Out of Sector VS In Sector Balance Patch?

[jojorne]

It's no secret that the games have different calculation method depend if you are in or out of sector.
I build a new fleet: 1x Honshu , 5x Osaka. Each of them carrying 40x S ships (20 Takoba + 20 Kalis).
For the weapon setup of the fleet, I had the Terran L guns as Bolt and M and S guns as Pulse. Engines and Shields as Terran Mk3.
Honshu was set to Supply mode and the rest of the fleet subordinates was set to Attack mode. I saved the game.
Next I was in sector and told them to attack a xenon station. About ~7% of my S ships survived. That's about ~20 ships of my 200 that was still alive.
Then, I reloaded the game. Went out of sector. And told them to attack the same xenon station. About ~93% of my S ships survived. I lost about ~2 ships.
I was astonished... ~7% IS vs ~93% OOS.... Game really need some serious balance patch! What do you guys think?

Edit: Add ship setup.

[Exitialis101]

I do most of my battles in sector because I love watching the fireworks. For me, my main problem is janky behaviour like the Asgard trying to beam S and M ships, often missing and tearing apart an allied ship, this usually happens when the Asgard is in patrol or other automated mode, I would never manually set the Asgard to target an S or M ship.

Other janky IS behavior is ships not navigating properly.

[jojorne]

I do most of my battles in sector because I love watching the fireworks. For me, my main problem is janky behaviour like the Asgard trying to beam S and M ships, often missing and tearing apart an allied ship, this usually happens when the Asgard is in patrol or other automated mode, I would never manually set the Asgard to target an S or M ship.

Other janky IS behavior is ships not navigating properly.

oh you tell me lol
i lost 3 Syns but the Osakas are okay.
mainly because i set the Syn's L guns to attack capital and Syns only have two M guns left to attack fighters.
while the Osaka only have 3x L guns and the rest M guns. so, setting a Syn like this against fighters make it lose.

[Imperial Good]

If you have not modified saves that reliably reproduce such discrepancies I recommend posting them in case the developers want to use them to test balance.

What usually kills S ships attacking stations in sector is the station module explosions. These might not be simulated in low attention. Before these were added it was common to only lose a few ships attacking Xenon stations, similar to what was experienced in low attention. After these were added people report losing most of their S ships because they face tank the explosions.

[jojorne]

I was hoping more people would share their experiences, maybe I'm doing something wrong with the fleet setup idk...

What usually kills S ships attacking stations in sector is the station module explosions. These might not be simulated in low attention. Before these were added it was common to only lose a few ships attacking Xenon stations, similar to what was experienced in low attention. After these were added people report losing most of their S ships because they face tank the explosions.

That sounds like we cannot use S ships when killing station while in sector anymore. lol >.<'
Like if that happens, then even using them to kill L and XL ships might not be advised.
I mean, I try to use them as a distraction or to kill the components, engines, weapons, etc.

[ZacKPloK]

Yeah, using S ships against stations in high attention is really not a good idea.

Against L and XL ships, they are still great. A single explosion might kill one or two that were already damaged, but most will survive.

The problem while attacking stations starts when more modules start blowing up, so previously damaged ships are finished off. I used 100 Chimeras with Blast Mortars to attack a Xenon Wharf, and around 60 or 70 with Tau Accelerators to kill off reinforcements. While I lost a few to the turrets, they really started dying after the first few modules blew up. I then reloaded and just commanded my fleet from OOS, and lost only seven Chimeras total. But I also might have been better at manually ordering my Interceptors so less reinforcements arrived.

Ships should at least try to get away from these explosions I think, otherwise the losses get crazy.

[Imperial Good]

Like if that happens, then even using them to kill L and XL ships might not be advised.

They work fine for individuals as the explosion damage is usually not enough to kill them but does damage their hull a little and leave them without a shield for a few seconds. If they go and repair, they will be fine.

The issue with stations is that the fighters can experience multiple such explosions in short succession. That and some modules, like XL Ship Building, have extremely powerful explosions. They do not go to repair until the station is dead, likely killing them in the process.

[flywlyx]

They work fine for individuals as the explosion damage is usually not enough to kill them but does damage their hull a little and leave them without a shield for a few seconds. If they go and repair, they will be fine.

I don't think AI will go repair automatically if its target is not finished. It feels like the resupply command only kicks in after the current order is finished.

[Falcrack]

One major issue that needs to be addressed is the pitiful damage done by missiles OOS compared to IS. Maybe the game calaculates a much higher miss probability or effectiveness of flares, or there is some straight up bug in the way damage for missiles is calculated OOS.

[jojorne]

They work fine for individuals as the explosion damage is usually not enough to kill them but does damage their hull a little and leave them without a shield for a few seconds. If they go and repair, they will be fine.

I don't think AI will go repair automatically if its target is not finished. It feels like the resupply command only kicks in after the current order is finished.

They go repair more often if you set them to docked but it's not all orders that will launch them, especially if they are a sub of a subgroup (2nd level+).
And setting them to docked will... Well, if the carrier dies, it takes down every docked ship together with him. lol

One major issue that needs to be addressed is the pitiful damage done by missiles OOS compared to IS. Maybe the game calaculates a much higher miss probability or effectiveness of flares, or there is some straight up bug in the way damage for missiles is calculated OOS.

I wouldn't know. So far I made a carrier bomber and... Well, he doesn't attack stations. And the Auxiliary doesn't even have the "Coordinate Attack" command.
I was discussing this with someone about maybe carriers are only good to set them to "Follow" in a fleet, you know? idk... But my ships that are in other fleets do seems to prefer an Auxiliary over a Carrier for repairs.

[j.harshaw]

I don't think AI will go repair automatically if its target is not finished. It feels like the resupply command only kicks in after the current order is finished.

Correct, although we've done an improvement for fighters that have a carrier or fleet auxiliary ship in their fleet. Should be in a future update.

[CBJ]

If you have not modified saves that reliably reproduce such discrepancies I recommend posting them in case the developers want to use them to test balance.

I cannot emphasise this point enough. Asking for a "balance patch" without providing an unmodified save that demonstrates a specific issue is like asking a mechanic to fix the funny noise that your car is making without giving them access to the vehicle! Just describing the noise, or even playing a recording of it, isn't going to help much.

As most people are no doubt aware, things have to be simplified quite a lot when the player isn't present in order for there to be any chance of one of the game's key features, the full universe simulation, to be viable. The number of possible combinations and permutations of ships, weapons and orders in a battle situation is immense, and it will never be possible for the simplified logic to exactly match the results the player sees when they are watching the battle in person for every case, nor will it ever be possible for developers to test every potential situation that a player might encounter. We can and do test a wide variety of scenarios, and whenever we find discrepancies that we can improve on, we do so (some of these improvements, especially the more minor ones, are not always listed in the patch notes), but any given player is almost certain to encounter scenarios that aren't part of our test suite. If you run into a situation where you think the simulation isn't working as well as it should, then providing a savegame is the only way a developer has any chance of improving it.

[Omni-Orb]

It's no secret that the games have different calculation method depend if you are in or out of sector.
I build a new fleet: 1x Honshu , 5x Osaka. Each of them carrying 40x S ships (20 Takoba + 20 Kalis).
For the weapon setup of the fleet, I had the Terran L guns as Bolt and M and S guns as Pulse. Engines and Shields as Terran Mk3.
Honshu was set to Supply mode and the rest of the fleet subordinates was set to Attack mode. I saved the game.
Next I was in sector and told them to attack a xenon station. About ~7% of my S ships survived. That's about ~20 ships of my 200 that was still alive.
Then, I reloaded the game. Went out of sector. And told them to attack the same xenon station. About ~93% of my S ships survived. I lost about ~2 ships.
I was astonished... ~7% IS vs ~93% OOS.... Game really need some serious balance patch! What do you guys think?

Edit: Add ship setup.

I agree. As a combat player that loves precision and pushing the limits of a game. The immersion and flow of the game between high and low attention can be improved by being accurate to how combat is when the player observes it.
Priorities that I feel should be improved is that ships should keep their original angles and positions when going in and out of the sector repeatedly. The immersion of the combat experience when dodging and weaving in and out of gates both as a fighter and fleet commander and when simply entering a sector with a battle would be drastically improved. Two examples would be in Tharkas Cascade to recharge shields outside the sector in a large battle or escaping death while close to a gate to recharge shields. Immersion will be drastically improved if equipment is equally efficient in low and high attention. Also having the ships mimic the time it takes to stop after travel drive and having turning speed be the same is very important.

If all this is implemented, it will feel perfect from my perspective

[Falcrack]

One thing that should change with regards to in sector/out of sector is the rapidity with which ships change direction. Large ships OOS turn 180 degrees in a second, while IS, it takes considerably longer. Weapons OOS should only be able to engage it the target is in the correct firing arc of the ship that is shooting, ie frontal weapons should not be able to shoot enemies behind them.

[flywlyx]

Correct, although we've done an improvement for fighters that have a carrier or fleet auxiliary ship in their fleet. Should be in a future update.

So they will go to repair even in the middle of the fight? That sounds great for my pilots, so many lives saved by this change

[LughC]

One major issue that needs to be addressed is the pitiful damage done by missiles OOS compared to IS. Maybe the game calaculates a much higher miss probability or effectiveness of flares, or there is some straight up bug in the way damage for missiles is calculated OOS.

My biggest problem with missiles oos is just how fast they are drained. OOS my capital with go through 360 missiles in only a handful of seconds.

In system it can be several fights before I have to order a reload (have never gotten automatic resupply to work for anything other than repairs)