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Author Topic: Militarized sub system needs a rework.  (Read 1996 times)

Wyvern

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Re: Militarized sub system needs a rework.
« Reply #15 on: November 20, 2022, 11:34:01 AM »

Spoken like someone who doesn't take the Makeshift Equipment skill.

...But more seriously, yes, there are tradeoffs to using Revenants, they're not pure up-side. I still like them better than the standard civilian-hull freighters, but once you're into late-game fleets with 5+ combat cruisers, there's a strong argument to be made for switching from Revenants with Efficiency Overhaul to Colossi with Insulated Engines. I generally don't, because by that point I've got a couple of Revenants with s-mods, and swapping story point expenditures around is a nuisance. But I might add an extra Colossus if, sometime after that point, I decide I need more cargo space.

(Excluding trying to get a coronal tap back online. There it's Atlases or nothing because of the ridiculous requirement of delivering all the cargo all at once.)
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Wyvern is 100% correct about the math.

Lortus

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Re: Militarized sub system needs a rework.
« Reply #16 on: November 20, 2022, 12:05:08 PM »

bruh hell nah no way people are recommending revenants
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Hiruma Kai

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Re: Militarized sub system needs a rework.
« Reply #17 on: November 20, 2022, 01:51:56 PM »

Militarized subsystems I find is an early game compromise hullmod that you have from the beginning of the game.  It is quite good at the stage of the game where you have less than 240 DP worth of ships in total, at which point the skill fall off doesn't even happen.  It's +1 speed, reduced sensor signature in a single hullmod, allowing for another logistics hullmod without penalty, where as +2 burn from Augmented Drive Field and Insulated Engines take two, and even if you use s-mods, expanded cargo holds or auxilliary fuel tanks still adds some additional expense.

It definitely falls off in use late game, but the whole concept, militarizing civilian ships, is by its nature a "make do with what you have" philosophy.  Late game you aren't making do; you're specializing your fleet. I think it is fine to have such hullmods useful early game, and as the game transitions, for them to stop being used.

As for Revenants, I think they're perfectly fine late game transports for combat fleets - if you can acquire them.  They're not as efficient as an Atlas or Prometheus in terms of raw cargo or fuel capacity per credit, but on the other hand, they're not capitals, which does weird things to your fleet's campaign maneuverability and efficiency traversing deep hyperspace and the like, not to mention ballooning your sensor profile if you're not already stacking 5 combat capitals.  I certainly prefer them in "light weight" high tech fleets.  High DP cost but small physically ships like Hyperions, Scarabs, and so on maybe with a single fast capital leading the pack.  A low tech Onslaught/Legion heavy fleet likely would just grab a couple Prometheus though. Might still slap an s-mod on them though for either +2 burn or insulated engines.

Your typical late game logistics solution options are basically:
Atlas (Pro: 2000 cargo/400 fuel, Con:Civilian, 50 crew, 10 supplies/month, 6 fuel/ly, 6 burn base)
Prometheus (Pro: 200 cargo/3000 fuel, Con: Civilian, 50 crew, 10 supplies/month, 6 fuel/ly, 6 burn base)
Colossus (Pro: 900 cargo/120 fuel, Con: Civilian, 40 crew, 6 supplies/month, 4 fuel/ly, 7 burn base)
Phaeton (Pro: 20 cargo/800 fuel, Con: Civilian, 10 crew, 4 supplies/month, 2 fuel/ly, 8 burn base)
Revenant (Pro: 600 cargo/900 fuel, phase field, Con: 30 crew, 15 supplies/month, 3 fuel/ly, 8 burn base)

Let us assume no story points spent s-mods, and just slap on expanded cargo hold or auxiliary fuel tanks along with insulated engines to get the sensor signature down.  Revenant just has both cargo and fuel mods (and still will tend to have smaller signature and full cruiser sensor benefit).

Colossus + Phaeton: 1190 cargo and 1160 fuel
50 crew (500 credits/month), 15 supplies/month (1500 credits), 6 fuel/ly (150 credits per light year)

Revenant: 780 cargo, 1170 fuel
30 crew (300 credits/month), 15 supplies/month (1500 credits), 3 fuel/ly (75 credits per light year)

You're trading off about 400 units of cargo for one fewer logistics ship and slightly longer fuel endurance (30 light year trip from the core out and back is 180 fuel difference, so 1160-360=800 fuel for other ships vs 1170-180 = 990 fuel for other ships.  Plus the advantages of a smaller fleet profile from phase field.

The Atlas and Prometheus are more efficient, however at the cost of adding capital logistics to your fleet (i.e. base 6 burn, which either means Bulk transport late game, taking a hit to sensor profile, and whatever the behinds the scene calculation for terrain and campaign maneuverability there is).

Atlas + Prometheus: 2800 cargo, 4300 fuel
100 crew (1,000 credits/month), 30 supplies/month (3000 credits), 12 fuel/ly (300 credits per light year)

3x Revenant: 2340 cargo, 3510 fuel
90 crew (900 credits/month), 45 supplies/month (4500 credits), 9 fuel/ly (225 credits per light year)

For a 2 month run (15 days out, 30 days exploring/hunting bounties/etc, 15 days back), going out 30 light years and coming back 30 light years, most of the expense is in the fuel.
18,000 credits in fuel versus 6000 credits in supplies and 2000 credits in salaries for the capitals (or about 9.2 credits per cargo, and can handle a 59.7 fuel/ly fleet).
13,500 credits in fuel versus 9000 credits in supplies and 1800 credits in salaries for the Revenants (or about 10.4 credits per cargo, and can handle a 49.5 fuel/ly fleet).

Although, at the point of the game where I'm considering between capital logistics and Revenants, I really don't care about a few thousand credits here and there, and just tend to grab the Revenants for the better sensor stats.  I'll take a hit of 10% to my logistics credit costs for those sensor stats in an iron man game.
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Megas

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Re: Militarized sub system needs a rework.
« Reply #18 on: November 20, 2022, 01:56:47 PM »

Revenant is handy for the 100 DP max fleet led by Ziggurat.
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intrinsic_parity

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Re: Militarized sub system needs a rework.
« Reply #19 on: November 20, 2022, 03:50:50 PM »

Do people not take bulk transport early? That solves all the civilian burn problems without any hullmods and also significantly reduces the number of civilian ships required in the first place. For me, that's a super easy early game skill pick and I always want ordinance expertise so I have to take a tier 1 industry skill late game anyway. None of the other tier 1 industry skills seem much better.

Also, I'm not a big fan of using the extra cargo/fuel hullmods. If I need more cargo/fuel capacity, I will just get more logistics ships. With efficiency overhaul instead of expanded cargo holds/auxiliary fuel tanks, I end up with much more cargo/supplies/month and about the same fuel capacity/fuel/ly, plus reduced crew requirements.

The only reason to use the extra/cargo/fuel hullmods IMO is to reduce the number of logistics ships if you are running into the 30 ship fleet cap, but in my experience, it's actually kinda hard to run into that on default setting because you can only use 240 DP of combat ships, several skills punish you for having more than 240 DP of combat ships, and the officer limit incentivizes you to use some larger ships.

In my experience, 2-3 colossus/phaeton are fine until I start using capital ships, at which point I can just use atlas/prometheus instead. That leaves 24 slots for combat ships. I have a hard time imagining my combat ships costing less than 10 DP/ship on average. Even if you leave a few slots open for recovery, most 'normal' fleets with some cruisers/capitals shouldn't have too many issues IMO. I feel like you would need to be doing really frigate/detroyer heavy support doctrine/derelict operations stuff to have issues.
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FastestDraw

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Re: Militarized sub system needs a rework.
« Reply #20 on: November 20, 2022, 03:55:42 PM »

The +1 burn and sensor fix is very nice for early game smuggling where you don't expect/want to fight (I often go 0 combat ships selling everything for starting cash). D mod mudskippers with it and insulated engines are really credit-efficient, can be purchased almost anywhere. Its apx3K credits for 70 cargo at the lowest detection range.

You can start transverse jump + navigation for neutrino/'faster go slow' without needing to go into industry for cargo.

I wouldn't mind another burn level on them, so they don't fall off in terms of speed compared to cargo hauling, but they still have a niche outside that.
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Megas

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Re: Militarized sub system needs a rework.
« Reply #21 on: November 20, 2022, 04:04:38 PM »

Do people not take bulk transport early? That solves all the civilian burn problems without any hullmods and also significantly reduces the number of civilian ships required in the first place. For me, that's a super easy early game skill pick and I always want ordinance expertise so I have to take a tier 1 industry skill late game anyway. None of the other tier 1 industry skills seem much better.
If I take Industry, I get Field Repairs because I lose ships and frequently recover enemy ships early, and for partial repairs in fights that take more than one round to finish (like solo Ziggurat against some endgame fights).  If I get Hull Restoration, my primary source of pristine ships becomes whatever I loot from the enemy (instead of buying them from markets) and having some armor and CR right off the bat is convenient.  Also, late in the game, Field Repairs is handy for regenerating armor in fights that take more than one round to finish.

Bulk Transport is nice (and I have used it in early 0.9 releases when we had that funky mutually exclusive choice system), but I cannot afford more than one tier 1 Industry skill, and I consider Field Repairs the most valuable of the three tier 1 Industry options.
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BCS

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Re: Militarized sub system needs a rework.
« Reply #22 on: November 20, 2022, 11:32:03 PM »

Also, I'm not a big fan of using the extra cargo/fuel hullmods. If I need more cargo/fuel capacity, I will just get more logistics ships. With efficiency overhaul instead of expanded cargo holds/auxiliary fuel tanks, I end up with much more cargo/supplies/month and about the same fuel capacity/fuel/ly, plus reduced crew requirements.

In my experience it's easy to print supplies with either Salvaging skill or just three Salvage Rigs. Fuel, not so much. So I don't really care about supply use, at least not in the late game.
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Lortus

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Re: Militarized sub system needs a rework.
« Reply #23 on: November 22, 2022, 07:19:23 AM »

I'm always running at least 3 Atlases in the late game and a Phaeton or something, if I even use a fuel ship. Revenants aren't gonna cut it. Also Atlases are faster, because they can reach 10 burn with ADF and bulk transport, and you only need to spend 1 SP, and you are going Bulk Transport most times anyways to reach higher tier skills.

I guess it depends on how much you care about the logistics and personal preference yadda yadda but Revenants are not the easy answer to the logistics question.
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intrinsic_parity

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Re: Militarized sub system needs a rework.
« Reply #24 on: November 22, 2022, 08:02:05 AM »

Also, I'm not a big fan of using the extra cargo/fuel hullmods. If I need more cargo/fuel capacity, I will just get more logistics ships. With efficiency overhaul instead of expanded cargo holds/auxiliary fuel tanks, I end up with much more cargo/supplies/month and about the same fuel capacity/fuel/ly, plus reduced crew requirements.

In my experience it's easy to print supplies with either Salvaging skill or just three Salvage Rigs. Fuel, not so much. So I don't really care about supply use, at least not in the late game.
I mean, efficiency overhaul on all your haulers also reduces their fuel consumption too. Quick math:
Spoiler
take
colossus (900 cargo, 120 fuel for 6 supplies/month and 4 fuel/ly)
phaeton (20 cargo, 800 fuel capacity for 4 supplies/month and 2 fuel/ly)

That gives you a base efficiency of:
(900 + 20)/(6 + 4) = 92 cargo/supplies/month
(120 + 800)/(4 +2) = 153.33 fuel capacity/fuel/ly

If you put expanded cargo holds and and auxiliary fuel tanks on each ship respectively, you end up with
(900*1.3 +20)/(4*2 + 6*1.5) = 70 cargo/supplies/month so about 24% less than base efficiency
(120 + 800*1.3)/(4 + 2) = 193.33 capacity/fuel/ly which is about 26% more than base efficiency

But if you put efficiency overhaul on both ships instead, you get:
(900 + 20)/(4*.8 + 6 *.8 ) = 115 cargo/supplies/month which is 25% more cargo/supplies/month (and 50% better than if you used expanded cargo holds)
(120 + 800)/(4*.8 + 2 *.8 ) = 191.66 capacity/fuel/ly which is about 25% more than base efficiency (basically the same as if you used the expansion hull mods)

You also get reduced crew requirements with efficiency overhaul.
[close]
So the overall efficiency of your fleet with bonus cargo/fuel hullmods is clearly worse in the supply department while being pretty much the same in the fuel department. I guess, the best thing you could do fuel-wise would be efficiency overhaul on everything along with auxiliary fuel tanks on fuel ships. But I have not really found any need to do that. It depends on what you are trying to do, but containment procedures gives -50% fuel consumption along with +25% fuel salvaged, and bulk transport also gives lots of extra fuel capacity. With those skills, I find I can explore with capital ships in my fleet and pretty much never run out of fuel. I don't have anything more than a phaeton. I frequently cap out on fuel from random drops and have to leave some behind.

Once I finish exploring, then I will spec out of containement procedures, but at that point, I can usually have a big colony up and can just buy massive amounts of fuel.
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BCS

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Re: Militarized sub system needs a rework.
« Reply #25 on: November 22, 2022, 08:23:04 AM »

I guess, the best thing you could do fuel-wise would be efficiency overhaul on everything along with auxiliary fuel tanks on fuel ships.

That's what I do. The thing is in the late game you can stack so many bounties in same overall area that salvage really piles up. It's not uncommon for me to leave Corvus with 200 supplies and 1600 fuel and return with 1000+ supplies and 3000+ fuel.

Note that this is with Containment Procedures, but a) I'm generally against respeccing and b) there's almost nothing that I could take in its place anyway.
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Hiruma Kai

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Re: Militarized sub system needs a rework.
« Reply #26 on: November 22, 2022, 10:27:31 AM »

Do people not take bulk transport early?

Depends on what my final fleet is intended to look like.  If I'm doing an early Hull Restoration run, then probably.  If I'm doing a more normal combat run, then likely not, as Combat 5 for Systems Expertise is a pretty significant buff and lets me solo some fleets where as before I wouldn't be able to.  Or if I'm doing an Automated run then Tech 5 is first stop to get me a Radiant as early as possible (Red Planet gambling).

Since I often fight my way up from the beginning of the game, getting more combat edge sooner means larger enemy fleets I can take on sooner, and I can deploy less on small fry (i.e. solo), which also saves on supplies.  Not deploying a Hammerhead for example, is a month of supplies on an Atlas, so arguing about 1,000 credits here and there in terms of logistics efficiency seems to be losing the forest for the trees.

I view Revenants as being able to pay something like 1000 credits a month each (compared to Atlas and/or Prometheus) for a significantly smaller sensor profile.  45 plus Phase reduction for the whole fleet versus +300 or +150 with Insulated Engines).  They're close enough in terms of hauling (especially by the time you likely have a Revenant on hand to have the choice), that I find it's hard to notice the credit difference.

Opening up one late game campaign save, I've got a Radiant (Neural link), 2 Legion XIV, Doom (Neural Link), 6 Scarabs, 3 Glimmer, 4 Revenant. It has a signature of 420 for the entire fleet due to the x0.5 phase multiplier from having so many cruiser scale phase ships in the fleet.  Sensor Strength is 1020, for a 600 range difference in my favor in terms of spotting and being seen.  Consider that three Atlases by themselves, with nothing else in the fleet, have a base signature of 1200, or 750 with insulated engines.  Even when I stick a pair of Ox tugs in that fleet to get 20 sustained burn, the 115 signature (insulated engine Ox tug) raises overall signature only a bit because of the phase field benefits, to something like 490 or 500 perhaps.  Most players may not care, but for an Iron man play through, it matters to me.

Also that same save had 700,000 passive net income the previous month, so I mostly don't care Revenants are costing me an extra 2000-3000 credits a month in supplies compared to capital logistics.  It literally is a rounding error in my monthly income (702,667 credits income was the exact value).

Also Atlases are faster, because they can reach 10 burn with ADF and bulk transport, and you only need to spend 1 SP, and you are going Bulk Transport most times anyways to reach higher tier skills.

Faster than Revenants?  I can see an argument made for equal since going past burn 10 is a bit silly, but faster?  Bulk Transport Atlas is burn 8.  Bulk Transport Revenant is burn 10.  ADF + Bulk Transport Atlas is burn 10, so equal.  Revenants and Phantoms happen to count as civilian for all of the benefits and none of the disadvantages.   Although you can also use Revenants as logistics in a burn 11 frigate fleet if you throw on ADF and Bulk Transport, but that's pretty niche.

When I'm using Atlases/Prometheus, my logistics hullmods are typically ADF, Insulated Engine, Efficiency Overhaul, and Surveying Equipment (exploration fleet) or Solar Shielding (combat fleet), for 2 story points.  If I am running Bulk Transport, then ADF will probably be swapped for Expanded Cargo Holds, unless I'm running a frigate/destroyer pack.

For my Revenants, I run Expanded Cargo Hold, Auxilliary Fuel Tanks, Efficiency Overhaul, and Surveying Equipment or Solar Shielding, also for 2 story points.  Given there's no supply penalty for putting on the Expanded Cargo Hold and Auxilliary Fuel Tanks, might as well use them.

Atlases are still definitely more efficient in terms of credits and sheer capacity per ship, but personally when I'm playing on Iron man, I care more about signature and fleet range than an extra 1,000 credits a month here and there in terms of my logistics train.  If I've got enough capacity for my needs, then it really is just coming down to a few thousand credits a month.  The exact amount is dependent on distance versus time taken given Revenants are less supply efficient but more fuel efficient.  I suppose over 5 years or something that might be 100,000 or 200,000 credits, a level you might potentially notice if you're not running colonies, but if it saved me a fight I didn't need at a bad time, or saves having to earn back a single story point used to escape an encounter, it's well worth it to me.
« Last Edit: November 22, 2022, 10:38:31 AM by Hiruma Kai »
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YAZF

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Re: Militarized sub system needs a rework.
« Reply #27 on: November 22, 2022, 03:43:05 PM »

Like most ship mods, militarized sub sys CAN be useful depending on what you need. It doesn't have to be good all the time. I use it extensively anytime I'm doing a smuggler style playthrough. It provides a small burn boost and a sensor profile buff (which STACKS with insulated engines). Those are great perks! Maybe it's in-combat effect is a bit anemic, but does it need a full rework? I don't think so. 
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Dear Alex,
There should be a battlestation/star fortress fight in the main menu mission mode.  :)

smithney

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Re: Militarized sub system needs a rework.
« Reply #28 on: November 23, 2022, 04:00:01 AM »

One thing I feel needs to be pointed out in this thread is that Militarized Subsystems may act as a noob trap. I might be the only idiot, but in my early runs I used to pick it for the Burn increase and the Sensor buffs, not realizing that I made civilian ships eat into my fleetwide buffs with their DP despite never using them in combat. Doesn't help that Insulated Engine Assembly seems strictly inferior at first glance.

I never really found a good use for Militarized Subsystems in my later runs. True civilian ships plain suck at combat and putting the hullmod on rogue faction rebuilds isn't worth it. The idea of a Daud wannabe scraping up a fleet where auxiliaries play combat support doesn't currently translate into the gameplay in any good way.

EDIT:
Like most ship mods, militarized sub sys CAN be useful depending on what you need. It doesn't have to be good all the time. I use it extensively anytime I'm doing a smuggler style playthrough. It provides a small burn boost and a sensor profile buff (which STACKS with insulated engines). Those are great perks! Maybe it's in-combat effect is a bit anemic, but does it need a full rework? I don't think so. 
Well why would I bother myself with civilian hogs when I can achieve a similar result with customized non-civilian logistics ships, except also getting a passable combat backup? Especially in a world where phase ships exist? If you never get into combat, then sure Militarized Subsystems don't have downsides. But I have two problems with this: First, do you really want to avoid one of the most fun features of this game just to optimize your overworld gameplay? Second, isn't it quite a flavor mismatch when Daud's feat is being shoved into the player's face every other turn of a corner, yet a playstyle emulating it is unfun and suboptimal in practice?
« Last Edit: November 23, 2022, 04:13:52 AM by smithney »
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YAZF

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Re: Militarized sub system needs a rework.
« Reply #29 on: November 23, 2022, 01:34:02 PM »

I might be the only idiot, but in my early runs I used to pick it for the Burn increase and the Sensor buffs, not realizing that I made civilian ships eat into my fleetwide buffs with their DP despite never using them in combat.
I fully agree that once you go over the 240 DP cap for fleetwide abilities the mod can definitely be more harmful than helpful. And in such a situation I probably wouldn't use it. But like I said it doesn't have to be the type of mod that you use all the time.

Well why would I bother myself with civilian hogs when I can achieve a similar result with customized non-civilian logistics ships, except also getting a passable combat backup? Especially in a world where phase ships exist?
Some of the biggest strengths of civilian ships are that they are easy to find as well as relatively cheap to purchase and maintain. Sure in an endgame fleet you could use rarer and more costly logistic ships but that's not the point of the mod IMO. The point is to take something useful and common, but with crappy downsides, and to shore up it's weaknesses. I don't think the mod is designed to make a freighter or tanker into a combat ship. It's designed to make them less of a liability and to make your fleet not a giant target on the overworld map, especially during the early and mid game.
« Last Edit: November 23, 2022, 01:36:46 PM by YAZF »
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Dear Alex,
There should be a battlestation/star fortress fight in the main menu mission mode.  :)
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