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Author Topic: Hull Restoration change  (Read 3447 times)

SCC

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Re: Hull Restoration change
« Reply #15 on: December 28, 2021, 02:03:40 AM »

I do find it interesting there are some combat focused players who still won't touch Industry because it means taking at least 2 skills that don't affect combat directly (and potentially more if you're piloting a high tech doctrine ship).  Typically Technology and Leadership combined with Combat is considered better from a maximal combat power perspective since it only forces you to take 1 non-combat related skill, and has multiple fleet wide buffs. Then there are posts like the OP here which suggest Industry is too strong.
For bounty hunting, I would much rather increase my fleet's combat power and buy new ships, if any of the old ones get too damaged to be worth keeping. With raid discounts and contact special offers it can be quite cheap to get spotless ships, even if I don't have much control over what I get.

For exploring, though, I can imagine taking Hull Restoration, because derelicts are very easy to deal with and there's a lot of dead time while you travel. Might as well fix my junk a little, while my flagship does all the heavy lifting.

Mordodrukow

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Re: Hull Restoration change
« Reply #16 on: December 28, 2021, 02:54:20 AM »

Sitting on the orbit is complete opposite of economy, you know...

But i wish somewhere on the Industry line be ability, allowing to refit weapons without CR loss (maybe requiring to spend some supplies, so, it would be the same, but instant and cheaper).
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prav

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Re: Hull Restoration change
« Reply #17 on: December 28, 2021, 02:54:49 AM »

One of the best features of the skill is that I don't have to care about d-mods - they'll get fixed eventually, no action needed.
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Megas

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Re: Hull Restoration change
« Reply #18 on: December 28, 2021, 06:10:43 AM »

For me, d-mod removal is the selling point of Hull Restoration, and less of them after battle.  Gut that, and there is little left.  It is a massive QoL skill, one that puts the combat losses bar from none (or one small ship) to losing about half my fleet.  Restoration the normal way costs way too much and cranking out ships with Orbital Works only works for human ships, not exotics like automated ships.

My only gripe about Hull Restoration is I cannot get that, Automated Ships, Neural Link, and enough Combat skills to make piloting Radiant enjoyable.  If I want to pilot Radiant, I need to give up Hull Restoration (and one or two more Industry skills) to get enough Combat skills to make Radiant flagship good enough.

Want to gut Hull Restoration?  Make normal Restoration much, MUCH cheaper.  I do not care if it breaks lore.  I want casualties to be acceptable, and Hull Restoration is the only way.

I do not sit and wait for ships to be repaired.  I haul them while I travel doing other things until they become clean then, I do not need them (because they eat into combat ship DP), store them.

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But nerf the skill by making it take longer, instead of neutering it by completely changing its meta... hence why I instead suggested that repairs take longer or require above minimum crew.
Absolutely not!  Last release, Field Repairs (which was effectively Hull Restoration) repaired one d-mod every two months, twice as slow as today.  It was too slow!  Only good for removing the few d-mods from the occasional casualty, not fixing up several ships with multiple d-mods.  The current rate of one per month is acceptable, even if a bit slow to remove many d-mods.  I probably would prefer two per month instead of one, but this is good enough.  If Hull Restoration needs to be changed, it should repair even faster, or maybe offer discount to Restore for those who cannot wait.

I would prefer to get two combat skills instead of Hull Restoration (although Industrial Planning is still tempting because I am a colony fan), but since I cannot always stop my fleet from doing dumb things and getting themselves killed, I want the peace-of-mind of relatively painless casualties offered by Hull Restoration.

With that said, crew loss can be a problem, and it is a good idea to mitigate it somehow.

For bounty hunting, I would much rather increase my fleet's combat power and buy new ships, if any of the old ones get too damaged to be worth keeping. With raid discounts and contact special offers it can be quite cheap to get spotless ships, even if I don't have much control over what I get.
Buying new ships would not work for exotic ships that cannot be bought (and come with d-mods after battle).  But I guess that can work now that s-mods get refunded into bonus xp when scrapped.  I used to replace ships in earlier 0.9 releases when s-mods and exotic ships were not a thing, and everything could be minted out of Orbital Works.
« Last Edit: December 28, 2021, 06:25:36 AM by Megas »
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JUDGE! slowpersun

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Re: Hull Restoration change
« Reply #19 on: December 28, 2021, 08:47:28 AM »

But i wish somewhere on the Industry line be ability, allowing to refit weapons without CR loss (maybe requiring to spend some supplies, so, it would be the same, but instant and cheaper).

This is a good idea.  Prolly requires some balancing (hence your supply cost suggestion, or maybe it just reduces CR loss instead of eliminating it when swapping stuff), but this would be pretty big.
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PreConceptor

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Re: Hull Restoration change
« Reply #20 on: January 23, 2022, 06:23:09 AM »

Fact is, Hull Restoration makes every other top tier skill look like a worse choice by comparison. A quick look at any discussion about the skills people always take is demonstrative. Even if Dmods aren’t that big of a deal in theory (especially since the dmod nerf), thats not how most of the playerbase percieves them in reality, and such a relatively simple solution to the Dmod problem is a positively magnetic force in the typical skill choice.

Some (one) top tiers likely need buffs (looking at you Neural Link) but Hull Restoration stands out as exceptional among the exceptional. It’s an outlier.
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Megas

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Re: Hull Restoration change
« Reply #21 on: January 23, 2022, 06:39:56 AM »

Hull Restoration has no effect on combat power.  It is a campaign QoL skill.  Some people only want maximum combat power, and Hull Restoration is useless for that.  It gives some max CR for s-mods, but people who only care about combat power would probably get Crew Training instead.

Neural Link is still kind of lame, good mostly for enabling piloting Automated Ships, but to make it really shine, player needs Combat skills, which he cannot get enough with Tech 8 and Hull Restoration.  I tried, but unskilled Radiant (with 50 OP taken by Neural Integration) was worse than Paragon with more Combat skills and no Neural Interface tax.  If player wants Tech 8, he practically locks the remaining seven skill points in Combat and (likely) Ordnance Expert.

Of the other top tiers...  At least one of the Combat top-tiers are great for most ships.  Best of the Best is great.  Support Doctrine might enable fleets without officers and other shenanigans but is otherwise lackluster.  Automated Ships is good.  Hull Restoration is massive QoL for those obsessed with pristine ships.  Derelict Contingent might be QoL too for those who just want to grab whatever ships from the enemy regardless of d-mods and use them.
« Last Edit: January 23, 2022, 06:59:03 AM by Megas »
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SCC

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Re: Hull Restoration change
« Reply #22 on: January 23, 2022, 07:55:55 AM »

Hull Restoration is an autopick when you're exploring, if only because you will be avoiding combat for several cycles, so it doesn't matter much if you're weaker in combat. After exploration, it's 2 personal skills and 2/3rds of Crew Training for the price of 5 skill points. Better invest elsewhere.

Amoebka

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Re: Hull Restoration change
« Reply #23 on: January 23, 2022, 08:10:15 AM »

Hull Restoration (and Industry in general) saves literal millions of credits in the first few cycles, but eventually you hit the endgame wall where anything not giving combat power is unacceptable. Endgame fights require inhuman amounts of minmaxing to beat (or just spamming hyperions lmao), economy becomes irrelevant. It definitely doesn't "make other top tier skills look bad", it doesn't even compete with them. All other top tiers actually give major combat benefits.

Waiting is definitely the antifun part. I often lug around weaponless capitals to patch up, and it feels like an exploit. I would prefer making the "less d-mods on initial recovery" aspect stronger, and removing the repairs.
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Morrokain

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Re: Hull Restoration change
« Reply #24 on: January 23, 2022, 09:15:25 AM »

Just throwing this out there, but if there was a replacement for the d-mod removal portion of the skill I'd say that giving a high percentage to retain weapons and fighter LPCs would probably feel pretty useful alongside less d-mods overall.

It eases the impact of casualties a bit without any waiting. I think the d-mod removal is probably fine overall though.
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intrinsic_parity

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Re: Hull Restoration change
« Reply #25 on: January 23, 2022, 10:16:57 AM »

I like hull restoration early when I am building my fleet as a way to get pristine ships for free, but I think taking actual direct combat skills is much more valuable later on, particularly because you have to invest in 4 other industry skills (which are also very nice early and not that great later). Industry for me is a great pick early that I'm happy to spend one story points to spec out of later.
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Thaago

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Re: Hull Restoration change
« Reply #26 on: January 23, 2022, 11:04:52 AM »

I recently did a bounty hunting playthrough where I went straight for Hull Restoration and it was pretty painful up until level 7 or so: taking multiple noncombat skills in the early game is just such a huge power drop compared to taking the early, best, combat boosters. Ordinance Expertise is a good skill, but its not nearly as impactful on small ships as larger ones, and polarized armor is the same in that few early game ships have enough armor to make it worthwhile. If I was doing early game exploration or trading Industry is much better, and Hull Restoration keeps the ship in top shape after losses, but when in that phase of the game I'm usually not recovering many ships - the fleet wants to stay pretty small to cover costs. So its a fine skill there, but not all that essential compared to the other industry cost savers.

I can see a sweet spot in the midgame, where the player has enough skills that taking several noncombat skills isn't crippling, they want to grow their fleet, and they have 2-3 S mods on their core combat ships which are there for the long haul. Its really only S modded ships that the skill saves money on: other ships can be used over several losses (and D mods) before finally throwing them out and so free repairs is only a medium/small amount of money (the cost of the ship ameliorated over a dozen battles assuming the ship is killed 1/3 of the time which is very high). It also can save otherwise unique ships (XIV Legions, Zig) that have taken D mods, which can be powerful in the right circumstances.

As others have noted it has some combat application, with the 10-15% CR letting players skip Combat Endurance on their officers for some other pick (assuming they aren't flying anything with low CR/SO), on their permanent, always going to keep S mod ships. But for combat impact its a weak skill.
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Megas

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Re: Hull Restoration change
« Reply #27 on: January 23, 2022, 02:54:22 PM »

The main benefit of Polarized Armor for the flagship is the elite effect of venting flux faster, not the armor benefits.  It needs to combo with Resistant Flux Conduits to make venting in the enemy's face close to fast enough.  Just one of elite Polarized Armor or Resistant Flux Conduits only is not enough.  Needs both.
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