Point of Vulkoras..?

1) Phase missile swarm at rank 3 does 600 damage to 7 ships for 90 antimatter. That's 4,200 damage total dealt every 15 seconds. I don't know how you can say it isn't effective

2) Disintegration, even though it's channeled, deals 1600 damage and heals the Vulkoras for 1500 hp over 8 seconds. Just because it's channeled and interruptible doesn't mean it always gets interrupted, or that it sucks

3) Assault spec deals an extra 180 points of damage to structures with every shot, making it the best defense buster in the game.

4) Each siege turret does 32 bombing damage (just 8 less than the space whale) at rank 3, and the Vulkoras is able to keep 2-3 of these deployed at the same time. Planet drain does 1,350hp worth of damage with a 3 minute cooldown. It takes 30 seconds to channel, so the egg get another 150 seconds to shoot the planet. With 40 damage/10 seconds, the total damage dealt is 1950 (1350 + 40*15). Ignoring Vulkoras' bombing cooldown ability, it deals 53 damage every 10 seconds, plus let's say 2 platforms for another +64 every 10 seconds deals 117 damage/10 seconds, which is 702 damage per minute, which is 2106 damage in the same 3 minute time frame. Since it can maintain 3 platforms at least part of the time, it can do even more

Have you got any numbers to back up yor claims?  As I'm having a hard time agreeing with what you are saying from my experience.  From what I have seen it is as much if not more damage than the Kortul.  It's siege platforms are superb.  Disintegration is a little bit meh I agree but I still love the ship.

That's also 28 more fleet supply!

It is a pretty good ship, all around.  Other than being a little bit fragile, there is nothing wrong with it -- it fulfills its task as a world killer plus reasonable decent fighting ship.  There are enough ships that everyone has their favorites.  I never make this ship first, but I find it very useful in situations where I have to clean up a lot of worlds but there are still enemy fleets roaming around.

Keep in mind too, now that the siege platforms are fixed, they are even more useful.

 

Yeah, thanks for finally fixing this!  I have been microing that ability on my Vulkoras for the last 8 months...

How? I ran a test.
Level one Vulkoras with 2/2 basic phase missile upgrade went to fight sum neutral ships with autoattack turned off.
I fired the phase missile swarm. Experiment repeated twice.
Both times, all of the hit frigates were damaged for 170 on shields and zero on hull. What does this mean?
1) Phase missile swarm does not, in fact, fire phase missiles, just simple flat physical damage, subject to shield mitigation and armor. Sooo...
a] if you want the target destroyed, meaning it is under fire and has maxed shield mitigation, a 600dmg swarm will in fact deal 240 damage considering 60% shield mitigation. And if it is an advent ship (more shield mit) or the shields are down (armor in play), this damage goes down even further, so you'll deal less damage for that 90 AM than a standard salvo from its missile banks would do.
b] if the missiles hit random targets as they seem to be, those targets will then regenerate, unless you specifically order your forces to focus on one of them. So this damage wears off, because you aren't hitting all those ships. Also, with a battle of let's say 80 ships on both sides, a chance that your next focused target will be one of the few weakened by phase missile swarm is somewhere near 7/80 = 8,75%, which means almost naught. Might be a little higher if you follow each missile volley carefully to see if it hits a target type you want to focus next, but seriously, meh. This ability doesn't scale in usefulness with the number of enemy ships. Volatile nanites would cause so much more mayhem. Or even Radiance bomb. Missile Barrage.... just because they hit all targets in area, not SEVEN.
c] also note that Vulkoras has the second smallest antimatter pool of all Vasari cap ships, looking good in that field only against kortul.
So yeah, this is not effective in my opinion.

 

Maybe with 90 sec cooldown after the patch it will be considerable. As of yet, I find it that even normal AI ships often interrupt disintegration.
But I agree that if the enemy oversleeps it and all of the disintegration works (why does Vulkoras heal when disintegration damages shields, btw??), it is 'good'. Nowhere near awesome though.


a] Bombers are no.1 defense buster in game hands down.
b] 40 Assailants or 20 Enforcers will still three-shot any building. Don't know why would anyone ever send a cap to fight buildings. Caps do little compared to any, even small fleet, and it is their array of abilities and ability to bomb planets that make them even worth keeping around, not the pitiful damage of their guns, which Vulkoras doesn't really shine so brightly with - see bottom of the post.
IF the Assault Spec bug is corrected, then Vulkoras should be dealing 53dmg every 4 seconds to the planet (a salvo takes 4 seconds and has 6 sec cooldown thereafter, with -100% cooldown it should be 53dmg per 4 secs). THEN and with Platforms will the Vulkoras be a nice planet bomber... which makes him a support ship, not a combat damage dealer.

In fact, he can keep 3 all the time and four for about 10 seconds before the first blows up. BUT..
a] Platforms are two-shotted by 4 bomber squads, meaning bringing them in while any resistance is present is less than pointless. Space Whale/Egg can do all its mayhem without relying on 100AM/use platforms that will likely be killed by anything in a second. Yes, it is a long channeled ability, but unlike a typical Disintegration target, planets do not interrupt abilities. And if something interrupts the Egg's Drain, then it would likely disable the Vulkoras or its platforms too.
b] Platforms eat out 100 AM for each, so if you are after a fight (whoever has absoltely defenseless planets on their frontline?) or after a few jumps to the enemy's less defended inner worlds, deploying the max number of them may be severely delayed due to lack of antimatter (again, mind Vulkoras' low AM pool compared to other caps).

So, the only way to REALLY use the full potential of an (unbugged) Assault specialization + platforms is to have a Vulkoras with near-full antimatter pool put up against against a defenseless planet.
Which puts the vulkoras again amongst support ships, not battle damage dealers, to be used after a battle instead of siege frigates.

IF
a]  Vulkoras phase missile swarm dealt 100/200/300 (even flat physical dmg as it does now), but instead cost 40-60 AM with 8-10 second cooldown and a limit of 6/10/14 or maybe even 10/20/30 targets;
b] Disintegration dealt the same damage with the same cooldown, but over half the time (so it isn't so easily interrupted).
THEN I would be willing to agree it has some combat purpose or survivability.

 

Right now, Vulkoras is, for me:
1] a "meh" combat ship:
- Kortul does 25dps forward and 10 dps for each bank giving it 45 total dps
---- increased insanely by the spammable Power Surge
---- which also increases its survivability greatly
---- Casting Volatile nanites on a big fleet (the bigger the merrier, unlike with PMS) and destroying two affected ships does more or less similiar mayhem as the PMS.
- Vulkoras does 34dps forward and 4 on each bank, summing up to 42 total dps.
---- increased by his PMS ability which eats away his AM pool quite fast and handicaps his bombing ability later.
---- also note Marza does 46 straight FORWARD dps alone, plus 4 on each bank, which makes Vulkoras look small, even if it isn't *phase* missile dmg.
2] a good planet bomber... but to become a good planet bomber, you actually have to drop another cap ship to bring this bloke into battle for him to gain experience. Which is kinda risky, cause he has no survivability boosters. And handicapping you, cause he has little-to-zero utility, unlike any other cap.
Oh and his Assault Spec iz buggit  https://forums.sinsofasolarempire.com/329932

edit. to Blair - I never really had trouble with that deployment range bug. I just ordered him a little closer before I ordered to attack the planet and turned on auto platform deployment.

Get it all out, man.  You'll feel better.

Not nearly Cykur.

As my psychotherapist - you're fired.

I am glad that you identified the possible Assault Spec bug.  Hopefully a Dev can look into it.

there was another thread that talked about phase missles not always phasing, therefore, they won't always deal direct hull damage. I think the figure as 10% chance to phase and hit hull.

I used to think that the desolator was pointless. Once i realised how to use it i knew how wrong i was. It is fantastic. relatively high survivability, phase missiles and great abilities. seige platforms are MUCH better then siege frigs. Plafroms free up the desolator to do other things.

You need to get the space egg to level 6 before you can seige with it properly. Phase missile swarm is great against structures.

Phase missile swarm night not shoot phase missiles, but it is still extremely useful. If you think that the Kortul's volatile nanites are good, wait till you see that ability used with phase missile swarm. I have done this to destroy 7 carriers, 4 kodiaks and 8 Hoshikos instantly. This combo is MUCH better then either used alone.

So what if it has a small AM pool? it still has alot and the only ability used regularly is phase missile swarm. The desolator does not run out of AM fast.

Disintegration is rarely useful, but it can allow it to win against the odds. One time i had a desolator with no shields left and half health and it got picked on by a level 7 Marza. I used disintegration and won. And you say it has no survivability boosters? absolutely rediculous.

 

 

One last thing. sending in bombers to bust defenses still with fighters around is suicide. The desolator is not any harder to kill then any other capship. It is waaay better then the Maruader.

Mitigation affects all forms of dealing damage, it's sort of weird to dump on Phase Missile Swarm on that basis.

I think Phase Missile Swarm is probably one of the best abilities in the game. While its antimatter lasts the Desolator is an absolute terror to frigate groups.

I do wish Disintegration was more, well, useful.  I mean, phase missile swarm outshines it when it comes to dealing damage, and the healing has never really helped that I can recall. And I'm speaking as someone who often takes the Desolator as my first capital ship.

@N3rull: Whatever floats your boat. The kind of reasoning you're making can be applied to every ship. "The space egg can be destroyed by x bomber squads, it sucks!". It's irrelevant. Everything can be combatted by something else. The planet drain channeling can be interrupted too, you know. I can pick any capital and name 10 reasons why it "sucks", even though it doesn't.

Most of the time you aren't even making equal (or rational) comparisons. Vulkoras' damage against buildings vs 40 frigates? Yeh. Good luck with that one

The thing is, every ship should have its uses in any battle, unless it is not meant for battles. Something that makes it shine, ok? LRMs deal a lot of damage and have a long range, as the name suggests. Flak frigs take out fighters. Bombers bomb. Siege frigs bomb bigger balls. And so on. Hell, even light frigs are worthwhile for their antimatter crippling abilities.

Whatever you think of the Desolator's PMS and its forward damage you must understand - the FLEET is going to be killing, not the desolator. You aren't gonna win a game by spamming caps. In a balanced fleet, the LRMs and HCs are going to do most of the damage, the caps will only throw their 2 cents in.
Cap ships are dangerous, because they bring powerful abilities to the field. Weapon Jam, Volatile Nanites, Radiation Bomb, Microphasing Aura, Targeting Uplink, Armistice, Vertigo, Vengeance, EMP Charge, Flux Field.... these and many more other abilities are totally battle-shifting. It doesn't matter whether those are two small, dozen-ship groups or two huge 150-ship fleets spitting white hot iron shells on one another. Those abilities are still powerful and can turn the tide of any battle, big or small.

What Vulkoras has to offer in a battle, however, is a skill that does fixed 4200 damage which is not even "Phase Missile damage" as the name of the ability would suggest and will ALWAYS be mitigated at least by the basic 15% (so in fact it will never do more than 3570 damage over 7 targets, and possibly far less). This, along with Disintegration, is pure prawnage only if you are fighting, like, up to 30 ships. Further than that, when the numbers are beyond 60 or 80 ships per side (and it is very likely that they will before or shortly after Vulkoras goes level 5), his skills simply do not improve. Moreover, Phase Missile Swarm's effectiveness diminishes with the size of battles, because it hits 7 targets that aren't likely to be hit again anytime soon, so they regenerate.

That's the problem. Yeah, I bet that in one-on-one, Vulkoras is pretty likely to eliminate any other ship, simply because his forward damage is like 2nd in game among all capitals (second to Marza), PMS IS going to hit that Marza if there are no more than 7 targets and Disintegration will heal Vulkoras once a while, giving it an edge.

Vulkoras is dangerous to seven targets only. Any more around are not threatened at all.

I do agree that if the Ass Spec bug is corrected, Vulkoras will be the no.1 bombing ship in game. Still, you gotta level it SOMEHOW... which means big battles...

Oh pffttsssh.  Why do people keep bringing mitigation up as a point against missile swarm?  If anything it works in missile swarm's favor, since you are dealing massive damage in a single shot to multiple targets who are all sitting at 15% mitigation. Spreading the damage is only a problem if you are facing area-effect repair/regen spam.

I'm not sure why you bring up Radiation Bomb, being as it is directly comparable to missile swarm.

Are we to suppose abilities are only useful if they are force multipliers, that there is no role for direct abilities? We should just strip out the Dunov's shield restore, the Kol's rail gun, Rapture's domination?

What I dont like about it is that Phase Missile Swarm doesnt actually shoot phase missiles. I dont see why it shouldnt, I mean, it only makes sense. It can be tweaked to take into account the fact that Phase Missile research will give you uber damage, but as it stands now it takes too long to get the PMS + Volatile Nanites combo to work, compared to Malice and Cleansing Brilliance.

I wasn't saying that every skill should be useful against high numbers of enemies. Skills that have one target are ok to be there as well. However, each ship, which is supposed to be useful in large battles, should have a skill that would make it so. Radiation bomb deals less AOE damage than phase missile swarm, but it does it to everything, not just 7 targets - meaning that whatever you decide to kill next will go down quicker, because it was in the area of effect.

I would change my mind completely about Vulkoras if Phase missile swarm was more spammable with greater area of effect, even with less damage (say 1/3 damage, 1/2 cooldown, 1/3 AM cost, double amount of targets. It would still be less AM-effective than Volatile nanites backed with a medium sized fleet, but it would make some sense in big battles)

As I said before, right now the Vulkoras is in my opinion a "Planet Killer to be sent against weakly defended worlds, not to be brought into big battles".

The Assault Spec bug is fixed. The same bug was also causing the Vasari Weapon Jammer to make enemy ships bomb more quickly - ouch!!!

Whoa, between the Assault Spec bug and the bugged Siege Platforms, no wonder you thought the Vulkoras stunk

Thanks for tracking this down guys!!! 

Ok, so now the Vulkoras is going to be an über big fat siege frigate with strong "get lost nibs" abilities to be used against small enemy regiments.

Can't wait to throw a level 5 Vulk againt an enemy planet and see its health go dooown.

Thanks Fraser.

I'm not, at all, an "expert" at this game, so maybe it's me, but you keep saying something that confuses me; that the phase missle swarm is useless because the enemies hit will, most likely, not get hit again before they heal. I'm utterly baffled by this, unless you are micro-managing the battle like crazy (which I presume is possible, I dunno). Roughly speaking, if two large fleets engage, and you use Swarm, you'll hit a bunch of opponents that are currently being whacked anyway since they are right along the front line. Unless you are directing every single ship with regards to who to hit, I don't see this happening. I know that I, at least, like the ability to soften my opponents. Likewise, although I don't often use this, the Seige platforms and Assault Spec are handy in that you can have your Desolator run over, throw them out, and start blasting buildings (for bonus damage) AND the planet while the battle is going on (or ignore the planet, hit the buildings, and also smack anything that sneaks through your lines to attack). If you are more the type to wait until the enemy is completely dead or gone before you touch anything else (which is myself as well), then sure, a little extra damage in bombing isn't that big of a deal. But if you are trying to move quickly, and wipe out everything at once, I think it's not a bad ship to have at all, since you can make it a really powerful seige ship that is also capable against small defense fleets.

Point being, we all play differently, and I think it's easy to make it work in your favor, if you want to play that way. I hate the Marauder, the Revelation, and the Dunov for the same reason; doesn't fit me.

The PMS ability does a lot of damage, but it is all spread out.  If you have other ships fighting these ships, this is good.  If it is just the Vulkoras by itself, it can't be hitting all of them, so all of that splash damage is wasted because the ships recharge / repair (if it bypassed shields).  Ships not being attacked start repairing or replenishing shields fairly quickly.

PMS will hit 7 targets in range of Vulkoras, but it is not said it will hit those which are under your fire. From my experience, in big battles, my autoattacking assailants focus on one or two targets, my enforcers attack one or two, my caps attack another, my bombers attack one to three. So this is up to six targets being shot. If there are, say, 80 enemy ships, we can calculate the probability of at least two missile volleys hitting one of the attacked enemies.
It does take 5 minutes of maths and you wouldn't appreciate it anyway, so I'll just say that you have less than 5% chance for that (think of it as a lottery game - there are 80 numbers, you chose 7 and then 7 are being rolled by the lottery machine. You chance of winning is...? Nill). In other words, at least half of the damage dealt by PMS will regenerate before the damaged target goes under fire.
And I would say that 80% of it would regenerate if we're fighting big Advent fleets, if only because Phase Missile Swarm does NOT fire Phase Missiles, i.e. it does NOT have ANY chance of bypassing SHIELDS, which we all know Advent can regenerate like crazy.

That's what I admitted and that is its purpose in my opinion.
Not to be used in battles.
Not to be used as a dreadnaught.
Not to be compared to Marza.
Just an a lot harder to kill and a lot more effective siege frigate with some self defense capabilities.

I in turn <3 the Marauder. Phase Out hull is the most bastardish ability in game, as is the Stabilize Phase Space. Distort Gravity is pretty useful as well, to have your fleet (or the Marauder itself) run around freely between enemy planets to hit where it hurts the most. It is no combat ship I agree, but of all the capital ship's abilities, I find that the Marauder's abilities I use most often.

 use volatile nanites with phase missile swarm, its a great combo.

Use MICRO. Enough said.

That is rubbish. Since you dont understand the desolator and since it doesnt fit your playstyle, you dont like it.  Dont claim that it is useless though.

You say jam weapons is actually powerful? haha that is so sad, that it is actually funny.

 

n3rull  your comparing a vulkoras to 40 assailants 20 cruisers   atleast come up with some decent numbers,  even a marza cant deal with that

vulkoras is the 2e cap ship i build for vasari, it's great for quickly taking down planets (i rlly didnt notice that bug.... atleast.. i did think  on some occasions.. dam still not done?? but never imagined there'd be a bug like that)

its phase missle swarm is also superb, deals quick damage,  disintergration also a hard-hitter, but still prefer marza's missle barrage

there is no "best" "....." buster structures are easiyly wiped out by bombers yes,  but someone dug in with flaks and healers, i prefr using lrf's for that.... vasari and tec equivalant are out of turret range, vulkoras also great for taking out labs fast