Re: Jumping in at the deep end
 

I'm still perplexed about fighter management. They group as they're launched, I gather, but where did these 11 fighter units come from? I don't recall missing launches, and even then it's an odd multiple. Do the groups merge under some circumstances?

Good to know that I need to seperate fleets between fighters and capships. What about ideal fighter group size? And if I transport the fighters from one system to the next in a carrier and launch them, will they be in one big blob? Is that bad?

Re: Jumping in at the deep end
 

They stick onto existing groups when you launch them.

You may have had a stack of 3 sitting around after battle losses killed them down to an odd number, and then tried to launch 8.

Those new ones stick onto the first fighter stack they see.

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If you load fighters up and relaunch, they'll all end up in the same stack.
You'll have to launch, move, launch, move...
They can only stick to existing stacks in the same sector, after all http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Re: Jumping in at the deep end
 

That sounds sufficiently irritating not to be worthwhile, though... Multiple turn operations just to split up stacks? Anyway, good to know I guess. Would there be advantages to having a lot of different stacks from a PD perspective? I've not done enough combat to understand PD, because my chief use of fighters is on WPs so they don't have so much approach time, but it's very hard to set up a simulator to show a close-engagement with multiple stacks of fighters, so I've not done much testing.

Heh, it'd have been easier if I'd never gotten fighters from ruins http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Re: Jumping in at the deep end
 

It's now turn 25. I'm in first place, 5 settled systems. I have built a 40ish ship fleet, of which about 2/3rds are PPBIII light cruisers.

Thing is, I've faced off the fleet-heavy number 2 player, I've long had peace with number 4, number 7 or 8 is likely to be soon cutt off by number 4, and the only other opening pases a 3-way nebula system that is likely to be a mess to expand my empire through.

I have some moderate hopes for tortoising and using my comparitively good position and race design to build up safely.

What are some powerful research directions to move in at around turn 25? I am still on engines 2, PPBIII, sensors 1, light cruiser construction. I have fighters, mines, and thanks to a ruin, Massive Shield Generators, although I'm not sure with my large number of planets if that's practical.

For the meantime I'm backfilling and I'll probably pick up a few backward techs like my engines. But direction is much appreciated.

Re: Jumping in at the deep end
 

Hehe, it was funny in a PBW game, when 2 colony ships with no weapons attacked each other. My colony ship won http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/laugh.gif

Re: Jumping in at the deep end
 

Better sensors are good. Combat support for ECM is also a must. You should get point-defense cannons up to at least level 3 or 4. If you went through with the plan to get armor 4, go ahead and get 5 and 6 as well, and start putting one of each specialty armor on every combat ship. Your other main priority at this point should be military science 2, followed by advanced military science for the training facilities. Oh, and finishing off the last two levels of PPB is also a good idea.

Edit: Massive shield generators are never worth it in stock. You can get more protection for less cost from weapon platforms.

Re: Jumping in at the deep end
 

Good to know. I've gotten MS2 and will have mil science when the current turn is processed. Is there a significent next step in ship construction I should worry about beyond light cruisers? I know people like them, but I don't know what the next "good level" is, if any.

The fact that I might be in a peaceful situation for a while makes me wonder if economic choices might be best. I'll have to read up on whatever monoliths are, and I'm thinking of getting the atmosphere changing facility I, if it is adequate, since I'm unlikely to capture breathers. Other 'economic' techs developments would be good to know about. I'm browsing the complete tech tree pdf for the stock game, but it's a bit confusing since one only gets the tech names. I've been busy with work and I'm starting to experience the almost amusing sensation of having outplayed my research - that is, I've done very well and gotten very comfortable with my opening game, taken nicely from the book and you folks' kind advice, but I'm suddenly looking at each turn and going, "Oh crud, now what?"

EDIT: Now that I check again, I see that the planetary change techs start with climate control rather than atmosphere changing; I'd confused the two. Drat.

Re: Jumping in at the deep end
 

I assume "MS2" is Military Science 2, and you just forgot to put "advanced" in front of "mil science". The difference is quite important. Anyway, Advanced Military Science is a very cheap tech field and very powerful. Research it at least to level 4, for the best training facilities and the cheapest to research and build cloak-detection sensors. When you get the training centers, build them on the planets with the most moons that you have. Multiple training facilities in the same sector but on different planets stack, making planets with two moons the best training sites available in stock. Assuming you don't have none breathers, make one place concentrate on ship training and another on fleet training. The main planet should have both, but domed moons only have room for one.
Going strictly for combat utility, light cruisers can last you a good long while. Cruisers are necessary for mobile space yard ships, but aren't really a big step up for fighting power. The next major step in ship construction is level 7 with battleships, which are large enough to get the heavy mount.
Monoliths are all-in-one resource extractors. In the long term, they produce much more total resources than standard resource extractors, but they cost a great deal more, both in resources and time, to set up. I wouldn't recommend them until later in the game, but if you really want them, research Stellar Manipulation. I highly recommend getting Space Yards 3 first, however. Also, they're only really useful on planets with multiple high resource values.
Don't. Atmosphere converters take a LOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOONG time to research, and another LOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOONG time to give any benefit. You need Planet Utilization level 7 for the level 1 facility, and that takes 30 turns after construction to do its thing. They're just not worth it unless you have a huge amount of research or it's very late in the game.

Edit: Also, who ever said you have to capture other breathers? Try to arrange trade deals with your neighbors who have different breathers than you. You can each just load a transport with some population and then trade the transports.
Computers. Computers is the single most important economic tech in the game. It gives you facilities that give across-the-board 10%/level (max 30%) bonuses to all resource production, research, and intelligence on each planet you build them on. Levels 4-6 give the same thing, except it affects everything in the whole system, and one system facility stacks with one planet facility on each planet for a combined 69% bonus (no, that's not a typo, they multiply together like so: 1.3*1.3=1.69). Besides that, minerals extraction levels 2 and 3 are good. Beyond that, it just gives you minerals-only versions of the computer facilities that take a great deal of research to get any better than the computer facilities.
You still haven't even come close to maxxing out most of the techs you've started researching. Keep going in ECM and CS all the way to level 3, get adv. mil. science 4, finish off PPB, get good PDC, finish off armor 6, get at least computers 3 (the higher levels may be too expensive for now), and you should consider getting the other colonization techs sometime. After that, space yards is a good choice (get levels 2 and 3 back-to-back; no need to upgrade all your space yard facilities twice), and you might consider larger ships. Once you've done all that, then you can come back here and ask what you should research next.

Edit: Oh yeah, another nice thing to get is Stellar Harnessing. The first three levels give solar collectors which generate supplies, useful for long-range ships and fleets, and 4-6 give solar sails for bonus movement.

Re: Jumping in at the deep end
 

Excellent. Just the sort of advice I was looking for, thanks.

EDIT: In purely combat terms, how important are battleships with their heavy mounts, and are there improvements on them? I'm asking becasue of the emphasis people have put on the CL's 10% bonus and someone having mentioned that the heavy mount on a carrier is large and vulnerable in combat - and in simulator battles my carrier wasn't much of a fleet-conquering hero.

EDIT2: I know a methane breather who is likely to oblige - there's a lot of Oxys in this game - Do I need to remove the existing population of my domed worlds? This would be something of a project, I'd think.

Re: Jumping in at the deep end
 

Yes, you must remove the old population before you can get the benefit from the new, breathable population. Personally, I just space the old population. But I'm a rather evil ruler http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/eek.gif

As for battleships, they allow more spaces for armor and/or shields which in are much, much better than LC's in the end. But wait until you have good shields before going for Battleships, because their extra room for shielding is, IMHO, one of their best attributes. The heavy mount does more damage per kiloton of space used, so yes it's an advantage over the LC's large mount, but takes up more space per component which renders it more likely to be destroyed first in the event of a battle. Wait on Battleships until you get more important techs, like full PPB's, ECM, and combat sensors. Stellar harnessing tech too.