What about MOAG's(mother of all guns). A really powerful gun that can destroy large ships with 1 shot. long reload time (perhaps once per battle phase) and impossible to aim upon small agile ships, but can cream big ones.

A special modules slot for ship designs could certainly add some interesting possibilities,



cloak devices

Spinal Mounts

Gate/Wormhole Ship

ECM Ship

Drone Carrier

Kamikaze

stellar converter (convert planet to asteroid belt) dreadnought only?

tractor beam (enable ship capture)

salvage beam

You would be on the stardock forums you would get karma for this

'another one bites the dust' would take on a whole new meaning.



... aw c'mon! you know you were thinking it

"beam" was just a general idea. I prefer your virus attack, or "corrupted dust attack".

VieuxChat wrote:
[...]But what I would really like to see are : beam that converts enemy ship into you ships[...]

Computer virus attack? What if the enemy ship systems don't work binary, but yours do? Why a beam and not some kind of hacker drone swarm that tries to access the ships computer systems.



The general idea is nice, but I wouldn't like to see that as a "beam".

I really like "Gratuitous space battles", and it has a lot of modules, different kind of shields (strong but low recharge, weak but that reflect damage, weak but that recharge very quickly), jamming modules, decoys for torpedos, modules to help/hamper targeting, repair modules, modules that repair fighters.



But what I would really like to see are : beam that converts enemy ship into you ships, repulsive beam that keep your enemy at a distance, glu rockets that slow down enemy, traps (slow, damage, confusion), boarding troops, dividing/reuniting module : you can transform your ship in smaller parts then reassemble them when needed.

Becks wrote:
I think the complexity of the ship modules depends on the count of the ships which are fighting in a battle at the same time. Because it is impossible to command each single ship in a (e.g. 200 ship) fleet. It would be interesting how many ships are planned to fight in a battle? Are there any information.

It doesn't really matter how many there are per battle, since we won't be able to command any of them. Battles, as per the information released so far, have little human input. The strategy a player dictates emerges from ship design, heroes and the "battle phases"; in which apparently you can execute special abilities/actions/events. It is still early to say, but I think that fans of micromanaged space battles are not really the target audience.

I think the complexity of the ship modules depends on the count of the ships which are fighting in a battle at the same time. Because it is impossible to command each single ship in a (e.g. 200 ship) fleet. It would be interesting how many ships are planned to fight in a battle? Are there any information.

Yeah, That would be cool!

SABA wrote:
What about MOAG's(mother of all guns). A really powerful gun that can destroy large ships with 1 shot. long reload time and difficult to aim upon small agile ships, but can cream big ones.

Doesn't have to be an MOAG, a spinal mount for the guns should be enough. Can fire only in the direction, the ship is heading, incredibly powerful but of course hard to aim.



Anyone who knows the ion frigates of homeworld? Sth. like that just with customizable weaponry.

maceman wrote:
Actually you're right. battle usage is a bit too overt to be considered 'espionage'. fine! who is gonna make a general combat nastyness thread?

I will!



So this shall be the brainstorming thread about anything nasty you can imagine doing in combat.



The classics would be

• Fake ships or drones that project holographic ships
• Black hole generators out of MOO2: One-shot per battle weapons that slowly drag one ship into a black hole, if the generator is not destroyed in x turns.
• Terror drones: Cheap ships with some kind of explosive attached that just swarm enemies. Fire & forget
• Cloaking devices: Hit them where they don't expect it.
  
  

There surely is a ton more of cool and interesting ideas and tactics. Just feel free to state them.

Well considering the RUSE background present on this project I would expect some ability to be able to feint and thrust.



Battle Tactics I've seen/used/want



* specialty mines/weapons platforms (seeker (get em awaaaay...bang!), ionic (no shield for 10 sec), sticky mines (-1000 maneuverability), etc

* space marines - can board disrupt operations, chance to take control of bridge/engine room/torpedo bay, can only board if immobile, % are picked off by point defences, bleah

* nanite drones -- if reaches target explodes into hull/armor consuming, ship system compromising lil buggers (just realized this is DUST already)

* The Proseletyzer -- Once this big mama enters your planet atmosphere you have no choice but to believe!!

* En Passant - why can't we shoot a rocket right up the tail pipe of an attacker? Let him go by and nail him from behind. Bring flanking strategy to space with a 3rd dimension! ("Kiiiiiiiiirk!")

* Actually any number of basic chess strategies come to mind: Controlling board center, sacrificing piece for piece, pin and fork, invisible attack

* Drone launcher -- unleash a hiveful of small annoying drones. useful for wreaking havoc on dreadnaught/cruiser big slow gun targeting and essential for population control and assimilation.

* pirate drones - can't afford a spiffy attack computer AI? pilot em urself! warning, destruction of carrier ship/comm array could disrupt

* Trojan horse freighter? Look boss we found a derelict full of Endless tech! let's tow it home... bam. unleash

* Wave attacks - how many units will be in combat simultaneously? this could seriously change tactics.

* Skirmishing - small arms tactics against big slow fleets; not necessarily lethal but annoying as all hell

* Feigned panic - luring attackers into a minefield/trap behind an anomaly

* Spread Penetration - spread the attackers thin with concentration of your strength at one point easily breaking through line and flanking.

* etc etc etc



basically. let strategy mean something in combat. I am always annoyed when I have to manually take over my fleet to make them focus fire on one ship at a time to speed the enemy demise. I hope we're able to at least give our 'admiral' tendencies, tactics and priority focus. this is where AI becomes critical since it's turn based. Total War went from rock paper scissors with the initial Shogun to a much more complex model of flanking and morale factors for later versions. We don't have to get that complicated but I would hope to have at least a Gratuitous Space Battles level of combat parameters.

Some quick random combat module ideas:

• Phase Modulator - Ship becomes ethereal, it can't be hit but it is also unable to fire back
• Fleet C&C Center - Every ship on the fleet, except any with this module, receives a X% bonus to Y ability. If the module is destroyed, then the fleet gets -(2 * X)% on ability Y for the rest of the battle.
• Tracking Disruptor - All missiles can't seek the owner ship for X seconds
• Reflective Wave - Beams bounce of the ships hull for X seconds
• Mass Deflector - Ships becomes untargetable by projectile weapons for X seconds
• Ramming Package - Ship is able to ram enemy ships before being destroyed
• EMP Field - Disables any ship without an EMP Field for X seconds
  
  

Hmmm. Sounds more like work for smart/homming mines rather than drones (if we are still talking about suicide drones).

I think the most interesting application for terror drones is to bring them to a system, set them on standby and then swarm attack any enemy coming too close or trying to pass through, instead of lying around and waiting to be stepped on, like normal mines.

I suppose that drones act like guided ordnance. I mean it is either being controlled by some one from launcher ship or have sofisticated electronics. In both cases it should be able to dodge point-defence systems of a ship, pick a weak point in its armor, make a precision strike on a specific location, or just hit from a blind spot.



Or drones can act like a fire-and-forget ordnance that does not require target lock. Fire it in the direction of the enemy fleet or colony or base and upon arrival its expert systems will auto-engage the appropriate target.

Some special ship modules could be very interesting. Maybe a tractor beam or the possibility to beam troups to enemy ships. It could be nice, if you can drive against another ship or do a selfdestruction before the ship is boarded. Special ship modules are cool! So you can try different tactics with different modules. I hope we have several possibilities to design a ship. Only selecting the best beam weapon or the best missile could be boring. But it is of course really hard to balance the mass of modules.

Do you have some ideas for special ship modules?

Nosferatiel wrote:
You carry missiles around on ships while terror drones are completely self-propelled and can even travel around star systems. Basically missiles without the rocket launcher.

Not to be nit-picky here because I do understand what you mean. But the difference are a very subtle one in my opinion. A missile and drone both still need some origin to be launched from. The major difference would be one of definition. A drone would have more guidance electronics and probably be bigger and house more fuel. Other than that it is pretty much the same thing. A missile in space should pretty much be able to traverse an entire star system as well and they could very well house the same engine technology as a ship, it would only depend on the level of technology and the philosophy of the game designers.

Hm. Much like in Space Empires. We had drones that could travel in systems, but could not jump between them (required drone carriers to do that).



In moo2 i`ve enjoyed various stasis field generators that could trap a ship inside it until you decide to release it or the generator is destroyed, pulsars and spatial compressors that blasted around its ship damaging everything close enough. Also lightning fields that engaged missiles and fighters in close proximity and energy absorbers that fired back a portion of absorbed energy were very nice and useful.



In original non-patched MOO2 there was an unbeatable combo of time-warp facilitator that allowed you to get two turns before the player and phasing cloak that made your ship immune to any damage and untargettable while it was activated. It took one full turn to re-cloak the ship. 1ft turn to de-cloak and fire you guns, 2nd turn to skip and re-cloak



Various kinetic missiles, gravity repulsors, tractors, gyro and inertial destabilisers - all those pretty good and nice toys were always a fun in any games.



But i have a feeling that ES wont have many such fun things. In fact i know just a few games that had one or some of those.