I don't know if it stills the case, but I remember that little ships were being aimed at before big ships. So, it was possible to easily counter the destroyers/glass canon build.

What I did was that : 1 (or more, with more cp) big ship loaded with only weapons (eventually a fleet repair), and lots of little ships, that only carry defenses. The idea is a mothership, with a fleet of little ships protecting it. If correctly balanced, destroyers are near to inefficient against it. It's one of the few fleet that i've seen not resulting in a 1fleet winner/1 fleet destroyed, but still taking the advantage over destroyers fleet. It was destroying half of the destroyers each time, for 2-3 "protectors" killed.



Of course, that would work even better with big ships aimed first, as they are more resistant.

Romeo wrote:
And again, as has been pointed out by numerous players, Missiles are more effective than Beam and Kinetic. As I said, my 10/10/10 defence set-up renders me virtually immune to Beam and Kinetic, but I can still get thoroughly trounced by Missile. Doesn't take a rocket scientist (Read: Sophon) to figure out that when all defences are equal and one weapon is far better than the others, there's a very distinct advantage there.

Yeah I usually don't do 10/10/10. If we are talking mid-late game then I have been doing something like 15/9/6 against balanced setups. But sometimes you run into a late game fleet with nothing but those crazy purple kinetics and running the aforementioned defense becomes a problem.

Kareal wrote:
Several patches ago defense MP values were reduced by 50% as stacking defense modules created an effective invasion ship. So 50% of their MP in defenses is equivalent to equal numbers of equal tech defenses.

Makes sense, thanks. This highlights the importance of scouting and intelligence. I try to tailor my fleets to match the enemy.

Ash_F wrote:
So I hope that gives you some kind of guideline. If you have at 1/2 mp invested in flak as they have in missiles you should be ok.

Several patches ago defense MP values were reduced by 50% as stacking defense modules created an effective invasion ship. So 50% of their MP in defenses is equivalent to equal numbers of equal tech defenses.

Right now, the Horatio I am fighting are using nothing but beams. Some turns ago, their Dreads had about 700 missile mp and I was almost completely negating it with with about 350 flak mp on my dreads, which was about 15 modules, which is why they switched I suppose. I made adjustments to deal with their beams now.



So I hope that gives you some kind of guideline. If you have at 1/2 mp invested in flak as they have in missiles you should be ok. What is you fleet make-up like usually?

Ash_F wrote:
Are you talking about multiplayer or AI? I've been playing single player.

Single player for me too.

Igncom1 wrote:
They could have flak defenses have a deflect number as well to allow a number of guarantee missile kills.



But yeah, missiles are 0% or 100%.



It almost seems like missiles should be more of a risk/reward type of weapon, but hey what ever right?

That would be nice. Because they really are zero risk weapons as is. lol

They could have flak defenses have a deflect number as well to allow a number of guarantee missile kills.



But yeah, missiles are 0% or 100%.



It almost seems like missiles should be more of a risk/reward type of weapon, but hey what ever right?

Missile are not op, stop whining



Now the ONLY BASIS the thread has is that flak works differently to the other defences, where shields and deflectors both reduce damage by a number, flak only works 100% or 0% of the time, e.g. it ever kills a missile or it doesn't.



This causes an issue where you can load missile boats and still kill people cause flak will eventually stop working



The obvious change IF they want to bring it in line with the 2 others weapon types is to make missile do X damage and Flak to reduce X damage and graphically make it work.

Are you talking about multiplayer or AI? I've been playing single player.

Ash_F wrote:
Yeah I usually don't do 10/10/10. If we are talking mid-late game then I have been doing something like 15/9/6 against balanced setups. But sometimes you run into a late game fleet with nothing but those crazy purple kinetics and running the aforementioned defense becomes a problem.

I have never run in to an issue with Kinetics, so I usually don't bother pumping more in to Deflectors. Beam can hypothetically be a handful, but I usually try to simply overwhelm the enemy before they really come in to their own (Which is easy) while the Shields soak up the rest. Missiles are where I run in to problems - there's no way to stop them from firing, and even though my Flak defence is equal to Shield and Deflector, a good salvo of Missiles can wipe out an obscene amount of your ships in the opening round.

You don't need to stop all missiles IMO, you just need to stop enough to survive at long-range phase, around 1/2 flak to each missile (2/3 in some extreme cases) is enough, and after the long ranged phase, your repair will do the work, you will petty much near full hp after the battle.

And after the long ranged phase, your better weight to damage ratio weapons will do a better job. (Tech-wise just stick with your flak to pick your weapon.)



With sniper trail and some luck, this build can even kill a few missile destroyers with Kinetic weapon, due to their mad weight to damage ratio, while still got enough defense to survive -- in Long ranged phase.

Its not over powered, people who whine get devs to nerf stuff that ultimately ruins games, nerfing never fixes anything anyway it just moves the goal posts as it were, instead of whining learn to counter them some other way.



Also your playing a strategy game EXPECT there will be a BEST thing to do/ most common, if you don't like this stop playing strategy games.



Also really this game has NO COMPETITIVE SCENE and I don't think the devs intended it to be ever. Even the most comp games are ultimately broken because they have an "illusion of balance"



The only balanced game in existence is noughts a crosses Guess what happens nobody wins in a balanced game its always a draw unless someone brain farts.



use higher tech flak / make ships with less weapons and more anti w/e their using



its fairly easy to make a custom races that has +15% to def modules in addition to the modules that give you the same.



The type of people who whine something is op is the same people who after the devs nerf X will whine Y is now op



Also it hurts people who don't even play MP who might enjoy putting 30-40 missile on one ship and looking at the bright pixels and stuff

Is it just me, or does a ship with all thous weapons not make any sense?



In SOTS2 a ships weapons is determined by the 'supply' and 'energy' it provides, possibly we could do a similar mechanic?



But I don't know about you, but a ship with 15 multi missile launchers and nothing else but the required ship systems seems a little against the grain of what would be logical......you would only have enough space for 1 shot.....and ships start with some kind of fission/fusion engine so can you even power as many energy weapons at once?





I dunno about you guys, but ES's ship system does seem a little basic ATM......Not all of ES's races are like 40K orks, so that kind of logic shouldn't apply.

i don't know for sure : the question should be less "are missiles OP ?" and more "how to be sure missiles are OP ?". Destroyer boats full of missiles is a simple strategy so many use them and because many people use them, even more people use missiles. But it is not because a strategy is widely used that it is the most effective, it may just mean the strategy is more popular but they may still be others more efficient strategy that only few people use.

If my enemy was building huge ships filled with just missiles, I would just build some tiny destroyers with just enough firepower (in groups of 4, say) to down the enemy ship with missiles of their own.



Yours will be MUCH cheaper.



He will have to change what he builds. When he does, adapt accordingly.

Ash_F wrote:
You mean if the enemy intentionally loads up with low tier missiles? Interesting; let's examine.



Let's say you had 10 top tier flak. The enemy has 20 top tier missiles at a total mass of 400 tons. You block 10 and 10 hit for 5000-6200 damage, not considering crits. For 400 tons, the enemy could alternatively use bottom tier missiles. Those are 8 tons each so that comes to 50 missiles. You block 10 and 40 hit for 1400-2000 damage. In this scenario, the low tech option does much less damage, even less when you consider crits.



In another scenario, where the enemy only devotes 200 tons of missiles against 10 top tier flak(180 tons btw), then obviously the low tech option comes out ahead. 10 top tier missiles would do zero damage, but you can get 25 low tier missiles for the same mass. 15 then go through for 525-750 damage.



In conclusion, spamming low tech missiles is only superior if you devote an equal amount of tonnage to missiles as they do flak. If you are willing devote enough tonnage, high tech missiles will do much more damage than a comparative tonnage of low tech missiles.



PS - One small Note. Equal tier kinetic and deflectors will not cancel each other out, unlike missiles and flak. If you had 10 top tier kinetics vs 10 top tier deflectors, you would still take 180-240 damage per connecting salvo, not counting crits. Beams and shields are similar. That's what I meant when I said said flak was the most efficient defense per weight.

Yeah, his damage will suck, but consider the effects of an older or smaller ship with crap Missiles, and a nice Dread with up-to-date Missiles. You'll waste some of your Flak stopping the pathetic things, allowing in some more potent Missiles. This isn't really an issue with Shield and Deflector, who simply bounce off the weak ones while still being ready for the strong ones.



And again, as has been pointed out by numerous players, Missiles are more effective than Beam and Kinetic. As I said, my 10/10/10 defence set-up renders me virtually immune to Beam and Kinetic, but I can still get thoroughly trounced by Missile. Doesn't take a rocket scientist (Read: Sophon) to figure out that when all defences are equal and one weapon is far better than the others, there's a very distinct advantage there.

Romeo wrote:
The problem, as people have pointed out, is that Missile defence doesn't scale up well with Missile tech. 10 good Deflectors will stop dozens of cheap Kinetic weapons, or ten really good ones. 10 good Flak mods will stop ten really good Missiles... Or still just ten poor ones. Missile spam becomes much more devastating than the other two (With the way the game is currently). I usually pick ten of each defence mod, which will utterly stop all Kinetic, shove off almost all Beam damage, and then get utterly obliterated by Missile.

You mean if the enemy intentionally loads up with low tier missiles? Interesting; let's examine.



Let's say you had 10 top tier flak. The enemy has 20 top tier missiles at a total mass of 400 tons. You block 10 and 10 hit for 5000-6200 damage, not considering crits. For 400 tons, the enemy could alternatively use bottom tier missiles. Those are 8 tons each so that comes to 50 missiles. You block 10 and 40 hit for 1400-2000 damage. In this scenario, the low tech option does much less damage, even less when you consider crits.



In another scenario, where the enemy only devotes 200 tons of missiles against 10 top tier flak(180 tons btw), then obviously the low tech option comes out ahead. 10 top tier missiles would do zero damage, but you can get 25 low tier missiles for the same mass. 15 then go through for 525-750 damage.



In conclusion, spamming low tech missiles is only superior if you devote an equal amount of tonnage to missiles as they do flak. If you are willing devote enough tonnage, high tech missiles will do much more damage than a comparative tonnage of low tech missiles.



PS - One small Note. Equal tier kinetic and deflectors will not cancel each other out, unlike missiles and flak. If you had 10 top tier kinetics vs 10 top tier deflectors, you would still take 180-240 damage per connecting salvo, not counting crits. Beams and shields are similar. That's what I meant when I said said flak was the most efficient defense per weight.

The_Doctor wrote:
What can I say? I disagree on every claim.

Hey, fair enough. Perhaps it's a multiplayer thing, or you have a different playstyle than mine, but my own experience has been that Missile is clearly the best, then Beams, then Kinetics are a distant third.

Ash_F wrote:
Flak is the most efficient defense module per weight. 1 flak module stops 1 missile module. No other defense module can do that.



I do think there is too much of a problem with combat not making it to the third round, but perhaps this is a ship problem or an AI problem and not a missile problem.

The problem, as people have pointed out, is that Missile defence doesn't scale up well with Missile tech. 10 good Deflectors will stop dozens of cheap Kinetic weapons, or ten really good ones. 10 good Flak mods will stop ten really good Missiles... Or still just ten poor ones. Missile spam becomes much more devastating than the other two (With the way the game is currently). I usually pick ten of each defence mod, which will utterly stop all Kinetic, shove off almost all Beam damage, and then get utterly obliterated by Missile.

Romeo wrote:


As for the other two weapons types being spammed, they aren't a huge issue really. Beams and especially Kinetics are very easy to survive comparatively, even when spammed.

Flak is the most efficient defense module per weight. 1 flak module stops 1 missile module. No other defense module can do that.



I do think there is too much of a problem with combat not making it to the third round, but perhaps this is a ship problem or an AI problem and not a missile problem.

Romeo wrote:
It's funny Doctor, I don't consider Missiles useless in melee, simply because chances are you've already wiped out 2/3rds of their fleet, so you're now firing three times as many Missiles at each enemy. Even with the inaccuracy at that range, you're launching so many projectiles at each target you'll hit them enough to kill them. You mentioned them as a high risk, high reward weapon. I disagree with that. One can almost certainly guarantee themselves multiple kills in phase one, which means increased focus in phase two - which means more kills. Which amplifies the effect in Melee. Even though the accuracy degrades with each phase, missiles don't ever really get "weak". Beams are riskier even. Besides, if anything should be a high-risk, high-reward weapon, it should be Kinetics, especially with the way combat is set up.



As for the other two weapons types being spammed, they aren't a huge issue really. Beams and especially Kinetics are very easy to survive comparatively, even when spammed.

What can I say? I disagree on every claim.