Term 160-170

[Whoha]

I have no intention of disbanding ships, its a ploy :P

We have 7 right now, with 1 battle station and our original 5 points. we are 2 over with 2 battle ships and a scout.

When we get battlescanners we will have 8(which is another reason to have interspersed that with class 3 shields).

I want to wait until the colonies are fully populated before starting on a star base or battlestation, but if the Minister of Affairs and the people he is responsible to feel otherwise then the stations will be started.

[Gilgamensch]

It's mainly thrown in so that we can argue about. In the beginning of MoO2, I didn't really realise and was paying heavy money for my fleets

[Old n Slow]

If we want to go adventuring in the west, we may want some troop ships as well...

[Iasius]

I'd scrap the scout, if we want to use that hit and run tactic, we can always build a new one, they quite cheap and 10 BC a turn is quite a lot just to keep one scout.

[bakalov]

I'd like we to play in a more offensive manner :-) Do we hate the aliens, or not? Now the bears and the rocks are at war and this is the proper time to hit them ..... We'll need some transports though. These rock colonies are very tempting, and we must have them at all costs !

[bakalov]

I have noticed another thing from the screenshots - our missile ship designs can be improved just by spreading the missiles along all of the slots. We'd better have 9 slots with 2 or 3 missiles each, than just two slots with many missiles in them ....

Here I'll post a good beam ship design for the time when we'll be able to build it. This is the first good beam ship available, and soon we'll be capable for building it:

5 Hv AF Mass Drivers - Spread them in many slots
10 Pd AF Mass Drivers - Spread them in many slots

Battle Pods
Havy Armor
Inertial Stabilizer
Battle Scanner

Class III shields and Positronic(?) Computers

5 empty space! - it adds some defence and must be left empty!

Another note: Imo our ships do not need both heavy armor and reinforced hulls. The reinforced hulls should be sacrificed for more weapons, and the heavy armor is the better special. Anyway if we lose our heavy armor it is time to run, because if the ship takes hull damage it opens the possibility for the ship being immobilized which is almost sure death, or directly destroyed.

[Old n Slow]

Do we even need the heavy armor? Won't class III shields be enough?

I often use 360 AF Mass Drivers & skip the Pd altogether. Maybe we should have a little mix for flexibility

[Gilgamensch]

360? What for?

It takes far more space (IIRC 50%). We better just use uni-directional.

I tend to run as soon as my shields are damaged to much, avoiding, as bakalov mentioned, the death through internal structure damage................

[bakalov]

If we have inertial stabilizers turning the ship becomes almost unexisting issue. The class III shields are not enough, because they only give a few HPs. The heavy armor is what actually absorbs the damage. Inertial stabilizer gives the opportunity to use the 4 shields of the ship for absorbing damage with the proper play (turning the unharmed shields towards the enemy).

Just try the design above. With the proper play with a race like ours may have a ship with such design at turn ~110, and one of these ships may conquer 2 alien races ALONE at that time ...

[Whoha]

inertial stablizers also add a crapload of beam defense, it is awesome. Why not reinforced hull though?

Wait for war until class 3 shields and refitted ships though?

Also i'm going to cast a vote for HV AP AF mass drivers, it adds about 8 space at this point in the game, but it is worth it generally.

Or alternatively, some HV AF and some HV AP AF, the HV AF for just shield busting, the HV AP AF for killing.

[Old n Slow]

Yes, I usually have a mix of HV AF and HV AP AF -- (with the 360, but now I'll try the PD as slot three). I try to end up with only a point or two left over, as exact count costs a speed unit.

[Whoha]

Paging Mr Pave...

[bakalov]

Reinforced hulls add HP that we are not willing to spend - if our ships are so damaged to start losing hull points, then it is time to run - either with reinforced hull or not. We'd better use the space for some more weapons. Anyway the Heavy armor, Class III and Inertial stabilizer seems to give the ships enough defence to survive lots of fire targeted on them.

I agree that AP may be partially useful, but only against ships / starbases. And from my experience it is not the ships or bases what is hard to kill - it is the planet defences, and more weapons help against them, while AP does not. If an alien race develops planetary shields then we'll need some bombs too.

[bakalov]

If we keep some missile ships they may care about the planetary defences though ..... Then some AP may be a good option. May be I've got used to conquer with a single ship, and that's why I'm a little against the AP.

[Gilgamensch]

AP is a nice feature. It just bypasses the enemy armor.