Nominations for Worst Ship Ever (IX)

[chemical_art]

Zenith and Spire Starships
Missile Silos
Guard posts

[Faulty Logic]

I don't see a need to mess with the existing warheads. I'd be up for new ones if we can agree on something useful though.
Keep in mind that a lot of people don't have spirecraft enabled and so don't have martyrs and Carriers are not EMP immune.

Carriers prevent the EMP from reaching their ships, so you end up stunning only what is outside the carriers. EMPs don't prevent them from unloading, either. Nukes should kill entire waves or planets, and armored warheads don't have enough health to consistently reach their target anymore. If you want new warheads like I do, here's one possibility.

[LaughingThesaurus]

So you propose some kind of buff like;
EMP: Ships on the same planet as an EMP, loaded or not, will suffer the effects. The timer is frozen while the ship is loaded. When carriers unload, all of the ships that can, will suffer EMP effects as normal.
Nuke: Destroys the planet and everything on it, guaranteed. Player and AI home planets are 100% nuke immune.
Armored Warhead: Armor or HP buff?

[Hearteater]

What about making Armored Warheads cheaper, less AIP, but just functioning as single-target rams?  They'd be a generic answer to big boys like golems, provided you don't mind taking an AIP hit.  I'm thinking specifically of the issue with a first Exo-wave Armored golem generally being game-over?  But if I could build an Armored Warhead or two in advance to deal with that contingency, that might be a useful purpose.

[Diazo]

So you propose some kind of buff like;
EMP: Ships on the same planet as an EMP, loaded or not, will suffer the effects. The timer is frozen while the ship is loaded. When carriers unload, all of the ships that can, will suffer EMP effects as normal.
Nuke: Destroys the planet and everything on it, guaranteed. Player and AI home planets are 100% nuke immune.
Armored Warhead: Armor or HP buff?

Careful on the EMPs, there are player strategies that revolve around putting ships in transports to survive the AI sending an EMP guardian at you that that would nullify.

Also, as they currently are, I've used EMPs to stun the carriers then bring my fleet in to pop them one at a time and deal with the AI ships one carrier's worth at a time as they stream through the wormhole to my system and into my fixed defenses.

On the Nuke, that would make it a lot more potent. At only 50 AIP I would seriously consider nuking a core world that I would traverse when I went in for the homeworld assault. I do not do that currently because the number of Mk V and Nuke immune units present mean I can't sprint across the system after I've nuked it, I still have a fight on my hands so putting the homeworld on alert that much longer is not worth it in combination with the AIP cost.

On the Armored, I agree this one is pretty useless at the moment. I'd actually like to see this overhauled into a single target killer. Maybe boost the AIP to compensate but when there's that raid engine in a Mk IV system you just can't get to, this would give you a tool to destroy it.

I can adapt to any changes of course, but with the variety of units in the game, any changes will open up some strategies while nullifying others. All we can do is make our case for what we want to see happen.

I am also aware I am one of the more conservative players in terms of suggestion changes, but that is largely because I play with all the toys off, just me and the AI. So in my game the warheads as the currently are more then qualify as superweapons because I don't have spirecraft or golems or something similar.  Where-as in a game with golems or spirecraft enabled, they do most of what warheads can without the AIP cost and so warheads are underpowered then.

D.

[Faulty Logic]

Tachyon: they're jokes. Make them kill all the cloaked ships.
Armored: they don't reach their target unescorted, as is their design purpose.
Lightning: good. I still think that if any unit has "immune to aoe immunity" it should be warheads.
Emp: I don't use these much. I would rather spend the AIP on lightnings, which actually kill the enemy. I would still want them to affect the contents of carriers, though.
Nukes: Remove carrier nuke immunity. Thats all (mkV ships, starships, anything else with nuke immunity can keep it). But right now a nuke kills about as many enemies as a lightning or two.

On the armored ram idea: I am inclined against it. If you have a big target from an exo, then you also have the ability to deal with it. And most high-priority targets are squishy enough so that the AoE damage can kill them.

Careful on the EMPs, there are player strategies that revolve around putting ships in transports to survive the AI sending an EMP guardian at you that that would nullify.

It would still be avoidable by having the transports on a neighboring world. They are meant to be killed before they reach your planet. And transports are different from carriers.

[LaughingThesaurus]

With the EMP change, that would take away some strategies, and add some new trickery. But, if EMPs don't need the new trickery, then by all means don't worry about that change.
W/ the nuke, maybe nuke immune units could simply be nuke resistant, and take a very large portion of their maximum health in damage instead.

[Diazo]

Okay, at this point I am going to:

*Nomination: Spirecraft Polish Pass
*Nomination: Warhead Polish Pass

My reasoning for this is that it is simply been forever since these units got looked at so I think they in general need some love.

Nothing huge, just bringing them inline with the current game.

However, for warheads, that means deciding what their powerlevel is. Are warheads designed to be powerful units as compared to the base game only? On par with a single golem? On par with 3 golems?

Then we can talk about actual changes to the warheads. It is no use tossing out a change to make warheads as powerful as golems when the design decision is that they not be that powerful.

D.

edit: Argh. "Worst Ship" Neither warheads or spirecraft come close to uselessness of the Decoy Drone, so I'm leaving my nomination at that.

[LaughingThesaurus]

Good plan.

I'd have no problem with warheads being ridiculously powerful just because of the AIP cost, that deserves mention. It's permanent, irreversible. As long as the effect is inline with the AIP cost, it's fine. It could be as powerful as a thousand-golem fleet, but if it raises AIP by 5000, that qualifies as pretty much balanced.

[Bognor]

If we're going to look at Armored Warheads, we should address the anomaly where despite the name and ship description, they actually have zero armor.  Maybe a name change to "Durable Warhead" or similar, if for some reason they remain unarmored?

[Faulty Logic]

However, for warheads, that means deciding what their powerlevel is. Are warheads designed to be powerful units as compared to the base game only? On par with a single golem? On par with 3 golems?

The easiest assumption to make is: using the AIP you would get from golems moderate as warheads would be about an even trade.
Or 20 AIP of warheads is worth 3000k, 150k energy, a core fabricator, and some income.

[TechSY730]

Careful on the EMPs, there are player strategies that revolve around putting ships in transports to survive the AI sending an EMP guardian at you that that would nullify.

It would still be avoidable by having the transports on a neighboring world. They are meant to be killed before they reach your planet. And transports are different from carriers.

How about having transporter units (including carriers, even though it is not technically the transport mechanic) that are not X immune not protect their contents from a full planet X damage/blast?
Yes, this would nerf human transports as well, but in return human transports Mk. II could gain EMP and Nuke immunity, giving it a new use. Plus, it gives a reason to fear Mk. V carriers as well.

I also like the partial nuke immunity idea, especially for not normally nuke immune Mk. V fleet ships. Would really help the usefulness of the nuke a bunch. The huge stuff can keep their total nuke immunity

[keith.lamothe]

Here's the poll

[Kahuna]

*Nomination: Hardened Force Field Generator

OK, everything non-armour piercing only does 20% damage to the hardened FF, but the hardened FF only has 25% of the health of a regular FF.  This works out to a 20% bonus for the hardened FF against all non-AP weapons.  BUT... against AP enemies, it effectively takes a 400% damage penalty.  Given that risk, and the extra 1K cost to unlock the Mk 1 version, it seems hardly worth it.

MarkI Bombers vs MarkI Force Field
MarkI Force Field destroyed in: 20,000,000/(78,400*6)=42,5s

MarkI Bombers vs MarkI Hardened Force Field
MarkI Hardened Force Field destroyed in: 5,000,000/((78,400*6)*0,2)=53s