Armor is better than warheads

dmm · #1 September 26th, 2000, 01:35 AM

I rammed an escort equipped with a full engines, an ArmorIII, and a WarheadIII (300 damage, weighs 50 kT) against another ship (a frigate, I think) with a total damage resistance of 305 kT. The outcome surprised me. Both ships were affected equally by the explosion, so both were destroyed. On the other hand, replacing the warhead with 5 more ArmorIIIs and doing the same ramming test resulted in the destruction of the frigate with only armor damage to the escort. So armor is better than warheads for kamikaze ships. Which leads to the question: what are warheads good for?

Psitticine · #2 September 26th, 2000, 04:07 AM

Umm, they're for when you don't want your ship back!

IOW, for suicide rammers - real kamikazes. When they blow, they take the ship they're mounted on with them. They're for sending something cheap (or outdated) like an escort to take on a much larger (and costly) opponent.

dmm · #3 September 26th, 2000, 04:18 PM

I think you're missing my point. (But maybe not. See below.) The warheads are so heavy that ArmorIII does more damage to the enemy ship.
ArmorIII:5x10kT=50kT weight and does 5x70kT=350kT damage
Warhead(II?):50kT weight and does 300kT damage

Having slept on it, here's my answer to my own question (which maybe is what Psit. meant?):
1) Warheads are faster than armor to put on a ship as an upgrade because they're only one item. (Heavy items don't take any longer to repair/upgrade than light items.) So if my Yard can do 5 repairs/turn, then in one turn I could either turn one outdated escort into an armored rammer, or I could turn 5 outdated escorts into 5 warhead rammers. So if I'm in a hurry, then warheads win, no contest.
2) A warhead rammer that's down to 5 strength in the warhead and 5 strength in one engine can still sneak up and ram the enemy, doing the full 300 damage. So the enemy is forced to destroy it totally. An armored rammer down to 10 strength will only do 10 damage, so the enemy doesn't need to worry about it. (And if the enemy has EmissiveArmor or CrystalArmor, then he can ignore damaged armored rammers at even higher strength levels.)

One thing I've learned from my discussions about armor, is that new technologies are often not as good as a high level of an old technology. But if you keep researching to higher levels of the new tech, eventually the new tech has significant advantages.

Baron Munchausen · #4 September 26th, 2000, 05:17 PM

You're still using the .51 demo if you've got 70kt damage per armor component. That's very high and out of proportion. The .56 demo has much less value for armor and higher value for shields. You would find the warhead more valuable in that demo. In the final release, of course, you can adjust things as you see fit.

It's easy to add some power to the warhead and make it work the way you expect. And then it's easy to go back and change something else to correct game balance if you find it too powerful.

Cyrien · #5 September 26th, 2000, 07:18 PM

Hrmm...

I start a game with High Tech look and see...

70kt damage resistance on Armor III for a space take up of 10kt. I know for a fact I have .56, it even says so in the corner when I start it up

Version 0.56 DEMO

Hrmm... perhaps there is a bug here? Maybe it has to do with upgrading from .51 or dling .56 straight? I don't know but this is what .56 has for me.

Psitticine · #6 September 26th, 2000, 08:36 PM

quote:
Originally posted by dmm:
1) Warheads are faster than armor to put on a ship as an upgrade because they're only one item. (Heavy items don't take any longer to repair/upgrade than light items.) So if my Yard can do 5 repairs/turn, then in one turn I could either turn one outdated escort into an armored rammer, or I could turn 5 outdated escorts into 5 warhead rammers. So if I'm in a hurry, then warheads win, no contest.
2) A warhead rammer that's down to 5 strength in the warhead and 5 strength in one engine can still sneak up and ram the enemy, doing the full 300 damage. So the enemy is forced to destroy it totally. An armored rammer down to 10 strength will only do 10 damage, so the enemy doesn't need to worry about it.

Actually, I hadn't thought of the first point. The second is what I had in mind though. Sorry for not making myself clear!

I've only been ramming as a final option for badly damaged ships and, as you note, a ship's normal ramming damage, i.e. without a warhead, is based on its remaining damage capacity.

When I get to the point where I can't cram enough stuff onto an escort to make it worthwhile to keep the hulls around, I put a warhead on each one and use them as a screen for the more valuable ships. If the enemy damages one badly, and it can still reach them, there's some payback before they go up in a puff of flame and smoke.

I don't really want to pay the maintence costs of them anymore anyway, so why quietly retire an old warrior when it can take down one more opponent on its way out?

quote:
Originally posted by Cyrien:
70kt damage resistance on Armor III for a space take up of 10kt. I know for a fact I have .56, it even says so in the corner when I start it up

Version 0.56 DEMO

Hrmm... perhaps there is a bug here? Maybe it has to do with upgrading from .51 or dling .56 straight? I don't know but this is what .56 has for me.

I've got the same thing in my 0.56 demo. I never had 0.51 - 0.56 was the first (and, so far, only) Version I've installed.

Herr Baron is a beta-tester. It must be hard to keep track of what's in the Version you were using several updates ago, so perhaps this was actually changed after 0.56?