Alm888 wrote: ↑Mon, 27. Sep 21, 09:17
Remember, the Kukri here is not for player's use. It is here for the TER war against ARG/ANT. The TER fleet is OP as it is, no need to make it even more OP (by giving Kukri 3 shields, for example). Every faction needs some weak points. And the Kukri ideology is the "Alpha Strike" via Meson Streams (or "Quantity has a quality of its own", if you will). Kukri is being used as a Tokyo fighter wing craft, not as a standalone Rambo-jet soloing XEN incursion fleets.
Okay, I need to be a bit more precise it seems: When talking about speed, I'm aware that you can slap a Split Mk4 Combat Engine on everything to make it faster. So, when I compare ships, I generally assume they come as you can buy them with their faction equipment (which is the initial situation for any new player). And here I use the standard faction Mk1 all-round engine. With that in mind, the Gladius starts with 127, Kukri is 148, Kalis is 140, Takoba is 276, the Buzzard Vanguard as the probably slowest Commonwealth ship starts at 145.
But yes, we can take the Split Combat Engine Mk4 and see what happens: Gladius at 301, Kukri at 351, Kalis at 331, Takoba at 653... and the Commonwealth fighters are all more or less between 300 and 400, too. That would place Terran ships with CW equipment at CW speeds (with the Takoba being faster). However, Terran ships are much more expensive for what they offer, you get better options for less money if you go for ships like the Ares (3 shields, 4 guns), Chimera (fast, durable, 5 guns) or the Quasar (4 guns, cheap) or the Eclipse (2 shields, 4 guns, cheap). Even the Buzzard offers one shield slot more than the Kukri, for half the chassis price. Though some of the aforementioned ships are classified as 'Heavy' fighters, they're not slower than the Kukri, but have better hull, equal or better shielding, more guns. Only the Takoba does what one could expect: a light fighter with a good hull, good shielding, fast speed and adequate firepower (2 guns, the same as the 'heavy' Kalis).
To give you an idea what I mean when I talk about prices: According to the Wharf the chassis prices are as follows: Kalis 287065, Kukri 322792 (PIO)/327731 (TER), Takoba 287374, Gladius 400388. Compare that to the other, stat-wise equal or better ships: Buzzard Vanguard (since you mentioned it) 145110, Ares 272124, Chimera 311437, Quasar 92410 (!) Eclipse 155995, Buzzard Vanguard 145110.
So yeah, I might've exaggerated here and there in my little rant as I didn't check the exact values, but my general point stands: Terran fighters are overall too slow and don't excel in any category if directly compared to the Commonwealth. But they're expensive, which places them among the worst investments you can make if we're talking fighters.
The same can be said about bigger ships, too expensive for what they offer, be it freighters (less storage than Shuyaku and/or Incarcatura, slower than both, more expensive), or miners (again, less storage, slower, less shield slots, but more expensive). It hurts especially with the miners, as the combat speed is used for calculating OOS yield.
Terrans might still win in direct confrontations, but it comes down to their easy economy, lack of enemies and amount of material they can throw at something. Certainly not because their fighters are superior, because they're not. That hurts a bit, when I think back to the ATF Thor, ATF Fenrir or USC Scimitar and USC Scimitar. They had it right with those.