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[JUDGE! slowpersun]

I think this came up earlier in the Part 1 thread - it's an interesting idea, but I think it'd make you feel forced to use ships with fighters just to make the most out of the bonuses. And that'd likely be the "optimal" way to go.

Perhaps the optimal method of catering to peeps who want more carrier/fighter oriented builds is to add a few more carrier hull mods rather than more carrier/fighter skills, whether or not such mods can be built in or not.  IE, weaker carrier/fighter hull mods can be built-in, while the really powerful hull-mods cannot (like the upcoming changes for neural link and [redacted] ships can't be built in).  Example of "powerful" hull mod:  All fighter/bomber wings always launch with temporary Damper Fields (up to 3-5 "impacts" before going away, regardless of whether fighters have a shield or not), or maybe a launch catapult so that all fighters/bombers launch with a temporary speed bonus that lasts 30 seconds or something.

Point is that maybe having too many carrier ship skills runs into the same issue has having too many phase ship skills in skill tree... It wastes a skill point on a skill that might be better expressed as a hull mod.  Food for thought.  But I agree, carriers and fighters/bombers maybe need to have more varied effects that shouldn't necessarily be skill dependent, only money/OP dependent.

But then again, I keep complaining about bringing back fighter/bomber wing control to overhead tactical map so attack behavior isn't directed per parent carrier and that prolly ain't gonna happen, so not exactly holding my breath...

[Sutopia]

I think this came up earlier in the Part 1 thread - it's an interesting idea, but I think it'd make you feel forced to use ships with fighters just to make the most out of the bonuses. And that'd likely be the "optimal" way to go.

Perhaps the optimal method of catering to peeps who want more carrier/fighter oriented builds is to add a few more carrier hull mods rather than more carrier/fighter skills, whether or not such mods can be built in or not.  IE, weaker carrier/fighter hull mods can be built-in, while the really powerful hull-mods cannot (like the upcoming changes for neural link and [redacted] ships can't be built in).  Example of "powerful" hull mod:  All fighter/bomber wings always launch with temporary Damper Fields (up to 3-5 "impacts" before going away, regardless of whether fighters have a shield or not), or maybe a launch catapult so that all fighters/bombers launch with a temporary speed bonus that lasts 30 seconds or something.

Point is that maybe having too many carrier ship skills runs into the same issue has having too many phase ship skills in skill tree... It wastes a skill point on a skill that might be better expressed as a hull mod.  Food for thought.  But I agree, carriers and fighters/bombers maybe need to have more varied effects that shouldn't necessarily be skill dependent, only money/OP dependent.

But then again, I keep complaining about bringing back fighter/bomber wing control to overhead tactical map so attack behavior isn't directed per parent carrier and that prolly ain't gonna happen, so not exactly holding my breath...

How would the on impact damper field interact with lasers? They deal constant damage (10 ticks per second) so it can just tick away the damper counts?

The improved speed may be malus to certain deck orientations. For example, legion has first and second deck launching fighters backwards. Bombers with lower agility will suffer from this hullmod because they’ll get yeet forward and never have time to properly turn around to aim their ordnance.
I don’t see mod ships aligning the launching direction to the sprite (they just all launch forward), but maybe that’s just the mods I installed.

[JUDGE! slowpersun]

To clarify, those examples aren't set in stone or anything, the hull mod could just as easily apply like a 15% armor buff to fighters/bombers.  Or whatever.  Which is why I used the word EXAMPLE.  Lazy criticism is the worst...

[rabbistern]

I find that better hull is valuable for fast ships that can evade well, like phase ships.  Armor never lasts since so much breaks it, and better shields don't matter if you only zip in and out anyway, but more hull pads you against mistakes that may have otherwise been crippling.

https://fractalsoftworks.com/forum/index.php?topic=12268
FYI.

Armor is extremely effective at mitigating low damage hits.
It’s especially obvious against low dph ballistic weapons and kinetic damage weapons.
For instance, sabot has 100 hit strength on armor. An odyssey (1000) can mitigate 33% of its damage on hull but if you put a heavy armor it can now mitigate 43%.
Also part of the reason why current derelict contingent Venture so OP.

you are 100% correct. yet the key detail here is that the "0 armor" minimum armor values are a percentage of original armor, which do not further decrease until the ship sinks. they obviously favour more armor so technically a low tech ship at min armor with 1000 hp has more hp than a high tech ship at min armor. think of the difference RB makes on a wolf vs a centurion. and thats where the skills come in; take for example the current damage control which adds 25% hull value and containment procedures for less crew damage from hull tanking, they are skills which favor armored ships more, and yet theres still issues of disabling. we have industry skills which can basically replace some hullmods (for extra hull and less crew loss) or can add to them, having something more of that sort of synergy for increasing the effect of those hullmods and perhaps the automated repair unit in particular would open a new industry playstyle without the RNG mess that we know from derelict contingent.
there is even an example of that in the mod HMI, with ships that truly give you the hull tank experience, except their gimmick is getting more ordnance points per d mod. vanilla has extra CR per dmod which is cool and all but really say something like +15% extra effect to hull/repair beneficial hullmods or some op reduction on them would cure DC. i cannot remark enough how bad of a mechanic an RNG based skill is, when theres projectiles such as reapers which are night and day to your victory prospects, all down to a coinflip rather than meticulous fleet engineering and kitting in synergy with appropriate industry skills.

I find that better hull is valuable for fast ships that can evade well, like phase ships.  Armor never lasts since so much breaks it, and better shields don't matter if you only zip in and out anyway, but more hull pads you against mistakes that may have otherwise been crippling.

+

[Sutopia]

To clarify, those examples aren't set in stone or anything, the hull mod could just as easily apply like a 15% armor buff to fighters/bombers.  Or whatever.  Which is why I used the word EXAMPLE.  Lazy criticism is the worst...

How is that a criticism? I’m simply interested in what ideas you have to make fighters interesting, and point out where may cause issues from my limited experience. Hey, no idea is perfect at the first iteration.

The limited damper idea seems nice, it can definitely increase the survivability of fighters, just feeling 3 to 5 may be too conservative numbers judging from how chaotic the battle field may be. I wouldn’t mind if it’s designed to be weak to beam attack which just deletes the damper stack.

[WeiTuLo]

Hmm... if fighters (non bombers) will not be made stronger, could they have faster base speeds, so they can better chase down frigates and other fast ships?

[SonnaBanana]

Hmm... if fighters (non bombers) will not be made stronger, could they have faster base speeds, so they can better chase down frigates and other fast ships?

I think fighters and bombers per wing need to be increased, not speed.

[namad]

I want to mention, phase ships have been basically "OP" for a long time now. If the next patch aims to "fix" this problem. Then I think the logistics/campaign map layer might need some tuning as well. Because while phase ships were OP they also were quite overpriced and expensive to maintain. If they're not supposed to be "OP" then maybe they need some price/costofmaintenance adjustments back in line with normal ships?

[TaLaR]

I don't think Alex ever meant for phase ships to be as strong as they are.

A player piloted Afflictor with character skills can kill about 300 DP of pretty much any un-officered ships (unless it's ridiculously too many small ships, like Kites. AM blasters have limited shots and attack approaches against shielded frigates are particularly time consuming, unless you can just kill through the shield). More in favorable matchups, less vs officers (mostly due to armor/hull skills) or Moras (due to system). At only 8 DP cost. And then you swap to next Afflictor from reserve.

Nothing comes anywhere close in per-DP efficiency. Doom is probably next best thing, but it's far less efficient.

[SCC]

Nothing comes anywhere close in per-DP efficiency. Doom is probably next best thing, but it's far less efficient.

If Afflictors cannot destroy everything in the game, then Doom wins out in the cases Afflictors fail. And potentially against the station, but I don't know how good Afflictors are against stations.

[Sutopia]

I have always thought balance is based on AI vs AI strength and the game is meant to be fighting stronger enemies and use flagship to turn the tide, thus my unpopular opinion is that they are unnecessarily nerfed from player and is making fights even more trivial than ever.

[TaLaR]

If Afflictors cannot destroy everything in the game, then Doom wins out in the cases Afflictors fail. And potentially against the station, but I don't know how good Afflictors are against stations.

Not all that good actually, or at least strongly dependent on type, level and armaments of station. In some cases there is literally no safe way to attack due to overlapping coverage of something like phase lances or tachyon lances.

It's not that important in vanilla though. You don't get to or need to fight tier 3 stations all that much, unlike Nexelerin. And even when you do, if it's just the station, your fleet should be able to mostly handle it while also creating opening for Afflictor. Otherwise there are ships to kill for Afflictor, until we are back to fighting just the station.

[6chad.noirlee9]

i think it would be cool to have amechanic where you can level up skills, say where the effect of skills over time and by some sort of experience thresh hold eventually makes the skill more effective, or able to affect more ships at once

[SonnaBanana]

Rather than adding more player colony skills (or even having any in the first place), give colony-related bonuses once a number of skillpoints are invested in an aptitude?

[Gothars]

Now, with so many of the skills influencing the conditions of the battlefield and the properties of fleets, maybe it would be a good idea to show the opposing commanders relevant skills?
 I think the player should not be left in the dark if the enemy fleet will have a early numerical advantage via best of the best, be able to field an overwhelming amount of junkers via derelict operations or if their un-officered ships will perform better than expected via support doctrine. Having that information could make the difference between a fight feeling arbitrarily difficult or being an interesting challenge you can adapt to.