So, were combat starships overbuffed? (v. 6.019)

[Radiant Phoenix]

Back when the Spire Starship was the only base ship other than the Raptor to have gravity immunity, its radar dampening was essential to its function -- which was messing up stuff under gravity, which would have been difficult if it was getting whaled on by half the ships in the system for the whole time.

I'm not sure if it needs it now.

[Faulty Logic]

After playing a couple games with the new starships, here are my thoughts:

They are too good, but not by much.

I want to keep their durability and resource costs, and their k costs are in the ballpark (maybe another 500 k for the mkIIs).

I would say to nerf DPS by a factor of .8 or .75 and reinstall the munitions boosting cap at 150%. As the epitome of low-cap units, with all the advantages that entails, they will manage.

[keith.lamothe]

After playing a couple games with the new starships, here are my thoughts:

They are too good, but not by much.

I want to keep their durability and resource costs, and their k costs are in the ballpark (maybe another 500 k for the mkIIs).

I would say to nerf DPS by a factor of .8 or .75 and reinstall the munitions boosting cap at 150%. As the epitome of low-cap units, with all the advantages that entails, they will manage.

I've played a few games with them too, although in the 7-7.6 range.

I really like playing with them, but they're crossing one of the lines: I can take out AI HWs with only starships.  I basically don't have a lot of reason to need fleet ships at those difficulty levels.  Shield Bearers are great to have along, and "Space Dock Cannon" types like the autobomb and firefly are great tools, and so on... but I could actually just put all the K into starships, use the free fleet ships from start and ARS's plus the free turrets on defense, and take the starships around as an unstoppable wrecking crew (particularly once taking an ASC) through anything I really care to.  Granted, that's with HarvesterIIIs but it doesn't take that much K to get the starships.

What I was going for with the 6.012 changes to the main combat starships was to make sure they were a good deal for the K (which I think succeeded, to put it mildly, though the plasma-siege is a little more borderline), but that the "total" available to you even if you just unlocked all of them would not suffice as a replacement for fleet ships.  Maybe all_starships+free_fleetships, and it's fine if they work as an independent fleet for small-to-moderate ops, but not as an independent AI-HW-wrecking fleet.

Part of the problem is that when I halved their K costs and set about making their stats target "half a cap" of comparable fleet ships, there was community pressure to not take them that low.  Which is fine, but the result is starships (specifically the mkIV zenith or spire) that don't die and have enough firepower to face down the AIs strategic reserve.  Not to mention superweapon-territory stats, though that by itself isn't the problem.

I could partly alleviate that by bringing them all back up to caps of 4 or whatever, but I honestly would prefer having them all have caps of 1.  The epitome of the low-cap ship, as you say.

Anyway, what I'm seeing is a need to further emphasize that starships as a category are intended as supplemental units, not superweapons.  Before that, though, I think we need to take a look at the current stats and ask if they're in line with their K costs.

You're willing to pay 2500 K for mkII fighters.  On epic-combat-style, that's paying 2500 K for about (slight overestimates) 32M HP and 600k bonus-DPS.  Right now you can buy a mkI Zenith Starship for 500 K and get 36M HP and 160k bonus-DPS.  The mkII is 1000 K for 72M HP and 320k bonus-DPS.  Even for just the DPS you're getting more for your K, and the HP is over twice as good.  Granted, you pay a lot of m+c for these, but I don't think that justifies that magnitude of stat difference.

I'm not really wanting to bring the K costs up to match the stats, but rather bring the stats down to suit the K costs.  Possibly even bring the K costs (and thus stats) down even lower.

Otherwise it seems inevitable that these will overshadow fleetships.  I don't mind if someone wants starships that overshadow fleetships (I'm one of those people), but we've already got an option for that (Fallen Spire) and having a base-game category that does it too is just too much.

[TechSY730]

Yea, I agree.
The starships need somewhat of a nerf. Not a huge one, but IMO, they do need at least some "toning down".

[Faulty Logic]

I would like the human combat starships (flag, bomber, leech, siege) to keep their cap of 2. I often use these for garrisons, and 1 ship, for all its advantages, can't be in two places at once.

I would nerf them by degrees, because balance around these is really unintuitive, so it doesn't take much to go from "awesome" to "expensive wastes."

I think my proposed nerf would be a good starting point.

[keith.lamothe]

I would like the human combat starships (flag, bomber, leech, siege) to keep their cap of 2. I often use these for garrisons, and 1 ship, for all its advantages, can't be in two places at once.

Yea, that's why I've kept them at 2.  The Zenith and Spire could also go up to 2 to sand off some of the outlier performance we're seeing, though I confess nigh-immortal starships are entertaining.

I would nerf them by degrees, because balance around these is really unintuitive, so it doesn't take much to go from "awesome" to "expensive wastes."

Right, we don't have to go whole-hog right off the bat but I'm trying for some kind of objective understanding here, otherwise it's more of a "press button repeatedly until too many people scream" process which tends to not really produce balance.

Anyway, if you're willing to pay 2500 K for 32M HP and 600k bonus-DPS in a cap of 96 ships (assuming normal caps), how much are you willing to pay that same amount to get those same stats on a single-unit cap?  More, less, or exactly the same?  On a 2-unit-cap?

[Aklyon]

I'd agree with the zenith/spire starships having a bit too much health, fighting one of those in the middle of a bunch of AI ships is like walking into a non-sand wall someone built in the middle of the beach for no apparent reason.

[Faulty Logic]

Anyway, if you're willing to pay 2500 K for 32M HP and 600k bonus-DPS in a cap of 96 ships (assuming normal caps), how much are you willing to pay that same amount to get those same stats on a single-unit cap?  More, less, or exactly the same?  On a 2-unit-cap?

Depends. Generally, I would pay about 1000 k extra for condensation (I essentially do this if I ship-design hack for a low-capper), but in large-scale battles, they are essentially equivalent.

2-unit is not much different.

[keith.lamothe]

Anyway, if you're willing to pay 2500 K for 32M HP and 600k bonus-DPS in a cap of 96 ships (assuming normal caps), how much are you willing to pay that same amount to get those same stats on a single-unit cap?  More, less, or exactly the same?  On a 2-unit-cap?

Depends. Generally, I would pay about 1000 k extra for condensation (I essentially do this if I ship-design hack for a low-capper), but in large-scale battles, they are essentially equivalent.

2-unit is not much different.

Ok, thanks.

And if you're willing to pay 2500 K for a cap with 600k DPS, how much would you be willing to pay for a cap with 320k DPS, all else (HP, cap, etc) being equal?

[Faulty Logic]

And if you're willing to pay 2500 K for a cap with 600k DPS, how much would you be willing to pay for a cap with 320k DPS, all else (HP, cap, etc) being equal?

2500* (320 + 30*) / 600 = 1458.33333. Or 1500 k, to avoid fractions.

*HP matters a bit.

[keith.lamothe]

And if you're willing to pay 2500 K for a cap with 600k DPS, how much would you be willing to pay for a cap with 320k DPS, all else (HP, cap, etc) being equal?

2500* (320 + 30*) / 600 = 1458.33333. Or 1500 k, to avoid fractions.

*HP matters a bit.

Ok, makes sense.  Would condensation of that from a 96-cap to a 1-cap or 2-cap be worth 1000 K, or more like 500 K?  And what would increasing the HP from 32M to 72M be worth?

I feel like a car salesman.  Well, not quite.

[Faulty Logic]

Ok, makes sense.  Would condensation of that from a 96-cap to a 1-cap or 2-cap be worth 1000 K, or more like 500 K?  And what would increasing the HP from 32M to 72M be worth?

500 (less if it comes with obscene resource costs), and situational (from ~250 to ~750 extra k, depending on how important increased raiding ability is).

[TechSY730]

I feel like a car salesman.  Well, not quite.

Come on down to Keith's used starship emporium!

[chemical_art]

(tries not to scream)

k costs need to roughly come down with the degree of nerfing for starships.

[keith.lamothe]

(tries not to scream)

k costs need to roughly come down with the degree of nerfing for starships.

I don't want to nerf these, but if they're just drastically a better deal than fleetships, it's kind of inevitable right?  Anyway, what are your answers on the "is it worth it?" questions?

Are mkII fighters or bombers or missile frigates worth it?  In other words, 2500 K for roughly 32M HP and 600k DPS (on normal combat style).

How much are you willing to pay to get those same stats packed into 1 or 2 ships instead of 96?

How much are you willing to pay for half the DPS?

How much are you willing to pay to double the HP?