What I would like to see for Fed ship build list/warpin

posted on August 6th, 2010, 12:50 pm

No Monsoon when playing as the Feds?  How strange.  And no bugs.... better watch out for those rushes.

posted on August 6th, 2010, 1:08 pm

Well, I never build a saber for example. Falls too fast, not enough firepower to really destroy a thing.

the sabre is actually a good ship. try double yard sabre spam, add hyper impulse and you will find that the sabre swarm is pretty nice. hyperimpulse allows you to counter short ranged stuff (-25% damage) and gives u the speed to escape long ranged stuff with ease. long ranged phasers always hit and can kite easily. risner's sabre is even stronger.

The monsoon is also a vessel I never build. Only the mixed tech one is sometimes used, if available.

this is also a lovely vessel. build some at the start mixed with intreps and the enemy wont be able to easily counter you with supports.

when a monsoon ranks it becomes a tank, useful in the later game.

also unranked monsoons can be used as a hit and run force. they are very fast, not much can catch them. run in a pack of them, use the special on a miner and it will die. then run. rinse and repeat. the monsoon can take just enough turret fire to get 1 kill like that. assuming the enemy hasnt turtled. if they have turtled then they wont last long anyway as turtling is easy to beat.

Then there is the supply-vessel, which gives you a second volley of torps. I only use it to gain some supply, but never use the ability, because I need the supply in order to build ships.

the nova is really useful just for its special. its basically a mini support ship. there is not much downside to it, feds have plenty of supply laying around to use it, it gives extra dps to your fleet, never a bad thing.

I nearly never build the fed-fighter carrier. It costs too much and there is not a massive fleet where it could provide enough distraction for a real counter.

i dont know why you ignore the avalon. its a lovely ship, it costs a small bit more than an excel 2, but has quite a bit higher stats (only 1 less off/def than a defiant, which costs a lot more and takes more time and requires the 3rd chassis). its got a long range phaser that always hits, it often gets the last shot and ranks up, becoming really nice at higher ranks. it launches fighters which can be useful as it gives u early warning of enemy fleets, plus the first enemy volley will be wasted on killing the 1 little fighter with 50 times the firepower needed to kill it. plus turrets will sometimes waste fire on fighters and u cant order a turret to fire any more. the avalon is a really nice ship.

Rommies:
Well, here I must say I nearly use every ship. Pretty well made. Only the small shrike or so may be overjumped.

shrikes are really useful, they absolutely devestate detroyers. and their special is really funny, if the enemy has any support ships u can disable their engines while cloaked. they will probably stop their entire fleet to wait for that one support to regain engines. delaying them for a few seconds while other romulan ships do their thing.

Klingons:
Where should I start. Well, the B'rel does good in early game, but later it is cannon fodder. I build two of them, max 3, and if one falls, it wont get rebuild. I change directly to the K'Vort.
The Susa falls before it reaches the enemy base to strike with effect. I rather use the Sang-class, then the Susa.

brels are useful as harassment, use their special to regain loads of supply.

the susa is something that works really well vs borg. but in other games it can be made in fewer numbers in late game.

The Qaw’Duj is only used because of its special ability. I dont know what to do with this ship in a mixed encounter instead of letting it fire its special and retreat (if I manage to micro it correctly). But in most cases, I dont even build it. Same goes for the Charg’H. I replace both with the Vor'cha.

make qawduj from both battle yard and kahless if your enemy intrep/bug spams. the qawduj is tough on its own even against non adai. its default special is pretty good giving it more power (you can never have enough lol). also polaron field as u say is awesome. i make a couple qawduj always, as they can hold their own as combat ships, and when i do polaron field research they become awesome.
charghs are awesome too, mainly for its special, it can hold any ship for long enough to have your fleet kill it. that is particularly strong againt sphere dance. any harassing ships that are trying to run away, u can catch one of them.

klingons rely on spam

no they dont, spamming from field yard is silly now, as klinks you shouldnt be spamming any more. make a kbq kvort qawduj sang vorcha, thats 5 classes already.

Well, well. The bug is a rarly seen ship if you play with me. Same goes for the C-11. I like the B-8 and S-2 with one or two bombers that do flanking manouvers in order to destroy mining operations.

the bug isnt necessary any more, but it still is a valid ship. make a few of them early on, dont try spam them any more as bug spam isnt as strong as before. but some bugs is rarely a problem. combine bugs with another ship (b-8/t15 etc) and some s2 and you have a nice fleet. when the fleets get big enough to kill bugs quicker than they can retreat then you can use them for ramming important things (like spheres) to stop escape.

the c-11 i agree i dont build usually. the only time i would use it is in a dom vs dom 1v1 where the other dom player spams bugs, but that is rare now.

Borg: I never build the detector, the probe and the adaptor. sometimes a scout cube and then building assims and spheres for initiating diamond and cubes.

I use two fleets for the borg. One to assimilate the small flies, and one to do devastating damage.

The first fleet, two assims and maybe one or two pyramids with 4 holding beams are there to cause fear and confusion in the middle of the field. They assimilate, capture ships and I send them right back to where the enemy is, so that it cant rest. The second fleet is then build, while the assims do their job and will the overpower the enemy, that isnt able to do any sigificant action to me at this point.

Not to mention, that a dodeca or two are supporting my assim/pyramid-fleet.

i assume you play only assimilate avatar?

detectors arent build much, unless u want more scouts.

assimilate can do scube/probe start before transition to assims.

[Nebula_Class_Ftw]

posted on August 6th, 2010, 3:39 pm

Last edited by Nebula_Class_Ftw on August 6th, 2010, 3:46 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Saber counters B'rels, even tho the B'rel is supposed to counter long. Saber is great if you're facing pulse/torp heavy ships but it is pretty weak so it does tend to end up getting eaten by short-range pulse-wielding K'Vorts if you don't micro it really really well. Saber spam isn't really too effective since for only 20 more seconds of build time you can get Intrepids, which are a great double-yard spam.

Monsoon is a good long range counter, but it gets no boost for Risner (unlike Akira, Intrepid, Saber.) Monsoons also don't do too well later in the game since they only have phasers and you need to research to get the torpedo that is really only effective on small and medium ships, they do less early game tho because they do 10% less to short range. And then the pulses you will likely face will hurt your Monsoons more than Intrepids (Monsoon=small destroyer, but Intrepid=medium cruiser, even more odd since the Defiant is slightly smaller than a Monsoon yet is medium sized.)
Hit and run is a good use for Monsoons, Miners fall fast to 8 Monsoons. Problem is, you can expect lots of frontline combat since you're not a cloaking race (if you're facing feds theyll warpin on your Monsoons, Borg you're facing bigger miners that arent great for attacking with Monsoons, Romulans will uncloak on top of you with the Shrike that supercounters Monsoons, Klingons will uncloak on top of you, Dominion has medium sized miners like Borg. Use Monsoons very carefully for harassment.)

I like Nova, but 6 extra torpedoes for a ship with a 90+ second build time that has basically the stats of an Intrepid and gets slaughtered by pulses is barely worth it to me.

One of the problems with the Avalon is that, like most long range, it is slow as crap and ends up being completely unable to runaway or chase any shorter range ships. Another is that it costs 50 (!!!!!) supply, so if you already built the Supply-heavy Intrepid (18 supply) then you're really gonna lose res buying more supply. Fighter carriers are great for the free cannon fodder and sort of extended range but the ship is already long range so it's kind of pointless unless you have a big fleet around it to protect it.

Shrikes are just overlooked since Rhienn refits or regular with phase plates become easily a superspam that is very hard to stop without lots of cloak detect (watch replays with Rhienns and you will see they are probably the worst spam to be hit with besides Generix.) Shrikes would be built more if Rhienns weren't so much more appealing. Also it is uncommon to see lots of support ships unless you're facing another Romulan player or Dodec spam (which you should be using anti long range on since they wont get subsystems disabled.)

B'rel special is a gamble as it might not kill things so you won't get back that supply. They are good for harassment, but their best use is to stop ships from getting away with cloaking. I like to keep two or three B'rels thruout the game until I get three or more Vutpas.

Sus'a is useful, especially against bigger ships.

I agree with Sheva, I only really make Qaw'Duj when I want polaron field, tho its tier one special can replaceweapon so enemy ships will stop targeting the Qaw'Duj while it sneaks away.

I agree completely with Myles about Bugs, C-11, and Borg.

posted on August 6th, 2010, 7:02 pm

c-11 is a support ship.  Get yourself a group of medium range and short range ships, and have the c-11 use it's range-increasing special.  Watch your opponent get hammered by ships they thought they were out of range of.

posted on August 6th, 2010, 7:51 pm

Well the thing is tho, right now long range is slow and short is fast, so there's no need to extend ranges since it takes like half a second for ur short range to get up to the enemy medium/long range and they cant run away easily (unless they're sabers.) The only good use for extending range is to bombard turrets or kill fast short range ships that are retreating. And those two situations are usually for smaller fleets, with most fleet engagements or critical mass you don't need C-11.

posted on August 6th, 2010, 7:59 pm

Well I don't think this is supposed to be a balance thread ....  @ Myles and Nebftw ...


  But you guys are indeed making some rash decisions about the uses of many of the ships.

Saber counters B'rels, even tho the B'rel is supposed to counter long. Saber is great if you're facing pulse/torp heavy ships but it is pretty weak so it does tend to end up getting eaten by short-range pulse-wielding K'Vorts if you don't micro it really really well.

  Sabers are still excellent skirmishes in my opinion.  I would not build them though if I were facing a large number of beam ships.  They will do great against Klingons and Romulans though.

Monsoon is a good long range counter, but it gets no boost for Risner (unlike Akira, Intrepid, Saber.) Monsoons also don't do too well later in the game since they only have phasers and you need to research to get the torpedo that is really only effective on small and medium ships, they do less early game tho because they do 10% less to short range.

  Monsoons are the Fed's best raider in my opinion (until you can get Defiants).  They are exceedingly fast and the proxy torpedoes give you an insta-kill on miners with 4 or more.  5 make an excellent raiding force as you can swoop in, phaser one miner, then plaster another with the proxies before running off.  I did this to Mort in our 1 v 1 to excellent effect.

I like Nova, but 6 extra torpedoes for a ship with a 90+ second build time that has basically the stats of an Intrepid and gets slaughtered by pulses is barely worth it to me.

  It's an incredibly fast support ship.  You're not supposed to spam them for fleet combat, you're supposed to build a few to either raid or support Intrepids/Akiras/Warpins with their support special.  They're like Canaverals in that sense.

Fighter carriers are great for the free cannon fodder and sort of extended range but the ship is already long range so it's kind of pointless unless you have a big fleet around it to protect it.

  That's what Avalons are for :  fleet combat.  They SHOULDN'T be left without support.

Shrikes are just overlooked since Rhienn refits or regular with phase plates become easily a superspam that is very hard to stop without lots of cloak detect

  Shrikes are less appealing to me as they are much more easily countered than Rhienns are in my opinion, but they make much better raiders for mining at much less expense than Leahvals and can almost hard counter certain ships in the game.  Again, not a baseline unit in my opinion due to it's passive focus against small destroyers.

(watch replays with Rhienns and you will see they are probably the worst spam to be hit with besides Generix.)

  I agree with you here about Disruptor Rhienns, but I'm pretty sure that it's special will be changing, which should make a big difference in the future.  Gens still remain far too cost-efficient as opposed to Disruptor-R's which cost about the same as a Vorcha each and require 2 science stations + research of their special.

B'rel special is a gamble as it might not kill things so you won't get back that supply. They are good for harassment, but their best use is to stop ships from getting away with cloaking. I like to keep two or three B'rels thruout the game until I get three or more Vutpas.

  Definitely agree here.  I'm an avid Klingon Player and I've even tried doing double yards with the BoP attachments to field a decent number of ships, but their role is that of a Manual Targetter.  They are too fragile and supply-costly to use effectively when Kvorts fulfill nearly the same role with less liability.  The B'rel special is nice, but being unable to use it after a decloak is a last-straw for me.  The defense boost is nice, but they are still targeted first among Kbq/Kvorts and die nonetheless.  Using even a group of them with special BURNS through your supply and the regain is hardly a sure thing.  I find it almost NEVER worth the risk of just eating your supply dry.  Having 3 cloaked B'rels around your main fleet to decloak and target cloaking Rom/Klinks is their best use (or raiding miners).

Sus'a is useful, especially against bigger ships.

  Actually, try using even a small handful of Susa with their specials against a mining station or even a shipyard.  They will blow that shit up faster than you'd expect.  They have the anti-building passive and will cut through them like butter.  It only takes a few and they are FAST.

I agree with Sheva, I only really make Qaw'Duj when I want polaron field, tho its tier one special can replaceweapon so enemy ships will stop targeting the Qaw'Duj while it sneaks away.

  I don't find the Qaw'Duj from the Starbase very useful as it's cripplingly expensive for even a single one + it can't do enough damage to even a single bug or Intrepid to kill it before it can easily retreat.  Making enough of them to adequately match common ADAI units is possible, but an impractical strategy in my opinion.

posted on August 7th, 2010, 1:33 am

:lol boggz, u started by remarking how off topic this thread had become, but then continues the off topic discussion

[navyguy]

posted on August 7th, 2010, 3:55 am

Last edited by navyguy on August 7th, 2010, 4:39 am, edited 1 time in total.

Funny not one word of old faithful, its a dam conspricay and everyone is in on it, Ambassador Class at veteran rank is a powerhouse but no.......... mention of her, just dont get it we talk about older ships but not a word of the ship that really brouht in StarFleet to a new level. Like to see a buildable, and a upgraded warpin. I think the Ambassador will be taken from the game soon enough, just a worry. I wonder am i the only one who likes the Ambassador Class? What i dont get the Ambassador Class is a powerhouse when she is upgraded, serveing in the NAVY the Ambassador is a welcome ship to any battle group , and we have for warp in a Nebula class ship  granted strong sensor's yet weak in combat. The Ambassador is a fuctional ship, it rivals the Galaxy Cass to some extent.  T he Miranda Class and Excelscior need to go. T he Ambassador is far mor e powerful, it could with no problem take any ship on , i think she is a fine canidate for a upgrade, for warpin. The other Nebula has a powrhouse killing to it, so why not focus on these ship's and rid the FEDERATION, of older ships.

[Tyler]

posted on August 7th, 2010, 3:57 am

Last edited by Tyler on August 7th, 2010, 4:14 am, edited 1 time in total.

Maybe it wasn't mentioned because it isn't on trial? Ships are usually mentioned here when you have an idea to change it, not because of popularity (many people like functional ships).

As for being removed, I can't see that happening when ships from a similar era and earlier are still in full use. No need to worry about the Ambassador, it's lasted this far into FO.

posted on August 7th, 2010, 4:18 am

Got myself an elite Sabre last night as Risner.  Avatar level up bonus enables it to become quite the nice little combat ship.

Just a few hours now and leaving for holiday.... BUT, ive found my wife's Acer Asprire One indeed is capable of playing Fleet Ops!!!  YAY!! 

posted on August 7th, 2010, 5:07 am

No way the Ambassador would be a buildable unit.  The Galaxy is her replacement design.  They're both powerful, versatile ships though.

I wouldn't mind seeing an Olympic-Class with the ability to recrew ships in the field.

posted on August 7th, 2010, 10:35 am

I wouldn't mind seeing an Olympic-Class with the ability to recrew ships in the field.

That would be sweeeeeeeeeet.

Definitely agree here.  I'm an avid Klingon Player and I've even tried doing double yards with the BoP attachments to field a decent number of ships, but their role is that of a Manual Targetter.  They are too fragile and supply-costly to use effectively when Kvorts fulfill nearly the same role with less liability.  The B'rel special is nice, but being unable to use it after a decloak is a last-straw for me.  The defense boost is nice, but they are still targeted first among Kbq/Kvorts and die nonetheless.  Using even a group of them with special BURNS through your supply and the regain is hardly a sure thing.  I find it almost NEVER worth the risk of just eating your supply dry.  Having 3 cloaked B'rels around your main fleet to decloak and target cloaking Rom/Klinks is their best use (or raiding miners).

I agree Boggz, paying supply for a chance to get even more supply is dodgy at best. I think the special shouldn't cost any supply, but setup the special weapon energy so it takes a good number of seconds before you can use it after decloak. That way, the special is a trade off for cloak.

posted on August 7th, 2010, 11:27 am

Hell, just change it so that using cloak resets it's use timer.  And make that timer something like 30sec-1min.

After all, anybody can win a battle if you catch your enemy by surprise.  Only a true warrior...no, a Dahar Master can take on a whole wing of dominion ships in a single B'rel.

To KOR!

posted on August 7th, 2010, 2:39 pm

But then the Dahar Master must be able to evade beam weapons. I think, we need that feature. The only question is how ti implement it, because a miss would result in an infinite ranged beam across the map.

If there would be something like beam-miss chance for very tiny ships like scouts and small/medium destroyers, the B'Rel could prove quite useful.

Is there any ship out there, that is small and resilient against pulse weaponary, while at the same time doing great against torps and beams? (beams from long range)

That would be the mixed tech monsoon. High density shield generators, good against long range weapons, good torpedo avoidance and with the 6'th level shield generators perfectly suited against pulse weapons and beam weapons. If mixed tech tactical armor comes also in handy, this vessel is best against other destroyers/cruisers.

For all other things, Intrepids will do very fine.
Also the dominion can counter with the Ketracel ability of the S-2. Its like a mobile klingon "make me stronger" station with a longer lasting effect/you could use it more.

For a good B'rel, it is really best to engage it into anti-cloaking measures.

posted on August 7th, 2010, 7:32 pm

I really like the idea of having the Olympic be a re-crewing vessel. Thats about the best way to use a ship in that role anyone could possibly think of. Great job there!

In general warp in needs to have some dire changes - Im exclusively a fed player and the current warp in has way too much chance to get a really good group of vessels than not. Currently the vessels are balanced very well its just that you get them so frequently its too often that it goes your way. It really should be that 50% of the time you get good vessels like now, and the other 50% you get crappy ones where the vessels are garbage - granted that means adding several more older classes of starship. But this will change Fed play styles to rely more on production ships for combat, and the warp in could be used to turn the tide, or bolster defensive locations.

Warp in should be to support your fleet, not be your fleet. It also needs tweaking so that it cannot be used for one off strikes, and raids. As a distress call, the warpin should only be sendable to your own vessels and stations or your allies.

B'rels special are useful for increasing their effectiveness but as many have said it is a bit of a gamble to spend supply to use it and not have a guaranteed return. Id definately go for it being changed to energy use only and the trade-off being unable to cloak. Trading combat effectiveness for surprise seems reasonable.