Hi, welcome to this post, This NEBULOUS: Fleet Command – What is Starter Fleets in Nebulous? Guide was written to be useful to you, and we hope you will find that to be the case.

Take command of your hand-tailored fleet of space warships and use realistic radar, electronic warfare, advanced movement controls in 3D space, and precision targeting to outmaneuver and outwit your opponents in a simulation-heavy tactical space game like no other.

Introduction

The Starter Fleets in Nebulous are the first ships people tend to play with in both Single Player versus AI and Multiplayer. However, the descriptions are not that descriptive. In this guide, OSPN tester, and Captain Vren55 will explain the strengths and weaknesses of each Alliance and Protectorate Starter fleet and how to play them.

A fundamental note:

Players and balance testers designed all Starter Fleets in Nebulous. However, while they were designed by some of best players around and established community members, none of them are what people will consider meta or high-end. In fact, if you participate in the Nebulous Discord, some would argue these fleets are just bad.

This is intentional. Starter fleets are not designed to be meta or high end.

Based on the history of starter fleet picks and discussions with some of the Nebulous Mods, Starter Fleets are exactly what their name means: Starter Fleets. Being non-meta or not-high end or highly optimised is exactly why they were picked. Instead all Starter Fleets tend to do the following:

• Showcase key Nebulous mechanics
• Be relatively easy to micro
• Have one specific specialization to show a faction’s doctrine

As such, people are encouraged to modify their fleets based on or inspired by Nebulous Starter Fleets. If you lose or overwrite that fleet, re-verify your game files from Steam (Right click on Nebulous Fleet Command in library, Properties, Local Files, Verify Integrity of Game Files).

Without further ado, the current Nebulous Fleet Command Starter Fleets

Author’s Note: If you designed one of the starter fleets here and want to add your comments, please DM me in Discord and let me know so I can add.

Alliance Starter Fleets

 

Task Force Ash

Designer

: HIGHSCORE TRIGGERHAPPY, SENIOR MODERATOR, TESTER, SUPERIOR DISBALANCER, APPLIER OF BEAMS, UNMATCHED ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ (seriously this title was per his request)

Usage

:As stated on the description, Task Force Ash is a close-range brawling fleet with a long ranged punch through its missiles. You don’t want to stand in open space and fight with this fleet. Ambushing, or popping in and out around corners with the assistance of your jamming is the key to winning battles.

The Beams are the most powerful weapon on this fleet. The maximum range is 6km, but ideally ambushes and engagements are to be conducted at 5.5km. An Axford or Solomon can be shredded in seconds under fire from three of these beams. Use the Battle Short Toggle to override the reload on the beam cannons in these engagements to make sure you stop getting shot at. Be careful about leaving the beams on Battle Short for too long though, as that will knock your weapon out.

Key to this force’s survivability though isn’t the beam Keystone Destroyers, but the Sprinter.

There is a reason the Sprinter on TF Ash is the #1 warship. It provides the Bullseye fire control locks to orientate the beams. It also can provide cover to the destroyers by using its two blanket jammers and hangup. The Hangup is crucial as it stops people from receiving friendly radar tracks, rendering scouts outside of the jamming cone useless in many situations (exception is if you are attempting to jam a ship with an Ocello or Axford providing a friendly track).

A note on the missiles of TF Ash, the primary missile armament of Ash is a 4 point 12000 meter ranged Size 2 missile called “Rain.” This is very good for quantity, but can be decoyed easily by Chaff or Blanket Jamming. Again, very useful for pop up strikes and ambushes at close range but perhaps not so great at extended ranges. The missile armament is supplemented further by 18 Size 3 torpedoes called “Hail.” These command-guided missiles are far more reliable and can be launched quickly, but they only have 6km range. It is advised you use these during your ambush.

The MK62 Dual Purpose 120mm cannons are also essential to this fleet. In particular, against OSPN they will help the destroyers negate rocket Shuttle threats and provide a useful addition to the point defense of this fleet. Still, you do not want to fight in the open versus enemies with 450mm big guns or 250mm cannons, or even 100mm with Plasma support. This fleet is a specialized ambush fleet. You don’t chase people, you pop up and beam them to death and then sink back into cover, leaving dead hulls in your wake.

Comments from Highscore:

– The Rain missiles are stress-application missiles I use primarily against 1) scouts with no chaff or PD (they die), 2) the target you’re attacking, to apply additional micro and threat pressure – they are not intended to hit, so much as to apply stress to the opponent;

– The Hail missiles are not just just ambush weapons, they are excellent finishers to finish off badly damaged targets with no PD, so you can re-target your beams without staying on target long enough for a kill

– The 120s are primarily there for PD! The fleet brings 120 HE-RPF and you should keep that loaded so the 120s can intercept missiles on reflex. It’s very effective!

– Note the dual drive layout of the destroyers. They are something I think a lot of new players can find interesting, and change the performance of the destroyers drastically.

We hope our NEBULOUS: Fleet Command – What is Starter Fleets in Nebulous? guide was informative and enjoyable. If you find any mistakes or have suggestions for improving this post, please share them with us in the comments below. Kind regards, and I hope you enjoy the rest of this lovely day! I feel it’s important to give credit where credit is due, so I’d like to point out that this tutorial was inspired by a post that vren55 published. Don’t forget to add us to your bookmarks if you like the post; we update the site frequently with fresh articles.