1.8.1 - Optimal Ship Nomenclature

[Larknok1]

As the guy who brought you the previous meta's nomenclature (if you've ever heard of the legendary 422 battleship), I'll be the first to admit that, looking through the comments and research spurred on by my most recent thread, that the old meta's nomenclature isn't particularly useful in 1.8.1.

Useful nomenclature is capable of distinguishing small changes to an otherwise optimal build, in order to discuss how those variations on near-optimal builds compete with and against one another. The old nomenclature had its uses. It's time for a new one.

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In order to do that, one has to know what's "very good" (if not yet quite optimal) in the new meta. If the results of the Combat Patch point to anything, it's the following:

1) Corvettes and Destroyers are not viable. 1.8.1 is a Cruiser / Battleship patch.
2) 4 Shields + 2 Capacitors is the optimal defensive build.
3) Missiles, Torpedos, and Bombers, and the necessity to respond to them (Point Defense) are the name of 1.8.1.
4) Otherwise, the old "422" Battleship is still very viable, especially against A/FEs.

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These results largely leave many possible builds open. As a result, the accuracy of a simple 3-number nomenclature is somewhat limited. As a result, this meta's nomenclature will be by no means cleaner or simpler than the last meta's -- which could have a simple nomenclature because there were literally 3 viable weapons: Kinetic Artillery, Plasma, and Tachyons.

The new nomenclature is going to assume -- defensively -- 2 Shield Capacitors + 4 shields on everything. This is largely the best, most accessible defensive build disregarding Crystal Hulls. This is the kind of generalization the new nomenclature is going to gloss over, for simplicity's sake.

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Without further ado, and understanding that the new nomenclature cannot (and will not) be 100% perfect, here it is:

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Z-ABC

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Z specifies a special weapon or build, with a few non-binary options:

Empty: None of the following options are true.
N: Neutron Torpedos
D: Devastator Torpedos
T: Tachyon Lance
G: Giga Cannon
A: Arc Emitter

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A specifies the number of bomber strikecraft the build uses.

B specifies the number of missiles (any kind) the build uses.

C specifies the number of point defense (any kind, including fighters) the build uses.

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Summarizing over the new combat thread's results, here are the important ships to know, preceded by their new nomenclature:

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The D-050 Cruiser:

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The N-102 Cruiser: (Discovered by redditor thelunararmy)

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The T-000 Battleship: (Previously known as the 422)

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The A-242 Battleship:

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The 070 Battleship:

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The G-000 Battleship:

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At the moment, N-1X2 (Neutron Torpedo, 1 bomber, X missiles, 2 PD, where X is unspecified) cruiser builds seem to be the strongest build in the meta right now.

Feel free to discuss what number that X should be, and provide results to back up your claims.

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Any very strong ships this patch that I missed? Let me know in a comment!

 

[PAnZuRiEL]

Bombers ignore shields. What's the point of using neutron torpedoes alongside them? Shouldn't you use normal torpedoes, which also ignore shields? And what about swarmer missiles for disarming enemy PD?

 

[Larknok1]

Bombers ignore shields. What's the point of using neutron torpedoes alongside them? Shouldn't you use normal torpedoes, which also ignore shields? And what about swarmer missiles for disarming enemy PD?

The funny thing about empirical evidence is that it gets to disprove our well crafted theories, not the other way around.

To be blunt: I didn't think it would be the best build (or even a particularly strong build) until I started testing it. Here's the gist of why I think it works:

1) Bombers are really, really high DPS on their own. Maybe they're choosing to target the same ships without shields, therefore synergy.
2) Neutron Torp + Plasma / Rockets seems to be a self-sufficient damage system of their own.

Where you would think -- according to all initial theories -- that some damage combination like Neutron + All Plasma (without Bombers doing their own thing) would be the best, we have very little evidence concerning any fleet designs that can actually beat the N-1X2, except possibly a D-132. (That's a single-Devastator torp Cruiser with 1 Bomber, 3 missiles and 2 point defense.)

 

[pieman]

I like this nomenclature less for how useful it is, and more because it makes the ship designations sound cool.

 

[Pooks1]

Did you do any testing with disruptors, are they at least somewhat viable now? AI used a combo of plasma and disruptors against me and it was pretty difficult to counter (although it was in the early midgame).

 

[Evaris]

I would note that the A-242 in various variants have been referred to as the "unshield" and "omega" in the prior state of combat thread.

 

[moyang]

While shields could be better in multiplayer, it looks like armor is better in SP especially against FEs.

I tested with cruisers-only fleet, using builds like D-050 and N-102. (one for full torpedo, ond other for PDs)
My fleet was 80 cruisers and materialist FE had 20 Battleships and 40 Destroyers.

When I used full shields, I lost about 30 ships.
With 2~3 shields (thus replacing them with armors) I lost 15~20.
With 1 shield, I lost less than 10, like 7~9. (in this setup my ships had 83% damage reduction, with neutronium ore.)
With no shields however, I lost 15~20.

In this experiment I used Enigmatic shields since I couldn't find a lythuric gas, so you can say they had more shield(and shield regen) than they normally would.

Edit: Also I lured FE fleets to jump right on top of me.

 

[Pyramid_Head]

 

[RoverStorm]

I usually run a modified version of the A-242 known to my frequent players as the "Archangel". Depending on what I'm facing, I don't use the medium missiles-I either use swarm missiles or I replace it with a kinetic battery. The small missiles I keep, however, as they are perfect for curb stomping corvette spam. I usually use 2 flak and no PD, however.

I also run the N102, under the name "Cataclysm". I frequently use a triple neutron torpedo build (code name "Ragnarok), though, as usually I'm having to deal with a high-shield target. Psionic Avatar and FE come to mind.

Additionally, I often use a high-armor build on my cruisers instead of shields, with crystal plating naturally. Yeah I know the shields are more useful on cruisers, but the existence of armor ignoring makes relying on it on battleships too costly.

 

[klingonadmiral]

The N-102 Cruiser: (Discovered by klingonadmiral)

Just so you know, I did not discover it, I got it off reddit

 

[MrGuyPerson]

I also saw the N-102 a couple weeks ago on Reddit. Here is the thread

 

[Torakka]

Few important things I found out with my testing against AI-mock-up fleet (featuring ships from all four vanilla FEs) in the other thread:

1. Bombers start to behave badly when there are a lot of them (or a lot of ships utilizing them, not sure which): instead of charging straight towards the enemy as they probably should, they go to a some sightseeing trip before attacking. This negates a huge part of the alpha strike potential of a big, bomber heavy fleet.

2. Keeping high level weapons, but downgrading reactors at the expense of downgrading utilities (and even losing shields) works rather well against AI, at least from the mineral efficiency point of view. However, it is not significantly better than having high tech components.

3. Using strike craft (and to a lesser extent missiles) strains the computer a lot more than using kinetics or energy weapons.

Because of these reasons, I think I will myself use some T-000 (i.e. the old 422) variant with high tech components in order to achieve good performance against AI, regardles of their PD use, while still having the game not-unplayably-slow with huge fleets.

Btw, if I recall correctly, there are no bonus damage strategic resources for strike craft and no strategic resource or technology increases the health of strike craft or missiles. On the other hand, the repeatable technologies boosting strike craft damage and attack speed give double the bonus of other similar repeatable technologies for other weapon types. I haven't tested if that results in strike craft being better or worse in a battle of nearly matched opponents as the tech levels increase.

 

[klingonadmiral]

1. Bombers start to behave badly when there are a lot of them (or a lot of ships utilizing them, not sure which): instead of charging straight towards the enemy as they probably should, they go to a some sightseeing trip before attacking. This negates a huge part of the alpha strike potential of a big, bomber heavy fleet.

This can be a blessing in disguise though, as point defense refuses to shoot down missiles as long as enough hostile strike craft are in the air. Meaning they can fulfill a more defensive role of blocking enemy PD for a bit, which in turn allows missile-heavy configuration to shred the opponent. It's countering bug-fu with stronger bug-fu, but it's at least something.

I'm increasingly shifting from N-102 cruisers (mixed with D-050s at a 2:1 ratio) to G-000 BBs. I use 60 cruiser and 20 BB fleets to keep the fallen empires from awakening, however this means my cruiser stacks always take 2 casualties when attacking a spaceport with a fortress nearby, whereas battleships take no losses. A mix of G-000 and A-242 BBS seems like a good combination between offensive kinetic artillery boats and more defensive carrier.

 

[Torakka]

This can be a blessing in disguise though, as point defense refuses to shoot down missiles as long as enough hostile strike craft are in the air. Meaning they can fulfill a more defensive role of blocking enemy PD for a bit, which in turn allows missile-heavy configuration to shred the opponent. It's countering bug-fu with stronger bug-fu, but it's at least something.

Not sure if I understood you correctly, but currently with huge fleets the bombers go away from the enemy at the start. This means that if you are using missiles and bombers, the enemy PD has only your missiles to shoot at while your bombers are doing their own things away from enemy PD range (and obviously unable to damage the enemy ships themselves). Therefore, not only does your alpha strike lack the damage from the bombers, but also the impact from the missiles is decreased as more of them are shot down.

 

[Gratak]

Not sure if I understood you correctly, but currently with huge fleets the bombers go away from the enemy at the start. This means that if you are using missiles and bombers, the enemy PD has only your missiles to shoot at while your bombers are doing their own things away from enemy PD range (and obviously unable to damage the enemy ships themselves). Therefore, not only does your alpha strike lack the damage from the bombers, but also the impact from the missiles is decreased as more of them are shot down.

No. PD also goes haywire when strike-crafts go crazy.

 

[Torakka]

No. PD also goes haywire when strike-crafts go crazy.

Ah, that's good to know. Are you certain that it does so really (i.e. more missiles get through than otherwise) and not just graphically appear to shoot in nonsensible directions? (I'm fairly sure the bombers really go sightseeing and not just appear to do so, as the enemy ships start to die a lot faster when the bomber swarm visually reaches them.)

 

[Jorrhast]

Psionic Avatar and FE come to mind

btw, what about psi avatars in 1.8? they still don't have any PD, right?

 

[FlyingPhoenix]

This nomenclature is not ideal.

Does the G-000 Battleship run kinetic artillery, plasma, disruptors, what?

 

[Gratak]

Ah, that's good to know. Are you certain that it does so really (i.e. more missiles get through than otherwise) and not just graphically appear to shoot in nonsensible directions? (I'm fairly sure the bombers really go sightseeing and not just appear to do so, as the enemy ships start to die a lot faster when the bomber swarm visually reaches them.)

No. I have just visual evidence. No PD to be seen in battles where the strike craft go crazy. And usually they are very visible considering that they are my only "lasers". Haven't done any explicit testing myself. Just experience from normal games.

 

[Cubia_]

Some responses:

I don't like the lack of armor, I think that's a missed potential EHP gain against most AI setups, even more so if you run into endgame repeatables (players will exploit the hell out of it too). I don't think the title designation is very helpful in understanding the ships intent either. I keep looking back at the reference images. Now onto the specific ships:

The D-050 Cruiser:
Abuse that "max % missiles shot down" until the xenos are cleansed, screen with 1 whirlwind to be sure! Sure it's pretty much all burst damage but if your cruisers aren't taken care of by the enemy multiple salvos will be a big problem for them. The downside is of course that it is extremely bursty, meaning a death before another torpedo salvo is actually a LOT of dps lost, but that's true of all torp ships.

The N-102 Cruiser:
Has initial burst damage versus shields, but nothing to keep them down sporting only weapons that have a 33% penalty against them or completely penetrate them, meaning other ships have to do that job. If you don't, a bunch of damage is easily wasted until the next burst of damage from neutron torpedos. Think of it as hitting 33% armor, that really blows. In fact unless the ship is armored enough you might want to swap for Gamma Lasers since they have 20% penalty since Gamma has surprisingly high damage before armor comes into play. Depends heavily on the overall shield suppression and armor values.

The T-000 Battleship:
The ship also doesn't have any direction on if it's countering shields or countering armor. This only works if you have just battleships and only that kind of it, otherwise you're losing tons of potential dps. Specializing ships is the best way to deal optimal amounts of damage, so this "generalized" design won't do as well in a fleet compared to 2 specialized battleships.

The A-242 Battleship:
Missiles AND Strike Craft? Oh you naughty xeno you. PD never can figure its shit out when both are deployed and half the time just sits there (side note: screw Holy FE for this reason). However the Arc Emitter is kinda a weird choice, especially since you're running small and medium missiles already which fill a similar role. Picking a strong solo fire weapon like a Giga Cannon or a followup weapon like a Tachyon Lance should be a better idea unless you are fighting corvette+destroyer screens (but you run cruisers for that anyway).

The 070 Battleship:
This one relies on missile screening a bit too much for me to be comfortable. Additionally the lack of instant damage may mean that the delayed hits may cause unnecessary losses. It is however another generalized ship design oriented around doing a LOT of damage, since Marauder Missiles do insane DPS against almost any target in comparison to any other weapon. It's a general purpose ship that in general cleanses the xenos with not too much pain taken.

The G-000 Battleship:
Fast, instant damage on a generalized design. All the weapons are solid picks, but they don't counter anything. They're what you run when you're not sure what's about to happen next and you just want high instant damage with great overall stats. It isn't bad at all, but if the fleet is already taking down shields the damage versus armor starts to be concerning depending on the opponent (or vice versa with shield suppression). The fact that there aren't really any faults in this ship other than no armor shows how insane the Kinetic line is though tbh. (We need a noob friendly weapon type though!)

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Finally, solving for X number of missiles is a bit weird. It changes depending on who you're fighting. If you're the type to never change ship designs, I don't think you're going to be much of a theorycrafter or systems designer
I'm someone who often changes ship parts out and messes with overall fleet composition just to counter the enemy. I think that's true of most of those posting here in this thread, but not true of those playing Stellaris overall. Basically, if you want a solution for X missiles you need to specify an enemy type, otherwise we're stuck trying to solve for more than one variable somewhat endlessly.