Neutron Bomb

[CW]

Since I don't trust my AI admiral with planetary napalms, I'm looking for a way to kill off the militias on a homeworld without resorting to plague bombs (which take time). Does anybody know how to calculate how much of the population a neutron bomb kills? What happens if you kill of the whole population? Is the planet counted as destroyed or as an empty colony?

[Suicide Junkie]

Oops ignore the italics, then. The rest actually applies to the question.
Ahh, planetary napalm.

Napalm will do generic damage, burning buildings, platforms and everything, leaving a cinder of a planet which you will have to recolonize.

Neutron bombs will irratiate the people, and leave buildings intact.
Since the buildings are still there, you can drop a single troop to take control, and then land 1M people to activate the planet's industry.

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[This message has been edited by suicide_junkie (edited 10 August 2001).]

[geoschmo]

Laf. Methinks SJ misread your question, no?

Anyway, according to the components.txt file the Neutron Bomb I does 40 damage per shot. According to the settings.txt file it takes 10 damage to kill 1 unit (1 Million) of population, so each bomb kills 4 million per shot. (Neutron bomb is treated as a direct fire weapon)

Assuming 5 combat turns to get in range of the planet, and assuming every shot lands (Since the target is a planet, this will be very close to true) then you'l get 25 turns of actual firing on the planet. Neutron Bomb I has a reload rate of 2 so that's 12 shots per combat round. So each Bomb in your fleet should kill 48 million people per round of combat.

90 Neutron Bombs spread through your fleet, would wipe out a fully loaded medium sized planet in one combat round. That's assuming they have no defenses that would prevent your ships from staying close enough to land a shot every other turn.

That's a lot of neutron Bombs, but they only take 20Kt so you can get several on a ship. Also since they are direct fire weapons, so you can use weapon mounts on larger ships. Can be quite devastating on a larger ship with mounts since damage per shot goes up considerably.

Geo

[geoschmo]

Now that I have wowed you all with my statistical abilities, let me say I have never actually used the Neutron Bomb in combat. The idea of eradicating the planets population leads me to one question.

What happens with the weapon platforms after you destroy the population. I know resource production stops, but will the weapons platforms still attack ships in orbit? And will they defend the planet when you land troops? If so you may need more than just one troop to take the planet once you exterminate the population.

Geo

[Urendi Maleldil]

If you can conquer a planet with troops, you gain control of any units on that planet that weren't destroyed in combat. This includes weapon platforms.

[geoschmo]

Every time I have landed troops on a planet with units (WP's, troops, mines) the defending units are destroyed in the attack. You have seen something different?

Geo