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1

General Discussion / Re: Anything desperately in need of Balance Pass next version (Add yours here)

« on: January 09, 2025, 11:42:04 AM »

I think it's best both squall and especially harpoons stay untouched. Neither of them is a problem on their own, but especially in nerfing harpoons range there is a significant amount of collateral damage to be done. Too little range with that missile speed and they simply won't connect anymore, especially when equipped on ships like Mora or escort package Manticore, both of which prefer to stay at long range. If their range gets reduced, they absolutely need a projectile speed boost, which in turn might necessitate a projectile health reduction so pd can have a chance against them and so on.

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General Discussion / Re: Anything desperately in need of Balance Pass next version (Add yours here)

« on: January 09, 2025, 10:05:38 AM »

If there is something that *desperately* needs balancing, it has to be the gryphon. Missile spam gryphon is still pretty ridiculous. This may be a problem inherent to harpoons and squalls, but it doesn't seem to present a serious balance issue when they are used anywhere else. I haven't seen anyone go out of their way to demonstrate such a problem, at least.

How would one re-balance the gryphon without ruining it? It seems fair as a support ship in mixed fleet compositions, but presents an issue when you spam mostly gryphons. Well, how about giving it a built-in escort package, and reducing its OP by 15? Basically forcing it to pay for a hullmod that missile-spam doesn't want, while it could get value out of it in a more normal fleet composition.

I view this ship in the same way as I've come to view safety overrides in general: A way to make the game easier but much more boring (Though I have to say having an option like this in a game isn't necessarily bad). Linking squall and harpoons to force it to fire harpoons whenever feels like I'm cheating, as does using more than three gryphons in a single fleet to reach critical mass. Using both I might as well set everything on autopilot and go get groceries.

Without spamming them and without linking harpoons to whichever large missile I'm using the ship feels quite alright. Not too strong, not too weak, and with clear weaknesses and strengths. I'm not sure if it should be balanced around monofleets/abusing linked harpoons, as it would most likely make it weak when used "ethically".

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General Discussion / Re: Anything desperately in need of Balance Pass next version (Add yours here)

« on: January 04, 2025, 10:26:52 AM »

I did indeed not specify that everything I listed I meant with player skills, officers, smods, everything the game lets the player use. This basically means that what I say is based on mid to late game player fleets, where the expectation is at least two s-mods, a level 5 officer (or support doctrine), and flux regulation unlocked.

So yeah, it might be true that omen without systems expertise isn't a problem. I still think combined with sys.ex. it's too strong, though. I just played a few fights against bounties and remnants without having my omens officered, and the difference is noticeable. Maybe it's the extra *range* sys.ex. gives that makes it so strong? Right now I think an officered omen is more anti-everything than a specialized support ship due to its ability to duel other frigates with EMP emitter, and my omens rarely die either due to maxed caps + hardened shields + unstable injector, but without officers they take too long to kill other frigates and as such are more in line with what I guess they're supposed to be (support ships).

I don't like the idea of changing the omens missile slot to a synergy one: I feel like missile autoloader is one of the more interesting mods to use, while not being too strong. As far as I know it's not even "meta", as the omen likes so many other mods (Hardened subsystems, hardened shields, unstable injector, flux coil adjunct, accelerated shields, solar shielding) and a salamander in the missile slot is actually quite decent due to free ECCM.

A stationary EMP emitter is an interesting idea, but might be too much of a nerf for omen and too much a buff for shade. Phase ships in general seem to be a bit of a difficult subject. Most players find them unfun to fight, and what's more important in a game, regardless of actual balance? Hard to say, a change as big as that would require testing I think.

My opinion on railgun might be similarly skewed, as there's basically two cases in which I use it: On frigates intended to duel other frigates, such as centurion and lasher, and on bigger ships with large ballistics for HE damage, such as onslaught and manticore. On the former it doesn't have the problem of the "warmup" causing shots to miss, because the range is short enough that the shots hit anyway. On the latter I always pair it with elite ballistics mastery, where the higher shot speed means they won't miss. This is in contrast to the light autocannon: I found it still misses a lot even with elite BM at a range, and for frigates it doesn't do quite enough damage, requiring the frigate to use another weapon to deal with armor and hull. This is also why I don't think  "dps per OP" is a good metric to use, as it disregards both the weapons other properties as well as the fact that weapon slots have a baseline value and opportunity cost. With the dps per OP approach the likes of light machine gun, light mortar and mining laser would be amazing weapons.

Light needler is a good weapon, I would call it a sidegrade to railgun. However, it costs an OP more and necessitates another weapon for armor and hull. If railgun and needler shared a cost, I'm not even sure if the light needler would be the correct pick most of the time. Back when railgun was 8 OP, I don't think ballistic mastery and more importantly its elite effect existed. I believe elite BM benefits railguns more, as it allows them to accurately shred frigates at range without need for HE. As it is, I'm still not convinced railgun is not in need of a slight tweak.

I have played with lots of different Scarab builds too, it's been one of my favourite ships ever since tempest lost its old ship system. I find that right now it has three major problems:

-Locked into small energy weapons for damage
-temporal shell drains peak performance
-Remnants punish overextension harder than ever in this version, and scarab often overextends with temporal shell.

This is how I go about building a scarab with these in mind. First, as a frigate in a mid-late environment, it really wants max capacitors and hardened shields to avoid being popped. -20 OP. Hardened subsystems is a must for 180 PPT with a ship system that drains it further. -5 OP. Low base speed needs help, frigates are good with it anyways, and this type of ship doesn't suffer from the downside at all, -5 OP for unstable injector. Frontal shield conversion to not die against fighters and when flanking/diving, -3 OP. Tell me if you think some of this isn't necessary, but I really feel like every frigate needs to max durability now because of how brilliants and novas are. This puts a heavy strain on the scarab, even when using S-mods, because small energy slots aren't that good at killing things on their own. It leaves very little OP for actual offensive systems, which usually leads me to using weird *** like 3x burst pd+HSA+S-mod expanded mags or just two antimatter blasters as the main weapon and leaving all other slots empty, which just feels kinda bad, especially in a prolonged battle.

One good thing I have to say about the scarab is that it's probably the best ship in the game at utilizing non-missile omega weapons. It's amazing with shock repeaters and a minipulser, but then again, I'm not sure if omega weapons should be taken into account when discussing balance.

4

General Discussion / Re: Anything desperately in need of Balance Pass next version (Add yours here)

« on: January 03, 2025, 03:45:56 PM »

Balance is really quite good right now. Especially happy with escort package and missile autoloader. Wishing for other things like those in the future. However, there are still things that could use some tweaks. I would not call any of these "desperately in need of balance pass" but rather a wishlist-ish thing.

Omen
Overpowered. I'm convinced the ship system is the problem. 100% hit rate, hard flux, low flux cost, EMP, decent damage to frigate-grade armor and hull, clears fighters and missiles, low cd... the list goes on. 8 DP omen doesn't sound right, so I think the ship system should be nerfed in a way that hurts the shade as little as possible. I think EMP emitter damage against shields should be changed to soft flux.

Afflictor(p)
Overpowered. Simply too good at 6 DP, similarly due to its immensenly powerful ship system. Definitely deserving of 8DP deployment cost, so that the normal afflictor can stay as it is. Alternatively it could have its ordnance points drastically lowered, to 30 or so, so that it at least couldn't get all of AMB+max caps+two needlers.

Scarab
Underpowered. It was nerfed from 60 to 55 ordnance points in 0.95.1a, and while the nerf was deserved at the time, other ships and playstyles have caught up and surpassed the wolfpack tactics fleets of that time. As of now, scarab feels weak for 8 DP. It should have its 5 OP back. Another thing I would like to see on the scarab is to have its two back small energy slots given better firing arcs. At the moment I think they're best left empty, but changing the arcs to something like the middle slots on a centurion would make them usable, and likely open up some interesting new builds.

Railgun
Very slightly outperforms alternatives in the small ballistic slot. Was changed from 7 to 8 and then back to 7 OP before, so meddling with the cost is probably not a good idea. What I suggest is to lower its damage per projectile, then buff its firing rate and flux cost, so that its performance against shields is unchanged but performance against armor lowered.

IR autolance
While situational, when it's good it's amazing. Just a bit too good for how cheap it is. Moving from 8 to 9 OP would do the trick, I think.

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General Discussion / Re: [0.97a] Post Your Endgame Fleets Here!

« on: February 23, 2024, 09:22:40 AM »

Hey tseikk1,

have you tested the medusa with Smod expanded magazines vs. Smod SC-Front?
Or is it just preference?

Yeah, I used the same medusa build except -3 mining lasers +2 burst pd lasers last patch, and with expanded magazines s-modded in instead of SC-front. I'm pretty sure it's a little more powerful that way, since the medusa can handle the extra flux.

The main reason I tried S-modded SC-front this time was because I wanted to see how high I could stack defensive modifiers like the new elite system expertise and cybernetic augmentation. I also wanted to try out multiple different loadouts, so I went with generalist S-mods.

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General Discussion / Re: [0.97a] Post Your Endgame Fleets Here!

« on: February 21, 2024, 08:27:46 PM »

Here's my "High tech basic b- , but with a little spice" fleet.
I know what some will think. "Oh, a flagship Paragon, and an Astral behind it? How original. And a couple Omens too!? Daring today, aren't we." And I'd be inclined to agree. However, there is beauty in simplicity, and for someone who's played the game a lot before but sucks at piloting this fleet was really neat to play around with. Oh, and also, escort package Doom.

In general I'm very happy how it turned out. There were multiple things I wanted from it:
1. Complete any and all content in the game. Doritos, ordos, ziggurat, stations, bounties from all factions, the new colony crisis fleets from all factions, everything.
2. To test out new things, such as escort package, cybernetic augmentation and changed weapons and skills.
3. Player pilot a ship that doesn't rely on speed.
4. Require little micro/be easy to play.
5. Be able to easily change into a stealth fleet.
6. Have ships that are effective as part of the fleet as well as with limited teammates. (Meaning I don't want to deploy my whole fleet for every fight)
7. Have ships that are available from the early game (In this case Medusas and Omens)
8. Have multiple different kinds of ships in it. Monofleets (or really anything with more than 5 of the same thing) are incredibly boring.

It delivered. I struggled a little before my officers started leveling up and getting system expertise. After that everything became a cakewalk.
In battle the main strategy is this: Right at the start, escort order on the Paragon for both Dooms and the Astral. Capture order on each control point. Search and destroy on Medusas. Every ship will be doing roughly what they're supposed to do, leaving the player to focus on piloting the Paragon. Omens, Medusas and the Afflictor will mostly be doing their own thing - dueling and destroying anything their size or smaller, while capturing points and ganging up on bigger targets.

Player skills

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Fleet

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Flagship Paragon

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The player piloted Paragon leads the Astral and Dooms into battle. The build itself is quite basic, the most spicy thing about it probably the IR autolances. But there was actually a surprisingly satisfying amount of skill expression for a bad/middling pilot such as myself. Venting and armor/hull tanking at the correct time, focusing a vulnerable target with tachyon lances and IR autolances by pressing R while shooting another with hardpoint plasma cannons, maximizing value from Energy Weapon Mastery by getting close to tougher targets while not overloading, timing attacks together with Doom's mines or Astral's bombers, using the shield to protect said bombers, actually learning to use an omni shield properly (It's much easier to use on a slow battleship with good firing arcs unlike on a, say, Aurora), and of course flicking fortress shield on and off to safely vent soft flux and avoid damage.

Astral

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The Astral build is also very standard I think, nothing special. Some kinetic pressure from squalls and longbows, great damage from triple tridents, some beams. The medium pd lasers in the back probably aren't necessary, but oh well.

Doom

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The Doom build is something that required quite a bit of cooking. It went through multiple iterations and tests, as well as more than a couple hours spent in the refit screen. The first question mark has got to be the kinetic damage dealer: why light autocannons? At first I tried dual light autocannons, but quickly moved away from them. 100 less range hurts - especially since it's base range and I wanted to use range boosters and phase lances. (I also tried Ion beams, but they did not convince me.) Not to mention the DLAC is still horribly inaccurate even in a hardpoint, and costs an ordnance point more. I then tried light needlers, the usual go-to. It didn't feel bad, but it didn't feel particularly good either. They're for sure better for a more classic doom build, but I wanted something different. Also, they're very expensive. I then tried railguns, and moved away from them even quicker than I did from DLACs. The difference in flux was extremely noticeable, and the Doom can use both its flux and its OP for better things. The result was regular light autocannons. They actually surprised me with how accurate and cost efficient they were, and I was satisfied.

Then came the hullmods. I wanted Escort Package, that's the whole thing I built the ship around. I also wanted to test the buffed phase lances. To capitalise on Escort Package, I decided to run Advanced Optics and Integrated Targeting unit. Heavy armor is something I'm a big fan of on the Doom, especially when S-modded and paired with an Impact Mitigation officer and some maneuverability buffs. I also wanted to get Adaptive Phase Coils, as I believe it's too good to drop due to how much safer it makes the ship, and then as many capacitors as possible. All these hullmods left me unable to get Resistant Flux Conduits (though I still wonder if it would be worth it to drop some caps for it), and basically meant I'd have no support for missiles. At first I tried some Gorgons - the AI just spammed all of them at the first target without need. Left were Salamanders and Pilums. I tested both, and Pilums were the winner, easily. They have a surprising amount of synergy with this build, even. Their ability to create space and EMP engines and weapons through shields can make ships prime targets for some mine spam, or devastating firepower from the flagship Paragon. Also, salamanders kinda just suck.

Medusa

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The Medusa build is very strong. Ever since the chance to S-modded extended shields, the Medusa has been my favorite destroyer, and now it's even stronger. I think this build does everything. It now has insane 0.3 flux/damage 360 degree shields to protect it's fragile armor and hull from fighters (the main weakness it had in the past) and chip damage when flanked or when diving to eliminate targets. It's high base speed and the phase skimmer system with systems expertise means it can chase and kill all kinds of opposing ships, while also being very difficult to kill. It's got great burst damage with kinetic, energy and anti armor, lots of EMP, lots of OP, and amazing base flux stats almost fitting for a light cruiser.

Omen

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The Omen is an amazing multipurpose frigate, and if you just max capacitors and give it an antimatter blaster you're set. My version also has the Missile Autoloader mod - I'm not quite certain if it's optimal, but it sure is fun. Wolfpack tactics + Target Analysis + Cybernetic Augmentation means those Reapers HURT. It can do multiple things, duel and beat other frigates and capture points, EMP and shove a reaper up some poor low tech ship's behind, or quickly come to help the main force if needed.

The Omen is, frankly, just overpowered. It has just one weakness, and that's Harbingers. Everything else it's good or at least okay against. It never dies due to it's strong shield and deep flux pool, it's too quick to be chased, it's small so it dodges a lot of damage (tachyon lances could be dangerous, but I've never, ever seen my omens actually hit by that weapon, because it turns so slowly), It can't be ignored due to EMP emitter, it wins duels because EMP emitter is flux free hard flux damage... And unlike every other frigate, it also doesn't die to fighters, thanks to EMP emitter.

Afflictor(p)

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The Afflictor is there to act as a force multiplier. Just a single Afflictor makes something like an Invictus much faster to take down. With Helmsmanship, Coordinated Maneuvers and Phase Coil Tuning it's also comically fast. Perfect for capturing that third control point at the start of a battle. The build is, again, very simple. Max caps, Adaptive Phase Coils, Hardened Subsystems. In hindsight I should've given it a steady personality officer, and probably switched the EWM skill for something else.

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General Discussion / Officers are a pain!

« on: July 15, 2023, 10:10:28 AM »

Changing combat personality costs a story point, up to THREE if going from timid to aggressive for example.

Choosing the skills you want costs a story point. But you still aren't guaranteed to get what you want. Trained an officer to level 6 all the way from 1? Didn't get the skills you wanted, even after spending a point? Too bad.

Making skills elite costs a story point PER SKILL.

Promoting promising officers from fleet costs a story point.

No way to change officers skills, leaving 99% of cryopod officers entirely useless, even the rare level 7's.

Officers are still uncommon enough that it takes me a good chunk of midgame just flying from place to place looking for level 1 officers.


What is the purpose of the current officer system? It for sure can't be lore, in the story the player is surrounded by incredibly competent crew. Surely we can have someone equip the new kid with Gunnery Implants, or tell them not to pilot their ship as if they're suicidal without these being considered "exceptional feats".
An argument could be made for balance... Except the newest update just added a way of getting 100+ DP worth of ships piloted by alpha cores for no skill investment.
Is it vision? Are officers supposed to be scarce? Then why is every non-player fleet (even pirates) and their dogs running with more and higher leveled officers than the player could get?

If you didn't guess, I'm not a big fan of how officers work in this game. I think they should be less rare, I should be able to choose their skills and personalities freely and I should be able to retrain them if I wanted to.

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General Discussion / Re: Support doctrine, wolfpack and frigate armor

« on: January 13, 2022, 04:50:49 PM »

It would be cool if wolfpack tactics worked more similarly to the carrier skills, as in you could get a small effect without officers and a larger one with officers.

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General Discussion / Re: The best wolfpack - Hyperion Vs End game(Space Dorito, Ziggurat, unique bounty)

« on: January 13, 2022, 08:17:54 AM »

Yeah, and in that video the hyperions did a lot worse. Barely beating the 1m bounty with you manually clearing most fighters. Without player piloting you would've lost that 100%.

Hyperion without SO is utter garbage so don't use it without SO. Even with elite helmsmanship you need to drop shield before using teleport which is too dangerous, not to mention you can't really deal significant damage due to limited weapon choice.

This is an odd claim to make while barely clearing the content with high losses while doing most of the heavy lifting in a player piloted supership.
I'd love to see you clearing that 1000DP ordo, in vanilla, with all SO, without doing 3/4 of the work yourself. What I'm trying to say is the player can make any fleet comp or ship build work, claim it's "the best", when all they do is player pilot (albeit skillfully) a solo carry ship and/or use mods. Heck, a certain member of the community even SOLO'D doritos in a Doom. Maybe this means the best fleet is having no fleet at all?

Because losing 1 Hyperion and some junk Aurora I salvaged or 0 Hyperion against Dorito and Ziggurat is "barely clearing content with heavy losses", and according to Detailed Combat report I contributed only 15% damage. I suppose 3/4 means 15%, damn mad math.

You can see kill logs on the upper left side by the way, which is about 95% kills done by AI.

I'd love to see you clearing entire end game content without taking any "heavy losses" like losing even 1 ship, without player controlled. Your fleet must be extremely strong.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fzp_hgMmUDU


Anyway, here's 1100 DP ordo battle only done by AI. I hope you don't say I'm cheating because I used tactics instead of brainlessly watching it.
 
I admit without legend mod it's kinda dangerous due to low CR, but then again you don't have to fight 1100 DP by going to high danger system and stacking them intentionally. It actually felt more fun because it felt like playing Total War game set in space. These things can move from opposite of map within 10 second so they are essentially like super cavalry, but I also made some dumb decisions here and there.

 it also seems like 2x speed make AI more likely go commit suicide by deactivating shield when they are right next to ship about to go blow up.

By barely clearing the content I specifically meant the doritos fights, and especially the part where they split up as fighters and you clear them. But yes, this is impressive, provided this is indeed vanilla.

I'm really surprised the fight went so well for you. I was almost certain you'd either run out of ppt or have more casualties due to random malfunctions screwing you over. Neither happened. 30-40DP worth of stuff lost is usually what I manage with smaller double ordos (although they are almost always non-smodded glimmers), but the best result with 1000+ dp I got was 62, with similar levels of command point usage as shown in your video.  I'm wondering how your hyperions managed to keep their CR so high during all that fighting. It also feels kind of wrong to see SO hyperions fight for what I believe in real time is 14+ min? When I tried to use SO with my hyperions they straight up didn't last long enough to finish the fight.

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General Discussion / Re: The best wolfpack - Hyperion Vs End game(Space Dorito, Ziggurat, unique bounty)

« on: January 12, 2022, 04:47:01 AM »

This is before I disabled mods though so I'm a bit overpowered.

That's important point. Any balance claim on heavily modded content is kinda null and void.

First video is mods disabled as stated on the subtitle. It's also not heavily modded as it doesn't have any faction mod or weapon/ship pack.

Yeah, and in that video the hyperions did a lot worse. Barely beating the 1m bounty with you manually clearing most fighters. Without player piloting you would've lost that 100%.

Hyperion without SO is utter garbage so don't use it without SO. Even with elite helmsmanship you need to drop shield before using teleport which is too dangerous, not to mention you can't really deal significant damage due to limited weapon choice.

This is an odd claim to make while barely clearing the content with high losses while doing most of the heavy lifting in a player piloted supership.
I'd love to see you clearing that 1000DP ordo, in vanilla, with all SO, without doing 3/4 of the work yourself. What I'm trying to say is the player can make any fleet comp or ship build work, claim it's "the best", when all they do is player pilot (albeit skillfully) a solo carry ship and/or use mods. Heck, a certain member of the community even SOLO'D doritos in a Doom. Maybe this means the best fleet is having no fleet at all?

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General Discussion / Re: Need some wolfpack tactics ship builds

« on: January 11, 2022, 09:10:26 AM »

You'll want at least Target Analysis, Energy Weapon Mastery and Systems Expertise on all of your officers. Rest is up to you. I don't have the patience to retrain officers, so usually I just mentor them to aggressive and go with the skills I get.

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General Discussion / [shitpost]Speculating next patch

« on: January 11, 2022, 04:10:47 AM »

It might be time.

13

General Discussion / Re: Need some wolfpack tactics ship builds

« on: January 11, 2022, 03:47:29 AM »

Here are some of the builds I used in my last campaign - stripped of their story point upgrades. Some extra advice regarding wolfpack tactics: Try to have all aggressive officers, except if using the Eradicator, in which case you should go with reckless.

I feel like some of these ships really need those story point upgrades, as without them, they look to be performing worse than some of their simulator counterparts in testing.  The Medusa builds for example seem to lose out to their Medusa counterpart in the simulator (done from mission interface, so no skills involved on either side).  Or is this more of needs to be used in a full fleet setting to see the effectiveness?  They just feel over fluxed with their baseline capacity filling up really fast.  S-mods obviously would help allow you to put more vents and capacitors in.

Also, some of the flux capacitor/vent choices seem unusual to me.  For example with the Hyperion it has 1340 flux dissipation, but only 1190 flux build up with weapons and shield.  Seems like you could shift at least 8 vents over to caps, increasing flux available for  shields from 8,480 to 10,080, an increase of 18%, while still staying flux neutral with the shield up.  That's like throwing another hardened shield mod on the ship.  Is there a reason it needs that extra 160 flux dissipation per second?

These ships are built with the intention of using eliminate orders to pick off single ships one by one, they aren't meant to 1v1 anything bigger or even same size as them. That isn't the wolfpack tactics way. I consider simulator 1v1's (or 1vx) to be largely useless, as they aren't a representation of a realistic battle, especially with a wolfpack fleet. Some ships are also designed to cover up for others weaknesses - some of my ships lack finishing potential, some have antimatter blasters. Some lack EMP, others have nothing but. Many lack PD, which the PD medusa covers. Of course using 28 OP to fill in burst lasers is useless in a sim 1v1.

There are two reasons why all my ships are overfluxed: 1. Energy weapons mastery. I actually think no fast ship really wants to be flux neutral. Especially ones that benefit from EWM. It's better to build for hit & run burst. 2. The nature of how my fleet performs is ships will go in on a target, fire all their weapons until close to max flux (receiving bonus from EWM this way), then falling back while another takes its place. It's a lethal cycle the AI is pretty good at doing with speedy enough ships - Phase skimmer, phase teleporter, time accelerator, SO speedboost and Coordinated Maneuvers speed boost help with this.

Three reasons for why hyperion has vents:
1. EWM. I want it to build up hard flux faster for more damage.
2. Vents are twice as much value with SO
3. The build is actually slightly wrong. I was just recently doing the AI pilot-only 1000dp ordo challenge, where I was using non-SO hyperions for more PPT. The "correct" SO build would actually have a second heavy blaster in the place of the ion pulser. I simply forgot to put it in.

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General Discussion / Re: Need some wolfpack tactics ship builds

« on: January 10, 2022, 05:25:52 PM »

My favourite subject. Wolfpack tactics imo is the most fun way to play the game.
Here are some of the builds I used in my last campaign - stripped of their story point upgrades. Some extra advice regarding wolfpack tactics: Try to have all aggressive officers, except if using the Eradicator, in which case you should go with reckless.

THE BASIC WOLF: Don't s-mod these ever, and get rid of them as soon as you can get something better. Really weak flux stats and bad shield make this one not good in even mid-game encounters

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THE BASIC OMEN: Consider assigning officers with Systems Expertise, Point Defense, (Elite) Target Analysis, (Elite) Field Modulation and (Elite) Energy Weapons Mastery to this one. Consider S-modding Hardened Shields, Hardened Subsystems. This ship is incredibly versatile, works well even without officers (for example when running with Support Doctrine) and has great synergy with some of the best [MEGA-Redacted] weapons you'll get in the late game.

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THE SPEEDY BOI, SAFETY OVERRIDES TEMPEST: This ship lost its powerful High Energy Focuser ship system in favor of one that it's actually best off not using, ever, as it hurts itself by using it. It has a low amount of ordnance points, is very squishy, has low base flux stats and an EXTREMELY small shield, leaving it very cost-ineffective against anything but pirates. Almost worse than the wolf, and that's saying something for a "quintessential attack frigate". Don't recommend keeping these around outside of the early-mid game. Oh how the mighty have fallen.

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THE ACTUALLY GOOD SPEEDY BOI, SAFETY OVERRIDES SCARAB: There are many, many ways to create a good scarab build, so feel free to experiment, maybe you'll find a better one yourself. Always recommend shield conversion - front, though. Officers with Systems Expertise, (elite) Energy Weapons Mastery, Target Analysis and (Elite) Field Modulation have great synergy. Consider S-modding in Hardened Shields and -Subsystems.

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THE NOT QUITE AS SPEEDY, BUT STILL VERY SPEEDY BOI, THE BASIC SCARAB: Same story as above, but not with safety overrides. This is what I used in my late game fights against late game stuff%u2122, although with some [MEGA-Redacted] weapons. Remember, you can go crazy with the scarab. Almost anything works, just remember to use shield conversion - front.

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THE OVERDRIVEN DESTROYER DUO: These are quite similar in function, both of them like to get close, use their ship system and blast the enemy until it dies. Both of them also heavily benefit from S-modded Hardened Subsystems and Extended Shields especially, as well as officers with Systems Expertise, (elite)Ballistic/Energy weapon mastery, Target Analysis and Field Modulation. Both of these are also quite squishy and will die more often than frigates because they are bigger and slower. Don't let that discourage you, though. Use either Support Doctrine (if without officer) Derelict Operations or Hull Restoration, or even combinations of these, to make sure you don't care about these being disposable.

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THE HUNTER-KILLER/POINT DEFENSE HYBRID MEDUSA: A favourite of mine. Heavily benefits from Elite Point Defense skill, as well as Systems Expertise. Great at hunting anything smaller than it, great at dispatching fighters and missiles. Has enough punch to be a big help with capitals and cruisers. Absolute MVP when fighting doritos. Gets a great upgrade with [MEGA-Redacted] weapons.
Consider S-modding Advanced Optics, Extended Shields and Hardened shields. I used 3 of these all the way to the hardest fights with great success.

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THE SAFETY OVERRIDES MEDUSA: In my opinion outclassed by the above, but still, it has to be mentioned. A combination of kinetics, emp and big damage is always scary.

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THE JUGGERNAUT OVERDRIVEN ERADICATOR: You might be thinking, what is a cruiser doing in a wolfpack fleet? Let me tell you. It's as fast as a slow frigate, with INCREDIBLE firepower and tankiness. It's also burn 9, so it doesn't slow down your fleet. It helps with wolfpacks greatest weakness, orbital stations. It can face tank radiants. It brings ALL the dakka. It's fun and satisfying to watch. Try it. Enjoy it. Easily the MVP of my entire wolfpack fleet last run. Benefits from S-modded Heavy Armor, Hardened Subsystems, Expanded Missile Racks or Reinforced Bulkheads. Best officer skills are Systems Expertise, Ballistic Mastery, (Elite) Point Defense, and any and all defensive skills you can get. Mine were piloted by level 7 officers with 5 elites I found in derelicts around the sector.

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THE CROWN JEWEL, THE FLAVOR OF THE MONTH, THE NOTHIN' PERSONNEL KID, THE FRIGATE WITH THE STATS OF A CRUISER, THE ONE AND ONLY HYPERION:
An incredible, probably overpowered frigate. Any wolfpack fleet should aim to get at least a few to capture points. These can be massed with great success, too. I used 3. S-mods are not as necessary as in other ships, since Hyperion has such great base stats already and all necessary hullmods can just barely fit without S-modding. Officers, on the other hand, are extremely necessary: Systems Expertise, once again, a must have, as well as Target Analysis and (Elite) Energy Weapon Mastery. Hyperion can also be used without SO for great value in really big fights where it's small peak performance time would be too low to last, but doing this absolutely necessitates Helmsmanship Elite. Couldn't find a fresh hyperion hull anywhere quick, so the build will have s-mods. if you don't want to s-mod just remove all vents and add the hullmods.

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THE ILLEGAL FRIGATE: Do you want to win the ECM race in every fight? Do you want even more value out of wolfpack tactics? Do you want to have a disposable line of deadly little chestnuts swarm your enemies? Automated Ships is the skill for you. AI cores benefit from wolfpack tactics, and remnants have a nice little frigate: the Glimmer. When using Crew Training while under 240DP, and having the AI core of each ship use Combat Readiness as one of its skills you can have 12 Beta Core Glimmers with 67% Combat Readiness, which is more than enough for pretty much anything. The Glimmer is in many ways the same as the Scarab. Multiple things work, but in all good builds, Shield conversion - front AND Extended Shields are a must. Even with those, Safety Overrides and defensive combat skills, they will still die a lot thanks to the AI cores "fearless" personality. Preferred use with either Derelict Contingent or Hull Restoration. Here are my two favourite builds, The "basic" EMP Droneship and the [MEGA-Redacted] abuser. Both variants will have their AI cores pick Combat Endurance, Field Modulation, Target Analysis, Gunnery Implants and Energy Weapon Mastery, though the EMP droneship will additionally pick Ordnance Expertise, while the [MEGA-Redacted] abuser will pick Systems Expertise. Recommended S-mods are Hardened Subsystems, Hardened Shields and Extended shields, although, let's be honest, you'll end your playthrough before you have enough story points to use on these.

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SOME MORE SHIPS AND THOUGHTS: The Fury, Falcon XIV and Falcon P are cruisers that can kind of do what the Eradicator does. I was just so amazed with the Eradicator's performance I didn't even bother testing the others. You might want to, though. Don't know.

The station killer astral: I ran with two of these in the mid game, because my fleet was having problems with some of the bigger pirate and pather stations. I quickly realised these were not worth the cost to have in the fleet constantly. Before becoming an Eradicator enjoyer I used to pick these up whenever I went station-busting.

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The artillery Manticore: Overall just straight up underwhelming performance, which is surprising. Somehow it was constantly out of position and died almost every mid-late game fight.

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The be-all and end-all spoiler ship: Issue wasn't that this ship isn't good, but quite the opposite. Even strictly under AI control it was too good to the point it made the game very boring, so I dropped it. Here is the build, anyways. Care for major spoilers.

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General Discussion / Re: The State of Derelict Contingent

« on: December 28, 2021, 04:56:47 PM »

Building the ultimate derelict contingent fleet is tedious

I feel like the idea somebody would take this skill and not bend over backwards to maximize the gains from it is about as likely as somebody buying a ship and just throwing random weapons and hull mods on it and never experimenting to make that ship better.

I feel the same. In fact, this is the reason I haven't really played with Derelict Contingent at all. I love gradually building up and perfecting, or close to perfecting, a late game fleet. Usually I spend a lot of time in the ship editor brainstorming a certain playstyle. Derelict Contingent doesn't sound like a fun skill to me, because I know if I want to build a late game fleet with it it means I'd have to do the aforementioned grind.

Just letting it do its thing and not focusing on it, kinda having it as an early game-ish skill isn't really an option either, because for that kind of playstyle I find Hull Restoration is just superior in every way. Why make your d-mod ships less bad, when you could have no dmods in the first place? I just finished a playthrough, and it's likely Hull Restoration gave me upwards of 50 million of value in credits when it mattered, WHILE saving a ton of time and nerves, AND also giving a nice CR boost. I thought Wolfpack Tactics and Automated Ships were my favourite skills, nah, friendship ended, now Hull Restoration is my best friend.