Posted by: Micro102
« on: February 16, 2010, 02:27:55 AM »They can also be annoying...like having 10 scientists half being propulsion half being missiles....I don't even have enough queues for them!
Posted by: sloanjh
« on: February 15, 2010, 10:40:49 PM »Quote from: "WCG"
Quote from: "Erik Luken"I generally let the game pick my starting tech. It's not always what I would pick, so that is a challenge to fit the tech I have into my preferred playstyle.
Just wanted to comment on this. One of my favorite games ever was the original Master of Orion. One of the neat features in that game was that the tech tree wasn't exactly the same in each game. Well, the tree itself was the same, but your research opportunities varied a bit.
With most strategy games, I tend to play every game the same way after awhile - after I get to know the game. But this feature pretty well forced me to play a different game, depending on what I could research. One game, I'd use small fighters armed with beam weapons; another, I'd use larger ships with missile weapons. It just depended on my research situation.
I always thought that was a great feature in a strategy game. This sounds similar, to some extent. If you start with different techs, that might encourage you to use different research threads. It's a neat idea.
Bill
This is one of the nice things about the scientist research bonuses, especially in a conventional start - they act as a very strong driver on what gets developed first, and they're random for each game.
John
Posted by: WCG
« on: February 15, 2010, 10:30:53 PM »Quote from: "Erik Luken"
I generally let the game pick my starting tech. It's not always what I would pick, so that is a challenge to fit the tech I have into my preferred playstyle.
Just wanted to comment on this. One of my favorite games ever was the original Master of Orion. One of the neat features in that game was that the tech tree wasn't exactly the same in each game. Well, the tree itself was the same, but your research opportunities varied a bit.
With most strategy games, I tend to play every game the same way after awhile - after I get to know the game. But this feature pretty well forced me to play a different game, depending on what I could research. One game, I'd use small fighters armed with beam weapons; another, I'd use larger ships with missile weapons. It just depended on my research situation.
I always thought that was a great feature in a strategy game. This sounds similar, to some extent. If you start with different techs, that might encourage you to use different research threads. It's a neat idea.
Bill
Posted by: Balibar
« on: February 14, 2010, 09:32:53 PM »Thank you all for the tips and the examples.
Posted by: Brian Neumann
« on: February 14, 2010, 05:49:37 AM »Quote from: "Balibar"
Quote from: "Steve Walmsley"A fire control can't find targets by itself but it can lock on to targets detected by the active sensors on a different ship. One commonly used strategy is to have single FAC with sensors instead of weapons that acts as the eyes and ears of a FAC squadron. The scout FAC finds the targets and then the rest of the Squadron lock on their fire controls and open fire.Thanks for the explanation. I am going to try something along the lines of Brian's examples.
Steve
As a side note on design philosophy. I use large box launchers on my FAC's for a couple of different reasons. One is that I will be able to use any missile my ships are carrying if I run out of the larger missiles that are normally stocked for the fac's. The second is that by the time you get a missile to size 6 there is enough room to play all kinds of fancy games. Putting a decent sensor on the missile, or ecm, or armour. Another options is to make it very short ranged like the starfire sprint missiles, or to make a multi stage/multi warhead missile. There are all kinds of options available as you make bigger missiles. The downside of the bigger missiles is having a larger percentage of the strike shot down with each interception, and the fewer number of total missiles that you can carry. The main reason that I use smaller missiles from my standard missile ships is the rate of fire. These size 6 missiles would have a 60second cycle time. A size 3 would be 30 seconds, and with a little more reasearch they can get down to 15 seconds. That allows a lot fewer counter launches for each incomming salvo, and a lot more salvo's for the same magazine space. Neither of these is a factor for ships with box launchers however.
Brian
Posted by: Hawkeye
« on: February 14, 2010, 02:36:55 AM »This concept is also easily used for your regular warships.
Here is a missile cruiser from my latest game:
You´ll notice that the active sensor does not even have the range of the missiles it carries, not to speak how it will be once a new, longer ranged missile type comes online.
This is intenionaly so (well, of course I would like to have a longer ranged sensor on it, but everyone has to make tradeoffs)
And here is the fleet scout, that act as the eyes for those cruisers:
Here is a missile cruiser from my latest game:
Code: [Select]
Resolution class Missile Cruiser 11950 tons 1181 Crew 1723.96 BP TCS 239 TH 567 EM 0
3163 km/s Armour 4-46 Shields 0-0 Sensors 10/10/0/0 Damage Control Rating 8 PPV 49
Annual Failure Rate: 142% IFR: 2% Maint Capacity 721 MSP Max Repair 60 MSP Est Time: 3.6 Years
Magazine 440
Rolls Royce Class 63/75 Ion Engine (12) Power 63 Fuel Use 99% Signature 47.25 Armour 0 Exp 7%
Fuel Capacity 450,000 Litres Range 68.5 billion km (250 days at full power)
Twin 100mm/L15/R5 Meson Cannon Turret (1x2) Range 15,000km TS: 15000 km/s Power 6-6 RM 1.5 ROF 5 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
Norton PD FCS Mk. I (1) Max Range: 32,000 km TS: 12000 km/s 69 37 6 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
Pebble Bed Reactor 6 (1) Total Power Output 6 Armour 0 Exp 5%
Rheinmetall Class 4 ASM Launcher (10) Missile Size 4 Rate of Fire 60
Bosch Class 90/60 Missile Targeting System (2) Range 90.0m km Resolution 60
Bosch Class 24/16 Missile Targeting System (2) Range 24.0m km Resolution 16
ASM-4 Starstreak (110) Speed: 25,500 km/s End: 32.7m Range: 50m km WH: 4 Size: 4 TH: 85 / 51 / 25
0.6/1 Radar (1) GPS 60 Range 600k km Resolution 1
12/20 Radar (1) GPS 1200 Range 12.0m km Resolution 20
48/80 Radar (1) GPS 4800 Range 48.0m km Resolution 80
Westwood Class 10 Thermal Sensor (1) Sensitivity 10 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 10m km
Gallager Class 10 EM Sensor (1) Sensitivity 10 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 10m kmYou´ll notice that the active sensor does not even have the range of the missiles it carries, not to speak how it will be once a new, longer ranged missile type comes online.
This is intenionaly so (well, of course I would like to have a longer ranged sensor on it, but everyone has to make tradeoffs)
And here is the fleet scout, that act as the eyes for those cruisers:
Code: [Select]
Hawkeye class Fleet Scout 8000 tons 698 Crew 1193.8 BP TCS 160 TH 425.25 EM 0
3543 km/s Armour 4-35 Shields 0-0 Sensors 125/100/0/0 Damage Control Rating 6 PPV 0
Annual Failure Rate: 85% IFR: 1.2% Maint Capacity 560 MSP Max Repair 150 MSP Est Time: 2.46 Years
Rolls Royce Class 63/75 Ion Engine (9) Power 63 Fuel Use 99% Signature 47.25 Armour 0 Exp 7%
Fuel Capacity 300,000 Litres Range 68.2 billion km (222 days at full power)
30/20 Radar (1) GPS 3000 Range 30.0m km Resolution 20
120/80 Radar (1) GPS 12000 Range 120.0m km Resolution 80
Westwood Class 125 Thermal Sensor (1) Sensitivity 125 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 125m km
Gallager Class 100 EM Sensor (1) Sensitivity 100 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 100m kmPosted by: Balibar
« on: February 13, 2010, 10:25:38 PM »Quote from: "Steve Walmsley"
A fire control can't find targets by itself but it can lock on to targets detected by the active sensors on a different ship. One commonly used strategy is to have single FAC with sensors instead of weapons that acts as the eyes and ears of a FAC squadron. The scout FAC finds the targets and then the rest of the Squadron lock on their fire controls and open fire.Thanks for the explanation. I am going to try something along the lines of Brian's examples.
Steve
Posted by: Steve Walmsley
« on: February 13, 2010, 04:54:01 PM »Quote from: "Balibar"
A fire control can't find targets by itself but it can lock on to targets detected by the active sensors on a different ship. One commonly used strategy is to have single FAC with sensors instead of weapons that acts as the eyes and ears of a FAC squadron. The scout FAC finds the targets and then the rest of the Squadron lock on their fire controls and open fire.Quote from: "Beersatron"2nd Gen FAC (Fast Attack Craft), the 1st Gen had the size 8 launchers which were too big for my design styleA question on this FAC design. There is no active sensor. Does the Fire Control act as its own sensor? Or does the Fire Control use sensor information from the base or mothership?Code: [Select]Fearless II class Gunboat 1000 tons 56 Crew 176.8 BP TCS 20 TH 126 EM 0
8400 km/s Armour 1-8 Shields 0-0 Sensors 1/1/0/0 Damage Control Rating 0 PPV 7.2
Annual Failure Rate: 16% IFR: 0.2% Maintenance Capacity 55 MSP Max Repair 52 MSP
Magazine 48
FAC Plasma Drive (1) Power 168 Fuel Use 880% Signature 126 Armour 0 Exp 21%
Fuel Capacity 150,000 Litres Range 30.7 billion km (42 days at full power)
S4ML BOX - 1 (12) Missile Size 4 Hangar Reload 30 minutes MF Reload 5 hours
AGFC - 1 (1) Range 19.2m km Resolution 20
Chisel MK1 (12) Speed: 33,600 km/s End: 9.6m Range: 19.3m km WH: 4 Size: 4 TH: 168 / 100 / 50
Missile to hit chances are vs targets moving at 3000 km/s, 5000 km/s and 10,000 km/s
This design is classed as a military vessel for maintenance purposes
Steve
Posted by: Balibar
« on: February 13, 2010, 02:41:50 PM »Quote from: "Brian"
Hope these examples help you.Thank you very much for the examples.
Brian
Posted by: Brian Neumann
« on: February 13, 2010, 12:05:51 PM »Quote from: "sloanjh"
1. Any active sensor on any ship/base/pdc, ect will do to allow the fire control lock up. It does not matter if the active sensor is in the same task group or not. For defending a planet having a purpose built pdc with massive active sensors is a good idea. You leave that on to let you see anything approaching, and all your other ships can keep thier actives off line.Quote from: "Balibar"A question on this FAC design. There is no active sensor. Does the Fire Control act as its own sensor? Or does the Fire Control use sensor information from the base or mothership?
B (I assume). Active sensors are very expensive to stick on every ship, especially when you're talking about FAC. I think most people design special "Leader" variants of their FAC that substitute active sensors for a few missile tubes/magazines.
John
2. For FAC the problem of getting a decent sensor into such a small package is the overall size. For most of my designs I will include a .5hs active sensor to spot large enemy ships. This will give me some standoff capability even if there are no other sensors available. I usually only bother to do this with missile ships. There will usually be a scout FAC attached that has NO weapons and uses that space for both passive and a more varied active sensor suite.
Here are some designs from a recent game, General tech level exept for engines is 8000-10000 rp systems.
The Victory is a basic missile FAC. It does have some sensors and can engage either capital ships at long ranges, or FAC at a shorter range.
Code: [Select]
Victory class Fast Attack Craft 1000 tons 51 Crew 270.1 BP TCS 20 TH 67.2 EM 0
9600 km/s Armour 5-8 Shields 0-0 Sensors 1/1/0/0 Damage Control Rating 0 PPV 6.3
Annual Failure Rate: 32% IFR: 0.4% Maint Capacity 42 MSP Max Repair 84 MSP Est Time: 1.28 Years
Magazine 42
GB Magneto-plasma Drive E70 (1) Power 192 Fuel Use 700% Signature 67.2 Armour 0 Exp 48%
Fuel Capacity 20,000 Litres Range 5.1 billion km (6 days at full power)
Size 6 Box Launcher (7) Missile Size 6 Hangar Reload 45 minutes MF Reload 7.5 hours
Missile Fire Control FC56-R20 (1) Range 33.6m km Resolution 20
Missile Fire Control FC28-R100 (1) Range 84.0m km Resolution 100
Size 6 Anti-ship Missile (7) Speed: 40,000 km/s End: 12.5m Range: 30m km WH: 7 Size: 6 TH: 213 / 128 / 64
Active Search Sensor S14-R20 (1) GPS 280 Range 2.8m km Resolution 20
Missile to hit chances are vs targets moving at 3000 km/s, 5000 km/s and 10,000 km/s
This design is classed as a military vessel for maintenance purposesThe Long Ears is the scout for an attack group. I usually try to have 3-4 stationed on planets, and at least 1 per carrier.
Code: [Select]
Long Ears class Fast Scout Craft 1000 tons 85 Crew 378.9 BP TCS 20 TH 67.2 EM 0
9600 km/s Armour 5-8 Shields 0-0 Sensors 11/22/0/0 Damage Control Rating 0 PPV 0
Annual Failure Rate: 32% IFR: 0.4% Maint Capacity 59 MSP Max Repair 140 MSP Est Time: 1.16 Years
GB Magneto-plasma Drive E70 (1) Power 192 Fuel Use 700% Signature 67.2 Armour 0 Exp 48%
Fuel Capacity 30,000 Litres Range 7.7 billion km (9 days at full power)
Active Search Sensor S28-R20 (1) GPS 560 Range 5.6m km Resolution 20
Active Search Sensor S140-R100 (1) GPS 14000 Range 140.0m km Resolution 100
Active Search Sensor S28-R1 (1) GPS 28 Range 280k km Resolution 1
Thermal Sensor TH1-11 (1) Sensitivity 11 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 11m km
EM Detection Sensor EM2-22 (1) Sensitivity 22 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 22m kmThe Scorpion class is the beam armed version. It has an active sensor to spot incomming missiles and because the FAC is so fast the meson is only about 1/2 as effective as a turret pd weapon would be.
Code: [Select]
Scorpion class Fast Attack Craft 1000 tons 103 Crew 273.9 BP TCS 20 TH 67.2 EM 60
9600 km/s Armour 5-8 Shields 2-300 Sensors 1/1/0/0 Damage Control Rating 0 PPV 4
Annual Failure Rate: 32% IFR: 0.4% Maint Capacity 43 MSP Max Repair 84 MSP Est Time: 1.3 Years
GB Magneto-plasma Drive E70 (1) Power 192 Fuel Use 700% Signature 67.2 Armour 0 Exp 48%
Fuel Capacity 20,000 Litres Range 5.1 billion km (6 days at full power)
Delta R300/12.5 Shields (1) Total Fuel Cost 13 Litres per day
R8/C4 Meson Cannon (1) Range 80,000km TS: 9600 km/s Power 4-4 RM 8 ROF 5 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 0 0
Fire Control S03 48-8000 gb (1) Max Range: 96,000 km TS: 8000 km/s 90 79 69 58 48 38 27 17 6 0
Stellarator Fusion Reactor Technology PB-1 AR-0 (1) Total Power Output 6 Armour 0 Exp 5%
Active Search Sensor S28-R1 (1) GPS 28 Range 280k km Resolution 1Hope these examples help you.
Brian
Posted by: sloanjh
« on: February 13, 2010, 10:12:41 AM »Quote from: "Balibar"
A question on this FAC design. There is no active sensor. Does the Fire Control act as its own sensor? Or does the Fire Control use sensor information from the base or mothership?
B (I assume). Active sensors are very expensive to stick on every ship, especially when you're talking about FAC. I think most people design special "Leader" variants of their FAC that substitute active sensors for a few missile tubes/magazines.
John
Posted by: Balibar
« on: February 13, 2010, 10:07:18 AM »Quote from: "Brian"
As long as one of your ships has the target on it's active sensors, then all of your ships fire controls will work. You do need to have at least one active sensor picking up the target. Passives are not sufficient for this.Let's say I am designing a FAC for Earth Defense and I want to leave out the sensor in order to pack more launchers in. Do I need at least one ship in the Task Group with a sensor? Or can a ship in another Task Group that is also stationed at Earth fill the sensor role? Or can the FAC use sensors based on the planet Earth?
Posted by: Brian Neumann
« on: February 13, 2010, 06:18:25 AM »As long as one of your ships has the target on it's active sensors, then all of your ships fire controls will work. You do need to have at least one active sensor picking up the target. Passives are not sufficient for this.
There is a way to use passive contacts in a missile engagement, but it can be tough to pull off. The missiles have to have their own sensors on board, preferably ones big enough to spot the target from some distance. You fire the missiles on a way point that is ahead of the target but will be fairly close by the time the missiles arrive. This is the hard part as figuring out where the target ship is going to be in 20-30 minutes can be tough to pull off. When the missiles arrive at the waypoint they will remain there until their endurance is used up. If any enemy ships come into thier sensor range (the missiles only, parent ships have no control at this point) they will attack the ships. Normally they will attack the nearest/largest, but if there are multiple targets then they will spread out and attack different elligable targets.
If you pull it off it can be a devestating attack, especially if you manage to get several salvo's on the waypoint before the targets come into range. Their is little warning, and if they do not have thier active sensors going, they will have a limited time to shoot back. Their is a bug currently that will allow the point defense to fire on the missiles even though they are not detected by an active sensor, but it is still a very handy trick if you can pull it off.
Brian
There is a way to use passive contacts in a missile engagement, but it can be tough to pull off. The missiles have to have their own sensors on board, preferably ones big enough to spot the target from some distance. You fire the missiles on a way point that is ahead of the target but will be fairly close by the time the missiles arrive. This is the hard part as figuring out where the target ship is going to be in 20-30 minutes can be tough to pull off. When the missiles arrive at the waypoint they will remain there until their endurance is used up. If any enemy ships come into thier sensor range (the missiles only, parent ships have no control at this point) they will attack the ships. Normally they will attack the nearest/largest, but if there are multiple targets then they will spread out and attack different elligable targets.
If you pull it off it can be a devestating attack, especially if you manage to get several salvo's on the waypoint before the targets come into range. Their is little warning, and if they do not have thier active sensors going, they will have a limited time to shoot back. Their is a bug currently that will allow the point defense to fire on the missiles even though they are not detected by an active sensor, but it is still a very handy trick if you can pull it off.
Brian
Posted by: Balibar
« on: February 13, 2010, 06:00:31 AM »Quote from: "Beersatron"
2nd Gen FAC (Fast Attack Craft), the 1st Gen had the size 8 launchers which were too big for my design styleA question on this FAC design. There is no active sensor. Does the Fire Control act as its own sensor? Or does the Fire Control use sensor information from the base or mothership?Code: [Select]Fearless II class Gunboat 1000 tons 56 Crew 176.8 BP TCS 20 TH 126 EM 0
8400 km/s Armour 1-8 Shields 0-0 Sensors 1/1/0/0 Damage Control Rating 0 PPV 7.2
Annual Failure Rate: 16% IFR: 0.2% Maintenance Capacity 55 MSP Max Repair 52 MSP
Magazine 48
FAC Plasma Drive (1) Power 168 Fuel Use 880% Signature 126 Armour 0 Exp 21%
Fuel Capacity 150,000 Litres Range 30.7 billion km (42 days at full power)
S4ML BOX - 1 (12) Missile Size 4 Hangar Reload 30 minutes MF Reload 5 hours
AGFC - 1 (1) Range 19.2m km Resolution 20
Chisel MK1 (12) Speed: 33,600 km/s End: 9.6m Range: 19.3m km WH: 4 Size: 4 TH: 168 / 100 / 50
Missile to hit chances are vs targets moving at 3000 km/s, 5000 km/s and 10,000 km/s
This design is classed as a military vessel for maintenance purposes
Posted by: Balibar
« on: February 05, 2010, 06:11:33 AM »Quote from: "Erik Luken"
Your last salvo from the Atlanta is going to be an odd number. 11 in 6 salvos, 5 in the last.Thank you for pointing that out. My reasoning in the mazazine size was to ensure an even multiple of all missile sizes. I neglected to consider the grouping based on the number of launchers. I suppose it might make more sense to stick to a number of launchers that was a "round" number in terms of magazine size.
My personal taste would be to go with 10 launchers and see if I can't cram in another magazine.
