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[Tartiflette]

Well that doesn't make sense concerning the Buffalo. The pirate (D) is combat converted, has tons more weapon mounts and no shield where as the standard Buffalo is a pure freighter with a shield but only a single weapon mount. The stats should not at all be the same, lol

He is talking about the pirate skin of the normal Buffalo, that has the shielded cargo and is objectively better than all the other buffalos skins, not the Buffalo mkII

[Dri]

Oh, gotcha. I wouldn't even consider any of the other Buffalo variants when the Buffalo (A) exists! It not only has boosted stats but no longer has the negative "Civilian Grade Hull" mod! I like to snap up at least 2 of them as soon as I can. You can buy them on Hegemony open markets too!

[Sy]

Buffalo (A) is great, but pirate Buffalo has the largest shielded cargo hold of any ship. i usually try to get one or two of the pirate version for the occasional trade with illegal goods, then a bunch of the militarized version for more capacity.

[Megas]

I consider pirate Buffalo the best for being able to mount Vulcan instead of weak and/or expensive beam PD.  At least before Buffalo (A) lost civilian-grade hull.  Now, Buffalo (A) may be good for not bloating profile as much as civilian Buffalo.  (Then again, I rarely care about sensors and profiles after a certain point.)

[Tartiflette]

I consider pirate Buffalo the best for being able to mount Vulcan instead of weak and/or expensive beam PD.  At least before Buffalo (A) lost civilian-grade hull.  Now, Buffalo (A) may be good for not bloating profile as much as civilian Buffalo.  (Then again, I rarely care about sensors and profiles after a certain point.)

Given how limited is the impact of the sensor profile on the detection range, I wouldn't care that much about the civilian grade hull. Unless you are running a full phase ship fleet for role-play (and I bet role-play isn't your style).

[Megas]

Occasionally, I may try to minimize profile when I really want to sneak into a hostile market that is likely guarded by patrols.  (Fighting would mean I need to want months, which will not do.)  I have done this in my 0.7.0 Hegemony game (before commissions, when everyone became hostile), when I bought organs in Askonia, and I really needed small profile to avoid Diktat patrols.

[Tartiflette]

Occasionally, I may try to minimize profile when I really want to sneak into a hostile market that is likely guarded by patrols.  (Fighting would mean I need to want months, which will not do.)  I have done this in my 0.7.0 Hegemony game (before commissions, when everyone became hostile), when I bought organs in Askonia, and I really needed small profile to avoid Diktat patrols.

Well, here are a few "standard" detection range for various profile I tested in the game:

I tried it with several profiles:
0 => 510
1 => 570
2 => 680
4 => 790
8 => 930
16 => 1050
40 => 1210
79 => 1350
150 => 1470 (25 Onslaughts with augmented engines!)
250 => 1570 (25 Atlases with augmented engines)

Also that quote link to an interesting discussion about the way detection works.

[Voyager I]

Not sure how I feel about the new phase ships as a symmetrical mechanic.  They seem to fall into the same category as the Hyperion where there's no real counterplay available other than waiting for them to run out of CR and malfunction or hoping the AI makes an unforced error (because there is no way to make impositions against ships with incontestable mobility advantages to that degree).  The Afflictor's systems also seems insane.  Maybe I'm misunderstanding how it works but in a large fight having it zip up and overload something through shields can just mean a ship is instantly dead and there's very little that can be done to prevent it.  This is also assuming  you aren't in a ship with fixed front shields, in which case against a phase ship you might just be straight dead since you can't even make it hard for them to get behind you anymore.

They're a ton of fun to use, probably in part because of how brutally unfair they can be, but oh boy can they be awful to fight against if the AI isn't durdling around trying to EMP swarmer missiles instead of violating engine ports.


Other things on the list:  Hegemony fleets with multiple quad-Harpoon Enforcers flown by missile-specced officers, fond of launching unified alpha strikes of turbocharged missiles to delete the first ship on your side of the field to let their flux get high, even if they happen to be two screens away fighting something else at the time.

[Alex]

Not sure how I feel about the new phase ships as a symmetrical mechanic.  They seem to fall into the same category as the Hyperion where there's no real counterplay available other than waiting for them to run out of CR and malfunction or hoping the AI makes an unforced error (because there is no way to make impositions against ships with incontestable mobility advantages to that degree).  The Afflictor's systems also seems insane.  Maybe I'm misunderstanding how it works but in a large fight having it zip up and overload something through shields can just mean a ship is instantly dead and there's very little that can be done to prevent it.  This is also assuming  you aren't in a ship with fixed front shields, in which case against a phase ship you might just be straight dead since you can't even make it hard for them to get behind you anymore.

They're a ton of fun to use, probably in part because of how brutally unfair they can be, but oh boy can they be awful to fight against if the AI isn't durdling around trying to EMP swarmer missiles instead of violating engine ports.

The idea here is that they run out of CR much faster due to being in fast-time much of the time; counter-play can actually involve forcing them to spend more time there. You're also much less likely to be in a situation where you're waiting them out - a larger battle will generally take enough time that phase ships are going to be close to "done" by the time you start targeting them.

So, yes, they're dangerous and hard to counter directly - though it's still possible: if you're piloting an Afflictor it's doable, if you're using a Hyperion, it's easy, and even something like the Medusa can do it with some planning. Basically, the goal is for them to be fun to use, and for you to mostly not encounter the "let's wait it out" situation to a degree where it's annoying. Even wearing down a frigate from full peak time to 0% CR isn't *that* bad, and that's the worst case.

Bringing an escort or two along can also be very helpful if you're in a front-shield ship.

Specifically regarding the Afflictor's system: the overload only lasts for half a second, so it's not generally instant death. It can be very dangerous, of course. It's also very short-ranged, so simply packing enough firepower and keeping it pointed at the Afflictor is enough to keep you safe. The design here (per the blog post) is that there's something about the new phase ship systems that feels "unfair" (it's part of their feel), but on closer examination is only marginally so and offers some opportunities for counter-play.

Other things on the list:  Hegemony fleets with multiple quad-Harpoon Enforcers flown by missile-specced officers, fond of launching unified alpha strikes of turbocharged missiles to delete the first ship on your side of the field to let their flux get high, even if they happen to be two screens away fighting something else at the time.

Yeah, this is something I'll be looking at alongside the skill revamp. It's definitely a bit much.

[Megas]

Encountered something that I cannot tell if it is a bug or stealth change to game mechanics.

I went to Qaras (with transponder off).  I already have extreme suspicion level before visiting this time, but since pirates are Vengeful at me, I do not care.  At the black market, I sold a bunch of stuff (mostly marines and fuel) at the black market to drop stability, wait a day, revisit Qaras to see stability drop to zero, then cleaned out the market of marines, fuel, and supplies.  I profited handsomely.

Then the trouble starts.

I took a -2 penalty to reputation with Independents (due to Killa being in Yma), from 77 to 75.  Okay, fine, cost of doing business.  But that does not stop.  For four more months, reputation steadily drops twenty-five more times, over four (in-game) months, -2 each time.  Eventually, my reputation sank to 25.  I waited a bit more, but had to cut it short.  I do not know if the reputation loss will continue or not.

If I was supposed to lose -52 reputation, shouldn't I lose it all in one big hit, rather than many -2 hits?

[Voyager I]

Not sure how I feel about the new phase ships as a symmetrical mechanic.  They seem to fall into the same category as the Hyperion where there's no real counterplay available other than waiting for them to run out of CR and malfunction or hoping the AI makes an unforced error (because there is no way to make impositions against ships with incontestable mobility advantages to that degree).  The Afflictor's systems also seems insane.  Maybe I'm misunderstanding how it works but in a large fight having it zip up and overload something through shields can just mean a ship is instantly dead and there's very little that can be done to prevent it.  This is also assuming  you aren't in a ship with fixed front shields, in which case against a phase ship you might just be straight dead since you can't even make it hard for them to get behind you anymore.

They're a ton of fun to use, probably in part because of how brutally unfair they can be, but oh boy can they be awful to fight against if the AI isn't durdling around trying to EMP swarmer missiles instead of violating engine ports.

The idea here is that they run out of CR much faster due to being in fast-time much of the time; counter-play can actually involve forcing them to spend more time there. You're also much less likely to be in a situation where you're waiting them out - a larger battle will generally take enough time that phase ships are going to be close to "done" by the time you start targeting them.

So, yes, they're dangerous and hard to counter directly - though it's still possible: if you're piloting an Afflictor it's doable, if you're using a Hyperion, it's easy, and even something like the Medusa can do it with some planning. Basically, the goal is for them to be fun to use, and for you to mostly not encounter the "let's wait it out" situation to a degree where it's annoying. Even wearing down a frigate from full peak time to 0% CR isn't *that* bad, and that's the worst case.

Bringing an escort or two along can also be very helpful if you're in a front-shield ship.

Specifically regarding the Afflictor's system: the overload only lasts for half a second, so it's not generally instant death. It can be very dangerous, of course. It's also very short-ranged, so simply packing enough firepower and keeping it pointed at the Afflictor is enough to keep you safe. The design here (per the blog post) is that there's something about the new phase ship systems that feels "unfair" (it's part of their feel), but on closer examination is only marginally so and offers some opportunities for counter-play.

I agree that they're generally not a problem in larger battle because there's enough other stuff going on to keep you occupied in the time it takes them to run out of CR and enough overlapping fields of big guns that they have to play somewhat conservatively, and it's even possible they'll let you kill them just because the AI doesn't seem to account for officer bonuses when evaluating threats and they will decide to unphase near a ship that can instagib them.  The Afflictor's system is probably still too much against any of the high-tech sluggers, though.  A Dominator can probably survive its shields going down for a moment, but something like an Aurora or a Paragon that needs to shield tank and has shields that take 10+ seconds to deploy will just die if it gets them switched off in the middle of a fight, especially if the fight involves enemy officers with Harpoons or torpedoes.

The bigger problem is in small battles against something like a Hegemony patrol.  You can't deploy a similarly sized force because your own frigates will probably just get murdered, while anything big enough not to lose in a straight fight is too slow to pressure them and may still need an escort to avoid getting tailpiped, so now to win the fight you have to heavily overdeploy and then wait for them to time out.

Really, the new phase ships are approaching a power level where it might be advisable to start carrying around dedicated anti-phase platforms (if such a thing truly exists at the moment) just do deal with them, and I recall you said that you didn't want them to turn into an RPS mechanic where they own regular ships but then die to some specialized countership you have to lug around.

Other things on the list:  Hegemony fleets with multiple quad-Harpoon Enforcers flown by missile-specced officers, fond of launching unified alpha strikes of turbocharged missiles to delete the first ship on your side of the field to let their flux get high, even if they happen to be two screens away fighting something else at the time.

Yeah, this is something I'll be looking at alongside the skill revamp. It's definitely a bit much.

Glad to hear it.  It's almost impossible to not lose a ship to one of those fleets, so you end up just hoping they blow their wad on something you don't care about or something that is more durable than they estimated from its own officer bonuses.

[Megas]

Glad to hear it.  It's almost impossible to not lose a ship to one of those fleets, so you end up just hoping they blow their wad on something you don't care about or something that is more durable than they estimated from its own officer bonuses.

This is another reason why I solo fleets.  They cannot murder my ships like this when they are not on the map, and I can better prevent or defend against incoming missile storms.

In 0.65, it was eliminate enemy flagship before it launched missiles, something Hyperion can kill before it became a threat to the rest of my fleet.  Now, player needs to eliminate every ship with an officer.

[Alex]

@Megas: this sounds like a bug. I'll take a look.

The Afflictor's system is probably still too much against any of the high-tech sluggers, though.  A Dominator can probably survive its shields going down for a moment, but something like an Aurora or a Paragon that needs to shield tank and has shields that take 10+ seconds to deploy will just die if it gets them switched off in the middle of a fight, especially if the fight involves enemy officers with Harpoons or torpedoes.

Harpoons aside (being a separate problem), this seems like it discourages single-ship deployments. Which is probably a step in the right direction, actually. I'd like the eventual skill revamp and possibly some other mechanics tweaks help take some more steps along that path. And, again, if something like the Paragon lets the Afflictor get within 500 units and it feel safe enough to unphase, that's probably a sign that the Paragon is being surrounded and overwhelmed. If it's not, I mean, half a second of downtime and re-raising in the right direction isn't *that* bad.

If you're trying to duel an enemy Onslaught and it's got an Afflictor buddy to trip you up at all the wrong times, you're going to have a bad day - but that's exactly the point of the Afflictor in that scenario. It's meant to be a powerful support ship (hence the system actually halving its own energy damage for a bit, so it can't combine with its own AM blaster shots quite so devastatingly).

The bigger problem is in small battles against something like a Hegemony patrol.  You can't deploy a similarly sized force because your own frigates will probably just get murdered, while anything big enough not to lose in a straight fight is too slow to pressure them and may still need an escort to avoid getting tailpiped, so now to win the fight you have to heavily overdeploy and then wait for them to time out.

I see what you're saying, but I actually ran into this exact scenario while playtesting. My approach was to, in fact, deploy a comparable force, and then personally focus on keeping the phase ship busy. It was, as I remember, fun and a bit of a nailbiter, but doable. Although, iirc, I was piloting a Shade at the time, which was certainly helpful to being able to be where I needed to be. And multiple enemy phase ships would pose a bigger problem.

It does seem like a frigate kitted for speed might be able to do the job too, but surviving against an Afflictor can be tough - you'd really have to play off your allies to avoid getting chased down, while also not getting them killed.

Hmm. Will think on this some more. It might just be that the Quantum Disruptor could use a bit of a nerf in some way; it's very good in a wide range of situations. It's supposed to be better in a support role, but still useful in a 1-1 - but perhaps it's too useful there atm.

I want to keep an eye on it and see how things play out, without making a knee-jerk change, though.

Really, the new phase ships are approaching a power level where it might be advisable to start carrying around dedicated anti-phase platforms (if such a thing truly exists at the moment) just do deal with them, and I recall you said that you didn't want them to turn into an RPS mechanic where they own regular ships but then die to some specialized countership you have to lug around.

It's all a matter of degrees, right? Don't want the only counters to be hard counters, but if something has a hard counter but can also be countered with skillful play, then that becomes interesting.


I'm certainly not saying it's perfectly balanced at the moment, though, and very much appreciate the feedback!

[Tartiflette]

Specifically regarding the Afflictor's system: the overload only lasts for half a second, so it's not generally instant death. It can be very dangerous, of course. It's also very short-ranged, so simply packing enough firepower and keeping it pointed at the Afflictor is enough to keep you safe. The design here (per the blog post) is that there's something about the new phase ship systems that feels "unfair" (it's part of their feel), but on closer examination is only marginally so and offers some opportunities for counter-play.

It's only not-unfair with the vanilla loadouts though. When you put torpedoes+AM-blaster in those mounts it really feels like cheating as you can instantly kill or silence any ship instantly without ay possible counter. With SS+ randomized variants, one single Afflictor with an average officer in a frigate fleet killed all my destroyers by himself and then harassed my remaining frigates (leading to a humiliating retreat).

[Alex]

Are you sure this isn't the case of underestimating it until it was too late? I'd bet you could probably do a lot better replaying that battle a second time. Worst-case scenario, a mass escort formation would make it very difficult for an Afflictor to pick destroyers apart like that.

(Edit: another consideration here is officers being too good at the moment for what I'd consider ideal...)