Defending Warp points...

[itnetpro]

I have been using mines (LOTS AND LOTS) to protect 5 warp points into my systems. So far they have been very effective but a lot of work to maintain. I was wondering what tactic everyone is using to protect their warp points?

John...

[Fyron]

Overwhelming hordes of ships that take the fight to the enemy.

[Baron Munchausen]

As with everything else in SE, no one solution is best for defending warp points.

Satellites are more effective than mines as long as the tech difference of your opponent is not enough to wipe them out too quickly. A mine gets only one attack, while a satellite gets re-used many times. Back when you could have multiple Groups of satellites in one location they were incredible. Now it's best to have a sat group and at least one base to distribute your firepower a little bit. Then you can have some ships fleeted with the base to round out your defense system.

If you like fighters, a base loaded with fighter bays is a great way to keep them on station at a WP. Like ships, fighters are able to pursue ships that run away instead of stand and fight.

[AeoN2]

One thing I did in my Last game was set one mine layer ship on each wp I wanted to defend, and one planet in the same system to repeat build mines.

Then I selected to load mines and remote launch mines... then I selected repeat orders...

Then it would continually load more mines to the site.

You could set the same ship to mine several warp points too with more complex orders...

--
AeoN2
--
Maier's Law:
If the facts do not conform to the theory,
they must be disposed of.

[Tnarg]

I've been trying to get a grip on my ever expanding empire and have developed a pretty nifty defense system. First I built about ten space yard ships and sent them to all of my borders that could possibly flare up and be the back door for a sneak attack. Once the space yard ships were positioned I had them build small and inexpensive "Warp Point Defense Bases". Just big enough to hold a space yard and all of the other neccessities. Then I had that repeat build mines up to about a 100 thick. Then I had it build a mixture of satellites. Some PD, some PPB, some Missles. Pretty thick too. All the while I had my space yard ship build another "Warp Point Defense Base" to speed things along or I would just move it to another warp point that could be used. Once you feel you have a good blockade you could mothball the Space yard until you possbibly needed it.

If by chance your empire begings to expand beyond the old borders, just send some transports in to mop up the old warp point and move it on to the next area.

I like to use a thick barrage of mines to soften up large fleets. More in likely the mines won't stop them, but they sure do put a dent in the fleet. That's where the next phase of sats come into play. To expand even further you could also use a fleet of fighters as mentioned in a previous post. (I think I'm going to implement that into my doctrine)

This is all very expensive of course, but then again so are heavily built up planets that you don't want glassed.

[Tezzezar]

Don't forget to add cloaking technology to mineships. Kind of fun mining your next victims homeworlds.

Prefer the fighter defense myself. Carriers can relay them to the next starsystem to help conquor and to hold the next WP.

[tesco samoa]

Defending warp points are good up to the mid point of a game.

Then they become too costly.

It is better then to spend those resources on attacking the enemies warp points

[CW]

I usually prefer a mix of static and mobile defense. For a starter I deploy a barrage of satellites with allegiance subverters at my WPs, and if they fail then I scramble my nearby intecepter-battlecruisers fitted with emergency populsion pods.

{edit} forgot to add, I often find myself running short on mines, since my expansion strategy tend to be quite aggressive and too often I've a "fluidic" battlefield on my hand.

[ June 18, 2002, 02:22: Message edited by: CW ]

[Gryphin]

To date I have only used Sattelites. They work great against AI but I have never played against humans. The advantage is that they can be moved. Mines cannot be.
Fighters are the same but I have not used them.

[Marvin Kosh]

Personally, I like to mine one side of the warp point and put all the guns on the other side. Then you either get the mine sweepers sweeping your minefield but running smack against superior firepower, or some fleet getting smashed up by your mines and finished off mercifully with same firepower

But then I'm just evil like that....