Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[SCC]

I just took Guardian for a spin and it isn't inconcievable that it could solo an ordo on its own (eventually), but it's nowhere as easy as it was with Doom.

[Lucky33]

I like the idea of getting the Guardian, as long as the missile recovery special is removed of course

Ah yes, just gut the very thing that makes it interesting and unique.

Well, this is considering that Guardian will be left completely unchanged after removal of its Unlimited Missile Works.

However there is a possibility that it will be turned into a more menacing something. Worthy of being called monstrous.

[Lucky33]

I just took Guardian for a spin and it isn't inconcievable that it could solo an ordo on its own (eventually), but it's nowhere as easy as it was with Doom.

This is what to be expected. With current skill/officer distribution system ship's capabilities defined mostly by the basic hull stats. Such as flux and speed. Guardian have rather mediocre (for a supposedly "super" ship) effective shielding and dissipation. Mobility is above average but after single use of PJ you gain less distance than Radiant gets out of all its teleport charges. And without mobility system it is just another 40 speed capital. This is even worse than Conquest kiting the Paragon scenario when the certain battlecruiser is enjoying speed advantage even without use of its mobility system. Although fight is still taking too long.

[Sutopia]

I just took Guardian for a spin and it isn't inconcievable that it could solo an ordo on its own (eventually), but it's nowhere as easy as it was with Doom.

This is what to be expected. With current skill/officer distribution system ship's capabilities defined mostly by the basic hull stats. Such as flux and speed. Guardian have rather mediocre (for a supposedly "super" ship) effective shielding and dissipation. Mobility is above average but after single use of PJ you gain less distance than Radiant gets out of all its teleport charges. And without mobility system it is just another 40 speed capital. This is even worse than Conquest kiting the Paragon scenario when the certain battlecruiser is enjoying speed advantage even without use of its mobility system. Although fight is still taking too long.

Guardian can use ballistic and it makes the entire world of difference.
Paragon is stuck in energy large which means it either can fit lances to outrange everyone but can only use two HVD to deal hard flux damage, or use autopulse and get outranged by even onslaught.
However, guardian has enough flux to support two Mjolnir, which means it has the best long range hard flux dps in the entire game even without missile autoforge. If desired, it can theoretically support two gauss with dedicated fit. What does that mean? With an officer in .95.1 it may outrange an autopulse high tech station. Absolute bonkers.

[WeiTuLo]

Yeah the Advanced Targeting Core on it is very nice.

[Lucky33]

I just took Guardian for a spin and it isn't inconcievable that it could solo an ordo on its own (eventually), but it's nowhere as easy as it was with Doom.

This is what to be expected. With current skill/officer distribution system ship's capabilities defined mostly by the basic hull stats. Such as flux and speed. Guardian have rather mediocre (for a supposedly "super" ship) effective shielding and dissipation. Mobility is above average but after single use of PJ you gain less distance than Radiant gets out of all its teleport charges. And without mobility system it is just another 40 speed capital. This is even worse than Conquest kiting the Paragon scenario when the certain battlecruiser is enjoying speed advantage even without use of its mobility system. Although fight is still taking too long.

Guardian can use ballistic and it makes the entire world of difference.
Paragon is stuck in energy large which means it either can fit lances to outrange everyone but can only use two HVD to deal hard flux damage, or use autopulse and get outranged by even onslaught.
However, guardian has enough flux to support two Mjolnir, which means it has the best long range hard flux dps in the entire game even without missile autoforge. If desired, it can theoretically support two gauss with dedicated fit. What does that mean? With an officer in .95.1 it may outrange an autopulse high tech station. Absolute bonkers.

Or you can put Rift Cascade Emitters on the Paragon and start dealing hard flux damage in the same range as TacLances.

On the other hand, we have Radiant what can simply jump through 2k range and delete any given target, Guardian included, in a matter of seconds with the sole exception of: a) Phase ships, b) Paragon, c) Monitor and d) multisegmented station in the sense that its modules are on the different sides at any given time.

Also we have one certain phase super ship what can do the same and there is only one ship what can do something about it and it is not Guardian.

[Sutopia]

Rift cascade only generate one rift at max range. It requires 200 range for every additional rift and it only deal as much hard flux as autopulse at autopulse range.

Phase skimmer has only 300 base range and 450 at SE.
Spamming all 4 gives 1800 range and it takes 6.66 seconds to recharge each charge.

On the other hand, plasma jets has 80 average speed increment over 6 seconds time span and 3.33 seconds cooldown, not that far off. Helmsman could help with this (increased acceleration).
Phase skimmer has more burst potential but is roughly on par with plasma jets in extensive use. Not to mention phase skimmer forces shield down.

Guardian has a 25k flux pool, same as Radiant, not sure what you're gonna use to insta delete Guardian.
Guardian without autoforge is literally the low tech version of Radiant (identical hull, identical flux cap, 5 larges)

[BaBosa]

I like the idea of getting the Guardian, as long as the missile recovery special is removed of course

Ah yes, just gut the very thing that makes it interesting and unique.

The Guardian is the only ship that can have a large weapon of every type, it also has the same number of large mounts as the conquest but instead of thermal pulse cannons you can have missiles for even more insane burst. It's armour is almost the same as the conquests and it's flux is almost the same as the paragons.
Plasma jets improve manoeuvrability as well as speed so having it's weapons facing forward aren't as big of a deal and it doesn't last long like burn drive and make you more flanked like conquest.
The bigger deal though that makes me really want to play it is that it's two large missile mounts face the face direction as the large ballistics and it's not got *** stats. I want to try chucking on storm needlers, sabot pods and cyclone reapers. That would be awesome.

[Megas]

Remember that a player with Guardian flagship will only have seven points left for the other three trees.  It would not get two more tier 5 skills.

And someone who gets Automated Ships but not Neural Link will just get a beatstick that will charge into battle and maybe run away only when it is losing the flux war.

As for phase skimmer and plasma burn, Aurora can eventually overtake and kill Medusa.  And if player gets Systems Expertise, he will not have enough for Missile Specialization or Best of the Best, because eight are already taken by both Automated Ships and Neural Link.

One reason why I like Guardian to be recoverable is it gets tiring of using Radiant, Radiant, and more Radiant for Automated Ships because Radiant is too good (or rather, the only ship worth taking Automated Ships for instead of getting a better tier 5 skill), and the other Automated Ships are nothing special compared to the best human ships of their class.  Remnant frigates are frustrating to pilot (Lumen is Scarab without time shift, Glimmer is old omni-shield Wolf without skimmer).  Remnant destroyers are... bleh!  Brilliant is okay but nothing special - just an evil Apogee with a bay instead of cargo capacity.  Also, would be nice if there was a Remnant battlecruiser (or possibly Doom clone), something midway between Brilliant and Radiant.

[Big Bee]

I edited the files to make it recoverable (plus gave it slightly bigger shield arcs) and it was absolutely broken, even without using many missiles. I actually had to put it in storage alongside my United Pamed cruisers cause they were so strong they made the game a lot less fun. Sleep tight Sigma Prince.

[SCC]

And without mobility system it is just another 40 speed capital.

What does that matter? It's not as if you can not take the system. It's enough that Guardian can live where Conquest dies overwhelmed, unable to kite Remnants.

Guardian without autoforge is literally the low tech version of Radiant (identical hull, identical flux cap, 5 larges)

Omnidirectional mobility ship system, a mix of ballistics and energy weapons... It's a midline version of Radiant, not low-tech!

[Sutopia]

Remember that a player with Guardian flagship will only have seven points left for the other three trees.  It would not get two more tier 5 skills.

And someone who gets Automated Ships but not Neural Link will just get a beatstick that will charge into battle and maybe run away only when it is losing the flux war.

As for phase skimmer and plasma burn, Aurora can eventually overtake and kill Medusa.  And if player gets Systems Expertise, he will not have enough for Missile Specialization or Best of the Best, because eight are already taken by both Automated Ships and Neural Link.

One reason why I like Guardian to be recoverable is it gets tiring of using Radiant, Radiant, and more Radiant for Automated Ships because Radiant is too good (or rather, the only ship worth taking Automated Ships for instead of getting a better tier 5 skill), and the other Automated Ships are nothing special compared to the best human ships of their class.  Remnant frigates are frustrating to pilot (Lumen is Scarab without time shift, Glimmer is old omni-shield Wolf without skimmer).  Remnant destroyers are... bleh!  Brilliant is okay but nothing special - just an evil Apogee with a bay instead of cargo capacity.  Also, would be nice if there was a Remnant battlecruiser (or possibly Doom clone), something midway between Brilliant and Radiant.

You don’t take system expertise for Guardian. It only benefits from reduced cooldown but it doesn’t affect active time, reducing its effectiveness by a huge margin.
Taking system expertise is really just for the ability to chase down everything non-phase where it really doesn’t need to. It can already outrun most vanilla non-phase ships without.

[Megas]

If I wanted Systems Expertise for faster jet recharge, it would be more likely for escaping swarms.  Guardian is vulnerable to getting swarmed by a mob of fast ships.  However, chasing ships down is still good against the cowardly AI.  Chasing cowardly ships until they get cornered is annoying.  Aurora is faster than Medusa, but it still take some time to catch up, and Guardian is slower than Aurora.

As for tier 5...
Systems Expertise would be good if player wanted to pilot other automated ships (but player who gets both Tech 5 skills will likely pilot the capitals).

Missile Specialization is probably irrelevant for Guardian that still has unlimited missiles, but if that gets stripped, then Missile Spec. would be good.

Best of the Best as Spec.Mods successor needs no explanation.

As for the new other Leader 5 skill, since Guardian will probably cost a huge lot of DP, stronger redshirts probably means little if there is not enough DP left to deploy enough extra ships... unless Guardian costs so much CR to deploy (like Ziggurat) that it cannot chain battle, and it must sit like a hangar queen and let other ships fight successive battles (kind of problematic in a red system with several multi-Radiant Ordos after your fleet.)

Hull Restoration is to make inevitable deaths less painful when your stupid AI ships blow themselves up (or reckless player gets in over his head).  For players who give up combat power for QoL.

No comment on DC.

P.S.  I have not tried this, but if Ziggurat costs so CR to deploy, then perhaps an easy way to kill it at Alpha Site is to deploy some ships then retreat a few times to drain its CR, then fight it while it is crippled at zero CR.  If that works, and Guardian gains massive CR loss per deployment as a balancing mechanism, then Guardian losing too much CR from deployment might make it a lame boss if player catches on.

P.P.S.  My point was if player goes double tech 5, then he only gets to pick one other tier 5 skill, so no munching with multiple non-Tech tier 5 skills.  BotB would probably be the likely third pick, though.

[Lucky33]

And without mobility system it is just another 40 speed capital.

What does that matter? It's not as if you can not take the system. It's enough that Guardian can live where Conquest dies overwhelmed, unable to kite Remnants.

That's my point. It is good for kiting. If you want to simply start deleting ships as fast as possible and as I always obsessed with, it becomes irrelevant. In my eyes super battleship optimized for running from the threat is not super. The threat is.

[Sutopia]

If I wanted Systems Expertise for faster jet recharge, it would be more likely for escaping swarms.  Guardian is vulnerable to getting swarmed by a mob of fast ships.  However, chasing ships down is still good against the cowardly AI.  Chasing cowardly ships until they get cornered is annoying.  Aurora is faster than Medusa, but it still take some time to catch up, and Guardian is slower than Aurora.

As for tier 5...
Systems Expertise would be good if player wanted to pilot other automated ships (but player who gets both Tech 5 skills will likely pilot the capitals).

Missile Specialization is probably irrelevant for Guardian that still has unlimited missiles, but if that gets stripped, then Missile Spec. would be good.

Best of the Best as Spec.Mods successor needs no explanation.

As for the new other Leader 5 skill, since Guardian will probably cost a huge lot of DP, stronger redshirts probably means little if there is not enough DP left to deploy enough extra ships... unless Guardian costs so much CR to deploy (like Ziggurat) that it cannot chain battle, and it must sit like a hangar queen and let other ships fight successive battles (kind of problematic in a red system with several multi-Radiant Ordos after your fleet.)

Hull Restoration is to make inevitable deaths less painful when your stupid AI ships blow themselves up (or reckless player gets in over his head).  For players who give up combat power for QoL.

No comment on DC.

P.S.  I have not tried this, but if Ziggurat costs so CR to deploy, then perhaps an easy way to kill it at Alpha Site is to deploy some ships then retreat a few times to drain its CR, then fight it while it is crippled at zero CR.  If that works, and Guardian gains massive CR loss per deployment as a balancing mechanism, then Guardian losing too much CR from deployment might make it a lame boss if player catches on.

P.P.S.  My point was if player goes double tech 5, then he only gets to pick one other tier 5 skill, so no munching with multiple non-Tech tier 5 skills.  BotB would probably be the likely third pick, though.

It make little sense to double top tech and not pilot an automated ship thus binding the remaining 7 points into combat.

As of missiles expertise, it effectively 1.5x the missile dps due to lowered refiring delay. It also provides huge speed bonus and extra missile HP to make them much harder to shoot down.  It’s totally a must pick for Guardian.