Frequently Asked Questions for Newbies

[Stone Mill]

Help me out here, fellas...

WEAPONS
2.4.4 Weapon Types / Classes
2.4.4.1 Seeking. Example: (Missiles, Crystalline Torpedo). Once launched, have a %100 hit probably unless intercepted by point defense, fighters, or some direct fire weapons.
2.4.4.2 Direct Fire. Example: (Anti Proton Beams, Normal Torpedoes). Must be fired within range determined by weapon type and mount. Offensive Bonus and Defensive Bonus variables affect the actual chance to hit.
2.4.4.3 Point Defense. Example: (Point defense I-V). Automatically fire at seekers or fighters when in weapon range.
2.4.4.4 Armor and Shield Skipping. Example: (Null Space, Engine Destroyers, Weapon Destroyers). Successful hits ignore enemy armor and shield components. Engine/Weapon Destroyers do damage to those components only.
2.4.4.5 Armor Skipping Example: (Boarding Parties, Security Stations, Crystalline Shard Cannons).
2.4.4.6 Shield Skipping. Example (Phased Polaron Beams). Successful hits ignore normal shield components. Phased Shields absorb Phased Polaron hits (Shields 6+ technology).

2.4.5 Targeting. In order for a weapon to fire at a particular target (satellites, ships, etc.), that target must be included in the Weapon Details "Targets" list.

[ August 15, 2002, 16:04: Message edited by: Stone Mill ]

[kalthalior]

2.4.4.4 Armor and Shield Skipping -- I think the patch was supposed to change the Engine Destroyers so that they did not skip shields, not sure if Weapon Destroyers were included in this change or not.
Haven't had a chance to play with the new patch yet to verify this took effect, Last night was bowling night -- my only obsession other than SE.

[capnq]

Help me out here, fellas...

Corrections:

2.4.4.1 Seeking. Example: (Missiles, Crystalline Torpedo). Once launched, have a 100% hit probability unless intercepted by point defense, or the target moves beyond the seekers' range.

[In the unmodded game, Point-Defense Cannons are the only weapon that targets seekers.]

2.4.4.3 Point Defense. Example: (Point-Defense Cannons I-V). Automatically fire at seekers, fighters, satellites, and drones when in weapon range.

[minipol]

it might be interesting to add a section on the most know mods and what they are focusing on. a lot of questions of that kind have come up. i can't help you much with this since i'm a newbie myself when it comes to mods.

[Elowan]

This may have been suggested before but I don't see it here.

Add a cargo pod to the Colony Ship design used to colonize your race's breathable planets. Then when you hit the "Colonize" button to send a ship off to a planet (whether you do it from the planets screen or main screen) extra pop will be loaded to give that colony a kick-start.

I use 3 colony ship designs:

CS-LR - long range (has a supply pod on it)
CS-SR - short range with cargo pod for breathable (green + planets)
CS-SR-nbr - short range, no cargo pod for non-breathable atmosphere planets (red + -- cheaper to build). I use these for storage planets so pop doesn't matter as much.

[Mylon]

Newbie question: What does racial experience mean? Does this somehow give the race an edge, does it carry over across different games (importing a pre-made race), or is it just an indication of how much a particular race is played?

[Taz-in-Space]

From what I heard on previous discussions, the racial experience has no effect on the game. Theory is that it is a feature that was never implemented.

[Quikngruvn]

Originally posted by DirectorTsaarx:
First, Quikngruvn, good work on most of your inputs. I only disagree on one point:

If your ship ends its movement over a planet with a resupply depot, the display will show you have full supplies MINUS one sector's worth of movement. I haven't tried moving one sector beyond the resupply depot, so I don't know if "touch and go" provides a workaround...

Thanks, Tsaarx. Are you doing your resupply with simultaneous or sequential turns? All I ever play is simultaneous, so there may be a difference.

Also, addendum to 2.4.2.02:
Well, I was about to list all the variables that could affect the chance to hit a direct-fire weapon, but that would make for a huge entry, so....

2.4.3 Chance to hit with direct-fire weapons
The chance that a direct-fire weapon will hit its target depends on the following factors:
2.4.3.1 Range: longer range is less chance to hit (-10% per square on the tactical map).
2.4.3.2 Racial bonuses: aggressiveness for the attacker, defensiveness for the target.
2.4.3.3 Cultural bonuses: the Space Combat bonus of both attacker (added) and target (subtracted).
2.4.3.4 Ship and fleet experience: experience of the attacker is added to the chance, experience of the defender is subtracted. Ship and fleet experience are cumulative (if the ship is in a fleet).
2.4.3.5 Inherent weapon to-hit bonuses: for example, the Wave-Motion Gun has a built-in +30% chance to hit.
2.4.3.6 Size of the target: smaller ships (light cruiser and smaller) are harder to hit.
2.4.3.7 Components: Combat sensors on the attacker increase the chance to hit; ECM, stealth armor, and scattering armor on the defender all decrease the chance.
2.4.3.8 Weapon mount: some mounts, such as weapon platform mounts, increase the chance to hit.
2.4.3.9 Caveats
2.4.3.9.1 If the attacking ship has a talisman, every direct-fire shot will hit, if in range.
2.4.3.9.2 Without a talisman, the highest adjusted chance to hit you can have is 99%.
2.4.3.9.3 The lowest adjusted chance to hit you can have is 1%.

I think that the base chance to hit is 100% before modifiers come into play, but someone should confirm this. I hope I remembered all the to-hit variables....

Quikngruvn

[Suicide Junkie]

The base to-hit is 100%, and is moddable in settings.txt.

However, the closest two ships can get without ramming each other is range 1, so that might make it effectively 90%

[tbontob]

This is getting huge

Thanx guys

Lots of "stuff" to think about.