Worst ship?

[McKinstry]

Just for the fun of it. We've talked about ships we liked best but what, in your opinion, is the most overpriced piece of space offal flying around on ACTA:SF tables.

Just off the top of my head, the Gorn Megalosaurus CL strikes me a doing almost nothing well while costing way too much for what is essentially a bad destroyer although the Romulan War Eagle at 140 for what in most battles is a one shot Plasma R seems right up there as well.

[Myrm]

Part of the problem here is it is fairly easy identify ships that might be poor as an individual because they have obivous weaknesses but will fit well into a fleet as a specialist. ACTA being a fleet game this makes those weirdoes suddenly useful but too many and you are in trouble.

For instance that War Eagle is one heck of threat - a fleet in being cloaked and ready to go. A one shot plasma R is quite a significant one shot.

FOr me the worst ship is a single Fast Cruiser.....not enough firepower to last as a flank attack but all those points invested in speed. Make it 2 of them or a squadron of 3 and you have a seriously useful hammer for your anvil. The fed vessel wih 6 photons but an inability to fire them is the most annoying to me - and it isnt in the game yet but I would expect the same from the basic Fed DD.

[Greg Smith]

The Fed New Fast Cruiser. It is slightly better than the Wolverine in most aspects and worse in others. It is certainly not worth 25 points more. Though it is a great looking ship.

[tneva82]

The Fed New Fast Cruiser. It is slightly better than the Wolverine in most aspects and worse in others. It is certainly not worth 25 points more. Though it is a great looking ship.

Manta? I have found it pretty useful. I just love ph-1 banks and lots of them. Manta offers more ph-1's than wolverine.

[billclo]

The Fed New Fast Cruiser. It is slightly better than the Wolverine in most aspects and worse in others. It is certainly not worth 25 points more. Though it is a great looking ship.

Manta? I have found it pretty useful. I just love ph-1 banks and lots of them. Manta offers more ph-1's than wolverine.

I also like the extra phasers. I have a hard time hitting with Photons, and have a love for more phasers. It's why I like the Texas CL, despite it being an "old" ship. Photons, eh, okay I'll fire them against an target but I don't expect them to hit.

[Keeper Nilbog]

The Gorn CL does appear to be a bad ship, easily out performed by the Heavy Destroyer it would appear. One thing - just don't let it get near you, 12AD of Plasma is a cruiser's nightmare, and as said, it's a fleet game, so the wing ships will be coming at you too.

To my mind, some of the worst ships, at present, at the '1 channel' scouts (baring Kzinti)- limited firepower (as they generally loose their 'punch' weapon - though not Kzinti), and one channel doesn't do much. That said, Fleet game - a '1 channel' scout backing up a '2+ channel' scout is great.

You pays your money and takes your choice.

[Ben2]

The Manta is a good ship, hitting harder than the Wolverine and better at long range (and with better drones/drone defence). However running a pair of them is 50 points more than a pair of Wolverines, and the question is whether those points are better spent on something else.

[Greg Smith]

The Manta is a good ship, hitting harder than the Wolverine and better at long range (and with better drones/drone defence). However running a pair of them is 50 points more than a pair of Wolverines, and the question is whether those points are better spent on something else.

That is my point, it is not a terrible ship. It's point cost over and above the Wolverine makes it poor.

And on a more general point: are ships bad, or are the just over-pointed?

[scoutdad]

That's a deep question with many possible answers.
In a single ship vs single ship, equal points environment, I'd say the Gorn CL is the bottom of the bunch.
Other ships have simialr disadvanages... ie, bad turn more, over-pointed, bad weapons suite, etc. But the CL gets it all, in spades.

In a fleet environment however; those disadvanages do not seem quite as bad. Sure, I'd rather have a HDD... but sometimes, you don't get what you want. At least in a fleet, the CL cna provide a heavy hit if you get it in range.

I agree with the Scout 1 comments, too.

[billclo]

In some situations, it may be better to have a scout-1 and a scout-2 ship instead of a single scout-3 ship.

Say you have a Scout-3 ship and the enemy has a Scout-3. You have to activate and use all 3 scout channels in one go, and then the enemy scout can nullify yours. If you have multiple smaller scout ships, it gives you an opportunity to nullify something he did, or you could have pre-emptively used your scout to get him to do something, and then jam/nullify AD on a target he didn't use a channel against.

Say you have a scout-2 and a Scout-1 versus an enemy Scout-3. Use the scout-1 to jam a target he wants to shoot at. He then has to use one of his channels to unjam what you just did, plus do something with the other 2 channels right now. You can then use the Scout-2 to react to what he did, or jam/nullify AD on some other ship. He then cannot do anything about what you just did.

Yeah, the scout-2 and -1 ships aren't as nice, but they have a place.

[scoutdad]

Never meant to say the scout-1 ships didn;t have a place, just concurring with the statement that by themselves, they are not that effective.

Take Saturdays campaign game for example.
Federation versus Romulans and random selection of scneario yeilded a 400 point, A Call to Arms battle.
The Romulan player, not wanting to be w/o a scout - took a scout-1 K5RS, and 2x KR.
The Federation player, wanting to at least be equal and preferably rule the EW field - took a scout-3 NSC and 2x FFB.
With the extra scout channels, he was able to effectively control the tempo nad actually ended up destroying one of the KRs without losing any of his units.

Personally, is a large enough battle - I too would go for two smaller scouts rather than one big one.

[Zarathustra Suicune]

I'd say the Callahan cutter and Burke class frigate are good contenders for the title, as they just don't have the fire power to harm, well anything really, unless attacking in a group, and even then I'm guessing you would need to invest far more points into them to get the same result that you would with less points if they were spent on constitutions, earsages, ramius's ect.

[krashreed]

Right now I'd have to say its a toss up between the Mars or the Gettysburg. They are absolutely unusable!!

But that opinion may change if we ever get Rules for them.

[Allerka]

Right now I'd have to say its a toss up between the Mars or the Gettysburg. They are absolutely unusable!!

But that opinion may change if we ever get Rules for them.

Hah! I see what you did there.

[Zarathustra Suicune]

Right now I'd have to say its a toss up between the Mars or the Gettysburg. They are absolutely unusable!!

But that opinion may change if we ever get Rules for them.

Not true, I'm sure most opponents would just let you use them as very pretty constitution/Lexingtons and dreadnoughts.

[Ben2]

I hadn't thought about it, but Gettysburgs imply that D7Ws will be forthcoming at some point.

I'd add the Gorn Destroyer. At 5 points less than the Battle Destroyer would you ever not just take the BD instead? If it were 10-15 points cheaper it might be a harder choice.

[billclo]

I hadn't thought about it, but Gettysburgs imply that D7Ws will be forthcoming at some point.

I'd add the Gorn Destroyer. At 5 points less than the Battle Destroyer would you ever not just take the BD instead? If it were 10-15 points cheaper it might be a harder choice.

Think historical scenario where BDs are not available. But those are probably going to be rare since most players do the buy X points of ships thing.

I do occasionally try to make a scenario out of an interesting F&E battle, and there are times where you have to use DDs because you haven't been able to convert them all to BDs yet... especially vs the Roms, any hull is better than no hull because the Roms have gross numerical superiority.

[Gorgo]

Undoubtedly the Romulan War Eagle.
It is over priced (130 would be a better cost) and suffers the underpowered trait.
The only ship in the game with the underpowered trait I might add.
An easy fix that we follow in my campaign is to replace the underpowered trait with the slow trait.

Cheers,

Gorgo

[Myrm]

Undoubtedly the Romulan War Eagle.
It is over priced (130 would be a better cost) and suffers the underpowered trait.
The only ship in the game with the underpowered trait I might add.
An easy fix that we follow in my campaign is to replace the underpowered trait with the slow trait.

Thats not a good substitution really, a War Eagle that decides to run should be able to fly with the best of them. That plasma-R does hideous damage if it hits and the thing can take a surprising amount of punishment. The Underpowered is a good translation the the bird from SFB.

If you want desperately want something to replace it from the current set up then I would suggest you make firing the R a Power Drain activity. So it could fire phasers if it moves slowly, but if it does a special action as well it has to slow and fire one system only...its a bit more flexible than underpowered for ACTA alothough not necessarily more accurate.

There are a couple of other ships that could well do with the trait, but they are all earlier war ships, if the game is extended that way in the future this is the best trait I can think of.....unrefitted Fed destroyer leaps to mind immediately, several Lyran vessels pre-power pack refit also could come under the ruling - so its nice it is established.

[Gorgo]

Myrm,

I couldn't be more in disagreement with you. In SFB for example, the war eagle, flat out, uncloaked, no power to weapons could make 2/3 the speed of any other warship in the game following the same actions. Conversely, it was an extremely capable cloaking opponent.

Underpowered is a misnomer in the case of the War Eagle. It was fully capable of arming all weapons and firing them while still maintaining close to its top speed (superb battery power). Unlike the Federation DD, which simply was unable to arm all four Photon torpedoes at the same time.
SLOW is a more correct trait. As for running with the best of them it just doesn't do it. It never has. Neither in SFB or Fed Com can it keep up with a quick moving fleet.

The "R" torp is a lovely piece of hardware but frankly it's easier to deal with then a pair of "S" torps and doesn't have the arcs available to it.

It can take a useful amount of damage while cloaked (the shields have been reduced as well) but is vulnerable to direct fire weapons in the open.

As a cloaking weapon it is overpriced, underpowered and lacks the ability hit with all its might. It is the worst ship in the game which is a shame as it probably has the greatest cachet in the Romulan fleet.

Gorgo