Re: Cheaters AI Race
I was working on the Cheaters this afternoon and their ship designs were very fast. I was testing them in combat when I realized: How fast your ships are doesn't matter in combat.
Aside from being able to catch a ship that's running away from you, the speed of your ship has little or no effect on its combat effectiveness. What makes a ship effective is having just enough speed to reach the enemy first by jumping in at them from just outside of weapons range, and bringing enough firepower to destroy them before they have a chance to fire back.
Obviously an AI won't be able to do that as perfectly as a human, but if I consider most enemy ships will start out on the opposite side of the map, and have a combat speed of 3 or 4, I should be able to figure out an optimal number of engines to give an attack ship enough movement to win most of the time against a comparable opponent.
Of course, I also need a high damage first strike weapon. I'm thinking about using Rocket Pods, but I don't like the short range and the refire rate. The Cheaters build Kamikaze ships with Mine Warheads on them, giving them tremendous damage potential, but you also loose the ship.
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