Two things I would change

posted on May 22nd, 2009, 3:15 pm

I've been playing this game for a while now, and absolutely love it. There are, however, a couple of things I would change, both for balance, and because they simply bug me. I mostly play Fed, and I've been trying to master the Risner avatar, to no avail. There is already a phalanx thread, but hey:

-Rework the code for the Avalons fighters. They spend most of their time flying around in circles, and when they do fight, they tend to just revolve around the target, occasionally making a strafing run. Without tweaking their stats, they could be a lot more effective if given a bit more ability to "go after" the enemy. I know fighter carriers arn't supposed to be a big part of the game, but making what few carriers you've got more effective does seem a sensible idea.

-Switch the ranges for pulse phaser and the phaser turret. In nearly every movie, game, etc, the Phaser is the long range weapon, but the pulse is the short range one. I don't know how it would change building defences, since you won't be hitting them with your strongest weapon until they're up close, so they may just stay out of range, but the current config does seem strange.

posted on May 22nd, 2009, 3:51 pm

In the battles in DS9, no-one seemed to bother with coordinated attackes and just fought whatever was in-range at the time. Which is the same as what fighters do now.

The Turret weapons switch was already suggested.

[Google_Bot]

posted on May 24th, 2009, 4:09 pm

Last edited by Google_Bot on May 25th, 2009, 12:21 am, edited 1 time in total.

True, but the problem is that at the moment the fighters are simply ineffective. Sure, in the movies, they just flew around in a mish mash fashion, but in the movies they were only ever shown in huge battles where individual control would have been impossible. That, coupled with the fact the carriers themselves can't hold their own in a battle means they are pretty much useless (the only use I've found for them is massed around a wormhole or floating around randomly in the middle of maps as scouts) means they need an improvement.

Two general routes:

-Modifcation:

Increase their sensor range slightly, rate of fire, aggressiveness a little bit.

-Rework:

A bit more radical. Three basic ideas. Make the fighters selectable, and be able to give them targets (note, that doesn't mean make them individually movable, just able to pick targets). Give them a fixed operating range from the carrier. Finally, give them two modes: Snipe & Melee. In snipe, they avoid their individual targets "main firing arc", and don't switch targets. Consequently, they last a bit longer, their speed would be a tad lower but their ROF is a bit lowered too. In Melee, they'd be exactly the same as they are now, only they'd switch targets a bit more readily.

Thoughts?

posted on May 24th, 2009, 5:18 pm

The aggression mod could be interesting, the the reworking part would be difficult.

posted on May 24th, 2009, 8:22 pm

Make the fighters selectable, and be able to give them targets (note, that doesn't mean make them idividually movable, just able to pick targets). Give them a fixed operating range from the carrier.

That would be awesome. Or get them to just deploy and then attack the same target as the carrier. Or take away the carriers weapons, and use it as the selectable targeting system.

In the meantime, I'm off to play Empire At War for a bit

posted on May 25th, 2009, 12:56 am

Given the fact that carriers IRL are only supposed to be able to fight off little ships, what about replacing the phasor with a couple of light quantum pulses? It'd give it good fire power against little ships, but would enhance it's vunerability against cruisers/BB's. Reducing it's firing arc would also mean, that like carriers in real life, they'er vunerable to being swarmed from multiple sides.

Only problem with that is that a phaser is pretty much standard trek cannon.

Is there some kind of "uber crap" phasor that it could be switched to if it was given light quantum pulses? Could also change the range of the phaser to short (if it isn't already, too).

Thoughts?

[Tyler]

posted on May 25th, 2009, 1:02 am

Last edited by Tyler on May 25th, 2009, 1:11 am, edited 1 time in total.

Standard Shuttle Phaser, maybe? Then again, I'd just stick with Pulse Phasers. Instead of one cannon, give it 2 wing-tip mounted cannons.

posted on May 25th, 2009, 3:27 pm

I too feel that the fighters are a little weak and Silly at times esp. when  you repair the carrier and the fighters stay in the same space  just buzzing aroung  in the middle of no where after a battle. It would be nice  to have a button to recall the fighters to the carrier. On the weakness issue Fuse the  indivigiual fighters  in to a controlable block.The fighters would be seperate but move only as a one unit not as  seperate units. Give them the Attack formations from stock A2 like  a  simple Circle target or a more aggressive  figure 8 pattern. Or  the clover leaf formation ( think double figure 8 patterns) going above and below the target. Upon reaching veteran status the carrier would get 2 additional fighters  that have micro torpedo up grades. Upon veteran status the carrieg  can upgrade to carry a nother wing of  fighters giving you  the  (original) 4 fighters + 2 veteran up graded torpedo fighters,plus a nother  3 regular fighters + 3 upgraded tordedo fighter bombers

[RCIX]

posted on May 26th, 2009, 9:25 am

Last edited by RCIX on May 27th, 2009, 2:47 am, edited 1 time in total.

edit: here it is:
* carriers have 2 modes: a "normal mode", where they are basically a normal ship, and "fighter attack mode" where they can launch fighters to attack
* when in the normal mode, the carrier has battle cruiser stats (just above an excelsior II/T-15) and is pretty fast, while in the "fighter attack mode" the ship is slower, more fragile, and all of its normal weapons are offline
* when the carrier receives an attack order in fighter mode, it moves to within a certain distance of the target and launches fighters similar to the current ones (but with better turning) that go attack it
* the fighters have an attack range of approx. 2 to 3 screens (depending on resolution)
* if the carrier receives non-attack orders while in fighter mode and there are fighters in the field, they immediately return to the ship
* if the carrier receives explore orders while in fighter mode, it launches scout fighters to explore an a 90 degree arc in front of the ship and out to an unspecified distance

posted on May 27th, 2009, 4:45 am

That may be true but is  there still noway to recall them (Fighters/Bombers) after being deployed? I recently played a Map that had  alot of worm holes  had the Avilons camped over the worm holes.After getting the ships hammered.I sent  the ships  back to the repair yard,Yet the  fighters and  bombers stayed there after there was no  carrier present.

posted on May 27th, 2009, 5:01 am

Yup, there is no way currently to recall them...

What RCIX was stating was a proposal to rectify the mostly-useless fighter-carriers 

posted on May 27th, 2009, 5:22 am

Yup, there is no way currently to recall them...

What RCIX was stating was a proposal to rectify the mostly-useless fighter-carriers 

Yep i was! what do you guys think?

posted on May 27th, 2009, 6:17 am

I like the idea, but I see no mention of talking about cost, cooldown etc (other than this : if the carrier receives non-attack orders while in fighter mode and there are fighters in the field, they immediately return to the ship) ... which is really what bugs me about the fighter-carriers currently (that it takes a significant amount of resources, and the ships forever circle...)

posted on May 27th, 2009, 6:25 am

The idea is that the carrier uses the fighters as it's weapons, and it takes a decent stat hit to balance it. The thing would have as its main advantage long range, being able to launch fighters to attack from 2 to 3 screens away. The fighters themselves would be pretty much unchanged except maybe a stat drop and number increase, and a significant weapons evasion ability increase (so that they dont get picked off quite so fast). Perhaps a cost could be added when the fighters come back (for repair and refueling) but overall costs could be lowered because of the aforementioned stat hit.

posted on May 28th, 2009, 5:10 am

that would be nice, then we could change the stats of some ships so that they became an anti-fighter ship.