STFC Knowledge Base

Combat Triangle

Combat Triangle

In this game, the combat triangle is going to be the basis of every attack you make. So what is the combat triangle and how does it work?

It's pretty simple, but not necessarily clear as you start playing. Interceptors have a significant advantage against battleships, battleships have one against explorers, and explorers have one against interceptors. This is with hostiles and with players, so picking the correct targets will make your life easier.

You can see in the image above the logo of each.

So let's take a look at my Saladin, which is an interceptor as we check out some ships.

As you can see, it has an equal sign when fighting a survey ship and an interceptor, so no advantage there. It has an advantage against the battleship and a disadvantage against the explorer, shown by up and down arrows.

Because of this, when you have to kill hostiles for a mission or a daily you should pick a system which has appropriate hostiles for whatever ship you are using, as you will take less damage for every kill.

So with my Saladin, if I could kill about 100 level 38 interceptors before blowing up, I'd probably be able to kill about 100 traders OR 200 battleships OR about 50 explorers. So it would clearly make more sense to kill battleships/traders and try to avoid fighting explorers and other interceptors.

There tend to be systems of your level for most of the enemy ship types, in all three of three parts of faction space. You can search them very easily on stfc.space.

So here I've searched for level 40 Romulan systems, and have the filter pull down menu open to choose what type of enemy ship I'd like to fight. Choose the ones that are easy for you, so for all ships surveys are easy, plus the one you can kill in the triangle (Battleships kill Explorers, Explorers kill Interceptors, Interceptors kill Battleships).

The Math

Okay, now down to the actual formulas that make this work. If you have no interest in these, skip this section and move on to the math summary.

So let's take a look at the base stats of the three tier 3 rare ships and one of the t3 rare miners at tier 1 as an example.

Now, let's have a B'Rel attack each of these ships, and let's see what percent of its damage it actually does.

B'Rel vs. B'Rel

Damage Done

1-(1-0.2*1 / (1 + 4^(1.1 -((Armor÷Armor Piercing))))(1-0.55*1 / (1 + 4^(1.1 -((Shield Deflection÷Shield Piercing))))(1-0.2*1 / (1 + 4^(1.1 -((Dodge÷Accuracy))))

B'Rel vs. Gladius

Damage done to Gladius:

1-(1-0.2*1 / (1 + 4^(1.1 -(Armor÷Armor Piercing))))(1-0.2*1 / (1 + 4^(1.1 -(Shield Deflection÷Shield Piercing))))(1-0.55*1 / (1 + 4^(1.1 -(Dodge÷Accuracy))))

Damage done to B'Rel:

1-(1-0.2*1 / (1 + 4^(1.1 -((Armor÷Armor Piercing))))(1-0.55*1 / (1 + 4^(1.1 -((Shield Deflection÷Shield Piercing))))(1-0.2*1 / (1 + 4^(1.1 -((Dodge÷Accuracy))))

Analysis

So, in this case the Gladius (an interceptor) takes 76% of the damage done by the B'Rel, while the B'Rel (an explorer) takes 45% of the damage done by the Gladius. This means that overall the B'Rel does 41% more damage in this fight, so all other things being equal, will always win.

B'Rel vs. USS Intrepid

Damage done to USS Intrepid

1-(1-0.55*1 / (1 + 4^(1.1 -(Armor÷Armor Piercing))))(1-0.2*1 / (1 + 4^(1.1 -(Shield Deflection÷Shield Piercing))))(1-0.2*1 / (1 + 4^(1.1 -(Dodge÷Accuracy))))

Damage done to B'Rel

1-(1-0.2*1 / (1 + 4^(1.1 -((Armor÷Armor Piercing))))(1-0.55*1 / (1 + 4^(1.1 -((Shield Deflection÷Shield Piercing))))(1-0.2*1 / (1 + 4^(1.1 -((Dodge÷Accuracy))))

Analysis

So, in this case the USS Intrepid(a battleship) takes 34% of the damage done by the B'Rel, while the B'Rel (an explorer) takes 76% of the damage done by the Intrepid. This means that overall the B'Rel does 44% less damage in this fight, so all other things being equal, will always lose.

B'Rel vs K'Vort

Damage done to K'Vort

1-(1-0.3*1 / (1 + 4^(1.1 -(Armor÷Armor Piercing))))(1-0.3*1 / (1 + 4^(1.1 -(Shield Deflection÷Shield Piercing))))(1-0.3*1 / (1 + 4^(1.1 -(Dodge÷Accuracy))))

Damage done to B'Rel

1-(1-0.2*1 / (1 + 4^(1.1 -((Armor÷Armor Piercing))))(1-0.55*1 / (1 + 4^(1.1 -((Shield Deflection÷Shield Piercing))))(1-0.2*1 / (1 + 4^(1.1 -((Dodge÷Accuracy))))

Analysis

So, in this case the K'vort (a miner) takes 81% of the damage done by the B'Rel, while the B'Rel (an explorer) takes 36%% of the damage done by the K'Vort. This means that overall the B'Rel takes 70% less damage in this fight, so all other things being equal, will always win.

In addition, since you multiply all three attack stats by .3 in this case, it doesn't matter which stat is strong, so the same result should happen whether it's an explorer, an interceptor or a battleship.

Math Summary

So overall, you can see by the following table how the battle triangle works:

There is a wonderful calculator made by QuirkyZombie here: https://stfc-toolbox.vercel.app/

I'm not certain if Quirky is also where the formula came from, but it is where I had gotten it.