So here's the deal. I've been meaning to write since my friend and I got to play the Vaulters expansion after that accidental early release but I thought maybe I was playing wrong and I'll give it another go.

In that first game, we both played Vaulters and we noticed how easy it is to capture other ships. Whole fleets' ownership changed turn by turn, and I'm not exaggerating here. Later, as I've learned more about the mechanic, I thought that probably it was down to our low manpower levels. In our latest match, I went Horatio, my friend played Vaulters and from the very beginning I prepared for the boarding pod tactics. I made sure my fleet was full on manpower and I had at least one flak to defend against those pods. Otherwise, my fleets were fielding energy weapons. I noticed something was up when at one point he started sending whole captured Craver fleets against me. What he did was stuff his ships with boarding pods, as he said, after getting the pod tech, his military research was done, he was just capturing enemy fleets with ease.

I eventually gave up because I saw no way I could defend against that. I even tried sending my own boarding pods against him but all that happened was that some ships changed hands for a few turns until I was no more.

Then, just to test, we sent one of our dedicated ships against each other on a one-on-one, to see what happens. I had two flak defense modules, one anti-personnel defense module, he had 3 slots full of boarding pods. My flak defended against the first two waves of pods but when the next wave hit it was literally over in a second.

I mean... come on, it can't be that easy... Then I felt like I didn't wanna go on like that and I abandoned an otherwise good game.

Now you tell me, people of experience, especially in MP, what do you do to protect against boarding pod spam? Don't you think that the current balance makes it too easy to capture ships? I most certainly do. I don't think it is right that I have to ultra-dedicate all my ships in the hopes of eliminating the threat, and then I haven't even put any normal weapons on my ships.

I'm feeling very let down now and I wanna know whether it is because my own inability or there is something wrong with the current balance of things.

Boarding pods are extremely, extremely powerful

Dragar wrote:

Boarding pods are extremely, extremely powerful

So I found out. But should it be that way?

To make things worse Boarding Pods are overepowered despite the fact that they are currently shoot down way before they reach zero HP.

It is a bug I am trying to pinpoint.

So by design they should be even more powerful (which is crazy).

They need a lot of adjusting and I was thinking something along the lines:

1) If you send manpower to take over another ship then than manpower should be substracted from the boarding ship.

2) Fire rate of boarding ships should be once per phase (3 during battle) or maybe even limited to once a battle (depends on overall mechanics).

3) Boarding pods should deal damage once every 2-3 seconds so that take over takes longer. (There should be no damage at second 0, first one after 2-3 seconds).

4) Damage per second should be lowered and new module types introduced
       (ones that have a smaller crew but some flares or other tech to try to evade flak).

5) Gauss weapons should be able to act as flak agains Boarding pods (and why not agains missiles and squads). This way defending is easier and those weapons will be more useful.

6) Boarding defences should be a lot better. Something like -50% damage to manpower from boarding. But we need to keep in mind those can stack so maybe something else is needed here. Like -10 damage from boarding pods. This way only a large team has a chance to take over and small ones don't do damage? But I don't like that fact of doing no damage.

In short those modules need a lot of work to be balanced.

Thanks, at least I know I'm not the one messing something up.

Also, if this is the case, this change needs to be pushed ASAP because as things stand right now, I can't play any MP games with my friend. How can I ask anyone not to use a certain feature in the game? It'd be unfair. And I don't mind the use of pods, just not in this state, where you literally don't have to research anything after you get them because you can easily hijack whole fleets with them at a time.

Best way to limit boarding pods is for it to exact a heavy toll on your manpower.  Every boarding pod shot down should make your manpower reserve hurt. 

Boarding pods are op however they are coubterable by flak. Everything currently is counterable by flak except lasers railguns beams and blast effect batteries. The problem with boarding pods is it allows a strategy to wait until your opponent drops their manpower and sieges a system. This makes that fleet incredibly vunerable to take over, to the point of being affraid to siege to lose your manpower sink on your ships. However full flak will keep boarding pods use to a min at the sacrifice of damage.  The pods imo if they did damage over time and fired only once per battle phase they would be much better balanced.  You can think of having a boarding pod be a damage or manpowere over time where a succesful takeover only occurs if the host ship survives. 

I find that it changes the game too much to where your ship designs need to care for just the "possibility" that the enemy could be using pods. Again, because the outcome is not just a loss of your ships, but also a boost to the enemy strength, which is making combat so much more deciding. The winner not just wins, he even gets a positive feedback loop. 

In a game such as 4x, I just don't see a positive feedback loop making much sense. Hit and run attacks are already very strong, now catching a fleet off guard with hit and run becomes even stronger. 

Pods should be high risk / high reward and the burdon of correct usage should be on the ATTACKER using the pods. The burden shouldn't be on the defender to put flak on every of his ships. 

It feels like an "exotic specia gameplay" and thus it should have exotic and special requirements to pull off. Like a backstab. You need to maneuver unseen behind the back of someone. If you can do that unnoticed, you get backstab damage multiplier. If you get seen, well, tactic failed.

Pods go in the same "philosophy".

Just my opinion.

Dreepa wrote:

I find that it changes the game too much to where your ship designs need to care for just the "possibility" that the enemy could be using pods. Again, because the outcome is not just a loss of your ships, but also a boost to the enemy strength, which is making combat so much more deciding. The winner not just wins, he even gets a positive feedback loop. 

In a game such as 4x, I just don't see a positive feedback loop making much sense. Hit and run attacks are already very strong, now catching a fleet off guard with hit and run becomes even stronger. 

Pods should be high risk / high reward and the burdon of correct usage should be on the ATTACKER using the pods. The burden shouldn't be on the defender to put flak on every of his ships. 

It feels like an "exotic specia gameplay" and thus it should have exotic and special requirements to pull off. Like a backstab. You need to maneuver unseen behind the back of someone. If you can do that unnoticed, you get backstab damage multiplier. If you get seen, well, tactic failed.

Pods go in the same "philosophy".

Just my opinion.

Absolutely agree on that. That's what I thought too. Why should I go full flak defense just because someone MIGHT come at me with pods, otherwise if I use my regular fleet build I get hijacked in the first phase of the battle PLUS now I have to deal with the enemy sending his AND my OWN FLEET against me while I'm (worst case scenario) left fleetless...

Well when a fleet lacks manpower there boarding pod strength does not seem to be affected however if your ships are down on manpower they are extremely vunerable to takeover. I do not like the situation where flak is almost manditory because it counters now over half thevweapons in the game. It makes beams and lasers the high risk high reward combo which is opposite of what was intended. Bring a defensive reworj that brings fighters and bombers back into the meta. They are one of the most fun weapons to use and there current functionality is close to nothing. Heck they were a GDD in importance it would be a dream to see them back in action. Survivability of the host ships is what is keeping them out of the meta it is not their own dps. 

I'm in the middle of another MP game but I feel like throwing it already, again because of the pods. My friend (Vaulters) sent a captured Craver fleet to siege one of my outlying systems. I (Lumeris), to scare him away, built a 100% boarding pod fleet at that system. He left then sent a single hero ship there. Knowing that you cannot take over hero ships, I wanted to retreat but accidentally pressed fight. As it turns out, the hero ship was full of pods too so he took all my ship over easily.

Now I'm at a point that there's my ex fleet of boarding pod ships cruising up and down my empire and I'm scared of sending anything at it.

As it is now, I'd take boardng pods out of the game with immediate effect. It's breaking it.

I believe boarding pods should be limited to support ships, and also need manpower to use and last, take time to capture the ship. They would be a lot more balanced that way as you could not equip all ships with them and they would not allow you to take over everything...