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Fighters stationed on the Armitage of any use at all?
herkulius
Member Posts: 0 Arc User
The little fighters distract the enemy. That's a good thing, however I find them dying in ship and torpedo spread explosions way too often. This results in having the fighter launch timer on cooldown all the time while only having one or two fighters out.
So what's the deal with the Armitage? Should I refrain from using torpedo spread? How can I make the little fighters not die in the blast radius of exploding ships? Any suggestions on how to better handle these fighters? What are your thoughts on having the possibility to put universal consoles in the hangar slot instead?
So what's the deal with the Armitage? Should I refrain from using torpedo spread? How can I make the little fighters not die in the blast radius of exploding ships? Any suggestions on how to better handle these fighters? What are your thoughts on having the possibility to put universal consoles in the hangar slot instead?
Post edited by herkulius on
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The truth is the little guys are very good for contributing damage but not so good at surviving, adjust your HUD so that you can see how many are alive at any time and look at the Doff to reduce recharge time, spamming the spawn button can just be a fact of life with a carrier.
Your own torpedo's shouldn't be touching your pets with any kind of damage unless you're running tricobolts AFAIK. My pet's are pretty damn useful, I wouldn't give them up for a Universal counsel.
They do need to be periodically refreshed, so keep plenty of Aux batteries on hand, fly in Aux mode between targets, and remember to use them as on-command attack run when you lay Beta 3 and Sensor Scan/Fire On My Mark on a target, especially as you pop its shields. Think like a boomerang, send 'em out and call 'em back (if you're a Sci cappy, Scattering Field and Science Fleet will massively improve their survivability). Just steer clear of AoE blasts and you'll be fine.
The other option for "these things are getting on my nerves" is to get the shield drones. They blow up whenever you get hit with an AOE but provide a decent healing effect that can be used on you or a team mate.
I don't consider that a good option unless you're doing blockade or another PVE encounter and are feeling too lazy to spam the spawn button. Adding "spawn fighters" to your space bar key bind might be a good idea.
razellis, you can set up your HUD to show they are alive? How can you do that? Someone who has used the Atrox since day 1 and I have not seen this before.
Kyle
The Armitage should be thought of as a strike carrier, which uses ownship's weapons as its main offensive option. The fighters or whatever's in the hangar bay are used in support of the main ship's actions, not on their own.
So yes, that one hangar slot in-game should be used to isolate and overwhelm a single target of your choosing or as above-posted, SRUs can do a basic team support role too. If you think of the hangar pets as a bonus swarm attack system on top of your quad DHCs, you got the strike carrier concept for this game more or less spot on.
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Sort of. You adjust it to show the names and/or health of your pets at all time instead of just when you target them or have the mouse over them. It can clutter up the screen but eyeballing how many are still alive and how wounded they are can help with the "to spawn or not to spawn" question and let you keep track of where the little devils actually are.
It's under the officers section of the HUD options. "Show your mine and Fliers______". Personally I like reticules and health on every thing that's alive and is not a team mates pet.
Kyle
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I totally get the fighters aren't really meant to attack targets on their own, but they aren't fast enough to get away far enough to stay clear of the warp core breach AOEs of exploding ships. I practically have to call my fighters back way before I pop the target.
Heck, I managed to kill two other players in their T2 cruisers in a T2 PVE encounter that way. They were to either side of a target, I came up from behind the target in my T2 escort, warned the two cruiser captains of my intentions and to get clear of the target, to which they both only said "lol". I nuked the target to kingdom come and the ensuing warp core breach took care of both cruisers.
And warp core breaches are that much more dangerous to smaller craft, at any level. Micro managing these little suckers on top of having to look out for everything else that's happening around me is what I find rather distracting. I have no trouble holding my own in elite difficulty PVE encounters, but strangely enough when trying to keep the fighters alive my Armitage takes quite a pounding. It' like an additional difficulty setting.
Finding the right DOFF for a task is something I haven't yet fully mastered. It either costs Zen or a lot of EC, both of which I rather keep than spend.
It looks like I've got two options. Accept the fact that the Armitage's fighters really are nothing more than a distraction buff becoming available every 30 seconds, or accepting the fact that the Armitage is too much ship for me, aka "l2p"
Yes, they die easily of course, but even so, a Flight Deck Officer doff who reduces cooldowns makes life so much easier, not to mention the occasional Aux battery.
I also use them in a support role...Kang needs it's shields back? Shield drones! Ally is pulling all the aggro and needs help to survive? Shield drones!
On top of that, the enemy sometimes shoots them down of course, but that's fine, because any shots they take, are shots I'm not getting hit with, at all. So they still provide a purpose, sometimes also making the baddies waste like a torpedo spread on those or a hit from an FAW, compared to hitting others on my team. It's not guaranteed, but it can help in small ways sometimes.
By no means am I invincible, but it really does help a lot. At least in PvE terms, in PvP, expect those shield drones to pop like an over-ready pimple. FAWs, cannon spreads, point defense consoles, and just about any other AoE you can think of. Warp plasma is probably the biggest one.
So, I really like the shield drones, they can really help, especially if an engineer is in the Armitage (like mine is sometimes). Between them, Rotate shield Frequency, and various BOFF heals, it can be an astoundingly tough little cookie.
Second, I use the intercept mode a lot. Not only does that make them protect me from high yield torpedos (which can cause some serious damage to me, or a dps loss if I have to avoid or shoot them), but it also helps to reduce the enemy fighter spam in fleet events somewhat. And the best part about it is that they spread out, thus reducing the chance they're all blown up at once.
The Armitage isn't a true carrier, but the pets have their uses...to me, the hangar's my swiss army knife slot. I add the fighter type that I need for the role...be it dps, snaring or freighter protection.
Outside of that situation they're rather useless. Their flight pattern and limited firing arc will mean you'll get very little benefit out of using them against a shielded opponent. Also as you've noticed, they die very easily.
Either use Danubes or Delta Flyers for attacking. In most cases danubes are actually incredibly more useful, since the tractors/chronitons reduce the targets defense and allow you to pummel the same shield facing with little effort. Wouldn't use them for PvP mind, since they're rather overpowered.
Both Delta Flyers and Danubes have a 360 degree phaser array, which means the target is always within it's firing arc. They may not do much damage, but chances are they will phaser proc.
Advanced shield repair units are also very useful.
Basically, unless you're fighting targets with no shields, use anything other then peregrines.
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So instead, I use the Delta Flyers, and they work well once you have 4 ships out.
I also have a Blue Flight Deck Officer on hand to make sure I can drop a new pair out quickly. In Fleet Actions, I tend to just spam the Flyers quickly, since it's hard to keep track of them, and they're easy to replace.
But yeah, ditch the Peregrines unless you're using the Advanced variant.
Q.F.T.
Seriously you should go to ESD and get the runabouts or another shuttle from the people at the ship yard. In exchange for a few thousand EC you won't need to babysit them near as much. You gave up a Lt.Commander Tac skill for that hanger, it should be more than an decoy function for you.
The Delta flyers are handy but are about as fragile as the peregrines so you won't notice much of an improvement in survivability there.
I will tell you my affection for the A. peregrines took some time, they were not as tough as I'd hoped and didn't seem that much more damaging in the beginning. They had virtually no advantage over the A. Runabouts that took the last of my dil at the time while the Runabouts brought a lot of control to PVP and PVE play. It was carrier spamming klinks flooding the map with Brel' B.O.P and bio warheads that made me retry the peregrines and learn to value their higher "fighter scale" damage set to intercept mode.
I recommend going to mid thirties level encounters and practicing with the different commands. See how long it takes them to switch to your new target, how they behave when escorting a random person and yourself, what they attack and ignore in intercept mode; and how well they use their Boff powers. They won't be in a lot of danger at that encounter level and in 5 minutes you can learn a lot.
Here's the secret: Don't bother keeping your fighters alive, especially not if you're flying an Armitage.
1. I've never flown a dedicated carrier, but since the Armitage is an escort with a hangar, no matter what, the bulk of your DPS comes from you. The fighters are your support, nothing more. They either add DPS or set up enemies for you to kill. They will rarely if ever kill anything on their own, either through lack of numbers (a max of 6 fighters or 4 shuttles/danoobs) or because you finish the job more quickly.
2. Pet abilities have a recharge time, the same as yours. That means they only trigger a power or launch a torpedo every 30 seconds or so. Worse still, pets are always moving, and in some cases have limited arcs on their powers (like the Delta's Tachyon Beam). That means that a pet orbiting its target is wasting time.
3. What's the solution to #2? Constantly relaunch your ships, ASAP. Why? Because as soon as they launch, pets have fresh abilities, fresh torpedoes, and fresh shields/hull. And since you'll likely launch your craft within weapons range, they will fire immediately, without the need to wheel around for another run, especially for Peregrines, which unlike shuttles or Danubes, need to face their targets to shoot their cannons. Don't keep them alive, keep them coming. You are not a home, you are a factory.
3. About the only small craft you should even think about not refreshing ASAP is the runabout. Why? Sometimes they still have a tractor beam going, and relaunching them will naturally break the beam. Even then, the downtime is usually negligible.
4. If you're too attached to your nameless faceless pilots to abandon them, think of it in canon terms. Things die fast in Star Trek war. Think of those mass battles from DS9 like in "Sacrifice of Angels". Even Galaxy-class ships would die in a single shot from a Jammie cruiser and NegVars would pop from a single DS9 torpedo. Battles in STO are longer and slower. In Star Trek canon, a Peregrine Fighter is a coffin with cannons.