What range do you fight from in Ship Combat?

[drspendlove]

I wonder what people choose as their primary Ship Combat position. I typically hang out in position 4 and feel pretty strongly about my choice but before I rant about it, I'd love to hear about other playstyles and strategies.

[resistor]

I don't have a single answer to this because it depends on the build I am going for.

For long range builds, I stay at range 5 and use 2 medium missiles and 1 small torp. Although the missiles, the real power behind this build, aren't as accurate at range 5, I still use them at that distance because I'd have a lot of Speed, Nav, and Tactics to assist with accuracy, I can use them from range 5 immediately without having to spend RP to move, and because it gives me some buffer space if the enemy gets a lucky Twitch Surge and advances 2 slots.

For mid-range builds, I'll typically go for range 3 and use plasma cannons and boarding talents.

[veyer]

My builds tend to be boarding-oriented, so I usually go with Plasma Cannons to fry the enemy crew while boarding their vessel repeatedly with the "Boarding Assault" Talent. That said, I do keep a Lance, or two should I have to move into range 1.

[pendell]

I'm new to this game, but my primary quarry are xeno. I can't really afford to stand off and fight a gun or torpedo duel; they have more guns, more hull, and have startlingly high dice pools.

So my strategy is:
1) Flash jump in to range 4 or 3. As soon as I can, board and hit 'em with crippling dread. If I start out at range 4, hit 'em with "tag the beast". At range 3, boarding assault shuttle accompanied by plasma cannons booming out the "1812 overture".
2) On every turn , advance and board assault in the hopes of stacking crippling dread and inflicting ever more troubles on them.
3) Within range 1, rip the ship open with autocannons and grav cannons while I continue to board, now able to use ALL my boarding talents. Even at range 1, grav cannons can inflict a great deal of hull damage. Engine failures caused by boarding coupled with crew and component failures while the guns inflict venting hull repeatedly. Pair up with healing and morale talents to assist the boarding crew as the enemy gradually loses the ability to fight. If the boarding crew becomes too unhealthy to continue , just keep blasting away at the hull with grav cannon and auto cannon until either a critical subsystem gives way, their critical crew die (which happens frequently when i'm tossing 'bio bomb' , 'ferocious crossfire', 'targeted killing', 'parting shot', 'gut the leadership' as well as crippling dread) , or their hull just flat collapses.

I may change my strategy on higher difficulties, but it works pretty well on normal.

Respectfully,

Brian P.

[fallen]

Since we can only provide one answer (range 3 please), I gave the answer for my current Impossible captain. We're a pulverize and loot crew.

[Bariel]

I tend to use torp, but close to range 4 to a) reduce the opponents accuracy, and b) ensure they can't escape.

[drspendlove]

Apr 4, 2019 10:55:10 GMT -5 Bariel said:

I tend to use torp, but close to range 4 to a) reduce the opponents accuracy, and b) ensure they can't escape.

Ditto. Avoiding damage and electrical fires is so important that taking an identical hit to my own accuracy is fine. There's a single missile launcher that's quite accurate that gives me grief from time to time though.

[brentaur]

I love range 1. Rake them with cannons, tear through their crew, and neutralize their systems with sabotage all in the same turn? Yes, please. Besides, my crew combat team enjoy their work so much they get cranky when I don't let them out to play.

[drspendlove]

The new Ship Combat is changing this a lot I imagine. Once foe carriers show up, I suspect we'll see even more shifts in preferences.

[pendell]

Apr 20, 2019 14:33:13 GMT -5 drspendlove said:

The new Ship Combat is changing this a lot I imagine. Once foe carriers show up, I suspect we'll see even more shifts in preferences.

I'm looking forward to enemy carriers.  My initial intent is to reinforce my range-1 attack even further. The idea being that while my boarding crew is wrecking the mother ship the gunners can focus solely on enemy small craft until they are eliminated or driven away.  I note that auto-cannons have the single highest chance to hit craft in the game, so I have every reason to buff those with a targeting matrix and continue my Nelson strategy -- "When I am without orders and unexpected occurrences arrive I shall always act as I think the honour and glory of my King and Country demand. But in case signals can neither be seen or perfectly understood, no captain can do very wrong if he places his ship alongside that of the enemy." 

I assume we will be able to salvage craft , just as we can regular ships? 

Respectfully, 

Brian P. 

[tarquelne]

5 or 1, depending on the Captain - trying to push my range-optimized advantage as much as possible.

The new disabling effects system might make that a lot less advantageous, though, which would be cool.

[dmesse]

My builds are always boarding oriented but I've been very much enjoying Lances with their range coverage of 1~3.

I'd happily sit in 2 or 1.

Two Lance shots and 4 reactor points to move forward fits in nicely to my default available 8 points.

Being in 1 or 3 range doesn't matter, I'm still frying hostiles inside their own ship with crippling hits.

I was, however, forced to choose a LVL 4 Lance for slightly higher radiation damage hits instead of higher leveled ones with better hull damage.

I want the enemy ship to be still intact so that I can loot them!

If I'm feeling comfortable I may throw in boarding parties before reaching range 1 for that sweet spinning monkey wrench of doom.

Edit: I should add that I am not using Autocannons at all in my Cautela Heavylift. I've been carrying two lances and two torps for electrical fire, but I'll have to swap out a torp for autocannon once enemy ships begin launching small crafts.

[BLM]

I used to fight at range 1 to board repeatedly, but my latest playthrough focuses on range 3. I use one medium missile one medium and one plasma artillery. I close in on the first two turns, then sit at range 3 firing all my weapons until the ennemy ship is disabled, and close-in for boarding only if the ennemy's hull is too damaged to keep firing. Plasma artillery has the best radiation/hull damage ratio of all weapons, so I'm likely to fry the engine, piloting system or crew without even needing to board.

Aiming to stay at range 3 also means I can use missiles to reliably inflict on-hit debuffs from the first turn (I don't like to have more weapons on my ship than I can all fire at the same time, so I wouldn't use missiles if aiming for range 1). The combination of electrical fire from missiles and radiation wash from plasma also tend to inflict a lot of damage to crew, and can't be both cleansed on the turn, forcing the ennemy to waste a lot of talents on it.

[Cory Trese]

I'm surprised Range 3 wins on the forum. That is very interesting.

[sparda4]

Cory Trese Because Xeno can't hit the broad side of an orbital at range 3 let alone a fast enough ship. Range 5-4 ? Now that might cause some problems.
Range 5 especially. Them dice on both Terrox and Jyeeta are nuts.

People aren't worried about human ships. They are worried about Xeno. So ofcourse range 3-1 dominates