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[Dazs]

OK now for the juicy reply!

Right, so I have played with it for a few hours and I believe someone mentioned the weapon flux values all being a little wonky, but it is super noticeable on the Super Ship start. Likely just oversight errors, multiple frag pds have flux costs in the 1000/sec range for equivalent damage (Culverin has 1.07 flux/dam at 1.5k damage and like 1.6k flux/sec) They all seem to be of the same design philosophy of the vulcan pushed to its limits and I assume they should work more in line with something like your Fog of War frag pd at a much more reasonable .25 flux/dam? As it stands, the super ship start comes with a ship whose stock flux loadout is 6k weapon flux/sec with 2k dissipation at 50 vents. That was a funny start tbh. The weapons have some weird spots overall on that ship.

Well as a standard loadout I was going for a well defended ship. Since it's armor and hull are so low I made sure there was a flurry of flechette to protect them along with it's shield. Now the flux use to dissipation is only if all weapons are firing at once and I have the weapons all not facing forward to help mitigate that. Now that is my intent but I'll  put it through a round of testing and get back to you on that one.

Auto Cannon: The Auto Cannon feels like a weapon meant exclusively for stations and AI and has massive damage. 3k effective range is funny, very very funny, but also means as a player, you can't realistically use that weapon range due to actual view range in combat, so what purpose is served by having it so high? The extremely low flux cost suggests just leaving it on autofire to snipe frigates? Is it meant to abuse small ships AI and dissuade engagement at all? That would fit the long-range commander vibe, for sure. Just seems excessive to me. Otherwise, I like that the ammo count theoretically means you can get in trouble if you increase fire-rate, but that is completely obseleted by something like extended mags or some hullmod out of the very popular MHM. On top of starting with 100 ammo, it means that consequence will only happen late into a very, very large fight if you're manually firing in any way. There isn't much semblance to Vanilla or typical modded balance with a 3k range weapon, even if it is a super weapon. 30 OP is a wise choice for cost, since it has so much going for it and is expensive to mount, but .25 flux/dam on an HE weapon? Big numbers, all around.

I felt I was filling a hole in the game with the Auto Cannon. You are correct it is not really intended for direct use at maximum range. It is meant as a AI controlled sniper weapon at extreme ranges with a huge cooldown but damn when it eventually hits it HITS. I tinkered with various ammo counts and 100 seemed right for a long fight against a tough foe like an Ordo fleet. The flux/dam is because it has such a long cooldown but you make a good point, I'll give it a lookover. The OP was to ensure it was only viable to use on large ships that can afford it. It is a trade off of using multiple weaker guns or having a big punch. If you are using it to tin can a small wolfpack fleet well more power to you I guess

Dart-Gun/Shredder: These two I want to call strong, but when I compare them to vanilla counter-parts, I cant. Maybe the Shredder? But I don't see it being anything other than a neat side-grade. Trading range and accuracy for a bit of efficiency in the Dart-Gun, and losing some efficiency and accuracy for massive range on the Shredder. I like this, opening up build flexibility on a lot of ships with these options. I question the 1x3 emp for the Dart Gun. It's cool, it's flavor, but its simply too weak. Maybe the visuals make it worth it? I dunno, I like it, but don't understand it. Even slaving it to IPDAI for the light emp to affect missiles seems like a waste considering its now a 150 flux kinetic pd gun for missiles.

The EMP damage on the Dart Gun is meant to be bit of flavor and not the primary purpose of the weapon. If you look at the Dart Gun's description, it fires "charged core" flechettes. It's not really there to add a meaningful amount with only one mounted but if you have a ship with several same facing mounts it does stack up. The shredder is meant for larger ships that have the op and want more umph than the lower OP fog of war could provide. I did my best to have all the CFT PD weapons (and yea there is quite a few) to fill different roles for different needs. Idk I probably went overboard. I can put em all side by side and give them another round of balance testing though.

Volley Rockets: Holy *** what an insane kinetic shotgun. The 5/s fire rate means you will churn through the ammo fast, even with its 250 capacity, but that is some insane value on 75 kinetic damage a missile in a small slot for 5 OP. 5 OP is Salamander tier btw. I will be abusing this with ESR so hard, every ship will have a missile Commanders *** Kinetic down every other fleet's throat. Hundreds of dumbfire Micromissile making an impenetrable kinetic wall. The sheer amount of PD screening these guys do is absurd. Wow, I think they need a nerf, bad, but will be sad to see them go.

Good points and I'll give it some thought, I hadn't considered using them that way. OK now for my hot take on the Volley rocket. I'm a big ole fan of Mech warfare and having a bursting wild firing rocket is a core thing in that genre so it's just me having a nerd moment when I fire them. Seriously though, If you look at the stats I have them set to a spread of 35, launch speed of -50 and a flight time of 5 and very low 5 HP to balance out that damage potential. Potential is the operative word, because they are inaccurate to the point that yes once in a blue moon they can all hit a target but they are more likely to fly off to Narnia.

Wavemotion/Waveburst: Sick, awesome, cool. Wavemotion is an HE Beam Side/Upgrade. More Flux, but more HE beam damage, theoretically you would be able to use it less, since you're stripping copious amounts of armor off. The whole wave series feels like very competent sidegrades and more-over, they are just cool. I don't have any complaints, they are just neat.

I'M A' FIRIN' MAH LAZER!!

Other than that, Prussia station is incredibly decked out. Wow, they look like one of my late-game colonies minus my Access Control Planetary Shield to stop Pather problems. The Path is gonna eat that place alive eventually.

Well the station is meant to be the first line of defense and hold out a warp point assault long enough for fleets to come to it's aid. Of course there is that pesky fringe entry but ah balance and all that for the sneaky sneaks.

Balance and quality is in-line with JYD, visually exceeding it in some places. This is a good mod, I like it. I look forward to tinkering with it even more over the next few play sessions.

CFT is the product of my accumulate learning to sprite over time with my other two faction mods. I am pretty happy with how it turned out visually tbh. This is still early days for the freetraders and with the help of fine folks such as yourself I plan to keep tinkering under the hood until I get it right.

[Omnicast]

Ahh this is a faction mod! I thought it was ships only. I have failed reading comprehension! I must commit sudoku now.

Jokes aside I had a chance to install this on my recent fresh run, but... uhh I didn't.

I'll try adding it in anyhow and see how it goes.

[Dazs]

I have failed reading comprehension! I must commit sudoku now.

You sir have just made my day

[5ColouredWalker]

I like the mod generally, but the non-semetrical mounts with Energy/Kinetics instead of double kinetic or double energy irks me something fierce. Any chance of using Hybrid mounts?

[Dazs]

I like the mod generally, but the non-semetrical mounts with Energy/Kinetics instead of double kinetic or double energy irks me something fierce. Any chance of using Hybrid mounts?

TLDR: I sort of struggled with that in the initial storyboard. I am a lore kind of guy and I tried to stay consistent in the mod design. When I laid out their ship designs, I took into account that lore wise they are wreckers and scrappers and the hook being they were also smugglers, which sets them apart from my other mods, so I wanted their ships to reflect that. I added shielded holds and sneaky sensor dampening to satisfy the smuggling hook, next I made sure that salvage was only limited to a few ships since JYD is all about salvage and lastly their base hull mod expands cargo on all ships so that satisfies the trading aspect.

That being laid out for background, let's talk weapons. Since they are scrappers and wreckers I figured they would have an abundance of scrapped weapon parts to slap together their own designs which is how I ended up adding so many to the mod. I have all hybrid mounts on one of my faction mods and all synergy mounts on the other and I wanted CFT to stand alone and offer a difference. So I made each ship to have the ability to mount each weapon type but I sort of did that in stages. Some ships are side by side, some are sorta random and some are back/front in weapon types. It was a purposely made decision based on their ships are made from scrap and scarp isn't exactly evenly gathered so they would have an uneven mounting system. But I also did this to offer a ship design that most ships do not have in order to set them apart.

(You can skip to here if the TLRD isn't your thing) The mod is still a work in progress and you are not the first player who as made this comment. I am open to changing them and making the randomly mounted ships evenly laid out. For example there is a frigate has four mounts with two energy weapons on the left and two ballistic weapons on the right. Would it be more satisfying to have a more vanilla layout of two ballistic on the front and two energy on the back mounts?

[ThatFolfy]

The mod seems interesting and kinda fitting for a vanilla-adjacent modpack. I might eventually do a write-up of what I think about it if I ever I get around to properly trying out the ships and weapons it provides.

My current modpack is, however, the very opposite of vanilla, and I've just found a... non-conventional way to abuse the Auto Cannon, which already seemed kinda broken even with the 30 OP cost. Gaze upon this abomination, and despair.

Spoiler

[close]

I realize that the Onslaught on its own is a bit of a meme, however this... doesn't exactly seem right. (Also yes, the sound for the Auto Cannon seems to be missing. Kinda scary, considering the damage it can cause.)



Obviously this gets countered by a single semi-competent Wolf, 2-3 stray harpoons, or anything else that can get close for a couple of seconds, but I dread to think what a bunch of those could do if properly supported by a couple of tanky cruisers/capitals/Monitors and a bunch of fighters so they don't get shredded in the backlines.

Needless to say, I might try that at some point. Maybe after tweaking the gun's stats a bit

[Dazs]

The mod seems interesting and kinda fitting for a vanilla-adjacent modpack. I might eventually do a write-up of what I think about it if I ever I get around to properly trying out the ships and weapons it provides.

Sweet, if you decide to do that, please toss me a link and I'll check it out.

My current modpack is, however, the very opposite of vanilla, and I've just found a... non-conventional way to abuse the Auto Cannon, which already seemed kinda broken even with the 30 OP cost. Gaze upon this abomination, and despair.

Spoiler

[close]

I realize that the Onslaught on its own is a bit of a meme, however this... doesn't exactly seem right.

I am always amazed at how players can find ways of playing that would never occur to me. Probably why I like this forum so much is there are so many creative people who interact. Well you are using it in a sniper role as intended but what had not occurred to me in my testing is tactically working the AI shield routine that has ships lower their shield when at range to bleed off flux. Kudos!

(Also yes, the sound for the Auto Cannon seems to be missing. Kinda scary, considering the damage it can cause.)

I'll take a look at the weapon's sound files and change it to something more impactful, good call on that.

Obviously this gets countered by a single semi-competent Wolf, 2-3 stray harpoons, or anything else that can get close for a couple of seconds, but I dread to think what a bunch of those could do if properly supported by a couple of tanky cruisers/capitals/Monitors and a bunch of fighters so they don't get shredded in the backlines.

Well, as you state, all it would take is one frigate to spoil your day. I am sure you could craft a fleet that you propose and it would make a fun watch, looking forward to that if you do.

Needless to say, I might try that at some point. Maybe after tweaking the gun's stats a bit

I leave my mods open source for that reason. I know putting the code in a JAR file is good compression but I learned how to do all this by going over other mod author's code that I could access and I feel I am just passing it forward.

Great post all in all, thank you for taking the time to put it together. I am already looking over the Auto Cannon based on rawkhawklives notes, I'll add your thoughts to my CFT To-Do list as well. I should have some more updates next week when I am done putting in some graphic update requests I have gotten for Hiver Swarm.

[5ColouredWalker]

I like the mod generally, but the non-semetrical mounts with Energy/Kinetics instead of double kinetic or double energy irks me something fierce. Any chance of using Hybrid mounts?

Would it be more satisfying to have a more vanilla layout of two ballistic on the front and two energy on the back mounts?

A great deal.
There's usefulness in asymmetry, but particularly on the frigates it ends up being more awkward instead.

[Dazs]

There's usefulness in asymmetry, but particularly on the frigates it ends up being more awkward instead.

I agree, there's more room to play with the big boys and I think I went a bit wonky on the destroyers and frigates. I'll get on those changes when time permits, these posts really re-charge my batteries. Thank you.

[Dazs]

v0.4 released today - Save compatible with v0.35a - A new hull mod, weapon balance changes and some graphic updates - Some ships in you current fleet may need to be re-armed - See the current changelog notes posted on the Forum OP or in the RAR for details.

@5ColouredWalker - When looking into your comments I noticed the AI was having trouble with ranges when facing forward with the asymmetrical layout so thank you for brining it to my attention.

@rawkhawklives - I made several changes to the PD weapons and the auto cannon based on your comments. Please let me know what you think of the changes if you get a chance.

@everyone I hope you enjoy the changes and as with all my mods, I am open to comments and suggestions so please keep them coming! You can reach me in the forum thread or on discord, I check each daily.

[5ColouredWalker]

Demi-Calverns: Way too low on flux. I think you made it .1 flux/non-emp damage instead of 1.

Additionally there's a issue with Inferno Rockets and Point Defense missiles.

Compared to volley rockets they're way too small (Volley ones might be a bit big compared to anhialators.). Additionally, Point Defence Missiles launch super fast, do 75 damage, and fire about 3 per second for 4 OP for 360 missiles. Inferno Rockets are rockets, are 8 OP, shoot 1/second dealing 25 damage, and have a 100 limit.

I think somehow their stats got transposed. Because right now Point Defence Missiles are incredibly good, while the inferno rockets are a trap. This extends to their medium equivilent.

Next, I think Sloop's (Small Fuel Tankers) need to drop a few OP and maybe 2 weapon slots, because they have Destroyer Ordinance in a Frigate Body without being civilian and having insulated engine assemblies. For slots, if OP gets dropped to the more reasonable 30 range instead of 60, they could probably do with 3 weapon mounts in their current layout instead of 5. Though 5's still fine!

I also like how their meadium slot weapons basically have swapped damages for their immage. Makes them theoretically unpredictable. (I.e. Is that a kinetic or high ex hypervolocity driver?) Lots of neat variations.

Their ships might be a bit heavy on the Salvage Rigs, but it's nice to get some really great hauls out of not necessarily non-combat fleets. As a side effect makes them really good mining fleets combined with some of the ore smelting mods since they work on them. Fleet has a interesting 'Not quite pirate traders' feel, though I tend to descend into piracy with them.

Edit: Also the Autocannon could probably use less ammo. Before mods it's only going to run out of ammo in the most extreme firefights. With mods, it might as well not have a cap.

[Dazs]

Hello again and thank you for your detailed analysis. I'll take these one at a time and explain my reasoning and any planned changes based on your feedback.

Demi-Calverns: Way too low on flux. I think you made it .1 flux/non-emp damage instead of 1.

Yes that is a typo on my part woops my bad, I'll have that adjusted next patch.

Additionally there's a issue with Inferno Rockets and Point Defense missiles.

Compared to volley rockets they're way too small (Volley ones might be a bit big compared to anhialators.). Additionally, Point Defence Missiles launch super fast, do 75 damage, and fire about 3 per second for 4 OP for 360 missiles. Inferno Rockets are rockets, are 8 OP, shoot 1/second dealing 25 damage, and have a 100 limit.

I think somehow their stats got transposed. Because right now Point Defence Missiles are incredibly good, while the inferno rockets are a trap. This extends to their medium equivilent.

I am not sure what you mean by small, are you referring to the pixel size of the weapon or the missile or something else entirely? Point Defense rockets are set to target fighters vs Inferno that target ships. I have PD rockets set so fast so they can catch up to the faster fighters and set their damage higher since they are HE and would suffer against all the shielded fighters out there. I'll take a look at their firing behavior and ensure they aren't targeting ships first but I do see your point and will get back to you once I look into it deeper.

Next, I think Sloop's (Small Fuel Tankers) need to drop a few OP and maybe 2 weapon slots, because they have Destroyer Ordinance in a Frigate Body without being civilian and having insulated engine assemblies. For slots, if OP gets dropped to the more reasonable 30 range instead of 60, they could probably do with 3 weapon mounts in their current layout instead of 5. Though 5's still fine!

My intention was to make it a quick tanker well defended with PD weapons so it can flee a battle when a fleet is forced to retreat. I had not intended it to be a warship and not marking it civilian was a mistake on my part, I'll have that fixed next patch.

I also like how their meadium slot weapons basically have swapped damages for their immage. Makes them theoretically unpredictable. (I.e. Is that a kinetic or high ex hypervolocity driver?) Lots of neat variations.

Well my goal was to make them different that what was already out there. Some of them are based on vanilla models with some kitbashing and some of them are original designs. I am glad you like then, always nice to hear a positive word

Their ships might be a bit heavy on the Salvage Rigs, but it's nice to get some really great hauls out of not necessarily non-combat fleets. As a side effect makes them really good mining fleets combined with some of the ore smelting mods since they work on them.

Well I sort of struggled with the salvage rigs. JYD (one of my other faction mods) is saturated with them as they are miners and salvagers where as CFT are salvagers and smugglers and I did not want to double them up. I only have rigs on the ships with the yellow wavy lines and that there is one for each ship size whereas JYD has rigs on several non utility ships. I did add additional NEX mining stats to the five utility ships so CFT could have a decent AI mining fleet for their economy.

Fleet has a interesting 'Not quite pirate traders' feel, though I tend to descend into piracy with them.

That is a design decision I made for them to offer player choice. I set them as neutral to just below neutral to all in game factions (including pirates and pirate themed modded factions) with some exceptions like Hiver swarm. I set it this way so that the player can decide if they want to play as more of a pirate or a bit of a shady rogue with a good reputation. By setting the faction settings this way, a player has some time to make that decision but the game will slowly make it for them since as time goes on you will loose reputation with one faction because you are friends with another. You can choose the pirate path in one playthrough and the trader path in another, gives it some replay variety (at least that is my intention)

Edit: Also the Autocannon could probably use less ammo. Before mods it's only going to run out of ammo in the most extreme firefights. With mods, it might as well not have a cap.

Well I set up CFT as a solo faction mod for players who do not play heavily modded games and wanted a vanilla+ friendly faction to play with. I did not balance anything with the thought of how another mod author set up hull mods and such. That being said, this is not the first time I've gotten that note. I will adjust it for the next patch after some testing to find that sweet spot.

Thank you for this, I tend to get blind spots and sort of rely on player feedback to finetune my mods. This really helps!

[GFYguy]

Heyo! installed this mod mostly for the multi-purpose ships that it contains, and now, 25 or so hours into this run, i have noticed a few... interesting ways i can utilize certain ships. figured i should post them here in case you want to adjust some things based on my findings.
First off, the Galleon-class Battlewagon. as it states, its supposed to be a back of the line missile support ship, so why in the hell does it have plasma burn? in my adventures, I ended up loading it full of torpedoes and sending it off charging into battle with limitless supply due to the missile autoforge. while controlled by an aggressive level 5 officer, and me in a Hyperion supporting it, it was able to take out entire [REDACTED] ordos like it was nothing.

I only have simulation photos, but it gets the point across.
This also goes for similar hulls, like the bombardier. its a backline support, its plasma burn and insane amount of medium missiles make it shine if i set it up to be super aggressive.
I suggest replacing the system with much more defensive or omnidirectional movement type systems, reduce the top speeds a tad, and maybe make the shields a bit worse, they soak up a really high amount due to the lack of flux going into weapons.
This is all i have a good amount of understanding of, I'll most likely be back once i have a good understanding of some more super cheesy tactics you can pull off with these ships, I've found a lot that I need to dive into lol. let me know if you need me to go in depth, or record a video with a deeper explanation, I suck at explaining things over text.

[5ColouredWalker]

Hello again and thank you for your detailed analysis. I'll take these one at a time and explain my reasoning and any planned changes based on your feedback.

Additionally there's a issue with Inferno Rockets and Point Defense missiles.

Compared to volley rockets they're way too small (Volley ones might be a bit big compared to anhialators.). Additionally, Point Defence Missiles launch super fast, do 75 damage, and fire about 3 per second for 4 OP for 360 missiles. Inferno Rockets are rockets, are 8 OP, shoot 1/second dealing 25 damage, and have a 100 limit.

I think somehow their stats got transposed. Because right now Point Defence Missiles are incredibly good, while the inferno rockets are a trap. This extends to their medium equivilent.

I am not sure what you mean by small, are you referring to the pixel size of the weapon or the missile or something else entirely? Point Defense rockets are set to target fighters vs Inferno that target ships. I have PD rockets set so fast so they can catch up to the faster fighters and set their damage higher since they are HE and would suffer against all the shielded fighters out there. I'll take a look at their firing behavior and ensure they aren't targeting ships first but I do see your point and will get back to you once I look into it deeper.

Next, I think Sloop's (Small Fuel Tankers) need to drop a few OP and maybe 2 weapon slots, because they have Destroyer Ordinance in a Frigate Body without being civilian and having insulated engine assemblies. For slots, if OP gets dropped to the more reasonable 30 range instead of 60, they could probably do with 3 weapon mounts in their current layout instead of 5. Though 5's still fine!

My intention was to make it a quick tanker well defended with PD weapons so it can flee a battle when a fleet is forced to retreat. I had not intended it to be a warship and not marking it civilian was a mistake on my part, I'll have that fixed next patch.

Edit: Also the Autocannon could probably use less ammo. Before mods it's only going to run out of ammo in the most extreme firefights. With mods, it might as well not have a cap.

Well I set up CFT as a solo faction mod for players who do not play heavily modded games and wanted a vanilla+ friendly faction to play with. I did not balance anything with the thought of how another mod author set up hull mods and such. That being said, this is not the first time I've gotten that note. I will adjust it for the next patch after some testing to find that sweet spot.

Thank you for this, I tend to get blind spots and sort of rely on player feedback to finetune my mods. This really helps!

Happy to help, some clarifications.

For the Missiles/Rockets, I believe the actual image in battle/the targetable rocket is too small. The PDM is basically a glowing dot, and the inferno rockets are much smaller than the anti-shield option (I'm at work so I don't have the name on hand.)
Also, the Inferno-rockets still do far too little damage and move too slow if they're intentional. You've made them worse than Anhialator's or even Light Mortars and far more expensive.
As for targetting, the targeting works well. But pilots can pilot them, and use them as a weapon targeting ships, which causes them to shine.

For the tanker, I haven't taken it into battle (Sounds far too risky when it comes to my fuel supply), it's more that I could quite feasibly give it a pair of Railguns and have a ok support ship due to the sheer OP available.

Finally for Autocanon ammo, I was considering just Expanded Magazine which from memory would bring them to 200. They then fire every 5 seconds, and reload every 10. At that rate, the ammo limit is... A joke.

[Dazs]

First off, the Galleon-class Battlewagon. as it states, its supposed to be a back of the line missile support ship, so why in the hell does it have plasma burn? in my adventures, I ended up loading it full of torpedoes and sending it off charging into battle with limitless supply due to the missile autoforge. while controlled by an aggressive level 5 officer, and me in a Hyperion supporting it, it was able to take out entire [REDACTED] ordos like it was nothing.
This also goes for similar hulls, like the bombardier. its a backline support, its plasma burn and insane amount of medium missiles make it shine if i set it up to be super aggressive.
I suggest replacing the system with much more defensive or omnidirectional movement type systems, reduce the top speeds a tad, and maybe make the shields a bit worse, they soak up a really high amount due to the lack of flux going into weapons.
This is all i have a good amount of understanding of, I'll most likely be back once i have a good understanding of some more super cheesy tactics you can pull off with these ships, I've found a lot that I need to dive into lol. let me know if you need me to go in depth, or record a video with a deeper explanation, I suck at explaining things over text.

You are correct that was my intention. I gave them plasma burn drives so they could escape but I had not used them with an aggressive officer and I agree that another system should be installed on them. I'll add that to my to-do notes, thank you!