ship design, basic questions

[lord of the mark]

Ok first question.

It seems like its desirable to have ships specialize in missiles OR beams OR etc. So that you can leverage the systems that are specific to them (IE a beam ship with extras that help beams, a missile ship with extras for missiles, etc) Is this correct?

[vmxa1]

I guess you could say that. To me it is not even about specialized ships or specials for ships.

It is simply I will make missile ships first, if I need them. Not at all if I do not need them before I get to the point that I can make a decent BB.

So in a rare case I may make a missile BB, but normally it will be a beamer. The rare case that comes to mind is if I am playing as a feudal tele and go on a blitz (why else be one). I won't be researching at all, so I am stuck with missiles.

I am not sure what a special would be for missile ships, except a fast rack. By th etime I have fast racks, I am no longer making missile ships.

[vmxa1]

Oh I forgot Dautless. I don't count EMG as a special. I won't have Dautless, unless creative.

[lord of the mark]

so its usually all missile ships, till you get high enough beam tech, then switch to beams, and add supporting specials for beams.

Is it based on a the beam tech, or on sufficient production capacity to switch from CA's to BB's? If the former, at what tech do you make the switch? Phasors?

[vmxa1]

Remember in some cases, I will not even make any missile ships. If I am isolated or doing a turtle game, I can wait for beamers.

In my current game, I started making CA missile ships after threats occurred. Once I got to where I could make BB in less than 20 turns, I started making them.

They were not going to be very good even with mods for mass drivers as I had crappy comps. I just wanted the tonnage to scare the AI, until I could get better stuff.

Later I refit them. In this game, no waiting for phasors, but I had a lot of spies on the humans and got comps and most everything they had. Now the ships are solid.

[Tiemler]

I build missle frigates as scouts. No nasty surprises awaiting my colony ships, and I find any nearby wormholes or lush paradises quickly. Later, I either use them as backup for my beamers on the offense or refit them for use against space eels or other nasties guarding awesome planets.

If they aren't needed as cannon fodder, I'll use them to continue scouting after first contact. It's remarkable how many players stop colonizing at this point, and that's a mistake.

Also, long after they've become obsolete, they can still blockade.

[lord of the mark]

Originally posted by vmxa1
Remember in some cases, I will not even make any missile ships. If I am isolated or doing a turtle game, I can wait for beamers.

In my current game, I started making CA missile ships after threats occurred. Once I got to where I could make BB in less than 20 turns, I started making them.

But did you build the BBs with pre-phasor beams, or with missiles?

So far, I have found early missile cruisers useful for taking out space monsters.

[vmxa1]

I think they were mass drivers and then later I got phasors. In fact I recall the ones with MD's did more damage at first as they had all the mods.

I almost never take on space monsters with cruisers. This is because at impossible I fear that I will not be able to hold the planet. So it comes down to what is around me at the time.

I will nearly always wait to get a BB first. One exception is if I have no one real close and I have no other planets I can get.

The problem for me is that I will not have fighter garrisons or missile bases, or even battle stations. So holding planets early is not easy, if any attacks come. Even a blockade will often be painful, forcing me to put so many pop on food. Worse if I cannot feed the planet.

[Garth Vader]

Unlike many here I like building both cruisers and early beamers.

My basic cruiser which I can build once I get battle pods, battle scanner, and class 1 shield is:

2 HV AF, AP, CO lasers
4 Pd AF, CO lasers

battle pods, battle scanner, reinforced hull (I take heavy armor instead if I have been able to trade for it). I like to build them with tritanium if I can get it, but that depends on if I need deut cells, or if I can trade for one of them.

I try to get up to planetary gravity generator fairly quickly because then you can have 5 of the heavy lasers on this ship.

I started building these because I often play telepathic and cruisers are the smallest ships you can mind control with. If an AI doesn't have ground based planetary defences you can take them over with a couple of these. I have often won games on huge galaxies with only lasers (in fact I just finished a game like that last night).

I also like cruisers for defence, because you can have more of them and they will still be able to take out a couple of battleships.

[vmxa1]

A tele is the main exception to ship selection for me. You want to get out asap with at least a cruiser to capture the nearest race.

Otherwise, I will do as I do in Civ3, delay troops (ships in Moo) as long as I can, until I must. I do this on the belief that poring production into ships that will not be doing anything is slowing down my progress.

At the early stage, the SB can be the only defense needed. Once contact is made, I will reevaluate the usefullness of ships, if I do not have them already.

As a non tele, I am not going to be taking down planets with a cruiser and I will not have any transports, so why build cruisers.

[Garth Vader]

As a non tele I will often take down planets with cruisers if there is a ripe target, or somebody who is attacking me. Then I just build the transports for conquest.

[Aabraxan]

Originally posted by vmxa1
Oh I forgot Dautless. I don't count EMG as a special. I won't have Dautless, unless creative.

If Dauntless is the device I think it is (intelligentes leitsystem = retargets rockets to next foe if target is destroyed), I find Dauntless to be something of a double-edged sword. I frequently continue to pack a few rockets into my ships if my opponent has radiation shields and I don't have disruptors yet. While the Dauntless is great for ship-to-ship, if that last enemy ship or sb is destroyed with too many rockets still on the loose, all rockets immediately target the planet. Can devastate a planet's pop. Admittedly, this isn't usually a problem unless I'm fielding a relatively large fleet, or if the planet's pop is pretty small.

[MORON]

I use beamers or missiles depending what I techs I have.

When playing with warlord, usually I go supercomp -> Zort/Robo and rely on missiles and the uber power of Armor to win my battles, as early beamers don't do enough damage. I usually rely on missile destroyers with an pinch of cruisers and grow into missiles bbs and orion killing EMG missile ships.

Without warlord, I have to tech all the communication stuff for command points and grab energy weapons along the way. If I have good comp (creative or trade) I can get beamers before phasers, but normally the need for chemistry to clean up robo pollution and armor and that pure swarms works better than mixed beam/missile ships means I don't.

I think that small missile ships gives the most bang for the buck (damage/cost) until phasers and that is most important for starbase/battlestation cracking. Early beams can't hit/kill the small ships before they retreat....

besides, an whole screen of 200+ missiles looks kinda cool. With dauntless (usually stolen), an missile fleet will not lose against an beamer fleet (especially with warp dispator-defense bounse-stacked frigs dodging beams) until the specials and mods starts stacking.

If I have an significant missile fleet, perhaps due to tele rush + robo, I'll might keep the missiles in one task force until I'm ready to refit all of them. While late game beams might kill most of my ships one turn one, once the missiles hits, they'd be hurting too. As far as I know, no battlestation/ground battary/starfort combo can stop an broadside from 4+ missile BBs at the same tech level.