Stat changes for 18/19 Speedgame

[Appocomaster]

• Change Harpy to 60 armour/cost and 45 damage/cost
• Increase Spider armor from 62 armour/cost to 68 armour/cost
• Beetle damage/cost from 46 to 53.
• Viper changed from FR to CO. Damage/cost improved from 44 to 47.
• Scarab efficiency increased to 47.
• Black Widow dam/cost increased from 62 to 76.
• Guardian dam/cost increased to 35.
• Tarantula dam/cost from 18 to 30.
• XPK absolute damage from 175 to 190.
• Dagger absolute armor from 10 to 9.
• Cutlass dam/cost from 28 to 34.
• Change Thief class from FR to CO.
• Change Marauder target from DE to BS.
• Change Pirate target from BS to DE.
• All Structure Killer armour halved.
• Scorpion, TBT and Wyvern have been convered to steal and inits, damage and armour adjusted accordingly

Final Edit:

Scorpion: Armour 170-> 180, damage 175-> 160
TBT armour 24 -> 25 damage 30 -> 26,
Wyvern -> back to armour / damage (armour 460, damage 215)
Thief: reduced cost / armour / damage to make it more "Co like"

[Cannon_Fodder]

Can we have it in stats form like usual?



P.S. THX FOR THE TARANT BOOST

[teknik]

every race having a steal ship? might be fun for havoc but i hope this isn't an intend change for a full round...also interesting how caths steal co not cr?

[ChubbyChecker]

I quite like the changes overall. Although what you did to the Chimera wasn't very nice! Terrans will be pwning each other with BS fleets now.

Cats might be interesting now, much more powerful. Especially the attacking CO fleet since Vipers are now Corvettes. Also Tarantulas now chew through Corsairs like nobody's business so they're a better option too.
Hopefully this is a glimpse of what is to come in R14 (if so I'm becoming Cat )

[MAdnRisKy]

Originally Posted by teknik

every race having a steal ship? might be fun for havoc but i hope this isn't an intend change for a full round...also interesting how caths steal co not cr?

If you haven't worked out that Cath should have been using Co before these changes anyway, and still can't see why they should after the viper change, then the fact that in every other race it's the secondary roiding fleet providing new ships for the primary probably also escaped you and thus I can understand your confusion.

yes this is one of those belittling posts I make from time to time, but to compensate here's a free hint, "what hits co as a xan player?", and "what do your co ships target?"

[Appocomaster]

Originally Posted by teknik

every race having a steal ship? might be fun for havoc but i hope this isn't an intend change for a full round...also interesting how caths steal co not cr?

It *is* one possible way to "balance" stealing. TBH allowing races other race's technologies - while properly applied (Terran huge armour, low damage etc) - can still keep the race's characteristics.

[teknik]

Originally Posted by MAdnRisKy

If you haven't worked out that Cath should have been using Co before these changes anyway, and still can't see why they should after the viper change, then the fact that in every other race it's the secondary roiding fleet providing new ships for the primary probably also escaped you and thus I can understand your confusion.

if you havent worked out, the signifcant increase in the tarants damage actually makes the cath cr fleet pretty effective again, so the fact that cath should have been using co before these changes has nothing to do with anything.

the fact is that CR is a caths main attack fleet, co is its secondary..even if the cr fleet did suck for r13.

Originally Posted by MAdnRisKy

yes this is one of those belittling posts I make from time to time, but to compensate here's a free hint, "what hits co as a xan player?", and "what do your co ships target?"

yes i realise thats why vipers were changed...but whats wrong with hiting xan's with cr? nothing. besides stealing fireblades with scorps is a far more effective way of hitting a xan with lancers than buying vipers.

[ChubbyChecker]

Due to the new crapness of the Chimera and the corvetteness of the Viper Terrans have really been toned down. I don't think this was necessary, Terrans were pretty balanced beforehand.

[Appocomaster]

Originally Posted by ChubbyChecker

Due to the new crapness of the Chimera and the corvetteness of the Viper Terrans have really been toned down. I don't think this was necessary, Terrans were pretty balanced beforehand.

Yes Terran did probably come off worse, as I think it might have been overlooked that Chimera are Terran's only anti Bs. The Wyvern may have been a better option... (and would also bring the BW into play, and the lancer to scare the viper defence). There might yet be a final change.

[teknik]

also i'm interested, is the new gal system and the invention of CTF the death of normal speed games? i was looking forward to a proper 24 hour straight speedgame with no roid or res boosts

[Appocomaster]

No, but as havoc CTF seemed popular, we thought we'd try out this speedround. There's quite a few speedrounds that have been different - one with no defence, for example

[ChubbyChecker]

Originally Posted by Appocomaster

Yes Terran did probably come off worse, as I think it might have been overlooked that Chimera are Terran's only anti Bs. The Wyvern may have been a better option... (and would also bring the BW into play, and the lancer to scare the viper defence). There might yet be a final change.

Good idea. The Black Widow has too much power though. Also look at how much damage (normal or EMP) that Cats do against roiders and they harm BS a lot more than any other ship type.

[Appocomaster]

Originally Posted by ChubbyChecker

Good idea. The Black Widow has too much power though. Also look at how much damage (normal or EMP) that Cats do against roiders and they harm BS a lot more than any other ship type.

That's because the only race with Bs pods is Terran, and they have huge armour. The Viper doesn't need a boost, as that'd upset the Viper/Lancer ratio and make Xan even more vunerable to Cath Co attacks, but the BW exists mainly as the best form of defence vs Terran Bs, especially the pods. The damage was upped so that Terran wouldn't find it quite so easy to bomb through Cath, while Zik were opened up so that that they were slightly easier to attack (most of their steal classes now aren't off class like they were)

[Askane]

that are a good improvement rising the cath damages, but giving an steal ship to every race? that seems a bit pointless
But np, as long as Cath are the best race of the game

[noah02]

Wyverns targetting battleships sounds interesting
As long as you give them a tad more firepower

[Appocomaster]

No, Wyverns with their current targetting and so on.

[MAdnRisKy]

Originally Posted by teknik

if you havent worked out, the signifcant increase in the tarants damage actually makes the cath cr fleet pretty effective again, so the fact that cath should have been using co before these changes has nothing to do with anything.

the fact is that CR is a caths main attack fleet, co is its secondary..even if the cr fleet did suck for r13.

well you keep believing that then

(three ticks for def, one tick for def... tough call - though galaxies tend to dominate defence in a speed round it still means less time to spot and react)

Originally Posted by teknik

yes i realise thats why vipers were changed...but whats wrong with hiting xan's with cr? nothing. besides stealing fireblades with scorps is a far more effective way of hitting a xan with lancers than buying vipers.

except it's slower and relies on you building two fleets rather than one!


But have it your way, the traditionalists will always try to play the game "the way it should be", suprising though how quickly people took to BS fleets over the more tradtional DE fleets for terran...

[Appocomaster]

Originally Posted by MAdnRisKy

But have it your way, the traditionalists will always try to play the game "the way it should be", suprising though how quickly people took to BS fleets over the more tradtional DE fleets for terran...

Yes I was upset by that, the Pegasus always was THE ship for Terrans. I think it's something to do with the armour/cost of the Demeter vs the Leviathon. It does show that the idea of making Terran love big ships seemed to work though

[Cannon_Fodder]

All the top caths last round went CR afaik including myself. The CO fleet had so many weaknesses and to every race that it was suicidal unless the target had poor fleet compostion.

Build CR to start with, then when youve stolen some CO, build a CO fleet and roid the latter stages with that.

[Banned]

Originally Posted by sniborp

Build CR to start with, then when youve stolen some CO, build a CO fleet and roid the latter stages with that.

The efficiency of the Mosquito supports this.

[Hude]

Originally Posted by Appocomaster

No, but as havoc CTF seemed popular, we thought we'd try out this speedround. There's quite a few speedrounds that have been different - one with no defence, for example

Will there be random galaxies? Along with CTF that makes two reasons NOT to play speedround for me.

[Virall]

Im absolutley gutted at the deciscion to keep CTF for the speed round.

The stats are interesting and I agree, Terrans have come off worse, although this would not be the permanent stats for round 14, im sure.

[teknik]

Originally Posted by MAdnRisKy

except it's slower and relies on you building two fleets rather than one!

personally i would build cr as a cath whether i attacked with it or not, and scorps stealing really are nice to help you build a decent co fleet...and i think you have more options attacking with a cr fleet.

Originally Posted by MAdnRisKy

But have it your way, the traditionalists will always try to play the game "the way it should be", suprising though how quickly people took to BS fleets over the more tradtional DE fleets for terran...

lol traditionalist, you make me feel old but still you are basing what you are saying on r13 stats where the cr fleet really was lacking, i think the changes to the tarant and scorp really make the cr fleet feasible again.

[Appocomaster]

Yes, the speedgame will be random this round as we haven't got the code / time to make private galaxies, I'm afraid.

[Cannon_Fodder]

Originally Posted by ChubbyChecker

Due to the new crapness of the Chimera and the corvetteness of the Viper Terrans have really been toned down. I don't think this was necessary, Terrans were pretty balanced beforehand.

Terran BS is stronger against other terrans and ziks now :/

[Appocomaster]

stats changed.
A pod fleet being strong against it's own race and only one other isn't a great idea, btw

[ChubbyChecker]

These new stats are fine. No complaints about the Terrans now

[Appocomaster]

The only problem is the similarity of the Pirate and Wyvern, but that can't really be helped without changing more stats. This also allows combinations like the Lancer and the Black Widow with De fleets, which makes them more powerful (how much less happy will Cath be seeing De fleets containing Lancers bare down on them? )

[Tietäjä]

Originally Posted by sniborp

Terran BS is stronger against other terrans and ziks now :/

Terran BS is the only attack fleet that by default will never suffer zero-loss defences on it (cruisers - dragon/scarab, destroyers - fireblade/viper, frigates - syren/drake/guardian, corvettes - lancer~bucc/scorpion/phoenix, fighters - tarantula/tzen). Of course, zikonians, xandathrii and cathaar can cap stuff to patch to their wholes, but terrans have it as it is. How much this is worth in a speedgame enviroment though, is another story.

[I am Idler]

Originally Posted by teknik

every race having a steal ship? might be fun for havoc but i hope this isn't an intend change for a full round...also interesting how caths steal co not cr?

What have you been smoking? Stealing is the pld!

[Cervantes]

Originally Posted by Virall

Im absolutley gutted at the deciscion to keep CTF for the speed round.

The stats are interesting and I agree, Terrans have come off worse, although this would not be the permanent stats for round 14, im sure.

Back tracking a bit, yes im very much gutted about this too but many people seem to like CTF each to their own.. but im not to keen on it i was looking forward to an all out kick each other ass play to win thing. But good luck those who play, Ship stats look interesting tho.

[Makhil]

Originally Posted by sniborp

Build CR to start with, then when youve stolen some CO, build a CO fleet and roid the latter stages with that.

Might be the same for Xans. Build first FR fleet (keep the Caths away) steal Corsair (anti CR) from Ziks (cath and terran Fi are not worth it)... then build a Fi fleet.
The only thing i worry about is, how to steal enough ships to make them useful without cheating ? I hope steal ships for every race won't lead to massive ship farming.

[Makhil]

Stealing ship that can steal other ships etc... is possible for Cath and Xan, but not for Terrans

In theory :
Ter BS > DE
-----
Cath CR > CO > FR > CO
Cath CR > CO > FI > CR > BS > DE
-----
Xan FR > FI > CR > CO > FR
Xan FR > FI > CR > BS > DE

Maybe you should make the zik DE a steal ship and instead of the 2 CO steal ships, only 1
Simply enough : Thief (steal FR) becomes the DE, and Cutter (kill FR) becomes CO. Why would a steal race have a ship class with no stealing ship in it anyway ?

On the other hand, Terrans can use their steal ship in attack and steal cath BW (a DE targeting BS). Xans and Caths steal ship are more for def purpose (no FI anti FR, no CO anti CR so no possibility to steal anything on attack).
- Caths stealers are meant to def vs Zik and... Cath so they can hope to steal Cutlass and Thief which opens more stealing capacity.
- Xans stealers are meant to def vs Xans only... so in fact no hope to steal other stealers or any other race's ship Xan race would remain pure !

[Petru]

Someone say stats?

[antheon]

anybody know if there will be any battle calcs using the speedgame stats?

[ChubbyChecker]

Originally Posted by teknik

every race having a steal ship? might be fun for havoc but i hope this isn't an intend change for a full round...

When I first heard about this a couple of weeks ago I was appalled, I'm starting to come round to the idea though. As long as it's restricted to one ship per race (excluding Zik of course) and as long as that race can also shoot at that class with a kill ship (or EMP ship in the case of Cats) then I think it might make things interesting. This might be done with EMP ships too, as long as the same priniciple is applied I'm not too bothered.

Originally Posted by Makhil

Stealing ship that can steal other ships etc... is possible for Cath and Xan, but not for Terrans

In theory :
Ter BS > DE
-----
Cath CR > CO > FR > CO
Cath CR > CO > FI > CR > BS > DE
-----
Xan FR > FI > CR > CO > FR
Xan FR > FI > CR > BS > DE

Maybe you should make the zik DE a steal ship and instead of the 2 CO steal ships, only 1
Simply enough : Thief (steal FR) becomes the DE, and Cutter (kill FR) becomes CO. Why would a steal race have a ship class with no stealing ship in it anyway ?

It doesn't bother me that Terrans can't steal stealers. In fact I'd be happier if Cats and Xan couldn't either though this isn't really possible with Ziks being around.

Originally Posted by Makhil

On the other hand, Terrans can use their steal ship in attack and steal cath BW (a DE targeting BS). Xans and Caths steal ship are more for def purpose (no FI anti FR, no CO anti CR so no possibility to steal anything on attack).

Yes, this does compensate for the Terrans' lack of being able to steal stealers.

Originally Posted by Makhil

- Caths stealers are meant to def vs Zik and... Cath so they can hope to steal Cutlass and Thief which opens more stealing capacity.
- Xans stealers are meant to def vs Xans only... so in fact no hope to steal other stealers or any other race's ship Xan race would remain pure !

As you say the Cath stealing ability might become a bit out of hand. Vishes and Buccaneers can be used to defend against Cath corvette fleets so these ships will be stolen too. In fact once a Cath has stolen Buccaneers he can use these along with his Scorpions to defend in-galaxy and his corvette fleet will balloon beyond all proportion! But hey, it's about time Caths had some fun for a change.

[Tietäjä]

Terran can steal stealers, on the either end of it; both pirate and marauder still exist as they were. Now we are, though, facing a scenario where terran battleship fleet has no zero-loss defence ship against it and it can steal two of the ships used against it. Each other attack fleet promptly sees zero-loss defences. In a speedgame enviroment, this will do a bit of difference, as people are slightly less likely to budge their fleets when they are just given 27 minutes to do so. Coincidentially, terrans also have the best cure for the upgraded CO fleets, and now the ace zero-loss anti-fr.

Fighters suffered a lot due to the upgrades on tarant (and harpy, if anyone uses them, requires xans to build a few sentinels even) and changes on TBT (there will be plenty of eager in-gal xans if nearby should they be fast enough). Corvette fleets will be far more common with the upgrades they received, and just to annoy you, they decreased dagger armor slightly. The xandathrii frigate fleet overall seems rather weak (terrans answer with drakes, cath with guardian -- yes, it's a choice now, other xan with arrowheads, and ziks with thief en masse). You'll need to add in co/de to punch holes, which leaves you open for even more zero-loss defences.

Zikonians perhaps don't mind the loss of thief as FR that bad. After all, it's a heavy corvette now, and FR fleet could be rather interchangeable with CO fleet for pulling stunts. Besides, with the cutlass upgrade, it's slightly more powerful -- as if it wasn't powerful enough before -- your corvette fleet just became a smack. There's the phoenix though! Well, your frigate fleet now died -- not. Buccaneer was, in my opinion, key last round, and it will remain good. You no longer have to wrestle with thieves and compare which one has more, now you just got to watch out the occasional drake (terrans will be busy building their Big and Beautiful Battleships). You can plow through thieves and arrows with buccs, and steal cathaar corvettes all with the same bucca-bucca-neer.

Cool if any. Now the cathaar. Well, enough said it's upgraded and could now be competitive in a speedgame enviroment, especially with the bump on tarantula (ftw, you xandathrii and zikonian boys!) and scorpion change. Corvette fleet is now very viable (ftw, you xandathrii boys!), and the guardian can be used to reduce the interest attacking you.


Xandathrii are the loosers of these changes. Your secondary attack fleet steals (it's primary for others; I like being able to patch up for losses when attacking), and you get pounded by the spectacular corvette upgrades, and general zero-loss anti-fi changes. Cathaar scorpion can be used to achieve dodgy corvette fleets, though drakes are around to make the buccaneer work little less effectively. Thief change didn't hurt that bad in my opinion, and now the corvette fleet will be the prime zik fleet. Terrans are now tactically good all-around.

[ChubbyChecker]

Yeah, at first glance Xans haven't been changed much but due to the changes in the other races they've been severely toned down. This isn't a bad thing though, Xans were the second best race in R13. Besides, Ziks still came off worse as a result of these changes.

[Tietäjä]

Originally Posted by ChubbyChecker

Besides, Ziks still came off worse as a result of these changes.

Yes, Pirate was severed, and thief was adjusted (not really to a much worse). What else?

[Makhil]

Zik don't come worse. Other races able to steal means they too will grow in value, hence more targets for the high value Ziks.

[ChubbyChecker]

The Frig roiding fleet was severely toned down. The Corvette fleet was improved but not to the same extent.
The Marauder now gets shot at.
The Pirate now gets shot at.
It is now a lot easier for Cats to roid Ziks due to the increased power of the Tarantula.
It is easier for Ziks to attack fellow Ziks with Corvettes, or even Frigs.

I also meant that Ziks were reduced in power the most, not that they are now the worst race.

[Tietäjä]

Originally Posted by ChubbyChecker

The Frig roiding fleet was severely toned down. The Corvette fleet was improved but not to the same extent.
The Marauder now gets shot at.
The Pirate now gets shot at.
It is now a lot easier for Cats to roid Ziks due to the increased power of the Tarantula.
It is easier for Ziks to attack fellow Ziks with Corvettes, or even Frigs.

I also meant that Ziks were reduced in power the most, not that they are now the worst race.

Frigate roiding fleet was not severely toned down. The lack of thief as frigate not only means that your frigate fleet does not have a ship that targets frigates but also that there is one less frigate targetting frigate in the universe. Now drake is the sole frigate hitting buccaneers -- no need to wrestle with thieves anymore. With the increased amount of corvette fleets, buccaneer still comes very handy.

I wouldn't under-estimate the cutlass upgrade. 21% or so real increase in damage is a lot, and you might see as in the battlecalcs that mass cutlassing pays off now very good. The only real problem there is scorpion.

Maradeur never was good, so it didn't get much worse. Actually, I'd say it improved. Though, Pirate got severely downgraded and is now frankly useless. Which is a loss. Increased tarantula power is an aspect zikonians will have to worry about, but frankly, so does the rest of the universe -- except for terrans. Zikonian corvette-frigate fights will be sorted by "who has less fragile ships collected" and "which one got more, bucco or thief". The scenario on that isn't actually *new*, but appears very similar to thief thief fights, with switched ships.

Zikonian attack fleets weren't toned down, cathaar was upgraded. I'd say, at the current scenario, terrans are a prompt choice.

ps. the real looser isn't zikonians, but xandathrii.

[Appocomaster]

Originally Posted by Petru

Someone say stats?

Petal \o/\o/\o/ wb m8

[Petru]

I can't belive this game is still going

[Appocomaster]

get on IRC

[MAdnRisKy]

Originally Posted by Petru

Someone say stats?

come baaaaaaaack!

how have you been?

where (if at all) do you hang out these days?

[Goatsemaster]

Originally Posted by Tietäjä

ps. the real looser isn't zikonians, but xandathrii.

This is correct. Though, I think 'loser' may be a bit strong.

Edit: I mean, seriously, the guy is right. Give him a column on the portal or something.

[Appocomaster]

Xan typically do well on speedgames though, really.

[Goatsemaster]

Originally Posted by Appocomaster

Xan typically do well on speedgames though, really.

I'm terribly amused that you increased the damage on the wyvern, left the 'emp' level damage on the scorpion alone and ditto the TBT.

[Appocomaster]

The scorpion and the TBT aren't targetted by the things they're stealing - the Wyvern is.
Edit: but having looked at it again, they probably are a bit overpowered
2nd Edit: Updated.