Spirecraft units

[KDR_11k]

I doubt it since the attrition is a special effect, not a regular attack. Do FFs even affect engine damage?

Not sure the scouts CAN be balanced. By the time you can access high mark SC scouts you can also access scout IVs which are guaranteed 100% map reveals. SCs are overall too niche, I usually have tons of asteroids left over because I see nothing I want. Conversely I will never play SC hard because I don't feel that SCs add much to my power.

[TechSY730]

Spirecraft certainly are very niche units, and many of them haven't really kept up with the balance of the rest of the game. A balance pass is certainly due.

However, personally, I still enjoy using them.

[KDR_11k]

Their jobs don't come up very often though.

[Zair]

Yeah. I've been scratching my brain, trying to think of a time when I'd want to add siege towers to my fleet, but with their HUGE volley reload time, I really can't come up with much. For a big battleship sort of vessel, the reload really hurts them.

The only time I've really used attritioners is to stack them at a chokepoint world in a Fallen Spire game. I have no idea how effective they actually were (Full cap of mk I/II attritioners, I think) but they probably helped.

[Kahuna]

Mark I Siege Towers have 426666 cap DPS against everything (no damage multipliers). That combined with cap health of 32 million they're actually very good.

IMO Spirecraft ships are underestimated. I'd rather have Spirecraft enabled than Golems. I find them more useful.

EDIT:
How to use the asteroids:
Mark V: Ion Blaster > Penetrator > Attritoner > Implosion Artillery > Siege Tower
Mark IV: Penetrator > Implosion Artillery > Ion Blaster > Attritoner > Siege Tower
Mark III: Penetrator > Implosion Artillery > Ion Blaster > Attritoner > Siege Tower
Mark II: Penetrator > Ion Blaster > Siege Tower > Attritoner > Implosion Artillery
Mark I: Penetrator > Siege Tower > Attritoner > Implosion Artillery > Ion Blaster

[Draco18s]

Mark I Siege Towers have 426666 cap DPS against everything (no damage multipliers). That combined with cap health of 32 million they're actually very good.

And Heavy hull type.

They really really don't stand up against any kind of sustained fire.

(Also, oddly, Mk5 have the worst cap health: 20m, where as Mk2 and Mk3 have cap-healths of 48m)

[Toranth]

Mark I Siege Towers have 426666 cap DPS against everything (no damage multipliers). That combined with cap health of 32 million they're actually very good.

Problems are the very low rate of fire, the low range, the average speed combined with immunity to speed boosts, and the difficulty in replacement. 
If you look at the stats in comparison to other units, they are average turrets that can go through wormholes, but require irreplacable resources to build.
They were better before the Starship buff, but now?  I'd rather have a Spire, Bomber, or Plasma starship.

How to use the asteroids:
Mark V: Ion Blaster > Penetrator > Attritoner > Implosion Artillery > Siege Tower
Mark IV: Penetrator > Implosion Artillery > Ion Blaster > Attritoner > Siege Tower
Mark III: Penetrator > Implosion Artillery > Ion Blaster > Attritoner > Siege Tower
Mark II: Penetrator > Ion Blaster > Siege Tower > Attritoner > Implosion Artillery
Mark I: Penetrator > Siege Tower > Attritoner > Implosion Artillery > Ion Blaster

I think you both over-value Penetrators and Ion Blasters, and under-value Attritioners.
Attritioners do a little damage per second, which is usually insignificant except against swarmers, but the feedback effect matters everywhere.  It basically multiplies the damage dealt by your units by a fixed percentage, ABOVE any Munitions boosts that may apply.  That adds up fast.  Of course, you need caps to get any significant effect - a single Mk I Attritioner is kin of a waste.

Penetrators are good for killing heavily defended stuff under glass (Especially AI Home Command Centers), but that's about it.  They don't do enough damage to matter against Motherships or their ilk, and the 1-shot-per-30-minutes thing makes them worthless against fleetships.  Very situational, and basically a ranged cloaking version of the Spirecraft Ram.

Ion Blasters are worthless at Mk I, as you point out, but Mk II isn't much better since when you need them, you'll be facing either Mk III or Mk V ships.  Combine that with low range and the large numbre of Ion immune stuff out there, and you get a fragile, irreplacable ship that requires significant micro to use properly.


My build order is Attritioners first, then Implosion Artillery (to sit on my chokepoint and free up my fleet).  Then, if I've got a bunch of extra asteroids, I start grabbing Siege Towers, Penetrators, etc.

[Kahuna]

Hm well I made that list quite quickly. Penetrators are very good for sniping certain Core Guard Posts. I think I undervalued Implosion Artillerys and Attritioners. Implosions are very good at killing exo startships and a cap of Mark I Attritioners does 4,5 million dps vs 3000 ship CPA.

[Bognor]

If either of you are interested, I crunched the stats on Attritioners a little while ago: see the wiki.

I'm pretty sure their effectiveness will vary quite a bit depending on game settings - best on epic, high caps; worst on blitz, ultra low caps.

[TechSY730]

True, Spire Siege Towers are sort of squishy in terms of HP, but they have radar dampening to make up for it. Their slow speed can actually help them abuse this some in a death ball, as they will generally arrive near last, so that even when they do move within range to be hit, the forces that arrived first have already aggro'd the ships and eaten the alpha, which the longer range stuff may have gone to the spire siege tower if it wasn't for the radar dampening.

In terms of spirecraft, I often find the spire siege tower to be the most long lived of the offensive ones, despite the relative cap HP "meh-ness".

[Bognor]

Another weirdity is that Ion Blasters have slightly higher dps than equal-mark Siege Towers, as well as having slightly longer range, double the speed, and the same hit points.  I guess the balance is that you need a rarer asteroid to make the Blaster, plus the Blaster lacks high armor and can't damage immune-to-instakill ships.

[Ragnarok]

So, any official word on a rebalancing of Spirecraft ?

[keith.lamothe]

So, any official word on a rebalancing of Spirecraft ?

It was in the last big poll: http://www.arcengames.com/forums/index.php/topic,13501.0.html

And didn't do particularly well.

It's been something I've been thinking about for a while, and do plan to do something, but evidently it is not a priority.

[Justus23]

Once you can find the roids which build mk3 or perhaps mk4 scouts you have to have sophisticated far adequate in which 8 and maybe even 6 ticks must offer you full coverage, yes.

[ZaneWolfe]

So, any official word on a rebalancing of Spirecraft ?

It was in the last big poll: http://www.arcengames.com/forums/index.php/topic,13501.0.html

And didn't do particularly well.

It's been something I've been thinking about for a while, and do plan to do something, but evidently it is not a priority.

To be fair Keith, that was only because the other things there are actually much bigger issues overall than the Spirecraft. Still, getting them to be less of a niche would be VERY good.