Current state of battlestations?

[MrUnclean]

Sorry if I speak nonsense since it's been a long time since I last played this game but I wanted to ask about battlestations on space stations. When the game first released if I remember correctly having battlestations was pretty good since they could withstand fleets of alien ships pretty well and they created interesting fights (at least for me idk why I enjoyed space station vs alien fleet so much). Later on I think they changed something about battlestations and they became so underwhelming that they had trouble defending against a couple ships. If anyone could provide any info about their current state I would appreciate it. Thanks in advance

[Riepah]

Against aliens, they seem pretty useless in actual combat. However, their existence seems to deter them from attacking unless they have overwhelming might.

If you support your Battlestations with some ships though, they can make a huge difference.

[LorDC]

In general, static defenses will never withstand any kind of serious assault. After all, even T3 one has less armament than a battleship with pitiful armor and PD. Only thing that it has is massive HP pool.

Their only use is to protect against negative events (space debris) and opportunistic attacks of human AI. (And yes, human AI will now kill all your undefended stations if it sees a chance.) But if you disable random events (which makes the game 100x more enjoyable) and know what you are doing (read, kill any human ships in any SOI you control) you can easily get by without building any static defenses at all.

[CaptainSpacetime]

Much like real life heavy defense installations act mostly as a deterrent against opportunistic strikes.

Slapping one or two battlestations seems to do a good enough job at forcing the AI to go for something else.

Their combat value does seem too high for what they actually contribute though. But I think that's a general issue with however the combat values are calculated. Like how laser/phasers and dV is massively overvalued. Things that'll be futzed with as EA continues.

[Ericus1]

They will act as a significant force multiplier in combat, allowing your defensive fleets to be far more effective and protected behind their PD and HP. In effect, they can act as meat shields while your ships do most of the damage, which is largely what static defenses are supposed to do.

They also will buy you a 4 hour window to transfer to a station before an enemy fleet can blow it up if you don't beat them there, and given the idiosyncrasies of short transfers with the transfer planner I found that very useful. This is on top of their random event choice and discouragement effects already mentioned. I recommend always having at least one PDA defensive module at every hab you want to protect, and use 2 LDAs or BSs on all remote habs you don't want to protect with a fleet as that is usually sufficient to push the aliens into attacking places you do have fleets.

[Blaarg]

As for ones in stations, between the random events and the delay if enemies take them out, having a pda at least at every station is a good idea. Their overinflated combat power is great for keeping things safe by just not getting attacked. It can also let you pick which station the aliens attack first by defending some stations less well than others. Just don't expect too much from them in actual combat. Each one is like having another middling battleship in your line.

Battlestations on bases are a different thing altogether. LDA's or Battlestations are rather good at defending against bombardment. The largest problem for them is the lack of an armored power production building to keep the power going. Admittedly, there is not a need to defend against bombardment if you have a fleet in orbit. Great for defending lone asteroids or similar, though. Often just 2 LDA's is enough there.

[wei270]

Originally posted by Blaarg:

As for ones in stations, between the random events and the delay if enemies take them out, having a pda at least at every station is a good idea. Their overinflated combat power is great for keeping things safe by just not getting attacked. It can also let you pick which station the aliens attack first by defending some stations less well than others. Just don't expect too much from them in actual combat. Each one is like having another middling battleship in your line.

Battlestations on bases are a different thing altogether. LDA's or Battlestations are rather good at defending against bombardment. The largest problem for them is the lack of an armored power production building to keep the power going. Admittedly, there is not a need to defend against bombardment if you have a fleet in orbit. Great for defending lone asteroids or similar, though. Often just 2 LDA's is enough there.

you know you can go to your ground installation that is being bombarded, and short down all other facility to keep the power going.

i do find battle stations to be very good, they can't take as much hits as before, but they can still take more hits than most of your ships, their weakness is their range, but if you have your own ships there is a different story.

[gimmethegepgun]

Originally posted by wei270:

you know you can go to your ground installation that is being bombarded, and short down all other facility to keep the power going.

It already does that automatically. When there's a power shortage, defense modules get a priority on the power.