Troops are useless

[GuyOfDoom]

It came up in a recent game of mine. SEV v1.33 w/ BM 1.03a

Basicly it was discoverd that if you load fighters into a cargo bay you can drop them off on a planet like troops and you can capture the planet.

I had weapons platforms, but they appearred to do nothing, which I assume is a seperate bug.

The question is this: Why if fighters can do space AND ground combat would you EVER build troops?

[PvK]

Because if no one has balanced them yet , someone should give troop components some advantages over fighter components. Like, fighters probably should require some propulsion which would make them much faster than troops, but more expensive, and troops should probably be able to more economically mount more equipment, since they can use the ground to hold them up... etc.

[Arkcon]

And a decent ground only weapon for weapon platforms would be nice. Something that would make you want to give up tonnage that could be firing into space instead. Sort of a mixed bag of troops, fighters, weapon platforms, militia all mixing it up on ground combat.

[se5a]

I don't think fighters give happiness.

[Suicide Junkie]

Why not make troops able to pile on heavy armor, while fighters can't afford the weight.

[Q]

Or make fighter weapons unable to target troops.

[RCCCL]

Q said:
Or make fighter weapons unable to target troops.

That would push the advantage to far in the other direction, especially since the AI tends to keep a number of fighters in cargo, which are then used in ground combat.

Someone might try creating an AntiAircraft weapon, ie: only targets fighters, with higher damage.

I don't know if it will work though, because I think in ground combat the targeting is a little off. Weaponplatforms will often have DUCs or Laser weapons that should target fighters, but only their point defense weapons fire during ground combat.

[Phoenix-D]

That's because ground combat gets a separate damage line, and space-based DUCs can't fire during ground combat.

[RCCCL]

I see, so a AA type weapon for troops should work.

[GuyOfDoom]

A point worth noting is that the Weapon's Platforms listed above were equipped with 2x Point Defense Cannons Lvl 4 and 2x Anti-Proton Beams lvl 2.

I think it should be changed such that fighters are only good for space combat or at least are incapable of planet capture without troops.