Do your space battles tend to be one-sided?

[lennson (OP)]

Obviously I am a new person here, in my limited experience playing with Aurora I've found that space battles seem to always result in one side being completely destroyed and the other take insignificant damage.   I was wondering whether other people have encountered this as well or if I am missing something. 

Here are some of the simple scenarios I've encountered:
Both fleets missile armed -> which ever fleet has longer range destroys the other with no damage. 
One fleet beam armed the other missile armed -> if beam ships have enough tracking and fire volume they take no damage and win otherwise they inflect no damage and loose. 
Both fleets beam armed -> which ever fleet has longer range destroys the other with no damage. 

Obviously this is an over simplification as fleets will be a composition of these types but it feels like even in more complicated engagements it still is a series of check that ultimately determine which side takes almost no damage while the other is destroyed. 

Example: (Fleet 1 vs Fleet 2)
Fleet 1 has better range missile ships and so fires first, test the PD/anti-missile strength of Fleet 2 if not strong enough Fleet 1 wins else continue. 
Fleet 2 now fires missiles, test the PD/anti-missile strength of Fleet 1 if not strong enough Fleet 2 wins else continue. 
(Repeat the above as different range missile ships groups come into range each being of higher missile volume)
If both sides run out of missiles then it comes down to which side has higher beam range. 

[Starmantle]

Like you say, that's an oversimplification, but I think it's largely correct and largely appropriate.

I love sci-fi space battles as much as anyone, but I always have to roll my eyes at the incredibly short ranges involved in movies and video games. 

If one side has superior range and speed, they can dictate the terms of the engagement and then the only question becomes - did they bring enough ordinance to get through the enemy's defense?

[Paul M]

The difference between a wet navy battle and land battle is largely on the point "decisiveness."  In a land battle there is almost always the option to withdraw safely, also battles may result in minor losses to both sides and so forth.  In naval battles this is not the case except where one side outranges the other which nearly always has meant has bigger ships and hence the other force has a speed advantage.

It is a tenant of naval warfar theory that battles are decisive affairs and that the outnumbered (all other things being equal) side will be eliminated in total while the stronger side will suffer lesser losses.  This is shown in math even regardless of if the engagement is guns or missiles.  Missiles are more complicated as the enemy has active defences to be factored in but essentially comes down to if you have enough missiles to sink the enemy force or insufficient to penetrate their active defences.

It is this core element of decisiveness that resulted in the limited number of major warship engagements (gun to gun) in WW1 and WW2.  Basically if you outnumbered the enemy the enemy would withdraw if they had a chance.  In WW2 air strikes were far less decisive than gun battles (compare the two actions of Leyte Gulf) and as ships were modernized air power became far less potent (late war ships had powerful AA compared to ships from 39-40) until the development of the air launched missile.

I'll look up the math for it tonight but basically it is easy to show mathematically that even a single extra ship on a side results in a tremendous boost in the loss rate.  This is because naval gun engaments are 1:1 until the extra ship comes in then they become 2:1 which are won twice as fast essentially.  So if 5 ships engage 4 ships.  Half way to the loss of one ship on the stronger side the weaker is down to 3 ships, then it is 5 ships to 3 ships which is 1:1, 2:1, 2:1 and the ships are 50%, so at 75% of the way to the stronger side loosing a ship the weaker looses 2 ships leaving it at 5:1 and before the stronger side likely losses a ship the weaker force is eliminated.

The math changes for missiles but in that case again numbers count.  Factoring in the costs of naval ships in time, money and people you begin to see why naval battles are rare...both sides no the above math.

The NCN has won battles even though they were slower and outranged, they have lost battles due to being out teched...it all depends on the ship designs and your fleet doctrine.  Steve's campaign shows a case where the point defence was sufficient to stop the enemy missiles and the longer ranged missile ships were destroyed.  It isn't a given that any weapon set up will always work.

[Iranon]

The chance of decisive victories is always there in naval battles, depending on which forces each side can bring to bear. Messy battles can ensue because of overarching concerns.

Good historical example: Battle of the River Plate.
Germany's 'pocket battleship' Admiral Graf Spee (slow-ish 12k ton heavy cruiser with 11 inch guns instead of the usual 8 inch treaty limit) faced several light cruisers, which it should be heavily favoured against as it outranged them comfortably.
However, the commanding officer feared the light cruisers would shadow him until a true capital ship (he believed a 30k ton battlecruiser with 15 inch guns was nearby) could be directed his way. He accepted battle at close range hoping for a decisive victory that'd allow him to fully disengage. Didn't work out, he had to withdraw and eventually scuttle his ship.

Something similar can apply in Aurora. My ships are designed to achieve clean victories if possible, but sometimes I'm forced to throw my forces into a dubious engagement to prevent excessive civilian losses, break up a large enemy fleet, secure a crucial jump point, board a juicy-looking prize or something of the kind. More fun than playing it safe all the time.

[Father Tim]

Yes.

I'd say well over ninety percent of my Aurora battles are won before a shot is fired.  Whether it be an advantage in numbers, speed, or tech, the outcome is never really in doubt.

The effect is also amplified when your ships have more (sometimes far more) 'hit locations' in their armour and/or shields than in their internal components.  A ship with 220 armour boxes and ~60 in engines, weapons, fuel, etc is going to be 'fine, fine, fine, BOOM!'

About the only time I have an indecisive battle is when shock damage takes out fire controls or active sensors, and one side withdraws prematurely.

[83athom]

Most battles I have had have been one sided. However, it wasn't always when I had the numbers advantage. During my end tech game, I took on an enemy fleet of mid-late level tech (anti-matter engines, soft x-ray lasers, etc) with only a handful of gunships and a couple frigates. They had about 20 or so ships ranging from 10k tons to 30k tons and they were missile heavy, wheras my gunships were 1000 tons and my frigates 30k tons. Since my gunships had heavy thermal reduction on their engines I sneaked them around while my frigates shot down missile after missile, and when they got into range of their back-most ships (just outside of their res 20 that was active) they opened fire (the gunships had 2 fairly large lasers that shot every increment each). While the enemy ships then became distracted looking for my gunships, my frigates moved up while simultaneously opening fire with missiles on the enemy. The enemy shot down a fair few of the missiles but the volleys were too dense (I use large amounts of reduced size launchers) and a lot got through killing most of the smaller designs. Both the frigate and gunships groups then moved in to mop up the larger of the enemies that remained with their beam weapons. The results: My side; 2 gunships heavy armor damage (little internal), 4 gunships light damage, 1 frigate moderate armor damage, 1 frigate light damage. Enemy; ~20 ships from 10k to 30k tons destroyed.

There were times where engagements were not one sided, but those were mostly small detachments for recon encountering an enemy and doing some damage while falling back.

[SteelChicken]

Depends on the situation.  When dealing with some of the spoilers, I generally know what I am dealing with and prepare accordingly.   With some NPR's - not always.   Currently engaged in a major battle with an NPR thats about 3-4 tech levels below me(except for their particle beams are advanced) but outnumber me about 4:1 and were defending a jump point.   I had no idea what I would be dealing with when I jumped and its been challenging to adapt to the situation.

[AL]

In my current carrier game, I decided to try fighting Star Swarm FAC's with fighters. I imagined the extreme speed of my fighters would allow them to dodge any incoming weapon fire, but that turned out to not be the case. By the end of the engagement, I had lost something like ~10 of my 500ton fighters in exchange for ~30 of the enemy's FAC's. I guess this would probably still count as a "one-sided" battle, but losses were much higher than if I were to use the usual specialised anti-FAC ships instead.

[linkxsc]

As far as my experience. Even with a normal ROF doctrine, fights tend to be 1 sided in favor of the higher tech nation, as they usually have the range, speed, and sensors to dictate the engagement.

Course you can beat higher tech factions that would destroy you normally.
Box launcher equipped ships saturating AA. Foghters and FACs that avoid detection. Or just goingg for sub par ship designs, but having them faster than normal, to skirt the range of enemy weapons.