Honestly I do not see that much of an issue with fighters.



They could act as a long range weapon similar to missiles - but attack with kinetic weapons (basically turning a rocket attack into a long range kinetic attack)

The fighters themselves could be very heavy - meaning a battleship might only be able to carry a small detachment while a carrier could carry a few more.



Since fighters are that big and heavy (launch bay) you would have to compromise on defense or offense (less armor on carriers, less weapons on battleships).



If done right balancing should not be an issue.

EgoManiac wrote:
If done right balancing should not be an issue.

That's why they want to do it right, when they do it.

It's tracked in the devs list here: /#/endless-space/forum/28-game-design/thread/13098-community-suggestions-amplitude-is-following

"Fighter / Bomber Squadrons - Tech to create Fighter / Bomber Squadrons for carriers and orbital structures"

EgoManiac wrote:
Honestly I do not see that much of an issue with fighters.



They could act as a long range weapon similar to missiles - but attack with kinetic weapons (basically turning a rocket attack into a long range kinetic attack)

The fighters themselves could be very heavy - meaning a battleship might only be able to carry a small detachment while a carrier could carry a few more.



Since fighters are that big and heavy (launch bay) you would have to compromise on defense or offense (less armor on carriers, less weapons on battleships).



If done right balancing should not be an issue.

The problem is that logic gets in the way, why have a fighter when a missile is better.



Fighters require a complex control mechanism, missiles do not, fighters/bombers probably won't carry a heavy enough weapon to damage a enemy ship more effectively then a missile, missiles are cheap, fighters are not.



all in all, fighters are obsolete in a fleet to fleet battle because missiles just do it better.

fighters however would be able to switch targets, unlike a missile.

I see potential in this idea, yet we should give the devs time for this. When its done, it should be done good

(as they already stated)

Necro- wrote:
fighters however would be able to switch targets, unlike a missile.

but would fighter be able to actually do any damage anyway?



Besides a larger missile would indeed be able to switch targets as it would have the room for the targeting computer.

i'd imagine fighters being primarily kinetic based as they'd be in close quarters but yea the casualties would be quite high i'd imagine.

Hey everyone,



I just purchased ES and I'm utterly surprised. I love this game even tho I've only been playing it today, one of the highlights are those cinematic battles. But to get to the point of this thread :



I feel like the Ship sizes don't vary enough, when playing a space game, I love to see tiny fighters in a battle and like huge titans, but in this game it's more like the "titans" (huge ships) are not that much bigger than the smaller ships.

Just like to hear your opinion on that and if there is something planned, like perhaps more ship types?



(If there is another thread like this, I apologize for not finding it and posting something unnecessary)



Sincerly, Mavcu





Edit :



In case you need like an "optic" thing to understand what I mean, look at this http://images.wikia.com/egamia/images/2/2b/Eve_chart.jpg



That's a bit extreme of course, but I thought it'd be cool to have like bigger differences in size.

Igncom1 wrote:
The problem is that logic gets in the way, why have a fighter when a missile is better.

Thats why I mentioned having fighters with kinetic weapons - alternatively maybe also with lasers.

The benefit would be to be able to attack twice with the same type of weapon basically - making it easier to break the enemies shield / defense for that specific type of weapon.



So instead of L/M/S range attack you get M/M/S or S/M/S range attacks. This also would make battles more varied - if you know your enemy mostly uses fighters - you do not need a missile defense with your ships - giving you room for additional firepower or additional kinetic / laser shields.

But a fighter is a missile with guns, the same purpose, same function and by making the weapon small enough to fit onto a smaller craft you would never do as much damage.

Well it would be more than one fighter.



So maybe 1 launch bay can house either 5x small fighter with kinetic weapons or 3x big fighters with lasers.

The launch bay itself would be quite huge and take a up a lot of space to balance it a bit and not get overpowered spam fleets.

But a single fighter won't be carrying weapons that can penetrate the hull, let alone do any real damage.



Even a swarm of them wouldn't do a thing to an enemy's hull, you could just ignore them.



but in terms of game play, i would see them as a type of long-range bombardment weapon as in actual combat they would just get in the way of the big guns.

If you are going the realistic route... then fighters could maybe just penetrate the shields (slower than missiles).

And while the weapons might not be as powerful they can be better targeted.

A fighter probably would not attack a thick plate of steel but look for vulnerable spots (see Star Wars )

but a missile would and could do the same.



And better as well, as a pilot cannot target as well as a computer.

Igncom1 wrote:
The problem is that logic gets in the way, why have a fighter when a missile is better.



Fighters require a complex control mechanism, missiles do not, fighters/bombers probably won't carry a heavy enough weapon to damage a enemy ship more effectively then a missile, missiles are cheap, fighters are not.



all in all, fighters are obsolete in a fleet to fleet battle because missiles just do it better.

The logic problem depends on the game's "physics", e.g. beam weapons using speed of light or the range of flak. Sci-Fi games like Wing Commander, Starlancer etc. are using "physical laws" which allow the use of fighter/bomber groups: torpedos as the most (and nearly only) powerful weapon against other capital ships - but to slow (and to easy to target) to be fired on long range by a capital ship. ES is using another approach in their torpedo/flak mechanics, though there are still options to implement a bomber/interceptor mechanic.



A potential use of flight groups in ES could be as a 4th weapon/defensive module - less powerfull than torpedos, but more shots and faster etc. Some kind of hybrid between torpedos/kinetics and their counterparts.



As long as balanced I believe it would be nice to have more than just 3 weapons - even if not always "logical"

Mavcu wrote:
I feel like the Ship sizes don't vary enough, when playing a space game, I love to see tiny fighters in a battle and like huge titans, but in this game it's more like the "titans" (huge ships) are not that much bigger than the smaller ships.

Just like to hear your opinion on that and if there is something planned, like perhaps more ship types?

Agreed. A little more difference in size would have been nice - or corvettes/destroyers could have been a bit smaller (dreadnought size per se is quite well, in my opinion).

Igncom1 wrote:
But what you must consider is that endless space kinda uses the age of sail for its ships, and those vessels were never much bigger then cruisers of today.

Well, today's modern corvettes (e.g. Visby-Class) are about ~70m long, the biggest build dreadnought (Yamato-Class) was more than 3x this size. That argument does not really fit

but missiles are defeated by shields (as long as you have enough shields)

also fighters can react to changing situations.



This basically is asymetric warfare - to take a real life example.

Iran has thousands of small speed boats and missile boats while the US has destroyers and carriers.

In theory the huge number of fighters can overcome the defenses just due to their numbers. (although there would be significant losses)



We could also say that a launch bay houses 30-50 small fighters - which basically is just visual cosmetics geared towards realism as this is not about gameplay itself.

The effect would be the same - it might just look more believable.

Kesat wrote:


Well, today's modern corvettes (e.g. Visby-Class) are about ~70m long, the biggest build dreadnought (Yamato-Class) was more than 3x this size. That argument does not really fit

Modern era ships are not like the wooden ones of old, improvements in engine technology allowed ships to massively grow in size.



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medieval_ships

EgoManiac wrote:
but missiles are defeated by shields (as long as you have enough shields)

also fighters can react to changing situations.

And a missile cannot be piloted?

Well they can of course.. but they have less situational awareness.



Though I think we are drifting off a bit.



The point is to get more variety and options into battles.

You seem to try and find an explanation why it is not possible to have fighters because of realism - while we are playing a game with aliens and space ships



Having small fighters shuttles was good enough for Star Wars, Star Trek, Babylon 5, Stargate, Battlestar Galactica and many others... so I think ES can work with them, too

Mother of god. What have I done.



I didn't mean to start such an argument about fighters actually. That is a bit missing the point of my idea, I just felt like we need to vary ship sizes in general(!)



Perhaps adding 3 more ship types (Smaller / bigger ships) or just make the ship types we already have differently.



But I really would love to see something even bigger than dreadnoughts, titans for instance. Like after 150 turns I had fleets full with dreadnoughts, that's not actually how it should be (they were effective as hell)



The Titan type could be even bigger, but expensive, very expensive. Perhaps even cost dust to maintain it or something like that? (Just a balancing idea)





So rather than talking about that fighter thing I'd like to know your thoughts on just "Size" of the current ships.



And just to throw my cents in, I do feel like fighters could deal more damage than missiles, if done correctly. (Having them with kinect like someone said) and they could attack more accurately as they go pretty close to the enemy fleet.