Discussion - military command stations good or not?

[Wuffell]

Hi all,

Today's the first time I've played the game in a couple months, so I just encountered the new changes, particularly the lack of energy harvester thingies (whatever they were called) and that military stations no longer give you tons of turrets.

I can see the energy has been rolled into the stations, mostly meaning you can't simple spam military stations or you won't have enough energy for military. I can understand why that was necessary.

Personally I feel the military stations lost their identity and their style; they're still necessary if your frontline planets are being attacked, but they no longer multiply the number of turrets you can build, so they don't feel great to me.

Overall, I think the new changes make them necessary, but they no long feel good.

Opinions?

[Ozone]

Military stations are a sacrifice to make; they are expensive so you should use them sparingly.

Currently, the logistic stations are often the best choice: they grant an amazing mobility, productivity, and vision on the neighboring planets.

You will want to switch to economy on planets far behind the front, and military to planets with strategical value and a high risk of loses.

Feels nicely balanced to me.

[kocur4d]

> Currently, the logistic stations are often the best choice: they grant an amazing mobility, productivity, and vision on the neighboring planets.

I wasn't aware off the vision. Cheers.

[Nuc_Temeron]

I almost always build Military when I capture a new border world. After it is captured, and I'm comfortable it's not going to face imminent attack, I'll convert that military to a Logistic. Then, once I've captured or neutered all of the nearby planets and set up a new MIlitary border world that protects it, I'll convert it to an Economic station.

[Wuffell]

Thanks all.

The turrets dealing more damage is interesting, and also their health ... I thought my military stations and turrets were being overrun much more quickly, but I guess it's not due to this.

The multiplier I meant was the number you see right from the start; logistics used to be able to have x of a turret type, economic 1/2 x and military 2x. I guess the change now means they're the same at the start, but with the modified to command augmenters, it means later game they feel more useful?

This may be why I feel military stations aren't great at the start of a game.

[Apthorpe]

Originally posted by RocketAssistedPuffin:

What did change was, to help with people having sore wrists from placing tons of turrets, player ones were consolidated into fewer, but stronger ones. Each turret you have now is worth 5 of the old ones. There's some oddities with it, but in general you still have the same firepower.

I had forgotten about this change since I've only started playing again since the addition of fleets. Doesn't this mean that turrets are less effective against swarms of low-health enemies now, since the extra damage isn't needed while your effective rate of fire is a fifth of what it was?

[Wuffell]

Originally posted by RocketAssistedPuffin:

The multiplier you mention is the one I'm referring to - it's definitely still in there. Far as I know that's the way it's been for Augmenters, always.

Military Stations do get Beam Cannons as well, which can be fairly monstrous if you can power them.

I thought the same of the turrets versus swarms, but oddly stacking helps here a lot. Nobody has raised it as an issue, if nothing else.

Thanks for the reply.

Aha, I see how t shows Global Command Augmenter: 50% for economic, 100% for logistics and 200% for military.

Testing:

I started a new game, no tech spent.
Wiped out the AI on one planet.
When I build, I mouse over the three command stations and get the following:

Economic: shows: GCA 50%. Pike Turret x24, Engineer x4, Tractor Array x1, Forcefield Generator x1, Matter Converter x6, Factory x1, Station-Keeping Watchman Frigate x2.

Logistical shows: GCA 100%. Pike Turret x24, Engineer x7, Tractor Array x6, Forcefield Generator x2, Tachyon Array x4, Focused Gravity Generator x2, Paralysis Minefield x5, Sentry Frigate x3, Matter Converter x3, Factory x2, Assault Frigate x1, Watchman Frigate x3.

Military shows: GCA 200%. Pike Turret x24, Ambush Turret x15, Beam Cannon x5, Engineer x2, Tractor Array x8, Forcefield Generator x1, Tachyon Array x2, Sentry Frigate x1, Matter Converter x3, Factory x3, Assault Frigate x2, Watchman Frigate x4

I choose Economic and can build:
Pike Turret x5, Engineer x4, Tractor Array x1, Forcefield Generator x1, Matter Converter x6, Factory x1, Watchman Frigate x2.
The only change is 5 Pikes instead of 24.
Those pikes have 27k hull, 68k shields, 2080 damage, 10,100 range

I change to Logistic and can build:
Pike Turret x5, Engineer x7, Tractor Array x6, Forcefield Generator x2, Tachyon Array x4, Focused Gravity Generator x2, Paralysis Minefield x5, Sentry Frigate x3, Matter Converter x3, Factory x2, Assault Frigate x1, Watchman Frigate x3.
The only change is 5 Pikes instead of 24.
Those pikes have 28k hull. 68k shields, 2080 damage, 10,100 range

I change to Military and can build:
Pike Turret x5, Ambush Turret x3, Beam Cannon x1, Engineer x2, Tractor Array x8, Forcefield Generator x1, Tachyon Array x2, Sentry Frigate x1, Matter Converter x3, Factory x3, Assault Frigate x2, Watchman Frigate x4
The changes are 5 Pikes instead of 24, 3 Ambushes instead of 15, 1 Beam Cannons instead of 5.
Those pikes have 28k hull. 68k shields, 2080 damage, 10,100 range



My conclusions:
1) If you can only build 1/5 of the turrets, please change the text when mousing over Economic/Logistical/Military command stations when first building and when changing to another type
2) It feels very weird for the initial number of pikes to not be adjusted, or their stats ... but I guess that's intended, and the modifiers are intended to make more difference later on the game? I don't really know, they still seem to be paper-thin to me so far.
3) I think after a while away from the game, I forgot what the GCA multiplier is, so I misunderstood things a little! After getting a GCA I see it's mostly okay, cept 4 spider turrets turns to 7 for a military station.

[Wuffell]

4) When holding Ctrl and looking at a station, it would be cool to see what GCA would give you, as well as what the basic station would give.

[Wuffell]

Originally posted by RocketAssistedPuffin:

1): Just a bug, it's known.

2): The initial Pikes aren't from an Augmenter, they're part of the base Command Station design so they aren't affected. They are affected by the stats multiplier.

For #2, is that the military station's planetary attack amplifier? And the actual turret stats themselves don't change to keep things simple?

[Wuffell]

Thanks a lot for the explanations.

I'll try to keep an open mind about military stations. I think I'm happier with them now, seeing they do actually add more turrets at the start, but they still feel like they're mandatory instead of being cool. I think that's not because of them, though ...

Having played a bit more, the base number of turrets is what really feels wrong to me. There's just not enough of them. I think it's because an RTS should allow you to have lots of small turrets, instead of only having large powerful turrets, which feels like more of a tower defence thing.

The old issue (if anyone actually had an issue placing too many turrets?) could have also been solved by placing them in fives by default. I know reducing the number of units is more efficient for programming etc ... but when I have 19 max turrets on one world, and over 400 units with a single transport, I feel the ratio is wrong. Anyway, just my opinion!

[themouthofsauron]

The number of turrets was decreased, but their current strength and firepower is roughly equivalent to "a bunch of old turrets"

[Ozone]

Difficult to provide enough power for so many turrets tho.

[x-4000 (Chris McElligott-Park)]

Having so many small turrets also just eats performance with very little benefit (and a lot of UI clicking pain for players), so that was another reason behind that change. Basically the goal of allowing you to express yourself with fewer clicks and have similar-to-higher firepower but not drive performance into the ground simply because of all the turrets and their natural inability to stack when needed (since they're not mobile).

[Wuffell]

All good, I still miss more turrets. Logical or not, when I had way more, I felt I could divide them up and defend multiple wormholes. Now I can't force myself to do that lol.

I still love the game, I'll get used to having a tiny number of turrets.

[themouthofsauron]

If you get enough GCAs then you can still have a field of turrets.

[kasnavada]

Military stations are currently extremely niche. Mostly, because you can't power the extra turrets you get. And because they're worse at preventing units to go through than logistical stations - and for some reason, they don't give vision around them.