Home » Stars! 2.6/7 » The Academy » Hull musings 2
| Re: When to build up defense? |
Sun, 04 April 2004 14:52   |
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| Kotk | 
 | Commander |
Messages: 1227
Registered: May 2003 | |
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| multilis wrote on Sun, 04 April 2004 18:56 |
I played, I checked. Cruisers get damaged. We are talking possibly multiple gatings, attacks get shifted over the front, our early empires were spread more than 250 ly.
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Nope we arent talking of 500x500 empires. 500 ly is half of medium universe. If i have grabbed a territory size like quarter of medium universe i wont attack. I will develop and defend until nubs.  Even if i will attack someone at 2430 i wont build 15% inferiour ships because i am afraid to lose 10% when gating.
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Cruisers have higher init and more bonus slots, destroyers have last move advantage (which allows different range beamers to work better). Every hull has a strength.
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You arent going to "counter" anything. You have to decide what fleet you build going to kill someone who probably has cruisers + jihads when you arrive. How that bla-bla & stuff helps you there? Only reason for building destroyers is that you got JOAT. Even then you build mostly cruisers.
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Suppose I have my destroyers splitting 2 of your worlds you defend with cruisers, and you have 100/250 gates. My destroyers are within 81 ly of each world, your worlds are more than 100 ly apart. Your crusiers are less flexible to jump back and forth while I either attack my choice or sit gathering more forces.
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Jumping back and forth to defend planets? It sure does sound too gay for me.  My general defending strategy is not "defend my planets". Nope.  Wrong. (Why there is no smiley with "Wrong") My strategy is "damage and kill attacking fleets, slow them down and make their player cautious and careful".  Its LOT easier when these are destroyers.
[Updated on: Sun, 04 April 2004 14:54] Report message to a moderator
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| Re: When to build up defense? |
Sun, 04 April 2004 15:31 |
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I am describing what DID happen in our last game. At the time, I had a bigger fleet in position. There was a large area under contention from the NE corner where he battled the IT in the corner (he started a war against late start IT) all the way to near the centre of the board where there was a planet under contention because it was a good green for several players. In between there were several stategic gate worlds of his, including a colony he set up near my border (good green for him plus future gate world).
If you think your cruisers are so great, give me a testbed with your best cruiser design. I will add a destroyer with around the same amount of tech development needed at most and my destroyer will kick your butt.
[Updated on: Sun, 04 April 2004 15:34] Report message to a moderator
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| Re: When to build up defense? |
Sun, 04 April 2004 15:40 |
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| multilis wrote on Sun, 04 April 2004 12:56 |
I played, I checked. Cruisers get damaged. We are talking possibly multiple gatings, attacks get shifted over the front, our early empires were spread more than 250 ly. Cruisers have higher init and more bonus slots, destroyers have last move advantage (which allows different range beamers to work better). Every hull has a strength.
Suppose I have my destroyers splitting 2 of your worlds you defend with cruisers, and you have 100/250 gates. My destroyers are within 81 ly of each world, your worlds are more than 100 ly apart. Your crusiers are less flexible to jump back and forth while I either attack my choice or sit gathering more forces.
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I think the possible interplays are a little more complex than you have presented them.
First: What is the approximate force differentials between the two gathered fleets? i.e.
1. The CAs would beat the DDs?
2. The DDs would beat thd CAs?
3. A near draw would be expected?
If (1) or (2) I'd expect one or the other fleet to be wanting to avoid battle if possible. The defender would be writing off these two planets and making other plans. The offender  would be either planing a withdrawl, or taking a risk of losing their fleet if they are the weaker party. Otherwise, I'd expect them to be *desiring* an immediate battle.
Option (3) is probably a Pyrrhic victory unless there is no third party competition.
Complicating the situation is the relative ability of each race/economy to recover losses and/or reinforce the situation as it stands.
Second: What decisions does each side actually have?
Defender:
1) Withdrawl, possibly writing off the two planets - trading space for time.
2) Stand - and see if the enemy attacks the current position.
3) Jump to other planet expecting enemy to attack there.
4) Set orders to intercept - essentially take the offensive.
5) Move fleet to another position in space
6) Split fleet and take multiple options
Attacker:
1) Withdrawl out of potential interception range
2) Attack Planet A
3) Attack Planet B
4) Intercept orders for enemy fleet
5) Stand
6) Move to another position in space
7) Split fleet and take multiple options
And I probably missed some!
I think the scenario is actually quite complicated and can produce a wide variety of results depending on the background situation and the tactical decisions. Probably also why we bother to play the game since, to some extent, this *is* the meat of the game.
- Kurt
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| Re: When to build up defense? |
Sun, 04 April 2004 16:29 |
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In the actual game senario, I was the attacker with my HE, and JOAT was the defender. The worlds were valuable to the JOAT, but he was outnumbered at the time warship wise. An extra factor was eventually fully armed starbases, and I didn't know when Jihads might suddenly pop up. I had thought he might be cunningly hiding a close to jihad tech level to give me a suprise.
It played out as a kind of stalemate on the big front (after he lost his forward colony on my border), while he gradually lost ground on the top corner with the IT over a bunch of smaller colonies. In the beginning he was threatening the IT core, in the end I had taken a colony 81 ly from his HW. This was all in the era where cruisers and destroyers dominated our warships.
If someone wishes to testbed the cruisers verses destroyers ideas, personal message me a testbed with a single race with the prefered eccon and cruiser design. I will create a similar two player testbed with both OWW races with identical eccons matching the race and have a destroyer counter design for the other. Then I can post it for all and we can pick apart the relative advantages of a cruiser or destroyer counterdesign.
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| Re: When to build up defense? |
Sun, 04 April 2004 17:34 |
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| Kotk |
| Commander |
Messages: 1227
Registered: May 2003 | |
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| multilis wrote on Sun, 04 April 2004 21:31 |
If you think your cruisers are so great, give me a testbed with your best cruiser design. I will add a destroyer with around the same amount of tech development needed at most and my destroyer will kick your butt.
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Best cruiser for what task at what tech for what race?
Okay... lets say IS race. Lets say it has IFE, OBRM, NAS and RS, weapons and construction cheap rest expensive, starts at 0 in all but propulsion. Plan is to attack a neigbour, territory is large so needs lighter ships to gate.
Takes tech:
Energy 6 (wolf good enough)
Weapons 8 (bazookas are good enough)
Propulsion 5 (needed for gates)
Construction 9 (needed for cruiser)
Electronics 1 (enough early scanning with NAS)
Bio 2 (for terra 7)
All that tech costs 13K in game without slow tech so doable by 2430 with quite standard immunityless HG.
Okay...now he builds 80 of this cruiser:
Fuel mizer, 2 maneuver jets, 4 bazookas, 4 wolf shields.
Weight 124 so only 3% gateing losses + 11% damage that goes immediately away by merging with SFX at waypoint 1.
Costs for our IS:
76 45 30 199 per piece
6080 3600 2400 and 15920 per 80 pieces.
Buildable at ~5 bigger planets during 4 years flat out.
Fleet takes about 20 standard scout chaff with to check enemy designs etc. that cost about 400 resources more... rest are bombers, freighters and fuel exports.
What destroyers and tricks you use to kill such fleet with other IS with similar settings?
*edit -- added overgating damage*
[Updated on: Sun, 04 April 2004 17:42] Report message to a moderator
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| Re: When to build up defense? |
Sun, 04 April 2004 19:00 |
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I look at costs as well as have my ways to simulate battles without testbeds. But like the last case with trying to describe why beta torps can work early... I have given up on talk and wish to show using testbed. Easier to prove ideas, and allow others to throw in their own variations after.
First reaction is:
a) (tech different) opponent has lower const and higher weapons (research weapons and trade const), while making do with privateers for transport as low germ solution. Opponent counters with range 3 beamers on destroyers with enough speed to stay out of range. In my last real game, my collodial phaser destroyers were deadly to his phaser bazooka cruisers.
2) (tech behind) opponent goes for super cheap, tries to make do with range 1 beamers with a bit of beta torp backup so not completely helpless later. Whole thing needs to be tested to make sure works well, it is possible to first strike (range 1 weapons have higher init) though may not be profitable.
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In either case it is the lower weight of the destroyer that makes the plan possible and allows last minute gating without needing time to repair after. I will get the testbeds built.
[Updated on: Sun, 04 April 2004 19:33] Report message to a moderator
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| Re: When to build up defense? |
Sun, 04 April 2004 20:26 |
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I was the JOAT that Multis's HE stomped.
The battle front really was as vast as Multis writes. Well over 500ly long, with about 5 key focal points.
True to strategy we both focused on trying to disable the other's fleets, by tactical manovering to apply power to different combinations of stars. For most of the game the balance of power of the main fleets was finely balanced so neither fleet could move forward without dying.
Multis used those Beta FFs to good effect. The first year I met them they won the battle using retreat orders. For the second battle I was able to transfer range 0/1 beamers to my WM ally which gave us the speed to catch the Betas and slaughter them. OFC Multis replied with his own counterdesign with horrific results....
It was a fascinating design-counterdesign war which lead from FF/DD era right through to the late BB era.
The lifetime of the ship designs may have been assisted because we were both using weap expensive races (although we both had allies providing tech.)
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| Re: When to build up defense? |
Sun, 04 April 2004 20:54 |
|
 LEit |
 | Lt. Commander |
Messages: 879
Registered: April 2003
Location: CT | |
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This was an all HP game. Was it a lot slower to develop higher tech?
Also with an HE you probably had 1/1000 pop production vs most races having 1/2500. This will make you much faster then other races, so an early war was clearly to your advantage. If you could have ran into an HG race, you would have had to alter your strategy.
In other words, I think you did very well for the game you were in, but I don't think you can extrapolate that experience to every other game.
[Updated on: Sun, 04 April 2004 20:55]
- LEitReport message to a moderator
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| Re: When to build up defense? |
Sun, 04 April 2004 21:41 |
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| Orca |
 | Chief Warrant Officer 1 |
Messages: 148
Registered: June 2003
Location: Orbiting tower at the L5 ... | |
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To expand on LEit's comments, and my own earlier ones, with beta torps/bazookas, you can basically expect to see design/counterdesign at best during that era unless it's a small universe with slow tech/forced BET/similar other game conditions. Even in a small I expect to see cruisers deployed by the 20's to 30's, battleships 30's to 40's depending on the speed of the individual race. With equivelent or higher weapons tech and supporting tech somewhat lower (typically energy 7-10, prop 7-9, elec 4-10, bio 4-7). And yes, that's fighting the whole time. There just isn't enough *time* under those circumstances to bother with more than one or two rounds of counterdesigning. Why bother constructing a Fleet O' Death with lower tech when you can wait a year and build a Fleet O' More Death with more effective components? Especially if it's more resistant to simple counterdesigns.
Once cruisers are out, destroyers and frigates are largely relegated to the role of chaff and minesweepers. There are a few exceptions (say, somebody deployed bazooka cruisers) - but there's a reason why bazooka cruisers should be considered a stopgap at best, given how little time it takes to get from w8 to w10. And of course once the colloidal battleships are out in force, the lesser hulls tend to have problems due to the many advantages battleships (and 300/500 gates) confer. A W14 cruiser horde can win, but you need to start building sooner.
edit: got rid of double negative for clarification.
[Updated on: Sun, 04 April 2004 22:00]
Jesus saves.
Allah forgives.
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| Re: When to build up defense? |
Mon, 05 April 2004 09:30 |
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If you are an HP sitting beside an aggressive HG or a HG sitting beside a -f, or because of other factors it is not always to easy to play defence. Lots also depends on diplomacy, etc. In that last game, 'Budgies' and several others had similar hab settings by fluke.
It is much harder to defend small colonies.
Not everything was predictable. Budgies didn't expect war from me, and a little later I didn't expect 400 delta torp destroyers to suddenly show up from his newly made ally JOAT.
I still have to do the testbed, work comes first and my first attempt ended in a 'random event' toasting a HW (know now to turn off random events).
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| Re: When to build up defense? |
Thu, 08 April 2004 12:38 |
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Ok, finally got time to do first test results.
The whole thing gets kind of complex in the range 3 destroyer verses range 2 cruiser field. With no overgating damage I would give the edge to the cruisers (despite destroyers including sappers) but a whole bunch of tricks, counter-tricks and luck comes into play (didn't have time to show examples here). If destroyers prevent their main beamers from getting cornered, the cruisers get slaughtered.
The reasons... destroyers have same firepower but much less armour. Destroyers get a few extra strikes but not enough to turn the tide once the cruisers get close and their init gives them first strike.
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Suprisingly, it is the low tech guy only using C3 and W6 who ends up a clear winner. Of course range 1 beamers are weak to other sorts of attacks, but here they really shine. I include an example of destroyers out init cruisers, but the out init in this case is probably not worth it, I would skip battle computer in a real game. But included them here to show it could be done.
In this case destroyers nearly match armour but have 1/3 more firepower. Considering this can be achieved at much lower tech level (which means more resources could be thrown into ships or eccon), the counter design range 1 destroyer has lots of merit on defense IMO. In defense, you often don't have time to repair after gating.
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Here is a link to some tests so far...
http://members.shaw.ca/david_edmonton/kotktest.zip
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| Re: When to build up defense? |
Thu, 08 April 2004 14:27 |
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| iztok |
| Commander |
Messages: 1207
Registered: April 2003
Location: Slovenia, Europe | |
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Hi!
| multilis wrote on Thu, 08 April 2004 18:38 |
Ok, finally got time to do first test results.
...snip tests...
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I've checked your testbeds. IMO you didn't play fair. Your DDs have DLL-7 engine, but your CCs only FM and TWO MJs, too much investment for the gained firepower. Most certainly I'd design CCs differently: AD-8 engine, 6 beams, rest shields. And to counter your DDs I'd use FFs with Yaks or even two Blackjacks, and not CCs. Would also build forts with BJs and some sappers in order to kill/damage your DDs.
However I'd wait for Jihad CCs before committing more resources to shipbuilding, but the very minimum needed. I'd even let you have orbits of my border planets until you wouldn't have bombers in your fleets and would send suicide attacks against them when they'd arrive. With the amount of FP fleets have my ships would easily kill all your bombers before being destroyed. After devoting most resources to research I'd get Jihads in 2-4 turns and in 4-6 I'd have a fleet of Jihad CCs, coupled with a dozen or two all-sapper 1.5 speed DDs on their way to my besieged border planets, singing "Bad boys, bad boys, what you gonna do...".
BR, Iztok
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| Re: When to build up defense? |
Thu, 08 April 2004 14:47 |
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My cruiser ship design was the exact one requested by Kotk for the cruisers (look back on thread). In his example he is attacking with them which means defender has to pop up a gate and not have a whole lot of time for repairing overgating damage. As defender, it is easier to play counterdesign.
If you want, propose a senario with your race settings and tech levels and whether you are attacking or defending. I will try to come up with tech levels that do not exceed yours that can make use of destroyer hull effectively.
We were talking early pre-jihad situation, but if you want we can switch to post jihad where both sides mix missile ships and beamers. As pointed out by you before each game is different, needs are different depending on game rules, and what your neighbours are like.
[Updated on: Thu, 08 April 2004 14:54] Report message to a moderator
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| Re: When to build up defense? |
Thu, 08 April 2004 18:59 |
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We started as a generic cruiser vs destroyer discussion, so I was avoiding croby and frigates in the tests.
Comments about your croby frigates... one point often forgotten about IS is weapons are 25% more expensive. This means having the latest weapons is less effective compared to better armour, part of the reason my range 3 destroyers did much poorer than my range 1 destroyers.
Another from our discussion in the new game forum (I didn't notice sticky at the top of the forum), croby frigates aren't that bad of minesweepers depending on your needs. You may have some left over as part of 'border negotiations' in a previous era where croby advantage made everyone else polite and agreeable. (Walk softly and carry a big stick)
2 croby frigates can absorb a minehit from non-SD, and sometimes it is useful to send in multiple packs of 2 to increase chances of bringing down up to 81 ly of mines in a single turn.
In my last game, I liked my destroyer minesweepers, but a weakness was opponents had counter design minesweepers to me (as I was the scariest). I wished I didn't have to send missile ships or BBs after the enemy spread out little sweepers, but slots were worth more than the inconvenience.
[Updated on: Thu, 08 April 2004 19:56] Report message to a moderator
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| Re: When to build up defense? |
Fri, 09 April 2004 04:33 |
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| iztok |
| Commander |
Messages: 1207
Registered: April 2003
Location: Slovenia, Europe | |
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Hi!
| multilis wrote on Fri, 09 April 2004 00:59 |
In my last game, I liked my destroyer minesweepers, but a weakness was opponents had counter design minesweepers to me (as I was the scariest).
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That's the big dilemma I usually have when designing first warships: to make one multi-purpose design or two-three specialized. The multi-purpose design I usually consider is a DD with 1 sapper and 1 R3 beam, battle speed 1.5-2, good shield and decent armor. Can sweep, fight and escape if needed, but shines at neither role and is pretty costly. So I usually end with a cheap sweeper (who cares if it's countered) and a fast CC skirmisher (2 sappers, 4 beams, speed 2+ if possible, gateable), that also guards sweepers. As a support for them are older warships, that will be scrapped when I run out of design slots.
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I wished I didn't have to send missile ships or BBs after the enemy spread out little sweepers, but slots were worth more than the inconvenience.
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That's what older warships are for, but usually I don't have them in large enough numbers to catch all intruders, so I need a skirmisher. When opponent fields a counterdesign in numbers, I scrap remaining ships and design a better one. And so goes the process until the end of the game.
BR, Iztok
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| Re: When to build up defense? |
Fri, 09 April 2004 12:31 |
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Strange that you cheated in your range 3 DD battle with one B3 or one S3+Flak?
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The said design was with same amount of effort put into research but with a focus on different techs. Only Const 5 but Weapons 10 rather than Const 9 and weapons 8. Ends up costing similar, and under some systems (which focus on privateers for germ saving transports) it may actually occur.
I tried to explain that in my original post, that some might hurry for jihads (to put on starbases) and trade for const, expecting to get w12 and c9 at reasonably the same time.
My point wasn't that destroyers aren't better than cruisers but rather destroyers are a viable option for warships, especially when gating through 100/250 matters.
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| Re: When to build up defense? |
Sun, 11 April 2004 12:43 |
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| Kotk |
| Commander |
Messages: 1227
Registered: May 2003 | |
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My cruiser gates with losses of 3% with 100/250 so gating does not matter.
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