Buff the Federal Dropship

[Rubbernuke]

Theoretically yes. I especially like the idea with more seats for the Gunship. It would really need that to be what it should be. (Mind you, from the medium federals, i consider it the only one still useful in some tasks. But more seats would really help it a lot in a play-with-friends environment... unlikely as that is to still happen for me, after all the things FD did to drive people away. )

On all the other buffs discussed here, i dare to point out that the FAS was a well renowned combat ship at some time and the FDS also was seen as a competent one. No the best there is, but able to do very well. And once again, the disaster which broke it all has the same name: engineering.

So again i do believe that if engineering, after all these years of damaging the game, would finally be nerfed down and brought under control, ships like the FDS could also once again shine. Indeed not by being the "best" choice. But there's only so many things to do, so not all of the ships we have can be the best at something. But being a reasonable choice already would go such a long way and i would welcome that a lot.

The other way is to enhance other aspects of the game- for example:

make engines much more delicate: this would then make the Alliance ships have much more of a weakness since they are stuck out like they are

make retracting hardpoints inside the ship protect said modules from incoming fire (so weapons take on the hulls protection)

 

[Insanerobert]

Theoretically yes. I especially like the idea with more seats for the Gunship. It would really need that to be what it should be. (Mind you, from the medium federals, i consider it the only one still useful in some tasks. But more seats would really help it a lot in a play-with-friends environment... unlikely as that is to still happen for me, after all the things FD did to drive people away. )

On all the other buffs discussed here, i dare to point out that the FAS was a well renowned combat ship at some time and the FDS also was seen as a competent one. No the best there is, but able to do very well. And once again, the disaster which broke it all has the same name: engineering.

So again i do believe that if engineering, after all these years of damaging the game, would finally be nerfed down and brought under control, ships like the FDS could also once again shine. Indeed not by being the "best" choice. But there's only so many things to do, so not all of the ships we have can be the best at something. But being a reasonable choice already would go such a long way and i would welcome that a lot.

Since I am using the Federal Assault Ship for PVE combat, I really love it and I greatly enjoy it's capability to dance around enemies, while the 2x L and 2x M hardpoints can do pretty decent damage and with Long-Range engineering it really suits my playstyle. I am somewhat disappointed with the Cannons performance, though - I still use them since I like to tap and damage enemies once on target, but the damage per shot and the Debuff of High-Yeld experimental effect really make those weapons weaker when compared to other options.

 

[Fizzatron]

OR!! They introduce a NEW passenger cabins called “troop transports” and missions to go with them. No auto landing, taking fire as you come down, land on beacon and sit for a short deployment period, then take off and return to turn in mission.

this would give another Avenue for players to jump into planetary conflict zones.

+1 I've thought of this too when it comes to giving ships some role in surface conflicts, ie; be the ship sending in reinforcements under heavy fire etc..

 

[Gordon Freeman IV]

The Federal Dropship is the ugly stepchild of the Federal family. It's basically a Gunship that's lost the two small hardpoints, the fighter bay, and 25% hull and shields in exchange for...what, exactly?

10% more speed. That's literally it.

I think this is the most neglected ship in the game, and that's saying something considering the Asp Scout exists.

I have a few ideas for how this ship could be buffed.

Option 1: Make it into the medium Federal Hauler.

The Corvette is a perfectly decent mining ship, and is actually the best passenger transport in the game. The Dropship could take this even further.

Just give it an additional C6 Optional, boosting its maximum cargo capacity to 230. Also, convert its unrestricted C4 slot into a C5, bringing its cargo capacity up to 246. This is well above the Gunship, but still 4 cargo shy of the Clipper, but with the added benefit of the 2x C4 Military optionals, making it a slower but more durable hull tank trade ship, in keeping with the Federal doctrine.

It would remain significantly below the T7 and Python in cargo space as well, but would be cheaper than either of them. Overall, it would be a very viable ship for mining or cargo runs into dangerous territory.

Option 2: Buff its utility and durability.

Rather than making it a more purpose-built trader, make it into a more general utilitarian ship, trading outright firepower for durability and options.

The Dropship currently has 4 Utility Slots which are all on the bottom side, leaving it quite vulnerable to missile attacks on its top and back sides, which can lead to thrusters quickly being disabled and the ship being destroyed. This is a critical flaw for a ship which is nominally a hull tank.

Firstly, add Utility slots to the topside of the ship. There is plenty of space for them to be placed here; the simplest way would be to put one directly above the cockpit, where the Gunship has its two small hardpoints, and a second on the back/top of the ship. If additional utility slots are wanted, they could easily be placed in the same place as the Gunship's top-oriented utility slots. These would not be as useful, however, since they can only protect one side of the ship, and so should be a second choice over the more optimal center-line placements.

View attachment 283643
The yellows indicate the location of the proposed new utility slots.



This alone would make a big difference in the ship's utility; having 8x utility slots would make this a unique ship among mediums, and give it tremendous options for carrying both Point Defense AND Shield Boosters, not to mention boosting its firepower with well-timed heat sink usage. And because of its relatively low base shields, it wouldn't become impossibly durable, at least not with a shield-tank focus.

In addition to this, compliment the ship's increased shield durability by buffing its Armor Hardness. The current front-runner is the T10 with 75 hardness, but I see no reason why the Dropship, purpose-built to punch through planetary defenses and safely drop its payload, couldn't be updated to have hardness even better than that, especially given the current weakness of hull tanks in general. Buff its armor hardness to 80, making this ship a tough nut to crack for smaller ships, and quite durable even against larger ones.

This would give you a ship that's got less firepower than the Gunship, loses its fighter bay, but gains a significant amount of durability and a huge amount of options via utility slots and hardness for various builds.

One way or another, the dropship desperately needs some help. Either or neither of these might be the right path, but it clearly needs something.

Maybe make it jump. Its a multipurpose but has worse jump range than corvette

 

[cmdr Ramius007]

Dropship is best dps/credist if we would use such stat. Best thing to balance dropship would be giving ships landing fees related with ship rebuy and much higher rebuy prices, and making pve challanging more often, in galaxy where money doesnt matter it's hard to balance anything, and siriously, best you can do here is to nerf Krait jump range and maybe 2sec boost interval even on c6 distributor rather than anything else really, but it's fdev, they dont care, they dont do anything to balance, just check missions difficulty to rewards sometimes or land on small pad settlement to see a lot of 700 tons cargo missions to it, you realize devs not play game and dont give a ****

 

[SergMx]

General - Improvement Federal Drop Ship

I do not quite understand why I am thrown off the ship in the suit and if I am flying my ship and stopped at the ground I can not do it myself, letting go of my ship. I propose to make such a possibility for all ships and FDS could still drop both types of SRV. I think it's time to make...

forums.frontier.co.uk

 

[YoEgo]

The FDS is a combat-oriented multi-role ship, the particular idea of combat in the Federation: sturdy ships with paper shields.

It has as many modules as Python, and for a third of the price. It has as many modules as Python, and for a third of the price. It can do everything you set your mind to, it may not be the best, but it will do a good job.

Simply, use ships suitable for suitable jobs, the FDS is a ship to do risky work, not to take tourists to visit a star, use a Orca, nor to load up on tea to take them on a walk through high security systems, use a T-9 ... he is there to go to hard places, shoot a few shots and come back with scars after having done his job. There's another ship made for that, and that's the Alliance Challenger... and no one likes this kind of ship, simply, because no one understands its purpose. But that is the purpose of these ships: to do all kinds of work in risk areas, and that is why they fall into the category of combat ships but do not fit completely into it ... and seek to change them.

And if anyone wonders why it is not used for personnel descents... Think it's twice the size of a Vulture, you could carry an entire company with its support vehicles... This is ED, not Total War.

 

[SergMx]

The FDS is a combat-oriented multi-role ship, the particular idea of combat in the Federation: sturdy ships with paper shields.

It has as many modules as Python, and for a third of the price. It has as many modules as Python, and for a third of the price. It can do everything you set your mind to, it may not be the best, but it will do a good job.

Simply, use ships suitable for suitable jobs, the FDS is a ship to do risky work, not to take tourists to visit a star, use a Orca, nor to load up on tea to take them on a walk through high security systems, use a T-9 ... he is there to go to hard places, shoot a few shots and come back with scars after having done his job. There's another ship made for that, and that's the Alliance Challenger... and no one likes this kind of ship, simply, because no one understands its purpose. But that is the purpose of these ships: to do all kinds of work in risk areas, and that is why they fall into the category of combat ships but do not fit completely into it ... and seek to change them.

And if anyone wonders why it is not used for personnel descents... Think it's twice the size of a Vulture, you could carry an entire company with its support vehicles... This is ED, not Total War.

When making money like in the game, the cost of average ships does not matter.
If it's not Total War maybe you should have used then Sidewinder will end up being less of a drag.

And as I wrote in another post, there is no role division in the game (except for combat slots and staterooms). You can carry stimulants or dig ores on any one of them.

 

[YoEgo]

Money may not be important, but that's for you to use the ship you like best. If we give buff to the least used, in the end they will all end up being the same.

There are roles, and there are ships that we can prepare to perform its, some better than others. We have seen how the AI uses T-9, or ASP for combat... and how well they go, but, despite hating the Challeger, they are a pimple in the butt when handled by the AI and are high-level, and still carry a decent cargo hold. There is no ship specially made for mining like in other games, so anyone will have to be worth it.

As in everything, there are extremes, and it is what is sought because they are simpler to do: a cargo ship only needs cargo space, nothing to worry about weapons or shields. The same if you are dedicated to the transport of personnel. Something more complicated, in the aspect of assembling the ship, is to dedicate oneself to war.

But it is much more so to achieve balance in a ship that does several roles at the same time, such as the FDS or the Challenger. And much more when you try to fit into a unique role that moves away from the concept of this ship. You have to fit what you want to do with having a good defense, and there are times when the puzzle does not fit as we would like: it is not fast enough, or it does not have as much armor as we want, or its jumping ability is diminished, etc. Decisions that in a pure role you don't have to make.

Try doing the same thing with an FDS and with an FGS, or with a FAS, in the concept of doing several roles at the same time, and then you will see that the number of modules and its sizes that the first one has is decisive for those jobs, and you'll still have a decent fighting force. Use the FAS for close combat, and the FGS for battles with comrades, and the FDS for everything, It will do well, though not as much as the others, and it's the cheapest ship.

 

[Sylow]

The other way is to enhance other aspects of the game- for example:

make engines much more delicate: this would then make the Alliance ships have much more of a weakness since they are stuck out like they are

make retracting hardpoints inside the ship protect said modules from incoming fire (so weapons take on the hulls protection)

Under the theory that a ships shields go down, this would be an interesting thing. Just like different hardpoint distributions would then make sense. (You could quickly disarm ships with oh so perfectly grouped together hardpoints with just a few missiles. But you need piles of missiles to do the same on ship like the Clipper. )

But as long as we can insanely stack up shields and nothing can ever do harm to our modules as long as shields are up, it just is pointless. I do remember times when some of my ships regularily took hull damage, and i kept fighting while waiting for the shields to return. It just does not happen any more these days... my shields are just too tough.

It's also a curious thing about the above mentioned Krait Mk II. I find it the most enjoyable SLF carrying combat ship. Speed, agility, firepower, it all fits well together. It does have a weaker base shield than many alternatives, even before pondering that some alternatives also have two more utility slots, allowing even more engineering and thus even more powerful shields. But its shields are still more than you usually need. Which completely covers up one other inherent weakness of this ship: very low hull hardness. No matter how much HRPs you put in and how much you engineer them, the Kraits hulls never can be as tough and durable as some other ships hull.

If you could not engineer your shields to such crazily overpowered levels, the mentioned weaknesses of the Kraits would really be an issue. But as long as engineering is the way it is, it's the only thing that matters.

 

[Rubbernuke]

Under the theory that a ships shields go down, this would be an interesting thing. Just like different hardpoint distributions would then make sense. (You could quickly disarm ships with oh so perfectly grouped together hardpoints with just a few missiles. But you need piles of missiles to do the same on ship like the Clipper. )

But as long as we can insanely stack up shields and nothing can ever do harm to our modules as long as shields are up, it just is pointless. I do remember times when some of my ships regularily took hull damage, and i kept fighting while waiting for the shields to return. It just does not happen any more these days... my shields are just too tough.

It's also a curious thing about the above mentioned Krait Mk II. I find it the most enjoyable SLF carrying combat ship. Speed, agility, firepower, it all fits well together. It does have a weaker base shield than many alternatives, even before pondering that some alternatives also have two more utility slots, allowing even more engineering and thus even more powerful shields. But its shields are still more than you usually need. Which completely covers up one other inherent weakness of this ship: very low hull hardness. No matter how much HRPs you put in and how much you engineer them, the Kraits hulls never can be as tough and durable as some other ships hull.

If you could not engineer your shields to such crazily overpowered levels, the mentioned weaknesses of the Kraits would really be an issue. But as long as engineering is the way it is, it's the only thing that matters.

In an ideal world I would love shields and particularly boosters to have much higher power draw, and / or engineering on powerplants and shields dropped to G1 levels (with the bonus of making Guardian modules really useful).

 

[Sylow]

In an ideal world I would love shields and particularly boosters to have much higher power draw, and / or engineering on powerplants and shields dropped to G1 levels (with the bonus of making Guardian modules really useful).

Merely power draw on shields and boosters is not doing it. I mean, shields themselves in old times were fine. SBs even at old times generelly were a bit more valuable than other utility slot options. (And people adjusted their setups accordingly, to have more power for SBs. )

So i guess you actually mean to give the engineering effect of shields and SBs to really increase the items power draw. At first glance this seems attractive, but i think that people will just find more workarounds for that. It's the actual massive power of these items which needs to be reduced.

Anyways, i would very much welcome any attempt to cut into the crazy defense stacking we have now. But i think that diminishing returns on resist stacking and capacity stacking would actually go over better than increasing the power use. Existing setups would still be functional after the change, merely everything would be more vulnerable again. Which would mean that combat could be a bit more challenging again. Some players would resist it, write thousands of forum postings again, etc. but i think most players would understand.

In contrast: Increasing power draw on those modules would result in many ship setups suddenly not working any more. Including the one of the explorer, thousands of jumps away from the next station. This would really be a massive explosion of the community.

 

[Rubbernuke]

Merely power draw on shields and boosters is not doing it. I mean, shields themselves in old times were fine. SBs even at old times generelly were a bit more valuable than other utility slot options. (And people adjusted their setups accordingly, to have more power for SBs. )

So i guess you actually mean to give the engineering effect of shields and SBs to really increase the items power draw. At first glance this seems attractive, but i think that people will just find more workarounds for that. It's the actual massive power of these items which needs to be reduced.

Anyways, i would very much welcome any attempt to cut into the crazy defense stacking we have now. But i think that diminishing returns on resist stacking and capacity stacking would actually go over better than increasing the power use. Existing setups would still be functional after the change, merely everything would be more vulnerable again. Which would mean that combat could be a bit more challenging again. Some players would resist it, write thousands of forum postings again, etc. but i think most players would understand.

In contrast: Increasing power draw on those modules would result in many ship setups suddenly not working any more. Including the one of the explorer, thousands of jumps away from the next station. This would really be a massive explosion of the community.

For me the ideal is to make it a choice between sheilds, weapons and speed- you can't have everything. So, if you go big on the shield you can;t also be fast or use high end energy weapons.

 

[Sylow]

For me the ideal is to make it a choice between sheilds, weapons and speed- you can't have everything. So, if you go big on the shield you can;t also be fast or use high end energy weapons.

I get the idea. But i fear that boat has sailed, as introducing that would leave many players setups non-operational. While "merely" hitting hard at resist stacking and shield capacity stacking will not break those ships. They still get something for all the SBs they have slotted. They might at some time consider if other utility options would do more for them and might replace some, but it would not leave them stranded.

 

[DemiserofD]

I get the idea. But i fear that boat has sailed, as introducing that would leave many players setups non-operational. While "merely" hitting hard at resist stacking and shield capacity stacking will not break those ships. They still get something for all the SBs they have slotted. They might at some time consider if other utility options would do more for them and might replace some, but it would not leave them stranded.

Something I've thought about for a while is, why not change Explosive damage to be more effective against shields, rather than armor?

Right now, missiles are completely OP against hulls, since they utterly wreck modules, while being completely ineffective against shields, doing both reduced damage AND not damaging any modules. This means that shield users can stack infinite shields with no worries, while hull users must carefully consider point defense and ECM and the like to survive, since a single hit can disable.

But if you inverted that, then the game would suddenly become a lot more balanced. If missiles did 40% extra damage to shields, and -40% damage to hulls -- indeed, reduce the armor piercing of missiles, as well, so they're even less effective against particularly large, durable ships -- then suddenly, it's the shield tanks that would need to take Point Defense to defend themselves, while the hull tanks have more leeway!

This, in turn, means that shield tanks can't take as many shield boosters, which means less total shields stacked, so it hits on multiple fronts, not only making missiles better, but ALL weapons better against shields.

Seems to me like a win/win. ECM/Point Defense become more useful, shields are weaker, hull tanks stronger, the game is more diverse...everyone wins! Except the people who like the current, stale meta.

 

[Gordon Freeman IV]

Your entire post makes me sad for so many reasons. Mainly because I love the Krait. I want to need it soooo bad! To me, it’s the coolest ship in the game. However… I have zero use for it. Combat? Nope! I tend to gravitate to the big boys like the corvette, Anaconda and 10. Trade? Nope! Cutter is my horse of choice and if it’s medium pad trade or passengers, it’s the python. Exploration?? Nope nope. It’s slightly less cool sister ship the phantom and it’s iligitimate father the asp X are my go too ponies in that arena. Ok, then medium ship combat??? No again! The gun ship, crusader, and mamba come out swinging in ways that are thrilling and scary that leave the krait feeling lacking….

literally, the krait is the coolest ship in the game that people fly just because of its cool. Sadly, it’s a ship absolutely no one needs for any other reason. It’s jump range only slightly beats out the python, and if I were going to make it a serious jumper.., why wouldn’t I just use the phantom? I would sacrifice 20 or so light years just for its cool factor. And if I’m doing that, I might as well bring a bigger ship with more toys.

In so many words, the krait is the coolest ship in the game, that by the time you can afford it, no one has a need for it.

I mained krait 2 for 3 years. That thing beats the life out of NPCs and is faster than python. While having SLFs and 3L,2M hardpoints. Its Class 7 distributor and plant make loadouts very versitile. As far as medium ship combat goes krait is awesome. It also slightly edges out the python in deep core mining as its faster and shorter for getting in the tight spaces to blast bits off.

 

[Sylow]

Something I've thought about for a while is, why not change Explosive damage to be more effective against shields, rather than armor?
[...]

I guess what you'd propose is to reduce a shields explosive resists, while boosting the one of hull. Sorry, that is about 6 years late. In old times it would have mattered, but does not any more thanks to engineers. Looking at my Krait MK II, its resists are near 60%, with my explosive resist actually being a little over it. Which indeed could still be fine-tuned a little, but it just does not matter at all.

Would my shields resist to explosive be reduced, my setup with "merely" running three shield boosters would indeed suffer. I'd have to dedicate a fourth to fill the "resist hole". It would eliminate the kill warrant scanner from my setup and in general would hurt ships with "only" two of four utility slots a lot. But those with six utility slots (see: FDL, Mamba and the big three) have enough utility slots to easily compensate for the proposed change.

In effect, it would hurt the weaker ships a lot, while merely requiring some limited re-engineering on the meta ships, making those ships even more powerful compared to the rest.

Your suggestion would have worked and made sense before engineers came around. But with engineers and how you can stack up resists, it would do a lot of damage without doing any good.

 

[DemiserofD]

I guess what you'd propose is to reduce a shields explosive resists, while boosting the one of hull. Sorry, that is about 6 years late. In old times it would have mattered, but does not any more thanks to engineers. Looking at my Krait MK II, its resists are near 60%, with my explosive resist actually being a little over it. Which indeed could still be fine-tuned a little, but it just does not matter at all.

Would my shields resist to explosive be reduced, my setup with "merely" running three shield boosters would indeed suffer. I'd have to dedicate a fourth to fill the "resist hole". It would eliminate the kill warrant scanner from my setup and in general would hurt ships with "only" two of four utility slots a lot. But those with six utility slots (see: FDL, Mamba and the big three) have enough utility slots to easily compensate for the proposed change.

In effect, it would hurt the weaker ships a lot, while merely requiring some limited re-engineering on the meta ships, making those ships even more powerful compared to the rest.

Your suggestion would have worked and made sense before engineers came around. But with engineers and how you can stack up resists, it would do a lot of damage without doing any good.

I don't think they could easily compensate. For example, if they have a few resistance boosters already, the bonus given by taking a blast-resistant booster would only be about ~25%.

By contrast, a well-used point defense or ECM can reduce damage from missiles to zero.

It's already smaller ships that have more to fear from seeker missiles, I don't think it would inordinately hurt them. If anything, it'll help them, since they'll now take less module damage from the missiles they can ill afford to take.

 

[Sylow]

I don't think they could easily compensate. For example, if they have a few resistance boosters already, the bonus given by taking a blast-resistant booster would only be about ~25%.

By contrast, a well-used point defense or ECM can reduce damage from missiles to zero.

It's already smaller ships that have more to fear from seeker missiles, I don't think it would inordinately hurt them. If anything, it'll help them, since they'll now take less module damage from the missiles they can ill afford to take.

That is very optimistic. I have tooled around a lot with PDs some years ago, during one beta. And it did not make PDs shine in a too good light. Indeed, a single PD has about a 50% chance to shoot down a single missile fired at you from almost 2.5km away. If the attacker fires from an angle where the PD can shoot at the missile during the complete flight time.

But fights in ED usually are at shorter range and the rarely will an attacker permanently stay in a PDs firing arc. And that's before even looking at the situation of an attacker having two missile launchers. So unless PDs get miracle-buffed, you'd at most ships have to run at least 3 of them to compensate for the resist gap.

Which means that smaller ships take the beating, while big ships with their 6 or 8 utility slots might actually combine both, to get maximum resists and have the necessary number of PDs. Mind you, i'd appreciate missiles being made more useful, but in no way would your proposed change ever fix the current issue of resist stacking.

Only if PDs would be made extremely powerful, it would make sense to replace a fully engineered SB with a PD. Which then would make missiles worthless again. As long as engineering is as powerful as it is, we're at a deadlock here. No way to solve this problem by just making something stronger. It merely would hurt all the ships with less than at least six utility slots and thus even more reinforce the domination of the already now most prominent ships.

On why i have not even spoken about ECM yet: you ever tried to use them against missiles? A good pilot might use it to fend of the first volley of missiles, despite it being extermely clumsy to use with its chargeup time. (I really would expect a defensive system to charge up and be ready for when you need it... ) But even worse, it has quite a long recharge time. So the best it can do is to fend off one volley of missiles, then takes quite a long break, where your shields have to absorb them. Hope you did your engineering there... better to have more SBs with explosive resists, if the shields would be changed according to your idea and perhaps don't waste the precious utility slots on ECM.

In the hands of an excellent pilot, who can reliably control the distance to an attacker and keep the incoming missiles in the firing arc, the PDs can at least theoretically be a valuable tool. Not so for the ECM. As long as it has the charge-up mechanic and the long recharge, carrying it is quite pointless. (Unless you expect to be attacked by reverb cascade torpedoes, that is. But i could not remember having ever been attacked by those, i only destroyed my own shields a few times when learning how to use reverb mines... ) The buff it would need to be more valuable than fully engineered SBs would have to be huge. Which again would invalidate start of this line of thought: boosting missiles.

 

[Ploppy9001]

The dropship was my previous ship and I thought it was good, could punch above my weight in some battles taking out Pythons. It's a good stepping stone as it is tbh