Sound like a better nerf for HSA would be to increase the flux consumption of beam weapons, maybe by 100%?
I've thought about that, yeah! So I know where you're coming from with that idea. I think it'd be too hard to make it work in a "one size fits all" way. That's overall the main problem with the idea, really.
Also, just to Alex's points: HB does full DPS upfront until you get high on flux, so it ends up being 'bursty' in a similar way to PL and thus still does much more upfront DPS IMO. I generally value HB most for its performance chewing through hull, and use it mostly on ships like fury/aurora/doom that can support it pretty well anyway, so I kinda expect the full DPS most of the time.
Fair! Thought I'll say that just about 2x Phase Lance DPS, plus 10%, comes pretty close to matching full HB DPS for that initial 6 second or so window.
Didn't work. It simply lacks the punch. A single AMSRM+cryoblaster burst can one-shot a Fulgent (assuming mines successfully re-oriented their shields) -- that's 6000 energy damage at 1000 hit strength, plus an additional 2800 frag damage at 1400 hit strength (which really becomes 350 to armor/hull). Usually a second dual Cryoblaster burst gets fired before the Doom can phase again. 2 Phase Lances and 4 Rift Lances comes out to a 5500 energy damage burst at 550 hit strength (since it has HSA), then a weaker 2750 energy damage burst (while the Phase Lances are on cooldown). You'd need to do 2 bursts (a strong and a weak), and even if you flicker into phase in between, it's less efficient (a smaller fraction of your cycle time is spent in phase, since you're on unphase cooldown more often), and sticking around for the 2nd burst makes it more dangerous. Even 6 rift lances wasn't as good.
(Just a note that comparing Omega weapons with regular weapons maybe isn't the most fair comparison. And, yeah, Rift Lances in both cases, but they're not the main contributors or that much of a standout, while the AMSRM is *extremely* powerful and only borderline-ok because of the limited number of them being available.)
Just wanted to ask about the rationale behind the extreme resource demands (10 volatiles / transplutonics) of the Fusion lamp and Hypershunt tap items. By the time they can be met the bonuses given by the items barely matter, so why not let us actually use them in the early/midgame phase when they'd be useful? Maybe lower the costs significantly but make it so that it has to be met by in-faction imports (something something safe use requires non-standard exotic componds mixed in the supply due to copyright issues or whatever)? For the Hypershunt tap the player has to beat one of the most difficult combat encounters AND fork over a fortune's worth of materials to fix the Hypershunt, isn't that enough?
It's mostly so you have something to mess around with once the campaign is just about "won". Though as you noted, the lamp is usable and potentially useful before that point!
About shield shunt makeshift shield situation, imo banning shield shunt from being S-modded is preferable way, shield shunt + makeshift shield is interesting combo (even if not very useful one) and removing it coz S-mod exploit is bad idea, shield shunt is extremely cheap Hmod i don't see point in ever S-modding it
Hmm, interesting.
It's not quite clear enough to me how polarized armor and shield shunt work now, so ill ask here.
Is it that it gets upto 50% increase at 50% hardflux, or is it 50% increase at 100% hardflux?
As conseqence to this, is shunt with polarized armor still getting 50% increase, or is it only getting 25%?
It's 50% at 100% hard flux, so shunt with polarized armor would get a permanent +25% armor strength from Polarized Armor.
I can't speak for Alex's vision for HSA, but to my eyes HSA could be a way to turn 1000 range beams from long-range pressure weapons into proper hard flux support weapons for large energies, similar to Ballistic Rangefinder for small ballistics. The problem is that hard flux also makes short burst beams (Phase/Rift Lance) too much of generalist weapons.
The answer I think is to make HSA's penalty disproportionately impact short burst beams: flat -300 to base range, does not affect PD (similar to Ballistic Rangefinder). This way:
That's an interesting analysis, but the problem is you end up with small energy weapons dealing hard flux at 700 range, which is in the small ballistic range band, and combined with high-tech ships being faster, this is generally not a good place for the design to go.
I love the idea behind slipstreams and I want to love them in practice, but as-is they've been almost entirely a nuisance so far. Maybe it's different if you're just cruising around surveying and scavenging and don't much mind where, but if you're taking missions and heading for a specific destination the odds have so far been exceptionally low of a slipstream spawning as anything other than an obstacle. I'm on board with the general goal of making hyperspace interactive and this was supposed to be the carrot to the stick of hyperspace storms, but so far they've been another way to get punished for not paying attention to the mundane part of the game.
This moment was the breaking point that made me tab out to make this post:
(and this was after following parallel to the SW Slipstream for an in-game month, with several reloads when cutting too close to a storm or failing to hit S in time got me booped into the stream and blasted downriver)
You just know these jerks are gonna have reversed polarity by the time I finish my mission and try to go home, too.
Hmm. I wonder if this is something where being more aware of the seasonality of their directions would help? In playtesting, I've been aware of that and generally deciding which missions/bounties/etc to take - and when to go do them - with that in mind. And slipstreams have not been more than a minor hindrance, and most often quite helpful. (They go left-to-right in the first half of the year, and the reverse of that in the second. June and December is when they dissipate.)
This isn't something the game explains super well or upfront and it's meant to be something you pick up on (with, I think, only the slipstream tooltip hinting at this, and a "tip" explaining it), so perhaps it's too subtle.
But, with that awareness... you would only very very rarely end up in the situation you're describing - if the stream layout happened to be the relatively rare "random" one,
and you got unlucky. Otherwise, if you're following the seasonality, it'd either 1) be going roughly where you want, or 2) you'd only need to cross it. Or at least, if you're going against the prevailing winds, so to speak, you'd know what you're getting into.
That said, I've got some ideas about letting you get some info on the current state of the streams ahead of time, which should hopefully help both with this and with planning how to take advantage of them.
That's an impressively good hotfix. I love it 
Funny thing about Ballistic Rangefinder: when combined with IPDAI it no longer buffs small ballistics, as IPDAI changes those to PD. At the same time, IPDAI + Elite Point Defense gives +200 range to all small ballistics, which is a bigger bonus than BRF on ships without Large mounts. Now that BRF is more expensive than IPDAI, and given how important PD is for Low Tech IMO, I can see myself preferring IPDAI + Elite Point Defense over Ballistic Rangefinder in like 90% of cases.
One thing to note there is BRF modifies base range, so any percentage bonuses apply to that bonus, too. That said, IPDAI + Elite PD would still be more range unless you're getting over +100% range bonuses somehow, but there *is* also the opportunity cost of picking up Point Defense, so this feels like more of a playstyle choice - and it seems nice that it's a viable one!
I suppose making it look good with an arbitrary beam turret might be impossible, though.
Yep! That, and also making it work with an arbitrary beam would be quite a pain, too.
(Hi, and welcome to the forum, by the way!)
Is it a bug if you have the Hull Restoration skill, but your one lost ship in a fight, a Kite (A), ends up requiring a story point to recover? I didn't bother spending the story point, but was just curious if it's intended?
Ugh, that sounds like a bug, yeah. Looks like there's a fairly low chance of this happening if the ship was "destroyed" (and not "disabled") - hah, looks like the skill description is accurate after all. And Hull Restoration does greatly reduce the chance of it happening. Fixed this up, though.
