Happy New Year! (January 1, 2023)

[ChrisReid]

Happy New Year all! Today we've got our annual January 1 poll that asks Wingnuts for their expectations for the year ahead. As we saw in yesterday's news post, 2022 was a busy year, and we've got every reason to believe 2023 will be just as exciting! What do you think? Whatever happens, we're looking forward to sharing it with you!



The old poll was a Halloween-themed choice between ghostly named fighters. The powerful Vampire took the top spot, but the spooky Jincilla Skull was close behind. WC4's Banshee and the Wraith also did quite well. Sadly, almost no one likes the Phantom.

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Original update published on January 1, 2023

 

[Mekt-Hakkikt]

Happy New Year to all! I sincerely hope it will bring good things to the world.

And yeah, I don't like the Phantom either.

 

[capi3101]

I like the Phantom for what it does - it gives you a slightly more robust craft for patrol and picketing while not costing too much more. I might've voted for it if the polls on this site would ever work for me...I don't think I've been able to register a vote on a poll here since at least 2016...

 

[Rylex]

The Phantom was only good for its guided missiles. The (additional) Mass Driver cannons are too low ranged to make the ship otherwise superiour to the Arrow. The speed and acceleration are also worse than the Arrow. OK, well ... that's true for any (Armada) ship. I've always mass built Arrows and only 1-2 heavy fighters (preferred Gladius) for killing the enemy carrier in Armada campaign mode. Never had a problem to win on hardest difficulty.

However, I missed the Dragon (Black Lance) fighter from WC4 in the poll - loved the infinite afterburner capabilities.
I would have rather voted for the Shok'lar (Armada or Privateer RF) than for the Phantom, Wraith or Banshee.
The Arrow is not scary... it's just beautiful 😍.

 

[Mekt-Hakkikt]

I like the Phantom for what it does - it gives you a slightly more robust craft for patrol and picketing while not costing too much more. I might've voted for it if the polls on this site would ever work for me...I don't think I've been able to register a vote on a poll here since at least 2016...

Nah, I really don't find it worth the ressources. Plus I remember the view being restricted.

 

[Mekt-Hakkikt]

The Phantom was only good for its guided missiles. The (additional) Mass Driver cannons are too low ranged to make the ship otherwise superiour to the Arrow. The speed and acceleration are also worse than the Arrow. OK, well ... that's true for any (Armada) ship. I've always mass built Arrows and only 1-2 heavy fighters (preferred Gladius) for killing the enemy carrier in Armada campaign mode. Never had a problem to win on hardest difficulty.

However, I missed the Dragon (Black Lance) fighter from WC4 in the poll - loved the infinite afterburner capabilities.
I would have rather voted for the Shok'lar (Armada or Privateer RF) than for the Phantom, Wraith or Banshee.
The Arrow is not scary... it's just beautiful 😍.

I absolutely agree on the pitiful range of the Armada Mass Drivers. In no WC game did I find gun range to be as important as in Armada. When I had to fly the Phantom in the gauntlet, I only used the Laser cannons and never bothered with the MDs. Too bad 3 out of 5 Kilrathi ships use the equally useless Flux cannons. Whereas the Confederation has the good sense to only use them on one ship.

EDIT: As for the poll missing the Dragon or Shok'lar: I guess their names didn't fit the spooky Halloween theme.

 

[Rylex]

In no WC game did I find gun range to be as important as in Armada. When I had to fly the Phantom in the gauntlet, I only used the Laser cannons and never bothered with the MDs.

That's exactly what I did when playing Armada. As I'm a fan of real cockpits, the Phantom cockpit view was much too restricted for me, like you said.
Short gun range is critical in Armada, because it's the game with the fastest ship speeds and the enemy flies by so fast...
That is why cou can kill all ships with the Arrow (if you are experienced)... 😁

 

[Mekt-Hakkikt]

Yeah, that's also the reason why I can't get lucky with the Kor-larh. Fighting Gladius in it was always a real pain for me and I ran out of afterburner fuel before the end of the third wave. Armada's flight model / AI gave (still gives) me more trouble than any other WC game.

 

[Rylex]

Yeah, that's also the reason why I can't get lucky with the Kor-larh. Fighting Gladius in it was always a real pain for me and I ran out of afterburner fuel before the end of the third wave.

So true! The Gladius was quite good but it had too little guided missiles.
Yeah I know: "Some of us are able to aim, Maniac!" (said Blair to Maniac in WC4 when they were told that they could only use Dart Dumbfire missiles for a mission)... 🤣
Arrow had two Dart missiles... taking down a Kor-larh with the long range laser cannon was quite fun!

I have to admit that I was never able to play through Gaunlet Game Mode without being shot down at least once (or cheating). The first Armada version I had did not have the possibility to continue a run with a code. So I opened the data.tre file with a hex editor on Windows 3.11 and searched for the guns and cannons. Then I changed some positions at will to FF or 01 and started the game until it did not crash. First try was the laser cannon. Well, I changed all Confed Cannons to a fire rate of 100 shots per seconds and draining nearly zero energy. Yeah, I was cheating. But it was fun. I don't have the modified file anymore... it was back on my 486DX4, which had only a small harddrive so I needed to uninstall some games back then to play new ones. Boy, I had lots of time back then. Just loading the file with my 16 MB of RAM using Windows 3.11 took forever...

 

[Bob McDob]

The Skull is absolutely the scariest ship, not because it's amazingly good but because unless you have Stream Mk. IIs / missiles you will never be able to shoot it down and be trapped at the nav point forever.

 

[ChrisReid]

Proximity missiles are very good against the Skull