Building PDC's

[Roblakov (OP)]

Hello all,

Loving sinking my teeth into all of the detail in this game.  Played years ago pre-C# and have waited years to get back into it until this release.

At any rate, I cannot for the life of me figure out how to design a PDC.  I knew how to do that in VB6 but haven't tracked it down in C# yet. . .  Probably staring me in the face, but I cannot see it!

Thanks!

[DFNewb]

They don't exist anymore. You have STO's now.

[Marslettuce]

PDCs have been removed. STO ground forces serve their planetary defense role now. If you want PDC missile bases, you'll have to replace them with orbital equivalents.

[Roblakov (OP)]

Thank you for the quick replies!

As a follow up, how do you design a space station? In my searching for a way to create a PDC, I don’t remember the option to design a Space station.  I know you can build them with industry, but not where to create the design. 

Love how active this community is!

[DFNewb]

Thank you for the quick replies!

As a follow up, how do you design a space station? In my searching for a way to create a PDC, I don’t remember the option to design a Space station.  I know you can build them with industry, but not where to create the design. 

Love how active this community is!

Click the no armor check box

[Shooer]

A station is just a ship that has no significant ability to move it's self.  (It's stationed, if you will.  Nyuk nyuk nyuk.)

So just design a ship but don't install fuel or engines.  Remember that stations won't provide tracking for beam weapons so if you are going to fit beam weapons make sure they are turreted.

If you want to make a cheaper civilian station check the no armor check box on the right.  That's useful for orbital habs, maint facilities, terraformers and fuel harvesters.

[Roblakov (OP)]

A station is just a ship that has no significant ability to move it's self.   (It's stationed, if you will.   Nyuk nyuk nyuk. )

So just design a ship but don't install fuel or engines.   Remember that stations won't provide tracking for beam weapons so if you are going to fit beam weapons make sure they are turreted.

If you want to make a cheaper civilian station check the no armor check box on the right.   That's useful for orbital habs, maint facilities, terraformers and fuel harvesters.

Ah, that's helpful.  So if I wanted to make a defense station, say, parked next a jump entry point, I would essentially just create a large, engine-less ship? How does that work with maintenance and service time etc. ?

[mtm84]

You would need to make an even larger commercial only station that has recreational facilities (I think those still exist?) and enough maintenance modules to and msp storage to support the defense station.

[Mark Yanning]

Is it possible to make land, park fighters or ships in the space station, if it's provided with hangar? Thanks
And what happen with fighters? Can I just have it on earth, orbiting all the time?

[DFNewb]

Is it possible to make land, park fighters or ships in the space station, if it's provided with hangar? Thanks
And what happen with fighters? Can I just have it on earth, orbiting all the time?

Yes the fighters can sit at Earth like they used to be able to a long time ago. I think the only problem is if they have box launchers. Reload ordinance from colony might even work with those actually.

[Mark Yanning]

Ok, now it's clear

[Zincat]

Ah, that's helpful.  So if I wanted to make a defense station, say, parked next a jump entry point, I would essentially just create a large, engine-less ship? How does that work with maintenance and service time etc. ?

You can also take another approach. Build one or more stations with very long maintenance life. Say, 10 years? Tow them with a tug to the place you want to defend (say a jump point), and when needed (in the example, every 10 years or so) tow it back to your planet and conduct maintenance.

This works best if you make 3-4 such stations, as you can perform maintenance one at a time and still have the others at the jump point. Now, you can always do this for RP, but is it worth doing? Depends

Sensor stations: super useful, build them super minimal and dirty cheap and with very long maintentance life. They'll see anyone who passes through (very useful since in c#aurora sensors have less range). No need to put them ON the jump point, jut park them nearby and in sensor range. I put these on any sort-of-important jump point.
Beam stations: not worth it because of how jump transit works, and because of the limited range of beam weapons
Missile stations: Quite nice for defence. Once again, no need to put them ON the jump point. Some millions km away are perfectly fine
"Carrier" stations: Hell yes I love these. Fill them up with fighters (can also be beam fighters), scramble them once the enemy enters the system. If  the station is heavily armored, you can drop it on the jump point so you can attack while the enemy suffers jump shock, or you can build them cheaper and put them further away. The real bonus is you can change the fighters with newer fighters even without towing them back home.

In general, while sensor stations can always be worth using, defense stations are useful only if you think a jump point is likely to be a zone of conflict, because you cannot defend EVERY jump point well. If you have multiple ways an enemy can get inside your important systems, it's better to build a mobile fleet + sensor stations for early warning.

[smoelf]

A station is just a ship that has no significant ability to move it's self.   (It's stationed, if you will.   Nyuk nyuk nyuk. )

So just design a ship but don't install fuel or engines.   Remember that stations won't provide tracking for beam weapons so if you are going to fit beam weapons make sure they are turreted.

If you want to make a cheaper civilian station check the no armor check box on the right.   That's useful for orbital habs, maint facilities, terraformers and fuel harvesters.

Ah, that's helpful.  So if I wanted to make a defense station, say, parked next a jump entry point, I would essentially just create a large, engine-less ship? How does that work with maintenance and service time etc. ?

Well, you could create an engineless ship to and tow to the jump point, but unless something changed recently, in order to classify as a space station it can have no military components. So what you might prefer to do is create a space station with maintenance modules and facilities and allow that to service a squad of smaller military ships. As long as there are enough maintenance supplies, you can keep the squad there indefinitely.

[Rastaman]

You could still build military space stations around your planet that act as PDC. No engine costs or explosions, less crew, lots of missiles, even more armor and space marines. The emperor protecc.

[smoelf]

You could still build military space stations around your planet that act as PDC. No engine costs or explosions, less crew, lots of missiles, even more armor and space marines. The emperor protecc.

Absolutely, you could build that. My concern is mostly to avoid confusion going forward. A ship classified as a space station can be built using construction factories, but that classification has certain conditions. My point is mostly that I think we should avoid using the term 'space station' for ships that doesn't classify as such ingame - just to ensure that there is no confusion as to what can be built using construction factories and what needs shipyards.