Seeker Ships, scouts? Or the Next complaint.

Scouts have light armor and do anti-light damage. They're a great and unexpected way to fight off early LRM spam (because you can get an awful lot of scout vessels of any sort) but they're absolutely toasted if they go up against flak or regular light frigates or carriers with fighters (basically anything with medium or heavy armor that can do a good amount of damage to lightly armored craft). The suicide ability isn't bad, but it requires a lot of micromanagement and it expects that your opponent hasn't prioritized anti-scout vessel ships to fight off your scouts before they get there to kamikaze themselves.

This isn't to say that there's no use for them. They're quite handy in the right situations, as you've discovered. I just would not base a core component of my strategy around them.

TEC has the same type of scout ship.

The Arcova Scout Frigate. It requires no metal or crystal and inflicts 3 damage.

Dude he's talking about the suicide ability, martyrdom.

I see where your logic is heading, but... I mean, yeah, assuming you have around 6-8,000 credits to throw about, and 30-40 supply to waste, yeah, you might be able to ice a cap ship fairly quickly. But with that same amount of resources, you could've built a capital ship yourself, or made a serious addition to your fleet.

It's a great tactic, and now that you mention it I might try it, but it's a wild-card maneuver, not a strategy. Suicide units are always strategically inferior to regular units because their damage potential, by it's nature, is limited. Units that persist have effectively, an infinite damage potential.

Not to mention that Martyrdom is what, like tier five or six?

Yeah, people will be bitching about it for sure, nobody likes losing a cap ship to scouts. But it's not going to be anybodys uber strat. I think though, that it's just about perfect for what you used it for there. It would be worthwhile to tag along a fleet of scout ships a jump behind your main fleet, out of enemy eyes... Then once you engaged and got his attention, jump in the kamikaze fleet and ice one of his cap ships, maybe cripple a second... Keep in mind that once you select a group of units, hitting 'tab' lets you select the next one in the formation... And martyrdom probably has a hotkey... So that should make things easier. I think they'd be even better at taking out other stuff, like carrier cruisers and support vessels and such. What a poetic way to pwn a carrier fleet... But you'd really have to catch somebody with their pants down.

So, not an uber strat, but an awesome wild-card. I'm sure that if a player is paying attention and knowledgeable he could probably neutralize a great deal of an assault of that nature, but it seems like if you were intelligent about the execution it would be nigh impossible to defend against it entirely. But there is no way that could be your main strategy, I mean it would have to be an axillary tactic for sure.

Glad you brought it up!

Also though, during the same match, I realised the potential, and I made thirty of them. (I didn't realised what a strain it would be on my economy, but I had money to spare. ( Take heed this is my third match.) That with a Balanced fleet of LRM's, Defence vessels, some Capital ships, a handful of disciple vessels, and hosts, I got into the Normal A.I.s stronghold, Took out the Capital ships, and then sending in Scouts with matrydrom, one or two on each disciple vessel, plus the damage of all of my other ships, about half their fleet was downed before they left the gravity Well. So they do make a good back seat driver, but they where very painful to manage effectivly, and I had to deny the rest of my fleet. So I ended up throwing the last four or five that didn't make it to the desciple vessels into a nearby mine. It was a waste, and I know that know, but for the ever-so-common Siege Spams the A.I. has, I'm going to be holding the Chokepoints with scouts. Not to good Vs. Frigates and such, but hitting a purge vessel with three or four scouts, then repeat to two or three of the ships. They turn around, and with Bombers, Point Defense, PJI's, and Scouts all merging together, it could make a great defense to hold a Chokepoint. But thats just my Two Scents.

Interesting tactic. The kind of ability I tend to ignore, but you're right to try to get a use out of it. I played a random map the other night where there were no Ice planets for some reason in my starting star system. Lots of cash --> scout armada? Could be worth it in some situations.

Seeker Vessels do 250 damage flat during a Martyrdom attack. This does seem kind of pathetic as a stat, but lots of them would be a serious problem - great at taking down high-value units such as superweapons. The 20-25 scouts that would be required to ram a superweapon to death would cost 4000-5000 cash, while the superweapon would cost 8000 cash + 600 metal + 500 crystal.

However, for this task, the TEC Arcova Scout is far more effective. It's Timed Explosives do 1200 damage apiece, so far less scouts would be required and they don't necessarily have to kill themselves during the attack. All scouts have an upgrade that allows them to ignore Phase Jump Inhibitors, but the TEC also get a tech that reduces Phase Jump charge time. These would both aid in the survival of as many scouts as possible during a raiding attack.

Using Martyrdom to take down cap-ships is kind of ineffective though since cap-ships are rather tough in comparison to structures, but it would be effective against fragile, expensive siege frigates.

This is a good tactic since you can do a lot of damage in a very short time, surprising your opponent and making it tough to retreat. Also probably a great way to take out repair bays, although again, TEC scouts are better at assault structures.

I'm gonna try this with TEC scouts actually next time... do they die too when setting explosives or can they move on?
10 scouts cruising through undefended enemy backwater planets could cause a real lot of damage...

No, they set explosives on the target structure and are then free to do whatever they want. The bombs go off only after a few seconds of delay and the ability cool-down is long, but the scouts don't get killed unless there is a large enough number of fighters/turrets defending the planet.

I've got to try that then. Sounds like a nasty idea to blow up other players trade ports/research labs early on.

Makes for a quick way to satisfy diplomacy requests involving civic structures too. Or in a pinch, tactical structures.

The tech for the TEC Arcova Scout's Timed Explosives ability is on Military Tier 3, while the tech for the Advent Seeker Vessel's Martyrdom ability is on Hostility Tier 4.

The TEC scout attack can effectively screw a Vasari player trying to pull a Returning Armada tech-rush, or indeed, any kind of tech rush at all. 4 bombs is all it takes to destroy any orbital lab, any factory, any trade port, any culture building, any special tactical building, or any superweapon(before hitpoints upgrades). Even hangars and repair structures are vulnerable to this, and even if the structures have max hp upgrades, they can still be taken out by just 5 bombs.

However, metal/crystals extractors and defense turrets are too cheap to be worth the risk, and refineries tend to be a good deal tougher than other buildings(7 or more bombs required).

Hmmn. Lots of interesting tactical possibilities with the Arcova's ability:

1. On a map where the big limiting factors are metal/crystal, the TEC cash-generating economy with trade ports and the arcovas' 2-point logistics requirement makes a small fleet of Arcovas practically free.

2. My understanding is that scout ships are the fastest non-strike craft in the game. A little fleet of 10 arcovas could do a deep strike of multiple jumps, past the border worlds to take out labs and culture structures at the more-logistics-slots internal worlds that typically have them.

3. Nice quick way to take out multiple cultural stations that otherwise prevent your colonization or threaten to de-colonize one of your border worlds.

4. Interesting addition to a "fire sale" quick strike (everything must go...) against enemy infrastructure: LRM unit takes down SD platform defenses at the close edge of the gravity well from outside their range; Percheron bombers take out whatever's currently being built, followed by repair structures and hangars; arcovas take out labs, culture, and trade ports; and an accompanying Sova carrier with embargo steals the production from the gravity well. It would be (A) annoying as heck, and (B) low risk, since everything but the arcovas probably stays high in the gravity well, near a retreat lane, and the arcovas would be all over, and running fast and last, once the large defensive fleet jumps in, and might jump to the next enemy grav well to continue the carnage.

5. Makes for an interesting reconaissance in force play: 10 arcovas jump through the enemy space gathering real time intel until they find vulnerable lab/culture/trade port structures, then go active.

Is there anything good about Martyrdom that makes it good compared to the timed explosive? Or is timed explosive just all-out better?

Martyrdom takes out ships as well as structures, making it useful on defense in fleet engagements as well.

By contrast, timed explosive only takes out structures, not ships. But it's available earlier in the research tree and doesn't destroy the scout ship using it. The repeatablity adds an additional annoyance/dimension to the threat.

It seems like a small number of arcovas could tie up a large fleet of chaser ships, especially if (A) there were few or no fighters on defense or the fighters were suppressed, (B) the arcovas were retreated until the LONG cooldown period passed, then jumped in again to repeat, and (C) after travelling together (perhaps with flak frigate support) the arcovas split up for attacks on multiple structures, maybe even in multiple gravity wells. An arcova attack at the same time as a pirate raid could be especially useful, since the arcovas and the pillagers are both high value targets for the limited number of fighters on defense.

TEC economy seems to excel in generating income early and mid game, once the trade ports are up and linked, making it easier for the TEC player to support building the arcovas, and the way it fits with the other TEC tools for an anti-facility strike (embargo, LRMs, bombers) makes the arcova version more interesting to me.

[edited: Per the notes on timed explosives extracted from the game, the arcova's timed explosive ability has a zero antimatter cost, but a 900 cooldown period.]

https://www.sinsofasolarempire.wikia.com/wiki/Timed_Explosives

The repreatability, earlier tech availability, and the way it works with the early cash economy advantage of a TEC player and stacks with the other elements of a TEC infrastructure strike force (Sova embargo, LRM ranged attack on SD platforms, bomber raids) all make the arcova version of this sound more interesting to me.

The only thing I dislike about scout frigates is their incredible speed. They outpace all other frigates, they outrun the turning speed of gun platforms, and the only thing that can take them down is several fighters. As mentioned, with their special abilities, they can do a lot of damage to units or planets that aren't being protected by a fleet, and with their speed, it's impossible to keep up with them.

I'm not sure why I haven't used the TEC scouts more often, but the few times I have, it's been incredibly easy for them to slip behind enemy lines and start blowing stuff up unopposed. Who can afford 2+ hangars on each planet? Something should be toned down.

... the TEC timed explosives has a REALLY long cooldown though AND its what, tier 5? Your not gonna get that early game. Also unless you REALLY micro them they tend to overkill on structures (I saw like 13 get used on a turret one time cause it was the nearest thing after the refinery).

Don't forget that martyrdom is subject to shield mitigation. It ends up dealing very very little damage. I literally threw 15-20 seekers into a lvl 3 cap ship and it survived with well 50% hp.

Timed Explosives:

Tier 3 Military technology(not tier 5!).
1200 damage per bomb, detonates after 15 seconds.
900 seconds cool-down(15 minutes!!!).

5 bombs is enough for a guaranteed kill against anything except for a Refinery, a Matter Processor(Vasari refinery) or an Advent Hangar Defense structure. For those structures, you may need up to 7 bombs. And it's easier to micro Timed Explosives than it is to do so for Martyrdom. It's useful, but not something to rely on given the huge cool-down.



That sucks. 20 Seekers cost 4000 cash! It only seems to be worth it if you're REALLY low on crystal and can't buy some cruisers instead, or a new capital ship. At least those are re-usable, but 20 Seekers are nothing but a bunch of throwaway missiles.

I realized the potential of martyring seekers just yesterday, so it's fun to see a thread on the subject.

Yes, due to shields, Martyrdom doesn't end up doing much damage, and it's an utter bitch to micromanage... so why micromanage?

Seekers have the same shields and armor as a Disciple, cost half the fleet cap, and are faster.

They don't do any damage to speak of, but they're a target, just like anything else, and when they get shot up, WHO CARES? Turn on martyrdom autocast and they'll ram the nearest target and do some extra damage before they go.

I don't go overboard with them, but I've started mixing them in to a group of light, fast frigates, which I send in ahead of the main battle group.

The enemy locks on to this fast-moving, expendable group, most of which are suicidal seekers, while the ships that I actually care about keeping alive move in at a slower pace and tear them up.

Even with human opponents, having that many useless targets flying around increases battlefield confusion and (his) micromanagement, which is a good thing for the piddly cost.

I don't feel it really adds confusion, I target by highlighting over the side panel and seeing which units highlight to tell if there near my ships so I don't have to run to shoot at them. I never target seekers. They don't really hurt.

5 scout vessels cost 1000 credits, but can blow up structures that cost 800 and metal/crystal

it'd be easier to just scuttle them and build 5 new ones

So you're saying that it would be easier to scuttle the scouts after the attack and build new ones than to wait 15 minutes for the old scouts to reload. That would take 15-75 seconds depending on how many factories you put on the task + a bit more cash + transit time.

Sounds effective, not giving the enemy time to rebuild. The first strike could knock out key military installations like hangars, factories, shield generators, phase stabilizers, military labs etc. and the second strike would tear down trade ports, culture buildings, civil labs, etc., and they would then be followed with a siege force or Marza to bombard the surface. Combined with a Sova Carrier with Embargo and Heavy Fighters(for somewhat effective air cover), and you've got a guerrilla raiding force that makes the Insurgency Rebels look like clowns(they are anyway) and the Pirates look like rookies. 5 scouts take up only as much supply as a single Kodiak and the buildings they kill(except for defense turrets and metal/crystal extractors) are always more expensive than they are.

Lol I've done it before...it was really funny but sonce I had so many it was hard to control and most of them just blew up from the enemy shooting at them...I did knock out the shields of a Vulkoras though!

Advent scouts can blow themselves up... TEC scouts can blow other things up... but what does the Vasari scout get? Phasic cloaking, which I beleive stops it from moving. It can't be attacked though and I've only ever gotten it once, but it didn't seem good for much. Maybe putting a scout somewhere it can stay perminatly cloaked somewhere to provide unlimited intelligence?