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Author Topic: Vigilance is bad  (Read 7561 times)

Amoebka

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Re: Vigilance is bad
« Reply #60 on: July 30, 2022, 08:21:59 AM »

Regular flares are already mostly phased out in favor of flak canisters on newer low-tech ships. Active flares are pretty nice for a low-impact system for support ships, don't think there's anything wrong with them. Just don't put them on premium combat ships like Tempest.
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Igncom1

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Re: Vigilance is bad
« Reply #61 on: July 30, 2022, 08:24:08 AM »

Well, older low tech ships  ;D
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Goumindong

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Re: Vigilance is bad
« Reply #62 on: July 30, 2022, 10:31:45 AM »

Vigilance would have to be 3 DP, if it remained as it is. It's a kite that trades mobility and so survivability for more firepower, except this firepower isn't enough to make them competitive with Gryphon or Falcon P.

But neither the gryphon nor Falcon P can be in four places at once which four frigates can nor can they bring four ion beams.

The thing is that a ship does not have to be as good as other ships to have a value. Not all fleets or ships need to be good against remnant to have a place in the game and the main problem with vigilance against the main threat in the system (Pirates and bounties) is that it’s hard to find ion beams and advanced Optics.
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Igncom1

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Re: Vigilance is bad
« Reply #63 on: July 30, 2022, 10:37:47 AM »

I mean they also have hybrid mounts so you can just put a HVD on there as well.
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Goumindong

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Re: Vigilance is bad
« Reply #64 on: July 30, 2022, 10:56:40 AM »

I mean they also have hybrid mounts so you can just put a HVD on there as well.

True but there is no HVD equivalent of advanced optics and the extra 200 range is really huge in getting the vigilance out of the range of destroyers.

Without AO and with UI(which is pretty necessary) the vigilance is in range of 800 range weapons on an ITU destroyer. With AO the vigilance is outside of 800 range weapons on a ITU cruiser (though juuust barely and enough that you don’t really want them to engage a cruiser)

The margin of error against frigates is also very important because it takes time to turn around. If you start turning around at 1050 because you’re in range (1135) and want to hold like 1050 that is a lot different than turning around at 850 because you’re in range (935) and want to hold 850.

At 850 your margin until you hit the kinetics/HE of something like a lasher is pretty low. You will start to take shield damage and then your shields will have to prioritize between the missiles and the primary guns of the enemy. And since they’re probably faster than you always lose this.

But you may not win but can actually still kite if you start backing up 200 units earlier. Ion beams are also pretty essential to dealing with the majority of truly fast pirate frigates since those tend to not have shields. (You will still get wrecked by pather cruisers and destroyers though.
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Thaago

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Re: Vigilance is bad
« Reply #65 on: July 30, 2022, 11:00:22 AM »

Trying hard to think of possible advantages for the Vigilance... I suppose in the early game, a Vigilance with Wolfpack Tactics (taken for other hunter ships most likely) to get +20% damage to their missiles to anything destroyer or above is interesting (I might give that a try with ECCM Pilums) (but using an officer on such a small ship is a waste later in the game unless the advantage it brings is truly huge, like an officer on an omen is). Vigilances have 110 speed so the +40% speed from a leadership build helps them more than it does the Gryphon (60 speed base) or Falcon P (80 speed base) - the +40% does not act on the bonus from unstable injector, only base speed. Fast missile racks combos well with Pilums and Salamanders for saturation. They can do ion beam or HVD kiting on top of missiles? Not a bad way to build them but not unique. I think thats all I've got haha.

For spam fleets, they don't benefit quite as much from the support doctrine DP reduction as some other ships do from "good" rounding. The Shrike at 8 DP gets a better reduction (1.6 rounded up to 2, for a 25% reduction)... considering the 30 ship limit Vigilance for 4 is hard to justify over Shrike for 6, which is a decent skirmisher with good shield hitpoints on top of their medium missile.
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mr. domain

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Re: Vigilance is bad
« Reply #66 on: July 31, 2022, 08:30:19 PM »

I think that the best route to make the Vigilance have a clear identity as a midline support frigate in service of the Persean League is for it to be the best option for cheap and effective deployment of missiles in general and DEM missiles in particular. To aid this goal, one or more missile benefitting hull mod should likely be added to the ship. EMR is almost certainly needed to increase the staying power of the ship. Additionally, ECCM could be built in if it gains a new benefit relevant to DEMs, or a new DEM-oriented hull mod that, for instance, slightly extends the duration or range of their beams. I don't think that a change to the ship system is necessarily needed, but this depends entirely on DEM cooldown times. If a change to the ship system is needed, the best option for the ship system is likely something like HEF, but which applies to beam weapons as well as active DEMs. Survivability should also be improved, so I think at least one of the earlier thread suggestions like a small PD mount, shield arc to 180, or a speed increase should be added.

While I think that the idea of the Vigilance fits best into midline thematically, I find the suggestion made by Harmful Mechanic early in the thread interesting, perhaps there's room for a Vigilance (P) along those lines?
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smithney

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Re: Vigilance is bad
« Reply #67 on: August 01, 2022, 12:30:20 AM »

@mr. domain
I don't think DEMs are gonna change much for the Vigilance, but the HEF-like system does sound interesting considering the hybrid mount. With that said, I don't think Vigilance would be a good fit for it, the hull is not well built for using beams atm. It does open up an interesting path if Vigilance got a speed boost and kept its squishiness, though. It could be seen as a precursor to Tempest, one not nearly as reliable, but almost as spiky.
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Brainwright

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Re: Vigilance is bad
« Reply #68 on: August 01, 2022, 07:06:32 AM »

I think a key point for the Vigilance is that it shares a flaw that a lot of ships with weak point defense and an omnishield : they can't reliably vent hard flux.

Maybe at some point in the past, you could use an omnishield as a makeshift point defense, but the balance of the game has moved on from that.

Ships built like this either need to be able to vent very fast or have some kind of defense against overloading.

Maybe give Accelerated Shields faster vent speed?  A bonus to dissipating hard flux while the shield is down?
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Candesce

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Re: Vigilance is bad
« Reply #69 on: August 01, 2022, 08:07:40 AM »

I think a key point for the Vigilance is that it shares a flaw that a lot of ships with weak point defense and an omnishield : they can't reliably vent hard flux.
Hmm.

How well does Vigilance with Heavy Machine Gun or Flak work?

It should always be acting in support of a ship with either longer range or higher speed, so being kited shouldn't be too much of a threat. And a medium missile + point defense is a decent combination for an escort.
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Brainwright

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Re: Vigilance is bad
« Reply #70 on: August 01, 2022, 10:15:50 AM »

Hmm.

How well does Vigilance with Heavy Machine Gun or Flak work?

It should always be acting in support of a ship with either longer range or higher speed, so being kited shouldn't be too much of a threat. And a medium missile + point defense is a decent combination for an escort.

Poorly.  There's no problem with the Vigilance being kited.  None at all.  The problem is it can't kite.

So if it is closing to ranges where the PD weapons are useful, it's taking damage to its shield.  The shield isn't too impressive to begin with, so something like a Shrike can destroy it in one pass.  Place PD weapons in the main mount, and other frigates will bully it.

Another issue is behavior.  When surrounded by allied ships, the weapons will determine its behavior, and a standoff loadout will have the ship acting in a standoff fashion, but as frigates spread out over the course of combat, the standoff behavior matters less.
 The ship is being pressed by multiple opponents, so it more or less acts like every other frigate, where speed is all that matters.

I've had good experience assigning the Vigilance as an escort to ships that are also supposed to serve as fire support.  More aggressive ships are a no-go, as the escorts get isolated or tangled up with opposing ships, where they don't want to be.

Maybe the new DE missiles will make fire support more valuable?  It seems the reason fleets spread out so much is avoiding the firing arcs of allies, and missiles can pass over allies to strike opponents.  Great way to allow the Vigilance to sit behind other ships, where it wants to be.
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Igncom1

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Re: Vigilance is bad
« Reply #71 on: August 05, 2022, 03:13:47 AM »

What do you lot think of the idea that Vigilance's make for good second line ships as opposed to frontline ships like Tempests or Centurions?

Working with them recently armed with heavy blasters and a verity of missiles they are obviously incapable as one on one duellists, hell my tempests can frequently duel enemy destroyers and win, but I often find them stuck behind otherships when ganging up where normal guns obviously are of no help. In those situations missiles and carriers work because they can fight over friendlies.

Been a while since I have used Pilums too, they are interesting to say the least, not sure if they are much stronger then the old ones though. Not needing the extra missile mod is a nice for the infinite missile weapons.

Breach missiles are interesting due to their number as very light armour stripping missiles which can work well.

Heavy blasters are.... not the worst on the Vigilances honestly, as it's not like being shot by anything else is any better with a less fluxy weapon. HVDs are also nice fire support but plenty of craft can pack at least one of those.

At the moment trying to work out situations where a vigil and a centurion might be better then two centurions in a fleet battle. But yeah they could probably do with a buff if they are at least supposed to match brawlers in carrying more then a frigate is generally supposed to.
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Amoebka

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Re: Vigilance is bad
« Reply #72 on: August 05, 2022, 04:29:30 AM »

Heavy blaster is the absolute worst weapon you could put on a slow frigate with 130 effective dissipation and 2000 capacity. It literally overfluxes itself in 5 seconds, not to mention it has to somehow get within 600 range without taking a bunch of shield damage.

I've been using HVD + Pilum with 5 shield boosting hullmods, and while it doesn't die too much, it also doesn't really do enough to be worth using. Missile ships really want officers, and dedicating one to a budget frigate is just not a good choice. If I could put a gamma core into it, the ship would be decent, but the game doesn't work that way.
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Igncom1

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Re: Vigilance is bad
« Reply #73 on: August 05, 2022, 04:35:55 AM »

Heavy blaster is the absolute worst weapon you could put on a slow frigate with 130 effective dissipation and 2000 capacity. It literally overfluxes itself in 5 seconds, not to mention it has to somehow get within 600 range without taking a bunch of shield damage.

I've been using HVD + Pilum with 5 shield boosting hullmods, and while it doesn't die too much, it also doesn't really do enough to be worth using. Missile ships really want officers, and dedicating one to a budget frigate is just not a good choice. If I could put a gamma core into it, the ship would be decent, but the game doesn't work that way.

My AI's seem to make the HB work, dunno how, but then again you aren't always being shot at in practice, as in fleet battles.

I've got mine with the Hardened Subsystems, Reinforced Bulkheads, ECCM Package and Expanded Missile Racks mods.
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Amoebka

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Re: Vigilance is bad
« Reply #74 on: August 05, 2022, 04:41:39 AM »

Yeah that basically means your Vigilances never come into range to shoot their blaster or shoot at one third of the normal rate. Might as well leave the mount empty then, or give it PD. As soon as a fighter wing flies by, the ship will overload itself missing blaster shots, which is worse than doing nothing. Again, a single shot is 720 flux, the ship has 2000. AI doesn't magically change that.
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