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[Girlinhat]

Also of note: In the ship design window, if you go to the Rank/DAC/Etc little tab, you can click a window that shows "names of class".  I chose "small birds" for my large passive scouts that run around a system and check for contacts.  It rather well started generating ships named "sparrow" and "hummingbird" and such.  There's a huge list of options there, and it can be rather entertaining to set battleships to "united states" and such.  Nothing like the Washington, Strongarm class Battleship tearing into battle!

I assume if you're savvy, you could even edit the lists somewhere in database...

[ThtblovesDF]

Man, multyplayer mode. You get XXX instant build units (like in the fast fleet creation) as set by the host and thats it, drop you into the map, do turns when everyone pressed the button, does it at the speed of lowest clicked/set by host.

[Girlinhat]

You try that when you've got 6 months for a research project and someone else is performing 5 second battle ticks!

[Sheb]

He's referring to battle MP. You get X RP and Y ship BP to play with. I suspect frigates bearing thousands of box launchers would win the day.

[forsaken1111]

I suspect frigates bearing thousands of box launchers would win the day.

Only if they knew where to apply the firepower on the first shot, because they aren't getting a 2nd shot. If they all fire at that hugemassive contact with the super high thermal profile and it was actually a shell of a ship with an orbital hab module... well you wasted all your missiles.

[ThtblovesDF]

Just supply a way to do it, people will self rule, maybe disallow some things, whatever.

Have battles with special rules, like:

>No Missles
>Only one ship per player
>Go.

[Sheb]

Well, you can shoot only some of your missiles.

[Flying Dice]

So how common is it for people to design heavily cloaked ships with mesons and low output engines, and sneak around taking potshots and attacks of opportunity?

[Sheb]

Uncommon. Meson have a for too small range for that, even a cloaked ship will be detected long before engagement range. Cloaked ship with long range drone separating into several smaller warhead may work though.

[Girlinhat]

I think an array of particle cannons will do better for ranged cloaked shots.  Less power, but more power at range.  If you can take down enemy shields in one hit, then you can whittle away their armor over prolonged shots.  Just make sure you've got the maintenance life to keep at it.

Ranged cloaked warfare runs into a lot of issues though, namely fire control distance rating.  But if you can mount a phalanx of particles and fire them off with any degree of accuracy, you should be able to do some damage to unwary targets.  Missiles are also a good option, as the enemy can be cause with their sensors down and thus unable to mount their point defense.  If you can time things right, you can get a 50 warhead slowboat missile in under the radar and just destroy ships.

[Flying Dice]

I think an array of particle cannons will do better for ranged cloaked shots.  Less power, but more power at range.  If you can take down enemy shields in one hit, then you can whittle away their armor over prolonged shots.  Just make sure you've got the maintenance life to keep at it.

Ranged cloaked warfare runs into a lot of issues though, namely fire control distance rating.  But if you can mount a phalanx of particles and fire them off with any degree of accuracy, you should be able to do some damage to unwary targets.  Missiles are also a good option, as the enemy can be cause with their sensors down and thus unable to mount their point defense.  If you can time things right, you can get a 50 warhead slowboat missile in under the radar and just destroy ships.

Yeah, I agree with you on particle beams. The reason I suggested mesons was that if you successfully executed a firing run and got away, you were pretty much guaranteed module damage. With missiles, I'd either go for a setup with a ton of box launchers and a carrier/collier/tanker parent ship hiding very far out, or with .25x size launchers that use saturation 2-stages with their own sensors.

[Girlinhat]

I'd go with the .25 launchers, for the purpose that they do not need to reload quickly, but they do need to reload without support.  Unless you want to get a stealth mothership out there to resupply them...

And actually, considering the options, your best bet is to get a stealth ship into a system and let it sit there for a while.  Once the enemy has started defending a planet or jump point, and is sitting idle with active sensors and shields offline, then you've got some easy pickings.  A drone could strike from 2b km range with a pretty good sized warhead.  The usual concern, that drones have poor agility and the target will move, is rendered inert because the target is sitting idle, thus allowing you to get a low-agility payload in.

This is also the reasoning for particle beams, as you can strike at long range because the enemy isn't moving, and you can utilize the particle beam's range advantage.  You can have a rather small fire control, with 4x range and 1/4 tracking, because your target won't be moving.

[Tarran]

...You can have a rather small fire control, with 4x range and 1/4 tracking, because your target won't be moving.

You can't reduce tracking speed beneath x1. You can only reduce range.

[Osmosis Jones]

Wait... if you're using beam weapons, don't you need an active sensor to paint the target (which will then reveal your location)? Missiles with a passive thermal sensor would surely be best?

[Girlinhat]

Active only needs to be on briefly.  I'd recommend a small, quick ship that can flip active on from beyond beam range, then the warships can get a shot, and the sensor ship deactivates and tears hell running away.

I've also discovered that you can deploy a buoy from a drone or missile.  It's very reliably to have a ship with a 25% launcher fire a drone that releases a buoy at a waypoint, and that buoy paints an active sensor target, which the particle beam ship uses to line up fire.  Could be the same ship, for that matter.  You can also use this remote deployed buoy to remotely launch minefields or large passive sensors to get a look at a system or to quickly check a low cost planet for existing life.  I'm starting to equip all my grav survey ships with a box launcher and a remote thermal buoy.  In case they find an interesting something, they can fire the buoy at a nearby waypoint to check on the surroundings!