Best turret upgrades?

[TheUbiquitous]

How do I know which turret upgrades to purchase with my finite amount of science?

[Coppermantis]

There are a few that are always useful, like gravity turrets. Otherwise, you might want to consider what kind of ships the enemy has, look at their hull types, and unlock turrets that have bonuses against that type.

Kahuna has a comprehensive guide to strategy here, which includes a section on tech to unlock for defense.

[Aklyon]

Spider turrets are wonderfully good, but they do get countered by sniper-immunity. Otherwise I'll agree with Coppermantis.

[Mal]

When it comes to turrets, I always grab two at the very beginning just due to their ubiquitous use - Heavy Beam Turret and Gravitational Turret.

Both are 500 knowledge and are so damned good because they fill a niche that you need that most other turrets in the beginning fail to do effectively : Anti-Starship.

The gravity turrets are amazing and can easily be deployed on all of your planets all throughout the game and on all hostile worm-hole trails.

The heavy beams are a lot more limited due to a galaxy cap of 12, but damn! They can focus fire down any early threat effectively and for ~360k metal, they can be moved to the front-line to defend a beach-head much faster than throwing up a line of any other turret or defense for that matter.

[Zebeast46]

I always grab tier 2 electric shock turret things (dammit I forget their name) because of their attack affecting every unit in range they are very good for putting them next to wormholes, they also work well under forcefields.

Sniper turrets are a must.

[Aklyon]

I always grab tier 2 electric shock turret things (dammit I forget their name)

Lightning!

[Zebeast46]

Yeah, sorry about that, had a brain fart while writing that reply.

[Kahuna]

because of their attack affecting every unit in range

Actually no. They can hit up to 200 enemy units at once. Which is 12*200=2400 damage at Mark I without attack multiplier. They can also focus that 2400 damage to a group of 40 enemy ships at minimum. Against groups smaller than 40 some of the attack power is wasted.

[steelwing]

I always grab tier 2 electric shock turret things (dammit I forget their name)

Lightning!

BZZZOWNNT!

[Kahuna]

I always grab tier 2 electric shock turret things (dammit I forget their name)

Lightning!

BZZZOWNNT!

I know right! Lightning Turrets' DPS is absolutely shocking!

[steelwing]

I always grab tier 2 electric shock turret things (dammit I forget their name)

Lightning!

BZZZOWNNT!

I know right! Lightning Turrets' DPS is absolutely shocking!

Simply electrifying to see a cluster of those salvo-firing...

[Bognor]

I always grab tier 2 electric shock turret things (dammit I forget their name)

Lightning!

BZZZOWNNT!

I know right! Lightning Turrets' DPS is absolutely shocking!

Simply electrifying to see a cluster of those salvo-firing...

Older versions were weak but the current ones are good.  Not much can resist them.  When it comes down to the wire, they're the potential difference between a short and a long game.

[cdn]

Heavy Beam Turrets - I've found the Mk. I version to absolutely essential for early starship defense.  Mk I/II bombers just don't have the DPS to keep early starships from killing command stations and my homeworld, even under Mk. I forcefields.  Mk. II/III are solid front-line turrets despite their galaxy cap and the Mk. IV version does more damage than a Mk III fortress and doesn't have the weakness that fortresses have to polycrystal hulls.

Spider Turrets - These are always the first ones I take to Mk. IV.  They do engine damage *and* solid DPS.  They get hard-countered by sniper immunity but rarely is that an issue unless I'm going to lose the system anyway.

Other turrets it depends... lately I've been using Gravity Drains and Rippers instead of gravity turrets, at least early on, but obviously that requires selecting those as my starting unlock.

[Pumpkin]

I barely never unlock turrets. I'm always glad to capture core turret controllers, I sometimes unlock MkI spider, on big exo games (golem/spire) I unlock full line of HBC, but on normal game I just build all MkI turrets. I spend my K on fleet and some starships, and a bit on economy (MkII harvesters, MkII eco comstat, MkII engineer) but almost never on turrets. I feel I need my K on ships to assault the core/home systems. I also play at low AIP (end up between 100 and 200).

The question is: how? How do you manage to spend K on advanced turrets (energy may or may not be an issue - ZPgen) and still have enough fleet power for the final assaults? Is this reliable only on 300+ AIP games with enough K to unlock both fleet and turrets?

[Toranth]

I barely never unlock turrets. I'm always glad to capture core turret controllers, I sometimes unlock MkI spider, on big exo games (golem/spire) I unlock full line of HBC, but on normal game I just build all MkI turrets. I spend my K on fleet and some starships, and a bit on economy (MkII harvesters, MkII eco comstat, MkII engineer) but almost never on turrets. I feel I need my K on ships to assault the core/home systems. I also play at low AIP (end up between 100 and 200).

The question is: how? How do you manage to spend K on advanced turrets (energy may or may not be an issue - ZPgen) and still have enough fleet power for the final assaults? Is this reliable only on 300+ AIP games with enough K to unlock both fleet and turrets?

I almost always unlock Mk III Military Command Stations, which allows me to get a LOT more mileage our of my turrets.  So I unlock a few of the cheaper and more useful Mk IIs - Grav, Needler, Laser, Sniper - as needed, and rely on my mobile fleet and captured Core Turrets Controllers for the rest.
Basically, aside from minimal defensive unlocks, everything goes into Fleetship unlocks.

Of course, I also play with a very "disposable units" style of gameplay, where my fleetships are generally sent out with the expectation that they will die.  Starships don't work in that playstyle, since they cost too much to replace, and you need a lot of fleetships (both types and Marks) to make a strong enough fleet.  Mobile Space Docks help here, but I really don't have the Knowledge to unlock much else.