AOE Nuke weapon?

[Phoenix]

I have a problem with the combat: there is no point to spliting fleets. When at war, just pushing with all your ships is THE ONLY option. Not only is this boring since it means the war is decided by a 1-3 engangements (the winner being who ever has more ships or more minerals assuming it becomes are war of atrittion), but it also cuts strategic options since you will NEVER destroy a fleet if you are outnumbered more than 1:1.5

However, a heavy weapon (X mount most probably) that deals AOE damage rather than single target would fix this issue. It is also suprisingly realistic since in real life, the same strategy worked for a while. Pushing with your full military was the best option when going to war, but then the Nuclear Bomb was invented, wich forces you to split your forces to not lose them all at once.

It is easy to implement LORE wise assuming the game engine can handle it. If you google neutronium, you will find that if taken out of a neutron star (something you can do with the Neutronium Strategic Resource) it will explode apocalipticly at the point were grams of the stuff can obliterate PLANETS. A mid-game (or even late-game) tech unlocked after Neutronium Extraction that changes the battlefield would be quite intresting

TL:DR An neutronium AOE weapon that deals heavy damage to large fleets would force creative strategy that would make the game more fun

[Phoenix]

WELL, that sound a little extreme, at that point i feel like we would need a special Planet Killer Station but whatever

Personally i liked weapon systems in Stardrive 2 and i just feel it sucks weapons aren't nearly as important in Stellaris (or effective for that matter)

[Not a Teddy Bear]

it would definitely be a huge F U though especially if you have them in their planet systems. bye bye colony

[Maddin]

I don't mean it as a normal Superweapon.
Lets say you can for example build your ships and mount a bunch of them with that AOE weapon. You''d thus hardcounter ship spam. But on the same hand, if you are getting attacked with serveral small forces, you'd lose even if the enemy did not use as much military power as you used.

Or to give an example.
A Fleet with a Military Power of 10,000 all equipped with that AoE weapon fight against a fleet with a Military Power of 100,000 and it will do considerable damage, like at least 20,000-40,000. Way more than it would today times do, as now it would maybe damage of about 2,000.
On the same hand, the same fleet would lose against 3 fleets of 2,000 easily as it wouldn't do nearly as much focussed damage.
Thus you'd need to decide if you want to have your fleet doing a lot of AoE Damage or Single target damage.
Build it full AoE and it will only be strong against big fleets, whereas a lot of small fleets will easily defeat it.
Build it full Single target and small fleets will devaste it.
Build it really big and a AoE Fleet will devaste it.

Thus you would create a need for serveral fleets and tactical gameplay. And not just a Supwerweapon that kills a fleet whole and all you need to do it put the superweapon against a big fleet and yourself not having big fleets just so the superweapon doesn't instagib it but instead just instagib a part of your fleet.

[Salami Tsunami]

I like the idea, but I'm scientifically inclined to nitpick here. Nuclear weapons, (or any other large explosion for that matter) cause most of their damage due to the shock wave that propogates through the surrounding medium. The surrounding medium being the ground, the air, and whatnot. In space, there's no shockwave, because there's no local matter to conduct the kinetic energy of an explosion. There would be a release of heat, yes. But that becomes exponentially less intense as it propogates from the source, and unless you're talking about unleashing a supernova scale energy release, I find it very unlikely that any explosion could cause significant damage to more than a few closely packed ships. (Bearing in mind also that these ships are covered in exotic metal armor, energy shielding, whatnot)

However, I do very much agree that there needs to be a better combat mechanic. There are some clever strategies that you can use when luring the enemy into a disadvantageous engagement, but there's really no point in doing anything but lumping all your ships together into one fleet, and that we need more options.

Better defense platforms would be nice, for starters, so we can build static defenses that are actually useful past the early mid-game. Other than the advantages of the subspace snare, even endgame fortresses are useless against any fleet bigger than 6K. Having one more progrssion would be nice, like some sort of mega fortress with slots for eight spinal mounts. That, and it would be nice to have things like space mines.

I would also appreciate a 'break contact' button, so I can withdraw from a battle and not have my fleet go MIA for the next year. Or some sort of depth to a space battle besides having all my ships blindly charge at the enemy fleet. Maybe something for me to specify engagement ranges. Larger ships would be better. And more classes. Maybe a dreadnought class ship that gets constructed like a megastructure. But yeah, I agree with the OP. We need options besides 'Zerg for the win'

[Phoenix]

I like how this trow away idea i had in the shower somehow started a full discussion on the game's mechanics

Regardless

Originally posted by Macbeth:

I like the idea, but I'm scientifically inclined to nitpick here. Nuclear weapons, (or any other large explosion for that matter) cause most of their damage due to the shock wave that propogates through the surrounding medium. The surrounding medium being the ground, the air, and whatnot. In space, there's no shockwave, because there's no local matter to conduct the kinetic energy of an explosion. There would be a release of heat, yes. But that becomes exponentially less intense as it propogates from the source, and unless you're talking about unleashing a supernova scale energy release, I find it very unlikely that any explosion could cause significant damage to more than a few closely packed ships. (Bearing in mind also that these ships are covered in exotic metal armor, energy shielding, whatnot)

However, I do very much agree that there needs to be a better combat mechanic. There are some clever strategies that you can use when luring the enemy into a disadvantageous engagement, but there's really no point in doing anything but lumping all your ships together into one fleet, and that we need more options.

Better defense platforms would be nice, for starters, so we can build static defenses that are actually useful past the early mid-game. Other than the advantages of the subspace snare, even endgame fortresses are useless against any fleet bigger than 6K. Having one more progrssion would be nice, like some sort of mega fortress with slots for eight spinal mounts. That, and it would be nice to have things like space mines.

I would also appreciate a 'break contact' button, so I can withdraw from a battle and not have my fleet go MIA for the next year. Or some sort of depth to a space battle besides having all my ships blindly charge at the enemy fleet. Maybe something for me to specify engagement ranges. Larger ships would be better. And more classes. Maybe a dreadnought class ship that gets constructed like a megastructure. But yeah, I agree with the OP. We need options besides 'Zerg for the win'

Awakened Empires already have access to several "Titan" class ships, I am sorry if i seem whiny but it would be trivial to smash 2 battleship models and giving access to the player to these behemoths, the lasers titans are equipped with is also a good representation of what i imagine a ship mounted superweapon would be like.

And regarding the "nukes don't work as well in space", I think a neutronium detonator has more than enough energy for supernova levels of devastation. Whatever neutronium powered weapons Paradox adds will probably be underpowered compared to reality since i for some reason aren't allowed to glass planets with the thousands of nuclear missiles my ships apparently have

Originally posted by Maddin:

I don't mean it as a normal Superweapon.
Lets say you can for example build your ships and mount a bunch of them with that AOE weapon. You''d thus hardcounter ship spam. But on the same hand, if you are getting attacked with serveral small forces, you'd lose even if the enemy did not use as much military power as you used.

Or to give an example.
A Fleet with a Military Power of 10,000 all equipped with that AoE weapon fight against a fleet with a Military Power of 100,000 and it will do considerable damage, like at least 20,000-40,000. Way more than it would today times do, as now it would maybe damage of about 2,000.
On the same hand, the same fleet would lose against 3 fleets of 2,000 easily as it wouldn't do nearly as much focussed damage.
Thus you'd need to decide if you want to have your fleet doing a lot of AoE Damage or Single target damage.
Build it full AoE and it will only be strong against big fleets, whereas a lot of small fleets will easily defeat it.
Build it full Single target and small fleets will devaste it.
Build it really big and a AoE Fleet will devaste it.

Thus you would create a need for serveral fleets and tactical gameplay. And not just a Supwerweapon that kills a fleet whole and all you need to do it put the superweapon against a big fleet and yourself not having big fleets just so the superweapon doesn't instagib it but instead just instagib a part of your fleet.

To be honest: I agree. As far as I understand, you mean several smaller forces coming from different angles, wich is how i assumed my superweapon would be countered. Though i feel like there still should be something like a doomsday weapon like the Titan's laser but for groups of ships rather than single targets

[Kennyshouldadied inS1]

You know the game takes so much from Babylon 5...why not thier answer to the naked corvette issue? In Bablyon5 Larger ships carried energy mines, these mines would be shot between the capital ships and created massive gravity wells before detonating. They would rip the guts out of any large corvette fleet and help slow down capital ships.

It could help with ship tactics a bit...but yeah they need to look at ship combat a bit...add in stand off weapons made to kill smaller tagets...perhaps let the capital ships gain level so people are not so willing to throw them away.

[cooltv27]

there needs to be some kind of limit on how many ships can be in a system without penalty, and not a cost penalty. being double over the limit should result in only equal power as being at the limit, 3 times could result in only 2/3 the power.
this is the way EU4 solves it, having to many troops in one place causes them to start dying, which then costs gold and time to replace.

the reason given could be something like: due to coordination issues our ships are not operating as effectively as they could be, reducing the number of people our volunteer commander has to manage will improve results.
having an actual admiral could improve the amount of ships you can have with no penalty.

[Phoenix]

Originally posted by cooltv27:

there needs to be some kind of limit on how many ships can be in a system without penalty, and not a cost penalty. being double over the limit should result in only equal power as being at the limit, 3 times could result in only 2/3 the power.
this is the way EU4 solves it, having to many troops in one place causes them to start dying, which then costs gold and time to replace.

the reason given could be something like: due to coordination issues our ships are not operating as effectively as they could be, reducing the number of people our volunteer commander has to manage will improve results.
having an actual admiral could improve the amount of ships you can have with no penalty.

Currently, the "Talented Trait" gives +1 skill level, a civic gives another +1 Skill level, the "War Games" trait from the domination tree gives another +2 to admirals!!!!

Not only could it cause an annoying problem that NOBODY would like. If admirals would reduce the penalty, IT WOULD COMPLETLY NULLIFY the efforst of anyone not huge fleets, since it's possible to have 5 star admirals right from the point you click "HIRE", people that use other playstyles would be PENALIZED MASSIVLY

If they ever add a ship limit per system, THEY WILL NEVER make admirals reduce the penalty of such a system since it would be a balancing NIGHTMARE

[Maddin]

Why not for example use Plasma.
Have lets say a Plasma Bomb Weapon, it gets shot between the ships of a Fleet and then sprays Plasma everywhere. Might be weak against shield but strong against Armor.
Then there could be a gaseus kind of weapon which creates energy distortion field which are particulary strong against shields.
As for Defensive Weapons, in one of the the Scifi books I've read about they build a defense Station in the Inside of a Sun which would then use the suns power to create a doomray. That doomray was able to kill a bunch of ships which were close together. It could only be fired every few weeks though. except for a smaller ray which couldn't even kill nearly as many ships though.

This way a smaller fleet could at least damage a bigger fleet and there wouldn't be much use in a fleet that is too big, but also none in a too small fleet. The Doomsday weapon could still be there, but firing it once a month is too extreme. Maybe once a year or even less depending on the strenght. As i have sometimes single battles taking 3 months.

[Maddin]

Maybe the ship limit could be focussed around the single fleets. In a style of like, ship coordination becomes worse by having too many ships controlled by a single admiral.
But anyway, as ship combat is currently made as intelligent as if a psychopathic Lama would lead the ships, this wouldn't make sense, as all ships just ram into each other.

[cooltv27]

having a ship limit would also cause defense platforms to be useful, as you now somewhat know what can be thrown at them at once

[Salami Tsunami]

As long as this debate is still running, I'll suggest that damage done to planetary fortifications should be determined by the fleet's firepower, and not just the number of ships.

Also, fighters, bombers, missiles, and torpedoes (excepting energy torpedoes) could use a lot more armor, speed in the endgame levels. Twenty cruisers with one flak artillery each can wipe out an entire fleet's worth of incoming ordnance.

[Salami Tsunami]

Originally posted by Maddin:

Why not for example use Plasma.
Have lets say a Plasma Bomb Weapon, it gets shot between the ships of a Fleet and then sprays Plasma everywhere. Might be weak against shield but strong against Armor.
Then there could be a gaseus kind of weapon which creates energy distortion field which are particulary strong against shields.
As for Defensive Weapons, in one of the the Scifi books I've read about they build a defense Station in the Inside of a Sun which would then use the suns power to create a doomray. That doomray was able to kill a bunch of ships which were close together. It could only be fired every few weeks though. except for a smaller ray which couldn't even kill nearly as many ships though.

This way a smaller fleet could at least damage a bigger fleet and there wouldn't be much use in a fleet that is too big, but also none in a too small fleet. The Doomsday weapon could still be there, but firing it once a month is too extreme. Maybe once a year or even less depending on the strenght. As i have sometimes single battles taking 3 months.

What, I'm not the only person in the world who read House of Suns? Go figure.

[Maddin]

Well the book i read was actually the seventh book of Rise of an Empire. But whatever.

I still believe defense plattforms should be more powerful than they currently are. Currently they are just not worth the cost.

[Salami Tsunami]

Originally posted by Maddin:

Well the book i read was actually the seventh book of Rise of an Empire. But whatever.

I still believe defense plattforms should be more powerful than they currently are. Currently they are just not worth the cost.

Oh, okay then.

I feel like defense platforms are great, presently. Except for the fact you unlock the Fortress right around the early-mid game, and then that's the final model, and there's nothing else for you.