Nebulous: Fleet Command

[supple sonnet]

oh, no, for sure

we're just,,,, kicking around new ideas

we have a beam solomon build with nothing really of note in the top small hardpoint and we're wondering if we could sneak a few extra amms in there

although we might be getting to the point of having too many

[junior heron]

I've had a lot of luck with softkill on battleships

except against torpedo ocellos

and am really wrestling with the idea of adding a second interruptor to fight the CMD

[olive blade]

enough illuminators overpowers jamming, so you can sorta cheese that way

but you do have to manage the chaff

[supple sonnet]

for sure

we should probably sleep but we have. strange and interesting thoughts

we are mangling our beam solomon

(although we accidentally put 6pt amms on it that didn't do anything so /shrug)

[wary flame]

The most effective beamomon I have seen lately was all of 2000pts, although I'd possibly add 100 or so

[grand pine]

beamomon?

[wary flame]

Beam Solomon battleship

Conveniently I can take the beam sol, three of my torpedo corvettes and precisely one extra chaff in a full list

[lime jungle]

Fleet 'Solomon Beams GOH-SACTHOJ' is composed of 2 ships that cost 3000 points:

  The Hanged Man : 'Solomon' class Battleship [Beam PD Missile EWar Sensor]
The Six of Wands : 'Sprinter' class Corvette [PD]
```This fleet uses 4 different missile types:
```yaml
         SGM-101 Ceremonial Arming Dagger : DIRECT - HOJ(RADAR) - HE SHAPED [1pts]
             SGM-166 No Thank You, Please : DIRECT - ACT(RADAR) - HE FRAG [2pts]
SGM-278 I Remain Thoroughly Disinterested : DIRECT - NONE - NONE [7pts]
                             SGT-378 None : DIRECT - ACT(RADAR)/HOJ(RADAR) - HE SHAPED [8pts]

[supple sonnet]

,,,, fuck it, we're going to throw this at a match and see how it sticks

[grand pine]

wow that looks like a good fleet

[supple sonnet]

it probably isn't, but we're about to see

[grand pine]

im sure its better than whatever the heck that is

[lime jungle]

Fleet 'Me no know what' is composed of 5 ships that cost 2911 points:

        Sunk Kitty : 'Vauxhall' class Light Cruiser [Gun PD]
Pearline B. Salvay : 'Keystone' class Destroyer [Gun Beam PD]
    The Such Rummy : 'Keystone' class Destroyer [Gun Beam PD]
               Pen : 'Raines' class Frigate [Gun Sensor]
         Lucid Jay : 'Raines' class Frigate []

[formal tiger]

goodness gracious

[grand pine]

yea i know its bad

wait am i missing a gun on my vauxhall? fuck

[noble zodiac]

no

that’s the backpack

do not put a gun in the backpack

[grand pine]

but thats an empty gun mount!

[noble zodiac]

do not

speaking as a vauxhall main

the backpack is not for guns

because if you are presenting broadside in a vaux you just die

bowtanking vaux is tough as nails; broadsiding vaux dies instantly

[grand pine]

what do i use for a broadside? the other cruiser?

[noble zodiac]

you dont

[grand pine]

D:

[noble zodiac]

broadsiding is 90% of the time a bad idea
you want to be bowtanking as much as humanly possible

sloped armor massively increases your survivability

and putting your more critical systems behind the mass of your hull keeps them alive significantly longer

now
there is one caveat

the OSP lineship

wants to broadside

because it basically has to to do anything (unless you run turret bulker, in which case you point the top at the enemy)

[grand pine]

damn :(

[olive blade]

yeah lineships are there for the broadside lovers

[noble zodiac]

anyways uh immediate observations:
- not enough PD, your ships will die to missiles
- on at least the vauxhall and probably the DDs, you want to run reinforced CICs. also the default CIC locations aren’t great especially for the Bowtank Machine (vauxhall), you usually want them as far back as you can get them (aside from some niche uses like bricknose axford and dual-CIC capitals, and small ships tend to not care)
- battle dressing station is functionally useless, it will get better when crew mechanics get revamped for conquest and casualties actually mean something but right now it’s not worth the 20 points
- bulk mags are kinda just… you really want reinforced mags, bulks will die is something so much as breathes on them
- DCC + workshop buffing a single large DC is a bit suboptimal, they are valuable but you really want a lot of DC for them to buff
- the actual ship roster is pretty good, beam destroyers as cap guards slap and the ARR+spyglass brick is an important niche for ANS
- you have too much gun ammo and too little defender ammo, a good benchmark is maybe 10k 20mm per defender, id recommend using the Show Hidden Stats mod to get a better feel for this, it’s suuuuper helpful

[grand pine]

crew mechanics get rewamped
what

[grand pine]

i have 0 idea how to add more PD because i am hecking stoopid

[noble zodiac]

uuhhh currently crew mechanics are kind of barebones, there’s gonna be a massive overhaul to them at some point (i think it’s planned for when the Conquest update drops) that adds things like morale and makes crew casualties actually matter

but yeah DC teams are basically immortal as it stands unless you’re getting hit by grapeshot

[grand pine]

oh.. i didnt know that D:

[noble zodiac]

stonewalls in the C2s, 1-2 pods of chaff and active decoys and flares, killjoys if you’re good enough to use em, interruption jammers if you can fit them
you don’t really need auroras that much vs OSP and sarissas are niche

[noble zodiac]

well yes
that’s why im telling you xP
dont sweat it, you’re learning and learning is good

[grand pine]

C2s? killjoys? why not defenders? ;-;

[noble zodiac]

so, every type of PD is good against a specific kind of threat

rebounds and stonewalls (flak) are good against massed, low-health missiles, because they do limited DPS to a very wide area. this means S2 spam, and also decoys covering slow missiles
defenders are good against single big missiles with a lot of health and straight trajectories. this means containers, or rather containers without decoy penaids
auroras are good against agile, fast missiles, because they’re hitscan and are DPS limited. this means hybrids (which, yes, OSP doesn’t have) and rockets

going all in on defenders means you’re putting all your eggs in one basket
terminal maneuvers will fuck you up
massed volleys will fuck you up
and decoy penaids will fuck you up
flak covers one of those weaknesses (massed salvoes) and significantly helps the other two

C2 = Class 2 mount, the 3x4x3s

killjoys are a really weird bit of emergent technique people discovered
basically, if you put a self-screening jammer penaid in a size 2 missile, and manually fire it at incoming missiles, it defeats a noticeably wider set of seeker combinations than an active decoy

[grand pine]

oh.. to fit stonewall ill have to give up mk62's but those are guns i can shoot D:

[noble zodiac]

your destroyers have beams
they will be fine

[grand pine]

but i wont be able to output enough lead

[noble zodiac]

beams have a tendency to just instantly erase the kinds of targets that Mk62s are good against, Mk62 don’t do that

there’s a case for keeping two mk62s in case you get jumped by a shuttle from a weird angle and need to buy time to turn the beam around, but other than that

[arctic magnet]

I'd probably replace the ammo elevators with FPAs on those DDs

[grand pine]

eh, not like this build will see use anyway :( but it is at least good to know that i was wrong in every aspect

[noble zodiac]

nonono this is actually an okay starting point!

[grand pine]

is putting HE-RPF for 120s even a good idea?

[noble zodiac]

sorry, i didnt mean to be like putting you down or anything x.x

[grand pine]

or do they not work against missiles?

[grand pine]

everything is fine

[noble zodiac]

you do want RPF! but for an entirely different reason

[grand pine]

there's just too many fucking ammo types and i cant fit all of them D:

[noble zodiac]

RPF isn’t great against missiles, it helps a little bit but its not ideal
where RPF excels is at killing small ships that can dodge your HE, damaging their thrusters until they can’t dodge anymore and you can switch to HE

[grand pine]

aaaaaaaaagh

i am just a bit overwhelmed, sorry

[grand pine]

FPAs?

[mint sinew]

Bring less of each type. You will generally find different scenarios over the course of a game where you want a different ammo so you don't need to bring enough of each for the whole time

[grand pine]

but how many rounds is enough? 2k of each type? 1k? less that that?

[mint sinew]

Less would be my guess for most uses, but it depends on how fast the ship in question can shoot.
(And to a lesser extent how long you expect it to be in combat e.g. spotters with a self defence gun can skimp on ammo)

The general rule of thumb that gets thrown around is to carry ~20 minutes of total ammo for each offensive calibre spread over your ammo types. This does mean you need to do some maths or install the "Show Hidden Stats" mod

My intuition would expect a 250mm Vauxhall to be carrying about 1500x 250mm rounds total, but I'd want to check those numbers.

[arctic magnet]

Focused Particle Accelerators, they boost beam damage

I think you want 2 on your Beam DD, otherwise the damage might be a bit sad

[grand pine]

i can't fit 2, reactor doesnt allow that

[arctic magnet]

I'll echo just dropping the secondary guns, they don't add that much when you already have the Face Melter 5K and a gun Vaux

Plant Control Center or Reactor Boosters?

[noble zodiac]

well really it should be the Face Melter 6K because thats the range of the beam :V

[grand pine]

or just another reactor instead of 3rd ammo elevator because it fits, huh

i never should've done that 😔 the fleet will perish to anything

i mean this isnt any better, is it

[lime jungle]

Fleet 'Me no know what' is composed of 5 ships that cost 2879 points:

Ship A : 'Vauxhall' class Light Cruiser [Gun PD]
Ship B : 'Keystone' class Destroyer [Beam Gun PD]
Ship C : 'Keystone' class Destroyer [Beam Gun PD]
Ship D : 'Raines' class Frigate [Gun Sensor]
Ship E : 'Raines' class Frigate []

[grand pine]

this one doesnt even have enough points for ammo

[tulip vault]

I think you could probably fit the ammo you need by cutting the second reinforced mag on both destroyers

the second mag takes a lot of points

some components have compounding costs, which means the second costs more than the first, and so on

[grand pine]

but what if all the ammo wont fit in a single mag

[tulip vault]

I mean, from experience, it will

[grand pine]

it has only 270 capacity

[tulip vault]

oh wait you're significantly under 3k

you have a fair few more points to work with, try adding ammo to the magazines and see if that's enough

[grand pine]

im only 121 point below 3k

[tulip vault]

yeah, for how much ammo costs that's a fair bit

[grand pine]

that's like half a corvette

[tulip vault]

even the most expensive ammo is 1 point for every 25 shells (I think?)

really though I'd reccomend sticking with starter fleets for a while longer until you get a better handle on how the game works, or even just looking at them for inspiration

[grand pine]

i dont think i'll ever play a normal game of nebulous 😔 mainly out of fear of getting destroyed by a single waypoint missile

[tulip vault]

It's a daunting game, for sure

[grand pine]

and i dont want to ruin the game with my shitty builds for anybody

[oak shell]

Saper you are welcome to play with us
If I can get decent at Nebulous then so can you, and I promise nobody will be upset with you if you make a misplay

[tulip vault]

advancements in sheer raditative power never before seen

[glad aurora]

holy Shit

[arctic magnet]

the ball and cylinder device

[sharp crow]

putting your laundry up next to the heater so it dries faster

[grand pine]

what's happening in the image?

[formal tiger]

no guns all radar any%

[arctic magnet]

it's literally all jammers and early warning radars

[formal tiger]

there's something so beautiful about this

[arctic magnet]

you should go to ship design jail for stuff like this

[grand pine]

they should not

[formal tiger]

i wonder if it's possible to do this with a monitor

not that i would! i play modded

[grand pine]

wait there are mods?

[formal tiger]

ye

[plain ice]

Second this. My first ever game involved my game crashing and ships being eaten alive

And people don’t hate me

[sharp crow]

that's what boat night is for

[plain ice]

I also learned it is a bad idea to play OSP for your first ever Nebulous game

[grand pine]

I can't even join boat night D: exams started;(

I really wish I could tho

[tulip vault]

sure is a pubulous day today

[fresh storm]

fleet name: same day delivery

[junior heron]

though this boat night is hopefully a fleet swap, so you'd be learning other people's fleets.

[supple sonnet]

One of the best ways to learn to build stuff your not used to AFAWC

[wary flame]

me and DerangedOcto managed to carry two entirely useless ensigns against a full team of commanders

fun game, but I'm not sure I'm cut out for this bulker life

having important ships is stressful

[dark dawn]

How do you make bulkers work now that EO is gone?

Wait that's bulkers not containers, disregard

[junior heron]

i've had good luck with CMD/ACT/[ARAD] containers

(at least i'm pretty sure that's their seeker combo, lemme double check)

yeah, CMD/ACT/[ARAD] for the damaging containers, and CMD/ACT for the decoy containers

[tulip vault]

it is very stressful yeah

Your triple threats misc, do their escorts have jamming?

[quiet quiver]

Are you calling cap ships unimportant? 😛

[wary flame]

mine are stolen, but no, two dazzlers, flak, 20mm, pinpoints

and then AMMs on the ships themselves

[supple sonnet]

cap ships are inportent but they are atritable assets

[misty storm]

how important is it to have the chaffbox on the front? i wanna swap the bullseye and the chaffbox positions since it was behaving kinda clunky when it was trying to use the T20

like this

[wet root]

Not very important, chaff box location is rarely relevant, you'll just get your bullseye shot off a bit more easily

[tulip vault]

My brain cannot stop theorycrafting for conquest

I feel like I am going to spend far too much time grooming officers with any kind of spread modifier for higher commands

[wet root]

I wonder which types of officers will be best for high command

My immediate thoughts are signals and/or logistics

[tulip vault]

Im convinced spread will be excellent

Like

Hitting more shots is always good

[wet root]

Since those are useful to just about every ship, while things like gunnery buffs are limited to gun ships

[tulip vault]

Yeah

Logistics also makes sense

[wet root]

Oh I had read "spread modifier" as "spread of modifiers" lol

[tulip vault]

I don’t remember if there’s an engineering one

Oh no lmao I just want accuracy

[wary flame]

if anyone makes you faster I am immediately promoting them all the way up

[tulip vault]

Yeah also that

Turn rate could also be excellent on OSP

Im wondering if we’ll have any which affect the strategic level

Presumably

[wet root]

That's what I'm guessing logistics will do

[tulip vault]

Maybe ops too

[wet root]

Faster resupplies, maybe better fuel efficiency, better out of dock repairs

[tulip vault]

Since that deals with radar

Better fuel efficiency would be amazing for a sprinter or something

[wet root]

Any cruiser group will want that if it's available

[tulip vault]

I really do want to suggest a support ship which can DC enemy ships once the next devlog happens

Or just disabled/abandoned ships in general

To put out reactor blooms/fires which will turn into reactor blooms

[wet root]

I still hope carriers bring literal flying DC teams

Let me send restores to my friends

[tulip vault]

Thatd be neat

[grand pine]

sorry, one of them probably was me:(

[olive blade]

I wonder if there is anything that will actually be important for missile boats

like there will be programming and reload time but tbh those are not in the end thaaat important

[fresh storm]

I might actually make it to this bote night if I speedrun sleep after my shift

[rigid bison]

% programming time would mean that slots and points spent on %programming time could be spent on moar channels...or anything, really

[wary flame]

unlikely, unless you remember playing a huge swarm of monitors on Pillars alongside a 450 bulker squad and some mass drivers

[fresh storm]

also I played some larger AI games and I can't believe I made the mistake of trusting AI to cover my ass lmao

it had a clear line of sight to where I was getting shot from but chose to instead keep low and move its entire fleet at a snail's pace to a cap

iirc it was one of the default heavy cruiser fleets that was easily in range of the railguns shooting me

lesson learned act as if AI allies are not there

[supple sonnet]

Yeah the AI only knows how to death ball from point to point

[fresh storm]

by the way, I'm not sure what to put on the large top mounts of my ocello - ideally it will never Be Perceived so they're purely last resort self defence

[wary flame]

all ocellos should have a full set of heavy guns

you pay an exorbitant amount for those mounts and cannot justify leaving them empty, Ocellos may be shoddy capital ships by ANS standards but they're the best thing you've got

[fresh storm]

that's the thing I'm getting to

I'm wondering if swapping one 450 for a 250 is a good idea to be able to track rushing corvettes

or is losing a 450 bad enough that it's better to shift the fleet around to make sure it's never not screened by another ship's small guns

[wary flame]

250 is also a good option but 450 is probably the go-to

needs a parallax radar and a bullseye for target locks, plus an Interruptor Jammer

those are core

ANS loves to spam CMD missiles and Bullseyes are better locking equipment than anything else OSP has

so the ocellos like to stick with bulkers and protect them with the big bubble while painting targets

[glad aurora]

I run 2x250 and 1x450 on my Ocellos, it's a good deal

Massacres frigates and the dreaded Capfleet Swarms

[fresh storm]

shame OPN can't load HE-RPF on guns that support it on ANS

unless they can and I'm blind

[oak shell]

They can't

It's advanced technology, long lost to the outer worlds

[fresh storm]

the forgotten WW2 shell

[oak shell]

During the second world war, the Allies made sure to never fire them on trajectories that would take them into space

so that the OSP couldn't reverse-engineer them

[fresh storm]

now that is forward thinking

[wary flame]

this is why that incident where the US ship Langley tried to shoot down the planet Venus was notable

[fresh storm]

on that note, is there more faction lore than just the fleet selection blurb (and gear flavor text but that's mostly army campfire stories)? because from that alone the conflict reads a little funny

[wary flame]

"Pretty soon, word came down from the navigator," he added. "It was determined that this was the planet Venus. It turned out that we had fired 300 rounds at the planet Venus."```

[rigid bison]

Mazer does have a lore doc...somewhere explaining the backstory (and a map to boot). Supposedly it'll come out with Conquest.

[fresh storm]

Like OSP trying to break away from the unusually reasonable for a space federatiob alliance not because they were ever mistreated but because they can

I'm still maining OSP because space toyotas

conventional warfare is for squares (don't ask me to engage in it I will cry)

[wet root]

I have been running 1x250 on my Ocellos recently because of a glut of corvettes, it's less a matter of tracking speed and more that 450s will overpen so much against Sprinters it's actually really hard to kill them

If you only have one mag it's not worth the 450 ammo

[quiet quiver]

That’s why we need 450 grape

[grand pine]

wait WHAT

[grand pine]

i was joking but funnily enough i tried assembling something like that

[olive blade]

I don't really spend points on programming time

is the thing

maybe container liners really like it

[fresh storm]

it's a bit scuffed that you can pre-program missiles by flicking fire control on and off and not as a normal order

[wet root]

There is, as it turns out, a certain point at which you get enough Pavises to protect against the Fishtail

(At least for the ACT[CMD] version)

(That number is somewhere between 4 and 40)

[past light]

Misc, never stop bringing us ridiculous naval history anecdotes.

[olive blade]

I did see a player that just had a trillion of them and it seemed kinda good I guess

[wary flame]

it can be as few as two, as long as one is offset, since sometimes bursts coming in at an angle end up firing along the path of the more-or-less-random oscillation

it's designed entirely to murder lone pavise shuttles

[wet root]

I do like the ACT[CMD] version, it doesn't have the awkwardness of a having a lock make them worse

[grand pine]

when is the boat night again?

[wet root]

This should adjust to your local time

[grand pine]

oh

[oak shell]

heck there's randomized boat night tomorrow, right?

[wet root]

There is! Join us!

[oak shell]

I am unexpectedly able to!

I need to cook some fleets though

[wary flame]

my S2H and S2 designs are straight CMD becuase when mounted on a bullseye and blanket frigate or corvette they become un-softkillable MMT murderers

the S3H is Act/[CMD] because it's loaded in corvettes that lack effective FC radar

[wet root]

Makes sense, I'm putting them on ELINT Sprinters with - yeah that

[wet root]

If you don't have time to get fleets tested and submitted you're still fine to join, we should have plenty of fleets

Remember that we'll have 4x as many fleets as needed if everyone submits 2 of each faction

[oak shell]

true

[tulip vault]

this looks like a CoaDE clip

[wet root]

I really adore how PD looks in neb

[olive blade]

yeah

[tulip vault]

the ANS (if I recall correctly, and mazer may have changed it by now) is extremely the US, especially in the way in which it's very different from region to region, being a collective of originally independent states. The OSP was some level of oligarchy IIRC (in a very robber baron style, I think they literally have barons), and was suffering some sort of vague economic displeasure/violence that I don't totally recall

[wary flame]

the Fishtail series are also very flashy missiles because of that big sprint stage flick they do

[olive blade]

they are nice

[tulip vault]

something with manufacturing and not having much of it but being resource rich, I think

[olive blade]

did some testing good missiles

[wary flame]

the ANS also just got done bombarding striking miners, so you know, very 1920s

[tulip vault]

yeah also that

the escalation described made a lot of sense in a very like

bad way

like there's a terrorist action which results in a blockade which spirals out of control, is what I recall

[wet root]

The ACT versions are particularly nice for that since if they catch it anywhere except the very center of the cone they just fling themselves sideways then do a nice harmonic descent

[fresh storm]

hm, is the escalation described anywhere in the game?

also reading about killjoys was amusing when the very first thing I did upon acquiring the game was making a slow forward jamming container

[tulip vault]

not really, the lore doc's also been taken down because mazer wants to make some significant changes to it

[wet root]

Of course if you want some background context on the AN, there's https://secondlife.fandom.com/wiki/Alliance_Navy

[olive blade]

yeah lol

some day mazer is gonna see one of my ships with a cursed second life thing and know

[wet root]

If someone could upload these to the drive I'd appreciate it

[wary flame]

need to figure out which of mine to add

presumably I update my OSP capfleet and add that

or do something funny

[olive blade]

yeah hmmm

gotta think about mine

[bitter furnace]

I hate to be that guy but you're missing the mark here on a lot of things, and as the Neb lore aficionado I must nitpick it ||sorry||

the ANS is extremely the US, especially in the way in which it's very different from region to region, being a collective of originally independent states.
This one is the closest to being right. You can draw parallels to the very early USA, when the states still had significantly more autonomy and identity to them, and citizens were often more loyal to their state than the federal government. The way it's been described is a defensive pact like NATO slowly becoming a single state.TL;DR much more decentralized than the modern USA, and explicitly much more dysfunctional and bureaucratic.

The OSP was some level of oligarchy IIRC (in a very robber baron style, I think they literally have barons)
Marshall is on record saying that they called the OSP leaders "Barons" because it sounded cool. I personally think that was ill-advised because it generates this exact misunderstanding. The OSP is an indirect democracy. Each inhabited world, of which the OSP has four major ones, elects a delegate called a Baron to represent them in the Conclave with the other Barons. Interestingly, the Conclave itself is the executive branch of government, there's no single person who is head of state. Which leads to problems, such as the current conflict - most of the Barons wanted to slowly secede through the legal process, but a minority thought that was taking too long.

and was suffering some sort of vague economic displeasure/violence that I don't totally recall
Which was solely the Alliance's fault, and is one of the main reasons why the people of the OSP don't particularly like the Alliance and want to leave. There was a famine created by the Alliance's corruption, leading to a small uprising which was crushed by the Alliance Navy. Bethel, the system that took the worst of it, later voted in the Barons who would kickstart the war.

[bitter furnace]

Yeah, the chain of events goes something like: famine from Alliance mismanagement -> uprising in Bethel -> AN crackdown -> few years of quiet -> OSP does a terrorism -> AN puts up a blockade -> OSP stokes tension -> AN does a war crime -> Bethel declares independence and starts mobilizing

at which point the Alliance has to move in and crush the rebellion as quickly as possible to show strength, lest other member nations think the Alliance is weakening and also try to secede. Since the Alliance's representatives' power is tied to the Alliance as a political construct, their personal incentives greatly align towards keeping it together, so despite not wanting to fight, they won't offer peace

at which point the other OSP systems have no choice but to join with Bethel and also secede, because if Bethel is crushed then their strategic position and bargaining power evaporates. They can't sue for peace and go back to trying to legally secede, though they want to, because their voters would massacre them next election

Most people in this setting don't want to be at war, but through incompetence and a few warmongers on both sides, that chain of events happened and now everyone's locked in with no way out

[fresh storm]

so my toyotas have a decent enough cause? sweet

feels better than playing the Texas Faction

[grand pine]

toyotas?

[fresh storm]

they're very popular as technicals round the world

[grand pine]

i thought that was the reason you called them toyotas

[fresh storm]

you could replace every image in this with ospn ships

[grand pine]

really?

[fresh storm]

aside from the ocello, which is a bunch of mothballed ANS ships they've captured, everything in the lineup is a repurposed civilian vessel

armed with either very antiquated guns assembled out of museum pieces or industrial equipment

or The Device that they've just slapped together

[grand pine]

oh

[tulip vault]

oh thank god someone corrected me

please, it is not unwanted, it's been like. a long time since the lore doc got taken down and I can only half remember

also like

you only pointed out one thing that I said which was wrong lmao

[fresh storm]

observations from more playing vs AI: I'm making the mistake of approaching this with an RTS mindset instead of a sim mindset

being fired at at all got hands

[tulip vault]

@wicked mirage do you still use your torp liner, and if so, would it possible for you to send the fleet my way?

[wicked mirage]

Sure!

Give me one sec to make sure it's up to date.

[lime jungle]

Fleet 'THE ISEKAI TRUCK' is composed of 1 ship which costs 3000 points:

ISEKAI TRUCK : 'Bulk Freighter' class Line Ship [Missile PD Sensor]
```This fleet uses 7 different missile types:
```yaml
             SGM-102 Starshard : DIRECT - ACT(RADAR) - HE SHAPED [2pts]
               SGM-171 Esunaga : DIRECT - CMD - HE FRAG [5pts]
    SGM-177 Orichalcum Barrier : DIRECT - CMD - HE FRAG [9pts]
           SGT-308 ISEKAI TOOL : DIRECT - ACT(RADAR)/[PSV(WAKE)] - HE SHAPED [9pts]
         SGT-309 ISEKAI DEVICE : DIRECT - ARAD(RADAR)/ACT(RADAR) - HE SHAPED [10pts]
SGT-310 PROTAGONIST NOMINATION : DIRECT - CMD - HE SHAPED [23pts]
      SGT-311 ISEKAI MACGUFFIN : DIRECT - ACT(RADAR)/[CMD] - HE SHAPED [11pts]

[wicked mirage]

Here you go~

[noble zodiac]

isekai truckulous

[grand pine]

w-why is it called isekai truck and why does it have so many missile

[tulip vault]

because it runs over you and sends you to isekai land

btw thanks pyrope

[grand pine]

these missiles scare me

[noble zodiac]

well yes that is rather the point

:3

[wary flame]

providing one good fleet and one somewhat-meme fleet in each category because what else can you do

[grand pine]

i bet your meme builds are way better than my actual build:(

[sly glade]

I have been so unable to keep my fleets up to date with whatever the current meta is that the prospect of joining games where I don't have to bring any of my own is potentially a bit of a relief tbh

(according to the pin you don't have to submit any fleets to join?)

[tulip vault]

yeah there's plenty

[wicked mirage]

You're welcome!~

Also, thank you random ship name generator xD

https://tenor.com/view/rwby-jaune-arc-rwbygifgallery-gif-16993674859599529849

[grand pine]

RWBY?

[wicked mirage]

Yeah!~ It's my favorite show ^^

[noble zodiac]

holy shit its John RWBY

[wary flame]

fleets uploaded with descriptions

50% are memes of varying levels of quality, two are actually good

although I am using this as an excuse to get people to test my new fleets out so they might still have a few kinks

[tulip vault]

oh mine don't have descriptions but are pretty straightforward

[wary flame]

the MCRN badges are returning to pubulous

nature is getting worse

[dark dawn]

What's wrong with those?

[wary flame]

they used to be absolutely everywhere and tended to be used by very bad players indeed

lots of complaining about not having nukes or the ability to shoot people up with the 20mm

[wicked mirage]

Does this make the Isekai Truck a California summer and blueberries with MCRN tags an aging pine forest?

Nature must heal. Renewal through destruction.

[dark dawn]

The what truck?

[grand pine]

the isekai truck
3k bulk freighter with missiles

7 different types of them

[dark dawn]

[supple sonnet]

We have our own version that just uses one kind of torp, but yeah they are meen ship arcatype

[grand pine]

there it is, Shogun

[dark dawn]

Iesu Christi

[wary flame]

Very possibly

[grand pine]

why crayon point at viewer

[wary flame]

My landmine MN is an attempt at a controlled burn, maybe I should call it the Firebreak

From the neb server, natch

[grand pine]

CAP Players?

[dark dawn]

That's
Yeah, that's accurate

[noble zodiac]

people who build fleets entirely around capturing objectives

[wary flame]

Players who bring lots of fighty small ships that scatter everywhere and take capture points, usually with some scouts as well

[grand pine]

oh

one day I'll learn

[wary flame]

sometimes called "dad" because you take care of everything or because you're off grilling while the big fight is happening

[tulip vault]

did you stop seeing them?

they've never left for me lmao

[wary flame]

I did, yes

[tulip vault]

strange

[grand pine]

what does MCRN stand for?

[tulip vault]

I do love this meme but also the fact that cap is capitalised strongly implies that they are in some way a combat air patrol

[tulip vault]

martian congressional republic navy

I think

it's from the expanse

[grand pine]

when planes? they are coming, right?

[tulip vault]

like

2 years

[grand pine]

2 years is pretty soon

i just want to play night sky falling in nebulous

[wicked mirage]

Speaking of mines. I just got done making a pair of capping Sprinters that double as minesweepers, and can kill enemy Shuttles.

[lime jungle]

'Minesweeper SX' is a 'Sprinter' class Corvette that costs 350 points.

[lime jungle]

'Minesweeper MX' is a 'Sprinter' class Corvette that costs 340 points.

[wicked mirage]

These are free to be used by anyone of course ^^

[tulip vault]

oh huh

sarissa sprinter

[wicked mirage]

The Sarissa Sprinter is able to have everything on at once so long as the PCC stays intact

[tulip vault]

that's an interesting idea

does it have room to run an AE?

[grand pine]

what's sarissa again? a laser pd?

[tulip vault]

coilgun pd

[wicked mirage]

Railgun PD, basically

[tulip vault]

shoots sand

[wicked mirage]

Unfortunately no, the power is very tight.

[grand pine]

one day I'll learn.. i only remember defenders D:

[tulip vault]

mm, tragic

[oak shell]

If you only remember 1 thing, that's a good thing to remember

[wicked mirage]

It's only got 70kW to spare, unless you wanna turn the Radar off lol

[tulip vault]

I wonder if you'd be further ahead leaning hard on s1 offensives

are AE's 100?

[wicked mirage]

150kW

[tulip vault]

ah, welp

I do really like the idea of a sarissa vette for minesweeping

[grand pine]

but I've heard that defenders are not good and i should use stonewalls

[tulip vault]

does the sarissa have an integrated FCR?

[tulip vault]

both are good at different things

[wicked mirage]

The only downside is that you have to be very careful because you need the Sarissa to get close enough to FCR lock but not trigger the mines. So you only have like, less than 1km of wiggle room.

[oak shell]

Defender is the #1 anti-container device

[tulip vault]

presumably why its friend has the illuminator?

[wicked mirage]

Oh you could run both if you wanted xD These are made to be independent if need be.

[supple sonnet]

Yeah you need a wide and in depth PD net to like stop every thing

[wary flame]

you could also drop the gun, put the sarissa on the nose and add the usual torp complement

[tulip vault]

the sarissa fits on the nose?

[wary flame]

bit pricy but works

it's an S2 mount

[tulip vault]

the nose mount still doesn't look like a class 2 to me lol

[wicked mirage]

You'd have to put on a Small Reactor Booster but yeah.

[tulip vault]

but yeah I suppose so

[wicked mirage]

S1 Offensives are good, but they're pricey and I wanted these ships to be as economical as possible.

While still being effective.

[tulip vault]

I mean, you've got a sarissa already lol, but fair

[wicked mirage]

Yeah, but I gotta cut points somewhere! lol.

[tulip vault]

:p

points shmoints

600 point corvettes

[wary flame]

since it's only one gun, you can save 20pts with Mk61 and stock drive

[wicked mirage]

Also to clarify, the one with the Illuminator has SAH EL Frag AMM's to take out Mines. They can also double as anti-S2 and anti-Rocket. You'll to put them on manual though so they don't waste themselves.

[tulip vault]

ahh I see

[wicked mirage]

Magic Sparks!

22 of em

[tulip vault]

wouldn't losing the whip leave it under power?

[grand pine]

have fun boat nighting, commanders!

[wicked mirage]

I think so yeah. The Whip gives 150kw over the stock.

You'd be 80kw under.

[wary flame]

acceptable if you are down with only using sarissa or defender, but not both I suppose, and minesweeping is a high risk occupation

[wicked mirage]

Yeah, it'd be a trade off lol

[tulip vault]

I wonder if you could run the 250 on this instead of a 120

[wicked mirage]

The important thing is that these things have minesweeping as a second job, with their first job being capping and dogfighting.

[tulip vault]

probably not much more effective though

[wicked mirage]

You could, you'd be 5kW under I think, but that just turns off your R-mag which does... nothing.

Literally the 10kW the R-mag uses is worthless, does nothing.

[tulip vault]

that's very sad

[wicked mirage]

And it's the first thing to shut off in the event of low power

It doesn't exist xD

[tulip vault]

it should stop the automatic doors from working

[wicked mirage]

lol

[tulip vault]

oh also, you're a tester, do you know if mags still working at 0% but not greyed is intended behaviour?

[wicked mirage]

Yes

As far as I know anyhow.

[tulip vault]

bizarre, but fair enough lol

[wicked mirage]

R mags are very misleading xD

Oh btw fun fact, the Sprinter's innate radar buffs also buff the Sarissa's FCR.

So it can lock missiles further away than other Sarissas.

So that makes it more forgiving when Minesweeping.

It's like a free ARR and TC just about

Also the Pixie Moth missiles in those are just 1pt Wake Offensives

Size 3 warhead to give a bit more maneuverability and range.

[grand pine]

what gamemodes are played during the boat night?

[quiet quiver]

Control is the standard

[supple sonnet]

And now that we know that out thermastat and firealarmes are not goign to be replaced mid boats we have uploaded our fleets

We might be a bit late to first game tho

[oak shell]

@toxic scaffold your ANS fleets are jpg files rather than fleet files

[supple sonnet]

🤦🏽

[grand pine]

jpg? the formations instead of actual fleets?

[oak shell]

Looks like they grabbed the thumbnail image instead of the actual fleet file

[supple sonnet]

Yeah that is exactly what i did

[wicked mirage]

Hey guys, I fixed up my cap fleet and made a true Rainbow fleet! 🌈
7 Ships all named after different colored gemstones! 💎

[lime jungle]

Fleet 'Color Shards (Intel+Cap)' is composed of 7 ships that cost 3000 points:

  Emerald Shard : 'Keystone' class Destroyer [Beam Gun PD Sensor]
Tigerseye Shard : 'Raines' class Frigate [Gun Sensor PD]
     Ruby Shard : 'Raines' class Frigate [Gun EWar PD]
  Citrine Shard : 'Raines' class Frigate [Sensor PD EWar]
 Amethyst Shard : 'Sprinter' class Corvette [PD Gun]
    Lapis Shard : 'Sprinter' class Corvette [Gun PD]
   Iolite Shard : 'Sprinter' class Corvette [Gun PD]
```This fleet uses 6 different missile types:
```yaml
                SGM-102 Starshard : DIRECT - ACT(RADAR) - HE SHAPED [2pts]
                SGM-11 Pixie Moth : DIRECT - PSV(WAKE) - HE SHAPED [1pts]
               SGM-123 Ruby Thorn : DIRECT - CMD - HE SHAPED [4pts]
          SGM-123 Star Ruby Thorn : DIRECT - CMD - HE SHAPED [7pts]
SGM-133 'Red Scythe' Anti-Clipper : DIRECT - CMD - HE SHAPED [7pts]
               SGM-172 Blood Rose : DIRECT - PSV(EO) - HE SHAPED [11pts]

[grand pine]

6 missiles, damn

[wet root]

Requesting again that someone upload these to the drive

(I can't)

[sly glade]

<@&942093958551588904> boat night channels are now open!

Are we on testulous? Wait, is testulous even a distinct thing right now?

[tulip vault]

it is but I don't think we are

[sly glade]

I've never done the randomized fleets thing, how are the fleets assigned?

[junior heron]

I'd like to be

but it's not a huge deal

[grand pine]

how does one even sign up for a boat night

[tulip vault]

it has been done

[junior heron]

if you've got the role you can see the channels

[wicked mirage]

Oh darn I forgot to submit any fleets, is it too late?

[oak shell]

No

[wicked mirage]

Ok just gimme like 10 mins!

[wet root]

Ty much!

[sly glade]

<@&942093958551588904> looks like we're doing test branch tonight btw!

[junior heron]

@sly glade

[wary flame]

attempt 1 at Tom's container liner: do nothing because everything is CMD and there are many interruptors, then get beamed
attempt 2: deal 17k and cap one (1) important point, resulting in a clutch victory
at this rate of improvement I will be singlehandedly destroying opfors and capping the entire map by game five, right?

[forest star]

Exactly

Game six and your containers'll be winning other games, too

[grand pine]

how do you even deal with containers

[noble zodiac]

softkill

[grand pine]

my brain is smooth, is softkill like.. flares? decoys? chaff?

[forest star]

yeah

hardkill is stuff like shooting the container

[grand pine]

i feel like the moment i show up to a game with my fleet instead of Perijove's (very cool build by the way) i would get instantly deleted by a single missile :(

[olive blade]

I mean thats part of the fun of swapping fleets, you learn new tricks from other peoples fleets and try things you usually wouldn't that you can apply to your fleets

[junior heron]

yeah
long range direct feels alien to me but it worked really well

[grand pine]

what is long range? ~11 km mass drivers? or is 8km considered long range as well?

[junior heron]

mass drivers are 20-ish km
I didn't see quite how far those missiles could go but it was probably 11km+

[grand pine]

also mass drivers fucking hurt, maybe I should get them

[wet root]

For a very rough rule of thumb, 10k+ is long range, 6k- is short range

(Though doubtless everyone has their own numbers for that)

Also it looks like the server just crashed from running out of RAM, I guess 12 players and a bunch of missiles was a bit too much for this instance size

So time for me to bump it up to the next size up for the future

[grand pine]

ouch..

how drastic is the range difference of mass drivers and plasma in osp? i am sadly in bed:(

[wet root]

Drastic

[junior heron]

very

[wet root]

MDs are what, 24k? And Plasma is... 8k I think?

[junior heron]

plasma has a max of 8, and is most effective at 4

[wet root]

MDs are the premier long range weapon, they hit the entire map

[grand pine]

oh

[wet root]

(Well, MDs and missiles)

[grand pine]

i hope i wasn't completely useless during game 1:( got kinda lost in movement control

[wet root]

Oh, there's a new flavour of compute-optimized instances, fancy

[wet root]

You did fine from what I saw

You survived and shot stuff, that's doing well as a new player, let alone in a game as chaotic as taht

[grand pine]

I lost a frigate and nearly lost one of Vauxhalls:(

[wet root]

That's kind of the ideal amount of losses, means that you were taking actual fights but managed to retain combat effectiveness

[grand pine]

i wasn't taking actual fights D:
flanked a bulk freighter that Tom was beaming while the frigate was moving to C (and died there:c shouldn't have separated it)
and the vauxhaul was damaged by mass drivers on the way to A :(

[wet root]

Flanking a bulker is a fight

And losing a ship trying to take a point is just how the game goes

Taking no risks usually means taking no wins

[grand pine]

a defenceless at the time of arrival freighter :( that i wad shooting with he-rpf for some reason:(

[wet root]

(Though I recommend playing somewhat cautiously when you're newer, it takes practice assessing how big a risk is)

[supple sonnet]

250 RPF can pen a bulkers thin skin

[grand pine]

oh they can? huh

[tulip vault]

yeah actually on that topic @wet root you had a group of like

[olive blade]

I wouldn't be hard on yourself in your first games

[tulip vault]

s3h/torp frigates

how was I supposed to use those?

because they seem like a really cool idea but uh

I was not doing it right

[tulip vault]

wait it can?

the more you know

[wet root]

Hunt scouts and cappers, and also torp bigger ships that skimp on PD

I think we just didn't have EWRs that game lmao

[grand pine]

me still think that was more of a Perijove's.. failproof(?) fleet design than my performance:(

[wet root]

I had one but I thought it was an MMT until I went to take a point

[tulip vault]

ah, alright lol

so I guess it was simply a skill issue on my part

very understandable

[wet root]

I think you ended up doing a fair amount with them?

[grand pine]

i had a disco ball and 2 hangups on a destroyer

[wet root]

Oh wait frigates I thought you were talking about the Sprinters

[tulip vault]

yeah

frigates

[wet root]

Those are just supposed to go hit whatever looks good to hit

Bulkers, Monitors, Tugs, whatever

[tulip vault]

oh alright

I liked their designs for the most part

[grand pine]

next boat night is normal boat night, right?

[tulip vault]

Not a huge fan of Act [wake] torps but otherwise they were very neat

[wet root]

Be a strong enough force to punch most small capping forces and threaten combat ships, while being small enough to skulk about

[wet root]

(Early Warning Radar, not EWAR [Electronic Warfare])

[grand pine]

oh

[wet root]

I really like the combination on torps, since they're the hardest ones to softkill if you launch from close enough within the rear aspect

And they're super cost-efficient

[tulip vault]

isn't act [wake] 3 points?

I may be misremembering

[wet root]

1.5 points

[tulip vault]

oh damn

alright yeah no then I get it

[wet root]

Those torps cost 5 points I think? Or maybe 7

They can also just act as normal ACT for finishing ships you've knocked out temporarily with the hybrids

Btw @tulip vault how did you like the 460 point Beamstone?

[tulip vault]

it's hard to get across a jovial tone over text, so read the following in one

I despised it lmao

[wet root]

:D

[tulip vault]

like, fascinating insight into someone else's brain

but holyyy I did not like that ship

why could it not lock anything, that's my question

[wet root]

I knew whoever would get that would hate it

[wet root]

Because a Bullseye costs 40 points plus some extra power

[tulip vault]

it put in pretty good work I'll admit but I think the work would've been better with a bullseye instead of the guns

[wet root]

That's fair, I've been wiffling on whether to keep the guns or not

Helps with goaltending, but it is 40 points

[tulip vault]

yeah

I think the use case for secondaries is mostly superceded by the fact that you'll probably know what direction you need to point in already as a goaltender

but I do get the logic for sure

[wet root]

Well it's more that I like to skulk it around somewhat ahead of the points to try to catch the flank on a bulker or Ocello

And the secondaries mean I can still deal with shuttles that want to get past in the meantime

[tulip vault]

mm, fair enough

[wet root]

But as mentioned, definitely on the fence with those

[tulip vault]

I'm skeptical of mostly unbuffed 120s, really

like I think the axford or vaux can bring enough AEs to push it over the edge

and the DD probably can too, but does it want to

[wet root]

They're not exactly terrifying, but 3 of them can still deal with a shuttle fairly well

Maybe what I should do is put some S1 offensives on actually

[tulip vault]

maybe

40 points worth of s1 offensives could work

I think personally I'd nudge it up to 500 points to fit s1s and a bullseye

[wet root]

Spotlight + 25 S1s does a lot of work

[tulip vault]

haha, yeah

[wet root]

I should maybe do the same for the guns on the gun cap Sprinters

[wary flame]

a development of the surrender CL I put in tonight's list pool, this one has only about three-quarters of the missile load, most of it HEI, but has two cap sprinters

[lime jungle]

Fleet 'Biblically Accurate Vauxhall' is composed of 3 ships that cost 3000 points:

      Triclavian Insurrection : 'Vauxhall' class Light Cruiser [Missile Sensor PD EWar]
A Miraculous Surfeit of Nails : 'Sprinter' class Corvette [Missile Gun PD]
                Unholy Bridle : 'Sprinter' class Corvette [Missile Gun PD]
```This fleet uses 7 different missile types:
```yaml
SGM-101 Ceremonial Arming Missile : DIRECT - PSV(WAKE) - HE SHAPED [1pts]
       SGM-111 That'll Be The Day : DIRECT - ACT(RADAR) - HE FRAG [3pts]
            SGM-200 Be Not Afraid : DIRECT - NONE - NONE [7pts]
          SGM-H-266 Reign In Hell : DIRECT - CMD/SAH(RADAR) - HEKP [21pts]
        SGM-H-299 Serve In Heaven : DIRECT - CMD/SAH(RADAR) - HE SHAPED [12pts]
               SGT-358 Gom Jabbar : DIRECT - ACT(RADAR)/[CMD] - HE SHAPED [13pts]
             SGT-358 Wierding Way : DIRECT - ARAD(RADAR)/ACT(RADAR) - HE SHAPED [12pts]

[wary flame]

featuring a bunch of bad jokes made by a friend about a niche religious argument from the thirteenth century

[wary flame]

bulker of the snow what is your wisdom

muffled groaning

[olive blade]

it is tired

let it sleep

[wary flame]

really falling in love with the torpedo corvette format of fighting the OSP fleet waves

VLS-3 sprinter cap units feel like proper small warships, not just platforms for kit you can't fit on the capitals, ANS feels far more like the "high-tech real military" faction when you have these little dogfights breaking out everywhere with individual ANS warships slinging half a dozen different kinds of missile and countering the same with multi-layered PD even on ships that small

[oak shell]

I would try that but I'm pretty sure I can't handle the micro required

[wary flame]

I've started using them as general-purpose auxiliaries

I have a cheap BB somewhere that is basically fine to go fight on its own, so the extra 900pts go into two torp sprinters and a spy frigate

[oak shell]

They'll be really interesing in Conquest!

[wary flame]

I also made this awful thing where I stripped most of the HEKP out of my surrender CL, filled up some of the space with HEI so it still has about 80% of its prior missile count and then gave it two torp sprinter friends

[wary flame]

boat

[wary flame]

I suspect that if balance is still broadly similar you'll see a lot of ships like that, general-purpose escorts and defence ships

give me command of the ANS Harwich Force, I'm ready

might want to load up with a few more cheap S3H and a few less torps, because then if a superior force shows up you fire off all your missiles at range, try to inflict casualties and retreat from a less suicidal position than those occupied by torp corvs that just failed to kill their target

[glad aurora]

converse opinion: the dominance of small ship swarm fleets has become slowly stifling to anything except excellent micro capabilities (and good-performing computers)

[wary flame]

the frontline fleets seem to be the same ship count as ever, 3x bulker, 2x axford, 1x BB or 5x monitors in a big formation are all still pretty popular

cap game ship count has just exploded somewhat from the days when I could patrol the entire map with three frigates

I love this kind of dispersed ambush warfare disrupted by the big fleets ploughing through and exerting these big zones of control, but I hate fighting blobs of smaller ships all moving as a unit, which seem to have been mostly disrupted by bombshells at this stage

[glad aurora]

Oh, I'm aware - it's just become rather disheartening to go and play my cruisers like usual and end up either 1) gunned down by a monitor swarm or 2) torpedoed to death without being able to react in time to save the ship

(which is why I was working on modernizing my BB lately)

[wary flame]

MNs and plasma/100 bulkers are very scary and I fully admit I'm not much good at fighting them

torps are an easier problem to solve since we have The Bubble

I have actually seen lots of BBs going double interruptor to wall off torp Ocellos and guarantee that anything else can't even try

[plain ice]

Ah, even more reason I won’t be able to play Nebulous

My computer is uh, not good

[glad aurora]

Yeah, I've been thinking of putting a disco ball on the vauxhall backpack mount at this point

just because that's the only point that can reasonably fit one

[wary flame]

optimisation I've actually been impressed with

since the dedicated server update I haven't noticed many dropped frames at all, and my machine is quite dated if not completely out of it

6.5 year old 1060

disco on the backpack and missiles on the other backpack has been my go-to

[glad aurora]

laptop :^)

[olive blade]

yeah I'm standing by my lots of illuminators torp doctrine

[glad aurora]

I start dropping frames when I see more than ~20 missiles on the screen at one time

which, coincidentally, is exactly when I need to be doing micro

[quiet quiver]

Some of the dominance of small fleets is also a consequence of the demands of 5-7 point control

[bitter furnace]

it's been pretty fascinating to see the evolution unfold, we started out with barebones scoutcorvs with the team's railguns able to instantly wipe anything they spotted. Then railguns got nerfed and hybrids were introduced, the scoutcorvs got a bit more fitted because unlike railguns, missiles can be shot down. Then we got the OSP and a whole new era began. The cost efficiency of rocket shuttles led to another big evolution in corvette loadouts, as you now have to kill the enemy capper quick or at range. People began to adjust to rocket shuttles, and in return, the OSP began to evolve the multi-mission tugboat as an all-purpose scout and capper that could outgun corvettes. The Alliance then rediscovers the torpedo and starts to shift scouting duty to frigates and lean more heavily on ELINT

[olive blade]

tbh the real threat to the MMT is the s2h carrier

[bitter furnace]

I expect more SAH torps to be appearing in response to this

[wary flame]

in general corvettes kill shuttles, MMTs kill corvettes, bullseye/CMD bombers kill MMTs (and anything else insufficiently protected) and then mass drivers and old-style EWR and LRT tugs suppress bombers

[bitter furnace]

response to #2 is organizing a good teamcomp with your teammates in the lobby, with sufficient scouting to spot the torpers early enough to prevent the torpening from occurring. Or bring your own scouts for the purpose, but then the "gunned down by monitors" problem becomes worse, so yeah, tradeoffs

[wary flame]

but, interestingly, can kind of be ran down by shuttles if the other layers aren't there

[wary flame]

there's been one very recent evolution, which is the OSP going "wait, all our stuff really is dirt cheap" with the advent of tanky DCX MNs and LNs and tripling the small ship count

which I think has really pushed ANS to round their scouts out and start fighting a proper small ship war rather than supporting heavy units with a handful of unarmed utility ships

exemplified by the 4-6 shuttle acap rush replacing the old "both sides send one, both sides lose one, now we begin the real game" joseki

I really loved that when I first saw it, it was very much "wait, are we trying to go through the motions on A or do we really want to win A"

[bitter furnace]

Funny how the DCX worked out, it increased the cost of the average bulker to the point where the triple bulker fleet became inadvisable, and they've gotta fill the remainder of their points with something, so fuck it more clippers

[wary flame]

"if you wanted to win early tempo", my master said, "you should have been prepared to cap A immediately, with every last shuttle in your fleet."

[supple sonnet]

To bad it's not cap the enamays naturals with every shuttle in your fleet any more

[wary flame]

I've actually seen them come back but only in pre-stacked games where the other three OSP fleets are each bringing 8-10 ships

and the natural subsequent progression of that was "if the enemy is set up to play scoutwar, the OSP just balls up half a dozen monitors and 3-4 bulkers, then drives straight to the nearest ANS natural murdering anything they see while 20 shuttles hold down the map"

not sure what to do about that yet

[supple sonnet]

We think that Beemstone PID getting fixed might help thigns once wolfpacks caome back into fassion

[bitter furnace]

hmm, random guess, avoid the deathball and move around it killing shuttles until the deathball splits up to cap, then missile the split up elements

[bitter furnace]

oh yeah beam targeting getting fixed is gonna be huge

Keystones will be a much more common sight to counter MNs and Ocellos

[supple sonnet]

Yeah MN's don't relay have much to worry about other then getting to the fight right now. though the still need to respect beems

[wary flame]

harder to do these days when you're moving through shuttle-infested territory, but I suppose that the PID fix means it might cut directly the other way if an ANS deathball forces OSP to make a similar rotation into dispersed beamstones

still, those Plas/250/100 triple threat LNs are bloody terrifying, since they outrun vauxes and outgun Axfords

[bitter furnace]

yeah the "avoid the deathball" is very much easier said than done against the longhaul

[fresh storm]

reactor blooms aren't as bad as I thought huh

my ocello ate three when I was testing my PD because apparently the AI for missile fleets has the great backup plan of "hug the player with your ships after your missiles are spent and hope for FF"

was actually inside the "fireball" of all three

and was mostly just scratched up

[wary flame]

it can knock out or remove the mounts and thrusters from smaller ships like corvettes and shuttles, but the big effect on anything else is removing all the armour

a charred black ship has no armour protection whatsoever, which will completely ruin the defensive capabilities of an Ocello, Monitor, Axford or Solomon and put a sizable dent in anything else

there was a brief incident where people were deliberately starting overloads on specialised all-aux-steering tugboats and using the two minute countdown to suicide them into enemy battleships dug into tricky positions

that got fixed quick sharp

[lime jungle]

Fleet '01 - Impedance Marching' is composed of 5 ships that cost 3000 points:

Merit and Marks : 'Ocello' class Command Cruiser [Gun EWar PD Sensor]
    Fried Dough : 'Cargo Feeder' class Monitor [Rail Plasma Missile PD Gun]
    Study Risky : 'Tugboat' class Clipper [Sensor Missile Gun PD]
   Beep and Fun : 'Tugboat' class Clipper [Gun EWar PD Ewar]
     Gooey Curd : 'Shuttle' class Clipper [Gun Rocket EWar]
```This fleet uses 2 different missile types:
```yaml
CM-S-400 Container : CRUISE - PSV(WAKE) - NONE [14pts]
  SGM-100 Balestra : DIRECT - ARAD(RADAR) - HE FRAG [3pts]

[fresh storm]

my first attempt at a fleet, up for major point redistribution already

(ammo counts also not zeroed in, just testing)

this is meant as a support fleet for my friend's amazon warehouse but I'm having trouble getting a good idea for what works and what doesn't because AI games are really something else

I think I'll be getting rid of the monitor because it's not durable or punchy enough for its cost and I'd rather have something for ambush bursts

though admittedly it was able to fully come back online after getting punched by three keystones and hiding behind a rock

[bitter furnace]

so serious feedback time if you want it - I think your fleet lacks focus. You have a wide variety of ship types, and each has a wide variety of equipment on it without committing to any single role. Sure they have many different roles, but if one of your ships meets a specialized opponent, it's not going to win

the mantra of fleet design is Specialized Ships, Generalized Fleets - you should come in to each fleet with a playstyle idea or set of roles you want it to fulfill, design a bunch of specialized ship types, then combine those ships like legos to form a generalized fleet that can take on most challengers when operating in the intended role

[quiet quiver]

But also in team games your teammates can pick up some of the other specializations

Which means in a 3k you don’t need to super-generalize

[bitter furnace]

taking your ship the Fried Dough as an example, it has a TE45, T81, and T20. The buffing module mechanics in this game really encourage ship specialization. The TE45 likes energy regulators, the T81 likes rapid-cycle cradles, and the T20 likes ammo elevators. Generally speaking, your primary weapons need at least three buffing modules, otherwise they won't have the damage output to do more than tickle. The gold standard is five buffing modules. For example, the Mk66 cannons on your Ocello have a reload time of 20 seconds unbuffed, and can be brought down to 10 seconds with five ammo elevators - that's double the damage output. With three different weapons in different buffing categories, it's really difficult to buff them to an acceptable level

[fresh storm]

I was going to fully commit to scouting and ewar and have a swarm of clippers to intercept threats

[bitter furnace]

That's true I suppose, it depends on how closely reliant on your teammates you want to be

[fresh storm]

but I got the impression that I'd look stupid without enough gun

[bitter furnace]

well your scouting tugboats seem to not be very fully committed, they have a bunch of other equipment on them that's not scouting related (guns, minelayers, jammers, etc). OSP scouts are often very very far from the frontline because of the long range of the EWR and LRT, all that extra stuff that only works at a closer range is either going to be unused or is going to drag your scout into danger so you can use it

[bitter furnace]

you really wouldn't, plenty of people like playing gunnery fleets in this game, we always need more players who like filling the scouting role for the team 🙂

[fresh storm]

sweet, official approval to bring less firepower

though for the record all the guns aside from Fried Dough are dual purpose

...or maybe not

the C30 is the same gun as T20 in a different mount but it's not marked as dual purpose so I assume it won't shoot missiles

[wet root]

IIRC the C30 has no ability to elevate/depress, so the entire ship has to rotate to bring it to bear

Which would make targeting missiles difficult, considering how fast they are

(And also just annoying since your ship would be randomly rolling about)

Also the 250mm on the Ocello aren't actually dual-purpose, since the OSP doesn't get access to RPF

[fresh storm]

also I like how the random names gave the ocello the proud sounding Merit and Marks

and it's flanked by ospn rustbuckets Fried Dough and Gooey Curd

[fresh storm]

second go at it, will revise with testing

[lime jungle]

Fleet '02 - Impedance Marching' is composed of 6 ships that cost 3000 points:

Merit and Marks : 'Ocello' class Command Cruiser [Gun EWar PD Sensor]
   Beep and Fun : 'Tugboat' class Clipper [PD Gun Missile]
 The Neat Modem : 'Tugboat' class Clipper [PD Sensor Gun]
The Muted Panic : 'Shuttle' class Clipper [Gun EWar PD]
 The Shot Valor : 'Shuttle' class Clipper [Gun EWar PD]
    Fancy Intro : 'Shuttle' class Clipper [Gun Ewar]
```This fleet uses only one missile type:
```yaml
SGM-200 Tempest : DIRECT - SAH(RADAR) - HE SHAPED [4pts]

[grand pine]

damn, i've ran out of power and cant fit more energy regulators D:

oh, i can't just stick 4 mass drivers on a side of a freighter.. damn

[mint sinew]

The usual magic numbers work out to be 3 mass drivers and 3 Energy Regulators (with no radar installed). This balances the cost of the power needed with the rate of fire you get

[grand pine]

will note, thanks

i tried fitting 4 and ran out of space for mags D:

[mint sinew]

Yeah, the 4th is really intensive on the power infrastructure

[grand pine]

who needs bulk magazines anyway

but eh, the freighter is probably better left for more experienced players

[grand pine]

with no radar? how am i going to be shooting then?

what's the difference between Bullseye and pinpoint other than the max range?

[fresh storm]

relayed radar tracks are as good as your own

the max range is significant and the bullseye, hm, I'm not exactly a radar specialist

casts a wider beam and has a smaller aperture

I don't remember if you get better resolution with a smaller or larger aperture in radars

I wanna say larger, inversely to cameras

[noble zodiac]

that... kinda is pretty much it, iirc the pinpoint handles jamming better tho

im probably wrong on that tho

[fresh storm]

I'm not sure how much about gain and aperture size matters for tracking radars in the current implementation of radar mechanics

since they can lock anything in range anyways if they know that it's there

[lime jungle]

Fleet 'OSP something something' is composed of 3 ships that cost 2708 points:

           Purse : 'Ocello' class Command Cruiser [Gun PD EWar Sensor]
Terrence B. Rape : 'Bulk Freighter' class Line Ship [Rail PD]
   The Back Lean : 'Tugboat' class Clipper [Sensor]

[grand pine]

i have no idea what i've done

like, my sensors are stuffed into a small ship that doesnt have damcon (tho i can fit it with change of reactor and removal of PCC)
the ocello is just.. a mess, same with bulk freighter

and i havent spent like 300 points

i can't buy a mass driver monitor since it puts me over 3k..

[fresh storm]

combining a mass bulker with a railgun ocello could be a funny maximum annoyance build

but probably only an option in large team games

oh, you exist on the map? big mistake

[grand pine]

railgun ocello is something i havent thought of because i saw mk65s and slapped them on

[tulip vault]

This is intense necro but also like

I really don’t think it’s true

You need a cap fleet in a 4v4 certainly, but frontline elements are no less useful than they’ve ever been imo

You just need to shift priorities towards exerting a bubble of instant small ship death around you as opposed to mainly anti-capital tech

I think that’s why 100mm is so good right now (and imo to the same extent 120mm on axfords but opinions vary on that one)

[tulip vault]

It does, pretty significantly

Its about 3-4 blankets to break a bullseye depending on range

I have no idea how to break a pinpoint beyond killing the mount itself

[tulip vault]

I actually did the instant flank speed C rush in a pub lobby on pillars

It worked shockingly well

We didn’t really kill much because it was all vauxhauls but ANS ended up so wildly out of position that it became very easy to pick them apart

[grand pine]

oh, good to know

[tulip vault]

The pinpoint is excellent

hey @wet root , how did you go about changing the corpus for your ship names?

[glad aurora]

It's informed more by my recent experience as a Vauxhall player than anything - I don't imagine other fleet archetypes have similar issues.

I'm just in an awkward spot where 250 isn't killing fast enough and I'm putting out less S3T than the enemy, relative to how comparatively fragile I am

[tulip vault]

If you'd like advice, I've advice to offer, but I will admit vauxes specifically suffer a little harder than most things against the main OSP threats, yeah

[glad aurora]

Shoot, go ahead

[tulip vault]

EWAR

I think, keyword on think, the answer is lots of EWAR

it won't help with torps much, though those can be universally (only 30% caveats) softkilled

but EWAR is your friend, especially as ships with small-ish radar sig

if you want to play fully anti small ship you're also not likely at risk of bloodhounds looking at you

I've had a lot of success with massive amounts of EWAR on all my fleets recently, but ymmv

[glad aurora]

Might be time to pivot back to "one gun/s3h vaux, one with disco/2x hangup/2x blanket," then?

[tulip vault]

I'm not sure

Personally I'd go down to two vauxes from 3, and fill the remaining points with EWAR escorts

but I am not a CL player at all

[fresh storm]

revised based on experiences

[lime jungle]

Fleet '02 - Impedance Marching' is composed of 6 ships that cost 3000 points:

Merit and Marks : 'Ocello' class Command Cruiser [Gun EWar PD Sensor]
   Beep and Fun : 'Tugboat' class Clipper [PD Gun EWar]
 The Neat Modem : 'Tugboat' class Clipper [Sensor Gun PD]
    Fancy Intro : 'Shuttle' class Clipper [Gun Rocket Ewar]
 The Shot Valor : 'Shuttle' class Clipper [Gun EWar PD]
The Muted Panic : 'Shuttle' class Clipper [Gun EWar PD]

[grand pine]

wow how did you fit all the fancy stuff under 3k

[fresh storm]

I did the inverse of this

also I really like the autogen names

didn't have to click on them long at all to get something fitting

[grand pine]

i really wish i could do good builds like that

[fresh storm]

I'm throwing things at the wall

haven't had a chance to test it against players

[grand pine]

like what would you add there? some shuttles with 100mm?

[lime jungle]

Fleet 'Me no know what' is composed of 5 ships that cost 2879 points:

Ship A : 'Vauxhall' class Light Cruiser [Gun PD]
Ship B : 'Keystone' class Destroyer [Beam Gun PD]
Ship C : 'Keystone' class Destroyer [Beam Gun PD]
Ship D : 'Raines' class Frigate [Gun Sensor]
Ship E : 'Raines' class Frigate []

[grand pine]

wait shit wrong one

[lime jungle]

Fleet 'OSP something something' is composed of 3 ships that cost 2713 points:

           Purse : 'Ocello' class Command Cruiser [Gun PD EWar Sensor]
Terrence B. Rape : 'Bulk Freighter' class Line Ship [Rail PD]
   The Back Lean : 'Tugboat' class Clipper [Sensor]

[fresh storm]

that's an unfortunate name

[grand pine]

which one of the two

[fresh storm]

I'm still rotating the actual ships in my head but I can see that you could bring more ammo at the same cost

it'd be a better idea to put the pinpoint on a shuttle or some other ship because the tug will be very visible due to the woodpecker and it can't survive being close enough to lock

[grand pine]

woodpecker?

[grand pine]

my idea was to let the tug sit with the sensorless bulk freighter :(

[fresh storm]

I call the early warning radar that because well

let me get the image

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duga_radar

I'm not familiar enough with the game to give tips on the roles of the ships but for components:

• rapid DC locker doesn't come with repairs so if the other one goes first, you can't bring it back up, permanently losing the repairs it had stored - I think the rapid teams can use the repairs from the module that adds no teams but only repairs though
• frontline is a very good economy option but unless you're extremely short on points the burnthrough and backup locks of the parallax are too good to pass up
• similar thing for the pinpoint, ocello can mount the much more comfortably ranged bullseye

ah nvm, I made that repair module up

[junior heron]

rapids don't come with restores, but also the rapid DC teams can't restore components

[fresh storm]

I was thinking of large DC storage

[junior heron]

yeah
it does add a repair team now

[grand pine]

so rapid on beam dds is a bad idea? got it

[junior heron]

no, rapid on beam dd is great

ideally you don't burn the beam out and need restores for it

(also ideally you have the rapid team go there but that might require putting a rapid DC in one of the large compartments)

[grand pine]

augh

[lime jungle]

Fleet 'Probably a bad idea' is composed of 4 ships that cost 2844 points:

   Ship A : 'Vauxhall' class Light Cruiser [Gun PD]
   Ship B : 'Keystone' class Destroyer [Beam Gun PD]
Evil Peel : 'Keystone' class Destroyer [Beam Gun PD]
   Ship D : 'Raines' class Frigate [Gun Sensor]

[grand pine]

it has become worse

not enough ammo, no rapid DC but i will probably burn the beam :(

[glad aurora]

What's the current state of the art in S2H?

I have 16 slots open and base Vauxhall channels

(all the modules are ARRs to fuel the abominable device, so no buses to be found)

[junior heron]

FWIW I think ARR caps out after just 1

as in, the bonuses don't get you anything more meaningful after the first one

[glad aurora]

Ah, sorry, ACAs

wrong module name

[junior heron]

ah, that's different

[glad aurora]

the abominable device benefits greatly from their inclusion

[grand pine]

the abominable device?

[glad aurora]

you'll see 🙂

[fresh storm]

what's a good gamemode for AI practice? one where they act the least stupid

[grand pine]

you scare me, Ash

[glad aurora]

behold: the abominable device

[lime jungle]

Fleet 'NG 3 Hanged Man' is composed of 2 ships that cost 3000 points:

Diadem of Eyes : 'Vauxhall' class Light Cruiser [Gun Missile PD]
 Storm Lantern : 'Vauxhall' class Light Cruiser [EWar Missile Sensor PD]
```This fleet uses 3 different missile types:
```yaml
SGM-270 False Idol : DIRECT - NONE - NONE [8pts]
  SGM-H-251 Rapier : DIRECT - CMD/ACT(RADAR) - HE SHAPED [16pts]
   SGM-H-334 Saber : DIRECT - CMD/ACT(RADAR) - HEKP [38pts]

[grand pine]

wow, 2 ships with cool names

[glad aurora]

pov: you are an OSP fleet that has to get through three blankets, two hangups, and a disco ball just to have the privilege of running the chaff, active decoy, and activest decoy gauntlet

[grand pine]

wait WHAT is this 38 points missile

[glad aurora]

relatively standard HEKP cmd/act corkscrew s3h

[grand pine]

that looks.. scary

[glad aurora]

The S2H won't really penetrate a proper Ocello defense net, but it'll fairly solidly massacre lighter ships

[supple sonnet]

Small numbers of s2h wont even relay deal with any small ship that has any investment put in it. and like to circle back to your complainets about geting stomped by small ships Storm Lantern is just asking for a shuttle to close with in visual and murder it slowly

[glad aurora]

I mean, I don't intend to ever split up these two ships (and I'd be surprised if shuttles have enough PD to kill hybrids?)

I tossed it at a shuttle swarm in the testing room and it fairly reliably could kill a few shuttles with its S2H load

[supple sonnet]

Most of them do if they are not naked, eather trough soft kill or cheepo AMMs

That and a t20 and a pinppint make a budget sarissa

[glad aurora]

I suppose.
I just don't really see any other way to compete without the abominable device

[wary flame]

The current state of the art S2H is usually 11-14 pt CMD/SAH or CMD/Wake, fired on bullseye lock

[fresh storm]

I keep forgetting that missiles can be locked

[wary flame]

The popular platform is something generally referred to as a Bomber, a sprinter or frigate with bullseye, blanket, VLS2 and spyglass or elint that floats around undetected in the stratosphere locking the swarms of OSP light units and deleting them because OSP has no comms jamming outside Ocellos.

Two pairs of bomber sprinters plus cappers are probably the single most annoying list to fight in the game because they can also exterminate bulkers if they don't have adequate PD.

[supple sonnet]

Invest less in individual hulls and bring more ships IMO, eggs and baskets and all that

Ash And Gold ↩️

[Reply to:](#1164000873031151637 message) I suppose.
I just don't really see any other way to compete without the abominable device

[glad aurora]

Tried that, didn't work

(traditional guns-only triple vauxhall, died to torpedoes)

[wary flame]

and yeah, ewar is usually handled by one blanket tops on the cruisers and then a dedicated ACA sprinter

Quad blanket, double hangup induces suffering because two blankets are often enough to hide you so you can just rotate them

[supple sonnet]

Yeah three blankets is enough to hide a Solomon at normal gun ranges from any native OSP radar

i was thinking more like 2x 1k Vauxen and 1k of suport/cap/escorts ships

Ash And Gold ↩️

[Reply to:](#1164000873031151637 message) (traditional guns-only triple vauxhall, died to torpedoes)

[glad aurora]

... I'll be real, that doesn't sound like a fleet I'd enjoy playing at all

it'd be undeniably more effective though

[wary flame]

If you want to do super ewar cruiser, probably best to give it all the missiles so you can shuffle the interruptor onto the other one and then focus on guns and gun accessories

[glad aurora]

On one hand: yes, makes sense. On the other hand: where are my channels

ACAs and bus arrays conflict

[tulip vault]

I'm just not sure that fleet has enough damage to really hold its own in a fight

[glad aurora]

Yeah. I'm much more comfortable playing a version with several extra guns and another six S3H, but it has no softkill and half the EWAR.

¯_(ツ)_/¯

At the moment, that's meant it just Dies whenever I take it out

[grand pine]

damn now i kinda crave more nebulous but my fleets are hot garbage

[supple sonnet]

It dose take a but to learn what value certian bits have Saper, but like a fleet that can get into postion and shoot it's guns is a functional fleet

[grand pine]

it's just.. there are too many options and not enough points D:

and not enough space in reinforced magazines ;(

[supple sonnet]

TBH a full mag in a largish slot is enough for most non-capital ships but for them a secondaray mag is not a bad investment

[grand pine]

but what if 500 rounds of each type isn't enough? it probably isn't

[glad aurora]

it is

[supple sonnet]

Yeah unless it's like 100mm 500 should be enough

[glad aurora]

thought 1: I have moved most of the ewar functions off to a 2x blanket/2x hangup frigate, added another 250 and doubled the S3H count

thought 2: this fleet is now a 4k fleet, not a 3k

:^)

[grand pine]

can you even do a 4k fleet

[oak shell]

You can make one, but it's not likely to see play

[glad aurora]

of course, you're just never going to bring it to a game

back to cutting, I suppose

[supple sonnet]

Yeah you might have trubbe finding folks to play with, but ike 6k fleets and 12k fleets are more common

6K's for when your short a player, and 12K for 4v1 MATCHES

Gah

[grand pine]

like how's that for a fleet? terrible?

[lime jungle]

Fleet 'Probably a bad idea' is composed of 4 ships that cost 2994 points:

   Ship A : 'Vauxhall' class Light Cruiser [Gun PD]
   Ship B : 'Keystone' class Destroyer [Beam Gun PD]
Evil Peel : 'Keystone' class Destroyer [Beam Gun PD]
   Ship D : 'Raines' class Frigate [Gun Sensor]

[glad aurora]

you have way too many shells and way too many flares

also way too many ammo elevators, cut two of those and put them into mount gyros

then spend the points on better DC and a parallax on your CL

[supple sonnet]

I woud not say to menay flares, but yeah more 20mm rounds and less of every thing else. and swap the large DC locker for a Reinforced on and then buy more lockers wiht the spare points if you can. rappids are preaty good for keeping your dries functional if you permaflank, and will fix crits faster

[grand pine]

MORE 20mm? damn

is 12k enough?

[supple sonnet]

yeah it's 2k rounds a point for a resion, and yeah that's good

or 10k

[glad aurora]

last attempt

[lime jungle]

Fleet 'NG 4 Hanged Man' is composed of 2 ships that cost 3000 points:

 Storm Lantern : 'Vauxhall' class Light Cruiser [Missile EWar Sensor]
Diadem of Eyes : 'Vauxhall' class Light Cruiser [Gun EWar PD]
```This fleet uses 3 different missile types:
```yaml
SGM-270 False Idol : DIRECT - NONE - NONE [8pts]
  SGM-H-251 Rapier : DIRECT - CMD/ACT(RADAR) - HE SHAPED [16pts]
   SGM-H-334 Saber : DIRECT - CMD/ACT(RADAR) - HEKP [38pts]

[glad aurora]

I would like another 6-salvo of S3H but there's no feasible way to put it in the budget

[grand pine]

so something like,, that?

[lime jungle]

Fleet 'Probably a bad idea' is composed of 4 ships that cost 2999 points:

   Ship A : 'Vauxhall' class Light Cruiser [Gun PD]
   Ship B : 'Keystone' class Destroyer [Beam Gun PD]
Evil Peel : 'Keystone' class Destroyer [Beam Gun PD]
   Ship D : 'Raines' class Frigate [Gun Sensor]

[glad aurora]

your destroyers have about three times the amount of shells they need

cut those, parallax on vauxhall

and give your frigate an rcic

[grand pine]

3 times the amount of shells they need
but.. shells..

[glad aurora]

I'm not sure whether a CL with no hardkill PD is viable, but fuck it, I have only so many mounts

[wary flame]

Part of the reason you have no money is because all those missiles are insanely expensive

[grand pine]

i am, sadly, low on power

[wary flame]

have you considered half 15pt HEI and half hardened skin HEKP, and moving to 12pt 1100 damage S2H?

[glad aurora]

Not really, because HEI doesn't kill anything in my experience

I'm absolutely open to how to make the S2H less expensive, though

[wary flame]

I have some shiny new models for most of those

[glad aurora]

current S2H

[lime jungle]

SGM-H-251 Rapier is a size 2 missile that costs 16 points.

[wary flame]

HEI reds out stuff for your guns to kill, and is fatal against anything small, which is the danger zone normally

Is that SEACT or just one of the cheap ones?

[glad aurora]

SACT

[wary flame]

You only actually need a little bit of HEKP to go through all the red stuff and finish it off

unless you're specifically planning to fight bowtanking Ocellos at knife range, which I'd say you probably aren't with a single gun cruiser and no torpedoes

[glad aurora]

I mean, bowtanking ocellos is what I specifically tested this against

(which is also why I said I wanted another 6-salvo, because I killed one but had to finish the other off with AP and would've (if it were a player ship) lost a CL in the process)

but yes, I'm not exactly sure how to make the S2H small-thing-killer cheaper but it would be nice

[wary flame]

Slower is cheaper for hybrid sprint stages, and you can dodge the cost of weave by using Minimum Angle to make the missile oscillate wildly as long as you're firing on a bullseye lock to ensure it actually hits

12pts gets you good S2H, 11pts gets you janky but functional for shuttle/tug mass murder

[grand pine]

may i share another probably bad fleet?

[wary flame]

Given Ocellos are perfectly equipped and statted to murder CLs but heavily outmatched by ANS capital ships to the point spamming them is asking to be wrecked by a gun BB, I don't think "kills two Ocellos with no lost vessels" is a necessary design feature

Being able to HEKP one Ocello or a pack of MNs is great, but ANS is being swarmed by cheap meat either in shuttle or LN form and big HEI bombs either handle those or disable them for the guns much more reliably

If they have enough Ocellos that you need to kill two of them with no losses, you're probably good anyway

[grand pine]

maybe mixing all the stuff here was not a good idea after all..

[lime jungle]

Fleet 'OSP something something' is composed of 5 ships that cost 2998 points:

              Purse : 'Ocello' class Command Cruiser [Gun Plasma PD EWar Sensor]
   Terrence B. Rape : 'Bulk Freighter' class Line Ship [Rail PD]
      The Back Lean : 'Tugboat' class Clipper [Sensor]
         Math Potty : 'Shuttle' class Clipper [Gun]
Charmian Z. Spieler : 'Shuttle' class Clipper [Gun]

[glad aurora]

kills one ocello with no losses (other was a bulker)

[lime jungle]

Fleet 'NG 4 Hanged Man' is composed of 2 ships that cost 3000 points:

 Storm Lantern : 'Vauxhall' class Light Cruiser [Missile EWar Sensor]
Diadem of Eyes : 'Vauxhall' class Light Cruiser [Gun EWar PD]
```This fleet uses 4 different missile types:
```yaml
       SGM-270 False Idol : DIRECT - NONE - NONE [8pts]
         SGM-H-251 Rapier : DIRECT - CMD - HE SHAPED [12pts]
          SGM-H-334 Saber : DIRECT - CMD/ACT(RADAR) - HEKP [38pts]
SGM-H-334 Saber Mle. 1893 : DIRECT - CMD/ACT(RADAR) - HE SHAPED [20pts]

[glad aurora]

the Mle. 1893s are weave/HEI, regular Sabers are corkscrew/HEKP

I'm reasonably sure double interruptor / 2x blanket / 2x hangup / the Softkill Missile Suite makes me relatively immune to OSP missiles without worrying about the fact I only have three Defenders

new Rapiers are 960 warheads for a little extra oomph - couldn't quite get another notch of warhead while still staging comfortably outside of 3k

[wary flame]

need to not get rocketed, but their cruise should have a bad day

[glad aurora]

Yeah, the ideal with rocket shuttles at this point is "sit somewhere where I can actually see them coming (wasn't possible with torp CL) and hit them with 12 S2H and five 4-AE 250rpf"

[supple sonnet]

there are not that menay maps that have points whare you can sit out side of rocket shutte amubush range and not be a target for MD fire

[wary flame]

staging outside of aurora range doesn't help S2s that much because they have no health whatsoever, so they get auroraed a lot anyway

so I keep mine cheap and punchy

Hardened Skin S3H HEKP is the Ocello Removal Device and also resists one or two AMM hits when fired into bulkers

this is my standard model

[lime jungle]

SGM-H-266 Flakskip-A is a size 2 missile that costs 12 points.

[wary flame]

and a dirt cheap S3H bomb using the same min angle trick, although paying for actual weave is actually an improvement here

[lime jungle]

SGM-H-388 Fishtail-LRH is a size 3 missile that costs 15 points.

[glad aurora]

Any particular reason for Hardened Skin? I can probably put that on my six HEKP Sabers if I cut an activest decoy or two.

[tulip vault]

I imagine it pushes it over a breakpoint

[glad aurora]

Yeah, I'm just wondering which one for my own knowledge base

[wary flame]

auroras inflict a continuous string of small damage ticks so more HP is good for them, and it means you can tank two optimised EL AMMs (33 damage each, so against unbuffed S3H you would use salvo 2)

[glad aurora]

Ah, gotcha

[tulip vault]

as the missile not understander ™️ I did not know myself lol

[glad aurora]

yeah, for this fleet I was testing against my AMM-toting bulker + fleet support ocello fleet

as opposed to my usual double ocello battlecruiser target

Well, when my laptop isn't dead I'll throw hardened skin onto the HEKP and see where that leaves me

also, the HEI don't need a backup seeker, yeah?

Just CMD on the HEI S3H and S2H

[supple sonnet]

If you don't mind losing vollys to loving the contact you don't need a backup for CMD, but like even a wake seconadary will help you and hits

[glad aurora]

I doubt the S2H need it with parallax/bullseye, but wake secondary on the HEI S3H makes sense - in general, for all of these things it's just "strip down the softkill suite a bit to afford better missiles"

[wary flame]

I use a SAH secondary because if comms jammed it will go straight

and it costs a grand old zero points

[supple sonnet]

Yeah you have to makae choices on wht to bring, an it's not just jamming but like but also the CIC gettign redded out. or any of delaate inportent bits getting shot off.

Ash And Gold ↩️

[Reply to:](#1164000873031151637 message) I doubt the S2H need it with parallax/bullseye, but wake secondary on the HEI S3H makes sense - in g…

[fresh storm]

current iteration, any feedback?

[lime jungle]

Fleet '02 - Impedance Marching' is composed of 6 ships that cost 3000 points:

Merit and Marks : 'Ocello' class Command Cruiser [Gun EWar PD Sensor]
   Beep and Fun : 'Tugboat' class Clipper [PD Gun EWar]
 The Neat Modem : 'Tugboat' class Clipper [Sensor Gun PD]
    Fancy Intro : 'Shuttle' class Clipper [Gun Rocket Ewar]
The Muted Panic : 'Shuttle' class Clipper [Gun EWar PD]
 The Shot Valor : 'Shuttle' class Clipper [Gun EWar PD]
```This fleet uses only one missile type:
```yaml
SGM-112 No U : DIRECT - CMD - HE FRAG [4pts]

[supple sonnet]

Take off the iluminator, and see if you can upgrade the shuttes CIC's to reinforced ones, needing to get hit twice befoer it dises is a massive inpovement

But otherwise it's a soild looking fleet

[tulip vault]

my only thing is the rapid cycle cradle is a dead module on your ocello

[fresh storm]

I might drop the rapid cycle cradle on the ocello since it's using multi barrel turrets anyways

[tulip vault]

yeah

I think it literally has no effect, but even if it does its so minscule on ANS weaponry that it is not worthwhile

[fresh storm]

it has an effect but yeah it's minuscule

in general I'm not feeling the ocello's cannons, either I'm really bad at them or I got the NERF version

[tulip vault]

they're... not awesome

the ocello is super surviable though

[fresh storm]

but shooting raines flat on in the side with a mix of shells and watching them just leisurely fly away is depressing

[tulip vault]

oh well 450 won't do much to a frigate

[glad aurora]

this is why I do 2x250 1x450 instead of vice-versa, yeah

[tulip vault]

most of the time it'll simply overpen and fly out the other side

The 450 lets you hit the big ANS threats, like cruisers and up

and destroyers, actually

[fresh storm]

yeah about that

I did a station capture match vs AI

[glad aurora]

to an extent guns in general have a problem with being nerf blasters

[fresh storm]

they had an axford that circled the station for something like 15 minutes

[glad aurora]

if you want to see things disappear, S3s of either variety

[fresh storm]

beaten to hell, all black armor and venting everywhere

but it still wouldn't die

the concentrated fire of my everything and the allied AI couldn't put it down

that repair threshold buff got hands

I think ironically 100mm grapeshot ended up doing most of the damage that mattered

once it was completely cracked open

[supple sonnet]

yeah guns in Neb have high DPS and no armour pen or are AP nerf rounds, with the 600mm being a weird outier

[glad aurora]

250rpf into a shuttle swarm really do make you see where the DPS comes from

[supple sonnet]

I was more talking about 120 HE vs Bukers

[glad aurora]

I've honestly not seen that, but I've been on the receiving end of enough plasma/100 to believe it

[tulip vault]

the smaller rounds have far higher DPS but have less pen as a result, as a general rule

[supple sonnet]

We play a lot of gun corves, and 5 of them will kill most OSP ships with 120's faster then a vaux can wiht 250

[grand pine]

ap nerf rounds?

[supple sonnet]

450 has the best penatration of all the guns but the RoF is low enough that killing certian ships wiht it is slow and plooding

[olive blade]

I think the beam bb is kinda the strongest single hammer

and I don't think anthing much trades positively into facechecking it

[fresh storm]

anyone up for some games?

[wary flame]

I like the 2000-2100pt beam BB going around

Bad Score

[olive blade]

like I think the beam bb is a really tough threat for osp

and can really zone out a big area

[tulip vault]

I think that's mostly accurate but a dedicated plasma 100mm push I think can facecheck a BB in the right circumstances

certainly not if it pops out prealigned though

[olive blade]

if they get the drop on it maybe they can beat it, but I'm not convinced there

but like if they are flank speeding your natural it probably should be prealigned

[oak shell]

I could

[fresh storm]

we've been trying to find a server but no one's filling out our missing

[oak shell]

Test or main branch?

[fresh storm]

osp slots

main branch

[oak shell]

Give me a minute to update

What server are you in

[fresh storm]

"NebKillboard.com"

[wet root]

I might be able to catch a game 2 in like 20 mins

[fresh storm]

pov: open osp slots

@rocky robin

[rocky robin]

https://tenor.com/view/jerma-jeremy-short-midget-boomer-gif-15554620

[grand pine]

god i wish I had an osp fleet ready

[rocky robin]

I have a handful on the workshop I can share

[oak shell]

Impedance Marching is a very good name

[oak shell]

The starters are OK, or you can grab one from the randomized fleet folder

[wet root]

Ship names randomly choose a line from patterns.txt, which I think is under neb>assets>wordlists? Somewhere in that vicinity. Anywho, if you just replace the patterns with a list of names it'll select from those instead

[rocky robin]

https://steamcommunity.com/id/mrturkeytoe/myworkshopfiles/?appid=887570

My workshop fleets

[wet root]

Technically I suppose if someone names their ship [verb] it won't be able to select that

And will roll a random verb instead

Though you could avoid that by replacing the verb list with a single line that says [verb]

[rocky robin]

I have a variety of fleets derived from several different standard excepted sort of 'templates'

[wet root]

(Ditto for the nouns and last names and other random lists)

[rocky robin]

https://tenor.com/view/consume-cardboard-box-cat-gif-25431281

[fresh storm]

#voice-channels

[wet root]

I've recently been running PDless independent Vauxes with 2x Blankets 2x chaff pods on the side mounts and an Interruptor backpack, been quite pleased with their performance