Is it clear that "Flux per Salvo" means all possible ammunition? (not including expanded mags of course)
After a few seconds of thought yea. Its how much flux you have to spend to flush it's entire ammo stock out. As such, to use it effectively you generally want at least that much flux capacity available, and that is how much your shields will be taxed if you try to fire it.
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I like a lot of the turret slot changes, especially the addition of tons of multi-type slots.
The downscaling or replacement of some slots is annoying, especially with weapons being scaled up, but makes sense. More smaller weapons and medium/large weapons are a serious upgrade in power. Plus some get replaced by additional fighter slots.(sometimes causing loss of symmetry)
That was rather incoherent. I must have been tired.
You converted or replaced quite a few medium slots with smaller slots, which while annoying initially seems reasonable.
You also replaced some slots with fighter bays, which makes a lot of sense here.
Also, you in general added quite a few extra smaller slots (and larger slots too)
As a bonus, the larger weapons seem proportionally more powerful than vanilla (but I might be wrong. I generally find that range is the greater focus in vanilla half the time)
Overall its a..... Change
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Why did the hammerhead have its missiles and ballistic slots swapped? It just looks sooooo wrong..... I don't know why it bugs me soooo much.
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I much preferred the original "Sinking the Bismar" mission. Mainly because it let you try out the Hyperion without actually finding one. Expensive, fragile (1k health?), high upkeep, and horrifyingly good at flanking and strikes, as well as the fastest ship in the game. It is probably still quite a bit faster than fighters too.
More importantly in this mod, at drastically higher risk from fighters, such that new tactics may be required, and heavier point defence mounted.
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Made some suggestions on your manual.
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There don't seem to be many/any assault medium/large flux weapons. The mining laser at least should qualify imo.
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Some weapon niches are harder to find.
Is there a small energy strike weapon similar to the Antimatter blaster in vanilla? Long cooldown and high impulse damage?
Medium ballistic assault like Assault chaingun (current version is very burst fire instead of the constant stream gattling cannon I like)
Where is the vulcan cannon? is it Small or medium now?
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I've started using armored weapon mounts and engine insulation, and might try advanced repairs. Fighters and bola missiles justify it.
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The sheer size of fighter furballs in larger battles is insane. Especially amsuing how well those swarms block beams. (fighter disrupts the beam, explodes, and it has to re-extend)
My interdiction frigates are more tuned to Assault/PD and work reasonably well here, both as escorts and outriders.
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Its vanilla, but the effect of U.I. and S.O. has an interesting effect. Range or speed? S.O. gives 100% constant flux venting in effect, and speed too (and you plan to make that give them a peak performance limit?)
Like a number of other mechanics, the effects are exaggerated here. With speeds being far more normalized, and fighters outrunning most everything, frigates aren't nearly as fast as I was used to. Trying to use those speed boosters is important, but the crippled range causes them to be VERY specialized.
that said, U.I. and S.O. make for rather potent assault ships, able to dance in and out of combat, (although they have to be exposed to more danger than normal)
And, naturally, as said before, that is how you get interdiction ships.
In vanilla, I tend towards heavily hybridized ships, with most ships being assault/strike, and carriers as LR support missile-boats, and general PD coverage.
Here, I've messed with pure assault, strike, which had to have PD support (although constant fighters certainly help), support, assault/strike, and assault/support ships.
Supports are harder to build, because its generally not feasible to get enough flux to fill out all main turrets with LR support weapons. If it goes to near flux-overflow and can sustain it with minimal venting, its great, but... yea.... And missiles like Harpoons are full-fledged Strike-Support weapon hybrids, with the missile trait. Homing and support-level range, and hits like a proper strike weapon, but it's flux cost is intense. its not a finisher like vanilla, or rather it is, but the flux cost makes it a serious strike weapon.
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Fighter-wise, I mostly go with shielded variants. Mainly because they seem more resilient.
Cruisers, I usually give an interdictor and a PD/intercepter. (2 slots)
Carriers, generally bombers and intercepters, although I am planning to try out some serious gunships soon.
Having frigate-carriers helps a lot, but you won't get too many fighters on the field.
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The makeshift carrier deck hullmod seems unnessesary in this mod. Almost every you might consider using it on already has fighter slots. Maybe make it an "expanded Fighter Deck" hullmod, which gives +1-2 extra fighter slots (at the cost of even less OP to spend on anything else)
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The civilian star-liner ship has a tooltip from vanilla claiming it lacks a fighter deck. this is no longer the case.
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I just reread the manual, and you stated that armor is tougher. I suppose that is why armor-based ships seem feasible to use again.
Being able to take some hits and not be massively concerned about it isn't something I tend to experience in vanilla. Armor breaks very fast unless it is shrugging off low-grade kinetic damage. Here, it can take quite a few solid hits to break through armor. That said, I frequently face Gatling laser equipped frigates, and similar, so yea...
Also Reapers are scary.
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I would note that the other half of Peak performance was to balance shield and armor-based ships. Shield ships tended to have far lower performance, so neither armor nor shield based ships could last forever. Shielded ships would malfunction, so their theoretical infinite damage resistance doesn't really apply.
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- > Fighters are smaller, faster, more numerous, and can deal extra damage to ships' weapons and engines.
How much exactly? double damage? How is it done? EMP? some kind of damage modifier effect?
Either way, the effects are obvious.
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Though the weapons they carry are the same ones (visually/sound/lore) as the ship-based versions equipped on combat vessels, all fighters have a built-in hullmod (visible by title only in the in-game codex) called Fighter Systems that Reduces missile ammo by 50%, Beam range by 50%, Energy Weapon Damage by 33% and Energy Charges(if Strike) by 66%. This is so fighters can be more numerous without making carriers/cruisers/capitals overwhelmingly powerful. As it is, they are very strong.
What were the justifications for the fighter hull mod's changes.
-less Ammo - Forces them to reload more often, reduces the burst size. Same with strike. Why exclude Ballistic? Even if there are no Balistic strike weapons,
-Beam range - force fighters to get closer. Why not the same for missiles/Ballistic
-Missile regen - Forces fighters to reload. - Should this include all strike weapon's regen in general? A fighter is small and might not fit a proper autoloader XD
-Energy weapon damage - Why?
It might be outdated, but as stated seems wrong.
Should be, Replace all strike/missiles with non-regen versions.
-50-66% ammo on all weapons
-33% or something damage on all weapons
-50% range on all weapons
At least thats the thought I am running on.