions that rely on the tag (expanded flight decks from SS+) don't work.
While the trend started with the base game, it can be found in most mod fleets.
In my opinion, Carriers should ALWAYS tend towards the edge of combat. Heavily armed carriers can attempt to fight from the fringes, but no carrier should ever be in the middle of the fighting. I personally want better armed carriers even at the edges so that they are better able to fight off any ships that come their way, while still not attempting to persue and risk their precious flight decks.
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Optimized combat carriers should be allowed to slug it out if the player wants to. If I deploy an Odyssey, I want it to seek and destroy anything that is not a battleship.
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I think the carrier tag is fine as it stands - there is a big difference between dedicated carriers and ships like the Venture or Odyssey (Ventures are incredibly tough - one of the things that makes them a good carrier is that they repair on the front lines, at least imo).
As for how mods interact with the ships... I'm reasonably sure the mods could be searching to see if the flight deck number is different from 0, rather than if it has the carrier tag. I could be wrong though. Either way, perhaps its working as intended that not all ships with flight decks can get the expanded decks.
If you don't want them to charge in then you can set a rally point for them (and for the carriers too if you would like, no need to use different ones).
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If you don't want them to charge in then you can set a rally point for them (and for the carriers too if you would like, no need to use different ones).
That doesn't actually work. I try all sorts of rally points, but then I find the ship halfway across the map chasing after something stupid.
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You need to actually select the ship and right-click it onto the rally point. Both "rally task force" and "rally carrier" will do the job.
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I believe you can also make a group of ships by selecting them with shift and then control# to hotkey. You can then just click the number hotket, then right click the map. The groups last between battles as well.
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I believe you can also make a group of ships by selecting them with shift and then control# to hotkey. You can then just click the number hotket, then right click the map. The groups last between battles as well.
Yeah I figured that out. I was actually somewhat impressed by how well laid out the command controls were. I've played full RTS games with worse.
And yes, I know how to give rally point orders. Ships just completely ignore them whenever an enemy is in sight, to the point where they will chase that enemy all the way across the map in spite of the order telling them to stay put. I'm mostly hoping that the carrier AI will be less aggressively suicidal, but that's probably a vain hope anyway.
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Given the modular nature of loadouts - even with the hardcoded number of flight decks, you might be crazy enough to outfit an Astral as a brawler, the game gives you the means to do so - it would be preferable to have a framework for ship tags to be used by the player. Tags should work similar to Variants, but alter the AI towards certain goals and behaviours, telling it how and if to respond to certain fleet commands.
Carrier, Assault, Support, Tank, Sniper, Interceptor, Point Capture, etc. Along with a possible Aggressive, Balanced, Defensive setting.
SS+ already removed the restriction for Carrier-only hullmods, so that's a non-issue now.
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I'm against forcing anything with a flight deck to try to avoid the enemy. Ventures and Odysseys are prime examples of ships which are first and foremost direct combatants but which have a secondary carrier function, and forcing these vessels to try to avoid the enemy would largely prevent them from functioning properly. If I want a single flight deck that hides off in a corner, I'll try for a Gemini or a Condor; Ventures and especially Odysseys cost too much to deploy to be worth it without the contribution of their guns, and on top of that the Venture has one of the most durable hulls in the game.
I agree with Schwartz that it'd be better to have some kind of behavior setting.
SS+ already removed the restriction for Carrier-only hullmods, so that's a non-issue now.
What carrier-only hullmods?
And yes, I know how to give rally point orders. Ships just completely ignore them whenever an enemy is in sight, to the point where they will chase that enemy all the way across the map in spite of the order telling them to stay put. I'm mostly hoping that the carrier AI will be less aggressively suicidal, but that's probably a vain hope anyway.
This isn't my experience. My experience is that ships stay within a certain distance of a rally point, but that that distance is rather large. The leash, at least in my experience, is two grid squares or something like that.
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You need to actually select the ship and right-click it onto the rally point. Both "rally task force" and "rally carrier" will do the job.
I tried this before, but ships often ignore that to try to fight ships in sight. The only way I can fool the AI to do what you say once it is close enough to an enemy is to order an escort on a ship already at the rally point. For example, I rally a frigate to a point to move it away from the skilled battleship approaching. Frigate decides it knows better and tries to fight the killer battleship.
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What carrier-only hullmods?
Expanded Flight Decks, which halves rearm and rebuild time for fighter wings at the cost of high OP and some logistics increase.
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What carrier-only hullmods?
Expanded Flight Decks, which halves rearm and rebuild time for fighter wings at the cost of high OP and some logistics increase.
Something from a mod, then.
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I'm against forcing anything with a flight deck to try to avoid the enemy. Ventures and Odysseys are prime examples of ships which are first and foremost direct combatants but which have a secondary carrier function, and forcing these vessels to try to avoid the enemy would largely prevent them from functioning properly. If I want a single flight deck that hides off in a corner, I'll try for a Gemini or a Condor; Ventures and especially Odysseys cost too much to deploy to be worth it without the contribution of their guns, and on top of that the Venture has one of the most durable hulls in the game.
I agree with Schwartz that it'd be better to have some kind of behavior setting.
SS+ already removed the restriction for Carrier-only hullmods, so that's a non-issue now.
What carrier-only hullmods?
And yes, I know how to give rally point orders. Ships just completely ignore them whenever an enemy is in sight, to the point where they will chase that enemy all the way across the map in spite of the order telling them to stay put. I'm mostly hoping that the carrier AI will be less aggressively suicidal, but that's probably a vain hope anyway.
This isn't my experience. My experience is that ships stay within a certain distance of a rally point, but that that distance is rather large. The leash, at least in my experience, is two grid squares or something like that.
Are you high? Ventures are terrible close combat ships. They have poor shields, very slow move speed, and with a grand total of 3 medium ballistic+energy weapon slots (0 smalls) that don't even face in the same direction they are worse than most frigates in direct firepower.
What they ARE good for is long range fire support. 2 medium missiles and fast missile racks makes them a good LRM platform. Between that and the flight deck, and the ability to defend itself against extremely light threats, the venture is an okay ship. But only as long as it skirts the edge at near max LRM range.
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Venture has approximately destroyer level firepower (possibly more if including missiles), and can beat down a wide-variety of targets. Its main weakness is slow speed. If it gets overmatched, kiss it goodbye. Venture should be armed with something that can overpower small targets that try to sack it.
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It's not that bad, but the rust bucket aesthetic has admittedly kept me from using it. Just kidding, it's lovely David! What's kept me from using it is that it's a hybrid and my fleet tends to rely on specialists.
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Ventures are good close combat ships - I won't say great, but only because of their speed. Pretty much anything can get away from it. That said, the ship is monstrously tough - almost capital level armor and hull. Also, the closer it is to combat the faster fighters get back in the action.
Put a Heavy Blaster on the front - Voila, it has destroyer level firepower. Now take off one of the side flaks and put on a kinetic gun - suddenly the ship is very very dangerous.
The missiles don't have to be LRMs - I very much like the 5 shot reapers on it. Get brawling with an enemy cruiser, take some hits but drive up its flux, then flood it with 6 torpedoes. No more enemy cruiser. Granted this is better done as the player, and LRM's are a dependable choice for the AI.
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I like to give my Ventures all Harpoons. A full volley of harpoons can overload and destroy most Destroyers.