Planetary weapons problem.

[geoschmo]

So I built all these neat ships with Planetary Napalm and included them in my assault fleet. Problem was they stayed well out of combat. Milled around at the edge of the combat map, didn'treally head for the corners or anything. But they didn't close on the planet. The rest of my ships took a beating from the weapons platforms in the process.

I should point out this is playing a mod that increseas the Kt to kill one pop, so my standard ship weapons were less effective against the Wp's. I intended the planetary weapons to take out the Wp's and fix that problem so my troop transport could close in safely.

My napalm ships had a strategy of optimal range. They had no other waepons other than the napalm. I ran tests in the simulator with just the napalm ships and they do attack, but in a fleet with other ships they hang back.

Any ideas?

Geoschmo

[Atrocities]

I would guess that the ships with the bigger guns take priority in the attack. Hope that helps.

[Phoenix-D]

What was the ship and fleet strategy?

Phoenix-D

[Baron Munchausen]

The 'Damage to Kill One Population' ratio does NOT affect damage to cargo on the planet. It affects ONLY the population. This is the problem with planetary weapons that we have discussed before. You should not be able to kill large amounts of population with anti-ship weapons, AND you should not be able to pulverize planetary defenses with anti-population (area effect) weapons. The current system in inadequate.

As for the non-attack stategy, that is odd. In my experience the AI is always incredibly stupid about just rushing in and attacking. I guess you customized something that has had an odd effect. Check the strategy used by those ships very carefully. It doesn't have "dont' fire on planets" set to true or anything?

[ August 18, 2002, 01:08: Message edited by: Baron Munchausen ]

[Krsqk]

I've had fleets of PN-only ships just mill around like you've described. When I added a lowly DUC I to each ship, they all descended on the planet like the plague.

[Q]

Originally posted by Baron Munchausen:
The 'Damage to Kill One Population' ratio does NOT affect damage to cargo on the planet. It affects ONLY the population. This is the problem with planetary weapons that we have discussed before. You should not be able to kill large amounts of population with anti-ship weapons, AND you should not be able to pulverize planetary defenses with anti-population (area effect) weapons. The current system in inadequate.

But you can do this:
1.) Increase the damage value to kill population.
2.) Increase the damage of the neutron bomb in the same extent but leave all other weapons including planetary napalm unchanged.

[geoschmo]

Yes, well I hadn't really intended to start a debate bout whether incresing the points to kill one pop was realisitic or not. THe fact is with the mod I am using that is the way it is. Because of this it does make it much harder to kill the weapons plats with standard ships weapons. That is why I wanted the Napalm, and I was just taken off guard by their behaivior.

Thnaks for confiming the problem Krsqk. Perhaps it's some kind of bug.

I can say for certain there was nothing unusual about my strategies. My Napalm ships and my DUC ships all haad the same strategy, optimal range. SO if it was the stratgy none of them would have closed on the planet. There is something about having only planetary weapons on a ship that makes it not close with the planet if there are any other non planetary wepoans available apparently. I think that's a problem.

Geoschmo

[capnq]

This sounds like the same thing that requires point-defense ships to have at least one non-PDC weapon.

[geoschmo]

Originally posted by capnq:
This sounds like the same thing that requires point-defense ships to have at least one non-PDC weapon.

I thought that too, except that DUC ships will close if there are fighters or missles that they can target with their weapons. Napalm can target the planet. I guess I will have to stick a DUC on them.

Geoschmo

[dumbluck]

Hmm. I have not seen this problem. In a recent PBW game, the 5000 RP I invested in Planetary Weapons was the most productive (so far); I've reduced the enemy to just his homeworld and one other colony (both protected by minefields for the time being. THAT was an unpleasant surprise!)

The ships were your basic design: escorts with just enough room for 2 PNs. No ducs, and everything worked just fine.

EDIT: Granted, this is v1.49. Maybe a Gold patch introduced this bug???

[ August 19, 2002, 10:10: Message edited by: dumbluck ]