The Face of the Enemy (Destroy this Ship!)

[Mordante]

1) defence modifiers are a null issue with baseships really - yes the stealth armour stacks with ecm (as would scattering too) for a +75% bonus but compare that with the +65% attack bonues and the inbuild -40% defense for base ships and hits are assured (even without considering my empires +20% attack bonus)

2) fighters are interesting but need to attack with vast numbers to penetrate those shields in a timeframe to effect the outcome of the cap ship engagement.

3) refits to pds-massed designs are likely should i use missiles and fighters in the first combats. It is likely that the enemy power has some specialised defense assets.

4) i have consider system-destruction weapons as a Last ditch fleet interdiction weapon. i.e. black hole generators trigger when an overwhelming incoming fleet is spotted. This use is entirely hypothetical though - I have no idea how the dynamics of triggering/resolution would work in simultaneous play....

thanks

[Nitram Draw]

You could also try to fight in nebulas, shield aren't as effective.
Fighting a war of attrition against a maintenance free opponent isn't a good idea IMO. You will lose units also and still pay to maintain your remaining ships.
A better goal would be to cripple his shipbuilding capacity, either by targeting planets with yards or big resource producing/storage planets. Once he has built them he's done. Keep him from building as fast as you and the attrition strategy makes more sense.
The benefit of the Wave Motion Gun is range and a +30 to hit modifier on the weapon. This makes those long range hits more likely, although I agree sometimes I'd rather fire 4-5 beams every turn. WMG's are a good alternative to going toe to toe.

[dogscoff]

QUOTE:
2) mines and selective intelligence hits vs minesweepers; nice combo - any hints as to the best way of knocking down 100,000 pts of counter-intel? (I have 200,000 pts of intel available)
/QUOTE

Now the way I understand counter-intel is that no matter how many points are invsted in a counter-intel project, it can only counter a certain amount of enemy projects, 1 for level I counter intel, 2 for II and so on.

Therefore, (correct me someone if I'm wrong) if the enemy has invested 90,000 points in a counter-intel I, you can effectively cancel out that entire project by throwing a single 5000 point cargo bomb at them. A 150,000 point CI II can be wasted with any two cheap ops.

This means you can wear down your opponent's counter intel much faster than he can build it up. Set a dozen or so cargo/ ship bombs to complete in the same turn, and there will a very good chance at least one of them will get through. If it does, you know that next turn your opponent will have _no_ effective counter intel projects left. He will have to start some new ones from scratch. OK, if he's investing more in counter intel than you are in sabotage AND he starts enough projects then you won't be able to touch him, but if you can hit him with enough projects and / or persuade other empires to spend intel points on him you will sabotage him into the ground=-)

Oh, it's worth mentioning - I think the defender in intel conflicts gets some kind of bonus modifier, so counter intel points are worth more than offensive ones.

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"Pinky, are you pondering what I'm pondering?"
"Uh, I think so, Brain, but balancing a family and a career ... oooh, it's all too much for me. "

[dogscoff]

QUOTE:
2) fighters are interesting but need to attack with vast numbers to penetrate those shields in a timeframe to effect the outcome of the cap ship engagement.
/QUOTE

The fighters don't need to damage the cap ships, just draw their fire. PPBs _can_ target fighters, so depending on your opponents' fleet strategy settings, you could force all those big scary weapons to be wasted on cannon fodder fighters, allowing your cap ships to get in closer and do damage. Just a thought.

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"Pinky, are you pondering what I'm pondering?"
"Uh, I think so, Brain, but balancing a family and a career ... oooh, it's all too much for me. "

[Suicide Junkie]

If you make a black hole at one of your empire's chokepoints, you can then decide whether to fight with shields or without.
Just move from one side of the wormhole to the other, and you get to disable the enemy shields OR make full advantage of your own.

You can put shields on your ships and fight outside the BH, or use armor & long-range WMGs to fight inside the blackhole.

The enemy has a 50/50 chance of guessing correctly, and will either have useless shields(by BH) or few shield points(by design), if they guess wrong. In case they guess right, you can use the other strategies mentioned in this thread.

Armored boarding ships in a Blackhole system would rule against baseships, since his shields would be gone

Research stellar manipulation to destroy stars in his industrial systems. Go cloaked with two minesweeper DN sweep 100+. Of course by the time you pay for the stellar he will have researched sensors and put up sensor sats - but is worth a try ? It seems likely that his maintenance free option is going to kill you unless you get him FAST.

[Taqwus]

Hrrrrrrrm.

What's the range on your engine-killing beams? Given that he has NO missiles, and no range-7 or range-8 weapons of any kind, engine killers might be helpful.

Since you have all technology and a propulsion advantage, you may want to go for speed/range. Say --

BC chassis/propulsion:
6xQE III, Solar Sail III => 13/7 speed
All ships use maximum weapons range, tweaked so that second movement strategy may need to be 'Don't Get Hurt'. Try it in the simulator -- it's smarter than it used to be.

Weapons to favor:
Engine-killing beams if range is good. Don't bother with missiles unless you've got a LOT of them -- his PD will probably shoot them down. PD is probably more space-efficient than most of the missiles in terms of shots needed to kill a missile and shots available while it closes.
Shield depleters, if you WON'T be fighting in a nebula.
High-energy magnifiers (range 7) or possibly WMGs (range 8). His armor is insignificant, so it's not like you need to rely on low-damage shard cannons. Incidentally, his shields won't help at all in minefields.

As a Last-ditch scorched-galaxy defense, have a cloaked star destroyer ready IF your opponent prefers the Main Fleet approach.

Does your opponent have supply ships at all? I'd be tempted to (simulate first!) try to designate a few ships to kill only unarmed ships if it looks like they're vulnerable... probably wouldn't be, but maybe.


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-- The thing that goes bump in the night