Ace's Guide To: "Fighter or Cruiser?"

While there are a million other topics that i could explain much more in depth, the idea hit me and i could not back down.

Why choose a fighter?

1) Very fast. This is why
2) you can maneuver much better. Your turn and acceleration add greatly to outrunning those pesky defense gobblers like missiles and rockets.
3) Along the same lines, and even moreso when you are fitted with afterburners, you can jet out of the way of cannon and turret fire when something goes hostile.
4) Your armor may not be that of a cruiser, but if you fit yourself wisely, you can be just as powerful as one.

5) The trick here is mastering your fire. While many people say that you should just auto-pilot at them blazing, i think that auto-piloting is a sure fire path to death. You can always do the monty python if you are fitted with the right arsenal. When fighting things that can only fire rockets from teh front like crescent and UE, i recommend a maneuver called, as i named it, "playing circly". Just always stay behind them. It makes them much less powerful in the long run.

Closing argument: I do not recommend going up against the Dreadnought in a krait. No sir. Find something a bit more heavily armored like a helian, arada. I recommend the Miranu Gunship, but even a Zidara is a good choice, an excellent choice. Key thing to remember: Stay behind them and as far out of reach as you can. Always remain firing, and always be ready to fly off suddenly should they launch seekers.

Why choose a Cruiser?

1) Heavy Shields and armor.
2) More weapon room so you can load up on the big "whoppers" like the defense system and many many seeking weapons.
3) More slots for guns and turrets. The more guns, the harder the punch
4) Even though they are very slow, usually, if fitted wisely, they can take out things before they lose significant armor. The main problem is that cruisers are so slow, that they get hit much more than fighters. It actually evens out, because cruisers will lose armor and shields much faster.
5) The monty python maneuver is one of the most important moves you can use. If you can prevent yourself from being hit, you can destroy almost anything, and faster than a fighter, allowing less time for enemy reinforcements surface.

Closing argument: Use a cruiser if you can use your ammunition wisely. Many times I have noticed that I feel invincible in a cruiser and I will spend my ammunition on fighters, frigates, and whatnot. This is a BAD idea. You forget the main idea behind a figher, that it can outrun those things. Also, in EVO, ECM systems are greatly enhanced, so generally, seeking missiles are only effective at close range because of their un-reliability. That is why, you should use the monty python maneuver as much as possible, only fire rockets and missiles if you know they will hit, and always watch your shields and armor. Many times you will think you are safe but you will really be far from it. This is especially important if you are playing in strict mode but you should already know that if you are in strict mode.

Verdict: Can i say this any simpler? They are exactly equal. The only thing that defines which is better is your experience and preference. The purpose of this was to enlighten some of you on the good and bad points of both the fighter and the cruiser, to help you, the reader, decide which best suits you.

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Ace Battlepilot
<mercenary for hire>
"My contract is simple. Give me a Miranu Gunship, give me upgrade funds, and turn this mad dog loose, cus once I'm let out, there's no hope for you..."

Verdict: Can i say this any simpler? They are exactly equal. The only thing that defines

Exactly equal my ass. There's a reason that cruisers cost so much more than fighters - they're just plain better.

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So Giule, you're saying my little fighter Arada can't take out the big Voinian Cruiser?

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- Captain Stud Beefpile
- UE Naval 238th Squadron
- Azdgari Squadron "Firebird" Leader
- Member of the Zacha Renegade Elimination Corporation

An Arada can take out anything in the game. Cruisers are easier than fighters, because the Arada packs enough punch to kill it quickly yet is fast enough to avoid it's weapons.

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Is the answer to this question 'no'?
Chaos to the enemies of the Azdgari

Heh, the Arada is one of my favourite ships in the game. I'll put up against anythig, anything at all! Bring on your cruisers! The bigger they are etc. Size just adds to the casualty roster!

But seriously a lot of people like cruisers (myself included) because in a fighter one slip can spell doom (though apparantly you can do what you like with an Azdara - including leave it in a system with a rather upset Voinian Cruiser while you go to the bog - must try one of them). A fighter requires more skill to fly well than a cruiser but may well be a more rewarding choice (it takes less time to get your ultimate ship too!)

On the monty python - with this tactic just about any ship can beat any other (just about). I am trying to use it less but it is more or less essential for me in big battles.

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Non est ad astra mollis e terris via.

(This message has been edited by Great White Godfather (edited 03-06-2001).)

I agree that crusiers and fighters are equal when compared to player preferences. I mean, I can kill anything at all in my CW and even more in my Voinian Frigate, but I couldn't destroy much at all in my Miranu Courier or CF. (Please no rebuttles about how I didn't try an Adra or Azarda, I relize it)

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If you give a man a fish, he'll eat for a day. If you don't give a man a fish, you'll have something for dinner.

Hmm....The reason cruiser cost more isn't because they're better altogether, it's because they have more shields, armor, turret/gunspaces, and more crew, giving higher capture percentages when you board a disabled ship. I currently fly an Azdgari Warship, which could easily be called a cruiser, what with its fighter bay and six fighters, plus its powerful ammunition and good shielding. But I'm not careless about fighters, because I know that a good-sized swarm of Azdaras plus the firepower of one/two more Azdgari Warships vs. me would reduce me to scrap, that is, unless that were an Igazra around to help me out...But I think that fighters and cruisers have strengths and weaknesses of their own. Because, I mean, if you buy say an Arada or a UE Fighter, and fit it with both types of shield generators for insanely fast shield regeneration, there wouldn't be anything that could kill you. Whereas, when you fit a cruiser or warship with shield capacitors and armor to increase its defense, and then fit it with rockets/missiles and you could easily mow down any fighter that came your way. And what Arada Pilot said is quite true, once you fit an Arada with shield generators and an exsp. shield generator it could very well be called an 'invinci-ship', as could any other small fast ship, excluding kraits, of course.

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The renegade lies on the ground, a hole in his chest. ESPilot: "Next one of you bastards to cross me gets a cartridge or two of phase energy up his ass." The people all have the expression of fear on their faces as they slowly exit the bar.....

An Arada isn't an Invinci-Ship with just the outfits. An Arada is only an Invinci-Ship with a skilled pilot.

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- Captain Stud Beefpile
- UE Naval 238th Squadron
- Azdgari Squadron "Firebird" Leader
- Member of the Zacha Renegade Elimination Corporation

There's one thing I don't recommend doing in an Arada: dominating planets. When I'm in a conquering mood I usually trade my Arada in for a Crescent Warship. Cruisers (I guess the CW is comparable to a cruiser) have so much more armor and shields to absorb defense fleet fire and I wouldn't try it in an Arada (well, maybe Meria, but that's it :)).

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Renegade Infestation?
Meet me in the bar.

Well, if you have the right stuff, anything can be the prefect ship. I've used an Arada, UE Crusier, Voinain Crusier, UE Fighter, Azdgari warship, etc. and all have been excellent ships when I put the right upgrades on them. I was bullying the Voinains with the Monty Python in a UE Destroyer, and I beat about 3 Crusiers in that ship. On the contary, I've played the Arada againist the UE and found that the Arada is death to any ship other than the Voinians. All in all, if you have the right stuff, you can have an invci-ship with the Krait!

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-DeadMan
The only good Voinian is a dead Voinian.
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- Visit my Website: (url="http://"http://geocities.com/evo_info")EVO Info(/url)

So Giule, you're saying my little fighter Arada can't take out the big Voinian Cruiser?

Heck yeah that's what I'm saying. If there were multiplayer EVO, my cruiser would smear the floor with your wussy little Arada.

I also feel that I should say that fighters are way overpowered in EVO, and cruisers are way underpowered. Basically what I'm saying is that in EVO, size doesn't matter nearly as much as it /should/, and in any /realistic/ game (like my upcoming Galaxy's Edge plugin, hint hint), cruisers would be way more powerful than fighters.

I really want to prove my point here, so I'll make a big deal about it. For an example of how screwed up EVO is with regards to size, let's look at how a UE Destroyer stacks up to a UE Cruiser. Keep in mind that the UE Cruiser is three times bigger than the destroyer and costs five times as much, so realistically UE would never build cruisers unless they were at least five times more powerful than destroyers.

So here are a few statistics on the destroyer, giving the cruiser a value of 100%.

Destroyer:
Cargo: 60%
Shields: 40%
Armor: 40%
Accel: 155%
Speed: 150%
Turn rate: 150%
Fuel: 80%
Freemass: 87%
Shields / Shieldre (this will tell us how quickly shields charge): 75%
Blaze Turrets: 75%
Rocket Launchers: 66%
Rockets: 33%
Hunter Launchers: 50%
Hunters: 33%
Fighters: 0%
Max Guns: 60%
Max Turrets: 60%

Averaging these figures together, we see that a UE destroyer is 71% as good as a UE Cruiser. SEVENTY ONE PERCENT! So for five times the cost, UE is only getting 1.4 times the performance from the cruisers. See what I mean about unrealistic? By golly, a ship that costs five times as much should be five times as powerful. (One little side nitpick I have to make is the mass numbers for EVO - the ship masses are totally bogus. For example, an Azdara has eighteen tons of weaponry, but the whole ship weight no more than five tons. Impossible, you say? Right.)

If you want a number for how inefficient the cruisers are, that number is 28%. (or if you prefer the reciprocol, 355%) For every dollar that the UE spends on cruisers, they could instead spend 28 cents on destroyers, and it would be an even match. Now, mind you, my point here is that cruisers are absurdly underpowered, but don't think that means the destroyer is actually /good./ The destroyer is absurdly underpowered too, as we can see by comparing to the best ship in the whole damn game where efficiency is concerned, the SHUTTLECRAFT. Unfortunately, I'm too damned lazy to calculate it too, but just consider this: for the cost of a UE destroyer, you could buy TWO HUNDRED shuttlecraft, and that means two hundred blaze cannons, which would make short work of a UE destroyer. If EVO were at all realistic, the UE would not use destroyers at all, or even fighters. Rather, they would have enormous fleets of millions of shuttlecraft, laying waste to hapless Voinians and destroying planets for cheap.

So here's my chance to plug my plug. Galaxy's Edge will be the most realistic and thoroughly researched Escape Velocity Override plugin ever. And it's so damned fun that sometimes I have trouble keeping myself from playing it instead of working on it. The best ship in the plugin is, of course, a cruiser, and it's about as fast as a Helian. There's no reason cruisers can't be fast. A bigger ship can fit a bigger engine, after all. However, even I am forced to admit that while the /best/ ship is a cruiser, the /coolest/ ship is definately a fighter. It's called a Pulsar, and it can kick an Azdara's ass. (well, it would except that there's no way that the two ships could ever come face-to-face)

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I really don't think your cruiser/destroyer comparison is very accurate. You can't just add up a bunch of numbers representing the statistics ambrosia decided to give you, average them out, and find just which is more efficient. It just doesn't work that way in the actual game. You've got to look at how they do pitched against one another in the game. Personally, I'd much rather be in a stock ue cruiser going up against two or three destroyers than one of those destroyers. Determining what is the best ship can't be done with purely numbers; in fact, numbers shouldn't be used for much beyond exactly what they mean.

btw, I'd really love to see a fleet of 200 shuttlecrafts. Man, would it be fun to have some space mines then.

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DeadMan - If you are a smart Arada Pilot, you don't need escorts. I have hired escorts ONCE in my pilot's lifetime. That was when I assaulted Council Station.

I will defend my Arada and it's ability to the end of the world if I have to. I don't know what you people expect out of the Arada, but it is a DAMN good ship. With mine, I've been able to take out hundreds of ships, Voinian Cruisers, Renegade Crescent Warships, and all the big boys. Hell, I even tried to dominate Gadzair, I was able to take out quite a few of those Crescent Warships. Here's the secret behind the Arada:

It's shields aren't great. Fine, do the Azdgari Missions, and slap on 4 Shield Enhancers, and the Experimental Shield Generator, along with another one. Problem solved. I am able to take quite a beating from Voinian rockets and neutron fire, before going down to my armor. The armor isn't enough. Fine. Slap on a layer of Dospect (sp?) armor. Problem Solved. It isn't a good freighter. Fine. Slap on 1 or 2 Cargo Expansions, and you'll have enough room for weapons AND your freight deliveries. Not enough weapon space. Fine. Slap on 1 mass expansion, and you should have enough. Not enough fuel. Fine. Slap on 2 fuel tanks and 2 fuel scoops. Problem Solved. Too slow. Fine. Get RCS, Thrust, Engine, and Azdgari upgrades. Problem solved.

Three major forces have stopped my Arada:

  1. Council Station's Defense Fleet

  2. 3 Igazras grouped together. Hey, thats 15 Phase Turrets. Longer than my Swivel Phase Cannons can reach.

  3. 4 Voinian Cruisers and 6 Voinian Frigates, all grouped together.

Let's see your "precious" Cruiser take those out Single Handedly, without cheating.

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- Captain Stud Beefpile
- UE Naval 238th Squadron
- Azdgari Squadron "Firebird" Leader
- Member of the Zacha Renegade Elimination Corporation

I would like to remind you of something for those of you that have seen the Star Wars films. A single fighter (X-wing) destroyed a space station (Death Star), and another single fighter (A-wing) destroyed a super-cruiser as well as another space station (not as fantastic but it crashed into the bridge of the Executor and the executor spun out of control and collided with the Death Star II)

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Ace Battlepilot
<mercenary for hire>
"My contract is simple. Give me a Miranu Gunship, give me upgrade funds, and turn this mad dog loose, cus once I'm let out, there's no hope for you..."

  1. Council Station's Defense Fleet
  2. 3 Igazras grouped together. Hey, thats 15 Phase Turrets. Longer than my Swivel Phase Cannons can reach.
  3. 4 Voinian Cruisers and 6 Voinian Frigates, all grouped together.
    Let's see your "precious" Cruiser take those out Single Handedly, without cheating.

I'm not even gonna try to take out the council station. Even I don't that much free time. But the Igazras, Cruisers, and Frigates are no problem. My Voinian Cruiser (With engine, thrust, maneuverability, and azdgari upgrades) can actually fly circles around other cruisers. And with six neutron turrets and loads of pursuit missiles, I can take out just about anything. Trust me, I could also blast the crap out of your dinky little Arada.

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GENERAL ANNOUNCEMENT AND REQUEST

Please please PLEASE do not continue down the path you have been going. The point of my post originally was to inform some of you on the good and bad points of both the cruiser and fighter to help you choose which is right for you.
Saying "my ship is better than yours" or "I can whoop your ship" will get you no where and it is generally considered spam. If this persists, this topic will be closed like the rest of them and it will look bad on my record for starting it. Those kinds of claims will get you no where. Instead, try discussing your battle strategies, outfitting tips, and the like. These sort of topics for discussion are generally much more user and web board friendly and it will create much less tension. All those types of thing ("my ship is better than yours") do is just push buttons and make wires hot, so to speak.

Thank you.

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Ace Battlepilot
<mercenary for hire>
"My contract is simple. Give me a Miranu Gunship, give me upgrade funds, and turn this mad dog loose, cus once I'm let out, there's no hope for you..."

Ah if only we could play this out for real . . . . Anyway despite the fact that there is no way this could happen I
would back the Arada in this fight. The Arada has the advantages in speed manouverability and recharge rate. It
can play hit and run on the cruiser and whenever shields get low it can burn off for a while and then come back
in, guns blazing.

(This message has been edited by Great White Godfather (edited 03-07-2001).)

(This message has been edited by Great White Godfather (edited 03-08-2001).)

Boy I'd love to have a duel with you, that'd be a battle that would last through the wee hours of the night!

BTW, A Voinian Cruiser smartly outfitted and smartly piloted CAN take out those two forces you claim you can. I EXPECT you to. The ONLY reason you can however, is because you have extra armor! My Arada, if it had a little bit of extra shielding, even 10 extra points, would be enough to kill those 2 forces, and a few extra ships.

IMHO, a Voinian Cruiser, is more of a "beginner's" ship. Why do I say that? Hear me out before slamming that "post reply" button. It's got gobs of armor. And you can add more armor on top of that. This makes it a VERY tough ship to take out. It can have up to 6 turrets! It has more than twice the weapon space of an Arada, and it has a figher squadron! Then look at the Arada. 50 shields, 10 armor, hell, the Cruiser even has more FUEL than the Arada. The Arada can only have up to 4 Cannons, and can only handle 1 turret! The Arada, is for an expert! The Voinian Cruiser is for people who think brute force and mass destruction are the only answers! Arada captains, look at ALL possibilities before striking. How do I know this? Because ANY Arada captain knows off the bat, as soon as the "Alert!" Klaxxon goes off, he is no doubt outnumbered. A Voinian Cruiser pilot hears the same klaxxon, and laughs. Though a Voinian Cruiser may not be able to do the same manuvers an Arada Pilot may do, the pilots usually don't need to. This makes Cruiser pilot's lazy, and quick to jump at the "Fire Weapons" button. As usual, battles involving one krait don't count in this debate.

Oh, Read a few of the stories in "Moment of Pride and Accomplishment" and maybe you'll think twice before calling an Arada "dinky".

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- Captain Stud Beefpile
- UE Naval 238th Squadron
- Azdgari Squadron "Firebird" Leader
- Member of the Zacha Renegade Elimination Corporation

Quote

Originally posted by Great White Godfather:
**Ah if only we could play this out for real . . . . Anyway despite the fact that there is no way this could happen I would back the Arada in this fight. The Arada has the advantages in speed manouverability and recharge rate. It can play hit and run on the cruiser and whenever shields get low it can burn off for a while and then come back in, guns blazing.

**

Atta Boy! Thats the way to do it!

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Ace Battlepilot
<mercenary for hire>
"My contract is simple. Give me a Miranu Gunship, give me upgrade funds, and turn this mad dog loose, cus once I'm let out, there's no hope for you..."

Quote

Originally posted by Ace Battlepilot:
**Atta Boy! Thats the way to do it!
**

You have my apologies. Your message was posted while I was writing my own rant.

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Non est ad astra mollis e terris via.