MOO2: a comparison of late-game beam weapons (long)
John Alcock
Many people have been posting regarding their particular favorites for
late game weapons. All, I believe, are in agreement that missiles
fall by the wayside in the mid to late game and so it becomes a matter
of comparing the relative effectiveness of the various beam weapons,
including in the analysis miniaturization and all possible
modifications.
As a first step towards what I hope will be a continuing analysis, I
offer the following. Context is important here, as in all MOO2
discussions. The race I looked at had reached the end of the
Construction and Physics research trees (i.e., about to research the
generic advances). In all other categories there were one or, at
most, two fields left to research. They were at the point in the game
where they were about to make their big move towards galactic
domination.
If anyone else has more accurate information, or notices a mistake on
my part, please feel free to jump in. I am by no means trying to
state the final word here.
OK. For the sake of argument, let's take the space occupied by a
Stellar Converter -- 500. (Part of the problem will be that I am not
sure which weapons miniaturize and which, if any, don't. Death Rays
don't seem to be miniaturizing for this race. Does anyone know? The
strategy guide is of course useless.)
Unless otherwise stated, this will be the heavy mount variety of each
weapon.
Stellar Converter:
# in 500: 1
Base damage: 400
Notes: No heavy mount, at least at this stage. Enveloping. An
advanced plasma cannon. Multiply damage by 4.
Total damage/500 space: 1600
Particle Beam:
# in 500: 16
Base damage: 15-45
Notes: ignores shields -- significant, but not clear how to factor it
in. Let's stick with a damage comparison for now and then argue about
how significant the "ignores x" should be.
Total damage/500 space: 240 - 720
Death Ray:
# in 500: 8
Base damage: 75-150
Notes: Kills marines.
Total damage/500 space: 600 - 1200
Mauler Device:
# in 500: 6
Base damage: 150
Notes: Always hits. 2x range damage penalties.
Total damage/500 space: 900
Disrupter:
# in 500: 19
Base damage: 60
Notes: Damage not reduced by range.
Total damage/500 space: 1140
Plasma Cannon:
# in 500: 50
Base damage: 9-45
Notes: 2x range damage penalties. Enveloping -- multiply by 4.
Total damage/500 space: 1800 - 9000
Phasor (heavy mount only):
# in 500: 71
Base damage: 7-30
Notes: none
Total damage/500 space: 497 - 2130
Phasor (heavy mount, continuous, shield piercing, autofire):
# in 500 : 27
Base damage: 7-30
Notes: Again, shield piercing is difficult to factor in. I will
consider continuous and the penalty to autofire to-hit to cancel each
other out and therefore multiply damage by 3.
Total damage/500 space: 567 - 2430
Clearly, plasma cannon is the overwhelming winner in terms of pure
damage delivered. While the 2x damage penalty for range will lessen
this if distant from the target, it still seems to me that plasma
cannons are inarguably the way to go in the late game.
Thoughts? Arguments? Flames?
John
David Ramsey
John Alcock (jal...@ct1.nai.net) wrote:
: Many people have been posting regarding their particular favorites for
:
I've come to the same basic conclusion with the following
exception. Late in the game when I have a large enough industrial
base, and when I don't want to muck around with anymore colonies, I
will build small fleets of 2-3 doom stars equipped with stellar
converters (and some plasmas for other work). These beasts DO NOT
engage enemy fleets - they go door-to-door in his backyard and
vaporize (permanently) his industrial base. I find that if I bomb out
his industrial base, he often comes back in behind me, recolonizes,
and gets it going again quickly - especially at the hard and
impossible levels where the CP's have big production bonuses
anyway. By destroying the planets, I destroy any chance he has of
continuing to compete against me. I then use my main fleet to protect
my empire. But plasmas can't be beat for general purpose warfare. They
start out reasonably small. They miniaturize well. They pack a great
punch. And they benefit immensely from addon goodies like structural
analyzers, high-energy focus, or achilles targeters.
If you want to REALLY throw a game out of kilter, throw ALOT of effort
into early research in the computer tree to get research labs and
subsequently, supercomputers. Then take these, get one each built on
each colony you have, and then try racing down the physics tree
towards phasors first (they are great when you first get them) and
then plasmas right after. You won't NEED any friggin shields (class I
or otherwise) nor any armor higher than titanium. Just load up some
cruisers with phasors (and later plasmas) and go CP hunting. They
won't even get a shot off. Don't worry about ANYTHING else (except
some of the early biology that you might need to feed your early
empire). Plasmas are the killer weapon from what I can see especially
considering how easily they can be had (3500 RP) when playing in a
large or huge galaxy. (I like the big galaxies because I like the long
drawn out games that others seem to despise.)
:
:
:
:
:
:
:
--
***********************************************************************
* dra...@neosoft.com * If you love wealth better than liberty, the *
************************ tranquility of servitude better than the *
* animating contest of freedom, go home from us in peace. We ask not *
* your counsels or arms. Crouch down and lick the hands which feed *
* you. May your chains set lightly upon you and may posterity forget *
* that ye were our countrymen. -- Samuel Adams, 1776 *
***********************************************************************
RICHARD KENAN
John Alcock (jal...@ct1.nai.net) wrote:
: Many people have been posting regarding their particular favorites for
: late game weapons. All, I believe, are in agreement that missiles
: fall by the wayside in the mid to late game and so it becomes a matter
: of comparing the relative effectiveness of the various beam weapons,
: including in the analysis miniaturization and all possible
: modifications.
: OK. For the sake of argument, let's take the space occupied by a
: Stellar Converter -- 500. (Part of the problem will be that I am not
: sure which weapons miniaturize and which, if any, don't. Death Rays
: don't seem to be miniaturizing for this race. Does anyone know? The
: strategy guide is of course useless.)
No Antaran techs miniaturize. If it's in the research tree, it isn't
Antaran. If it's not in the research tree, it *IS* Antaran. So, no,
Death Rays and Particle Beams will never miniaturize.
For ignoring X, try just adding to the total damage the amount of
damage it takes to burn through X. This is troublesome with the
shield piercing weapons, where burning through varies a lot. But
armor piercing essentially doubles damage.
Oh, and consider analyzing Gyro Destabilizers. If they come in even
1/3 as good as plasma cannons, they're probably better, because of
the only hitting structure. High-end shields can peel off a heck of
a lot of damage. But I doubt they miniaturize quite *THAT* well.
: Clearly, plasma cannon is the overwhelming winner in terms of pure
: damage delivered. While the 2x damage penalty for range will lessen
: this if distant from the target, it still seems to me that plasma
: cannons are inarguably the way to go in the late game.
This matches my experience. Plasma Cannons are the best!
Just me.
--
Richard Kenan
Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta Georgia, 30332
uucp: ...!{allegra,amd,hplabs,ut-ngp}!gatech!prism!eefacdk
Internet: eef...@prism.gatech.edu
James Winsor
jal...@ct1.nai.net (John Alcock) wrote:
<excellent analysis omitted>
>Clearly, plasma cannon is the overwhelming winner in terms of pure
>damage delivered. While the 2x damage penalty for range will lessen
>this if distant from the target, it still seems to me that plasma
>cannons are inarguably the way to go in the late game.
>Thoughts? Arguments? Flames?
>John
Very good analysis! The only thought I might want to add would be to
point out exactly how I think shields (and shield piercing) factor
into all of this.
As I understand it, shields help you in two ways. First, they nullify
damage, from each attacking weapon, in an amount equal to their shield
number. So, for example, if you have a Type V shield on board, each
attacking weapon will do 5 points less. Add Hard Shields, and we are
talking 8 points less.
Second, any damage that survives this nullification process gets
absorbed by the facing shield, just like armor operates. For example,
a Type X shield absorbs 50 times the ship size, so a Battleship would
have 200 pt. shields. So, any damage over the nullification mentioned
earlier hits the shields, until the shield points are burned up (just
like armor).
Thats how I THINK shields work; I am not 100% sure though and the
manual is not too clear on this subject.
So, in theory, one way to defeat the Plasma Cannon strategy would be
to go big time for shields. Say, Type 10 Hard Shields, which would
nullify 13 pts. of damage. Thus, each Heavy Plasma Cannon would do -4
to 32 pts of damage, instead of 9 to 45 pts.
As you can see, the shield nullification effect can completely block
the Plasma Cannon at the low range of its damage potential (ie, 9-13
points each). So, in theory, if you keep your range at long distance
to reduce the Plasma Cannons' damage to this low end (using Subspace
Teleporters, for example), you can create a tactical situation where
the dreaded Plasma Cannons just envelop and go "boing" off each of
your four shields each round.
So, assuming you are also armed with no range dissapation, shield
piercing Phasors, you can prevail over your Plasma-armed foe. In
theory. :)
Jim
John Alcock
jwi...@earthlink.net (James Winsor) wrote:
>jal...@ct1.nai.net (John Alcock) wrote:
>>Clearly, plasma cannon is the overwhelming winner in terms of pure
>>damage delivered. While the 2x damage penalty for range will lessen
>>this if distant from the target, it still seems to me that plasma
>>cannons are inarguably the way to go in the late game.
>Very good analysis! The only thought I might want to add would be to
>point out exactly how I think shields (and shield piercing) factor
>into all of this.
>As I understand it, shields help you in two ways. First, they nullify
>damage, from each attacking weapon, in an amount equal to their shield
>number. So, for example, if you have a Type V shield on board, each
>attacking weapon will do 5 points less. Add Hard Shields, and we are
>talking 8 points less.
Good point. The only place I have found that mentions this effect of
shields is if you right click on them in the ship design screen. I
suppose we must take the online help as the most accurate source of
information, as opposed to the manual or the <shudder> strategy guide.
The only question I have here (shades of old MOM discussions) is "what
constitutes an attack?" If I have one "slot" (hard point, I guess)
filled with 5 phasors and you have class III shields, are you skimming
off 3 or 15 points? I don't know the answer and the documentation is
unclear.
<snip explanation of the other way shields work>
>Thats how I THINK shields work; I am not 100% sure though and the
>manual is not too clear on this subject.
I believe you are correct.
>So, in theory, one way to defeat the Plasma Cannon strategy would be
>to go big time for shields. Say, Type 10 Hard Shields, which would
>nullify 13 pts. of damage. Thus, each Heavy Plasma Cannon would do -4
>to 32 pts of damage, instead of 9 to 45 pts.
>As you can see, the shield nullification effect can completely block
>the Plasma Cannon at the low range of its damage potential (ie, 9-13
>points each). So, in theory, if you keep your range at long distance
>to reduce the Plasma Cannons' damage to this low end (using Subspace
>Teleporters, for example), you can create a tactical situation where
>the dreaded Plasma Cannons just envelop and go "boing" off each of
>your four shields each round.
Mmmm...you may be exaggerating here just a TAD. Don't forget, these
are heavy mount plasma cannon (1/2 to range penalties for BOTH
dissipation and to-hit). Obviously, neither of us has the foggiest
notion of precisely what the range penalty IS.
>So, assuming you are also armed with no range dissapation, shield
>piercing Phasors, you can prevail over your Plasma-armed foe. In
>theory. :)
I don't believe Phasors get no range dissipation (the only weapon I've
seen that gets it as a mod, as opposed to naturally, is lasers).
Also, if you get all this nifty stuff on your ships, how come I don't
get anything on mine? :) I'll take High Energy Focus at the very
least, increasing my base damage by 50%.
The thing about Plasmas is that they miniaturize so well. Sure,
phasors miniaturize better, but only in their "natural" state, where
they are a vastly inferior weapon (less than 1/4 of plasma's damage).
If you start glopping the phasors up with all the mods, you will then
only be fitting about half as many phasors on a ship as you can
plasmas with just heavy mount. And they still won't be coming close
to plasmas' POTENTIAL damage.
Even if by some miracle you manage to attenuate my damage to 1/2 on
average, I am still doing almost twice the damage you're doing.
>Jim
best,
John
Thomas M. Holsinger
jal...@ct1.nai.net (John Alcock) wrote:
>Clearly, plasma cannon is the overwhelming winner in terms of pure
>damage delivered. While the 2x damage penalty for range will lessen
>this if distant from the target, it still seems to me that plasma
>cannons are inarguably the way to go in the late game.
>Thoughts? Arguments? Flames?
>John
My sons and I agree with you. It didn't work for me,though, when one
of them took Orion first and got Xenotronium armor. Then my plasma
cannons were almost useless and, because my race wasn't creative, I
didn't have continuous auto-firing ion pulse cannons.
John Mueller
>> Oh, and consider analyzing Gyro Destabilizers. If they come in even
1/3 as good as plasma cannons, they're probably better, because of
the only hitting structure. High-end shields can peel off a heck of
a lot of damage. But I doubt they miniaturize quite *THAT* well. <<
So, do you consider Gyro Destabilizers a good weapon or not? I wasn't
quite sure after reading your post. Personally, I stop using them about
mid-game, but could easily be persuaded to keep them if they were a good
weapon for the end game. I've been trying to use more Plasma Cannons as
the result of the some other discussions on the newsgroup.
>> This matches my experience. Plasma Cannons are the best! <<
Just out of curiosity, what would you recommend for someone who prefers
to stand off and fight from a distance? There are times where I can get
a lot less damage to my ships by avoiding the CP's PD weapons.
John Mueller
John Mueller
>> As you can see, the shield nullification effect can completely block
the Plasma Cannon at the low range of its damage potential (ie, 9-13
points each). So, in theory, if you keep your range at long distance
to reduce the Plasma Cannons' damage to this low end (using Subspace
Teleporters, for example), you can create a tactical situation where
the dreaded Plasma Cannons just envelop and go "boing" off each of
your four shields each round. <<
What about if you mixed your Plama Cannons with Phasors using the Shield
Piercing add-on? That's what my current ship designs are using. Of
course, I put the very best shields on my ships along with the Shield
Capacitor and Automated Repair. I don't often lose ships since I've
added these two specials.
John Mueller
John Mueller
>> The thing about Plasmas is that they miniaturize so well. Sure,
phasors miniaturize better, but only in their "natural" state, where
they are a vastly inferior weapon (less than 1/4 of plasma's damage).
If you start glopping the phasors up with all the mods, you will then
only be fitting about half as many phasors on a ship as you can
plasmas with just heavy mount. And they still won't be coming close
to plasmas' POTENTIAL damage. <<
What if you use a combination of Phasors and Plasma Cannons? I've been
trying a combination where I have heavy Phasors with only the Shield
Piercing capability added on. They fire first to kill the enemy
shields, then the Plasma Cannons take over.
John Mueller
John Alcock
For Richard Kennan, who asked about the figures for Gyro
Destabilizers, here they are. Note that this will of course only
indicate how good a LATE game weapon g.d. is. G.D.'s time in the sun
is really the late early and middle game, IMO, so it properly should
be compared to other weapons from that span. Perhaps a future post.
The figures for the same race as in the original post:
Gyro Destabilizer:
# in 500: 25 (has anyone conclusively seen that they are in fact
additive in one slot? I don't use them much myself)
Base Damage: 3-7 x ship size class
Notes: Does structural damage only, ignores shields and armor.
Multiply by 3 since only (VERY roughly) 1/3 of a ship's overall hit
points have to be destroyed. (In my experience, shields rarely account
for as much as 1/3 of a ship's total hit points, but let's leave it
like this for now.)
So we get:
Total damage/500 space:
target ship:
frigate: 225 - 525*
destroyer: 450 - 1050
cruiser: 675 - 1575
battleship: 900 - 2100
titan: 1125 - 2625
doom star: 1350 - 3150
* -- remember, you will only be seeing 1/3 of these damages reported
on the combat screen. I state it this way for comparison with the
figures in the original post.
Certainly respectable numbers, but plasmas are still queen of the
battlefield. The trouble with the g.d. is that it's such a BIG mutha
(physically). I picture it as about 30' tall and occupying an entire
cargo bay of the ship. It miniaturizes, but it's got a LONG way to go
before anyone calls it tiny.
John
Franck
RICHARD KENAN wrote:
>
> John Mueller (JMue...@pacbell.net) wrote:
> : >> Oh, and consider analyzing Gyro Destabilizers. If they come in even
> : 1/3 as good as plasma cannons, they're probably better, because of
> : the only hitting structure. High-end shields can peel off a heck of
> : a lot of damage. But I doubt they miniaturize quite *THAT* well. <<
>
> : So, do you consider Gyro Destabilizers a good weapon or not? I wasn't
> : quite sure after reading your post. Personally, I stop using them about
> : mid-game, but could easily be persuaded to keep them if they were a good
> : weapon for the end game. I've been trying to use more Plasma Cannons as
> : the result of the some other discussions on the newsgroup.
>
> what was my cutting beam?) But I, also, stop using them, because they
> are *SO* slow to watch. Once I can survive with other weapons, I use
> them instead.
>
> : >> This matches my experience. Plasma Cannons are the best! <<
>
> : Just out of curiosity, what would you recommend for someone who prefers
> : to stand off and fight from a distance? There are times where I can get
> : a lot less damage to my ships by avoiding the CP's PD weapons.
>
> very useful outside of the max range of point defense beams. Stellar
> Convertors only hit one thing at a time, but they were reasonable
> damagers in his list, if I recall, and are unaffected by range. But
> I usually just blast away at point blank range with HV Plasmas in the
> late game, so I'm not the best authority here.
>
> Just me.
>
> --
> Richard Kenan
> Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta Georgia, 30332
> uucp: ...!{allegra,amd,hplabs,ut-ngp}!gatech!prism!eefacdk
> Internet: eef...@prism.gatech.edu
game... not bad, 3 shots each doing 40, (60 w/ high energy focus)and
since the damage doesn't decrease with range I had some fun with a
doomstar with 40 AF disruptors, high energy focus, subspace teleporter,
and hyper-X capacitators. (once fried 21 battleships in 1 round of
combat) fun,fun,fun
RICHARD KENAN
RICHARD KENAN
John Alcock (jal...@ct1.nai.net) wrote:
: For Richard Kennan, who asked about the figures for Gyro
: Destabilizers, here they are. Note that this will of course only
: indicate how good a LATE game weapon g.d. is. G.D.'s time in the sun
: is really the late early and middle game, IMO, so it properly should
: be compared to other weapons from that span. Perhaps a future post.
: The figures for the same race as in the original post:
: Gyro Destabilizer:
: # in 500: 25 (has anyone conclusively seen that they are in fact
: additive in one slot? I don't use them much myself)
Yes, they add up in one slot. My GD battleships do *LOADS* more
damage than my GD cruisers. But they do not combine usefully with
other weapons, because of the ignore shields + armor thing, which
other weapons lack.
: Base Damage: 3-7 x ship size class
: Notes: Does structural damage only, ignores shields and armor.
: Multiply by 3 since only (VERY roughly) 1/3 of a ship's overall hit
: points have to be destroyed. (In my experience, shields rarely account
: for as much as 1/3 of a ship's total hit points, but let's leave it
: like this for now.)
I usually consider it between 2 and 2.5 x effectiveness. Ignore armor
is a x2 bonus, ignore shields is x1.3 (approx), in my experience. The
bonus, other than ignoring even hard shields and xentronium armor, is
that they *NEVER* miss. Beam defenses are useless. Well, whatever.
: So we get:
: Total damage/500 space:
: target ship:
: frigate: 225 - 525*
: destroyer: 450 - 1050
: cruiser: 675 - 1575
: battleship: 900 - 2100
: titan: 1125 - 2625
: doom star: 1350 - 3150
: * -- remember, you will only be seeing 1/3 of these damages reported
: on the combat screen. I state it this way for comparison with the
: figures in the original post.
: Certainly respectable numbers, but plasmas are still queen of the
: battlefield. The trouble with the g.d. is that it's such a BIG mutha
: (physically). I picture it as about 30' tall and occupying an entire
: cargo bay of the ship. It miniaturizes, but it's got a LONG way to go
: before anyone calls it tiny.
Yes, they're respectable. That's all I asked for from a weapon,
actually. Godlike power (ala Plasmas) gets boring fast.
Thanks for working that up!
Vernon L. McCandlish
On Sat, 21 Dec 1996 07:39:59 GMT, jwi...@earthlink.net (James Winsor)
wrote:
>So, in theory, one way to defeat the Plasma Cannon strategy would be
>to go big time for shields. Say, Type 10 Hard Shields, which would
>nullify 13 pts. of damage. Thus, each Heavy Plasma Cannon would do -4
>to 32 pts of damage, instead of 9 to 45 pts.
>
The problem with this is shields will regenerate at a rate based on
the highest current field strength. Since plasma hit all shields,
this number will drop each time, lessening the shields regen power.
Walter
jal...@ct1.nai.net (John Alcock) wrote:
>The only question I have here (shades of old MOM discussions) is "what
>constitutes an attack?" If I have one "slot" (hard point, I guess)
>filled with 5 phasors and you have class III shields, are you skimming
>off 3 or 15 points? I don't know the answer and the documentation is
>unclear.
I believe that it must be 15 points.
This would be one of the reasons why eventually, using MIRV'ed Nukes
and Auto-fire, etc etc Lasers are not as good as using basic higher
tech weaponry.
At any rate, when I'm using high powered shields, I find that the CPs
ships with fancy Lasers don't even bother firing at me... I guess they
realize it would be wasted effort. (however, they do fire their
Nukes...)
James Winsor
jal...@ct1.nai.net (John Alcock) wrote:
>jwi...@earthlink.net (James Winsor) wrote:
>>jal...@ct1.nai.net (John Alcock) wrote:
>>>Clearly, plasma cannon is the overwhelming winner in terms of pure
>>>damage delivered. While the 2x damage penalty for range will lessen
>>>this if distant from the target, it still seems to me that plasma
>>>cannons are inarguably the way to go in the late game.
>>Very good analysis! The only thought I might want to add would be to
>>point out exactly how I think shields (and shield piercing) factor
>>into all of this.
>>As I understand it, shields help you in two ways. First, they nullify
>>damage, from each attacking weapon, in an amount equal to their shield
>>number. So, for example, if you have a Type V shield on board, each
>>attacking weapon will do 5 points less. Add Hard Shields, and we are
>>talking 8 points less.
>Good point. The only place I have found that mentions this effect of
>shields is if you right click on them in the ship design screen. I
>suppose we must take the online help as the most accurate source of
>information, as opposed to the manual or the <shudder> strategy guide.
>The only question I have here (shades of old MOM discussions) is "what
>constitutes an attack?" If I have one "slot" (hard point, I guess)
>filled with 5 phasors and you have class III shields, are you skimming
>off 3 or 15 points? I don't know the answer and the documentation is
>unclear.
Yeah that is a good question and I think I know the answer. I had a
battle last night where I was using Hv Mass Drivers as my primary
weapon, which meant it would always mete out 9 pts of damage each
regardless of range. I had 6 of them on each of my attacking BB's.
My opponent was using Type III shields. After I closed range a bit, I
noticed that my BB's were ALWAYS inflicting 36 pts of damage on each
volley. Never more, never less.
I guess I was at the range where my beams had 100% to hit, so that was
why the damage was not varied. Now, if 6 Hv Mass Drivers were causing
36 pts per volley, then each individual Hv Mass Driver was doing 6
pts. Which makes perfect sense : 9 (Hv MD) - 3 (III Shields) = 6 pts.
So, it would seem that the nullification is applied to each weapon,
NOT to each volley. Which makes strong shields a very nice thing to
have!
But, probably not nice enough, when you think about it. Taking a best
case scenario, Type X Hard Shields which nullify 13 pts, Hv Plasma
Cannons still seem to rule: (32 x 4) x 50 = 6400 pts max damage, using
the original example. So, they would do in the range of 0 to 6400 pts
rather than 1800 to 9000. At average ranges, that still beats the
pants off the Stellar Converter, which would do only (387 x 4) x 1 =
1548 pts. in this instance.
Jim
Vernon L. McCandlish
On 22 Dec 1996 00:08:24 GMT, eef...@acmex.gatech.edu (RICHARD KENAN)
wrote:
>Yes, they add up in one slot. My GD battleships do *LOADS* more
>damage than my GD cruisers. But they do not combine usefully with
>other weapons, because of the ignore shields + armor thing, which
>other weapons lack.
Actually, they combine well with Ion Pulse Cannons, the GDs take out
structure, the IPC takes out systems. You pull the teeth right out of
the the ships. Down side to GD's is that structure failures do not
cause drive ruptures, the ships just collapse. A way I have been
installing GD's is in multiple banks with tractor beams (which BTW
cannot be multiple banked) Then spin the badguy till it is no longer
facing you and then lock on the TB. Makes approach a lot easier.
>I usually consider it between 2 and 2.5 x effectiveness. Ignore armor
>is a x2 bonus, ignore shields is x1.3 (approx), in my experience. The
>bonus, other than ignoring even hard shields and xentronium armor, is
>that they *NEVER* miss. Beam defenses are useless. Well, whatever.
That never miss clause is a biggie, it gets its own seperate die roll,
has a semi decent range, and if used in close quarters, the
disdvantage of no drive breaches becomes and advantage.
Ong Boon Hean
>damage delivered. While the 2x damage penalty for range will lessen
>this if distant from the target, it still seems to me that plasma
>cannons are inarguably the way to go in the late game.
>
>John
Ok, I've recently tested out almost all the weapons on your list by
sending one Doomstar equipped with all the possible enhacements
(Tech tree was completed, only generic advancements to research,
some at level one and others not touched yet) to improve damage
which included :
a) Battle Pods
b) Time-Warp Facilitator
c) Hyper-X Capacitators
d) High-Energy Focus
e) Achilles Targeting Unit
f) Structual Analyzer
g) Rangemaster Unit
h) Battle Scanner
and the maximum amount of weapons it was able to carry (All
of them Heavy, etc.). Next, I sent each Doomstar one by one
to Antares (Since Damper field knocks down 3/4 of damage, it's
probably the best shield there is. Also, its more uniformed and
easier to compare). I sent a Doomstar with Stellar Converters,
Death Rays, Particle Beams, Mauler Devices, and the like
and most of them failed to defeat the Antarean fleet of the Star Fortress,
Harbringer (Titan), 2 Interdictors (Battleships) and 4 Cruisers.
However, there were 3 Doomstars that managed to defeat the
Antarean fleet. The Plasma-Cannon Doomstar (99 P-Cannons,
Hvy Cont.) utterly obliterated the fleet with 20 left, without
even using its Hyper-X or Time-Warp! The Disrupter Doomstar
(Much to my surprise! I never even used it!) was next, using all
of its 39 (Or 78 actually) Auto-Firing Hvy Disrupters to defeat the fleet,
after discharing Hyper-X, but it didn't use its Time-Warp! The Hvy-Continous,
Autofiring PhasorDoomstar ranked 3rd and last of the Doomstars that
even managed to destroy the Antarean fleet, but I had to re-configure it abit
(Had to add a Damper Field instead of Battlescanners) since it was destroyed
by its own phasors mid-way in the battle first-time around. It used its entire
complement of weapons, hyper-x and time-warp to defeat the fleet.
So, you could say, in terms of raw firepower, the plasma cannon is
the best weapon, bang for buck-wise. But, it's really screwed by
shields more than Damper Fields. A fleet of 4 Titans armed with 20
Hvy Cont. Plasma Cannons I had going around was stopped cold
by a Barrier Fielded-Planet. Hard Shields / Multi-Phased Shields
in combination with Class VIII or X shields would nearly do the same.
I'm still quite shocked that Hvy-Autofiring Disruptors were ranked so
highly though. I personally never had found any use for them... I'll be
trying to implement them in my future games.
Unfortunately, like so many have already said, by the time these weapons
can be implemented succesfully in fleets, most of the games have already
been decided. When last was it that you lost a game after getting to put
Phasors on your ships? =)
For me, I still think Sub-Space Teleporting, Phase-Cloaked, Time-Warping
ships still are the ultimate weapons (ie you can't even touch them =P) for
endgame, while Death-Ray Shield-Busters + Transporters + Troop Pods and
Telepath with Damper Field/Xentorium Armor/Heavy Armor/Reinforced Hull/
Auto Repair System for midgame, and Gyro-Destabilizing (In combination
with MIRV Nuke/Merculite Frigates) BSs for earlygame. Oh yea, Ion Pulse
Cannon/Shield-Buster Battleships and Assault Shuttles Carriers rank somewhere
in there too =)
John Alcock
John Mueller <JMue...@pacbell.net> wrote:
>John Mueller
Shield piercing doesn't kill enemy shields, it ignores them. So the
shields should still be there when the plasmas go (I assume the
phasors are above the plasmas on your ship design screen? As you no
doubt know, top-listed weapon goes first).
Here are the figures for phasors with only heavy mount and shield
piercing for the same race:
# in 500: 45
Base damage: 7-30
Total damage/500 space: 315 - 1350
Let's make the same assumption as elsewhere in this thread that
shields are 1/3 of the enemy ship's hit points, so we'll multiply
those figures by 1.5: 472 - 2025. Not even close.
There's no getting away from the fact that plasmas are x4 NATURALLY,
before any mods. Phasors have to play big time catch-up to get
anywhere near that, and by then they're too big. Plasmas' only
weakness is the range attenuation to damage, and it's unclear what
that is right now. I guess the moral is, since you go first anyway,
barrel right up to 'em and blast away. I've had a Doom Star with 100
or so plasmas take out a Star Fortress with one shot and still have
almost half its weapons available for any fleet in the vicinity.
regards,
John
Vernon L. McCandlish
On Sun, 22 Dec 1996 18:26:39 GMT, jwi...@earthlink.net (James Winsor)
wrote:
>My opponent was using Type III shields. After I closed range a bit, I
>noticed that my BB's were ALWAYS inflicting 36 pts of damage on each
>volley. Never more, never less.
Did your opponent have hard shields, they are supposed to absorbe
another 3 hits, even when the shields have fallen. Unless the hard
shields are damaged and not working.
VernMcC
James Winsor
Nope, no hard shields.
Jim
Pan...@chatlink.com
>There's no getting away from the fact that plasmas are x4 NATURALLY,
>before any mods. Phasors have to play big time catch-up to get
>anywhere near that, and by then they're too big. Plasmas' only
>weakness is the range attenuation to damage, and it's unclear what
>that is right now. I guess the moral is, since you go first anyway,
>barrel right up to 'em and blast away. I've had a Doom Star with 100
>or so plasmas take out a Star Fortress with one shot and still have
>almost half its weapons available for any fleet in the vicinity.
Only half¿ I usually take one out with 7-11 heavy plasmas. This is
on a doomstar loaded with specials.
Dean
In article <32BC35...@pacbell.net>, thus spake JMue...@pacbell.net:
>
>So, do you consider Gyro Destabilizers a good weapon or not? I wasn't
>quite sure after reading your post. Personally, I stop using them about
>mid-game, but could easily be persuaded to keep them if they were a good
>weapon for the end game. I've been trying to use more Plasma Cannons as
>the result of the some other discussions on the newsgroup.
Oh, the GD stays a good weapon all the way through. I'm up against a CP that
has Doom Stars loaded with GDs...25-30 in a single slot. Even a Star Fort
can't stand too many 800+ spins. Unfortunately for him, I have Stellar Conv
mounted on MY Doomies....
--
Dean Robb (WB: Raz1)
PC-Easy
On-site Computer Services
(757) 495-EASY [3279]
David Ramsey
James Winsor (jwi...@earthlink.net) wrote:
:
: Yeah that is a good question and I think I know the answer. I had a
: battle last night where I was using Hv Mass Drivers as my primary
: weapon, which meant it would always mete out 9 pts of damage each
: regardless of range. I had 6 of them on each of my attacking BB's.
: My opponent was using Type III shields. After I closed range a bit, I
: noticed that my BB's were ALWAYS inflicting 36 pts of damage on each
: volley. Never more, never less.
: I guess I was at the range where my beams had 100% to hit, so that was
: why the damage was not varied. Now, if 6 Hv Mass Drivers were causing
: 36 pts per volley, then each individual Hv Mass Driver was doing 6
: pts. Which makes perfect sense : 9 (Hv MD) - 3 (III Shields) = 6 pts.
: So, it would seem that the nullification is applied to each weapon,
: NOT to each volley. Which makes strong shields a very nice thing to
: have!
:
: But, probably not nice enough, when you think about it. Taking a best
: case scenario, Type X Hard Shields which nullify 13 pts, Hv Plasma
: Cannons still seem to rule: (32 x 4) x 50 = 6400 pts max damage, using
: the original example. So, they would do in the range of 0 to 6400 pts
: rather than 1800 to 9000. At average ranges, that still beats the
: pants off the Stellar Converter, which would do only (387 x 4) x 1 =
: 1548 pts. in this instance.
As I've noted elsewhere, DITCH THE DAMN SHIELDS. If you get the damper
field (and you almost always do from Orion) use it instead - and
voila! 75% of ANY damage from ANY beam weapon is GONE. Add in
reflection fields (which you can often get from Orion) and almost all
of the rest of the damage is gone too AND it is reflected back on the
shooter. I don't even research shields anymore beyond say Class III
becuase by the time I have Class III I have enough firepower to take
down the guardian. And when you take down the guardian, shields are
obsolete.
: Jim
David Ramsey
: >Clearly, plasma cannon is the overwhelming winner in terms of pure
: >damage delivered. While the 2x damage penalty for range will lessen
: >this if distant from the target, it still seems to me that plasma
: >cannons are inarguably the way to go in the late game.
:
: >Thoughts? Arguments? Flames?
: >John
:
: My sons and I agree with you. It didn't work for me,though, when one
: of them took Orion first and got Xenotronium armor. Then my plasma
: cannons were almost useless and, because my race wasn't creative, I
: didn't have continuous auto-firing ion pulse cannons.
:
Oh man, Xentronium armor... I started out thinking that this was sweet
stuff but now I don't even bother with adamantium and I always HOPE
that I don't get the Xentronium armor but instead get both the
reflection field and the damper field. The damper field completely
replaces standard shields (and at a significant space savings too)
while the reflection field is one sure way to beat large CP
fleets. Put these two on neutronium hulled titans and watch the CP's
doomstars blow themselves up with the reflected damage from their own
shots! And the damper field works inside of nebulaes. These two techs
are real killer toys. I once built a cruiser with reinforced
neutronium hull, heavy armor, and a few heavy plasmas (to tickle the
opponent). I then watched a Mrrshan fleet mostly self-destruct while
trying to take down this "little" ship. They would shoot and the
cruiser would take maybe 8-10 points of damage from their heavy
phasors while they would take 140-180 points of reflected damage. The
Mrrshan ship shoots two banks like that and is dead in the water. Next
round my little cruiser finishes it with a couple of plasma bursts. Or
more frequently, the CP ship just blows up from receiving too much
reflected damage. Try refitting your fleet with these two babies when
you get them and see how hard they are to kill. (Put an auto repair
unit onboard and they'll often repair all of the minor damage that
does get through. You could kill a CP fleet without taking any damage
and without firing a shot...)
:
:
:
:
Brian Trosko
David Ramsey <dra...@neosoft.com> wrote:
: As I've noted elsewhere, DITCH THE DAMN SHIELDS. If you get the damper
: field (and you almost always do from Orion) use it instead - and
: voila! 75% of ANY damage from ANY beam weapon is GONE.
And hope like hell the other guy isn't using Ion Cannons, or Transporters,
or emissions-guidance missiles.
Too many weapons that will kill you if you don't have shields. What good
does it do you to reflect 75% of damage if the ion cannons knock out your
engines and your weapons in the first salvo?
James Winsor
dra...@neosoft.com (David Ramsey) wrote:
>James Winsor (jwi...@earthlink.net) wrote:
>:
>: Yeah that is a good question and I think I know the answer. I had a
>: battle last night where I was using Hv Mass Drivers as my primary
>: weapon, which meant it would always mete out 9 pts of damage each
>: regardless of range. I had 6 of them on each of my attacking BB's.
>:
>: My opponent was using Type III shields. After I closed range a bit, I
>: noticed that my BB's were ALWAYS inflicting 36 pts of damage on each
>: volley. Never more, never less.
>:
>: I guess I was at the range where my beams had 100% to hit, so that was
>: why the damage was not varied. Now, if 6 Hv Mass Drivers were causing
>: 36 pts per volley, then each individual Hv Mass Driver was doing 6
>: pts. Which makes perfect sense : 9 (Hv MD) - 3 (III Shields) = 6 pts.
>: So, it would seem that the nullification is applied to each weapon,
>: NOT to each volley. Which makes strong shields a very nice thing to
>: have!
>:
>: But, probably not nice enough, when you think about it. Taking a best
>: case scenario, Type X Hard Shields which nullify 13 pts, Hv Plasma
>: Cannons still seem to rule: (32 x 4) x 50 = 6400 pts max damage, using
>: the original example. So, they would do in the range of 0 to 6400 pts
>: rather than 1800 to 9000. At average ranges, that still beats the
>: pants off the Stellar Converter, which would do only (387 x 4) x 1 =
>: 1548 pts. in this instance.
>:
>As I've noted elsewhere, DITCH THE DAMN SHIELDS. If you get the damper
>field (and you almost always do from Orion) use it instead - and
>voila! 75% of ANY damage from ANY beam weapon is GONE. Add in
>reflection fields (which you can often get from Orion) and almost all
>of the rest of the damage is gone too AND it is reflected back on the
>shooter. I don't even research shields anymore beyond say Class III
>becuase by the time I have Class III I have enough firepower to take
>down the guardian. And when you take down the guardian, shields are
>obsolete.
Yeah, but the only problem there is you are vulnerable to
transporters.
Jim
Kirati Laisathit
In article <32be1886...@news.dreamscape.com>,
Vernon L. McCandlish <ver...@dreamscape.com> wrote:
>
>Actually, they combine well with Ion Pulse Cannons, the GDs take out
>structure, the IPC takes out systems. You pull the teeth right out of
>the the ships. Down side to GD's is that structure failures do not
>cause drive ruptures, the ships just collapse. A way I have been
>installing GD's is in multiple banks with tractor beams (which BTW
>cannot be multiple banked) Then spin the badguy till it is no longer
>facing you and then lock on the TB. Makes approach a lot easier.
Why would you want to combine IPC & GD? Aren't they sort of redundant?
After all, once either structure or system reaches 0, the ship goes
kaboom. In other word, IPC & GD don't complement each other at all.
The only reason that I can think of is if you plan to use
the IPC equipped against Antaran or Space monster.
Later...
--
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
K I R A T I L A I S A T H I T kir...@u.washington.edu
http://weber.u.washington.edu/~kirati/
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
David Ramsey
Brian Trosko (btr...@primenet.com) wrote:
: David Ramsey <dra...@neosoft.com> wrote:
: : As I've noted elsewhere, DITCH THE DAMN SHIELDS. If you get the damper
: : field (and you almost always do from Orion) use it instead - and
: : voila! 75% of ANY damage from ANY beam weapon is GONE.
: And hope like hell the other guy isn't using Ion Cannons, or Transporters,
: or emissions-guidance missiles.
:
:
: Too many weapons that will kill you if you don't have shields. What good
: does it do you to reflect 75% of damage if the ion cannons knock out your
: engines and your weapons in the first salvo?
As I said earlier, use damper fields AND reflection fields. The
dampers knock out 75% of whatever is incoming, period. The reflection
field reflects almost all the rest back at the shooter. heavy ion
pulse cannons just don't even register against such a ship...
As for transporters, while I've seen the CP get clever in a few games
(but not really TOO clever), I've never seen it make good use of
transporters. Against a human player the situation is different, of
course. But against the CP I'll take damper fields and reflection
fields every single time.
Jake
Pan...@chatlink.com wrote in article <59nmip$h...@news.chatlink.com>...
Does everyone max out their ship with stuff until theres no space left or
is there someone out there that actually leaves a ton of space unused to
get the manuverability bonus ?? (especially in the small ships)
Is it harder to hit you if your ship moves or doesnt it matter?
--Panther
John Mueller
>> Yes, I love Gyro Destabilizers, ever since my game as the Borg (guess
what was my cutting beam?) But I, also, stop using them, because they
are *SO* slow to watch. Once I can survive with other weapons, I use
them instead. <<
I'm finding that Gyro Destabilizers are a complete waste of time in the
end game for me. I usually wipe the CPs out in one or two turns using
beam weapons, so the Gyro Destabilizers don't even get used all that
much. Standing off and firing beam weapons seems to be a pretty good
end game strategy. Right now I'm using a combination of Phasors and
Plasma Cannons.
>> Missiles early on, torpedoes later. Or just use Plasmas, they're still
very useful outside of the max range of point defense beams. Stellar
Convertors only hit one thing at a time, but they were reasonable
damagers in his list, if I recall, and are unaffected by range. But
I usually just blast away at point blank range with HV Plasmas in the
late game, so I'm not the best authority here. <<
So, what do you think of using Phasors to cut through the enemy ship
shields? I've started using three alternating banks each of Phasors and
Plasma Cannons. The combination of both weapons seems to kill the
greatest number of ships with the least number of weapons.
John Mueller
John Mueller
>> I recently discovered the joy of auto-firing disruptors in my latest
game... not bad, 3 shots each doing 40, (60 w/ high energy focus)and
since the damage doesn't decrease with range I had some fun with a
doomstar with 40 AF disruptors, high energy focus, subspace teleporter,
and hyper-X capacitators. (once fried 21 battleships in 1 round of
combat) fun,fun,fun <<
At what point in the game do you start using disruptors? I've found
that they take up a lot of space and really aren't as flexible as a
Plasma Cannon. Then again, by about the middle of the game I've gained
enough of a technical advantage that I can pack a whole lot of those
Plasma Cannons on a ship. I use Plasma Cannons in combination with
Phasors. The Phasors knock out the shields, the Plasma Cannons kill the
ship. It's a great combination <g>.
John Mueller
John Mueller
>> Oh, the GD stays a good weapon all the way through. I'm up against a CP that
has Doom Stars loaded with GDs...25-30 in a single slot. Even a Star
Fort
can't stand too many 800+ spins. Unfortunately for him, I have Stellar
Conv
mounted on MY Doomies... <<
I'm finding that I prefer to stand off and fight, so beam weapons are
looking like the better choice once I have Phasors and Plasma Cannons.
By the time the CPs actually get close enough to use something like a
Gyro Destabilizer, I've destroyed most of his fleet. The one place
where they do come in very handy is fighting the Guardian. There isn't
much of a choice about fighting in close in that particular situation.
John Mueller
John Mueller
>> There's no getting away from the fact that plasmas are x4 NATURALLY,
before any mods. Phasors have to play big time catch-up to get
anywhere near that, and by then they're too big. Plasmas' only
weakness is the range attenuation to damage, and it's unclear what
that is right now. I guess the moral is, since you go first anyway,
barrel right up to 'em and blast away. I've had a Doom Star with 100
or so plasmas take out a Star Fortress with one shot and still have
almost half its weapons available for any fleet in the vicinity. <<
I'm finding that the Phasor/Plasma Cannon combination is working really
well for me since I prefer to stand off and fight. That way the CPs
don't get much of a chance to fire the PD weapons before I've destroyed
their fleet. Getting in close seems to incur more damage for my fleet
than if I stand off and fight. Of course, I guess the damage you get
would be determined by the strategy you use.
John Mueller
John Mueller
>> Does everyone max out their ship with stuff until theres no space left or
is there someone out there that actually leaves a ton of space unused to
get the manuverability bonus ?? (especially in the small ships) <<
I max my ships out since I usually stay at a distance from the CP fleet
and fight. The problem with getting in too close is that the CPs seem
to use a lot of PD weapons. Those weapons are only available if you
fight in close.
John Mueller
Richard Kuo
As a note to this, I would love an option or a little setting
I could click to set the weapons to fire only until the shields have
dropped, since there are lots of fun things you can do like boarding,
ion cannons, etc. Same goes with planets...I keep accidentally razing
entire planets of their population when I just want to take out the
missile base!
John Mueller
>> As a note to this, I would love an option or a little setting
I could click to set the weapons to fire only until the shields have
dropped, since there are lots of fun things you can do like boarding,
ion cannons, etc. Same goes with planets...I keep accidentally razing
entire planets of their population when I just want to take out the
missile base! <<
I think there are ways of selecting specific weapons banks before you
fire. Why not just choose a lower power weapon to knock out the
shields, then board the ship? I usually don't bother boarding the ships
since the CP stuff is out of date most of the time.
John Mueller
John Mueller
Dragon Slayer
> I usually don't bother boarding the ships
> since the CP stuff is out of date most of the time.
>
> John Mueller
I once boarded an Antaran ship while the game is still in neutron blaster age
and got all the cool tech out of it, what do you make of that?
--
\
O===l===Dragon Slayer===> ty...@po-box.mcgill.ca
\_/ bu...@musicb.mcgill.ca
D. B. Brown
David Ramsey wrote:
> As I've noted elsewhere, DITCH THE DAMN SHIELDS. If you get the damper
> field (and you almost always do from Orion) use it instead - and
> reflection fields (which you can often get from Orion) and almost all
> of the rest of the damage is gone too AND it is reflected back on the
> shooter. I don't even research shields anymore beyond say Class III
> becuase by the time I have Class III I have enough firepower to take
> down the guardian. And when you take down the guardian, shields are
> obsolete.
Have to disagree here - it depends on the situation for me. If
I'm fighting a Psilon fleet with really cool weapons, the damper
fields are far and away better... However, if I happen to be
fighting a Klackon horde (Say, 20 titans armed with mass drivers...
The Klackons never fail to amuse me with their huge armies of
really mediocre ships), a good V or VII shield will do much better
than the damper fields...
--
+=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=-+=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=-+
|Do you ever get the feeling that the story's|D.B. Brown |
|too damned real and in the present tense? |zep...@spectra.net |
| -Ian Anderson | "..." |
+=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=-+=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=-+
John Mueller
>> I once boarded an Antaran ship while the game is still in neutron blaster age and got all the cool tech out of it, what do you make of that? <<
I usually play a very diplomatic game until I've got something
worthwhile to hit the CPs with. That means I'm usually well out of the
neutron blaster age when I start attacking. When the Antarans do attack
me, I'm usually more interested in getting out of the conflict with my
skin intact than getting one of their ships (especially during the early
game when getting one of their ships would make a difference).
John Mueller
Dean F. Mason
In message <32C409...@pacbell.net> - John Mueller
<JMue...@pacbell.net>Fri, 27 Dec 1996 09:36:27 -0800 writes:
:>
:>>> Does everyone max out their ship with stuff until theres no space left or
Late in the game I'm not intrested in boarding ships. I've got so
many ships by then I'm overwelmed with them. I just destroy and go
on. I like the Mauler and the Sub-space Teleporter. I can get right
in their face and blast them to hell.
docb...@cybergate.com
http://www.cybergate.com/~docbraun