A return to flak

[Zero.Ghost]

Currently, flak cannons are considered near worthless. They have a short range, a minimum range, minimal effectiveness against strikes, and are worthless against bigger ships.
It isn't useful enough to consider in a normal load out.

So since it is a specialty weapon, why not merge current cannons with the flak cannons, using flak shells as an alternative ammo? It has a precedent in the show (difference of 'salvo' and 'target' or something along those lines). Minimum range will have to be coded into the ammunition instead of weapons, making this more difficult to implement, but it would bring back what, in my opinion, is an all to infrequently used defense.

[DRAKE_BLADEX]

Most likly u have been pwned by strikers one time too many and now u want the best of both worlds, while ur idea has some merrit we have enough issues here that big point needs to deal with so this idea should get shelved in my opinion

[St3v3f26]

There has been the idea around for liners to be able to mount strike cannons. I for my part would love that.

How awesome would it be, seeing a big fat 9k hp Jormung desperately trying to get, let alone keep a Viper into a 75 degree firing arc :D

[PepperPots]

Currently, flak cannons are considered near worthless. They have a short

So since it is a specialty weapon, why not merge current cannons with the flak cannons, using flak shells as an alternative ammo? It has a precedent in the show (difference of 'salvo' and 'target' or something along those lines). .


Yep Yep. Be a nice answer to the instant death button strikes have with ruiner missile launchers. Think those shells should be cubit purchases that are fairly expensive. But I like the idea.

[KoTLoNa]

There has been the idea around for liners to be able to mount strike cannons. I for my part would love that.

How awesome would it be, seeing a big fat 9k hp Jormung desperately trying to get, let alone keep a Viper into a 75 degree firing arc :D

Lol Dude!!!

You aren't thinking at all :)

Fighter class ships have 75 degree firing arc because unlike Line class ships their guns cannot rotate up to 180 degree firing arc.

[St3v3f26]

Lol Dude!!!

You aren't thinking at all :)

Fighter class ships have 75 degree firing arc because unlike Line class ships their guns cannot rotate up to 180 degree firing arc.

So you want to put strike cannons on a liner and make them work even better there? Why not double the damage output while we're at it. Accuracy could be improved by too, by the way. Of course we can make the energy consumption to three times the value so they arent op then. What did you say? Liners would still produce more energy than they would need for 9 of those firing constantly?

[PepperPots]

I think the point trying to be maid is if you can have strikes with 5 rcs ducts that are impossible to hit with a line. And can carry Ruiner/Nova missiles that splash a line on a single pass. There should be a load out on lines to counter it. The arguments for strikes so equipped is that they are worthless against escorts and other strikes. The same could be said of a line so equipped as the flak would have minimal to no impact on an escort and absolutely no impact on another line.

[airrefueler]

There is one aspect that the flak cannon is extremely effective at, and that's making my system lag like nobody's business. Personally I hate the flak cannons for that very reason. My system seems to go at 1 frame every 2 seconds until I can turn enough to get it off my screen. It doesn't matter whether it's Colonial or Cylon. I've tried adjusting settings but there's no change.
:D

[KoTLoNa]

Well I'm sry but the hole idea of single striker owninig one Liner is just too big nonsense!


Imagine you are ship engineer and you will let a single striker to play around with liner? No way!
it is just that BP need striker pilots to donate more to cubits, that is the truth. That is the truth to all internet games!

[St3v3f26]

Maybe the intent was to make a game that doesn't work by the bigger is better principle? There is no need to turn this into another dark orbit. But if you like it that way you should give it a try. Just make sure you have a couple of hundred bucks at hand.

[Macrophage]

flak cannons are certainly not useless. I've run a flak and PD boat during an OP defense and the entire center of my screen filled up with +10 exp from all the missiles I took down. Of course, the enemy had a lot of missile boats, but the flak still did it's job.

Flak certainly has its uses. It is not meant for soloing strikes definitely, (though I have taken down a few careless ones in the fleet battles).

The only tweaks I can imagine for it would be to increase its accuracy,
or, even better, to decrease its upgrade costs. Flak is simply not worth the cubits in upgrades as it currently is. I mean, only +22 max range?

[KoTLoNa]

Maybe the intent was to make a game that doesn't work by the bigger is better principle? There is no need to turn this into another dark orbit. But if you like it that way you should give it a try. Just make sure you have a couple of hundred bucks at hand.

Fine, then I want equal upgrade costs on all classes!

Is that OK with you?!

I think it won't be. And I will tell you in numbers why.
I don't know how much are exactly your numbers in cubits and Tilyum for a striker class, but I know that: "Higher class - higher costs" in Battlestar Galactica online.

Now I have Advanced Jotunn.
I have:
-3 Rockets on +4
-5 Guns on +7
-4 Hulls (HP) on +6
-1 Hull (HP) on +1
-2 Gyrostabilise on +6
-RSU manevering part on +4

P.s. (This are the parts in witch I had invested)
So in theory if I made my upgrades with cubits only, no kits at all, my total expences for now are 286 800 cubits without the 60 000 cubits I gave for the advancing.
My future upgrade costs for all of the upper parts on +10 require more 1 465 000 cubits.
P.s.2 I used tuning kits for some of the upgrades.

So if you think owning a Liner with a single striker is fair (witch ship upgrade is far cheeper than Liner's) then I don't see reason to continue to argue with you.

Btw if you want to compare the ship's classes costs in numbers go in the store and do some research.

[St3v3f26]

First, don't tell me Strikes are cheap.
My current setup alone costs 2.6 Million Cubits, so please forgive me if I am not impressed by the tenth of that amount you have put into your ship.
Additionally I have equipment worth 900k Cubits in the Locker, a total of 3.5 Million Cubits.
That neither includes upgraded equipment that I sold, the minor upgrades I made on my Scythe (used for jumping only), the UFO i opened before realizing they are rubbish nor the thousands of DC Packs I consumed.
And just on an unrelated note here, I have bought exactly 78k Cubits (First special offer), the remaining 3,422 Million Cubits are 100% earned by water, plats and pvp.
So please explain to me where the frakk my strike is cheap.


Now, let's move on:

Strikes have undoubtedly the hardest work in this game.
We die fast because we have low hp. Especially if not paying attention when mining we are easy targets due to micro avoidance. In combat we always have to remember that too, we can never slow down unless we are in a blindspot.
A short lag can seal our fate. Having the controls locked once is often our doom.
Liners have a huge Dradis range to see us coming and they can easily jump out before we reach them. Unless we are talking about a lvl 20 hel, they even have enough time to thread-jump, run away to npcs or a convoy or call wingmates or other players for help...
It takes a few minutes to kill a decent liner, many minutes if he is using a dc and he is invincible if he uses two of them or one with a high level.
Strikes aren't cruise-around-and-watch-the-enemy-die ships. Using a strike efficiently is a lot of hard work.

How would punishing this hard work by making strikes cost as much as half-automatic ships be fair?

Liners work much more by themselves. Select target, apply buffs and debuffs, wait for target to die, repeat. Yes I know its a bit more than that, yet much less work than flying a strike.
Farming plats afk? No problem in a Liner. Impossible in a strike, even if you had all lvl 15 gear.
Sitting around, killing assassins while watching porn or getting a coffee? No problem in a Liner. Impossible in a strike, no matter what gear you have.

Liners are more expensive, yes. You pay for the luxury of having to work less.