These thematic skins for midline and high looks really awesome. Apogee-like Hammerfall is also really nice.
Cheers!
That's really interesting. I never looked closely at hot loaded missiles before. It boils down to a 75% increase in missile DPS, whether it's a normal or regenerating missile?
Large missiles tend to have a very long cooldown of 10, 15 or even 20 seconds. For being a main weapon on a ship, like it is on a Hermitaur that downtime between shots is way too long and it must be addressed on a design level. Letting off a missile and then doing nothing for half a minute is simply unfun, regardless of how powerful missile itself is.
The goal is to have the main weapon available every ~10 seconds, preferably less or to otherwise fill that downtime. For missiles this can be achieved by having more mounts, a Gryphon is never idle thanks to its many small and medium missiles. Or the FMR, bypassing missile cooldown on demand is a powerful move, think of Pegasus as a prime example.
Granted FMR is a perfect fit for the Hermitaur, its something i recognized and wanted to avoid from the very beginning. I looked for something different but also fun and interesting.
And so i came up with a low tech ship, with 1 large missile and a mobility system, burn drive or m-jets. (Initially Hermitaur had a burn drive and no shield and a damper field, it was a rather different beast alltogether!)
The hot loaded missiles. Whats up with that? Its to bring the cooldowns down and reduce downtime on the large missile mount in the absence of meaningful secondary weapons, the dps increase is very pleasant but secondary. The ammo regeneration portion is to keep regenerating missiles on par with the rest but not strictly better, of which in vanilla there is only the humble Pilum! And the not so humble [omega redacted] if one manages to find those, which also happen to be the only missiles in vanilla that generate flux so the flux reduction part is just for them!
This mod is intended to be very much vanilla+ in terms balancing and design, so vanilla game is the only consideration i make, but i'm sure there are missiles in the modiverse that regenerate or use flux that could be very very powerful.
As for loadouts, try building around the large slot! Choose a large missile and fill the rest slots to complement it. It could be a stand off build with hurricane and a pair of High Velocity Drivers, or an annoying pest with Pilum, Salamanders and Flak Cannons. Or maybe lead the charge with Cyclone Reaper and Sabots with a Needler or two. Perhaps overwhelm with missiles using Hammer Barrage and Annihilators supported by Arbalests and Mortars. Locust with Breach srm? Yes! Full [redacted] missile loadout? Oh, absolutely!
do you have any guidance on the Hammerfall and the Hampter? I tend to find multiple Hammerfalls early in my runs and while that mining laser does work early on, I end up abandoning them eventually.
Easy, Hammerfall is a Salvage Rig that can fight as its core identity. Its more expensive to maintain, and it eats into military dp limits for skills but in exchange it can fight!
Its really cheap for a destroyer and it has a powerful built-in mining laser drill, a little bit like an upscaled phase lance in terms of performance. Its great in early game since it already comes with a reliable weapon that is good enough to dismantle shieldless hounds and the like on its own.
Naturally it pays for it in other areas, defense suffers with the fixed, abysmal shield generator power from which had to be redirected to power the drill, so getting flanked or hit with EMP is an instant trouble.
For offense there is no access to missiles whatsoever and the biggest weapons are forward fixed hardpoints, a Hammerhead's heritage from before the hull blueprint was demilitarized and used to serve as a base for an asteroid mining and salvage ship. But in the post collapse Sector everyone has to fight, a Mudskipper fights, a Mule fights and the Hammerfall fights as well.
Gameplay wise, very early Hammerfall is useful in direct combat and late it can replace Salvage Rig if skill dp limits are not much of a concern. Its a decent choice for a converted hangar aswell. Alpha strike with drill and 2 phase lances is fun, medium ballistics are reliable, and ion weapons can be a good support choice.
I am not sure what to make of the Hampter. It feels like a Manticore variant. How should I be using it?
The idea of Hampter is a high-end low tech destroyer above enforcer filling in the ~12dp bracket that felt a little empty at the time. Low tech means big ballistic guns! And missiles!
I gave it a large, notably offset ballistic hardpoint and instead of heavily leaning on missiles it recieved a single modular fighter bay!
Humorously, the Hampter existed before Manticore was added and their somewhat similar nature simply reaffirmed the above ideas.
Similar does not mean same however, Manticore is versatile with its ability to completely skip pd, its 2 medium missiles, a large ballistic turret with a great coverage and small mounts that can naturally range-match to support it, its fairly fast, Manticore can do it all, but also its flux grid suffers in a classic low tech fashion.
Hampter is greedy, it too wants to do it all! Just not all at the same time. But that also means Hampter can specialize. Skimp on pd and focus front-loaded firepower? Yes! Cheap guns and an expensive bomber? Sure! Full point defense coverage and a support fighter for safety but with less firepower? Why not!
Hampter may not be as well rounded as Manticore but it will also spike above it in certain areas depending on how it is outfitted. Oh and its flux grid weeps just as well in a suitably low tech manner.
The Carnelian is of course everyone's favorite ship from this mod, and I like the Volt personally. The Fluorspar is also great but pretty fragile in the AI's hands. Definitely feels like it was made for player use.
Carnelian is pure playerbait, very much worth its cruiser grade dp tag and more with proper piloting or a strong officer. Tier 1 Helmsmanship skill is all it truly needs to shine.
Volt is probably the most balanced ship in the mod fitting very naturally next to the Champion and Dominator in the heavy cruiser 25dp bracket.
Fluorspar is the single most powerful ship in the mod, by far. The penultimate glass cannon.
Granted, its deliberately balanced in a way that without an officer/combat skills and fleet wide buffs from skills it is not quite worth its cruiser grade deployment cost, not without personal piloting anyhow. Things start to change rapidly with skills and levels as its power soars.
All ships become much much stronger with those things but for Fluorspar the change is even more crystal clear. If player level cap was 40 instead of 15 i believe Fluorspar could wipe out even capital ships in mere seconds with ease.
