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Author Topic: give the squall a miniscule flux cost  (Read 1083 times)

Deshara

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give the squall a miniscule flux cost
« on: June 13, 2021, 08:32:05 AM »

it is AFAIA the most oppressive weapon in the game; it does 5 thousand damage to shields, is tied for the longest range weapon in the game, and (what IMO puts it easily into the position of best kiting weapon in the game), can be used while maintaining 0-flux boost.
if the squall was given a very small flux cost with every missile it fired it would IMO be a lot less annoying; at least you'd be able to catch the ship that's using
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Histidine

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Re: give the squall a miniscule flux cost
« Reply #1 on: June 13, 2021, 05:44:54 PM »

It runs out of base ammo after 5 volleys, and small ships can trivially dodge the most of the missiles while larger ones can just partly or completely take them on armor. Squall is definitely not on the list of weapons that need a nerf, and if it were then adding trace flux would not help.
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Deshara

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Re: give the squall a miniscule flux cost
« Reply #2 on: June 13, 2021, 06:00:22 PM »

It runs out of base ammo after 5 volleys, and small ships can trivially dodge the most of the missiles while larger ones can just partly or completely take them on armor. Squall is definitely not on the list of weapons that need a nerf, and if it were then adding trace flux would not help.

missile autoforge + officer skills + hullmods gets it up to the realm of 20 volleys (10 in missions, dunno how the mis spec skill factors into it), which seeing as each volley can 1hk smaller ships & can singlehandedly blow out the shields of many similar-sized ships from outside of anyone's range means that the ability to do so while running away with 0-flux boost is annoying AF to fight against. I don't think it's OP or anything (it is NOT the best large missile slot) so I don't think it needs to be less powerful, I think it just needs a micronerf to pare away the edge case of getting kited by infinite squalls
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Retry

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Re: give the squall a miniscule flux cost
« Reply #3 on: June 13, 2021, 07:25:57 PM »

EMR+Right Officer Skills+Autoforge gets you up to 9x the initial ammo, otherwise it's "only" 3x.  In vanilla only the Gryphon has the Autoforge to manage the 9x fleet, and frankly if you've got that great an officer to put on a Gryphon you're far better served with a Hammer Barrage than a Squall.

That's not the most interesting thing though.  That this suggestion is currently requesting a nerf for what's already the most underwhelming and least-used large missile weapon in vanilla is the most interesting part of this suggestion.
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Grievous69

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Re: give the squall a miniscule flux cost
« Reply #4 on: June 14, 2021, 12:31:15 AM »

The only time I've felt threatened by them was in the previous version when I fought huge pirate fleets with 10 or so Atlases Mk II. Getting shot with 3-4 volleys at once is suuuuper annoying, that said if I was swarmed with Hurricanes on multiple sides I'd be in an even worse situation. Squall definitely doesn't need a nerf in any way.
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Arcagnello

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Re: give the squall a miniscule flux cost
« Reply #5 on: June 14, 2021, 03:03:40 AM »

EMR+Right Officer Skills+Autoforge gets you up to 9x the initial ammo, otherwise it's "only" 3x.  In vanilla only the Gryphon has the Autoforge to manage the 9x fleet, and frankly if you've got that great an officer to put on a Gryphon you're far better served with a Hammer Barrage than a Squall.

That's not the most interesting thing though.  That this suggestion is currently requesting a nerf for what's already the most underwhelming and least-used large missile weapon in vanilla is the most interesting part of this suggestion.

I do agree with everything retry says, since it's 100% accurate. That said, I've been using Squalls on my Midline fleet in this fourth 0.95 modded capaign to great effect.
Sometimes it aims its rather limited ammo at the wong targets, but that applies to all missiles:
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But when it works (I don't even have ECCM on my (PL) Conquests by the way) it's the most kinetic damage intensive weapon in the entire game (with Elite Missile Spec) and gives ships with large missile mounts a huge damage spike as long as they last, the "overloading a Radiant" kind of damage spikes (with minimal help from other weapons, the enemy AI really not liking to get its hull hit by Mjolnirs really helps):
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Then there's also to mention that every single missile-rocket hybrid that's fired from the Squall deals some 250 kinetic damage, which is close to the damage a single Hypervelocity Driver shell does. Start massing them like this and things are going to get deleted, especally if they're over-reliant to their shield being good like ramnants:
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In all honesty, despite being potentially very effective, even the humble Medium Sabot Pod has more charges that the Squall. 5 Volleys is an absolute pittance and just one less volley than a Small Sabot SRM. They need to be made cheaper to reflect their low damage potential or they need a lot more ammo to be more widely used.

Nobody that's sane is using them seriously. They're probably one of the most unused weapons in the game right now. They need more ammo.
I do not care if they get rebalanced up to costing 30 Ordinance Points, having them get 10 volleys instead of the current 5 would make it compete with all the other large missile weapons.

« Last Edit: June 14, 2021, 03:08:01 AM by Arcagnello »
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Yunru

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Re: give the squall a miniscule flux cost
« Reply #6 on: June 14, 2021, 06:34:26 AM »

It's funny; the Squall was clearly supposed to be the Large variant of the Sabot (kinetic and EMP damage), but it's so much less viable.

Grievous69

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Re: give the squall a miniscule flux cost
« Reply #7 on: June 14, 2021, 06:41:23 AM »

Thank god someone else agrees with the ammo problem. I've been saying since it first got released that it's not really a "pressure" weapon if you can only fire it 5 times and goodbye. For a destroyer that might be enough but it's just sad in bigger battles.
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Deshara

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Re: give the squall a miniscule flux cost
« Reply #8 on: June 14, 2021, 08:27:19 AM »

Thank god someone else agrees with the ammo problem. I've been saying since it first got released that it's not really a "pressure" weapon if you can only fire it 5 times and goodbye. For a destroyer that might be enough but it's just sad in bigger battles.

it also doesnt help that as far as Im able to discern, the AI just uses it off cooldown? I tried testing it in the sim & I dont think I've ever seen it hold squalls for anything. But if you calculate out the ammo cap by its refire delay you'll note that the squalls will last for the first 100 seconds of combat before ammo bonuses so its not that bad when you hold it up next to how long sabots will last compared to a sabot pod's 54 seconds

That this suggestion is currently requesting a nerf for what's already the most underwhelming and least-used large missile weapon in vanilla is the most interesting part of this suggestion.

its the same nerf as mining pods have
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robepriority

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Re: give the squall a miniscule flux cost
« Reply #9 on: June 14, 2021, 07:35:30 PM »

I think one AI instance that Squalls shine is remenant battlestations, since as long as the modules up, that *is* consistent shield pressure.

That being said, that's more of an issue of not being able to focus fire/bomb indivisual modules than anything else.

Deshara

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Re: give the squall a miniscule flux cost
« Reply #10 on: June 14, 2021, 08:27:33 PM »

I think one AI instance that Squalls shine is remenant battlestations, since as long as the modules up, that *is* consistent shield pressure.

That being said, that's more of an issue of not being able to focus fire/bomb indivisual modules than anything else.

or tell that they're on the wrong side of the station to hit the last module as it squalls them to death :')
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I cant be blamed for what I said 5 minutes ago. I was a different person back then