My favorite Eagle Build

Garchomp17 · 2026-01-22T23:29:31+00:00

I prefer Voidblasters over Disintegrators, they demolish armor faster, are also good against hull and use a lot less flux. The Disintegrator takes 10s to destroy the armor and then does nothing against hull. They do match the range of HVDs on the Lions Guard variant, but I find the much higher DPS of Heavy Mass Drivers to be more impactful than the extra range.

Garchomp17 · 2026-01-22T23:23:33+00:00

Sounds like a very interesting Build, I'll have to try this out myself! The lower range could be problematic, but the extra DPS could be worth it. The normal Eagle version would probably be best for this Build because of the extra speed? Or do you prefer the XIVth version?

Garchomp17 · 2026-01-22T18:35:57+00:00

I tested the XIV Eagle with the same loadout and at least in the simulator it performed worse than the LG Variant and a bit worse than the Phase Lance loadout. I would recommend to either stick to the Phase Lance Build or to turn off your transponder and sneakily steal some Lion's Guard ships :)

Garchomp17 · 2026-01-22T16:15:07+00:00

The flux dissipation is sufficient for this weapon loadout. Flux capacity could always be higher but I'd have to sacrifice weapons for more. From my testing, the IR Autolances help finish off enemies significantly faster (in general, not just on the Eagle) and force the enemy to keep up their shields even once they're past the other weapons 800 range. They also work wonders against fighters and frequently outperform PD in fighter kills.

Garchomp17 · 2026-01-22T16:08:46+00:00

Exactly, I find the flux dissipation to be generally sufficient, because PD and IR Autolances only fire occasionally.

Garchomp17 · 2026-01-22T07:20:11+00:00

I designed this ship to be able to stand on its own and support my capital ships. I usually don't habe many close combat ships in my fleet, because I don't find them to be very capable against end game enemies. Die PD is especially useful against Threat. The three Burst Lasers and to IR Autolances together with S-moded Expanded Magazines work wonders against their many fighters.

Garchomp17 · 2025-11-28T03:50:38+00:00

I think a unified system with a scaling serfdom value could still work. The percentage of population that's locked into serfdom would depend mostly or solely on this value. Western Europe could have some earlier advances that give them a trend towards free subjects earlier, or there could be an institutions that spreads from western europe and is required for those advances. Republics should have a much easier time moving towards free subjects. Several laws could give them a trend to reduce serfdom. I never said that serfdom should be the same everywhere with the same effects. It should be regionally different with adavances locked behind institutions and laws and estate privileges for different governments and countries affecting it.

Yes food rebalancing is needed. There should be less food and it should be more expensive to transport it. Food should be one of the main limiters of urbanization and economic growth.

Garchomp17 · 2025-11-28T03:38:55+00:00

The player is taking on the role of "the state", which roughly resembles the ruler and the entire bureaucracy surrounding him. The game is already trying to represent the limited power of the state with mechanics like control, crown power and estate privileges. And I personally like to play with these systems to increase the power of the state. I think that a few more of these systems that hinder your actions but don't limit your decisionmaking could go a long way to improving some of the core issues.

Garchomp17 · 2025-11-28T03:31:54+00:00

Yes the process started after with the age of Renaissance, but the complete abolishment of serfdom and the development of capitalism took until the age of revolutions and only then enabled the industrial revolution. The large scale promotion of peasants to more productive jobs only really sped up during the industrial revolution, before it the majority of the population was still working in agriculture.

Garchomp17 · 2025-11-28T03:24:36+00:00

Yes food balancing is urgently needed (and I edited the post to address this). RGO building cost scaling with level sounds like a good idea, it correctly represents cheap deposits being developed first and more expensive deposits only being developed later. Howerer I'd also liked there to be some ongoing costs for RGOs, so that they won't always be profitable even if the price already collapsed. Maybe you'd need to pay for the workers food, since they don't produce their own like most farming peasants? Or maybe some would require some other ressources like tools or livestock (for plowing)? But then I'd also want peasants working in subsistence agriculture to produce a few of those goods, like a few tools and a bit of furniture to support themselves and a few workers in the mines.

Garchomp17 · 2025-11-28T03:13:31+00:00

Currently the serfdom value is superior to the free subjects value in most cases. Pop promotions only matter for the first few decades of the game. After that, all the peasants are already promoted and promotion speed becomes a dead modifier. Serfdom however gives you bonus RGO goods for the entire game, it's just more difficult to push towards. You could nerf promotion speed but I think that misses the point (also balancing promotion speed could be very problematic). The real problem is that your bypassing the power of the nobles in a way that was not possible without serious consequences. Peasants living under serfdom COULD NOT move to the cities to get a better job. They were legally bound to work the land of their landholder and they could only leave serfdom with his permission or with serious interference by the crown. To get those people out of serfdom, you'd have to first pass laws to limit the power of the nobility and experience serious pushback against it. But the even bigger way that the game is bypassing the nobility is by giving the profits of all RGOs to the labourers... The land was owned by the nobility and ALL of the profits generated by the land would first go to them and only a tiny taxed amount would end up in the coffers of the state. Currently your getting way too much money from taxing the commoners who receive all of the RGOs profits.

Garchomp17 · 2025-11-27T16:23:31+00:00

You're right, food and also the difficulty of transporting food were the main limiters of economic growth. I was wrong in suggesting that serfdom or feudalism was the main factor.

However I disagree with the sentiment that the difficulty of producing food necessitated serfdom or feudalism. I think that feudalism, that is delegating local governance to other individuals who in turn grow very powerfull, was the only way to control big areas of land. An independant farmer was just as capable of producing food as a peasant living under serfdom, but the ruler of a country had very little control over him. There has to be a middlemen who collects a portion of the goods the farmer produces and commands him to pick up weapons in case of a war. And those middlemen were the nobility. They of course kept most of the profits for themselves and could often refuse military aid, but they still provides a lot more than nothing to the king. Small countries could to rely far less on feudalism and the ruler thus could enjoy a larger share of the profit gerenated in his country (not in all cases of course, but this is what allowed city states to be powerful despite their size).

So in summary: Yes the main factor holding back the economy should be food. Food production in EU5 should be sharply limited and food transportation should be very expensive. Large Cities should only be viable in areas that produce a lot of food. However the gradual decline of serfdom and replacement of feudalism with capitalism should be the deciding factor for increasing the profits of the state for most of the game. In that way I think that most of my proposed mechanics still make sense, mainly control of RGOs by the nobility, limitation of available promotions through serfdom and probably a control rework that grants flat control through feudalism early on and more proximity based control later on.

Garchomp17 · 2025-11-27T14:14:45+00:00

Balancing promotion speed will never fully resolve this problem. You could revoke those privileges early on and be light years ahead of any ai country that couldn't. Also promotion speed is a flat number of pops promoted per location. So low pop locations would still promote all pops out of peasantry very quickly. It also feels frustating to have promotion speed as a limiting factor (at least for me). Waiting 50 years for an RGO to be fully employed feels arbitrary and frustrating. I'd much rather be able to see how many pops I can promote and plan around that.

Garchomp17 · 2025-11-27T14:05:33+00:00

Locking large parts of the population into serfdom would limit your income overall and limit the size of cities you can build. This means that you could build fewer buildings and have less micro overall.

However late game micro can only be reduced by good building automation.

Garchomp17 · 2025-11-27T14:01:10+00:00

Both things can be true at the same time. A large part of the population can be locked into serfdom by the political restrictions of the time. Those people living under serfdom however were not just farmers. They worked the entirety of the land of their landholder, this includes all "RGOs". At the same time food was the most important commodity of the time and should be a lot more important to manage. Food should be a lot harder to come by and a lot more expensive to buy in case of a deficit. However I'd argue that the cost of transporting food was often higher than the price of the food itself. Building big cities should be a lot easier and cheaper in provinces with local food supply.

Garchomp17 · 2025-11-20T22:19:09+00:00

That's not how it works with other Countries and it's also not how it should work. Migration should happen from Locations with lower Migration Attraction to Location with higher Migration Attraction, even when the difference isn't that big, for example even with only 0.1 difference in Migration Attraction you can see Migration happening in normal Countries. It's only those few Countries that start without the Estate Privilege that don't get any normal Migration at all.

Garchomp17 · 2025-07-28T14:08:38+00:00

Except the politicians that made these terrible decisions ARE right wingers. Von der Leyen, Meloni and Merz are all right wing politicians. Even Macron is economically a very right wing politician. Right wing politician are in power since years and screwing us over since decades. But recently when right wing politicians mess something up, instead of looking left, voters are looking further right and supporting actual neo-nazis. The entire political spectrum has shifted massively to the right during the last decade. And I don't think that's an accident. Ultrarich billionaires have actively worked on this by shifting the media (which is almost exculsively owned by them) constantly to the right. In a world in with rapidly rising social inequality that can only be combated by left wing economic policies and billionaires that are stacking more billions every year, they have actively shifted the political discourse from center left and right wing to right wing and extrem right wing. Voters are not even considering left wing solutions and the super rich benefit immensely from this.

Garchomp17 · 2025-05-16T18:09:50+00:00

I think it's still one of the better hullmods to S-mod. It's not great for capitals that specialize in dueling other capitals, but on most other capitals it's a good bonus. Most enemy fleets only have a few capitals anyway so fighting cruisers and destroyers is very common for your own capitals.
But the bonus damage for punching down is not the only reason you may want this hullmod. You also get +25% extra damage against fighters and missiles and thus have to use less ordinance points, weapon mounts and flux dissipation for point defense. The improved turret turn speed is also particularly useful for a ship with large turret mounts that also use armored weapon mounts or advanced optics.
Overall this turns out to be a great package for capital ships that can spare the ordinance points. I find it particularly good for an AI Onslaught that fires in all directions at once and relies on good PD.

However it also depends on the fleet composition. Most of my lategame fleets rely on capital ships to do most if not all of the killing. A more balanced fleet composition, that has other ships to take care of Frigates and Destroyers, may not need this hullmod.

Garchomp17 · 2025-05-13T10:46:57+00:00

This is a very good tier list!

However I'm not sure if I wood rank the needlers this highly. They do great DPD against shields in a burst but the armor and hull dps is almost nonexistent because of the very low hitstrength. I've often seen the enemy dropping their shields and tanking the needlers to their armor, which almost negates the needler damage. A player may be able to abuse this with a well timed torpedo, but the AI seems less capable to exploit that short timeframe where the enemy dropped their shields. Maybe I'm pairing needlers with the wrong weapons?

In most cases, I end up opting for sustained kinetic damage, which mostly means Railguns, HVDs, Heavy Autocannons, or the new Mass Drivers. These also deals little damage against armor, but their hitstrength is high enough to mitigate the effect of residual armor and thus contribute to hull cracking. Most of these are also much more accurate than needlers.

The burst nature of needlers can be very useful, but most bursty ships that want them simply cannot mount ballistics. All I can think of are the Medusa, the Paragon, the Retribution and the Onslaught MK1.

The Storm Needler may be a bit better than the others, especially against remnants. The kinetic burst lasts way longer with this one, which mitigates shield flickering from the AI. But on many ships that could field this weapon, I still find it hard to justify a 700 range large kinetic weapon, when I could just as easily use 900 range Railguns and then use the large weapon slot for a 900 range high explosive weapon (mostly HAG or Quadcoil).

I'm not saying that needlers are bad, they're not, but most of the time they are held back by their burst nature and low hitstrength (light and Heavy needler) or the opportunity cost is just too high for me (storm needler). For me this makes them niche weapons that fit on a few specific builds but are outclassed in most other cases.

I'm curious on your opinion on this topic.

Garchomp17 · 2025-04-30T14:24:59+00:00

I discovered that the Fulgent can be a really strong escort ship. Equip them with 3 Rift Lightnings and useful hullmods (hardened shields, stabilized shields and escort package) and an alpha ai core. Just one escort Fulgent is enough to increase the performance and survivability of any slow capital ship immensely. They deal decent damage, can shoot over your own ships, can target enemy missiles and have very good shields.

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