Attack of the Ankle-Biters - Replacment player needed.

[Slick]

Wow! Pax, I don't want to sound negative so please don't take this the wrong way, but that is certainly different than what I originally had in mind. Run with these ideas, this project may turn into a fun mod. If you would like a little more about my original thoughts I would be happy to post them here.

Slick.

[Pax]

Originally posted by Slick:
Wow! Pax, I don't want to sound negative so please don't take this the wrong way, but that is certainly different than what I originally had in mind. Run with these ideas, this project may turn into a fun mod. If you would like a little more about my original thoughts I would be happy to post them here.

Slick.

Sure.

Your original thought was, ISTM, just to chop out the bigger hulls, but then I got to thinking abotu how you could make a small-ships game still have a variety of hulls. That requires greater variation in more than just size, since you're workign in such a small "window" of possible sizes, so some speed variations seemed appropriate.

So I came up with 2 scout, 4 warship, 2 carrier, and 3 transport hulls, for 11 ships in all. Starbases should also drop in size (or they become absolute TERRORS on defense).

The possible changes to the Spaceyard componentare intended solely to permit spaceyard ships; I'm in favor of dropping it to 100kT, since that'd fit on a spacedock, and you could push the 500kT base hull out a ways, tech-wise.

I do plan to explore this further. Generally, I won't likely touch much beyond the hull sizes, and the tech fields that affect them.

To re-introduce some design variation, OTOH, I may *cough*"borrow"*cough* mounts form other sources. Some of the Gatling moutns could be amusing, for example.

Oh ... one thing I forgot to work in is Drones. Make them 50/100/150 (2EpM), perhaps.

[Slick]

Please don't feel obligated to incorporate any of these ideas, but use them if you like.

There were a few of ideas that I was trying to combine. One was the idea that the ratio of ship size to planet size seems too large. Indeed some ships can have more firepower and/or storage than small planets. I think this is unrealistic. Limiting the size of ships to Frigate would go a long way to correct this. Also, based on most sci-fi, planet defenses should be a more formidable. It should be very hard for a ship to glass a planet - even a tiny planet. Taking on a homeworld would take a huge number of ships and the better course of action might be to attack the economy instead of the large planets. The caution here is that planet defenses must be kept vulnerable to fleets or else the game would end in stalemate. Large Weapon Platforms would be very formidable, but still be suceptible to attacks of large numbers and/or blockading.

Also, having small ships would somewhat un-nerf minefields, and make defense bases more formidable as they should be. In the unmodded game a Battlecruiser is larger than a Space Station. Under this scheme, the smallest base should be larger than the largest ship.

Another idea was that there would be only 3 available ship sizes (on purpose): Escort, Frigate, and Colony Ship. Colony Ships would be used only as colonizers. That leaves only Escorts and Frigates (rarely used in the unmodded game) for everything else. You would have to make many different configurations of Escorts and Frigates to accomplish all the functions of an empire. They could do all the essentials: attack ships, carriers, troop transports, mine layers, mine sweepers, etc. However, you couldn't build a spaceyard ship - the best you could do is a repair Frigate with very limited movement (2 engines, or 1 engine and 1 solar sail). Again, these ideas would make more of a challenge out of supply, repair, minesweeping, etc., which come all to easy with large ships. You would have to deal with being unable to put spaceyards and other large components on ships - you could use them only on bases if appropriate.

Only having 2 real hulls for all ship designs would really create a creative duel against humans. This is why I didn't mention creating other hull sizes or using qnp to give more space in the smaller hulls. There is no doubt that, under this system, large fleets would rule small fleets. But there would be real attrition during fleet battles instead of quite lopsided battles where the winning side takes little no losses. I believe that, in general, a small fleet would still be able to take out a somewhat (maybe slightly less than) proportional number of ships against a large fleet. Also, the non-availability of mounts for Escorts and Frigates was intentional. Mounts would only work for WP's and bases to make up for their immobility.

I also think that some of the non-used weapons would be much more useful. I am thinking that a small plague bomb fleet would be a good alternative to attempting to glass a planet (which would mean heavy losses). Because of the limited capacity of Frigates, planet capture would not be so easy anymore. It would also involve heavy losses, but the fruits of victory are great.

Drones, being comparable in size to ships, now also become a much more viable option.

Also, the cost of ship maintenance would be more significant. Frigates and Escorts have lots of "overhead" space used for non-combat systems. Since the obvious way to win a game like this would be to massively produce ships, the economic pain of ship maintenance would really come into play. Do you attack the enemy fleet or his economic base?

Basically if someone wanted to create a full blown mod to address all these issues, it could be done. But a "quick & dirty" way to get a new twist on the game would be to simply eliminate all hulls except Escort, Frigate and Colony Ship.

Of course, AI controlled empires would probably not be very good at this, if they would even work at all.

Well those are the things I was thinking about when I made this post. Use or discard any ideas you like.

Slick.

[oleg]

Why not leave ships sizes as they are but get rid of ship mounts alltogether ? There would'd be much advantage to build bigger ships as it is now.

[Taz-in-Space]

Another idea for including the larger components in the smaller hulls would be to add miniaturization mounts, just make them cost a lot.

Half size components cost twice or even three times as much...
Further miniaturization costs even more...

You then have a choice, make LOTS of ships with standard components OR fewer (more powerful) ships with miniature (but high cost)components.

[Slick]

Originally posted by oleg:
Why not leave ships sizes as they are but get rid of ship mounts alltogether ? There would'd be much advantage to build bigger ships as it is now.

There are other reasons as stated. Cargo capacity, overhead, intentionally limiting what can go on the ship, ... You simply can't build a Frigate with all the goodies. That is what would make it interesting. It forces choices.

Slick.

[oleg]

Originally posted by Slick:

quote:

---

Originally posted by oleg:
Why not leave ships sizes as they are but get rid of ship mounts alltogether ? There would'd be much advantage to build bigger ships as it is now.

There are other reasons as stated. Cargo capacity, overhead, intentionally limiting what can go on the ship, ... You simply can't build a Frigate with all the goodies. That is what would make it interesting. It forces choices.

Slick.

---

True Then may be give smaller ships attack and defence bonuses ? Like in Proportions or AIC mods. It's got to be more difficult to hit smaller ships. It follows from basic physics and mathematics, I think.

[Pax]

Originally posted by Slick:
One was the idea that the ratio of ship size to planet size seems too large. Indeed some ships can have more firepower and/or storage than small planets. I think this is unrealistic. Limiting the size of ships to Frigate would go a long way to correct this.

Planet cargo capacity can also be increased.

Also, based on most sci-fi, planet defenses should be a more formidable. It should be very hard for a ship to glass a planet - even a tiny planet. Taking on a homeworld would take a huge number of ships and the better course of action might be to attack the economy instead of the large planets.

Oh, I agree, 110% -- though the economy in SE4 is untouchable, as it occurs behind the scenes.

Also, having small ships would somewhat un-nerf minefields, and make defense bases more formidable as they should be. In the unmodded game a Battlecruiser is larger than a Space Station. Under this scheme, the smallest base should be larger than the largest ship.

Well, as you can see, that's not entirely true, but the largest base is around three times the size of the largest warship (and over double the size of a carrier, and nearly double the size of the largest noncombatant ship). Only one ship is bigger than the next-biggest base, and not by much at that ... not to mentionit's not a combat hull.

Another idea was that there would be only 3 available ship sizes (on purpose): Escort, Frigate, and Colony Ship. Colony Ships would be used only as colonizers. That leaves only Escorts and Frigates (rarely used in the unmodded game) for everything else.

That's where your ideas and mine unavoidably part ways. 8)

You would have to make many different configurations of Escorts and Frigates to accomplish all the functions of an empire. They could do all the essentials: attack ships, carriers, troop transports, mine layers, mine sweepers, etc. However, you couldn't build a spaceyard ship - the best you could do is a repair Frigate with very limited movement (2 engines, or 1 engine and 1 solar sail).

Actually, with 15kT to work with, at best you have a satt/minelayer. I would NEVER make a 150kT carrier (one launch bay, MAYBE two ... ? nosir ... gotta be at least 5, thanks!)

Again, these ideas would make more of a challenge out of supply, repair, minesweeping, etc., which come all to easy with large ships. You would have to deal with being unable to put spaceyards and other large components on ships - you could use them only on bases if appropriate.

I consider a SYS to be an essential component of imperial expansion. especially where bases are so key for repair and defense, a big base or two sitting on a warp point provides more defense, when the targets are destroyers or smaller, than they do currently.

Only having 2 real hulls for all ship designs would really create a creative duel against humans.

See, that, I don't see. You'd boil it down to one or two "best" designs, and then it'd be a race to see who could build more of them per turn.

Also, the non-availability of mounts for Escorts and Frigates was intentional. Mounts would only work for WP's and bases to make up for their immobility.

Which IMO also limits creativity. Even given two shisp with identical shield/engine/etc, both using the same tonnage of the same direct-fire gun ... if one goes with an enhanced-targetting mount, whiel the other goes with a Gatling-style mount, both ships could play out very differently. Who's to say which one would win, without trying the two out?

Because of the limited capacity of Frigates, planet capture would not be so easy anymore. It would also involve heavy losses, but the fruits of victory are great.

With only frigates for cargo transport, I'd never even TRY. Consider: it's now much more punishing to try and land troops on a defended planet (read: one with WPlatforms). If each ship then only had 40-60kT dedicated to cargo bays ... planet capture would be functionally impossible, IMO.

Well, we'll see what I can cook up (if anything).

[Slick]

With larger hulls, it might have to be called "Knee-Biters" instead of "Ankle-Biters"

Slick.

[geoschmo]

So slick, are you gonna do this?

Geoschmo