Frequently Unused Starships

posted on October 6th, 2011, 12:08 am

In many of the games nowadays, I've noticed most people only uese the same set of ships, and only very rarely do you see others. Some of their ships are only useful in a few circumstances, but most can be exceedingly useful in nearly every conventional battle. Some of these examples are:
- Remore
- Vutpa
- Siege Cruiser
- Teutoburg
There are a few others, I cant think of them at the moment though My point is that these ships, even with terrific abilities and/or weapon systems, are almost never seen, and there are just the same combinations of Intrepids, Dodes, etc. I agree that these ships should form the bulk of your fleets, but they shouldn't be all of your fleet Basically, what it comes down to is to make people more aware of the value of these ships, and possibly make them more attractive to build. Ideas, thoughts?

posted on October 6th, 2011, 12:21 am

Right off the bat, I recognize two of those vessels as requiring extreme micro-management skills.  The Remore's point-defense phaser for example.  If a button is pressed to activate the special, then all ships selected will have their special energy drained.  You'd require more skills to get a few vessels to use the point-defense phaser while the others make use of the rest of the abilities available.

The Teutoburg is the same.  It requires great micro-management skills to keep it out of combat and fire from a great distance.  Normally, you may see this vessel in the middle of combat with the other vessels, and as the battle moves, this vessel must be moved manually to maintain distance and remain safe.

So basically, I believe that the level of micro-management skills required for these vessels to be effective in combat is the primary deterrence.

posted on October 6th, 2011, 2:37 am

I agree with you on the Teutoburg, but not with the Remore. To me, the Point-Defense Phaser is more of a situational ability, and it is the other two that hold the real value. Vector Calculation is easy to use and requires very little micromanagement; just click on a ship when combat starts, and it lasts a full 60 seconds, far longer than most battles. The Pricise Volley also requires very little micro. Since it can fully drain the shields of almost any ship, this ability alone makes the vessel worth it. Hell, two or three in your fleet will pretty much knock down the shields of a fully upgraded starbase.

posted on October 6th, 2011, 6:33 am

And here you've hit the true issue already.  The ships that aren't used very often aren't actually bad ships.  They can be very useful in some situations, and their rarity is more the fault of the community than the devs.

The best answer is to pick a race and keep playing it until you're a pro.  Take it very seriously, practice starting builds and different counter strategies.  Get your butt kicked a few times.  I'll gladly commentate your matches and SHOW people how awesome these ships can be, but first you have to make sure you can win by using them.  If you experiment a little bit without really knowing how to use the ship, it's obvious you'll lose and it won't be a good example for others.  Lately we've all gotten to see Boggz using Negh'Var against Old Time Pro, and it's inspiring because he really knows how to use them.  Only when 2 players get really good with their strategies and fight against each other multiple times will the devs be able to perfectly balance the game.

By the way, it's a bit off-topic but I watched the latest game that Clintsat has uploaded to YouTube but not to the video database yet.  Boggz had come out on top with a bigger fleet, 3 moon pairs to OTP's one, and he teched straight for Neghvar which should counter OTP's diamonds, but the diamonds still won.  I believe that given that situation it shouldn't have gone that way, and the radius of Nanites needs to be nerfed some more while Neghvar receive a small buff.

For that matter, I want to suggest that the fancy cost equation be modified a bit, so that the higher the tech requirement for a ship is, the less its passives count toward its strength when figuring what its cost should be.  After all, it is much harder to use a counter that takes several minutes to get started.  Boggz started in the direction of Neghvar about 2-3 minutes before OTP even started his first diamond, and with that kind of a head-start I believe the Neghvars should have countered the diamonds harder than they did.

Umm, going back to the main topic.  I've decided that I want to go ahead and play Romulans exclusively for a while, and just try to use Serkas, D'Deridex and warbirds in general in a 1v1 game.  Funny trounced me today because I didn't micro them well enough, but I hope to get better so I can show the devs that these ships really are underpowered (or I might discover that they aren't.  Who knows.)  The best way to convince a gaming community of something is to lead by example, show them a winning strategy that uses a rare ship and make them want to try it themselves.

[Anonymous]

posted on October 6th, 2011, 8:58 pm

Last edited by Anonymous on October 6th, 2011, 9:00 pm, edited 1 time in total.

The Vutpa is a nice ship. The only reason I see why it is not used is because it needs the weapon depot. It is cheaper than the Vor'cha but higher up the tech tree, it has a very interesting role: mid-late game torpedo defense, exactly the point where the Vor'cha and NeghVar fail. As troop transport it even has decloaking abilities. The normal special is already great though.
In my opinion the Vor'cha is that useful that switching places in the tech tree with the Vutpa wouldn't be a huge problem. Or simply leave the troop transport and her special abilities in the depot but allow it to be built with armory already. There must be an old thread of Boggz somewhere where all those points have been brought up already, however it's been some patches since then and nothing has changed :/.

Oh, as usual I just want to say that the ChonaQ has much more problems and is used even less than the Vutpa and I don't have easy solutions for it. I know already that Myles will try to tell me again that the ChonaQ is great .

posted on October 7th, 2011, 11:04 am

Oh, as usual I just want to say that the ChonaQ has much more problems and is used even less than the Vutpa and I don't have easy solutions for it. I know already that Myles will try to tell me again that the ChonaQ is great .

The problem is that the concept of the ship is simply not Klingon. Slow and long range. For an artillery ship it has horrible range, the same as the much faster and versatile Sang. It has a severe weakness in that its main weapon uses special energy.

The weapon itself doesn't look/feel Klingon. I would prefer if the ChonaQ would fire torpedo bursts at arty range.
Or a 2 second cloak special for quick decloak, unleash mayhem from short medium range and withdraw.

posted on October 7th, 2011, 11:14 am

the chonaq is great. its beam hits hard and has no tech requirements.

it's definitely slow, which means you arent gonna be raiding with chonaqs. but if you mix some chonaqs into your fleet to defend against the enemy, it can really help you. they can stay near yard and hit from long range. and just like warpins/e2, when used near a yard, the slow speed isnt as crippling. but unlike warpins/e2 the chonaq always hits.

it would make dancing with nanites harder as well, as the second they get in range, they get hurt. and if they retreat their diamonds for a few seconds to try lure you out, you can recharge your precious chonaq energy faster than their hull repairs.

and importantly, the chonaq isnt very costly. you can mix them in to a fleet of other ships maybe. most klingon ships work great as raiders and offensive ships. the chonaq is one of the few that is different, thats why its seen so little.

[Andre27]

posted on October 7th, 2011, 1:57 pm

Last edited by Andre27 on October 7th, 2011, 1:59 pm, edited 1 time in total.

the chonaq is great. its beam hits hard and has no tech requirements.

it's definitely slow, which means you arent gonna be raiding with chonaqs. but if you mix some chonaqs into your fleet to defend against the enemy, it can really help you. they can stay near yard and hit from long range. and just like warpins/e2, when used near a yard, the slow speed isnt as crippling. but unlike warpins/e2 the chonaq always hits.

it would make dancing with nanites harder as well, as the second they get in range, they get hurt. and if they retreat their diamonds for a few seconds to try lure you out, you can recharge your precious chonaq energy faster than their hull repairs.

and importantly, the chonaq isnt very costly. you can mix them in to a fleet of other ships maybe. most klingon ships work great as raiders and offensive ships. the chonaq is one of the few that is different, thats why its seen so little.

IMO the lack of survivability for this ship is my main concern. Sure it can get a cloak after a very costly/time consuming research. Without its special its special energy drains quickly limiting the total damage.

Sure, it may have its uses but because it so different from the regular Klingon playing style it is hardly seen.
When you commit the chonaq to a battle you better be sure you can win because you have no chance to escape then the tables turn.

It always hits that's true, but using a cheaper, faster and earlier available Sang to kite/fire from distance will be the choice of many players.

Edit: as for its defensive uses, i think most players prefer the Klingon turret for that.

posted on October 7th, 2011, 3:21 pm

Chonaq survives ok if you keep it near yard. And you can leave chonaq to defend while kvorts raid.

You don't need the big cloak for that.

Chonaq is different from other klink ships, but that doesn't make it bad, just you have to use it differently.

Chonaq is much cheaper than hwp and can repair at a yard. And once you are in a position to win a straight fleet battle you can take chonaq to fight the enemy. Hwp has to stay home for that.

posted on October 7th, 2011, 5:37 pm

Chonaq is alright, it just has alot of limiting factors. Most players will skip this ship in lieu of other vessels that accomplish the same thing for less. Sure it can be an effective ship, but it's also slow and unwieldy, and requires special energy to fire its weapons. A single energy-draining ship could render this vessel completely ineffectual, and unlike everything else, energy doesn't recharge at shipyards. That said, it is also a useful long-range defense ship whose weaponary guarentees hits against the enemy.  To me this ship can be useful, but is also very situational, hence why I didn't mention it before.
All in all, good ship though It's stats lie though, its more powerful than it lets on

posted on October 7th, 2011, 6:07 pm

Here are two games with vutpa, there both actually very good in my opinion

a win! Ray320 vs Liatris - The Hitchhiker's Guide to Fleet Operations

and a loss... Ray320 vs Boggs 6-05-2011 - Tourney Game - The Hitchhiker's Guide to Fleet Operations

posted on October 7th, 2011, 6:10 pm

In the replay thread I had the idea of splitting the research for Neghvar and Chonaq cloak, that would make it easier to get without throwing down a TON of cash and time.

The thing about Klingon ships without cloak is, they have to stay home most of the time.  And if you're committing to a ship that can't raid, you have to be certain that you can out-macro your enemy, something the cloaky races are deliberately terrible at.  So the effective role of the Chonaq is to defend your territory and stall for time while you tech up to better ships, the only problem is if you have Chonaq you're already at the end of the tech tree so there's nothing better coming while you hold off the enemy.  The non-cloaky races all have their stall tactics early in the tech tree because they can build awesome things after they've survived long enough, while Romulans pretty much have no defensive stall tactic.  Chonaq don't fill any roles that the Klingons really need.

That being said, a successful Chonaq rush in a team game is an awesome thing to behold.  

posted on October 7th, 2011, 6:41 pm

Well the Teutoburg is a very weak ship it does very little damage and it doesnt take alot to kill it, i think we would be better off sticking the steam runner back in.

posted on October 7th, 2011, 7:16 pm

In the replay thread I had the idea of splitting the research for Neghvar and Chonaq cloak, that would make it easier to get without throwing down a TON of cash and time.

I think the large-scale device would be better off with a lower cost. Right now it's so expensive that very few people actually research it.

Well the Teutoburg is a very weak ship it does very little damage and it doesnt take alot to kill it, i think we would be better off sticking the steam runner back in.

Not necessarily. Its weapons are weakened mainly for balancing purposes; after all, it has the longest range in the game, and is extremely useful for taking down enemy turrets. Not only that, but it has some pretty powerful special abilities:
- Tricobalt Carpet can quickly take down enemy stations and is pretty good against battleships too
- The other ability (can't remembber the name right now ) can take down enemy weapons systems, and is great for quick raids on enemy bases.
While it is true that Intrepids also have tricobalts and the Defiant has the more effective Critical Shot, the Teutoburg has both in one. These alone do not make the ship worthwhile, and its real value comes in the annoyance you give your opponent; in fleet battles you can force him to cut straight through your lines in an effort to get that irritating bombardment vessel It can also be used to distract your opponent at a critical time by attacking one of their installations right before an assault; as we all know, a distracted opponent is a dead opponent
I miss the Steamrunner too, I think itll be back soon though

posted on October 7th, 2011, 7:35 pm

also the teutoburg has the advantage that no turret can return its fire. it can fire completely unopposed. so if the enemy sits at their turrets you can just whittle them down. and if they leave their turrets your fleet is ready to fight. i once sat a teuto near an enemy expansion constantly chipping away at his torp turrets, every time his fleet came out my fleet would pounce and force him back. then rinse and repeat. at the time my team was losing the team game badly, my teuto annoyance forced them to change their plans and commit whole fleets to go after my one ship. in the end they got the teuto, but only because they had the huge advantage to begin with.