Poll: Worst Ship Of The (time interval) Award

[keith.lamothe]

How does their buff in the patch notes look?

[TechSY730]

How does their buff in the patch notes look?

I'm a little concerned by their health. One of the reasons they were OP before is because in many cases, good, reasonable defenses for a stage of the game were not enough to kill enough of them in time if they were thrown into a wave at that stage of the game. Basically, if the AI got them, it was a unfair struggle to stay alive at every wave, which although may be intended in the late game, was not so good for the early game.

Of course, that health may not be all that high. What was their cap health like when they were OP as crud?

The biggest reason they were underpowered before is their speed, not so much their health.

[chemical_art]

Their HP is fine, but they desperately need to lose their armor so MLRS and flak cannons can harm them.

[TechSY730]

Their HP is fine, but they desperately need to lose their armor so MLRS and flak cannons can harm them.

Their old HP or their new HP is fine?

And what is their armor rating currently? Is it really so high that their intended turret counters have trouble damaging them, even with the hull bonuses?

[keith.lamothe]

Iirc their armor is the top for fleet ships: 750*mk (I think at some point Armor ships were actually bumped up to 1000*mk just to be special).  Basically you're shooting at a big chunk of angry metal.

[TechSY730]

Iirc their armor is the top for fleet ships: 750*mk (I think at some point Armor ships were actually bumped up to 1000*mk just to be special).  Basically you're shooting at a big chunk of angry metal.

Yea, that seems a bit much for a melee ship. IMO, for any melee ship, good HP, good armor, good damage, or good speed, pick at most three. All four, and you got yourself an OP melee unit on your hands, which you would have in their currently proposed 5.025 version.

[chemical_art]

New hp is fine.. Actually, looking at the stats, MLR's still do over 77% of their damage, and for flaks the damage is over 97%.***

***Their damage is 186% and 233% of their base damage, for reference

I forgot that even with their relatively high armor it still means little due to the abysmal armor across the board.

So, if anything, I'd like to keep their armor. Keep in mind that in any blob they attack they will get the brunt of the attacks due to they being right in the middle of it, AND they lose HP simply from attacking, and they lack any healing or reproduction mechanic.

They will still die quickly.

[chemical_art]

Looking at the stats, I'm surprised the vampire claw was not on the list.

Has anyone ever used it successfully? It's cap HP is less then 1/3 of shredders and 2/3 the damage of the shredders. If you count how easily it is to have a 1/2 more of a cap of the shredders per world (is that how the mechanics go? Or is it total? I'll go based on a 1/2 more cap total since that is easy for standard play) then the claws have about 1/4 the health and 50% the damage of shreders.

Any time I use the claws, their tiny health and very few numbers make their vampirism worthless. The only way to not make them completely useless to have them blob with your fleet and move the whole fleet into melee range.

***Cutlesses not listed. Before the patch their health and dps completely trashed them, but now with their speed boost the claws will be  vastly inferior in almost every way, aside from one being able to attack virtually everything and suffer a little damage while one can attack few things and heals a little.

The ship is terrible.

[TechSY730]

Looking at the stats, I'm surprised the vampire claw was not on the list.

Has anyone ever used it successfully? It's cap HP is less then 1/3 of shredders and 2/3 the damage of the shredders. If you count how easily it is to have a 1/2 more of a cap of the shredders per world (is that how the mechanics go? Or is it total? I'll go based on a 1/2 more cap total since that is easy for standard play) then the claws have about 1/4 the health and 50% the damage of shreders.

Any time I use the claws, their tiny health and very few numbers make their vampirism worthless. The only way to not make them completely useless to have them blob with your fleet and move the whole fleet into melee range.

The ship is terrible.

Agreed, the vampire needs a buff. Maybe keep their attack as is, but give them a standard fleet ship cap (92 on medium, was it?), buff their HP enough to actually survive long enough to attack for their vampirism to kick in (but not so much to trivialize their vampirism as a survivability aid), and increase the percentage of damage inflicted that goes back into healing itself.

[keith.lamothe]

They will still die quickly.

Yea, that's why I also made them dirt-cheap, so you can use them kinda like autobombs or younglings if needed (I was surprised while in there to see that some younglings are still more expensive than some non-auto-attrition fleet ships... not sure how big a deal it is, but seems odd).

To borrow from Shrugging Khan: these are a "Death And Glory" ship   The Death part is inevitable, but hopefully they can do enough damage for little enough cost that there'll be some Glory too.

[chemical_art]

They will still die quickly.

Yea, that's why I also made them dirt-cheap, so you can use them kinda like autobombs or younglings if needed (I was surprised while in there to see that some younglings are still more expensive than some non-auto-attrition fleet ships... not sure how big a deal it is, but seems odd).

To borrow from Shrugging Khan: these are a "Death And Glory" ship   The Death part is inevitable, but hopefully they can do enough damage for little enough cost that there'll be some Glory too.

Their cost will help, yes.

What I was getting at was to leave their armor so as to help a little to survive. So that they can be (I'll paraphrase) "A hunk of angry metal"

[Hearteater]

Please be cautious with buffing Vampire Claws, they are the #1 unit killing my important structures.  They have missile immunity which makes them rough on your turrets and takes out 1/3 of your triangle ships.  If it weren't for Lightning Turrets evaporating them, they'd be incredibly tough to deal with.  I'm not saying they don't need help (they do) but be gentle.  I would absolutely love to see their vampirism be much more effective.  I almost think they should have AOE vampirism, where their melee attacks heal not only themselves, but all other friendly Vampire Claws nearby.  This would make swarms of them very effective and fun.

EDIT: Forgot the "my"

[Shrugging Khan]

Well...I'm really happy about the changes. The speed alone, combined with their blade attack advantage, will put them right up there with the Shredders and Vampires 

PS: Good ideas on the youngling NSs, too!

[chemical_art]

Please be cautious with buffing Vampire Claws, they are the #1 unit killing my important structures.  They have missile immunity which makes them rough on your turrets and takes out 1/3 of your triangle ships.  If it weren't for Lightning Turrets evaporating them, they'd be incredibly tough to deal with.  I'm not saying they don't need help (they do) but be gentle.  I would absolutely love to see their vampirism be much more effective.  I almost think they should have AOE vampirism, where their melee attacks heal not only themselves, but all other friendly Vampire Claws nearby.  This would make swarms of them very effective and fun.

EDIT: Forgot the "my"

I don't see how they are tough. They are immune to missiles, yes, but those turrets do not get a bonus against them anyway. They get butchered against flak turrets and lasers, and a few lightning turrets is an absolute curb stomp against waves of them. Any threat they could pose is almost half as bad as shredders or cutlasses would pose.

[Hearteater]

They are "tough" because when they get anywhere you don't have much defense, they are self-sustainable and able to kill Fabs and Adv. Factories under Force Fields extremely fast.  And sometimes even when you do have a lot of defense:

A reinforcement cycle adds some more enemy ships which helpfully stream into my fleet ball and I score a good chunk of reclamation on them, including another Mark III Bombard! Then suddenly, I hear the AI taunt me as a Command Station is destroyed.

I pause and check the map. Everything looks fine. I go back to Youdon and realize he just killed my freshly build Command Station there--right under nearly 800 fleet ships--with a single freaking Vampire Claw! Out of that entire stream of Mark III ships, that one thing slipped through and got the kill. I reclaimed it for the annoyance of rebuilding the Command Station. While I'm messing around with this, a wave warning has popped up but I was so focused I didn't notice.

Just to be clear, a small stream (less than 100) Mark III ships engaged my Mark I-III ball of 800 ships.  One Vampire Claw III made it the entire distance, traveled directly through my fleet, and killed my Command Station.  How it didn't die I do not know, but I'm assuming it attacked ships as it passed, healing the damage done so it could continue to the CS.