Are Needlejets worthless or neccessary...

[Flubber]

Originally posted by Commy

Apparently, when a needlejet looses health, its range is affected...so a badly damaged needlejet way out in the field may not be able to come home...

Weird I have NEVER seen this. If my needle is 95% damaged it still makes it home even if it attacked at maximum range

[Dis]

Originally posted by Chaos Theory
Why do you have clean reactors on chaos/tachyon units? You'll never recoup the cost unless you like obsolete units.

I update the units . I don't like all my production being tied up in military units. But I know I need a large number of military units or the ai will beat me up.

[Dis]

Originally posted by Flubber


Weird I have NEVER seen this. If my needle is 95% damaged it still makes it home even if it attacked at maximum range

I've never seen it either. I think he's got it backwards. Copters range does decrease with damage.

[Chaos Theory]

Originally posted by Dissident
I update the units . I don't like all my production being tied up in military units. But I know I need a large number of military units or the ai will beat me up.

The thing is, when you upgrade a unit (presumably to another clean unit), you pay for the clean reactor again. If it cost you 2 mineral rows to put it on a chaos needlejet, and it costs you 3 mineral rows to put it on a shard needlejet, your upgrade costs 30 more energy than an upgrade to a non-clean shard needlejet, whether you're upgrading a clean chaos needlejet or an ordinary chaos needlejet. Therefore, unless you keep your planes alive and unupgraded for a few decades (more as planes cost more), you don't recoup your expenses. When you factor interest, you lose even more. Thus, unless you like obsolete units, you come out behind when giving most needlejets clean.

Of course, if your cities are producing enough minerals to build both the clean and non-clean version in a single turn, the extra cost is reduced to zero, but if you can make a best-1-needle-best unit in a single turn, you don't need to worry about support either.

[Sikander]

Against the AI I usually build clean interceptors, as the AI rarely kills them.

[BlackCat]

Originally posted by Dissident


I've never seen it either. I think he's got it backwards. Copters range does decrease with damage.

Just tried damaging copters and gravships to 80 % damage and they don't get any decrease in range, so I guess you both have got it wrong .

[livid imp]

Originally posted by Commy
Apparently, when a needlejet looses health, its range is affected...so a badly damaged needlejet way out in the field may not be able to come home...

I can confirm this. It has only happened to me a few times, so I am not sure if it is a bug or not. I have had jets running patrols straight out n back, nothing fancy. The jet runs into a ship at sea around the jet's max range, I attack said ship and attempt to go back to base next round. On my way back I run out of fuel a tile or two before the base. Nothing blocked my path coming home, I didn't move through any extra tiles. The only thing I did different was attack. Afterwards I counted back the tiles to confirm I should have had the move points to get back. It is like I lose a move point or two. I can't seem to recreate the situation, but it has happen to me 3 or 4 times. Stupidly, I never thought to try to reload the turn to see what happened. If it happeneds again, I plan on doing just that.

Originally posted by Commy
On thing that I haven't tried yet is if copters can be attacked by non-sam units when they make "emergency landings"

Yes, they can. I had the AI do it to me just the other day. Strangely enough, this is the first time I had noticed this.

[Flubber]

Originally posted by livid imp



Yes, they can. I had the AI do it to me just the other day. Strangely enough, this is the first time I had noticed this.

Sure a copter is a ground unit when it faces a counterattack in the sense that the simplest rover can attack it

So one strategy is to have a needle/or interceptor provide air cover. It will still get killed if the opponet has SAM ground units to take out the air cover


As I have said many many times, there is no unit or combination of units in SMAC/X that has even a 50% chance of surving when in the open against opponents of similar tech. You can envision any stack of units you want and the attcker would have a cheaper stack that can kill it

[Chaos Theory]

There is a short, but major exception to this: very early in the game. Hand weapons against no armor, lasers against synthmetal, and even impact weapons against plasma steel are all matchups that can be won by the defender in the open. Early wars can be over by this point.

[Dis]

Originally posted by Chaos Theory


The thing is, when you upgrade a unit (presumably to another clean unit), you pay for the clean reactor again. If it cost you 2 mineral rows to put it on a chaos needlejet, and it costs you 3 mineral rows to put it on a shard needlejet, your upgrade costs 30 more energy than an upgrade to a non-clean shard needlejet, whether you're upgrading a clean chaos needlejet or an ordinary chaos needlejet. Therefore, unless you keep your planes alive and unupgraded for a few decades (more as planes cost more), you don't recoup your expenses. When you factor interest, you lose even more. Thus, unless you like obsolete units, you come out behind when giving most needlejets clean.

Of course, if your cities are producing enough minerals to build both the clean and non-clean version in a single turn, the extra cost is reduced to zero, but if you can make a best-1-needle-best unit in a single turn, you don't need to worry about support either.

many of my units are for defensive purposes. I rarely use them until the last 1/3 of the game.

Yes even this last game I was using chaos and tachyon in the last 1/3 of the game. After I eliminated the believers from my continent, I started getting tech advances like every 2 turns, and then ever 1 turn. And before I knew it, I built the ascent to transcendence.

[Flubber]

Originally posted by Chaos Theory
There is a short, but major exception to this: very early in the game. Hand weapons against no armor, lasers against synthmetal, and even impact weapons against plasma steel are all matchups that can be won by the defender in the open. Early wars can be over by this point.

I agree -- The attacker advantage is negated somewhat in the early game since the attacker doesn't have the wide variety of attacking options that come with later tech discoveries

But this window can be very short given that impact can be gotten very very quickly. As for plasma defenders, they only come one tech before missile attackers so I generall see the 6 versus 3 matchup. Besides a plasma on a rocky has defnse of 4.5 versus an impact rover with an attack of 5 in the open . .. . still slightly losing odds

And during this time, unless you add trance, any of these units will have losing odds against a worm ( assuming equivalent morale/lifecycle)

Generally though the best survivability a ground unit in the open has is in the early game. Later when everyone has air units and arty and possible natives with a Planet attack bonus . . . Plus throw in the self destruct tactic if a defender stacks too much stuff

I actually like that early part of the game since a good road to allw you to control some key rocky squares can br the key to defeating a enemy with superior numbers

[Flubber]

Originally posted by Dissident


many of my units are for defensive purposes. I rarely use them until the last 1/3 of the game.

Yes even this last game I was using chaos and tachyon in the last 1/3 of the game. After I eliminated the believers from my continent, I started getting tech advances like every 2 turns, and then ever 1 turn. And before I knew it, I built the ascent to transcendence.

Do you mean they are garrisons since I often do a police/clean combo there.

I guess we play differently since I don't have many units sitting around. My preference is to build military only when I need it. Against the AI, the few mobile units I keep around for worm defense are sufficient until I can crank out more.

Offensive units almostimmediately go on the offense and in an attack I am quite willing to see them die since more are on the way

Usually I don't mind the earlier units disappearing if they are poorer morale ones anyway

[Commy]

True, defense usually has an advantage, but since you never know what the offense will be, no single plan will save you...

I had a game with at least 250 clean reactor units dispersed among about 30 bases...almost all of them gravships...and yet, against all odds, I lost almost 10 bases to native life...hypnotic trance, missiles, empath song, even planet busters...they just can't stand up to hundreds of mindworms every other turn...

[Dis]

how did you manage to get mindworms every other turn?

and by defense, I wasn't specifically referring to garrisons (though they are clean too once the tech become available and I get the cash to upgrade). My best defense is a good offense.

I know this game is not like civ3 (you have to maintain a good size military or the AI will "sense" it and attack you). But I find I will lose bases if I rely on defensive units only. I can't instantaneously or even in a couple of turns, produce about 10 offensive units. Unless I keep a hefty amount of energy lying around which I don't.

[Zoetrope]

When I was inexperienced, Lal's interloping trops got on my nerves, so I set gas on theirs ... repeatedly. Outcome: rapidly drowning planet, and massive worm riots galore! After losing my best bases to about 30 worms and locusts each per turn, that was one game I quit.

Fungus in late game produces enormous amounts of minerals per square, and the ecodamage causes it to expand, quickly worsening the problem.

BUT worm stacks "flower" only when fungus grows, and fungus can't grow where it already is, so when fungus becomes more productive than farms and mines, I pave my entire territory with fungus so it has nowhere to grow but outward (toward my foes, heh heh).

Then I breed worms and locusts by the hundred to cover my land and keep any stray natives off.

Occasionally a fungal tower will rear its ugly head; then I move my units away and give the menace a blast of psicosphate (or whatever it is that high morale empath units use as a psychotoxic chemical additive : ).

Now I can generate hundreds of points of ecodamage at every base every turn with no ill-effects (to me ).