strategy & tactics

[Alneyan]

- The defender fires first indeed. There will be problems to determine who is the defender if two fleets, with the same speed, moves to the same sector at the same moment. In this case, it is random. Being the defender gives a strong advantage when the attacker warps through a wormhole; otherwise, the defending fleet will not be in firing range, and so who fires first depends on the speed of the two fleets. (Being the defender may be very useful when the two fleets are so big they take the whole battle area, but I have yet to see such a battle)

- Weapons are fired in the same order as they are in your ships, provided they can be used (a ship will not fire its Shield Depleting weapon if no enemy has shielding for example). Point Defence Cannons are fired when an enemy moves in their range, and so aren't fired along with the other weapons.

- In a fleet, ships will fire according to their id number. So, your oldest ships will act first, and your newest warships Last (at least, it is the common opinion about this as of yet). So you cannot change the order of the ships in a fleet. Formations can matter, but I am no expert on formations and ship strategies, so I cannot tell you anything more on this one.

- When you have the Talisman, the only purpose for Combat Sensors is to act as a backup. If your Talisman is destroyed, but your ship still has Combat Sensors, it will be able to have a chance to score a few more hits. Since the Talisman is a big component (50 hitpoints), it is more likely to be hit than most other components, and so you may find a ship with a broken Talisman but a few weapons still running. Besides this, Combat Sensors are useless on a Talisman equipped ship.

- Torpedoes deliver very little damage per turn and per kt, and they have no bonus to accuracy in the stock game, so it is not advised to use them. Shield Depleters are useful if your opponents are fond of shields, and the APB is a very good weapon when it reaches level VII or VIII. You will seldom be able to hit at range 8 though if your target has all the components helpful for defence, and adequate training. The Wave Motion Gun can also be useful given its range (8) and its bonus to accuracy (+30%), which makes this weapon able to deliver some damage at maximum range. It only fires every *three* turns though, and deals less damage per turn per kt than the APB (for example). Still, if you do not expect your ship to survive for more than one turn, and would prefer to deal as much damage as possible, the WMG is useful then. If you can afford the research to get it.

- Some players like to build BSY (Base Space Yards) early on, whereas others put all their efforts towards research and colonisation. So there is no definitive answer here I believe. For what it is worth, the only use I make of BSY in the early game is to be built while my homeworld recovers from the first 11 turns of Emergency Build.

To counter Boarding Parties, you may want to use Security Stations or the Self Destruct Device, depending on how many Boarders you are facing (if there is only one per ship, the Security Station is likely your best bet). Shielding may help as well, if they do not use Shield Depleters (since they already have the PPB).

And PDC will do wonders against their own seekers. Be careful of them using fighters to overcome your defences though; if they have too many resources on their hands, fighters may be a nice way to put these extra resources to good use (a few fighters aren't too powerful; a few thousand of them are another matter).

[ July 16, 2004, 14:00: Message edited by: Alneyan ]

[Mephisto]

Originally posted by Alneyan:
- Weapons are fired in the same order as they are in your ships, provided they can be used (a ship will not fire its Shield Depleting weapon if no enemy has shielding for example). Point Defence Cannons are fired when an enemy moves in their range, and so aren't fired along with the other weapons.

That is from left to right.

[Ruatha]

Originally posted by Ed Kolis:

Point Blank and Short Weapons Range force the ship to fire up close; there's really no point that I can see to using them in place of Optimal Weapons Range.
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Doesn't the chance to hit decrease with distance?
If so Point blanc is a good strategy for a non-talisman ship/fleet to use against a Talisman ship/fleet that will hit at any distance.
So no need to keep the distance then, get in close..

[Cyclop]

Can fleet experience (i.e. 29% +) make a differnce when both sides are using talismans?
I have a legendary fleet of 300 that faced a larger fleet of 500 (equal to better ships) and we decimated them (not defending through a warp point either). Needless to say I survived with about half my fleet still in tact.
I didn't take the time to watch the replay since there are over 800 ships.

[Alneyan]

It may have an influence indeed; fleet experience improves both your defence and your offence, which means that your ships were much more ready to fight without the Talisman than the enemy. It probably hadn't much of an influence though, especially if most ships were heavily armoured/shielded. The same reasoning would go true if some ships in the battle didn't have the Talisman (either due to a peculiar ship design or because of previous damage/retrofitting). However, save for this, two Talisman ships aren't influenced by fleet and ship experience when fighting, until said Talismans are destroyed.

However, the main factors were probably ship design and luck. Since you were in open space, who fired first was an open question, and I guess your fleet delivered first blow. Depending on the designs involved in the battle, it may have been very important; or not so, if you haven't been so lucky and only managed to do marginal damage in this first round. Given the end result, I gather luck was on your side for this battle.

[Fyron]

Talisman ships are definitely affected by experience, as it increases their defense/ECM value.

When fighting talisman fleets, it is a good idea to get as much experience as you can for your ships and fleets. The more you have (assuming the talisman ships are all at 20 exp), the narrower the gap in to hit rates becomes (100% talismans vs. 20% non-talismans could become 100% vs. 40%, for example). Experience still makes a huge difference when fighting talisman ships.

The experience does not help the defense of the non-talisman ships at all against the talisman ships.

[Newborn]

ok, i like to sum up the Last postings to get it clear for myself:

first scenario:
if i fight a talisman fleet without having the talisman on my own, then i should 1. train all my ships/fleet 2. use combat sensor to get as close as possible to the to hit rate of my religious opponent.
using ecm and scattering armor are worthless in a kind of way for me because the talisman always hits me, right. this free space could be used for more weapons or shielding.
the strategy for my fleet should be 1. trying to get the first shoot 2. do as much damage as possible 3. maybe go to point blank range to do the most damage cause the talisman ships will hit you at any range.

second scenario:
if two talisman fleets are fighting each other, then 1. you do not need to tain your fleet and ships (because of 2. and 3.) 2. you do no really need the ecm/scattering armor bonus because you get hit by 100% 3. having the talisman as well means you do not rally need the combat sensor because you also hit 100%. ship/fleet training, ecm/scattering bonus and combat sensor are only useful as backup in case of a destroyed talisman.
basically try to have the first shoot and more combat movement. strategy in this scenario should be range when you have long range weapons such as WMG or APB. otherwise you could use point blank as well using null space weapons or depleter weapons for example.