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61

General Discussion / Re: my "Dream Team"

« on: July 30, 2012, 11:25:36 AM »

Properly outfitted, I'm partial to a Conquest with Enforcer support, Wasps, a Venture, and Broadswords. The Wasps excel at tying up enemy fleets, dealing with bombers, providing PD escort, and capping points, while the Enforcers bring a huge amount of firepower, rockets, and toughness to bear at extremely long ranges.

The Conquest is just fun to fly and is quick enough to get from battle to battle, and the Broadswords are great for support and filling gaps.

62

Suggestions / Re: A handful of suggestions

« on: July 29, 2012, 03:27:38 PM »

I think flak is balanced out by the fact that there are so many incredible Medium Ballistic weapons that you have to give up to use.

Also, I have no problem with the shielding-challenged lower-tech ships having access to superior PD than the high-tech ones (who nevertheless get the excellent Burst PD lasers.)

63

General Discussion / Re: Stagnant Development

« on: July 29, 2012, 03:25:07 PM »

Everyone is entitled to their opinion. I also had the feeling that Alex was stalling with these combat updates. I'm not going to lie and say that feeling has disappeared, but I do feel that every update has improved the game enough so far.

Weird. I can't say I really understand that.

He's been pretty transparent with his updates, and I can completely understand wanting to have combat locked down before moving onto other systems.

Plus, what does he have to gain by stalling?

64

Suggestions / Re: Newtonian Engines

« on: July 27, 2012, 07:55:29 AM »

@ Griffinheart - I think what is being assumed is that combat in starfarer occurs at speeds where relativistic affects do not really come into account and Newtonian  mechanics may be used to approximate ship physics.

That doesn't mean it would make for good gameplay.

65

General Discussion / Re: why are sabor SRM pods so slow firing ?

« on: July 26, 2012, 10:50:45 AM »

It's to differentiate racks from pods a little further, aside from just ammo count.

66

General Discussion / Re: Underpowered Ships

« on: July 26, 2012, 08:17:58 AM »

The Falcon is basically a Destroyer that gets Cruiser-level hull mod bonuses. Not great, but not terrible.

The Vigilance is fragile, but quite effective. That medium missile slot is incredibly powerful.

Buffalos are designed to be suboptimal.

Condors are not worse armament-wise than the Tarsus; they actually have flight decks (the Tarsus just has hangar space) and a medium missile slot + 2 small ballistic instead of the Tarsus's multiple small ballistic slots.

The Hammerhead is incredibly fast and maneuverable for a destroyer with great shield coverage, and the twin medium ballistic slots give it an awful lot of firepower. Two missile racks make it quite versatile, and it has enough PD coverage on the side small slots to be easily protected from missiles. Tactical lasers, IR Pulse lasers, or similar on the front Small slots are great for destroying smaller craft or pressuring larger ones. It's got enough hangar space and cargo to support a Broadsword wing, and makes a very effective early-game flagship due to how cheap it is to buy and outfit.

67

Announcements / Re: Starfarer 0.53a (In Development) Patch Notes

« on: July 24, 2012, 07:43:24 PM »

Combat Freighters:
Condor, Buffalo Mk. II, Hound, and now the Mule

Condor: not a freighter, a former freighter converted to a carrier - no longer fills freighter role.
Buffalo Mk. II: poor cargo capacity, no longer a freighter
Hound: Fair enough, but it's a frigate

The Mule retains significant cargo capacity and combines it with respectable firepower and strong defenses - that's what I mean when I say "Combat Freighter".

If it's like a Venture-lite, I am going to like it!

68

General Discussion / Re: Least Useful Hull Mod

« on: July 24, 2012, 06:33:15 AM »

I just can't believe that nobody has mentioned Expanded Magazines. They don't add THAT much ammo anymore, and I still have not found a battle where I would run out of ammo for my weapons, and wish I had more ammo. Either the enemies are basically dead, or I put those OP to much better use elsewhere. Now that they don't double ammo capacity, it seems like kind of a waste.

Also, do you think we could see an option to sort the hullmods by cost instead of alphabetically? It just takes that little bit longer to search for the ones with the right cost when the costs are not sorted.

Expanded Magazines is important for Gauss Cannons and Dual Flaks in long engagements, and if you use the Autopulse Laser a lot.

69

Announcements / Re: Starfarer 0.53a (In Development) Patch Notes

« on: July 24, 2012, 06:32:16 AM »

Ships colored in blue can survive two shots, you also forget that lances require a spotter to be effective.  I see the lance as an energy artillery gun, weak in short range or against prepared, good otherwise.  What I don't quite like is that people are complaining that an artillery weapon does too much damage when it's very weak up close and relies on other ships to operate effectively.  I also don't believe that the correct solution to a modestly overpowered weapon is to nerf it to the point where no one will want to use it.  It sounds a little too close to TF2 and their tendency to nerf good weapons into the ground because people whine and moan, like the tomislav from tf2 was nerfed into yet another gimp gun for the heavy, like the other 2 it already has.  I seriously want a weapon that's worth using next to the auto-pulse.  Right now there's not any good energy weapon besides for the lance that can compete with the autopulse.  I don't believe the solution is to make everything equally as impotent to induce some semblance of 'balance'.  What irks me the most is people complaining about a gun being really good at what it's supposed to be good at.  Back to the Tomislav again, people complained that a gun who penalizes damage and increases deployment speed was too powerful because it increases deployment speed.  Frankly I see the lance going down the same path already.  Incredibly flux inefficient, subpar damage, soft flux, horrendous OP cost, with these changes it'll be just another HIL, flashy but ultimately useless and impractical.

The problem is, all it takes is a wing or two of wasps (the fastest fighters in the game) to spot, since fighters are immune to Lance friendly fire. Then, anything that shows its face at the capture points or wherever the Wasps are situated takes two or three concentrated Lance shots at once. That's enough to completely neutralize anything fast enough to make it to the capture point, if not destroy it outright. This immediately cedes map control and allowing you to bring in more ships that travel faster and have longer range. Four or more lances brought to bear will cripple anything short of a Paragon with Hardened Shields and maxed venting in short order.

I am speaking not from a theorycrafting perspective, but from many dozens of hours of experience.

70

Suggestions / Re: IPDAI Hull Mod Buff

« on: July 23, 2012, 11:53:57 AM »

And, I know that we will probably be getting more OP to spend on our ships in the future, but that doesn't change the fact that this hull mod still isn't worth the OP cost IMO.

can you explain why it isn't?

Because a ship needs to have an enormous number of Small weapon slots to make the per-slot OP investment worth it. And even then, the PD tactical lasers or similar weapons are still not nearly as good at tracking and destroying missiles as dedicated small PD like the Burst PD laser, Vulcan, or Dual MG.

For example:

I don't remember exactly, but IIRC the PDAI costs 30 OP on a Capital-class ship.

Tactical lasers cost 5 OP each, Burst PD cost 8 OP each.

If you only have 5 small energy slots, then each of those PD-enabled tactical lasers costs you the equivalent of 11 OP (5 OP for the tactical laser, + (30/5) OP for the hull mod) and they're still not that great at tracking and destroying missiles due to the Medium turn rate and slower method of damage delivery.

It would be much cheaper and similarly effective to mount two or three Burst PDs and two tactical lasers. That way, the burst PDs can quickly, easily, and effectively zap missiles, and the tactical lasers can stay focused on a target doing damage, AND you save a large amount of OP.

Even in a situation like the Odyssey, where you have more than 10 small energy slots that would benefit from PDAI, knocking the total OP cost down to ~8 per tactical laser, they're still suboptimal at tracking and destroying missiles due to the slower "damage over time" nature of the tactical laser and its less optimal tracking speed. It's better just to mount a few burst PDs on the mounts with the most coverage and save the rest of the slots for more dangerous weapons.

On a frigate or destroyer, the per-mount cost is lower, but you have fewer mounts to work with, and still have to buy Advanced Turret Gyros to have any hope of having the weapon actually hit the missile. Even with the Wolf and Medusa and Lasher and their (relative) plethora of Small mounts for their size, it's still typically more effective to use one or two dedicated PD weapons and use the OP and slots you've saved for more efficient damage-dealers.

71

Announcements / Re: Starfarer 0.53a (In Development) Patch Notes

« on: July 23, 2012, 07:50:45 AM »

Lances are Lances, they will poke a giant hole in your ship without mercy.  Overpowered as they are, they're balanced out by the long time in between bursts.

They're not balanced out by the long time between bursts. That's the problem. They completely destroy smaller craft singly with pinpoint accuracy (I know, I ran a Railgun/ TacLance Sunder solo against hilariously large fleets) and if you can bring two or three to bear, nothing smaller than a cruiser will hold up under that onslaught due to the incredible ability of the Lance to concentrate a lot of firepower on one ship from anywhere in the map.

Seriously, anyone who's used the Lance in combat knows its power, and it overshadows many of the other Large-sized energy weapons as a result. No other Large weapon (not even the devastating Heavy Needler) has such an incredible effect on the dynamics of the battlefield, nor such incredible effectiveness against every ship type with such long range.

72

Suggestions / Re: IPDAI Hull Mod Buff

« on: July 23, 2012, 07:40:10 AM »

I think it'd be a perfectly passable hull mod as is if the OP cost were lowered somewhat to be more in line with, say, Expanded Missile Racks or Resistant Flux Conduits. That would let you easily take Advanced Turret Gyros to offset the slower turning rate of many non-PD small weapons.

This doesn't solve the Antimatter Blaster or Railgun PDAI issue, but I tend to control those manually so it becomes less of a problem.

73

General Discussion / Re: A wee bit confused about using missiles... carrying extras?

« on: July 23, 2012, 07:37:18 AM »

Convoys bring a variety of different weapons in to each station when they arrive, and IIRC the Tri-Tachyon station has Harpoon Missile Racks default (those are the primary missiles I use in the early game, so that's pretty much all I worry about.)

74

General Discussion / Re: Least Useful Hull Mod

« on: July 23, 2012, 06:11:53 AM »

Spoiler

I feel PDAI  is extremely useful on frigates and sometimes destroyers. Since many frigates have few weapon mounts and i cant waste one on a PD weapon. Especially on the 3 tac laser Wolf.

The problem is, Tac Lasers have a relatively slow turn rate and pretty much need Advanced Turret Gyros to be effective against most missiles. The incredible cost associated with PD AI is just too much, and it can be a problem if you have turret-mounted stuff you don't want to fire at missiles, like railguns or antimatter blasters.

What? Incredible cost? Its only like 3-5 OP on most frigates if i remember correctly. Still i find it much better than investing in a lot of PD weapon OP. Especially on high tech ships. As the weapon now can be both be offensive and defensive.

PDAI costs a lot. Keep in mind, it costs just as much as, say, Integrated Targeting Unit or any number of other hull mods. 5 OP is a significant amount on a frigate, and the effectiveness of having one Burst PD laser seriously outweighs any benefits given to a Tactical Laser + PD AI.

And the slow tracking speed of Tactical Lasers means that usually what happens is the laser shoots at the Lasher or whatever, then the Lasher fires the missile and the laser slowly tracks towards the missile, misses it, the missile impacts or misses, and then the laser slowly tracks back to the Lasher. It's not nearly useful enough to justify the cost when Expanded Missile Racks or any number of other genuinely important hull mods can be had for equal or fewer OP.

[close]

Oh come on, your being a little harsh. The LRPD has a slower tracking speed and the lower op of them really helps. Take an Oddyssey, slap on 12 tactical lasers and you have at least 10 vents more thatn the standard :p. This is really useful for dual plasma Oddysseys.

I'm just relating my experiences trying to use it. Running a few burst PDs in strategic locations works far better and offers a lot more versatility than a lot of tacs with PDAI.

75

Announcements / Re: Starfarer 0.53a (In Development) Patch Notes

« on: July 23, 2012, 06:10:40 AM »

well uf you use more then 1 lance then of course it will be a good wepon, like many more large wepon type,
lances are good only on far range, on cqc its almost suicide ( pint def + lancec + shield = overfux in no time) 

They're pretty solid up close too... huge burst damage punches through armor and the enormous EMP burst disables just about everything it hits.

And keep in mind, it's very easy to use the lance JUST at long range. Stick two on an Odyssey and give it a "Carrier" or "Fire Support" waypoint behind a cloud of fighters and watch everything melt.