Boarding ships inside a nebula

[Erthel (OP)]

Hello everyone,

I'm trying to board ships inside a nebula, which reduces quite a lot my max speed (strenght 20 nebula).  The thing is I have speed 4000 boarding ships, and I'm trying to board speed 400/500 ships, but every time I send my ships on "attempt boarding action", I get 100% casualties. 

From what I've read, seems you get a casualty ammount equal to 20D10 minus your speed divided by target speed (which, in my case, would be minus 8-10D10).  So I should get casualties from 10-12% to 100-120%, but I'm always getting 100%.

I've attempted about 10 drops (losing 10 battalions so far).  Anyone has idea if this formula has changed, or I'm doing some other thing wrong?

I've had no problem boarding enemy orbital stations.

Thank you very much!

[83athom]

1) Your ships aren't fast enough. 2)Are you using Marines? 3)Can you post the design of the boarding ship?

[Erthel (OP)]

This is the multi-purpose ship I'm using.  Trying to assault ships traveling at 400-600kps

Code: [Select]

NAV Satie II class Cruiser    25,000 tons     624 Crew     7410.725 BP      TCS 500  TH 360  EM 0
4500 km/s     Armour 36-76     Shields 0-0     Sensors 1/1/0/0     Damage Control Rating 31     PPV 128
Maint Life 1.13 Years     MSP 2038    AFR 454%    IFR 6.3%    1YR 1619    5YR 24286    Max Repair 1139.0625 MSP
Intended Deployment Time: 14 months    Spare Berths 0   
Cryo Drop Capacity: 1 Battalion   

1125 EP Magnetic Fusion Drive (2)    Power 1125    Fuel Use 11.53%    Signature 180    Exp 9%
Fuel Capacity 2,500,000 Litres    Range 156.1 billion km   (401 days at full power)

25cm Railgun V3/C5 (16x4)    Range 150,000km     TS: 4500 km/s     Power 15-5     RM 3    ROF 15        5 5 5 3 2 2 2 1 1 1
Fire Control S02 160-4000 H50 (2)    Max Range: 320,000 km   TS: 4000 km/s     97 94 91 88 84 81 78 75 72 69
Magnetic Confinement Fusion Reactor Technology PB-1 (2)     Total Power Output 80    Armour 0    Exp 5%

Active Search Sensor MR4-R1 (50%) (1)     GPS 42     Range 4.6m km    MCR 503k km    Resolution 1

ECCM-2 (2)         ECM 20

This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes
Actually this just happened (trying to board a ship 125km/s):



My ships are running 36 times faster than this one. 100% casualties.

[Erik L]

Certain of the spoiler ships are not boardable. Might this be one of them?

[Erthel (OP)]

That was my thought at first. Yes, they're spoiler ships, so I might just give up. On the other hand, they had orbital defense stations over ruin worlds and I could happily capture those (classed as ships).

[TCD]

That was my thought at first. Yes, they're spoiler ships, so I might just give up. On the other hand, they had orbital defense stations over ruin worlds and I could happily capture those (classed as ships).

Hmm, you might have found a bug (but the other way round to your initial thoughts!) I believe the justification is that the spoiler ships are not designed to have a living crew, so can't be captured?

[Black]

I am certain that if those are spoilers with orbital stations Precursors then their ships can be captured. I did it in my last game at several occasions.

[baconholic]

I am going to take a wild guess and say that the nebula is masking the true speed that's used for boarding. It's probably using the max speed of the enemy craft when calculating casualties.

From the screenshot, it appears that the spoiler ship has 1920 thermal, which is over 5 times your thermal output. If they are similar size, the non-nebula speed of the spoiler ship will be much higher than yours. I guess this is why you suffer 100% casualty.

[83athom]

While decent against stationary targets, my recommendation would be to replace the drop pod bay for a hangar to fit a 500 ton dropship. All the dropship should carry is a cryo-company pod, 4HS of engines (max power modification), and the rest as fuel, and remember to drop deployment time to 0.1 - 0.2 months. For the same size as the one battalion cryo-drop bay, you can fit 2 of these dropships. The bonus from this, you can build them from fighter factories. Alternatively, you could make a 1000ton dropship which can fit 3 company cryo-drop pods easily enough.

[83athom]

I believe the justification is that the spoiler ships are not designed to have a living crew, so can't be captured?

Things pertaining to the spoiler races should be put in the spoiler code. Precursor ships are automated but were designed with crew in mind. Extra-galactic invaders are long lived creatures that enjoy some decadence, so they need living spaces. The Star Swarm is the only spoiler which it makes sense you couldn't capture as they are giant biological beings in space.

[AbuDhabi]

The Star Swarm is the only spoiler which it makes sense you couldn't capture as they are giant biological beings in space.

Pierce their skin, fight your way against antibodies to their brain and hack it!

[alex_brunius]

I am going to take a wild guess and say that the nebula is masking the true speed that's used for boarding. It's probably using the max speed of the enemy craft when calculating casualties.

From the screenshot, it appears that the spoiler ship has 1920 thermal, which is over 5 times your thermal output. If they are similar size, the non-nebula speed of the spoiler ship will be much higher than yours. I guess this is why you suffer 100% casualty.

My guess is that this is the issue. I can't find any other logical explanation.

[Garfunkel]

That's the reason. Nebula speed depends on your armour and not only engines and the boarding calculation does not take into account reduced speed caused by nebula, because all the engines are still there and functioning.