best weapons on WP\'s
 

I would like everyone's opinion on what weapons best to use on Weapon platforms's, small, med, large. Taking into consideration the AI's special weapons (orgainic, etc). I know, missles in beginning but what else and what to upgrade to. Is it best to use cargo and build more wp's and lose buidling especially on small income planet (5 or less). Just curious as to what everyone uses.

Also anyway of getting around ships sitting out of gun range and just hitting your planet with missles? This causes you to use missles on your WP's.....

just some ideas Mac

[This message has been edited by mac5732 (edited 20 August 2001).]

Re: best weapons on WP\'s
 

Two 'strange' weapon platforms I am starting to use.

1: Engine Destroying weapons combined with Wave Motion guns (or Acid Globs, etc)...Stop them and then hit them at a distance.

2: 'The Turn Stopper': ie, just keep them away from the planet for combat, a wp platform of nothing but WormHole beams, Repulsar beams(or engine Destroyers) and multi-tracking/sensors. Destroy the Engines and then warp them away.

(and a 3rd of course: the Defender: Weapon Destroyers and TONNES of point defense)...

some ideas to think on...

------------------
"And what the hell would you know about sanity?" demanded Beatrice. "There are depressed lemmings on the edge of cliffs who've got a better grasp on reality than you have. And more common sense."--Simon R. Green 'Deathstalker Rebellion'.

"We are all...the sum of our scars"....(paraphrased) Matt. R. Stover-'Blade of Tyshalle'.

Re: best weapons on WP\'s
 

Lot's of PDC of course. Missles yes, but not exclusivley. I have found a WP with PDC and DUC to be quite nasty when the enemy forgets to change ship strategy to maximum weapons range before attacking my planets. http://www.shrapnelgames.com/ubb/ima...ons/icon12.gif
And if they do remember, usually my missles don't hit them often anyway.

Geoschmo

Re: best weapons on WP\'s
 

If you worry about ships keeping their distance, and the ships have PDCs so missiles don't work, you either need to go with LOTS of fighters and accept the losses, or use mines, ships, or pref. a starbase. A starbase with massive mount weapons gets a +6 to range, and especially combined with a Religious Talisman can be a fearsome, inexpensive (half-off maintenance) defense compared to the cost of the DNs it'd take to neutralize it. Just don't expect WPs to be much of a deterrent in a very long game -- non-Deeply Religious WPs will have a very hard time hitting highly experienced, high-tech ships in experienced fleets.

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-- The thing that goes bump in the night

Re: best weapons on WP\'s
 

I specialize my WP's. I have long range ones that I put WMG's and short range ones w/ Graviton Hellbores. And I ALWAYS have at least 1 or 2 WP's with nothing but PD. I usually play Religious - the Talismans ARE well worth it IMO, folks - so they all have one. Early game I usually rush-research for PPB so I usually have those to start, then migrate once I get the later techs.

And late game WP's are almost exclusively built on my RW's or SW's unless I PPP a planet deep in enemy territory - then I'll build a few there.

Re: best weapons on WP\'s
 

I think we all agree that PDC are very important for weapon platforms. As offensive weapons I use in the early game missiles. In the later game IMO the weapon platforms have the same problem as satellites: If your enemy uses long range weapons and does a "dance" with his ships, you might never get the chance to fire your weapons at all! So for sats and weapon platforms to remain interesting even in the late game you should create weapon mounts with incresed range and hit chance for them. Not so high as for the bases, may be half of their values will be adequate. I use this in my games since the the release of the mounts for bases and I am very satisfied with that modification. My choice is then phased polaron beam or later anti proton beam.

Re: best weapons on WP\'s
 

Q, how is your enemy ever going to do the "dance"? I've only seen the AI do it a few times, and unless you're playing hot seat, that's the only way to do it. Email and PBW- no tactical, so you have to rely on the AI anyway. And when it DID "dance", it spent a turn in weapons range firing before it moved back out.

Phoenix-D

Re: best weapons on WP\'s
 

I haven't tried this, but one way to avoid the dance might be to use tractor beams in a large enough mount.

Re: best weapons on WP\'s
 

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Oggy ben Doggy:
I haven't tried this, but one way to avoid the dance might be to use tractor beams in a large enough mount. <HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Unless your playing with a mod which increases WP weapons range alot, I don't think this would work. Tractor beams have an infuriatingly short range http://www.shrapnelgames.com/ubb/images/icons/icon7.gif

Re: best weapons on WP\'s
 

Planets are terribly vulnerable because they are immobile. WPs need long range weapons, at least in games against humans. The AI is usually stupid enough to charge right in and take on a planet at close range. And yes, the PDC is absolutely vital to protect a planet. The surest way to destroy most planets is to just sit at the edge of missile range and fire away until the WPs are destroyed. If the planet has enough PDCs to counter the missile capacity of the attacking fleet then there is no option but to approach within direct-fire weapon and and risk losses. With mounts for WPs equivalent to mountsfor bases, that is very expensive.

I've also modded my AIs to use "High Energy Discharge Weapons" or the equivalent in special weapon platforms. These long-range weapons are even longer ranged with the WP mounts and absolutely devastating. Sometimes a ship can be gutted by a single hit.

The tractor/repulsor beams are an interesting weapon choice for a planetary defence. With ships, the size class of the ship determines what it can move. Does a WP get compared to the size of the ship it is trying to move or does the planet count as the firing 'vehicle' and any size ship can be moved? If the latter is the case then this has some real potential for defense. You could fling ships half-way across the map and break up the attacking fleet, or pull in one at a time from extreme range into close range where you could smash it.

Re: best weapons on WP\'s
 

I know this is pushing the thread a bit off topic. But IMHO WP's should have mounts better than those available to ships and bases. If you think about it, what's the limitation in a weapon on the surface. There really shouldn't be.

One thing in SE that is a little too easy is glassing planets. Yes hitting the planet should be very easy, but it should take a LARGE fleet, or at least a small fleet a long time to totally obliterate the population on a planet.

I would be in favor of strengthening planetary defenses considerably. An easy way to do this is through mounts for warp points. With equal tech levels in weaponry, the Weapon plantform should have an advantage in range and damage over ships that are attacking. This would compensate for the lack of mobility, and the huge differance in chance to hit.

I know it would be easy to mod in, but I think it should be a change from MM for game balance.

I would also like to see a "Warp point only" Point defense cannon that is available earlier than the PDC we have now for ships. In a low tech start you have missles right off the bat. If you find your enemies home before he has a chance to research PDC, he's toast. A couple of frigates with CSM I's can finish him off in a couple turns.

Geoschmo

Re: best weapons on WP\'s
 

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by geoschmo:
I know this is pushing the thread a bit off topic. But IMHO WP's should have mounts better than those available to ships and bases. If you think about it, what's the limitation in a weapon on the surface. There really shouldn't be.

One thing in SE that is a little too easy is glassing planets. Yes hitting the planet should be very easy, but it should take a LARGE fleet, or at least a small fleet a long time to totally obliterate the population on a planet.

I would be in favor of strengthening planetary defenses considerably. An easy way to do this is through mounts for warp points. With equal tech levels in weaponry, the Weapon plantform should have an advantage in range and damage over ships that are attacking. This would compensate for the lack of mobility, and the huge differance in chance to hit.

I know it would be easy to mod in, but I think it should be a change from MM for game balance.

I would also like to see a "Warp point only" Point defense cannon that is available earlier than the PDC we have now for ships. In a low tech start you have missles right off the bat. If you find your enemies home before he has a chance to research PDC, he's toast. A couple of frigates with CSM I's can finish him off in a couple turns.

Geoschmo<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

'Warp Point Mounts'??? Multi-tasking a bit too much? http://www.shrapnelgames.com/ubb/images/icons/icon7.gif But yes, I've given WPs in my game better mounts than bases. The range/damage bonuses are the same but the size increase is less so you can cram more firepower into a WP pound for pound (uh, kt for kt?) than any other vehicle. I've also got "Bulk Armor" for WPs only that stands in for massive earthworks/concrete type fortification. 8 to 1 damage ratio, better than anything but Crystalline armor. If only the AI were smart enough to use it. :-/

This is the real problem, you know. There's no way to tell the AI how many WPs or what sort of WPs to build and where to put them. Why can't you tell it that a "Military Installation" needs more WP defenses than a mere mining colony? http://www.shrapnelgames.com/ubb/images/icons/icon9.gif A "defense profile" for each colony type like there is a "construction profile" would be very nice.

Oh, I've changed my starting techs so that PDC level 1 is available at the 'medium' start level. That's usually how I start a game. Max tech is no fun, low tech is too tedious in the first few years of play.

[This message has been edited by Baron Munchausen (edited 21 August 2001).]

Re: best weapons on WP\'s
 

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Phoenix-D:
Q, how is your enemy ever going to do the "dance"? I've only seen the AI do it a few times, and unless you're playing hot seat, that's the only way to do it. Email and PBW- no tactical, so you have to rely on the AI anyway. And when it DID "dance", it spent a turn in weapons range firing before it moved back out.

Phoenix-D<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

You are right in e-mail and PBW games this is not possible. But even there, if you stay with your ships at maximum weapons range you have a big advantage, because the chance to hit a planet is much greater than to hit a ship (unless the race on the planet has a religious talisman).
On the other hand if you give weapon platforms mounts as potent or better than for bases, will you use bases for defense at all?? You have to pay maintenance for bases and they can be located at the wrong side of the planet if the enemy attacks. So I think base mounts should be better than weapon platform mounts. But that's just my opinion.

Re: best weapons on WP\'s
 

Range is definitly the problem for wp's. I agree wp's should have increased range with the various mounts, but a good point was would this elimiate bases? (my opinion), I don't think so. There are a lot of planets where you can only use between 1-4 wp's unless you increase cargo on planet. Maybe increase the toughness of the WP's, make them harder to kill. If you put these new massive wp's on planet, this would leave your bases free for extensive PD's or closer type weapons. Or Make the new mounts only effective at extended range and impotent at close range, this would force you to put other type weapons on the wp's as well. Say certain mounts (only for WP'S Have range of say 16-18 but nothing or little effect at say 5-10 or something similiar.

just some ideas mac

Re: best weapons on WP\'s
 

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Or Make the new mounts only effective at extended range and impotent at close range, <HR></BLOCKQUOTE>Range-bonus-mounted weapons have their range 1 damage repeated, and since the damage at range 1 is always the highest damage any (unmodded) weapon does, ER mounts will be good at close range.

Although, you can look at it another way; P&N has a sattelite "Siege" mount, which boosts range, but reduces firepower.
So, if you want to reach out and touch someone, you need the siege mount.
Close in, large mounts are twice as powerful.

That makes the ER mount good at long range, and bad at close range, though not really http://www.shrapnelgames.com/ubb/images/icons/icon7.gif.

Re: best weapons on WP\'s
 

For those looking for 'new and different' mounts for weapons, I have posted a CompEnhancement.txt file with some new mounts and some tweaked old ones, under the thread 'Deathstalkers Mount Mod (again...)', hope it is of some use to you.....

------------------
"And what the hell would you know about sanity?" demanded Beatrice. "There are depressed lemmings on the edge of cliffs who've got a better grasp on reality than you have. And more common sense."--Simon R. Green 'Deathstalker Rebellion'.

"We are all...the sum of our scars"....(paraphrased) Matt. R. Stover-'Blade of Tyshalle'.

Re: best weapons on WP\'s
 

SJ, what I was thinking of is that with large mounted weapons being good at ex range and poor close up, is massive artillery being unable to adjust or being depressed enough at closer range. These would be mamoth
pieces and not easily effective the closer you would get to them thus less effective close up. Therefore a defense against them would be to close rapidly to get under their cone of fire, but this in turn would bring you within range of close up weapons of the defensive forces. I'm just looking for something for the WP'S and yet not to make them invincible. All weapons have strengths and weaknesses. This could be theirs. You would have the ability to hit those who stand off and hit you with missles, but if they close, the weapons would be less effective. This in turn would still create the need for bases and putting other weapons on the wp's. I'll have to take a look at Deathstalker's mounts. They sound similiar to what I'm saying. What I'm looking for is something to negate those who stand off and hit you with missles and if they have decent pd's ftrs won't do you much good. This is especially true in hotseat games. The one I'm playing now, the players just sit off and glaze your planets. Throwing ftrs at them suck when they have good pd support, and your bases are also ineffective because of range. Some type of compromise needs to be patched into the game, that's why I'm looking for imput to see what everyone thinks or comes up with to try and do something with the WPS. Maybe make the special mounts for the large wp's only. Deathstalker's mounts sound good as long as they are not invincible and still have a weakness. It shouldn't be easy to take out a planet without some losses but yet not make the planet invincible by their use, just harder to take.

just some ideas mac

[This message has been edited by mac5732 (edited 22 August 2001).]

Re: best weapons on WP\'s
 

I was just saying that because of the way the mounts work, you can't make a mount to have a gun do more damage at long range that short range. at least not easily

If you were willing to mod all weapons in the game, you could give them +1 range, and set them to 1 damage at range 1.
Then, with a +5 range mount, the Artillery couldn't hurt stuff at range 6 or less, while working great at longer ranges.
You would then need a normal mount to reduce the weapons range by 1, to eliminate the weapon's "blind spot", making it just like SE4 now.
You would also need to do something along the lines of:
- scale down weapon damage by 5x
- make all mounts multiply damage by 5x in addition to the "large/heavy/massive" multiplier.
That is to force players to use your "normal mount" rather than no mount at all (no-mount would give +1 range and a blind spot).

Basically, you would probably need to change every weapon and mount in the game to get this to work right.


[This message has been edited by suicide_junkie (edited 22 August 2001).]

Re: best weapons on WP\'s
 

SJ, would it be possible, instead of re-doing all the guns and mounts, to just take one specific type gun and mount and make it into a planet defense battery. Say one which by passes both shields and armor with the range adjustments. This way massive planet defense battery would be the same type weapon for everyone and you wouldn't have to mess with all the mounts and guns. Just take one and re-do it as a special battery. You wouldn't have to adjust the rest, it would basically be a new weapon say for planets only. Could you leave all mounts and weapons as they are, then pick one, mod it as an additional weapon and mount without changeing all the rest. I've seen what everyone in this post mentions as to what they use but it still comes back to range against missles vs planets.. As you can tell I'm still not a modder, that's why I ask these sometimes dumb questions, but I'm learning...

Also Deathstalker, how did you re-do your mounts to extend the range???

just some ideas mac

Re: best weapons on WP\'s
 

Quote: 'Also Deathstalker, how did you re-do your mounts to extend the range???'.

If you mean, what line to use then its the 'Range modifier' in the CompEnhancement.txt files, positive to increase range, negative to decrease range. If you mean my actual stats I increased some of the ship mounts but for the others it is as follows:

Light Weapon Platform Mount: -1 range, 1/2 size and cost, 1/2 damage.
Large Platform Mount: +2 Range, +15% to hit, x2 damage.
Heavy Platform Mount: +3 Range, +25% to hit, x3 damage.
Massive Platform Mount: +4 Range, +35% to hit,

Satts:

Mini Mount:, -10% to hit, 1/2 size and damage and cost.
Normal: +1 Range, +5% to hit.
Large: +2 range, +15% to hit,
Hvy: +3 Range, +25% to hit, 120kt size.

Basicly I added a 'small' range increase, this makes say the Meason BLaster VI have a range of 8 for a Large Mount Platform, or Range 12 on a Massive Mount, which IMO is quite good enough. Satts may need to be tweaked though, as they often launch 'behind the planet', which makes them worse than useless.

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"And what the hell would you know about sanity?" demanded Beatrice. "There are depressed lemmings on the edge of cliffs who've got a better grasp on reality than you have. And more common sense."--Simon R. Green 'Deathstalker Rebellion'.

"We are all...the sum of our scars"....(paraphrased) Matt. R. Stover-'Blade of Tyshalle'.

"Memory," the old man said softly, "is tricky. I have learned two things from it. One: That without meaningful memories, there is no life. Two: that we are desperate for our lives to make sense, to have meaning,--and at a great enough remove , all memory is malleable." -Michelle West 'Sea of Sorrows', SunSword book IV.