Uses for Raid Starship > Bomber Transport?

[Spikey00]

I'm having a bit of difficulty using raid starships effectively because, well, I don't really know what to do with them especially when I can use transports with a load of bombers to deal with structures and structure sniping.  I don't want to post another rebalancing thread on these--perhaps there's some use for them that I have not realized yet?

Firstly, I am only using the first tier of them as the knowledge cost for them is quite steep (3K, 4K, 4K) and I frankly don't want to spend any more of my knowledge on them from what I have seen, which is consistent from my past perspective.  I'm having a group of three, along with a fleet of ~500 fighters and bombers to deal with a planet that, supposedly, lost its command station already due to marauders (didn't see AI progress gain message) and has a few ~100 turrets remaining, with the last of its forces traveling to another AI planet.  At this point, I am wondering what to do with these raid starships, so I put them into FRD just to see what their behavior is like and what their preferences are.  They quickly destroy the guard posts [that are useless since AI doesn't own planet anymore], then begin attacking the turrets; however, I notice that one of them is already down to 40% on a silly planet that now has nothing but turrets remaining, and they aren't doing so well anyways so I pull them back for repairs.

The problem here is that, well, they weren't very useful.  This was before trying them on attacking the special ops post that was covered by a forcefield, of which the forcefield and subsequently spec post disappeared quickly when my bomber transports unloaded.  If they are designed to attack objects beneath forcefields, they aren't really useful for that task because they do insignificant damage to... everything.  If they are for attacking command stations, I tried that before, but my bomber transports handled that too, and if it were raid starships alone, they would have never made it as they would have taken forever to destroy the structures whilst the AI forces and turrets would have destroyed them rapidly (even more so if there was a fortress).

So in the end I have three raid starships which cost 3K knowledge, 72K metal, 138K crystal that contribute very little to my fleet.  These ships are identical--save the HP and attack--up the tiers--why would anyone want to use these when they could use transports, even if they force you to capture adjacent planets (which I say is a bonus) to avoid the attrition?

I prefer them when they were OP, but useful because they a) had multiple shots, b) more versatile (due in part of multiple shots), and c) could actually destroy structures under forcefields and quickly destroy remaining turrets (which was extremely helpful).  


If they were changed to quickly deal with all types of structures, I may consider re-using them again--this would mean significantly increasing the raw attack or bonus against structures.  Multiple shots isn't necessary because the raid isn't purposed to handle fleets, nor is an HP increase (attack will help it destroy whatever, and get out); generally I feel that the raid starship fields the role of "quickly destroy certain targets".



Thoughts and arguments are certainly welcome.

[superking]

Raid starships are superfast, fire through shields and are immune to missles.

they are good for raiding fragile structures that are deep in enemy territory - hybrid centers, data centers, gaurd posts, special gaurd posts, co-processors, warpgates, counter-spys. this is because they move fast (taking less fire before being out of the area, outrunning projectiles) and are immune to missles (most turret types thus wont fire and they wont be insta-shredded by fortresses like every other starship line) and can fire through shield generators (which is hyper useful for obvious reasons). it can move an infinite distance out of supply (transport can only safley return from 2 planets out of supply), it is cheaper to run than a transport & bombers, it requires far less micromanagement than a transport full of bombers (which unloads slowly out of supply) and it can be repaired in about 15 seconds by an engineer, which work fine out of supply, paired with cloaking starships...

none of these abilities are any use in, eg, a stationary slogfest with turrets, but then that is the 100% inverse of what a raider is intended to do. they were nerfed because previously they could do the same work as heavy slow flagships AND still excell at all the stuff above. They seem fine to me- I use them fairly regular (only MK I for me also) for data centers and gaurd posts way out of supply just by giving them long long ques of orders and sporadically teleporting cheap cheap engineers in to repair them. they are little use paired with the regular fleet, but I suspect they are not intended to be given how much faster than regular ship types they are

[Spikey00]

I forgot about the cloak starships (heh, good idea); though that could be quite a lot of macro/micro if you're using engineers with them.  Consequently you would have to worry about alerting the AI planets prematurely if you're doing deep territory strikes.

I don't know your playing style, but I generally capture all my planets, so that tends to suffice the need for supply for the transports and provides eventual accessibility to all planets.

These ships are shot up pretty bad when they're sent alone, and if they're destroyed they are expensive to replace, especially when they're such a specific unit.  When you're at the point of having a great economy, building a few of these wouldn't be too bad, but then their ship cap of three prevents you from bolstering their numbers lest you opt for the higher tiers, which is all the reason to turn to transports and bombers again because they become more expendable and have a higher ship cap.

Thanks for the reply!

[superking]

I don't know your playing style, but I generally capture all my planets, so that tends to suffice the need for supply for the transports and provides eventual accessibility to all planets.

I play with minimalistic planet capturing (usually 7-8 planets on 80 planet map) and try to keep AIP and AI buildup low, so i operate out of supply most the time.

[Spikey00]

Ah, I can see why raid starships would be useful to you. 

[Kjara]

I think the problem here is transports being too good rather than raid starships being subpar .

[Spikey00]

Ah, though still I think they take a long while in destroying anything else that's not lightly armoured, ie. command stations and such (and shields can deflect some shots). 

I can't say I will use them anymore because of my "command and conquer" everything style, but the arguments here are fair enough, 

[Dragon]

I don't know your playing style, but I generally capture all my planets, so that tends to suffice the need for supply for the transports and provides eventual accessibility to all planets.

These ships are shot up pretty bad when they're sent alone, and if they're destroyed they are expensive to replace, especially when they're such a specific unit.  When you're at the point of having a great economy, building a few of these wouldn't be too bad, but then their ship cap of three prevents you from bolstering their numbers lest you opt for the higher tiers, which is all the reason to turn to transports and bombers again because they become more expendable and have a higher ship cap.

Thanks for the reply!

Well, as far as playing style, I tend to capture most, if not all, of my planets too.  Lately I have been playing on Tree maps, which means that for most of my planets, if I raid a system ahead, I can blow up the command station, and then the planet I'm attacking is out of supply.

Like this:
(ME) --- (Missing Station) --- (To Be Raided)

So once the planet To Be Raided gets it's command station blown up (a lot easier with Raid starships then transports due to being out of my supply), the one called Missing Station will be out of the AI's supply.  That means no turrets (except core) will work.  Then I send my main fleet in, and mop up with very low losses.  Then the one that used to be To Be Raided becomes the new Missing Station, and I raid the next one.  That way, my ships mostly only attack planets that are already out of supply.

Even on maps where that doesn't work, they are amazing for things like deep strikes, taking out data centers, that sort of thing.  In one game, in a Simple Normal map type, I sent my raid starships (all 9 of them that is) first to a co-processor that was 4 jumps away (through some low levels and a single mk3), blew it up, went 2 jumps up, blew up a data center, went another two jumps, into a black holed system (transports can't leave them, but raids can), blew another data center, and then returned to safety via two more jumps.  Total systems visited that were not mine: 10.  One trip.  Of the 9 I sent out, I got 8 back, having lost a single Mk1.  Why did that work so well?  Part of it is because that several jumps from your lines, they actually have very few ships guarding them, and thus very little to shoot at your ships with.  And the other part is just that raid starships take very little damage in general, assuming they are used for raids, sending them in to take out a single target (command station, data center, etc), or several specific targets (guard posts, spec posts, etc).

To take out a single target, rally points inside the target system in the general area of the target are good.  Then, once the raid starships enter the system, you give them the order to attack that exact target.  Then hold shift, and either queue up the next target, or a return to your system, or hold shift and Z and X and then click outside all the red circles, so they will fly to safety after blowing the target.

These are very micro-intense ships, and should not be considered anything otherwise.  They aren't for attacking ships, although, that being said, they are super fast, and actually do pretty good damage to single targets, so they can be handy for catching lone ships, or starships that have escaped the wormhole blob.


As far as your comment about the higher tiers, and the more ship cap, while the T3 ones do survive a lot more then the tier 1 ships do, having more ships spreads out the fire the AI sends your way among more ships.  If you send in just 3 T3 ships on a big raid, you are likely to lose one.  Sending in all 9, likely none at all, plus the target dies faster.  If you do lose one, it will be a T1, which is cheaper.  As far as the mark 1's go, I do tend to agree, they aren't very good on their own....  Mostly....  For really deep raiding, if you can get them out past the hordes to the less defended areas early in the game, they could do some damage.  But in general, I would say raid starships are one of those ones where unless you are planning to unlock the whole line, I wouldn't bother with them.  Early game they aren't as good as mid game.  Late game, they are okay....  But you lose them (often lots) going against core planets.  It can be worth it though....