Question regarding the Flagship

from Sins Forums

Hi all,

 

I'm a new player to Sins - I picked it up at the weekend and purchased Entrenchment as well and have been having a blast so far, thoroughly addictive and fun gameplay.

My question is regarding the capital ship denoted by the prefix "Flagship" before its name. This prefix seems to be given to the first capital ship that you produce and, when that ship is destroyed, it passes to the next most experienced capital ship. I would have thought that, being the flagship of your fleet, it would have improved offensive/defensive capabilites or generate some sort of "aura" that improves the morale of the crews of nearby ships, leading to improved performance across those ships. This way, there would  be a definite benefit to targetting your opponents flagship as destroying it would affect the rest of the fleet.

From what I've seen so far, this does not appear to be the case and the flagship of your fleet is identical in stats and performance to any other ships of that class and level.

Could anyone confirm this either way? Perhaps there is a hidden bonus to the flagship that I haven't noticed yet.

9,427 views 12 replies
Reply #1 from Sins Forums Top

Nope, there's no bonus. It just has a cool title :)

Reply #2 from Sins Forums Top

It serves no purpose, except informing your allies and enemies which of your ships is (usually) on highest experience level :)

Elemental: Reforged
Reply #3 from Sins Forums Top

That morale aura could make for an interesting mod with effects that increase as the flagship's level goes up.  The loss of the ship in battle could be temporarily detrimental to its fleet during the battle it's lost in.  It would add a great sense of realism to the game and make for some pretty good fleet engagements.

Reply #4 from Sins Forums Top

Yeah, I was surprised about this too.

Originally I thought that the flagship would get a slight bonus in shield strength or something. This would be nice as it would partially discourage the practice of always targetting an enemy's highest level cap-ship first; ie. if you destroy the flagship first you must fight through another x ships each with the flagship tag (and so improved shields), but if you leave it until last you will only need to fight one ship with the shield bonus.

...but it wasn't to be.

Reply #5 from Sins Forums Top

Having some sort of small bonus aura for the flagship isn't a bad idea.  However, it should be something a bit more interesting than a standard damage bonus or ROF buff.  Ideally, it would be cool if the type of bonus was unique to each cap ship, thereby playing a role in how you choose your first cap.

More than likely, though, it would just lead to that cap getting focus fired, even more than they are now.

Reply #6 from Sins Forums Top

Quoting VRaptor117, reply 5
Having some sort of small bonus aura for the flagship isn't a bad idea.  However, it should be something a bit more interesting than a standard damage bonus or ROF buff.  Ideally, it would be cool if the type of bonus was unique to each cap ship, thereby playing a role in how you choose your first cap.
End of VRaptor117's quote

I like the sound of this idea. It would allow a little bit more variety to the individual fleets.

Quoting VRaptor117, reply 5
More than likely, though, it would just lead to that cap getting focus fired, even more than they are now.
End of VRaptor117's quote

So make it such that the enemy can't see which ship is your flagship.

Reply #7 from Stardock Forums Top

So make it such that the enemy can't see which ship is your flagship.
End of quote

I like that idea.  In real naval battles it isn't always obvious which on is the flagship.  Usually the most powerfull, but not always.

Reply #8 from Stardock Forums Top

Another idea I have been thinking about was a "hero captian or admrial" (or two or three) that you could transfer to whatever ship you wanted, and any ship fleeted with that ship would receve a bonus to it, (like 10% to everything: speed, fire power, shields and hull, whatever it can do.  If you had more than one in a game, each hero would have a diffrent effect, like one would have a bonus to speed wile another had a bonus to fire power.  Also I would think that they could only be found or recuited though your homeworld. (new reserch: Fleet Officers Accademy) Mabey a one-time-use-per-game ability, instant level 6 (or 1 up for any ship at or above level 6) for a cap ship. (use it wisely)

Reply #9 from Sins Forums Top

Quoting sawakaki, reply 7

So make it such that the enemy can't see which ship is your flagship.


I like that idea.  In real naval battles it isn't always obvious which on is the flagship.  Usually the most powerful, but not always.
End of sawakaki's quote

Yes, it is usually is that obvious.  Traditionally, the one ship that the overall commander of the fleet is on has a special "commander's flag"(forget what it's actually called), denoting that ship in the fleet as containing the fleet commander.  Hence the term "Flagship".(That's also why fleet-level officers in navies are called "flag officers", because they get a special flag.)

While ships in Sins do not have flags, the flagship would be found by monitoring communications traffic of a fleet.  The equivalent in-game result is that you are able to see which ship is the flagship.

Reply #10 from Sins Forums Top

Well, I don't mind haivng bonus, from flagship, but rather bonus in shielding or culture, having the flagship in the same fight will increase boast your ships moral and fighter harder.

Reply #11 from Sins Forums Top

Flagships have a culture-stopping bonus the last time I checked. Maybe this was removed in a patch, I'm not sure.

Anyway, it would be really good if each race had their own unique bonus to their flagship that effects friendly ships.

 

Reply #12 from Sins Forums Top

Why?  Because bonuses and magic powers are 'cool'?

Leadership bonuses don't really make a whole lot of sense when the game doesn't even really have a morale or order propagation system.  There's no crews abandoning ship, none turning rogue or joining your enemies, none panicking and having difficulty following orders.  All orders are magically propagated any distance, instantly, with perfect accuracy.  All information received is precise, perfect, and also instantaneous.  All vessels are identified to incredible detail, down to their ownership, exact state of repair, and level of crew experience.  There is never a single spurious contact of any kind.  All weapons systems target with impossibly perfect accuracy even on moving targets that know they're in battle and should be taking countermeasures.  Your crew are, essentially, already minor deities.