Computer combat Q

[Wardad]

I used the Subverter and Computer Virus in a GOLD PBW game. The results were not were not impressive.

The CV just stops the ships movement, but you have to get close to use it. The ship can still shoot even if it can't move. If the ship has the typical APB12 max range beam weapon, well it is still deadly, and your too close.

The CV may have some tactical applications, but for large fleets the hull space is better used for some more APB12s.


My game suffered partly because they changed the rules (revision upgrade) and killed the subverters advantage. It also suffrered because the racial points and research points are better used elsewhere.

I think that at one time, when the ship lost movement points (Br, ls, cq) it also lost some ability with weapons and shields. Maybe an earlier revision? Maybe SE3?

[Fyron]

SE3 had a random chance of some weapons not firing each round if its C&C components were destroyed if I recall correctly. It never had anything to do with movement points.

[ January 16, 2004, 18:41: Message edited by: Imperator Fyron ]

[jim]

So, back to my original Q, are there more resistant ship designs in the NON-Gold game to the virus+subverter combo?

I may try a slow base ship with APB-12s at max range in a fleet of Cap Missile V BBs with some fighters thrown in to attrite PD. Sure as heck, nothing else seems to have worked so far.

Maybe put some wormhole beams or repulsers on the base ship(s).

[Fyron]

No. Once the MC is down, the ship is vulnerable to AS in pre-Gold SE4.

[jim]

I did not say that I could ever make them not vulnerable.

I asked if there were any ideas as to making them more RESISTANT.

The H mounts for the computer virus give damge of something like 160, so multiple MCs would not appear to offer any chance unless I put more than 160 mass units into MCs. That would be 4 MC I's and a fifth MC.

The repulsers have a range of 4, it seems. Thus, the virus and subverter outrange it.

The wormhole random mover has a longer range than the Virus and subverter, so that might work sometimes.

Fighters are not much help, unless used with lots of missiles. In fact, given that the fighters dance around before they shoot because they like PD or something, I am tempted just to put kamikaze warheads on them.

[PvK]

Building multiple MC's would be extremely wasteful in unmodded SE4 - it just takes another shot, or a larger virus gun, and MC's are expensive.

If you have a long-range weapon, you might be able to use Max Range/Don't Get Hurt strategy to keep them out of range.

Is SE4 1.49 before the fix that added a reload time when a ship gets subverted? If so, then if you can take one subverter ship with boarding (e.g. at a warp point defense), and/or intel, sometimes there can be a wacky subVersion chain-reaction.

You might want to look into large shielded fighters.

Ambush fleets at warp points.

Go capture their planets, avoiding their fleets.

Stellar manip them.

It's pretty tough to deal with virus + subverter in pre-Gold though - that of course is why the change was made.

PvK

[PvK]

Oh, another weak idea: Single-weapon Escorts with an MC and an ECM, using a weapon with shorter range than your main ships (all ships using long-range Max/Don'tGetHurt) - so the Escorts deploy closer, and if they are using Target Nearest, the escorts will absorb some fire, giving your full warships more time to do damage.

If the AI uses only Target Strongest, you might be able to have "strongest" ships hanging out at long range (where hopefully they won't get hit too often), while "weaker" ships charge to point blank and hopefully do lots of damage.

Another weak idea: cheap ram ships.

PvK