VD2 Unofficial FAQ posted to Guides section.

[Fenris]

As VD2 is getting more popular, I am noticing that some questions are starting to be repeated. I expect there will be a point where I won't have as much time to be active on the forums or Discord, between life and wanting to spend more time on the modding side, so I wrote a FAQ up. I would not call it comprehensive, and I will add to it over time, but I hope it helps a bit. I put spoiler tags around common campaign questions but left the rest visible. You might personally think something is a spoiler that I do not. Consider yourself warned before you go read it.

Please continue to ask new questions in the Steam Forums or at the VD2 discord channel. I won't be monitoring the comments at the guide for new questions. I prefer to see them exposed to community discussion as there may be aspects of the game and tips that I do not know myself, and the comments on the guide are relatively disconnected from general exposure.

@Chaossavy: Feel free to pin this.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1999145210

[Scoob]

Thanks for this, as a new player this is most welcome. I'll check it out!

Scoob.

[XartaX]

Huh, I never realized the Talon mission was hard, as the first thing I did was use a Drake and fly backwards. It didn't take 10+ minutes though. The hardest mission for me was actually the one where you take Sanctuary, because you need to fly a Frigate and the four enemy droppers immediately attack you. And you can't really shoot the teardrop drones off yourself. Managed by immediately retreating and letting my fleet advance, but no way I could play aggressive on that mission. I also didn't know trade ships could "level up" over time, so I learned something new.

[Fenris]

I guess I was being too cautious on staying out of its range. There were times my bolts would fade out before connecting, that's how carefully I was kiting it. That certainly increased my overall TTK.

[XartaX]

Originally posted by Fenris:

I guess I was being too cautious on staying out of its range. There were times my bolts would fade out before connecting, that's how carefully I was kiting it. That certainly increased my overall TTK.

I was close enough that it'd hit me with some lasers, but it didn't deal a lot of damage. Could easily keep up with my rapid repair.

[Zeppelträger]

Nice guide! Could you add some ship reviews (eg must-have-ships for fleets) in the future?

[Fenris]

Uh... I'll think about it for the FAQ. That wasn't exactly the scope I was thinking of when I set out to write it up.

Personal tastes vary, and most of them have their uses. The bigger distinction is that some of them handle better under AI control than others.

Player piloted: the HadesB, Victory, Drake, Bulldog, most Pride ships, and most TSF ships, are very strong. Swordfish is a notable excellent heavy corvette from the Kind, as well.

AI piloted: Swordfish, Hound (Mk1), PerezMk2, Intrepid, Raider, Killjoy, Brig, Priam, and Marauder handle well.

I don't personally use Beggar or Reborn ships. Gunships and up for the Reborn tend to have a decent loadout for the AI, and others comment that they are pretty good, but I am a bit biased against them since I'm usually fighting them and slaughter them by the hundreds, so they don't seem that tough to me.

[ImHelping]

Yeah when it comes to ships, at most you should list which ones have important attributes. Like a reminder about WHICH ships are the repair ships and capture ships. A new player won't know the difference between a LittleJoy and a LittleBigJoy.

Rather than let yourself get dragged into slapfights where my willingness to kite with a solo fighter for ten+ minutes clearly means clearly the Gremlin is top tier vs corvettes, I'm not crazy! You just need to git gud! (Why did I do that to myself...)

You should definitely focus on unintuitive without running a magnifying glass over the guide but absolutely vital mechanics. Like the frequent offender that is "If you enter overworld while still targeting a Pirate, you will U turn immediately back into the pirates", etc. (A quick once over didn't see that in the guide as of this posting).

Warnings about expected common UI elements and mechanics that are missing would also save people a lot of confused fumbling. Like how you can't assign targets or multi select via the contacts lists, for just one example.

[Fenris]

Major update completed 2/18. New FAQ items, and Index / Sections reorganized for the order to make a bit more sense.

[Scoob]

Originally posted by XartaX:

Huh, I never realized the Talon mission was hard, as the first thing I did was use a Drake and fly backwards. It didn't take 10+ minutes though. The hardest mission for me was actually the one where you take Sanctuary, because you need to fly a Frigate and the four enemy droppers immediately attack you. And you can't really shoot the teardrop drones off yourself. Managed by immediately retreating and letting my fleet advance, but no way I could play aggressive on that mission. I also didn't know trade ships could "level up" over time, so I learned something new.

I've read a few times that the Talon mission was really really hard. Remembering how tough VD1 could be I was actually quite apprehensive about attempting this mission, but I was ready to advance the plot.

To my surprise, capturing the Talon - well, enabling it to be captured - was easy, I lot a few ships and had some chunks taken out of my personal ship, but success was quick. I got the dialogue telling me well done and meet outside Sanctuary, then another Outsider ship blew up the Talon! lol.

My second attempt saw me taken out the PIncer first, then the two reinforcement ships, before focusing on the Talon. Not doing too much damage was key here, as I felt I had the upper hand the entire time.

Great mission, and I loved (afterwards, not at the time lol) "twist"! when the other Outsider ship took out the Talon its self - apparently though that's no as intended, but I liked it. I suggested adding "take out supporting ships first" to the mission description, rather than "fix" the issue.

Next mission said I needed a Destroyer - not something I have, wouldn't even know where to get one - so I went in with just a few Frigates and supporting ships. I totally steam-rollered the enemy there too, it was a really fun scrap though.

Scoob.

[Scoob]

I've been reading through you guide again, great work btw, and had a query.

Regarding:

Do ship upgrades effect combat auto resolution on the Overworld map?


As you specifically mention "combat calculations" I assume you mean the maths regarding "did it hit" and "how much damage did it do" sort of thing. So, while upgrades that perhaps improve raw damage (turret upgrades), dps (RoF and clip capacity) accuracy (projectile speed) etc. don't impact the mechanics of Overworld combat, do upgrades like Armour and Shields at least enhance the hit point pool of a given ship?

I must admit, I've built small fleets of Fighters to use as wingmen for me, who've then been sent to join one of my Trade Ships and they've performed admirably, far better than I would have thought for very basic ships.

While I assume Overworld combat is kept simple (well, less complicated) deliberately as there are of course LOTS of Overworld fights going on at any one time, does adding the the ships pool of health really have an impact in that regard?

Just wondering as it would be nice to be able to enhance my "no player present" ships with upgrades, rather than just adding more of them. I wonder if Overworld combat will be tweaked further in this regard?

Just curious really, I'm aware that Early Access - where doubtless these things were discussed to death - is over now. It just appeals to me to be able to make my ships better in the Overworld by means other than just numbers.

As an aside, I guess I like to always tweak my smaller ships - Fighters and Gunships - as I can then call on them for local duties when I'm around too. Tweaked smaller ships have MUCH improved survivability after all.

Cheers,

Scoob.

[chaosavy]

Pinned :)

Good work - thanks

[Fenris]

Thanks, chaosavy.

I'm getting really slammed by work at my office for end of month targets, so I am going to be slowing down the pace of my updates for a few days to take some 'me' time.

@Imhelping - As I told Jan, I wasn't planning on doing a guide breaking down all the ships because that is a lot of work under a whole separate category and should probably be its own thing.

My primary objective here is to get all the repeat questions in one place, so I can back off being so active on the community forums to do other things like my modding, and so it also frees up chaosavy from having to spend time on answering the same questions over and over again by having it in one place. That allows him to focus more on the bug fixes and any new content he hopes to add. I don't blame him for feeling obligated to spend so much of his time on answering questions if there is no FAQ to take care of that for him, and he hasn't had time to write one up himself beyond what was done for the ingame guide. I had a window where I had the time, and my hope is that past a certain point it won't take a lot of effort to maintain it.

At the moment, Sayanora's ship stats guide will help a reader with a very basic overview, and that is available right now. That's all I can suggest for you.

@Scoob
I said no, upgrades don't impact autocalculation in any way, in two different places. I'll take a look to see if I can choose my wording a little more carefully on that.

Briefly since I won't be updating a while: active abilities are only good a) if the player is piloting directly or b) if the player plans to use time dialation and remote piloting to rapidly micro firing multiple abilities off at once. Most passive abilities are good if the player is present, but the ships are AI controlled. Only 3-4 passive abilities do anything at all for AI controlled ships on the overworld map, none of which are combat related, and my understanding from how chaosavy explained overworld combat auto resolution is that only a ship's base stats and size class are considered and none of the upgrades count at all. So if you are spamming ships for high level auto-resolve combat on the overworld map where you will never join in and never see them in person, all upgrades are basically wasted resources for those ships.

[XartaX]

You can also use abilities on non controlled ships through tactical map without actually switching to them...

[Fenris]

See, I don't know everything! Thank you.

[Fenris]

2/27 update. Primary focus is the new 'Capture Related' section for ship and base capture. All pre-existing FAQ items tied to that subject have been moved there, there are more items covered for that topic, and it includes a basic capture ship stat comparison since that was requested.

Also minor updates to General Mechanics Related Pt. 2, and Economy Related. Biggest item from these is probably how to have your pilot leave a carrier that it boarded.