@op Be glad they're doing it with Dreadnaughts instead of destroyers. Personally I'd counter that by running all destroyer fleets loaded with beams. Not only are they cheaper/faster to build, but the discount on weapons modules means you can have enough beams to rip those dreads to shreds. Especially since with the same number of command points you would have 4 ships for each of theirs. Destroyers have 1/4 the tonnage of Dreadnaughts, but because of the weapons module discount that Dreadnaughts don't have you can actually have more weapons in total and won't waste any of them due to the combat mechanics limiting the ship to only one target at a time. Since their Dreadnaughts are running all missiles, they can only kill 1/4 of an all Destroyer fleet per round. Meanwhile that all Destroyer fleet running beams, or even projectiles, can switch targets when the first target dies and gets to fire at it's target in phases 2, 3 and 4, while the missile boats have to wait for phase 4 to do any damage.

Flak beats a missile on a 1 to 1 basis, and with enough HP and the anti-missile card and such it can easily become the case where missiles become worthless.



Besides, if they are going all missile just go all laser on destroyers and show them the meaning of attrition warfare.



Then you will ask what is OP my friend!

Flak: X chance to intercept per round



Missiles: X damage per missile, 1 missile per salvo, 3 rounds before reach, 3 rounds to reload



...Ie. a single flak module counters three missiles

This is misleading, either due to a mix-up between the terms "round" and "phase", or just a bad description. I have never seen a missile countered before the third round of each combat phase. In other words, flak activates once per missile salvo, despite saying once per round.

Combatmechanics (including the "when does a flak intercept a missile"):



/#/endless-space/forum/33-strategy-guides/thread/14046-combat-mechanics



Solution: if you see them missile-spamming, just get yourself a focus tech in flaks, as higher tier flaks deal very well with missiles of lower level, Getting a level 5 Flak vs level 4 missiles means that 1 Flak counters 2 Missiles, mostly even 3 - not considering Battlecards.



I normaly counter Missile-Destroyer-spam with Cruisers - 50% defence, the 15% Defence module (Accelerated Magnetics, under Adcanced Countermeasures) - rest offense - works like a charm.



And I counter Laser-Destroyer with Battleships, same strat as above, but with some missle defence if he trys to change.





You also can counter it pretty easy with battlecards (to name a few):



Illusion (Adventure, creates 40% [50%oncounter] of your fleet CP as illusions which draw fire)

Emergency Shelter (Commander, prevents ships from beeing destroyed that turn)

Sabotage (+15% of the missiles miss)

Camouflage (+40% Inteception Accuarcy)





Sincerly

Enemy's doing destroyer missile spam?



Use destroyers half filled with beams or kinetics, and kill them with your non-overkill firepower.

I have found a method of dealing with the very frustrating missile spam, and that's using "Offensive Retreat" coupled with either Beam or Kinetic glass cannons. You'll fire off a salvo and flee before they can retaliate. It's a slow, boring method, but you can win through attrition that way.

As long as your flak equals or exceeds the enemies missile then you won't take damage.



Higher tiers of tech means that you get more for

My own testing during my three months offline indicate that what we initially thought still applies:



Missiles fire in round 2 of every phase.

Flak fire in rounds 2, 3, and 4.

Intercept is compared to evasion, and the higher value wins. No idea what happens on a tie.



My battles pretty conclusively indicated that each flak counters 3 missiles unless their intercept is too low, in which case the flak counters zero. The missiles don't, however, blow up until the end of round 4.



It appears that flak doesn't target missiles already flagged as 'destroyed', so there are no wasted shots.



I have never seen flak fail to intercept missiles that had lower evasion than the flak's intercept.

1 flak module can shoot down 1 missile a round of shooting, but it won't display till they are supposed to hit.



However as this is a kind of chance system, you could theoretically shoot down none.

Nobody has provided a definite answer to my question on how many missiles a flak module counters - I take that as a sign nobody knows! If it works how I suspect and flak beats several missiles then I think that punches a hole through any 'missiles are OP' complaint. I've created this thread that I hope we can get an Amplituder to respond to which should make it easier to discuss balance.



As for myself, I've seen (and screenshotted) situations where it certainly looked like flak counters more than one missile. I can upload if anybody's interested once I get home on my own PC.

Flak needs modifying once fighters etc. hit the game anyway. Plus we need Point Defense versions of all weaponry added which target things at melee range, starting with missiles, fighters, bombers and if no other targets are present: other ships. Due to short range and reduced damage, this will add design depth.



As for the original question - missiles are fine. What you're lacking atm is more variety in combat options but the expansion should sort that. Right now as far as most people are concerned, it's pretty much just Beam Weapons and the other two types as secondary weapons..

Catma wrote:
This is misleading, either due to a mix-up between the terms "round" and "phase", or just a bad description. I have never seen a missile countered before the third round of each combat phase. In other words, flak activates once per missile salvo, despite saying once per round.

Well, this is the big question: How many missiles does a flak module counter? This is where my lack of MP experience comes in, meaning I can't put the hard facts down (it's pretty hard to inform the AI you would like to run a few test battles).



I must say I find it impossible to believe it is just a poorly worded phrase, however - if flak only countered missiles on a 1:1 basis missiles would clearly be OP. It should be obvious to anyone, Amplitude staff included, that you can't let the 'strongest' weapon class not also have a strong counter. Alright, SaintD, it may be a chance to intercept, so we'll call it 2.5 missiles intercepted per flak, lack of flak firing visuals or not. That still means your battleships should have an absolutely fantastic time against all-missile destroyer swarms: Two destroyers with 15 missiles each will still get wholly nullified by a lone battleship packing just 12 flaks, leaving you with ample storage for the weaponry you'll need to blow up those puny missile boats.



Unless you still want to insist it's 1:1? In which case the answer to the thread title question is a resounding 'yes'. SaintD's description of the current status of MP does sound dangerously much that way, I'm afraid...

First, if this is in the wrong place, I apologize.



Okay, so I have had chance to play a couple of games in MP now and the experience is so different from SP. This is how it should be of course. However, I have noticed a rather alarming trend. People will build ships with nothing, NOTHING, but the best missiles they have available. While I know that all is viable in the MP game and if they want to they can, but, its kind of unbalancing. When this happens, it becomes more a war of attrition and who expanded faster first, rather than actual tactics and strategies. You could have a well established core of systems, good tech and ships and then along comes someone with Dreadnaughts loaded out with 30-40 missiles and nothing else, all loaded in a fleet with over 40k in military points. Its just...boring, because the only real counter is either to make similar ships, or, load your ships with nothing but Flak.



The first option is just pointless, its becomes a simple case of who as the larger fleet and number of military points in said fleet. I havent tried building ships with just Flak on them, because it makes the ship pointless. I would like to know what others think about this and if anyone actually agrees with me.

I do also feel like Flak systems should get more turrets as they level up, so each flak system can take on the same amount of missiles each round per tech level, making missiles high risk high reward weapons.

Apheirox wrote:
Right, so I only ran research into missile/flak mechanics several months ago and also have little experience with the major changes of the patch, BUT: Isn't the whole point of missiles that while they are dangerous, using them is a huge gamble? Read the descriptions:



Flak: X chance to intercept per round



Missiles: X damage per missile, 1 missile per salvo, 3 rounds before reach, 3 rounds to reload



...Ie. a single flak module counters three missiles since missiles take four times as long as the other weapon types to fire, making missiles the strongest (due to being the best weapon at the first, ie. longest ranged phase), but also the potentially weakest weapon type: If the opponent is using just a tiny amount of flak it will nullify your entire missile barrage.



Therefore, I would think the counter to these 'unbeatable' no-brain-all-missile destroyers are ships with just a moderate amount of flak and whatever weapon class you wish to blow up the puny destroyers with. A dreadnought with 40 missile modules? No problem! Battleship with 13 flaks is nearly impervious to its attacks.

X chance to intercept. Not guaranteed. And when you use disposable, -20% weapon module weight destroyers for it, you literally mount out with absolutely nothing but missiles. In order to effectively defend yourself you then end up needing to mount a level of flak that leaves you with little else. Literally. Nothing else. You end up in a sucktastic situation of All Flak vs All Missiles and if someone is skimping on either end of the equation, they lose. Which isn't taking into account that the one playing with all the flak is going to get shafted by the RNG, unlike the missile user whose numbers are all guaranteed....you're still on the losing end of an attrition war.



None of this is theory; it is basically the only way to play multiplayer. Well....unless you're playing multiplayer in order to get curbstomped into the floor, in which case you can play any way you want to!

Right, so I only ran research into missile/flak mechanics several months ago and also have little experience with the major changes of the patch, BUT: Isn't the whole point of missiles that while they are dangerous, using them is a huge gamble? Read the descriptions:



Flak: X chance to intercept per round



Missiles: X damage per missile, 1 missile per salvo, 3 rounds before reach, 3 rounds to reload



...Ie. a single flak module counters three missiles since missiles take four times as long as the other weapon types to fire, making missiles the strongest (due to being the best weapon at the first, ie. longest ranged phase), but also the potentially weakest weapon type: If the opponent is using just a tiny amount of flak it will nullify your entire missile barrage.



Therefore, I would think the counter to these 'unbeatable' no-brain-all-missile destroyers are ships with just a moderate amount of flak and whatever weapon class you wish to blow up the puny destroyers with. A dreadnought with 40 missile modules? No problem! Battleship with 13 flaks is nearly impervious to its attacks.

Ah, I see. I didn't consider the chance to fail with flak, and I must admit I don't understand the math behind flak/missile interaction. I guess it'll require a more creative solution. Also the problem of beams and kinetics being less effective in earlier rounds comes into play, which makes nerfing beams in phase one a tougher thing to do.

Catma wrote:
All that you say could be countered by loading up on anti-missile modules. If there was a ship that could carry as many of them as missiles.

You are fundamentally wrong. The maths just aren't favourable considering the closely equivalent weight between the missile and the flak (a missile weighs only 1 extra until you reach the top level....which is 2), which would require you to literally have absolutely nothing except flak defence modules in order to have a chance to stop the all-missile opponent. A chance. Because a flak module isn't 'perfect' like the other defences are.



In order to counter the broken mechanics of being able to create unstoppable suicidal missile destroyers, you propose being able to create ships with almost no modules whatsoever except for flak. While the current setup of weapon weight reducing destroyers makes it completely impossible to have an equivalent weight of flak to missiles, it is still utterly worthless to have that equivalent weight. It is simply a losing proposition to try and defend against this attack.

All that you say could be countered by loading up on anti-missile modules. If there was a ship that could carry as many of them as missiles.



I do like your idea of having missiles fire in round 2 (You mean round 2 of each phase, right?)

Catma wrote:
The problem is not with missiles, but rather with the fact that there is a destroyer with a bonus to carrying weapons, but none with a bonus to carrying defenses. It takes a long time to get to the ship chassis with defense bonuses. Missiles just happen to be the best weapon, with their unique functionality, to take advantage of this balance problem in the early game.



You also have battle cards to deal with this. But you do start at a disadvantage to missiles at that stage of the game.

No, the problem IS missiles. As has already been noted, destroyers cost so very little that you can spam piles of them with no difficulty. When loaded out with missiles they can all be destroyed and it doesn't matter, the missiles will still hit regardless and that many command points worth of missiles is going to scrub the enemy fleet easily even with heavy point defense. The sheer attrition is unstoppable. A missile destroyer fleet will at worst achieve mutually assured destruction. If any survive you're just laughing. This gets worse in the late game because destroyers become relatively cheaper and cheaper and cheaper while continuing to flatten their opposition the exact same way.



Missiles can be very easily balanced by simply dropping the mechanic of them being fired in round 1 and hitting in round 3. Make them operate like the other weapons as a per round weapon, with their damage tweaked to maintain the same expected DPS, and no longer can you create expendable destroyers that can all be instantly obliterated in the first round, but in death will still do an entire combat phase of damage anyway.



It's a pointless little gimmick anyway. Missiles would still be unique in that each module will fire a single projectile capable of huge damage, compared to the middle ground of beam weapons, and the low damage but high rate of fire of ballistics. It remains an all or nothing, 'lucky' weapon that will either do horrible damage or get intercepted.



As it is, all the problems with missiles stem ENTIRELY from their unique behaviour in being fired in round 1, unstoppably so because it's the first round in the entire combat, and hitting in round 3 regardless of whether their firing platform was atomised in the same round they were fired. Hell, the loophole could be enormously closed by having them fire in round 2 and hit in round 3 instead. No defense? Oh, most of your fleet was killed in round 1. Bad luck. Literally nothing changes except the ability to create an unstoppable suicide Macross Missile Massacre.