Capital ships should still be able to use thrusters when engines are dead.

[grapedog]

This is why I use the Stork as my aux ships always. Much less likely to get immobilized, and their turret placements offer decent 360 protection compsred to other ships which are mostly top mounted. From my experience, they handle swarms much better.

Plus, i actually like the mushroom design ship, id use the phoenix a LOT more often if it wasn't so underpowered overall.

Those big TEL ships seem more like militarized freighters than actual warships.

[jlehtone]

for example, how is it that a missile with a 17km effective range can only be deployed/fired at around 5km of the target

Which missile are you talking about?

I know that turrets of Osaka do launch missiles from near 20 km distance. (I was in the receiving end, in Phoenix. They must have been EMP; very fast, no shield damage, both Boost and Travel were disabled. For a while I thought that they did disable turrets too, but that had been me setting them to missile defense. )

[Imperial Good]

That is true - missile strikes to turrets on the dome section can damage the nearest engine. However a single missile is extremely unlikely to get all 3 (I've certainly never managed that when hunting SCA Phoenixes - always needed 3). That's the big contrast with the other destroyers. May occasionally lose a single engine on a Phoenix, but the enemy has to work much harder to completely immobilise it. Compared to being able to nuke the engine cluster on most other destroyers with a single torp, or even just sustained gunfire. Did not have even a single case of losing all 3 engines on my Phoenix during my Teladi game, whereas this was not a particularly uncommon occurrence in my subsequent Argon & Split games: https://www.dropbox.com/s/epky5sg7flkvq ... 1.jpg?dl=0

Both Split and Paranid destroyers are immune to heavy missiles and torpedoes when upgraded with ship mods. This is because their flight speed exceeds that of heavy missiles and torpedoes so they can infinitely kite them. Similar to trying to hit the Katana with heavy missiles, it can just keep going straight and never be hit. Light missiles still hit them but the engine shielding is enough to take a fair number of those.

On the other hand the Phoenix is so slow it will always be hit by heavy missiles and torpedoes. So its engines being more resistant to them does not really matter.

I have seen many phoenix lose all their engines. Especially when under fire from a Xenon S/M swarm as they prioritise targeting engines.

[GCU Grey Area]

This is why I use the Stork as my aux ships always. Much less likely to get immobilized, and their turret placements offer decent 360 protection compsred to other ships which are mostly top mounted. From my experience, they handle swarms much better.

Plus, i actually like the mushroom design ship, id use the phoenix a LOT more often if it wasn't so underpowered overall.

Those big TEL ships seem more like militarized freighters than actual warships.

Matches my experience with turret coverage of the Condor (auxiliaries didn't exist when I was doing my Teladi game), particularly if you fill it's M docks with Osprey class auxiliary turret batteries. Very few angles from which enemy fighters can approach that isn't covered by decent amount of firepower. Agree on the aesthetics too - very fond of Teladi capitals. Think it's the radial symmetry. Also found the dome section of of their capitals very handy as a literal shield (i.e. the medieval kind) when flying an S or M ship. Very useful thing to take cover behind while waiting for shields to regen. Have fond memories of flying a Peregrine into battle alongside a Condor, just peeping over the edge of that shield as we approached the enemy forces.

[GCU Grey Area]

Both Split and Paranid destroyers are immune to heavy missiles and torpedoes when upgraded with ship mods. This is because their flight speed exceeds that of heavy missiles and torpedoes so they can infinitely kite them. Similar to trying to hit the Katana with heavy missiles, it can just keep going straight and never be hit. Light missiles still hit them but the engine shielding is enough to take a fair number of those.

On the other hand the Phoenix is so slow it will always be hit by heavy missiles and torpedoes. So its engines being more resistant to them does not really matter.

I have seen many phoenix lose all their engines. Especially when under fire from a Xenon S/M swarm as they prioritise targeting engines.

Can't comment on Odysseus, don't think I've ever flown one. However did fly Rattlesnakes in both of my Split games, always heavily upgraded, e.g.:
ship mods: https://www.dropbox.com/s/aedw0zia7lyc3 ... 1.jpg?dl=0
workbench stats: https://www.dropbox.com/s/sgwp1lskf83cq ... 1.jpg?dl=0
As you can see, by no means a slow ship. Didn't help. Cerberus frigates armed with Swarm missiles were the bane of my existence in my last game. All that speed only helps if all you want to do is run away. The moment you want to fight you need to slow down a bit, manoeuvre to get the enemy in the crosshairs, etc & that's when one of those damn Cerberuses sneaks up behind & nukes the engines. Happened over & over again, sometimes more than once in the same battle (incidentally that's how I got the screenshot in my earlier post - was limping away to get repairs & wanted to have a look at the damage from the outside, only to see my engines were once more in the process of exploding). The crappy shielding on a Rattlesnake really doesn't help either - just a single M shield protecting the engines (whereas Phoenix has 3).

[al_dude]

The Teladi destroyer may have not powerful L guns, but that ship is made for escorts.

Mod it for normal speed and just stick close to a M mining ship you are meant to escort. The mushroom shape protects any shots from getting through, and the destroyer is meant to fight foes approaching from behind.

It's got a pretty good design philosophy.

Try doing that with other destroyers; you will lose your engines eventually.

[Raptor34]

The Teladi destroyer may have not powerful L guns, but that ship is made for escorts.

Mod it for normal speed and just stick close to a M mining ship you are meant to escort. The mushroom shape protects any shots from getting through, and the destroyer is meant to fight foes approaching from behind.

It's got a pretty good design philosophy.

Wish the Teladi kept their slow but tanky philosophy though.
Why would the Condor have less shields than its counterparts. It should have more.
Same for the Phoenix.
Nowadays they seemed to have traded that with the Argon.

[Imperial Good]

The moment you want to fight you need to slow down a bit, manoeuvre to get the enemy in the crosshairs, etc & that's when one of those damn Cerberuses sneaks up behind & nukes the engines.

The Rattlesnake is a L destroyer. You do not slow for S or M ships because they are beneath you. You are not meant to shoot them with batteries either, even though the AI flies so badly you can at times.

If they have missiles you keep flying at full speed. They will eventually run out of missiles, in which case they become harmless.

The Teladi destroyer may have not powerful L guns, but that ship is made for escorts.

Mod it for normal speed and just stick close to a M mining ship you are meant to escort. The mushroom shape protects any shots from getting through, and the destroyer is meant to fight foes approaching from behind.

It's got a pretty good design philosophy.

Try doing that with other destroyers; you will lose your engines eventually.

TER Osaka. Only slightly slower than the Phoenix but has orders of magnitude better turrets and main batteries. It is also Behemoth like so has excellent turret placement unlike the Phoenix which has the worst turret placement of all destroyers. The Phoenix L turrets cannot even shoot directly forwards due to the dome...

[jlehtone]

The Phoenix L turrets cannot even shoot directly forwards due to the dome...

However, you don't have to shoot only forward with your batteries either.


It could be interesting if EMP missiles could affect thrusters in addition to boost and travel. Comm links temporarily fizzled. Granted, benefiting mainly player.

[al_dude]

TER Osaka. Only slightly slower than the Phoenix but has orders of magnitude better turrets and main batteries. It is also Behemoth like so has excellent turret placement unlike the Phoenix which has the worst turret placement of all destroyers. The Phoenix L turrets cannot even shoot directly forwards due to the dome...

You did read what I wrote, right? The mushroom is the point. It protects whatever is in front. The phoenix is not meant to use its main guns. It's meant to fight backwards while safeguarding something in front of them.

P.S. Osaka and Behemoth are my two favorite destroyers. Osaka needs a bit shorter though. That thing is unnecessarily long. Behemoth has got 4 S landing pads. It's basically a cheap mini carrier.

[Tarsis]

for example, how is it that a missile with 17km effective range can only be deployed/fired at around 5km of the target

Which missile are you talking about?

I know that turrets of Osaka do launch missiles from near 20 km distance. (I was in the receiving end, in Phoenix. They must have been EMP; very fast, no shield damage, both Boost and Travel were disabled. For a while I thought that they did disable turrets too, but that had been me setting them to missile defense. )

Check the Encyclopaedia, it says cluster missiles have a 17km and Dumbfire 24km effective range but when I used them on my Syn, I had to be at around 6km before it started firing. I'm not alone on this one, you can check Captain Collins on YouTube when he tested missiles https://youtu.be/pmTcjzVvfaA?t=6900.

Now if you're saying the NPCs are capable of hitting you from 20km away and it is "working as intended", that is the epitome of unbalanced and perhaps we should start a new thread about missiles.

[GCU Grey Area]

The moment you want to fight you need to slow down a bit, manoeuvre to get the enemy in the crosshairs, etc & that's when one of those damn Cerberuses sneaks up behind & nukes the engines.

The Rattlesnake is a L destroyer. You do not slow for S or M ships because they are beneath you. You are not meant to shoot them with batteries either, even though the AI flies so badly you can at times.

If they have missiles you keep flying at full speed. They will eventually run out of missiles, in which case they become harmless.

It's not a matter of slowing down specifically to engage fighters. Generally it's more that there are fighters present in the sector when I slow down to engage my primary target (e.g. enemy capital or station). As for passively waiting for fighters to run out of missiles, simply don't have that much patience - frigates can carry 100 of them. Anyway it's not the fighters I'm aware of that are usually the issue - those I can account for, even pause the game & have a close look at them for missile launchers if I'm feeling paranoid. It's generally the ones arriving in travel mode from elsewhere in the sector that can catch me out & sometimes I only become aware of those new arrivals when engines start exploding...

The Phoenix L turrets cannot even shoot directly forwards due to the dome...

Phoenix L turrets can shoot forwards if you need them to. Unlike the other Teladi capitals the Phoenix's 'dome' isn't a single piece, it's comprised of 6 distinct segments. There are gaps between them through which the L turrets can fire if you know how to aim them: https://www.dropbox.com/s/v2x5st70g8g81 ... 1.jpg?dl=0

[nOy]

No matter how we look at things, the simple fact is once a capital ship's engines are taken out, it is essentially a sitting duck. If enemy forces at that time isn't enough to take it down, additional reinforcements will. I can understand the decision behind thrusters being connected to engines but taking out engines is way too easy. I am deviating a bit from the thruster discussions but here are some suggestions.

Have 2 modes of engine operation, normal/travel mode and combat mode.

In combat mode, I imagine engines "recessing" into the superstructure or armored cowlings coming out to cover and protect the engines giving them additional protection at the expense of reduced forward thrust performance. In addition, in combat mode, make the "afterburner" boost more effective like 150% to 200% of combat thrust at the expense of lost shield strength. At the moment, there is no benefit at all in engaging boost for the majority of capital ships. You just lose shield strength over nothing. Combat boost thrust should be tactically useful (with a corresponding tradeoff like losing shields). This change will make it more interesting to make tactical decisions/tradeoffs when piloting capital ships like destroyers. Having combat mode for engines means thrusters will also work longer.

In normal/travel mode, the engine is out of the superstructure (comes out if transitioning from combat mode) as it currently looks in vanilla, or the armored cowlings recess back to the superstructure. Then it essentially performs like vanilla. You can even tie in the travel delay to the time it takes for the engine to transition from combat to travel mode. That would look cool and would give another meaning to the wait/spool up time for travel mode to engage. You can even make it so that engines in non-combat normal mode would be 50% out of the superstructure, 100% out for full travel mode. Visual indicators would be nice. It adds tactical options like, ooh that destroyer is not in combat mode, we have xx seconds to ambush and get that engine before it goes into lockdown.

Lastly, in combat mode, the recessing into the superstructure of the engine or deployment of armored cowlings make it so that the only way to easily take out an engine is if we shoot it from directly behind. You can then introduce a mechanic wherein the thrust wake damages shields/hull if we stay on it for too long. Make it difficult, but not impossible. IT IS A CAPITAL SHIP for crying out loud.

At the moment, it is laughably easy. I can take down a Xenon I with just 2 ships, a fighter to take out engines (no thrusters too so dead in the water), and a big boy with guns outranging the I's L turrets. Again, once the engines are taken out, its just a matter of using guns with a longer reach and staying out of range while you pound it to entropic oblivion. It gets boring after some time. These proposed changes introduces a bit of uncertainty and choice: shall I take out the engines or brute force my way through it? At the moment it's always, take out the engines dude, duh?!

If something like this is implemented, then flying solo in a fighter trying to take down a capital ship's engines won't become a chore. Of course there is always the option to brute alpha strike your way to victory but winning in other ways should be challenging and rewarding.

[jlehtone]

You don't need two ships now. Just one.

You can then introduce a mechanic wherein the thrust wake damages shields/hull if we stay on it for too long.:

The 4.0 did add that already.

[nOy]

I get the warnings, but it doesn't seem to do any damage so I am not sure what it was for.

[dtpsprt]

...................

Have 2 modes of engine operation, normal/travel mode and combat mode.

..............................

If something like this is implemented, then flying solo in a fighter trying to take down a capital ship's engines won't become a chore. Of course there is always the option to brute alpha strike your way to victory but winning in other ways should be challenging and rewarding.

Very nice and thought off suggestion providing that there is time (always precious) for the devs to work on something like this and the, inevitable, bugs that it will introduce to the game...

[RodentofDoom]

imo, the shieldgenerators protecting the engine(s) could be stronger perhaps, a few seconds of burst-fire from an S-classed ship (even if using powerful weapon mods) shouldn't be able to take out an engine.

personally, i like the idea of always being somewhat on guard whilst solo'ing in a capital ship (always that threat of strike-craft crippling my engines if i overextend into something's turret range) the current mechanic of dispatching repair-drones seems to work okay (could be open to some tuning) allowing thruster-usage should allow you to bring some turrets to bear. (does roll work? not at the gaming PC atm)

i guess, in the end, no capital ship should be flying without escort realistically. (i'm just glad Ai isn't smart enough to use heavy missiles or torpedos frequently)

That's the catch with sub-components that are independently targetable.
They are easy to neutralise even if the main shields are powered up.
If the main shields have to go first, sub-components then largely become redundant.

[Alkeena]

imo, the shieldgenerators protecting the engine(s) could be stronger perhaps, a few seconds of burst-fire from an S-classed ship (even if using powerful weapon mods) shouldn't be able to take out an engine.

personally, i like the idea of always being somewhat on guard whilst solo'ing in a capital ship (always that threat of strike-craft crippling my engines if i overextend into something's turret range) the current mechanic of dispatching repair-drones seems to work okay (could be open to some tuning) allowing thruster-usage should allow you to bring some turrets to bear. (does roll work? not at the gaming PC atm)

i guess, in the end, no capital ship should be flying without escort realistically. (i'm just glad Ai isn't smart enough to use heavy missiles or torpedos frequently)

That's the catch with sub-components that are independently targetable.
They are easy to neutralise even if the main shields are powered up.
If the main shields have to go first, sub-components then largely become redundant.

I agree, and certainly don't want subsystem targeting to become less useful.

However, if someone wanted to explore this space a bit more I could see an effective balance point where shields were made significantly less effective while capital ships were likewise given substantially more hull. I don't think that approach would be any more satisfying, personally, but it would be a path forward along these lines.