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« Last post by Vandermeer on Today at 01:15:45 AM »
I also miss the ability for ground missile bases. I still remember how often NPR planets had peppered my approaching forces with (supposed) AMM spam and sunk my huge frigates or cruisers.
Many RP fantasies also relied on having a planetary launch facility to find a good representative of the sci-fi franchise lore that I usually try to implement.
Generally I think the whole STO setup needs to be looked at again as a whole however, because also the way you control them is currently quite manic. The targeting priorities don't really let you discern between civil and military targets for example (very relevant for multi-faction start), and all your STO formations are on the same screen, which makes it troublesome to find the relevant batteries in an expansive empire. You can also only change targeting behavior one at a time.
I am sure Steve will come around to that however, since I would say the current system seems like a construction site interim solution. When he does, I reckon there is a chance he might also find a way to introduce ground missile launch in some way. Perhaps he might even pop another questionnaire regarding the topic like he did in the past.(eg the officer assignment system)
Regarding the missile base range debuff, I don't think that would be a good idea. Range for munitions is not based on the launcher but the missile itself, so it would be rather challenging and a code exception to make them run shorter just for ground bases. (and Steve stated the base philosophy for C# being 'least exceptions')
'Air drag' in an age where the lore has you dipping into a fluid extra-dimension to fly, is also rather dubious as an explanation for this. Though to be fair, there used to be protoplanetary-nebulas (also dearly missed), so there is some precedent for real matter presence limiting the scope of movement, yet those would also only slow you down while in them, not actually reduce the range. Translated to comparably thin atmospheres, this effect would also be negligible.
The whole tech-lore also functions under pretty much anti-gravity/ignore-gravity assumption, so this can't be it either.