Fighter Question

[solops]

In SE IV v 1.49 fighters and missiles seemed to become relatively useless at the higher tech levels, so long as the oppositions point defense was intact. Is this still true in the latest Version of SEIV Gold?

[Gryphin]

solops,
SE for the most part is a matter of Play Style combined with "Sissors, Paper, Rock".
So I feel the answer is: Yes and No.

[Ed Kolis]

Probably. Though you can fix that by giving missiles more damage resistance and/or mounts (yes, those do work!) and giving fighters special armor that takes more hits...

[ August 24, 2002, 20:59: Message edited by: Ed Kolis ]

[PvK]

In the unmodded game, I think there is not much difference in that department, except that drones are now also a major PD target, which are much more durable at higher tech. So, a combined drone/fighter attack, especially with ECM/shields/armor, can overpower PD defenses, and since fighters and drones have no maintenance cost, they can be worthwhile to accumulate during peacetime or in limited resource games.

Mods tend to make fighters for valid in various ways, however. In my Proportions mod, for example, I actually reduced fighter weapon damage by about a factor of five, but then made the to-hit chances very high in their favor, so that PD is not a guaranteed hit, and main weapons usually can't hit them, which makes a world of difference.

PvK

[DirectorTsaarx]

I think they've also made seekers harder to hit:

From History.txt:

Version 1.75:
7. Added - Added new Settings.txt fields - "Seeker Combat Defense Modifier", "Planet Combat Offense Modifier", "Planet Combat Defense Modifier".

So that may help keep seekers viable until later in the game. Besides, just because it's "common knowledge" that seekers lose their effectiveness once everyone has point-defense doesn't mean you should completely abandon seekers; more importantly, you also can't just stop using point-defense because the enemy isn't using seekers anymore. If the enemy is human, they may just be waiting for you to let your guard down (i.e., stop using PD). Finally, a large planet full of seeker-armed weapon platforms can still be fairly deadly to a smaller fleet. Or, if the ships are smart enough to stay out of range of missiles, they're not going to get many shots at the planet...

[mottlee]

Or you can overwelm there defences (?) with a lot of them at one or two ships (will still need some beam weapons tho)

[solops]

Thanks for the comments. My limited experience in SEIV 1.49 was that missiles/fighters became useless in the face of an enemy prepared with med-hi level PD, particularly if the line combatants each had 2-4 PD mounts and were supplemented by purpose-built PD cruisers, bristling with nothing but PD and perhaps one beam weapon (which seemed to keep them from running away). I hoped (hope) that Gold makes missile/fighters survivable enough to make them a useful part of the fleet mix throughout the game, if deployed in adequate numbers. I do wish that there was some way to force the AI to wait a bit before launching them in simultaneous combat mode so that attacks could be coordinated between beam and stand-off weapons, or so that one could launch late and hope some of the enemy PD mounts had been damaged.