illus dont always autofire...

test it, they can sometimes be right nexst enemy moving same way not shooting...

I would say don't make Carriers slower. If you do, you lose their entire usage, because HCs can shred Carriers in seconds. Hence, just make LFs faster and more powerful to be able to catch the Carriers and stay in range.

I feel invisible

Guys, making them faster isn't going to solve it completely. It's going to make it so when you micro manage it's easier, but we don't want more micro-management. If LF's engaged at the closest range possible and kept firing while moving problem the would be solved. You'd take your 25 LF's shift click attack each one and they would follow the cruisers around the grav well tearing them apart, never stopping to go out of range and having to re-accelerate to catch back up. They would just sit right behind the carriers shooting them.

The guy who continually has his fleets moving isn't going to get any advantage because your LF's will be smart enough that you won't have to waste time micro managing them.  Splitting his carriers up would though, but that's good strategy, not good "exploit the game mechanics".

Is it really too hard to make the LF AI to engage at the closest possible range without lowering their max range?

I have done exhaustive tests...they DO shoot at anything they are close to unless you give them an Attack Target order for a distant target or an order to phase jump out of system.  The side guns still shoot at stuff on the attack order.  They can chase a ship that is in range and tear it to shreds.  Assailants and LRMs are seriously disadvantaged in this aspect...which is why Illuminators can beat Assailants and LRM's by moving thru them in combat.

LF's do shoot while moving, they just need to do what you ask, keep something in an optimal range rather than wait until it is out of range before accelerating.  Your idea is a good one.  In general, they don't have many problems deal with carriers, but your suggestion would make them more effective without a stat buff.

There are always alternatives to light frigates or Illums to counter grav-runners.  TEC and Vasari end-line Heavy Cruiser abilities.  Subverter swarms.  These are mid-game rather than early and take micro, but they have the advantage of being relevant against *any* other ships your opponent throws at you, once you cripple his carrier fleets.   

normaly they do, but ive encounttered a situations when i need to reorder the move to X before they fire again...

annoying as frack when you chase

when you got a end line upgrades like these, i dont need to run my carrier anymore... ill have an advent battleball by that time...

It would seem fighters/bombers would be an effective counter to grav-running carriers? You certainly can't outrun them. If the opponent is running bombers, fighters will clean them up and then can be used to chase down the carriers. If he/she is fielding fighters, add flak to cover? Just a thought, I'll have to test it out somehow.

bump

On the flak not using all its firepower. What if you raised its rate of fire and lowered its damage so it will always be ready to fire when SC enter its range?

I think the suggestion that LF should continously fire while in persuit is the best one.

This would eliminate the need to slow carriers down or even increase LF's speed and damage to because LF's DPS will go up dramatically vs. carriers while maintaining balance within the entire game.

Basically it will make it slightly easier to counter carriers, but you still have to know how to properly counter.

As I said in post #30 for those who hate to read the thread, LF's DO shoot while moving.  The main problem is that in vanilla Sins they have a habit of falling just outside of their firing range while chasing.  In Entrenchment, they do a better job of following inside of their range.  At some point, I'm sure many of the engine / AI enhancements will make their way back into Vanilla sins...but right now they are in Entrenchment only.

The whole issue is that once they achieve weapons range, ships tend to decelarate.  This sucks when you are trying to kill a moving target, as long as they dont decelarate if tharget is moving, that would make them much better at persuit.

I recommend proceeding with caution, and executing small "baby step" nerfs if nerfs are to be forthcoming.  Especially since there were recent nerfs to carriers in Entrenchment (which will need some play-testing before anything futher is done?).

This is coming from a guy who just got beat AGAIN (just now) on multiplayer by what seemed to me to be another very mediocre opponent, again with the restriction that I would not build carriers.  He of course built quite a bit of them.  I have discovered that I simply cannot counter a mixed fleet that has carriers if I do not build carriers of my own (and sometimes even if I do).

I sent a bunch (I mean a BUNCH) of lf to deal with his carriers - 3 to 1 ratio of lf to carriers (when he had 10 carriers in the beginning of our clashes, I sent over 30 lf).  When the lf hit his grav well I shift-clicked on all his carriers.  He did not kite the grav well at all (just let his carriers sit there), but all my waves of lf always died, and they never killed many carriers that I saw.  Why?  Because he started mixing in lrf.  At first I just proceeded with my strat (lf spam), reasoning that I'd lose some lf to lrf, but at least I should waste some carriers in the process.  But his lrf took down my lf way faster than my lf could take down his carriers.  Eventually I tried building a few carriers (got up to 7 at once point) to try to counter his lrf, but it wasn't possible.  Also built my own lrf to counter his lrf, but my lrf died to his fighters, and I'm guessing his own lrf.  Also ended up building some significant flak at some point, but by then he had heavy cruisers and God knows what else, so....

If more balancing is forthcoming, a good idea might be to look into balancing lf killing carriers around how easily lrf kill lf.  Try to match the time it takes for the "optimum ratio" of lf to kill carriers around the time it takes an "optimum ratio" of lrf to kill lf.  It's an idea, anyway.  At least that way your lf at the grav well has a chance to kill carriers at the same rate they are dying to lrf (all things being equal, that is).

Personally, I am through with making any suggestions whatsoever that carriers be nerfed because after this last test game, I have honestly concluded that I suck (Cykur and Howthe? have both stated definitively how to kill carries with lf, and I can't do it.  They don't have problems doing it - I do.  Therefore, I suck.).  And since I suck, I don't want *ANY* balance changes occuring over my suckiness.  So take my commentary here (and from now on) not as any personal opinion that carriers should be nerfed (or other things buffed against them), but rather... if adjustments are to be made, proceed with caution, look into balancing around the time it takes other counters to counter what they are countering, etc.

On the other hand, I retain the right to protest against any buffing for the siege frigs, as one poster on this thread suggested.  I retain this right because it isn't an issue of my sucking against them, neither in tactics, strategy, or micro - I DON'T (otherwise, I WOULD shut up).  Rather, it is simply an issue of "gameplay mechanic."  Yes, I can counter you sending siege frigs against my planets - I will just park fleets at all my worlds, or I will just do the same thing to you.  The problem is, that just makes for a sucky game.  Defenses are piss poor in this game - too sucky to be relied on to protect against siege frigs.  No amount of turrets will protect - you will just go around them.  Hanger bays were ineffective back when siege frigs had diamond-plated armor - you couldn't build enough of them to protect.  If siege frigates are rebuffed it will be cost-prohibitive to ring every planet with hangers, even IF that would be effective anyway.  Finally, in Entrenchment the only SB that can protect against siege frigs is the vasari one because it moves.  The siege frigs will just go around any other SB.  In short, don't buff siege frigs, but do whatever you want to carriers because I no longer consider myself as having any say-so in that.

It is beyond me why you would expect to win fighting a mixed fleet if you don't make a mixed fleet yourself.

i think we need to get back on the right perspective regarding carrier balance issues.

the question should be whether it is ok or a good plan to just spam a fleet of carriers. it should not be whether you can counter carriers with just light frigates. it should not be about discrepancies in the movi+fire behavior of different ships.

the question SHOULD be about what a reasonable expectation ought to be for the relative importance of carrier cruisers in a mixed fleet. this is a complicated question and hard to answer because the appropriate proportion of carriers will change based on circumstances. i think at the moment though alot of us have the sinking feeling that carriers are slightly too important in almost every circumstance in the game.

in the early game we've all noticed that adding just a couple of carriers to a fleet of mainly LRFs will almost completely neutralize an enemy fleet of LRFs unless he has added carriers of his own or invested a large proportion of his fleet logistics into flak frigates. maybe this is a little out of whack. adding 3 or 4 carriers to a fleet can almost completely invalidate a LRF strategy and will force the game into the next tech tier.

the mid-game tech tier seems to have been almost completely taken over by carrier vs. carrier fleets. typically you'll mix in some LRF's to prevent getting countered by LFs (it only takes a small number of LRFs, maybe 10ish to counter even much larger commitments of LFs). The situation can seem slightly degenerate at this point. The fleet that wins will be the one with the larger number of squadrons and the impact of tactics at this stage seems truly minimal. just a pure economic contest.

the dominance of carrier based fleets in the midgame also impacts capital ship decisions by a large amount. i generally feel foolish if i've neglected to develop a strong anti-squadron cap-ship ability (Flak Burst for TEC, TK Push for Advent, and some combination of Jam Weapons and Repair Cloud for Vasari). It almost feels obligatory for your first or second cap ship to be chosen primarily for its anti-fighter abilities.

on the other hand the late-game tech tier seems well balanced. heavy cruisers make great counters against carriers if they're escorted by a few of your own fighter squadrons. late tech tier support cruisers (Domina Subjugator and Stilakus Subverter and the disabling bots upgrade for Hoshikos, specifically) are also good counters. seems balanced. late game combat becomes more about cap ship ultimate abilities than anything else , which is a good state of balance in my opinion.

I didn't expect to win.  I expected to take out his carriers.  "What?!" you will say.  "You actually played a game you had no expectation of winning, where that wasn't even your goal?!?!"  Yes - shocking isn't it (go ahead and blackball me from ever being considered for your clan, LOL)?  My goal wasn't to win, it was to eliminate his carriers, period, paragraph, "by any means necessary."  I didn't do that.

I think this is what I finally learned on the game I spoke of above.

One of my problems with this game is that I prefer to learn things "for myself" where as everyone else just apes what everyone else does and learns that way.  But at least, at the end of the day, I can say I did it "myyyyy way," and that's good enough for me.

OK  -- that is the problem then...carriers are kind of time consuming to take out.  Carriers don't actually kill things that fast either...it seems fast only because people make so many carriers.   

Considering most people kill anything trying to kill their carriers first, you kind of have to put some effort into killing the things they are using to kill the stuff you made to kill their carriers.

I'm tired of long posts...there are a million threads on this subject....BORING.