quote:
Originally posted by Aristoi:
I've never quite gotten the hang of building good troops. I can build ones that take planets, but I have no idea if it would be better to go with range over firepower, or more shields, or armor, or whatever.
Does anyone (a beta tester, perhaps?) know the formula that is used, or even some tried and true guidelines for making the most powerful troops?
Thanks!
I can't claim to have extensive experience with all sorts of designs, but I have used ground troops. There's a really interesting wrinkle in that ARMOR, especially small emissive armor, seems to work better in making your troops durable than shields. At least, on a "point by point" comparison. Putting several armor components in a troop seems to make them Last as long in combat as a single shield generator, even though the shield generator technically gives them more ability to absorb damage. I've gone on several successful conquest binges using 'primitive' troops with only armor and the troop cannon. Adding shields later hardly seems to make any difference.
Maybe this is because 'militia' are very simple, and the result would be different in troops vs. troops combat? Dunno. Troops with only armor are certainly cheaper than troops with shields. I'd like to see troops vs. troops combat but it's actually very difficult to destroy only the WPs and then land troops before destroying any AI troops that are present. They never place very many in a single place.
Maybe there should be a change in the way populations generate defenders. Maybe there should be 1 real TROOP of your latest design just spontaneously available for every 20 or so militia. It seems much too easy to just wipe out all units from orbit. There has to be a way to make that less absolute.
[This message has been edited by Baron Munchausen (edited 23 September 2001).]
Ground Combat Formula
Linear Mode
