Flak turrets feel weak

[chemical_art]

will elaborate later

[keith.lamothe]

Haha, you successfully baited me, thinking there would be details   Will check back later.

[TechSY730]

In my experiance, they are not durable enough for their short range. As such, they almost always go down before they can do much.

[keith.lamothe]

The range is tricky, yes, but they do have fairly high durability (mkI: 24 million cap-health, 750 armor, the only normal types with higher effective cap-health are ShieldBearer, ArmorShip, Laser Turret, Antimatter Starship) and their maximum cap dps (with efficient aoe application against things it has a bonus again) is about 1.6M.  Against stuff they don't have a bonus for they still do 672K, which is the highest of the normal fleet ships, turret, and starship types other than a few types that are either kamikaze or fairly situational to get efficient application from (specifically, ZenithAutoBomb, SpireMiniRam, ZenithPolarizer, ImpulseReactionEmitter, LightningTurret, ZenithBeamFrigate).  And that advantage actually gets higher at higher marks because they can hit more targets per shot at II and III.

Anyway, I don't mind buffing the range a bit, but the fact is that flaks have very nearly the highest durability AND very nearly the highest damage of the standard fleet ship, turret, and starship types.  So they need some kind of counter-balance.

[BobTheJanitor]

Will make pointless off-topic comment later.

[Mánagarmr]

Stating a pointless opinion that no one is going to pay attention to, simply to raise my post count and appear "active".

[keith.lamothe]

I see you've been streamlining your implementations.

[Mánagarmr]

I see you've been streamlining your implementations.

Aye, have to stay efficient. I've yet to actually write the method though >_<

[chemical_art]

I've thought on it a little, a few things:

MLR's seem to more efficently do the job flaks do. I know their effectiveness doesn't always match up, but...
Flak turrets have damage reducers in addition to no armor piercing, resulting in puny damage in wide range of ships and
With their short range, if they can fire, so can all the wave blob as well. It doesn't matter that they are tough, they still go down and
With their high cost, they drain the economy, acting as much as punching bags as damage dealers

The mental test I came up with when I first started this was (a great judge for many things in game)...

"Is there ever a time where I would want to research an upgrade?"

For the flak, it has always, always been no.

[Wanderer]

The flak turrets have always annoyed me for one thing.  Unless you stick them under the FF, they can't cover the entire bubble of even a Mk 1 forcefield.  Under the bubble is practically useless, as well, the damage reduction is so blinkin' high.

I've never upgraded them but I will use them as 'final turrets' to build once I'm out of the others in the whipping boy, if for no other reason then to slow up inbound waves that much more.  They go down pretty quickly but meh, the math works.  Side note: Caps of Zenith Starships and Spire Starships will beat out DPS on Flak Is.  Not an equivalent comparison though due to knowledge investment.

One place I have used flaks more effectively is closer to the home station, to thwack stragglers and/or cloakers who get past the net.  It kind of defeats the point of their massive multi-strike, but usually cloakers and the like are running really weak armor so it works out, and I can keep more effective (read, better ranged and more survivable) turrets up at the front line.

Now, if we want to get to useless, can we discuss lightning turrets?  Well, I'll open that door after I test the new upgrades where there's no cap of hits on the cap of turrets, because half die in the first blob strike.  I still want a tazer turret, though.

[TechSY730]

I wouldn't mind them losing some health and maybe bit of DPS for some more range.
When it comes to turrets, generally speaking, more range does more for survivability than more health.

[keith.lamothe]

MLR's seem to more efficently do the job flaks do. I know their effectiveness doesn't always match up, but...
Flak turrets have damage reducers in addition to no armor piercing, resulting in puny damage in wide range of ships

They do have a reduction against Heavy and UltraHeavy.  That's largely thematic: how much does flak do to something really big?  But damage penalties are generally not done much anymore, those can go away if it really makes a difference.

As for armor piercing, I think it'd be a bit much to give them that too.  MLRS lacks it, too, and the basic turret armor piercing is pretty low.  If everything gets armor piercing, then...

Compared to a cap of MLRS, a cap of flaks can do 62% more raw damage.  How big would the difference need to be in order to make up the other differences?  Basically 4x so it can go under forcefields?

With their short range, if they can fire, so can all the wave blob as well. It doesn't matter that they are tough, they still go down and
With their high cost, they drain the economy, acting as much as punching bags as damage dealers

As far as cost, a cap of flaks only costs about 9% more than a cap of mlrs's; or would replacing mlrs's also be a big drain, it's just that they don't get hit much?

The mental test I came up with when I first started this was (a great judge for many things in game)...

"Is there ever a time where I would want to research an upgrade?"

For the flak, it has always, always been no.

And that is an important data point, but I'm not completely persuaded that we're working from the same starting facts, yet

[Wanderer]

With their short range, if they can fire, so can all the wave blob as well. It doesn't matter that they are tough, they still go down and
With their high cost, they drain the economy, acting as much as punching bags as damage dealers

As far as cost, a cap of flaks only costs about 9% more than a cap of mlrs's; or would replacing mlrs's also be a big drain, it's just that they don't get hit much?

Pretty much.  The only thing that can reach the MLRS out of the tractor ball early is the Missile Frigs and their ilk.  Everything has flaks in range.  Squish.

[keith.lamothe]

Pretty much.  The only thing that can reach the MLRS out of the tractor ball early is the Missile Frigs and their ilk.  Everything has flaks in range.  Squish.

Fair enough.

Ok, here's the thing: I want there to be some short range turrets.  What would have to happen to the flak for it to be competitive with other turret types at their current range?  And it doesn't have to be exactly the same, I'd be willing to add 500, maybe 1000, to ease placement, but more than that is getting out of the territory I'm aiming at.

[HellishFiend]

Rather than increasing the range, how about AOE damage on-death? That would give us more reason to build them close enough to the wormhole to have adequate fire coverage, plus getting a warm fuzzy feeling in place of the rage when they die and take out a few more ships with them.  Wouldnt have to be an outrageous amount of damage - just enough to be felt and contribute to the cause of destroying large amounts of smaller ships.