Best Planetary Defense: Discuss.

[Stone Mill]

I credit Dragonlord for this spinoff idea while reading about the PPB thread...

Let's say you are under attack from an opponent who is systematically conqering your planets... your defending fleets have been waxed and you are trying to throw up something to slow them down while you "form up" another fleet.

I have had nill success with this one by the way... Against an attack fleet of 20 or so, I could get nothing to even put a dent in 'em!

I like the sound of Nitram Draw's WMG weapon platforms, they sound like they might do some damage...

Any suggestions?

[Rich04]

In my experience. If an attacker has a balanced fleet there is nothing your planet can do to save itself fast. Otherwise the only defenses I can think of are.
Spending a lot of time/effort to fortify the planet. This is not very pratical on a large scale and you are better off building ships generally.
If you have the tech. Build a star destroyer in each of your systems. Blamm his fleet and your planets at the same time. You were going to lose them anyway.
Give the planet to someone that is allied to both of you. If you die at least you have helped someone else and some of your population may live till the end. If things change you might get the planets back from the person you gave it to. Think of it as the planet asking for sanctuary from a neighboring neutral empire. They pledge to stay out of the conflict and support their protectors.

[tesco samoa]

Use moons as defence systems.

Ie. Put only cargo containers on them. And then fill them up with different types of units.

Point defence WP's and then the rest Direct Fire Platforms.

Make sure you have the range on the Platforms.

Throw some fighters into the mix and you can take on a fleet.

Always remember you want to make each planet hard to conquer. Force time on the enemy. That way they cannot split their fleet and take out many planets at once.

Another thing I recommned is that if your losing your systems then as soon as your about to lose the Last few planets in that system. Gas the sun. Take everything out with one shot.

And always try to fight your battles at warp points.

But Battle Moons rock. If you have 2 of them maxxed out with units and then units on the planet. The player will be in for a big surprise.

If you cannot take them out all at once then make sure it is a costly victory for them.

But to do this you have to plan your defences early in the game and stick to your plan.

Use fighters and small ships to alter your plans. If they are low on missle defence build fighters to take this on with missle destroyers. Or to exploit what ever weakness you find. Same with mines.

Base ships with the battle moons work out realy well.



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[Nitram Draw]

One thing about defending planets is you can't hold out forever against large odds. If the enemy has 50 ships and you cannot reinforce it soon, kiss the planet goodbye. Once fleets get large, over 20 ships, you will need a fleet to run them out.

Some other tactics I've used are:

Launch mines over the planet, usually minesweepers aren't brought in to combat. This only works on a Human 1-2 times but will work against the AI.

Fighters are ok if the enemy doesn't have much PD, otherwise they get chewed up fast but can occasionally swing the battle your way.

Sats, lots of them, with missiles or beams can help. Bases are better especially Starbases and larger. They can hold out for quite a long time if there are WP on the planet.

If you are in danger of losing a well colonized system try to use engine destroying weapons to thin out, or slow down, the fleet until you can launch a counter attack.

[Urendi Maleldil]

Take out all your opponent's ships.

[Baron Munchausen]

As a practical matter you cannot make a 4X game that does not make ships supreme. If it were possible to fortify a planet so that it could not be taken by a fleet of ships you would have a game that would frequently get into stalemates. So, the starship is the ultimate weapon in SE just as in any other 4X game.

That said, the best way to defend a planet is, like most things in SE, with a combined strategy. WPs on the planet with direct-fire weapons using mounts (assuming you have a mod that uses these for WPs) and satellites with missiles and PDC. This is important. The satellites with PDC defend your planet against missile attack and can launch long-range counter-attacks with their own missiles. Since sats cannot be targetted by missiles your enemy would have to approach the planet to attack them directly and then the heavy weapons on the planet can fire on them. This is a fairly deadly combination. But, as with anything you can be overwhelmed by sheer numbers or a large technological advantage.

A fleet of ships is also effective, of course. But since ships cost maintenance it's usually not possible to have a fleet over every planet or even in every system.

There are also mines of course. Without a doubt mines are the cheapest and most effective defense. That's why I hate them. They are too simplistic. They ALWAYS hit, and there's no defense but a generic "mine sweeper" that also ALWAYS works. It's just disappointing that a game as sophisticated as SE would still be so crude aboutmines.

[This message has been edited by Baron Munchausen (edited 04 September 2001).]