Cobalt and Kodiaks

from Sins Forums
Alrighty. Two small questions.

Should I bother using Cobalt-class frigates past the initial rush? Or should I just switch over to using Garda-class and Javelis-class frigates as soon as I have the tech requirement?

Are Kodiak-class heavy cruisers worth building? I ask since in my experience they are the first to be destroyed in the larger engagements, which is disappointing considering they are fairly high up in the tech tree and are not inexpensive. Or could it be due to the fact that I don't have any Cobalts to act as fodder and draw fire away from them?

Let me give an example. I just fought a fairly large battle (one of my largest to date in fact) against a Vasari fleet. I had 120 Javelis-class frigates, 30 Garda-class Frigates, 15 Kodiak-class heavy cruisers, 10 Hoshiko-class cruisers, 20 Percheron-class light carriers, 4 Kols, 2 Marzas, 2 Akkans, 2 Sovas and 1 Dunov, versus about 120 Vasari ships, none of them being a capital ship. At the end I had all my capital ships and Hoshikos, 97 Javelis frigates and 29 Gardas, but none of my Kodiaks came out. And this seems to be the case in most large engagements.

Opinions?

Oh yeah, I'm patched up to 1.05.
strategy
18,782 views 26 replies
Reply #1 from Sins Forums Top
Kodiaks tend to be high priority due to the damage they deal.

I find that the prevailing opinion is that Cobalts and other light-frigs have little use after early games.

Though I love going for a massive economy, then dropping 400 Cobalts on somebody, then pumping out an endless stream forever.
Reply #2 from Sins Forums Top
Yeah but you should this mention to (armor/weapon type)

https://forums.sinsofasolarempire.com/177607
Star Control: Origins
Reply #3 from Sins Forums Top
Hi!
Should I bother using Cobalt-class frigates past the initial rush?
End of quote

In early and mid-game (when there's still lots of long-range fregates) you better forget Cobalts and build something else. In late game when early heavy-hitters (long-range fregates) are mostly gone are Cobalts (and light fregates from other factions) useful because:
- they have anti-heavy attack and lots of ships in that time-frame has heavy armor,
- they are fast, so you can send them around your opponent to hit his support ships,
- they can be upgraded to remove antimatter from opponent's ships, so you can deal with them somewhat easier.

However in late game they have only support role. Your main fleet shuld have either lots of HCs or lots of carriers.

BE, Iztok
Reply #4 from Sins Forums Top
You should rush Javelis-class frigates as soon as you have the tech requirement, just to be safe. It is arguably the best damage dealer for you in the early game, until the later upgrades such as Kodiak prototype. Long Range or "Anti-Medium" does 75% damage against Caps, 150% against medium frigates, 75% vs. Heavy or V heavy...you can't really make any smarter purchase than that, then again I am not that experienced yet, so...ask around.
Reply #5 from Sins Forums Top
i think their quite good for filling out the ranks a bit, juat never use them on their own later in the game their only really any use for adding firepoer to a larger well balenced fleet
Reply #6 from Sins Forums Top
cobalt / diciple / skrimishers are a pretty good addition to any fleet late-game
this is cuased mostly by their unique racial ability,

Advent, steal anti matter
TEC, sabotage reactor
Vasari, auto-repair + sabotage engines (not sure about that last one)

this gives pretty neat support + theyre great if you focuss fire with them on either siege frigates, carriers or FLAK

you gotta be carefull about the flanking strategy tough, advent illums will make tht part difficult, instead try to hit the back
(1 flank)
(2 fly through enemy ranks then turn around)
both works. tough sometimes one works better in a different situation then the other


Heavy cruiser class has high health, low to medium firing range and does high damage, only drawback = it being to slow
people tend to rush for Heavy Cruisers, i personally think thats a bad idea cuase if just one thing goes wrong, it's over, al the money spend lost for nothing :P (thus the player leaves says im a cheater etc.etc.etc, not a good method...
Reply #7 from Sins Forums Top
O.K., junk the flak frigates all together. They do very little damage and are effective at attacking fighters/bombers (that's about it). The cobalts can be useful if you have the sabatoge reactor function with them. However I usually opt to produce LRM's over the cobalt. The kodiaks will draw alot of fire but thats what they're there for. They can easily win a battle that's 2:1, in short they're worth the investment. Like I said earlier junk the flak frigs and apply those resources to more kodiaks. They are the damage sponge for your fleet. Don't worry about enemy fighters or bombers, just toggle all of you LC's to fighter production.
Reply #8 from Sins Forums Top
hands down, cobalts are the best choice for attacking enemy light carriers. this is because fighters nor bombers do much damage to them. so if they are spamming carriers, spam back with cobalts.
Reply #9 from Sins Forums Top
Should I bother using Cobalt-class frigates past the initial rush? Or should I just switch over to using Garda-class and Javelis-class frigates as soon as I have the tech requirement?
End of quote


After long-range (Javelis) frigates come into play, the Cobalt should be put on the bench until Kodiaks are available. Then the Cobalt can be added to your fleet as a support frigate to destroy anti-matter (with the upgrade) and hunt support cruisers.

Are Kodiak-class heavy cruisers worth building? I ask since in my experience they are the first to be destroyed in the larger engagements, which is disappointing considering they are fairly high up in the tech tree and are not inexpensive. Or could it be due to the fact that I don't have any Cobalts to act as fodder and draw fire away from them?
End of quote


Heavy Cruisers are most definitely worth building. Your Kodiaks are dying because their role is to be the vanguard, the backbone of your fleet and take the brunt of your opponents fire. You simply need to make them a larger part of your navy. 120 Javelis to 15 Kodiaks is the problem. 45 of each would be better (roughly same cost and support), plus the rest of the fleet you had mentioned. Don't forget your armor and hull upgrades too, though if your fleets are that big, I'll assume you've teched up already. ;)

Also, you did have a few too many Garda's. They have a limited role, and for a fleet that size, 15-20 would be plenty. Add more Hoshinko's instead. You should have as a bare minimum 1 Hoshinko per 10 ships, though I prefer twice that (so minimum 20 for the fleet above, 30 would be better).
Reply #10 from Sins Forums Top
A few light frigs are useful late game because they can be given special abilities to take out support cruisers, and frankly, they're good for the distraction effect. They will soak up some enemy fire off of your HC's at the beginning of an engagement. Of course, you should expect to severe losses in these units, but that's more or less acceptable since they're relatively cheap.
Reply #11 from Sins Forums Top
Holy **** that's a lot of ships.

The reason I think they didn't survive is because I think you should keep them heavily defended with fighters, cobalts or, lets say the LRM for long-range support. They can't do it on their own.

Like in Star Wars: Empire At War expansion pack, the Vengeance-class frigate needs protection because it doesn't have shields.

All you need is better protection. If you moved a couple LRMs and Cobalts to each Kodiak some might've pulled out.
Reply #12 from Sins Forums Top
Like in Star Wars: Empire At War expansion pack
End of quote


Heresy! Speak not the name of the unclean!

Reply #13 from Sins Forums Top
Like in Star Wars: Empire At War expansion packHeresy! Speak not the name of the unclean!
End of quote
It's a fun game.

Reply #14 from Sins Forums Top
Like in Star Wars: Empire At War expansion packHeresy! Speak not the name of the unclean!
End of quote


What would you know about it.

Get back on topic before we're banned or this thing gets locked.

Reply #15 from Sins Forums Top
i recently had a battle very similiar to that one, except i was playing as vasari. i had destroyed most his other ships and had some1 else takeing care of the ones who were reatreating. i very easily crippled all of his kodiaks with the subverters in gravity well phase jump (cant remember the name). i just had a few enforcers (vasari heavy cruiser) and assalints (vasari long range ship) deal some damage and they were praticly done.
I havent had much expeirence but i can say that from wat ive seen kodiaks dont entirely last that long. and also, when i enter a battle against TEC those heavy cruisers are high on my list for ships i need to destroy. So in my opinon i would say its not worth building some unless you are planning to only build a few to do some quick damage.
And btw this is a veiw point from a vasari player, that is my veiw of kodiaks
Reply #16 from Sins Forums Top
~snip~

I havent had much expeirence but i can say that from wat ive seen kodiaks dont entirely last that long. and also, when i enter a battle against TEC those heavy cruisers are high on my list for ships i need to destroy. So in my opinon i would say its not worth building some unless you are planning to only build a few to do some quick damage.And btw this is a veiw point from a vasari player, that is my veiw of kodiaks
End of quote


...and while you're focus-firing on the Kodiaks, the other player should have enough other craft to take you out...that's the whole point of the Kodiaks...to draw fire because they hit hard. In large fleets, I like to take in at least 15-20 Kodiaks... Take a couple dreads, a couple Kols, a swarm of light carriers and a metric butt-ton of LRM's and watch the enemy go after the Kodiaks while you beat him to death... ;)

Reply #17 from Sins Forums Top

I assume we're talking about multiplayer because I fail to understand why you would build anything else besides HC's, Carriers, and support cruisers late game against the AI.

Ive never been beaten with fleets of 100+ HC, 60+ carriers, and 30-40+ support cruisers. That might be because of my Vasari invulnerability hacks (repair cloud) though.

Reply #18 from Sins Forums Top

Quoting Kitkun, reply 1
Though I love going for a massive economy, then dropping 400 Cobalts on somebody, then pumping out an endless stream forever.
End of Kitkun's quote

I'd love to see you come try the Cobalts-only strategy against me online; you'd become known as "Quiche Poirot the 2nd".  My hungry Illuminators would just tear through them as I'm thinking "capital ship food, yummy".

Reply #19 from Sins Forums Top

so, 120 vasari only killed 39 of your ships because they focused on the kodiaks? I think the kodiaks did their job. if the enemy had concentrated on say, your LRMs instead of your kodiaks, you would have lost a lot more. Look at the hull/shield/armor difference in 1 kodiak and a LRM.  15 ships asorbed enough damage that 120 ships only killed 24 out of the rest of your fleet.

Kodiaks can kill illums out numberd 2:1 if you focus fire. throw in a repair port and some robotic cruisers and it gets even better.

30 LRMs vs 30 Illums = dead lrms

30 Kodiaks vs 30 illums = you lose about 5-7 kodiaks, dead illums.

i killed 37 lrms with 18 kodiaks and 10 robo cruisers.  i lost 4 kodiaks.

hope this gives you a good idea.

Reply #20 from Sins Forums Top

@Badfish:

37 LRMs also cost less and have less fleet supply than 18 kodiaks and 10 robo's, so what's your point?  Also, Hcs are the counter to LRMs so of course you would win, your fleet used more resources to build, was bigger in fleet supply, and was the counter to the only ship he had on the battlefield.

If your enemy was smart, he would have retreated and built a better force, hopefully with bombers to help.

 

Honestly, you guys need to come online and play against us.  We'll show you how to really play Sins.  Oh, and you can send all the cobalts against me you want, it will help me level up my space egg of doom faster.

Reply #21 from Sins Forums Top

Quoting Howdidudothat, reply 20
@Badfish:

37 LRMs also cost less and have less fleet supply than 18 kodiaaks and 10 robo's, so what's your point?

If your enemy was smart, he would have retreated and built a better force, hopefully with bombers to help.

 

Honestly, you guys need to come online and play against us.  We'll show you how to really play Sins.  Oh, and you can send all the cobalts against me you want, it will help me level up my space egg of doom faster.
End of Howdidudothat's quote

I would be glad to play online with you. I can never find a game and have been itching to learn how to play well. Playing the AI is nothing like against people!

Reply #22 from Sins Forums Top

I'm [DT]Howthe? and also Howdudothat?  Just add me to your friends list, it's easy to find people once on their friends list.  You can whisper to someone even in game and you're in lobby (and vica versa) by typing /w [name] [message].  I'm usually online in the evenings EST weekdays and on and off on weekends.

Reply #23 from Sins Forums Top

You're HowThe?

*shivers*

Reply #24 from Sins Forums Top

Since this thread is about Cobalt and Kodiaks, I presonally think instead of letting Basic Assualt frigates to 50% of damage to V heavy armor, they should or the siege units able to do 100% to V heavy units.  My mean, come on, it's the siege units of all, shouldn't they be the ones who blow up the V Heavy guys?  This way, Cobalt would actually be able to play a role by counter the V Heavy units, instead of just the bombers.  I like to think the strikecrafts are kinda different than the main frigates.   We shouldn't just rely on the little guys to take care of the heavy cruisers.

What do you think, I know it's may not sounds like a smart idea.

Reply #25 from Sins Forums Top

Quoting EmperorPalpatine89, reply 23
You're HowThe?

*shivers*
End of EmperorPalpatine89's quote

Yes, and who are you?