Player Features and Ideas Discussion

Hello folks!
We're planning on making a set of changes to the hitpoints of subcapital missiles, which are currently all 70hp (except for Torpedoes at 280hp). The significant implication would be to “firewall” tactics where people use smartbombs to destroy incoming missiles in fleet warfare. Firewalling is an example of very clever use of game mechanics and can involve a ton of player skill. We really like the tactic in general but as players have improved their techniques over time it has gotten a bit too strong and tends to stifle the use of interesting missile fleet concepts. Ideally we’d want to provide more interesting play around firewalling without nerfing it out of existence.

These changes would consist of:

• Moderate buffs to the HP of most missiles, with higher HP for larger missiles and higher HP for shorter range missiles within each size.
• An extra HP increase for the Guristas (but not Dread Guristas) line of faction missiles (which have the lowest damage of the faction missiles and are therefore missing a useful role).
• Each missile would gain 20% damage resistance to its own damage type, allowing for some advanced counterplay for large fleets that use and face firewall tactics.

The new hitpoint numbers would be:

Light Missiles: 60hp

Guristas Light Missiles: 80hp

Rockets: 90hp

Guristas Rockets: 120hp

Heavy Missiles: 120hp

Guristas Heavy Missiles: 160hp

Heavy Assault Missiles: 180hp

Guristas Heavy Assault Missiles: 240hp

Cruise Missiles: 240hp

Guristas Cruise Missiles: 320hp

Torpedoes: 360hp

Guristas Torpedoes: 480hp

This would mean that for instance two T2 small smartbombs or one medium T2 would be required to take down a Heavy Missile (with that threshold rising to two mediums or one large for Guristas faction Heavy missiles) and Cruise missiles would require two T2 mediums or one large smartbomb (rising to three mediums or one large faction smartbomb for Guristas versions). When facing smartbombs of the same damage type that threshold would rise even further.

We hope that these changes will provide more interesting gameplay for pilots flying in fleets with or against missile ships.

Let us know what you think!

not going to buff capital missiles the same way?

';(

Disco firewalls incoming.

You NEED to put capital missiles in with this.

[19:04]TeensinJeans: Grath Citaldel missiles already have 2k hp right now
[19:04] GrathTelkin: they need more

Please clarify the case of missiles being launched from grouped launchers.

If I had, for example, eight launchers grouped, will the singular "missile" that is spawned when they fire be HP*8, or is there a stacking penalty involved? Or is it just the same HP as 1 missile?

I agree the HP needs to be higher but at least this is a start.

I did not think the firewall tactics was that big of a deal, I had hardly heard any really using them effectively to make a difference too

unironically agree

the phoenix has a small group size (3 missiles) so its missile group EHP is fairly low at 5.76k meaning around 20 large T2 smartbombs per second eliminate all the missiles

taking this further, at energy pulse weapon 4 each 8-highslot battleship can stagger 1 smartbomb per second so a group of only 20 smartbombing battleships fed cap are a hard counter to a phoenix fleet of any size

the required number of smartbombs per second is actually probably half this or lower, as the citadel missiles move slowly enough that they are usually in smartbomb range for 2 or more ticks

factoring in how slow the missiles are it is also conceivable that a carrier group could achieve the smartbomb density necessary to screen itself from a large portion or all phoenix damage without even relying on an external firewall

tl;dr phoenix fleets larger than a couple dozen dudes are not tactically viable until the citadel missile ehp is buffed

What about Golem and its 4 Launcher?

is it possible for Golem to get role bonus to boost its missile hp to comparable to other missile BS's group of missile?

Realtalk: they really can't. We're too clever for it to be possible.