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[mr. domain]

Kitbashing with slightly more care then (see attached):

This is the funny option, therefore I endorse it strongly

[Lawrence Master-blaster]

Sunders work worse in a pure destroyer fleet, since they're made of wet tissue paper.

Weekly reminder that Sunder has pretty much the same shield EHP as the Hammerhead with maxed out capacitors - with the caveat that Hammerhead will never have enough spare OP to max out capacitors, and Sunder will.

I dunno. I find it very hard to believe that a Hammerhead using Heavy Mortar and Railguns is any way useful in mid to late game.

Watch out, lack of faith is a potentially bannable offense.

[Princess of Evil]

Weekly reminder that Sunder has pretty much the same shield EHP as the Hammerhead with maxed out capacitors - with the caveat that Hammerhead will never have enough spare OP to max out capacitors, and Sunder will.

Hammerhead, even with its half base flux venting, vents its damage faster. 0.8 vs 1.2 is a lot of vent speed difference. Sure, you can *make* a Sunder vent its damage slightly faster, but at that point, you don't have the OP to use your main weapon slot. I don't compare ships in vacuum, i compare them ~~in atmosphere~~ based on their reasonable builds.
It also has double armor (and 20% more hull), and while 500 is not that much armor, it's still miles better than Sunder, which has only slightly more than a Sarissa.
(Hammerhead is also 1 DP less and rotates much faster, but is 25% slower to accelerate.)

[FooF]

I feel like Hammerheads are fine. I recently tested them with and without converted hangar as part of a destroyer lineup alongside enforcers, sunders, and manticores. Pretty much everything other than the Manticores did similarly, trading off positions, while the Manticore's missiles put them consistently above the rest (the Sunders did not do as well as I expected, maybe because things were too crowded? Not sure). The Hammerheads did best as frontline 700 range (+ ITU) units with mortars and needlers, swapping to mortar + HAC vs ordos. (Yes, I kept using them in this role up to Ordos, with a converted Hangar broadsword each: they did fine.).

One thing about the current Hammerhead: it is the easiest destroyer to build something functional with. We can argue about whether, when built precisely and compared to other highly optimized builds it stacks up, but the fact is that if a player just throws some guns and vents on, the thing will work well enough. Mortars, HACs, Arbalests, Thumpers, light autocanons, light assault guns, etc etc etc: the recoil reduction on the mediums and arcs on the smalls means that every gun will do fine (except maybe light mortars in the front smalls? Might be too high recoil there!). The system works with everything too. Medium stats with the only weakness being the rear + some guns = something that can contribute.

It's the same argument against the Eagle: generalists feel anemic in the end game where everyone is trying to push each ship to the max. I think Hammerheads are among the "Ships That Wish There Was A 800-Range HE Option" to pair with the HAC. Heavy Mortar is fine, especially in a hard point, but HAC is kind of an odd duck on 700-range everything else. It also doesn't help that Small HE is miles behind Small Kinetic in usefulness.

That's why an extra Small Energy mount is appealing to me. It adds a bit of flare to an otherwise very vanilla setup and doesn't take away from the actual DPS of the Smalls up front if you opt to go for some utility or PD. Maybe I'll mod in the changes I'm thinking about and come back with a trip report.

[Princess of Evil]

A small energy would be considered more if there were a small energy that actually had armor damage *and* more than 400 range. And with 400 range, why not just go SO ACGs?

[Selfcontrol]

Honestly, slaightly raising its OP to 100 might be enough.

My main critic of the Hammerhead is that it is not resilient enough in lategame and that's mostly because I have to sacrifice too much capacitors for things like AWM, IAE or Extended Shield, etc. Having an extra 1000 flux capacity can go a long way.

[Killer of Fate]

Honestly, slaightly raising its OP to 100 might be enough.

My main critic of the Hammerhead is that it is not resilient enough in lategame and that's mostly because I have to sacrifice too much capacitors for things like AWM, IAE or Extended Shield, etc. Having an extra 1000 flux capacity can go a long way.

so what you're saying is we should give Hammerhead 1k more flux?

Spoiler

no, god. Please no

Just give it more flux and flux venting to allow it to face tank missiles.

Those weird back slots aiming at the front in a weird pattern would just make LR PD Laser or Burst PD the go to. Right now there is an interesting choice between that and Vulcans.
Additionally it would just look horribly wrong. Disrupting the whole ship's 3D perception

It wasn't a problem before. More flux is not the answer to everything - if anything it is the worst solution, because it removes any tradeoff between offense and defense.

no, it would make LG Hammerhead viable

>:3

Spoiler

[close]

edit: it would also make recovery for it easier
One of the issues with Hammerhead fighting in short to medium ranges is that it finds it very difficult to actually restore its durability after taking damage. I feel like a 10 DP destroyer should be able to actually withstand some punishment through its shields alone. Which would justify its PD grid providing protection only if its frontal slots are sacrificed. Similarly to how you would place Heavy Burst PD on medium mounts of a Falcon. It would be thematic to Midline of having very restricted design. But the ability to be more flexible in design?

Champion too being able to equip a Paladin PD or a HIL.
Falcon Eagle with Heavy Burst or Graviton/IR Autolance/Ion Beam
And then this...

If you gave it its back slots facing forward kinda back, this would cause Hammerhead to not actually improve in any aspects except long-range defense via beam weapons. Rendering as I said the Hybrid slots pointless. Because Vulcan and Light MG are designed for close quarter defense of the engines.

I mean there could be specific scenarios with PD+. But these weapons shooting like that through the entirety of the ship's hull to hit a missile at the front would imply Hammerhead having a very odd architecture

Also giving more flux is a last resort buff. I'll admit. I would honestly take away the flux buff from Falcon and Eagle for example that they have received in recent year or so. But for Hammerhead specifically. It fits. That ship is supposed to be a next step in destroyer evolution. And yet it has barely more flux capacity than a dated Enforcer.

In fact Hammerhead only has 200 more flux capacity. And 50 more flux venting.
I would give it like... 4200 base flux capacity? Maybe increase of base flux venting from 250 to 275 or 280... Playing it safe though here. Cause I don't really think Hammerhead is any way more weaker than other destroyers. Destroyers in generally are quite pathetic.

Unless you were willing to start a destroyer revolution... Hmmmmmmmm, though maybe Hammerhead IS weaker than other destroyers. Shrike has 0.7 shields and is faster. And has medium missile. But it lacks range? But it is also cheaper by 2 DP. Can field beams.
Enforcer is tankier. Manticore is more expensive but it is a perfect duellist. Sunder is annoying.

Okay. Hammerhead should have... 5200 flux capacity and 300 flux venting. If we want to REALLY buff it. But it should have 4200 flux capacity and 280 flux venting if we want to buff only by a small margin

Though tbh... One of the aspects that I would enjoy nerfing to justify giving Hammerhead more flux would be the ammofeed. I would gladly give it 5200 flux cap and 300 flux vent base if I reduced the flux spending reduction from 50% to 30%. Then it would encourage using energy weapons more on the ship.

edit edit: obviously this would also be a secret ploy to push buffs for Eradicator too

[close]

[FooF]

A small energy would be considered more if there were a small energy that actually had armor damage *and* more than 400 range. And with 400 range, why not just go SO ACGs?

An Ion Cannon, Burst PD, IR Pulse, or even a PD Laser up there would uses. The AMB isn't the only Small Energy option. No, none of those options match the 700 range band of the Ballistics but it's not always operating at max range. If it gets a little closer, an Ion Cannon can turn a close battle into a landslide if it knocks out enemy weapons. On the defensive side, an additional forward PD (in conjunction with the rears) might stop a missile or two that would otherwise turn the tables. It's not much, but we're not looking to overly buff an already solid ship.

[Killer of Fate]

A small energy would be considered more if there were a small energy that actually had armor damage *and* more than 400 range. And with 400 range, why not just go SO ACGs?

An Ion Cannon, Burst PD, IR Pulse, or even a PD Laser up there would uses. The AMB isn't the only Small Energy option. No, none of those options match the 700 range band of the Ballistics but it's not always operating at max range. If it gets a little closer, an Ion Cannon can turn a close battle into a landslide if it knocks out enemy weapons. On the defensive side, an additional forward PD (in conjunction with the rears) might stop a missile or two that would otherwise turn the tables. It's not much, but we're not looking to overly buff an already solid ship.

500 range is really short
I tried using Ion Cannons with Ballistic weapons on a Hammerhead. And the Hammerhead has basically to get into melee range, at which it will become horribly vulnerable to just getting Sabot'ed in the face

I am a strong believer that we should increase the range of Ion Cannon, IR Pulse and AMB by 100 units. Especially now that we are nerfing phase ships

[Doctorhealsgood]

A small energy would be considered more if there were a small energy that actually had armor damage *and* more than 400 range. And with 400 range, why not just go SO ACGs?

An Ion Cannon, Burst PD, IR Pulse, or even a PD Laser up there would uses. The AMB isn't the only Small Energy option. No, none of those options match the 700 range band of the Ballistics but it's not always operating at max range. If it gets a little closer, an Ion Cannon can turn a close battle into a landslide if it knocks out enemy weapons. On the defensive side, an additional forward PD (in conjunction with the rears) might stop a missile or two that would otherwise turn the tables. It's not much, but we're not looking to overly buff an already solid ship.

500 range is really short
I tried using Ion Cannons with Ballistic weapons on a Hammerhead. And the Hammerhead has basically to get into melee range, at which it will become horribly vulnerable to just getting Sabot'ed in the face

I am a strong believer that we should increase the range of Ion Cannon, IR Pulse and AMB by 100 units. Especially now that we are nerfing phase ships

so it's fine if there are no sabots?

[Killer of Fate]

A small energy would be considered more if there were a small energy that actually had armor damage *and* more than 400 range. And with 400 range, why not just go SO ACGs?

An Ion Cannon, Burst PD, IR Pulse, or even a PD Laser up there would uses. The AMB isn't the only Small Energy option. No, none of those options match the 700 range band of the Ballistics but it's not always operating at max range. If it gets a little closer, an Ion Cannon can turn a close battle into a landslide if it knocks out enemy weapons. On the defensive side, an additional forward PD (in conjunction with the rears) might stop a missile or two that would otherwise turn the tables. It's not much, but we're not looking to overly buff an already solid ship.

500 range is really short
I tried using Ion Cannons with Ballistic weapons on a Hammerhead. And the Hammerhead has basically to get into melee range, at which it will become horribly vulnerable to just getting Sabot'ed in the face

I am a strong believer that we should increase the range of Ion Cannon, IR Pulse and AMB by 100 units. Especially now that we are nerfing phase ships

so it's fine if there are no sabots?

At that range you endanger yourself to other threats too. Pulse Lasers, Heavy Blasters, Plasma Cannons, and most importantly the Autopulse. Then there are Heavy Autocannons, etc.

The Hammerhead cannot sustain against these threats. It cannot dodge them. It cannot tank them. It cannot retreat in time. It will die.
Easily. Its flux stats are the same as that of an Enforcer. Its shields are merely 20% stronger. And its armour and hull durability is significantly lesser

[Lawrence Master-blaster]

Hammerhead, even with its half base flux venting, vents its damage faster.

20/20 Hammerhead vents in 18.2 seconds. 20/20 Sunder vents in 16.4 seconds.

I guess you could argue that in reality it will be something like 20/5 for the Hammerhead(because it ran out of OP for caps) and 5/20 for the Sunder(because it has plentiful base dissipation) so Hammerhead will pull out ahead, but that would be a weird argument to make. "My ship is better because it has worse base dissipation and ran out of OP for tank"?

[Wyvern]

I guess you could argue that in reality it will be something like 20/5 for the Hammerhead(because it ran out of OP for caps) and 5/20 for the Sunder(because it has plentiful base dissipation) so Hammerhead will pull out ahead, but that would be a weird argument to make. "My ship is better because it has worse base dissipation and ran out of OP for tank"?

Oh, so that's why you think the Sunder has more room for capacitors; you're not giving it full vents. Yes, it has more base dissipation, but "plentiful"? It'd be plentiful if it was feeding a pair of medium ballistics as its main guns, but it's not - it has a large energy and two medium energy hardpoints for its main guns, and thus needs all the dissipation it can get.

[Selfcontrol]

The Sunder has 500 base dissipation. If you stick to weapons like HIl (400 flux/sec) and graviton beams/IR autolances (respectively 75 flux/sec or 150 (30) flux/sec), it doesn't need much vents. And any officer with EWM and Ordnance Expertise will allow it to almost not needing to invest OP into vents at all.

You only need to invest quite a few OP in vents if you decide to equip it with weapons like Pulse Lasers or Tachyon Lance.

[Princess of Evil]

20/20 Hammerhead vents in 18.2 seconds. 20/20 Sunder vents in 16.4 seconds.

I guess you could argue that in reality it will be something like 20/5 for the Hammerhead(because it ran out of OP for caps) and 5/20 for the Sunder(because it has plentiful base dissipation) so Hammerhead will pull out ahead, but that would be a weird argument to make. "My ship is better because it has worse base dissipation and ran out of OP for tank"?

A sniper Hammerhead would probably vent worse, but one of those caught out of position would just die the same way Sunder does. I'm not a big believer in sniper builds for it, i prefer to use assault, which usually needs all the vents it can get.

Oh, so that's why you think the Sunder has more room for capacitors; you're not giving it full vents. Yes, it has more base dissipation, but "plentiful"? It'd be plentiful if it was feeding a pair of medium ballistics as its main guns, but it's not - it has a large energy and two medium energy hardpoints for its main guns, and thus needs all the dissipation it can get.

To be fair, i don't think overloading a Sunder with guns is the right way to use it. And there are very few reasonable guns for the Sunder. It's too fragile to go in close, so you're basically forced to go with the beam loadout.