Ed1975

Join Date 03/2015

+10

Your thoughts wanted again :)

Hi Guys,

I've recently got back into this game after a lull, buoyed especially by the news that some work will be done at some point on improving invasions.

I've now played 107 hours but still feel like an advanced beginner and there is much I either do not know or do not understand. In the beginner level galaxy I am playing at the moment as the Drengin, I am only the 4th placed civ (the Yor are nearly 10 times as powerful). The more I play this game, the more complex and deeper I realise it is (I have the same feeling with Crusader Kings 2).

I'm a bit disappointed, though, about how much different it feels playing an evil civ compared to a good one. The difference doesn't seem as massive as I'd expected, and plenty of civs love me, despite me being thoroughly evil and wanting to eat their offspring

Anyway, I'd love to hear your thoughts on the following:

1) Which in your view is it best to defend with orbiting ships, shipyards or planets? On the one hand your planet does not have immediate defence if you orbit the shipyards and the AI could sneak a sneaky invasion fleet to your planet before you can react or before you notice. But if you orbit the planet, your weak (and I think they are unrealistically weak) shipyard is fair game for an AI fleet, and once you've lost it, no more new ships for you. So would you defend one or the other, if you had to choose?

2) Can you advise me on where to position economic and military starbases, as I have no ideas. The AI seems to plonk them down randomly in space...

3) Would you say it's best to have an all-rounder ship or specialise in ships featuring very strong types of just one weapon and just one type of defence?

4) What do military alliances do exactly? I had a standard Alliance with an AI civ, and after I then researched military alliances, I had to no extra alliance diplomacy options from them. So I felt like I had wasted my time.

5) Can you advise on how best go about starting to design my own ships (never done this before).

I think that's enough questions for now.

Many thanks for your thoughts - cheers!

Locked Post

Advanced Search

Watch this post

Do not email me updates for this post Email me updates for this post

Successfully updated karma reason!

1. I would defend the shipyard with armed ships and place an unarmed ship with good sensor range on the planet. The armed ships enhance the survivability of the shipyard while the unarmed ship prevents lone transports from rushing the planet.

2. Place economic starbases five hexes out from planets that have shipyards. Each economic starbase will increase the raw production on the planet by 10% before adding any manufacturing modules.

If you're going to place a military starbase near one of your planets place it so both the planet and the shipyard are within five hexes so they get combat bonuses. I prefer placing military starbases either where I expect fighting to occur or close to my forward combat area so ships that need repair have shorter distances to travel. A starbase provides the same repair rate as a planet.

3. Generally, specialty ships are cheaper and faster builds than all-around ships. You want the specialty ship to have a defense that counters your current enemy's offense while having an offense for which the enemy does not have a defense.

4. A military alliance prevents the other party from declaring war on you and improves your diplomatic relations.

5. Check YouTube for tutorials on ship design by eXplorminate. Also check the forums for ship design discussions.

Successfully updated karma reason!

Gauntlet03

Join Date 01/2004

+139

5) Can you advise on how best go about starting to design my own ships (never done this before).

My rules for ships:

1) You need two designs, a escort, and a capital ship role. Without these, a fleet doesn't function optimally. You don't need any other class, except support. Ever.

2) The escort should have one weapon, and mostly defenses. Preferably of which weapon system you expect to fight.

3) The Capital should have many weapons and no defenses.

4) Generally, I don't bother with military ships unless I have Ion Drives. I recommend 2 drives, 1 range modules.

5) Sensors are a waste of space. Never put a sensor on a combat ship. Built specialist sensor ships that follow near a fleet instead.

6) Have a support class ship with ability boosting modules when possible. Range is always awesome.

7) Build a few designs with 4 engines, and all weapons. Use these to avoid enemy ships and hunt down their starbases. I consider them the "Cossacks" of GC3.

8) Bigger is better. Build your biggest hulls. Tinys and Smalls are so worthless they should never be used for anything (combat wise) other than padding/fluffing your military score.

9) Jamming is awesome. Thrusters are crap. Its arguably better to "slow down" ships than to speed them up, so as to capitalize on range advantages.

Successfully updated karma reason!

Many thanks guys, espcially Runifoc and Gauntlet, that's very useful

Successfully updated karma reason!