The Ur-Quan Masters Discussion Forum

So, what ship do you prefer? What tips do you have for certain ships and what ship do you recommend against another ship.
My favourite ships are:
Arilou Skiff: it's fast, it's maneuverability. If you could have TWO of thouse, you could with much maneuvering defeat a Dreadnaught. I found Skiff an excellent choice for Mycon and Vux. I think the main thing that I love about this ship is that ,it needs skills to fly, but when flown skillfuli, it's an excellent vesseal.
Earthling Cruiser: It's human  ;D! It's also excellent choice for the beginners since it's an excellent choice when playing against computer that's not an hard. It's a fair match against the Vux if you get lucky enough to get away from it before it destroys you. After that- he's done for.
Utwig Jugger: This ship has only one good thing about it: IT CAN COUNTER NEARLY ANY SHIP IN THE GAME!!! It's THE BEST choice againste both Ur-Quan ships.
So, let's hear it!

Utwig Jugger sucks.. Why? It's slow, and what it REALLY is, is LAME....

Na, my personal favorites are the Mmrnmhrm X-form (lame too, but still), the Chmmr Avatar (averagely good in regular hands, awesome in expert hands), and the Yehat Terminator (near-permashield-for-the-win! Plus, gravitywhips WORK!)

Yes, Jugger isn't all that interesting, but it's the best choice for three strongest ships in the game (except the Precursor ship and Sa-Matra): Chmmr Avatar and both Ur-Quan ships.

I've always liked the pkunk, but a well handled spathi is very hard to defeat.

Hmmm...faves...

Discriminator/Eluder: It's quite manueverable, can take a fair amount of punishment, and has homing missiles. You'll have to be patient to destroy something with it, though.

Skiff: Their manueverability is unparalleled(it's the only ship that isn't affected by inertia and planet gravity!), and the laser comes with a built-in aimbot. Just make sure not to get hit, or you're screwed-it may take some practice not to run into any stray flames or shruikens.(Damn Marauders!)

Cruiser: The torpedoes can really pack a punch at long range. The PDL might also provide immunity from things like missiles and fighters(could pose some great trouble for the Safe Ones if it ever came to such a conflict). This thing is slower than a snail, though, so you'd better hope you can keep your distance if you want to stay alive.

Jugger: The weapons don't affect your shields, which can be regenerated by simply taking "damage" while they're up-just make sure not to run out of energy, lest you lose what is practically the only redeeming factor of this ship(and the only reason it makes the list). The manueverability is atrocious when compared to the Skiff and Discriminator/Eluder, so it won't take much for your opponent to move by faster than you can turn.

Then again, I really don't mess around in Melee with many of the ships. I will tell you that I really do favor manueverability, though.

Thraddish Torch. I don't think there is anything
I can't beat with some fire.

Earthling Cruiser. Lots of crew, excellent turning, damn cool missiles. Could move a little faster though, but that's nothing a little gravity whip can't remedy. If you're good with it, you can beat:

Ur-Quan
Thraddash
Mycon
Shofixti
Vux
Slylandro
Supox
Ilwrath
Syreen
Arilou
Orz
Spathi
Umgah
Druuge

The only ones who do well can beat it are:

Utwig
Kohr-Ah
Yehat
Chenjesu
Androsyn
Veloxi
Nelsons
Arthling
Thrynn
Uhlek
Zerg
D'ni
Me

If i had to be choosy i would pick the modified Ur-Quan Shown here (http://uqm.stack.nl/forum/index.php?topic=2613.msg33775#msg33775)   ::)

I'm not sure how you'd bring Starflight stuff into Star Control...maybe a rip in QuasiSpace?

I know, kind of a pointless post, but I couldn't help the reference to the series that pretty much spawned the epic space adventure genre, Star Control 2 VERY included.
I sure as hell wouldn't want to be anywhere near that thing-provided that the lightning hurts. Which, going by your demos, it doesn't.

Then again, that might change with your new damage code.

"I'm not sure how you'd bring Starflight stuff into Star Control...maybe a rip in QuasiSpace?"

Someday, someone might mod together the two universes. Starflight 2: The Spemin Masters. Ancient Vs Precursor. Hehe.

The Orz Nemesis will forever be my favorite in every conceivable way.

The Nemesis is an excellent little ship, but I just suck with it. I can never line up the turret right while still being able to maneuver well.

My favorite ship is the Eluder for reasons already stated in this thread. It takes patience to be able to destroy large ships with it though. In capable hands, a Skiff can wear it down and of course an Avatar is more than a match for an Eluder. Just about anything else, even a Jugger, can be defeated by the Eluder with enough patience.

This is falacy. Why are you depending on the cannon to win fights? The Nemesis has a durability of 16 and that's if you aren't using marines, which you should be. It can't stand up to punishment, so the only time you close in and use the cannon is when you're 100% sure you'll get away with it. Otherwise, the marines are doing the fighting for you.

However, in many cases, you simply can't rely on the marines to win battles. Ever launched marines at an Eluder? They'll never catch it. Same story with a Skiff or X-Form (when played well, anyway). Let's not talk about an Avatar. It's easy to trick the AI and knock out its zapsats; a human will not be so gracious as to chase you endlessly once they figure out what you're trying to do. How about a Torch? A competent pilot can turn your marines into a fish-fry pretty easily.

That's why you have to be good at using the turret. What do all these ships have in common? Pretty short range. If you can learn to pick them off at medium range with your turret gun, you've got a decent shot of at least punching them up pretty badly, or maybe even winning.

I am sorry, did that last post have "SPAM MARINES FOR INSTANT WIN" written in it? I know you're sometimes forced to depend on the cannon. Marines are still handy in a supporting role for those fights.

Ever launched marines at an Eluder? They'll never catch it.

Pretty sure I've managed to get a few on board an Eluder before. Marines pretty much take a back seat in this fight, though.

Same story with a Skiff...

The awesome AI Skiff (which has reflexes that put most human players to shame) is best beaten with space marines harrying it into teleporting over and over until the Skiff finds its way inside the planet.

or X-Form

Fishy goons stomp all over that thing when its AI controlled. Against a player the best thing to do is only have one or two out at a time so that it's not cost effective to laser-lance them.

Let's not talk about an Avatar.

Player-controlled Avatars can't really do anything about Orz either. Some of them are smarter with the tractor beam, but that in no way prevents their inevitable death.

How about a Torch? A competent pilot can turn your marines into a fish-fry pretty easily.

Truth. Same goes for the Illwrath. They are both cheese-cake, regardless. I can't believe you never mentioned the Androsynth, although through proper abuse of the Leyland Gravity Whip those can be bested as well.

I was never that great with the 'Synth (though in light of all the praise they get around here, I've been trying to improve. They really do have a wickedly effective ship a lot of the time).

I've done more than my fair share of PvP combat in SC2 back in the 90's, so I really don't even consider how the AI controls ships; the AI was just a punching bag I used to hone my skills for when my friends were over, and we could crowd around the 486's keyboard and go round-robin, losers-out. I guess that attitude has stuck with me even today, despite the fact that I don't get to see most of my friends from back then all that often anymore. But let's just say that we all got pretty damn good with our favorite ships, and I use that as a benchmark for how they should perform.

Close in? The cannon has a medium range so getting dangerously close is often unnecessary, especially against the AI. It does make sense to get close to slow moving opponents, perhaps to drop off a few space marines so they can enter the ship safely from behind.

But of course, you can only use marines so many times before they're killed off and you're left with a very vulnerable ship. This is where the cannon usage comes into play. I just can't adjust the cannon properly to compensate for when I turn or for when my opponent changes his angle of approach.

What I'm saying is that while using the marines to win is easy, when it comes to skillful flying and attacking I lose with the Nemesis far more often than I win. To me, the only use for the Nemesis is as a space marine transport.

I have a suggestion: Fly the Nemesis in Super Melee as if it didn't have the marine function for a while, until you get a better feel for the turret. This is the only reason I'm even halfway decent with the ship: When I first started playing the game, I didn't even realize that the ability to launch marines even existed. So I got good duelling with the turret, and found the ship to be quite effective. It wasn't until I first played against a higher level AI that I realized that there was more to the ship than just omni-directional firing ability, and once I figured out how to launch marines, it was just gravy; I had gotten good enough with the turret that I didn't have to rely on them as much. Even today, I'll usually only launch a few marines in a given battle, and mostly rely on the turret to do damage.

Yeah I guess I'll just have to do that then. My prediction: even if get to be pretty good with that turret, I'll never really be "good" with the Nemesis. My brain just can't keep up with all of those angles and the way they need to change in order to win. I'm really much better at maneuvering and firing weapons that either take care of themselves or that come from a fixed spot on the ship. =)

1. Pkunk Fury - fast sons of guns. Resurrection ability. Love it.
2. Thraddash Torch - near perfect. Takes down big dudes easily. Has problems against certain fast ships like the Spathi Eluder or the Syreen Penetrator, but mostly the Spathi Eluder.
3. Orz Nemesis - with practice this ship is godly. I like the Marines better than the ships of the Ur-Quan.
4. Spathi Eluder - I really hate this thing. Really annoying with its poop bombs. Good overall stats.
5. Shofixti Scout - this is an excellent tech ship with its self-destruct feature.
6. Arilou Skiff - great speed. Must use Guerilla Warfare tactics to use it properly. Chmmr Avatar really kills this thing if it gets caught.
7. Earthling Cruiser - great range weapon and nice close quarters defensive laser. Its speed will get it killed though.
8. Chmmr Avatar - my favorite of the big dudes as it hurts most of the little dudes.

After this list there are others I like, like the Kohr-Ah Marauder, the Syreen Penetrator, the Mycon Podship, and the Supox Blade.

I really only think one ships blows and that's the Sylandro Probe. That's mostly do to the crazy controls and its secondary weapon which is basically just recharging its battery.

You think the Umgah Drone is better than the Slylandro Probe?

Also, the Torch is not so great if the enemy camps... just imagine what a fight between it and a Dreadnaught would be like if the Dreadnaught didn't thrust or launch fighters. Worse yet, go against a Kohr-Ah playing like that. The torch won't do close to its value in damage.

You're right about the Umgah Drone. That is a pretty bad ship. I saw from another user that the Probe can be deadly if used right. But it must take alot of practice to use it properly.

The thing is, the computer will not "camp". The Torch
is perfect against nearly every computer-commanded
ship. Other humans are rarely so naive.

It's true, the AI is particularily stupid against the thraddash... even the utwig won't use their shields if you place your flame wall properly.

It's so easy to mop up UrQ fighters with the flames... in fact, I think it would be harder to play a dreadnought on easy, since it wouldn't use fighters at all.

But the thraddash is still a fun ship, especially for venting... you can just pwn the AI on any setting and feel good.  ;D

Anyone tried thraddash vs thraddash against another human? Now THAT's an intense battle.

What a lot of people seem to forget about the Orz Marines, is that they do 1 damage IMMEDIATELY when they enter the enemy ship...

Most people send marines out almost immediately when a battle starts.. This isn't too crew-efficient.. It's better when you put down the enemy ship to, say, 10 crew, and then launch 5 marines. As soon as they enter the enemy craft, there'll be only 5 enemy crew left, which can be dealt with quite fast, with minimal losses on your own side...

I've found Thraddish vs. Thraddish battles tend to
come down to bizzard cannon fights. Two little
ships with little guns, taking pot shots at
each other.

Marines don't always make a kill as they enter an enemy ship, it just seems to happen reasonably often. But believe me, I've had plenty of "failure" marines, that board a ship, stand around loitering for a few seconds, and then drop dead.

Hi, I'm new to this forum...

Okay, I'm reanimating this thread, because I think it should be kept alove... I will now post some tactics. Today a rather simple example:

Melee Tactic Earthling vs. Umgah
In this battle your enemy actually isn't the Umgah ship - inertia is! Due to the small range of its cannon and its weak acceleration (even slightly lower than yours), you can easily outmaneuver the Drone and kill it with your long range missiles (3 hits are enough), as long as they do not use their special ability! When they suddenly approach your ship using it, you have to get out of the range of their plasma beam quickly - which will be impossible if you are drifting out-of-control. So always keep an eye on the stars in the background to avoid this deadly situation. When they use their special ability now, you will have enough time to get a sufficent distance while they are turning around - meanwhile old down the Shift-key to fire the lasers.

Another tactic... I'm not quite sure about that... In fact, it is no entire tactic, but a specific maneuver.

Umgah vs. any (especially slow ones)
(I'll call this the "Shelton Slide", due to similarities with the most useful thing in the space-flightsim "ing Commander", which is also called "Shelton Slide". I saw the computer doing this by accident a few times, and thought it could be quite efficient if you use this yourself.)
The Shelton Slide is a maneuver which combines special ability with primary weapon and irritation of the enemy: Use the special ability to approach your enemy quickly, but in the last one, try to not stop in front of him, but aside... If possible, begin turning your ship during the speed-boost (don't know if engine allows that), otherwise directly  afterwards. And then engage your cannon, firing at his ship. He will not expect you at his side and will struggle to get out of your range. The tactic described above will not work very well anymore, because you have less turning to do, he has less time to flee PLUS if you calculate well, you will come out there, where he will get, WHILE trying to escape.

Androsynth Guardian  8)

Vs. humans and comps alike, it has a decent to great chance against just about any ship in the game. I'd say only a human-controlled Thraddash has a real clear advantage...

it does; but as you turn the ship, the direction of back-boost changes too.


Not sure about that... Anyway, Umgah CANNON?


Since you came in on the target's side, you've only got the very edge of your cone on it. Remember, the Umgah don't turn very quickly.


The last part seems to me to be the only part of this that works. Maybe I'm misunderstanding.

Diagram, please?

It would be a total omission to not present the super totally gnarly and awesome ultimate UQM Melee thread to have ever existed on this board.
 ;D  ;D  ;D
http://uqm.stack.nl/forum/index.php?topic=1128.0 (http://uqm.stack.nl/forum/index.php?topic=1128.0)

I just used the term cannon as for a "device used to fire something at someone"  ;D

But hey, anyway you have to turn less than 90 degrees instead of 180... It will indeed only work against slow ships...

Play a few rounds with earth cruiser against umgah in melee mode, you will see what I mean... The computer sometimes does this, but I don't think, he intends to do so, but this happens by accident.

hehe so the dreadnaught just sits there? slowely turning and shooting now and then haha. would be pretty boring


my favourite ships would have to be thraddash, arilou, and pkunk. thraddash i can only really trash orz and kzer za, cos my aim is so terrible haha.


on the topic of the thraddash, is there any effective way to go up against the syreen dildoship?

Against the AI, simply use the same tactic that kills nearly every other AI controlled ship; lure them close, point your rear at the nose of their ship, and cut loose with a stream of flame as soon as they're in range. It might be a bit trickier to pull off against a more manuverable ship like the Syreen, but given enough practice, there are few AI ships that the Torch can't bring down reliably.

Err, am I missing something with the camping vs. Traddash bit?  That gun may have pathetic damage and firing rates, but the range is very long;  Ur-Quan or even Chmmr can't just sit there.  Orbiting complicates things, a blade barrier looks effective defense, and Chmrr tractors mess up long range firing quite nicely, but camping in dead space seems slow death for anything that can't at least match the Traddash firing range.

Why does everyone think that the afterburner is the only way to cause damage?  Use the gun, dagnabbit!  Same thing with shofixiti, but using the gun on that thing is waaaaay harder.

As for a Chmmr vs. a Nemsis, i've never seen this come out, pvp, with the nemesis in the win.  Maybe no one was that good with them (I certainly didn't use the nemesis often) but others did use this ship regularly.  Then again, we all also used the Chmmr regularly.

As for Draxas' comments, I fully agree that crowding around the X86 as a pack of children to play this game is one of the fond memories I hold in my fuzzy heart. 

Maybe for the Nemesis vs Chmmr its a matter of patience - use the Nemesis' guns to destory the ZapSats? and then GoGos?

The Thraddash after burners + the main gun is actually a very effective way of fighting, because the after burners make the Torch decently manueverable.

Beating a chmmr with an orz is easier than you might think. its a simple matter of circling the chmmr firing at it. Execution is of course tricky but doable with practise. the chmmr tractor beam cannot rein in an orz that changes its direction every now and then.

Quick melee tip - when fighting chmmr changing direction reduces tractor beam's deadliness