How do you beat the Talisman?

[Pax]

Originally posted by Phoenix-D:
"EDIT: Oops. I guess Phoenix is making that case."

Uh-uh. Look at my comparison a little closer. (I've never seen a non one-shot external missile in SE4, either)

Phoenix-D

Expect it from me. I've already drafted preliminary plans to do something similar; not sure it'll be external, but it'll be single-shot regardless.

Might be a fighter weapon, so technically it WOULD be external (mounted under a wing or the like).

Might actually be an external SHIP missile.

Might be no lighter, but do compatratively trememndous damage (picture taking the mass of a CSMV, with magazine, reload mechanism, launch system, tc ... packing it ALL into a single, half-as-big-as-an-escort missile ... LOL ...). Sort of the reverse of flooding the target's PDC; one gigantic easy-to-hit heavily-armored godawfully-huge-warhead missile. Think of it being, oh, say ... ~250kT, having perhaps 20x the damage resistance and damage potential of a CSM of comparable technology, slow as molasses, ultra-long-range, and firing once per combat. Great against bases and planets,or bigger,slower ships, but smallfry could run circles around it (like, speed 2 to 3 ... range 20 to 30 ... 3000 to 5000 damage ... damage resistance of ~1000 or so ... heh ).

[Puke]

hmm. while a one shot launcher can save mass by leaving out specific components, one shot and external do not always go together. indeed, the only thing external should mean is that its not protected by armor.

by taking a significant part of the ships displacement and bolting it outside of the armor, you should be able to get better coverage with your existing armor for the rest of the ship. i dont think there is any way to modle this though, so external missiles really mean nothing in this game.

if you are using 'external' to be synomous with 'one shot,' then the component designs make some sense, but it could be a bit clearer, i think.

i guess im just nit-picking.

[oleg]

If it would be possible to assign "armor" ability to externally mount missiles, it will work exactly as you want - it will be destroyed before internals and even absorb some damage in the process (assigned armor ability should be small of course).

[CW]

This is possible, but it takes a LOT of ships. The biggest advatage using swarms of small ships is that the difficulty in hitting them makes up for how easily they go poof when hit. Against a Tailsman fleet you lose this advantage. It's better to go with fewer larger ships that can hold up to the damage longer, since their defensive disadvantage is irrelevant anyway. In the end you will land more shots against him for the same amount of resources.

If you are using subverters against someone with talisman, it *IS* probably better to go small. AI targeting is flawed and even if you have the highest level of combat sensor, your ships won't shoot at 5 targets in one turn in simultaneous games. Build a whole bunch of light cruisers with a single virus pack and a large mount subverter each, tell them to deliver the "message" up close and personal is perhaps the best thing to do. The biggest resource wastage with small ships is that you have to build a lot more engines, so if you play with a newtonian propulsion mod the waste is a lot less significant.

By the way, fully filling up a hull is NOT a design requirement! You can always use the swarm tactic AND large/heavy mounts together. The base cost for a dreadnought is only 850 minerals more than an escort.

[ August 07, 2002, 13:12: Message edited by: CW ]

[geoschmo]

By all means CW if you have a one shot weapon that will fit on a small ship and take out an enemy with that one shot regardless of size, armor, or shields, then small is definetly a good way to go with that. But beyond the subverter there is no such weapon I am aware of, so for non Psychics larger is better when facing Tailsmans. And I wouldn't get too attached to that strategy. It's likely to get patched out in the future. It's a pretty cheese tactic. You shouldn't be able to capture a ship with a subverter because you destroyed the master computer. The ship doesn't spontaneously grow a crew when the computer is destroyed after all. The problem is that ships are immune to the subverter if they have a master computer. This is wrong, they should be immune to the subverter if they don't have a bridge/crew quarters/life support.

Puke, I think you are too married to the ship tonnage is displacment thing. If you simply view the ship sizes not as tonnage or mass, but as a measure of the size of components that they can contain, then external mounting using less of that space makes sense. In that case you would still take up some internal space as you need to have mounting equipment, hard points, etc. But they might not take up any more internal space than armor.

These ships function in a vacuum afterall. How do you displace vacuum?

Geoschmo

[Phoenix-D]

"By the way, fully filling up a hull is NOT a design requirement! You can always use the swarm tactic AND large/heavy mounts together. The base cost for a dreadnought is only 850 minerals more than an escort."

Don't forget the extra crew quarters/life support.

Phoenix-D

[Pax]

Originally posted by Phoenix-D:
Don't forget the extra crew quarters/life support.

Phoenix-D

Unless ofc you'd use the Master Computer anyway, ofc.