Weak Ship Screens

[WKE235]

WKE 235,

 

That would be the ZB-22 Nova Inducer which while ridicously expensive in weird materials to build, will do the trick once and for all. But how to enslave the incinerated alien HW is a trick we've yet to figure out but it is something to ponder as we continue our quest for the Pocket Universe Creation technology.

 

Cloaks are not as uber as many think, pretty easy to quite early, well relatively speak, find a good detection technology vs cloaked ships.

 

Cheers

 

/Locklyn

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

 

Given how for every tech there seems to be an advanced defense, and given some exploration hits showing there are things such as planetary shields ... it may be there is a planetary shield that could protect against even stellar nova's (if such weapons exist). Just imagine, you blow up an entire star system, and the enemy sits on their HW and get nothing worse than a tan and a nice light show.

 

Actually, I remember a board game that was like this. In the later stages of this space conquest game, you could buy advanced techs like planetary shields. And the shields as laid out in the rules could not be penetrated by anything. No one was ever able to win the whole thing as eventually all the remaining players had shields on their last planets .. and that was it.

 

Oh well .. all I want to do is stick around long enough to build one lousy Dyson Sphere. Just one. I know that tech exists from exploration hits. Oh, and one ring world (so I have a complete set). Hmmm .. wonder if I can build a ring world inside a Dyson sphere.

[Locklyn]

The first levels of planetary shields only protect popgroups on the world vs enemy BOMBardment but perhaps in combination with the FSG tech path it will be possible. Also it may be that the higher levels of Stasis Field Generators combined with Stable Wormhole creation and perhaps of late Planetary Gates could provide a way for planetary defense, ie to shunt power/energy directed vs the planet "elsewhere". With the costs of SWs and PGs it sure should lead somewhere along that.

 

Cheers

 

/Locklyn

[Locklyn]

I had offered some suggestions for current designs for screen ships a la the GGT. Now after some deliberations with allies I decided to post some of my older ships, not that I don’t trust you fine gentlebeings but you know what I mean.

 

The designs shown here are all part of the Dremut Picket Line force. Dremut is a system which acts as waypoint for four of my allies but also borders an Empire whom my allies have yet to completely trust but whom I’ve been vouching for thus it fell to me to police the system in question, guaranteeing the safety of the others with my own ships. Not being a hotspot and not really anticipating any trouble with this Empire which is basically a nice guy, not many of my newer ships are in the system but rather a motley collection of ships from the corners of my Empire.

 

The system in question has 6 warp points leading INTO it, ie WPs which exit in the Dremyt system. One is controlled by Vietarmis forces, labeled Alpha. Two are from systems controlled by the potentially friendly Empire these we’ll Beta and Gamma. One is dead end leading into a colony system for the GGT which we’ll label delta. 2 are one way wps from allied empires which lead to this system. Since they both exit at the same WP and are from deep within friendly empire territory we’ll just ignore them for now.

 

Alphas exit size is 10, meaning that 10 ships can enter the Dremut system from Alpha system per round

 

Betas exit size is 30

 

Gammas exit size is 12

 

Deltas exit size is 13.

 

Now you may wonder why this is of interest? When defending a system it is vital to configure your defensive fleets Fire Control rating to be at least the exit size of the WPs leading to the defending system, thus you can ensure that you destroy as many ships as can enter per round. This is an especially important lesson for swarm defense.

 

For Dremut I’ve setup three defensive fleets plus one defensive fleet which is always on convoy route between the WPs.

 

 

I’ve had two generic models for screens which I’ve worked from in the past and probably will elaborate on in the future. The basic older screens were 1000 tons a piece, as GGT shipyards expanded and production swelled even further with the new homeworlds come under GGT control it was decided in the Quadredron that the new screen ships would be a minimum of 4000 tons a piece. ( GGT ships are often in multiples of 4 when it comes to tonnage, some religious thing from when their slavemasters were ritually cut into four pieces for each direction of the world during the Ny’bata revolt in 01)

 

The older 1000 ton design looks like this

 

1 x Mk VI Nuclear Engine (100 tons) Gives an AP of 11

1 x Mk V (Later Mk VI for ease of building) Nuclear Jump Drive (100) Warp Bubble 1

100 x Fuel Tanks (100) Fuel Consumtion is 1/warp multiplier

500 x Tckon 68 (500) Armor integrity of 500,000

1 x Mk I Computer Systems (100)

x Weaponry of choice for 100 tons

 

Total Integrity: Approx 500400

Damage Rating:

 

So here is a 1000 ton ship which can move a long way, has a Warp Bubble of 1 ensuring mass transits, high mobility for good defense vs fighters, missiles etc and can take quite a punch each ship. Why the computer systems you may ask? Since the computer systems handles the ships own weight, negating it for FC purposes, all you have to do is add a command and control ship to the fleet for the desired FC. Especially useful when defending specific WPs as per my introduction. This is actually something you should ponder to have on all ships even frieghters passing through where you have defensive forces or allies forces. if your ships always carry enough FC equipment to negate their own weight in combat then they will never drag down a planned FC if they should be dragged into a conflict zone.

 

While 100 tons of weaponry may not seem much, multiply it by the amount of ships…These older ships usually travel in packs of around 200.

 

What many Commanders forget is to not just put screens in assault rank but everywhere in the fleet to shield ships there. Also be versatile, if you need sensors, make sensor screens etc

You should change names to reflect their purposes as well as their armament to keep your foes guessing. You can change the ration between armor etc to keep your best weapons on these babies etc etc

 

 

This is even more true with a 4000 ton design which can be extremely versatile as you can exchange it’s weapon platform for sensors, computers for Fire Control or whatever

 

3 x Mk VI Nuclear Engine (300) AP: 6

2 x Mk VI NJD (200) WB: 1

200 x Fuel Tankage (200) Fuel Consumtion: 4/WPM

1200 x Tckon 68 (1200) Armor Integrity: 1, 200, 000

1 x Mk II Computer System (100) (Negates 4000 tons)

1000 Tons of varied weaponry (1000)

 

For a total of 4000 Tons AP 6 WB: 1 FC: 1 Damage: Varies, typically 8800

Total Integrity: 1201600

 

This design can also be varied to incorporate sensors etc for specific missions

 

Nowadays I only build 4000 ton screens but have exchanged the Tckon for even better protection which for 1200 tons gives 3000000 in protection which when you encounter 50-100 of these babies takes a while to chew through.

 

Now to remember that screen fleets are there for a purpose, to defend the bigger ships. So with the example of Dremut in mind each WP fleet has a number of screens, plus a heavy hitter in the form of a Battle Cruiser and a Carrier to provide the real offensive punch in the form of Combat Gunboats. I’ve added FC Command Cruisers to each of the WP fleets to get the right FC for any incursion into the picket zone as well as sensor ships for cloaked ships adventuring by.

 

Remember to have a mobile force in your system, one that takes an erratic route via convoy not just WP to WP which you can use for either reinforcement or counterattack when you find yourself under attack.

 

As I’ve said before, I’ve yet to actually have to test my screens in large scale battle but somehow I think they’ll carry the day. Not all by their lonesome of course but I think they’re still a must in every large fleet.

 

Grand Admiral Dreams of Novas in the sky

First Claw of the Genesian Gremloid Technocracy

[ali-t-akua]

Locklyn, thanks for the insight on building and using screens. One point I am not clear on is:

 

Why the computer systems you may ask? Since the computer systems handles the ships own weight, negating it for FC purposes, all you have to do is add a command and control ship to the fleet for the desired FC. Especially useful when defending specific WPs as per my introduction. This is actually something you should ponder to have on all ships even frieghters passing through where you have defensive forces or allies forces. if your ships always carry enough FC equipment to negate their own weight in combat then they will never drag down a planned FC if they should be dragged into a conflict zone.

 

I was under the impression that FC rating was due to computers and Naval characters with the FC rating due to computers equal to the total sum of all the computers in the fleet divided by the mass of the fleet. Therefore I would think that using your best computers everywhere you can would make more sense as it would give the defending fleet the highest possible FC rating.

[ShadowKitsune]

I think Locklyn is trying to make his screens "zero impact" on his FC rating. That way he can focus his better FC equipment on his larger warships. If all of his ships have a minimum value of FC equal to their tonnage, obsolete ships won't adversely affect his Fleet FC rating. Seems to make sense as a thought experiment, but I haven't crunched the numbers to see if it works out that way.

 

FWIW,

-SK

[Kurassier]

I'll remember that I enjoy looking forward to my turns. I'll also hope for a weapon or device that counteracts the impact of the several thousand screens.

When I was little, there was a neighborhood cat that used to shred screens all the time and was rarely hurt. Maybe there's a Type A, etc. Cat CIDS out there......

[Lord Uriel]

Kurassier,

With that analogy, perhaps Shathar has a racial advantage for destroying screens?

 

Would someone help me out with the FC rating? I seem to recall a post of Pete's explaining it, but I can't seem to find it.

 

Locklyn:

 

I'm a little afraid of running in to your empire. You actually have Tckon 68 and you allude to something even better?

 

Perhaps New Spartan Legions could fulfill some duty for you in exchange for that worthless Tckon 68 you have laying around.

 

Lord Uriel

[ShadowKitsune]

From the Oracle known as RTGPete:

Fire Control is a straight tonnage calculation. Mk II Computers, for instance, have a Bridge rating of 4000, and mass 100 tons each. This means that if you put one on a 1000 ton ship, representing 10% of its tonnage, that ship would have a Fire Control rating of 4. It would split its fire into 4 "globs" of damage and target those 4 shots independently. It might hit the same enemy ship 4 times, by the way, but this is very unlikely if there are a lot of targets to choose from. More shots does give it a better chance to hit (with one quarter of its firepower) enemy ships that are rear deployed.

 

So...if you want a Fire Control rating of 4, you'd need to have 10% of your fleet made out of Mk II Computers. There would be no point in using 2.5% of less, since you always get a Fire Control rating of at least 1. As it happens, Mk II Computers are pretty low tech, with Bridge rating efficiencies rising dramatically for superior technologies (well beyond the 2.5% = Fire Control 1 mark). If you've got a trading partner, having one of you run up a Bridge item tree isn't such a bad idea...who said trade was dead?

 

-SK

[ShadowKitsune]

From the Oracle known as RTGPete:

Fire Control is calculated for each side (all combined fleets on each side) in a battle. An allied fleet can provide Fire Control for your entire combined force.

 

When a battle runs, the total of all Fire Control type systems is used for your entire side (one ship in one fleet on your side could provide Fire Control for all of your fleets involved in the battle, or each ship could add to it, or any combination). Some systems are better than others, much like any other item in the game (Holographic Battle Display systems, for instance, are bridge items that help in Fire Control). That total is compared to the total tonnage and ships on your side to determine how many enemy ships your bridge and flagship personnel can target given the equipment at their disposal. It doesn't matter if the equipment is on one of your ships or many--it's all coordinated together to figure the final Fire Control number. Putting all of your eggs into one basket is dangerous if that ship (essentially your flagship) became damaged or destroyed, but then again it might be easier to protect that one ship by putting it into Deploy Location # 12, screening it with other ships, and providing it with armor, shields, defensive systems and so on.

 

Fire Control recalculates as ships are destroyed, so if you lose a flagship loaded with bridge gear, your fire control would drop on the spot.

 

Suppose, however, that two super large assault ships had a third ship - a Pathfinder, for instance. If you had no Fire Control at all, your ships could easily target and annihilate the Pathfinder during a combat round, wasting a significant amount of firepower. It didn't take much effort for the enemy to include this otherwise insignificant ship in his force, but it sure had an effect on that combat round. In this case you would have been much better off splitting your firepower, because in the same combat round you would have destroyed the Pathfinder anyway and dished out some damage to the big enemy ships. That damage is inflicted immediately and would reduce their effectiveness for the following combat rounds.

 

There is no maximum fire control since it is impossible to determine here how many ships your opponent might have, or how he has them deployed. The decision to devote 2% of your ship to bridge systems instead of 1% is like most other tech advances: if you use an inferior laser system, you would need to devote more ship tonnage % to achieve the same firepower output. How you balance the various tech upgrades to save on % efficiency is up to you. You might research up the bridge tree while an ally runs up the weapon tree, and then you would both benefit.

 

If fire control only represents a tiny % of your ship designs, then there is less need to worry about it. As it happens, there will be a wide variety of details displayed in the new space combat reports. Plenty to mull over.

 

Fire control is indeed calculated off of fleet tonnage, so if you lost ships that had poor bridge ratings, your fire control would improve over the course of the battle. Of course, you'd be losing ships in the process.

 

Fortunately, it's pretty easy to get a high fire control rating - computers and other systems are rather efficient in this area.

 

Example 1

 

1 million ton fleet with 250,000 bridge would get 0.25 shots, which defaults to 1.

 

Fire Control (shots) = Bridge total / tonnage

 

If Mk II Computer Systems were used for that 1 million ton fleet, that would mean only 62.5 of them somewhere in the fleet, or 6,250 tons out of 1,000,000.

 

To multitarget over 2 enemy ships, that fleet would need 2 million bridge output, or 2,000,000 / 4,000 = 500 Mk II Computer Systems, for 50,000 total tons somewhere in the fleet (5%). Better bridge systems would drop this 5% figure dramatically, or in any event allow for even more bridge systems to be installed (to raise Fire Control to 3, 4 etc).

 

If you wanted to split your fire over 20 targets and only had Mk II Computer Systems, that million ton fleet would need

 

20 = x / 1,000,000

x = 20,000,000

# Mk II Computer Systems = 20,000,000 / 4,000

# Mk II Computer Systems = 5,000

tonnage of Mk II Computer Systems would therefore = 5,000 * 100 = 500,000 which is half of the fleet! In this case you'd be well served to use superior bridge technology.

 

-------------

I hope that helps.

 

FWIW,

-SK

 

PS - Thank Eternus IV for this info.

[WKE235]

3 x Mk VI Nuclear Engine (300) AP: 6

2 x Mk VI NJD (200) WB: 1

200 x Fuel Tankage (200)  Fuel Consumtion: 4/WPM

1200 x Tckon 68 (1200) Armor Integrity: 1, 200, 000

1 x Mk II Computer System (100) (Negates 4000 tons)

  2000 Tons of varied weaponry (2000)

 

For a total of 4000 Tons AP 6 WB: 1 FC: 1 Damage: Varies, typically 8800

Total Integrity: 1201600

 

This design can also be varied to incorporate sensors etc for specific missions

 

Nowadays I only build 4000 ton screens but have exchanged the Tckon for even better protection which for 1200 tons gives 3000000 in protection which when you encounter 50-100 of these babies takes a while to chew through.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

Lets take this a step further. Say the design is changed so you build an Orbital Installation instead of a Starship. No need for Engines, Jump Drives, or Fuel Tankage (700 tons). Yould could devote this to better computer systems like the FCS-1 Archer Fire control system, and maybe some to armor. The result.

 

1700 x Advanced Armor (1700) Armor Integrity: 4,250,000 x 3 = 12,750,000

3 x FCS-1 Archer (100) (Negates 60,000 tons) = 60/4 = 15 Fire

2000 Tons of varied weaponry (2000)

 

Remember the Orbital Installation gets 3 x integrity.

 

Put about oh ... 1000 of these up. You now have 1000 ships with 12+ Billion points integrity (that's right, billion), firing 2,000,000 tons worth of weapons. Adjust as desired. Less integrity, more weapons. Less Computers, more armor. Whatever.

 

Lets get really obscene and build the items as 4000 tons Outposts on the Homeworld. Who needs colonization when with Improved Stripmines and advances in Industrial Science eventually boosting your improved Industrial Complexes production by 60%, you can outdo any colonies potential production. Toss in some Deep Core drilling for random increases in what the planet does provide and why leave home. With that in mind, outposts get 9 x for integrity. 1000 of these on a HW = 36+ Billion points of integrity to shoot through before you can consider even bombing or invading. Good luck.

 

Sigh .. the old SN game was to generous towards offense. I guess to balance things, they've given so much benefit to the defenses that going on the offensive is virtually useless.

[Ur Lord Tedric]

Sigh .. the old SN game was to generous towards offense.  I guess to balance things, they've given so much benefit to the defenses that going on the offensive is virtually useless.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

 

Ah ha! You're right - and quite possibly a better way to do it.

 

A true turtle empire, one who has no intention of really leaving their HW can invest in a defensive strategy that is quite possibly unbeatable.

 

And so, what's the effect? That they impinge little on the galaxy at large. Defensive empires don't go on the rampage.

 

So, the defensive player can enjoy playing the game as much as they want to, perhaps even never interracting at all with anybody - if that's their kick, then this provides a mechanism for them to continue to play having invested time and money in their empires for years, without losing to the "uber" offensive 'weapon' - as per SNII.

 

Actually we find it a little sad that most of the talk seems to favour only genocide as the strategy of choice and decries the fact that a technologically advanced race who invests their production in defences actually has a chance to survive.

 

Just think about that for a short moment.....

 

Chief Existentialist to Ur-Lord Tedric

[Marvin]

I don't think a game where everyone is invulnerable appeals to many players. If this was RTG's intentions they should have stated so up front. I doubt they would have had many players, but it would have been more honest.

[Hughestrog]

I still believe that the screen issue is just a current topic. As we all develop our technologies we may discover weapons, armourments or new strategies that in a year may create new issues.

 

How many of us would be willing to put time, effort and cash into this game, only for three years into it for our HW to be over run? I'd be annoyed (and not only in my own lack of leadership!).

 

So being able to have uber defences around the HW or even in the HW system does feel OK. And whislt the player is defending their HW so intensely, they may not be expanding, and certainly not defending their out lying colonies- if they have any. I'd not be invunerably; it would be a case of wearing my defences down, which given time and resources for the attacker, they could do.

 

For several reasons I've followed the 'Turtle Strategy'. I've been exploring the past couple of months and have run into another player. They're closer than I like to any of my systems, but 'Hey' that's what I get for turtling. Thankfully they're friendly. But what if they weren't? I'd throw what ever I could into orbit to help stop any aggression and make any conquest extremely painful and costly. Which it should be.

 

And how many of us are trading? And now that many more of us are finally meeting up, how are alliances and pacts forming? Could a prospective attacker make peace, rather than expand huge amounts of resources to take over your HW? Would you be prepared to offer a %tribute, rather than go down in flames?

 

How has the 'draft revised naval document' gone down? What's been it's real impact? What effect (if any) has the document had on naval architects, and subsequent battles? Sure, screens may be the order of the day, at the moment, but so were battleships in their time.

[ShadowKitsune]

I don't think a game where everyone is invulnerable appeals to many players.  If this was RTG's intentions they should have stated so up front.  I doubt they would have had many players, but it would have been more honest.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

I don't think it was RTG's intent to make it so everyone is nigh invulnerable. This may be overcompensation for the end result of SuperNova II - Nigh Unstoppable Roving Fleets of UberDrone Laden Monstrosities. It has been stated in the past that this game forces an emphasis on Trade not Conquest. The only Empires that you can take out by yourself are Abandoned ones, Empires that used to belong to a player but were dropped, if you are fortunate to find such a prize. The "Core" being a richer environment for such things than the "Periphery".

 

Can you still conquer other Players, sure. You'll just need friends to do it. I shall predict, at this time, that it will take 3:1 odds to take out the average position. In other words, the combined might of three Empires will be required to conquer a single, non-Abandoned, Empire. Anything less than that and your throwing away good resources after bad, IMO.

 

-SK

[ali-t-akua]

I don't think a game where everyone is invulnerable appeals to many players.  If this was RTG's intentions they should have stated so up front.  I doubt they would have had many players, but it would have been more honest.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

I don't think it was RTG's intent to make it so everyone is nigh invulnerable. This may be overcompensation for the end result of SuperNova II - Nigh Unstoppable Roving Fleets of UberDrone Laden Monstrosities. It has been stated in the past that this game forces an emphasis on Trade not Conquest. The only Empires that you can take out by yourself are Abandoned ones, Empires that used to belong to a player but were dropped, if you are fortunate to find such a prize. The "Core" being a richer environment for such things than the "Periphery".

 

Can you still conquer other Players, sure. You'll just need friends to do it. I shall predict, at this time, that it will take 3:1 odds to take out the average position. In other words, the combined might of three Empires will be required to conquer a single, non-Abandoned, Empire. Anything less than that and your throwing away good resources after bad, IMO.

 

-SK

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

 

Thanks SK. I was going to say something similar. I agree that having allies are key to taking down someone in turtle mode. In fact in all of the above scenarios, I fail to see a single one where the defender is invulnerable if one has allies (unless of course the defender does as well).