The Gray Talons! 🦅 ⚛️ From the Depths Faction Overview

[@piolewus]

Fun fact: the one time I beat the pyre, was by hand-driving the empyrean and getting too involved in roleplay: shouting orders to an imaginary crew made me beat the pyre relatively undamaged and also made me dodge 70% of nukes

[@UntoppedToppHat]

The Emperor protects his strongest willed fighters.

[@skelehedron3070]

"No fun allowed, none at all! You know what? Not even that much, only up to -2% fun!" - My high school band director, and also the Grey tallons apparently

[@SephirothRyu]

What makes a Talon turn Gray? A lust for airships? Stand-off ships? Or maybe they were just born with a heart of grayness?

[@morimoriplaygames]

they turn gray because they're too close to the sun

[@robro2214]

40:30 me hearing that the imperium gives birth to nukes* oh shit that’s scary better work on better point defense My intrusive thoughts: now draw her……

[@BorderWise12]

@@robro2214 Oh nooooooo

[@memecat57]

Last time I was this early crams were bullet hose custom cannons

[@settratheimperishable4093]

I miss them so much 😔

[@HalIOfFamer]

They were so cool. I like building realistic old timey stuff like ironclads and pre dreadnoughts and crams were perfect for them but I hate the fact that I am stickng 2000mm guns on them. Thankfully making very weird APS rounds has somewhat saved my building style.

[@memecat57]

@@HalIOfFamer railguns and steam engines let turrets look like whatever you want while being powerful just put the firing piece at the back of the turret to run the rails inside the turret

[@SephirothRyu]

You are now remembering the original Paddlegun. I, meanwhile, am remembering the time I welded three paddleguns together pre-CRAM, and added giant jet engines and wings and a couple extra turrets so that they would fly (the extra turrets only helped it fly when enemies were behind it).

[@Shaun_Jones]

@@SephirothRyu that was you? I accidentally necro’ed your thread on that thing on the old forums once.

[@Hwboy3]

opening with the Adrastos, possibly the most outdated GT craft in-game, was unfortunate. i'm glad you like my Pyre, credit to Paddock for making it so ungodly strong.

[@ithuriel128]

What are you most excited about in the upcoming update?

[@Hwboy3]

@@ithuriel128 the LH thing that i'm not gonna be able to finish in time probably lmao. for real i'd say the LH reworks, used to hate them but the hydrotrains actually are looking really good now, alongside the HQ update. maybe the singularity update if its done in time. ; )

[@ithuriel128]

@Hwboy3 hydrotrains???? 0.0 I'm hyped! May I ask the name of the thing you're working on so I know what to keep an eye out for?

[@Hwboy3]

@@ithuriel128 nope! :) it'll be a larger cousin to the Dynamo, ideally. *eventually...*

[@BorderWise12]

I just like the Adroastos, I know it's not up to date, XD The Pyre is such a wonderful vibe-check, you and Paddock did an excellent job. 😁

[@dripwastaken7884]

The new singularity should be a perfect demonstration of how to tell the grey talons to f off

[@Cobrax_x]

Sing got updated since fire update?

[@dripwastaken7884]

@@Cobrax_x theres a plasma based update in the works that is super scarry from the demonstrations i have seen

[@Shaun_Jones]

@@dripwastaken7884 ohhh, plasma Snig! I’m interested.

[@leetheeagle7264]

The grey talons unironically inspired my entire build style cause of how hard their craft could whoop my boats. They were too fast and worst of all actually sent fleets. I learned my lesson from that and have made a roster of fairly capable airships as a result, all boasting large railguns and incendiary APS secondaries. It works very well until submarines find me.

[@spinekingjrgensen5779]

I Think you should be fine to just add a new shell type for APS: supercavitators!

[@Driver2806]

My favourite dieselpunk sky dwarfs!

[@Driver2806]

I like to think that the difference of airship and thrustercraft is mainly visual, airships have ballons or at least a more zeppelin like shape with hidden propulsion while thrustercraft are more spaceshipish with visible engines.

[@nanorfewerinlength4920]

!!! IMPORTANT GOSHAWK NEWS !!! The current in-game goshawk version was built and submitted in early December 2020. That makes it almost 4 years old. Happy early birthday to the OG gos. I have, for the last few months primarily, been toiling away at an update to the goshawk which improves it considerably in most aspects. It performs better, looks better, and is more cleanly constructed. I will outline some of the changes that I have made, and why I made them, and some of its interesting favorable battles in this comment as it is now going into neter. Also yes, I built the original. AESTHETIC CHANGES: - Basically everything. The general shape is the same but the details have been almost completely redone. FUNCTIONAL CHANGES: - The guns have been reduced to 205mm and are no longer railguns. In this aspect, they are somewhat similar to the kobold. However, they still fire hollow points and still hurt quite a lot. - The missile interceptor battery has been somewhat reduced and converted entirely to mediums. Smalls barely work on my machine, and I did the math with someone to determine that mediums are generally better. - The cavernous hole in the nose full of smoke dispensers has been eliminated. - Most of the forward facing turrets have been converted to DIF Flak CIWS. They help with getting rid of large missiles and CRAM volleys, such as from rushdown CRAMS. - The LAMS is gone because it was useless - The thrust layout has been altered and is seemingly significantly more survivable. - The strafe evasion is better, there continues to be no vertical evasion. - Forward and rearward propulsion is almost completely accomplished via propellers. This makes it hideously slow (60m/s both ways), and I have left this weakness intentionally. - 3m omni mantlets. Need I say more? - The bottom blimp gun is now fully kinetic and can spear relatively heavily armored enemies - So much more INTERESTING FIGHTS: - It can beat hypernova with approximately 80% health remaining - It can beat in-game kobold at the time of testing with between 85-95% health remaining - Megalodon 2v1win The general premise is still quite similar to what the original goshawk was, but it's also a significant improvement on the strengths of the original. I put a lot of work into making it not be a cursed deco-covered abomination this time so I hope you enjoy. I certainly do, and am quite happy with my work. P.S. You might need to revise some statements after this update, but the similarity in concepts makes certain weaknesses still apply.

[@BorderWise12]

@@nanorfewerinlength4920 Excellent to know, cheers! And thanks for your hard work! :D

[@nanorfewerinlength4920]

@@BorderWise12 Figured it was worth telling since this came out so close to the time of update. Also it's basically my pet project, I couldn't just let it die.

[@ultmateragnarok8376]

What comes to mind as a build style that could work against the Gray Talons might be some sort of hydrofoil or just-above-the-surface flier with weapons basically only able to fire upwards. Though given the craft are meant to move above their targets, and they'll thus have more armor on the bottom than the top, it's still a lot less than they have when you're level with them. Though any big enough sniper could probably do it if you can land the shot. Going to be interesting to see what monstrosities the big update brings to our favorite reclusive sky tribes and alien invaders.

[@leetheeagle7264]

What borderwise said in video is pretty accurate, but Faster is by far more important. The talons are strong when fought on Their terms, so build your airships like muscle cars with the biggest engines and guns you can slap on them.

[@felcakes2153]

Bird Faction, yay! I think there's one thrustercraft of significance that is worth mentioning, the Hunchback. It's a medium difficulty rushdown frontsider and it's so comically evasive, doing these massive arcs in the air. At ~770k cost it isn't particularly efficient but it's very fun to watch.

[@BorderWise12]

Oh yeah, that thing is pretty formidable. :D

[@robgamer3073]

The way I beat the gray talons on very hard the first time was just rushing their bases once we went to war and avoiding their fleets at all costs. I honestly cant figure out how to beat their airships without dedicated plasma craft

[@djxthunder9631]

I love the grey talons they are by far my favorite faction for the airships and the fact that they are cool as hell and kick my ass so hard

[@bigboygrease5922]

I think your anti pyre craft should be called The Extinguish or The Smother

[@OnurErtas-q1o]

Objectively, the second coolest faction in FTD.

[@HalIOfFamer]

What's your 1st?

[@piolewus]

For me they are the coolest, but we all want to know what’s your 1st favorite

[@OnurErtas-q1o]

@@HalIOfFamer Steel Striders.

[@OnurErtas-q1o]

@@piolewus Steel Striders, looks cool, works col, is cool.

[@blake790]

@@OnurErtas-q1o They're my favorite because they have feasible looking vehicles and do not use cheese.

[@Tylon3T]

I have been slowly but surely getting back into the game with a vid from lathland kickstarting my journey back into the game and you and gmodism teaching me how to build things that work. I have been trying to build a decent engine and got one that I'm decently happy with, but I will be trying more different ones. One day I will have a functional and armed vessel (outside of that one ancient wooden plane that still uses an engine from before steam and injectors and turbochargers were a thing). Also good to know that an update is inbound, more motivation for building. The gray talons do have some very good looking airships, maybe I can take some ideas from them and the steel striders. Hopefully I can catch one of those streams once.

[@robro2214]

26:30 had me laughing my ass off, the idea that lightning hoods are the 1 year in a business class and discovered the stock market bros makes me very happy

[@BorderWise12]

@@robro2214 They do love their capitalism! XD

[@Shaun_Jones]

I’d recommend the name Extinguisher for your Pyre-killer.

[@GMODISM]

Heard folks use large stream drill bits as armour being more efficient than 7m HA ducts but it kinda feels a bit wrong to waste a functional component.... I shall stick to ducts for the aesthetics! Can't believe I haven't started on the campaign even but fun to get their vibe a bit!

[@BorderWise12]

@@GMODISM I agree, it feels weird using drill bits as armor... but it also feels good to not have internals shot out immediably by PAC or sabot railguns. 😆

[@scribblesmcgee]

Fun fact about the pyre, it used to be scarier but it was waaay over all the size limits, so they had to try and cut down its block count. The wedges for example used to have backing to improve their effectiveness but they were swapped to pure wedgespam to save volume, and the side missiles used to be crams, which were changed to missiles to save block count.

[@BorderWise12]

So we're dealing with the WEAKER version of the Pyre?! Mother of pearl... o_O

[@hondacivic8222]

the misinformation campaign!!!!!

[@Remington53]

I don't think that I've seen the Hunter land a hit in actual combat

[@BorderWise12]

I swear she can do it... she just had stage fright. >_

[@eliteleon2212]

No no. I believe any time the Hunter misses is because Lathrix is at the helm of its target. The many runs he's done have yet to disprove this so far.

[@JohnMcFist]

The Hunter has poor yaw control and no ability to slow down or back up, so usually it either misses its target or gets a glancing blow then moved past it and can't turn fast enough to keep up. The concept is cool, but the execution leaves a bit to be desired.

[@dragonflybug1577]

Looking forward the final faction overview, the Scarlet Dawn

[@peterjohansson1828]

I haven't beaten the Pyre but I think piercing pacs and lasers targeting hot blocks is one of the better ways to fight it. Sure it has heat decoys but a laser can quickly destroy the exposed ones, besides you'll want a laser against those nukes anyway. As for surviving long enough to kill it, idk... maybe try a front sider that reverse as fast as the pyre? A more fun idea could be a massive ramming craft that equal it in size and just face slam it as hard as possible >:) Edit: btw what are the neter build rules for faction crafts?

[@BorderWise12]

Go on the official FtD Discord, the rules for the factions are there somewhere. 👍

[@triggerhappycollaborations7716]

the grey talons... scary? geezus me and my group had a hard time fighting the lightning hoods! .. by the time we fought the grey talons most of our ships were running High Velocity autocannons with extremely fast bullets and fuse timers to detonate-on-miss XD

[@BorderWise12]

That's actually one of the things I like about this game: the difficulty is pretty subjective, based on your playstyle and when exactly you fight any particular faction. :D

[@ithuriel128]

This video is great fun! Looking forwards to future content.

[@bigboygrease5922]

Ahh you finally beat the pyre lmao😂

[@BorderWise12]

YES I DID FINALLY DID IT

[@avi8aviate]

There's a particular Gray Talons craft I like to bully with my aircraft: the Monsoon, an airship that spams large laser-guided missiles... which are too short-ranged to hit any of my faster aircraft.

[@248_mph]

a type of craft that might be able to beat the pyre is something that warps in with doom crams and shoots once, then warps out to avoid getting hit. If the craft is 5000m away and moving at like 100m/s it won't get hit almost ever

[@dthree4496]

Dawg these welcome speech thingys keep getting better

[@mostlycarbon8323]

Such a fortunate video to find right as I'm encroaching on the GT with my fleet of thrustercraft.

[@BorderWise12]

@@mostlycarbon8323 Good luck and have fun! :D

[@JohnMcFist]

Okay, first of all, 54:30 made me just about die laughing. My name is actually James, so I guess the Pyre is coming for me? To which I say: challenge accepted. I'll bet I can beat the Pyre economically and without resorting to cheese. 10:00 there is actually a 7x7 drill bit, it's just that it's exclusive to large steam drills. It has 50,000 HP and 60 AC, making it tied for the single toughest block in the game with the huge missile hatch, which has 60,000 HP and 50 AC but costs over 2x as much as the drill and is 2m thick. The drills do indeed weigh less than the ducts as well, and the ducts are already lighter than the same volume of regular HA. However, even the drill is less raw HP than the same volume of HA blocks, even before factoring in armor stacking or the 20% bonus from using 4m beams. Duct/drill armor is not overall better than regular HA armor, it's a tradeoff to get better resistance to single massive piercing hits and a more "all or nothing" armor scheme. 12:30 while I won't disagree that ships have some real downsides, they do have some countervailing advantages. Natural buoyancy is the most obvious one, which also tends to include better resistance to damage since shooting out the engines is less likely to make it roll over or flat out die. Water is a very good natural defense against a majority of weapons in the game, including being the only way to actually put out fire, which means you can store fuel under the waterline without worrying about burning yourself, and steam boiler explosions only do their HE damage since the fire is nullified. Water thrust is cheaper than air thrust as well; CJEs are very strong, but also very expensive, and direct drive steam props are also quite powerful. An addendum to the "weapons to use" section is piercing weapons against the frontsiders, especially PACs and charge lasers. Frontsiders have some strong advantages in a 1v1, and one of those is that they can be a smaller target, but against pierce weapons this actually works against them. Being a smaller target, their internals are more densely packed and so more vulnerable to having holes put through them. A pierce PAC that does 100,000+ damage is going to be wasted against a Megalodon; it's going to take forever to really accomplish much because there's so much area for it to aim, and a lot of that area is just basically empty space. Put that PAC against the Pyre or the Kobold though, and odds are very good that it's going to hit *something* important on its way through. PAC and laser also nullify the problem of evasion.

[@BorderWise12]

Good points! And one of the builders of the Pyre has challenged me to beat the Pyre without being in space, so I'm also going to be figuring out wow to beat her without cheese. Glad there was at least one James in the audience, too. XD

[@JohnMcFist]

@@BorderWise12 aaaand done. Video is up on my channel and the craft is up on the workshop.

[@tennetrynighthawk3844]

I suggest the name of the Anti-Pyer ship be: The Ion-Storm Strike Platform

[@AhumbleStugIII]

I have a corvette that while heavily damaged took out half a fleet and won a battle against abunch of easy and medium craft due to it having 80 vls missiles and that’s the only time I’ve given a ship a custom name

[@jocylinfrancis930]

Ideas for the anti-pyre vehicle name: The Fire Department Vengeance The White Death Steve Plasma Perry

[@BorderWise12]

'Fire Department' is pretty darn good. XD

[@minutemanhomestead7214]

suggestion mobile ion cannons using ppcs and 3-4km alt in space use a simple buoy to get there much more cost effective

[@alligatorswollower8848]

Gray talons more like gay talons (im gay).

[@BorderWise12]

I only saw the first two thirds of your comment as a notification and I was like 'Uh oh.' XD

[@leopardspheel3638]

the ultimate joke

[@robro2214]

Actually me though

[@sunRay04]

lmao

[@cornpie9755]

Gottem

[@drkreuzer670]

If it gets outdated, no worried, you can make a part 2 of it :>

[@BorderWise12]

@@drkreuzer670 Yaaaay I hope the Pyre doesn't get buffed...

[@riumoonglow8813]

Is it just me or do some airships look like they are warhammer inspired?

[@BorderWise12]

Now that you mention it... they are are kinda Warhammer 40k-ish, aren't they? 🤔🤔

[@thecatwithatophat4069]

The Pointy Pointy Railguns are my favorite Ska group

[@MinecraftSurge]

i made my craft all use maxed doom rail for 70k a turret. then i used a breadboard to change the gauge based on the volume of the enemy, whenever enemy spawns or dies. 150-500mm. So GT kinda folds like a lawn chair instantly. I guess it's not really fair because i havent seen any expansive on high difficulty. Nothing above 600k vehicles.

[@gilbertley1309]

I did not know you could change APS gauge with breadboard

[@drecknathmagladery9118]

as my favorite neter faction i love this video also for map characteristics another thing of note is that the weather in grey talon territory is not friendly either. its not quite as bad as onyx watch weather but its rough the deep lore for grey talons as an OG to FTD grey talons where the main thing that prevented the scarlet dawn from claiming more territory in neter infact 1 particular ship that was removed by the devs was responsible for such a massive push back against the scarlet dawn that for a time there was a location on the map named after it that ship was the devils curse. it was the strongest ship in the game pre repair bot removal and modern cram cannons. having what was the highest power rating at the time of 986 and its main claim to fame was its capabuility to... if stolen. solo the scarlet dawns mother ship along with most of the scarlet dawn faction. tldr grey talons back in the day where even more terrifying than they are now as a note early in the days of adventure mode you used to start in what was basicly a random dificulty zone and the most terrifying thing that could spawn in it was none other than the devils curse. so the first thing you used to have to do would be run for the nearest green portal. it is a rather hard to miss thing but the grey talons are heavily inspired by warhammer40k (or used to be). the warlord being the biggest give away. (atleast remaining) though it used to be far less subtle than it is now. another thing of note grey talon though its vehicle roster is short right now. that is because it has over the years had the most vehicles of any faction just strait up cut out. and in some cases like the devils curse have been wiped from the game. things i remember that are no longer on that list of vehicles (off the top of my head) devils curse, abomination, apocalypse, and a whole bunch more. id have to go back to a previous version of the game to check the whole list but of all the factions pre full release grey tallons where known for godly designs what they used to be known for was cannon spam even more so than the onyx watch. the thunder clap is one of the last relics of what grey talons used to be. except turn the damage up to eleven. the lore of the grey talons is definitely in need of an overhaul along with the vast majority of its remaining roster compared to what they used to be. as of right now before the update they are like a puppy compared to what they where back in the day. we shall see what they are like post overhaul. i hope to see them returned to their former glory. (as in be a bigger menace than they already are.)

[@Hwboy3]

the lore of the grey talons is infact undergoing massive overhaul as GT once being apart of the SE's airforce is as far as i know entirely unfounded, alongside 'old relicships' in OW and DWG--and i've spoken with the old guard loremaster of GT for double confirmation. whether this is something you assumed or something that used to be the case, it is not now. though the GT keeping the SD at bay with an all-out war to prevent landfall is correct. the Devil's Curse has ascended to legend, where the ship if reproduced in Neter would crash effectively everyone's computer and burn out every builder so it's not gonna happen. o7 Thunderclap builders, they will never find the mass grave. GT is not heavily inspired by WH40k, the Rusted Ram tribe was a long time ago and has since been distanced from that. games workshop is not merciful. GT's power is still extremely high but the introduction of fire has effectively broken a large majority of the most powerful craft as once-inert blocks are now suddenly self-reproducing damage sources if they are sniped. GT's roster is short due to general fat-trimming in the game quite some time ago, which has affected every faction.

[@drecknathmagladery9118]

@@Hwboy3 thank you for correcting me my memory on the pre old overhaul lore is fuzzy at best. and i appreciate clarification. I'm glad somebody has kept better track of their lore than me.

[@Frostbyte00]

​@@drecknathmagladery9118this comment largely consists of lore that never even existed

[@goodstormsgames9744]

SD nukes warp and recoil rifle themselves into you. So much fun

[@BorderWise12]

Yaaaaay

[@jtownsend788]

Is there any information on the upcoming update referenced in the beginning? I haven’t heard anything about it

[@BorderWise12]

It's very hush-hush, all I know is that the camera is being changed and some factions are getting big updates.

[@ushankagaming-91]

I created a ship to destroy the entirety of the GT, and it can destroy everything except the Aquila in 2-3 volleys. If you want, I'll post it to the workshop.

[@BorderWise12]

@@ushankagaming-91 That would be lovely, cheers! What's its name?

[@ushankagaming-91]

@BorderWise12 the October-class missile submarine. Also, I made a mistake with the thing it can't beat, it actually can't beat the Empyrean, the one with 4,000 firepower.

[@ushankagaming-91]

@BorderWise12 Sorry for the delay, but it is now on the workshop.

[@gilbertley1309]

I built a set of cram cannons at a total price of 600k mats that could oneshot any campaign craft it hit. I lost them when my laptop died though :/ so I have to build them again

[@dragonswrath1890]

How are you able to spawn them in with that description on them?

[@BorderWise12]

@@dragonswrath1890 How do you mean?

[@mrmoo8420]

where can i find the actual campaign building rules, I've tried to look for them but idk where they are, all i know is no block spam or lua

[@BorderWise12]

@@mrmoo8420 Official FtD Discord, methinks. They're somewhere in there.

[@morimoriplaygames]

Scary factions? Nu uh, have you met the Mori's Faction (basically re-skin and much worse Gray Talons) :3

[@BorderWise12]

@@morimoriplaygames Don't worry, you'll out-Talon the Gray Talons eventually! :D

[@leopardspheel3638]

I'm proud to say I gained absolutely nothing from this and will continue to make really bad and very oversized ships that don't really work. I'm sure the video was very informational, I just don't have a brain anymore. Also the comments on your videos are all amazing Edit: this video did actually inspire me to go and try to make a good ship in FtD, and the game IMEDIATELY crashed. Great omen lmao

[@BorderWise12]

So long as you are having fun! 😅👍

[@leopardspheel3638]

@BorderWise12 i actually am. I took my new adhd med to see if it would help and it seems to be allowing me to focus on building. It's still oversized and the armor concepts are probably pretty outdated, but it's gone smooth thus far

[@JohnMcFist]

First lmao I'll comment for real after I actually watch the video.

[@boom426nk]

you forgot to showcase the long range craft like you said you were. i hope the pike makes all of your campaigns horrible

[@BorderWise12]

@@boom426nk Goshawk and Aquila.... and there's no way I could show off every craft, this video was long enough as it is. XD

[@boom426nk]

@@BorderWise12 TRY HARDER