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[Thaago]

In the last fighter redesign, there was a move away from pure fighter spam fleets with the introduction of the de-scaling bonuses. This was I think a great call and I really like how the existing bonuses are very strong at what they do when the number of decks is reasonable (they just don't boost everything that's needed, more below). There was also baked into these support for combat carriers/hybrid carriers: the mere presence of an officer boosted the fighters when the player had the leadership carrier skills, without requiring any of the officer skills to be taken up. They could remain as gun/missile/defense boosting skills

That said, I think fighters are undertuned because of low skill support right now. Beyond CR for 10%, there isn't any boost to fighter offense or defense. Just by raw numbers, enemies are getting multiple stacking boosts to both damage and to defense, and fighters have no options to match, so fall behind. For Support Doctrine Carriers this is acceptable, I guess, even though they really aren't that competitive right now. They get a 20% discount to DP values as their boost, even if the fighters themselves don't get much.

This got me thinking about missiles, which almost suffer the same problem: Support Doctrine missiles boats are fine, but not spectacular. Missiles with officers get some other offensive boosts (target analysis for example), but missile hitpoints don't get anything. Except for Missile Specialization, which is also a powerful offensive boost. For any ship with a medium or larger proportion of missiles it is very good, and on a missile specialist ship it is amazing.

Carriers are specialist ships, but there is no such specialist skill to boost them. My main suggestion for this thread is that there should exist a skill for an individual officer/player pilot to boost their carrier by a lot, and to be as game changing for a Heron as Missile Spec is on a Gryphon.


Here is my first idea for what the fighter capstone's non-elite skill could be: All wings get +1 fighter.

It gives defense, offense, and extra missile hitpoints for bombers (via more missiles) all in one. It carriers its own built in penalty: a bigger wing takes longer to rebuild in case of disaster, so really wants the fighter fleet skills to keep replacement rate up. It cannot be spammed (easily) because it is limited by officer count.

It changes the meta of fighters in what I think is an interesting way: wings with only 2 fighters get a larger relative boost than those with 3 or more. Cobras get literally doubled (which might make them work). Tridents, Thunders, and Longbows get +50%, while daggers and broadswords only get 33%.

On the one hand, 50% boost of fighter count to some options might seem too large, but I ask: is it really out of line with what missile spec does for missiles? The PD load of saturation missiles goes up 49%; the damage of a single missile goes up by 10% multiplied by target analysis, and raw DPS from fire rate goes up 25% multiplied by all other bonuses: this varies, but at +40% other boosts this comes out to +75% total, IE the 25% fire rate is resonsible for 35% base damage increase. Totaled: 45% NOT counting increased hits from more missiles fired = more missiles hit. For some options such as reapers, it allows firing another volley into a ship while it is still overloaded, which is a huge but hard to exactly quantify boost. And also doubled base ammo too.

Also what I consider to be an advantage: because Remnant wings are higher in fighter count, this would finally be a capstone skill that helps player/normal faction fleets more than it helps Remnants.


Thoughts? What kind of elite skill could go with the above? Have an entirely different idea for a fighter capstone? Or think a fighter capstone shouldn't exist?

[Phenir]

I think it sounds like insanity for bombers but just alright for non bombers.

[Thaago]

I think it sounds like insanity for bombers but just alright for non bombers.

It would definitely be a huge buff for bombers! Especially as the % of ordinance that actually hits would be going up by greater than the raw wing increase, thanks to how PD works. But would that be out of line? Bombers right now are in rough shape, far worse than fighters in my opinion.

For fighters, maybe its not enough, but at the same time it is a good increase. On a warthog/broadsword Heron, its like having 4 bays instead of 3, or for a thunder Condor (early game say) its like that carrier being 3 bays instead of 2.

Maybe the elite effect, whatever it is, could be better for fighters than for bombers? That would even things out a bit.

[mr. domain]

For the sake of evil:

rework the best of the best skill to a fighter capstone and punt the 3rd s-mod unlock to hull restoration, eliminating the hull restoration CR per s-mod bonus altogether

[Thaago]

For the sake of evil:

rework the best of the best skill to a fighter capstone and punt the 3rd s-mod unlock to hull restoration, eliminating the hull restoration CR per s-mod bonus altogether

Oh interesting! As in one of the Leadership capstones is a single ship capstone?

Huh. That is really interesting and the more I think about it the more intrigued I am.

Hull restoration getting the third S mod makes a certain amount of thematic sense and is a great combat boost, which the industry tree in general lacks. It also lacks story point consuming things, which the Leadership tree has plenty of with officer elite skills. It might be too powerful as a single skill, but considering how it requires multiple non-combat supporting skills... maybe. People who already swear by Industry for the restoration will certainly rejoice!

From a skill tree building perspective, someone who is right now going 5/5/5 in combat/leadership/tech would not be able to get 3 S mods without making drastic changes. For someone not interested in piloting carriers, going to 4 leadership would open up a point for another combat or tech skill, or they could go for 10 boosted officers instead of 8.

"Fleet command" players going 0/5/5/5 who don't take combat in the first place could park themselves in a carrier with just the 1 skill and be quite effective, gaining an extra officer and stopping the "deploy in a command kite" strat from being so optimal.

[mr. domain]

For the sake of evil:

rework the best of the best skill to a fighter capstone and punt the 3rd s-mod unlock to hull restoration, eliminating the hull restoration CR per s-mod bonus altogether

Oh interesting! As in one of the Leadership capstones is a single ship capstone?

Huh. That is really interesting and the more I think about it the more intrigued I am.

Hull restoration getting the third S mod makes a certain amount of thematic sense and is a great combat boost, which the industry tree in general lacks. It also lacks story point consuming things, which the Leadership tree has plenty of with officer elite skills. It might be too powerful as a single skill, but considering how it requires multiple non-combat supporting skills... maybe. People who already swear by Industry for the restoration will certainly rejoice!

From a skill tree building perspective, someone who is right now going 5/5/5 in combat/leadership/tech would not be able to get 3 S mods without making drastic changes. For someone not interested in piloting carriers, going to 4 leadership would open up a point for another combat or tech skill, or they could go for 10 boosted officers instead of 8.

"Fleet command" players going 0/5/5/5 who don't take combat in the first place could park themselves in a carrier with just the 1 skill and be quite effective, gaining an extra officer and stopping the "deploy in a command kite" strat from being so optimal.

Not what I intended, but honestly making the leadership skills into officer skill capstones could be funny - best of the best boosting fighters while support doctrine provides skill effects to all unofficered ships within 1000 su of the ship that has it. You would need to do away with the dp bonus from support doctrine for that rework, on top of punting the 3rd s mod unlock though.

It could reflect different interpretations of the theme of officers providing bonuses to other crafts, which I like the thought of.

[SafariJohn]

Here is my first idea for what the fighter capstone's non-elite skill could be: All wings get +1 fighter.

Roider Union Mod fighters approve this message!

[mr. domain]

I took a moment to eat and think about this further and I thought of the following elite bonuses for hypothetical green officer skills:

Best of the best: 1% repair per second for fighters, 40% hard flux dissipation for fighters, fighters can contest objectives. (two effects that make fighters less vulnerable to chip damage, and a homage to the original "Deployment points bonus from objectives is at least 10% of the battle size, even if holding no objectives" effect)
Support doctrine: Deployment cost of the ship is reduced by 10 points or 20%, whichever is less

Edit: for clarification, this would mean the skills would have the following effects:

Best of the Best: +1 fighter to all wings
(Elite)
1% hull repair per second for fighters
40% hard flux dissipation for fighters
Fighters can contest objectives

Support doctrine: Unofficered ships within 1000 su gain non-elite Helmsmanship, Damage Control, Combat Endurance and Ordnance Expertise.
(Elite)
Deployment cost of the ship is reduced by 10 points or 20%, whichever is less

[Alex]

It cannot be spammed (easily) because it is limited by officer count.

Hmm, to me it feels like this is a conceptual deal-breaker - 8-10 officers, plus potentially mercenaries, feels like an ample number for spamming purely carriers, or very nearly so. I don't think it's anywhere near sufficient to rein in the disproportional increase in power fighters get from being better in some way. Consider that the current skills cap out at 8 wings, where for officered ships it's... way, way more than that, even if you don't put them into Astrals.

Maybe if the skill carried some kind of scaling with the number of fighter bays benefitting from it, hmm. But at that point it might almost be another fleetwide skill/effect. And, also: if we're adding a new skill, some other skill needs to be removed, since we've got 10 per aptitude all filled up!

(Also do think that +1 wing size is an awkward bonus because of how disproportionate it is... and it doesn't lend itself to scaling down if that's the approach.)

Edit: thinking about this a bit more, it feels like the least disruptive way to do this would be through just tuning up the existing fighter fleet-wide skills a bit. I'm not sure if that's truly necessary or not, though. I feels like fighters can already be part of an effective composition?

[mr. domain]

It cannot be spammed (easily) because it is limited by officer count.

Hmm, to me it feels like this is a conceptual deal-breaker - 8-10 officers, plus potentially mercenaries, feels like an ample number for spamming purely carriers, or very nearly so. I don't think it's anywhere near sufficient to rein in the disproportional increase in power fighters get from being better in some way. Consider that the current skills cap out at 8 wings, where for officered ships it's... way, way more than that, even if you don't put them into Astrals.

Maybe if the skill carried some kind of scaling with the number of fighter bays benefitting from it, hmm. But at that point it might almost be another fleetwide skill/effect. And, also: if we're adding a new skill, some other skill needs to be removed, since we've got 10 per aptitude all filled up!

(Also do think that +1 wing size is an awkward bonus because of how disproportionate it is... and it doesn't lend itself to scaling down if that's the approach.)

Edit: thinking about this a bit more, it feels like the least disruptive way to do this would be through just tuning up the existing fighter fleet-wide skills a bit. I'm not sure if that's truly necessary or not, though. I feels like fighters can already be part of an effective composition?

Repair of hull damage, partial hard flux dissipation, reduction in fighter flare cooldowns could all be useful bonuses to fighter staying power. Putting those in a "x bays softcap, x officer mult" effect, and shipping it off to tactical drills could be interesting? A range bonus could be fun to put in fighter uplink too. I'd personally stay away from any kind of raw damage bonus or raw damage reduction though.

[Thaago]

I took a moment to eat and think about this further and I thought of the following elite bonuses for hypothetical green officer skills:

Best of the best: 1% repair per second for fighters, 40% hard flux dissipation for fighters, fighters can contest objectives. (two effects that make fighters less vulnerable to chip damage, and a homage to the original "Deployment points bonus from objectives is at least 10% of the battle size, even if holding no objectives" effect)
Support doctrine: Deployment cost of the ship is reduced by 10 points or 20%, whichever is less

Edit: for clarification, this would mean the skills would have the following effects:

Best of the Best: +1 fighter to all wings
(Elite)
1% hull repair per second for fighters
40% hard flux dissipation for fighters
Fighters can contest objectives

Support doctrine: Unofficered ships within 1000 su gain non-elite Helmsmanship, Damage Control, Combat Endurance and Ordnance Expertise.
(Elite)
Deployment cost of the ship is reduced by 10 points or 20%, whichever is less

I was thinking of leaving support doctrine the same: I think the uncertain nature of making it within 1000 units of a ship that has the skill would be a deal-breaker!

For the elite effects: a defensive boost primarily for fighters is what I'm reading from it. 1% hull repair per second would be a boost for fighters especially considering they hover around a target. Maybe throw in armor as well. Some sort of hard flux dissipation for fighters to help the shielded ones would do the same thing, but it would probably require some tweaking to fighter dissipation: there is weirdness going on there considering that many of them have a 'no weapon flux' hullmod. I don't think this is impossible to do, but it would need some careful value tweaking (exactly what %, what the fighter's dissipation is, etc).

Here is my first idea for what the fighter capstone's non-elite skill could be: All wings get +1 fighter.

Roider Union Mod fighters approve this message!

Yeah, this might break some things! In vanilla the only single wing fighter is the cobra and it is terribad, so getting +100% wing count is fine. But mod fighters with things "corvettes" for 30 OP (basically full fledged regenerating frigates) would be nuts.

On the one hand, I don't think vanilla should balance around mods; on the other, maybe a straight +1 is just too simplistic. +50% rounded down then? So the poor cobra still suffers alone, but

2 --> 3
3 --> 4
4 --> 6 (Aaiiiii the flash! Remnants rejoice!)
5 --> 7
6 --> 9

Put like that it does start to look excessive...

It cannot be spammed (easily) because it is limited by officer count.

Hmm, to me it feels like this is a conceptual deal-breaker - 8-10 officers, plus potentially mercenaries, feels like an ample number for spamming purely carriers, or very nearly so. I don't think it's anywhere near sufficient to rein in the disproportional increase in power fighters get from being better in some way. Consider that the current skills cap out at 8 wings, where for officered ships it's... way, way more than that, even if you don't put them into Astrals.

Maybe if the skill carried some kind of scaling with the number of fighter bays benefitting from it, hmm. But at that point it might almost be another fleetwide skill/effect. And, also: if we're adding a new skill, some other skill needs to be removed, since we've got 10 per aptitude all filled up.

(Also do think that +1 wing size is an awkward bonus because of how disproportionate it is... and it doesn't lend itself to scaling down if that's the approach.)

Hmm, you know when you put it that way, 8-10 + mercenaries really is a lot. Would the scaling of the fleet skills be enough to deter that approach, IE they could all have the capstone but otherwise would be weaker?

Lets see, 8 Herons at 24 bays would make the fleetwide replacement rate be 50%*(8/24)*1.5 = 25%. Likewise speed would get a 10% boost. That's a lot less, but still decent bonuses. Then again, for the fleet-wide skill's the problem has never really been that they get bad at what they do, its that they don't do enough to make fighters competitive.

This kind of points to the idea of there being an individual ship capstone skill similar to missile spec isn't workable without too much other work. What about an individual skill, not a capstone, that is more modest in power? Or, alternatively, a few of the current skills could get fighter effects.

And, also: if we're adding a new skill, some other skill needs to be removed, since we've got 10 per aptitude all filled up.

I think the idea of moving the effect of Best of the Best to Industry and replacing that with something fighter related could work. A properly scaling fleet-wide fighter skill for example.


[Edit] Missed your edit!

Edit: thinking about this a bit more, it feels like the least disruptive way to do this would be through just tuning up the existing fighter fleet-wide skills a bit. I'm not sure if that's truly necessary or not, though. I feels like fighters can already be part of an effective composition?

I think some aspects of fighters can be effective: those requiring them to be present as distractions and support work ok because they get a lot of replacement rate. For dealing with frigates and destroyers, current interceptor and heavy fighter options, respectively, are pretty good. They are fast enough to keep up and concentrate, and don't take too many OP so battle carriers can focus on other things. In the early to midgame, I've found that carriers, as long as they can be kept safe, can maul smaller enemies for only 1 or 2 skill points invested.

But dealing with heavier ships in the mid and late game, when they have officers, is rough. This might be due to control/timing issues (attacking pristine targets and then not being ready to attack something in trouble), but bombers in particular are very hard to get value out of. Wave timing vs being held back vs vulnerable targets, combined with no support in terms of damage output and projectile hitpoints, combined with some questionable-at-time target selection/pathing, let skilled enemies just shrug off bomber strikes and while their friends around them delete the wings.

[mr. domain]

BOTB being a fleetwide fighter capstone makes the most sense if you want to put fighter bonuses in an extra skill. Again, I could see a range bonus in fighter uplink too.

While we're at it, what about a cheap hullmod "fighter service bay"? It allows non-carriers to repair but not rearm fighters, and can only be installed on ships with no fighter bays.

[FooF]

Personally, I think buffing Support Doctrine to have some Fighter-specific effect is more in-line with a Fighter Capstone than BotB. It could be as simple as increasing the the number of fighter wings affected by skills at 100% effectiveness from 8 to 12. I suppose that could also work for BotB, but it seems more thematically appropriate for Support Doctrine.

I could also get behind a capstone-like skill that reduces (i.e. raises) the minimum recovery rate for officered ships. Let's be generous and take it from 30% to 60%. It would only really kick in when you're losing (which isn't preferred, I know) but it's not that uncommon for carriers to get down to 60%. A carrier-heavy fleet with skill investment would have a higher floor of effectiveness.

[Princess of Evil]

Edit: thinking about this a bit more, it feels like the least disruptive way to do this would be through just tuning up the existing fighter fleet-wide skills a bit. I'm not sure if that's truly necessary or not, though. I feels like fighters can already be part of an effective composition?

Fighters absolutely need something. Fighters can be a part of an effective composition, but mainly in a "just hang around and don't get in my way" way (the only carriers i see a lot in people's fleets are either Legion, which can be easily built without any fighters at all, or Heron, which is more of late-battle cleanup than anything meaningful). Otherwise you just have carrier spam, which doesn't get anything meaningful from the skills anyway.

[TaLaR]

As it is, I almost completely stopped using carriers (beside Shepherd distractions).

I don't want to waste very limited player character skill points to moderately buff small portion of my fleet that I'm never going to pilot personally. I pick skills that either have combined fleet & piloted effect, or are particularly significant for either piloted/whole fleet. Which makes piloted Odyssey about the only potential exception.