Things in SEIV I never knew about....

[dogscoff]

you can get unused construction points to carry over into the next build by ordering multile units (ie one fighter takes one turn to build, but ten fighters of the same design might only need 8 or 9 turns at the same yard. YMMV)

I didn't know about ramming and experience, thanks.

[Ward]

Later in the game when you fight ships with shield depleters consider investing in Armor. It really pays off.

Yesterday, I did some experiments with hi-tech ships. I found out that ships with armor perform much better than those with shields, when facing enemy with shield depleters(this is logical, after all, but it didn't strike me before). I admit I didn't consider weapons that penetrate armor(this inludes almost exclusively crystaline tech tree, Null space weapons are too exppensive to be effective) and you will have to repair very often but this way your ships will survive longer and thus will have more experience. The point is that ships with shield depleters will have less damage potential against you. Another advantage is mineral cost. While a "standard" dreadnought with anti-proton beams costs about 27000 minerals, an armor-protected ship costs about 21000 minerals.
BTW: You can add one shield generator and one shield regenerator. Just in case there are some boarding fanatics. :-)

[oleg]

Ships with armour and no shields will have a hard time if enemy uses engine killers !

[Ward]

Yes, that's true and that's why I proposed to give there shield regenerator. Anyway, if the enemy has the firepower to put down your shields in 1 turn(and on hi-tech ships he usually has) you are in trouble anyway. With armor you have at least something to protect you... And if you know that the enemy has those weapons, just retrofit one wepon to repulser beam and most problems are gone.

[oleg]

Originally posted by Ward:
.. And if you know that the enemy has those weapons, just retrofit one wepon to repulser beam and most problems are gone.

But only if you have bigger ships !
That' not always an option.

[Ward]

I was speaking about dreadnoughts. That's surely a BIG ship. O.K. There are Baseships, but those you can outmaneuver and save the space for weapons.

I did the experiment for 12 hours. I tried every logical combination and ship sizes BB-BS. For a long time I played with Shield- and Engine- and Weapon- damaging weapons(Including Null-space). Unfortunately it seems that the best weapon is Anti-proton beam alone. I don't like that result but it is what I have seen. (As I mentioned before I didn't count any special techs in.)

[ March 28, 2003, 13:30: Message edited by: Ward ]

[raynfala]

Originally posted by Atrocities:
Retro is about economics. If you can aford it, do it. This is a viable alternative to races with weak production, but extra resources per turn.

The downside to retrofitting is that you lose precious time waiting for those ships to be repaired. This is the potential drawback to Fyron's suggestion of building without a couple of components, and then retrofitting them in after completion. If your tinkering only gets your ship built one turn faster, then your efforts have been wasted; you're going to have to wait another turn for the retrofitted ship to be repaired. You could have some other ship with repair facilities escort it to the front lines. But does anybody really want to micromanage this much? (you in the back: sit down... we all see you waving your hand )

In my current game, I've been doing a lot of retrofitting... mostly retrofitting of ships that I captured through Intel (yeah, yeah, I know...). At your retrofitting sites, it helps a lot to have ships/bases bristling with repair bays. Otherwise, your retrofitting takes way too long to be of use, and it hampers repairs on battleworn ships returning from the front lines.

If you retrofit a lot, invest in Repair tech. Repair-intensive bases should be sufficient to assist planet-based shipyards, but if you want to go mobile, you'll need some Ship Construction tech to efficiently cart around multiple repair bays.

Of course, when you go mobile, you can't retrofit "one-timer" components, such as Emergency Propulsion, planet building/destroying items, etc. You need a planet-based facility for that.

--Raynfala