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[Jo Jo]

Thanks to everyone on the forum who have contributed to my sincere enjoyment and growth in the game. I'm making progress and am now able to take on 180k bounty fleets with no losses and 300k bounty fleets (three capitals and a bunch of cruisers) with only the loss of a few destroyers. I'm still on a steep learning curve and I'd like to ask a couple more questions about fleet sizes and controlling fleets during battles.

I'm not interested in piloting my own ships, though I would like to make sure I am giving the AI the best possible direction. 

Yesterday I discovered there appears to be a hard cap of 240 recoverable CR on fleet fights, or at least the ones I have encountered. I do have my game set to 400 max fleet size and I did increase the RAM available to the game up to the max 8 GB, per the recommendations by the mod community. I've looked and so far I have not found a utility mod that will increase the fleet fight size, though I would assume one of the larger mods has already taken the liberty to include such a desired feature. Have I missed the mod I'm looking for or is that just the current state of the game and the modding community? Does it even matter? Will the game simply not allow fights larger than 240?

I've experimented quite a bit in my somewhat limited game time with regards to directing my fleets and what seems to work best (least number of causalities on my side) is to "C" capture the closest two points and then take a guess at where the enemy is heading and "A" assault the third point. My fleets seem to be too spread out if I try and capture all four. So, that's the first part of my successful battles, then I look at where the bulk of the enemy fleet is and I change the assault order towards the capture point closest to the enemy blob.

This strategy works well for the first 1/2 of the battle with my ships tending to take out a horde of smaller ships and thin the heard quite a bit. The second half of the battle (300k bounties) usually results in three enemy capitals on grid and few support ships. This is generally when I will select a group of four or more ships and right click to assault one of the capitals. Once a couple of them have gone down, then I usually "Full Assault." How do you direct your ships?

My current fleet comp is against the meta, primarily since I'm still Alt-Tabbing to the Wiki nearly every time an enemy ship dies so I can see what actually left the battle. Yes, I'm familiar with the basic ships like the Condor, Mule, Falcon, and Atlas II, so I don't have to look them up, but there are quite a few ships in the game. My fleet has three capitals plus four or so heavy cruisers and two of my favorite, the Apogee, along with some lighter cruisers, a few destroyers and maybe two frigates. They don't all get deployed, since there's a limit of 240 recovery points, so I usually start with two capitals (Onslaught), both Apogees, some Eagles, a Champion (another favorite), a Falcon (maybe) and a Mora. The Mora is fitted with three Warthog squadrons and has yet to die in an engagement. It's able to kill a Falcon in a one-on-one and it moves around the battlefield unlike a Condor which just sits in the back. I don't have access to better ships, though I have the thread "A Noob's Insight on Ships" bookmarked and I keep that one open as well when I play.

I should point out that I have the Detailed Combat Results Mod installed and I rigorously evaluate each battle, along with what I observe from an AI piloting standpoint. Results from this mod have taught me that ranged weapons are a good investment along with a hullmod that further increases the range. 

I also have had very little luck with the AI piloting phase ships in the current build, at least the frigate size which is all I have experience with. They do pretty well in the very early game, but they die very quickly in the hands of the AI when running against these bounty fleets. I know the cruiser size is considered OP, though I've yet to run into it.

Also, I've only had steady pilots, and even then if I take an Onslaught and right click on an enemy too early in the battle my ship may take a terrible beating. The steady pilots appear to make relatively wise decisions and do manage to whittle away the enemy over time under the capture and assault capture point commands.

Thought from you vets on any of these observations? Suggestions for controlling my fleet with the in-battle commands? Thanks!

[Thaago]

Regarding officer personalities my mantra is: Steady is defensive, aggressive is balanced, reckless is offensive. If you aren't flying your own ships you will see better results if you hire purely aggressive officers and in your doctrine page up the aggression levels of your non-officered ships by a few ticks. Also, the "Full Assault" command in combat in the upper right is extremely valuable. If you ever look at the map and go 'yeah, my forces are a bit superior I just need them to attack' toggle that command on.

As you've seen right clicking on an enemy to give eliminate makes them often take damage. Whats going on there is that the eliminate command makes the ship mostly ignore threats except for the target ship - great for attacking that ship, really bad if the target ship has allies about. I often cancel this command if it doesn't look like I can get a clean kill.

[Jo Jo]

Regarding officer personalities my mantra is: Steady is defensive, aggressive is balanced, reckless is offensive. If you aren't flying your own ships you will see better results if you hire purely aggressive officers and in your doctrine page up the aggression levels of your non-officered ships by a few ticks. Also, the "Full Assault" command in combat in the upper right is extremely valuable. If you ever look at the map and go 'yeah, my forces are a bit superior I just need them to attack' toggle that command on.

As you've seen right clicking on an enemy to give eliminate makes them often take damage. Whats going on there is that the eliminate command makes the ship mostly ignore threats except for the target ship - great for attacking that ship, really bad if the target ship has allies about. I often cancel this command if it doesn't look like I can get a clean kill.

Thanks for the tips! I'm not sure I've ever seen the "doctrine page" that you referenced. Would you mind telling me the keyboard commands that will bring up that page so I can see it and make the changes you suggest.

Thanks for the tip on the aggressive officers. Interesting. I'll have to experiment with a whole batch of new officers. Sadly, I've already mentored most of my current officers.

Edit: I found the "Fleet Patrols and Doctrine" page, but I thought that was only for the fleet patrols of my colonies. Are you saying the doctrine I choose there affects any AI controlled fleet, even the one I take with me?

[Yunru]

It controls all your faction's AI, your fleet's included.

[Thaago]

Right, thats the one! It effects the non-officered ships in your own fleet as well.

[SCC]

Yesterday I discovered there appears to be a hard cap of 240 recoverable CR on fleet fights, or at least the ones I have encountered. I do have my game set to 400 max fleet size and I did increase the RAM available to the game up to the max 8 GB, per the recommendations by the mod community. I've looked and so far I have not found a utility mod that will increase the fleet fight size, though I would assume one of the larger mods has already taken the liberty to include such a desired feature. Have I missed the mod I'm looking for or is that just the current state of the game and the modding community? Does it even matter? Will the game simply not allow fights larger than 240?

To increase the battlesize, go to Starsector\starsector-core\data\config, open the settings.json file in notepad, search for "maxBattleSize" and change the default number of 400 to whatever you want.
As for why 400 is the max by default, is that it's the intended battlesize and everything below is a compromise, in case you can't run 400 smoothly.

I don't have access to better ships, though I have the thread "A Noob's Insight on Ships" bookmarked and I keep that one open as well when I play.

I would advise you keep an open mind on that tier list, it's hardly perfect. It wouldn't have generated so much activity, if it was...

Also, the "Full Assault" command in combat in the upper right is extremely valuable. If you ever look at the map and go 'yeah, my forces are a bit superior I just need them to attack' toggle that command on.

Once a couple of them have gone down, then I usually "Full Assault."

Thaago pls

[Vanshilar]

For adjusting the battle size, you can go into \starsector-core\data\config\settings.json, search for "maxBattleSize", and then set it to whatever you want. Each side can deploy up to 60% of the battle size, hence your 240 DP cap when the battle size is 400. (Note that this is just a limit on how much you can deploy at once, not the overall size of your fleet.)

Be sure to make a backup of the settings.json file first! So you can always go back to the original version if anything messes up. There are many settings that you can customize to improve your playing experience. For example, if you don't like being blinded every time a ship dies, you can look for "enableShipExplosionWhiteout" and set it to "false".

[Jo Jo]

Yunru and Thaago, thank you both for confirming something that I would never have anticipated. It sure looks to me as a new player as that screen only controls the ships that protect your colonies. Great to know! I'll definitely increase it by one bar to "aggressive officers and ship commanders."

SCC and Vanshilar, what you have described as far as battle size goes makes perfect sense. I'll work on editing that file this weekend and I'll thoroughly enjoy the carnage! One thing I do see during base assaults is that the AI is not such a good pilot. I tried bringing three capital ships to the last couple fights and one of them just couldn't get a clear line of sight and thus really didn't participate. The AI seems to do much better when the enemies are spread out as in a normal fleet battle. I've also read in the forums that the next patch has better AI piloting with a specific focus on smaller ships getting out of the way of larger ships so they can bring their big guns to bear. Sounds like a nice improvement for those of us dependent on the AI for results.

Thankfully I was able to upgrade to an i9-9900K last year though my office with a nice graphics card, too. Just good timing as far as this game goes. I would think I could easily take it up to 1000, since I can run four instances of Eve in 1080p without issue. Wow! Sounds like some real fun and huge fights soon. The only sad part will be the anticipation I feel as my ships race to the capture points so I can go from 199 starting points to 240 or so once the first two points are captured.

I'm reading through the post on the ships with an open mind. Everything is new to me and I've yet to find many ships I really like, besides the Apogee which consistently does just a little less damage per encounter than either of the Onslaughts. The Onslaughts kill more ships by far and have more assists, though the Apogee sure seems to keep several ships busy at something like a stalemate until help can arrive. It's a good tradeoff, and the smaller missiles (600) + expanded missile +600 + captain's skill +600 = 1800 and can also kill a lot of fighters or bombers.

[SapphireSage]

If you like commanding and want to avoid taking personal combat skills I would recommend taking a Hound (when the upcoming patch comes out then the Kite(S)), slapping an Operations Center in it, and using that as your flagship as it will increase how fast your CPs regenerate so long as you are on it. Just place that in a far corner somewhere away from all the combat and command from there.

[Jo Jo]

If you like commanding and want to avoid taking personal combat skills I would recommend taking a Hound (when the upcoming patch comes out then the Kite(S)), slapping an Operations Center in it, and using that as your flagship as it will increase how fast your CPs regenerate so long as you are on it. Just place that in a far corner somewhere away from all the combat and command from there.

That's a very good idea, actually! That way you save four or five character points which could be used on something else. Nice.

[pairedeciseaux]

I also have had very little luck with the AI piloting phase ships in the current build, at least the frigate size which is all I have experience with. They do pretty well in the very early game, but they die very quickly in the hands of the AI when running against these bounty fleets.

Some tips/suggestions - YMMV:

• Hullmods to improve survivability: Heavy Armor, Reinforced Bulkheads, Resistant Flux Conduits, Armored Weapon Mounts, Insulated Engine Assembly, Hardened Subsystems
• Officer skills: Phase Mastery (Elite!), Gunnery Implants or Energy Weapon Mastery, Reliability Engineering
• Player character skills: Field Repairs, Wolfpack Tactics
• Main guns: Antimatter Blasters
• Also, I like to have at least 1 PD Laser or 1 IR Pulse or 1 Ion Canon
• Afflictor is a bit better than Shade - well, it depends on the ship's precise role in the fleet, Shade can be an amazing asset, but sometimes its ship system can be a liability
• Both Afflictor and Shade are great to capture and recapture points, tell them to capture those on the top part of the map at the beginning of the battle : C on the point, select a phase frigate, right click on the point

(haven't played recently, so maybe I forgot some must-haves)

Expect nerf for next version of the game, currently they are too good for 8 DP, even when controlled by AI. 

[Jo Jo]

I also have had very little luck with the AI piloting phase ships in the current build, at least the frigate size which is all I have experience with. They do pretty well in the very early game, but they die very quickly in the hands of the AI when running against these bounty fleets.

Some tips/suggestions - YMMV:

• Hullmods to improve survivability: Heavy Armor, Reinforced Bulkheads, Resistant Flux Conduits, Armored Weapon Mounts, Insulated Engine Assembly, Hardened Subsystems
• Officer skills: Phase Mastery (Elite!), Gunnery Implants or Energy Weapon Mastery, Reliability Engineering
• Player character skills: Field Repairs, Wolfpack Tactics
• Main guns: Antimatter Blasters
• Also, I like to have at least 1 PD Laser or 1 IR Pulse or 1 Ion Canon
• Afflictor is a bit better than Shade - well, it depends on the ship's precise role in the fleet, Shade can be an amazing asset, but sometimes its ship system can be a liability
• Both Afflictor and Shade are great to capture and recapture points, tell them to capture those on the top part of the map at the beginning of the battle : C on the point, select a phase frigate, right click on the point

(haven't played recently, so maybe I forgot some must-haves)

Expect nerf for next version of the game, currently they are too good for 8 DP, even when controlled by AI. 

You make a good case for phase ships and you certainly know how you like to keep them alive. Those are some good ideas. Also interesting that they will be nerfed further in the next version. I must be missing something. Thanks!

[Zonk]

I'm at a similar point in the game to you and it sounds like we have similar approaches to commanding the AI

General tips I've found is that I give almost every ship an escort at the start of the battle. This stops mainline combat ships like Paragons from focusing on little harassing enemy frigates as the escort will deal with them instead. I send dedicated point-defense/Hurricane MIRV Gryphons in with most of my capitals which do a great job with long-range missile support and anti-fighter work. I have a Champion too I use in a similar fashion but it's more expensive to deploy as a pure escort. Escorting ships won't be very aggressive except with missiles (they won't charge in and shoot the same thing as the ship they're escorting, but they will shoot missiles at it) so I tend to make escort ships heavy on missiles and EMP weapons like the ion blaster (to disable harassers).

I tend to make heavy use of right-click eliminate commands to focus my friendly AI's attentions. I find that even if I am outnumbered on a broad scale, two Paragons with eliminate orders will basically always be able to establish local superiority. You don't have to beat the entire enemy fleet, just the ones currently in range of you. I totally believe in the "decisive battle" model: it doesn't matter if I'd lose a longer fight if my two Paragons basically alpha the scariest enemy off the field in the first minute. Even if you overextend, playing extremely aggressively often causes the enemy AI to overextend because they think you're an easy target (especially enemy Radiants with their equivalent of reckless officers) making them easy pickings. Worst-case scenario, set the "eliminate" orders to "engage" or even order your ships back to a waypoint with a "defend" order if your ships are dying.

As for aggressive or reckless officers, I find the XIV Onslaught is a great ship to give them if I don't have a disposable cruiser like a Fury or Pirate Falcon to throw them in. With Reinforced Bulkheads/Blast Doors/Heavy Armor and the damage control/impact mitigation skills it takes a stupid amount of damage to kill one (2500 armor and 30,000 hull, and that's before officer skills or Derelict Fleet shenanigans) even when the friendly AI does something silly like burn drive into missile of the enemy fleet. They do such a good job being distractions that a single XIV Onslaught is often the first ship I deploy into tough fights with a pair of Paragons coming in behind that to clean up the greedy enemies who overextend bashing on my Onslaught.

I really don't like full assault unless the enemy really has only shuttles or very weak ships left. Full assault removes all escort orders, which can be bad for things like Astrals who need it, and will also cause weak ships like escort frigates and support carriers to charge into potentially dangerous enemies. I have better success with right-clicking to direct my big ships' attention at the tough enemies and otherwise using the leftover Command Frequency time to set up "engage" orders on the targets I want my ships to shoot after their main targets die or run away.

Good luck and godspeed!

[Igncom1]

I'll often attempt to use a couple points on a battlemap to form my fleet into something resembling a formation in battle.

With three or more points distributed among my gunboats for fighting and defending on the line. Rear line points for support ships and carriers. And points on the wing if not just nav satellites and such with small skirmishers assigned to potentially flank the enemies blob or to simply control the enemies skirmishers.

At least once or twice I have successfully drawn much of an enemy fleet into one of the bottom corners of the map before unleashing a reserve force to attack the enemies rear with.... mixed but usually good results.

Catching otherwise safe enemy missile or carrier ships where they might have otherwise been protected by gunboats is always a great feeling. And if the enemy fleet tries to readjust to meet the flankers your line can be moved up, or even set free to assault the less then prepared enemy.

Basically I often try to fight fleet battles like they were ancient army battles with infantry, skirmishers, and cavalry which seeing as this is a 2d game works rather well! I mean you COULD do that in a 3d game but I find even then how well such tactics work can be a bit iffy. Never could get my head around homeworld.

[Jo Jo]

I'm at a similar point in the game to you and it sounds like we have similar approaches to commanding the AI

General tips I've found is that I give almost every ship an escort at the start of the battle. This stops mainline combat ships like Paragons from focusing on little harassing enemy frigates as the escort will deal with them instead. I send dedicated point-defense/Hurricane MIRV Gryphons in with most of my capitals which do a great job with long-range missile support and anti-fighter work. I have a Champion too I use in a similar fashion but it's more expensive to deploy as a pure escort. Escorting ships won't be very aggressive except with missiles (they won't charge in and shoot the same thing as the ship they're escorting, but they will shoot missiles at it) so I tend to make escort ships heavy on missiles and EMP weapons like the ion blaster (to disable harassers).

I tend to make heavy use of right-click eliminate commands to focus my friendly AI's attentions. I find that even if I am outnumbered on a broad scale, two Paragons with eliminate orders will basically always be able to establish local superiority. You don't have to beat the entire enemy fleet, just the ones currently in range of you. I totally believe in the "decisive battle" model: it doesn't matter if I'd lose a longer fight if my two Paragons basically alpha the scariest enemy off the field in the first minute. Even if you overextend, playing extremely aggressively often causes the enemy AI to overextend because they think you're an easy target (especially enemy Radiants with their equivalent of reckless officers) making them easy pickings. Worst-case scenario, set the "eliminate" orders to "engage" or even order your ships back to a waypoint with a "defend" order if your ships are dying.

As for aggressive or reckless officers, I find the XIV Onslaught is a great ship to give them if I don't have a disposable cruiser like a Fury or Pirate Falcon to throw them in. With Reinforced Bulkheads/Blast Doors/Heavy Armor and the damage control/impact mitigation skills it takes a stupid amount of damage to kill one (2500 armor and 30,000 hull, and that's before officer skills or Derelict Fleet shenanigans) even when the friendly AI does something silly like burn drive into missile of the enemy fleet. They do such a good job being distractions that a single XIV Onslaught is often the first ship I deploy into tough fights with a pair of Paragons coming in behind that to clean up the greedy enemies who overextend bashing on my Onslaught.

I really don't like full assault unless the enemy really has only shuttles or very weak ships left. Full assault removes all escort orders, which can be bad for things like Astrals who need it, and will also cause weak ships like escort frigates and support carriers to charge into potentially dangerous enemies. I have better success with right-clicking to direct my big ships' attention at the tough enemies and otherwise using the leftover Command Frequency time to set up "engage" orders on the targets I want my ships to shoot after their main targets die or run away.

Good luck and godspeed!

Hey Zonk! Man was that ever an incredible post. Thanks for the complement, though I'm 100% sure you're light years ahead of me. There's just so much to learn in this game. In fact, I had to look up every ship you mentioned on the Wiki just so I'd know what you were referencing. Even then, I still missed several of the weapons systems and had to go back to try and figure out what was what.

I sure love your approach with the escorts for capitals, and you're going to laugh, but I just gave up on my Gryphon, because I tried to make it an assault cruiser and it ended up being destroyed in every single fight. Clearly I wasn't using it correctly. Actually, your comments make me rethink my entire battle doctrine. Long ago I did use escorts, but I let that idea go when I started getting larger ships while believing that fitting them with adequate point defense was enough.

One thing you do mention that seems to scare others away is the consistent use of Right-click "take that target out." What I'm reading is that you beef up your Onslaughts and send them in with escorts to deal and soak up damage, while taking out the enemy's capitals very early in the conflict. That's a real thought.  Maybe what's different between what works for you and what scares me is that when you right click on a target, your attacking ship is dragging backup with it. Nice. Also noted the use of the more aggressive officers. I'm maxed out and the game doesn't have a place I can store unused officers so I think I'll need to let a few go and either find the aggressive officers or mentor a steady to aggressive.

Actually, I completely misunderstood what you were referring to when you mentioned a MIRV Gryphon. I thought you were talking about the Paladin PD system. I see the support variant with the MIRV launcher in the default fittings. Hmm. Will have to give that one a try. I do really like the Paladin PD system in just the couple of battles I had with it so far.

The rest of the post I'll simply have to print, highlight and experiment with. So much food for thought which will go well with the change to the game's max fleet #. I'm really looking forward to that alteration and the possibilities it brings. Thanks again!