[TC] Falcon Hauler missile boats

[StarSword]

Need a little advice. As I've previously mentioned, I'm planning on experimenting with Falcon Haulers as missile boats. My current loadout plan is this:

• full shields
• 8xEBC spinal, 1xPAC tailgun
• 25 ecells for jumpdrive
• 35 Tornado missiles (primary anticapital armament)
• 22 EBC ammo, for 4400 shots.

That fills the cargo bay completely. I'm just wondering if anyone has any ideas to tweak this.

[Triaxx2]

Dump the EBC's, ammo and energy. You're launching masses of dumb fire missiles, and now matter how big the target some of them are going to miss. Fill half of them with Tornadoes completely, and then fill the other half with Tempests. This way after the Tornadoes shatter their capital target, the Tempests will then auto retarget the escorts and start chewing those up.

As for moving them, a pair of TM's is more than enough for the job. That gives far more tactical flexibility than 25 energy cells.

Or a single Shrike, not that the Shrike really needs more anti-capital capabilities.

The reason for removing the EBC's in addition to opening space for more missiles, means they won't get as close to capitals and will stick to standing back and launching missiles.

[Morkonan]

EBCs are nice, but do they really need all that firepower up front if they're primarily going to be launching missiles? If they're on heavy missile launch orders, will they ever have a chance to fire those guns? I don't know that the engine discriminates when choosing which weapon to fire. AFAIK, it just looks at the percent preference for missiles and figures that into each firing calc.

What do you estimate their "Time on Target" is going to be? Will you order them in and then leave them there after they have shot their load of missiles? Or, will they dump their loads on a very high firing percentage and then get recalled?

[Lone Jedi]

Tornadoes are pretty useless in NPCs' hands.

[StarSword]

The original plan was to use the EBCs against slower fighters (planning on a small wing of either Sabres or Mamba Raiders for the fast ones) and crank up the missile launch rate against capital ships, kind of how I used Chimeras and Cutlasses in my last game. They'd be fighting alongside my Panther as general-purpose strike fighters.

I picked EBCs over my usual choice of HEPT partly due to the weak laser generator on the FH, and partly because an EBC only takes up 1 unit of cargo space compared to 6 for the HEPT. Resupply of ordnance shouldn't be an issue; I'm getting ready to build a complex in the Asteroid Belt for missiles and working up a plan for a CLS supply train.

The ecells and jumpdrives I suppose can go, and that much EBC ammo is probably overkill. (I guessed based on the wiki's value of 394 rounds per minute, but the AI seems to fire slower than max ROF, and they wouldn't be firing the whole time anyway.)

[Nick Northern]

I really like your idea StarSword. Heavy m3's and light M6's make great missile boats. I understand your choice of EBC's, as long as you don't mind refilling ammo for that as well as the missiles.

I am really interested to find out if your wing uses the dumbfire missiles effectively. Are you planning to switch the wing to high % missile fire rate against capitals, and low % missile fire rate against fighters? Or how will you use those dumbfires?

I've never tried using them on a computer controlled ship before.

[DrBullwinkle]

I assume that your plan is to use these Falcons In-Sector (IS), right?

For IS, I give Falcon Haulers half energy-based weapons and half EBCG's. The energy weapons hit harder. In my experience, PAC's perform better in-game than HEPT's. HEPT's look good "on paper", but PAC's have a higher hit percentage than HEPT's. That results in more real-life damage-per-amount-of-ship-energy. (Or just use PBG's, which are awesome IS).

For OOS use, don't use ammo-based weapons at all. First because you don't have to and, second, because there is a bug that may cause your weapons to not fire.

However, I think that Triaxx2's suggestion of "no guns" is even better. In addition to the increased stand-off distance, AI fighters with both guns and missiles tend to blow up their own missiles IS. If you are going to try them as carrier-based bombers, then skip the forward guns (but leave the PAC in the rear turret).

[StarSword]

I've never tried using them on a computer controlled ship before.

Neither have I. It's a build I read about on the forum one time and never tested because I found all the CLS stuff for the supply train a little daunting.

And, yeah, Typhoons are the best missile in the game (against any target larger than an M5). Why use Tornados when Typhoons penetrate flak better?

Mainly because I have yet to see flak even target an unguided missile like the Tornado. They're difficult to use against non-capital targets (as anyone who's sat there laughing as a Firelance goes careening past them can attest), but they pack a heck of a punch; I've used them to great effect against Qs, and that was in a Zephyrus.

And yes, this is an IS build; I'm well aware of the bug of which you speak and use HEPTs on fighters I expect to be OOS.

But you raise a good point: is the enemy any better at shooting down swarm missiles than it is at unguided?

I guess it's a question of accuracy (guided Typhoon versus unguided Tornado) versus damage (30k/warhead Typhoon versus 50k/warhead Tornado).

Incidentally I've done a little more research, and turns out I can swap out the Tornado factories in favor of Typhoon factories since they're both Teladi in origin. (Haven't built the plex yet.)

[DrBullwinkle]

I edited my message to remove the Typhoon comment because Falcons cannot mount them.

Vanilla TC turrets are weak at missile defense. AP's turrets (and all add-on turrets scripts) are much more effective. Swarm missiles help to overcome even the smartest turrets.

Good point about unguided missiles; it would be interesting to see more reports on in-game experience with those.

[StarSword]

Upon recalculating, I tossed out the energy cells, replaced the PAC with an IRE (it's really just for point defense anyway), and pared the EBCs down to two. This leaves room for 40 Tornadoes and 5 boxes of ammo. I suppose I'll just keep a larger stock aboard my Panther than I'd planned.

[DrBullwinkle]

Be sure to come back and let us know how this interesting experiment works out for you.

Also, you may want to do a test with the "no guns" option because of the AI exploding-their-own-missiles-in-their-face phenomenon.

[StarSword]

Be sure to come back and let us know how this interesting experiment works out for you.

I'm planning on it.

Also, you may want to do a test with the "no guns" option because of the AI exploding-their-own-missiles-in-their-face phenomenon.

I've actually never seen the AI blow up their own missiles, though I've seen them launch while under fire and self-destruct. M8's are really vulnerable to that, it seems.

[Falcrack]

The Falcon in all its variants is so ugly that I could never stand to use it under any circumstance.

[kolimbo]

Utility over aesthetics man. Falcon is THE toughest fighter, bar none.

A single sentinel can take out a pair of scimitars without breaking a sweat.

[Triaxx2]

I still say Tempests are the way to go. 30k warhead, auto-re-targetting, fast moving. The more in the air, the more damage you'll generate and the easier it is to deal with new arrivals because already flying missiles will turn on the new enemies.

[StarSword]

I've used the Tempest, but in this context there's a couple problems with it. One, I get a bit less bang for my buck: it does 60k damage, but that's from one warhead that takes up 5 cargo space. Each Tornado warhead does 50k damage, but there are eight of them, and they take up 8 cargo. Two, being guided is actually counterproductive with the missile boats. The main part of their role is helping kill capitals, and in my experience unguided missiles are better at penetrating enemy point-defense than guided.

@Falcrack: I don't much like its looks either, but I tend to prioritize function over form. Take the Spitfyre. It's a cockpit with engines. Not pretty in the slightest. But unless you're a total klutz (and assuming you can arm the damn thing) it's likely the deadliest M3 in the game.

[Yazoo]

I actually like the looks of the Spitfyre. It reminds me of a small ship Obi Wan Kenobi flew in one of the Star Wars movies. It gives me a retro muscle-car impression.

I will be very interested to hear the report on the effectiveness of the Tornado...good hunting.

[Echofinder]

I'm actually rather fond of the Falcon Hauler, it's not something I'd prefer to pilot myself (At least, not without a ton of overtunings); but it's pretty difficult to kill in some incompetent manner, even in the hands of an AI.

I prefer to use M8s instead of smaller yield missiles against capitals, but I'm also curious to how your attempt turns out. Good hunting!

[Triaxx2]

Sorry, I didn't mean as a main missile. I mean using it instead of guns. The Tornado is very useful as a capital killer, but once the capitals are gone, the Tempest is going to turn away and seek out other targets, and 1-1 it's more potent than the Tornado.

[Morkonan]

I'm actually rather fond of the Falcon Hauler..

IMO, it's one of the most useful ships in the game. Good speed for its roles, heavily shielded, huge cargo bay and decent stats, all around. A wonderful ship.