Deceiver_0 Deceiver_0

NEW Patch Stat Changes Forums [NEW TOPIC: CAPITAL SHIPS!! 1/2/10]

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NEW Patch Stat Changes Forums [NEW TOPIC: CAPITAL SHIPS!! 1/2/10]

For Sins Version 1.19 and Entrenchment 1.05

from Sins Forums

Hey everyone its that time again, lets compile some data!

This is a post that I will update regularly to give the DEVS a better idea of what people think should be done to stats in the next patch. This is ONLY for patches, no new ships or elaborate concepts for the next expansion. This is for dealing with peoples’ concerns about balance. If there’s a balance idea you have that’s not on here, post it and I’ll put it up for voting if it seems valid. I love the fact that ICO pays attention to the forums and what people suggest, I’d like to make it easier for them. The idea is to have all ideas posted straight forward and ranked so the DEVS don’t have to sift through pages and pages to find popular ideas. SP and MP players are both welcome to comment. Post yay or nay for any idea you like or dislike (be specific please) or say no fix needed. If you’d like I’ll also insert specific values you may come up with. Some votes will be taken from other threads.

BUGS

Since the last patches release, the main complaint I've seen on the forums are in the form of bugs, so I'm compiling a list of the known ones, and will update the list as more are discovered. Some of the early bugs were fixed in the hotfix, and perhaps (fingers crossed) the Devs will release another hotfix to address the rest, rather than a whole new patch. So here it goes:

- Nano Weapons Jammer autocast AI casts continuously

- AM Recharger autocast AI casts continuously

- Illuminator causes mystery damage between shots

- Phasic Trap research Level 2 still has no effect.

- Orkulus Phase Stabilizer does not work on stars.

- Random Map Bugs:

              - Single Phase lane starts

              - No connected Asteroids

              - Overlapping Gravity Wells

- Backwards Dunov Icon

- Pathing Improvements (specifically dealing with stationary obstacles)

- Orkulus commands cancelled when trade ships dock

- No wave cannon sounds on Kortul

- Resource extractors on HWs produce income before they're constructed.

- PAWELOS BUG HUNTING

- Siege Militia/pirates run from turrets before construction is complete (exploit).

 

CAPITAL SHIPS

This will be a large section that will continue to evolve through out the life of this thread so check back often for new topics. Consensus seems to think now that carrier caps have all been buffed, many of the other caps need to be brought up to par with them.

Buff Battleship Class(Kol/Radiance/Kortul)

                          Increase hp/shields/armor?-

                                     Yay-           Volt_Cruelerz(20-25%)  Darvin3                Deceiver_0
                                                      CallenExile               MindsEye                 Swordsalmon
                                                      Hrabandur                CrazyElectron           Ryat
                                                      Arthanis                   Warlord Mike           Onigiri

                                     Nay-

                          Increase DPS?-

                                     Yay-           Volt_Cruelerz(20-25%)  Darvin3                Deceiver_0
                                                      MindsEye                 Swordsalmon           CallenExile
                                                      Hrabandur               CrazyElectron           Ryat
                                                       Arthanis                 Warlord Mike

                                     Nay-           Onigiri

                          Buff Gauss Rail Gun?-

                                     Yay-           Volt_Cruelerz(800/1200/1600)  Darvin3       Deceiver_0
                                                      CallenExile              MindsEye                  Swordsalmon
                                                      CrazyElectron           Ryat                        Arthanis
                                                      Warlord Mike

                                     Nay-            Hrabandur              Onigiri

                          Re-work Animosity?

                                     Yay-           Volt_Cruelerz           Darvin3                   Deceiver_0
                                                      MindsEye                Swordsalmon            Ryat
                                                      Arthanis                 Warlord Mike

                                     Nay-           CallenExile              Hrabandur               Onigiri

         No Change needed-                    CoBBQ

Colonizer Caps(Akkan/Progenitor/Jarrasul)

                        Buff Jarrasul Evacuator's colonize?

                                    Yay-            Darvin3               Volt_Cruelerz              Deceiver_0
                                                      Swordsalmon       Agent of Kharma           Hrabandur
                                                      Ryat                   Arthanis                     Warlord Mike
                                                      Onigiri 

                                    Nay-            CallenExile           MindsEye

        No Change needed-

Carrier Class Caps(Sova/Halcyon/Skirantra)

                       Buff Scramble Bombers?

                                  Yay-              Darvin3              Volt_Cruelerz               Deceiver_0
                                                      MindsEye            Swordsalmon               Agent of Kharma
                                                      Hrabandur          Ryat                           Arthanis
                                                      Warlord Mike 

                                  Nay-              CallenExile         Onigiri

                      Buff Replicate Forces?

                                  Yay-               Arthanis            Warlord Mike                 Onigiri

                                  Nay-

        No Change needed-

Buff Support Class Caps(Dunov/Antorak/Rapture/Revelation)

                      Increase AM regen?

                                 Yay-               Darvin3               Hrabandur               CrazyElectron
                                                      Ryat                   Juletron                  Arthanis
                                                      Warlord Mike        Swordsalmon

                                 Nay-               CallenExile           Mindseye                 Onigiri

                     Increase maximum AM?

                                 Yay-               CallenExile          Darvin3                    Hrabandur
                                                      Mindseye            Volt_Cruelerz             CrazyElectron
                                                      Juletron              Arthanis                   Warlord Mike

                                 Nay-               Ryat                  Swordsalmon            Onigiri

                     Increase Dunov EMP range?

                                 Yay-               CallenExile          Mindseye                  Volt_Cruelerz
                                                      CrazyElectron      Ryat                        Juletron
                                                      Arthanis             Warlord Mike             Swordsalmon

                                 Nay-               Hrabandur          Onigiri

                     Allow Dunov shield restore to be self targetable?

                                Yay-                Mindseye           CrazyElectron             Juletron
                                                      Arthanis            Deceiver_0

                                Nay-                Ryat                 Volt_Cruelerz            Warlord Mike
                                                      Swordsalmon      Onigiri

                     Allow Antoraks subversion to effect SC?

                               Yay-                 Mindseye           Juletron                    Volt_Cruelerz
                                                      Arthanis            Warlord Mike             Onigiri

                               Nay-                 Ryat                Swordsalmon

                     Buff Phase out hull?

                               Yay-                 Mindseye            Juletron                   Volt_Cruelerz
                                                      Arthanis             Warlord Mike            Swordsalmon
                                                       

                               Nay-                 Ryat                 Onigiri

         No Change Needed-

 

 

DELIVERANCE ENGINE

Without a doubt the weakest of the superweapons, there is little point in seeking it. For too long its been sitting in a dusty box on the shelf, to weak to be worth its tremendous costs. Lets consider some buffs to at least make it functional as a weapon. The one buff thats been suggested that I like is an instant allegiance drop, which will aid Advent in cultural takeovers of border planets and with enough, could possibly overthrow an enemy planet (though Id say it should require many more than the fearsome novalith)

Buff Deliverance engine-

                         Cause an instant decrease in allegiance?

                                    Yay-           Deceiver_0                Kitkun                    Greyfox2
                                                     anteachtaire              Mow Mow                Warlord Mike
                                                     Hrabandur                 Arthanis

                                    Nay-           Howdidudothat

No buff needed-                                Qu4r                        Darvin3                  CallenExile        

 

 

EMPIRE TREE

As I feel that the devs decision to put "Phase Jumping" ships at the top of the tree was purposeful and not a bug, I think most of us agree that the constant movement it creates (especially with phase monitoring!) makes the empire tree difficult to use. Move it to the bottom?

Adjust Empire Tree-

                         Move "Phase Jumping Ships" to the bottom of the tree?

                                    Yay-           Deceiver_0               Darvin3                  SwordSalmon
                                                     JSW_Ballz                Mindseye                Agent of Kharma
                                                     Ryat                        52500                    Mow Mow
                                                     Fuzzy Logic              EadTaes                 Warlord Mike
                                                     Hrabandur               Howdidudothat        -Ue_Carbon
                                                     Chaotic Magician        Arthanis

                                    Nay-           CallenExile

 

FIGHTERS

Some are unsatisfied with fighters with regards to surviving flak. I urge everyone to read the points of debate between Mindseye and myself starting on page 10-11, to get a better understanding of why fighters should or should not be adjusted. Below are a few suggestions

Buff Fighters-

                        Increase armor/hp?

                                  Yay-             Mindseye                 Mow Mow                Greyfox2
                                                     Qu4r                       Arthanis          

                                  Nay-             Deceiver_0               Darvin3                  Ryat
                                                     Top Vasari               Warlord Mike           EadTaes
                                                     Hrabandur                Howdidudothat        -Ue_Carbon
                                                     Chaotic Magician       Agent of Kharma      CallenExile
                                                     CrazyElectron 

MAPS

Raging Amish has proposed some modest changes to maps that I think we could possibly have implemented with enough support, so lets get a vote to see what people think of them. Magnetic clouds are huge wastes of space as their is nothing terribly beneficial about them. People with ability heavy fleets and caps would opt to fight you somewhere else (and can do so without much penalty). They make awful chokepoints because you can't put starbases or mines there, and they offer no economic value. I'd like to hear some ideas on how to improve them (beyond removing them completely from the game as RA has suggested). If we can come up with some good ones I'll put them up for a vote. In the meantime, I think one should at least be able to construct Starbases here, so I'll put that up as a topic. Also, all too often we see Ice and Volcanic planets  (which require research to colonize) offering you only 2 resource mines for the trouble of colonizing them. Personally I don't think that PLANETS should have less resources to offer than an asteroid. What do you think?

Magnetic Clouds-

                          Allow starbase deployment?

                                    Yay-            Deceiver_0              Darvin3                  Hrabandur
                                                      Juletron                  Howdidudothat         Warlord Mike
                                                      DirtySanchezz          Kitkun                    Qu4r
                                                      CrazyElectron

                                    Nay-            Ryat                       CallenExile              EadTaes
                                                      DesConnor              -Ue_Carbon             Chaotic Magician

Ice/Volcanic planets-

                          Change minimum mines to 3 (currently 2)?

                                   Yay-             Deceiver_0              Swordsalmon           Ryat
                                                      Darvin3                   Juletron                  Mindseye
                                                      Mow Mow                 EadTaes                 JSW_Ballz
                                                      Howdidudothat         Warlord Mike          Kitkun
                                                      Ovi_187                  -Ue_Carbon            Chaotic Magician
                                                      CrazyElectron 

                                   Nay-             CallenExile              DesConnor              DirtySanchezz
                                                      Hrabandur               Agent of Kharma      Qu4r

No Changes needed-

 

 

 

ORKULUS STARBASE

This topic is going to be heavy on the debate, and will likely be updated several times with NEW votable options throughout the life of this thread. Now, I think it's safe to say that we're beyond the point of the DEVS making a Vasari Assault cruiser and making the Orky stationary. So if thats what you think should happen thats fine, but it would be more useful for everyone if you hada second opinion on the Orky and voted on the issues below.

Nerf Orkulus-

                           Increase build penalty in hostile wells? (currently 2.25x unupgraded)

                                     Yay-          Greyfox2                   Raging Amish(3x)   Mindseye
                                                     Arthanis 

                                     Nay-          Deceiver_0                 Cykur                    Howdidudothat
                                                     Top Vasari                  Swordsalmon         Ryat
                                                     anteachtaire               LordMechanoid       JSW_Ballz
                                                     Warlord Mike              Agent of Kharma    DesConnor
                                                     DirtySanchezz             Kitkun                   Qu4r
                                                     52500                        Hrabandur            -Ue_Carbon
                                                     Chaotic Magician         Qu4r                    CallenExile
                                                    

Other-

                           SB constructors trigger phase monitoring alarm? ("Hostile forces are inbound")

                                    Yay-          Mindseye                    Deceiver_0            Howdidudothat
                                                    Top Vasari                   Cykur                   LordMechanoid
                                                    Warlord Mike               DirtySanchezz        Kitkun
                                                    52500                         Hrabandur            -Ue_Carbon
                                                    Chaotic Magician           CallenExile           CrazyElectron
                                                    Arthanis 

                                    Nay-          JSW_Ballz                   DesConnor           Qu4r

 

 

SCOUT FRIGATES

A hotly debated topic right now on the forums, none can deny their increased presence on the MP battlefield. As the cheapest buildable unit in the game, as well as being tier 0, its utility against long ranged frigates has been thoroughly exploited. The question remains, is it balanced? This topic will be split into two sections, a general section for a blanket nerf and a more specific section for interspecies balance. The reason for this is that some think scouts need to be weaker in general, whike other think they need to be balanced on par wtih TEC scouts.

Nerf Scouts-

                          Decrease hp/shields?

                                     Yay-

                                     Nay-          DirtySanchezz            Cykur                Arthanis

                          Decrease DPS?

                                     Yay-          DirtySanchezz            Greyfox2           Mindseye
                                                     Arthanis 

                                     Nay-          Cykur

                          Increase Cost/supply?

                                     Yay-         Mindseye                   Cykur                 Swordsalmon

                                     Nay-         DirtySanchezz             Arthanis

No Nerf Needed-                              Deceiver_0                 Wingflier            Howdidudothat
                                                     Darvin3                      Ryat                 CallenExile
                                                     Chaotic Magician        Agent of Kharma  Sivcorp
                                                     52500                       JSW_Ballz           LordMechanoid
                                                     Kitkun                       Hrabandur          -Ue_Carbon
                                                     Qu4r                        CrazyElectron

Balance Scouts-

                          Decrease Seeker Vessels Hp/shields/armor?

                                     Yay-         Deceiver_0                 Wingflier             Mow Mow
                                                    Swordsalmon              Darvin3               Ryat
                                                    Greyfox2                    52500                 JSW_Ballz
                                                    Cykur                        Top Vasari           LordMechanoid
                                                    Kitkun                        Hrabandur          -Ue_Carbon
                                                    Qu4r                          CrazyElectron       Arthanis

                                     Nay-         DirtySanchezz            Howdidudothat      CallenExile
                                                   

                          Decrease Seeker Vessels DPS?

                                     Yay-         Swordsalmon              DirtySanchezz      Howdidudothat
                                                     Greyfox2                   Hrabandur          Qu4r 

                                     Nay-         Wingflier                    Darvin3               Ryat
                                                     CallenExile                52500                 JSW_Ballz
                                                     Cykur                       LordMechanoid     Kitkun
                                                    -Ue_Carbon                 CrazyElectron       Arthanis

                          Decrease Jikara Navigator cost/supply?

                                     Yay-         Deceiver_0                 Wingflier              Howdidudothat
                                                    CallenExile                 52500                  LordMechanoid
                                                    Hrabandur                  Qu4r 

                                     Nay-         Swordsalmon              DirtySanchezz       Darvin3
                                                    Ryat                          Chaotic Magician   JSW_Ballz
                                                    Cykur                        Greyfox2             Kitkun
                                                    -Ue_Carbon                CrazyElectron        Arthanis

                          Increase Jikara Navigator DPS?

                                     Yay-         Mow Mow                   Swordsalmon         Howdidudothat
                                                    Ryat                         Chaotic Magician     52500
                                                    JSW_Ballz                  Hrabandur            -Ue_Carbon
                                                    Qu4r                         CrazyElectron        Arthanis

                                     Nay-         Wingflier                   DirtySanchezz        Darvin3
                                                    CallenExile                Cykur                   Greyfox2
                                                    LordMechanoid           Kitkun   

                          Increase Jikara Navigator hp/shields?

                                     Yay-         Mow Mow                  Darvin3                  Ryat
                                                    Chaotic Magician         Sivcorp                   Top Vasari
                                                    Kitkun                      Hrabandur              -Ue_Carbon
                                                    Qu4r                        CrazyElectron           Arthanis

                                     Nay-         CallenExile               JSW_Ballz               Cykur
                                                    LordMechanoid

No Balance Needed-                         Agent of Kharma      EadTaes                 DesConnor

 

 

RAVASTRA SKIRMISHERS

While the most expensive light frigate in both resources and supply, these ships have the worst DPS per supply. With the recent buff to all light frigs, Cobalts and Disciples are now delivering on the tasks they're meant to, yet skirmishers are still struggling. So what should be done?

Buff Skirmishers-

                            Increase DPS?
                                        
                                      Yay-        Deceiver_0                Darvin3               52500 
                                                    Cykur                       Chaotic Magician   Top Vasari
                                                    Howdidudothat           Wingflier              Swordsalmon
                                                    Juletron                     Ryat                   Sivcorp
                                                    DirtySanchezz             GreyFox2            Raging Amish
                                                    CallenExile                 Mindseye            JSW_Ballz
                                                    Warlord Mike              lbgsloan             Mow Mow
                                                    EadTaes                    DesConnor          Kitkun
                                                    Agent of Kharma        Hrabandur           -Ue_Carbon
                                                    Qu4r                       CrazyElectron        Arthanis

                                      Nay-        LordMechanoid

                            Decrease Supply cost?

                                      Yay-        Raging Amish           LordMechanoid      Hrabandur
                                                    Qu4r    

                                      Nay-        Deceiver_0                Darvin3               52500
                                                    Cykur                       Chaotic Magician   Top Vasari
                                                    Howdidudothat           Wingflier             Swordsalmon
                                                    Juletron                    Ryat                    CallenExile                
                                                    Mindseye                  JSW_Ballz            Warlord Mike
                                                    lbgsloan                   Mow Mow              Kitkun
                                                    -Ue_Carbon               CrazyElectron        Arthanis

                            Decrease Resource cost?

                                      Yay-        52500                       Warlord Mike

                                      Nay-        Darvin3                     Cykur                Chaotic Magician  
                                                    Top Vasari                 Howdidudothat    Wingflier
                                                    Swordsalmon             Juletron              Ryat
                                                    DirtySanchezz             Raging Amish     CallenExile
                                                    Mindseye                   JSW_Ballz           LordMechanoid
                                                    lbgsloan                    Kitkun                Hrabandur
                                                    -Ue_Carbon               Qu4r                   Arthanis

                            Adjust Reintegration autocast AI to activate earlier?

                                      Yay-        Deceiver_0               Darvin3               52500
                                                    Chaotic Magician       Top Vasari           Howdidudothat          
                                                    Wingflier                  Swordsalmon       Juletron
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                                      Nay-        LordMechanoid

 

No Change Needed-

 

 

 

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Reply #576 from Sins Forums Top

Ok maybe we can work out the mitigation to an exact level, so that it performs its essential task, while still keeping caps killable and not making ti to high for smaller fleets to kill Bombing cap rushes. Thing about early game bombing rushes is you need 2 caps to make it work effectively, which means you arent going to have a whole lot of cash lying around to increase their level (so most likely they'll be lvl1 when they get to you hw maybe lvl2) and if the mitigation increases per level but remains similar at low levels, it shouldnt make much of a difference. I'd say best case scenario for the bombing rusher is 2 lvl 3 caps, and each would have only 2-3% more max mitigation, which is probably not enough to make a significant difference. Its only when the caps get to lvl 5 and above that the max mitigation starts making a big difference (ie 5+% extra mitigation) However, advent have 2 ways to increase max mitigation, so it can't be an additional 1.8% per level as I recommended, as it would give advent the possibility of having above 85% max mitigation on their caps, which needs to be avoided. As Carbon said, approaching 90%, caps become too difficult to kill, so I say 85% should be the absolute ceiling.

OK so here's the problem with mitigation increase:

Advent get +1% mitigation for every level of culture they research, for a total of 6%. Add that to the research at the end of their shield research tree and they can have 10% more mitigation than any of the other races. If we kept that and the ceiling at 85%, we could only add 3% mitigation max over 10 levels, which means for TEC and Vasari, their caps could only have a maximum of 75% mitigation at level 10, which is not enough of an improvement (over 72%).

So the only way to do mitigation as a solution is to leave advent caps the same, and only buff mitigation increases to TEC and Vasari caps. which probably isnt fair to Advent (eventhough an additional 10% dmg reduction to all their ships doesnt seem very fair anyway). The only problem I see with excluding Advent caps from mitigation increases is it would be messing with faction benefits (like culture bonuses and specialities like TEC Armor research). The only way around that is to compromise with mitigation increases across the board, but more for TEC and Vasari. So it would have to be like this:

Vasari: Max Mitigation increase per level = 1.6% for an absolute mitigation ceiling of 78%

TEC: Max Mitigaiton increase per level = 1.6% for an absolute mitigation ceiling of 78%

Advent: Max Mitigation increase per level= 1.2% for a mitigation ceiling of 74% (Shield upgrades make it 78%(+4%), culture bonuses make it 80% (+6%)) For a total mitigation ceiling of 84%.

Might not seem fair that Advent caps need research to reach those kinds of mitigation level, but it should be noted that the mitigation bonuses under culture and shield research apply to ALL ADVENT SHIPS, where as for TEC and Vasari, the increased mitigation only applies to their capital ships (for better scaling). 

If this were the case, TEC and Vasari cap ships would gain an extra 2% mitigation every 3 levels, and Advent caps would gain an extra 1% every 5 levels.

Now that I see it though all written out, the gains probably arent enough to make a huge amount of difference. I mean a level 6 cap taking 4% less damage from a horde of illums would probably only buy it a couple of extra seconds to escape, and the risks of altering faction dynamics are a bit to great for this to be a workable option. 

Reply #577 from Sins Forums Top

As much as my tinkerer's instinct makes me want to delve into all the different ways mitigation might be altered to achieve our ends, I have to agree that it doesn't fit the spirit of this board.  I think there's general agreement that the problem is the role of capital ships scaling as fleet sizes get bigger, but there isn't an obvious way to address that within the boundaries of what we consider acceptable topic for this thread.

 

With that stated, I would like to suggest a topic for discussion:  carrier cruisers and hangers.  They are expensive and have antimatter problems, particularly early game when compared to carrier capital ships.  Because fighters are the only counter to bombers, and it's difficult to suppress fighters without a strong fighter presence of your own, carrier caps are ruling the roost.  A possible way to tone down their excessive dominance is to give them some real competition by buffing the hanger and carrier cruiser (leaving the strike craft themselves unchanged).  I believe an antimatter regeneration buff and cost decrease are the most sensible courses of action.

If we're going to propose a cost decrease for hangers, we may as well also address turrets at the same time.  I propose two possibilities for buffs:  a cost decrease and a range increase.

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Reply #578 from Sins Forums Top

First of all I hink carrier caps are far too superior in terms of SC...

Pure numbers:

Skinatra has max 8 squadrons + 6 given by Scramble bombers = 14 SC at 10 level

Halycon has max 11 squadrons + lvl6 ability increasing effective number of squadrons by ~5 = ~16 SC max at 10 level

Sova has 8 SC max, but have ability increasing their overall effectiveness by ~30% = effective number of SC is ~10-11 squadrons

CarrierCaps in terms of armor and damage are just little weaker then other caps, which is not justifying their fighters superiority.

Everyone agree CarrierCaps are fine, problems are other caps which are UP.

Thats why I think we should ask for slight SC squad number increase for non-carrier caps.

 

As I said before: BattleCruisers/PlanetKillers should get 3 squadrons Max and support caps (which are definitely weakest caps class) should gt 5 squadrons max. Why? CarrierCaps will be still superior by far in terms of SC control because both of their max SC limit AND abilities giving further SC improvements, but player choosing other caps will no longer suck in terms of SC completely.

Because Carriers are relatively strong in terms of DPS and HP/SH i see no reason of giving them so huge superiority in terms of SC.

Reply #579 from Sins Forums Top

I'll second an increase in AM regen for both hangars and carriers. Otherwise I think their cost is sufficient, maybe a little pricey, but I feel like the seemingly high credit and resource cost of things is slightly skewed by the type of games most frequently played by posters here, IE team MP games on single star randoms. Turrets I feel are certainly priced correctly.

As for Cap survivability. This is also seeming to be skewed by the MP single star random type of game, where half of the players have military but no econ, and the other half have econ but little military, leaving little room for multiple caps (2-3 per player tops), where as in longer games, players will have econ and military and many cap ships that are able to support eachother with superior abilities, and a single cap ship is less valuable and somewhat easier to keep alive. These types of games are also where illum spam flourishes, and once it toned down a bit with a bug fix, melting caps may become less of an issue.

So maybe there is no solution, and maybe there isnt such a need for one.

Arthanis- Adding extra squads will not help the other cap ships, because their weakness to them isnt in the late game, its starting off where 2 lvl 1 carrier caps can provide 6-8 squads. Your proposed solution would not work because 2 of any other cap ship would still only provide 2 squads at lvl 1, which would still be dominated by the carrier caps. Darvin suggestion of increasing AM regen on carriers would help because a carrier or 2 would be able to keep up production of SC to fight off the early squadrons that dont cost carrier caps AM to build.

Reply #580 from Sins Forums Top

Arthanis- Adding extra squads will not help the other cap ships, because their weakness to them isnt in the late game, its starting off where 2 lvl 1 carrier caps can provide 6-8 squads. Your proposed solution would not work because 2 of any other cap ship would still only provide 2 squads at lvl 1, which would still be dominated by the carrier caps. Darvin suggestion of increasing AM regen on carriers would help because a carrier or 2 would be able to keep up production of SC to fight off the early squadrons that dont cost carrier caps AM to build.
End of quote

 

As I said before I strongly prefere multiple slight buffs (like SC increase) to many aspects for UP caps instead of single huge buff to one cap's aspect. I don't say "it will fix problems with UP caps". I say "SC increase is step into good direction".

Reply #581 from Sins Forums Top

i think its hilarious how we've come full circle from saying SC are way too overpowered to saying SC need to be buffed to make X Y and Z viable... =P

just a slightly random question, is it possible to make a unit invulnerable to a certain type of damage (i.e. anti-light etc)?

like, lets say we make (after research) late game caps either invulnerable or highly immune (though still damageble) to fighters and maybe certain other ships like LF, maybe bombers, maybe turret defense, one or both types of support cruisers or whatever units (im just throwing names out there)

i mean, the heavy hitters like HC, LRF, other caps, bombers and of course SB's should of course damage caps as normal, but the little annoying units like SC and LF/Flak would be extremely ineffective, thereby increasing survivability...

another idea is: to discourage early carrier spamming (without proper support) might be to (if at all possible) make carrier caps particularly vulnerable to LF, while Battleships and Dreadnoughts are vulnerable to LRF etc etc... it may not be possible... but it might be an idea...

Reply #582 from Sins Forums Top

Darvin and Deceiver_0, I guess the only other idea I can come up with for mitigation would be to leave the late game mitigation for caps exactly where it is now, but bump the early starting mitigation.  This would mean caps start out with higher mitigation than they do now, but it grows more slowly to the level 9 mark than it does now.

Thing is, this probably wouldn't really solve the problem of melting capships, so then why tinker with anything at all?  If this wouldn't be enough to help the issue, I guess I'm for tabling the motion.

EDIT: What about simply making capships cheaper?  This would be something to allow their role to scale with fleet size.  Just throwing a number out off the top of my head, 2500 credits instead of 3000 would be about 16% cheaper.  I think its a good idea, but would have to be done with other adjustments so that you dont' see even MORE carrier cap spam.

Reply #583 from Sins Forums Top

Making capships worth their cost >>> making capships cheaper

- my 5 cents :)

Reply #584 from Sins Forums Top

They don't need to be cheaper by any means. The first one is already free, and you can buy a second one less than 5 minutes into a game. The cost of a cap ship is relatively low if you have an economy. Like jsut last night, I was Vasari and had only 5 planets pretty much the whole game, but I had econ up and was able to build, 1 egg, 1 skirantra, 1 marauder and 4 kortuls, and still had a giant fleet to go with them. (40 carriers, 20 sentinels, 60 assailants). Sure they seem really expensive when you have no economy and are being fed by your allies, but thats only 1 specific situation. I know that the kind of deathmatches played really point out the relative strenghts and weaknesses of things. But again, I'm leaning towards the melting capship being a situational game specific issue where the solution to me is just have a better economy to support building them.

Reply #585 from Sins Forums Top

Otherwise I think their cost is sufficient, maybe a little pricey, but I feel like the seemingly high credit and resource cost of things is slightly skewed by the type of games most frequently played by posters here, IE team MP games on single star randoms
End of quote

While I think carrier cruiser price is more arguable, I do think that hangers need this buff badly.  The problem with them (and turrets) is tactical space.  On virtually any planet, you'll need to buy at least one tactical upgrades to build any reasonable static defense other than the classic overlapping repair bay.  This costs an arm and a leg, and turrets and hangers aren't exactly cost effective to begin with.  Hangers especially cost only a little less than carrier cruisers (which I already mentioned are pretty pricey) but they cannot move and are very vulnerable to being attacked because of this.

The reason I've leaned towards both an antimatter buff and a cost decrease is because I've been forcing myself to play out early game carrier-cruiser vs carrier-cap fights.  I've fought on both ends... and the capital ship has won every time.  My findings were that the carrier cruisers simply didn't match up to the carrier caps on a cost basis, and you could never deploy enough to overpower the capital ship, even presuming you could keep their antimatter up.  I did the math and backed up my in-game gut feeling. The following is a simple breakdown of effective costs (metal/crystal are treated as costing 4.5 credits each for sake of simplicity.  I presume two military labs are agiven, but if you need a third [TEC/Vasari] I add in the cost)

Capital Ship:  6000 to build, 1500 for crew upgrade
Drone Host:  3300 to build, 1300 to research
TEC/Vasari Carrier: 2100 to build, 2000 to research, 1500 for third lab

So, let's presume you need three carrier or two drone hosts (6 strike craft) to match a level 1 capital ship.  This is probably low-balling it, since capital carriers have many other advantages in their favour, particularly having their own built-in weapons and special abilities.  So, what's the cost of fielding this counter compared to the capital ship:
Drone Hosts:  7900 effective credits
TEC/Vasari Carriers:  9800 effective credits
Capital Ship:  7500 effective credits

As you can see, there's not a hope in hell of TEC or Vasari actually getting a cost-effective counter to capital carriers out of carrier cruisers.  They should ALWAYS go with a carrier cap.  Advent might have a shot with drone hosts, but why would you bother when your capital carrier also happens to have anti-strike craft abilities, making it the hands-down best choice. This is why I'm calling for a carrier cruiser cost reduction; it costs too much to get them out of the door early compared to carrier caps, which are now very cost-effective.  Obviously at a certain point you can get a mass of carrier cruisers that's just not feasible with capital ships, but the problem is right at the start of the game that's not a consideration.

Reply #586 from Sins Forums Top

Thats what flak is for.If you buff am on carriers then all you will do is make bombers less useful.It will cause carriers to be able to produce a constant stream of fighters so you will never be able to clear fighters out.Advent fighters build at 17 sec a piece.Just 2 hosts will be making a fighter every few seconds.Make fighters themselves tougher and make losing them more costly.Most of the am upgrades are paticularly helpful to the carriers.Most people dont like the sc for free part about carriers and your just bolstering this with an am buff.

I think hangers need a big price buff and maybe even turrets a little.No am buff to them tho because vas hanger with ability is already exetremely powerful.

Reply #587 from Sins Forums Top

As you can see, there's not a hope in hell of TEC or Vasari actually getting a cost-effective counter to capital carriers out of carrier cruisers. They should ALWAYS go with a carrier cap. Advent might have a shot with drone hosts, but why would you bother when your capital carrier also happens to have anti-strike craft abilities, making it the hands-down best choice. This is why I'm calling for a carrier cruiser cost reduction; it costs too much to get them out of the door early compared to carrier caps, which are now very cost-effective. Obviously at a certain point you can get a mass of carrier cruisers that's just not feasible with capital ships, but the problem is right at the start of the game that's not a consideration.
End of quote

Why should you be  able to counter a cap with same amount of carriers?Mix in some flak.They are cheap and always produce full dps.You could also get some carriers and then start building lrf.He will have to choose to use his fighters to kill your lrf and lose his fighters or they will fight each other for awhile in meantime you are killin his cap with lrf.

Reply #588 from Sins Forums Top

Flaks are not the answer.  While they can suppress fighters, they are ineffective against bombers in any realistic numbers.  If you don't have fighters (ie, carriers) of your own, then you have no way to stop bombers.  Even if you did manage to get enough flaks to do the job, this would cut out virtually every other unit type and your opponent only needs to follow up with a light frigate spam or starbase rush to get the kill.

Right now, the only early game answer to a carrier-cap loaded with bombers is a carrier cap loaded with fighters.  As far as I'm concerned, until this is dealt with, the ONLY viable opener on the front lines is carrier.  Maybe you could get away with colony if you quickly got a carrier cap to back it up, but only then.

 

No am buff to them tho because vas hanger with ability is already exetremely powerful.
End of quote

If phasic traps become a problem, compensate by raising the antimatter cost on those.  However, the problem right now is the hangers ability to produce strike craft; the antimatter regeneration they currently have is so low that they completely empty all their reserves just by building their first set of strike craft (Advent hangers - and they're brutally expensive - need 2 or 3 minutes of antimatter regeneration just to fill all their strike craft capacity, it's that bad)

 

You could also get some carriers and then start building lrf.He will have to choose to use his fighters to kill your lrf and lose his fighters or they will fight each other for awhile in meantime you are killin his cap with lrf.
End of quote

You're missing the point.  I agree that doing this is the best course of action, but the math I just showed demonstrated that the correct carrier to choose to counter a capital carrier is another capital carrier.  This is the problem, the carrier caps are blatantly outperforming carrier cruisers at level 1.

Reply #589 from Sins Forums Top

Carrier cruisers need both a cost decrease and an antimatter/antimatter regen increase. Preferably, I want to see a decrease in metal/crystal costs and increase antimatter by 100 or so. Currently, the cruisers are outclassed by carrier caps because of the expense and lack of good antimatter regen. You can swat out any Fighters/Bombers and make the cruiser completely useless.

Hangers also need a good cost decrease and a large antimatter increase, for similar reasons.

Reply #590 from Sins Forums Top

I'm not sure that the carrier capital problem is a lack of a viable carrier cruiser counter so much as an issue with the starting stats of the capitals themselves.  I suspect that this could be solved with capital balancing and cheaper early game defences. 

The carrier capitals just aren't as fragile as they need to be compared to the others.  It seems fair for the siege and colony capitals to have problems with carriers, as these two have very strong abilities outside ship-ship combat.  The Revelation has only as much health as the Halcyon and less shield, though.  The battleships might use enough of a boost to make them a viable anti-carrier choice.  The support capitals also need a boost, their antimatter costs could be brought down.  I've always wondered why none of the support capitals have their faction's area healing ability, the classic support ability- this affects their utility to begin with, though the Dunov has got the single target shield heal.  Whether a support capital needs to be made a viable starting capital is questionable though.

Reply #591 from Stardock Forums Top

probably because in theory a colony cap is supposed to be a support cap.

In practice this kinda fails though.

Reply #592 from Sins Forums Top

Thats why I suggest increasing number of SC on support Caps to 5. Support caps are atm caps with no purpose (because other caps are usually better in everything including supporting fleet), giving them better SC armament will at least make them decent in SOMETHING. Of course DPS/HP/SH increase and abilities buff in addition to SC increase will be nice too.

Reply #593 from Sins Forums Top

LOL, increasing SC on other Caps doesnt make them more support'ish'. Cap carrier is suppose to be support in theory also reminde you. If you want support SC wise for your fleet you build one of those.

I fail to see the reason for your push for MORE SC. When its SC that have got us all in arms since Entrechement started. A huge portion of most of any debate has centered around SC.

 

To be honest, I think everyone forgets (Including me) that Caps are all support ships. Every single one is suppose to help your Fleet. Problem with this is they either dont b/c they die too quick to make a differance for your fleet, or they overshadow your fleet by themself.

 

 

Reply #594 from Sins Forums Top

To be honest, I think everyone forgets (Including me) that Caps are all support ships. Every single one is suppose to help your Fleet.
End of quote

This was certainly the "old school" pre-buff philosophy.  It still works that way, but I see some people trying to flip the equation, i.e. use fleet to support the caps.  I actually think this was the proper way to go with the game.  The devs had the mechanic backwards.  Playing the game with hundreds of frigs all shooting at each other is just... boring.

Problem with this is they either dont b/c they die too quick to make a differance for your fleet....
End of quote

Ya.

Reply #595 from Sins Forums Top

The capital ships have no real escorts in the game- that is, ships which are poor when attacking capitals but good at attacking threats to capitals.  Flak are the nearest, but flak are better at defending LRF than capitals, and LRF are one of the two main threats to capitals.  LF also come close in that they threaten carriers and therefore bombers (though not on carrier capitals), but LF are too vulnerable to LRF to function as escorts.  Scouts are useful against LRF but are too vulnerable to a mixed fleet, and can just end up feeding an opponent who isn't employing pure LRF spam.

It doesn't make sense to me to have LRF counter both LF and capitals.  If the LF-LRF balance were adjusted so that LF countered LRF and LRF countered flak and carriers, then LF would become proper escorts for capital ships, and the LRF problem would be solved.  Fighters and scouts just aren't the solution to LRF and should be left to fulfil their more natural roles.  Better one proper counter than two half-counters. 

If all capitals are support ships then why have 'support' capitals at all, it becomes no surprise that they are marginalised?  Also, why are the carrier capitals allowed to kite, when the carrier cruisers aren't?

Reply #596 from Sins Forums Top

Idea: LRF have 50% reduced accuracy at 50% of their max range and below

Lore: targeting systems have problems with attacking close opponents

Balance:

- It will significanlty reduce short-range effectiveness of LRF and will force players using them too keep optimal range.

- LF/Caps/HC at close range are real opponent to even massed LRFs

- mindless LRF spam no longer work vs smart opponent

- it will promote micro

Reply #597 from Sins Forums Top

If the LF-LRF balance were adjusted so that LF countered LRF and LRF countered flak and carriers, then LF would become proper escorts for capital ships, and the LRF problem would be solved.
End of quote

Then what counters LF?  The only counter to LF currently is LRF.

Reply #598 from Sins Forums Top

Then what counters LF?
End of quote

 

Caps?

SC?

HC?

 

The only counter to LF currently is LRF.
End of quote

Then what counters LRF?

Reply #599 from Sins Forums Top

Capital ships are a hard counter to LF at the moment, as are structures and heavies, that wouldn't change?  The abilities of support cruisers also counter LF more effectively than any other ship, though LF would retain the drain antimatter ability.  Flak might have parity, with both disadvantaged against the others armour flak have superior stats.  Strikecraft wouldn't be much use but then LF would only have LRF damage against carriers without the range advantage. 

I doubt that LRF would be marginalised in the game, they'd still be useful against a wide variety of targets and the only early counter to a capital rush.  Early on the effect might not be much different from the existing scout/disciple mix.  However, it would make capitals much less vulnerable later.  

Reply #600 from Sins Forums Top

Quoting DesConnor, reply 595
It doesn't make sense to me to have LRF counter both LF and capitals.  If the LF-LRF balance were adjusted so that LF countered LRF and LRF countered flak and carriers, then LF would become proper escorts for capital ships, and the LRF problem would be solved.  Fighters and scouts just aren't the solution to LRF and should be left to fulfil their more natural roles.  Better one proper counter than two half-counters.
End of DesConnor's quote

If LRF/Assai/Illums are not suppose to counter capitals then why is there an entire weapon research line dedicated to them? LRF are the destroyers of the SINS navy whose job is to screen out other LRFs so the Capships can get in and fight.