Aurora 4x
C# Aurora => C# Bureau of Design => Topic started by: DFNewb on April 21, 2020, 10:47:53 AM
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How do people feel about this? With the changes to maintenance (and even a bit of the CC QoL update for shipyards) its much easier to have large ships early.
do you like to make large ships or small ships?
I have been making ships with size 25 engines two large fuel storage and then whatever they need to do their role with a 5 year deployment time and 6 year maintenance time for surveyors and 2y deploy / 3y maintain for military ships. This leads to ships generally under 10000tons. For example:
Cutlass II class Cruiser 4 541 tons 137 Crew 561.3 BP TCS 91 TH 313 EM 0
3441 km/s Armour 3-24 Shields 0-0 HTK 35 Sensors 8/8/0/0 DCR 2 PPV 24
Maint Life 3.23 Years MSP 273 AFR 66% IFR 0.9% 1YR 39 5YR 592 Max Repair 156.25 MSP
Cheetah Control Rating 1 BRG
Intended Deployment Time: 24 months Morale Check Required
Ion Drive EP312.50 (1) Power 312.5 Fuel Use 31.62% Signature 312.5 Explosion 10%
Fuel Capacity 500 000 Litres Range 62.7 billion km (210 days at full power)
Particle Beam-3 (4) Range 128 000km TS: 3 441 km/s Power 7-3 RM 150 000 km ROF 15
Beam Fire Control R128-TS3600 (1) Max Range: 128 000 km TS: 3 600 km/s 83 76 69 62 55 48 41 34 27 20
Gas-Cooled Fast Reactor R6 (2) Total Power Output 12.4 Exp 5%
Active Search Sensor AS2-R1 (1) GPS 2 Range 2m km MCR 219.8k km Resolution 1
Thermal Sensor TH1.0-8 (1) Sensitivity 8 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 22.4m km
EM Sensor EM1.0-8 (1) Sensitivity 8 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 22.4m km
This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes
Which were doing really well against an NPR until the NPR starting pumping out 12450ton (4135km/s) ships with 1 spinal laser and 9 regular lasers which outrange and outdamage me. Sure they clearly have more specialized tech than I do for their beam weapons but it made me wonder if I could make a 12450ton ship with my current tech that can match theirs.
This is what I currently have:
Axe class Battlecruiser 11 334 tons 351 Crew 1 447.7 BP TCS 227 TH 938 EM 0
4136 km/s Armour 4-44 Shields 0-0 HTK 87 Sensors 8/8/0/0 DCR 4 PPV 72
Maint Life 2.29 Years MSP 719 AFR 257% IFR 3.6% 1YR 187 5YR 2 798 Max Repair 156.25 MSP
Cheetah Control Rating 1 BRG
Intended Deployment Time: 24 months Morale Check Required
Ion Drive EP312.50 (3) Power 937.5 Fuel Use 31.62% Signature 312.5 Explosion 10%
Fuel Capacity 500 000 Litres Range 25.1 billion km (70 days at full power)
Particle Beam-3 (12) Range 128 000km TS: 4 136 km/s Power 7-3 RM 150 000 km ROF 15
Beam Fire Control R128-TS4400 (1) Max Range: 128 000 km TS: 4 400 km/s 92 84 77 69 61 53 45 38 30 22
Gas-Cooled Fast Reactor R6 (6) Total Power Output 37.2 Exp 5%
Active Search Sensor AS2-R1 (1) GPS 2 Range 2m km MCR 219.8k km Resolution 1
Thermal Sensor TH1.0-8 (1) Sensitivity 8 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 22.4m km
EM Sensor EM1.0-8 (1) Sensitivity 8 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 22.4m km
This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes
At less than 3 times the cost and 3 times the build time I have a ship with 3 times the damage, 1 more layer of armor, that moves faster.
The only restriction would be shipyard size but even 10 years in you can easily have massive shipyards not to mention with the starting default build points you could make 40 of these which I think could handle the 10 enemy ships with 10 lasers each but maybe not. I probably just need better tech to fight them but this is supposed to be a discussion on ship sizes.
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In my opinion there does not need to be a choice between either large or small ships as you can use both for different reasons.
There are both pros and cons with either types.
A smaller ship will obviously tend to always be specialised while a larger ship can perform multiple mission types and become more and more self sufficient and use more efficient component designs.
Smaller ships are generally faster and cheaper to research and also is faster to build... A shipyard with two shipyards at 4000t build two such ships faster than a single yard at 8000t for example. Smaller ships have a lower thermal radiation for the same speed as a larger ship.
Large ships tend to be more expensive to research individual parts but those parts also are more efficient in return. Larger ships can withstand more punishment in combat and not be destroyed and can also have more layers of armour for the same weight than a smaller one.
The size of the ship you build should not be some arbitrary size limit but rather depending in the role they are suppose to carry out from a strategic point of view. As a general thought I view larger ship classes to be best for more offensive purposes while smaller ships are better for defensive purposes. With this I mean from a strategic point of view and not tactical. Small ships work really well as shorter ranged who can dedicate less space for fuel, maintenance and deployment times. A larger ship can maintain a more efficient command structure and be more efficient in terms of engine, defences, fuel, deployment and maintenance perspective.
What constitute a small or a big ship really depend on your industrial and technological capacity. The maximum size usually will depend on the most research efficient jump drive that you can get your hands on, this put some severe limitations on early ship design sizes. At a conventional start then a big ship might be in the range of about 10000t while later on a 10000t ship is a somewhat small mid sized ship where many ships perhaps are in the 30-40.000t size or even bigger.
Once I reach about Magneto Plasma level engine technology my ships tend be 15-20000t for a mid sized destroyer and 5-10.000 for smaller less capable but still multi-purpose to some degree. Anything below 5000t would be almost exclusively dedicated to one function only. Ships above 20000t would likely be some dedicated carrier capable ship of some kind at that point in time.
All in all the size and the number of ship types you can maintain will largely depend on the amount of research you can afford to dump into component research versus continue to research better basic technology. So this is solely depending on your overall needs and potential enemies that you face and how advanced these enemies are.
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In my opinion there does not need to be a choice between either large or small ships as you can use both for different reasons.
There are both pros and cons with either types.
A smaller ship will obviously tend to always be specialised while a larger ship can perform multiple mission types and become more and more self sufficient and use more efficient component designs.
Smaller ships are generally faster and cheaper to research and also is faster to build... A shipyard with two shipyards at 4000t build two such ships faster than a single yard at 8000t for example. Smaller ships have a lower thermal radiation for the same speed as a larger ship.
Large ships tend to be more expensive to research individual parts but those parts also are more efficient in return. Larger ships can withstand more punishment in combat and not be destroyed and can also have more layers of armour for the same weight than a smaller one.
The size of the ship you build should not be some arbitrary size limit but rather depending in the role they are suppose to carry out from a strategic point of view. As a general thought I view larger ship classes to be best for more offensive purposes while smaller ships are better for defensive purposes. With this I mean from a strategic point of view and not tactical. Small ships work really well as shorter ranged who can dedicate less space for fuel, maintenance and deployment times. A larger ship can maintain a more efficient command structure and be more efficient in terms of engine, defences, fuel, deployment and maintenance perspective.
What constitute a small or a big ship really depend on your industrial and technological capacity. The maximum size usually will depend on the most research efficient jump drive that you can get your hands on, this put some severe limitations on early ship design sizes. At a conventional start then a big ship might be in the range of about 10000t while later on a 10000t ship is a somewhat small mid sized ship where many ships perhaps are in the 30-40.000t size or even bigger.
Once I reach about Magneto Plasma level engine technology my ships tend be 15-20000t for a mid sized destroyer and 5-10.000 for smaller less capable but still multi-purpose to some degree. Anything below 5000t would be almost exclusively dedicated to one function only. Ships above 20000t would likely be some dedicated carrier capable ship of some kind at that point in time.
All in all the size and the number of ship types you can maintain will largely depend on the amount of research you can afford to dump into component research versus continue to research better basic technology. So this is solely depending on your overall needs and potential enemies that you face and how advanced these enemies are.
The jump drive thing isn't really an issue for me as I have been using Civilian jump ships with both types of jump engine to move ships through systems (and also work as a refueling hub).
Seems like you make ships much larger than I usually do (the same way NPR's do to me aswell) so I guess I should make larger ships.
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One of my favorite campaigns in VB6 was using "star destroyer" doctrine. Military ships were big (120k) multi-mission vessels armed only with lasers. Lots of shields and armor. They weren't terrible efficient, but the they were resilient.
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I am always amazed by how big some people build their ships but I think that's because I always do conventional starts and struggle to get shipyards that can produce those multi-hundred thousand ton monsters. I feel like I'm on the low end but not as low as people who like truly small ships. Mine tend to fall into the 4000-32000 range mid game.
I like mixed task groups so what I tend to do is pick a speed and engine size then build around that in multiples to maintain consistent speed across the fleet. Ex. Size 1250 engines can give you a nice ~31% engine to mass ratio with this progression:
1 Engine - 4000 Tons - Corvette / Gunship
2 Engines - 8000 Tons - Frigate / Destroyer
4 Engines - 16000 Tons - Cruiser
8 Engines - 32000 Tons - Battleship
I did some math to work out roughly the sizes of these ships based on the conversion of Aurora/Traveller tons to volume and it runs from about 100 meters to 400 meters for various cylindrical shapes. That feels about right to me for the kind of gritty near future scifi that I like to imagine and it seems fairly consistent with the AI ships that I've met (mostly spoilers).
That said I'm doing a Star Wars themed campaign right now and I am planning to try some ludicrously big ships so I'll let you know how it goes.
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My experience is that getting the shipyard up to that size isn't all that hard. Just set that initial shipyard on constant expansion and wait a decade or two. The hard part is getting the maintenance facilities to keep up. I basically had to strip-mine my entire system of neutrionium just to build enough Maintenance facilities.
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With the shield changes, big ships can have a large bonus to survivability. I have a 25kt ship at around 30k research level (magneto engine) and it has 1000 htk counting shields and armor.
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The jump drive thing isn't really an issue for me as I have been using Civilian jump ships with both types of jump engine to move ships through systems (and also work as a refuelling hub).
If you use two jump engines in one ship/station that is a bug so should not really be used, that is certainly not intentional. Anything with a military jump drive is suppose to be a military ship/station.
When I spoke about jump engines being a limitation I mainly meant from a research perspective. From conventional technology then using ships larger then say 10000 can be a bit expensive research wise for first generation military engines. 10000t is not really a very large ship in general. After a few generation of Jump Engine tech it will become less and less of an issue for limitation of size. You then have engine size, which also can be quite expensive early on, especially if you need many different types of engines.
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My experience is that getting the shipyard up to that size isn't all that hard. Just set that initial shipyard on constant expansion and wait a decade or two. The hard part is getting the maintenance facilities to keep up. I basically had to strip-mine my entire system of neutrionium just to build enough Maintenance facilities.
The size of the ship should not really matter all that much though... small ships actually builds faster for the same total tonnage so will fill up maintenance facilities even faster if you build ships continually.
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The jump drive thing isn't really an issue for me as I have been using Civilian jump ships with both types of jump engine to move ships through systems (and also work as a refuelling hub).
If you use two jump engines in one ship/station that is a bug so should not really be used, that is certainly not intentional.
I think it was Steve's inention that you could create jump tenders capable of jumping both types of ship, which is why military jump drives count as commercial components and you can jump other ships larger than the jump ship with a sufficient drive.
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The jump drive thing isn't really an issue for me as I have been using Civilian jump ships with both types of jump engine to move ships through systems (and also work as a refuelling hub).
If you use two jump engines in one ship/station that is a bug so should not really be used, that is certainly not intentional.
I think it was Steve's inention that you could create jump tenders capable of jumping both types of ship, which is why military jump drives count as commercial components and you can jump other ships larger than the jump ship with a sufficient drive.
I doubt it. If Steve had thought much about it, he would have coded C# Aurora to be the same as VB Aurora and allowed military jump drives to move civilian-engined ships.
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The jump drive thing isn't really an issue for me as I have been using Civilian jump ships with both types of jump engine to move ships through systems (and also work as a refuelling hub).
If you use two jump engines in one ship/station that is a bug so should not really be used, that is certainly not intentional.
I think it was Steve's inention that you could create jump tenders capable of jumping both types of ship, which is why military jump drives count as commercial components and you can jump other ships larger than the jump ship with a sufficient drive.
I doubt it. If Steve had thought much about it, he would have coded C# Aurora to be the same as VB Aurora and allowed military jump drives to move civilian-engined ships.
Then I will just make 1 for civie ships and 1 for military ships and use them together in a fleet, really doesn't make much difference it's viable even if he restricts 1 Jump drive per ship.
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But that gets back to the problem of size without the cost reduction of being limited to only commercial...
It is very rare for me to have a military ship breach 100,000 tons, but it is rare I have a commercial ship that small by early mid-game.
500k military jump engines, I shudder at the thought of the cost...
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But that gets back to the problem of size without the cost reduction of being limited to only commercial...
It is very rare for me to have a military ship breach 100,000 tons, but it is rare I have a commercial ship that small by early mid-game.
500k military jump engines, I shudder at the thought of the cost...
It really doesn't.... Just make two commercial ships each with size 100 jump engines just 1 for military and 1 for commercial. Works the exact same as having 1 ship with both...
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But that gets back to the problem of size without the cost reduction of being limited to only commercial...
It is very rare for me to have a military ship breach 100,000 tons, but it is rare I have a commercial ship that small by early mid-game.
500k military jump engines, I shudder at the thought of the cost...
It really doesn't.... Just make two commercial ships each with size 100 jump engines just 1 for military and 1 for commercial. Works the exact same as having 1 ship with both...
Someone snuck in a reply, I was referring to Tim... ;) So having a military jump engine trying to jump a 500k commercial freighter... :o
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I think Father Tim's problem with the current system is that you cannot, for example, have a 10,000 tons survey ship use commercial engines if you ever want a military ship to escort it through a jump point (or vice versa). It feels like an arbitrary restriction that military ships cannot use larger, efficient engines.
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Ok... I rechecked how it is suppose to work now...
Military Jump drives does not count as a military component but is necessary to jump a ship with a military engine. So you can build a commercial station with a military jump engine and jump military ship with them so that is pretty neat. Military Jump Drives can't jump ships with a commercial engine though.
You can't have two jump drives on either a station or a ship in the newest patch so that ability is gone.
I agree that building jump drives is not really an issue... I was referring to them limiting the realistic size for jumping ships using early technology. An efficiency 4 jump drive capable of jumping a 10000t ship will cost nearly 3000rp while researching the next level of jump efficiency 5 cost 4000rp... so at some point it simply is not worth researching new jump drives rather then the next level of efficiency. This is only important for the few first levels though. That is why I mentioned that it is a limiting factor in the early technology age.
A ship at 10.000t is not really a large ship even at early technology. Expanding a few yards to above 10000t is not really very difficult to do early on.
At Magneto Plasma level of engine technology you probably could easily build ships in the range of 50.000t or so, at least for you biggest military ships without straining your research or yard spaces that much.
But large ships does not exclude smaller ship from being built at all as they both have benefits and drawbacks.
As I said... I view larger ships more capable as an offensive strategic tool while smaller ship are more important for defensive strategical considerations.
The larger a ship gets the less it make sense to specialise them too in general, there are always exceptions to the rules of course.
Whenever I design a ship I want to imagine what operational role it is to take and make sure there are not another ship that does the exact same thing. Criteria can be anything from speed, defences, weapons, range, deployment, hangar space, sensors etc...
In general I'm not too hung up on every ship needing to have the exact same speed for example, it entirely depend on their operational role.
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I think Father Tim's problem with the current system is that you cannot, for example, have a 10,000 tons survey ship use commercial engines if you ever want a military ship to escort it through a jump point (or vice versa). It feels like an arbitrary restriction that military ships cannot use larger, efficient engines.
But then again it probably is enough with a size 24 military engine with say a 25% power efficiency rate get a 0.02 fuel efficiency rate which is pretty damn good. You could also build say a size 100 at 55% power efficiency for a fuel efficiency at 0.07 fuel efficiency if you want to go that route instead.
Any of those choices should be good for a survey vessel.
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You can't have two jump drives on either a station or a ship in the newest patch so that ability is gone.
That is unfortunate. :(
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I think Father Tim's problem with the current system is that you cannot, for example, have a 10,000 tons survey ship use commercial engines if you ever want a military ship to escort it through a jump point (or vice versa). It feels like an arbitrary restriction that military ships cannot use larger, efficient engines.
That is exactly my problem. With a conventional start, my first three generations of warships use civilian engines, because (one) engine models are expensive to research, so I generally just have one and (two) fuel efficiency is atrocious, so the one I have is the biggest, most fuel-efficient engine design I can manage.
Later on, I still use civilian engine for ships where range & fuel efficiency is more important than tactical speed. I also don't use jump gates / stabilized wormholes, so it is hugely important to me that my fleets can all move and jump together.
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Bigger ships put more raw power per tonnage or mineral cost than smaller ones.
Smaller ones are faster to iterate over, adapt to your enemy, faster to upgrade and therefore can stay closer to the current technological edge.
Both types have their value.
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I think Father Tim's problem with the current system is that you cannot, for example, have a 10,000 tons survey ship use commercial engines if you ever want a military ship to escort it through a jump point (or vice versa). It feels like an arbitrary restriction that military ships cannot use larger, efficient engines.
That is exactly my problem. With a conventional start, my first three generations of warships use civilian engines, because (one) engine models are expensive to research, so I generally just have one and (two) fuel efficiency is atrocious, so the one I have is the biggest, most fuel-efficient engine design I can manage.
Later on, I still use civilian engine for ships where range & fuel efficiency is more important than tactical speed. I also don't use jump gates / stabilized wormholes, so it is hugely important to me that my fleets can all move and jump together.
Fuel cost in general have also gone up a bit from VB6 to C# even for commercial engines. But a size 24 at engine power 50% have a power efficiency of 11.4% so it can't be that bad?!?
If you go down to 40% efficiency you get a fuel efficiency of 6.5%.
A size 40 at power efficiency 55% have a fuel efficiency of 11.2%.
And this is with a fuel consumption tech rate of 1.
I think we just have to accept that fuel costs in general have gone up a bit in C# over VB6... I don't think it is a huge issue to be honest.
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Lol, I think we have different definitions of large ships. Your "cruiser" there is in the entry-level weight category my current game race would be torn between calling a corvette or a destroyer. Your battlecruiser would be comfortably considered a light cruiser. And if anything in other games I have tended towards labelling things in a heavier direction (the curent game is based somewhat on modern ship weights, other games have assumed that ships would tend towads getting heavier).
I see no reason there can't be a place for multiple ship types in the fleet. I tend to go with small ships for things I want lots of and want the risk of destruction dispersed for such as PD for instance whilst heavier ships bring heavier firepower. My current race has a specific design philosophy for each. The corvettes are typically between 1,000 and 4,000 tons and mount PD weapons. Destroyers are between 4,000 and 10,000 tons and are the baseline ship-to-ship combat units. Light Cruisers are generally between 8,000 and 12,000 tons and are like Destroyer+. They have the same protection as destroyers and the same weapons systems, but more of them so they bring more firepower and whatever extra combat ability I might want to throw in (eg. more fire controls or whatever). Cruisers are between 12,000 and 20,000 tons, they typically step up the size and power of the weapons systems as well as the protection from the light cuisers. When I get to them, heavy cruisers will be 20,000 to 30,000 tons and will be to cruisers what light cruisers are to destroyers and 30,000 tons and up will be battleships, again a step up in terms of offensive and defensive capability. I haven't bothered with fighters as a general combat approach because its still on a patch that interrupts every time a fighter is built. Sensor ships are usually based on light cruisers with all their weapons stripped, replaced with a powerful sensor and a hanger bay containing 4 - 6 sensor fighters.
To be fair, this is more based on RP than raw design efficiency, but I think having a range of ships is useful so you can decide whether you want more, cheaper ships or less, more powerful ships or a mix in between.
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Lol, I think we have different definitions of large ships. Your "cruiser" there is in the entry-level weight category my current game race would be torn between calling a corvette or a destroyer. Your battlecruiser would be comfortably considered a light cruiser. And if anything in other games I have tended towards labelling things in a heavier direction (the curent game is based somewhat on modern ship weights, other games have assumed that ships would tend towads getting heavier).
I see no reason there can't be a place for multiple ship types in the fleet. I tend to go with small ships for things I want lots of and want the risk of destruction dispersed for such as PD for instance whilst heavier ships bring heavier firepower. My current race has a specific design philosophy for each. The corvettes are typically between 1,000 and 4,000 tons and mount PD weapons. Destroyers are between 4,000 and 10,000 tons and are the baseline ship-to-ship combat units. Light Cruisers are generally between 8,000 and 12,000 tons and are like Destroyer+. They have the same protection as destroyers and the same weapons systems, but more of them so they bring more firepower and whatever extra combat ability I might want to throw in (eg. more fire controls or whatever). Cruisers are between 12,000 and 20,000 tons, they typically step up the size and power of the weapons systems as well as the protection from the light cuisers. When I get to them, heavy cruisers will be 20,000 to 30,000 tons and will be to cruisers what light cruisers are to destroyers and 30,000 tons and up will be battleships, again a step up in terms of offensive and defensive capability. I haven't bothered with fighters as a general combat approach because its still on a patch that interrupts every time a fighter is built. Sensor ships are usually based on light cruisers with all their weapons stripped, replaced with a powerful sensor and a hanger bay containing 4 - 6 sensor fighters.
To be fair, this is more based on RP than raw design efficiency, but I think having a range of ships is useful so you can decide whether you want more, cheaper ships or less, more powerful ships or a mix in between.
In my campaigns I tend to make the ships for their roles and the sizes tend to grow with time. So a destroyer that is 8000t in the early game might grow to become a 15-20.000t ship later on. The main thing is that their role in the fleet remain the same.
In a developed game then my fleet sizes and roles usually look like this...
Corvette 2000-4000 tons
These are specialized patrol, scout ships. They have rudimentary weapon systems if any at all, they are not meant to go into actual battle. Their means of defence are usually stealth and/or speed, depends on what they designed for.
Frigattes 6000-10.000 tons
They are either old destroyers or newer ships tasked with the role of escort for commercial ships or other slower ships. Their main armament is that of defence and especially point defence to defend support ships from missile attacks, but also some beam weapons for dissuading an enemy to close in.
Destroyer 15.000-20.000 tons
Destroyer roles is both fleet escort but also scouting, patrolling and engaging enemy ships at limited capacity. A destroyer are suppose to be able to act on their own or in smaller groups, depending on their mission, but destroyers are very rarely deployed to a system alone but in small flotilla forces. They need to have both offensive and defensive weapons with a focus on the defensive side and these ships tend to be the most numerous as single type of vessels in a fleet if you don't count FAC/Fighter crafts.
Cruiser more than 20.000 tons
This is a really large ship whose role are basically long range patrol, reconnaissance and projection of power. They are suppose to act both alone or in a small task-group of cruisers. They are basically very big heavily armed and armoured scout ships and have basically all types of systems included in addition to a decent hangar space for a plethora of parasites depending on their mission type.
Battle Carrier more than 20.000 tons
This is an armed and armoured ships with the main role of carrying strike crafts for its main offensive capacity, usually in the form of missile strike crafts. The ships always have some for of anti-missile defences and a strong beam defence. They are suppose to hit and destroy enemies from a distance but they also can engage in close beam combat action such as jump gates or defending a planet. These ships would be the main capital ship of any fleet and would be like marrying a battleship with a carrier.
There might also be allot of other types of ships with different roles such as light carriers, assault carriers, jump tenders, and many more...
But I think that size is generally a definition of how advanced and developed the economy and technology has become. Bigger ships might take more time to build but they can have quite effective systems and allot more staying power. Smaller ships are more versatile and can be spread out over a larger area and obviously does not sting as much of you do happen to loose them. But in general if you can afford three 20.000 ton ships to do a task that is generally more effective than six 10.000t ships doing the same thing as the components on the larger ship probably are more efficient and the larger ships are more resilient in general. On the other hand six ships can be in six different locations where three ships can only be in three... so it is a give and take.
When it comes to offensive capacity then small ships can be built allot faster than the same tonnage of large ships... so if you want 30.000 ton of raw offensive power (say missile strike crafts) it is far quicker to build 30 1000t FAC than one 30.000 ton missile cruiser and the smaller ships are more efficient for doing overwhelming quick and surgical strikes. The big ship is more about presence, taking and holding space far way.
If all you need is defending yourself then concentrating on smaller ships is usually far more efficient... but if you want to project power over longer distances then the bigger you can make the ships the better in general.
But... at the same time... you should always try to maintain a good balance between different types of ships... so, small or large are both highly valuable no mater what.
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these days I design ships as the need arises to make the game more challenging (and it's closer to how it is IRL).
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From a role-playing perspective, I like the 'prestige' of larger ships (I also try to avoid using missiles so as to not 'waste' resources). Here's my intended military ship classes for the C# version:
Corvette 7,500T Survey ships
Frigate 15,000T Light anti-ship jump point defence pickets (non-turreted lasers)
Destroyer 30,000T Light anti-missile assault ships (small turreted lasers & large non-turreted lasers).
Escort Carrier 30,000T Light fighter/FAC support
Cruiser 45,000T Medium long-range defence ships
Carrier 45,000T Medium fighter/FAC support
Battlecruiser 60,000T Heavy long-range assault ships
Fleet Carrier 60,000T Heavy fighter/FAC support
Battleship 90,000T Super-heavy general purpose ships
Supercarrier 90,000T Super-heavy fighter/FAC support
Dreadnought 120,000T Does what it says on the tin :)
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I typically field a navy with a focus on small ships. My class breakdown is as follows:
Below 3,125 Tons - Miscellaneous craft, little standardization; Gun Boats, Missile Boats, etc.
3,125 Tons - Corvettes
The lower end of my flotilla, operate in squadrons, typically escort ships or specialized units, not typically Jump Capable.
6,250 Tons - Frigates
The upper end of my flotilla, also operate in squadrons, considered a "Sub-Capital".
12,500 Tons - Cruisers, Light Cruisers, Carriers, Destroyers
My commonplace Capital Ships, the low end of my Capital Ships.
- Cruisers are independent action vessels with a generalist load out and a Jump Drive. Cruisers are considered Capital Ships.
- Destroyers are specialized vessels built for Anti-Capital Ship duty, they typically mount no Jump Drive. Destroyers are considered Capital Ships.
- Carriers are used for all manner of duties, but typically have no Jump Drive at this tonnage. They are considered a "Sub-Capital" at this tonnage.
- Light Cruisers are focused on supporting Cruisers, typically in the fire support or intelligence role. They mount no Jump Drive, but are still considered Capital Ships.
25,000 Tons - Capital Ships
Typically just larger versions of their 12,500 Ton counterparts, these vessels are much less common, but far from rare.
50,000 Tons - Super Capital Ships
The pre-eminent vessels of of my common fleet, these ships are few and built to anchor the fight.
150,000 to 250,000 Tons - Dreadnoughts
The mightiest vessels, built as shows of force and for the commanding of war fleets. They are massive, and deadly. These are rare as they are built for Admirals and other high ranking officers.
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I really Like(d) multiples of 7500 tons as it would get me one size 50 engine per Shipsize, and made for reasonable designs.
Usually around Magneto-Plasma or later, I divide them into
7. 500 Frigates: Small, quick and short deployments, act as cheap and plentyful defense/short range attacks.
15. 000 Escorts: Support ships for the main fleet (like Sensors, Point Defence, Screening/Anti Fighter). Less dps bc they feel to small to have lots of armor and utility, but too big to be cheap.
30. 000 Cruisers: Bread and Butter, and start to be more diverse in their potential. Offensive ships, often can last 1, maybe 2 years for loitering
45. 000 Battleships/60. 000 Dreadnaughts: Until later tech I rarely build them bc they become outdated too quickly, though sometimes a small squad of them becomes my elite wunderwaffe.
Anything bigger than that I find overkill, at that point the benefit of more ships in different places are too great for me too ignore.