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Author Topic: Neural Link is S-tier  (Read 2047 times)

Void Ganymede

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Neural Link is S-tier
« on: May 28, 2023, 09:04:57 PM »

Neural Linked Afflictor-Shade tag teams are insane. Why?

- 700 base flux dissipation, x2 if you run Phase Anchor - almost a Radiant of damage potential!
- Neural Link cooldown resets get you 100% uptime on Entropy Amplifier/EMP when needed.
- You control the ship with Antimatter Blasters ready; AI retreats and vents the other one.
- Shade covers Afflictor's point defense, Afflictor helps Shade pop capitals, together they sandwich omni-shields.

It's easy to start and grow:

- Pirate variants are common on black markets. You can incrementally upgrade from lvl1 to 15.
- Massive XP from being outnumbered.
- Bully the Lion's Guard in Askonia for their unique loot.

The amount of map control two phase flagships exert is amazing. No gap goes unexploited.

I haven't experimented enough with the endgame, but there's fascinating options (Harbinger tag teams! Doom & friend! Infinite* AAF Atlas or Eradicator cheese!) I haven't seen tested.
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coldiceEVO

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Re: Neural Link is S-tier
« Reply #1 on: May 28, 2023, 11:06:38 PM »

I knew neural switching resets system favourably since its introduction, but i am a lousy pilot.
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TaLaR

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Re: Neural Link is S-tier
« Reply #2 on: May 28, 2023, 11:30:56 PM »

- AM Afflictor with system expertise already recharges system faster than AM blasters. You just need to vent soon enough after activating the system (and shooting AM blasters), to start recharge earlier.

- You don't need to directly PD a player-piloted Afflictor - it's fast enough for all missiles and most fighters (partial exception: speed-skill-boosted Thunders) to be unable to catch it. And single Shade can't do much against whole enemy fleet's worth of fighters anyway.  But distributed fleet PD/Anti-fighter weapons among the fleet do help a lot, since without that you need to vent much further from enemies, using up a lot more Afflictor's PPT.

- You obviously pay for Neural link in OP or built-in, making the Afflictor a bit weaker than otherwise.
« Last Edit: May 28, 2023, 11:36:36 PM by TaLaR »
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Void Ganymede

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Re: Neural Link is S-tier
« Reply #3 on: May 29, 2023, 04:18:46 AM »

Yeah, peak performance Afflictor does fine alone. Neural Link OP buys you a whole 2nd ship though. Twice the dissipation, more windows to slip AMB shots through, support two flanks at once, etc.
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TaLaR

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Re: Neural Link is S-tier
« Reply #4 on: May 29, 2023, 04:27:09 AM »

Shade can't support 4AM blasters like optimized Afflictor. 4AM already barely fit on Afflictor, with 5 more AP and better flux stats.

Then you need AI to behave much smarter than it's really capable of: player initiates with Afflictor's QD, shoots 4 AM, transfers to Shade almost in position to attack and uses Shade's 3 shots before QD has run out. How often can this scenario be executed perfectly, without AI bungling up any part of it? And how often is it really necessary, given that 4AM Afflictor with optimal character already one-shots most cruisers that aren't a Dominator, but 3AM Shade vs target not debuffed with QD won't secure a kill against most destroyers.
« Last Edit: May 29, 2023, 04:37:21 AM by TaLaR »
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Megas

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Re: Neural Link is S-tier
« Reply #5 on: May 29, 2023, 04:53:34 AM »

I do not trust the AI playing with my linked ships.  When I transfer back, it may be out of position, waste the missiles I have saved, or mess up my autofire settings.  For me, Neural Link is primarily about sticking an Alpha or Omega grade core in a human ship.  Occasionally fixes bad systems like Quantum Disruptor (one charge with too long cooldown? come on!) with Neural Reset.

Two Harbingers:  Mostly fixes Quantum Disruptor via Neural Rest.  Now player can almost spam Quantum Disruptor like he used to.  Still not worth a capstone.

Two Onslaughts:  80 DP for taking out an endgame human fleet by themselves.  Not as good as solo Ziggurat.

@ TaLaR:  Neural hullmods cannot be builtin.  That would have been nice for capitals, especially Radiant.
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Grievous69

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Re: Neural Link is S-tier
« Reply #6 on: May 29, 2023, 04:56:51 AM »

I almost went to try out Neural Linked Nova, to see how good it can be in player's hands. Then I remembered, oh right, capital costed Neural hullmod, screw that.
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Hiruma Kai

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Re: Neural Link is S-tier
« Reply #7 on: May 29, 2023, 11:11:57 AM »

Glad to hear you are having fun with the skill.  It sounds like a very frenetic way to play the game. :)

Neural Linked Afflictor-Shade tag teams are insane. Why?

- 700 base flux dissipation, x2 if you run Phase Anchor - almost a Radiant of damage potential!

Given a Radiant can run 2 large missile racks and 4 medium missile racks along with its flux dissipation to run flux consuming weapons such as Plasma Cannons, I don't think comparing raw flux dissipation is going provide a full picture of damage potential.  Don't get me wrong, +50% damage on top of 4 AMB is a lot of damage, but the biggest multiplier of an Afflictor's damage output comes from the ability to bypass shields.  Which for me would mean Adaptive Phase Coils instead of Phase Anchor for more speed at moderate hard flux.

I'm also curious about the actual loadout.  Neural Link + Phase Anchor is 13 OP of hullmods you can't s-mod.  I can't seem to get a reasonable Afflictor build with 4 AMB and those hullmods.  Are you only running 3 AMB on the Afflictor?  I always thought the Afflictor was about burst damage, not DPS, since if you need to make 2 passes instead of 1, it is going to take twice as long given the nature of phase space, hard flux buildup, and slowing down.

I guess I'd want to know how much worse it really is with just an officered Shade ordered to escort your Afflictor instead of Neural link jumping between.  The other thing that strikes me as hard to deal with, if you de-phase, the other ship is potentially going to recharge it's AMB in about 1.7 seconds of subjective time (10 seconds/6=1.7) if it is running Phase Anchor, and then take some pot shots.  It really does sound like you're jumping between each ship every 5 seconds or even more often.

- Neural Link cooldown resets get you 100% uptime on Entropy Amplifier/EMP when needed.
I feel like when I was piloting an Afflictor, the Entropy Amplifier cooldown didn't feel like it was limiting my DPS that much, although I admittedly had System Expertise and Adaptive Phase Coils.  If you're using Phase Anchor, I can see this being useful, but on the other hand, I assume you are cutting into your overall damage potential by 25% by dropping an AMB.

The amount of map control two phase flagships exert is amazing. No gap goes unexploited.

Do you really find that it is much more than a single Afflictor, or an Afflictor with AI Shades/Afflictors along for the ride as Escorts or generally ordered?  I'm kind of finding it a bit hard to judge.  A single Afflictor flagship already exerts a lot of map control.

I haven't experimented enough with the endgame, but there's fascinating options (Harbinger tag teams! Doom & friend! Infinite* AAF Atlas or Eradicator cheese!) I haven't seen tested.

I find in the case of charged systems, the reset isn't nearly as valuable as on a long cooldown, non-charged system.  For short cooldown systems, you're not getting all that much more uptime.  So you'll get a lot more benefit to the Harbinger tag team than AAF ships, which already have 50% up time, or a Doom.  Systems Expertise is already a much larger multiplier on a Doom than Neural Link would be. 

And on the capital variants, like Atlas Mk II, it eats up 25 out 220 OP, more than 10% of it's fitting OP.  Plus an Atlas MK II really wants Missile Specialization for its two large missile slots, which Neural Link prevents the bonus missiles on one of them.  Same goes for something like an Astral (2 large missile), Legion (5 medium missile), Legion XIV (2 Large missile), Conquest (2 large + 2 medium missile), Executor (2 large missile), Pegasus (4 Large Missile), Invictus (2 Large missile), and Odyssey (1 Large + 3 medium missiles). Even Onslaughts will kind of be sad with their 4 medium missile racks.

Now that I think about it, the only capitals that wouldn't care significantly about the lack of +50% more missiles are the Paragon and Retribution.

I almost went to try out Neural Linked Nova, to see how good it can be in player's hands. Then I remembered, oh right, capital costed Neural hullmod, screw that.

On the Nova, you are trying to work with an a hullmod that is specifically designed to nerf the Radiant in player hands, and the Nova is no Radiant.

50 OP out of 280 OP on a 40 DP ship hurts even more than the 50 OP out of 320 OP on a 60 DP ship.

Neural link certainly enables a different playstyle, but I'm not convinced said play style is actually as strong as other capstones.

There are a lot of opportunity costs associated with the Neural link skill:
1) It uses a capstone skill slot.
2) It prevents combat endurance and/or missile specialization on one of the two ships (which makes it a poor choice for missile ships, and generally is a relative -5% damage, +5% damage taken, -5% speed compared to other ships).
3) It costs OP, and a significant amount on a capital (25).
4) It costs a huge amount of OP (50, 15.6% of a Radiant's budget, 17.8% of a Nova's budget) if you want to combo with Automated ships.  It would be like if Derelict Operations + Support Doctrine capital ships had to pay an extra 25 OP to use both skills.

So having paid that price, what do you get?
An extra officer (with said skill omissions) or alternatively viewed as an extra officer and an extra pseudo officer when you transfer out.  And on small ships, or far away ships, a significantly faster swap time.  However on a pair of close capitals, you are saving about 1-2 sec in transfer time.  And potentially a combo with Automated ships which let you fly ships you wouldn't be able to do otherwise, but at a significantly reduced capability.

Consider this potential comparison.  Onslaught + support Pegasus escorting it, with Neural Link in one case, and the +2 officer skill Leadership as the alternative skill pick.

Neural Link Case:
5 second swap time at escort distance or far away
85% CR and no extra missiles on one ship
-25 OP for each ship
FMR and Burn Drive extra Resets
Full player skills to both ships other than Combat Endurance and Missile Specialization

Officer Management Case:
Start the battle with the extra two officers in the Onslaught and Pegasus. 
Use X to transfer into one of them after battle start.
6 second swap at escort distance, about 25 seconds half a map away - however you can enforce escort distance by commands
Don't need to take Missile Specialization or Combat Endurance on the main character, still get 100% CR and extra missile for both ships.
Only benefit from player skills when fully in one ship, other ship gets base officer skills.

In the case where I'm doing close coordination between the two ships, i.e. escort distance, both ships are significantly stronger in the Officer Management case than in the Neural Link case, unless I'm running a very heavy combat skill build.

I realize the combat endurance and missile specialization issues are quirks of the system, and not ideal interactions, but the fact of the matter is they are there.  It seems not great from a design perspective that I can get better tag team performance in some, admittedly corner, cases explicitly without the Neural link skill than I can get with it.

The case described here, multiple phase ships, is probably a best case use of neural link, with utility falling off strongly in the capital cases, unless the capital has a long cooldown non-charged system - like say the Astral.
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Megas

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Re: Neural Link is S-tier
« Reply #8 on: May 29, 2023, 11:30:14 AM »

I have not found Neural Link very useful for Astral.  Either the system is still on cooldown despite Neural Reset or I can use it but there is no need because fighters are dead (and being rebuilt) or enough are returning and close enough to not need recall.

Full player skills to both ships other than Combat Endurance and Missile Specialization
While the linked ship does not get extra CR (and probably PPT too), it does get hull regeneration from the elite effect of Combat Endurance, and that is nice for an Onslaught that would die slowly from chip damage from a lot of small arms fire.  I guess it would also inherit slower CR decay too (but I never tried that part out).

It is lame they do not get full benefit, but they still get the remaining benefits that apply.
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Wyvern

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Re: Neural Link is S-tier
« Reply #9 on: May 29, 2023, 11:41:56 AM »

Hm... I bet I could mod the Neural Link hullmod to grant +15% max CR if the ship doesn't have an officer and the player does have Combat Endurance. Might even be able to fix the missile ammo issue that way too.
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Wyvern is 100% correct about the math.

Void Ganymede

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Re: Neural Link is S-tier
« Reply #10 on: May 29, 2023, 08:00:37 PM »

4AM Afflictor with optimal character already one-shots most cruisers that aren't a Dominator, but 3AM Shade vs target not debuffed with QD won't secure a kill against most destroyers.
The thing I like about neural link is it's a nice buildup. By the time you're high level and find non-P, non-D modded ships - yeah, Afflictor can cherry pick critical ships every volley. But the tag team is a fun way to get there, and interacts better with an existing fleet. You can EMP missile volleys headed for overloaded allies, disable engines and let your fleet clean up, apply Entropy Amplifier from a distance and just leave knowing you can reset it for yourself, etc.

Peak endgame performance probably isn't a frigate, just due to flux and weapon size limitations. Although minmaxed 1vX Afflictor is a ton of fun!

good analysis of the numbers
It does look like high DP Neural Link is just an excuse to pilot a Radiant.

I *really* don't trust AI with phase ships unless piloted by officers with defensive skills. It has very different opinions on when chip damage is worth taking on armor and hull (securing clutch kills or at least mobility kills) and when it's unacceptable. It's decent at avoiding phase lance one shot threats, I'll give it that.

So yes, two ships gives way more map control. With the new escort behavior of ships covering each other's flanks fairly well it's real valuable, at least until you're high enough level to just flicker through entire fleets blowing up anything you like. Looking forward to trying it with 2x Harbs.
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BaBosa

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Re: Neural Link is S-tier
« Reply #11 on: May 30, 2023, 02:18:38 AM »

Hm... I bet I could mod the Neural Link hullmod to grant +15% max CR if the ship doesn't have an officer and the player does have Combat Endurance. Might even be able to fix the missile ammo issue that way too.
This would be really cool. Though since multiple ships can have a neural interface then it might end up as paying OP for more CR. Though you could make it only work if there’s only two ships with neural interface.

On a semi related note Wyvern, do you know how hard would it be to make it so when you have a neural linked ship selected in the battle screen, any commands made don’t cost command points but are ignored by non neural linked ships? And show up as a different colour to distinguish them from normal commands. 
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TaLaR

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Re: Neural Link is S-tier
« Reply #12 on: May 30, 2023, 03:10:53 AM »

The thing I like about neural link is it's a nice buildup. By the time you're high level and find non-P, non-D modded ships - yeah, Afflictor can cherry pick critical ships every volley. But the tag team is a fun way to get there, and interacts better with an existing fleet. You can EMP missile volleys headed for overloaded allies, disable engines and let your fleet clean up, apply Entropy Amplifier from a distance and just leave knowing you can reset it for yourself, etc.

Peak endgame performance probably isn't a frigate, just due to flux and weapon size limitations. Although minmaxed 1vX Afflictor is a ton of fun!

The buildup for solo Afflictor starts with getting an Afflictor(P), 2AM blasters, and first few skills. Goals are: Helmsmanship, Field Modulation, Wolfpack, Coordinated Maneuvers, EWM, Phase coil tuning, Flux regulation. But it's viable right from start.

Afflictor has very much comparable power level to capitals and Doom, if used right. As long as you allow swapping between multiple Afflictors during fight (swap takes only few seconds of world time, not an issue).
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Wyvern

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Re: Neural Link is S-tier
« Reply #13 on: May 30, 2023, 08:13:40 AM »

On a semi related note Wyvern, do you know how hard would it be to make it so when you have a neural linked ship selected in the battle screen, any commands made don’t cost command points but are ignored by non neural linked ships? And show up as a different colour to distinguish them from normal commands.
No clue, haven't done any work with the command interface. Sounds like it'd probably be pretty tricky, though.
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Wyvern is 100% correct about the math.