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As I understand it, nerve gas missiles were originally a belter cruiser weapon only. Giving them to every faction's sbs has somewhat diminished belters individuality, but that's a minor aside.

Fact is, NG sbs never get used. Let's look at ze numbers:

QUOTE Assume all values for ship speed, station shield etc are normal. Assume clk 3. Assume base scale is zero.

NG sb:
Arm missile at 2264m.
Fire at 744m.
It takes 19secs to load and arm missile.
Against garr, starbase, or adv tech it'll be eyed as soon as it mounts missiles.
Against tech and minor stations it'll be eyed 2 secs after it mounts missiles. Just 17 secs to go.

Regular sbs:
You need 2 ab1s to take down a techbases shields, 3 for an adv techbase or garrison, 4 for a starbase. So you need an appropriate number of escorting sbs.
A sb needs to arm missiles at 2120m.
Fire at 1400m.
It takes 10secs to load and arm missile.
Against starbase it'll be eyed 1.1 secs after mounting
Garrison, 6.25 secs
Adv tech, .6 secs after it's fired.
Tech/minor stations, 4 secs after firing.

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Now, there's two way to do this. And it hurt my brain to figure the numbers out for this.
1) Time everything so that missiles hit at the same time. The NG sb needs to start 896m closer to the base.
Against tech or minor stations: The NG will be eyed 14 secs before the sbs.
Against adv tech: The NG will be eyed 20.6 secs before the sbs.
Against garr: The NG will be eyed 18.3 secs before the sbs.
Against star: The NG will be eyed 13.1 secs before the sbs.

2) Time it so that everyone gets eyed at the same time.
Against tech/minor: NG sets up 1020m further away. At time of eying, 1st wave of abs are 1sec away from impacting, but there is a 12 sec delay before NG is ready to fire.
Against adv tech: NG sets up 750m further away. 1st wave of abs are 4.4secs from impact, but 17sec delay for NG.
Against Garr: NG sets up 900m further away. Sbs are 3.8 secs from launching 1st wave, 19sec delay before NG is ready.
Against star: NG sets up 1125m further away. Sbs are 8.9 secs from launching 1st wave, 19sec delay before NG is ready.
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Of course, if the NG is destroyed, you want a 2nd wave of sbs to destroy the station.
If you were following the first approach, of having all missiles hit at the same time, it's just a simple matter of having the 2nd wave setup ~200m further back than the other sbs.
However, for the 2nd option (time for more brain pain):
At the time the NG launches you want the 2nd wave of sbs to be 5 secs from launching (NG missile takes 3secs longer to travel as AB does, plus 2 sec margin of safety). So they need to setup 400m further than the NG. That is:
Minor/tech: +1500 than other sbs
Adv tech: +1150 than other sbs
Garr: +1300
Star: +1500[/quote]

That's enough numbers. So why doesn't NG sb get used more often?
Cons:
Costs extra money to research (5k iirc)Costs $1000 per missileHas 150% base signature (compared to the htts or normal sbs base signature of 100%)Can not mount hunters so sucks at defending itselfCan't mount heavy cloakRequires extremely good coordination with other sbs so that enough ABs hit to take down the shields, but not so many to destroy the base.As the numbers show, the extremely short range means there is a 17 to 19 second delay where the NG sb is completely eyed by the enemy team and isn't in position to fire.There is always the risk that the NG sb is destroyed before it launches the missile, and you didn't commit enough regular sbs to destroy the station. Even bigger waste of cash than a normal failed sb run.Pros:
Can capture a stationCan approach from any direction, unlike an htt... that's all.
But do we want to see NG sbs more often in games? If so how can we balance it to make it more appealing, but not completely overpowered?

1. Reduce the cost of using NG sbs
-Reduce the cost of NG research, or tie it in with regular sbs
-Make the ship cost more but the missiles free
-Reduce cost of NG missiles

2. Reduce the time the NG sb is eyed
-Give the NG sb regular base signature
-Reduce the signature on the missile
-Reduce load time so you can get closer before mounting.
-Increase range of missile (would also make it harder to defend against since you have to travel further to kill ng sb)
-Allow the NG sb to mount heavy cloak - it would need to engage it so early it wouldn't be super overpowered, especially if you reduce energy (although that would affect its ability to get in position using sig clk)

3. Change the way NG is used
-Get rid of the missile and make the sb have to dock - in other words make it a stealth htt.
-Or allow NG missiles to be mounted on bombers instead of sbs - would allow for different tactics.
-Allow the NG missile to damage shields, so the NG sb doesn't have to rely on other sbs. Would require a lowering of missile cost, probably.
-Allow NG sb to mount regular ABs.

4. Make the NG sb more likely to survive long enough to fire
- Increase hitpoints a bit.

4) perk the range of NG missiles.

mmm.. yeah I agree. I don't think I've seen them used efficiently before, even in a SG where we insisted on it.

I think you'd see them used more often if you let NG's hold all standard SB missiles as well to shoot first (AB) and reduced the cost of NG missiles to saaayyy... 250 a pop... Makes a pretty versatile stealth bomber/htt at the cost of a reg. bomber.

Keep the higher sig and slow load times though. Capping a base should be hard... With mein idea, it would be reasonably possible to NG a major tech base with a couple of NG pilots.

@Phoenix
That's really under 2), since longer range -> launch earlier -> eyed less

Eh I didn't see it anywhere in the list figured I'd pop it in there.

IMO the only usefulness in an NG SB is to

A)Capture a dreg spec ref (giga ones are fairly easy to defend)

Capture a ref to piss the enemy team off/waste time

C)At best capture a teleport

Capturing a base that allows people to dock/launch is, well, $#@!ing hard to do.

1. Put NG under Exp and let HTTs fire them, which ties in with your idea about giving 'em to Bombers.
2. Get rid of NG SBs and just let regular SBs mount them for a price. I prefer this instead of letting NG SBs mount ABs, because it gets rid of a ship for the same outcome.

I kinda like the SB/HTT combo though, but would they mount ABs or EMP missiles? If it's the latter it makes SBs much too strong.

In regards to Rix I like giving normal Rix SBs Station Drones and the ability to mount NG. That would be schweet.

I agree with lowering the barriers to NG SB use, but I'm not so confident about making it easier to use. Whatever the result, it needs to be harder to use than HTT otherwise it's just too unbalanced and NGs end up doing a better job at capping than HTT - which doesn't make sense.

CronoDroid wrote:QUOTE (CronoDroid @ Apr 29 2009, 05:40 PM) In regards to Rix I like giving normal Rix SBs Station Drones and the ability to mount NG. That would be schweet.

No... just no. Allow a Rix SB to solo cap a base is stupid.

Mr. Kltplzyxm wrote:QUOTE (Mr. Kltplzyxm @ Apr 29 2009, 05:44 PM) I agree with lowering the barriers to NG SB use, but I'm not so confident about making it easier to use. Whatever the result, it needs to be harder to use than HTT otherwise it's just too unbalanced and NGs end up doing a better job at capping than HTT - which doesn't make sense.

This is an issue with HTTs, because they are VERY hard to use. First off there's only like ten people who can really fly HTTs anyway, secondly, you almost always need to have the enemy's green door facing and close to an aleph or you will get annihilated while you're trying to turn around, and lastly, as soon as you get your HTT eyed that severely diminishes your chances of successfully capping.

If you think NG should be harder to use than HTTs, you have to perk HTTs or you might as well leave NGs as it because they're both ridiculous if you're even close to having even teams (and doubly so when the enemy is Exp).

QUOTE No... just no. Allow a Rix SB to solo cap a base is stupid.[/quote]

"Allow" is a nice word because it means the Rix SB CAN solo cap bases, but in reality that just will never happen. If it takes 19 seconds to arm NG, at the range you're dropping SDs, you'll be eyed immediately and have to wait all that time before you can fire the NG missile. Plus 80% of the time you'll be eyed dropping SDs anyway.