Adjudicator Balance

An ability permitting Adjudicators to switch  between single target damage and multiple target damage would be fine by me.

In all seriousness: there are times when you need to put the hurt on multiple structures at once, and there are times when a single structure has to die, STAT.

Being able to toggle between two different fire modes would facilitate both.

Easiest way to buff them would be to:

-increase DPS per target by maybe 40-50%

-reduce targets from 5 to 3

The biggest problem with the Starfish is that it cost twice as much and deals 33% less damage per target as compared to the Ogrov.  Which basically means it has to to be attacking all 5 targets to even come near the efficiency to the Ogrov- which is impractical, as you rarely have more then 2-3 actual priority targets.

Honestly I think the best solution is just to reduce the targets that can be simultaneously engaged while retaining similar DPS potential.

If the DPS were buffed by 50%, the max targets reduced to 3, ogrov would still deal damage 50% faster per cost against a single target, but Adjudicator would be 20% faster against 2 buildings and 80% faster against 3 buildings.

That sounds about right to me considering that frankly single target destruction is the most important anyway as dropping starbases quick is the cheif point of antimodule ships.

Dear god-whens the last time i built an ajusticator-can't even remember. last-no 2 years-can't be. When did entrenchment come out?

IIRC, the Adjudicator also has less range then the Ogrov, and can't outrange an upgraded Starbase (the Ogrov can). That's the biggest problem with them - the one thing they need to counter rips them to shreds (unlike the Ogrov).

Honestly it's hard to justify building something that's good against the static turrets, because bombers (the thing Advent will really use against a Starbase) also do that effectively.

I only play SP, and always have few Adjudictors. Mostly to help speed up clearing the planets of enemy structures, my fleet deals with defensive structures and starbases, Adjudicators are there just for the cleaning duty.

I like the suggestions here;  the Adjudicator as it stands is awful.

If the devs aren't fond of the existing suggestions, a reasonable alternate might be to vastly increase the hit points on Adjudicators such that a much smaller grouping of them can expect to take out an unsupported Starbase before the Starbase finishes them off. 

If say four or five of them can hold their own against a Starbase without upping their DPS, it might be more gentle to their balance against non-Starbase targets.

I built them for fun in a match once. They cost way to much, get outranged by a SB, there is no need for them when you can build bombers. They need to do something else, like give them more range, make them more resistant to the red button.

I agree, bombers are much better as it is. More versatile as well, not limited to engaging only structures and can be turned into fighter squadrons for defense if need be.

umm. by the way. both anti-structure cruisers have a range of exactly 12000.

so.

they both have the same range.  you wont get the extra banks firing, but.

Personally I think all they really need is a cost decrease. The whole point of the Advent is to have alot of AoE units. The illuminator, only good in numbers. Defense Vessels, only good in numbers. If the Starfish was more massable they would be better. Currently they cost, 1050175140. And have a fleet supply of 18. The Ogrovs cost 62013095. and have a fleet supply of 12. So lower their cost to something reasonable an overall cost decrease by 25% would make the Adjudicator cost 790130105(rounded). Lets face it no one actually masses turrets or mines which was why the Adjudicator was made.

Doesn't this make them exactly on the line for red button?

only lv 2 big red button. lv 1 big red button is 8000, lv 2 is 12000.

Except that they use plasma which receives DPS increases, while the Orgov gets significant DPS and a maximum range increase of 12%.

Hiyas.  Since this is a dedicated thread, I figured I'd post what I've done thus far.  I've given them a single-target beam attack ability called Sentence.

Prerequisites: 0
Levels: 1
Range: 12000 (same as Adjudicator range)
Cooldown: 4 seconds
Disables: weapons of caster for 5 seconds to simulate switching time
Damge: 200
DPS: 50
DamageType: CapitalAbility
Effective DPS: 50

Compare that with the Orgov.

Prerequisites: N/A
Levels: N/A
Range: 12000 (plus range research)
Cooldown: 20
Disables: None
Damage: 450
DPS: 22.5
DamageType: AntiModule
Effective DPS: 45

This is IMO a perfectly fair trade off.  The starfish is more expensive in all categories in addition to the fact that research can up the drastically increase the DPS and range of an Orgov.

My solution may not be the best, but IMO, it works out pretty well.  Orgovs are still going to yield more efficient destruction of single structures, but it allows the more expensive Adjudicator to deal slightly higher DPS to single structures.

So PB, what are you feelings about the Adjucator as it stands now?  Would you change anything?

I feel it is a fairly effective ship against everything not a starbase. (75 dps, 150 effective vs structures, vs ogrov's 45 effective dps vs structures, or 8.333 dps/supply vs 3.75 dps/supply), Unfortunatly, since everything not a starbase is fairly not effective, and hence, fairly not built, there is fairly little point to building them.  THis is compounded by the construction frig's deconstruction ability which significantly reduced their use as a quick clean up tool.

The devs will never add an ability to the thing... so only thing possible is messing with numbers.

as far as cost, 2310 credits vs ogrovs 1520, or 128.33 credits/suppy vs 126.66 credits/supply, aka, their costs are effectively identical.

They are also more durable than orgovs, both in raw numbers/supply, and due to the way shield mitigation works.

They are also avalible at tier 3, compared to tier 4 for ogrovs.

Basicly, they are tied or better than ogrovs in every way except their focus fire potential, and range issues from not having an akkan/missile range upgrades. 

Hence, I feel, that if I were to change something within the box, it would be reducing their target count and upping their damage to compensate. reducing the target count to 4, and setting the damage to 75, would give adjunctators a single target dps of 37.5. At max upgrades, this almost ties ogrov's single target max upgraded dps, (~56 vs 58.5) they would still be behind on a per supply basis, so thats ok.

Though, if i could change anything, it would be to only make their bank a 360 degree firing arc, but this is not possible.

I really only fine it useful as a cleanup ship.  After the threats are gone, park the starfish in the middle of the structues and they'll all be dead soon.  As a starbase counter, bombers are clearly better.  Damage increase, #targets decrease is the most sensible fix.

the other adjudicator idea i had once, but had no idea how to make it work, was that if you had multiple adjudicators (call them A, B, and C) in a well maybe you could have some of the guns from C that aren't shooting at targets shoot at B, and this 'supercharges' B to do more damage. Then you have A on the other side of B and it does the same thing.

This would be pretty unique, i think.

could make the ship spin...

first thing would require abilities. second though would require AI change, or stupid micro.

Hmm...  That would be interesting...  I'm not a big fan of that though simply because it would require adding stuff to the firing code of the game which is unlikely.