I've noticed two fairly impactful issues with Korolov mission balance.
1. EI200 escort missions are either trivial or practically impossible. I've had squadrons of Corsair IIs show up and flatten the ship in less than a second. I believe this a product of Corsair Is being weighted too heavily in terms of power, and the missions being balanced around this. When the mission spawns Corsair Is, the freighter kills them on its own with no player intervention needed.
Suggested solution: Buff Corsair Is so that they can affect mission outcomes in some way. A group of Corsair Is should be able to kill an undefended EI200. Once this is done, rebalance EI100 and EI200 escort missions with more realistic weighting to prevent excessively large groups of Corsair IIs and Vikings from appearing in place of huge but ineffective groups of Corsair Is.
2. Charon frigates are too fragile when faced with the guaranteed Smartcannon and their own Stiletto missiles. They typically last only a few seconds before dying, making later Korolov missions trivial. Another unfortunate side effect of this is that the Kronosaurus is thrown at the player very early on, and, if the player so chooses, he can lock himself out of the vast majority of Korolov missions by the first or second station.
Suggested solution: Replace Charon Frigate armor with something heavier than Advanced Reactive, which power creep has rendered insufficient to protect a capital ship. I would suggest an armor that is heavy but has high HP - this would provide the freighter with a de facto buff in the early game in addition to making frigates more useful. I would also suggest adding a chance of encountering large groups of Corsair IIs and Vikings rather than capital ships in later Korolov missions, both to make them more diverse and to spread out the frigates over a longer period of time.
3. Missions featuring freighters with internals often feature squadrons of attackers with no WMD capability. Any mission featuring a freighter that's neither an EI100 nor an EI200 should ensure that every squadron sent against the freighter has at least one Drake, Corsair II, or Frigate.
1) I totally agree. Corsair Is shouldn't die if you so much as glare at them. They could have light titanium or even regular titanium armor. Maybe their fireRateAdj doesn't need to be so abysmal either. And there's probably too much variation in difficulty in the pirate ambush encounters with all the 1d6s and whatnot. If Corsairs are toughened and the encounters made more consistent, EI100s and 200s need to be tougher too.
2) I'm not so sure about this. Charon frigates are already among the most potentially overpowered enemies for when they can appear, although they're less likely to be encountered super early now.
Also, they're actually tougher than they used to be due to internal hp, although they only fire 70% as fast as they used to. I just tested in 1.1 and the Smartcannon wasn't very effective due to level 4 armor resisting kinetic reasonably well and not having WMD to finish them off. But Stilettos were extremely effective, killing them in about 7 hits, though they tend to shoot a lot of them down unless something else is drawing their fire away from the player.
The Smartcannon has gained WMD, making it relevant against the compartments, though still mediocre against the armor. Stilettos gained some damage. But overall, it takes them longer to kill a frigate than it used to. I think this is just a case of tracking weapons being overpowered in general. I considered them great all along, but anecdotally, many players refused to use ammo weapons before ammo restocking and cost rebalancing.
And see also:
Charon frigate escorts should have a delay before gating in
Frigates are murderous for the unprepared or underequipped.
SmartCannon is not always a given. Aside from players skipping tutorial (by choice or not), some may not want to deal with ammo management (more than for a launcher) or need the money more than SmartCannon, and sell the weapon.
If frigates can still appear very early, then assuming player having a launcher is also not a given. Sure, Wolfen (and Raijin) will have one, but other starters might not. If my starter did not start with a launcher, I generally get one by looting one from the pirates, sometimes farming Corsair-IIs or Drakes for it.
Also, pirates other than Corsairs have kinetic-resistant armor. I usually pass most kinetics over for lasers because pirates are the most common enemy in the New Beyond, or at least in missions you cannot bail from. It hurts when Vikings refuse to die after several hits from a recoilless cannon or similar weapon.
Frigates are murderous for the unprepared or underequipped.
I'm saying buff frigate defenses - their offense is fine. Some heavy kinetic/blast resistant armor would work well, preferably something that's only useful to the EI500 so as to give players using it a break in the early game.
If frigates can still appear very early, then assuming player having a launcher is also not a given.
They cost 1K credits and can be bought at about half of friendly stations. Eridani alone provides enough money to fully outfit any starting ship to kill frigates. I would say that it's entirely reasonable to treat the tutorial as a minimum level of preparedness - a player that skips it is doing so because he thinks he'll be fine without the free gun.
Frigates' armor defense are fine. Level 4 armor is already pretty tough in level 1-3 systems, where Korolov stations appear. If their defenses are still not good enough, give them (and the Kronosaurus) a class I or class II shield. (If you want to be cruel, laser deflector to compliment their anti-kinetic armor.) Frigates have no shields, unlike their bigger Marauder cousin, the Tripoli.
Money may not be an issue unless you are saving it for other items like a bigger reactor (or other upgrades) or if you are struggling with fuel and spend all earnings keeping fuel up. What may be more likely is the launcher may not always be offered, despite NAMI launcher being "common", if not enough shops spawn and Starton Eridani does not offer the launcher.
As for SmartCannon tutorial, two things.
For pilgrims, if I play Wolfen, I do not need SmartCannon (as much as a reactor upgrade). It has the agility to use fixed fire weapons effectively and it has small cargo hold. I see the SmartCannon as a fallback for EI500 or omni lovers that cannot find a powerful enough omni or tracking weapon early enough.
For Eternity Port players, SmartCannon tutorial is not an option. Character is not a pilgrim, though few Korolov stations may appear.
Do not assume players will always get the weapons that will chew through any early-game enemy, including frigates, on time. Ditto for targeting program that lets player use omni and tracking weapons beyond short range effectively.
I made the following changes:
- For all encounters, I narrowed the range of ship counts. E.g., instead of 2d6 (2-12) I changed to 6-8.
- I buffed the low end encounters. Instead of 1-3 Corsair, you now encounter 3-5. The mid- and high-end encounters are mostly unchanged.
- I lowered the cargo values for EI100 and EI200 for apprentices. This means that it is less likely for either to face a Drake or a Corsair-II. At Journeyman and Master level, the chances increase, but the player should be ready for it by then.
- For Antares-* and EI7000, I raised the lower limit of cargo values so they are more likely to encounter missiles.