Ships The Cutter really takes the wind out of my sails

[Yokoshima]

Granted. But a 100 m/s advantage? Even the Imperial Clipper is not that much faster than other similar ships. It should be 20-30m/s faster, tops. Do this, then make the Cutter more maneuverable.

Look at the Clippers speed vs the FGS/FDS/FAS or even a python. It has much better boost speed. But, more importantly, it has much, much better top speed. Guess what the Cutter doesn't have? I would be very happy to take 40 from the boost speed and throw it on top speed instead. Most of the time it's insane boost does more harm then good in combat anyway.

 

[Zelos1983]

No, ships with more mass should mass lock. More ship = more room for propulsion. Speed isn't a factor for this. For example:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom-class_littoral_combat_ship
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Independence-class_littoral_combat_ship

Check out the ship size and displacement and their top speeds.

Space isn't an ocean. The top speed without Frameshift depends upon the available fuel and the efficiency of the thrusters. The limit is purely a software limit in the flight computer and doesn't relate to any ship characteristics at all. It's arbitrary.

Due to funding allocation based on their society the Federation would likely have the same amount of funding in its military. Hell look at what Hudson does. Economic and diplomatic strengths are useful, but in the end it is always military might that decides the victor.

No it isn't, because diplomacy will get you allies and economic power will allow you to go into a war of attrition. You can afford to loose more ships and engagements and still emerge the victor. Plus, you fight with fleets anyway, not with individual little warships one on one.

"The T9 is also among the super heavies, being larger and having more mass than the Anaconda. I don't see any problems for an imperial loyalist to fly a corvette"

So by your logic, you would think it normal for a fan of random sports team A to wear the clothes of random sports team B? No problem at all?

I don't see what sports has to do with that. Doing business is about choosing the right assets and investments.

Also why would you nerf the Cutter's trading ability? It costs hundreds of million more to A rank. It deserves its trading capabilities.

If you make the cutter an overpowered ship that can do everything best in the game, then others will start complaining about balance. It also takes away the "need" for diversity of ships.

 

[Yokoshima]

Space isn't an ocean. The top speed without Frameshift depends upon the available fuel and the efficiency of the thrusters. The limit is purely a software limit in the flight computer and doesn't relate to any ship characteristics at all. It's arbitrary.

You're right. Its space. A place that is largely without friction and gravity. Even more reason for the Cutter to be fast despite it's size. But you missed the point of my post. The point is, the more room you have, the better propulsion you can equip. The Cutter is huge. Plenty of room for massive thrusters.

 

[Zelos1983]

You're right. Its space. A place that is largely without friction and gravity. Even more reason for the Cutter to be fast despite it's size. But you missed the point of my post. The point is, the more room you have, the better propulsion you can equip. The Cutter is huge. Plenty of room for massive thrusters.

You forget the square/cube law. Volume and mass increase dramatically faster when the overall size of a ship/vehicle/animal increases than the propulsion can keep up with.

So yes, the Cutter can be as fast as any other ship. However, it will accelerate slower than smaller ships with the same (proportional) propulsion technology.

 

[Maruun]

To be honest we need a complete overhaul of how LARGE ships are going to work.

LARGE ships should have not one singel big shield but directional shields left,right, up, down, front back in order to compensate their missing manuverability and being a huge ship that cant be missed.

Turret overhaul:
Small turrets better accuracy against SMALL ships
Medium better accuracy against MEDIUM ships but less accuracy against SMALL ships
Large turrets better accuracy against LARGE Ships less accuracy against MEDIUM ships far less against SMALL ships.
Huge turrets better accuracy against LARGE Ships but slow turning far less against MEDIUM ships, useless against SMALL ships.

They should feel like big ships not big fighters, every large ships right now flys like a big fighter with less manuverability but more firepower...essentialy a heavy fighter...every ship >= Anaconda needs that overhaul.

We are getting to the point were "boom & zoom" construction theme for large ships is completly nonsense....

 

[Don_Von_Hulio]

It looks like a dairy cow so the description fits.

 

[Troa Barton]

Granted. But a 100 m/s advantage? Even the Imperial Clipper is not that much faster than other similar ships. It should be 20-30m/s faster, tops. Do this, then make the Cutter more maneuverable.

The clipper is also one of the fastest ships in the game, despite its weight.

 

[CMDR_UberDude]

We are getting to the point were "boom & zoom" construction theme for large ships is completly nonsense....

The only time I've ever heard "boom and zoom" was during that live stream with Sandro and he was talking about the cutter. I've never heard it in relation to the cervette or the conda. The idea of "boom and zoom" for the cutter doesn't work because of the cutters turn rate. If it turned better than the conda and slightly worse than the corvette. It would work flawlessly and would make sense with the C7 PD. Why? Because the C7 PD would give you just enough juice to alpha strike as you "boom" by the time you're done "booming" you're out of weapon juice and need to "zoom" out to recharge and prepare for another run.

 

[CMDR_UberDude]

The clipper is also the fastest ship in the game, despite its weight.

And it's pitch is amazing. It's what I'd expect a "boom and zoom" ship to be.

 

[Troa Barton]

And it's pitch is amazing. It's what I'd expect a "boom and zoom" ship to be.

It's exactly what a zoom and boom ship is in this game. The only others I would say are in that category are the cobra MKIII and FDL. Others can employ it but those ships can to greater effect the difference with those ships is they can effectively dogfight very well on top of it. The clipper actually thrives using that strategy over dogfighting.

 

[Yokoshima]

You forget the square/cube law. Volume and mass increase dramatically faster when the overall size of a ship/vehicle/animal increases than the propulsion can keep up with.

So yes, the Cutter can be as fast as any other ship. However, it will accelerate slower than smaller ships with the same (proportional) propulsion technology.

Then the thrusters are disproportionally great. Again look at the real world examples I already listed, the much larger (current generation) ship is much faster. Those C8 thrusters have a lot of juice, (over 5000 tonnes at A rank) and the Cutter knows how to get the best out of it. Not weird at all.
Though if you don't like a pseudo-realistic answer like that, there is always the fact that it is a game.

 

[askavir]

Vs its FAS/FDS/FGS counterparts? Really?

If you look at all the ships, the Clipper is clearly on the mid-top side of the armor scale, and on the lower side of the shield scale. That's what I meant.

It has a bit less armor than the FAS or Dropship (the gunship is another tier of ship), but has a bit more shield. If it was better than the FAS at everything it wouldn't be cool.

 

[Yokoshima]

To be honest we need a complete overhaul of how LARGE ships are going to work.

LARGE ships should have not one singel big shield but directional shields left,right, up, down, front back in order to compensate their missing manuverability and being a huge ship that cant be missed.

Turret overhaul:
Small turrets better accuracy against SMALL ships
Medium better accuracy against MEDIUM ships but less accuracy against SMALL ships
Large turrets better accuracy against LARGE Ships less accuracy against MEDIUM ships far less against SMALL ships.
Huge turrets better accuracy against LARGE Ships but slow turning far less against MEDIUM ships, useless against SMALL ships.

They should feel like big ships not big fighters, every large ships right now flys like a big fighter with less manuverability but more firepower...essentialy a heavy fighter...every ship >= Anaconda needs that overhaul.

We are getting to the point were "boom & zoom" construction theme for large ships is completly nonsense....

I kind of agree. The turret thing is still an issue though, they are very weak. If you buffed them to the levels needed for proper big ship combat, then you will need a way to exclude small ships from using them. The main reason being small ships can easily bring them to bear and avoid damage. If ships had the Cutter's pitch, due to size, most would break LoS. And, imo, big ships need more than turrets. They need big weapons. Long range bombardment. Weak at close range (poor tracking/RoF) but devastating weapons. But again there is the issue that all ships use the same modules. Not to mention tiny differences between PDs, shields strengths (relative to maneuverability) etc. The directional shield thing is kinda cool, but it would be quite the overhaul. The whole combat system would need to be reworked from the ground up to accommodate proper "big ship" combat.
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Aside from that though, there is a certain elegance in FDs current system. With all combat being dogfighting, and the super-heavies having, relative to size, mediocre gain for a massive loss to maneuverability/top speed. As a result they do not render small ships obsolete. A Vulture can out perform an Anconda in a few situations, and a Clipper/FAS/FDL/Python can best an Anaconda in many combat situations. FD said they didn't want "end all" ships for pilots (such as capitol ships) and that philosophy had laid the groundwork for the combat system we have today.

 

[askavir]

because in general, slower ships should mass lock faster ships.

No. Ships with more mass should mass-lock ships with less mass. This would make sense, but there are already hard-coded exceptions anyway...

 

[askavir]

And yes, you can fly circles around an NPC Conda, but they can't fly circles around you if you were in the conda yourself (unless you are doing it terribly wrong), with the cutter on the other hand...

True, NPCs are terrible pilots... The fabled AI improvements were giving the npcs top weapons and military armor.

 

[Yokoshima]

If you look at all the ships, the Clipper is clearly on the mid-top side of the armor scale, and on the lower side of the shield scale. That's what I meant.

It has a bit less armor than the FAS or Dropship (the gunship is another tier of ship), but has a bit more shield. If it was better than the FAS at everything it wouldn't be cool.

FAS has much, much better weapon placement and better "out of the blue" pitch. When comparing combat ships though, the Clipper is the counterpart to the FDS, FAS, and to an extent, the FGS (which I find much worse than the FDS do to lacking internals/pitch for just 2 c1s). Some even say the Python is a counterpart to the Clipper. So those are the ships I used. The imperial eagle has crap shields vs the Conda for example, but that's not the ship to compare it to (imo).

 

[CMDR_UberDude]

Then the thrusters are disproportionally great. Again look at the real world examples I already listed, the much larger (current generation) ship is much faster. Those C8 thrusters have a lot of juice, (over 5000 tonnes at A rank) and the Cutter knows how to get the best out of it. Not weird at all.
Though if you don't like a pseudo-realistic answer like that, there is always the fact that it is a game.

Yea I just used the Coriolis shipyard to do some comparing and it really has me confused. Technically the cutter should be more maneuverable than the corvette, by a large margin. Going based off Optimal weight of the thrusters and the weight of the ship. But unfortunately FDev uses some kind of base modifier for maneuverability in ships. And for some reason it's set stupidly low in the Cutter.

 

[Skyrun]

I haven't seen following advantage of the cutter mentioned:
The cutter can masslock an anaconda but the anaconda can not masslock a cutter. I think it is the same for the corvette but haven't verified it myself.
In combination with its superior speed this is a significant advantage. The cutter has the option to low wake the other big ships don't have this option if fighting a cutter

DISCLAMER: I am an absolute NOOB in wing PVP. This is just all hypothetical theory...
In wing battles this could be a important advantage compared to the other big ships. If one wing has cutters and the other not the big ships of the side without cutter will have only the possibility to high wake. The cutters will have always the option to low wake.
If you choose the battlefield on a place where high-waked ships really take long to get back (e.g. Hutton Orbital ) it sounds like an important advantage.
Probably cutters will be the first target to get down because of that. Again because it is faster than the other big ships this could be used as an advantage for the cutter side. Perhaps they are able to fight the small ships with the big ships just having to watch.

For me the cutter could play an important role in the wing battles. It will keep mid distance. Always ready to mass lock fleeing ships and trying to divide the enemy small ships from the big ones.

Anyway I am a complete Noob in large wing PvP. It sounds reasonable to me. Perhaps Gluttonfang or other experts can tell if the above is complete bull or not.

 

[Yokoshima]

Yea I just used the Coriolis shipyard to do some comparing and it really has me confused. Technically the cutter should be more maneuverable than the corvette, by a large margin. Going based off Optimal weight of the thrusters and the weight of the ship. But unfortunately FDev uses some kind of base modifier for maneuverability in ships. And for some reason it's set stupidly low in the Cutter.

I think the thrusters represent potential power, and its up to a ships design how it is used (or wasted). The manufactures of the T-9 and Cutter were...special.

 

[Yokoshima]

I haven't seen following advantage of the cutter mentioned:
The cutter can masslock an anaconda but the anaconda can not masslock a cutter. I think it is the same for the corvette but haven't verified it myself.
In combination with its superior speed this is a significant advantage. The cutter has the option to low wake the other big ships don't have this option if fighting a cutter

DISCLAMER: I am an absolute NOOB in wing PVP. This is just all hypothetical theory...
In wing battles this could be a important advantage compared to the other big ships. If one wing has cutters and the other not the big ships of the side without cutter will have only the possibility to high wake. The cutters will have always the option to low wake.
If you choose the battlefield on a place where high-waked ships really take long to get back (e.g. Hutton Orbital ) it sounds like an important advantage.
Probably cutters will be the first target to get down because of that. Again because it is faster than the other big ships this could be used as an advantage for the cutter side. Perhaps they are able to fight the small ships with the big ships just having to watch.

For me the cutter could play an important role in the wing battles. It will keep mid distance. Always ready to mass lock fleeing ships and trying to divide the enemy small ships from the big ones.

Anyway I am a complete Noob in large wing PvP. It sounds reasonable to me. Perhaps Gluttonfang or other experts can tell if the above is complete bull or not.

I have read a lot about PvP, but I could be wrong.

In "controlled" systems low waking isn't an option - someone else will just hunt you down. If it keeps a mild distance, it is effectively out of the fight (and PvP in this game, like almost all games, relies on burst damage). Add to that that the Cutter has such horrible pitch a lone FDL or Clipper could easily get rid of it.
But the meta shouldn't change much. Right now we already have ships that can mass all other's but themselves. Its not an issue right now.
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But lets say its 4 Cutters v. 4 Corvettes. The Corvettes (assuming equal skill) will just chase the Cutter's away. The Corvette with its great maneuverability (for it's size), dual C4s, and C8 PD is a better "hit and run" ship, though it lacks the speed. However if a Cutter tried to use "hit and run" on a Corvette the Corvette would use the Cutters only strength against it. Because when you are approaching a ship, they are approaching you too. Not only does the Corvette have much better Alpha damage, but it can whip around and keep blasting for a good while the Cutter gets out of range again.