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Post by pancakefury on Sept 1, 2017 13:31:06 GMT -8
So i've been researching some space-themed board-games for interesting combat mechanics i could use in my fan-game, and i've found this:  ![]()  So i thought: Hey, remember how utterly useless Icari was when dealing with anything that isn't a one-hit wonder ryder? With a combat mechanic like that, she could be of some use against ships as well. We just need to make some modifications, for example, enemies would receive a penalty to hitting her while she is latched onto an enemy ship, and the ship itself would receive some damage each turn, or maybe it would lose some of it's armor as she stomps around, in addition to increased cost of firing it's weapons (or maybe the weapons could be disabled altogether, although that can make her a bit imba.) This boardgame (it's free, by the way) also has some interexting mechanics regarding module damage for ships, i advice to all interested in modding take a look at it, i'll definitely be borrowing from it heavily in my project. |
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Post by limith on Sept 1, 2017 20:39:05 GMT -8
Icari is great idk what you are talking about.
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Post by pancakefury on Sept 2, 2017 1:14:31 GMT -8
Icari is great idk what you are talking about. About how she would get roflstomped on every second/third turn, because for her to do any damage she needs to get right into the enemy midst, and people would just gun her down point-blank? She is basically an overglorified missile on any difficulty past Visual Novel, imho. |
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Post by bigfoot on Sept 2, 2017 4:24:20 GMT -8
She can be good, depends how you build her. I would stack evasion, then assault, mostly kill an enemy ship and assault it for huge damage because of no armor left, stick her behind shields and a flak screen, then the entire enemy fleet goes berserk but can't hit her, sure there are other ways. That said the Icari supporters on this forum are near rabid so be careful  Will think about battleframes... |
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Post by pancakefury on Sept 2, 2017 5:07:05 GMT -8
>That said the Icari supporters on this forum are near rabid so be careful Well, i'm an Icariote myself, but good god is she useless. Or maybe it's just me and my shooty playstyle. That's why combat-wise, Sola is my favourite. |
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Post by bob on Sept 3, 2017 10:58:49 GMT -8
I usually use Icari as either hit and run, especially with the Full Engines command, or Stealth for Ryders. For ships I let others do the bulk of the damage to reduce armor, then have Icari finish with Assault (and possibly retreat) and evasion tank on the enemy turn.
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Post by neppi on Sept 3, 2017 13:58:02 GMT -8
With two points in evasion she is some of the best tanks you can get. Use stealth AFTER you attack, if you can (against Nightmare/Arcadius for example). Then the hate you build up during the current turn is also reduced. Icari has flak so I always try to get her between strong enemy vessels and the Sunrider. Sure there are fights where she gets killed but normally she kills enemys worth more than 2000 CMD  |
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Post by limith on Sept 3, 2017 20:15:33 GMT -8
I mean if you don't use Icari right then she's not that good no. Basically she's an anti mech unit that's it for me, I didn't put any points into Assault. In the first game she wasn't always great prior to upgrades.
Send her forward to slash some expensive mechs. Use Gravity on her to pull her to a safe spot (I read on the forums about space whale strats and this was a game changer for me and Icari, previously I thought the gravity gun was useless). Send Sunrider forward using teleport + cannons to blast the top or bottom flank. Flak Down enemy units and then use a nuke missile from the sunrider. Move up your shield units to cover her and have some flak for her. I got her to 10 EP movement which is enough to slash 2-3 units on turn 1 (with gravity). Iirc the system uses an aggro system so Sunrider should draw most of the aggro after you do this which leaves Icari safe to charge enemy support/bombers turn 2. I tend to use Full Forward at start of turn and 1 slash is enough to kill all units usually. Then use the Defense command at end of turn so she survives fine.
Blackjack can be a good Icari if you pump upgrades into her. Cheap energy weapon on blackjack + awakening is actually really good assuming the enemy shields are down. Except blackjack moves slower so you can't kill the far away bombers always. Icari can't deal with nemesis well, use Blackjack + Awakening for that instead.
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Post by Nemjen on Sept 3, 2017 23:12:22 GMT -8
Let's be honest it's her fault for choosing light ryder armour over the dreamy alliance grade plating. Saying that with a small evasion investment she can sell that decision to me.
I tend to play her as a hit and run ryder unit too although if she has kinetic support she can still take a chunk of ships before needing to retreat.
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Post by Somasam on Sept 4, 2017 21:39:33 GMT -8
Really, it depends on the game. From what I remember on both the forum and my own experience, Icari was deemed slightly under powered compared to other ryders back in First Arrival/Mask of Arcadius. Which is why she received some fun upgrades and over all buffs in her appearance in Liberation Day. To the extent that she could literally solo the final boss without taking a scratch. Which was left in iirc because Samu or Magpie said she deserved it after getting the short end of the stick in MA.Basically, the key to Icari is remembering her Ryder's overall purpose. It was labeled as the interceptor of the group. Its fast and nimble. An assassin, if you want to look at it that way. Able to eat mook ryders for days, or charge in and eliminate critical targets. True, she is limited in terms of weapons compared to other ryders. She only has assault guns and swords. This means she is best used to: - Rush in and sword a support/bomber/nightmare for massive damage and preferably remove them from play
- Rip apart enemies that have had their armor stripped due to damage from other sources, making her a fantastic "clean-up" at the end of your turn; a trait Ceran Gunships also have, which is why I love them so
- Eliminate lesser threats like mooks, so you don't have to waste the heavier hitters' energy on them
- Pepper enemies with tons of cheap fire/use as additional flak protection; if you have really killed all the ryder threats
- Evasion tank, depending on how you build her, and play-style
One of the big things for her is that, as the game progresses, specific ryder units that can influence the entire game become more prevalent (rage inducing support ryders). With their rise to power, Icari becomes much more useful as she is one of the better equipped units for dealing with support ryders and their ridiculous evade stats. With the addition of her cloak ability upgrade, her survivability goes through the roof, and allows her to go balls deep into enemy territory without repercussion, and continue to rip apart squishy support units. I cannot overstate how important it is those damn things die the turn they appear, and how Icari and Sola are typically the only two capable of dealing with them. Its my personal opinion that most every ryder is subpar at its starting energy pool. 100 has too many limitations. Once you get a ryder up to 120 energy, options really start opening up for it. This is most prevalent with the two support ryders, almost all their abilities are easily dividable into 120. Seraphim you want to go way higher for if you want to get double shot. Paladin gets double shot at 120. For Blackjack and Phoenix, 120 energy means they both gain a lot more fire power per turn as well as a lot more mobility. Mobility is the key for Phoenix, and to a lesser extent the Blackjack. Most of your other units hang back and stay in defensive formation, while these two will more often move ahead for better firing angles. Try giving her 120 energy, and maybe some efficiency on her guns/swords, and see if that makes her a lot more versatile over all. Otherwise, my favorite thing to do with her is in combination with the Bianca's Grav gun. I would like to go on record and say that I loved the grav gun when I first found it, before people started talking about it on the forums. The ability to royally screw over enemy positioning cannot be overstated. As well as to get that one or two extra tile movements you need to save your ryder. Sure, its limited to ryders; but that's why I shat bricks when Mining Union ships were introduced with up-sized grav guns. I mainly used it to drag enemies into overlapping flak attack-of-opportunity; or to bring a ryder next to the Phoenix for some free hits, as well as letting her not waste as much energy moving and more energy swording. Truly, the Bianca is probably going to be the ryder I'll miss the most. |
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Le_Fay
Corporal
i assure you no matter what is i am doing, i am absolutely up to no good
Posts: 69 
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Post by Le_Fay on Sept 5, 2017 10:24:32 GMT -8
Icari is great idk what you are talking about. About how she would get roflstomped on every second/third turn, because for her to do any damage she needs to get right into the enemy midst, and people would just gun her down point-blank? She is basically an overglorified missile on any difficulty past Visual Novel, imho. yea icari does close to 0 damage with her AR unless you get close by which then you might as well go for the melee kill, then watch her die after the enemy turn, cause shes pretty useless otherwise |
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Post by neppi on Sept 5, 2017 11:45:46 GMT -8
About how she would get roflstomped on every second/third turn, because for her to do any damage she needs to get right into the enemy midst, and people would just gun her down point-blank? She is basically an overglorified missile on any difficulty past Visual Novel, imho. yea icari does close to 0 damage with her AR unless you get close by which then you might as well go for the melee kill, then watch her die after the enemy turn, cause shes pretty useless otherwise If you get her to 120 EN and reduced assault/melee to < 31, you shouldnt watch her die. With her Assault she is an excellent finisher even at medium range. Going for the melee kill is alright as well. Just don't do it in the first turn because after turn 1 all the other vessels have much more hate (if you use stealth of course). Just don't send her into 3 Nightmares in Turn 1 emoticon_icari2_small she will thank you for that :3 I don't understand the Icari hate, she is such a great ryder to play. Much more interesting than ryders like Seraphim. And if played correctly, Icari might even have more impact than Sola  |
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Post by limith on Sept 5, 2017 11:54:10 GMT -8
yea icari does close to 0 damage with her AR unless you get close by which then you might as well go for the melee kill, then watch her die after the enemy turn, cause shes pretty useless otherwise If you get her to 120 EN and reduced assault/melee to < 31, you shouldnt watch her die. With her Assault she is an excellent finisher even at medium range. Going for the melee kill is alright as well. Just don't do it in the first turn because after turn 1 all the other vessels have much more hate (if you use stealth of course). Just don't send her into 3 Nightmares in Turn 1 emoticon_icari2_small she will thank you for that :3 I don't understand the Icari hate, she is such a great ryder to play. Much more interesting than ryders like Seraphim. And if played correctly, Icari might even have more impact than Sola 120 EN, 29 EN melee, 10-15 EN cost for move is great. Also You can turn 1 attack 3x with melee IF the sunrider gets more aggro (the cannon + some nuke missiles on T1). Icari has some flak and the AI will missile sunrider as well which Icari can block. |
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Post by Somasam on Sept 6, 2017 20:50:49 GMT -8
If I remember correctly, you can't actually adjust movement energy prices on units. Which is why Icari has the niche of having the lowest movement cost in the game.
Phoenix is lowest, with 10 per tile.
Blackjack and Liberty with 20.
Bianca, Seraphim, and Havoc with 30.
Paladin at 40.
Sunrider costs 30 to move.
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Post by ChapterSerf on Sept 8, 2017 8:24:01 GMT -8
I never had any issues with Icari. Usually she was good for picking off near-dead capital ships, even at a distance normally considered stupid for guns. This thanks to the fact that Sunrider rolled each individual attack in an attack, instead of for all the attacks at once. In other words, if an attack had 10 attacks, the game rolls 10 d100 dice (or 2x10d50 dice) and calculates each attack individually. Thanks to that, even a 30% hit attack could still had a fair chance of doing SOME damage.
Alternatively, she was good for picking off Ryders that got too close.
Usually at the end of the day this required me to make sure that Kryska had A: killed something and B: used taunt (at least in LD).
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Post by Ardanis on Sept 10, 2017 3:41:34 GMT -8
Icari is a kind of "mage" character, in that she requires more skill and management to play correctly, but also is more versatile and fun to play as a result. It makes even more sense if you think that typical fantasy "melee tank" vs "fragile ranged" roles are reversed in sci-fi settings dominated by guns.
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Post by stuffwar on Sept 20, 2017 16:03:17 GMT -8
She's a lot better in Liberation Day since she gets stealth. That allowed her to dive annoying support units and remove them from the battle and generally roam the map without instantly dying. Otherwise I used her as a cleaner or diving large mech units to take them down quickly.. I'd invest just enough points into her guns to let her use them one more time and a little accuracy. She was great for cleaning up weakened enemies or killing things like mooks with her guns because they only needed to hit a little to do damage and finish them off. She was especially good at sniping capital ships stripped of their armor. With how large they are it didn't matter all that much how far away they were because she'd still doe high amounts of damage.
In Mask of Arcadius I used her as a tank believe it or not. The AI loved to target her because I purposely kept her HP lower than everyone else's. I added as much as I could while keeping her HP lower than everyone else's. I stacked evasion and Flak and kept her in the back with Claude + Chigara to keep missiles off of them while drawing maximum enemy fire due to having such low HP. With the distance she was away she was almost impossible to hit.
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Post by quirriff on Sept 25, 2017 8:01:49 GMT -8
Phoenix got a cool new ability in liberation day.
It's Sola's Seraphim I think needs a little help to be honest. It spends whole turns doing nothing, i'm not talking about awakening turns, but she builds up too much aggro and dies, or she's either too damaged to risk awakening or attracting aggro, or too far away, as your other units have got in close to the enemy and now she can't make a good shot anymore even with her long range. and it doesn't have flack or shields to protect other ryders/ships.
Giving Seraphim the evasion debuff that Ceran gunships have fits in with the whole spotter/sniper bot theme.
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Post by Somasam on Oct 8, 2017 18:32:41 GMT -8
Depends on the Seraphim. On the one hand, I wouldn't mind it getting a bit more toys to play with. Considering her entire kit is just "power up" or "one shot that guy over there". I think there was at one point talk about a 'mirage' ability, which I assume let her get 2 clones to help with the aggro issue and just act as fodder. Maybe give her a pulse gun to use? Doesn't give a flak bonus, but still lets her hip fire enemies when a sniper round would be over kill. Might also make sense next game, since the seraphim might have to operate solo, without support of the sunrider or the rest of the fighter wing. This'd give it a bit more versatility to keep it alive.
On other hand, my style of combat is similar to a lot of others here. Especially when you start doing higher difficulty levels. Basically turtle, turtle to the max.
Keep lots of overlapping flak and shields. I put sola on the very tail of the formation. And taunt with kryska too. With this I've almost never had problems with sola getting overly damaged or knocked out. She's usually one of the last ones to go in all honestly if I've messed up that badly. Usually Sunrider, Paladin, and Blackjack are the ones taking the most aggro shots. Sola might get macross missile massacred on the initial turn's alpha strike; but thanks to the entire fleets flak field being between her and the enemy, she manages to weather it pretty well.
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Post by limith on Oct 9, 2017 0:35:45 GMT -8
If you get your upgrades well you generally don't need Sola to use awakening. At least I generally don't.
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Post by stuffwar on Dec 21, 2017 0:45:08 GMT -8
Sola was a late bloomer for me. Once I got enough points to allow her to attack twice in one turn she was significantly better. Huge damage per turn increase not to mention the ability to burst anything down when awakened.
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Post by defieroftheodds on Dec 21, 2017 22:40:47 GMT -8
It would require a lot of research points but could sola get to the point that she could awaken and fire in the same turn?
Id also state that Icari is very good at destroying support units too, especially with cloak.
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