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Alright boys here's my roughdraft of Peenix Rework:

(subtitled: good $#@!ing god this faction sucks)


Faction Global Attributes:


Hull will be nerfed to .85
Shields will be perked to 1.3
Shield repair will be perked to 1.05
He Yeild will be perked to 1.1
Cost will be reduced to .9
Signature will be nerfed to .9
Ripcord will be nerfed to .85
Accel will be nerfed to .95

Faction Specials:

INTs and HVY Ints have 75 less HP before faction modifiers
Can build Transceivers which cost $15000 and provide $500/min in paydays and build on He3 rocks. Do not require techbase.



Phoenix New Tech:

Mini-shield 1, 2:

Grants 50, 100 HP with Small Shield regeneration speed. +.25 sig, can be mounted on SFs, INTs, or Figs.

New Ship:

Skirmisher:

Tech: SF and INT research (ADV sf and HVY int required for ENH Skirmisher)
HP: 300, 450 for ENH
Shields: Mini shield only
Signature: .65
Missiles: Any SF missile. Can only have 1 hunter loaded at a time.
Booster: any INT booster + Hyperboost
Guns: Sniper and/or Minigun, 2 slots (no UTIL)
Cloak: Heavy cloak only
Ripcord: No.
Energy: enough for 15 seconds of hvy cloak 1, 25 at enh.
Ammunition: Same as INT/HVY INT
Max Thrust: Same as INT/HVY INT
Base Mass: 30
Armor Class: Medium
Scan Range: 1000m
Drop Slot: Pulse Probes, EMP Mines
Max Speed: 100/110 m/s.

Design Principle: Hybrid between SF and INT. Its role is to hunt down probers and SBs as well as provide a hard-to-see escort craft for stealth bombers and/or HTTs. Can also augment offensive and defensive roles by providing a "mobile probe" effect, hiding and picking off a nan or two before the bbr enters into the camp or before the team shows up to attack the miner.

Vanguards:


Tech: ENH Fig and INT research (ADV fig and HVY int required for ENH Vanguard)
HP: Same as current
Shields: Mini shield only
Signature: 1
Missiles: Dumbfires, same loadout as fighter
Booster: any Fig booster
Guns: Vulcan Canons, Gat, Minigun, Dis 2 slots (ENH may mount mini-AC)
Cloak: None
Ripcord: Yes, 15 seconds base
Energy: 0 is fine
Ammunition: Same as INT/HVY INT
Max Thrust: Same as ENH/ADV FIG
Base Mass: 50
Armor Class: Light
Scan Range: 600m
Drop Slot: Minepack, Laser Blossoms
Max Speed: 70, 100 m/s

Role: The role of the Vanguard is to be the primary forward presence when attacking. Interceptors will tend to be more effective at defending as they will be considerably more agile as well as quicker in-and-out of the fight while Fighters will be more versitile on the attack being able to mount Galvs and quickfires and react more quickly to changing situations thanks to their faster ripcord times. Most of the time Vanguards will take the place of Hvy Ints when force bombing or force capping is happening. Their light hull (as opposed to medium) will, along with their sluggish handling, will render them as poor choices for most forms of bbr defense as full AC will generally trump their miniAC or Vulcan canons. Basic Vanguards will also be slow and unsuited for long-range sorties.

Rearguard:

Tech: ENH Fig and SF research (ADV fig and ADV sf required for ENH Rearguard)
HP: 300
Shields: Med Shield
Signature: 1.25
Missiles: Any SF or Fig missile, SF capacity
Booster: None
Guns: Mini AC, Sniper, 1/2 slots Basic/ENH
Cloak: None
Ripcord: Yes, 10 seconds base
Energy: Same as SF, ADV SF
Ammunition: Same as ENH/ADV FIG
Max Thrust: Same as ENH/ADV FIG
Base Mass: 60
Armor Class: Light
Scan Range: 1500m
Drop Slot: None
Max Speed: 100, 125 m/s

Role: the Rearguard's role is to provide a strong defensive ship that engages enemy bomb runs at long range. The goal is to force people who are attempting to bomb Sup/Tac to bring escorts rather than using AC bbrs. They're loud and don't maneuver very well but pack a long-range punch.

Special Tech:

Vulcan Canon:
Research is now Gat 2 and Mini 2 for Vulcan Canon 1. Vulcan Canon 2 requires Mini 3 and Gat 3 as well as Vulcan 1.

Laser Blossom:
Research is now Prox 2 and Dis 2 for Laser Blossom 1. Blossom 2 requires Prox 3 and Dis 3 as well as Laser Blossom 1.

Hyper Boost:

Research is now Afterburner 2 and Sig 2 for Hyper Boost 1. Hyperboost 2 requires Afterburner 3 an Sig 3 as well as Hyperboost 1.

I may have went overboard with hyper dropping sig all the way down to 1%, make it equivalent of turning on hvy cloak1

P1 those additional ships are useless... If the enh vang requires a hvy int why would you fly it? "Primary forward presence" is bull@#(!.

Reasons for taking my solution and not the p1's:
1) KISS
2)
If you go exp your ships get a speed and sig buf (did I mention moving hyper to exp?)
If you go sup your ships get firepower (did I mention moving vulcans to sup?)
If you go tac you get disco balls (did I mention moving disco to tac? and sfs should be able to mount blossoms too imho (not sure if they already do))

Vanguards:
Won't be as effective at miner hunting as sfs (and will lose to sfs because of the lrms)
Depending on the bought tech will generally beat fighters
Will still mostly be beaten by mini3 hvy interceptors
Will be better than most enh tech
Will provide mid to late game miner hunting capability
Will provide mid to late game d

You'd get them by sacrificing your expansion at that point but you get a respectable ship capable of lasting till the very end (thus enabling you to expand better than your opponent at that point while hurting his econ)
Late game phoenix gets stuff to put the money in AND get something out of it.
3) KISS

Djole88 wrote:QUOTE (Djole88 @ Dec 4 2014, 02:26 PM) P1 those additional ships are useless... If the enh vang requires a hvy int why would you fly it? "Primary forward presence" is bull@#(!.

Because hvy ints don't let you mount vulcan canons or mini ac? Because hvy ints don't have ripcord? Because hvy ints have much less HP? Because hvy ints can't drop minepacks or dumbfires? There are definitely situations where you'd rather launch this Vanguard than a Hvy Int.

And as for the other ships being useless, no.

Skirmishers: These are basically very stealthy but less durable ints. They're much better at hunting SFs/SBs than regular ints as a result. Also they're very good at being the forward eyes against a bomb run while also being able to pick off scouts and can augment a good SF miner offense run.

Rearguard: These ships are VERY tough and also VERY long range. They're better at defense then fighters and much better at defense than SFs. They're not DESIGNED to be offensive ships.

Also they are by far the most powerful and useful for good reason: tac/sup is a rare combo techpath and imo should be encouraged. Tac/exp's combo is the least powerful for a similar reason.

Finally, these ships may seem weak on paper but that's also intentional from a design standpoint. See, it's better for the game if there's an underpowered tech that needs to be buffed up a little than an overpowered tech that needs to be nerfed down. That's because if Vanguards, etc. end up being too weak for their costs, games aren't ruined as people simply don't fly them until they're perked.

Compare instead to what happens if Vanguards end up being too powerful and Phantom032, Core Czar gets caught up in another project for a few months: there have to be soft bans on Vanguards because they're too strong for the game and then you get that jackass who goes small game tac+bbrs now also going vanguards every game because "hey free win."

QUOTE Reasons for taking my solution and not the p1's:
1) KISS[/quote]
That's... that's actually a terrible reason and is why Phoenix is so $#@!ing boring right now.

Simple factions are dull. Look at what, just to name one, IC has going for it above a vanilla faction:

1) Rescue probes
2) Ripping miners
3) Ungalvable bases
4) 2 minute small cons, 3 minute large cons
5) free enh/adv ship research with new techabse
6) start with lt ints instead of figs

Belters:

1) Rescue probes that rescue for both factions
2) No small shields
3) Cheap bases, including techbases
4) Cheap ships
5) Omni fighters
6) Boosters on scouts and bbrs and gunships
7) Minigun and UTIL on adv figs
8) Keeps enh ships after losing techbases

Giga:

1) Lt bases hurt by basic weapons
2) Spec mines
3) starts with scouts only
4) starts with enh cons and enh miners
5) Lxy versions of ships that are more powerful than other ships of their class
6) Patrollers

Rix:

1) NO MISSILES (this right here is probably the biggest revelation of any of these faction's specials)
2) Very high turn rate to one direction
3) Scouts are ripcord receivers

Bios:

1) Every single techbase starts as ADV and costs an extra 5k
2) Every ship can mount hvy cloak
3) Pods can ripcord home
4) 60s constructor and carrier build time


Your proposed Phoenix:

1) Vanguards
2) 1 piece of new tech per each techpath

Compare it instead to the other "new tech" faction, GT:

1) Palisades required for adv techbase
2) Miners offload at techbases, no refineries
3) Research station grants 2+ new pieces of tech per techpath
4) PT bbrs
4.a) ROCKETS
5) Mustangs
6) Guardians
7) Rescue Drones

I get it, you really, really like flying vanguards. But from a design standpoint if the only thing exceptional about Phoenix are that they get vanguards (and maybe some random durdle tech like laser blossoms or vulcan cannons or hyper boost) then the only reason to play phoenix is to get Vanguards. That means that every time someone picks Phoenix they're either playing a very, very @#(!ty version of supremacy/expansion/tac or they're going Vanguards (or in your case both for some inexplicable reason) which is incredibly boring to command and incredibly boring to command against because they do the same thing every time.

In short: KISS is BAD for faction design because it leads to boring-ass factions that have one or two plans for victory.

I would definitely like to see nix and GT reworked so they see play more often.

GT sees plenty of play. It's a fun little faction with a great economy and wonderful resilience against sup. Not to mention they have some great special tech like Gauss (which is a lot of fun) and HTT Armor Plating (which is really stronk). IMO GT Exp is very good against Giga specifically because minidis gives GT enough teeth to punish spec spam and Pali spam keeps Giga from being able to galv them off the map in the early late game.

Did you miss that I proposed significantly easier access to tech? Which should get that tech used much more and thus provide phoenix with unique stuff that's actually used.

Let me explain:

ALL phoenix ships are able to mount Vulcan now. I recommended making it easier to get BUT making basic and adv scouts not able to use it because a scout pwning your int is not fun.

Vulcans makes combining sup and exp viable and that is the least used tech combo imo.

ONLY vanguards can mount Hyper atm. I propose that if you manage to get it you can put it on your other combat ships because it gives phoenix something to look forward to while keeping the normal roles of each ship.

Blossom mines are just awesome. I want to see them being used.

Phoenix:
keeps recon and rescue drones.
keeps fig/scout/int drones which pwn sfs, sbs, stealthy htts.
keeps their ultra thin hitbox.
keeps the pitch and roll buff
keeps the extra missiles

*Consider removing the missile nerf and perhaps putting the 0.9 cost if phoenix still proves to be ineffective

Vanguards:
Since I started playing Vangs were up to par with mk3 tech and mostly beaten by hvy ints if the person flying the int was 1/2 competent BUT if it was a noob/voob vs similar the aiming reticule gave the adv to the vang pilot (also helped any voob/noob flying it to inflict more damage than he would normally do). When the lead indicator was removed (PCore001 I believe) noobs and voobs alike got back the same chance to aim and so vangs started loosing vs maxed figs and hvy ints properly (they were always losing vs adv sfs because of the lack of probes). Next issue was that vangs were dropping miners like flies so ac got a nerf (and they lost laser blossoms for whatever reason) which as a result made them completely unflyable vs mk3 tech and relatively susceptible to losing vs mk2 tech. I never saw vangs being uber and you always needed something to complement them if the game went into the second half.

I propose that the vanguards be a bit of a trade off (get respectable fighting capability reasonably soon OR take map and advance your chosen tech).

It could be done differently: make vangs require mk3 ships and adv gar and gs and transc but you better make them then uber like omnis are (ie 3rd ac, missiles...)

I actually approve the transciever change - 30min to pay it off and $15k over the next 30min (as opposed to 40min + 40min)
The mini-shield is also an interesting change and could be implemented to get a bit more complicated sig vs durablility management.

As for the proposed ships:

Skirmisher:
loses vs ints, probably figs too, not a scout, costs a bunch to get enh that doesn't excel at any time at any job EXCEPT whoring sfs. Why would you be doing that?

Vanguards: Still beaten by mk3 tech which must be up at the time when you get basic. At what point in the game do you consider using them?

Rearguard: by the time you get their basic version the chances are the enemy has a mk3 tech or they already lost. Which mk3 tech are they supposed to beat?

Hope you aren't upset, I enjoy discussing stuff like this and I reserve the right to be wrong

Phoenix rework - remove all other ships and give each techpath a different style of vanguard.

Discuss.

QUOTE Skirmisher:
loses vs ints, probably figs too, not a scout, costs a bunch to get enh that doesn't excel at any time at any job EXCEPT whoring sfs. Why would you be doing that?[/quote]

Skirmishers aren't designed to beat ints. Well handled; however, they are very capable of beating ints in a fight much in the same way SFs do... except with hyperboost they're considerably better at fighting ints than SFs are. That is to say, hit-and-run tactics with snipers. Same goes for figs, except that the significantly higher hull means that the Skrimishers aren't dead to a seeker.

As for whoring SFs, one of the major problems with tac right now is that it's remarkably hard to a) find and then b) be in range to shoot most SFs.

All of this ignores the entire point of the skirmisher, which is to eye bomb runs early and still provide significant defensive capabilities to a tacspan team. The goal of skirmishers isn't to have 4 skirmishers on, say, miner offense: it's to have 1 skirmisher (who's much better at killing scouts) and 3 SFs. You don't use 10 skirmishers on defense, you use 1 skirmisher to watch the bomb run and call drop. About the only time you'd use a bunch of skirmishers is when you're hunting SBs... which they're very good at.

QUOTE Vanguards: Still beaten by mk3 tech which must be up at the time when you get basic. At what point in the game do you consider using them?[/quote]

I have no idea why you think this is true. I'm not sure how 2 mini-AC 3 on a vanguard that has boosters and an extra 100 shield and can drop minepacks is going to get beaten by hvy ints. Have you seen what Terran does to most hvy int pilots in this game in hvy scouts? Sure the likes of Drizzo or Broodwich would find a way, but please.

QUOTE Rearguard: by the time you get their basic version the chances are the enemy has a mk3 tech or they already lost. Which mk3 tech are they supposed to beat?[/quote]

Ok I'll have to explain the economy to you afterwords. It's clear to me that you don't command just by the concerns you've brought up here and that you don't understand the game states that occur in allegiance. I'll do a quick write-up for you and post it in Gameplay (alongside Vogue's writeup because his is frankly great).

But aside from that, the Rearguard is easily the most powerful of all these ships. You may not have been around for med shield lxy sfs but they were pretty great. Rearguard is basically just med shield lxy sfs but tougher, without cloak, and can use mini-AC instead of sniper. The tradeoff is they're a little bit slower. Which mk3 tech do they beat? Pretty much everything except maybe mini3 hvy ints. But also they're pretty tough so they'd be fairly even with mini3 hvy ints and on any attacking run with, say, HTTs or whatever, do a great job of stopping them.

Finally to bring up just a taste of the economy: there's a reason that this version of Phoenix has a type of spec refs and the original version (I can't remember if I put it here I'm doing this on notepad to hide it from my boss) had a 1.1 yield perk and a .9 cost perk. The point is to be a duel-teching late-game monster like a more-expensive hybrid of Giga and Omicron Hive. The major differences between them is that Giga is much better at expanding and OH has a much cheaper mid/late game.

was I the only one that loled at p1´s idea?

YOU KNOW WHAT ARCHY OU ARE AN @#$%@#

*upon further review of the drunk P1 actually READING archy's post... seirously dude you're an @#$%@#.