Ship Design for Dummies, weapons, armor, shields, oh my!

[Master Belisarius]

As others posted before, I like to include at least a shield to avoid boarding and help to avoid the Ionic Disperser's effects.
And also, design my ships thinking in how to take an advantage over the enemy's ships.

But think the most important to me is the question: will be my ships able to have a good hit ratio??? Can my ships avoid (at least some) of the enemy's shots??

[Taera]

Geo - with the exception of very early game armor is not a defense - its the backup of the shields. Meaning that if a shield IS breached, you dont lose components -- at least not instantly.

The point is that shields can survive partially - four armors will be 1 if hit by enough damage.

My opinion.

[Wardad]

Originally posted by Stone Mill:
Just a note on shields... your designs will be vulnerable to ship capture without them. (Especially an WP ambush). So even though they are bulky and inefficient, I include just one even on my early designs.

If I see that a player is not using shields... I try and take advantage of this... hello boarding parties!

Yeah, what he said and what Master Belisarius said
"I like to include at least a shield to avoid boarding and help to avoid the Ionic Disperser's effects."

Try warping in and taking on a pack of fighters with no shields and no armor. All direct fire fighter weapons are weak, even the fighter PPB.

So even non phased shields have a purpose. Even if they use PPB and skip the shields, the shields will still protect against Ionic dispersers, Fighters, and Boarding Parties.

[PvK]

One or two normal shield gen III's on a destroyer can be very decisive against enemies who have no shields, no PPB, and no shield depleters. Quite useful for early-game wars.

PvK

[geoschmo]

Yeah, I need to get around to testing shields. I expect them to be effective. Even armor was for destroyers and smaller. I hope that shields at least prove semi usefull for LC's and above beyond just anti-boarding. the greater size to damage ratio should make the difference.

[oleg]

Originally posted by geoschmo:
... I hope that shields at least prove semi usefull for LC's and above beyond just anti-boarding. the greater size to damage ratio should make the difference.

Please don't forget ID. It was no coincidence MM was finally forced to do something about that uberweapon !

[spoon]

Originally posted by geoschmo:
But it just doesn't fit with what I see when I test it. I haven't tried shields yet, but at least for armor I see no point in using ANY once you get past LC's. The mounts make the weapons do just too much damage, even for Armor 3. That is unless you have a lot of armor, and then your ship is too weak to really hurt the other guy.

One of the main reasons I use armor is because it is cheap, and a lot of my designs end up with armor III on them just for the sake of keeping cost within the build-time cutoff points.