newby's guide to ship and fleet strategy

[dumbluck]

quote:

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Originally posted by PvK:
I meant PDC are weapons for purposes of AI maneuver. I am confident that I have seen PDC-only ships retreat while valid PDC targets were absent, and then advance as soon as valid PDC targets were launched by the enemy. You're right about them not being eligible for main weapon mounts.

PvK

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You may be right about that. Without valid targets, the PD cruisers would default to "don't get hurt". I guess I never paid attention to whether they tried to come out of their corners for a turn whilst my front line ships got pounded by the missles that the PD cruisers were out of range of (because they ran for the corners).

And that is the crux of the problem. Unless your enemy has either fighters or some of the upper-upper-tier missle tech weapons, there aren't going to be any valid PDC targets on turn 1. Or turn 2, or 3, or 4, or 5, or 6. And by that time, your PD cruiser is hiding in a corner where it will do your front line ships absolutely no good.

I will have to test that in a game sometime. If I set the strategy for weaponless ships to hold formation, and the PD cruisers break formation anyway, we will know that PDC are considered weapons. If they hold formation, then they aren't weapons. The concensus of the forums till now has been that PDC aren't weapons, but you have brought up an interesting point.

[ 26 February 2002: Message edited by: dumbluck ]