Newbie question

posted on November 14th, 2011, 12:31 pm

Hello, I'm new to fleet ops, but I used to love playing armada 1 and 2 back in the day. First off, from reading the forums a little I realize this has been said quite a few times, but I've gotta say it to for the record anyway; I think fleet ops is the best mod I've ever played for a game, hands down. Just freaking amazing. And from browsing here I've gotta say I already love this community, and how dedicated everyone is in sharing their ideas for making the game better. The video replays are awesome here, and have helped me understand the game better than I would have thought, props to everyone involved with that, too.
Soon I plan to jump into jump into playing some of you online, but I'm having a little trouble getting some stuff down playing instant action before I do. From what I understand the AI is far from perfect, I understand that it doesn't really reflect what I'll be dealing with when playing actual people, and that's cool, from my experience most rts games play out that way. I'm familiar with the old A2 AI, so like I said, most of what goes on in instant action doesn't bother me too much.
Anyway, here's what's been stumping me. I'll be playing a match against the borg AI, and after I've crushed their fleet and I'm rounding third, about to crush their base, my fleet will be mysteriously decimated. More specifically, about two thirds of it will be instantly assimilated, forcing me into a hasty and head scratching retreat. The first time it happened was a pretty good "oh shit!" moment for me. I'm pretty sure this is due to some ignorance on my part, so hopefully someone here can shed some light on this. It's gotta be a borg structure doing this to me, but like I said I can be a little dense at times. Halp?

[beserene]

posted on November 14th, 2011, 12:48 pm

Last edited by beserene on November 14th, 2011, 12:50 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Hi Brocoli, welcome to FleetOps.

I just gonna jump to your question:
That's the holding beam for stations, researched in the borg transmission matrix.
Best thing to do is to attack the enemy with more ships, or ships with decent crew, so the AI won't be able to assimilate anything in time. Try to attack the building one by one, so you're only in range of one of them.

Anyways, AI games are very different from real MP ones. Don't be affraid to hopin if you're comfortable enough, or feel free to observe first.

posted on November 14th, 2011, 12:52 pm

that was quick, thanks man! Hopefully it won't decimate me anymore.

posted on November 14th, 2011, 2:07 pm

Also be careful of the Incubation Centre, the version the AI (Assimilate avatar) uses automatically assimilates anything that comes within range. It isn't researched and the crew loss builds up over time.

posted on November 14th, 2011, 3:39 pm

Hi Broccoli, welcome to the forum
As stated previously, the combination of station holding beams and Incubation centers really drain your crew numbers. If they had any defense turrets, a second Assimilation Center, or a Cube, that would explain why the remainder of your fleet was decimated.
Well, I'd hope to see you online sometime, its alot better than fighting AIs

posted on February 29th, 2012, 9:51 pm

Well as others have mentioned atleast two of the borg stations have assimilation abilities so when you attack them either use long range units, units with large crew or swamp it with overwehlming fire power.

I for one don't go peace meal on Borg there is no over kill facing them only fire and reload! 

Also beware of Assimilators the Borg A.I. does tend to build them and they drain crew fast if you are not watching your fleets closely so an ambush by two or three of them wich does happen in A.I. games can decimate a fleet that is not closely manged.

I am realatively new as well but if ya want a partner in a team game I am game to team up with ya so give me a holar if you want to play or something.

Multiplayer tends to be faster paced then Instant action people will raid you with the sole intent of killing your minning to slow you down.

Turtling will get you killed in MP you need to expand and fight early on; alot of early MP action is attack and repair with killing only one or two enemy ships.

The thing is though as I have beign told being new myself and have experienced those one or two kills do add up.

Get good with the low tier ships those play a bigger role in Multiplayer then anything.

Quick question Bud do you have a prefered race?  I personaly like Federation so I am curious as to what you are playing as...

posted on February 29th, 2012, 11:57 pm

There are several Borg abilities for assimilating ships:

Holding beam (green) locks the ship in place and boards it.  Stations can do this at short range after the enemy gets a Transmission Matrix and researches it.  Humans will hardly ever use this.

Assimilator beam (blue) is used by the big boxy Assimilators to strip your ships of crew.  Keep track of the crew number and send your ships home to repair when they hit yellow crew.  Humans rarely use these, and when they do they have smaller numbers but they use the beams much more intelligently than the AI which just throws it around randomly.

Incubation chambers assimilate your ships very slowly when you're near them, this doesn't have a visual special.  This only happens when your enemy is the Assimilate avatar so you will almost never have to deal with it.

Assimilators can also use Nanite Swarm, which is a little gold ring that comes out of the Assim.  This reduces the crew of all your ships by 15% but shouldn't be a problem as long as you're generally aware of your crew levels.

The final and strongest ability is Boarding which instantly boards your ships with a few drones.  This is the only ones that humans really use, and when they do it they focus on one ship.  The AI uses it rarely and randomly so it shouldn't be a problem, but it also doesn't have a visual effect so it could be your problem.

The only thing that will really be important against humans is learning to send your ship home to repair with Shift-R whenever a blue beam locks onto it.

posted on March 1st, 2012, 12:30 pm

Holding beam (green) locks the ship in place and boards it.  Stations can do this at short range after the enemy gets a Transmission Matrix and researches it.  Humans will hardly ever use this.

you didn't mention that larger, higher tech ships can use this when holding modules are given to them.

the sphere is a common use for a holding module, it can only accept one i believe

boons of holding module:

1) ship is now a valid target for vinculum refresh from double vinculum module dodecahedron. gives over 1000 energy instantly and over a large distance. 3 regen 1 holding spheres are ridiculous tanks as 1 supporting (ie hiding outside of battle) dodeca can give it enough energy to regen a large amount of hull. one of my favourite strats this is, i once sphere danced with this and the other guy was playing feds and rage quit, and this was patches ago. works best if you taunt them over in game chat at how ineffective their weapons are.

2) holding beam stops the enemy ship, forgetting about the crew you're beaming over, the enemy ship loses engines. then have your fleet force fire on the ship to get the kill. spheres can't capture much with holding beam, but they can stop ships running away.

3) each holding beam module gives 20% resistance to special weapons. a pyramid with 4 holding modules is almost immune to specials. don't forget this if the enemy tries pink beaming/neggie cannoning you to death.

4) each module boosts system value a good amount, generally reducing the effectiveness of attacks by specials and increasing repair speeds.

5) and last but not least, if you for some crazy reason want to assimilate enemy ships, larger ships with holding beam will do that. a 4 holding pyramid on its own can take anything with 200 crew or less. that includes vorchas for example. if the target has shields down, combine holding with good old fashion transporters and you extend usefulness. combine holding with the Boarding special ability (research at transmission matrix, usable by nearly every borg ship), and you can capture pretty much anything that has engines. of course a double vinca dode will refresh this ship too to let it use holding beam for even longer.