This is just a short list of stuff that, IMO, needs to be looked at for gameplay and polish' sake in future updates.
BalancingIN GENERAL, Tri-Tachyon ships are the best right now and not much can match them. Adding some more useful Low-Tech and Midline ships is probably needed.
1) The Xyphos Heavy Fighter generates so much flux that it renders it's shield almost useless. It also lacks enough speed, hull, and armor, and squad size to make it survivable. It frequently loses to much weaker fighters and non-point-defense Destroyers/Frigates. Boosting these fighters by adding some speed, armor, flux dissapation, or something similar is needed.
2) The Trident has similar issues. Due to slow speed, weak hull, a near-useless shield, and small squad size, it seldom survives more than a single torpedo run. They need slightly more speed and armor to be usable. Currently the Dagger torpedo bombers are superior to them in almost every way, including raw damage-per-torpedo-run, squad size, and speed.
3) The Longbow Support Fighters are junk. They don't seem to do anything and have almost no survivability. I don't know what exactly needs done, but SOMETHING does.
4) The Brawler is too slow and cumbersome to catch any Frigates that they could destroy. And they don't have the shields/armor to tackle anything big enough for them to catch. Also, lack of any rear defenses makes them missile bait.
5) The Sunder has armor and hull far too weak for it's size and tends to die very early in a battle.
6) Broadsword Heavy Fighters are too good. Their dual MGs overload shields on even capital ships in seconds, leaving them helpless. It almost lets them effortlessly destroy Xyphos' and Tridents.
7) Thunder Heavy Fighters need a bit of adjustment too. They're already the fastest fighters in the game, with good Armor and Hull, but their real issue is that their ion-cannon weapon lets them disable other fighters in only a couple of shots, making them artificially good at taking out almost every other fighter out there.
Gameplay/Bugfixes1) Some mechanic to lock Omni-shields in place. I have a topic created about this. (
http://fractalsoftworks.com/forum/index.php?topic=1710.0)
2) Fix the annoying bug where something shows up on sensors, but when you go to the tactical map, it vanishes as "Out of range"
3) Fix the bug where multiple fighters try to dock at the same carrier, ignoring all others (To be fair, this doesn't seem to occur very often for me anymore, but it does still occasionally occur!)
4) Allow right-clicking on ships in the tactical map to have the camera follow them the same way it does if you left-click (Which opens a menu), then close the menu. This would allow snapping between ships easily if you're "Commanding" more than fighting in a battle.
5) Make PD weapons able to focus exclusively on Point Defense (Anti-Fighter and Anti-Missile) tasks, so they don't waste time, ammo, and flux on big targets they hardly hurt.
Content1) More Strike Weapons, including some sort of ballistic non-bomb Strike Weapon.
2) More Medium Missiles. Currently, we really only have the Pilum and some Pod versions of small missiles. Adding some new, unique missiles (Or torpedos!) would be great. Maybe even adding some 1-shot versions of Large missiles like the MIRV.
3) "Missileboat" Frigates and Destroyers. Lots of missile slots, few other weapon slots.
4) Some sort of AoE Energy PD weapons, similar to Flak.
5) Some "Fast" Low-Tech and Midline ships that can match Hyperions and Tempests in speed, if not efficiency.
6) More, better armed Low-Tech Frigates that have firepower to rival Hyperions and Tempests. Currently the only Low-Tech ships that field Medium hardpoints are the Brawler and Hound, and the only Midline is the Vigilance. We need low-tech and midline ships that are as known and feared as the Hyperion and Tempest. Some definitively purposed "Strike" and "Assault" ships would be ideal.
7) More "Slow, but powerful" High-Tech ships. Currently they're all about hit and run. They need some that are about staying power and endurance.
More versatility in the tech levels in general. For example, low-tech lacks a "Fast attack" frigate, high-tech lacks any carrier but the Astral, any frighters/tankers whatsoever, and any Destroyer but the Medusa.
More "Ambient Fleets" that do their own thing. Miner fleets that hang around Asteroids and fight back with mining drones, mining blasters, and mining lasers. Merchant fleets full of Buffalos, Geminis, and Atlas' move between stations and are juicy, but heavily-defended targets. The infamous Cult of Lud could even make an appearance.
9) Cruiser-Sized dedicated Carriers with 2 Flight Decks. Currently it jumps from the 1-flight deck dedicated Destroyer Carriers to the 3-flight deck Astral dedicated carrier Capital Ship.
10) A "War Room", where you can set up and save your own customized missions.
11) A "Tech Room", where you can set up and save your own customized Ship Variants, which can be used in missions or loaded in-game. It would feature a...
12) "Testing Simulator", where you can try out variants of ships, either against static targets or in mock battles, to see how they handle, how their weapons work, how the flux builds, ect...before you take them into the field.
I'm not picking on the game or criticizing anything. I'm just saying that these few things would make for a MASSIVE improvement for me, IMO, and shouldn't be too outlandish to work towards.
