This just shows the improvements made over the past few years. I remember when custom cannons were a thing and you could delete ships with bullet spam. Nice that these balances were made, and i wouldnt have it any other way!
This is creepily timed... I've just finished updating the tetris on my smaller CRAM slices, and then you drop this. Just hit a 3.6 Connection average in my 7x7 slices, so lets see how things work out in your ones ;D
I just picked up this game. This sort of information is so helpful. Theres very few people making up to date, informative content on this game. The learning curve is so real. Actually how do you build so fast are you just mashing the keyboard, using mouse mode, or am I missing something?
@@Hdickhaus i tried to use keyboard mode for nearly 100 hours and could never be good at it lol, my exprience in other building games just wouldent let me
Just a quick initial comment here regarding the stuff you seem to be showing here, you may want to look more into 2N turret layouts in any further videos expanding on this. 2 layer slices allow you to more efficiently achieve high packing efficiencies in turrets at much lower costs, and as such they're pretty much impossible to beat as you noted in your bits dealing with the 3x3 and 5x5 turrets. On a 7x7 the best 1N layout I'm aware of costs ~25% more than the equivalent 2N layout, and 5x5 is much the same. From what I know the disparity only grows as you ramp up to larger turrets.
@@BorderWise12 It's just designating the number of layers before the pattern repeats. Generally this means that you can set up a series of layers as prefabs (bottom layer with turret base and LWC, 2 thick middle layers, and a cap layer that wires them into firing pieces or a turret neck), and build up any height of turret that fits Base + 2N Layers + Cap. It's a lot more convenient than creating specific turrets in most cases, as you can easily grab the prefabs and creeate one that fits your requirements before copying it to other turret wells.
I already used your linear/zigzag tetris for my super efficient 3D 13x13 cram. Glad you also discovered it! Although if you make the zigzag into a straight line it would make the 3D much more easier to build and more efficient for 6 connections
I found that the 6way price decrease was really interesting and appreciate you introducing me to that. I have some critiques on other information. Firing pieces come with 20 free payload compactor connections so your "worse" tetris types can have a real advantage in small cannons. The best 3x3 single barrel 4c tetris is wrapping diamond around a connector pole (you showed me this in one of your earlier videos). My previous comments on reload time may have been misleading so I'll try to clear them up now. Compacter percentages and reload times should never be lower than the following amounts depending on gauge but higher numbers get increased health and damage for a loss in DPS. Derived equations and actual numbers below. I don't remember the integral of it so don't ask for it. rad = square root of, A = number of packers, B = Decimal percentage of compactors, use PEMDAS properly. Decimal % of compactors >= (5*rad(6)*rad(3A^2+80A+400)-6A-120)/(69A+380) Reload time in seconds>= (3+A*3/20+(250+A*750/20)*B or just look for when firepower stat is the highest and substitute packers and compactors until you get its maximum. Number of gauge increasers, Smallest Decimal % of compactors, Smallest Reload time 0, 0.3288, 9.1237 1, 0.3188, 9.8791 3, 0.3037, 11.3576 4, 0.2978, 12.0852 5, 0.2928, 12.8071 6, 0.2883, 13.5241 7, 0.2844, 14.2372 8, 0.2809, 14.9470 9, 0.2778, 15.6540 10, 0.2750, 16.3585 11, 0.2725, 17.0609 12, 0.2702, 17.7614 13, 0.2681, 18.4604 14, 0.2662, 19.1579 15, 0.2644, 19.8541 16, 0.2627, 20.5492 17, 0.2612, 21.2433 18, 0.2598, 21.9365 19, 0.2585, 22.6288 20, 0.2572, 23.3205 Numbers are not rounded and BorderWise, please save these numbers on a prefab of a text display for quick access or write it into a program on a graphing calculator like I have.
@@BorderWise12 The base cram capacity is 250+750/20*Gauge increasers. The Capacity a single payload compactor connected to one packer is 12.5+37.5/20*Gauge increasers. 20 connections is equal to the base amount and that is the "20 connections" part. The cost to add 20 payload compactor connections is at least 208+1/3. The firing piece and barrels cost 20 each so if you spam cannons with 60 (ideal for 250 storage) or less pellet connections that use 9 ((9+1)*20 < 208) or less barrels it can be both cost and space efficient. There will be losses is small cannons with any tetris so whether your tetrises can make full use of this niche advantage is dependent on the situation. This is what I meant by "Free".
Am I the only one who thought aps was simpler than cram cannons. Well, at least until I realised how automatic Packers do not work for me for some reason.
Hey Borderwise, I’ve gotten back into FtD thanks to your videos and I’m curious what the pros and cons are between Cram cannons and advanced cannons? On another note, I’ve forgotten how much of a pain advanced cannons are to build 😅, I’m trying to build a small anti air advanced cannon but I’m definitely struggling lol. Anyways, have a nice day mate!
Cheers! The short answer to your question is: CRAMs: Good firepower per volume, simple(ish) to build, but lousy shell speed and fire rate, terrible versatility. APS: Incredibly versatile, can do almost anything, but expensive and complicated.
@@bobertvc7492 APS is ALOT easier and more straightforward than it used to be. When gauge snaking if you have and open end you can connect to it. You also have 4 and 5 ways pieces now. No more autoloader complexity. Autoloaders and input feeders are more straight forward. 1 input feeder per loader. 1 Magazine is equal to 1 autoloader. Example. 1 autoloader with 2 magazines and 3 input feeders is the same as 3 autoloaders with 3 input feeders. AP value is more straight forward. if a piece of armor has an armor value of 10 then all you need is a AP value of 10. Ideally You want 48 AP as it will do full damage to stacked metal. Belt Feeders are ideally suited for smaller caliber rounds. The higher the caliber the less of a bonus you get. A few tips. Work in increments of 5, 10,25, etc etc. Its just easier to do the math. Second Design your shell 1st. Figure out what you want the shell to do and the caliber to do that effectively. For an AA gun for example try between 30mm to 50mm . Get it moving at least 1200 m/s and get an AP value of at least 42 to 48. Slap on 4 to 8 belt loaders 4 to 8 mags and figure out how many coolers and recoil buffers youll need
Hmm, remind me, don't LAMS target by pure proximity (and then untill said target is dead)? Sounds like a good reason for a Weird-gun, with *mostly* hardener pellets and many firing pieces, so as to saturate a LAMS defence with "useless" shells and let the real one go right in. Mind you, it may still be more efficient to just make more normal guns, but it wouldn't be as *fun*.
I watch this and think I really should give them another chance but then reality hits (unlike cram shells). Crams are so satisfying when they hit, but reload time and the fact they are so inaccurate against anything that moves makes me hate using they as a primary weapon. Still, good vid sir!
At best 6way connections appear to reduce cost to about 80%. (this assumes infinite size and only a mix of pellets, so compactors will decrease the benefit). The size increase is 43% but if you need space for many single Blocks (surge protectors, batteries fuel, or ammo) the increase is only 14.3%. A combination of 6way and diamond is ideal because 6way compactors increase cost by 4%. Hope this gives you all an incentive to try six way connector crams despite their difficulty.
One pattern that i use for giggles is the H one: L P L C L C L P L So the Connectors, Loaders (packers) and Pellets are set like 2 diamonds cut in half. It makes very compact, but on multi-barrel turrets i end up having to "spin" the outside loaders clock wise and the inside loaders counter clock-wise to keep everything with the same reload times. (Looking now, your "tree branching" one has the same pattern but sideways and optimized for 3d. Holy moly!) But i also like the zig-zag one since they are very economic and easy to sandwich.
(ok im typing it in the middle of vid but whatever) Is CRAM with some AP and HE payload works like APS after the last patch with similar shell aka it explodes ONLY after shell lost all its kinetic energy?
Ok, I've tested it. It seems it doesn't apply to CRAMs, unfortunately. Pure AP CRAMs can penetrate, but any amount of non-hardener pellets make the shell detonate on impact unless it's got a pen-depth or after-impact fuse.
Thank you so much for making this video. Is there a tutorial for the most effective ammo types to use for CRAM guns? I’m having trouble with squeezing out damage from my battleship guns at the moment.
I will be making a CRAM cannon categories tutorial, yes. 😁👍 The short answer is this: - Pure HE plus a little Hardener for shell health. - Pure frag, with high packing and set to a low angle for penetration or full 180 for airburst. - Mostly Hardener with some HE or Frag for pen-depth shells. - HE + EMP.
Multi-barres inst viable anymore and get shot straight out if the sky? But you still want to make realistic (or at least makes-sence) looking warships? Go full pre-dreadnought (and armored cruiser) style builds. Many of them had only single gun per turret. You can even make tumblehome ones that actually work (unlike french ones).
It can be both. When I say 'cute' in this context, it means trying something whacky and interesting that that isn't necessarily practical. Weird idiom of mine. 😁
It's the sweet spot between the shell being powerful and durable and the fire rate being decent. 10-13 second ROF results in more shells fired, but they do less DPS than a stronger shell (assuming both are consistently hitting) and more likely to get shot down by anti-munition systems.
@@BorderWise12 Ok, well. The Things you mentioned are logical. But what is the Magic behind this 20 sec. Where is the math behind it? I can't understand the 20 sec, why Not 15 or 21.45 or 30. If you don't remember the math or link to the original post it's ok, thank you once again for the good Video and the ideas and comparison of the cram Tetris!
I realised people would probably want to mess about with the tetris fortress, so here it is! steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2461584756
Also, Time Stamps:
0:00 - Ze Beginning
0:41 - CRAM Overview
3:25 - Definition of 'Tetris'
3:53 - Diamond/Standard Tetris
5:13 - Square/CRAMped Tetris
7:11 - Linear/Zigzag/SuperCrap Tetris
8:38 - Intermission: Breaking Tetris Patterns
10:07 - 5x5 Tetris Examples
12:47 - Intermission: Connectors
14:16 - Intermission: Multiple Firing Pieces
15:03 - Basic Diamond Prefab Example
15:33 - 6-Connection Tetris
19:59 - 6-Connection vs. Standard Diamond Comparison
23:45 - Intermission: Ideal CRAM ROF
25:21 - Intermission: CRAM Cost Efficiency
29:37 - 3x3 CRAM Turret Examples
34:57 - 5x5 CRAM Turret Examples
35:08 - Intermission: Extra Turret Packing
42:12 - 13x13 CRAM Turret Examples
43:26 - Intermission: DoomCRAM Definition
45:05 - Intermission: Neckless Turrets
47:08 - Intermission: Why 1 Firing Piece is Better Than Many
51:47 - DoomCRAM Efficacy!
Pin it!
@@scorpion563 Thought I alteady had, cheers. XD
This just shows the improvements made over the past few years. I remember when custom cannons were a thing and you could delete ships with bullet spam. Nice that these balances were made, and i wouldnt have it any other way!
Will you be doing a new aps tutorial just out of interest I really like your videos but I can't get my head around aps in FTD
The Square Tetris was the first kind of Tetris I made over a year ago before I found your UA-cam
This is creepily timed...
I've just finished updating the tetris on my smaller CRAM slices, and then you drop this. Just hit a 3.6 Connection average in my 7x7 slices, so lets see how things work out in your ones ;D
"Even when you miss, you don't" Ain't that just cram spam in a nutshell.
From the expert
Borderwise: "cram, cram, cram, cram, cram, cram, baked beans."
Baked beans 'r off!
I just picked up this game. This sort of information is so helpful. Theres very few people making up to date, informative content on this game. The learning curve is so real. Actually how do you build so fast are you just mashing the keyboard, using mouse mode, or am I missing something?
While in build mode double tap the direction you want to move in to go faster.
Hes just mashing his keyboard. He's probably been building for years.
Top tip, it seems easier but never use mouse mode
@@Hdickhaus i tried to use keyboard mode for nearly 100 hours and could never be good at it lol, my exprience in other building games just wouldent let me
Just a quick initial comment here regarding the stuff you seem to be showing here, you may want to look more into 2N turret layouts in any further videos expanding on this.
2 layer slices allow you to more efficiently achieve high packing efficiencies in turrets at much lower costs, and as such they're pretty much impossible to beat as you noted in your bits dealing with the 3x3 and 5x5 turrets. On a 7x7 the best 1N layout I'm aware of costs ~25% more than the equivalent 2N layout, and 5x5 is much the same. From what I know the disparity only grows as you ramp up to larger turrets.
What's the N stand for?
@@BorderWise12 It's just designating the number of layers before the pattern repeats.
Generally this means that you can set up a series of layers as prefabs (bottom layer with turret base and LWC, 2 thick middle layers, and a cap layer that wires them into firing pieces or a turret neck), and build up any height of turret that fits Base + 2N Layers + Cap.
It's a lot more convenient than creating specific turrets in most cases, as you can easily grab the prefabs and creeate one that fits your requirements before copying it to other turret wells.
Did a CRAM Battleship build and it looks like I gotta retrofit it already!
I already used your linear/zigzag tetris for my super efficient 3D 13x13 cram. Glad you also discovered it! Although if you make the zigzag into a straight line it would make the 3D much more easier to build and more efficient for 6 connections
Really? Damn, I have GOT to see how you made the zigzag efficient. 🤔
@@BorderWise12 Do you want an example via discord?
What if u built a tetris cram cannon minigun
You made the comment at 14:40 that single gun large cram is preferable in the current update to multi cannon. So are alot of these designs Redundant?
Dude you need to slow down with your camera. The voice over is great; but the camera movement makes it tough to follow.
I found that the 6way price decrease was really interesting and appreciate you introducing me to that. I have some critiques on other information. Firing pieces come with 20 free payload compactor connections so your "worse" tetris types can have a real advantage in small cannons. The best 3x3 single barrel 4c tetris is wrapping diamond around a connector pole (you showed me this in one of your earlier videos). My previous comments on reload time may have been misleading so I'll try to clear them up now. Compacter percentages and reload times should never be lower than the following amounts depending on gauge but higher numbers get increased health and damage for a loss in DPS. Derived equations and actual numbers below. I don't remember the integral of it so don't ask for it.
rad = square root of, A = number of packers, B = Decimal percentage of compactors, use PEMDAS properly.
Decimal % of compactors >= (5*rad(6)*rad(3A^2+80A+400)-6A-120)/(69A+380)
Reload time in seconds>= (3+A*3/20+(250+A*750/20)*B
or just look for when firepower stat is the highest and substitute packers and compactors until you get its maximum.
Number of gauge increasers, Smallest Decimal % of compactors, Smallest Reload time
0, 0.3288, 9.1237
1, 0.3188, 9.8791
3, 0.3037, 11.3576
4, 0.2978, 12.0852
5, 0.2928, 12.8071
6, 0.2883, 13.5241
7, 0.2844, 14.2372
8, 0.2809, 14.9470
9, 0.2778, 15.6540
10, 0.2750, 16.3585
11, 0.2725, 17.0609
12, 0.2702, 17.7614
13, 0.2681, 18.4604
14, 0.2662, 19.1579
15, 0.2644, 19.8541
16, 0.2627, 20.5492
17, 0.2612, 21.2433
18, 0.2598, 21.9365
19, 0.2585, 22.6288
20, 0.2572, 23.3205
Numbers are not rounded and BorderWise, please save these numbers on a prefab of a text display for quick access or write it into a program on a graphing calculator like I have.
Nice info, cheers!
But: "Firing pieces come with 20 free payload compactor connections"? What exactly do you mean by that?
@@BorderWise12 The base cram capacity is 250+750/20*Gauge increasers. The Capacity a single payload compactor connected to one packer is 12.5+37.5/20*Gauge increasers. 20 connections is equal to the base amount and that is the "20 connections" part. The cost to add 20 payload compactor connections is at least 208+1/3. The firing piece and barrels cost 20 each so if you spam cannons with 60 (ideal for 250 storage) or less pellet connections that use 9 ((9+1)*20 < 208) or less barrels it can be both cost and space efficient. There will be losses is small cannons with any tetris so whether your tetrises can make full use of this niche advantage is dependent on the situation. This is what I meant by "Free".
2, 0.3106, 10.6229
Sorry forgot to add this one
Even your old tutorial from 2018 or so was really helpful for me! Thank you!
Glad to hear it, cheers!
Am I the only one who thought aps was simpler than cram cannons. Well, at least until I realised how automatic Packers do not work for me for some reason.
It seems to depend on which you try and persist with first. I started with CRAMs, but many others go straight for APS and never look back. 😛
Hey Borderwise, I’ve gotten back into FtD thanks to your videos and I’m curious what the pros and cons are between Cram cannons and advanced cannons?
On another note, I’ve forgotten how much of a pain advanced cannons are to build 😅, I’m trying to build a small anti air advanced cannon but I’m definitely struggling lol.
Anyways, have a nice day mate!
Cheers! The short answer to your question is:
CRAMs: Good firepower per volume, simple(ish) to build, but lousy shell speed and fire rate, terrible versatility.
APS: Incredibly versatile, can do almost anything, but expensive and complicated.
@@BorderWise12 thanks a ton!
Yer welcome. 😁
Crams miss a lot, APS doesn't. 😁
@@bobertvc7492 APS is ALOT easier and more straightforward than it used to be. When gauge snaking if you have and open end you can connect to it. You also have 4 and 5 ways pieces now. No more autoloader complexity. Autoloaders and input feeders are more straight forward. 1 input feeder per loader. 1 Magazine is equal to 1 autoloader. Example. 1 autoloader with 2 magazines and 3 input feeders is the same as 3 autoloaders with 3 input feeders. AP value is more straight forward. if a piece of armor has an armor value of 10 then all you need is a AP value of 10. Ideally You want 48 AP as it will do full damage to stacked metal. Belt Feeders are ideally suited for smaller caliber rounds. The higher the caliber the less of a bonus you get.
A few tips. Work in increments of 5, 10,25, etc etc. Its just easier to do the math. Second Design your shell 1st. Figure out what you want the shell to do and the caliber to do that effectively. For an AA gun for example try between 30mm to 50mm . Get it moving at least 1200 m/s and get an AP value of at least 42 to 48. Slap on 4 to 8 belt loaders 4 to 8 mags and figure out how many coolers and recoil buffers youll need
Oof,did not realize this was new,but great help nonetheless
Hmm, remind me, don't LAMS target by pure proximity (and then untill said target is dead)?
Sounds like a good reason for a Weird-gun, with *mostly* hardener pellets and many firing pieces, so as to saturate a LAMS defence with "useless" shells and let the real one go right in.
Mind you, it may still be more efficient to just make more normal guns, but it wouldn't be as *fun*.
I watch this and think I really should give them another chance but then reality hits (unlike cram shells). Crams are so satisfying when they hit, but reload time and the fact they are so inaccurate against anything that moves makes me hate using they as a primary weapon. Still, good vid sir!
Thanks for this, I'm new to FtD and I'm having a harder time with CRAMs than APS.
Damn was this on time, I am messing with some CRAM for Menti's tournament
Not First
Would be nice to see how to fit 3D Tetris into bigger turret.
Guess il go do some science.
I got into this game watching Stealth17, and he did missiles, torps, and APS...this CRAM stuff looks maddeningly complicated compared to APS.
Funny you say that, 'cos it's supposed to be more simple. XD
At best 6way connections appear to reduce cost to about 80%. (this assumes infinite size and only a mix of pellets, so compactors will decrease the benefit). The size increase is 43% but if you need space for many single Blocks (surge protectors, batteries fuel, or ammo) the increase is only 14.3%. A combination of 6way and diamond is ideal because 6way compactors increase cost by 4%. Hope this gives you all an incentive to try six way connector crams despite their difficulty.
One pattern that i use for giggles is the H one:
L P L
C L C
L P L
So the Connectors, Loaders (packers) and Pellets are set like 2 diamonds cut in half. It makes very compact, but on multi-barrel turrets i end up having to "spin" the outside loaders clock wise and the inside loaders counter clock-wise to keep everything with the same reload times. (Looking now, your "tree branching" one has the same pattern but sideways and optimized for 3d. Holy moly!)
But i also like the zig-zag one since they are very economic and easy to sandwich.
From the last time I played, if memory serves me right, I was developing a dual 1.2m APHE CRAM, which well, it worked, hurt Marauders
(ok im typing it in the middle of vid but whatever)
Is CRAM with some AP and HE payload works like APS after the last patch with similar shell aka it explodes ONLY after shell lost all its kinetic energy?
I'm not sure. I'll need to test that.
Ok, I've tested it. It seems it doesn't apply to CRAMs, unfortunately. Pure AP CRAMs can penetrate, but any amount of non-hardener pellets make the shell detonate on impact unless it's got a pen-depth or after-impact fuse.
i like tasty cram cakes
I do enjoy my chocolate chip pancakes 🥞
Thank you so much for making this video. Is there a tutorial for the most effective ammo types to use for CRAM guns? I’m having trouble with squeezing out damage from my battleship guns at the moment.
I will be making a CRAM cannon categories tutorial, yes. 😁👍
The short answer is this:
- Pure HE plus a little Hardener for shell health.
- Pure frag, with high packing and set to a low angle for penetration or full 180 for airburst.
- Mostly Hardener with some HE or Frag for pen-depth shells.
- HE + EMP.
@@BorderWise12 I am suddenly fearful of HE EMP
yes finally i don't have to use the old one form 2018
Sad multishot cram gunner noises.
nicely made, for a mad man XD
So what still stands? A single doom cram or a double to quad general purpose Penfrag turret?
The DoomCRAM, hands down. Survives munition defense better, cheaper (less barrels) and makes a consistently bigger mess of the target.
Multi-barres inst viable anymore and get shot straight out if the sky? But you still want to make realistic (or at least makes-sence) looking warships? Go full pre-dreadnought (and armored cruiser) style builds. Many of them had only single gun per turret. You can even make tumblehome ones that actually work (unlike french ones).
Is "cute" a good thing or a bad thing?
It can be both. When I say 'cute' in this context, it means trying something whacky and interesting that that isn't necessarily practical. Weird idiom of mine. 😁
Those "necks" are actually called barbettes.
Thank you, I always forget that. 😅
@@BorderWise12 No prob.
This 20 second sweet spot: please tell me again, why ? I always build cram cannons which Fire ~10-13 sec. Seems fine for me.
It's the sweet spot between the shell being powerful and durable and the fire rate being decent. 10-13 second ROF results in more shells fired, but they do less DPS than a stronger shell (assuming both are consistently hitting) and more likely to get shot down by anti-munition systems.
@@BorderWise12 Ok, well. The Things you mentioned are logical. But what is the Magic behind this 20 sec. Where is the math behind it?
I can't understand the 20 sec, why Not 15 or 21.45 or 30.
If you don't remember the math or link to the original post it's ok, thank you once again for the good Video and the ideas and comparison of the cram Tetris!
BorderWise is the cram expert
Cheers! Not sure about 'expert', but I do play with them a lot. XD
@@BorderWise12 So CRAM enthusiast, then.