So, flak is really bad now huh?

[LameFox]

So I recently modded the weapons for my Asgard, and having no special plan for it I went with the old default of Paranid L plasma and Argon M flak. The flaks all got expediter with >11 speed, >9 damage, >16 lifetime, and >20 rotation.

Later on I sent the ship to kill some SCA stations, and rode along on it because it was inexplicably bad at it in low attention. Along the way, it was attacked by an SCA Kestrel Sentinel. This ship has been attacking it for over half an hour at this point, maybe up to an hour. The flak turrets have managed to take off half its hull in that time.

I'm going to uninstall them when this station dies.



Update: more S ships showed up. So far the turrets' only kills are ones that inexplicably stop near the ship to rotate to a new heading.

[vvvvvvvv]

So I recently modded the weapons for my Asgard, and having no special plan for it I went with the old default of Paranid L plasma and Argon M flak. The flaks all got expediter with >11 speed, >9 damage, >16 lifetime, and >20 rotation.

Later on I sent the ship to kill some SCA stations, and rode along on it because it was inexplicably bad at it in low attention. Along the way, it was attacked by an SCA Kestrel Sentinel. This ship has been attacking it for over half an hour at this point, maybe up to an hour. The flak turrets have managed to take off half its hull in that time.

I'm going to uninstall them when this station dies.



Update: more S ships showed up. So far the turrets' only kills are ones that inexplicably stop near the ship to rotate to a new heading.

Last time I used it I had impression that effectively Flak had its range halved. The range, of course, did not change, but the turret misses a lot more than before. It is like trying to shoot down fighters with bolts, except AOE helps a bit. On Last Asgard I equipped I went with half L plasma (capitals first), half L lasers (fighters first). And for M it was "whatever". I think it was some pulse turret. Installing M beams and making them prioritize missiles is an option.

Rolling expediter on multiple weapons is a royal pain, but to each their own, I guess.

[LameFox]

I have mats to just spam the roll at this point, and expediter seemed like the ideal stat types for a turret. I've put Terran M pulses on it now, hoping the faster base speed will help.

Watching it fight a few other ships before, I noticed that the one it couldn't kill had a plasma gun and so it would fire and pull away like a non-idiot might. The ones it killed had normal weapons and would fly up close, then either ram or have to stop dead in their tracks to avoid ramming, and it was then the turrets could kill them.

So, essentially the flak turrets (even with those mods) were only working because of bad AI behaviour...

[chibiphoenix]

I noticed this too and have been experimenting.

I now use L Pulse on the back slots, for the M slots you have some choices. I use flak at the bottom, a flak Jian at the top, the M slots on the top have tracking launcher with heavy smart (light runs out too quick; but is technically stronger, if its a short skirmish its probably fine, but for longer engagements/deployment absolutely use heavy).

The front top L slots have dumbfire to have more missile capacity, I usually bring a light amount of 400 dumbfires, in case of capitals swarming (again, only in long deployment/deep enemy territory), those are usually set to off.

The bottom front L slots I have L beams equiped, so the bottom part of the ship has adequate power vs s/m ships.

Works great so far

[taztaz502]

M Turrets are pretty diabolical vs everything, I tend to use Pulse or tracking/dumbfire.

L turrets a different kettle of fish, Plasma can save lives in clutch battles vs Xenon destroyers, but are generally useless. Best just to use main guns for destroyers than relying on turrets to do anything. L beam are pretty good in quantity, e.g. on a syn or rattlesnake with lots of turrets pointing in same direction, they can melt fighters.

But again a lot of the time i just use pulse, they're fast, accurate, and do decent damage.

Plasma also decent if you park ships near a station.

I recommend using destroyers just to swat out fighters or stations (OOS).

To kill Xenon capital ships just use 4-8 fighters equipped with torpedo's, I tend to use Pulsar for it's six guns, Takoba also work great with their fast speed.

[taztaz502]

I have mats to just spam the roll at this point, and expediter seemed like the ideal stat types for a turret. I've put Terran M pulses on it now, hoping the faster base speed will help.

Watching it fight a few other ships before, I noticed that the one it couldn't kill had a plasma gun and so it would fire and pull away like a non-idiot might. The ones it killed had normal weapons and would fly up close, then either ram or have to stop dead in their tracks to avoid ramming, and it was then the turrets could kill them.

So, essentially the flak turrets (even with those mods) were only working because of bad AI behaviour...

Slasher is a good mod for turrets, upto 90%+ for reload speed, 50%+ for damage and -whatever for weapon cooling. (Turrets don't have cooling.)

[vvvvvvvv]

I have mats to just spam the roll at this point, and expediter seemed like the ideal stat types for a turret. I've put Terran M pulses on it now, hoping the faster base speed will help.

Watching it fight a few other ships before, I noticed that the one it couldn't kill had a plasma gun and so it would fire and pull away like a non-idiot might. The ones it killed had normal weapons and would fly up close, then either ram or have to stop dead in their tracks to avoid ramming, and it was then the turrets could kill them.

So, essentially the flak turrets (even with those mods) were only working because of bad AI behaviour...

Slasher is a good mod for turrets, upto 90%+ for reload speed, 50%+ for damage and -whatever for weapon cooling. (Turrets don't have cooling.)

Expediter increases range, and it is possible option for hyperion main guns (sniping) or if you try to make H useful. Seismic charges by default have short range, but if you upgrade them with Expediter, you can take out Ks withuot being pummeled. It is also a possible choice if you want super long range plasma (I think you can reach range of 11 km or so with paranid plasma).

The issue though, is that it Expediter selects 3 out of 4 possible effects one of them is a debuff to reload. So, rolling Speed, Damage and Lifetime to high values (+12.5% speed, +18-20 damage, + 25% lifetime) is already 1/8 possibility, but the chance of getting debuff makes it worse. I had calculations somewhere I think it was less than 10%, meaning a ton of rerolls spent on a single turret.

That's why I commented about "royal pain"

[LameFox]

I focus on speed over damage because they largely deal enough damage already, it just doesn't connect very often unless a fighter is extremely stupid. The hope is the projectile going faster might offset their need to predict the target's movement. Though I think the innate spread causes a lot of it too.

[Raider480]

Later on I sent the ship to kill some SCA stations, and rode along on it because it was inexplicably bad at it in low attention.

That could be related to a known bug. It looks like, I guess, it was introduced in V7.60.

[taztaz502]

I have mats to just spam the roll at this point, and expediter seemed like the ideal stat types for a turret. I've put Terran M pulses on it now, hoping the faster base speed will help.

Watching it fight a few other ships before, I noticed that the one it couldn't kill had a plasma gun and so it would fire and pull away like a non-idiot might. The ones it killed had normal weapons and would fly up close, then either ram or have to stop dead in their tracks to avoid ramming, and it was then the turrets could kill them.

So, essentially the flak turrets (even with those mods) were only working because of bad AI behaviour...

Slasher is a good mod for turrets, upto 90%+ for reload speed, 50%+ for damage and -whatever for weapon cooling. (Turrets don't have cooling.)

Expediter increases range, and it is possible option for hyperion main guns (sniping) or if you try to make H useful. Seismic charges by default have short range, but if you upgrade them with Expediter, you can take out Ks withuot being pummeled. It is also a possible choice if you want super long range plasma (I think you can reach range of 11 km or so with paranid plasma).

The issue though, is that it Expediter selects 3 out of 4 possible effects one of them is a debuff to reload. So, rolling Speed, Damage and Lifetime to high values (+12.5% speed, +18-20 damage, + 25% lifetime) is already 1/8 possibility, but the chance of getting debuff makes it worse. I had calculations somewhere I think it was less than 10%, meaning a ton of rerolls spent on a single turret.

That's why I commented about "royal pain"

I never knew you could get such excessive range for turrets, that's the main reason i think turrets suffer, I'll have to give it a go destroyer plasma fleet with 11km range sounds great

Good thing about slasher is it will also benefit massively in OOS combat while i think range will be less so important.

[Scoob]

Flak has always been a disappointment. Every time I try it, I'm totally underwhelmed and switch back to a pulse or beam turret instead. Works SIGNIFICANTLY better vs. Fighters for me. Flak looks good based on stats, but simply does not deliver. I've never actually tried modding them to see if it helps, I never deemed them worth the effort. I cannot answer why they are so bad.

Thought: I do wonder if it's some sort of bug, as even in a modified game - where the Flak projectile is faster (aka potentially more accurate) Flak still continues to disappoint. I guess that mirrors what a game (researched) projectile speed mod would do...

Flak are, I assume, supposed to be relatively low-damage as they have a degree of AoE, so as long as they explode close to a target, they should at least do some damage. However, I watch several M-Class Flak Turrets wailing on a single Fighter looking like the shots are at least close to the target, but zero damage registering.

[vvvvvvvv]

Flak has always been a disappointment. Every time I try it, I'm totally underwhelmed and switch back to a pulse or beam turret instead. Works SIGNIFICANTLY better vs. Fighters for me. Flak looks good based on stats, but simply does not deliver. I've never actually tried modding them to see if it helps, I never deemed them worth the effort. I cannot answer why they are so bad.

It worked very well around version 6. Basically prior to flight model change. Was a de facto anti-fighter weapon.

At even earlier versions people recommended using bolts against fighters.

[LameFox]

The extra speed and drift seems to exacerbate the poor accuracy non-beam turrets already had. Not really surprising, but annoying. M beams are also excruciatingly short ranged, so I tend to avoid them on large ships because their time on target is affected by half its attack run being untargetable. Though on something mobile I sometimes find them worth equipping.

Pulse are the only non-missile turrets in the base set with anything resembling reach and speed, but they still have a horrendous base spread that sees shots go whizzing by a perfectly lined up target. Frankly if I could put Ion Pulse or EM turrets on other ships, I'd never use anything from the base set again. Their balance is just bad.

[EGO_Aut]

....Ironically, the ships crash into the hull and remain stationary for seconds.

[HeinzS]

whether someone has perhaps forgotten to adapt the AI flight routines for the “great new” flight model.

[LameFox]

whether someone has perhaps forgotten to adapt the AI flight routines for the “great new” flight model.

Nah fighters have been doing that for ages. Probably since launch but I wasn't paying that much attention back then. Their attack runs carry them too close to the target. The bigger it is the more likely they hit it outright or stop in place to steer to a new heading. I feel it's like the suicidal destroyers rushing into station turret fire, where the weapons meant to target them often only work at all (in high attention) because the AI does extremely counter-intuitive things.

[vvvvvvvv]

whether someone has perhaps forgotten to adapt the AI flight routines for the “great new” flight model.

No, they were always doing that, but perhaps the reason why flak worked better is because Ai was flying in perfectly straight lines often. Now all movement is curved so turrets miss. Just a guess though.

[LameFox]

Yeah that seems to be the bulk of it. That and their speed is overall higher I think. They're never anywhere for as long and they're moving in a less predictable way, and most turrets never hit well to begin with. Even fighter main guns struggle with it a bit.

[flywlyx]

Egosoft seems to have very low expectations when it comes to turret accuracy—they appear to accept issues like beam turrets losing track of targets due to drifting behavior. Given that capital ships also fail to track enemies in time, it’s likely that the game uses an extremely simplified target prediction system to minimize resource usage.

What confuses me is that, in general, perfect aiming calculations within the physics frame aren’t that complex—just position + velocity*t + 0.5*acceleration^2*t. Is it really so resource-intensive that they felt the need to simplify it even further? Or perhaps the prediction calculations aren’t running within the physics frame—which wouldn’t make much sense, but with Egosoft’s custom engine, anything’s possible.

In the meantime, weapons and turrets can only effectively track targets moving in a straight line or when their shot spread is wide enough that random hits occasionally land; ships that drift at high speeds are practically immune to them. Ships like The Katana can practically dance in a Xenon fleet without any trouble :https://youtu.be/ryCuTAeTG00?si=cbknpNb_mnYFkYwu

[Raptor34]

Egosoft seems to have very low expectations when it comes to turret accuracy—they appear to accept issues like beam turrets losing track of targets due to drifting behavior. Given that capital ships also fail to track enemies in time, it’s likely that the game uses an extremely simplified target prediction system to minimize resource usage.

What confuses me is that, in general, perfect aiming calculations within the physics frame aren’t that complex—just position + velocity*t + 0.5*acceleration^2*t. Is it really so resource-intensive that they felt the need to simplify it even further? Or perhaps the prediction calculations aren’t running within the physics frame—which wouldn’t make much sense, but with Egosoft’s custom engine, anything’s possible.

In the meantime, weapons and turrets can only effectively track targets moving in a straight line or when their shot spread is wide enough that random hits occasionally land; ships that drift at high speeds are practically immune to them. Ships like The Katana can practically dance in a Xenon fleet without any trouble :https://youtu.be/ryCuTAeTG00?si=cbknpNb_mnYFkYwu

Imo it's because they don't want to rehash the capital superiority of the previous games. Though frankly it feels they have swung too far to the other side, especially with reports from the latest patch.
Missiles are still good though.