I have just been looking at the mechanics of the "Drone Engine" and I have run into an unexpected snag. Since March 2008 (v2.6) when missiles were changed to their current format, I have been posting that missile drives are 5x power and 10,000x fuel. It turns out they are actually 4x power and 10,000 fuel. No one, including me, has ever noticed
The actual progression is:
Commercial: 0.1x Fuel, 0.5x Power, Size 25HS
Military: 1x Fuel, Normal Power, Size 5HS
Gunboat: 10x Fuel, 2x Power, Size 5HS, Max 1
Fighter: 100x Fuel, 3x Power, Size 1HS, Max 1
Missile: 10,000x Fuel, 4x power, No restrictions on size
So I am now having to rethink how to fit in drone engines. The options appear to be:
1) Forget drone engines altogether as missiles are already in the 4x power slot.
2) Change missiles to 5x power and introduce drones at 4x power and 1000x fuel
3) Leave the above as it is and Introduce drones as a cut-down fighter engine. Perhaps a set 0.25 HS or 0.5 HS size, 3x power, 1000x fuel
I am tempted at the moment by 2). Since the introduction of the new missile model in March 2008, the effectiveness of missiles has been steadily reduced by the new armour model, the introduction of gauss cannon, the missile tracking time bonus, the removal of the ability to 'stack' missiles at waypoints and most recently the introduction of CIWS. It is actually very hard to get any missiles through the defences of a well organized fleet. Increasing the speed of missiles, and therefore their chance of avoiding point defence, by 25% may not be a bad idea. Anti-missiles would not be affected very much as their own speed would also increase. I know this will re-open the question of beam fire control tracking speeds. I can see a couple of options here. One is to leave it alone, as my intention was never to have beam fire control tracking at max missile speed anyway. The other is to introduce a 5x size, 5x speed option, as that would equal the increase in missile speed, but that would negate the idea of giving missiles a little more penetration power.
Doing this would open up the slot for a 4x power, 1000x fuel drone engine. I would probably have this as a set 0.25 HS engine (5 MSP), or at least a minimum 0.25 HS engine. Their base manoeuvre rating would be 5 (10 for missiles) and 'drones' would not be allowed extra agility.
Comments?
Steve