Drone and Anti-Drone Tactics?

mac5732 · #1 February 6th, 2002, 10:31 PM

PvK, would it be beneficial to give the drones some tactical formations besides the option of the horde/mass movement? This possibly could make them a little harder to take out by defense ships/ftrs, leaving at least the chance of some/few to get thru the defenses no matter how much aa you put out, similiar to Kamkazies in WWII, some always managed to get thru and do damage. This in turn would cause or create some new tactics/strategies, I just don't know if 1. AI could handle it, and 2 if it is even workable
or is worth looking into. I'm not a programmer or modder, but working on it (modding)

just some ideas mac

Spoo · #2 February 6th, 2002, 10:58 PM

I think drones should be able to accept warp/move to orders, but should be unmovable after they reach their destination.

This way they'd be good for reconisence and attacking unseen targets that you know are there. Additionally, they wouldn't be unbalancing as warp point defense because of their limited fuel; satellites and fighters would still be superior.

PvK · #3 February 6th, 2002, 11:56 PM

quote:
Originally posted by mac5732:
PvK, would it be beneficial to give the drones some tactical formations besides the option of the horde/mass movement? This possibly could make them a little harder to take out by defense ships/ftrs, leaving at least the chance of some/few to get thru the defenses no matter how much aa you put out, similiar to Kamkazies in WWII, some always managed to get thru and do damage. This in turn would cause or create some new tactics/strategies, I just don't know if 1. AI could handle it, and 2 if it is even workable
or is worth looking into. I'm not a programmer or modder, but working on it (modding)

just some ideas mac

Drones could be more effective when used in formation, because they might arrive more at once and faster rather than the way they currently mob along and sometimes get slowed by each other and arrive in a less concentrated group than might otherwise be possible. It might be good for players to try the current system for a while though to see if they really need to be more powerful or not, though. On the other hand, it might have side effects that would be disadvantageous, since the entire group would be homing in on the same target, and might ignore other ships en route (target orders can be given to drones in strategies, but I haven't studied how these override the assigned target for ramming or weapon drones, if at all) I imagine it might involve a fair amount of work to program, but I'm not sure.

The drones I've mostly run into so far have been pretty low-tech and so not so hard to deal with. For example, I just had three light cruisers with one or maybe two PDC between them, and some beam weapons, encounter nineteen small low-tech simple warhead drones. Only two of the drones made it to a target - the rest were shot down. The cruisers did have first-rate fire control, though. I think more advanced drones with ECM and/or shields could have made a large difference, though, but you can see that drones can be dealth with. I think in this case if the drones could have used a formation it might have been closer - even more than ship combat, combat with ramming drones tends to be a landslide win for one side or the other - if they don't all get shot down, they will do a lot of damage. If there is enough firepower to shoot them down as they come in, probably only a few or no hits will be scored. I haven't seen much use of weapon-armed drones using stand-off tactics - those would be a different story. And of course, these are drone-vs.-ship scenarios - if the drones also had ships on their side, it could tip the scales, and so on.

PvK

E. Albright · #4 February 11th, 2002, 12:42 AM

All I really would like out of drones is the ability to launch them at planets that I have seen, but can't see any more. I just want 'em to be big 'ole cruise missles, but for now I need to have a spotter for 'em to launch - but not 'til they hit; it's enough to see it while launching. So it would seem just as reasonable to lemme shoot at planets that I know are there but can't see any more.

Oh, and if I were to get really demanding, a "go-through-the-warp-point-and-attack-the-nearest-enemy-planet (ship)" order would be nice, too. But the former bit would be enough for me.

E. Albright