Does Anyone Use Escorts?

[geoschmo]

I like escorts the way they are. It gives the game a realisitc feel. Real navies aren't totally composed of capital ships.

Great things about escorts...

They are small and cheap so you can crank them out at your low pop space yard worlds and at your space yards ships.

Ecsorts with direct fire weapons (ducs, beams) make great picket lines. a line of those between your dreadnougths and your enemy does a coupple of things. They have more fire power than a fighter, and they typically don't go poof when hit once like fighters do. This means even if the escort is disabled, the enemy has to use another shot on him next turn or spend movement points going around him to get to your larger ships.

Escorts with lower damage weapons a few spaces in front of your missle laden capitol ships may not even recieve fire from the enemy, as normally the ai will attack the strongest ships first.

A fleet of dreadnoughts goes into battle, afterwards most of the ships may still be alive but several will be crippled, causing them to be abandoned or slow the fleet down. With escorts taking some of that damge, you will lose more ships, but the ones left will be relativly unharmed, and moving at full speed.

Geo

[Baal]

It would be a good Idea to add movement points to smaller ship hulls. A sort of bonus so that there is an insentive to use the smaller hulls later in the game. And I never thought it made much sense that smaller ships go just as slow as a Dreadnought.

A movement bonus would be a good idea to balance out the game and give reasons to use smaller hulls later in the game.

[Emperor Zodd]

I agree,the escort should be fast like a PT boat.

[geoschmo]

Escorts are already faster than Dreadnaughts. In fact they are faster than anything larger than a Battle Cruiser becasue as they get larger than that they can't have as many engines.

I agree that is a silly way to limit the speed of larger ships, but that is how it is currently and it has the same effect as a speed bonus for smaller hulls.

Geo

[Suicide Junkie]

quote:

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Escorts are already faster than Dreadnaughts. In fact they are faster than anything larger than a Battle Cruiser becasue as they get larger than that they can't have as many engines

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That still means there are only two hull types slower than an ES: the DN & BS

I would prefer a mass-based movement system. So when you double your mass, you have to have twice the engine power to move at the same speed. Larger hulls would be able to get bigger, more efficient engines, but in general, the larger ships should spend more space on engines to move the same speed as a smaller ship.

[HawaiiFive-O]

Escorts are a major component of my battle fleets. Don't put shields/armor on them, as the AI rarely shoots at the little buggers. I use them as:
1) Sensor boats.
2) Point Defense boats.
3) Movement interdictors- surround the enemy ships so they can't move.
3) Suicide boarding ships. After a certain point, the AI always puts a Self-Destruct Device on board their ships. This can be inconvenient if you want to actually capture their ships, but it is also the ultimate weapon if you just want to blow them up. Cram 3 Boarding Party modules on board the ES and once the shields are ripped down send the ES in to board. If successful the enemy ship blows up. I've taken out multiple dreadnoughts this way. Use Master Computers if you don't like the thought of kamikaze crews.

[Noble713]

quote:

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Originally posted by suicide_junkie:
I would prefer a mass-based movement system. So when you double your mass, you have to have twice the engine power to move at the same speed. Larger hulls would be able to get bigger, more efficient engines, but in general, the larger ships should spend more space on engines to move the same speed as a smaller ship.

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I've modded the ship types to make use of the "Engines Per Move" Option, which was also in SE3. Currently it's set for 1 per move if less than 1000kT, 2 per move if less than 2000kT, etc. As such, a heavy battleship (3500kT) needs 3 engines per move. If equipped with its maximum of 12 engines, it has a speed of 4 (with Ion Engines).

By contrast a cruiser (800kT) needs one engine per move with a max of 6 engines, so 6 Ion Engines make it 50% faster than a heavy battleship, despite having half as many engines.