Broken Council - One-ish days in

So the raid started out and it was really hard.  

And players complained.

And then they nerfed the Mega hulls a bit.  And gave us a little point bonus (Mine sure didn't seem like 30%... but bygones)

And players complained.

So then they nerfed the targets again, and gave us 3 million points, six 4 hour repair tokens, and 3 Grease Monkeys.  And they extended the raid by a day.

Are you still complaining?  (I saw a level 37 complaining in comms that he spent the points & went up 2 levels.) Maybe you shouldn't be focusing on raids - work on FM tech.  If you're ready to give this raid a shot, read on.

Anyway, with the extra day and the changes last night... this article is just like it would be "one day in", right?  

The way I see it, just the tokens and points are worth about 8.2 million points, since I can do a single A set target and fully repair with that token (so I did 2 full A sets with the 6 tokens).  The extra day of the raid is worth about 48 coin if you can take advantage of the repair time, and then the Grease Monkeys will save maybe another 20 coin each.  For me - I don't feel too bad about where I'm at.  I'll explain some more.

For this raid, I am using my fleet that I've been using in the Forsaken Mission for quite a while - 
https://www.dahippo.com/bp/ship/#!B06Z00U0U25250C346F2B2A2A192A372A0NH01R1R2539386F2U175255555537555555555506V01W1R0V1R1R2L6F35346D54545454545454545453535352525206V01W1R0V1R1R2L6F35346D54545454545454545453535352525206V01W1R0V1R1R2L6F35346D545454545454545454535353525252dC

For those who dont care to look - it has:

• Punisher tank with mostly Gale 1s & Frontline Countermeasures.  It has a single Harrier Missile and SFB3 for spotting.
• Harlock Aegis with 4x Phalanx 4 & Countermeasure Equipment 3.
• 3x Rhinos with a mix of Blade, Harrier, and Disruption Missiles.  Interception System gives them extra speed to keep up with the Punisher and extra punch.

Where the targets are at now, I can complete any of the A set targets using my Punisher to tank, and the other ships take some damage from the Scattergun splash.  The Punisher will often die before completing the target, but I can use a Rhino to tank to finish it.

After the first nerf, I would be able to complete an A set for around 17 coin, which would have resulted in more than I'd like to spend on a raid.  I would usually just repair my Rhinos for 1 coin each instead of a full repair.

After the second nerf, it does come in a little cheaper, where I can do that set for around 11 coin.  I'll break down how I approach the enemies in the A set:

Heavy Cruisers: My fleet has 33 speed, and as long as I can line up and drive away from these as they approach, they aren't able to fire a shot from their Scatterguns before sinking - it's a little tougher in the 80s when you have to trigger them.

Zoe Rhinos: The missiles from the Switchblade have decent flak evade, and these all seem to outrange me by just a little.  I try to charge them as long as I can engage only one at a time, and they sink pretty quickly.  they usually get a few hits in return though.

Land Turrets: The Sentinel type turrets will occasionally get a few missiles through the Phalanx, but I generally am not too worried about those.  It's the Basilisks that look like Gargoyles that are the problem, and pretty much the most offensive part of this raid.  They outrange your ships, can't be countered, and just give damage.  Looking like Gargolyes resulted in a very rude surprise the first time I approached one as well.  Sometimes I can use the direction of approach to allow retargeting to kill a second, but it doesn't work on them all.  If I had a full fleet of Cobra-armed Tigers, I'd use those to finish off islands, but my 6 Cobras on one Phantom only does enough damage to kill one turret per dive cycle.

Mega Hull: These are the most challenging part of this raid, but with some skill the damage can be kept very low.  The previous generation of Mega Hull had a fairly clear mechanism of how they worked, with the "danger zones" and on-screen timer.  This generation has no timer on screen and the danger zones generally do not correlate to the incoming fire (as far as I can tell).  

The important technique that I use is to approach from the North to hit a missile turret first (generally the most active one).  Then I creep into range of the two scatterguns and stay out of their range (indicated by a red circle if you mess up & enter), then I finish the final missile turret and then the bridge.



A very important piece of this strategy is that I have enough Phalanx with enough accuracy to hold off 100% of their missile fire.  I get this by using the 4 Phalanx 4 on the Harlock Aegis with Countermeasure Equipment 3.  Between the 25% accuracy bonus from the hull, 40% accuracy bonus from CME3, and my alliance gunner accuracy bonus (thanks guys), my Phalanx 4 are well above 100% accuracy. 

I did want to try the S level target, but I am having some trouble finding them... Sorry.

So overall, there's no doubt Kixeye screwed up this raid - but I always just try to look at the game in front of me and decide if I will play it or not.  

For me, I'm taking the hull and weapon, but will probably skip the special.  This raid is costing me a little more than I'd like.  But I've had about 6 months of cheap raids, so I'll take it this time.  I'm not super sold on the Apollo, but I think the high damage Switchblade will be useful.  I will probably take Tokens and Ghost shards before the CM Extender.

A lot of players started calling for a boycott early, frankly I don't think players should tell each other what to do.  But if you make your own decisions about whether to play or not, and whether to spend or not, Kixeye will get the message.