I not for much of a nerf to carriers either. Im against makin them slower. Im not sure why this slower build rate is such a big deal tho. Its still gonna be who has the most fighters and who micros the best and who counters the best. Its going to make carrier battles faster and more tactical. Your right carriers are useless once they run out of am. Now its going to be when you run out of fighters. Either way you have to retreat them and let them build am or rebuild squads. I like it because maybe you will be able to clear the skies and actually use bombers. As it is now you cant untill you destroy enemy carriers or they run out of am which takes a longggggg time. It makes flak useful too cause now they are a threat since you dont want to lose sc.

I think your entire point has been to nerf carriers into oblivion creditsuisse.  You bitch about them constantly on here.  You talk about anti-SC cap spam against carrier spam and the whole time howthe, myself and others are stating that spam of any unit is NOT the answer.  Mixed fleet is the whole point and knowing what counters what.  Carriers are needed when going against carriers and other things but you also need light frigates and lrf or HC to protect the light frigates.  Flak needs a boost without a doubt because as is there is little reason to include them in a fleet right now.  The answer isn't to nerf carriers.  If carriers are nerfed and something else becomes dominant then I am gonna use that to the best of my ability to win.  I don't like to see just spam winning and right now its not with knowledgeable players.  My opinion is flak should be boosted to have a bit more utility in a fleet.

[_]-Greyfox

I don't think many people are arguing that a rush to carriers + carrier span = win, at least not in a good game. There are three main problems that are leading to a lot of confusion. 1.) Carriers are easily exploitable since they have expendable strikecraft and are fast enough to stay out of battles, making them hard for people unfamiliar with the mechanics of Sins to deal with. 2.) Carriers don't have a single-unit hard counter the way other units do (you need anti-sc + anti-carrier).  3.) Carriers are slightly OP. This combination makes newer players frustrated with the relative power of an all-carrier force (as opposed to, say, an all-HC force) and causes people who know that balanced fleets will win yell at the newbs for being newbish and not knowing how to deal with a carrier spam.

If you want proof that carriers are somewhat OP, just look at the AI. A friend and I have run simulations with varying fleets without micro and it seems like the optimal number of carriers of a early/mid-game fleet (no HC or cielo-equivalent) is around 60%, and is almost 50% when you allow all ships (tests were run TEC vs. TEC with each also having 1 lvl 6 marza, 1 level 4 dunov with 2 shield restore and 2 magnetize, and 1 level 3 kol with 2 pts of flak and 1 of adaptive forcefield, late-game test had 1 lvl 8 marza, 1 level 7 dunov, 1 level 6 kol, 1 level 4 dunov, and 1 level 3 Akkan).

Is it not possible that the AI built a fleet to counter yours?  If you had high numbers of LRFs in your fleet, it would be fair to reason that the AI would build the counter.

My 2 cents.

I play single player against normal AI with 9 AI's and me.

What i do per fleet is 3 or more Capitals ships usally 1 combat, 1 colony and 1 supporting Capital Ship. Better yet is one of each Capital Ship per fleet.

Make sure to upgrade anti bomber abilites on your Capital ships before bombers become a problem. Build only Fighters on your Capital Ships. 

Make sure to bring flak ships I usally aim for 10 - 15 flak ships per fleet and that along with the Capital Ships fighters for me has all but eliminated any worries about bombers.

Howdidudothat:

Your points are fine, and I have no quarrel with you putting your two cents out there at all.  However, I have a few retorts:

1.  I don't want to be forced to build an anti-strikecraft capital right off the bat to counter strikecraft guaranteed to come my way early game.  Why?  Because I like to open with a colonizer capital, that's why.  Opening with another cap will handicap me, and force me down a particular path I might not want to go.  You might say "well get one capital of each."  No - I don't have the resources for that early game.  You might say "well open with the colonizer, and when resources become available build the other capital."  No, the carriers appear too early before legitimate funds are available for me to build a second capital (something I am loathe to do anyway - see my thread on "do capships suck or what?").

Now, I understand that my contention that I should not have to be "forced down a particular path I might not want to go" can be called into serious question.  You can retort "My rushing you can force you down a particular path you might not want to go, too!  You can't go eco in that circumstance!  Should we get rid of rushing just so you have the covenience of not being forced down a path you don't want to go?"  That is a fine counter-argument.  So what it comes down to is what the devs had in mind when the game was designed.  If the devs said "yes, we intended that to counter carriers, you would be forced into either building carriers of your own, or getting the anti-strikecraft cap" then my point is moot, and your point (that I just made for you, heh) is correct.  Now, if the devs stated this, there wouldn't be anything wrong with it at all.  But I'm simply guessing that the devs wouldn't say this.

2.  I usually play as vasari, and have found jam weapons on the kortul to be rather anemic.  Given the ability's effectiveness (especially with a non-leveled cap) vs. the cost to deploy this beast, I have serious doubts as to whether it is worth building and fielding one of these critters to counter your strikecraft spam.

3.  I think no one builds PJIs (except maybe pros) because of the disaster with them when the game first came out.  As such, people were "trained" not to use them (this was certainly the case with me, anyway).  I understand that their effectiveness is much better now (its not GOOD, but its better than it was) but old habits die hard - I still don't build them, and nobody else does either because I have never seen one built in any game I've played.  I hopefully will build them in Entrenchment, where defense should hopefully actually mean something in the game, but in vanilla Sins, static "D" is a joke, LOL.  At any rate, a PJI is totally useless unless there is a fleet sitting right on top of it to defend it.

4.  Your answer to the question of "can carriers be countered?" is an overwhelming YES.  However, like any great philosopher, I'm wondering if we are asking the right question in the first place.  Should the question be "can carriers be countered?" or should the question be "AT WHAT COST can carriers be countered?"  In other words, is it just plain easier for you to spam carriers than it is for me to counter them?  I will quote you on the case you cited with the vasari:

This to me sounds like a lot more trouble and micro (and perhaps, at the end of the day, cost) than simply spamming carriers.

I will close with saying that I have been very careful to NEVER say "nerf carriers."  In fact, I've never said it.  The strongest tone I ever used was with the "lame-o-test" you spoke of, where I said something to the effect of "unless the devs state such and such, I'm willing to say there's a balance problem," and in retrospect I actually regretted using language THAT strong.  If CreditSuisse is a 10 on the "nerf carriers" scale, I'm a 1, which means 1) I'm not convinced either way that there's a problem, but I'm open to at least asking the question, and 2) I'm a little fearful of considering the option, as overnerfs are the history of games, plus it is guaranteed that another "OP" spam will replace the currect one, and the next "OP" spam will probably be worse than what we have now.  I have never said "nerf carriers."  If anything, I have always leaned towards some other option, i.e. buffing flaks, etc.  That is, assuming anything needs to be done anyway (I've always been open to doing "nothing" as well).

In short, I'm for asking the questions, but I am careful about pronouncing any answers.

So you want your SC to stop LRM spam, but don't want to face SC spam, nor spend the time to learn the game mechanics so you can handle what you face??? Hmmm.

If you cannot adapt your tactics, you lose.

Do you know what the counter to a modern naval carrier is today??? SC - either land based or from ANOTHER CARRIER (shock horror)...

Is this something we want in SINs? Do you really want it impossible to counter Carriers without your own Carriers? I think there needs to be an option to withstand strike craft assaults without spamming strike craft of your own - most people agree. 

Btw, in REAL LIFE, we have Ageis Crusiers that can take out a plane from 5 miles out and are ridiculously effective at poping fighters out of the sky like popcorn. Also each fighter plane in RL costs 70-120 million dollars each, bombers even more. What do Strike Craft cost in SINs? NOTHING.

Whoa, whoa.

Number 1, Adama you just got reported. Its too bad really.  Eat your words.

Number 2, I said people should have an option to withstand carriers without having to make any SC of their own. I'm wrong and this is considered bitching?

Number 3, Is anything I said about the Aegis Crusier wrong?  

Number 4, I didn't even talk about fleet logistic points? wtf?

Is Commander Adama just a hater or something?  

BTW - in real life we have Exocet (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exocet) and Harpoon (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harpoon_missile) missiles with a range sufficent to fire from over the horizon. Kinda hard to shoot a plane from 50km away....

Also Credit - you seem to be VERY good at telling everyone why THEY are wrong, but can't take any criticsm yourself it seems...

I haven't been playing for the last couple weeks, but I saw a patch note that said they are slowing down the strikecraft build rate for carrier cruisers when enemies were present.  Maybe that will curtail the real power of carriers, in that they are building free ships to replace the destroyed ones.

I would agree with Tyr in that carriers ARE a little bit overpowered, but as I have pointed out before, they are equally overpowered for everybody, which is kind of nice.  In the past "LRF Wars" one of the long range frigates always seemed to have a decisive advantage, most recently, the Illuminator in 1.05.  To be honest, I had a much easier time killing my enemies back then, and I never built carriers or played Advent for that matter.  The few times I played Advent, I found Illuminators so easy to use it was insane...people died fast!  Carriers actually make everyone a little more time consuming to kill, because it is harder to force a decisive victory when carriers run.

That said, carriers ultimately take more management and tactics to use effectively, so the skilled players become very, very hard to defeat once they have built up enough.  This is the main problem for most players.  Carriers in themselves are very counterable, but a skilled player will maintain the upper hand at all stages and not let his carriers' vulnerabilities be exploited.

Between the flak range increase and the carrier build slow down, hopefully it will reduce the effectiveness of carriers just enough that they don't need a hard nerf.  I still think they could use a tiny decrease of top speed so they can't kite as much.  Even with their advantages, they are counterable....it is just a lot of work.

Sometimes I kind of miss the old 1.05 days, but I have to tell you that post 1.11 it is more balanced.  Building carriers in the old days was the kiss of death in Multiplayer, they just were not that effective.  Back then everyone begged to make strikecraft better and nerf the LRF / Illuminators which had no true counter!  At least post 1.11 there is a counter to every ship.

At the end of the day, players figure out what the most effective ship / strategy is....and use it causing people to complain until it isn't the most effective ship anymore.    At the moment it is carriers with fighters, because they are the hardest to counter, and once you pay for the carriers and manage to keep them alive, they are a limitless source of fighters.

Summary: 

1. Carriers need FINE TUNING, not a major nerf, or they will be useless again
2. Pure carrier spam is counterable by non carrier fleets (basic frigs)...but mixed carrier fleets require your own carriers

PS.

And Capital Carriers are hugely effective, except for maybe the Sova unless you are rushing with it, in which case it is very nasty.  Capital Carriers are not there for brute power, they are there to give you special abilities.  I can't tell you how many times I have used a Skirantra Carrier to turn a battle in my favor.  Halcyons are equally nasty.

I think the Vasari Carrier might be good for achieving superiority also.  Especially at lvl 6 you can summon 3 additional carriers on top of the microphasing aura.  But it is not a first cap for sure.