Fleets and Fortress Worlds: advice?

[Proteus_MST]

Now the PD-Bug is fixed (most of the times).

But maybe you have noticed that it is still dangerous to attack Fortress worlds, especially if there is a large enemy fleet around.
I´ve found a nice tactic to invade them with minimized danger for your forces (it let me [Psilons] destroy the Defenses of the Tachidi Homeworld with all possible Bases on the Planet, 9 Orbitals around the Planet and 2 Moons and a large Defensive Fleet with 180 Ships [Techlevel maybe 40, with Shields around Level VII] and everything with just 111 ships on my side [97 from my own People [Techlevel ~48 and Demper Fields] and 14 from the Cynoid [with much lower Tech]]).

I just assembled my fleet at one point, near the Starting Position (so far away from the Planet that no enemy Units could spot me (as I had enough ECM-Devices and the ships [i.e. my Psilon Ships, but not the Cynoid] were equipped with advanced Cloaking Devices] it was no Problem not to be seen ). I assembled all the fleets as close as possible (so they could give each other PD-Support).
Then I told one Carrier Group (one of the Cynoids with just one Carrier) to launch their Fighters against the Planet (as I said, only one).
As the Fighters are on their way to the Planet they are normally attacked by both, the enemy Fleets and of course the enemy Fighters/Missiles.
The Trick is that every fleet which directly attacks the Fighters becomes visible for your Fleet and you are able to launch all of the other Fighters and Missiles against the nearest enemy Fleet (I found out that the Fleet pose normally much more danger than the far distant planet or the Orbitals ).
But after you launched the Missiles / Fighters at the nearest Fleet don´t forget to draw your Fleets again close together, as the enemy now also can see at least some of your ships and at once will begin to launch its own Missiles and Fighters against your Fleets.
Now I normally wait patiently with all Ships drawn cloe together, till the last Missiles of the ernemy have been launched (the enemy always repeats launching missiles at you, till all of his Racks are empty (he normally has up to 5 volleys).
As your Ships ar5e so close together, the Fields of Fire of your PD-Weapons overlap and you maximize your chances to shoot down all or at least most enemy Missiles/Fighters before they hit you.
And yes, even if the enemy has fleets nearby which start attacking me with their Beam Weapons I let my Fleets stay close together until the last enemy Volley of Missiles has been fired (Missiles are much more dangerous than the enemy Beam Weapons can be, especially if you already have High-Tech Units )
Now, after all enemy IF-Ships are empty, I start a Counterattack which normally leaves very few enemy survivors
(Or not even one, as was the Case with the Tachidi-Homeworld, where the enemy Carriers and IF-Fleets foolishly didn´t flee after I had destroyed all their LR and SR-Fleets but instead hoped to evade my attentiuon and keep me busy by launching Fighters at me.
As I discovered them they had no more chance to flee )

[Stormhound]

Generally, if the defending force is a significant enough threat I will attempt to Blockade or Intercept, so that the enemy ships don't get any extra backup from planets or orbitals. Sometimes they fall for it, sometimes they don't...but when they do, I can often take out enough of their fleet to leave the worlds themselves easier pickings.

[WhiteCrow]

Here is my tactic. This takes more turn but is no-brainer.

1. Build hundreds of big missile ships. (mark all other combat ships obsolete to force AI to build them) Use the largest hull size you have and missiles with most damage. (only 1 shot per rack)

2. Form bombing raid group with 10 squad. of such ships (just 40 ships total) and send them target system.

3. hit end turn

4. pick any planet (prefferably weak or no planet defense) on the system and select 'watch - assault planet'

5. batlle begins, your group unloads all missiles automatically (to the planet), you hit general retreat (unless very little resistance is expected)

6. your missiles hit target and bleed them. your fleet escapes with near zero loss. If the enemy is totally eliminated, hit escape key to end battle before your fleets retreat.

7. go to step 2. You may need to Build more than one raid group to bomb the system each turn.

First raiding waves are boring because the enemy empire has a lot of defending ships. (more ship, more defensive fire, less enemy loss). But usually the enemy empire cannot sustain that constant loss and and the line of defense will collapses. After that, you'll find the raid become much easier and you can sweep more systems quickly. The raiding campaign effectively drain their reserve ship pool!


Problem: Fleets purely consisted of IF ship do very poor in bombing planet. (I don't know why) So the raiding groups cannot eliminate industry in target planet well (so they'll rebuild defensive structure fast)

My solution was sending a fleet of LR/SR armadas specialized in destroying defenseless planet. It worked but, for logistics sake, I want to minimize ship class types in the field.

I'll try to add a few heavy beam weapons on my IF ship and see what happens.

[WhiteCrow]

Ah, and these missile ships never have to move in the battle field, so sacrifice system engine to, like 100Gm/s, put more volleys on the ship. :-)