Naval Balance Survey

We've had a few balance threads recently on the topic of Naval Balance, so I've created a survey to help compile opinions.

This survey is not official in any capacity. The balance team was not involved or consulted in its creation.

https://forms.gle/CW51bP3j2y5tyf6v9

Ive tried to put some comments in the link, but not worked very well.
Well well, as a free panel, lets to point something.

Battleships need, IMHO, MORE speed, and some more DPS, but NOT stay with groundfiring subs with surface weapons .
Carriers as in EQUILIBRIUM, producing planes while sailing.
Cruisers being cruisers, enlarge them. More heavier and costly than destroyers.
Destroyers more maneuvrable, AFTER the fix of all aceleration, and turning ratios of the ships in the game. 4th Dimension tried it.
All submarines being stealth while stoped, being detected only when in movement OR firing torpedoes. The new tactics and ambushes would be very amazing.

T2 torpedo launchers need to be buffed. If they're not going to do very much, the cost should go down. They serve almost no role at all in the game.

@arma473 T2 torp launchers are pretty useless, with almost no benefit compared to t1, just slightly longer range. The main problem is they are outranged by both cybran and aeon destroyers so they are completely useless against them. Buffing the t2 launcher range to 80 so it's equal to them might make them far more useful.

You could make the T2 ones useful by making them submerged.

No thanks, I am sure they won't be OP given the only reasonable way to deal with them will be torp bombers.

I think it's good they are useless. If they would be as strong Vs frigs as t2 pd Vs T1 spam then Eco would be the strongest option on naval maps like Seton's. Currently it's totally possible to naval rush with a slight defenders advantage in my books. Buffing to launchers would further amplify that defenders advantage. If you want to make defensive structures more viable versus units you need to first change the balance between eco and units. It you make units weaker you strengthen eco and that's so incredibly dull .

T2 torpedo defence feels like it needs a buff. In most matches that get to T2 tech you see T2 PD being built, but I've yet to see T2 torp launcher being built. It's not like T2 PD being good makes Eco the strongest option on matches, and you don't even need to buff T2 torp launchers to that level.

Provided you don't boost their range, then they'd still die easily to T2 navy, and so would only be of use if supported by T2 navy, and only then for defence. Even then, unless there was a key choke point or location of strategic importance they wouldn't be good since your opponent would have the option of ignoring them and targeting another location.

Giving them a DPS or health boost, and/or a mass cost decrease, and it would add an extra option/strategic decision. Ideally you'd combine it with a buff to subs who would be made even worse by an improvement to torpedo launchers though.

A significant buff to them would be a build time decrease. They often times take just a little too much time to be relevant. I'm in favour of a modest 10 per cent build time reduction. This increases their role as a last resort defense tool against early navy aggression, but not too much.

@Tagada
@BIG-BENNIS-MAGIC
You make good points and I agree with you that as it stands it could become far too defensive at the t2 navy stage to buff t2 torp launchers much. While land has specific counters for PD (t1 arty, t2 MMLs), there isn't a unit that really fits that role for navy. Subs and missile cruisers have different roles, and cruisers would still be pretty easily and cost effectively countered with tmd. Having to wait for battleships buys the defender a HUGE amount of time, so Bennis is right this is an enormous advantage for the eco heavy defender. There is already a significant enough defenders advantage. So I would be ok with making t2 torp launchers slightly more cost effective than t1, but still counterable with t2 navy. Looking at the unit database stats, t2 torps have double the dps, 60 range instead of 50 and cost a bit more than double the mass, and triple the build time. I think that makes them generally a worse option than t1, especially since as emergency defense build time is pretty important. So I think just a small mass cost and/or build time reduction is probably fine, but I don't want to make them too easy to spam up either.
But maybe t2 launchers having almost 4x the hp is important enough that along with the small range advantage they really are well balanced with t1 and we should leave it alone. In any case there shouldn't be any significant changes made here.

I am pretty traumatized from winning navy with a handful of frigates left over, only to be wiped out when I lack the dps to kill all engineers building T2 torpedoes. True he can also build land PD to kill frigates, but those don't kill my subs.

If anything, make them as punishing to T1 navy as T2 PD is to T1 land... but INCREASE build-time or short-range potential.

T2 Torp Launchers should have the same range as UEF destroyers. Make them require siege to outrange. (Or given them Aeon destroyer range to require battleships or cruisers.) It is obvious that the T2 torp launcher's main problem is it is outranged by all T2 and T3 ships. It's competent against subs, but nowhere near as effective as torpedo bombers or even destroyers. Merely being okay against subs is not a reason to make T2 Torp Launchers. Ideally, it costs a bit less than a destroyer, so it should be able to about match a single destroyer (because it can't move or hit hover/land targets) by returning shots at the destroyer's maximum range. Although it's worth noting that they might still be underpowered even with a huge range buff as taking them out safely with ships becomes a simple matter of parking your destroyer behind a rock or something the torpedoes will get caught on but the destroyer's shots can fly over. We shouldn't be afraid of over-buffing T2 torp launchers because nearly every trait they have sucks ass - Expensive/immobile/torpedoes only/extremely slow turret yaw speed/the stupid things can't even shoot straight down/useless against hover/lots of wasted shots because torps track targets and are slow (when a target dies, so do all the torps that were chasing if).

I see the T2 torpedo launcher much like T2 flak: it's an ineffective last resort tool if you failed to do your homework ( scouting) and therefore didn't prepare naval build power to defend against navy aggression, or Air BP likewise. The thing Is that both of these structures do not require the respective Hq they can defend against: T2 Torpedo can defend against some T2 naval aggression or keep these vessels out of naval factories range, but it can be build with T2 ACU or any other T2 builder. Therefore you save the hq worth of time, mass and power and therefore the structure needs to be less effective mass per mass wise than T2 naval units.

I think though that as a last resort naval defense the launcher builds just a little too slow, and I think a slight buff in terms of build time would be a nice way to fine tune it

@big-bennis-magic said in Naval Balance Survey:

I think though that as a last resort naval defense the launcher builds just a little too slow, and I think a slight buff in terms of build time would be a nice way to fine tune it

It is more like the first resort after losing navy. If spamming up T2 torpedoes is nerfed, T2 land PD is the first resort.

The key difference for me is that T2 land PD cannot kill the submarines, and the submarines will prevent your opponent from rebuilding its own navy until he builds torpedo bombers. This seems very fair to me. His superior eco allows him to shut down the coastal bombardment, but not to cancel your victory entirely.

I've always wondered why the torp launchers were floating.

If the t2 sunk after built could be area denial to t2 destroyers so one can win navy and keep it but have to fight for the beach before surface bombard

could T1 PD and SMDs be allowed to be built on water, SMDs maybe but T1 PDs might need to be considered as if your on a map like setons then you could build defenses on the water but hover (especially zuthees) could attack them, and might give navy more of a role to kill them and allow a defensive option for navy against hover unless its T2 or 3, also Aeon frigates should be reduced in cost if it has lesser HP then the other factions even if it needs more energy to be built, frigates are just unbalanced in general even with T3 involved, they all should have their HP reduced by like 500 maybe, also reduce the shards and coopers hp as well, the speed of the units should be changed to feel more diverse or feel more like the faction your playing, the frigates could stay the same speed to catch up with other units but units like destroyers and cruisers just have the same speed, maybe have the UEF and cybran cruisers just as fast as destroyers while the aeon and seriphem destroyers should be faster, or could make the sera and aeon cruisers slower somewhat, also should buff the cruisers HP by like 1000 hp in my opinion as i feel like torp bombers if enough of them are built could just shift G a full fleet of cruisers and wipe them out, could buff the AA and range of it as well, also the UEF and aeon cruisers need a buff with their main guns in terms of range, they are most likely never going to get used in naval combat so might as well use the guns to fire on land, also there needs to be options to target deep inland and strat subs are the only things that can do so, could maybe give them more of a role to snipe key targets if theres air superiority in the way and need to destroy something , and maybe add something to the UEF and Aeon strat subs like torp defense or speed for aeon or a deck gun or reduced cost for UEF, i think strat subs should be used more other then nuking, would you use the hauthuum just for nuking? could make the sera carrier fill in the role of killing land targets deep within

also should torpedos be able to be dodged if they are out of range of when they were fired like torp bombers and torpedo defenses, they could also expire if thats not an option

@valki Aeon and UEF T2 PD can kill subs with groudfire, also T2 arty of any kind can also, oh also T1 bombers with ground fire can also work against subs (aeon bomber has a trail in the water when bombing also) oh and T1 cybran mobile arty as well as zuthees can do the same as well