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[Darloth]

So lately I picked up a trident BP along with a dagger BP, and I've been enjoying using daggers on a Charybdis (modded combat carrier, but not particularly important to this discussion.  Lovely ship though!)

I've recently found an even larger battlecarrier as salvage, and I thought about upgrading to Tridents!  After all, they're higher Ordnance cost per bay, so you pack more firepower into the same space... right?

You don't, though.  Tridents are slower.  They will do less damage at anything except the very shortest ranges, and even then quite a lot of bomber flight time is taken up with maneuvering to land, taking off, getting into position to shoot, whatever, even when the carrier in question is only 100 units away from the enemy and unloading all its weapons into the frontal shields.

Tridents are notably tougher, but you get LESS of them.  I haven't tested exhaustively enough to be 100% sure, but I suspect the tridents will come home more often... however, with the increased construction time for the tridents, I suspect even then the daggers will have more combat uptime and higher DPS.

Anyone got any suggestions to improve Tridents?  Making them a wing of 3 would probably be fine, they're 25 OP, and could maybe go up to 26-28 OP to compensate for the fact they'll be six atropos torps in a single slot.  Still slower, probably less DPS, but then they'll be a really big punch in one go.

Alternatively, could we do something with them that makes them better without making them just more torpedoes?  Perhaps swarmer missiles to take care of fighters bothering them, or perhaps a burst PD laser?  I vaguely recall they used to have something like that before, but I can't be sure. (Edit: Files say they used to have three full PD lasers on them, that must have been something to see.  Wonder how old that is.  Probably from the time when daggers were still carrying reaper torps.)

What are everyone else's thoughts about Tridents nowadays?

[Spyro]

I genuinely forget that it exists since I never use it. Far too slow to be used without memeing, and the only ship that can partially circumvent the glacial speed is Astral with its GET OVER HERE system. But you know, you have to use an Astral.

[Selfcontrol]

Tridents are good with Defensive Targeting Array.

But beyond that ...

[Darloth]

Here's a tiny mod that gives them twice as many Atropos, and also three high delay burst PD lasers.  They still die to anti-ship weapons they're too slow to avoid, they still meander slowly across the battlefield like a midline destroyer that isn't in a particular rush, and they still take ages to rebuild...

But when they do fire, at least it doesn't feel like they're a complete waste of OP, because eight atropos in one spot is significant - and the PD helps them at least not be utterly useless as they're slowly floating from place to place.  I think I'd need to up their shield stats if I wanted them to survive more, but hey, it's better than nothing and this was super fast and easy and makes them LESS bad - hopefully not too good with Defensive Targetting Array, but eh, they're 25 OP I'm ok if they're good sometimes.

I'm going to try them out with this for a while.

[PixiCode]

Mmm Tridents are okay. They're the bomber you would want to spam if you are doing some sort of funny bomber spam fleet. They're also a decent choice to use on a battlecarrier, though the OP cost makes it difficult to use. You could do something a LegionXIV build with 2 Locusts, 2 Tridents, 2 Broadswords and it's probably about as good as going the same build but with 3 Daggers 1 Broadswords.

I actually think Tridents are not that good for Defensive Targeting Array compared to Daggers, unless your ship has flight decks that face forward. They are so slow to turn around to aim, unfortunately! Though, I never checked to see if Daggers were quicker.

Anyways, so long as you keep Tridents to battlecarriers, carriers you force to be close to the frontlines or a recall ship like Astral, they're fine imo. I'd like to see them get a little OP buff or a little defense buff - like, what if tridents had a burst PD laser like the Longbow? That would be cool!

[eert5rty7u8i9i7u6yrewqdef]

I genuinely forget that it exists since I never use it. Far too slow to be used without memeing, and the only ship that can partially circumvent the glacial speed is Astral with its GET OVER HERE system. But you know, you have to use an Astral.

Or Scintillas.

To OPs question, bombers outside of the Flash really aren't worth using in general. Their DPS as an artillery unit is just too low to justify without using en masse, at which point they are your mainline ships not your artillery, and the only reason they do decently en masse is because enemy fleets rarely have dedicated PD ships.
Even with the Flash being the best, you can't use them with friendly ships that have omni shields as they'll either friendly fire or cause friendly shields to point in the wrong direction. Likewise, the Flash is largely worthless against faster ships as most of the payload won't even get into range.

The only real niche for certain bombers like the Dagger, Longbow, or Trident is as Defensive Targeting Array missile support given their missiles shoot over friendly ships. All of which are terribly outdone by the Sarissa.
If you need HE, but somehow can't get a normal HE weapon and have a spare hanger slot and OP for it and DTA, the Trident is the best. Outside of the Legion and Odyssey, due to the general lack of Battle carriers that fit this niche in the game I can't see any use for it.

[Siffrin]

Or Scintillas.

Automated ships can't use crewed fighters.

[Dadada]

They are usually worse than Daggers unless you use Defensive Targeting Array.

E: Suggestions without much thinking: Lower their OP to 23/22 or increase their defenses or give them some PD or a bit of pewpew.
-> Lowering their DP makes them slightly more attractive but buffs a Defensive Targeting Array setup.

[Spyro]

If you think about it, it's called a Trident. So why don't we just reduce to wing size to only a single one, BUT it gets 3x Rift Torpedoes. Now it's useable, you're welcome.

[Doctorhealsgood]

If you think about it, it's called a Trident. So why don't we just reduce to wing size to only a single one, BUT it gets 3x Rift Torpedoes. Now it's useable, you're welcome.

But rift torpedoes are [VERY REDACTED] tech

[FooF]

Tridents just need better ordnance. Having 4 Atropos for 25 OP just doesn’t seem like a deal when you get 3 for 18 OP. If the Trident had a better missile, it wouldn’t be as much of an apples-to-apples comparison. However, there currently isn’t a better guided option or one that doesn’t impose on other current bombers.

If an Energy torpedo of some sort existed, I think putting it on the very expensive Trident would be a good call. Or if Tridents fired essentially AMBs.

[Scorpixel]

Tridents just need better ordnance. Having 4 Atropos for 25 OP just doesn’t seem like a deal when you get 3 for 18 OP. If the Trident had a better missile, it wouldn’t be as much of an apples-to-apples comparison. However, there currently isn’t a better guided option or one that doesn’t impose on other current bombers.

If an Energy torpedo of some sort existed, I think putting it on the very expensive Trident would be a good call. Or if Tridents fired essentially AMBs.

One i could think of is the Ion torpedo from ShipandWeaponPack, essentially if a pilum was a regular missile, which goes with the idea of both pilums and tridents being immobilising weapons.
Have them fire three beefy unguided not-pilums each along some flares (the "net" if you will), with crippling amounts of EMP damage. Should probably reduce the OP cost but that's one niche that's only partially filled by longbows and Xyphos.

[Dadada]

Inspired by FooF: Add an additional Annihilator Pod to each Trident, rest stays the same. I am serious. E: Okay, maybe a 5 missile pod is a bit too much, but 2-3 missiles?
EE: Or jank/inb4 impossible the way wings are implemented: One has the pod and the other one has a "Half Vulcan" or PD laser or something?

E3: As it currently stands: Outside of maybe teleport or DTA I am sure I get better performance with Daggers so I rarely pick Tridents. -> Sure, they are tankier but also slower. Etc. -> With an addition of 2-3 Annihilator missiles each they'd be better and more fitting of their 25 OP cost I think.

E4: Mmmm, I think the last time I used tested CH was on a Shrike with probably Sarissas or Broadswords with Support Doctrine... thinking.png

[Megas]

In old releases, when fighters were ships, Tridents had three rear-firing LR PDs in addition to their Atropos.

Many fighters back then were armed differently.  Broadswords had Swarmers like modern Talons, Talons only had Vulcan.  Thunders had single Harpoon instead of Swarmers (they were originally a fighter-bomber).  Piranha had LMGs plus bombs.  Daggers had Reapers instead of Atropos, basically the same as modern Cobra, but three per wing.  Xyphos was a simple heavy fighter with Phase Beam (double strength Tac Laser with EMP) and burst PD.  Wasps... had crew and did not have mines, just PD laser.

[Fotsvamp]

Going with the name trident, I'd like it if it had one of the 3x harpoon launcher, instead of making it better against big ships than the Atropos, it would instead fill another role completely.