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[Draba]

This games entire design rewards speed. Who dodged the reaper? Who retreated and recovered to reattack? Who skirted around the back and shredded the engines? Who has the most uptime and least downtime because of travel? The faster ship(s).

The game's design generally gives something to slower ships in return. Low tech gets long range ballistics and tons of armor.
Fast, heavily shielded ships HAVE TO jump in and out because they are outranged and will generally lose a straight fight to the death against a wall of armor, +usually multiple ships shooting at them.

As Hiruma Kai already mentioned: between mods and polarized armor low tech weapons are basically impossible to keep down and their PD shreds missiles.

Enforcers are some of the better options to make sure engine shredding doesn't happen.
That's one of the things that they do pretty well in big fleet battles, stay behind the big boys and swat frigates/destroyers/fighters.
At 9 DP they are very cheap, and even if they get overwhelmed it takes ages to chew through their armor/hull with <cruisers that might got around.

No one is investing heavy into armor hull mods to face Omega content.

Throwing big slabs of metal at doritos is one of the easier ways to kill them, plenty of people do that.

Slow ships ironically make the absolute worst use of heavy armor. Slow ships also make the worse use of shields for the same reasons.

Onslaught is slow, it loves heavy armor. Paragon is slow, general consensus is that its shields are pretty acceptable.

Your posts really read like you just didn't give a decent run to slower ship, the durability does make a difference and they can swat anything in the base game.
The hullmod/skill tax is higher than for shielded ships, but Onslaught in particular feels very good. For me it's tied with, or is maybe a step above Odyssey for best capital that you can give the AI.
Do give low tech heavy armor/reinforced bulkheads/armored weapon mounts, taking longer to get worn down is a good thing.

[Locklave]

Your posts really read like you just didn't give a decent run to slower ship...

I sure have a long post history focusing extremely heavily on them for someone that didn't give a decent run to slower ships.

I'm to take the word of all these people claiming they are great against my own actual experience with them? I'd wager they don't use them in their fleets after early-mid game. I honestly wish this game used data collection so we could see what people actually used. I suspect we'd find the people who always claim everything is fine don't use those ships.

I'm honestly regretful that there is no opt in for data collection, because data is far more honest then posts. If 90% of the players are using only 5-10% of the ships then those ships might need looking at. But I'm not in charge of that.

The game's design generally gives something to slower ships in return. Low tech gets long range ballistics and tons of armor.

I covered this, I'm not reposting it again. If you don't want to accept my reasoning then have the decency to simply say so.

Throwing big slabs of metal at doritos is one of the easier ways to kill them, plenty of people do that.

Your quality standard is fodder then.

[Supraluminal]

I'm not a moderator, but if you want a random person's advice - maybe take a breather. You're treating this internet discussion of a video game like a court case.

[Thaago]

@Locklave, please consider this an official warning for toxic behavior. Rules can be found here:  https://fractalsoftworks.com/forum/index.php?topic=2668.0

There's no reason to be aggressive and dismissive of people who are engaging in good faith.

[Draba]

I'm to take the word of all these people claiming they are great against my own actual experience with them? I'd wager they don't use them in their fleets after early-mid game. I honestly wish this game used data collection so we could see what people actually used. I suspect we'd find the people who always claim everything is fine don't use those ships.

Hiruma Kai has examples, I have examples. If it demonstrably works, but it doesn't work for you it's not a problem with low tech (no heavy armor is an obvious red flag).
Might not be as easy/cheesy as Ziggurat or Gryphons, but it still rolls over omegas, >700 ordos and triple nex invasion fleet stacks.
The 1 complaint I do have is that frigate selection feels a bit anemic to me.

[hqz]

I did a vanilla low tech run in 0.95a, and just took my standard fleet without tweaking and threw it against Doritos.  Just piloted and let the AI do it's think without orders. Took heavy losses, but mostly because it wasn't configured right.  And just slapped another one together in 0.95.1a, with a reasonable configuration, and it's losses were minimal.  And did include heavy armor on every ship.  I'm personally not seeing the issues with Enforcers in the current iteration.  They seem to work fine for me.

Do you mind sharing your loadout for the Enforcer? I'm trying a run with very few officers, where I would invest my SP into S-mods instead and the idea of an Enforcer fleet sounds really cool.

[Hiruma Kai]

Keep in mind, XIV Enforcer have a few more OP available than basic Enforcers, and I happened to have the blueprint to mass print them in that particular save file.  I admit I have a bit of hesitancy to put s-mods on plain Enforcers given there's a skin that is literally the same ship but simply better.  However early game if it is all I've got, I'll spend a few story points on maybe two or three ships I don't plan on keeping.  Depends on what the final fleet is going to look like.

The officerless Enforcers were 3x Arbalest, 2x Flak Cannon, 4x Harpoon MRM, 1x Xyphos, Expanded Missile Racks (S), Heavy Armor (S), Converted Hangar, 20 vents, 2 caps.

Officered Enforcers had Ordnance Expert for more flux, and ran 2x Hypervelocity Drivers, 1x Heavy Mauler, 2x Flak Cannon, 2x Sabot SRM, 2x Harpoon MRM,  Expanded Missile Racks (S), Heavy Armor (S), Converted Hangar, Resistant Flux Conduits, and 2 Vents.  The OE skill meant they had more flux dissipation and flux capacity than the unofficered ones despite only having 2 vents.  Other good skills include impact mitigation, polarized armor, missile specialization, combat endurance, gunnery implants or ballistic mastery.

Essentially, it has flux free weapons (Xyphos ion beams, 24 Harpoons or 18 sabots/18 Harpoons), flux free health (1300 armor, 6000 hull), and interlocking PD (Xyphos shoot over allies, flak are AoE PD which don't do much to their allies since their frag damage, and have a good chance of hitting on a deflection shot).  Once you start to hit a critical mass of them in an area, they're very good at backing off while allies and fighters shoot down any incoming finisher missiles.  This fleet was put together with Dorito fighters in mind, so perhaps has a bit too much PD for many other fleets.

[hqz]

Thanks Hiruma Kai. This is super helpful.

I really love the Enforcer XIV (I always have 2-3 in my fleet, even at end-game). With Heavy Armor they reach 1300 armor which (if I understand the maths correctly) means that even when fully stripped they keep 195 armor (15% x 1300) and provide at least a 50% damage reduction against any hit below 200 damage (80% reduction against a 50 damage hit).

I usually run them with 2x Hypervelocity Drivers, 1x Heavy Mauler, 2x Dual Flaks and 4 Atropos Pods. But I now realize that Harpoon MRM is better for this role, since it has the "finisher" tag (useful when the AI is piloting) and it's also a 2500 range weapon.

I never really considered the Converted Hangar hullmod for Enforcers as it seemed really expensive (20 OP for the mod and 27 for the Xyphos wing) I'll try that next.

Thanks again.

[Hiruma Kai]

Thanks Hiruma Kai. This is super helpful.

You are welcome.   Just a few minor comments.  I think you may be confusing the minimum stripped armor value (5%) with the minimum damage dealt after armor reduction (15%, 10% with polarized armor).

So at full 1300 armor, it reduces any hit of about 230 or less to 15% of it's base damage value (i.e. a 100 energy damage hit becomes 15).

After having it's 1300 armor fully stripped, an XIV Enforcer acts as if it had 1300*0.05=65 armor remaining for damage reduction purposes.  Which is still a lot when compared to most small weapons.

I'll note converted hangar only costs 10 OP on a destroyer hull, which when combined with the 27 OP Xyphos is only 37 OP.  And the 27 OP is isn't that bad when combined with an Ordnance Expert officer, since that's like 5.4 free vents.  Depending on the Enforcer and how many s-mods you invest, it's something like one third to one quarter of your OP budget.  I find it most worth while when massed, as they shoot over allies.

If you think how much Ion beams cost normally (12 OP each), and their flux cost (200 per second), you're getting something like a 64 OP value for 37 on just the long range beams alone, but with the weakness of the fighters being able to be shot down separate from the Enforcer and thus not being available.  However, a solid line of Enforcers are pretty good at keeping the fighters behind them alive.  A solo Enforcer less so.

[Candesce]

If you think how much Ion beams cost normally (12 OP each), and their flux cost (200 per second), you're getting something like a 64 OP value for 37 on just the long range beams alone

I don't think you get quite that much out of it - according to the Codex Xyphos only have 50 dissipation, so in a sustained fight they're only going to maintain fire for so long. It's more like 12+5+6 (caps) per xyphos, or 46 for the pair, neglecting their PD.

None of which takes away from what you've demonstrated they achieve in practice, of course.

[Draba]

Keep in mind, XIV Enforcer have a few more OP available than basic Enforcers, and I happened to have the blueprint to mass print them in that particular save file.

XIV ships nowadays are a bit easier to find early on, they spawn in bounties pretty often or can be bought from bars/established contacts.
Last run was Nex so not sure what base game selection is, but IIRC I did buy a few XIV Dominators/Onslaughts through military grade procurement (found on the underground contact).

But I now realize that Harpoon MRM is better for this role, since it has the "finisher" tag (useful when the AI is piloting) and it's also a 2500 range weapon.

I like Atropos a lot in S mounts, only 2 shots but those are stronger than Harpoons and have a much better chance to connect (can skip ECCM package without regrets). Also only 3 OP instead of 4.
Shorter range isn't ideal but IMO it's well worth it. Note that AI also saves Atropos until the target is high on flux or overloaded, pretty similar to Harpoon in that regard.

I never really considered the Converted Hangar hullmod for Enforcers as it seemed really expensive (20 OP for the mod and 27 for the Xyphos wing) I'll try that next.

Xyphos are very good, rarely a bad choice. PD, ion beam, shield, and it's usually protected by the carrier's shield/hull so surprisingly hard to kill.

An alternative that leans a bit more towards just being a ball of hard to kill stats:

Spoiler

[close]

Isn't very killy by itself, just good for adding more durable/fault tolerant bodies+cheap firepower.


+a dorito fight for illustration.
Enforcers aren't really the stars of the show here, a single Onslaught usually wins against a Tesseract without much trouble.
They are mostly useful as failsafes, and to make sure Onslaught doesn't get overwhelmed by the second stage (that can easily go south with some facet setups).


Doesn't even need a full deployment and wins with a few scratches on the paint.
It really is that easy, pretty silly to think you struggling with it means everybody else is just bad.

[hqz]

Thanks for fixing my maths.

The Xyphos/Enforcer combo really sounds cool.

I find this thread really useful and inspiring. All these diverse ways to build the Enforcer into a useful ship, for the small price of 9 DP (7 if you have no officer). Now I just need to add (even) more Enforcers into my fleet.

[intrinsic_parity]

Feels like it might be more beneficial to have officers in eradicators? They have a lot more armor and firepower to scale with officer buffs. Enforcers feel more like a filler ship than a good officer ship but maybe I'm wrong.

[Megas]

Feels like it might be more beneficial to have officers in eradicators? They have a lot more armor and firepower to scale with officer buffs. Enforcers feel more like a filler ship than a good officer ship but maybe I'm wrong.

Depends on the rest of the fleet.  If the player has two DP hogs (like Ziggurat plus another capital), but needs more ships on the field, there is not much DP left at first.  Also, it is nice to have few cheap ships available to fill out small remaining DP budget.

[DirectionsToL3Please]

Feels like it might be more beneficial to have officers in eradicators? They have a lot more armor and firepower to scale with officer buffs. Enforcers feel more like a filler ship than a good officer ship but maybe I'm wrong.

The XIV Enforcer does both really well.

If you can spare an officer, it's basically a light cruiser but cheaper.  If you can't spare an officer, it's basically the Death Star of escort frigates, especially if you only pay 7DP each.