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Author Topic: High tech feels like a wet noodle.  (Read 16793 times)

Juno

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Re: High tech feels like a wet noodle.
« Reply #75 on: May 16, 2024, 08:43:50 PM »

Just random nitpicks:

  • Tri Tach needs their fleet doctrine fixed so they are not the cripples like they are. Player should dread their fleets, not laugh at them.
  • Knife range weapons like AM Blaster shine on ships with plasma burn and other rush abilities. Odyssey, Aurora, Fury, Shrike, Medusa, even TT Brawler - all shine with it. I wish there was a class of scatter energy weapons of shotgun range to saturate this plastyle without having to dump into SO or HSA.
  • High Tech battlestations may not have best weight in autoresolve, but tier 3 HT battlestation is a monster that can chew up multiple fleets with nothing but Gravitons and Autopulses and will always win when you fight next to it.
  • Phase ships are not bad by themselves, but they are terrible in the hands of the AI, which definitely needs looking at. Just give Ziggurat to AI and watch what it is doing. It literally spams Phase every second from the start when no enemies even close an it should be speeding up to it destination, in general it spams the cloak way too much instead of applying damage, and can randomly stuck sit in phase for no reason until fluxed out. Just terrible. Afflictor is a nightmare in the hands of a human, dies horribly in the hands of AI. That being said, I always play on AI control though, some fingers not working and I cannot easily manual control a Doom to wipe entire enemy fleet. Basically, phase ships need their AI taken look at with a submarine logic - pop in, unload, dive into phase, back off a bit, recharge, repeat. If getting high on flux need to dive into phase and back off where no enemies in apparent vicinity, dump flux, then go back in. Unless criticall high on flux, then just dump flux where you at, even if next to enemies. AI just spams phase too much and not managing flux and rapid damage application well. Logic needs tuning.
  • AI is horrible at decision making when it comes to plasma burn and similar abilities, often rushing into a middle of enemy formation to get obliterated. This also needs to have looked at. My Furies are usually the first ones to go in first seconds of contact. Phase skimmer ships also have this problem by an extension, but its less obvious because Radiant can afford to yolo into entire enemy armada and not die, Hyperions do it from behind, and Medusas usually just die. The one and only huge problem of Phase Skimmer is that it doesn't teleport acros wrecks, which would help these ships a lot not to get stuck and dead. Movement is life.

Ship-wise my observations after a long string of high-tech plays. These are just my observations and thoughts, your mileage may vary:

  • Paragon is a monster no matter how you fit it. In the hands of competent player its extremely hard to kill and can dish back serious damage. I enjoy fitting Paragons that chew several Onslaughts solo in simulations. You can make it into anything you want from Autopulse spammer to Tach Lance sniper. Good as it is, albeit SO SLOW, I am seriously considering Unstable Injector and Aux Thrusters mandatory. I even considering s-modding Aux Thrusters for 0flux speed boost. So slow ;(
  • Astral is just pathetic. Why this is 60 DP is beyond me. I can field a Radiant or Paragon for that. A freaking Onslaught/Legion is 40. WHY THIS IS 60??? Literally entire community is chanting "make it 40 DP please". Why would you ever field this if you want a carrier, when Heron exists? Either give highh techs a good carrier cruiser, or reduce cost on this. 60DP and doesnt even have Large Energy turret lol. Just a terrible expensive ship taking up your DP. This ship right here is also the reason why AI high tech fleets suck - every time this is spawned instead of a Paragon, its a joke.
  • Odyssey probably used to be good, I saw a few old videos of Odysseys farming Ordos. Unfortunately, that is not the case anymore. With pathetic shield/damage ratio, awkward turret placements, and plasma burn that dumps it into the middle of enemy fleet it just dies horribly faster than a fruit fly. It's awesome when you farm pirate trash, but when you meet proper enemies or Ordos it just flops pathetically. Basically - yes, you can get faster to your enemies than a Paragon will. But what are you going to do once you got there? It shines in the hands of careful player who knows how to flank, and dies horribly in the hands of AI as soon as it gets any aggro. Badly needs its shield/dam ratio fixed, and AI looked at.
  • Aurora is perfect as it is. Surprisigly, outlives the Odyssey. You can mold it into anything you want and it will be glorious. SO also works perfectly - I love Heavy Blasters one just smashing stuff. Just a good ship, albeit some akward turret placements.
  • Fury (and by extension Shrike) too expensive for what it does - and what it does is rushing asap to die as quick as possible. I saw the old rant by players when its cost was raised to 20 DP, and I honestly don't understand why it was - the ship is terrible as it is now. Why would you ever field this when Aurora exists. Badly needs attention.
  • Medusa could be good, because phase skimmer is IMO hands down best combat aility in the game, but the extremely tight points makes it very hard to fit anything relevant. Usually just dies horribly in the hands of AI. SO Medusa is a little better with same issues - it simply cant fit the required SO kit to project good force on the field. Why would I field this when Hyperion exists? Needs fixing, but carefully, because if buffed too much it will outperform the Hyperion and will be a new meme.
  • Brawler TT is perfect where it is. Would love to see Escort Package integrated with this ship. Omen is okay but to me feels a bit too situational, squishy, slow, and not having good niche compared to other frigates. Scarab is strong with SO and not so good without it. I could see trying to minmax these, but why when Hyperion exists. Frigates live and die by their mobility usually, and this one doesn't have any. Tempest used to be a thing, but then got its ability changed to terminator drone which basically ended all its glory and usefulness. Never field those except Brawlers tbh, it just so good why bother with the others. I need these ships to rush to control nodes and win a dogfight with enemy frigates or destroyer. Unfortunately, all these other frigates suck at this role and only Brawler is good at it, the only one better at it is Hyperion.
  • Saving best for last. Hyperion is insanely good. Even after repeated hits with a nerf bat to its face it still can solo an Onslaught in under 20 seconds. Field a bunch of these guys. Autofit "Strike". Go fight. Open map. Select a few in groups and send them after enemy capitals. Congrats, you won. They will pressure Radiants to run and hide like little ***. Amazing ship you can fit several types of. Great with SO, not so great without it. Deployment cost is a bummer and very annoying to manage, and CR degeneration also insanely high. I don't know why these nerfs - it doesnt make me want to try other frigates. It makes me do anoying stuff like fight, run back to my colony, hit repair button, burn back to fight etc. Or fight, go dark, sit and repair, fight again. Player will always find workaround. I don't think the deployment cost and high maintenance are justified.

Again, these are just my observations and opinions, not a testament. Would love to hear your thoughts on the current state of these ships.
You know, let me start a new Low Tech playthrough and see how it goes. Refitting very aggressive high tech fleets recently gave me some ideas to try.
« Last Edit: May 16, 2024, 11:50:54 PM by Juno »
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Lawrence Master-blaster

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Re: High tech feels like a wet noodle.
« Reply #76 on: May 16, 2024, 11:04:29 PM »

and I'm currently playtesting a fleet for 0.97a that can kill over 300 DP's worth of enemy ships per minute against double Ordos.

Man you need to make like a blog where you post all your fleet tests. It's just a huge waste of information otherwise.
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Killer of Fate

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Re: High tech feels like a wet noodle.
« Reply #77 on: May 16, 2024, 11:17:22 PM »

and I'm currently playtesting a fleet for 0.97a that can kill over 300 DP's worth of enemy ships per minute against double Ordos.

Man you need to make like a blog where you post all your fleet tests. It's just a huge waste of information otherwise.
writing a blog would probably be enough effort to distract a person from actually doing the testing.
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Juno

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Re: High tech feels like a wet noodle.
« Reply #78 on: May 16, 2024, 11:53:57 PM »

and I'm currently playtesting a fleet for 0.97a that can kill over 300 DP's worth of enemy ships per minute against double Ordos.

Man you need to make like a blog where you post all your fleet tests. It's just a huge waste of information otherwise.
writing a blog would probably be enough effort to distract a person from actually doing the testing.

Yeah but the purpose of testing is to gather data, no? Would be lovely to read about the experiments.
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eert5rty7u8i9i7u6yrewqdef

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Re: High tech feels like a wet noodle.
« Reply #79 on: May 17, 2024, 12:09:29 AM »

  • Astral is just pathetic. Why this is 60 DP is beyond me. I can field a Radiant or Paragon for that. A freaking Onslaught/Legion is 40. WHY THIS IS 60??? Literally entire community is chanting "make it 40 DP please". Why would you ever field this if you want a carrier, when Heron exists? Either give highh techs a good carrier cruiser, or reduce cost on this. 60DP and doesnt even have Large Energy turret lol. Just a terrible expensive ship taking up your DP. This ship right here is also the reason why AI high tech fleets suck - every time this is spawned instead of a Paragon, its a joke.
It's 50 DP. It's mostly a joke due to bomber's poor performance, they are the worst of all the "artillery/backline" weapons. High-Tech does need a fast carrier, I would recommend a Shrike conversion that drops its medium missiles, as PD Shrikes are already very effective escort carriers.

  • Odyssey probably used to be good, I saw a few old videos of Odysseys farming Ordos. Unfortunately, that is not the case anymore. With pathetic shield/damage ratio, awkward turret placements, and plasma burn that dumps it into the middle of enemy fleet it just dies horribly faster than a fruit fly. It's awesome when you farm pirate trash, but when you meet proper enemies or Ordos it just flops pathetically. Basically - yes, you can get faster to your enemies than a Paragon will. But what are you going to do once you got there? It shines in the hands of careful player who knows how to flank, and dies horribly in the hands of AI as soon as it gets any aggro. Badly needs its shield/dam ratio fixed, and AI looked at.
Accidently due to its loadout, it is one of the best backline/artillery ships in the game, it just lacks good sustained missile options. Had the DEM missiles been regenerating like Pilums or the Omega missiles, the Odyssey would be fine as is.

  • Fury (and by extension Shrike) too expensive for what it does - and what it does is rushing asap to die as quick as possible. I saw the old rant by players when its cost was raised to 20 DP, and I honestly don't understand why it was - the ship is terrible as it is now. Badly needs attention.
Shrike is fine, you just can't build it for close range combat in late game. Instead, you have to rely on its large OP pool to make support variants. It suffers the same issue as the Odyssey as it would be far better with more sustained missile options.

  • Medusa could be good, because phase skimmer is IMO hands down best combat aility in the game, but the extremely tight points makes it very hard to fit anything relevant. Usually just dies horribly in the hands of AI. SO Medusa is a little better with same issues - it simply cant fit the required SO kit to project good force on the field. Why would I field this when Hyperion exists? Needs fixing, but carefully, because if buffed too much it will outperform the Hyperion and will be a new meme.
It's fine as is, you're just building it wrong. Same as all phase skimmer ships, Medusas need an officer with system expertise. Once you have that, they are functionally immortal, and can kill almost all non-capitals in the game. Albeit cruisers can take a long time for them to kill. Front universal mounts should be kinetic, medium mounts should be some mixture of a heavy blaster, pulse laser, or phase lance. The remaining OP should be spent on a tiny amount of PD, maximizing its combat time, maxing out its shield arc, and maxing out the damage it can take.

  • Brawler TT is perfect where it is. Would love to see Escort Package integrated with this ship. Omen is okay but to me feels a bit too situational, squishy, slow, and not having good niche compared to other frigates. Scarab is strong with SO and not so good without it. I could see trying to minmax these, but why when Hyperion exists. Frigates live and die by their mobility usually, and this one doesn't have any. Tempest used to be a thing, but then got its ability changed to terminator drone which basically ended all its glory and usefulness. Never field those except Brawlers tbh, it just so good why bother with the others. I need these ships to rush to control nodes and win a dogfight with enemy frigates or destroyer. Unfortunately, all these other frigates suck at this role and only Brawler is good at it, the only one better at it is Hyperion.
Omen is Emp support, and a PD escort. Its biggest issue is low PPT, which it shares with all the other HT frigates. Scarab has to be built for longer range, so maxing out HSA tactical laser is the minimum range you really need for survivability against everything. The problem is the Scarab's system costs flux, meaning if it gets stuck at near max flux it won't use it. All it really needs is an AI improvement to drop shields until it has enough flux to use its system. Tempest's system doesn't mesh well with the current skills, and its PPT it too low for sustained combat, same as the Omen. Otherwise, it's a fine ship. So, fast it never dies, with enough damage potential to easily beat other frigates and most destroyers.
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Beep Boop

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Re: High tech feels like a wet noodle.
« Reply #80 on: May 17, 2024, 12:59:03 AM »

It's fine as is, you're just building it wrong. Same as all phase skimmer ships, Medusas need an officer with system expertise. Once you have that, they are functionally immortal, and can kill almost all non-capitals in the game.
The main issue with Medusas is one shared with all multi-charge mobility-system systems: The AI blows its wad in one go, saving nothing for its nonexistent exit plan, and then dies. The choice of when the AI phase skims and where it skims to can be a little amusing, too: I once watched a Radiant use its skimmer to teleport away from my incoming fire...right into its own Reapers that it had just fired, immediately self-deleting.
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Juno

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Re: High tech feels like a wet noodle.
« Reply #81 on: May 17, 2024, 01:22:39 AM »

It's fine as is, you're just building it wrong. Same as all phase skimmer ships, Medusas need an officer with system expertise. Once you have that, they are functionally immortal, and can kill almost all non-capitals in the game.
The main issue with Medusas is one shared with all multi-charge mobility-system systems: The AI blows its wad in one go, saving nothing for its nonexistent exit plan, and then dies. The choice of when the AI phase skims and where it skims to can be a little amusing, too: I once watched a Radiant use its skimmer to teleport away from my incoming fire...right into its own Reapers that it had just fired, immediately self-deleting.

Yeah the suicidal AI skimmer / phase burn all the way into the middle of enemy fleet is famous far and wide.
If AI banked 1 skimmer charge to be able to retreat if enemy is near and things go bad that would be  blessing for Medusa.
Radian teleporting into its own Reapers would make a legendary video meme :)
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Princess of Evil

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Re: High tech feels like a wet noodle.
« Reply #82 on: May 17, 2024, 01:32:27 AM »

  • Odyssey probably used to be good, I saw a few old videos of Odysseys farming Ordos. Unfortunately, that is not the case anymore. With pathetic shield/damage ratio, awkward turret placements, and plasma burn that dumps it into the middle of enemy fleet it just dies horribly faster than a fruit fly. It's awesome when you farm pirate trash, but when you meet proper enemies or Ordos it just flops pathetically. Basically - yes, you can get faster to your enemies than a Paragon will. But what are you going to do once you got there? It shines in the hands of careful player who knows how to flank, and dies horribly in the hands of AI as soon as it gets any aggro. Badly needs its shield/dam ratio fixed, and AI looked at.

Frankly, this is less Oddy issue and more "AI doesn't know how to use battlecruisers". In my experience, Odyssey is the best overall battlecruiser. BC just isn't really a good ship class overall.
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Selfcontrol

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Re: High tech feels like a wet noodle.
« Reply #83 on: May 17, 2024, 03:48:21 AM »

The Omen is overpowered and should be nerfed (8 DP instead of 6). It's not "okay". It's the best frigate in the game (yes it's better than a Glimmer, by far).

System Expertise and Elite Target Analysis turn its EMP Emitter into the best anti-frigate and anti-destroyer weapon in the game (reminder that EMP Emitter deals energy damage too, not just EMP damage). A couple of them will also slaughter any cruiser that doesn't have a 360 degree shield.

It's also tiny (making it suprisingly hard to hit), has more than enough speed (especially since there is no reason to not put Unstable Engine on it), has a great Flux Capacity that can be maxed out for maximum tanking power and a 0.6 shield flux/damage ratio.
« Last Edit: May 17, 2024, 06:07:35 AM by Selfcontrol »
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Lawrence Master-blaster

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Re: High tech feels like a wet noodle.
« Reply #84 on: May 17, 2024, 05:13:58 AM »

Yeah, but you're sacrificing an Officer for it. Automated Ship officers are "free"(and amazing)
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Selfcontrol

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Re: High tech feels like a wet noodle.
« Reply #85 on: May 17, 2024, 05:24:31 AM »

Yeah, but you're sacrificing an Officer for it. Automated Ship officers are "free"(and amazing)

Glimmers are Tempests+ and suicidal because of Reckless/Fearless officers.

Omens murder frigates and destroyers, bring free ECM and on top of that also murder fighters and missiles.

Glimmers and AI Core officers are good (even very good because they only cost 5 DP). But I take Omens over them anytime.
« Last Edit: May 17, 2024, 05:33:54 AM by Selfcontrol »
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Juno

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Re: High tech feels like a wet noodle.
« Reply #86 on: May 17, 2024, 05:35:57 AM »

The Omen is overpowered and should be nerfed (8 DP instead of 6). It's not "okay". It's the best frigate in the game (yes it's better than a Glimmer, by far).

System Expertise and Elite Target Analysis turn its EMP Emitter into the best anti-frigate and anti-destroyer weapon in the game (reminder that EMP Emitter deals energy damage too, not just EMP damage). A couple of them will also slaughter any cruiser that doesn't have a 360 degree shield.

It's also tiny (making it suprisingly hard to hit), has more than enough speed (especially since there is no reason to not put Unstable Engine on it), has a great Flux Capacity that can be maxed out for maximum tanking power and a 0.6 flux/damage ratio.

0.6 is not great at all, considering Remnants and Hyperions got 0.3x :(
I will try playing with it, but tbh it's never like "omg enemy has Omens!" but if they have Hyperions, you will quickly feel their presence up your ass.
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Selfcontrol

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Re: High tech feels like a wet noodle.
« Reply #87 on: May 17, 2024, 06:03:04 AM »

The Omen is overpowered and should be nerfed (8 DP instead of 6). It's not "okay". It's the best frigate in the game (yes it's better than a Glimmer, by far).

System Expertise and Elite Target Analysis turn its EMP Emitter into the best anti-frigate and anti-destroyer weapon in the game (reminder that EMP Emitter deals energy damage too, not just EMP damage). A couple of them will also slaughter any cruiser that doesn't have a 360 degree shield.

It's also tiny (making it suprisingly hard to hit), has more than enough speed (especially since there is no reason to not put Unstable Engine on it), has a great Flux Capacity that can be maxed out for maximum tanking power and a 0.6 flux/damage ratio.

0.6 is not great at all, considering Remnants and Hyperions got 0.3x :(
I will try playing with it, but tbh it's never like "omg enemy has Omens!" but if they have Hyperions, you will quickly feel their presence up your ass.

What are you talking about.

Hyperions and Remnants ships also have a 0.6 shield damage/flux ratio. They get to 0.3 only because you put on them an officer with Field Modulation and the Hardened Shield hullmod.

As for why you don't feel their presence in enemy fleet, it's like most ships : AI autofit builds are kinda bad. You will rarely encounter an efficient Omen build.
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Phenir

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Re: High tech feels like a wet noodle.
« Reply #88 on: May 17, 2024, 09:13:38 AM »

Just give Ziggurat to AI and watch what it is doing. It literally spams Phase every second from the start when no enemies even close an it should be speeding up to it destination,
This actually is optimal for getting to the front at the start of battle. Phase gives 3x timeflow. So even though it loses zero flux, it's still faster to use phase. 120 speed > 90 speed. Possibly even more than 120 speed if you have phase coil tuning.
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Lawrence Master-blaster

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Re: High tech feels like a wet noodle.
« Reply #89 on: May 17, 2024, 10:06:54 AM »

Glimmers are Tempests+ and suicidal because of Reckless/Fearless officers.

That's why you use 1200 range beam fits.
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