Basic Ship Design Guide

[RSF777]

Once again, I did not build it to engage in dogfights and speed contests. I built it so I don't have to spend months running away and picking off an enemy ship, it is not a heavy combatant, its cheap, quick, and effective firepower. Also I like that the pirates copy your designs, some just like to tromp the easy AI so they build sloppy ships and show them to the pirates or just use larger ones, but I wish the AI Empires would do this as well with all sizes, it happens in real life so I see it as realistic, China does this to the US constantly. I build a ship, the pirates copy, so I will build another to fight that one, building ships is half of my fun in these games, so I play it very slowly and enjoy myself watching them carry out my orders as I plan them to.

I realize that if I was playing online with other humans, I would have to exploit some unbalance issue in the game to gain an advantage... but im not, im playing a computer AI that will allow me to take my time and have fun with this game. There is really no way to loose this game, before I fully understood the energy system, I built ships that hardly ever fired, but still won. The range of effective ships is very large against the AI currently, hopefully this will soon change. It certainly isn't, and probably never will be, hard enough that I have to start making ships that exploit a balance issue in order to win against the AI, a smart AI or a human would simply turn around and go back to what it was doing rather than chase a faster escort with 2 torpedos halfway across the galaxy. If you have to constantly flee to win a fight, you can't attack anything, and you can't defend anything, but you can however whittle away at everything. I would not expect to get into a debate on this with the only person on the these forums im told believes in bombarding and destroying everything. Im not saying your wrong man, im just saying I like guns better than I do engines.

[Deomrve]

I'm not sure if I understood what you were saying earlier. In ship design does one need enough excess energy to account for both the engines and weapons?

[Astorax]

Deomrve, thats correct. To be totally efficient, your vessel should have enough Excess Energy to cover the energy of Sprint + Maximum Weapon Energy Use Per Second so that you can fire all weapons and your ship can be full speed.

[Deomrve]

Thanks, that changes the way I design ships.

[Imrryran]

This guide is quite useful, thanks [:)]

[RSF777]

@Deomrve: I also overlooked this, not giving my ships enough energy to move and fight at the same time. Ships will most of the time try to Sprint during combat, and since energy is used for engines before weapons, it may skimp out on some of its weapons in order to go full speed if it doesn't have enough juice. Keep experimenting with ship designs, sometimes you can get away with a little less energy, a lot of times I base my ship designs/sizes around how many reactors they have.

@Imrryan: No problem, glad I could help.

edit: Someone clear this up for me... for ships that are low on energy, their lasers will take priority over torpedos when within range? I think this is right, but im not positive.

[Astorax]

ORIGINAL: Das123

Another question for the gurus please...

The AI tends to default to designing its own ships and won't upgrade your designs automatically. Which means when you first design an Escort the AI (I think) will use that as the default until it is superseded with the next version of its laser design. Is there a way to get the AI to switch its auto-update to your design over its own?

Hmm, I think the only thing you would have to do is obsolete the AI designed one leaving only your human designed one left.

[Dadekster]

Very nice write up RSF777. Think many new peeps to this game will find it useful.

[DasTactic]

ORIGINAL: Astorax

ORIGINAL: Das123

Another question for the gurus please...

The AI tends to default to designing its own ships and won't upgrade your designs automatically. Which means when you first design an Escort the AI (I think) will use that as the default until it is superseded with the next version of its laser design. Is there a way to get the AI to switch its auto-update to your design over its own?

Hmm, I think the only thing you would have to do is obsolete the AI designed one leaving only your human designed one left.

Yes, but as soon as the next piece of tech becomes available it then upgrades its old obsoleted design and your preferred design is no longer the latest.

[Wenla]

ORIGINAL: Das123

ORIGINAL: Astorax

ORIGINAL: Das123

Another question for the gurus please...

The AI tends to default to designing its own ships and won't upgrade your designs automatically. Which means when you first design an Escort the AI (I think) will use that as the default until it is superseded with the next version of its laser design. Is there a way to get the AI to switch its auto-update to your design over its own?

Hmm, I think the only thing you would have to do is obsolete the AI designed one leaving only your human designed one left.

Yes, but as soon as the next piece of tech becomes available it then upgrades its old obsoleted design and your preferred design is no longer the latest.

Because of that I see currently only two choises: a)fully AI automated ship design or b)fully players manually done ship design.

Veterans, are there any other option (like: I, as a player, make designs of all research bases, AI can do all others)?

[Gareth_Bryne]

To the propagators of long range torpedo bomber (TB) ships:

For those who are fans of Star Trek, there is something called the Picard maneuver. Basically, a ship uses hyperdrive to jump right on top, or really close to, its target. That way, a loaded beam ship(BS) can tear apart a TB in a very short time, wasting minimum fuel for a chase (fuel usage is smaller for jumping than sprinting such a distance, since it is a time-based consumption dependency). Note: I do agree that the accuracy for such jumps is limited and think, that there should be tech modifications for these options.

Then again, you MIGHT be able to design a BS with faster engines and
>= firepower than a similar TB, taking some damage and then outgunning the TB at point blank range.

The third solution is in the area of maneuver strategy. A ship runs from the TB, then turns around (greater turning engines, a hint) and is right within range before the TB can turn and stays there at least some time.

So, these ideas could be implemented as AI strategic construction variations, and for the rest of us it becomes evident that in this marvelous game the sky's the limit for our (and the devs') inventiveness.

[Astorax]

ORIGINAL: Wenla

ORIGINAL: Das123

ORIGINAL: Astorax




Hmm, I think the only thing you would have to do is obsolete the AI designed one leaving only your human designed one left.

Yes, but as soon as the next piece of tech becomes available it then upgrades its old obsoleted design and your preferred design is no longer the latest.

Because of that I see currently only two choises: a)fully AI automated ship design or b)fully players manually done ship design.

Veterans, are there any other option (like: I, as a player, make designs of all research bases, AI can do all others)?

Wenla, no, its all or nothing, I'm afraid.