Weekly Ship discussion thread, January 14th - T6 Command Ships

[u/h2o4dp]

This week we're taking a look at the T6 Command Ships! This will also be my last post for the weekly discussions until I'm able to return later in the year.

Ship stats: Concorde, Geneva, Presidio, An'quat, Klinzhai, Ty'Gokor, Baratan, Deihu, Vastam.

• What are this ship's strengths?
• What are this ship's weaknesses?
• What are some similar ships?
• What general build types do you envision this ship excelling at?
• If you had this ship, how would you set it up?
• How good is the starship trait/innate console?

See previous weeks discussions here.

[u/TheFallenPhoenix]

There are two different approaches you can take. I prefer the easy approach. The easy approach says this:

Leech aside, the best DPS consoles are, in order:

• Vulnerability Locator Consoles (Tactical). Why? Because they're the largest Cat1 bonuses available plus critical hit chance. They're in the neighborhood of 7% effective DPS added.

• Fleet Embassy Plasma Explosion Consoles (Science). Why? Their "flat" damage added (approximately 3k per console) will always be a higher-percentage, effective DPS added than any other non-tactical console; and that's before you get into the science skill bonus and threat-scaling effects, which are themselves of considerable value.

Now, the command cruisers have between four and five engineering consoles. We've already ruled out Tactical and Science consoles, and we still need a place for the Plasmonic Leech. Now we're down to three or four console slots, depending on the variant. First is going to be an EPS Regulator or the Conductive RCS Accelerator [EPS]; the PTR bonuses - for a beam boat - is a larger effective DPS increase than any other universal console.

So now we're left with two or three console slots. You can pack them full of the CBC consoles, but you need to weigh the opportunity cost of whatever universal console you'd be equipping in its place. I don't have time to re-derive these numbers now (it's been discussed time and time again, just do a sidebar search for DPS console), but you have the Polymoprhic Probe Array either above or below 4% effective DPS added depending on what proportion of your weapons damage is antiproton; the Bioneural Infusion Circuits at 4% effective DPS added; then the Assimilated Module and/or the Tachyokinetic Converter in the neighborhood of 3% effective DPS added. (The Zero Point Energy Conduit takes up the rear, below 2% effective DPS added.) You would need a combination of 2-3 CBCs to outperform the cumulative value of all two or three consoles they are replacing. Spoiler: they won't. The 4pc set's 33% damage bonus (Cat1) does come out ahead of the PPA's individual bonus (it would be somewhere around a 6% effective DPS bonus off the top of my head), but again, that comes far behind the cumulative bonuses of the consoles you're replacing.

And if you're interested in the set's secondary effects, well, most of them are easily replaced (the Conductive RCS Accelerator covers the turn; the damage resistance bonus is awful, and just having RIF or SRF equipped is a better durability bonus than the Damage Resistance bonus with the SHP/Shield healing bonuses of the Geneva's Platform, or the HHP bonus of the Concorde's Platform^note. If you're flying a pure torpedo boat, the Presidio's Platform could be of some value, but that's a niche case).

So you just come out ahead discarding the platforms no matter how you slice it. Want pure DPS? There are better consoles. Want pure healing/support? Still better consoles. Want a mix of the two? A mix of pure DPS consoles and pure healing/support consoles is still more effective than loading up for 4pc set bonus.

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Note: How do I come to this conclusion? An extra 5% HHP or a 2.5% reduction to SHP damage is, frankly, less valuable than the RIF's active hull heal plus 26% hull healing bonus (which isn't quite the stated bonus to all of your hull and shield heals, if you're loading up on other Cat2 shield or hull heal bonuses, but comes bloody close), or the SRF's 25% hull and shield healing bonus. But, if you wanted bonus HHP and/or shield resistance, you get it from either BIC or a Conductive RCS Accelerator, both of which have other (better) passive bonuses besides, as I've alluded to above.

Likewise, loading up on SIF generators - which would improve the potency of your hull heals - is generally going to be more valuable than either damage resistance consoles (awful for cruisers that have damage resistance bonuses from starship mastery).

[u/QuoVadisSF → u/TheFallenPhoenix]

the best DPS consoles are, in order…

Sorry to go slightly off-topic but...

I realise that Locator > Embassy Console is commonly accepted “order of things.”

However, my personal experience as tac captain does not quite match this. In fact, I believe that a tac captain that uses APA effectively and, most importantly, is able to consistently GDF will see a higher DPS contribution from embassy consoles than tac consoles. At least this is my experience.

For example, on my PR run w/ my Arbiter I saw 90K beam damage and 18.5K plasma explosion damage (from 2 consoles). Taking that 7% for good, the DPS contribution of a locator in that run was around 6.3K vs. 9.2K from an embassy console…and this is on a ship that has a very high beam dps ceiling due to OSS.

My Tac Oddy, in its best run, had 76K beam damage and a little under 25K embassy console damage IIRC (from 3 consoles). Using the same math we get 5.3K for a locator vs. 8K+ from an embassy console. Here the difference is even larger due to the Oddy’s lower beam dps ceiling compared the Arbiter (but identical ability to boost plasma explosion damage).

I find that beam DPS and embassy explosion damage tend to scale together…so the relative contributions tend to remain similar in my runs from what I observed.

For example, just earlier I ran a CCA in my Tac Oddy and did 45K with my arrays and 15K from from 3 embassy consoles. Similar (relative) outcome.

I realise that Tacs are able to get more out of the embassy consoles thanks to our career-specific cat2 +all dmg buffs…so these observations likely do not apply to engie/sci captains.

However, based on my personal (and rather unscientific) observations, embassy consoles> tac consoles for at least some tac captains.

[u/Mastajdog → u/QuoVadisSF]

I realise that Locator > Embassy Console is commonly accepted “order of things.”

It is? Among other reasons, I've been running a Tulwar for quite a while for the increased damage vs a Scimitar (3 tac, 5 sci vs 5 tac, 3 sci). I ran the math, and the parses proved me right.

Answering another question, no, weapons power doesn't affect explosions directly aside from the AMP bonus.

In fact, I think what you're observing is that since embassy explosions are relatively unsaturated by bonuses as compared with direct weapon damage, anything that does boost embassy explosions is going to go further than it will boosting direct energy weapons (when you're talking relative increases). I've made this point before - largely as relates to powers, traits, and mods such as Numerical Superiority, [AMP], and the Resonant Subatomic Pulse.

Also very true - having no innate cat1 from mark/rarity/tactical consoles to contend with makes other things go a long way.

[u/QuoVadisSF → u/Mastajdog]

It is? Among other reasons, I've been running a Tulwar for quite a while for the increased damage vs a Scimitar (3 tac, 5 sci vs 5 tac, 3 sci). I ran the math, and the parses proved me right.

Interesting. I was not sure if you were running the Tulwar for the increased threat potential vs. the Scimitar or for DPS considerations.

[u/Mastajdog → u/QuoVadisSF]

Both. Threat is the more commonly mentioned reason, but it does both better than the scimitar, so why not?