Messages

1

Gameplay / Re: Junker viability and builds

« on: February 01, 2015, 04:48:06 am »

The ship components on a junker are very easy to maintain and thus allow for a reliable trifecta

I was speaking to this, the practical application of a trifecta.  They have chosen Junker over Mobula and regard the trifecta as utmost importance, so yes, they are arguing that it's a better trifecta.

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Gameplay / Re: Junker viability and builds

« on: February 01, 2015, 04:22:51 am »

I was comparing two different Junker crewing positions, not only other ships.  Of course most ships will be reduced to one gun if both balloon and hull are taking heavy damage.  Galleons and Junkers are exceptions because the pilots are expected to help on balloon.  I'm not disputing it's a strength/weakness of the ship.  I have not heard the other side (hull engineer on front gun) advocating the top deck engineer to repair the hull.  That is not particularly compact and would be a strength/weakness of my side (hull engineer on top deck).

The Mobula/Spire components are not so far from the guns as to be substantially worse than the Junker, and are better protected, needing to be repaired less.  If you're arguing that the Junker has a better trifecta than the Mobula which is made specifically to have a trifecta, then you are arguing that the Mobula is just a bad ship.  This is a disaster design-wise and I'm not interested in abusing ship mechanisms to this degree, playing an unbalanced game.  Sounds like the Junker needs a nerf, such as removing hull repair from bottom deck completely.

Overlap is bad, it creates confusion and is inefficient.  Notice how in your scenario a gunner is repairing something and an engineer is shooting.

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Gameplay / Re: Junker viability and builds

« on: February 01, 2015, 01:20:20 am »

The difference of response time from gun to hull on Mobula and Spire compared to Junker is less than a second.  The Galleon is faster.  That time is important, sure.  The increased responsibilities on those ships also makes the hull engineer a less reliable third gunner, yes, but all you've done on the Junker is shift those responsibilities to the top deck engineer.  So your hull engineer is less a third gunner, and more the second gunner.  This limits your kill zone to the diagonals where the gun arcs overlap, making your turning engines more critical and pinning your captain to the helm more.  This means your ship is more likely to be reduced to one, ineffective gunner in a firefight than a normal setup.

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Gameplay / Re: Junker viability and builds

« on: January 31, 2015, 12:59:30 pm »

There is a great guide "aboard a junker" its here in the forums and on steam, it has the basics of what most people consider the "norm" for a junker which has also been discussed earlier in the thread.

on the lower Deck, together with the Gunner. With the amount of components on the top deck, the 2 Engineers are better suited for gunning there and one can always quickly run down to help, for instance when the Main Engine goes down

This is wrong.  The lower deck has a critical fire problem.  Sending an engineer down to fix stuff is incredibly inefficient.  Having two engineers top deck also creates confusion from the overlap of responsibilities.

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Gameplay / Re: Junker viability and builds

« on: January 31, 2015, 12:31:51 pm »

Pubs aren't always bottom of the barrel powder monkeys.  There's nothing you can do about them and it's fine to expect more from a crew.  The "man port guns" voice command should be sufficient in your scenario.  The problem you'll have there is the main engineer will get on the gun and then you have a gunner to repair things, so you may have to straighten that out from the start.  That's why I'm trying to establish some normalcy to crewing a junker.

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Gameplay / Re: Junker viability and builds

« on: January 31, 2015, 12:13:41 pm »

When I run Junker in pubs I have a gunner and gungineer, with a main engi, the main engi can shoot the merc on approach to enemies but will.soon find himself out of arc when its time for engagement, pushing him to repairs...

Junker balloon rams are very effective if their pilot is not prepared for it, and can often lead to painful goomba stomps, again situational, a good junker pilot often stays high keeping them safe from such situations (as discussed above.)

The problem with the main engineer being on the merc is that he couldn't be farther from where he needs to be, which is near hull or balloon/turning engines.  It's an inefficient transition.  He can use the hull ramp trick, but that requires special knowledge and he will eventually have to make himself up top deck anyways.  The gungineer bottomdeck is also ill-suited for it because of lack of ammo types.  The gunner with access to three ammo types should man the merc while the buff engineer buffs it on approach.  For middle range the gunner transitions port, top side guns to avoid the boxes.  Starboard should be close range or utility.

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Gameplay / Re: Junker viability and builds

« on: January 31, 2015, 11:23:13 am »

But the trifecta is not a good strategy for pyramidions in many cases, against many ships it leaves you open to a ram which will throw your main guns off arc, Junkers are resiliant yes but opening the angle for trifecta means a ram will still leave your main guns in arc only knocking the front gun off arc...

With the junker having the best arc coverage in game, usually the most armor in the game, being surprisingly nimble, and having a close, abusable balloon for altitude escapes, it is surely the ship least concerned about being rammed.  Furthermore, with this godmode trifecta, I have to wonder why it's getting rammed to begin with.

However this is mostly concerning competitive tactics. In pub matches I do agree trifecta with hull engineer on a junker is not a good idea as they will often forget the repairs, but this is a very different situation...

Right, it's not a good idea.  Unless you're using this advanced, specialist strategy with a pre-trained crew, it all falls apart.  This means a normal junker should not have someone on the front gun at all times, a gunner should not be bottom deck, and one guy should focus almost completely on repairs.

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Gameplay / Re: Junker viability and builds

« on: January 31, 2015, 10:37:22 am »

IIRC the devs have said its not a gimmick or a mistake but by design.

Then it's bad design.  It should be fixed to be easier and more apparent.

What I'm more surprised by is that someone is confused by the concept of a "main engineer" or hull engineer shooting.

You're confused if you think I'm confused.  I'm arguing that making the main engineer shoot for a trifecta on specifically the junker is prohibitively convoluted for the majority of builds and crews.  Your few and limited examples are not very compelling in the idea that hull engineers need to be firing guns often.  Your cemented idea that the Junker, a ship with five small guns in three different directions is a high firepower ship instead of a resilient, versatile ship is what I'm contesting.  While a trifecta is possible, it is not necessarily optimal in the ship's strategic use, like in the case of the Pyramidion.  If you want a small gun trifecta, the Mobula exists for just that.

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Gameplay / Re: Junker viability and builds

« on: January 30, 2015, 04:50:55 pm »

Really? That's how most comp. crews of run their junkers for at least two years.

I've been away for at least 2 years and I don't run with comp. crews, so yeah, really.  I also don't believe it to be that good, but that's not necessarily my main complaint.  The setup isn't intuitive and I see people mimicking aspects of it without giving any direction.  Like I said, I don't know what I'm supposed to be doing when I get on other people's Junkers because of this.

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Gameplay / Re: Junker viability and builds

« on: January 30, 2015, 04:21:02 pm »

Just because the hull trick is necessary for your crew layout to work doesn't mean it's not a gimmick.  I have also not said that I find it hard.  It's simply another complication to teaching a crew that can largely be avoided.  The only parts that are too far away are the turning engines, and only if they have broken or the hull is about to break.  In those cases, the gunner without an arc can fix them, or even the pilot if there's no control anyways.  I agree that the armor is especially important and that's why your advice applies more to yourself with your main engineer shooting stuff instead of repairing.  And in the case that turning engines are broken it's your loadout that suffers crucial firepower loss because your top deck engineer is no longer on side guns.  So your only killzone is the small arc where the front and bottom guns overlap and that's only when your main, hull engineer is firing.

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Gameplay / Re: Junker viability and builds

« on: January 30, 2015, 03:19:55 pm »

You need to be able to pull that trifecta off when playing on a certain lvl.
If you simply outdps your enemy you dont have to bother with other things. I mean a trifecta will always outperform a bifecta. Thats why you cant outdps a mobula. 3 or even 4 guns are better than 2.
Sure there are other things but trifectas are SO valuable. You shouldnt even consider not using them.
And your perfect mallet cooldown path will fail immidatly when your enemy gets your armor down. Cause then your just a bid of dead metal in the air.
Have your main engi on front and he will be able to react to a armorkill and might get the rebuild If gunner or second engi are aware they would also get 2 on hull and are even saver.

A simple repair path failing when something breaks is far less ridiculous than having your main engineer shoot things instead of repairing, or repairing slowly.  Furthermore, while trifectas are of course superior when available without downside, bifectas are sufficient as evidenced by the prevalence of Pyramidions.

So I don't see how you're saying the trifecta isn't a strength for the junker?

It's a possible strength, but not a unique one.  The particularly silly thing is that the Pyramidion, which the Junker is usually compared to, is also capable of a trifecta and is easier in terms of crew positions.  The Galleon has 3 guns pointed in the same direction.  Its maneuverability is moving into a different argument.

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Gameplay / Re: Junker viability and builds

« on: January 30, 2015, 02:38:54 pm »

You can hit hull, balloon, both turning engines, and run back to hull right as mallet cooldown ends, so it's not too far from everything else until something breaks.  In that case, the pilot and/or gunner can help if needed.  Trifectas are not easy on the junker in practice.  You have to angle your ship just right and sit still to avoid awkward diagonal movement.  It's not just a matter of arcs.  The Galleon, Mobula, Spire, do trifectas effortlessly, so no, a trifecta is not much of strength for the junker.  The Pyramidion is also capable of it.   The hull sweet spot, a gimmick, should not be essential to a ship's success.  I, and I believe the original poster, are not discussing highest level play so I don't care how useless you might find the gunner class or some supposed one only viable build.

If you're not using trifectas, why use a junker? Without a front engineer you're just a crab pyramidion with an odd balloon.

Oversimplification.  There are clearly advantages and disadvantes to Junker compared to Pyramidion without concern to trifectas.  I shouldn't have to elaborate.

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Gameplay / Re: Junker viability and builds

« on: January 30, 2015, 01:37:03 pm »

Yeah, see, I've never heard of anyone telling the main engineer to man the front gun.  With a premade savvy crew I'm sure your strategy works but it's needlessly convoluted most of the time.  Gunner gets front and top guns, buff engi downstairs, main engi on hull, balloon and turning engines with assistance from pilot.

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Gameplay / Re: Junker viability and builds

« on: January 30, 2015, 12:23:52 pm »

One of the junker's best assets is the ability to have trifectas. I recommend using this as often as possible. That's why  the front repairs hull, the gunner spot is the bottom, and one engi on top. This way the front and bottom can help eachother with repairs while the top focuses on the balloon (with the pilot) and engines. The pilot should usually be repairing and rebuilding the balloon. Bring a pipe wrench to repair damage while your engineer is occupied.

I loathe crewing junkers because of this mindset.  I do not automatically know what pilots expect me to do.  The trifecta puts people out of position and completely relies on that hull repair sweet spot trick.  And the gunner spot being below deck has a big fire problem.  It's just horribly inconvenient in practice.  I say if you want a trifecta, fly a Mobula.

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Gameplay / Re: Art meta is boring

« on: January 09, 2014, 08:27:28 pm »

I explained my reasoning with facts, so no, "almost all of that was wrong" is incorrect.  I also explained why a primarily short range weapon can still have a long shell life.  This is disputable but you haven't effectively done so.  The rockets seem faster than they used to be and I qualified my statement with "originally".  The speed is also useful for precision's sake as you must aim for components.  "Disabling power over raw kill power" is not particularly a feature of long range guns.  The closest weapon to the artemis is the hwacha, and that's a close range gun.  "Long range disabling" isn't a common feature in many games as it's usually close range where you need protection/to prevent escape and it's not particularly fair or fun.

The artemis has a great firing arc.  Compare to the mercury cannon, a long range weapon.  What's it doing on the side of a pyramidion in conjuction with a mortar if it's for long range?  If you're going to ignore my points, do me a favor and ignore my posts altogether.