MOO: Interesting Ship Designs
SRA Tobias Barzydlo
a Hard game in a Huge galaxy and needed some heavy-hitting
forces to mop up the Klacktons and finish the game. I was
starting to get those "Advanced Tech I, II, III", technologies,
so I was doing pretty well tech-wise.
What surprised me was the ship design I came up
with: A -small- ship with level 10 computer, level 15 (!!) shield,
level 8 ECM, Deutrium armor, warp 7 engines, Inertial Nullifier
and Battle Scanner, and armed with one MAULER (20-100 pt
weapons!) and one NEUTRONIUM bomb apiece. I was
-amazed- that all this would fit on these little bitty ships.
A stack of these could cruise up and... well...
What are some of the most FUN designs you
guys have come up with? Not neccicarily the most powerful,
though those are usually fun. <grin>
Tom Salyers
In a previous article, tbar...@NOT.hdsc.ssc.af.mil (SRA Tobias Barzydlo) says:
>forces to mop up the Klacktons and finish the game. I was
>starting to get those "Advanced Tech I, II, III", technologies,
>so I was doing pretty well tech-wise.
[stuff deleted with neutronium bomb]
> What are some of the most FUN designs you
>guys have come up with? Not neccicarily the most powerful,
>though those are usually fun. <grin>
Well, the two favorites I had were when I was in much the same situation--
I was getting all the advanced techs.
My first was a bomber I designed when I decided towards the endgame that I
just wanted to wipe out my enemies without all that messy ground combat, as I
already had 50 planets and I didn't want to run the risk of convening the
Council by colonizing and capturing too many.
Anyway, this thing had a Huge hull, warp 9 engines, 8 neutronium bombs,
and a hard beam for those pesky ships the Darloks had. It was a blast to
cruise up to a colony planet and just rain death and destruction down on
it while enemy ships shot their peashooters at me. =)
My other favorite was my battleship. Again, a Huge hull, warp 9 engines,
maneuver 8, neutronium armor, level 9 shield, high energy focus, 28--count
'em, 28--tri-focus plasma, and 3 death rays on board. That thing could have
given the Guardian a run for its money. Too bad I already blew it up. =)
--
Tom Salyers "Now is the Windows of our disk contents
IRCnick: Aqualung made glorious SimEarth by this Sun of Zork."
Denver, CO ---Richard v3.0
Daniel M Silevitch
|>
|> In a previous article, tbar...@NOT.hdsc.ssc.af.mil (SRA Tobias Barzydlo) says:
|>
|> >forces to mop up the Klacktons and finish the game. I was
|> >starting to get those "Advanced Tech I, II, III", technologies,
|> >so I was doing pretty well tech-wise.
|>
|> [stuff deleted with neutronium bomb]
[large bomber deleted]
|> My other favorite was my battleship. Again, a Huge hull, warp 9 engines,
|> maneuver 8, neutronium armor, level 9 shield, high energy focus, 28--count
|> 'em, 28--tri-focus plasma, and 3 death rays on board. That thing could have
|> given the Guardian a run for its money. Too bad I already blew it up. =)
Wimp :-). At full tech-99, I got a ship with Huge Hull, Neutronium II armor
(3600 hp :), warp 8 drive (no warp 9 developed), level 15 shield, level 10
battlecomp & jammer, HEF, Adv DamCon, Black Hole. 99 Maulers, 99 Pulse Phasors
(no tri-focus cannons), 198 tachyon beams. At the end, this thing only cost
~2200 BC to build. A bargain.
Between the BHG, the phasors and the tachyon beams, one of these ships can
rip a stack of 10,000 gnats to pieces in a couple of turns, while the Maulers
slice through planetary shields like Swiss cheese.
Another fun high-tech design is the Small hull, with a teleporter and a
single plasma torp. Stacked 500 high, this can do a lot of damage very
quickly. Plasma torps will also penetrate level 35 planet shields from 2-3
squares away, making them useful for bombardment if teleporters aren't
feasible.
|> --
|> Tom Salyers "Now is the Windows of our disk contents
|> IRCnick: Aqualung made glorious SimEarth by this Sun of Zork."
|> Denver, CO ---Richard v3.0
--
Daniel Silevitch dms...@mit.edu
``May the Source be with you.''
Andy Duca - 5881 * 2N4
I was maxed out in all technologies and up to 6 or 7 of the advanced technologies.
my ship design was a huge ship with max computer/shields/jamming/armor/speed/ etc., with
lightning shield, advanced repair, and high energy focus. The weapons bay held Death Rays
in all four slots with 7 per slot.
Needless to say, this ship was unbeatable - never lost one in combat. The only annoying thing
with this ship was with a fleet of 50 it would destroy any colony on the planet when using the
auto mode.
Torbj|rn Lindgren
Andy Duca - 5881 * 2N4 <du...@as44.eng.iac.honeywell.com> wrote:
>The weapons bay held Death Rays in all four slots with 7 per slot.
Death-Rays? You could easily stuffed in enough maulers to do two to
eight times the damage REGARDLESS of the target!
Both maulers and tri-focus plasmas is much better weapons than Death
Rays. They specifications looks nice but the size and power
requirement makes them almost useless.
Bronis Vidugiris
)In article <DUCA.94Ja...@as44.eng.iac.honeywell.com>,
)Andy Duca - 5881 * 2N4 <du...@as44.eng.iac.honeywell.com> wrote:
)>The weapons bay held Death Rays in all four slots with 7 per slot.
)
)Death-Rays? You could easily stuffed in enough maulers to do two to
)eight times the damage REGARDLESS of the target!
)Both maulers and tri-focus plasmas is much better weapons than Death
)Rays. They specifications looks nice but the size and power
)requirement makes them almost useless.
I have not found this statement to be true as written, though I agree
that death rays are not always the best weapon. They really are good
for dishing out a lot of damage to a target, and numerically are typically
better than maulers. The drawback is that massive damage to a single
target is not always what is called for.
--
"The power of this battlestation is _insignificant_ when compared with
the power of the Farce." - D. Vader.
Torbj|rn Lindgren
Bronis Vidugiris <b...@areaplg2.corp.mot.com> wrote:
>In article <CJIsp...@news.chalmers.se> t...@cd.chalmers.se (Torbj|rn Lindgren) writes:
>)Both maulers and tri-focus plasmas is much better weapons than Death
>)Rays. They specifications looks nice but the size and power
>)requirement makes them almost useless.
>
>I have not found this statement to be true as written, though I agree
>that death rays are not always the best weapon. They really are good
>for dishing out a lot of damage to a target, and numerically are typically
>better than maulers. The drawback is that massive damage to a single
>target is not always what is called for.
True, ONE Death Ray does more damage than any other single weapon. But
the Death Ray is so big that you can cram 10 maulers or so in the same
space as ONE Death Ray... And together these make more damage than the
single Death Ray.
I once played the game out to see what kind of thing that were
available at tech level 99 and the first ship I designed was a huge
hull. It had the best class I armour, max warp, maneuver, computer
shield and ecm. Specials was ADC, BHG and Beam Extender. It had 99 of
the best bombs (40 - 70), two slots with 99 maulers and one slot with
15-20 Death Rays (since there were LOT of empty space with 99
maulers).
If I had built it now I would probably have used 4 slots with 99
maulers, or possibly 3x99 plus whatever amount of Death Rays that
fits. It's possible that you need the bombs again in v 1.3, but in v
1.2 I did more damage with those two slots with maulers than the 99
high-end bombs!
hoa nhu truong
>Death-Rays? You could easily stuffed in enough maulers to do two to
>eight times the damage REGARDLESS of the target!
>
>Both maulers and tri-focus plasmas is much better weapons than Death
>Rays. They specifications looks nice but the size and power
>requirement makes them almost useless.
NO. Maulers and tri-focus plasmas won't do much damage when your opponent
fleet has high shield, high beam defense, and with displacement device.
My 50 maulers (attack level 12) on 1 slot tooked out around 2 enemy ship with
hull strength of 400. With hi-tech enemy, death rays, tech nullifier, and
black hole generator are needed. Maulers are better than death rays
with most other circumstances.
Bronis Vidugiris
)True, ONE Death Ray does more damage than any other single weapon. But
)the Death Ray is so big that you can cram 10 maulers or so in the same
)space as ONE Death Ray... And together these make more damage than the
)single Death Ray.
I haven't found this to be true. I can't support my experiences with numbers at
the current time, but my experience was that one death ray would average more
damage than the number of other weapons that fit in an equivalent space.
The figures depend on the tech level to some extent. At a sufficiently
high tech level, my experience is in general that energy efficiency is
the most important criterion for a weapon. This is because weapon size
halves for every 10 tech levels, wheras other parameters (including
the size of the energy producing drives) drops only 25% for every 10
tech levels. In addition, weapons technology (at least in my games)
tends to slightly outpace drive technology, because of the fact that
there are more weapons tech possiblities than drive tech possibilites,
and tech level is defined something like 80% of the highest tech item
plust 1 per technology. This is important because weapons size depends
on weapons technology, wheras the cost of energy (energy usage stays constant
but the cost drops) depends on the drive technology. Energy cost also
depends on ship design (mostly ship speed set via drive type) - a 'top of the
line' ship will have a higher energy cost than a somewhat slower one.
The energy cost may even go up late in the game for really slow ships -
there is usually an 'optimum energy cost' drive type / ship speed, as
well as the fastest drive available (usually energy is expensive here),
and the slowest (you can fit more in, but you have to pay for it).
Earlier in the game, retro drives tend to be cheapest, it's only later
that faster drives become cheaper than retros per energy unit.
Unfortunately, I don't have the figures for the 'death ray' handy (I think one
would have to take them off the screen, don't think they are documented) to
compare directly with the mauler.) The figures would allow an objective
comparison of the weapons at least, though there are so many conditions that it
would be hard to do in detail.
Possibly the intermediate conditions are the only ones under which
'death rays' are worthwhile - I only know for sure that under some
reasonably common set of conditions, I remember seeing death rays prove to
be better than maulers for dishing out large amounts of damage to large
targets.
Mastermind
Blah blah blah.
>
>Unfortunately, I don't have the figures for the 'death ray' handy (I think one
>would have to take them off the screen, don't think they are documented) to
>compare directly with the mauler.) The figures would allow an objective
>comparison of the weapons at least, though there are so many conditions that it
>would be hard to do in detail.
>
Apart from damadge, all other weapon stats change with tech level. This
makes low tech weaponry on small ships highly attractive, even if you do
less than 1 point average damadge per ship, for 2000 BC you can build
about 120. That's a lot of damadge. Depending on armor type, you get
a lot of hitpoints too. Since missiles don't carry damadge, such a stack
is highly effective against races that build ships with a lot torpedo
weapons and against planets. Also they can be devided in smaller forces to
take out a multiple invasion of smaller fleets. Your Dreadnought can't do
that.
>
>Possibly the intermediate conditions are the only ones under which
>'death rays' are worthwhile - I only know for sure that under some
>reasonably common set of conditions, I remember seeing death rays prove to
>be better than maulers for dishing out large amounts of damage to large
>targets.
>
>--
>"The power of this battlestation is _insignificant_ when compared with
>the power of the Farce." - D. Vader.
^ Spaceballs, right?
M.
Kim Joo-Hun
>>
>>Unfortunately, I don't have the figures for the 'death ray' handy (I think one
>>would have to take them off the screen, don't think they are documented) to
>>compare directly with the mauler.) The figures would allow an objective
>>comparison of the weapons at least, though there are so many conditions that it
>>would be hard to do in detail.
>>
>>Possibly the intermediate conditions are the only ones under which
>>'death rays' are worthwhile - I only know for sure that under some
>>reasonably common set of conditions, I remember seeing death rays prove to
>>be better than maulers for dishing out large amounts of damage to large
>>targets.
>>
When you get to max advanced tech everything, and hopefully advanced
tech VIII for weapons, you should have 45 Death Rays on Huges or
around 250 Maulers.
Maulers should be used against mediums and smalls. Armed with ionic
pulsar or neutron stream projector, you should whittle down 32000
smalls in a couple of turns.
For large or huges though, nothing beats the Death Rays.
Just 5 or 6 Huges armed with 45 Death Rays will destroy all the missile
bases and colonists on a planet, and if you have a ship with landing
capabilities, it will colonize on that turn so any troops you send
to that planet will not die of starvation.
Of course I usually have a fleet of 32000 medium armed with 3 maulers
and neutron stream, or 5 maulers and ionic pulsar and
around 3000 Huges, half armed with maulers, the other half with death
rays. Oh when attacking planets, have a ship armed with death ray
that will always attack first to destroy all the missile bases so
you can use your space teleporters.
How do I get so many ships?? There's a bug in the program where if
the cost of the fleet gets to big, it cycles from negative numbers, back
to 0, then negative numbers, then back to 0 etc.
You can, although I haven't tried it yet, probably have a fleet of
6 X 32000 Huges.
I'd like to hear from all those who think that their fleet of
small ships can beat that one :)
Bronis Vidugiris
) Apart from damadge, all other weapon stats change with tech level. This
)makes low tech weaponry on small ships highly attractive, even if you do
)less than 1 point average damadge per ship, for 2000 BC you can build
)about 120. That's a lot of damadge. Depending on armor type, you get
)a lot of hitpoints too. Since missiles don't carry damadge, such a stack
)is highly effective against races that build ships with a lot torpedo
)weapons and against planets. Also they can be devided in smaller forces to
)take out a multiple invasion of smaller fleets. Your Dreadnought can't do
)that.
I've never found it that advantagous to put weaker weapons on a small ship,
but I have found stacks of small ships with the best weapon that will fit
quite useful.
As others have pointed out, weapon choices are usually not critical to
ultimate victory, though. Other things tend to be more critical to
actual success in the game (IMO).
The problem with stacks of smalls is the Black Hole generator and sometimes
the pulsar, though - they can be quite vulnerable. I find uses for several
clases of ships. (This is v1.2, some things may change with 1.3)
small ships with best weapon that fits, maximum maneuver for high defense,
little to no shields (unless tech is very high).
small (possibly medium) ships with bombs, maximum maneuver and ECM for
high defense and missile defense. Planetary bombers.
medium (possibly small) ships with torpedo weapons (or missiles early on).
pulsar stacks - don't need computers unless other weapons fit. More specialized
than most of the above, they are useful if the enemy has dangerous swarms of
midgets. Can range from large to small.
Huge ships with damage control/adv damage control, repulsors, long
range weapons, max shields, max armor.
Anything with a BHG (usually large/huge).
Guardian ships with a warp dissipator were a favorite, they seem to be
less useful in 1.2 where dissipators don't seem to always damage the
enemy (I haven't figured out the algorithm yet).
I usually don't have one of every type - depending on the situation,
I build different ones. (I think I'm over 6 here anyway).
I usually have at the minimum some huge ships with auto repair and some
large stacks of smalls, though (as long as I have auto-repair, that is).
Mathew Yee
>In article <KREMPEL.22...@stpc.wi.leidenuniv.nl> KRE...@stpc.wi.LeidenUniv.nl (Mastermind) writes:
>I've never found it that advantagous to put weaker weapons on a small ship,
>but I have found stacks of small ships with the best weapon that will fit
>quite useful.
Actually, the best weapon is not always the highest tech. Usually, I try
for the best autofire weapon available. At the high end, 2 Pulse Phasors
can usually be fit on a small. (More depending on what else you put on board.)
>The problem with stacks of smalls is the Black Hole generator and sometimes
>the pulsar, though - they can be quite vulnerable. I find uses for several
>clases of ships. (This is v1.2, some things may change with 1.3)
Well, yeah, this is true, but if you make the smalls very fast, you can
pound on the enemy first.
>small ships with best weapon that fits, maximum maneuver for high defense,
>little to no shields (unless tech is very high).
>
I agree with this, but it sounds like you forgot to say that you use the
best battle computer. A fast, well armed fighter that couldn't hit the
broadside of the Guardian isn't very good. :)
--
!@#$%^&*!@#$%^&*!@#$%^&*!@#$%^&*!@#$%^&*!@#$%^&*!@#$%^&*!@#$%^&*!@#$%^&*!@#
&
Mathew Yee * "You're sick, twisted, and demented...
!
psi...@netcom.com @ ...I admire that in a person."
#
!@#$%^&*!@#$%^&*!@#$%^&*!@#$%^&*!@#$%^&*!@#$%^&*!@#$%^&*!@#$%^&*!@#$%^&*!@#
Bronis Vidugiris
)I agree with this, but it sounds like you forgot to say that you use the
)best battle computer. A fast, well armed fighter that couldn't hit the
)broadside of the Guardian isn't very good. :)
Yep. Actually, for 'best' substitute 'best or second best' in almost
all categories. You are right - sometimes there are significant advantages
in downgrading a bit. Usually, it's not worth it to downgrade the
weapons, though (IMO).
Mathew Yee
>In article <psifireC...@netcom.com> psi...@netcom.com (Mathew Yee) writes:
>)I agree with this, but it sounds like you forgot to say that you use the
>)best battle computer. A fast, well armed fighter that couldn't hit the
>)broadside of the Guardian isn't very good. :)
>Yep. Actually, for 'best' substitute 'best or second best' in almost
>all categories. You are right - sometimes there are significant advantages
>in downgrading a bit. Usually, it's not worth it to downgrade the
>weapons, though (IMO).
It usually depends on the situation. If the CPs don't have sufficient
shields, then an autofire weapon is usually a better bet since it will
cause more damage. In the case of the high end, a tri-focus plasma
can be nasty, but a pulse phasor will work better since you can place all
your guns in one stack and still shoot at multiple targets.
Bronis Vidugiris
)
)>Yep. Actually, for 'best' substitute 'best or second best' in almost
)>all categories. You are right - sometimes there are significant advantages
)>in downgrading a bit. Usually, it's not worth it to downgrade the
)>weapons, though (IMO).
)
)It usually depends on the situation. If the CPs don't have sufficient
)shields, then an autofire weapon is usually a better bet since it will
)cause more damage. In the case of the high end, a tri-focus plasma
)can be nasty, but a pulse phasor will work better since you can place all
)your guns in one stack and still shoot at multiple targets.
Without sufficient shields, repeat-fire weapons are indeed nasty and pulsed
phasors are one of the best, IMO.
Against high shields (esp lvl 15) though, they are fairly useless. This is both
from calculation, and experience.
David R. Paoletti
: If I had built it now I would probably have used 4 slots with 99
: maulers, or possibly 3x99 plus whatever amount of Death Rays that
: fits. It's possible that you need the bombs again in v 1.3, but in v
: 1.2 I did more damage with those two slots with maulers than the 99
: high-end bombs!
Nope. Once you get maulers, bombs become next to useless.
I'd rather have a ship that can kill _and_ bomb. Adding
a cloaking device, max movement, and inertial nullifier
makes a very nice bomber!
Dave :)
Mathew Yee
>In article <psifireC...@netcom.com> psi...@netcom.com (Mathew Yee) writes:
>)b...@areaplg2.corp.mot.com (Bronis Vidugiris) writes:
>)It usually depends on the situation. If the CPs don't have sufficient
>)shields, then an autofire weapon is usually a better bet since it will
>)cause more damage. In the case of the high end, a tri-focus plasma
>)can be nasty, but a pulse phasor will work better since you can place all
>)your guns in one stack and still shoot at multiple targets.
>Without sufficient shields, repeat-fire weapons are indeed nasty and pulsed
>phasors are one of the best, IMO.
>Against high shields (esp lvl 15) though, they are fairly useless. This is both
>from calculation, and experience.
>
Actually, the pulse-phasor is the best autofire weapon in the game if my
memory serves me correctly.
I will agree that against lvl 15 shields, they become less useful, but
then, if you have Oracle interface on a fighter along with HEF, they can
be nasty. I think you can fit as many tri-focus plasma cannons on a
fighter as you can pulse phasors at the top end, so these are also good,
the problem is that agains a stack of 9 point fighters, you end up kill
fewer since a tri-focus will only kill one fighter, and a pulse-phasor
can kill 3 for every two guns. This means that a stack of tri-focus
fighters will be able to kill 2 for one if armed with two guns, and a
stack of pulse-phasor will kill 3 for one if armed with two guns. Just
food for thought. Of couse, against mediums and larger, this no longer
holds.
Robert Dejournett
>Nope. Once you get maulers, bombs become next to useless.
>I'd rather have a ship that can kill _and_ bomb. Adding
>a cloaking device, max movement, and inertial nullifier
>makes a very nice bomber!
>
>Dave :)
>
1) Little fighter w/ (in decreasing order of importance) max computer, max
engine and manuever, best gun that will fit (just one will do), then if you
have space, you concentrate on cloak/anti missile (or something higher, llike
inertial nullifier), shield, and armor.
2) Little missile w/ best computer and a good missile (doesn't have to be
the best, 2nd best will do (note you can usually only fit the 2 shot variety
on it, unfortunately), everything else is whatever you prefer. These things
aim one shot at the computer's best stack, second shot at second best stack.
However, these are extremely tech. dependant. Your missiles have to be able
to a) hit the other guy b) penetrate his shields. You can launch 1000 missiles
and do 100 damage if they 'out-tech' you.
3) (most agree to this) Little bomber. One guy w/ best defence he can afford,
best computer, most speed, and most impt. best bomb. THe idea is if you get
600 of these guys and 300 make it thru, then you are doing good, but are
wasteful because your bombers are taking too lkong to get to the planet to
smash missile bases or are getting creamed by defenders. (repulsers might
be good here if you have a cruel sense of humor)
I've noticed that there is no best weapon until you stop making new tech advances (ie advanced weapon tech). You just have to be able to hit the other guy
better and cheaper than he can hit you. Computers are vital. So what your
attack level is 10. His beam defence is 15. Won't do too much good.
OH, streaming attacks. Tachyon beams are good until they are outdated. Note they are only good for stacks of ships, be them med, small, or whatever. Black
hole generators are deadly to the above three ships, don't know a good defence
against them (run?). Pulsars are deadly against the above unless you have
shield of 5. Then they are in for a shock!
Actually, my favorite gun of all time is the Gauss gun. Seems to be the best for the little fighter above. (yes, i've tried them all). Your little fighter can go in and kill 4 stacks in one shot, provided there are alot of you and a little of them.
Finally, small's are cheaper and can put more stuff on than a huge. You can
put say 120 smalls per one huge? That's 120 guns (assuming one gun per ship), and they are easier to scrap if out-teched. I'd rather scrap 1000 smalls than
10 huges, wouldn't you?
Cheers
-Rob
Daniel M Silevitch
|> >
|> >Nope. Once you get maulers, bombs become next to useless.
|> >I'd rather have a ship that can kill _and_ bomb. Adding
|> >a cloaking device, max movement, and inertial nullifier
|> >makes a very nice bomber!
|> >
|> >Dave :)
|> >
|> Yeah, but what if you have planetary shield 20? Maulers won't do much
|> against that. Actually, I like small ships. Screw those huge ones with 20
|> zillion whatever that are outdated the day they are produced. I'd have 3
|> classes, usually.
|>
Not so. A mauler will slice right through level 35 shielding. It will do some
damage, but if you use enough of them, they are very effective. I've found,
however, that Plasma Torps are a very useful all-around weapon, esp. since
they are smaller than maulers. There appears to be a minor bug/feature that
attacks on planets w/ Plasmas don't do any damage beyond killing all of the
missile bases, which means that you don't have to worry about wiping out the
colony, which is a major problem when you start dumping 300 neutronium bombs
on a planet or something...
|> Cheers
|>
|> -Rob
Mitch Gunzler
> Apart from damadge, all other weapon stats change with tech level. This
>makes low tech weaponry on small ships highly attractive, even if you do
>less than 1 point average damadge per ship, for 2000 BC you can build
>about 120. That's a lot of damadge. Depending on armor type, you get
>a lot of hitpoints too. Since missiles don't carry damadge, such a stack
>is highly effective against races that build ships with a lot torpedo
>weapons and against planets. Also they can be devided in smaller forces to
>take out a multiple invasion of smaller fleets. Your Dreadnought can't do
>that.
Which suggests a thread that has probably appeared and gone while I
wasn't looking: don't small ships seem generally more cost effective
than their larger brethren? The only reasons I've found to use large ships
are 1) To use nifty newly-developed weapons that can't be crammed into
a smaller vessel (ditto specials, like colony bases) at all, and
2) When already likely to be at an advantage in combat, large vessels,
especially when equipped with repair systems, to avoid having
to take any damage at all while squashing weaker fleets.
(But these tend to be be *completely* destroyed faster than
a similiarly priced small fleet, and dish out less firepower.)
I would have thought, but have not found particularly evident, that
3) Larger ships allow umpteen weapons to "share" support systems
like computers, ECM, specials, instead of buying a whole
set for each 1-gun small hull.
(Unfortunately, the extra size these systems take up in larger
hulls seems to pretty much balance out any such advantage.)
Add in the free defense bonus of smaller ships, and you begin to wonder...
For MOO II, how about having arbitrary-size hulls? You don't even need
to include an inherent price for prototyping and such, if you keep in
the (rather artificial) 6-design limit.
Mitch
Otmar Saeume Schlunk
>Which suggests a thread that has probably appeared and gone while I
>wasn't looking: don't small ships seem generally more cost effective
>than their larger brethren?
I think completely the opposite. A Huge ship can generally carry
as much fire power or more than the equivalent cost of smaller ships.
The big advantage comes in though, in that a huge ship can take out
a large number of enemy ships without sustaining any permanent
damage. Once a small ship is gone -- it's gone -- and unless you're
facing a fleet you can take out in one hit, you will lose ships
if you have small ones. Another big disadvantage of small ships
is that they can't really use automatic repair -- but Huge ones
can -- so they can regenerate in battle -- a huge plus since this
means you can take out enemy planets with incredibly small fleets....
I think small fleets can, however, be used effectively to draw attention
away from your huge ones -- making your huge ships even more powerful...
Hey, but if small ships work for you -- go with it....
Ots
Aaron Mandelbaum
>gun...@netcom.com (Mitch Gunzler) writes:
>>Which suggests a thread that has probably appeared and gone while I
>>wasn't looking: don't small ships seem generally more cost effective
>>than their larger brethren?
> I think completely the opposite. A Huge ship can generally carry
>as much fire power or more than the equivalent cost of smaller ships.
Buzzzzz! Nope. Small ships have the best damage-to-cost ratio. Huge ships
have the best HP-to-cost ratio. Theoretically :) an equal cost of huge should
mutual with an equal cost of small if fire was simultaneous, which it can't
be :(. I'm not sure if the ratios work out, though.
It also depends heavily on what kind of weapons you use. Non-streaming tend
to be less effective against fighters because one shot only kills one
fighter, but ions streams and pulsars wipe out stacks based on max HP/ship,
so fighters are toast.
--
Aaron
Roy Lee
, neutronium bomb, best of all computer,shield..., inertial nullifier, or
teleporter is they don't have interdictors. A big stack of these puppies
can take out three stacks of their ship and toast a planet before they
even move.
Along with that I usually build a huge with high enery focus and 4 banks
of stellar converters. I like to park them in the middle of the battle
and watch them take out ships from 6 spaces away.
James Dusek
Mandelbaum) wrote:
> Buzzzzz! Nope. Small ships have the best damage-to-cost ratio. Huge ships
> have the best HP-to-cost ratio. Theoretically :) an equal cost of huge should
> mutual with an equal cost of small if fire was simultaneous, which it can't
> be :(. I'm not sure if the ratios work out, though.
Depends on the tec ratio. Huge ships with big shields will have a better
damage to cost ratio than the small ship, because the small ships shooting
at it will have their damage reduced.
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| James Dusek | ______ ------ _____ |
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James Dusek
Gunzler) wrote:
> wasn't looking: don't small ships seem generally more cost effective
> than their larger brethren? The only reasons I've found to use large ships
I've mowed through a 1000 small ships with ONE huge ship.
> are 1) To use nifty newly-developed weapons that can't be crammed into
> a smaller vessel (ditto specials, like colony bases) at all, and
to use LOTS of nifty weapons.
> 2) When already likely to be at an advantage in combat, large vessels,
> especially when equipped with repair systems, to avoid having
> to take any damage at all while squashing weaker fleets.
Bingo, using a reapir system on a large ship, makes it more effective
than an equal value of smaller ships. Large scatter packs are also
effictive.
> 3) Larger ships allow umpteen weapons to "share" support systems
> like computers, ECM, specials, instead of buying a whole
> set for each 1-gun small hull.
Yup, throw on big computers, shields, ecm, and a repair system and
there you go, off stomping thousands of little ships.
> Add in the free defense bonus of smaller ships, and you begin to wonder...
can be negated by useing big shields on a large ships, and having a
big ecm system.
Chris Byler
: My favorite ship to build near the end of a game is a small with pulsar
Personally I like to build smalls with mauler devices. But to do that you have
to pretty much max your tech, especially level 99 weapon tech. Advanced * tech
really does do something - it raises your level, contributing to
miniaturization. Even adv. planetology will miniaturize your colony bases...
Of course if you have that much tech you can build a large with about 20 death
rays, 40 mauler devices, 40 plasma torps, and 50 scatter pack Xs. Those are
pretty nasty... :) Especially with class XV shields, ADC, and inertial
nullifiers.
Going back to the realm of realism: I discovered an interesting missile tactic
the other day. Build a whole bunch of ships with missiles and not much else,
and a few beam-armed ships. As soon as you enter combat, fire all your
missiles, then have your missile boats retreat. If you don't have the beam
ships, combat will end and your missile hits will not be resolved; with them,
even though they will probably get wasted, your missile boats will be intact
and your missile shots will waste the enemies (assuming they don't have zyro
shields or anything like that.)
Does anybody know how to avoid skipping soil enrichment? I keep getting
advanced soil enrichment w/o the first one, which causes bugs. (I realize this
is a little off-topic, but it would really help to actually be able to get
gaias, instead of just wishing I could.) Or how to avoid missing certain
techs, in general? I had a game once where I missed ALL the drive techs until
I finally got impulse... By that time I had been pretty severely weakened.
(Of course, two turns later I stole sublight from the Psilons.)
Chris Byler