What is the fleet meta right now in stellaris?

[AGenericAccount]

To elaborate on this. Arc emitters and Cloud Lightning penetrate 100% of shields and armor, which means the only thing that matters is hull. Shields and Armor keep growing late game, due to repeatable technologies, while the hull repeatable technology was removed so hull remains static all game. Long story short, it completely nullifies enemy shields and armor, which is immensely useful since a vast majority of the opponents you will fight depend on either one or the other as their primary source of HP. The few that do not are either Leviathans or endgame crisis, which you will see coming from lightyears away and you can retool your fleet accordingly.

I see the arc emitter/disruptor/cloud lightning meta as being the next thing smacked down by Paradox's balancing department, when they get around to it. Having something that completely nullifies shields and armor without crippling drawback is not really good design.

I find that BB max penetration setup is kinda weak against stations, especially FE stations so I like to have a couple of different groups with GC/kinetic arty or neutron launchers. Where the max penetration BBs excel is against mass Corvettes I find, it's kinda like watching an electric flyswatter.

 

[KingAlamar]

I find that BB max penetration setup is kinda weak against stations, especially FE stations so I like to have a couple of different groups with GC/kinetic arty or neutron launchers. Where the max penetration BBs excel is against mass Corvettes I find, it's kinda like watching an electric flyswatter.

I also like "Bypass" ships against crisis or AE fleets. The shields and armor of others is often so strong that bypassing their main protection provides fairly consistent results esp. when paired with range extending techs, admirals, policies, etc. The alpha vs. hull compromises other ships ability to fight back so is decent.