[Taqwus]

For space combat, you can get bonuses to hit from...

- race (aggressiveness)
- culture (space combat bonus)
- ship experience
- fleet experience
- combat sensors
- war shrine in system (religious races)
- event predictor in system (temporal races)
- inherent bonus to weapon (e.g. certain 'Big Guns' like WMGs get a bonus, as do point defense)
- religious talisman (religious races, direct-fire always hits)
- being REALLY tiny and manueverable (fighters)
- weapon mount (for certain ones like base mounts; they get accuracy bonuses meaning that they can actually *hit* at the extended ranges)


Seekers are an exception; they either get shot down, run out of fuel, or hit. Hitting planets also seems to be an exception -- I don't remember seeing anything less than 99% for them (the normal maximum to-hit chance).


Defensive bonuses include...
- range to target (straight 10% to-hit penalty per square, IIRC)
- most of the above, except for weapon bonuses, talisman, combat sensors, and aggressiveness
- defensiveness racial bonus
- ECM
- ship size (small ships are better; a few big ships/bases have a penalty)
- stealth and scattering armor


Incidentally, minimum hit chance is 1% always if within range and weapon is loaded, functional and applicable (permitted to hit at all -- e.g. cap ship missiles can't target satellites). Inherent weapon bonuses, such as PD bonus of +70%, seem to get applied Last, and after the 1% rule is applied -- meaning that PDs hit w/ a minimum rate of 70%. At least, that's the way it seemed to work pre-1.49 -- I'm playing a religious race in my current game, and ubiquitious use of the Talisman means that most of these rules don't apply to me.

Oh, and base chance to hit. It's somewhere in Settings.text, if memory serves (as is the range penalty). I don't remember what it is, but it's high (at point-blank). Other numbers get placed in the individual files for Components, Facilities, Vehicle Types, and so forth.

On ground combat, well, it's much harder to figure out what's going on there. I'd be interested in a detailed explanation, m'self.