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Post by tenbsmith on Feb 17, 2015 11:36:20 GMT -5
I need help with ship design. Below are a few requests and some info I've gathered. 1) When, based on the Tech Tree, can you design a fighter that is superior to the Strike Fighter design with which you start? (Similar questions could be asked regarding when to design your first cruiser, carrier, etc?) 2) Please provide the design specs for an early fighter superior to the stock Strike Fighter. 3) How do you design a ship? The wizard is fairly easy to use, so I want to focus more on what the decisions mean. --The Ship Designing Wizard will not let you save if the ship design breaks the rules (e.g., total weight exceeds the capabilities of the reactor). ----Be sure to end your turn after saving a ship design. If the ST4X closes before the turn ends, your saved design will be lost. --Written descriptions of each ship characteristic are provided near the end of the online Game Manual: www.tresebrothers.com/star-traders-4x-empires/game-manual--The following info is not confirmed by TB and comes from a previous thread (thanks vylox): "For values of your ship systems under 3, you receive a penalty on rolls, for values greaterthan 3 you will receive a bonus. The bonus is to base chance to hit and a small addition to damage. Any value of 3 provides neithera bonus or a negative to your ship." "For ship design, an allocation of 0, 1, and or 2 for gun decks, torpedo bays, evasion, shielding and sensor will all be below 'average' for those actions or affects. For example: A ship with 0 gun decks can have a set of guns added, however it is unlikely that said design will actually hit anything using a gun." "Ships with 3 points allocated to locations of ship materials will have a 0 modifier for attack, defense, explore, and damage reduction rolls. Ships with 4 or more points allocated to ship material locations will receive a bonus to attack, defense, explore and damage reduction rolls." "Captain skills also play a roll in the effectiveness of the ship for a given task." startradersrpg.proboards.com/thread/10017/basic-ship-design-guidelines#ixzz3S1KEoXKAStats for invasion ship offense and defense: "Transport ships will use their Sensors, Invasion, Pilot and Shielding during attacks. Military Transport ships will use their Durability, Shielding and Armor values to defend against damage from the Xeno Colony." startradersrpg.proboards.com/thread/11563/planetary-invasion-discussion-thread |
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Post by tenbsmith on Feb 17, 2015 11:47:33 GMT -5
Below is a Level 4 Fighter design posted by khamya9 using Fast Reactor 7. New players would benefit from a level 2 or 3 design. ____________________________ A fighter that's won me multiple games is this one: ,...................................................... Level 4 Fast reactor 7 Captain: Gun4 Pilot 3 SteLth 2 Repair 3 Ship: Gun 8 Durability 4 Shield 3 Evasion 6 Sensor 4 Weapons; VM whirlwind Mk ii Black Rock system (optional) Enhanced duranium cladding (optional) Titan crew (optional) Barrage and heavy barrage .................................................. Without the optional system for fast production if losing ground, make a few with optionals to beef up survivability if you have cash to burn. Haven't seen any ai defeat these up through level 5 ships. Never had an ai survive long enough for them or me to make level 6s. So my only e_patience with the heavy reactors is seeing them in the tech tree as something far down the line. startradersrpg.proboards.com/thread/10017/basic-ship-design-guidelines#ixzz3S1MVGGSk |
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Post by bookworm21 on Feb 17, 2015 11:53:59 GMT -5
I need help with ship design. Below are a few requests and some info I've gathered. 1) When, based on the Tech Tree, can you design a fighter that is superior to the Strike Fighter design with which you start? (Similar questions could be asked regarding when to design your first cruiser, carrier, etc?) I make that 3 questions  These are my initial thoughts after a couple of days of playing 1) It depends on your definition of superior. I am going to assume you mean something along the lines of "forget about the money lets build something awesome!" For this you need at least Fighters 1. This will unlock the same weapons as the stock Strike Fighter and give you the opportunity to make it better by tweaking the stats to your preferences. But really you need fighters 3 or whichever tech gets you fast reactor 5. Both of these will give you 2AP so you can shoot twice per turn. Fighters 3 also unlocks the whirlwind guns which are rather good. Having said that, I like to keep my fighters as more of a system defense force, so paying $100+ a turn in maintenance is not always justifiable for me, but I leave it to you to find your best balance. With regards to when to design your own, I design mine almost instantly as I like to fiddle around with the stats, but you could wait until you have a couple new items to add over your current design before making a new one. Nothing like that feeling of instant obsolescence whenever your shiny new cruisers roll off the line! I hope this vaguely answers your first question, and I will post the 'blueprints' of my early game fighters when i find one that works  Good luck and enjoy! |
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Post by bookworm21 on Feb 17, 2015 11:56:19 GMT -5
Below is a Level 4 Fighter design posted by khamya9 using Fast Reactor 7. New players would benefit from a level 2 or 3 design. ____________________________ A fighter that's won me multiple games is this one: ,...................................................... Level 4 Fast reactor 7 Captain: Gun4 Pilot 3 SteLth 2 Repair 3 Ship: Gun 8 Durability 4 Shield 3 Evasion 6 Sensor 4 Weapons; VM whirlwind Mk ii Black Rock system (optional) Enhanced duranium cladding (optional) Titan crew (optional) Barrage and heavy barrage .................................................. Without the optional system for fast production if losing ground, make a few with optionals to beef up survivability if you have cash to burn. Haven't seen any ai defeat these up through level 5 ships. Never had an ai survive long enough for them or me to make level 6s. So my only e_patience with the heavy reactors is seeing them in the tech tree as something far down the line. startradersrpg.proboards.com/thread/10017/basic-ship-design-guidelines#ixzz3S1MVGGSkThats pretty neat. I'll go about adapting it for a 'lo-tech' version for the game i just started. |
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Post by tenbsmith on Feb 17, 2015 12:58:23 GMT -5
bookworm21, by "superior" I mean something that gives a clear advantage over the stock design. This might be possible by re-assigning points, especially with cruisers where you might make a torp-focused cruiser and guns focused cruiser. For fighters I was thinking more along the lines the next step in technology. Cost is an important consideration, in a 4X game you want to spend efficiently. Fighters 3 seems a good early target, since it unlocks Fast Reactor 4 (2ap) and the whirly guns. I think I'll shoot for this in my current game--I can get there in under 20 turns. Fast Reactor 5 is a bit more difficult to get to, it requires unlocking Reactors 1 which branches off Starship Construction 4.
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Post by bookworm21 on Feb 17, 2015 16:23:56 GMT -5
Yeah, is working pretty good for me One thing I have noticed with the FR4 vs the FR5 is that unless I have misremembered the FR5 has a much higher Water Fuel capacity, about 48 vs 70 i think. Although this isnt much of a problem if they are a defensive force or have refuelling carriers anyways. Have you found a use for the 2AP heavy 'light gun'? It just seems a waste when I can shoot twice with a whirlwind for much more damage... |
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Post by tenbsmith on Feb 17, 2015 17:54:40 GMT -5
Drattts! I just fell pray to the dreaded unsaved ship design. Completed my first design. Hit save (message said saved). Then got distracted and the app went into background mode. Did some stuff and when I opened the app again, it had closed. bummer.
Thanks for the heads-up on the low WF capacity of FR4. In my current game, I've colonized a couple of systems a half-dozen parsecs from the xeno's main system--the system with 5 Xeno ships in orbit. So, the limited water-fuel capacity should be o.k. (but good intel for the future.)
Regarding the 2AP heavy light gun there could be a couple of advantages. First, I seem to recall one of them having +4 attack, a large accuracy bonus. Second, you'll loose less damage to soak from the alien armor in one massive attack than in two smaller attacks from a lighter light gun. Still, I chose the Panther for high 1AP damage and slightly lower cost than the Whirly--my design had room for the Panther's extra weight.
Edit: In ST4X, ships can still move after exhausting WF, but are limited on the talents and operations they can perform. (another reason you may get by with the lower WF capacity of FR4.)
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Post by hissrad on Feb 17, 2015 22:21:00 GMT -5
First time posting on here.
Well if you want something better then the strike fighter quick get research fighters 3 as quick as you can. The 2AP reactor and the whirlwind guns will be a nice combo. It'll also let you make assault fighters. Assault fighters will soften enemy ships up as well as doing damage. I hope that helps.
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Post by hissrad on Feb 17, 2015 22:32:26 GMT -5
Oh and for stats I put guns at 12 durability to 6 and the rest to evasion. For captain skills I go with 3 pilot, 3 stealth and the rest to gun attack. I only use this if I get pressed early on though.
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Post by fallen on Feb 17, 2015 22:42:10 GMT -5
hissrad - welcome to the forum! Great combo with the whirlwind guns!
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Post by hissrad on Feb 17, 2015 23:36:01 GMT -5
Thanks fallen:)
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Post by elwoodps on Feb 20, 2015 19:51:52 GMT -5
...... Have you found a use for the 2AP heavy 'light gun'? It just seems a waste when I can shoot twice with a whirlwind for much more damage... All the custom strike fighters I've built sport 1AP guns paired with 2AP reactors (I really like 2 shots/turn). That said, a ship only counter-attacks once per turn (regardless of how many times it's attacked and how many shots per turn it's otherwise capable of). So a fighter with a similar level 2AP gun should be capable of doing significantly more damage per turn, during turns when it both attacks and counter-attacks. An appropriate example would be two shots with a GC CANNON II (one attack plus one counter-attack), compared to three shots with a PANTHER AUTOCANNON (two attack plus one counter-attack). Both these guns are gained through the "FIGHTERS 1" research. Therefore if I was designing with a fighter with a 2AP gun, I'd put a few more points into sensors to further leverage this advantage. Just my two cents....... |
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Post by Cory Trese on Feb 20, 2015 21:34:17 GMT -5
I upgrade my designs sometimes as often as I get a new Ship Design Level.
This is more true of my Fighters than Cruisers, but is a good reason to upgrade.
I delete old unused designs pretty quickly, so I have a fleet that is a big mix of Levels and Load outs.
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Post by khamya9 on Feb 20, 2015 22:19:53 GMT -5
I've found the 2ap guns are grossly inferior to the whirlwind, and significantly inferior to all 1ap guns. The only exception is the assault fighter because boarding is amazing.
At the high end of the tech tree 2ap fast reactors with 4 move don't exist. If you want 4 move on your fighters then 2ap guns are not possible at all.
The 1ap gun has double the chance for critical/hits, which means your exp is more valuable, since that mods crit chance.
The 2ap gun faces counter attacks for every shot, the 1ap gun only half as many counter attacks.
When the 2ap gun misses, you get nothing. The 1ap gun almost always does a hit and miss rather than two misses (unless you have way too low attack stats).
Attacks take up movement, if you kill an enemy a 1ap gun ship could move 3 after, the 2ap ship at best 2.
If you overkill an enemy with a 2ap gun the damage is wasted. If you kill on one shot with 1ap the second can go against a different enemy, you can even move between shots.
The mass and upkeep of 2ap guns is mathematically pathetic compared to the mass/damage of 1ap guns. Meaning more room for armor and aux systems for better total performance.
Because not attacks twice, if you can keep it fueled a 1ap gun can use heavy barrage twice getting the damage bonus twice. Imagine 2ap hits for 20+4heavy total 24, 1ap hits for 10+4heavy twice total 28. Its not actually this good, but it is a nice advantage when you have fuel (especially defending your planets).
Tl/Dr I can find no mathematically sound reason to mount a 2ap gun on a fighter. In every case there is a superior 1ap option.
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Post by tenbsmith on Feb 21, 2015 10:16:42 GMT -5
elwoodps, how would increasing Sensors improve counter attack? In fact, can anyone provide insight into what roll if any Sensors play in combat? I've read elsewhere that Sensors currently aren't doing much. khamya9, that's an awesome break down of 1ap vs 2ap guns. I'm pretty well convinced to stick with 1ap, especially for fighters. It doesn't address enemy soak, is that because enemy soak is minimal or non-existent, or just for simplicity sake?
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