Cost/Benefit Ratio?

[Trandrin]

Lately I have been curious about a two things we have the choice to research. I wonder as too how often they are used and how much their knowledge cost/nature effects this. They are the Transport mk2 and mobile repair station. They both cost 4k knowledge. I have never had the desire to even unlock them. Not once.

These days its mostly because for that exact same price of knowledge I could instead get mk2/3 Engineers. The third mark has teleport. That is 78 teleporting, 12 repair rate, construction units, that are cloaked and an entire cap of mk2 I can leave to help speed building. Over a slightly quick multi-repair platform that can, if you use them in one group, all repair 120 ships at a repair rate 1.

The Transport thankfully has double the health of the normal transport, So can be used at longer distances through more hostile situations. Longer jumps though mitigated by deep strike. Does its regen cost resources to heal the ships inside? If not I could see that being useful. The ability to get stuff to where I send it easier is nice and all but still little desire to ever research it. The mk1 transports usually cover me on shuffling ships around reliably. Even through threatening situations, just need to send a few transports that are empty in first and leave there to be shot at while those that carry the fleet go past almost un-molested.

Anyone else have thoughts to these two, or use them often to show their worth?

[Kahuna]

Both of them are overpriced and Mobile Repair thing kills the economy.

[keith.lamothe]

If you want field repair, the MRS requires the least player-interaction during the battle, because you don't have to load stuff into it (like the Transport 2) and you generally don't have to worry about it being killed (like the engies, because the MRS is cloaked and stays cloaked while repairing).

The post linked by Kahuna was accurate at the time but hasn't been since version 5.051: engie-repair now costs the same m+c per hp as MRS-repair.  Overall repair costs were reduced to compensate, so the MRS repair is actually cheaper than it was, too.

Engies have a broader utility, though, if your engie-1 cap isn't giving you enough dock-assistance or turret-rebuild-assistance.

[chemical_art]

Unless you use younglings I've never seen a potential need for transports II, since they suffer the same % attirtion for deepstrikes.

MLRS suffer as you say because you can get II and III engineers for less then the cost of MLRS and the engineers are broadly more useful, and III engineers are better for deepstrikes then MLRS sometimes.

Sometimes the MLRS is better then MK III engineer, but since you get both the II and III engineers for less it seems a no brainer. Devote all the many more numerous MK III engineers to repair deepstrikes while keep the II engineeers at home, and you still do more as a whole then the MLRS.

[Trandrin]

Forgot that 35% still means that 8mil hp is going to go as fast as 4million. Made some silly mistake of thinking it took reduced attrition. Also didn't realize the MRS also had cloak. Shows me how much I have used them.

About the engies getting killed, that is the wonders of the mk3. They also have cloaking and can teleport. So fleet enters first, shots get fired. Engie jumps in and to the edge of the system, till I want some repairs done. Then they warp to the group, prop a few ships health up and back to the outer ring.

[Diazo]

Both of them are situational at best.

If I ever unlocked Mk II transports it would be for the doubling of the health over the Mk I transport, not for the repair ability. However, I've never run into a situation where defences were heavy enough to kill a Mk I transport but light enough not to kill a Mk II. 8 million HP is above average but it is not a really high HP like it used to be.

Also, the 35% HP loss per wormhole transit is the same and so a bigger absolute HP loss. Maybe make the Mk II transport only lose 15% HP on hostile wormhole transit? That way the Mk II transport has a higher operational range then the Mk I transport?

As for the Mobile Repair, as of the repair fix in patch 5.051 it no longer kills your economy, not beyond the repair costs anyway. (The repair fix made it so repairing the same amount of HP always costs the same amount of resources. Before the fix a higher repair rate would repair the same amount of damage for fewer resources.)

However, if I unlock the mobile repair station it is later in the game with a larger fleet and the repair station is capped at 20 ships at a time. When my fleet ball is hundreds of ships that just is not enough repair beams.

The repair station got the nerf bat the last time it was changed though, just adding more repair beams would be simply undoing the nerfs so I'm not sure what to do with this unit.

D.

[keith.lamothe]

However, if I unlock the mobile repair station it is later in the game with a larger fleet and the repair station is capped at 20 ships at a time. When my fleet ball is hundreds of ships that just is not enough repair beams.

Perhaps this is so, but I'm not sure:

1) Of your hundreds of ships, how many are damaged at any given time?
2) Of the damaged ones, how many are not under sustained fire (which prevents repair from any source)?
3) Of the damaged and repairable ones, how long (on average, not necessarily from 1 hp to full) does it take an MRS to repair them?
4) How many repair stations do you deploy with a single group?

On the Engie IIIs, do they stay cloaked while repairing?  I don't recall and don't have the code right in front of me atm.

The main advantage I see from the MRS over Engie IIIs in battle-repair is that with the MRS you can just position them or bring them along (assuming you can keep AI tachyon coverage off them) and they'll take care of repairs with not-much-micro, whereas keeping the engie IIIs alive in AI territory is either difficult or micro-intensive or both.

[chemical_art]

However, if I unlock the mobile repair station it is later in the game with a larger fleet and the repair station is capped at 20 ships at a time. When my fleet ball is hundreds of ships that just is not enough repair beams.

Perhaps this is so, but I'm not sure:

1) Of your hundreds of ships, how many are damaged at any given time?
2) Of the damaged ones, how many are not under sustained fire (which prevents repair from any source)?
3) Of the damaged and repairable ones, how long (on average, not necessarily from 1 hp to full) does it take an MRS to repair them?
4) How many repair stations do you deploy with a single group?

On the Engie IIIs, do they stay cloaked while repairing?  I don't recall and don't have the code right in front of me atm.

The main advantage I see from the MRS over Engie IIIs in battle-repair is that with the MRS you can just position them or bring them along (assuming you can keep AI tachyon coverage off them) and they'll take care of repairs with not-much-micro, whereas keeping the engie IIIs alive in AI territory is either difficult or micro-intensive or both.

Since you can't repair ships in combat, the fact that engineers cannot cloak while repair doesn't mean nearly as much, since generally repairs in general are done out of combat. Combined that MK III engineers cloak if they aren't in combat, and that they can teleport, then in function engineers III can accomplish what MLRS do, and then some, for less K.


I'll put it in my gameplay.

My blob hits an ai world. The ships I want to repair are in combat, so none can repair. Generally, its not until combat is over that I can repair anything. By that point, there is no agressive ships, so then it is irrelevant whether I deploy an engineer III or an MLRS. The engine III can help do stuff until it is necessary, then warp to help fleet repair, while the MLRS is worthless until it can finally repair things.

[keith.lamothe]

You can repair a ship in combat, you just can't repair a ship that's taken damage in the last 6-7 seconds.  I often find that a significant number of damaged ships get six-seven seconds between additional damage, in big fights.

[chemical_art]

You can repair a ship in combat, you just can't repair a ship that's taken damage in the last 6-7 seconds.  I often find that a significant number of damaged ships get six-seven seconds between additional damage, in big fights.

Maybe, but that's not so at all in either my fights or those whom I play with...at all.

I'll repeat, while acknowledging that its just me...its never happened at all. Not even a "theoritcal" sense, just not at all, period. If my ship can't live the initial barrage, it won't, and if can live 10 seconds, it will live the 15 seconds for my engineer III to get to it.

And that still doesn't discount the fact you get magnitudes less MLRS then you do engineers III cap wise.. .so if half are targetted in a fight but the other half live they still acomplish what the III MLRS can do. And with targetting mechanics, if you teleport in the engineers III 5 seconds or so after the combat blob arrives you still accomplish the same...

That may tie in to the fact that the AARS I read sometimes get engineer marks but never MRS.




...


To put another way...


Having the ability to repair while cloaked while doing nothing else simply is not in any way for me not worth 4k...it just is not, period.  Not when a cheaper engineer can teleport to heal it.

...

To put it a third way...if my ship can live to survive being damaged...then live with no damage for 10 seconds...it can generally live till it gets healed...since the only way it can be damaged and yet survive with no damage for 10 seconds is that the attacker of it died...which the vast majority of the time means a victorious blob fight.

...


so to conclude, if a ship is damaged yet is not attacked for 10 seconds, odds are it lives till it gets healed regardless, since generally for such a situation to occur the player blob is winning anyway, so the fight will be won, so the civilian craft can heal without harassment anyway.

[Cinth]

I would compare the MRS to the Medic Frigate in its utility now, anyway. To me, they both fill the mobile repair role. They should be comparable in that role.

[chemical_art]

I would compare the MRS to the Medic Frigate in its utility now, anyway. To me, they both fill the mobile repair role. They should be comparable in that role.

I could see that, except the mlrs can do nothing but repair...and it costs 4k as opposed to the medic frigate which gets I for free, the II for 2.5k (free if ars) and the 3 and 4 for 6k.

[TechSY730]

Given the recent buffs in caps for engineers, I would agree that the other repair focused stuff (transports Mk. II and MRS especially) could either use a buff or a reduction in knowledge cost. (I do like the Mk. II transport taking less damage each hop idea).

But, IMO, they do their jobs well enough; I don't think any mechanics changes are needed. Just some magnitude (of the mechanics, like # of repair beams) and cost tweaking.

[Diazo]

However, if I unlock the mobile repair station it is later in the game with a larger fleet and the repair station is capped at 20 ships at a time. When my fleet ball is hundreds of ships that just is not enough repair beams.

Perhaps this is so, but I'm not sure:

<SNIP>

I will concede I have not unlocked the MRS for a very long time.

My biggest objection about the number of repair beams would not really apply if I did another pure starship game. I'm thinking I'll do one of those next based on this thread and a few other things.

D.

[Cinth]

Probably could kill the delay and add some beams to the MRS.

Right now I only get them if I am using a bunch of parasites or I feel like taking the Champ out to "harvest" AI ships.