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Author Topic: Heron loadouts  (Read 9193 times)

colonelsanders

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Heron loadouts
« on: January 13, 2022, 04:11:33 AM »

How do y'all build your Herons? I want to like the idea of a battlecarrier but 100OP seems like peanuts compared to the Legion's 260. After you put on your fighters and Expanded Deck Crew, you have barely any spare OP for weapons, other hullmods or capacitors/vents. Do you just have to leave the weapon mounts empty and treat the Heron as a faster dedicated carrier?
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Ramiel

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Re: Heron loadouts
« Reply #1 on: January 13, 2022, 04:16:09 AM »

Heron's are rather underwhelming at the moment. If I get one, it's a pure pd ship, or an long range ion armed carrier..
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Megas

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Re: Heron loadouts
« Reply #2 on: January 13, 2022, 05:15:00 AM »

Heron is OP starved, especially since Mora got +10 OP this release, but Heron did not.  Now, Mora has enough OP to get the necessary hullmods, and mid-grade weapons and fighters.  Heron cannot afford a loadout configuration similar to Mora.
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Null Ganymede

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Re: Heron loadouts
« Reply #3 on: January 13, 2022, 05:19:08 AM »

Battlecarrier AI is more carrier than battle. LRM/MRM throwing ok, guns nuh-uh.

The Mora has the stats to go close quarters with SO, this thing doesn't. You're dedicating an officer to max out the speed on some interceptors with decent PD, and that's it.
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Megas

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Re: Heron loadouts
« Reply #4 on: January 13, 2022, 05:50:33 AM »

Mora has enough OP to get ITU and Deck Crew, some Light Autocannons and light HE of choice, cheap missiles, 8 OP fighters like Broadswords, and enough vents.  It can play battlecarrier.  +10 OP it received really helped.

Heron cannot do that.  If it gets ITU and Deck Crew and enough weapons to be a viable combatant (10+ OP energy weapon, some PD beams, and vents), it does not have enough OP left for any fighters aside from Talons and Pods.  Similarly, if Heron fills its bays with even mid-grade 8 OP fighters, it does not have enough OP left for a viable weapons loadout, at least not without s-mods mitigating lack of OP.  Since the point of carriers is to use fighters, Heron without s-mods is incapable of being a battlecarrier it used to be (before 0.8a), and Mora and Legion are today.  It needs the same +10 OP treatment Mora got.
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brroleg

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Re: Heron loadouts
« Reply #5 on: January 13, 2022, 07:40:30 AM »

S-moded ITU and deck crew, HVD and rest is mining lasers. 2 Longbows and 1 Trident. Aggressive officer. Performing fine. Mora probably will be better, but i like the looks of Heron more.
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Supraluminal

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Re: Heron loadouts
« Reply #6 on: January 13, 2022, 10:52:08 AM »

The Heron is not supposed to be used as a battle carrier, i.e. a carrier that also sits in the line of battle and trades fire with enemies. As far as I understand, carriers can have a "combat" tag that encourages the AI to use them that way, but the Heron does not have the tag. Only the Mora, Legion, and Colossus Mk. III do.

Everything about the Heron points away from putting it in direct combat. It's got low OP, minimal weapon mounts, and unimpressive hull/armor/flux stats. On the positive side, it's fast and its ship system makes its fighters more powerful. Clearly the design intention is that you load it with good fighters and use the Heron's mobility and ship system to maximize the value you get out of them. The Heron itself is just there to support the fighters while avoiding direct contact with enemies. Put a Pilum or Salamander and some PD lasers on, don't bother with any caps or vents, and let it hang out behind your front line.
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FenMuir

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Re: Heron loadouts
« Reply #7 on: January 13, 2022, 11:14:46 AM »

Herons work best as artillery that has something to hide behind.
I recommend using the Blitzkrieg Heron:
in conjunction with the Medley Mora:

The Mora can absorb an ungodly amount of damage, and having the Heron escort the Mora will result in the mora effectively tanking for the Heron.

The Medley Mora is a fighter carrier that kills frigates and destroyers with ease. The Blitzkrieg Heron is a bomber that kills everything above frigates with ease. If you use Salvage Operations (or whatever the last skill in Industry is called) you can get your Moras and Herons down to 11 DP, which effectively lets you spam them out. This is what I'm using right now, and they're basically the invincible duo once you hit that critical mass of 6 or 8 carriers.
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Serenitis

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Re: Heron loadouts
« Reply #8 on: January 13, 2022, 11:18:58 AM »

Bulkheads
Hardened Subsystems
2x PD Laser on the sides
1x Tac Laser on the nose
1x Misc. Missile launcher in the medium
Fighters can be almost anything except Xyphos or Mining Pods, but bombers preferred if available for maximum use of the uplink system.
(One of the most chaotically destructive things you can do in the entire game is fill a Heron with Pirahnas.)
Any left over OP into caps for just-in-case shield tanking.

The Tac Laser is there to encourage the ship to stay fairly close to its target so there's as little turn-around as possible for its fighters.
Bombers want thier carrier to be as close as possible to thier target, fighters don't care so much.
Generally I'd prefer to use low-rent missiles like Pilum rather than degrade the fighters too much.

Heron really needs Hardened Subsystems as it only has a PPT of 360, which is low for a cruiser, most others have 420 or higher.
But it's OP starved so it has trouble affording it.
Honestly, one of the biggest buffs you could give the Heron is to align its PPT with other cruisers.

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Megas

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Re: Heron loadouts
« Reply #9 on: January 13, 2022, 11:20:38 AM »

The game does not tell the player Heron is not a combat carrier.  (I would think a ship that is not a combat carrier would have Civilian-Grade Hull.)  The only way the player would know if Heron is a combat carrier or not is to dive into the code or wiki, which is an unreasonable expectation.  Just at a glance, I would presume Heron would be a midline competitor to the Mora, if Mora is a battlecarrier, I would expect Heron to be likewise, but with midline style (although it is practically a high-tech ship with midline paint job).

Heron was a very capable brawler back in the day, and I miss that.  Now, it needs s-mods to not be crap.

Mora before this release had less OP and could not use both mid-grade fighters and weapons well enough.  Now, Mora can, even without s-mods.  Heron, on the other hand, needs s-mods to fight and use fighters like new Mora can without s-mods.  Before Mora got +10 OP, both Mora and Heron were OP starved for fighters and guns.  Now, Mora has enough to do the job, but Heron got left behind.
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Thaago

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Re: Heron loadouts
« Reply #10 on: January 13, 2022, 11:38:34 AM »

Imo the Heron is the best pure carrier right now: 3 bays, a good fighter boost system, and high enough speed to kite cruisers and slow destroyers. But like Supraluminal says because of the AI tags its not suitable for a battle carrier build outside of player hands. The AI simply won't fly it right, which is a pity and not told to players in any way.

In player hands it has a comfortable amount of OP to be flown with a heavy blaster and mid-cost fighters combining kinetic and EMP. Its not a slugging battlecarrier, but it can be used to help more quickly finish off targets that its fighter has swarmed or to overpower weak destroyers by itself. The main key is to not install expanded flight decks (expanded flight decks is overrated and overcost and not needed for many fighter compositions, though it helps for bombers). DTC/ITU is also not required or even good if not being built in. This might seem bizarre, but for something as fragile as the Heron who's primary armament is its fighters range isn't important and with 80 base speed the ship quickly closes over the distance that the DTC/ITU bonus covers on a 600 range weapon. The ship is moving in to help support the fighters and provide armor breaking/dps after they've fluxed up the target and hopefully EMPd it as well, not engaging in a gun duel. Its fine to build in, but not especially needed.

The biggest thing that helps carriers is taking the carrier skills and CR boosters: +75% faster fighter refit time (for an officered ship) alongside -10% refit time from CR is very good for keeping the carrier's rate up; -10% damage received, +10% damage to all targets, perfect leading accuracy, and +40% speed on the fighter end make them much more effective and survivable.

[Edit] Decided to do a few mission screen (so no skills) builds to see what works well. Here are a few:
3x Thunder, 1xHeavy Needler, 1x antimatter blaster, 1x Ion Cannon, 2x pd laser (rear), 20 caps, 12 vents. No hullmods. Engage fighters at long range with system and close: once target distracted get into knife fighting range and pull back to regroup to preserve replenishment. Can easily take on multiple destroyers or a cruiser though it takes a while to chew through hull. The Ion Cannon can be swapped for a 2cd am blaster, but flux starts to get a bit tight so thats probably for campaign where skills boost it. Changing fighters to Broadsword-Broadsword-Claw makes them less good vs frigates but better vs larger and saves some OP for flux. Both changes together is 2xBroadsword, 1xClaw, 1xHN, 2xAMB, 2xpdl, 20 caps, 15 vents. Gladii can be substituted for broadswords: they are more fragile, but cheaper, faster (claws are faster too) so better vs small ships/more responsive to commands, and have higher firepower than broadswords.

Classic heavy blaster works and cuts through hull fast, and is OP cheaper, but lacks the shieldbreaking of the heavy needler. This works: broad/broad/claw + HB + burst pd laser (front) + 2x pd laser (rear) + 19 caps + 30 vents. Gladii instead of broadswords is the same consideration as before - better vs small craft including destroyers, worse vs large. The flux cost imo makes this build not very good without skills, but with them it works better.

The nemesis of the battlecarrier Heron are Hammerheads (in numbers, a lone one is dead pretty fast). They are just fast enough to kite (without speed boost skills/officers), have high firepower so shoot down fighters, and have high enough armor/hull that it takes a while for the 3x wings to overwhelm them individually. Other fast destroyers can be troublesome but are much weaker vs fighters so don't pose as much of a threat.
« Last Edit: January 13, 2022, 01:06:42 PM by Thaago »
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intrinsic_parity

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Re: Heron loadouts
« Reply #11 on: January 13, 2022, 01:17:51 PM »

My problem with heron is that it doesn't really have the weapon mounts to justify an officer IMO, but the enemy will have lots of officers so it will lose to smaller officered ships.
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Thaago

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Re: Heron loadouts
« Reply #12 on: January 13, 2022, 01:23:58 PM »

Unfortunately the AI doesn't battle carrier them right anyways so my AI builds are for pure carrier, but an officer is worth it to magnify the carrier skills and grant CR. Thinking of the magnification of 3 wings (weapon systems) as 'skills' that are granted for free makes officers look a lot better. Combat Endurance, Helmsmanship, System Expertise, and ordinance expertise are all good, as are the defensive ones just for keeping it alive if something starts shooting it.
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intrinsic_parity

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Re: Heron loadouts
« Reply #13 on: January 13, 2022, 01:28:31 PM »

I mean, the skills don't do nothing, but they would do way more on another ship IMO. Even if I want a carrier, I feel like mora can leverage skills way better. Missiles, armor, and even elite PD all seem like way more value.
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Thaago

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Re: Heron loadouts
« Reply #14 on: January 13, 2022, 01:51:00 PM »

I would need to do comparative testing with the combat analytics mod to say for sure, but I can say that in my run with them the officer didn't feel wasted so its certainly not way worse. It felt, well, about right for a 20DP ship. That one was set up with helmsmanship, combat endurance, shields, system expertise for its bombers, and elite PD for an LRPD grid ( I did put ITU on the ship, specifically for those lasers). I think I was running more officers instead of better that time? I don't remember. I did promote that officer to an Astral later (the astral was mostly worth it, though its slow speed makes it such a liability as compared to Herons).

Comparing Heron v Mora for me is all about the ship systems and role. Mora's are tough and have ok gun/missile firepower but are slow. Herons are mobile and the damage amplifier makes their fighters more dangerous, but are fragile. In terms of what the skill are doing, both sets of strengths get amplified: Moras become obnoxiously unkillable with both armor + hull skills and 2 medium missiles is good for missile spec. Herons get moderately faster, and a significant system upgrade that stacks with the fighter skill magnification more than it does for Moras (Herons fighters are better than moras: offiered heron's fighters are even more better than officered moras).

Support doctrine is also really nice for carriers imo, especially when going above the point of deck scaling - combat endurance + helmsmanship + DP reduction = great for carriers and the relative benefit from having an officer is reduced by the deck scaling anyways.
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