The early game

[keith.lamothe]

Two is that Riot's can't reduce to 0 engine anymore with the long range shots, only 10%

That's been the case since their first official release back in like March '10 (iirc on the time).  And actually that's the minimum for the mkII laser or shotgun modules.  For the mkIs of those it's 25%, and for the mkI/mkII machine gun ones it's 50%/25%.

[Draco18s]

(I never used the tazers because I used riots to kite things to halt them all so I could pick them apart slowly later).

Tazers make them good as part of your fleet blob because of the paralysis.  If you manage to get 4 Riot IIs in the same area you start racking up permanent stun.
(Even though 4 should be at the point of keeping them perpetually at 1 second of paralysis, but probably due to rounding errors it goes up and eventually peaks at 3 minutes)

[Zeyurn]

Two is that Riot's can't reduce to 0 engine anymore with the long range shots, only 10%

That's been the case since their first official release back in like March '10 (iirc on the time).  And actually that's the minimum for the mkII laser or shotgun modules.  For the mkIs of those it's 25%, and for the mkI/mkII machine gun ones it's 50%/25%.

If this is true there was a period of at least 6 months where that wasn't actually the case!  I used to leave behind globs of blinking red engine dead things with riots shotgun modules.

(I never used the tazers because I used riots to kite things to halt them all so I could pick them apart slowly later).

Tazers make them good as part of your fleet blob because of the paralysis.  If you manage to get 4 Riot IIs in the same area you start racking up permanent stun.
(Even though 4 should be at the point of keeping them perpetually at 1 second of paralysis, but probably due to rounding errors it goes up and eventually peaks at 3 minutes)

I should try this someday.  I was turned off by the short range IIRC and never tried using more than one of them, which of course didn't do very much.

[TechSY730]

That's been the case since their first official release back in like March '10 (iirc on the time).  And actually that's the minimum for the mkII laser or shotgun modules.  For the mkIs of those it's 25%, and for the mkI/mkII machine gun ones it's 50%/25%.

If this is true there was a period of at least 6 months where that wasn't actually the case!  I used to leave behind globs of blinking red engine dead things with riots shotgun modules.

Although the modules themselves can't take engine HP to 0, the weapon of the actual Riot control starship can. Maybe that explains what you are seeing? (Though there is also the possibility that the modules' restrictions were bugged for many beta versions)

[Zeyurn]

That's been the case since their first official release back in like March '10 (iirc on the time).  And actually that's the minimum for the mkII laser or shotgun modules.  For the mkIs of those it's 25%, and for the mkI/mkII machine gun ones it's 50%/25%.

If this is true there was a period of at least 6 months where that wasn't actually the case!  I used to leave behind globs of blinking red engine dead things with riots shotgun modules.

Although the modules themselves can't take engine HP to 0, the weapon of the actual Riot control starship can. Maybe that explains what you are seeing? (Though there is also the possibility that the modules' restrictions were bugged for many beta versions)

I'm 99.9% willing to say I never got close enough to use the main attack of the riot ships and kept them about 10,000 out to just plink away and kill engines.  Regardless, their engine killing as is seems basically useless compared to other ships that can actually reduce things to 0 and it appears the only thing people even want them for anymore is the tazer module?

[TechSY730]

I'm 99.9% willing to say I never got close enough to use the main attack of the riot ships and kept them about 10,000 out to just plink away and kill engines.  Regardless, their engine killing as is seems basically useless compared to other ships that can actually reduce things to 0 and it appears the only thing people even want them for anymore is the tazer module?

I don't know about that. If I can get a large number of ships to 1/4 speed, or even 1/3 speed, that seems really useful. Not only on the defense, but also on the offense.
Riots are great at severely reducing the engine health of a large number of ships, and stay far away from them in the mean time. Sure, other things that can take them all the way to 0, but can they zap the engines of the number of ships that riots can in the same amount of time for the same cost efficiency?

I will concede that when there are only a few ships with high engine health (not a rare case nowadays), the riot control starship is not the right tool for the job.


(BTW, despite my defense of the riot control starship, the modules could use an engine damage buff, higher mark modules could use some better growth with engine damage and/or number of shots, and the base ship could use a HP buff)

[Zeyurn]

I'm 99.9% willing to say I never got close enough to use the main attack of the riot ships and kept them about 10,000 out to just plink away and kill engines.  Regardless, their engine killing as is seems basically useless compared to other ships that can actually reduce things to 0 and it appears the only thing people even want them for anymore is the tazer module?

I don't know about that. If I can get a large number of ships to 1/4 speed, or even 1/3 speed, that seems really useful. Not only on the defense, but also on the offense.
Riots are great at severely reducing the engine health of a large number of ships, and stay far away from them in the mean time. Sure, other things that can take them all the way to 0, but can they zap the engines of the number of ships that riots can in the same amount of time for the same cost efficiency?

I will concede that when there are only a few ships with high engine health (not a rare case nowadays), the riot control starship is not the right tool for the job.


(BTW, despite my defense of the riot control starship, the modules could use an engine damage buff, higher mark modules could use some better growth with engine damage and/or number of shots, and the base ship could use a HP buff)

I think perhaps my perspective on things is irrevocably skewed from always playing multiplayer, and also currently in a Fallen Spire game with Spirecraft everywhere.  I'm rarely in a situation where I'm fighting less than 800 enemy ships or a few really really powerful ones and 10 riots just ain't gonna do squat to either of that, heh.

[Lancefighter]

A good rule of warfare - disrupt your enemies ability to respond to your attack. Cutting off communication, distraction, or simple brute force(engine damage) stops hostiles from reacting to your aggression in an ideal manner.

Thus

Riot starships are amazing, because you cant cut off ai communication, and you cant distract the ai. That leave brute force, riot starships :p