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[MrRoboto75]

If I'm going to use PID, why not just drop the wings and go pure thruster craft?

[LoSboccacc]

well it's cheaper and it's safer against ir seekers. still the control they send to vehicles without pid terrible. with the new ai UX you can see desired and actual and it's either slow and underdampened or fast and resonating.

[EnigmaticHat]

Control surfaces on planes are nice for the same reason as wings: with them you just need forward thrust.  Their only real weakness is that the force the exert is pretty weak if close to the CoM which encourages you to put them in exposed places.

Some of the customization options on APS were taken away, overclocking for example.  Wouldn’t be surprised if ejection azimuth can’t be customized any more.  Don’t know what it was before but currently ejection takes the form of a simultaneous shotgun blast in a cone.  With very little force so they’ll start falling straight down, but they also despawn quickly.

IME with the current APS balance, ejection safety fuses are the way to go.  They’re capped out at 100mm length, so up to 1/5th the size of a normal piece depending on gauge, and that 100mm I believe still contributes the same weight towards kinetic damage as any other normal piece.  Also the way autoloaders and ammo clips are priced favors longer, high caliber shells.

Edit: also random fun fact, missiles work the same way where support pieces on larger missiles are smaller than a single pieces size.  You can customize what the remaining space is used for.  So for example a medium missile with thruster>fins x 2>fuel x 3> regulator x 2 > safety fuse > guidance gives you a missile that lasts forever and still can still produce a decent HE explosion.  (Note: just example, not a good design)

[MrRoboto75]

Over in the devtest there's cluster missiles now.

You can stuff smaller missiles in your bigger missiles, so you can spend thousands of ammo while you spend thousands of ammo.

[EnigmaticHat]

I guess that would let you shoot down fighter planes from 5+ kilometers away.  Not that combat at that range is even slightly engaging.

BTW if anyone has any designs they want to share there’s a Bay12 FTD faction thread.  This will be my last time plugging it but I think the link might have been lost in the previous page. The more the merrier.

[nogoodnames]

I've gotten back into this game after a long absence. Never got past the Deep Water Guard in the campaign because I take forever to design ships but I'm hoping to do a bit more now, especially once the new strategic AI stuff becomes stable.

For now I'm doing the Onyx Watch campaign since that gives me an excuse to use prebuilt designs. My first new war vessel design comes from necessity. With two Onyx Watch fleets bearing down and my resource zone producing a tenth of what it should due to not yet being re-balanced (which I've since rectified, but I don't want to cheat in the materials I've missed out on) I needed a cheap and effective defense craft. I chose to make my first ever submarine.

Spoiler: MS-1 Opabinia (click to show/hide)

It's armed with 4 torpedoes and costs a total of 13k materials, and I'm kind of shocked how effective it is. I knew a sub would counter the Watch ships, I just didn't know how hard of a counter it would be. A few of these can eventually sink the Bulwark provided it doesn't score several lucky hits.

I also experimented with making a kamikaze mini-sub, but it's very hard to make such a small craft stable. Right now it handles like a drowning pig. I could try to improve the design, but I don't think I need it considering how effective the torpedo subs are.

Spoiler: MD-1 Wildhog (click to show/hide)

[Akura]

Significant update today. Dubbed the Strategic AI update, the biggest feature added is the inclusion of offset slopes and slope transition blocks to allow for smoother hull building. CRAMs, steam, and fuel engines have had significant rebalancing. Steam engine gearboxes, for example, can limit how much of the torque from the crankshafts is put towards generating engine power and instead put it towards steam-driven propellers. Fuel engines overall give more power but less fuel efficiency, and changed the way exhaust gas travels through turbochargers. I skimmed over the CRAM changes, so I don't quite know how that works now.

Oh, and they've added a functional, more dynamic AI for Campaign mode, for each faction who now attack each other. There are changes to the way resources are distributed; the campaign tries to keep the overall total of resources in the world(together in the form of resource deposits, ships, etc) at a relative constant, encouraging you to attack and take over the enemies' resources and ships(so that you can control a larger share of that total).

[nogoodnames]

Contrary to some of what I've heard, it seems like old campaigns can be continued in the new version. At least, my Onyx Watch campaign seems to have been converted successfully. I think I will start up a land campaign, though. That way I can see the new AI in action, and it might suit my inability to build anything larger than a patrol boat in less than a month.

Speaking of things that took me way too long to build, here are some craft I made that now require major refits!

Based on the success of the Opabinia, I decided to make a larger and more capable submarine.

Spoiler: MS-2 Laggania (click to show/hide)

It's got better armour and some decent sonar decoys, but it's still a bit of a glass cannon against anything with anti-submarine weapons. Its larger size also makes it easier to detect and hit with ship-borne cannons. Nevertheless, it's still quite effective for its cost, consistently beating the Steel Striders' (previously expert now just normal) level subs one-on-one. The major issue with it is the AI. It's supposed to stay pointed at its target and maintain distance but always either spends the entire time running away or gets way too close. I'll probably need to setup my own system with breadboards for it to behave properly.

I also retrofitted the second ship I ever made to help fight the Onyx Watch.

Spoiler: Black Turtle Monitor (click to show/hide)

Admittedly this thing has never been great at its role. When I first made it, I thought that a single layer of metal armour would be enough for a small short-range brawler. I know better now. Still, it's pretty cheap and can hold its own against most of the easy OW and DWG ships. The update increased its cannon size by 50% but reduced buoyancy so its detection systems tend to get submerged. Probably not worth the time required to get it working again.

[Akura]

Just saw that the next update is going to remove fuel and ammo. Everything is going to be the generic "material" now. The response to this has been... pretty ugly. Especially since this came out of nowhere. I'm certainly pissed about this.

[LoSboccacc]

Just saw that the next update is going to remove fuel and ammo. Everything is going to be the generic "material" now. The response to this has been... pretty ugly. Especially since this came out of nowhere. I'm certainly pissed about this.

yeah. and they say they going to work on diplomacy next, using material as currency. idk what this game focus is anymore. it was so fun smashing fleets in 2014, now between battle block limitation, tournament-winning enemy designs, stringent weapon optimal builds, paper armor, leaky shields and whatever they doing to steam it's just weird and sweaty.

[moghopper]

Just saw that the next update is going to remove fuel and ammo. Everything is going to be the generic "material" now. The response to this has been... pretty ugly. Especially since this came out of nowhere. I'm certainly pissed about this.

yeah. and they say they going to work on diplomacy next, using material as currency. idk what this game focus is anymore. it was so fun smashing fleets in 2014, now between battle block limitation, tournament-winning enemy designs, stringent weapon optimal builds, paper armor, leaky shields and whatever they doing to steam it's just weird and sweaty.

I feel the same way. The game just isn't fun for me anymore. Feels like they only care about catering to the super dedicated designers now. That aside I just can't stand the focus on spamming things as much as possible. Slow firing weapons are worthless, and small guns have zero impact most of the time.

I feel like I have to know both lua and advanced physics to do anything now...