Nominations for Worst Ship Ever (V)

[keith.lamothe]

Been a while since the last one because it took a while to get that release out and AVWW's definitely in crunch-mode now so not a lot of time for AIW, but I want to keep this ball rolling.  I'm thinking it's nearing time for a "what most needs a nerf?" but not just yet.

So: what most needs a buff?  Anything human-usable is fair-game this time around.

For reference, previous winners (in the sense that they got buffs as a result) :
I - Vorticular Cutlass
II - Acid Sprayer
III - IRE, Space Plane, Vampire Claw
IV - Harvester Exo-Shield, Harvester, Warp Jammer Command Station, Mobile Repair Station

[Hearteater]

Still pretty torn here.  Infiltrator and Armor ships are bad, but my friend has Electric Bombers in our current game and they are just struggling despite what appear to be decent numbers otherwise.  Their movement speed just makes them really annoying to use.  But given that I think the armor system is really the problem more than the Armor Ship itself, and that at least I can make some use of Electric Bombers on occasion, I think my nomination will be: Infiltrators

[Lee]

I'll go ahead and say Teleport Battlestations, they don't seem to be very effective either in player or AI hands, unlike the TP Raider.

[Nodor]

Tachyon Turrets and Tachyon Drones need a range buff.

[Diazo]

I can agree with teleport battlestations as being pretty weak.

I'm actually torn on the concept of combat units with teleport in general. By function of their movement method they are a terrible annoyance to try and use with your fleet but they are not strong enough as is to be used on their own, and if you buff them to be used on their own they move into over-powered territory.

Does the mechanic on cooldown between teleports still exist? If so, what about buffing the battlestation but giving it a 10 second cooldown between teleports? Turn it into a quick-response mini-fortress type unit.

But that would make it either useless or overpowered on offense depending on the size of the buff.

As for teleport raiders, give them a bigger first strike capability? Keep their absolute DPS numbers roughly the same but move it to a more powerful, longer cooldown shot (like 20 seconds?) and give them a 2 or 3 second cooldown on teleport so they can hit and run but not with impunity.

Have not ever had any other teleporting units under my control so no comment on them.

D.

[Hearteater]

Teleporting units are paralyzed briefly when they teleport long distances.  Short hops do not trigger the paralysis.

Teleport Battle Stations are actually pretty nice, although I won't cry to see them buffed.  The biggest issue with all teleporting units is they must be micro'd so differently that the current game controls don't really make it easy.  A control group improvement would be very helpful.  If TBS gets buffed, I'd mainly want to see them toughened up.  Their DPS is reasonable given their ability to teleport.  But some additional health and armor would make them much easier to use.  They have less than 30% of the cap-health of Fighters, and their additional 600 armor just doesn't make up for that.

[TechSY730]

I think teleporting units should get two things,
One, better behaviour of teleporters when group moving, like when group moving, they will incrementally teleport with everything else they are moving with. This will make them far less likely to teleport way ahead without "backup" and get themselves killed on the offense.
Two, teleporting units are basically specialists at alpha striking, and their stats should reflect that. Thus, a similar transform with damage like space planes got seems to be a good idea.

So despite that these ideas would make teleporting units much nicer to use, it isn't really enough to make me declare teleporters as a potential worst unit.

I would agree with the infiltrators. They have a low HP (which is fine, due to their high ship cap), but thy generally do not live long enough to take qladvantage of their FF immunity. Once again, adjusting their damage stats to focus on "initial volley strength" like space planes seems to be in order, and maybe a light speed buff too.

Armor ships, great durability, ok damage, but it is too slow to really use it, and they don't have enough of the other two to make up for it.

Spirecraft Ion blasters, their currently broken autotargetting behaviour (Mantis issue #4477) kills it usefulness. Their HP also seems a bit low for their range. So maybe an HP or range buff?
Spirecraft Attrtioners, their base DPS is too low (this also applies to AI attritioners) and having at least some portion of its "damage echoing" be a bit more focused could help make it's effect more visible (relevant forum post: http://www.arcengames.com/forums/index.php/topic,10069 my proposed change to "focus" its special damage "feedback" without making it OP: http://www.arcengames.com/forums/index.php/topic,10069.msg96546.html#msg96546)
Spirecraft sheild bearer, a bit of an HP buff and a minimum FF radius would make me happy.

Tachyon drone (the mobile one you don't have to unlock) range is supposed to be small, I know, but right now the range is so small it is useless. And only 2 of them?!

Tachyon turrets, HP seems a bit low for their short range. (not a nomination for "worst" though)

Pretty much all the experimental units I am nominating as well.

[Minotaar]

For me Teleport Raider is already the most annoying wave possible, their numbers build up really fast even in the early game and you can't stop them from getting in the face of your command station, barring Logistics 3. You need an insane FF stack to actually stall them long enough to kill all of them, and have to cover all the other wormholes too. So wouldn't like a buff to those very much, even though they are pretty useless for the humans.
Basically, for the AI the teleporters are very powerful on the offense (thanks to tractor and grav immunity), while humans can use them better at defense (high galaxy-map mobility). But none of the ships we have at the moment fill both of those roles. Teleporting Leech is a defender, the Raider is an attacker, and the Station isn't great at both.

For my picks I would also take experimental ships (the Arachnid fab got fixed up, gotta get the rest of them) and the decloaking options, including Mr. Decloaker himself, who for some inexplicable reason still has an 80k dmg gun and 40k hp. 

[Ricca]

I'd have to say Decloakers and Tachyon Drones, and maybe have a look at the experimental stuff, like Speed Boosters and Microparasites.

I mean, it feels like Scout Starships Mk 1 are better drones then the tach drones at the moment, and while Decloakers have amazing range, they're too frail.

And the experimentals have fallen behind in terms of HP and damage.

[Eternaly_Lost]

I want to put Neinzul Enclave Starships up again. But I do second the Decloakers and Tachyon Drones.

[Diazo]

Umm, wow.

Can I change my vote to the decoy drones? Attract all incoming fire with a health of only 200,000 and a ship cap of 9? That's less the 2 million hp absorbed.

Although with how infrequently I hear about these spawning I'm not sure it worth buffing.

D.

[TechSY730]

Doi, forgot about Neinzul Enclave Starships, I'll second that nomination.

[chemical_art]

Neinzul enclaves please.

[TechSY730]

Ok, after thinking things through a bit, I think I can narrow down my list to four items

• Decoy drone (nowhere near enough cap HP to do their job effectively)
• Tachyon drone (too little range, and as a lesser issue, too small of a ship cap) (If these get a buff, their "psuedo Mk. II" variant, the decloaker, should probably get a buff too)
• Neinzul enclave starship (Mk. I self construct rate too low, higher marks are near pointless thanks to no self construct rate increase over mark, too low HP to be used effectively)
• Spirecraft Ion Blaster (as mentioned before, their broken auto-targetting behaviour destroys any usefulness they could have. Their HP also seems rather low given their range)
  

[Wanderer]

I'm afraid I'll have to disagree with everyone regarding decoy drones, but not because of their lack of power in the player's hands.  Add the support style AI to any game, and you'll see how brutal decoys can be in the AI's hands.  They don't need a buff or nerf, they need to be glared at until the targetting mechanics for them are better understood.

Currently, what happens when a number of decoy drones come in is everything fires at ONE.  Then, when the rest are all streaming at the targets, your entire fleet fires at... ONE MORE.  Rinse/repeat for half a large planet, or until everything's on the command station in a small one.

However, my current personal votes are not from ships that I look at and scoff, but from ships I wish were actually useful (in my hands, in the case of teleporting ships).

1) Neinzul Factory Ships.  Their K prices, enforced Engineer III investment, and tin-plating make them more of a novelty ship then something you could use with heavy strategy.

2) Fleet Support Ship K rebalancing.  I'd like them to reflect their K costs more efficiently, and a better idea of how many ships each of them can boost within the fleet.  I'd expect a flock of MK I Fleet SSs to be able to boost a full fleetball of MK I fleet ships.  The new modifications got them in-line with each other, but their K costs are outrageous for what you actually gain.

3) Riot Starship III.  I've never been in a game where I've looked at the Riot III and said "I *want* that."  Can't remember the last time I said "'eh, they might be nice" either.

4) Teleporting ships in general, but not because of the ship themselves.  Does EVERYTHING I'd want to teleport raid really need to be Minor Electric Immune?  They can't stay with the fleet ball so they pretty much have to be a micro'd force and/or a raiding force.  These are the mechnics surrounding them that make me not want to use them.

5) Warheads.  Desperately. 

If I'm staring at a threatball or situation that's dangerous enough that I'm willing to trade AIP for destruction, these things need to destroy the target.  Threatballs of that danger already are larger in distance surrounding an inbound warp gate then the largest AoE available (which is, strangely, on the smallest missile).  Couple that with the AoE immune triangle ship (always a thorn in my side) and you've reduced, tremendously, the value of these items. 

The Tachyon Missile is merely a 'decloaker's too fragile, where's the stealth post' missile.  It's too expensive. 

EMPs could be fun but it's a minimum of 2 AIP for 30 seconds and doesn't work against the ships you REALLY need them for, MK V, particularly if they're doing a gate-camp. 

Armored are utterly pointless.  The only thing you need an armored missile for is popping particular and specific AI HW guardposts which are surrounded by, and include, warhead interceptors.  If you could pop the interceptors, you could pop the guardpost(s).

6) Harvesters, still far too weak.  It takes me 5 minutes to have my econ at 1 mill/1mill with these at level III in the opening part of the game.  That's just wrong for the cost.  Sheesh.  Please, buff these.  Maybe we can add a mechanic where each MK III harvester will pump out a MK V patrolling zombie fighter or something, or just a random unlocked fleet ship.

7) K costs for most, if not all, starships, in general.  The only ones I agree with currently are Raid and Cloaker.  Even after playing around with them heavily I don't see the need for higher MK Scouts nor can justify the K cost for the III/IV.  You get the MK IV fleet-scout for free eventually since you have to picket so many worlds and will simply need the volume of fleet scout III to do it in most games.  Well, I do anyway.