Spire Shield bearers suck and need to be reworked (I have ideas :D)

[zackk]

Alright, as I am sure that some of you are aware, Spirecraft Shield bearers are not worth the extremely rare and finite materials that they consume.

For those of you who do not know what the ship does, It provides a large shield to your fleet (yay) while not being able to be repaired (ugh). Also, for some strange reason, they do not like to be selected with my military ships, even though their entire purpose is to protect military ships. For a ship that can only be manufactured in a very limited quantity, the lack of repairing it makes it almost unusable and practically a waste. I suggest Spirecraft Shield bearers are long overdue for an overhaul that could allow them to be repair while still not being unbalanced

Option 1: Spirecraft Defense booster
Instead of a shield that eventually wears away, how about damage resistance. Think about it, for small ships it gives a 25% damage resist, for larger ships (such as flagships) it gives a lesser resistance  such as 10% at mark 1, with each mark adding 5%. This could allow you to repair the ship while not unbalancing it as the ships will still get destroyed, just not as fast.

Option 2: Spirecraft Accelerator
Essentially, this would let the ship act as a sort of tug boat, pulling slower ships along, not as fast as the quickest ships mind you, but faster than the molasses speed some ships currently travel at.

Option 3: Spirecraft Scrambler
This (possibly cloaked) ship would fly up to AI ships and reduce the damage that they can output, making it useful for mitigating damage that AI turrets do while the rest of the fleet goes out and hunts down the targets.

Let me know which option you would like to see as well as your own suggestions.

[TechSY730]

I don't know what you are talking about. I use Spirecraft Shield bearers all the time. Unlike regular forcefields, they don't require supply, and they are immune to EMP.
The lower tiers even have great cost effectiveness, given how common the lower tier asteroids are.

Yea, they can't be repaired, but they can buy you precious seconds when something slips through to an important planet.
These babies have saved my life on multiple occasions.


I will grant you that the higher marks don't have quite a good enough "cost efficiency" to be worth it, given the rarity of the higher tiers of asteroids. But this is a more general problem among the spirecraft overall.

Granted, it is very difficult to find a good balance point. What is balanced for defensive uses would be OP for offensive uses, and what is balanced for offensive uses would be UP for defensive uses. Not such as a big deal for the lower marks, but starts really evident for the higher marks.
This reason may be why a mechanic shift maybe needed; a highspeed forcefield meant for both offense and defense may be an inherently unbalanced given the current offense/defense ratio of the current balance of the game.

[Tridus]

I think they need to have a regen time. That'd be the simplest solution. If you can get it out of the fight alive, it should be usable for future fights.

That said, the general purpose of ships like this might need a rethink in the wake of Vengenance. Consider that a mk 1 Spirecraft Shield Bearer can stop 14 million damage, and it's dead.

A mk 1 Protector Starship can stop 1 million damage, per second, forever. In a five minute long fight, one of these is clearly superior to the other (let alone the goofy awesomeness that is the mk IV Protector). Then again, given that two Protector mk II's can shut down a mk III Fortress entirely, maybe the problem is that Protectors are just too good right now. That nerf would make me sad, though.

[TechSY730]

I think they need to have a regen time. That'd be the simplest solution. If you can get it out of the fight alive, it should be usable for future fights.

I proposed that earlier (WAY earlier, like a year or 2 ago back in the beta days of the expansion they were introduced, IIRC), but that was turned down due to the fear that would promote "Netflix play" (just wasting time at +10 speed) too much when using them.
However, with all of the other new plots, minor factions, and modifiers that have been introduced since then (not to mention champions) to give "something else to do", this might not be an issue anymore, and thus the regen idea may be viable again.



And yea, from what I have seen, the protector starship needs a good ol' whack from the nerf bat. (Maybe cost could come down some in return though, IDK)

[keith.lamothe]

Welcome to the forums


The Spirecraft Shield Bearer is very much like a defensive warhead: one use, a truckload of additional HP for whatever it is, and not good for sustained use.

That ability is pretty niche, but it can make the difference between victory and defeat.  Kinda like warheads.


Adding a slow regen timer is possible, but as noted there is always a concern with giving the player that's "this will do X for you if you're just willing to pass 10 game hours somehow"

[zackk]

What did you guys think of my possible reworks? I think the Damage resistance is a fun idea that would make it less niche, what about you?

Also, I can't figure out how to set them to where I get selected with my military ships, any help?

[Tridus]

If they're not considered millitary ships, you can hold down either shift or ctrl (I forget which one) and then click them to add them to an already selected fleet. There's no toggle for those to make them selectable automatically like there is for some other non-military ships.

As for the reworks, we already have #1 (armor boosters) and #3 (protector starships, essentially) in the game already. Not sure if there's a mobile speed booster or not.

The shield bearer has a niche, I don't think that needs changing.

[relmz32]

Yeah, shieldbearers could use a rework, but they are by no means weak. Keep a pair on your hw, adv factory and anything else that is too good to lose.

Also, by the  way, the minerals are not very rare at all, you can harvest from planets in supply(adjacent to your controlled worlds) which gives you access to even more tahtyou can use.

[LaughingThesaurus]

There should be a little bit of an upgrade to the higher mark ones. Low mark asteroids are really easy to find, so those ships being disposable is fine. The high mark shieldbearers though? Who in their right mind would spend a ridiculously rare resource to get something that is an irreparable shield? That sounds like a decision based on a bit of faulty... um... thinking. I'm more inclined to get high mark versions of other spirecraft ships and use the low mark shieldbearers instead.

[zackk]

Maybe instead of one big shield, it could have a smaller/weaker shield that "gives out" without the ship being destroyed. The only way it could get the shield back up is by going to a controlled planet and recharging. What do u think of that idea?

[Orelius]

How about instead of having multiple marks of shield bearers, only have one mark that consumes asteroids in order to gain an according amount of health and shield area?  For example, reptite could add 14 million hp to the shield bearer, while higher marks of asteroids give larger amounts according to the mark of asteroid.

[zackk]

Just an idea, I want to be able to tell the shield bearer to follow another unit. I like to build siege towers and use them as defense because they are so slow. I want to be able to make the shield to follow that siege tower around when it is in FRD mode. Is there a way I can do this with out excessive amounts of micro?

[Bognor]

... the minerals are not very rare at all, you can harvest from planets in supply(adjacent to your controlled worlds)...

I really hope I'm not the source of this common misconception.

I mean, you're right, you can mine asteroids from planets in supply... But you can also mine them from planets out of supply.

[Kahuna]

Decrease Shield Bearers' health from 1280000 to 855000 and make their shield NOT shrink when they take damage.

they are immune to EMP.

They are? It's not in the description.

Anyway.. remove the nuke and emp immunities.

[keith.lamothe]

Decrease Shield Bearers' health from 1280000 to 855000 and make their shield NOT shrink when they take damage.

They already don't shrink, iirc