Carrier

[Anrita]

I really love the Carrier body thematically, but it's very difficult to design effective builds for.
I think at least part of the problem is that I just don't know enough details about how the swarm constructs actually work. Like:

* How is it determined which constructs will be created as standard or advanced?
* What effect, if any, does Priority Zero have?
* What are the stats for standard and advanced swarm constructs?
* What are the improved abilities? I see a circle around some of them but have no idea what it does.
* What are the differences in swarm speed with and without a shield?
* Does having a shield protecting your constructs count as "you" having no shield for purposes of increasing swarm speed?

Any info would be much appreciated.

[rayden_solo]

I noticed that the swarmers sometimes don't get close enough to actually use their weapons, so they fire into thin air (or vacuum) it happens on the ring-boss and some other enemies too sometimes

[Anrita]

Ah, yeah, that seems to be a product of their projectile avoidance behavior. I suppose it's better that they dodge and live to keep shooting, but it would of course be best if they could do that while staying in range of their target.

[anarcher]

It's like engineer but worse, and it gets worse the longer the run goes because the little guys keep getting destroyed faster than you can replace them.

[Treyell]

i personally dont think carrier should be palyed with any construct mods. it provides no upsides for having other constructs. i suggest you play it as a variant of sentinel because the shield recovery the swarm can do is great

[Anrita]

I've tried both those approaches. I agree the swarm constructs don't make up for losing the engineer's bonus constructs if you're going to invest in non-swarm constructs. Sentinel is better for shield builds IMO because Hidden Power isn't compatible with swarm constructs, and because Sanctuary's upsides don't justify its downsides except for Bastion+Architect+Gemini Protocol (and maybe the reason Sanctuary is so bad for everything else is that B+A+GP is so strong and would be even stronger if Sanctuary were buffed).

The best I've come up with for Carrier so far is Shielded Constructs+Reflexive Shields+Discharge and Rapid Reconstruction+Dying Star, but neither really feels competitive with what other ship bodies can do.

[anarcher]

Carrier needs a toggle to recall all the swarmers back "on deck" so to speak.

[Lord Roo]

Personally I find a carrier body with swarm missiles and advanced assault or defense drones to be THE most powerful build there is. The immense damage output from all the drones + carrier fleet along with all those missiles spamming everywere (and properly upgraded) means that I almost always get to level 100 with this build before dying, usually to the ship with the plasma lance that ranges over half the screen. And with a bit more agility and speed instead of powering up missiles and shields, I could likely avoid it. There is nothing wrong with the carrier if you load it up right.

The build I can't seem to find much use for is the broadside one. But I am sure there is a good build for it somewhere. But if I am planning to go for a long-distance run, I re-roll until I get the swarm missiles and carrier body. (Temporal shield is nice, but I rarely need to worry about shields when everything dies so fast.)

[Anrita]

Any build that can't effortlessly breeze past wave 200 with Mayhem enabled is definitely not the most powerful.

I'm not sure if you're talking about Courser or Battery, but I've found both to work well with Salvo.

[Lord Roo]

Originally posted by Anrita:

Any build that can't effortlessly breeze past wave 200 with Mayhem enabled is definitely not the most powerful.

I'm not sure if you're talking about Courser or Battery, but I've found both to work well with Salvo.

Yeah considering I'm still a lowbie I probably shouldn't be calling something 'the best' yet, but for me it's the form that survives. The only one i've been able to crack wave 100 with.

And it's the battery form I find to be the most useless, but again I better try switching to it at a higher level and see if it's still bad there.

[Bozobub]

It's a horrid pain in the butt to start, due to all the movement debuffs and large hitbox, but Carrier + Vortex + Singular Strike is a pretty strong combo, IF you can get some mobility into that porky-butt hull ricky-tick. Thermal Lance also is very strong but Vortex gets kind of ROFLstomp-y about it.

I've gotten both to *exactly* wave 200 on Mayhem, not nearly my best but not a bad showing either; getting nearly a million on a new build isn't a bad sign. But OH! the vile starts... It's even more annoying than starting a Hullbreaker -.-'.

[Anrita]

I considered trying Vortex, but Vortex+Architect+Charged Mines+Apex Machinery kills everything so efficiency that I can't imagine swarm constructs even having time to shoot anything if I tried a similar build with Carrier. Similarly, with Thermal Lance, I like to have a dozen or so lances active at once, and Engineer is the best for that.

When I want to do a Hullbreaker build, I usually start with Halo shield and stick with that until I've collected enough mods to switch to Rapid Reconstruction and start ramming things. It's much less frustrating that way, and even more so if you stick with Standard body for the first several levels (although that carries a risk of never seeing a Hullbreaker upgrade). I've tried that approach to get Carrier builds started, but it doesn't seem to work nearly as well. EDIT: Ah, I remember why now, it's because I also take a Flak Cannon with Hullbreaker. Hidden Power allows Flak Cannon to be refunded, but Overseer doesn't.

[Anrita]

Well, I've finally found a Carrier build that isn't completely outclassed by a similar build with another body. It's very unreliable, but once it gets going, it can clear wave 200 relatively easily. It's Torrent to trigger Discharge and Reflexive Shields on Apex Pursuit drones with Siphon. The big problem is that Celestials tend to quickly destroy all the constructs, leaving you defenseless for several crucial seconds.

I still have no idea what those auras on the advanced swarm constructs do.

[rayden_solo]

Originally posted by Anrita:

I still have no idea what those auras on the advanced swarm constructs do.

those are propably just indicators on what counts as being "close enough" for the fire rate and hull resistance mods to be working. Just like the turrets' and allies' auras.

anyway, thanks for the build, gonna try that now

[Anrita]

No, those have their own auras, and they're a little larger than the innate swarm auras. Try playing Carrier for a while without taking Priority Zero, and sooner or later you'll see them.

[anarcher]

Try bastion discharge with matrix (adaptive armor, channeling, gemini) instead of siphon shield.