Any more ships in the work for 3.0?

[Warnoise]

M-size beat S-size
L-size beat M-size
S-size (in group) beat L-size

The circle is close and the only amomaly is Xenon I that bea everything and XL carriers that beat nothing (unless you ultra specify it with missiles or plasma).

Do things slightly differently myself - S ships distract enemy capitals, while my destroyers blow them to bits from about 10km away (best enemies are those which can't shoot back). Carriers, aside from transporting S ships, also function as my strategic bombers for station demolition tasks. Mostly Plasma loadout, generally including turrets of docked M ships (normally around 25-30 M Plasma in total per ship).

"while my destroyers blow them to bits from about 10km away (best enemies are those which can't shoot back)"

You must be very lucky with the AI. My destroyers love ramming enemy capitals and get shredded in seconds. Also plasma? Unless you are also very lucky again, that thing doesnt hit anything if the ship moves. The carrier will get shredded by missiles/Station L turrets and lose its turrets in seconds.

That being said, Egosoft should learn from Starsector on how to make pirates. It is not like they need colossal work (just refit existing ships).

Now pirates and khaak are still placeholder (i refuse to believe those are "finished") which is embarrassing after more than 1 year since launch.

[GCU Grey Area]

"while my destroyers blow them to bits from about 10km away (best enemies are those which can't shoot back)"

You must be very lucky with the AI. My destroyers love ramming enemy capitals and get shredded in seconds.

Not really. I just use good captains for all of my capitals. 4* piloting or higher means they're pretty good at stopping soon after entering effective range & shooting their main guns in long sustained bursts. Tends to be the lower quality pilots who overshoot the mark, get too close & can only fire a few shots before having to manoeuvre to reacquire the target.

Also plasma? Unless you are also very lucky again, that thing doesnt hit anything if the ship moves. The carrier will get shredded by missiles/Station L turrets and lose its turrets in seconds.

Plasma works fine against stations, which are the only things I let my carriers shoot at. Missile turrets have not been an issue - Xenon don't seem to use them. As for getting shredded by L turrets - I'm not daft, I do get rid of those from a nice safe distance before ANY of my other ships go anywhere near the station. Defence modules (as far as I'm aware) are the only location of L turrets & they're significantly weaker than other module types - even a single destroyer can eliminate them from max range in a very short amount of time. Other modules are much bigger & have a lot more hull, so the extra help from the carriers is handy to speed up the demolition process (looks cool too).

[Nort The Fragrent]

Each new game is allegedly not the same as before!
Using this same principal of non uniformity, Can it be applied to the ship spec’s ?

The core data, is rearranged so faction variants also change. Making the game harder to fathom as to who is best for what roll !

There is knowledge that Split are fast yet vulnerable, Why ?
Why not swop it all around on each new game start, so we as a player have to figure it all out as we get deeper into the new game. Not fall back on old standard stats. ( Predictable and boring )

It would make each new game start far more interesting, knowing you had to do your research and find out who had the better ships for the rolls we want ?

[Kaada]

Speaking of amount of Turrets and Modder made Ships. I think most if not all Modder made ships are usually so broken that they completely **** up the game. And the X Rebirth Ships only had so many weapons because they fired once every 2-3 seconds, or longer depending what size the cannon was.
If I were to make a Split Battleship I would give it 4 XL WW2 style Turrets with double or triple cannons, 6 L Weapons (they would be more like the secondarie Weapons of World of Warships Battleships) 3 on each side, and 8 M Turrets for Fighter defense.

Since I don't model and don't mod, this are just little dreams, Theories that cannot be tested to see if it actually works. But I think less is sometimes more and the amount of weapons should be sufficient for a Split Battleship.

Anyways the entire Combat system should be reworked anyways. The AI is crap, the weapons range far to short to look believable (at elast fo the L weapons), Fighters are the true kings since all of them can wield Plasma cannons or Torpedo Launchers with I don't know how many Torps, Nemesis is already the "best" ship in the game...Not to mention that many of the Corvettes and Gunship have all their turrets on top. In a 360° environment. WTF?! And the AI for Capital Ships is such a massive **** up that they rather hunt a single light Fighter than attacking the unprotected Tradestation right next to them. Speaking of AI, all of them seem to share the very same Fighter AI, Go in, go out, go in, go out. And when Capitals do that...

Enough of me for now. I anticipate the Split DLC. And am going to learn 3D modelling.

[Axeface]

So a new Paranid fighter variant. Not sure whether that means we're be getting a new ship, a slightly adjusted one or no new model at all (could mean a Perseus Raider for example, that has the same model like all the games other variants?).
My guess would be we might see our first visual difference for a variant which is pretty exciting.

[pref]

i kinda fail to understand how such a critical shipclass is simply denied to any other faction except Xenon using the "performance" argument.

Simple reason i guess, player flown ships need different balancing and constraints then NPC-exclusive ones.

That makes no sense.

It's not hard to see how npc ships (and so possible max turret count) can be limited way more easily then player ships.
Plus any ship the player can fly must be balanced from both AI and player aspect, while NPC exclusive ones don't.

Anyway just imagine what would happen to game balance and performance if player could board I's for ex.

[iforgotmysocks]

Simple reason i guess, player flown ships need different balancing and constraints then NPC-exclusive ones.

That makes no sense.

It's not hard to see how npc ships (and so possible max turret count) can be limited way more easily then player ships.
Plus any ship the player can fly must be balanced from both AI and player aspect, while NPC exclusive ones don't.

Anyway just imagine what would happen to game balance and performance if player could board I's for ex.

That's already been abstracted away by Xenons having different ship components. Other factions xl caps wouldn't dish out as much damage as an I, simply cause other factions weapons are way less dangerous. And balance really isn't an argument not to deliver one of the most important shipclasses in a space game that bases it's entire industrial and economical reason for existance on war. Balance is completely screwed up as it is, adding some real combat capital ships might actually improve things.

[GDS_dmitry]

Old thread about capital ships and weapons

In X4 very funny combat "capital" ships. Even in 3.0 beta.

Colossus given number of turrets and their fire range (which is lower than ship's hull length) could not compete with anything alone. Not even a chance.
Bad AI, bad ranges, too few turrets. XR ships pack and Ossian Raider mods show, how true capital combat ships should look like. But it doesn't fix weapons unfortunately. So, again - mods. The game is unplayable without them.

I always laugh, when hear aboout balance of these ships from people. That 2 L turrets on Behemoth - is "right". Yes, balance, in a game, where you have mods, which can almost double ship's rotation or forward speed. Really funny. Maybe instead focus on weak capital combat ships, which can be shredded with most M and S ships (AI control) in game ?

[GCU Grey Area]

Maybe instead focus on weak capital combat ships, which can be shredded with most M and S ships (AI control) in game ?

Not in my experience, certainly not in 3.0. Been flying a Behemoth quite a bit recently & 3.0 capital main shields are virtually immune to S & M class ships, even in substantial numbers. Can't completely ignore them though - they can wreak havoc with subsystems. Have learnt to worry about my engines in particular - once they're gone ship's a sitting duck for any nearby hostile capitals. Can't even turn the damn thing to bring main guns to bear - time to jump in a fighter & try to hold off the hordes long enough for the service crew to get the engines back online. Fun times.

[Bozz11]

Realisitically speaking, I see more sense in having lots of smaller capital ships like they are in x4 than having massive capital ships like the terran valhalla or so... , with the scope of the universe and the absence of Jumpdrives it would make no sense, stations are spread out too much and you can have soo many fronts at once that it would not make any sense to have very slow byt massive capital ships aremed to the teeth... sure you can guard a gate with them but it's not that hard too force a blockade and most systemes have several gates... I'd rather see more variants specially some pirate specific ships...
Just my opinion.

[dholmstr]

I would rather see a change in L ships. Take away those 40 fighter hold from destroyers, keep the landing pads but no space for more fighters. Either add a turret more per group OR change so that M-ships would have S-turrets (same size as M-turrets at the moment) and make a new set of M-turrets with more power. And remove drones from landing pads, give them X-Rebirth tubes. Let the graphics for launching them be silly for time being so that you don't use precious resources on graphics. That can come later. The drones should be fast to launch and fast to dock (no pilot so screw g-forces). With these changes Destroyers would be mobile turret batteries, still weak to swarm of fighters. Then later in the game we could get light carriers for L-class.

[GCU Grey Area]

With these changes Destroyers would be mobile turret batteries...

Why not just use a carrier in that role?

X4 carriers pretty much combine the role of M1 & M2 from previous X games. Can carry fighters, but also have a lot more turrets than the destroyers & (unlike X3 carriers) don't suffer from having far too little weapon energy to use them effectively. If they still don't enough firepower for your tastes you can roughly double the number of M turrets by docking a few M gunships on them.

They also have substantially thicker hulls & far more powerful shields than the destroyers, in some ways much better suited to a front line turret battery role. They're certainly one of my favourite options for station demolition - carrier rigged with 1x L Plasma & 30+ M Plasma turrets (i.e. including docked ships) is a fearsome beast indeed.

[MHDriver]

All I can say is thanks to the modders that tirelessly port over some of the awesome XR ships to X4. Now if we could just get a larger galaxy in X4 suitable to fly these big ships around in and do away with this bound to the highways AI behavior we will be in for some good times. Sadly for me after 2200hrs X4 has become a top down RTS map game and not a space sim. Fingers crossed that some day XR gets revived.

[dholmstr]

With these changes Destroyers would be mobile turret batteries...

Why not just use a carrier in that role?

X4 carriers pretty much combine the role of M1 & M2 from previous X games. Can carry fighters, but also have a lot more turrets than the destroyers & (unlike X3 carriers) don't suffer from having far too little weapon energy to use them effectively. If they still don't enough firepower for your tastes you can roughly double the number of M turrets by docking a few M gunships on them.

They also have substantially thicker hulls & far more powerful shields than the destroyers, in some ways much better suited to a front line turret battery role. They're certainly one of my favourite options for station demolition - carrier rigged with 1x L Plasma & 30+ M Plasma turrets (i.e. including docked ships) is a fearsome beast indeed.

Because Carriers should be for carrying stuff? Isn't that the role bestowed upon them? While I have heard of this before in how to use them, is this how the AI uses them? Again you are taking a ship and saying it just fine, just add some M ships on the back to get more turrets and it's fine to do a role that wasn't really intended. No it is not, you as player can do what ever you want in sandbox game. But the AI?. Yes the carriers are more suited for taking a beating, obviously they have huge shields. But I was talking about getting a more clear role for destroyers. The main guns are the big thing for them, and turrets should be part of it also. The 40 fighters ought not be one of them.

[phrozen1]

I hope so much that XL battleships will return. They are so important to many scifi and having just carriers in the XL class makes it obvious that battleships were cut from the game for some reason.

[GCU Grey Area]

Because Carriers should be for carrying stuff? Isn't that the role bestowed upon them? While I have heard of this before in how to use them, is this how the AI uses them? Again you are taking a ship and saying it just fine, just add some M ships on the back to get more turrets and it's fine to do a role that wasn't really intended. No it is not, you as player can do what ever you want in sandbox game. But the AI?. Yes the carriers are more suited for taking a beating, obviously they have huge shields. But I was talking about getting a more clear role for destroyers. The main guns are the big thing for them, and turrets should be part of it also. The 40 fighters ought not be one of them.

Destroyer's role is absolutely clear to me: long range artillery.

That's why they have guns with the longest range in the game, AI which (assuming they've got a competent captain) prefers to hang back near max main gun range & focus primarily on using those main guns. Think the fairly limited turret-based firepower is entirely intentional - enough to keep them moderately safe from fighters, but clearly not their main focus. Most of the time my AI controlled destroyers don't get anywhere near close enough to an enemy to use their turrets (they seem to actively avoid it). Incidentally, not a complaint - I'm very happy they work that way. I have many other ships (S class fighters mostly) to handle the up close & personal stuff.

Just these days I'm not playing X4 the same way I did X3, in particular I'm a lot less protective about my carriers. Since they've got that sturdy hull, incredible shields & all those lovely turrets they may as well get stuck in too, rather than hiding at the back, never firing a shot, like their X3 predecessors (which frankly couldn't fire more than 1 shot before they were out of energy). Devs didn't need to give them all that stuff, so my conclusion is that a more active role in combat is intended.

[MHDriver]

Destroyer's role is absolutely clear to me: long range artillery.

Hmm, yes but since the AI programming only allows for Destroyers to sit there wallowing around throwing a couple shots generally towards a target then the remainder indiscriminately off in random directions their role is really immaterial. Until the code is cleaned up none of the intended roles of the ships matter.

[GCU Grey Area]

Hmm, yes but since the AI programming only allows for Destroyers to sit there wallowing around throwing a couple shots generally towards a target then the remainder indiscriminately off in random directions their role is really immaterial. Until the code is cleaned up none of the intended roles of the ships matter.

That's the behaviour of a destroyer with an incompetent captain. Piloting skill is absolutely vital for a destroyer captain - they're pretty much useless without a decent one. Give them a 4* captain or better & they're much more reliable. They shoot in much longer, more accurate bursts & are far better at stopping at optimum main gun range. Think the problem isn't so much the AI itself, but that NPC factions don't always give their destroyers decent captains. Very easy to spot the ones with a 2* nitwit at the helm, they behave exactly as you describe.

[MHDriver]

Hmm, yes but since the AI programming only allows for Destroyers to sit there wallowing around throwing a couple shots generally towards a target then the remainder indiscriminately off in random directions their role is really immaterial. Until the code is cleaned up none of the intended roles of the ships matter.

That's the behaviour of a destroyer with an incompetent captain. Piloting skill is absolutely vital for a destroyer captain - they're pretty much useless without a decent one. Give them a 4* captain or better & they're much more reliable. They shoot in much longer, more accurate bursts & are far better at stopping at optimum main gun range. Think the problem isn't so much the AI itself, but that NPC factions don't always give their destroyers decent captains. Very easy to spot the ones with a 2* nitwit at the helm, they behave exactly as you describe.

Yes that is a big part of the problem. I don't know how the training was intended to work but I have taken 5* able crewmen from one destroyer and moved them to a destroyer that delivered with a 1 or 2* captain to take command but they lose all the skill the instant they take command. These so called training seminars never worked for anything so I have always just relied on luck of the draw for a captain's skill level. I don't know, seems like a lot of mechanics were never tied together in this game.

[Sandalpocalypse]

crew dont just have skill, they have skill in different things. the skills of a crewman dont necessarily apply to captaining, which is why you cant transfer a 5 start crewman to a ship and just have it work.\

I wish they would just remove crew skill tbh. Then maybe add a new mechanic to achieve the same gameplay goals without being annoying busywork, like hard-to-acquire and limited Elite Captains that are the only ones that can do autotrades.