AI War Base Game Unlocks
Bulletproof Fighters - Fighters are good and these are fighters+
Tachyon MicroFighters - Fighters than can't fulfill fighter role. AP too low. Detection does not make up for being half as strong per ship cap as fighters
Raiders - Too expensive for their weak durability unless you have FFBs
Parasites - Currently being discussed. Leech starship mk1 already reclaims just fine so they're redundant and there's no reason to get higher mk leech starships EITHER.
Vampire Claws - Too weak on higher difficulties due to more focused fire. Healing becomes less power as incoming damage rate increases. More fine on lower difficulties.
Raptors - Too flimsy. Kiting is useless when you already blow up almost everything in seconds with a durable fleet blob
Snipers - Haven't used since change. Might be ok
Space Tanks - Fighters+Bombers, second strongest bonus ship behind FFBs. Scale better than any ship in the game with mk except FFBs.
Electric Shuttles - Good for high difficulty defense. AI ships do not bunch up enough to make them all that useful on offense anymore thanks to guardians. Not on my starting pick list because lightning turrets are usually enough. If I get Elec shuttles as an ARS drop it's one of the few times I get excited though, along with getting any of the other top ship picks. Powerful for the AI on defense due to the fact that human ships stick so closely together.
Vorticular Cutlasses - Too flimsy. Can't destroy AI Eyes. Health scales very poorly with mk.
Infiltrators - Haven't used much. Not my personal cup of tea but theoretically seem at least ok since they fire through force fields. Personally, I think it's mostly an AI only ship due to turret bonus.
Eye Bots - Ok unit. Not powerful per ship cap with the removal of AI turrets, but at least extremely cheap in both build and power and fires through FFs with reasonable raw damage. Mostly an AI only ship though due to turret damage again.
Spiders - Engine damage might be ok in defense in some cases (counterwarps), but on offense you're usually vaporizing everything in seconds.
Laser Gatlings - Haven't used much due to low durability. Theoretically, I think they are kind of near to being a potential pick.
Autocannon Minipods - Terrible. Just terrible. They don't really seem to do anything even as good as bad. Worst ship.
Deflector Drones - Too flimsy compared to triangles. Otherwise decent to good.
Space Planes - Too high of a power cost to use effectively at most times since they have a high ship cap. Good ship otherwise though.
EtherJet Tractors - Best gimmick ship, and one of the best ships. Tractor beaming things into turrets is both fun AND effective. Being relatively cheap means it is ok to lose a few. Good for defense as backup tractor turrets or dragging counterpost waves to your defense planet too. Energy cost is kind of high, but has worthwhile effectiveness anyway. Candidate for spots #5 and #6 with anti-armor
Force Field Bearers - Current godship. Overlapping forcefields and an MRS means never losing ships except to ion cannons. Haven't used since the recent health change, but I imagine they are still #1. Only counter to autobombs, so if you don't take these and the AI gets autobombs, it is like moving the difficulty up by 1. These should really just be a regular default start ship, but cost a lot more knowledge (like 3000 mk1/6000 mk2/9000 mk3, they're that good and I would still do it right now at times) and start entirely locked since they are so unique, so irreplaceable, and so necessary to counter specific units.
Armor Ships - Mostly AI only due to turret bonus. Things do, however, like to shoot them and do very little damage instead of shooting other more valuable targets, particularly missile frigates since artillery and ultraheavy are both bomber bonuses, so somewhat useful as an mmo style tank.
Anti-Armor Ships - Combined with FFBs, they are insane damage output against anything. Without FFBs they blow up too fast. Their fearsome damage (wormhole guard posts aren't so bad to blow up with them anymore) make them a candidate for spots #5 and 6 though with Etherjets.
MLRS - Missile frigates+=2, pick #3 for me behind space tanks
Munitions Boosters - Poor man's flagships. Blow up too easy to want to upgrade with knowledge. Mk 1 essentially just saves the knowledge of upgrading flagships, but that only applies if you start with them instead of a better ship, which I usually do and use flagships instead. Upgrading is less worthwhile than just going down the flagship line.
Teleport Raiders - Too flimsy for attacking, and slightly worse than fighters for home defense. Can't group move with the fleet without intensive micro. Cheap cost keeps them useful however.
Teleport Battle Stations - Too flimsy for their cost and too flimsy to use on offense effectively. Can barely scratch mk3+ bombers (though they're great vs mk 1) and everything else of any danger pops them really quickly. Hampered by low ship cap. They are useful as an annoyance defense if the AI gets any of the weak-but-annoying ships like raptors or minipods, but otherwise not anything to spend knowledge on or get excited about, even if your game is one of the 10% that has this marginal value.
Zenith Remnant Unlocks
Zenith Bombardment Ships - Too weak for me, but does have a niche use. Raptors should be at least this good, but I think these could use a bit of a buff as well.
Zenith AutoBombs - Both godly and super weak at the same time, depending
Grenade Launchers - Haven't tried since health update. It's mainly why I never used them much before.
Zenith Electric Bombers - Worse than bombers per ship cap.
Sentinel Frigates - Might be ok. Not my personal strategy. Some people like the advanced warp detection
Zenith Mirrors - Need to be cheaper. They should be like anti-ship only autobombs than you can keep with your fleet.
Zenith Paralyzers - One of the top 5 units. Mk1 is all that is necessary though. Could use a ship cap being cut in half and health multiplied by 5. Kinda flimsy, but cheapness, in addition to being as good as FFBs at times, makes them a main fleet take-along.
Shield Boosters - They improve the survivability of the most survivable units, and do nothing to help other expensive units that you don't want blown up first survive, like cruisers. Maybe it should add a flat armor amount to everything instead of multiplying like attack boosts. Armor ships are better at protecting because armor ships are ultra-heavy and keep bomber fire away from the more fragile yet still expensive frigates at the moment, so armor boosters are automatically a participation award level prize
Zenith Beam Frigates - A bit underpowered in my opinion for human use. They are FEARSOME if the AI gets them. This is the main reason to pick them, so the AI doesn't. That turret bonus is killer. Unfortunately, this picking strategy doesn't really impact ARSes since ARSes are random. I'd also rather pick autobombs to make the AI not get them instead if I am not picking FFBs or some other actually awesome ship.
Zenith Chameleons - Candidate for second worst ship in the game. Only better than autocannon minipods, and only because they can actually hurt FFs a little. Far far far worse than bombers. If they were as good as bombers and had cloak-while-moving they would jump to near the top of the list as AI Eye killers, and a second bomber ship. They would be on par or better than space tanks in my pick list.
Zenith Polarizers - They can blow up bombers. Bombers are dangerous. This makes them at least ok. I still don't use them much though because they aren't as versatile as fighters and many other ship picks.
Zenith Viral Shredders - On lower difficulties these are fine, but they die too quickly to replicate effectively on higher difficulties due to more focused fire, a similar problem as vampires. Poor health scaling means teching up is not very useful.
Impulse Reaction Emitters - Blow up starships ok, and some other stuff. Not as versatile as bombers so again not used as much.
Acid Sprayers - Significantly weaker than fighters per ship cap. Less versatile too. Space tanks and teleraiders are better picks against polycrystal and neutron isn't too widespread, so this end up being near the bottom of the unlocking order.
Children of Neinzul Unlocks
I never use these because of the attrition damage being too great. I can see their potential use though if you're up to the micromanagement challenge.
