Am I the Only Person that Loves the Fregatidae?

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95% Chance
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Am I the Only Person that Loves the Fregatidae?

Postby 95% Chance » Tue Jul 07, 2015 10:50 am

Most places I look I see users consistently bashing the Fregatidae for being one of the worst ships in the game. I don't know if that's because they don't know how to play the damn thing or what, but it should be pretty obvious!

Sure it doesn't start out with any weapons, but it does start out with a Mantis, 2 Zoltan, and a human. Now, because humans are common and uninteresting, they get to stay put, and the other Zoltan gets to stay put too. But you send the other Zoltan in with the Mantis to do some really nice energy based kamikaze attacks while that awesome flak artillery charges. I can't tell you how many times I've won using the Fregatidae, it has to be my favorite ship.

Why does it get so much hate? Sure, the life expectancy of the crew isn't really a big strong suit, but the clone bay takes care of that.
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stylesrj
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Re: Am I the Only Person that Loves the Fregatidae?

Postby stylesrj » Tue Jul 07, 2015 11:27 am

I think it gets so much hate because what the hell is a Flak Gun doing on a boarding cruiser? Sure it's meant to show off that artillery systems can be different, but the Flak is just so out of place for me...
The ship gets a little bit better though if you find another non-Zoltan crew. Then you can put the Human and Mantis on the teleporter while the Zoltan make the shields ion-proof.

Seriously, having an ion-proof ship in Sector 1 is a great advantage.
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95% Chance
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Re: Am I the Only Person that Loves the Fregatidae?

Postby 95% Chance » Tue Jul 07, 2015 11:52 am

stylesrj wrote:I think it gets so much hate because what the hell is a Flak Gun doing on a boarding cruiser? Sure it's meant to show off that artillery systems can be different, but the Flak is just so out of place for me...
The ship gets a little bit better though if you find another non-Zoltan crew. Then you can put the Human and Mantis on the teleporter while the Zoltan make the shields ion-proof.

Seriously, having an ion-proof ship in Sector 1 is a great advantage.


So, you're saying that it gets a lot of...

Flak

Puns aside, the Flak Gun is there to batter and soften up the crew while your guys are on board. It punches through 4 layers of shields with no problem provided most of the shots hit, and it fires in such a wide area that a number of systems are gonna take damage. And along with that wide are-of-effect flak, some crew members are gonna take damage. Plus it doesn't matter if your crew gets a little banged up or even killed because of that clone bay.

Add in the respirators and even AI ships aren't that bad. Send your crew in to kill the systems and let the Artillery Flak finish it off.

Really, the only bad thing about the Fregatidae is that you have to use the godawful Nisos to unlock it.
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stylesrj
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Re: Am I the Only Person that Loves the Fregatidae?

Postby stylesrj » Tue Jul 07, 2015 7:18 pm

So, you're saying that it gets a lot of...

Flak


You forgot to whip out your sunglasses...

(•_•)

( •_•)>⌐■-■

(⌐■_■)

And put them on!

http://www.myinstants.com/instant/yeah/
Leylite
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Re: Am I the Only Person that Loves the Fregatidae?

Postby Leylite » Wed Jul 08, 2015 1:25 pm

Basically its problem is that it's a very slow boarding ship compared to something like Slug B, Rock A/Rock B if they're turned into boarding ships, or Mantis C, let alone the conventional and more powerful boarding ships.

You have no particularly good answer to ships that have both a medbay and good weapons, which happens more often than you'd like. Your defenses are not really good enough to feel comfortable boarding with all four crew, but sometimes you have to do that in order to overwhelm the enemy crew.

If the enemy ship is also trying to run away at the start of the fight, then you may as well forget about the Flak Artillery since escape timers are usually something like 30 to 40 seconds, and it may be a close call whether or not your crew can get enough momentum in time (especially if they have something like level 2 doors or an anti-personnel drone).

There's a huge difference between runs with this ship that get an early second Mantis (or Rockman), or an early free weapon, compared to normal runs where you don't get any of that stuff and have to really slowly upgrade your ship, while enemy ships continue to get more and more dangerous. That is, it might be an alright ship on Easy but it has a really tough time keeping up on Hard mode.

All of that said, having the level 2 clone bay does let you be slightly more aggressive, and let you consider boarding with 4 crew more often, or sparing a crewman to sabotage the oxygen system while everyone else is distracted.
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Re: Am I the Only Person that Loves the Fregatidae?

Postby 95% Chance » Wed Jul 08, 2015 1:55 pm

Leylite wrote:Basically its problem is that it's a very slow boarding ship compared to something like Slug B, Rock A/Rock B if they're turned into boarding ships, or Mantis C, let alone the conventional and more powerful boarding ships.

You have no particularly good answer to ships that have both a medbay and good weapons, which happens more often than you'd like. Your defenses are not really good enough to feel comfortable boarding with all four crew, but sometimes you have to do that in order to overwhelm the enemy crew.

If the enemy ship is also trying to run away at the start of the fight, then you may as well forget about the Flak Artillery since escape timers are usually something like 30 to 40 seconds, and it may be a close call whether or not your crew can get enough momentum in time (especially if they have something like level 2 doors or an anti-personnel drone).

There's a huge difference between runs with this ship that get an early second Mantis (or Rockman), or an early free weapon, compared to normal runs where you don't get any of that stuff and have to really slowly upgrade your ship, while enemy ships continue to get more and more dangerous. That is, it might be an alright ship on Easy but it has a really tough time keeping up on Hard mode.

All of that said, having the level 2 clone bay does let you be slightly more aggressive, and let you consider boarding with 4 crew more often, or sparing a crewman to sabotage the oxygen system while everyone else is distracted.


Well you see, it matters not to me if other ships are better at what it does, because I have way more fun running Fed C than any of the ships you've listed. I don't like checking off a list to win, I like fun.

Personal preference, yo.
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Re: Am I the Only Person that Loves the Fregatidae?

Postby Leylite » Wed Jul 08, 2015 3:56 pm

Well, of course some ships are going to be better at things than other ships - that's the whole point of having different ship layouts in the first place. :)

I'm not here to knock personal preference either; I like the idea of the Fed C and think it can be interesting to play despite its weaknesses. I'm just trying to explain why it has a bad reputation and is usually considered low-tier.

--

I was briefly thinking about whether it would make a big difference if this ship also started with Mantis Pheromones in addition to its Emergency Respirators (so the crew could kite around a bit better, get some extra hits or some free start on sabotaging systems before the enemy crew arrives), but honestly I think most people would probably just sell them for the early-game scrap.
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steamtex
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Re: Am I the Only Person that Loves the Fregatidae?

Postby steamtex » Sat Jul 18, 2015 2:31 pm

Because the artillery it gets is pretty much just a Flak 2.
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Re: Am I the Only Person that Loves the Fregatidae?

Postby long123 » Tue Aug 04, 2015 8:57 am

The ship gets a little bit better though if you find another non-Zoltan crew. Then you can put the Human and Mantis on the teleporter while the Zoltan make the shields ion-proof.
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R4V3-0N
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Re: Am I the Only Person that Loves the Fregatidae?

Postby R4V3-0N » Wed Aug 05, 2015 11:19 am

the zoltan kamikaze crew is the main attraction of this ship and most people ignore it for a mantis human boarding party.

I can see why people struggle with this ship. Must be like trying to use the kestrel without using the burst laser II. or using the engi cruiser without drones
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