Well, I have been reading Steve's fiction and am getting better at combat, but still getting hammered. I am fighting an NPR with super heavy, super long range (but slow missiles). I can see pretty clear when they launch, as they turn away, but the flight times are 1+ hours. As I try to speed things along as I either try to close with fighters or wait for my defences to receive the strike, I start playing with different length turns. What is happening is the first wave is practically right on top of me when I click a turn that's too long and my defenses suck.
So my question is, what is the best way to run out a long missile engagement? I am think maybe go auto turns, and with computer determined pulse lengths, and then 30 or 5 sec turn click? I just keep getting worried that auto turn won't turn off when the missile pop up, but that is the way its supposed to work, correct?
Also, just curious about using laser turrets for area defense. Should I set the area defense to my weapon max range? I has 18 twin turrets defending with area defense set to 4.8, much less than their max range. When an enemy salvo seemed to stop just out of range, the engagement on the subsequent turn seemed to go badly and I had a lot of leakers. I was setting area defense at a lower range, but it seems to me that higher would work better, although I am not sure if there are any hidden effects. Thanks for any confirmation. I am playing with these concepts myself in my current war, but it it will take a while to figure this out. Later - DC