Author Topic: Help with Specialty Weapons (Particle Beams/Plasma Carronades/Ect.)  (Read 3196 times)

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Offline Theodidactus (OP)

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Hi, I have a few misc. questions about the less-commonly used weapons systems.
I'm a deep RPer, I like my ships to have cool weapons, even if they're not minmaxed to the max, but it's nice to know how this stuff works at the strategic level.


1: Are Particle Beams good for anything at all? I fail to see how particle beams can offer up anything a laser can't. My laser tech is only slightly more advanced than my particle beam tech, but it's doing 24 damage falling off at a range of 800,000 km, while my particle beams are doing exactly 6 damage throughout a range of 200,000 km. They are only slightly smaller and faster than a laser cannon. Is there any reason to arm a ship with them.

2: My close-in frigate fleets are going to mount 3 25 cm railguns and 2 30 cm plasma carronades. Is this functionally any better than just slapping 2 more railguns on there? Range isn't an issue with these guys, they're supposed to be fast and close the distance immediately.

3: Why are missiles on this forum so darn small? Everybody uses designs with missiles sized 3-5. I want my strategic missile cruiser to be able to project power nearly systemwide, with large vollys of super slow firing, very long ranged missiles. I have some size-10 designs that do pretty significant damage over long ranges, and the missiles still go pretty fast (20,000+ kps). Aside from the obvious and quite-flavorful downsides (missiles take forever to reach their target) is there anything about this strategy I'm missing?

4: I want a bomber. The best way I can think to do this is have a very large (size 12) box-mounted missile with a phenomenally short range (1 million km, tops) but otherwise high-velocity, high agility, high warhead properties. My tiny, thermally shielded bombers would get in close and drop 2-3 of these each, then pull away. Is this a viable strategy?

5: I'm a little unclear about how missile fire controls and missile attacks in general work.
a) obviously weapons need a target to shoot at. Can missile fire controls attack a target that's only been detected by  thermal sensors, or do they need active scanners?
b) does the missile fire control provide its own active scanning power, or does it need to be supported by another active scanner?
c) can missiles be fired at things that show up on a scanner, but are below the resolution of the missile fire control itself (in my experience, the answer seems to be "yes", but i can't tell for sure


most importantly
d) how do missiles with onboard sensors work? Every time I've tried this, it's been a dud. Surely there's a way to fire a missile blindly at a waypoint in empty space and have it lock onto an enemy craft with onboard senors. I like the idea of firing a cluster of heat-seeking or radar-guided missiles at an enemy fleet and having the missiles break and do the work, but every time I try that, the missiles either blow right past the fleet (toward a waypoint behind them) or just sit their while the fleet rolls past (if fired at a waypoint in front of them). I've even tried deleting the waypoint and the events stream says something like "the missile will find a new target"...and it doesn't, while enemies sit within sensor range.
« Last Edit: July 11, 2012, 01:21:26 PM by Theodidactus »
My Theodidactus, now I see that you are excessively simple of mind and more gullible than most. The Crystal Sphere you seek cannot be found in nature, look about you...wander the whole cosmos, and you will find nothing but the clear sweet breezes of the great ethereal ocean enclosed not by any bound
 

Offline Erik L

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Hi, I have a few misc. questions about the less-commonly used weapons systems.
I'm a deep RPer, I like my ships to have cool weapons, even if they're not minmaxed to the max, but it's nice to know how this stuff works at the strategic level.


1: Are Particle Beams good for anything at all? I fail to see how particle beams can offer up anything a laser can't. My laser tech is only slightly more advanced than my particle beam tech, but it's doing 24 damage falling off at a range of 800,000 km, while my particle beams are doing exactly 6 damage throughout a range of 200,000 km. They are only slightly smaller and faster than a laser cannon. Is there any reason to arm a ship with them.
Lasers drop damage at range. Particle beams are constant through the entire range.
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2: My close-in frigate fleets are going to mount 3 25 cm railguns and 2 30 cm plasma carronades. Is this functionally any better than just slapping 2 more railguns on there? Range isn't an issue with these guys, they're supposed to be fast and close the distance immediately.

3: Why are missiles on this forum so darn small? Everybody uses designs with missiles sized 3-5. I want my strategic missile cruiser to be able to project power nearly systemwide, with large vollys of super slow firing, very long ranged missiles. I have some size-10 designs that do pretty significant damage over long ranges, and the missiles still go pretty fast (20,000+ kps). Aside from the obvious and quite-flavorful downsides (missiles take forever to reach their target) is there anything about this strategy I'm missing?
Volume = good in missiles. More volume = more good :) Bigger missiles fire slower, and are usually relegated to PDC (which have 2x the RoF of comparable ship launchers). That being said, I usually build the following sizes: Size 1 AMM, size 3-5 light missile, size 6-8 medium, size 9-12 heavy, size 12-18 capital. Those designations are my own.
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4: I want a bomber. The best way I can think to do this is have a very large (size 12) box-mounted missile with a phenomenally short range (1 million km, tops) but otherwise high-velocity, high agility, high warhead properties. My tiny, thermally shielded bombers would get in close and drop 2-3 of these each, then pull away. Is this a viable strategy?

5: I'm a little unclear about how missile fire controls and missile attacks in general work.
a) obviously weapons need a target to shoot at. Can missile fire controls attack a target that's only been detected by  thermal sensors, or do they need active scanners?
Active
Quote
b) does the missile fire control provide its own active scanning power, or does it need to be supported by another active scanner?
It needs a separate scanner.
Quote
c) can missiles be fired at things that show up on a scanner, but are below the resolution of the missile fire control itself (in my experience, the answer seems to be "yes", but i can't tell for sure


most importantly
d) how do missiles with onboard sensors work? Every time I've tried this, it's been a dud. Surely there's a way to fire a missile blindly at a waypoint in empty space and have it lock onto an enemy craft with onboard senors. I like the idea of firing a cluster of heat-seeking or radar-guided missiles at an enemy fleet and having the missiles break and do the work, but every time I try that, the missiles either blow right past the fleet (toward a waypoint behind them) or just sit their while the fleet rolls past (if fired at a waypoint in front of them). I've even tried deleting the waypoint and the events stream says something like "the missile will find a new target"...and it doesn't, while enemies sit within sensor range.
Missile mounted sensor ranges are very very small. Unless you dedicate a lot of space to them (reducing warhead, speed, fuel, etc). Chances are the enemy ships either miss the missiles scanner envelop entirely, or zip through it in one 5 second increment.

Offline Theodidactus (OP)

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what I had was a large, very low resolution scanner (5,000+ tons) which covered a very large area, for capitol ship destruction. The enemy precursors flew inside the sensor sweep area, and were larger than 5,000 tons, but the missile did not change course.


they must have been carrying ECM's or something. I just want to know if it works, and apparently it does so okay.
My Theodidactus, now I see that you are excessively simple of mind and more gullible than most. The Crystal Sphere you seek cannot be found in nature, look about you...wander the whole cosmos, and you will find nothing but the clear sweet breezes of the great ethereal ocean enclosed not by any bound
 

Offline Rabid_Cog

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Missiles never change course after being fired, unless they have their OWN sensor systems. On-board sensors as it were. They will also only lock on to a new target in such a case IF THEIR OLD ONE DISAPPEARS (through losing sensor lock or blowing up).

You need an active sensor result (active sensor busy scanning the target) and missile fire control with enough range to reach said target in order to launch missiles at it. You then have to keep both those requirements fulfilled until the missile impacts. Losing either leads to a lost sensor lock and the missile reverting to its own devices (blowing up if it has no on board sensor).

The resolution of a sensor only impacts its optimal resolution. It can still pick up things smaller than that, but not at the range given. Instead, they will be spotted at some fraction of that range depending on how much the resolutions differ.
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Offline Nathan_

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Quote
2: My close-in frigate fleets are going to mount 3 25 cm railguns and 2 30 cm plasma carronades. Is this functionally any better than just slapping 2 more railguns on there? Range isn't an issue with these guys, they're supposed to be fast and close the distance immediately.
Plasma Caronade research is just cheaper, you only have to research the size of the gun, rather than anything else. That said, railguns divide their damage over multiple shots so the Plasma will do better vs certain targets and the railguns will do better vs certain other targets.

Quote
3: Why are missiles on this forum so darn small? Everybody uses designs with missiles sized 3-5. I want my strategic missile cruiser to be able to project power nearly systemwide, with large vollys of super slow firing, very long ranged missiles. I have some size-10 designs that do pretty significant damage over long ranges, and the missiles still go pretty fast (20,000+ kps). Aside from the obvious and quite-flavorful downsides (missiles take forever to reach their target) is there anything about this strategy I'm missing?
How big are your ships, small missiles can fit in smaller ships which are much cheaper to maintain. Likewise small missiles can overwhelm PD much better, since AOE options are limited(railguns and gauss, with their respective drawbacks).

Quote
4: I want a bomber. The best way I can think to do this is have a very large (size 12) box-mounted missile with a phenomenally short range (1 million km, tops) but otherwise high-velocity, high agility, high warhead properties. My tiny, thermally shielded bombers would get in close and drop 2-3 of these each, then pull away. Is this a viable strategy?
Only way to see is to try it out, against ships that can't resolve your bombers on grav pulse sensors you'll do fine, against anything with any AMM capability what so ever you won't.

Quote
5: I'm a little unclear about how missile fire controls and missile attacks in general work.
a) obviously weapons need a target to shoot at. Can missile fire controls attack a target that's only been detected by  thermal sensors, or do they need active scanners?
b) does the missile fire control provide its own active scanning power, or does it need to be supported by another active scanner?
c) can missiles be fired at things that show up on a scanner, but are below the resolution of the missile fire control itself (in my experience, the answer seems to be "yes", but i can't tell for sure
a)Active only
b)You need a scanner
c)only if they are close enough, a max size sensor can resolve a small enough object that is close enough, the exact formula is on here somewhere.

Quote
most importantly
d) how do missiles with onboard sensors work? Every time I've tried this, it's been a dud. Surely there's a way to fire a missile blindly at a waypoint in empty space and have it lock onto an enemy craft with onboard senors. I like the idea of firing a cluster of heat-seeking or radar-guided missiles at an enemy fleet and having the missiles break and do the work, but every time I try that, the missiles either blow right past the fleet (toward a waypoint behind them) or just sit their while the fleet rolls past (if fired at a waypoint in front of them). I've even tried deleting the waypoint and the events stream says something like "the missile will find a new target"...and it doesn't, while enemies sit within sensor range.
They have to start their life within sensor range of their target(and it has to be active range). Mines with equal separation range/submunition active range can target enemy ships.
 

Offline Theodidactus (OP)

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They have to start their life within sensor range of their target(and it has to be active range). Mines with equal separation range/submunition active range can target enemy ships.


Thanks for clearing this up. So if I read you right, I can't detect an idling enemy fleet from across the system on thermal scanners, fire a massive bloom of missiles at a waypoint directly on top of them, and then have the onboard missile sensors blast the fleet apart.

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How big are your ships, small missiles can fit in smaller ships which are much cheaper to maintain. Likewise small missiles can overwhelm PD much better, since AOE options are limited(railguns and gauss, with their respective drawbacks).

The "Continental" class strategic missile cruiser is going to be among the largest ships in my fleet, along with its companion "Archipelago" class battlecruiser. We're talking 18,000 to 20,000 tons, jump capable craft built for extended operations in enemy territory. The idea I have here is for a cruiser with a primary weapon of 6-10 large, very slow firing missile launchers that can project firepower over a very large radius. Basically, I want to know the largest practical missile size for something like that.
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Offline Erik L

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Thanks for clearing this up. So if I read you right, I can't detect an idling enemy fleet from across the system on thermal scanners, fire a massive bloom of missiles at a waypoint directly on top of them, and then have the onboard missile sensors blast the fleet apart.

In theory, you could. As long as the enemy fleet does not move, and your waypoint is close enough for the on-board scanners to see the ships.

Offline Redshirt

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Thanks for clearing this up. So if I read you right, I can't detect an idling enemy fleet from across the system on thermal scanners, fire a massive bloom of missiles at a waypoint directly on top of them, and then have the onboard missile sensors blast the fleet apart.

The "Continental" class strategic missile cruiser is going to be among the largest ships in my fleet, along with its companion "Archipelago" class battlecruiser. We're talking 18,000 to 20,000 tons, jump capable craft built for extended operations in enemy territory. The idea I have here is for a cruiser with a primary weapon of 6-10 large, very slow firing missile launchers that can project firepower over a very large radius. Basically, I want to know the largest practical missile size for something like that.

You may want to armor those missiles, then. Remember, all it takes is one point of damage to destroy almost any unarmored missile, regardless of size. Whether it's from an anti-missile missile, a gauss cannon, or a meson gun doesn't matter. For that matter, if you're investing in that large a missile, you may even want ECM on it.

As for bombers... It would take a lot of tech to pull off, but I bet stealth bombers would be very effective.

Edit- I just remembered, for big missiles, go for multi-stage, multiple warhead missiles. If you plan them right, the warhead splits shortly before the AMM would intercept. You overwhelm the AMM by surprise.
« Last Edit: July 11, 2012, 08:52:10 PM by Redshirt »
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Offline Theokrat

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The "Continental" class strategic missile cruiser is going to be among the largest ships in my fleet, along with its companion "Archipelago" class battlecruiser. We're talking 18,000 to 20,000 tons, jump capable craft built for extended operations in enemy territory. The idea I have here is for a cruiser with a primary weapon of 6-10 large, very slow firing missile launchers that can project firepower over a very large radius. Basically, I want to know the largest practical missile size for something like that.

The trouble is that 6-10 missiles are very unlikely to penetrate enemy defenses at all. It takes about 2-3 AMMs (of size 1) to destroy a single missile, so for every one of your size-10 missiles the enemy must expend maybe 3 missile space worth of AMMs. So attrition-wise it is unlikely to be a successfull strategy against an equal foe. Moreover, its also hardly possible to overwhelm the enemy. 6 missiles are just not enough, and salvos are ages apart...

I have made a bit of an analytical thread on optimal missile sizes, which can be found here if you are interested.
 

Offline Theodidactus (OP)

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I'd say that depends pretty heavily on who your enemy is. I don't have much battle experience, but do enemy aliens always have good missile point defense?
My Theodidactus, now I see that you are excessively simple of mind and more gullible than most. The Crystal Sphere you seek cannot be found in nature, look about you...wander the whole cosmos, and you will find nothing but the clear sweet breezes of the great ethereal ocean enclosed not by any bound
 

Offline Theokrat

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I'd say that depends pretty heavily on who your enemy is. I don't have much battle experience, but do enemy aliens always have good missile point defense?
No, not all do. But those that do not are easy to overcome anyway. A strategy that does overcome strong PD will also prevail when no PD is present, but not vice-versa. Since one is likely to encounter a spectrum of PD capabilities, I would go for the strategy that prevails in most cases.
 

Offline Mel Vixen

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regarding Caronades and particleweapons i can say that particle-weapons have the advantage that even the very small ones get to the maximum range. This means a even small particle-beam with 2 damage can shell out these two points of damage at a million kilometers+ . If you need range and good recharge times from the start you can try them since you only need to explore the range path.

On the other end of the spectrum are Caronades, easy and fast to explore and they deliver huge amounts of damage althought only on close range. This means thought that your ship will vaporize the enemy out of space. Normaly i use a couple of them on a light cruiser to fight *spoilers*. They can also work facs if you are willing to lose a few.
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Offline Theodidactus (OP)

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I don't really play FACs, precisely because they're so easily pounded to a paste. Were this "starcraft", I'd have no problem sacrificing hordes of marines to the terran cause, but this is aurora, and I always become attached to my officers.



Regarding Particle beams, maybe you could have a particle beam cutter, a small long ranged gunship armed with small systems. Might be a good way to interdict fast attack craft or something.  
« Last Edit: July 12, 2012, 10:58:06 AM by Theodidactus »
My Theodidactus, now I see that you are excessively simple of mind and more gullible than most. The Crystal Sphere you seek cannot be found in nature, look about you...wander the whole cosmos, and you will find nothing but the clear sweet breezes of the great ethereal ocean enclosed not by any bound
 

Offline Theodidactus (OP)

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I recall that certain weapons on PDCs can be limited in range or damage because they have to shoot through an atmosphere. Are plasma weapons limited by the atmosphere or not? I think it would be fun to have a huge plasma artillery system on each of my planets...but only if it actually blows salami up!
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Offline Hawkeye

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Except for mesons, all beam-weapons suffer reduced damage proportional to atmosphere density. Once the atmosphere pressure reaches 1.0, no damage at all is inflicted.
The exception are CIWS, which _will_ work inside atmospheres, as they are supposed to be extremely short ranged (i.e. a couple km at the most) and, as I mentioned, meson cannons, which are totally unaffected by the atmosphere.

I usually put some battlestations in orbit over my homeworld to circumvent this and put some f****g-big-a** laser cannons on them :)


« Last Edit: July 23, 2012, 12:23:56 PM by Hawkeye »
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