Precursors?

[Trueknight (OP)]

Ok...in my game i first lost a single survey ship, attacked by unknown in orbit to a planet. The ship had no sensors, so i had no idea of what hit it.

 After a couple of years i returned to the system with two scout ships. They find 2 contacts near the same planet, Termal Signature of 4125 ( ) each, and no signature on the surface. They destroyed even the scouts, but this is my fault, i give'em wrong orders. During the "battle" i observed they could move at 9400 km/s...

 Since they seems to be watching over an empty planet, and have great technology, shall i deduce that i met 2 fearsome precursors?

Moreover, considering that they have a TH 50-100 times higher than my biggest ship, and they can move just a little slower than my best MISSILES, i suppose that the best course of action would be to steer away from them...the problem is that the planet they are guarding is just next to the only planet with acceptable colony cost i found....how much risks will an eventual colony have?

Thanks

[welchbloke]

Ok...in my game i first lost a single survey ship, attacked by unknown in orbit to a planet. The ship had no sensors, so i had no idea of what hit it.

 After a couple of years i returned to the system with two scout ships. They find 2 contacts near the same planet, Termal Signature of 4125 ( :twisted:

Moreover, considering that they have a TH 50-100 times higher than my biggest ship, and they can move just a little slower than my best MISSILES, i suppose that the best course of action would be to steer away from them...the problem is that the planet they are guarding is just next to the only planet with acceptable colony cost i found....how much risks will an eventual colony have?
Thanks

Depending on what engines they have (and how many) the Precursor ships could easily mass anywhere between 10 000 and 25 000 tonnes (for example if they have solid core engines with no signature reduction (TH 200 each) then the ships have 20 and a bit engines. The more likely engine tech is magnetic confinement which would give you a ship with 33 of them.). If the ship does have 33 Magnetic confinement drives then a ship with a speed of 9400 km/s would mass around 22 000 tonnes.  Good luck with knocking these monsters out  
I'm assuming from your post that your proposed colony planet is in the same system as the Precursors.  In that case I would say stay away until you can deal with the Precursors. Have you detected any active sensors yet? Until you do I would assume the worst case that the Precursors can detect your ships as the approach the colony planet (in that case they are most likely toast).

[Trueknight (OP)]

Yes, their planet is in the same system where the good planet is, and the distance between orbits is quite close. Anyway, my scouts didn't detected any active sensor until they reached the "guarded" planet, so i assume they were detected by passive sensor first, and only then the precursors used active sensors...their strenght was 11592, resolution 69...i suppose they'e quite strong sensors

[Steve Walmsley]

Yes, their planet is in the same system where the good planet is, and the distance between orbits is quite close. Anyway, my scouts didn't detected any active sensor until they reached the "guarded" planet, so i assume they were detected by passive sensor first, and only then the precursors used active sensors...their strenght was 11592, resolution 69...i suppose they'e quite strong sensors

Best not to attract their attention until you think you can deal with them as they might follow you through the jump point to Sol . I would suggest surveying around them for the moment. You could also develop some long-range recon drones (large missiles with sensors and no warhead) and send in a ship to fire some at the precursors to get more information about size and numbers. If you want to try it, designing a multi-stage missile will get you more range for the same missile size (the same principle as many modern-day rockets). You design a missile and use it as the second stage for another missile. For a three stage missile, use that new missile as the second stage for a third missile.

Steve

[Trueknight (OP)]

Best not to attract their attention until you think you can deal with them as they might follow you through the jump point to Sol

I like it, though...it sounds a much more smart enemy thant the "regular long-time destroyed civilization remnants "....