Systems Specialists

Anyone out there who regularly plays (or is familiar with) the systems specialisation? Previously I'd be underwhelmed by this particular skill tree.

Been thinking of tweaking the numbers so that the effects are actually visible - it seems to me that these pilots don't get enough love, at least compared to the skills from the other trees. Especially since there are even system modules that mimic what these pilots do.

[Sing_In_Silence]

To make sure we're on the same page:
The modules don't mimic the techs, System techs also need the modules, they just get more milage out of them.
(From both the general and specific perks.)


Regularly? No.
But I made a piont of just completing a run with a sys.tech hero, for comparison's sake.

They are underwhelming.


At first I thought I'd use a sys.tech. as my tank (instead of an ace), using his 150% (total) repair bonus and 4... Just blanked on the name. 10 hp/sec teamheal module (when the solo best - nannite - is 8 hp/sec) in a Trident.
Took too long to get a good enough repair module for that to work, and by then I had enough accurate damage to not need that kind of tanking.

Ended up using him as an ams for most of the game, when I finally switched, an unskilled pilot using a cerberus (best ams module) had the same results.


Not only that, my sys.tech. With 3 teamheals couldn't keep a focus-fired teammate alive against gen4 enemies.

Tl,dr - whine whine blah.


I *believe* that the problem is that enemy wings don't have the 'guru' perks, so between low base ecm penetration (low-gen missiles) and low pen-bonus, you're essentially safe from missiles if you have an equal-or-greater ecm.


Also, you need to walk a line between repair being useless and godmode.
(of course, if you wanted to cheese you could just go full-out stealth, but meh.)


Also also, with total repair and shield regen ending up at 150% and 125%, respectively, the added maxenergy that shields grant (at the cost of half their regen rate) make them better than an equivallent repair module across the board.
The difference is that shield are solo-only, but given that a maxed out repair pilot won't save you *anyway*...

All of which is why I was going to split shields into 2 components.
At least, once I finish hunting down all the things that need to be edited.

That's my take on it. Sorry for the tl;dr.

Sorry, yeah, that's what I meant. Hmm, overall seems pretty much how I saw 'em. The problem with using gear tiers is that someone motivated enough to grind can snag the top stuff fairly early on. Which is why I never bothered with a systems guy previously.

2 components of shields? As in, (1) the increase in shielding, and (2) the regen rate they add? The regen stacks, it would be nice if additional shields just added to the shielding but didn't amp up the regen. I tried boosting the regen rate and yeah, it gets pretty stupid ridiculous when it's too high. You could fly around shooting each other all day and the shields would just bounce back to max after each hit.

Dunno about repair though. If someone's bent on slotting 4 of them in a ship there's not much we can do to nerf it without screwing over players who are actually using them as intended (ditto stealth, etc). I suppose this goes back to regen rate stacking - in this case armor instead of shielding.

Not much to say about missile jamming; skill/numerical odds aside, slapping on the top tier ECM pretty much ensures you hardly get hit even if the pilot doesn't have any jamming modifiers. Doesn't seem like there's a problem here though unless you have experience otherwise?

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Was thinking of rebalancing some skills, like say adding a branch for wingmember skills (mostly for variety's sake). Having to adjust the UI for every single skill change is kind of a pain in the ass though.

[Sing_In_Silence]

Originally Posted by Trucidation

2 components of shields? As in, (1) the increase in shielding, and (2) the regen rate they add? The regen stacks, it would be nice if additional shields just added to the shielding but didn't amp up the regen.
I tried boosting the regen rate and yeah, it gets pretty stupid ridiculous when it's too high.

Yes, yes and yup :s which is exactly why I split shields.

See tl;dr 1, below.

Of course, what I'd love is to simply redo ****ing everything.

See tl;dr 2, below.

But that requires figuring out how these stats compare to each other in terms of survivability (so I can balance them), which is rather more complicated math than I care to tackle.

Originally Posted by Trucidation

Dunno about repair though. If someone's bent on slotting 4 of them in a ship there's not much we can do to nerf it without screwing over players who are actually using them as intended (ditto stealth, etc). I suppose this goes back to regen rate stacking - in this case armor instead of shielding.

Exactly right.
But idk how to limit how many it uses.

Originally Posted by Trucidation

Not much to say about missile jamming; skill/numerical odds aside, slapping on the top tier ECM pretty much ensures you hardly get hit even if the pilot doesn't have any jamming modifiers. Doesn't seem like there's a problem here though unless you have experience otherwise?

Not at all.
But you'd think that a bomber pilot would have some ecm-pen perks to counteract ecm.
And since A) they don't and B) they don't have DM, both endgame enemy missiles and allied jamming-perks are useless.

See tl,dr 3, below.

Originally Posted by Trucidation

Was thinking of rebalancing some skills, like say adding a branch for wingmember skills (mostly for variety's sake). Having to adjust the UI for every single skill change is kind of a pain in the ass though.

Let 'us' know how that goes, and yeah, respectively.

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Tl;dr 1
(You need to choose between high sp (which is perk independant) but when it's gone it's gone or regen (which benefits from system perks) but any big shot will get through to your non-regenerating hp, or just fry you outright.
And you'll get get best results from mix-and-matching, which costs system slots, e.g. Less possible stacking.)

Which is also why I'm experimenting with modding ship hp/sp values to current/gen.
It's either that or shift sp to hp, and a 2k hp wyvern mk2 is just insane. We'll see.
It's pretty good imo, but ships are a bit too fragile. Requires tweaking, as per below.
That or just halving gear- and ship-cost, making losing a ship less of a calamity.
Then you can, and should, stockpile ships. The limiting factor / penalty for losing a ship becomes power-play (hockey term) for the computer until you happen to vacuum up your downed pilot's pod.
We'll see how that pans out later.


Tl;dr 2
Generally speaking:
Light fighters= low shield regen, high manuverability, with either average hp&sp or low hp high shield. Intended for pilots.
Heavy fighters=high hp&sp, low/no regen, low manu. Intended for gunners.
Support= low hp, mid manu, high sp&regen.

With support and missile oddments, e.g. Dogfighters, siege, pacifist, etc.)


Tl,dr 3
Wanted to split missile buffs between guru perks and DM to (buffed ecm-pen and x0.5/lvl dmg perk).
Couldn't since apparently perks require 2 different sized icons, which I lack for DM.

Will get a plugin for irfanview and try later.

[Hypertonic]

System Specialist is actually almost game-breakingly overpowered except when the MS is tracked. The rest of the time I just stack engine boosting + one Diamond or ECM and have ships flying 2000-4000 speed with MD-1. Anything without laser weapons can't even hit them. Anything with laser weapons can't do significant damage. At +2500 speed you don't even need ECM because missiles can't go that fast. Scripts that track the MS or require it to be exposed are the only flaw with this tactic.

[Bany]

So, what ship would be basicaly high end choise for experienced System Specialist?



Trident T Fifth Generation Special Purpose Fighter 750 700 900 270 4 3 0 1
Trident Fourth Generation Special Purpose Fighter 450 580 900 250 4 3 0 1
Cheetah Fourth Generation Special Purpose Fighter 450 550 1000 260 4 2 0 2

For me Cheetach is kindof better to play with, as using experienced specialis makes the durability not so crucial. And having at you disposal another missle bay to use (especialy against those small planty and nasty berserkers) makes this ship is much more versatile then Tridents. What do You think?

[Nanaki]

I cant really answer this question definitively, since I use my own customised skill tree, but I do find that my attempts to have combined arms combat/support ships have tended to end in failure, the support ships simply dont provide enough support to make up for the loss of a combat ship. A lot of this has to do with the fact that the hp/sec regen of a support ship does not match the dps/sec of an equivilant combat ship. Thus, your better off just going pure combat ships as, while your slightly less durable, your DPS will be much higher so you will likely be ending fights before durability becomes an issue.

Thus, the best trees would likely be Gunners or Pilots. Missiles have great burst damage, but once you blow through the munitions (and missile ships in star wolves have little ammunition capacity) your a sitting duck while a gunner can pretty much shoot until he is destroyed.

As for the best ships, in Star Wolves 3, the best ships are, by far, the Templar variants.