How do you usually decide on whether to stabilize a jump point

[Lysine (OP)]

I'm wondering how do you usually decide on whether to stabilize a jump point?

I understand this will allow any race to traverses through without jump drive, but I don't know how likely it will happen in war time and how much disadvantage it will bring. Especially when some spoilers using them. What should I consider when fighting behind jump points in both scenarios?

About stabilizing jump points, maybe just stabilize the colonized system, and use outer rim systems as defense choke point?

Or break them up in some way, leave out the core systems?

Or maybe even just stabilize one side of the jump point which only allows the outflow but stops the entry.

The problem arises when I was trying to build some ark habitats about 2.5m tons for 1m pops. But the jump drive cost for such size will be 30k minerals. Or I could micromanage and build smaller habitats in like hundreds and tug them one by one. I don't really wanna do either. So how do you guy deal with this?

I'm thinking stabilize one side should be the way to go but does this really worth the trouble?

Thank you for any advice.

[lumporr]

For one thing - a 2.5mt rated commercial jump drive at the lowest base jump drive efficiency of 4 only costs 2,500 duranium and 10,000 sorium according to my version of Aurora (current) - which, isn't nothing, but is still only a third of what you mentioned. Are you sure you aren't accidentally using military jump drives unnecessarily? At this lessened cost, it might make sense then to create a station (no armour) with the 2.5mt civilian jump drive as the only component and tug it to whichever jump point you require, though I would recommend against tugging such large stations into potentially contested territory in the first place.

Personally, my stabilization ships are in the first wave that I send to any system where I am planning to found a major colony, alongside whatever I deem to be sufficient initial defenses. "Sufficient defenses" could mean a fleet in orbit of the most promising body in-system and sensor buoys at every incoming jump point, or it could mean a fleet stationed at the jump point itself using recreation and maintenance stations (especially handy when hostile contacts could threaten vulnerable stabilization ships), or it could simply be a naked stabilization ship in a quiet, empty system that I don't expect to have any trouble defending (I have been punished for this reckless overconfidence numerous times). But the sooner I can switch from precious government shipping to civilian orders (which require a stabilized jump point), I do so. Using the small stabilization system which can take up to a year, this usually means stabilizing in advance *during* the colonization phase, when my government ships are going in and out. As long as I have the forces to spare, I go for it ASAP. It's my territory, after all.

Very general potential spoilers: Generally, I have found that hostile forces will either be fully capable of supplying their own jump ships for an assault, or they aren't interested in crossing jump points in the first place, so stabilization doesn't actually make that much of a difference in the security of the system IMHO.

I am an incorrigible save-scummer though, so, maybe my advice isn't the best advice to follow!

[Lysine (OP)]

For one thing - a 2.5mt rated commercial jump drive at the lowest base jump drive efficiency of 4 only costs 2,500 duranium and 10,000 sorium according to my version of Aurora (current) - which, isn't nothing, but is still only a third of what you mentioned. Are you sure you aren't accidentally using military jump drives unnecessarily? At this lessened cost, it might make sense then to create a station (no armour) with the 2.5mt civilian jump drive as the only component and tug it to whichever jump point you require, though I would recommend against tugging such large stations into potentially contested territory in the first place.

Personally, my stabilization ships are in the first wave that I send to any system where I am planning to found a major colony, alongside whatever I deem to be sufficient initial defenses. "Sufficient defenses" could mean a fleet in orbit of the most promising body in-system and sensor buoys at every incoming jump point, or it could mean a fleet stationed at the jump point itself using recreation and maintenance stations (especially handy when hostile contacts could threaten vulnerable stabilization ships), or it could simply be a naked stabilization ship in a quiet, empty system that I don't expect to have any trouble defending (I have been punished for this reckless overconfidence numerous times). But the sooner I can switch from precious government shipping to civilian orders (which require a stabilized jump point), I do so. Using the small stabilization system which can take up to a year, this usually means stabilizing in advance *during* the colonization phase, when my government ships are going in and out. As long as I have the forces to spare, I go for it ASAP. It's my territory, after all.

Very general potential spoilers: Generally, I have found that hostile forces will either be fully capable of supplying their own jump ships for an assault, or they aren't interested in crossing jump points in the first place, so stabilization doesn't actually make that much of a difference in the security of the system IMHO.

I am an incorrigible save-scummer though, so, maybe my advice isn't the best advice to follow!

It does seems like I used the military jump drive, so the mineral problem is out of the way now.

And thanks for the advice, looks pretty soild to follow!

[Garfunkel]

I tend to vary things between campaigns as it depends on the RP I'm going for but one general strategy I use is the 3-tiered transit system.

1) Systems that have a stabilized jump point that connects them to Sol - these are the core systems where civilians will trade and all the major colonies exists. Obviously, these systems are all well defended with STO garrisons and fleet task forces, including fortresses at the JPs themselves.

2) Systems that can be reached via jump tenders - these are the periphery systems where civilians will not trade (yet) but minor colonies have been created. Some defences exist but they are also in the process of being built up. Once a system is deemed fully secure, the system will be re-classified as core system and the JP leading into will be stabilized.

3) Systems that can only be reached by jump ships - these are the edge systems where survey ships are diligently working. No defences exist outside of Navy Task Forces that either escort major survey efforts or are tasked to clear out encountered hostile forces.

This means that any encountered enemy that cannot be immediately wiped out must use their own jump capabilities, if they have them, if they want to follow my retreating ships. If they do follow, I can evacuate jump tenders from threated JPs and rush defenders there.

As to the final point lumporr made, in my experience he has been quite lucky. Other races (NPRs and spoilers) can and will use your stabilized jump points. Haphazardly stabilizing every JP can lead to nasty surprises. But I won't give out any details as I don't want to spoil anyone's experience.

[Aloriel]

If it exists, I stabilize it. I stabilize them all. I make several stabilization ships and put them on the standing order to stabilize nearest jump point. They run on automatic.

The others will tell you of tactical advantages or problems that could arise. I'd rather focus my time and energy on designing and building new ships, carefully planning where to put new colonies, and making sure that my fleets can protect those colonies.

[KriegsMeister]

If it exists, I stabilize it. I stabilize them all. I make several stabilization ships and put them on the standing order to stabilize nearest jump point. They run on automatic.

The others will tell you of tactical advantages or problems that could arise. I'd rather focus my time and energy on designing and building new ships, carefully planning where to put new colonies, and making sure that my fleets can protect those colonies.

Why not just play with the "All jump points are stable" option? Save you some resources since you already just want them done automatically anyways.

[SpaceMarine]

I myself do the same and stabilise everything I can primarily because I expand as much as possible, in my Halo AAR i have expanded to 9 systems and colonised 12 planets within 7 years with now over 100 million people living outside of Sol from a starting pop of 1 billion.

the reason to not just hit stabilise everything button is because its about the logistical complexity, it requires you to factor in the cost movement and distances to establish jump gates and it makes waging conflict atleast for me more interesting as this game is about logistics. I want the resource cost.  I also run jump drives on every ship I have which is a doctrine/in universe based thing and that will provide me with benefits both for squadron jump and also if I do have to leave my network to do a strike against an alien force I can, it gives me options.

[Steve Zax]

If it exists, I stabilize it. I stabilize them all. I make several stabilization ships and put them on the standing order to stabilize nearest jump point. They run on automatic.

The others will tell you of tactical advantages or problems that could arise. I'd rather focus my time and energy on designing and building new ships, carefully planning where to put new colonies, and making sure that my fleets can protect those colonies.

Why not just play with the "All jump points are stable" option? Save you some resources since you already just want them done automatically anyways.

See, I want an option in setup to "NOT ALLOW" stabilization. Not player stabilization, not NPR stabilization, NONE! I would even like a "no assisted jumps allowed" button! You want to go through a jump point? Put a jump drive on every ship!

But I accept that there is not such a button as programming the AI to use it in ship design would be an excessive development cost.

[KriegsMeister]

If it exists, I stabilize it. I stabilize them all. I make several stabilization ships and put them on the standing order to stabilize nearest jump point. They run on automatic.

The others will tell you of tactical advantages or problems that could arise. I'd rather focus my time and energy on designing and building new ships, carefully planning where to put new colonies, and making sure that my fleets can protect those colonies.

Why not just play with the "All jump points are stable" option? Save you some resources since you already just want them done automatically anyways.

See, I want an option in setup to "NOT ALLOW" stabilization. Not player stabilization, not NPR stabilization, NONE! I would even like a "no assisted jumps allowed" button! You want to go through a jump point? Put a jump drive on every ship!

But I accept that there is not such a button as programming the AI to use it in ship design would be an excessive development cost.

Same really, one of the few quirks of Aurora's Sci-fi that I don't really like is the squadron jump drives that take up such a large fraction of a ships tonnage until you get way up the tech tree. I'd much rather have every ship equipped with its own self jump only drives that were much smaller. I'd be happy if the Squadron size affected overall size and allow us to drop it down from 3 to self-jump

[Bughunter]

I tend to stabilize between my core worlds and planned future core worlds.. then being paranoid about not letting even the smallest alien scout vessel into those systems 

[GodEmperor]

Tbh i just wing it.
I never build jump engines so i usually pair jump stabilizer ships with survey - i stabilize at my end, jump the stabilizer alone, confirm if there is anything to survey on the other end and then start stabilizing way back and eventually get survey ship to do some surveying in the mean time.

As you can imagine my survey/jump stabilizer corps has the highest attrition rate of all of my armed forces lol.

[Steve Walmsley]

One point that hasn't been mentioned in this thread. You can detect a stable jump point on active sensors (without the need for gravitational sensors), so when deciding to stabilise, you are also making it easier to detect.

[Steve Walmsley]

Same really, one of the few quirks of Aurora's Sci-fi that I don't really like is the squadron jump drives that take up such a large fraction of a ships tonnage until you get way up the tech tree. I'd much rather have every ship equipped with its own self jump only drives that were much smaller. I'd be happy if the Squadron size affected overall size and allow us to drop it down from 3 to self-jump

Increasing the squadron size for a jump drive doesn't change the size - it just increases the cost.

Also, jump drives were made much smaller in v2.4, so you can have a drive on most ships now.

[alex_brunius]

One point that hasn't been mentioned in this thread. You can detect a stable jump point on active sensors (without the need for gravitational sensors), so when deciding to stabilise, you are also making it easier to detect.

I wouldn't complain if Stable JPs were automatically visible system wide. It would make alot more sense than it currently is having wrecks show up systemwide IMHO.

Edit: Isn't that how it worked in VB6 version?

[Steve Walmsley]

One point that hasn't been mentioned in this thread. You can detect a stable jump point on active sensors (without the need for gravitational sensors), so when deciding to stabilise, you are also making it easier to detect.

I wouldn't complain if Stable JPs were automatically visible system wide. It would make alot more sense than it currently is having wrecks show up systemwide IMHO.

Edit: Isn't that how it worked in VB6 version?

Wrecks being visible is covered in the Lore post. Ships travel in the Aether, but wrecks return to normal space and can be detected as normal matter, like system bodies.
http://aurora2.pentarch.org/index.php?topic=10239.0

You used to have to detect them, but it led to tedious micromanagement to search for them without really adding any gameplay decisions. Jump point are substantially more important than wrecks, so they are harder to detect.