Point the Goldfish's guns forward

[Velvet]

There's a trend I've noticed particularly in competitive but also (to a lesser extent) in pub matches. You see Junkers, all the time. Pyramidions, also common. Galleons or mobulas are seen often enough. Spires and squids; occasionally, with unpredictable rates of success. But Goldfish? I feel that right now that ship is highly underpowered and additionally somewhat uninteresting to play on, resulting in them being a somewhat rare sight in the smoky skies.

I think the heart of this issue is that the goldfish is so heavily reliant on its main gun - most viable goldfish builds only make use of the side guns as backup because a single light gun has very limited DPS and spinning constantly to get tantalisingly close to a bifecta is difficult, leaves you too busy maintaining angles to perform other manoeuvres and is not really worth the effort with no great light + heavy gun synergies to match a gatmortar. The result is a pretty uninteresting ship, both in terms of entertainment value and competitive prospects.

The Goldfish is not very fun in my opinion for a few reasons. Firstly, it is totally ineffective at getting kills since no heavy guns adequately combine armour stripping and permahull damage and as previously mentioned it's not particularly viable to use your side guns to shore up these deficiencies. This means you either have to very slowly blend enemies down or run a build such as disable or flak that is near totally reliant on your ally to cooperate with you to compensate your inability to get kills singlehandedly.
The second issue is that the enginners' tasks generally involve fixing the balloon, fixing the hull, taking the long trip to the rear engine and occasionally putting out fires on the front gun. Even when on occasion the sideguns do see some action, it's very often the gunner that handles these because the primary and secondary guns are almost never needed to fire simultaneously. Having no

The ship's total reliance on the front gun means that any goldfish build will have a very narrow range of tactical options, extremely limited and specialised firepower and perhaps most importantly, be very vulnerable to the disable builds prevalent in competitive play. The goldfish can't participate in sniper battles because it has a third of the firepower, significantly less armour and much more disable vulnerability than comparable ships. In brawls, it isn't an entirely hopeless prospect but falls short of ships such as the Pyramidion or Junker because of the inability to get a quick kill and again, the dreaded artemis. I mean, the Pyra blend more effective than the Blenderfish. The "synergy" between the Hades and the nice big Goldfish hull just compounds these issues.

My proposal is to give the much-neglected sideguns some love and rotate them forward. Not enough to allow for the madness of a double/gat hwacha combo, but at least far enough to get light gun bifectas with guns such as the artemis, flamethrower and rocket carousel. Yes, a Goldfish trifecta would be a massive buff. But as it is the goldfish is a ship with everything against it and nothing in its favour. This change would make the Goldfish a mild contender in sniping and a strong brawler but I think that the deck is so stacked against this ship right now that even this buff would leave it with a significant number of disadvantages. Unlike every competitively viable ship, the Goldfish still wouldn't have the option of bringing a secondary set of weapons so would have to choose between brawling and sniping. It would still be unable to make proper use of very strong sniping weapons such as the Hades or Mercury and remain extremely susceptible to art disable, that large, lightly armoured hull abetting the problem of constant explosive bombardment. Overall I think with these and other weaknesses in mind, the buffed Goldfish would retain the same character of a ship that has to work closely with its ally, whether specialising in support or relying on situational effectiveness by ambushing enemies or catching them off guard. I think the competitive meta needs some variety and this buff would make the goldfish not OP but a very interesting addition to the roster of frequently seen ships.

The rotation would also fix the previously mentioned issue of nothing interesting for engineers to do. A constantly viable trifecta would introduce the choice and variety present on the other vessels as prioritising between gunning and ever-vital repair work becomes necessary.

[Imagine]

https://gunsoficarus.com/community/forum/index.php/topic,2784.0.html

[Velvet]

https://gunsoficarus.com/community/forum/index.php/topic,2784.0.html

my bad, checked the gameplay forum but missed that thread.
Nevertheless, considering the lack of change that thread has catalysed in 5 months maybe it's time to try a new one in a different forum to see if it can attract some more attention.

[Imagine]

https://gunsoficarus.com/community/forum/index.php/topic,2784.0.html

my bad, checked the gameplay forum but missed that thread.
Nevertheless, considering the lack of change that thread has catalysed in 5 months maybe it's time to try a new one in a different forum to see if it can attract some more attention.

S'all good, just remembered there being a thread being... pretty much about the same thing. In fact, now that I recall and search, there's also https://gunsoficarus.com/community/forum/index.php/topic,3515.0.html which is pretty much literally the same thing.

I believe the general consesus was that putting both gun arcs forward would make the goldfish OP.

[HamsterIV]

The goldfish already has a lot going for it speed and maneuverability wise. I don't think it needs an easy bifecta. It can get boring at time for the engineers when only the front gun gets any play, so I usually bring a flare gun, which can overlap the front gun's arc. Putting 10 stack of fire on the hull or balloon on top of what ever chaos the main gun is causing is often enough to overwhelm the other team's engineers.

Also in a team fight a manticore fish can be used to disable one ship while the side gun helps strip the armor off another ship so that a teammate can finish the job.

[Wundsalz]

well this has been debated already. My personal opinion on this matter is tilting one of the side guns roughly 15-25° forward would make the goldie more viable and more interesting to play.

[Omniraptor]

I vote for this to be the next dev app test after light flak and flamer get figured out.

[Nidh]

Being primarily a Goldfish pilot i suggest against this. A hwachafish can get a bifecta with the light carronade and artemis, a blenderfish can get a bifecta with an Artemis and Banshee as well. As much as I'd like to get a buff to my favorite ship, this is not the right way to do it. I would rather have a more protected heavy gun, and a wider variety of heavy gun options to choose from.

[-Mad Maverick-]

the fish needs a buff that is for sure,  how we do it is up for debate... I would prefer a better way to shield the main gun but I don't know how that could be done.  if my suspicions are correct and that the front gun can not be protected more, easily, I think turning the side guns is a great alternative

[Dutch Vanya]

Would another front facing gun on the roof make it too powerful? Too similar to the spire?

[Nidh]

A single front facing gun would make it better than the pyramidion, beating it in maneuverability, firepower, tanky-ness, and ease of use. I hate to say this because i really want a buff to the goldie myself, but i think it's pretty well balanced... But it is definitely a support ship that requires a good ally ship to really have it shine. Taking kills is not it's job, it's job is to give its ally advantages over a target. If we give the goldie an easy way of killing things, it would be the best ship hands down in the game.

[redria]

Would another front facing gun on the roof make it too powerful? Too similar to the spire?

Too similar/powerful probably.
Junker and Galleon - 2 guns on each side, plus a gun facing along the axis of movement (plus the galleon gets a side light weapon).
Pyramidion and Mobula - Strong forward facing arcs combined with poor maneuverability and large blindspots.
Squid and Goldfish - Featured front gun with 2 more guns at 90 degree angles from each other. High maneuverability with low damage output.
Spire - (when not dead) Strong arc overlap with no durability

Junkers and galleons get good arc overlaps, and thus have seen more use in competitive play. Good gunning/engineering can help overcome piloting deficiencies. Good communication ships.
Pyramidions and mobulas get good arc overlap, and thus have seen more use in competitive play. Pilot awareness is key to protect blindspots.
Spires - Opponent has a merc/hades/gatling? gg (not really, but spire is the weakest ship IMO)
Squids and goldfish have poor arc overlap and thus have seen less use in competitive play. Ability of pilot to blend all weapons into use regularly is a must, and engineering oversights can leave you drifting.

Squids and goldfish properly maintained have amazing durability, and can enter battles and disengage better than any other ship. Lacking is the ability to get easy overlap of guns. It requires much higher pilot focus to blend together 2 guns at the angles used. Change the angles and make overlap easier and you get ships that can easily engage and disengage, and also get kills quickly without requiring the pilot to be perfectly dialed in.

I consider the squid to be the pilot's biggest challenge, and the goldfish to be the ship needing the highest level of synergy between gunner and pilot. I know this isn't about the squid, but it does come up. Watching Puppy Fur fly a squid makes me feel like a hack who gets by on just a couple tricks. The same can really be true about a goldfish. A goldfish is really sort of a heavy squid - as Nidh says, a ship that gives its ally an advantage. We already have ships with strong arc overlap. A well flown squid or goldfish are much more interesting to see fly, simply because it takes a lot more creativity to blend in different damage types.

TL;DR: Goldfish can be effective, just not in the same way as other ships. Giving it easier overlap makes it more boring. It simply requires more skill and dedication to be truly effective, and more trust in your ally.

[Velvet]

goldfish isn't balanced. Anything works in pubs, so imo the only relevance of balance in non-high level play is how it contributes to the game being fun. I feel the current balance of the goldfish is not fun, because firstly it makes the goldfish unexciting to crew on and secondly makes the Goldfish pretty rare leading to less variety in most matches.

High level is much the same as pubs. Weak Goldfish = less variety and less interest and fun, a narrower choice of viable ships leading to a shallower and less varied tactical layer. Competitive is the good proof that the goldfish is weak - because no one really uses it.

Could those postulating that the goldfish would be OP with a narrow trifecta (limited to certain guns) suggest some of the ship builds that they think would be too powerful and how the issue would emerge? I don't really see it myself but I may be missing something.

Redria, I don't think it's right to attribute the rarity of the Goldfish and squid in competitive to piloting difficulty. Some teams will learn anything if it will work best. They are difficult to pilot effectively, yes, but even when piloted well they attain a damage output that is lesser or equal to other ships, with no capability to snipe effectively and a low armour that is a much larger issue in high level play against teams that are spamming arts or have nailed down their mortar timing. I see the Goldfish's manoeuvrability as compensated by other weaknesses beyond just the bad gun angles.

[Crafeksterty]

Goldfish are very effective allready. Its not weak, it is teamwork reliant.

What would make the goldfish strong is a new heavy weapon. Just that can make some ships stronger or weaker or more viable. (depending on the recieving side)



And no, the goldfish is very fun if flown right. Alot of people really dont use the side guns and just put stuff on those sides. Seriously, ships can turn guys. Play by those rules. There is no heavy gun ship that is as fast as the goldfish. The Galleon has to show his sides, while the spire is allready slow. The goldfish is the only ship that goes fast with a front facing heavy gun.

You can actualy vary up with some style. Like a carronade fish can have pilots tools of Moonshine/kyrosine along with Impact bumbers. Making the Goldfish not only a support, but also a ramming ship that will not miss its ram how a pyramidion can miss a ram.

Or be a full support unit with a hwacha, where the hwacha is specific about taking out weapons of the other ships. And its side guns as an extra supplementary for the ally like a gattling or a carronade.

Now it sounds difficult doing this, but really no other ship can do this without putting themselves in a huge danger or waiting for the opponent to get to them.
Last time i played with a goldy competetively, i was all about making the enemy not be able to do much. But being as we are goldfish, we wont die as easily with the added meneuverability and tankiness that we have. Making it the best ship to fly in first from behind, grabbing attention, making them look where i want them to look so my ally can finish the job.

You shouldnt have the same tought as a pyramidion / junker / galleon or whatever ship when flying the goldfish. Every ship is different, utilise what they offer as much as possible.

[Alistair MacBain]

I totally agree with Velvet.
I really think this one gun focus of the goldfish is what kills its use.
Yes you can get bifectas but those bifectas are quite small and quite hard to keep them up.