All the fighter designs mentioned here assume large fighters with cockpit, life support, shield, max best engine, afterburners, ecm, sensors, which leaves 6 space left over.

1) I think the best defense against fighters when attacking is battle cruisers full of PD since the BC is the biggest ship that can have max engines. Of course if you are defending a fixed position then a starbase with lots of PD would work too. But sometimes it may come down to fighters versus fighters. In that case would the best fighter weapon to have be ppb ? The damage is puny, but not much is needed when the nonphased fighter shields are bypassed...

2) When fighter versus ships armed heavily with pd is expected then is the best weapon rocket pods ? I need to know if fighters will run to the corners after expending their rp, or do they just stay in place getting slaughtered ?

3) If not so much pd is expected, then wouldn't the best bet be to trade two engines to get the space for small antimatter torpedos ? The 35 every two combat turns beats 50 once only if the fighter survives to make a second shot.

4) If a cloaked carrier on station engages an attacking carrier to launch its fighters, then does that make it decloak ? If decloaked, is there a way to recloak during combat ? If it stays cloaked and refuses to engage, does that mean that the opposing fighters cannot shoot it ? That would be REALLY nice!

5) Of course if you see the fleet coming and units in space slots are available, then the fighters can be launched on the strategic map before the enemy arrives and the carrier can be cloaked when combat begins. In that case does it stay cloaked during combat, and if so, does that mean that enemy fighters cannot attack it ? If the attacking fleet has sensors, do they let all units see and attack cloaked ships ?

6) A smart enemy would launch a recon satellite in the system to reveal all cloaked ships before entering the sector for combat. Is the AI that smart ? This is obviously not a problem for warp points, but most of the places I will be defending are planets, not WP.

7) Many of my colonies will be in enemy home systems. Once hostilities begin, my first priority is to shoot every satellite in orbit. Does the AI keep recon satellites in cargo as a reserve ?

8) For shooting down satellites, would the best bet be a battle cruiser split 50/50 between shields and pd ?

9) One of the threads I read suggested launching missile satellites in tactical just in range of the planet, then pounding it until all the weapon platforms were gone. Does the AI put pd on its weapon platforms to negate this trick ? I have never seen it, but that was with the standard AI, so the modpack may have smarter designs. When I build wp, my weapon space is split half pd then the other half either beams or seekers.

That's all I can think of for now. If anybody else has related questions post them on this thread so it can be made a faq.

[This message has been edited by LCC (edited 10 June 2001).]