True Artillery Siege Starships

[Spikey00]

So, it has been a while since the siege starships became plasma siege starships, but as I recall there was some desire to keep an artillery-style starship for its niche purposes of long-range bombardment, particularly to destroy hybrids, starships, and other large and misc structural defenses.  I personally believe there is still a need for artillery siege starships, but what are your thoughts on it?

I'm interested to understand why they were 'one-button winners' anyway; most or all of the guard posts now have radar dampening and immunity to antimatter bombs.  Wasn't that enough to fix the whole matter of one-spot camping, along with its weak survivability, high cost, and inability to fire on fleet ships?

[keith.lamothe]

I'm interested to understand why they were 'one-button winners' anyway; most or all of the guard posts now have radar dampening and immunity to antimatter bombs.  Wasn't that enough to fix the whole matter of one-spot camping, along with its weak survivability, high cost, and inability to fire on fleet ships?

The 'one-button winners' phase was when it was still the siege starship, before the antimatter ammo thing was done.  In the antimatter form they weren't 'one-button winners'.  They were just 'losers'.

Taking away the range let us make them useful again.

[Spikey00]

IIRC still useful for eliminating and reducing AI starship engines to 0 from a substantial distance.  I particularly found them useful for weakening AI forcefields from a distance to mitigate my bomber losses during the early-mid phase of planet invasion, and for attritioning a flock of hybrids without having to engage them in close combat. 

Something I wouldn't necessarily build early-game or during need of resources, but definitely had those uses above which is IMO enough to justify keeping this type of starship in.  Ballistas destroying a lot of the hard points of a castle before sending in footmen is expensive and doesn't eliminate all the resistance, but it gives you more freedom and options to proceed with the siege.

[Diazo]

The thing is, how do you make them not one button win ships?

Back when they were still the Siege Starship, I'd unlock them first, stick the Siege starships in a ball of fleet ships for protection and anything short of a Mk IV system (or Mk III that had been on alert a while) just quietly died.

They were an option  yes, but they were the easiest, more resource efficient option by far. They were slower then most other methods, but when you can pop a guard post and it's guardians from beyond their range, then clean up the 30-50 ships that freed with your own fleet ball, rinse and repeat until the system is cleared.

I actually think that causes me problems these days, back in the day that was my only strategy. Even on a Mk IV or Homeworld I still used it, just preceded it with the appropriate warhead to break into the system. I'm still playing with alternate strategies trying to figure out what I like using these days. (Scout starship change? more testing ahead! )

In other words, you can't have a normal human unit (as opposed to rare, specialty stuff) outrange the average AI units you will run into, the way the AI works that leads to a boring grind of killing everything from beyond it's own range.

D.

[Spikey00]

I don't see the artillery starship as being the one-neuter-all strategy with the current guard posts that are completely immune to antimatter bombs AND have radar dampening--raid starships or groups of bombers would still serve the main purpose of sniping off posts.  I think this is fair and perhaps the guardians need to be made immune to antimatter bombs too (unless they are already), but let it snipe off starships and stuff like forcefields.

The AI would have access to it as well; give it antimatter bomb immunity too to let it snipe off player starships without it being immediately overcome by the player's own so it forces the player to elicit a response.

[Kraiz]

Perhaps it would cost resources to provide the artillery starship with munition/  I'm thinking a similar Build-Point system as the Hive Golem or Hybrid equipment, yet instead of like the Hive golem building ships inside of it, have a certain number of points create a shell in the Starship.  Every time it fires it subtracts 1 from that pool of shells it has (Just an integer, not actual shell entities).  While the starship was actively accumulating build points and "building" shells for its use, it would drain directly from the player's metal and crystal  Make it to where they can only "Re-arm" on allied planets and we have a ship that is both effective in its long-range role, isn't always the most cost-effective option, and has to be carefully used in regards to what targets you select for the ship to strike at.

In regards to it's ammmunition capacity, I'd say mabbe 20 + 10*mk, so 30/40/50/60 for how many shells each respective ship can hold.  Perhaps the mark IV could have the ability to rearm itself anywhere the player has supply and not just on allied worlds.

It may be something that is a bit beyond the scope o fthe game in terms of micromanagement, but maybe someone can adapt this idea to a more workable outcome.

EDIT: Sorry for all the typos; new keyboard, getting used to the vastly different spacing of the keys

[Diazo]

I don't see the artillery starship as being the one-neuter-all strategy with the current guard posts that are completely immune to antimatter bombs AND have radar dampening--raid starships or groups of bombers would still serve the main purpose of sniping off posts.  I think this is fair and perhaps the guardians need to be made immune to antimatter bombs too (unless they are already), but let it snipe off starships and stuff like forcefields.

The AI would have access to it as well; give it antimatter bomb immunity too to let it snipe off player starships without it being immediately overcome by the player's own so it forces the player to elicit a response.

Then are we not back at essentially the "Antimatter Starship" we had a short time ago? I am of the opinion that a long range artillery unit will either dominate because its range is so much longer then the other units in the game, or it will be almost useless because so many units are made immune to it in the name of balance.

Perhaps it would cost resources to provide the artillery starship with munition/  I'm thinking a similar Build-Point system as the Hive Golem or Hybrid equipment, yet instead of like the Hive golem building ships inside of it, have a certain number of points create a shell in the Starship.  Every time it fires it subtracts 1 from that pool of shells it has (Just an integer, not actual shell entities).  While the starship was actively accumulating build points and "building" shells for its use, it would drain directly from the player's metal and crystal  Make it to where they can only "Re-arm" on allied planets and we have a ship that is both effective in its long-range role, isn't always the most cost-effective option, and has to be carefully used in regards to what targets you select for the ship to strike at.

In regards to it's ammmunition capacity, I'd say mabbe 20 + 10*mk, so 30/40/50/60 for how many shells each respective ship can hold.  Perhaps the mark IV could have the ability to rearm itself anywhere the player has supply and not just on allied worlds.

It may be something that is a bit beyond the scope o fthe game in terms of micromanagement, but maybe someone can adapt this idea to a more workable outcome.

EDIT: Sorry for all the typos; new keyboard, getting used to the vastly different spacing of the keys

Hmmmm, don't think I've seen this idea before. However at first glance I'm not sure. I could see that on a specialty ship or maybe added to the artillery golem, but we are discussing a core ship here that a player will have access to every game.

I just took a look at the numbers (5.027) and the Plasma Siege has the longest range of starships at 10,000, the next longest range is the Fleet line at 6.250. (Goes up a bit with Mark Level.) That means the current plasma siege fufills its role as the long range bombardment starship to fly with your missile frigates and other long range units.

Running the numbers in a spreadsheet, the dps looks high enough so I don't think I would change that.

The only change I would make is a small increase in range, to maybe 11,000 to give a bit more survivability, but it's already at 5million HP for MK I so I'm not sure it needs that.

TL;DR: I think the current plasma siege is in a pretty good position and don't want to see major changes at this point, it fills its role of long range, without being artillery range, starship. If you want an artillery unit in your game, grab one of the bonus ships that are 'artillery', that is where something like that should be, not a core unit you have access to every game.

D.

[keith.lamothe]

TL;DR: I think the current plasma siege is in a pretty good position and don't want to see major changes at this point, it fills its role of long range, without being artillery range, starship. If you want an artillery unit in your game, grab one of the bonus ships that are 'artillery', that is where something like that should be, not a core unit you have access to every game.

That's pretty much my thoughts too.  Want Artillery? Pick Bombards   Want large stuff that batters down defenses?  Build Bomber and Siege Starships.

[chemical_art]

It wasn't until I played a game with three melee ships that I started to appreciate the range of missile frigates. I *gasp* got MK II's for them this game.