Meta Alloy Hull Reinforcements

DemiserofD

D
Meta Alloys are more or less useless. The ONLY time I use them, is when I have a brand new ship and I am too lazy to engineer human hull reinforcements for it, so I quickly buy some meta alloy hull reinforcements, instead.

But to be frank, the amount of time I spent unlocking them is far more than I will EVER save. They are objectively a bad choice in every circumstance I can think of.

So what would be the ideal use case for them? The big problem is, the caustic resistance niche is already taken by Guardian Hull Reinforcements. The Hull Value niche is taken by Human Engineered Hull Reinforcements. What, then, is left for Meta Alloys?
I think the best place for them is in smaller ships, especially ones that are limited on module space. For example, some ships might not have space for a heat sink, a caustic sink, and a pulse neutralizer.
With this in mind, I think meta alloy hull reinforcements should serve as a sort of low-grade version of all of these things; a universal AX module.

To achieve this, they should have a small caustic capacity; much smaller than a caustic sink, basically one scout missile. However, they should slowly and automatically dissipate this caustic damage.
They should also slowly regenerate health. Again, not very much; nowhere near as much as a repair limpet controller, but enough to add up, over a long fight, to be a reasonably decent option. Lastly, they should be a bit lighter than the other options, just as a minor bonus for speed.

So here's some comparisons:


C5 Human Hull Reinforcement(Engineered Heavy Duty/Deep Plating)
Mass: 22.4T
Hull Reinforcement: 738
Caustic Resistance: 0

C5 Guardian Hull Reinforcement
Mass: 16T
Hull Reinforcement: 488
Caustic Resistance: 5%


C5 Meta Alloy Hull Reinforcement
Mass: 12T
Hull Reinforcement: 351
Caustic Resistance: 3%
Hull Regeneration: 0.25/second(one quarter that of a C1 repair limpet)
Caustic Absorption: 1 Scout Missiles
Caustic Nullification: 0.05 Scout Missiles/Second


C1 Meta Alloy Hull Reinforcement
Mass: 0.75T
Hull Reinforcement: 99
Caustic Resistance: 3
Hull Regeneration: 0.1/second(1/10th that of a C1 repair limpet)
Caustic Absorption: 0.2 Scout Missiles
Caustic Nullification: 0.05 Scout Missiles/Second

Assuming you're at a CZ for half an hour, one of these C5 reinforcements would regenerate about 450 hull - in exchange, of course, for dramatically less hull at the start of the fight. It would reward skillful play, while leaving limpet repairs as a more effective option for those who want faster short-term repairs. Even with an anaconda loaded with 13 of these, they would cap out at 2.75 regen/second, nowhere near enough to become overpowered.

But for smaller ships, that can't effectively carry repair limpets and such, this would help them quite a bit!
 
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Felix DiCestria

Felix DiCestria
The Guardian ones are powered so not good on a cold build. They're also vulnerable to the Orthrus/Titan field.
I stick a meta alloy reinforcement in the smallest slot and engineered reinforcement in the other slots so they all gain resistance.
That said a caustic sink renders the whole argument moot.
 

DemiserofD

D
Felix DiCestria said:
The Guardian ones are powered so not good on a cold build. They're also vulnerable to the Orthrus/Titan field.
I stick a meta alloy reinforcement in the smallest slot and engineered reinforcement in the other slots so they all gain resistance.
That said a caustic sink renders the whole argument moot.
Click to expand...
A caustic sink would definitely be better, IF you had the spare space. Repair limpets would also be better.

But if you don't have that space, or want to use it for something else, then these could fill the gap!
 

Screemonster

Screemonster
The other day I was just thinking of something similar.

What I had in mind was Meta-alloy bulkheads. Similar protection to military grade, maybe slightly better than stock but not as beefy as human heavy-duty, in line with the other tech broker modules.

Have a built in caustic pool that acts as a singular caustic sink. While it has caustic stored, it acts as if a repair limpet is on the hull (depleting the caustic store as it goes)
If you get more caustic than it can hold, then you start taking damage as normal (which it will attempt to repair, naturally, depleting its caustic store and then topping itself off from whatever's on the hull)

A full caustic store takes the same time and restores the same hitpoints as a class 3, 5 or 7 repair limpet for small, medium and large ships respectively.

Somewhere particularly stinky like the outer cloud of a titan would pretty easily overwhelm the healing provided by such bulkheads, so watch out.
AXCZs would become that classic videogame thing of popping scouts and flying through the cloud for a health pickup.

Can only heal up to its base health value plus any meta-alloy reinforcements. Any hitpoints added by human-engineered bulkheads cannot be restored.
 

DemiserofD

D
Screemonster said:
The other day I was just thinking of something similar.

What I had in mind was Meta-alloy bulkheads. Similar protection to military grade, maybe slightly better than stock but not as beefy as human heavy-duty, in line with the other tech broker modules.

Have a built in caustic pool that acts as a singular caustic sink. While it has caustic stored, it acts as if a repair limpet is on the hull (depleting the caustic store as it goes)
If you get more caustic than it can hold, then you start taking damage as normal (which it will attempt to repair, naturally, depleting its caustic store and then topping itself off from whatever's on the hull)

A full caustic store takes the same time and restores the same hitpoints as a class 3, 5 or 7 repair limpet for small, medium and large ships respectively.

Somewhere particularly stinky like the outer cloud of a titan would pretty easily overwhelm the healing provided by such bulkheads, so watch out.
AXCZs would become that classic videogame thing of popping scouts and flying through the cloud for a health pickup.

Can only heal up to its base health value plus any meta-alloy reinforcements. Any hitpoints added by human-engineered bulkheads cannot be restored.
Click to expand...
I wouldn't want them to be TOO powerful. Guardian Hull Reinforcements are almost perfectly balanced, imo; the arguments over whether they're better than engineering or not have gone on for years, which basically means they're perfect, imo.

The goal here is to find a new niche with a similar balance point for MAHRPs, ideally. I do enjoy the idea of using the caustic damage to repair, but making it that strong would be pretty powerful. I also wouldn't make it scale to large ships, or they'd just become the default option.

Rather, I would prefer to have it be a flat amount, to help lower-hp and higher-resistance builds more, and further diversify the meta.

Great idea otherwise, though.
 

IstvaanDCIV

IstvaanDCIV
I use Meta Alloy Hull Reinforcements on my Titan core-killing Krait Mk2. I like to think that it makes my ship take caustic damage more slowly, but to be honest I haven't actually checked. In any case, it works well enough and I can also kill Scouts and Cyclopses with it.
 

DemiserofD

D
Michael Ryan said:
WAIT, meta alloy hull reinforcement has autoregeneration??
Why I didn't find this before? XD
Click to expand...

Sadly, it doesn't. Yet.

It'd be pretty neat if it did, though. If you had a few on your ship, you could maybe explore the dead Titans without needing repair limpets at all, because they'd entirely nullify the mild caustic effect! Of course, you'd have to sacrifice some raw HP to get that, but I'd consider that worth it in some cases.
 

DemiserofD

D
Here's something of how it could go:

Pilots’ Federation ALERT

Professor Ishmael Palin claims to have discovered how to 'activate' Thargoid Meta Alloys.

"The manner in which Thargoids achieve their impressive hull regeneration has been a subject of constant study. Since the start of the conflict, it's been evident that there was some sort of interaction between the 'heart' organs and the meta alloys themselves, but the precise mechanism has been unclear."

"Thanks to the large quantity of Tissue Samples contributed since the start of the war, I am proud to say I have made major headway in understanding this process. Careful modulation of Thargoid Hearts can trigger a sort of 'memory' in the meta alloys, seamlessly returning them to their original shape."

"Not only that, but it also allows for the material to actively neutralize the caustic contamination released by Thargoids."

"Both of these effects remain much slower than the type seen on Interceptors, but are potent enough I hope they can offer some significant benefits to some pilots bravely putting their lives on the line. With that in mind, I am requesting the contribution of ten million Thargoid Hearts, to fully activate any and all Meta Alloy Hull Reinforcements currently in stock, as well as to create a stockpile to activate more in the future."

“As well as payment in credits, I am pleased to offer a pre-engineered Lightweight Heavy Duty Class 5 Meta Alloy Hull Reinforcement as an additional reward.”

Pilots are asked to deliver Thargoid Hearts to Baird Gateway on the planet Arque 4 E.

---

This could be a fun CG to encourage player participation without distracting from the war.
 

Kissamies

Kissamies
Before caustic sinks were a thing, I had this kind of idea, but for the Guardian hull reinforcements. They'd take the caustic damage for the rest of the ship but be destroyed in the process. That'd fit the theme of Guardian and Thargoid tech being diametrically opposed. Bit clumsy because they don't have module hit points and we do have caustic sinks now.

For meta-alloys I envisioned a different path. Maybe buff their caustic resistance a little too, but mainly make them a hybrid of roughly G4 lightweight and heavy duty hull reinforcements. Tougher than lightweight, lighter than heavy duty in a way that would be an acceptable tradeoff for some. The lore seems to describe them as lightweight, yet durable so it would fit the theme.
 

DemiserofD

D
Kissamies said:
Before caustic sinks were a thing, I had this kind of idea, but for the Guardian hull reinforcements. They'd take the caustic damage for the rest of the ship but be destroyed in the process. That'd fit the theme of Guardian and Thargoid tech being diametrically opposed. Bit clumsy because they don't have module hit points and we do have caustic sinks now.

For meta-alloys I envisioned a different path. Maybe buff their caustic resistance a little too, but mainly make them a hybrid of roughly G4 lightweight and heavy duty hull reinforcements. Tougher than lightweight, lighter than heavy duty in a way that would be an acceptable tradeoff for some. The lore seems to describe them as lightweight, yet durable so it would fit the theme.
Click to expand...

Honestly, Guardian Hulls kinda fit that description right now! Compared to a heavy duty hull reinforcement they're about 25% lighter(lightweight engineering reduces weight by 20%), while their caustic resistance gives them long-term sustain that is honestly pretty dang useful nowadays, for space AXCZs where you're gonna be fighting for a while without a break, something that hasn't been done much historically!

My main goal with the meta alloy ones would be to try to encourage even more new ways to do AX content. While there are always a few players doing things crazy and off-meta, the majority of people stick with the main meta of chieftains and kraits. Something like this, that encourages players to use smaller ships with less utilities, could maybe expand that niche a bit and make AX combat more diverse, especially if paired with stuff like the new AGF engineering.
 

Greasetrap42

Greasetrap42
Off topic, but I always thought Meta-Alloy Armor for a ship would be really cool.

  • Better than Reinforced Armor, but much lighter.
  • Obsoletes Reinforced Armor, but requires player time & effort to get the mats. It is an upgrade.
  • Military Armor offers better overall protection at the cost of weight. -> Military Armor is superior for brute force combat.
  • Provides some caustic resistance, and extremely slow Hull repair.
  • Has a really cool dark purple glow.

Why? Who would use it?
  • Fantastic for explorers that also want to do exobiology. A small loss in jump range because of mass, but better protection from bumping into things and self repairing over time.
  • General bubble hopper and mission runner. Because it would look super cool.
 
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