So fast swarm is in it’s “early access” right now and I have it. Yay.
Now let’s have a quick run down on pros, cons, what-the-f**ks and more.
First thing on the table: Why would I use Fast swarm over Balanced swarm?
The entire reason for using Fast Swarm is in the name - it’s fast. The passive speed and turning buffs are far more significant on Fast swarm than Balanced and furthermore are present on 2 of the 3 once again. So if you wanna go fast or you liked Sirius pre-nerf then Fast swarm is good swarm.
With that out of the way let’s get to the general rundown.
Fast swarm when in boost mode will split into two clusters at the front of the Destroyer and glow when the Destroyer is moving forwards, The swarm thankfully however doesn’t clip through objects so you can’t accidentally wind up with a cloud wid-way through an Asteroid, although the thankfullness is limited at best thanks to one hiccup going on right now.
When cycling through the swarm’s modes there is a cooldown unlike the last two spec mods and furthermore you actually only really have two modes for the swarm. Projectile mode practically doesn’t exist thanks to the fact it just fires the swarm at the crosshairs into cloud mode _ except the hit detection on projectile mode sucks and cloud mode is far too small _.
Currently with projectile mode the swarm seems to only go to the location of the lead marker and no further and even better appears to collide with the shields of ships and form the cloud there, not even doing damage too might I add. It’s almost impossible to use cloud mode effectively for the debuff on anything but LRFs that are way out of position because half the time the cloud doesn’t even appear at the right spot.
Cloud mode on the other hand is another case of “it looks good on paper, but is very inefficient in practice”, with the debuff being significant enough to be noticable… except the cloud is tiny. The current size of the cloud (400m) is far too small for the debuff to be of any use and furthermore the " buff" aka the radar signature reduction is near impossible to legitimately notice working to the point where I currently doubt it even works at all.
Perhaps if the cloud was 750-1000m The debuff could be more of use but until the hit detection on projectile mode gets looked at it’s impossible to even theory craft what radius the cloud should be without it having clear impact on the field of battle; which also keep in mind sentry drone has a debuff range around abouts the 2km mark. So 400m seems kinda pointless in comparison to it.
Swarm aside, the model of the Fast swarm variant of Ze’ta is far more tolerable than the previous two variants. The capacitor is located at the front of the ship so a plasma arc if it ever happens to land won’t knock out everything in one tick of damage. The optimal firing zone for the turrets is also in a more favourable position (broadside, angled maybe 15-25 deg vertical) allowing for most turrents to be firing when enganging from broadside with the slight vertical tilt being able to be compensated for thanks to the massive mobility of Fast swarm.
Modules are in a decent position even with module 1 being off center, I haven’t had many issues with them being kocked out unintentionally when shields go down unlike Balanced and vanilla swarm which is a slight plus although engines despite having a tiny hitbox are in the awkward position where projectile weapons aimed at the lead marker from maybe 2km can knock them out by accident although it is rare.
Early Access Shenanigans
Oh. Boy.
And I thought the balanced swarm grind day 1 of free release was bad…
After reaching Rank 15 on my Ze’ta (nodes: https://i.imgur.com/FIJ3X5G.jpg) I got to see the costs for the rank 15 nodes… oh man.
Take a look
Crystalline suppressor
Module power booster
Capacitor boost node
Swarm regeneration
Engine slot
In case you didn’t notice. They’re all both f*cking expensive and currently not even remotely farmable.
I get this is supposed to be the cycle of “early access” like Balanced Swarm had with the Spec Ops mass farming bullsh*ttery but people are unlocking these nodes regardless. If the prices ever get dropped for these nodes those people really deserve compensation.
Apart from the prices, unfarmable resources and general derpyness of this the only other thing that bother me is mass bug testing/reporting won’t be happening _ for a very long time _. Ze’ta even without the absurd early access costs is massively expensive and takes a lot of time to upgrade - the masses most likely won’t reach these nodes for bugs to be found and reported for far longer than the E.A (cursed letters, I know) period.
Formatting is rubbish but whatever, have a youtube link instead from when I first picked up the swarm and tested it - you can see the projectile mode failing to deal damage/hit its target multiple times too.
If you’re on the fence about picking up the moon pass just for the Fast swarm I’d say it’ll probably be worth it overall in the long run - there are just some bugs and economy issues that need ironing out first.