Navigating Utopia's Big Ole Store

Well, if you buy into the whole consumerism thing and paradise is a huge shopping mall, then this next raid really will be Utopia for you.  

Since Kixeye was kind enough to post the prize list early, I'll try to make sense of this store and break things down. I'm NOT going to go with a full red/yellow/green breakdown... that's crazy.

I'm going to start with looking at it from my own point of view - a player who is pretty much caught up.  For players like that, the major priority will be to get set up for success in the next raid series (which will be Garrison).  Actually, that should be all players' priority.  As the game has moved towards a very predictable rotation of target types, you need to try to jump on to that hamster wheel so set yourself up for continued success.

So the first things to look at are the new equipment.  We don't have full blueprints, but we have some general ideas.

To get the new equipment, you first need to take the Empyrean generalist hull.  A valid question is - why do we need another generalist hull after the Zelos?  The answer is that the Empyrean is a remote targeting hull, so that you can build up the Zelos as a tank, and use Empyreans behind that to rain down fire.  With the new weapon and special being released for that hull (Advanced Imperial Mortar D100-Z and Advanced Trajectory Plotter) - the Empyrean will have remote targeting for mortars.  My hope is that in the spirit of true 'generalism', that hull will ALSO remote target for missiles, but right now only remote targeting stats for mortars are shown in the raid video.  (and a heavy weapon slot...) I also expect that new Imperial Mortar and Trajectory Plotter special will be relatively quick building and Generalist only (just like the previous Quake Cannon and Seismic Rounds released with the Zelos).  Players who are caught up are probably interested in taking the Empyrean only because they have to be.  I'm plenty happy with my Citadels for remote targeting of Mortars, and Rhinos for remote targeting of Missiles, and I don't think I'll be devoting shipyard time to that hull.  I've been quite happy with my decision to build no Zelos hulls so far.

Instead, I'll be devoting time to the specialized Garrison hulls - the first of which is the Icebreaker, which is described as the "Auto" hull.  This puts it in the same genre as the Ironclad and Tideseeker, which means it will be sort of a 'charge in and blow stuff up' kind of hull.  Released with the Icebreaker are the Siege Rockets D110-S and the Garrison Battery Mk-X.  These rockets and (likely) explosive-enhancing special should go with the Icebreaker.  Rockets haven't been really effective in this game since players were loading up Leviathans with Hydras and blitzing them into Sentinel missiles... but we will see how these look when we get the full blueprint.  Right now we have some hints from the video:

ICEBREAKER:  
Rocket Range: +30%
Rocket Reload: +100%
Explosive Defense: +80%
Penetrative Defense: +80%
Field Resistance: +90%

Note the last rocket hull we've seen, the Goresaber, had +25% Rocket Range, +160% Rocket Reload, 50% Exp/Pen resist, and +67% Field Resistance.  

SIEGE ROCKET D100-S:
Range: 57
Damage: 6672
Splash: 20

The previous generation of rockets, Dragonfires, Lockdowns, and Coaxial Firestorms (who remembers they fire rockets in primary mode?) all had range of 68.  Old school Siege Rockets have the 57 range.  Dragonfires also have that 20 splash, although they are a low damage, fast firing rocket.  If our targets have any deflection, Dragonfires will be near useless.  

GARRISON BATTERY Mk-X:
Unknown

So to start off with, players who are 'keeping up' will need:
Empyrean: 15M
Icebreaker: 60M 
Siege Rocket D100-S: 20M
Garrison Battery Mk-X: 10M
Total (new stuff): 105M points

That's kind of a bare minimum, unless you want to take a 'high-risk' approach to this raid.  That would be to wait for the Specialist hull, which should be released in an upcoming TLC. Even so, you may also want the Rocket weapon and Explosive special.  You don't know how much time you'll have to do that TLC before VXP weekend (with a 6 day raid). I'll just suggest that the 'high-risk' approach is too high risk for me.

Then I looked down at the rest of the prize list and I saw a bunch of tokens I wanted:

11d 3h ship build tokens: 30.9M
4x Liberator 25k VXP tokens: 24M
4x Oppressor 25k VXP tokens: 24M
8x 2 day Structure build tokens: 32M
Total (tokens): 110.9M

I would prioritize the Ship Build tokens very highly so I can get at least 4 Icebreaker hulls complete before VXP weekend.  I also really want those Liberator VXP tokens... since I already armored those 2 of the 3 I've built (even the Prof makes mistakes sometimes).  The structure ones I could probably do without if the points get tight.

I also saw some limited items:  
First off are the new Charged Zynthonite C1-X and C1-M Armors.  These new armors add no repair time and have some stats released in the video:

Charged Zynth C1-X
Explosive Dmg Reduction: 10,000
Explosive Armor Pool: 170,000

Charged Zynth C1-M
Penetrating Dmg Reduction: 37,725
Penetrating Armor Pool: 700,000

From the scant description we have, these seem to work like some sort of 'pre-deflection' damage reduction, but I'm not going to attempt any detailed description or analysis until we hear more from Kixeye.  But with the reduction of M & X damage, they certainly seem like they will be useful in these Garrison targets (which do primarily M & X damage).  I suspect you'll want one of each of these armors on ships being built for Garrison targets.  This means I'm going to want at least 4 of each ... if not 8 - 10.  I also want to restock my Agility system IV and Hydraulic Resistors.  I'm less concerned about Gales (Hail D is at least... useful) and Cobras.

4x Charged Armor C1-X: 40M
4x Charged Armor C1-M: 40M
5x Agility System IV: 5M
5x Hydro Resistors: 7.5M
Total (Limited): 92.5M

So, even not going for everything... I really want a bit over 300 million points this raid.  and I think a lot of players will be in similar situations.  WOOF! 

So what else is out there?

If you are going the "generalist" route, you will probably want:

Empyrean Hull: 15M
Advanced Imperial Mortar D100-Z: 9M
Trajectory Plotter: 6M
up to 15x Zelos 1 day Build Tokens (refit one to M/X defense): up to 30M
1x Charged Armor C1-X: 10M
1x Charged Armor C1-M: 10M
11d 3h Ship Build Tokens: 30.9M
Total (generalist):  30M - 110.9M

Lower end players who can't go after those big ticket items should make sure they have some sort of Garrison fleet in order.  If you can't get those Generalist hulls, then the Citadel / Punisher combination are the next best thing.  Hopefully you've gotten the hulls from the low end FM tiers, but you should make sure you have the equipment you need for them too.  If you don't have a Punisher tank (WHY NOT???) or Citadel mortar chuckers built, Berzerker build tokens are available.  If you are in this category, I would plan your fleet / refits very carefully so you can take only the tokens you need.  Note that the ship specific build tokens are cheaper than the general build tokens.  Consider:

up to 11d 3h Ship Build Tokens: up to 30.9M
up to 10 Citadel 1 day build tokens: up to 15M
up to 10 Citadel 5000 VXP tokens: up to 10M
Berzerker Hull: 0.75M
up to 10 Berzerker 3 day build tokens: up to 15M
Judgement Mortar: 0.9M
or Pandemonium Mortar: 0.6M
Explosive System IV: 0.6M
or Combustion System 2: 0.6M
No total here - too situation specific

Lower end players who have been having trouble in this raid cycle need to get a Siege fleet in order.  The best plan here is Ironclads with Mausers - Cannoneers and Millenium Guns are too expensive.  If you haven't been able to do the TLCs to win Ironclad/Mauser, get them now.  High Velocity Rounds are worth the splurge (for mortar/garrison fleets too).    Take build & VXP tokens to get them done.

up to 11d 3h Ship Build Tokens: up to 30.9M
Ironclad: 1M
High Velocity Rounds: 5M
up to 20 Ironclad 1 day build tokens: up to 10M
up to 20 Ironclad 5000 VXP tokens: up to 6M
Mauser Cannon: 0.75M
Nuclear Accelerators: 0.5M
No total here - too situation specific

Lower end players who have been having trouble getting Uranium need a Skirmish fleet.  Hellwraiths or Tideseekers are the thing here, but since Hellwraiths are comparatively expensive in the store, I recommend the Tideseekers.  The Conflagration Scattergun that is most effective isn't in the store, and neither are the concussive cannons, so torpedoes are the next best idea.

up to 11d 3h Ship Build Tokens: up to 30.9M
Tideseeker: 0.5M
Fire Twister Torpedo: 2M
Sealed Fire Charge: 1M
No total here - too situation specific

Going after Megas needs an Assault fleet, basically Apollos.  Phalanx 4 are preferred as your anti-missile solution, since switchblades can get overwhelmed, but they aren't available.  If you don't have Phalanx, don't go all Switchblade, make sure to mix in some Blades to maintain offense.

up to 11d 3h Ship Build Tokens: up to 30.9M
Apollo: 3M
Blade: 0.6M
Switchblade Anti-Missile: 0.9M
Interception System: 0.3M
Counter Missile Extender: 0.6M
No total here - too situation specific

If you want to get into Base Hitting and PvP, the tier 5 Conqueror hulls can still smash a lot of bases (just not the best ones).  If you're starting from scratch, I'd recommend taking the Vendetta and at least one other hull type, so you can use 2 tanks and 3 remote targeting Vendettas. If forced to pick one tank, I'd probably go with the Spite, but Malice are decent too (if you equip with Radioactive Plate).  All the "PvP" components are pretty cheap, so make sure you have weapons and specials to complete whatever hull you grab.  

Vendetta: 1.5M
Spite: 2M
Malice: 1.5M

For Base Defense we have the Valiant and Vanquisher.  Pick one and make sure you can equip it. Avoid the Alpha Behemoth and Cesium Scarab - they are really underperforming in most situations.

Valiant: 2M
Vanquisher: 1.5M

Whether to get Turrets is an interesting question.  The latest generation of turrets like Gargoyle 3, Hyena, and Explosive D99-S are not available, and they really are a step up in capability from previous versions.  Cataclysm is available and worth getting. I expect more improved turrets will be available to round out the damage types, so unless you are desperate, I would focus on the 'better' Limited turrets in this store.  

Glacial Launcher: 2M 
Coldsnap Rocket: 2M 
Cataclysm: 4M

Ferox Fury will be a flagship for Fury hulls.  Without seeing it, it's tough to figure out if it will be desirable to build.  Right now, the only people I could see really wanting it at its 40M point price tag are those who have a full fleet of Furys but are missing out on the Tier 6 Conquerors.

Well, although there are a lot of good prizes available at good prices, the massive size of the store and the high prices on new equipment mean that a lot of players will be wanting a lot of points.  Remember it will be a 6 day raid and you should try to use all 6 days if you can.  Also remember Alliance points reset on Monday, and so you'll probably be hit.  Deal with it.

Uprising - What did we do wrong?

Well, it's Friday night, I have about 60 million points... I feel like I should write an article.

When I looked at the prize list, and the points/structure to get the Cannoneer, I feel like asking Kixeye what we did wrong.  Why are we being punished?  Is the Zoe Vendetta like the vegetables we have to eat before getting dessert?  Players have never liked 'locked' prizes, where you have to get something before being able to get something else.  When the prizes are related and laddered, we kind of understand, but having to get a niche Limited hull before getting the mainline hull before the next raid... well it just isn't right. 

Anyway I'll start off with my process for doing the 107.  I use a 4 Hellwraith fleet, armed mostly with Fire Twisters (and a couple Mayhems).  What I heard / read was that it was easier to do the bottom 'pancake' first and with some practice I found that was correct.  My process for the 107 is:

• Clear the bottom five Scouts on the first two dive cycles.  Do not kill the Hellstrike - the oil slick makes it more difficult to complete the rest of the target.  (I find this also holds for the 105)  Don't kill any drones either.... they will respawn exactly where you don't want them.
• About halfway through the third dive cycle, there seems to be a spot where the drones seem to be clustered at or heading toward the top.  This opens the bottom side of the Southeast pancake. I target it by clicking on it - I don't want to get too close or I'm seen by the drones above the pancake.  (your window is from about 7:25 to 7:15.  Follow the last set of drones on in... but not too close)  Heading towards the right a little bit as you go gives you a little more time.  Once it's dead I head back to the bottom.
• Clean out the ships that are orbiting the (now sunken) lower pancake.  Also kill drones and then go after the four scouts that started between the Pancakes.
• There should only be two groups of drones left.  Wait until they are on top, then hit the remaining pancake from the bottom.
• Clean out the rest.

I can do a 107 for zero damage using this process, but usually end up with 2 - 4 coins repair.  Sometimes I'll take a couple hits from drones when hitting the first pancake, and sometimes I mess up a little with the scouts.  Again, just like last time, the Scouts are best hit by sailing alongside of them so you have more time to stop between your torpedo range and their thermal range.. 

So on to the prizes:

The Cannoneer certainly will be the go-to hull for the next raid with its resistances and ballistic weapon output.  I think the real question is whether they will work best singly or grouped.  I'm wondering this because when hitting mines, I find my Punishers are most effective when working alone.  Since they have enough offensive output to clear turrets in two hits, much of the firepower they would have when stacked up is wasted.  The splash weapons in the mines mean that the stacked ships just end up sharing more damage.  When I use Centurions, they have less offensive output, and also have the stacking field for splash resistance.  They work best stacked up so they can kill turrets faster.

The Cannoneer has the (new since preview) stacking field that provides speed and offensive output.  Whether they will work better stacked or not will remain to be seen, and may even depend on the target.  

The Zelos got better since the preview (when I panned it).  They've added resistance across the board, more deflection, combat speed, and more DPS.  I think with the new launchers or with ballistics (and its +45% ballistic range), it could be effective in the new Siege targets. 

One point many have seen on these new hulls is they have increased repair and build times compared to the times of many hulls since Kixeye made some reductions.  The Cannoneer is back to the old one point per second repair time.  I think what is going on is that we are getting back some power creep.  The longer build and repair times are reflective of the higher power level (performance) of these new hulls.  The alternative is to release hulls that are just as powerful as existing hulls, but the problem is that those aren't really very attractive to the players.  Power creep is necessary, let's just hope it doesn't get too bad again.

If you're unsure what to get in this raid, and you won't have the points to get everything, make sure you come out of this raid with the right hulls & equipment to do the following:

Siege Targets:

You need Radioactive and Ballistic resistances along with a weapon that won't get shot down.  After the Cannoneer and Zelos, Centurion, Punisher or Crusader are your choices (in that order).  If you're going with ballistic weaponry, the Arbalest is a great price this raid and still very effective.  CL-3 Alloy is key, or go after Reflective Plate (and pair with Layered Armor).  Also keep in mind that I, like many other players, expect some new Ballistic weapon + special to be released in the next FM or an upcoming TLC... so make sure you have a backup, but don't overcommit to ballistics right now.  Launchers may also be effective, and the new Squall Launcher + Flechette Feeder will be the best of breed there.

Reaver Targets:

The latest raid target style with these Reavers is expected to replace the current Draconian Armadas as the primary way to get Uranium.  Make sure you have the right equipment to build a fleet to go after these targets too.  If you are using subs, the most important thing is to have 88 range torpedos.  Mayhems are not available (coming from the FM Tier 5), but Fire Twisters are.  You could also go with Tideseekers and either Calamity Scatterguns (if you already have them), or the Concussive Gatling Gun (available in this raid).  

Conquerors:

If you want to hit bases and haven't gotten any conquerors yet... the Fury is the best all arounder, but the revenge is probably best against low end bases and the Vendetta will still be effective as a remote target mortar chucker against bases that don't have the new Cataclysm Mortar or Maxim guns.

Base Defense:

A whole lot of base defense weapons are available.  Glacial Launcher and Coldsnap should be top priorities if you don't have them, but the Executioner and Drac Scattergun are still effective.  The Wendigo isn't totally obsolete yet, but I wouldn't spend on it compared to many other turret choices.

Hellborn - What not to get

No pre-raid post this time, but I'll just combine my "pre" and "one day in" posts here.

Raid thoughts:

Hellborn is here and the raid looks just like the last one.  The one notable change is the addition of the 74 "blitz target".  This target is worth 600,000 points if you kill the Hellstrikes that run away.  If you beat it in one hit, it can be blitzed for a minimum cost of 5 coin, working out to 120,000 points per coin.  For me, I like to be able to do raids for 500k to 1 million points per coin, so using blitz would work out to be a very expensive raid by my standards, but your may vary.  In terms of target diificulty, I tried a couple 74s with the two Tideseekers I built using the build and VXP tokens from the High Tide TLC, and was able to beat it for 4 coin repair.  The keys I found for using Tideseekers there are to avoid drones until ready to hit the mothership, and drive so that you are only engaging only one ship at a time.  Basic stuff.

For most of the raid, I've been using my Hellwraiths to hit 105s and a Grease Monkeys crew to repair, and have just about completed the raid (64M points) using 2 GMs and less than 50 coin.  I've been seeing mixed messages from players in the Facebook groups and such, but I've been having pretty good luck using the 100 Uranium crew rolls lately and I had 3 GMs stocked up.  

The most important tip for this raid when using subs is to come alongside the thermal scouts when firing at them - this way small differences in your ship placement won't cause you to be in thermal range.  Note that the motherships have lower thermal range than the scouts, so you don't have to be as careful when approaching them.  

A couple other notes:

• The yellow thermal rings seem to pop up a little more often than last time, even occasionally when I'm not near a thermal ship.  I think the drones are involved in triggering those, but I'm not too sure.  I generally try to hit areas that are away from drones until I have to.
• When my Hellwraith fleet is full strength, it will kill a scout in one volley, so sometimes I will stop my fleet in front of a scout and let it creep into range... but your fleet may vary.

Prizes:

The new prizes are the Valiant - a new defender hull, a Harlock Tideseeker for finding Phantoms, and a new Scattergun weapon and corrosive special.  In addition there are two limited component prizes that will be available for only the first two days of the raid.

Valiant:


This hull has pretty good armor, but not as good as the Vanquisher (100k vs 500k) - it also has longer repair time (3h vs 2h, cut in half when in base defender fleet slot).  Instead, it has across-the-board deflection, which means that it just might hold up longer than the Vanquisher against a lot of attack types.

On the weapon side, this hull gives range, damage, and reload bonuses across the board, which means there are a lot of choices available to the player on what to use.

The first thing to look at is the range - Jefe put this chart together for the Wednesday night BP Crib show:



These are pretty good options across the board, but the new Calamity Scattergun looks really good here, considering it is a weapon that does area damage.

One more thought is that this ship with 1 speed (instead of zero speed) might be good for base prepping, this was probably more true with the stats from the preview, but the ranges as released are actually a little less than using Cyclone/D98-U launchers on a Retribution (103.4).  And even with a bunch of speed boosts, it's REALLY going to be tedious to use it.

Calamity Scattergun:


This Corrosive Scattergun has more range than any previous scattergun, and it also does a lot of damage with its secondary concussive damage.  Having two damage types is particularly useful against conqueror hulls that have the damage-type specific deflection.  In particular, the Fury and Spite have Corrosive deflection but no Concussive deflection (Fury gets 600 Concussive with Bloodthirst). A DPS comparison (again from Jefe) is shown below:



The DPS improvement from previous scatterguns (both by weapon and by weight) is pretty astounding.  Along with the range improvement, this is clearly the new "must have" scattergun.  Although the focus right now may be on building Valiants, any Furys you build would benefit from this weapon as well.

Compressed Corrosion Canisters:


Again, I'm going back to the Jefe well on this one:


From a pure damage perspective, improving the multishot though Heavy Barrel, or improving the concussive damage through Advanced Concussive will give more benefit than improving the splash damage through Compressed Corrosion Canisters.  But you don't have to choose.  Since each of those three specials affect different statistics, they can be combined for huge damage benefits (as shown in the "stacked" column).  On the Valiant with 5 special slots, and no reason to use an engine or armor special, there is enough room to do it.  But on Offensive ships where you may only have one special to allocate for your weapon boost, consider the other options and even the Hydroxide Injectors, which will give the +1 multishot with the +25% corrosive damage boost.  Adding to multishot is particularly effective with the Calamity Scattergun because it only starts with 3 pellets instead of 6 for the Conflagration Scattergun.  

Harlock's Tideseeker:

This is the anti-sub ship we've been waiting for since the very first phantom sub was released.  It can see phantoms on the world map, and it has the thermal range to see them in combat.  The only defense subs have left to survive against these is speed.. and that really applies only to Hellwraiths.  So when building Tideseekers, remember to emphasize speed if you want to kill the subs you hunt down.

Limited Components: 
I'm putting these together because they aren't worth any more time than that...
 
Using Armor to get 10% Slow Resistance just doesn't seem that great.  Better ways to get Slow Resistance are Agility System and Shielded Tactical System.  For Armor slots on Conquerors, War Plating is a better choice.  1 Million points per piece of armor doesn't seem like that bad a price, but only for armor you'd want to use.


With only 20 points of deflection, I feel like there are more important ways to use your special slots on the (generally) PvE hulls that this special is limited to.  If there were 100 points or so from this special, then it might be worth using.  5 Million points for this just doesn't seem right as-is.

What to get:
The new prizes are good for base defense... you want them.  At 30 million points they seem to be at around the same value point as other recent prizes.  If you're a little short on points, leaving off the new special is probably the best choice out of the three.

Elsewhere in the main prize ladder, the Enforcer (1.75M) and Charon Torpedo (900,000) are good deals if you are missing a defensive hull and a Scourge Torpedo.with 88 range.  D98-U Launcher (900,000) is also a good deal if you are missing a 94 range launcher.  It makes a great spotter weapon if you are building a tank-type ship, or even an alternative to railguns on a Punisher.  Stealth Attack System 4 (350,000) goes well with the lower end sub hulls where you are limited on special slots.  If you have to decide between the Tier 2 weapons, you'll just have to decide where you are weakest in capability and focus there.

And at this point in the raid cycle, I am less positive on the Hellwraith, especially if you were able to pick up the Tideseeker in the first run of High Tide.  If you don't have a good weapon for Tideseekers, the Fire Twister Torpedo (9M) is your best choice from this raid.  The Concussive Gatling Gun (7.5M) is also available but seems a bit overpriced.

The Harlock's Tideseeker, at 20 million points, also seems like a good value considering the brand new unique capability it brings to the table.  

The two new locked limited prizes just don't seem worth it to buy or use (as I mentioned above).  The shards for "super-hulls" may be worth it if you have the commitment to save up... the Gamma Behemoth in particular only takes 10 shards (45M total points over two raids), so only 2 raids are required to complete that hull.  Other than that I don't see too much use for the Hellstar, Protonemesis, or the Man-of-War.  Ghostcrawlers are fun and still useful occasionally... but don't be leaving them sitting around anymore (speaking of which I just docked mine)!

For the other unlocked Prizes, 

Good Deals:
Arbalest (1.1M) 
Heavy Plating 3 (2M)

Pick these up if you don't have them.

Overpriced but maybe useful:
Styx Torpedo (6M)
Concussive Gatling Gun (7.5M)
Concussive Upgrade (3M) 
Nuclear Accelerators (4M)
Punisher (12.5M) 

Only pick these up if you are 'desperate' for the capability, but look for alternatives.  For example, the Punisher is a great tank for the 109s in the FM, but many players are having success with the Tideseeker.  The Styx Torpedo is 6 million points, but the Charon is only 900,000.

OK pirates, play smart and have fun, and start sinking those Phantoms!

Rise of the Warlords - What to get

A new raid cycle is upon us - the Reavers have returned with Drones, Scouts, Hulks, and a whole lot of Sub Cavitator fields.  If you've paid any attention at all over the last month, you've seen that subs really are the only viable option for beating these targets.  I was sort of intrigued by the idea of trying V2H or a similar ship with Concussive Reciprocators, but these Reavers deal out enough damage that I wouldn't want to rely on that.

The Raid Briefing is here: https://www.kixeye.com/forum/discussion/659299
The Raid Video is here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ai6b7L8-P08
(it's more entertaining than usual by the way)

To take these targets on, you will need to use your subs, pick off the scouts when their cavitator field is down, then go for the Hulk(s).  For targets without the hunter-killer mortars, patience is key.  If you do it really well, the only damage you will take is from their death weapon.  In early versions of these targets, you were able to avoid some damage from that explosion by turning & running before the target died.  In what we've seen lately, the splash damage is the same no matter how far you are from the explosion, so it makes more sense to ignore the splash and just think about going for the next target quickly.  Most of the damage is explosive from these explosions, so X defense is key.  Some is plasma and just can't be resisted.

For the S target (only?) when the hunter-killer mortars are in play, you will really want to go after the mothership and hulks that fire the mortars ASAP.  Then once you've rushed through that... then you can slow down & try to pick off the rest.  We've also heard that the retargeting range of the hunter killer mortars has been reduced.  Hopefully what we will see is that you will only need to face the mortar from one enemy at a time instead of all four.

If you have Hellwraiths with Fire Twisters, using one sub at a time is the general strategy to minimize the splash damage.  However, if you have weaker subs and the Cavitator field comes back on before you can kill your target, you might want to use more subs and stack up so you can complete each target in reasonable time.  In this case you'll want to stick with the lower level targets.

Let's look at the new prizes:

Fury Conqueror Hull


This Conqueror hull is in the same class as the other ones we've seen, but this time the rotating wheel of weapon love has landed on Scattergun. 

It has a powerful overload that will buff your other ships, as well as briefly stunning nearby targets.

It has very high deflection against Penetrative, Explosive, and Radioactive Damage where it will basically ignore any weapons of that type.  It has some built-in corrosive deflection too, but not enough that it will ignore corrosive weapons.  Bloodlust will get this ship some additional Ballistic, Concussive, and Corrosive deflection, but this hull will really have to watch out for Blunderbuss and Miniguns.

When building these, consider that they have the 100% defense handicap we've seen recently on a lot of hulls, but they don't have any built-in turret defense.  I recommend Siege Battery on any build of these for the Turret Defense.  Resonance Capacitor could also get you some turret defense, but I don't think you can count on being in a field all the time with these hulls.

You also will want to look at your Evade stat.  You start at -50%, which means that with an evade special and armor, you can get that into a decently positive range.  Perhaps the only weapon you'd face where you care about evade is Javelins, but you might want to be able to delay Shockwaves too.

With a bare hull build time of a bit over 2 days, this hull can be built for a reasonable amount of shipyard time.

Conflagration Scattergun

This new Scattergun has higher damage and better range than other light Scatterguns - it is definitely preferable to the Cobra and the D81-M for dealing damage.  It also has a death weapon that will start making your battle look really pretty once ships start sinking.  The actual amount of death weapon damage isn't too high.

One thing to remember on the old D81-M - it was Kixeye's experiment with making weapons have a uranium cost, and although it has shorter range and less damage than this new Scattergun, it does have a much shorter build time (about 3 hours vs. 10) and it adds combat speed.  

Hydroxide Injector


This special adds multishot and corrosive damage.  It is ideal for light scatterguns (like the new Conflagration), but Barrel System 3 still does better for your heavy scatterguns.



What to Get:

The prize list is not too massive, so I'll try to be comprehensive this time:

MAIN PRIZES:

Fury:  The conventional story on these sort of blitz hulls is that they don't have very long useful lifespans.  I think the story might have changed a little bit, since most of the conqueror hulls are run like blitz fleets nowadays - you don't outrange the front line turrets anymore, remember?  This hull has a nice overload when damaged, so when fitted with a launcher for spotting, it can be swapped in for Retributions or Revenges as spotters for Vendettas and be a nice addition to your toolchest.

Conflagration Scattergun:  It's probably the best weapon to put on your Fury.  Concussive repeaters also come to mind, but without the damage bonus, those weapons are probably best on Revenges.

Hydroxide Injector:  Adding 46% to your DPS is a good thing, right? If you are using the Fury to spot, that might not matter too much though.

Hellwraith:  If you don't have these yet, I HIGHLY recommend them.  Of course, getting 15 million points this raid might be tough if you don't have these already.  They will be the critical hull to get in this raid cycle, and we expect to see these types of Reaver targets somewhere for a long time after this raid cycle.  If it is a question of "Fury or Hellwraith?" I'd strongly recommend Hellwraith.

Fire Twister Torpedo:  These torpedoes deal lots of damage, but the excitement for these was damped a bit when we saw they are "dumbfire" instead of aimed.  Coupled with Hellwraiths and Sealed Fire Charge, it really isn't much of a problem, but on other hulls you might not want to depend on these.

Sealed Fire Charge:  These go nicely with the FTTs, giving splash and speed bonuses. Critical hits are great against targets with deflection.

Tiger Shark:  I'm not scrapping mine just yet, but these subs are noticeably less effectivein this raid than Hellwraiths.  If this is all you can get (for a much lower point total than the Hellwraith), it might be a nice step-up to build these, but I'm not sure they are worth the build time in comparison.

Heavy Cruiser: These just don't seem like they have a place in today's game.

Charon Torpedo: Cheap at 900,000 points, these are the best alternative to Fire Twisters

Scattergun D81-M: I'm not sure where you'd really use these.  They were a cheap/light way to get some combat speed when they were introduced, but the nearly weightless/instant building Siege Cannons do that now.

Stealth Attack System IV: Again a good pickup for cheap, and usable in some combinations.

Barrel System 3: Best for "Heavy" weapon multishot of +6, you're more likely to want this special to be use with the Thermonuclear Launcher than the Heavy Scattergun.

LOCKED STORE:

Interception System: I liked this one in Tigers with my Styx torpedoes, or possibly on a ship with Antipode Launchers, but I'm not sure this is a must-have these days.

Railgun D-110:  Not bad if you have a use for it, but the Arbalest is better in Mine and FM targets.  This might be decent on the Gamma Behemoth if you are going that way - it has better speed than the Arbalest.

Gamma Behemoth Shards (limit 5):  Since you only need 10 shards for the Gamma blueprint, this raid could get you halfway there.  As a hull with significant buffs for ballistics and countermeasures, this hull has a place in many high-end guard fleets. 

Proto Nemesis / Hellstar / Ghostcrawler / Man-O-War shards x5 (limit 20 shards):  You already know whether or not you want to get these... just remember that you will need 250 shards to actually redeem the blueprint.  I still consider the Ghostcrawler useful.  Not so sure about the other ones.

UNLOCKED STORE:

Ship build tokens (limit 5 days 10 hours): Just make sure that you are getting a positive return on these before you redeem.

Fusion Charger: Not sure where you'd use this currently, but it sure is cheap.


Good luck in the raid pirates!

Catch up on the new FM prizes

Hello pirates - I've been doing a bit of travelling, and then when I got back I was having a bit of connectivity trouble on my main computer so blogging has been a bit difficult.  This game has also been pretty time consuming lately ... I'll get to that. But right now I want to catch up on some of the FM Prizes.  I'm not going to give them a full treatment since I'm about a week and a half late, but I'll share a few thoughts on each.

Mimicus System


I was really looking forward to this special for Hellwraith builds, and I wasn't disappointed.  Although its stats aren't quite as good as the specialized Cat Drive or Battery when those are retrofitted, I like this quick-building combo special.  It lets me use Hunter special to increase torpedo damage on my Hellwraith build.



https://www.dahippo.com/bp/ship/#!B0ZZ0NK0292A292A386S6T066EAQAQAQAQAQAQAQAQAQC000C00NK0292A292A386S6T066EAQAQAQAQAQAQAQAQAQC000C00NK0292A292A386S6T066EAQAQAQAQAQAQAQAQAQC000C00NK0292A292A386S6T066EAQAQAQAQAQAQAQAQAQC000C0dC

Although I show 4 subs in that fleet, I only have one completed right now.  The single sub was able to beat this latest set of Reaver Holdouts with about 40 min repair time per target.  Who got a Ghostcrawler blueprint completed today?  THIS GUY.


Blunderbuss


This weapon in in a similar class as the Frostbite & Scattergun turrets we have received lately for frontline base defense, however it is a ballistic weapon.  This is quite interesting because both the Vendetta and the Retribution (even at full bloodthirst) have no ballistic deflection - the only Conqueror hull (right now) with ballistic deflection is the Revenge.

As a ballistic turret, the first special that comes to mind to mount on these is Depleted Uranium Shells.  That special gives +50% damage and +40% accuracy bonus.  However, this is a splash weapon, not an aimed weapon, so the only advantage from that special is the 50% damage.  My Blunderbuss build looks like this:


Instead of DU Shells, I used the Supercharged EM Rails.  This special gives me a 25% chance of a 300% damage bonus.  This effectively adds 75% to my DPS, instead of the 50% added from the DU Shells.  For my other special, I used the Expanded Concussive Charge - the +60% splash should help against moving targets.  Possibly Eruption Pyre wouldn't be a bad choice either, but I liked the much larger splash vs. the Pyre's projectile speed.  

Anti-Missile Proliferation System


This special seems pretty specialized for Switchblades.  The extra accuracy with the extra shot makes the Switchblades more effective since they can have multiple shots at a single incoming missile... this makes it much less likely you will be overwhelmed by incoming missiles - always a risk with Switch.  

At a second look, I compared this special to Countermeasure Equipment 3.  When retrofitted to R15, that special gives the same range and accuracy bonus to anti-missile, does not have the multi-shot bonus, is 1% lighter, but it has about 12 hours extra build time.  So even for a Phalanx-only countermeasure build, this special might be a good value worth considering.

Corrosive Draconian Armor


This armor series isn't too different than the other Draconian armors we have seen lately - but it is the first armor we have to improve corrosive defense.

It might be very useful if you are still tooling up to fight 91 Mega Hull targets.  And even if you have collected your Gantry shards, and then collected your Hyperion shards... you still aren't done with those targets.

You could build something like this for 91s:

https://www.dahippo.com/bp/ship/#!B07902G2G0U2G00386U350C032E2E2E2E2E2E2E2E2E2E0ZZ0ZZ0ZZ0ZZdC

This ship would be quite effective with other Apollos or as a lead for Rhinos.  Would I spend the nearly 4 weeks of build time on this?  Probably not (Remember - I won a Ghostcrawler today).  But if you are considering a Zoe Apollo... there you go.

I finished my Mega Hull very recently and found they are very Titanium hungry - once you have a Mega, if you want to keep adding weapons and upgrading it, you will quickly find you need to keep collecting titanium to continue.  You get 8000 titanium from beating a 91, but adding weapons or specials to your mega modules will eat that up quickly.  Manufacturing the resources to upgrade or add new Mega modules is also pretty Titanium intensive... so what I'm saying is two things:
- you're not done with those 91s once your Hyperion is started
- My Mega Hull build guide is coming soon (and not like Kixeye "coming soon")

New Raid Prizes - Hellwraith creeping up

I hate steering my readers wrong... but between changes to the 70 Reaver Armadas and the preview of the new upcoming raid prizes... my last article is obsolete.  I gave 4 options for doing the next raid:

- Wait for new raid prize subs
- Refit Tiger Sharks
- Refit / Build low end subs
- Refit surface ship like Frosty, V2-H, or Proto-Hunter

The changes to the 70 targets added defense bypass - this nullified the resistance advantage of the surface ships, and made that option almost useless.  The increases in target health also made the higher end Reaver Armadas much more difficult with low end subs.  I did complete my Tiger Shark refit (at 2 days 7 hours per sub), and have been having more success against the Armadas... although it took some practice too.

But when we saw the results from the prize preview, the new Reaver sub, weapon, and special were looking quite destructive.

I'll do some comparisons and number crunching and see if we can figure out where the big advantages are coming from....

Hellwraith


Comparison below:


It's not all bad for the Tiger Shark in comparison, but I think the Tiger's DPS won't make up for the huge torpedo damage bonus, and the Assault Deflection will help the Hellwraith in comparison to the slightly higher submerged resistances.  I'll put those statements to the test in the next section.

The very high speed of the Hellwraith is certainly worth mentioning and will really come in handly - choosing range is often key for victory.  It will more than make up for the shorter dive/surface cycle.

Fire Twister Torpedo



The chart below compares the effectiveness of different combinations of attacking hull (generic, Tigershark R0, Hellwraith) & torpedo (Fire Twister, Charon R0) against different targets (Tiger R0, Hellwraith, and Cavitator Scout from Reaver 70s).



The numbers vs. the Reaver Cavitator Scout show the Fire Twister is about twice as effective as the Charon (R0), and the Hellwraith is about 50% more effective than the Tiger Shark This matches the destructiveness we saw in the preview.  But against player targets with high concussive resistance, the Assault DPS built into the Tiger Shark beats the extra torpedo damage of the Hellwraith, since the Assault DPS doesn't get resisted.

So my conclusion is that although the new hull/weapon combo will be much more effective than older hulls in this raid, it might not actually drive FvF power creep.  This hull will not be changing sub vs. ship or sub vs. sub outcomes significantly compared to older hulls.

The new torpedos are a big improvement though... 50% more damage and lighter weight than Charons.

Sealed Fire Charge


The Sealed Fire Charge is an unconventional weapons improvement - with the increase to critical damage, it gives a 20% DPS bonus - more if the target has deflection.  Splash and projectile speed are nice too (if you are using the Fire Twister).  The Cloak Efficiency hit shouldn't be too bad if you are using it on a Hellwraith, since those have a built in Cloak Efficiency buff.  So far, 70% - 75% is a good cloak efficiency target vs the Reavers.

Vassago's Punisher


I'm not going to spend too much time on this ship - it looks like it will be really good in Mines and pretty good in DUBs too.  However, with no Penetrative resistance and no Assault Deflection, this hull is not what you'd want to bring into a Forsaken Mission Stronghold.  With an 18 day buildtime, there are a lot more economical ways to beat a mine or a DUB.

Overall on the Prizes

The big must-get is the weapon, not the hull.  The Fire Twister makes all the other torpedoes obsolete.  The Hellwraith will be significantly more effective in the upcoming raid cycles, and it has some unique advantages with its high speed, but I think that players who can't get 50 million points for the new gear should shoot for 21 million to get Tigers & Fire Twisters, or even 12.9 million to get Spectres and Fire Twisters.

My plan is to pick up the new prize hull and start building ASAP.  My goal is to have at least two (mostly empty) hulls to rank during VXP weekend.  Two Hellwraiths should be at least as effective as my Styx Tiger fleet.

On the rest of the list
I'm not going to go through each of the other prizes - there are just too many.  I'll try to hit the highlights:

Hulls
Subs: Getting the best Sub hull you can is probably a priority if you don't have any.  I don't really like the Nighthawk over the lower build times and point cost of the Spectre, so the major ones to consider are the Hellwraith (30M), Tiger Shark (9M), and Spectre (900k).  

Chores: The Punisher (12.5M) is clearly the king of the chores right now but Apollos (12.5M), Centurions (9M), and Rhinos (1.75M) are also options.

Conquerors:  The Revenge (15M) is the only conqueror available in this raid.  Most players would have rather seen Vendettas, but no luck there.  If you don't have any options, and you really want to get into the base hitting game, pick up Revenge and the Concussive Gatling (7.5M) 

Flagships: The Omega Behemoth (11M) and the High-landers NC (4.5M) are the best flag options for chores.  The Savage Kodiak (10M) is also worth considering to enhance a Rhino fleet.  The Destroyer ECM (40M) is really a vanity hull - sonar protection doesn't help against thermal.  Vassago's Punisher (50M) just doesn't seem worth the build time or points right now.


Turrets
The limited Coldsnap (15M) and the Glacial Launcher (15M) are both very key pieces of a high end base defense.  The Apoc Mortar (12M) can be useful against some fleets, but really needs the Level 6 turrets (two specials) before it can shine.

Weapons
As said above - the Fire Twister Torpedo (12M) is the prize of choice this raid.  Most of the other weapons can be useful if you have a build in mind, but none leap out as must-gets.  The D98-U Antipode Launcher (5.5M) has been offered for the first time in a while, so you might want to pick that up.  Avoid the Styx and the UAVs... the Styx is not useful in the upcoming raid cycle vs. these targets with corrosive resist, and the UAVs simply lack a good hull to carry them at this point in the game.

Armors 
Streamlined Cadmium (7.5M) lost its lustre when ships repair times came down.  D5-X (3.5M) is good for its deflection bonus as well as defense.

Specials
The Sealed Fire Charge (9M) will be useful in conjunction with the new hull & weapon, but I'd avoid it otherwise.  Other useful specials out there are the Barrel System 3 (5M) and Stealth Attack System 4 (3.5M) 

Tokens & Shards
Up to 11 days of tokens are welcome.  So are Ghostcrawler shards.


Good luck in the raid!  Remember that it is a 6 day raid.  Use the time wisely and don't get frustrated early.  Don't forget your crews.

Concussive - New FM prizes & next raid cycle

In this article, I'll catch you up with the new FM Prizes and also give some thoughts on what to do with the next raid cycle - we've just seen a preview of the targets that are being considered.

Zynthonite Armor CT


The new Zynthonite CT armor is pretty much like any other single-resistance armor, except it resists concussive damage.  It is really most like the R armor, where the smaller versions have lowered resistance.  It also has the same build time as the equivalent sized R armor.

So whether you want to use this armor all depends on whether you have a ship that expects to be shot at by (mostly) concussive weapons.  The two biggest potential uses are for an anti-sub fleet (hopefully they have no Cobras) and an anti-Revenge fleet (with Concussive Gatling Guns).  Maybe you want this armor for your base guards, but I'm not super excited for this one.

Oh, and a two letter name for a single resistance is silly and inconsistent.  There's no T in concussive.  Of course, this all stems from whomever made the bad decision to use "C" for ballistic waaay back when.  Bad design decisions come home to roost.  On the plus side, the picture looks cool - probably cooler than is warranted for a ho-hum armor.

Concussive Platform Plating


This armor could go on your turrets to help defend against concussive damage.  This would result in a very specialized defense against the Concussive Gatlings - but that is still the number one threat to your base. The question is whether this armor would be as effective as the current best alternative - Permacrete.  The armor points given by the CPP is the same as the Zynthonite Reinforcements that provides resistance, but like those plates, the armor provided is way short of the 52,080 armor points provided by Permacrete.  The power is a small bit higher than the other Zynth options (955 vs. 925) but not as good a value as the Permacrete (1665 power for Permacrete gives you less than 2x the power draw for more than 3x the armor).

So will it defend well against the CGG?

Well the biggest sized plate gives 60 deflection, and let's just consider the best case on a Level 7 turret with 3 armor slots.  So my choices are 328,120 armor with 180 deflection on a CPP-defended turret or 436,240 with no deflection on a Permacrete-defended turret (280,000 health comes from the turret itself).

On a revenge, the Concussive Chain Gun is rated at 700 building damage (in long range mode) with salvo 2, but the hull has a +315% damage built in.  So it does (700 / 2 * (1 +315%) ) = 1452.5 points of blueprint damage per shot.

When shooting at the Permacrete turret, you do 726.25 points of "real" damage per hit, resulting in 601 hits needed to kill the turret.

When shooting at the CPP turret, you do (1452.5 - 180) / 2 = 636.25 points of "real" damage per hit, resulting in 515 hits needed to kill the turret.  

So this means that if you are defending, a Permacrete turret will perform better than a Concussive Plated turret.  Also keep in mind that the calculation above was the "best case scenario" for the Concussive Plate... many Revenge have a damage booster like Siege Battery or Concussive Warheads, which makes the deflection even less effective.  Or if you have a lower level turret, you have less built in health, which means that the ratio of the health difference between the Permacrete and Concussive will be larger, also making the Permacrete perform better.

So - for anyone who has Permacrete, Concussive Platform Plating is useless.

AT:R Transformer


This is our third Transformer option for a Level 7 turret.  The other two give increased damage at the cost of resistance (A-T), or increased resistance at the cost of damage (D-T).

In the current game, high Damage per shot is critically important when defending your base because it is needed to overcome high deflection stats on the Conqueror hulls.  That means that I choose the A-T (Offensive) transformer on my frontline turrets over the defensive - I want to make sure that the shots fired will count. 

So when looking at this turret, which cuts damage AND resistance to get range, you have to think carefully about where it might be useful.  I think the answer is on those mid-range turrets that lay down (or suppress) field effects - The Glacial Launcher, Wendigo, and the Coldsnap are all likely candidates for this transformer.  I find that it is particularly challenging to find a good spot to put the Glacial Launcher and that extra 10 range may come in handy.  I know that some players really like the damage done by  the Glacial, but for me it is the ice fields that slow enemies nearly to a stop and set up a huge amount of resistance bypass that I like.

I'll just say that this one is an option to keep in your toolbox, but think carefully before using it.

Reaver Holdout Targets

In this latest VXP weekend, we got a first look at the "Reaver Holdouts", which was claimed as a sneak preview of the next type of raid target (coming in September).

So the way the target worked, is that you are faced with 3 Reaver Scouts and 1 Reaver Hulk.  The Scouts have a Cavitator field (surfaces subs) that blinks on and off, and fire a concussive cannon.  The Hulk has a multishot mortar that sets up permanent cavitator fields when it lands.  The Reaver ships also have very high resistance to damage types besides concussive and corrosive.  

The intended way to engage these targets was by using subs.  If you could watch the Scout Cavitator fields, you could come in and kill the Scouts with just 1-2 torpedo volleys while the field is off.  The other key is to be able to watch the Mortar shots, estimate where they will land, and stay away from that area.  I did two Holdout targets with my Tigershark fleet to get an idea of the difficulty, and I was able to complete the target both times for under 2 hours repair - and all of that damage was done by the ships exploding.  You were able to retreat and re-enter to erase the Mortar Cavitator fields if they got too inconvenient - I did take advantage of that.

Just in case you're wondering what I'm using on my Tigers, here's my build.  I use Styx with Interception System to maximize my DoT damage, except one ship that has Sonic Targeting for spotting other subs (remember the Scourge?).  The Phantom has a few Cobra Scatterguns, but I never really put the shipyard time into those.  You'll also note I didn't max out my stealth armor... that's just a design choice that most players didn't make.

Looking at the resistances, it is possible that a Scattergun fleet could be effective too, but I don't know anyone who tried that.  Those targets with their concussive damage might also be best attacked with a ship using the new CT armor, but you'll still need to do some damage... once more, my head returns to V2-H with Concussive Gatling Guns. I'm not saying you gotta go out & build those... but it keeps tempting me as a refit.. let me know if you try it.  And next time I get on a preview server, I just might give it a shot.  On second thought, CGGs might have some trouble against fast moving ships.

Most people used these fleets for ranking - killing a full health ship on these fleets gave about 4k VXP (per ship, no crew), which was a very nice payoff.  But we want to understand how to beat these targets going forward, so let's look at what we know from Kixeye... They put these targets out early so that we can get a taste for them, and so that they can start to learn about how we would approach them.  There will probably be changes between now and September.   

What we do know is that the September raid target will be Skirmish-type, and probably sub friendly.  We will probably also see Skirmish ships go into the Foundry.  We may also see build time reductions for the hulls and some of the related equipment (Scourge torpedos desperately need a build time reduction). 

What Skirmish hulls might we see in the Foundry?  Looking through the Skirmish tab in the Shipyard at the non-limited hulls we have:

Tier 4: Tiger Shark
Tier 3: Nighthawk
Tier 2 - 2.5: Stingray, Interdictor, Spectre
Tier 1: - 1.75: Sawfish, Battleship, Battlecruiser X, Battlecruiser, Barracuda

It is very possible that the Skirmish Foundry hulls will be sub-only, resulting in the Barracuda, Spectre, Nighthawk, and the Tiger Shark being the choices.  If you have nothing built yet, the Barracuda on Tier 1 might be quite intriguing (as a quick build), especially with the likelihood that its stats will be improved to the R10 version with extra weight.  I would probably choose that hull over the Spectre on Tier 2 just for the extra special.  The Spectre would need more speed and an extra special slot to be chosen over the Cuda... its submerge time is nice, but I think in most anti-ship situations, I'd rather have a Cuda fleet.  (like this?) My thoughts might change when we see the Foundry updates.

In the short term, you might want to start some hulls for ranking, but I wouldn't go overboard until we see the Foundry release.  When I built my Tiger Sharks, I did the inital build with Vortex Torpedos just as a quick way to get them in the water.  The DPS stat took care of damage dealing for a while.  In addition, spending Uranium to retrofit the sub hulls probably isn't a good idea. 

For the long term, it looks like you will need a sub fleet.  You will do better in that upcoming raid cycle with subs, and then it is very likely that the target we fight in the raids will move to the world map to replace a "chore" type activity (in early 2017?).  

Overall, I'm kind of looking forward to these targets - they were creative and a change.  The thing I didn't like was that the only time they do damage is if either... the player messes up, gets surfaced, and dies ... or ... the ship does some damage when they die.  The nature of sub warfare in BP has always been like that - subs win easily or die horribly.  The raid design will be quite difficult, since they will need to find some middle ground - cause enough damage so players won't do it for free, but don't just destroy fleets.  Good luck Kixeye!