Size Does Matter

cascalonginus · #1 May 6th, 2002, 02:10 AM

After some months have finally gotten familiar enough with the ins n outs of SE4. While I am still on v1.49 with the TDM modpack, I suspect there is more that similar than not with the Gold release.

One game I have been running through (single-player) does suggest a certain ideas to be explored. Size of attacking fleet vs vessel size. In the first case, more ships invariably prevail regardless of tech differences of the smaller opponents. As your tech level/ship size progresses, economics ends up effectively capping the number and size of your fleet. This "economic truth" mimics MOO2, etc. I tend to find tho that the AI has no such limitations. I was forced to shut warp points to avoid get swarmed by 30-40-50 ship BC fleets.

At this point, I am struggling to build up my resources to maintain a necessary fleet strength and go back on the offensive.

One big MOO2 tactic was to build a large fleet of small vessels (FFG's, DD's, CL's) and swarm the opponents. The AI has used this with some success. Also is it me or are fighters mostly ineffective (given the eefectiveness of PD)?

Any comments & pointers would be most appreciated.

Suicide Junkie · #2 May 6th, 2002, 02:35 AM

quote:
One big MOO2 tactic was to build a large fleet of small vessels (FFG's, DD's, CL's) and swarm the opponents. The AI has used this with some success. Also is it me or are fighters mostly ineffective (given the eefectiveness of PD)?

The smaller ships do provide some nice defensive bonuses, and can tip the balance.

The biggest advantage of fighters is their lack of maintenance. You can build up huge stockpiles during peacetime, with minimal impact on your budget.
One thing you really need on fighters is shields. At 60 hp / 4kt they are amazingly effective.

Krsqk · #3 May 6th, 2002, 02:46 AM

quote:
Size of attacking fleet vs vessel size. In the first case, more ships invariably prevail regardless of tech differences of the smaller opponents.

If two fleets have equal tech, the larger one will usually win in strategic combat. There are always exceptions; you still have at least a 1% chance to hit and a 1% chance to miss, and enough hits/misses against the odds could happen to alter a battle. In tactical combat against the AI, anything can happen (see SJ's war story about a single dreadnought defeating nine opponents, although with major damage).

quote:
As your tech level/ship size progresses, economics ends up effectively capping the number and size of your fleet.

There is a limit to the number of ships you can support, but this can be greatly stretched. Some ways include:
1) Organic race--ships use more organics and less mineral resources than usual. Since the shortage tends to be in minerals, you can keep more ships fielded at once.
2) Maintenance reduction race characteristic--points spent here directly affect the maintenance cost of your ships.
3) Crystalline race--this trait has a facility which reduces maintenance on all ships in a system.
4) Units/Carriers--units are maintenance-free, and are excellent for warp point defense, where they get to fire first before enemy PD can take them out. Fighters, used en masse or alongside heavy missile fire, can overwhelm PD and extend the firepower of your fleet.

quote:
I tend to find tho that the AI has no such limitations. I was forced to shut warp points to avoid get swarmed by 30-40-50 ship BC fleets.

Did you set the AI to receive a bonus? That can multiply their available resources by up to 5x. Also, many AIs (the TDM races in particular, along with several other excellent AIs) are much more intelligent and aggressive in their ship building and fleet usage.

quote:
At this point, I am struggling to build up my resources to maintain a necessary fleet strength and go back on the offensive.

See above for maintenance reduction. Also, mothball any ships you don't need for defense or construction. Don't worry about infrastructure facilities; concentrate on mineral miners and ship yards.

quote:
One big MOO2 tactic was to build a large fleet of small vessels (FFG's, DD's, CL's) and swarm the opponents. The AI has used this with some success.

This can be a devastating technique, especially against an opponent with no/low levels of Mx tracking. It doesn't matter if one of his ships can blow one of yours out of the water with a single shot if he can't target more than one ship per turn. Meanwhile, you can fire to your heart's content. If an opponent uses this tactic against you, multiplex tracking is a must to research (Combat Support).

quote:
Also is it me or are fighters mostly ineffective (given the eefectiveness of PD)?

There has been much discussion as to whether PD is too strong. I believe the Proportions mod by PvK and Pirates&Nomads by SuicideJunkie have made changes to help this. One fix might be to lower the 70% to-hit bonus of PD. You could also increase the size (one PD=20kt; one CSM=50kt) or fire rate of PD, or make separate forms of PD which can only target missiles or fighters.

quote:
Any comments & pointers would be most appreciated.

Hope this helps.

Derek · #4 May 6th, 2002, 02:59 AM

quote:

There has been much discussion as to whether PD is too strong. I believe the Proportions mod by PvK and Pirates&Nomads by SuicideJunkie have made changes to help this. One fix might be to lower the 70% to-hit bonus of PD. You could also increase the size (one PD=20kt; one CSM=50kt) or fire rate of PD, or make separate forms of PD which can only target missiles or fighters.

My solution to Point Defense, which has been incorporated into the DevNull Mod (somewhat changed) is External Mount Capital Missiles.

These missiles are the same as the regular Capital Missiles, but they take 10 kt of hull space as opposed to 50 kT. However, they can only fire once per combat. They are mounted externally on the ship, and must be replaced outside of combat. They still take up some room (10kT) as the reloads must be stored somewhere.

Anyways, the point is to use them in one initial large barrage that will overload any normal point defense. Once this barrage is done, hopefully, the enemy ships will be wounded enough, or enough of them destroyed, that the reduced point defense capability is not large enough to handle a normal missile barrage.

This was shamelessly stolen by me from D. Weber's Starfire game system (which was, ironically, one of the inspirations for SEIV), and adopted into the Devnull Mod. Currently, I am working on a mod which takes the economic model of Proportions, many of the techs beyond the external mount missiles, and also Space Monsters from the Current Devnull mod, along with quasi Newtonian propulsion similiar to that of P&N, and a number of minor ideas stolen from many, many other mods.

Derek

cascalonginus · #5 May 6th, 2002, 04:24 AM

David Weber's Harrington series seems very relevant here as well. specifically the emphasis on size vs speed being inversely proportional. The allocation of weapons & weapons mixes is instructive there as well. It wouuld be interesting to see if one could mod weapons pods, etc.

DirectorTsaarx · #6 May 6th, 2002, 04:20 PM

quote:
Originally posted by Krsqk:
<snip>
There has been much discussion as to whether PD is too strong. I believe the Proportions mod by PvK and Pirates&Nomads by SuicideJunkie have made changes to help this. One fix might be to lower the 70% to-hit bonus of PD. You could also increase the size (one PD=20kt; one CSM=50kt) or fire rate of PD, or make separate forms of PD which can only target missiles or fighters.
<snip>

I like the idea of separate PD classes to defend against seekers & fighters. Should (can?) there be separate types of PD to target satellites & drones?

I guess the only problem would be getting the AI to use the new PD components effectively.

BTW - in my current game, I really discovered the usefulness of seekers (and point-defense); the Toltayans were my closest neighbor, and their ships really load up on seekers. It was a little disconcerting to see each ship launch 8-10 plasma torps at my fleet, especially since I hadn't gotten around to building my usual dedicated point-defense support ships. So, as usual, the answer to point defense is to launch more targets than the enemy can successfully hit...