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Author Topic: Xyphos - The sim queen  (Read 5866 times)

Sutopia

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Xyphos - The sim queen
« on: July 11, 2021, 08:54:16 AM »

People tend to compare Xyphos with two actual ion beams and state it as a great fighter.
2 ion beams AND 2 burst PD for 15 OP, that would usually cost 12x2 + 7x2 = 38 OP not considering the flux cost, sounds pretty busted yeah?

In reality, no, it's the most useless and overpriced fighter in the game IMO.

First of all, it doesn't benefit from ITU or DTC. If you're using a ship that relies on range the ion beam is probably going to sit idle most of the time.
Another reason why it's bad is due to they're not controllable in any degree. Even if set to engage they won't engage the carrier's target. Instead they will just happily shoot anything that is closest to the fighter itself.
Last but not least, ion beam is not an instant beam. It takes time to extend the beam to full range which means due to the behavior previously described, it may constantly switch target and resulting in more downtime than it should because the beam takes so much extra time to re-extend on target switch.

To sum it up, it's paying 15 OP to casually poke at frigates and fighters that tries to flank you and you have no control over it whatsoever.
The only place where it can shine is in sim 1v1 (non-carrier enemy) setup when it never gets distracted. It's the only situation (and unrealistic) it can live up to it's cost. Thus, the sim queen.

Or maybe I'm using it wrong? But how do I even use it wrong when I have no control over its behavior? Am I missing something or is there a particular vanilla loadout making it actually useful?
« Last Edit: July 11, 2021, 08:59:59 AM by Sutopia »
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Megas

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Re: Xyphos - The sim queen
« Reply #1 on: July 11, 2021, 09:31:06 AM »

Xyphos is okay on Odyssey that use fighters as Gradius options or Chmmr zapsats.  Odyssey is primarily a close-range brawler (plasma burn and short-ranged energy weapons), and does not have enough OP to get both Expanded Deck Crew and a viable weapons package, so it needs to focus on guns and treat fighters as a bonus.

Odyssey is one of the few ships where it makes sense to use Mining Pods on.  Xyphos is deluxe pod with burst PD (and ion beam).  May be a bit overpriced compared to other fighters.
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Lucky33

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Re: Xyphos - The sim queen
« Reply #2 on: July 11, 2021, 10:01:29 AM »

For Ody, will take Wasps over Xyphos most of the time. However I mostly play Ody with all combat skills so fighters do have some bonuses.
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Undead

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Re: Xyphos - The sim queen
« Reply #3 on: July 11, 2021, 11:02:05 AM »

Xyphos is okay on Odyssey that use fighters as Gradius options or Chmmr zapsats.  Odyssey is primarily a close-range brawler (plasma burn and short-ranged energy weapons), and does not have enough OP to get both Expanded Deck Crew and a viable weapons package, so it needs to focus on guns and treat fighters as a bonus.

Odyssey is one of the few ships where it makes sense to use Mining Pods on.  Xyphos is deluxe pod with burst PD (and ion beam).  May be a bit overpriced compared to other fighters.

Chmmr? From the ur-quan masters? I vaguely remember them when I watched playthroug of that game. And what is zapsat?
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Megas

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Re: Xyphos - The sim queen
« Reply #4 on: July 11, 2021, 12:21:59 PM »

Chmmr? From the ur-quan masters? I vaguely remember them when I watched playthroug of that game. And what is zapsat?
Yes, from Star Control 2, a.k.a. Ur-Quan Masters.  ZapSats are the three laser satellites that orbit the Chmmr Avatar.
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Linnis

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Re: Xyphos - The sim queen
« Reply #5 on: July 11, 2021, 12:53:23 PM »

I mean, you get the xyphos for the PD. Ion beams are pretty ok against bombers aswell.

Also add on the fact that they basically hover over ships 80% of the time means they will tank some damage but basically not die.

Great choice on things like odessey or even dominator.
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Lucky33

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Re: Xyphos - The sim queen
« Reply #6 on: July 11, 2021, 01:44:51 PM »

Xyphos are severely limited by the number of charges in their BPDs. Typical Talon+Broadsword pirate wing will overload the defense.
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BarnOwlBlue

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Re: Xyphos - The sim queen
« Reply #7 on: July 11, 2021, 04:50:28 PM »

I agree with you, it would be nice if they would focus fire what you targeted if set on engage.

They are neat though, by moving in front to protect you if you are venting or are overloaded.

They are great PD, and thanks to thier shields and positioning they rarely die.
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Vanshilar

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Re: Xyphos - The sim queen
« Reply #8 on: July 11, 2021, 09:24:29 PM »

It's the opposite -- the Xyphos doesn't really shine in small, "easy" battles like in simulation, but they do much better against fleets, especially when outmatched against larger, higher-firepower fleets like [REDACTED].

You have to consider what ion beams do in the first place. They don't do much DPS -- 50 DPS for 200 flux/sec and 12 OP are pretty terrible DPS/flux and DPS/OP ratios. Rather, the whole point is to disable the enemy's attacks. The more powerful the enemy, the more worthwhile it is to disable the enemy's attacks, because the flux war is a matter of maxing out their flux before they max out yours, and they can max out your flux very quickly. So ion beams prevent the enemy from maxing out your flux, allowing you to max out theirs first.

So the Xyphos is very effective when paired with good anti-shield weapons (hard flux is what gets the EMP arcs to trigger), against high-threat targets. That's the use case for them. If you're in a situation where talons/broadswords can overload the enemy, then it's simply too easy of a fight for Xyphos to be worthwhile. You might as well as just go in with some heavy blasters and get it over with quickly.

Generally speaking your ships will be flux-limited in terms of how much weapons you can equip. Especially in a situation where you're trying to output as much damage as possible quickly, it's usually hard to justify spending 400 flux/sec on a beam which doesn't do much damage. So "outsourcing" that flux to fighters is a good way to increase your overall damage output (in this case, to disable enemy weapons) while still staying within your flux budget.

Additionally, ion beams from fighters (like other fighter weapons) can fire through friendly ships, so you don't have to worry about them being blocked. (This is useful toward the end when you're up against Radiants, and the Xyphos in the rear can still help disable weapons even if the ship is blocked by other ships in the way.) You also don't have to worry about the Xyphos dying because they have a range of 0; they stay by your ship instead of running forward and getting killed.

The PD is a nice bonus. Not only is it omnidirectional (as far as I can tell), but it stays active when you're venting. So you can safely vent without worrying (as much) about incoming missiles. They also form a nice screen (when you have multiple ships together), and remove the need to equip PD.

Furies with Xyphos + sabot pods + cryoblaster (optional, otherwise use heavy blaster) make up the bulk of my [REDACTED]-farming fleet, and the Xyphos is the linchpin to making it work, by disabling their offense so that I can get my attacks in. The sabot pods do a lot of hard flux early in the engagement, the Xyphos disables their weapons so they can't attack me much, then my regular weapons kill them. 7 Furies meaning 14 ion beams on the nearest enemy ships to my fleet. The fleet can handle 2 full [REDACTED] fleets pretty easily, and 3 full [REDACTED] fleets with a bit of luck.

(There's no real reason to fight 3 [REDACTED] fleets at once, since I already get the full +500% XP bonus with 2 fleets, but it's just to stress-test the fleet. The main challenge is this. Usually my fleet fights them to their spawn point at the top of the map fairly early on, and basically ends up making a U-shaped formation around their spawn for the rest of the fight. The ship at the top left tip and the top right tip of the U can take a lot of damage suddenly when a new ship spawns in, especially if that ship is a 5-tachyon or 5-autopulse Radiant, before I'm able to get there in time to save them. The AI, of course, doesn't account for it quickly enough to back off -- it thinks that space is a safe spot, and tends to stay there too long even when given a direct order to back away.)

If you find a better fleet composition that can handle multiple [REDACTED] fleets simultaneously, I'm all ears. If you have trouble with [REDACTED] fleets, I'd recommend loading up on Xyphos on many of your fleet ships. The reason for having them isn't going to be apparent when you're going around chasing down pirate frigates. It's more when you're against heavy odds.

First of all, it doesn't benefit from ITU or DTC. If you're using a ship that relies on range the ion beam is probably going to sit idle most of the time.

If your fleet strategy is to snipe at [REDACTED] fleets, I don't think that'll be very successful. Long-range weapons have low damage output by design and they're not going to take out [REDACTED] ships quickly enough, plus enemy ships are going to close in on you quickly anyway; they're not going to stay back and let you snipe away. Ion beams have a range of 1000 su so that's plenty to be in range along with most of your weapons.

Another reason why it's bad is due to they're not controllable in any degree. Even if set to engage they won't engage the carrier's target. Instead they will just happily shoot anything that is closest to the fighter itself.

They can't move forward to engage because they have a range of 0. They're set to stay by the ship. Firing on the closest target is nothing new, it's basically like autofire. They're there to support.

Last but not least, ion beam is not an instant beam. It takes time to extend the beam to full range which means due to the behavior previously described, it may constantly switch target and resulting in more downtime than it should because the beam takes so much extra time to re-extend on target switch.

That's an odd complaint, because beams are generally more than twice as fast as projectiles, plus they continue to track as they extend (as opposed to projectiles, which go in a straight line once they're fired). While you do lose out on the potential damage as they extend, you do more or less 100% of the damage after that. Have you ever observed how often projectiles miss?

Not to mention, the beam speed is 2400 su/sec, so it reaches this distance in 0.42 seconds, so (assuming the target is at a perfect 1000 su away), this means you lose out on...21 damage. Since beams travel faster than projectiles, this will usually be before the projectiles do their hard flux anyway, and the hard flux is what basically "activates" the ion beam in the first place, so you're not really missing out on much. 21 soft flux which the target pretty much instantly regenerates.

If you're having issues with your Xyphos fighters trying to hop around different targets, then you have other problems. Fighters should be fairly quickly dispatched by your fleet, and if you have multiple ships in range that the Xyphos gets confused over, then it's a positioning error on your part. I haven't had issues with the Xyphos picking wrong targets to go after, since generally speaking the closest one is likely the one that I want killed in the first place since that's what you want for proper positioning. The exception is *possibly* when I'm trying to finish off a target before it retreats back behind other enemy ships, but in that case, I'm relying on my weapons for damage, not the ion beam which does little damage in the first place.
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Lucky33

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Re: Xyphos - The sim queen
« Reply #9 on: July 12, 2021, 03:40:41 AM »

Ion canon is 6 OP. Pulser is 11, Beam is 12. Why bother with the built in hangar and 23 OP fighter wing?
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Sutopia

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Re: Xyphos - The sim queen
« Reply #10 on: July 12, 2021, 06:08:05 AM »

Something something

You’re over focused on ordo farming which due to enemy AI is forced to do CQC and remnants have terrible fighter support that can’t distract the ion beams. On top of that you’re using fury which most people agree is OP for its cost. With 3 S mods it can easily be over 180 OP in a fit - 50% more than intended. The fury wouldn’t have enough OP to support a converted hangar without S mods and if you really have that much OP to spare why not just use a long bow? It costs merely 1 more OP but is effectively infinite sabot, allowing you to fit things like harpoon. If you really need that emp, just use an ion pulser.
I really don’t want to bring up long bow in fear of them getting nerfed but tbh long bow simply outperforms Xyphos in nearly all circumstances. Sabot has more range, deals more damage and long bows come with burst pd as well. I find in any given fit long bow would outperform Xyphos.
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KDR_11k

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Re: Xyphos - The sim queen
« Reply #11 on: July 12, 2021, 06:55:31 AM »

I think of the Xyphos as a gun pod for a battle carrier (or a combat ship with spare bays) that wants more PD. Though the Longbow is probably a better deal anyway since its sabots can help your main guns so much. Thanks to the range on those sabot launches it remains operable in direct combat as it barely moves past the front of the carrier's shields. I wouldn't rely on the longbow for PD since it'll be out of the fight for a while after launching its missile which it will do even on Regroup if you're close enough but the flux savings from not needing to deal all that kinetic damage can be used to power potent PD instead.

IIRC I got some use out of the Xyphos on a Prometheus Mk2 since that has pretty meh PD coverage and flux stats.
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Vanshilar

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Re: Xyphos - The sim queen
« Reply #12 on: July 12, 2021, 09:43:16 AM »

Something something

I take it then you can't counter any of the specific points I brought up.

You’re over focused on ordo farming which due to enemy AI is forced to do CQC and remnants have terrible fighter support that can’t distract the ion beams.

That's because it's the endgame content so it makes sense to build your fleet around the hardest content in the game; if a fleet can handle the hardest content the game has to offer, it can handle pretty much anything else (with very few, specific exceptions). It's much easier for an endgame-capable fleet to "punch down" on regular pirate/faction fleets than it is for regular fleets to "punch up" to endgame.

Thus, in forum discussions about how to build your fleet, it makes sense to focus on endgame-capable fleets.

Also, the [REDACTED] fleets that I use to stress-test my fleet has a total of 34 fighter wings (and 77 ships). The majority are Sparks which have 5 fighters per wing. I fail to see how that is "terrible fighter support".

On top of that you’re using fury which most people agree is OP for its cost. With 3 S mods it can easily be over 180 OP in a fit - 50% more than intended.

In case you're unaware, s-mods were introduced in version 0.95a and every ship can use 2 s-mods at the start, with a 3rd one available from the Special Modifications skill. In other words having 3 s-mods is very much "intended", in the same way that having a Radiant in your fleet is "intended". I don't recall you going into Radiant threads complaining that they're not intended, though.

I bring up the Fury because in the current version, it's a convenient platform to demonstrate this loadout strategy. In other words so that anybody can go into Console Commands, make a bunch of Furies, equip them the way I stated, and go out [REDACTED]-hunting and see this type of loadout strategy in action. But it works just as well using Falcon (P)'s, or now I'm also working on optimizing it with regular Falcons (since Alex has said the Fury and the Falcon (P) will increase in cost from 15 to 20 DP in the next patch).

What's funny is that on a lark, I took my current fleet, sized for 320 battle size, and then redid the same fight on 400 battle size, and it still works (although I have to spend more time babysitting ships that go out of position.), and this is with the current version where Radiants cost 40 instead of 60 DP. So it will work just as well even after Furies get bumped up to 20 DP in the next patch.

The fury wouldn’t have enough OP to support a converted hangar without S mods and if you really have that much OP to spare why not just use a long bow? It costs merely 1 more OP but is effectively infinite sabot, allowing you to fit things like harpoon.

Because longbows go out in front of the ship and die. Great when the enemy fleet doesn't have much anti-fighter support, but do you really want to send longbows in toward multiple wings of Sparks?

If you really need that emp, just use an ion pulser.

Let me get this straight. One of your arguments against the Xyphos was that the ion beam (range of 1000) is too short-ranged since it's unaffected by ITU and ends up being idle on long-range ships. But now you're recommending ion pulser (range of 400)? Even with ITU, that comes out to a range of 560 on a cruiser. Gunnery Implants is unlikely since that means you can't take Energy Weapon Mastery, which is superior. You're going to have to get into melee range to disable their weapons, which means you'll be in the range of multiple enemy ships.

I really don’t want to bring up long bow in fear of them getting nerfed but tbh long bow simply outperforms Xyphos in nearly all circumstances. Sabot has more range, deals more damage and long bows come with burst pd as well. I find in any given fit long bow would outperform Xyphos.

Longbows are nice because they're an anti-shield fighter (very important against [REDACTED]), but they're also fairly fragile. Also of course the other component of my loadout was sabot pods -- it's Xyphos + sabot pods as a combination that works so well. So it already has anti-shield, what it lacks is anti-weapon (which is what Xyphos provides).

If you think longbows are that much better, then give your ship/loadout using longbows that can go up against multiple [REDACTED] fleets. I've already given one using Xyphos. It should be pretty easy if longbow "outperforms Xyphos in nearly all circumstances" right?
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Sutopia

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Re: Xyphos - The sim queen
« Reply #13 on: July 12, 2021, 10:54:26 AM »

You’re not even trying :-[
Ion pulser range is 500 and anyone who has used it knows it.
And I just gave you the fit: replace your HB with IP, replace your Xyphos with long bow and replace your sabot pod with harpoon pod (or reaper if you trust AI using it - I don’t).
IP is short range because you’re already fighting short range, so the “extra” range on xyphos is not needed. It’s not even a counter argument.
As OP stated, it’s not good for kiting, so your use of it in a CQC ship is somewhat legit. But again, in such scenarios a long bow can safely launch its payload without even leaving the mothership shield range, rendering long bow a superior choice.

Edit: or if you find there’s already sufficient emp from long bow, phase lance is also a decent choice which has range on par with HB while being more flux efficient and can benefit from advanced optics if you so desire.
And btw an officer can has both tech skills, idk why you would mention it.
« Last Edit: July 12, 2021, 11:03:13 AM by Sutopia »
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Linnis

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Re: Xyphos - The sim queen
« Reply #14 on: July 12, 2021, 11:17:39 AM »

Xyphos let you vent flux while stopping small threats like a bomber wing or a frigate. It is PD that can fire when venting flux.

That's very very useful.
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