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Post by Enderminion on Mar 14, 2017 11:24:42 GMT
I am wondering, how do you defend a fleet from missiles and drones? keep in mind the enemy has enough missiles that you can't doge them.
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Post by darthroach on Mar 14, 2017 12:11:48 GMT
I am wondering, how do you defend a fleet from missiles and drones? keep in mind the enemy has enough missiles that you can't doge them. Lots of lasers, some close range sandblasters as last resort That being said, I haven't really put too much work into laser-resistant missiles or NEFP minimissile spam so I don't know how well lasers do vs a maximum tryhard attack. |
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Post by Durandal on Mar 14, 2017 13:11:03 GMT
Interceptor missiles, followed by 1 Mm lasers, followed by distance, followed by a hailstorm of .50 BMG, followed by ramming.  |
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Post by jasonvance on Mar 14, 2017 13:28:28 GMT
I am wondering, how do you defend a fleet from missiles and drones? keep in mind the enemy has enough missiles that you can't doge them. TLDR: Destroy the drones with lasers and then launch cheaper (cost saved in not adding any armor) missiles to intercept the attacker missiles. Attacker missiles require armor and a hefty rad shield to effectively protect them long enough to cost effectively saturate defenses. This means that an identical missile without the armor will be cheaper, have better acceleration (easier to insure interception), and be nearly as lethal (some lost shrapnel from armor). Since the interceptor missiles (without the armor) are cheaper than the attacking missiles you can just launch an equal value of missiles and win cost effectively as a result regardless of what else occurred point defense wise. Your fleet will also contribute a small amount in helping destroy some missiles with their weapons but in a saturation attack this will be a not very relevant amount as scaling more guns is far more expensive than scaling more missiles is. So for every n credits of weapons added to the fleet n credits missiles could be added (this heavily favors missiles). In the case that the missile fleet is defended by laser drones that would chew through interceptor missiles (which are unarmored) the first tactic should be to attempt to destroy the drones then launch interceptor missiles. If there isn't enough time or the drone fleet is too well defended or massive then the drone fleet will also be expensive and thus their fleet will be more susceptible to saturation attack from your fleet. In this case fire attacker missiles at their missile and drone fleet and destroy them cost effectively with your own attacker missiles. The idea is the missiles will all trade 1:1, the drones will destroy a couple of attackers, but if you have fully saturated for the missiles and point defense the leakers will then trade with the drones making up the cost differential. Since the missile are 1:1s they are a null factor and it is the same formula for intercepting a drone fleet alone with attacker missiles (simply subtract the missiles fleets in advance). I did a post on missile saturation attacks with all the math on another board somewhere if you want me to dig up a link so you can calculate exactly how much you need to launch for any situation (given you know some base line performance values) let me know. |
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Post by vegemeister on Mar 14, 2017 13:36:28 GMT
Missiles can be made resistant enough to lasers that it is very difficult to shoot down a large swarm of them on a high-velocity approach. Also they can be light and cheap enough that it's not difficult to deploy a large swarm. Example: Flares work, but I think it's unrealistically easy to fool the missile guidance. If your own ship has a large heat signature, though, it's best to have a small backup reactor with low temperature radiators and just enough power to run life support and the flare launcher. I use 500 kW / 850 k. That actually ends up being enough power to run missile launchers too, so you could make a (relatively) stealthy missile boat. When combat starts, shut down your main reactor, wait as many seconds as you can afford to, then close the radiators. Projectile point-defense guns could probably do it, but not with the current gunnery algorithm that doesn't switch targets until the first is dead. Kinetic-kill countermissiles could do it, but again, not with the current guidance that causes all the missiles to go for the same target. I've also had a problem with cannon-launched gyrojets where all shots after the first seem to try to home on the first missile's engine heat, instead of the enemy missiles. High-yield nuclear countermissiles probably work, to take out the entire swarm with a single bomb, but I haven't tried them myself. Big nukes are really expensive. A 1.35 Mt warhead alone costs as much as 41 of the above missile. Heavy too, if you go much bigger than the 1.35 Mt optimum (it's bigger for U-235, but I haven't tried to find it). I think a good bet is probably medium-small (<1 t), high-acceleration laser drones, with lasers mounted on the sides in extruded turrets, so they can shoot backwards. Such a drone could be launched to intercept a swarm of missiles long before it reached the mothership, fly through the swarm, and then immediately lase their unprotected engine nozzles. I haven't tried this yet, though. |
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Post by Durandal on Mar 14, 2017 13:53:18 GMT
Missiles can be made resistant enough to lasers that it is very difficult to shoot down a large swarm of them on a high-velocity approach. Also they can be light and cheap enough that it's not difficult to deploy a large swarm. Example: Flares work, but I think it's unrealistically easy to fool the missile guidance. If your own ship has a large heat signature, though, it's best to have a small backup reactor with low temperature radiators and just enough power to run life support and the flare launcher. I use 500 kW / 850 k. That actually ends up being enough power to run missile launchers too, so you could make a (relatively) stealthy missile boat. When combat starts, shut down your main reactor, wait as many seconds as you can afford to, then close the radiators. Projectile point-defense guns could probably do it, but not with the current gunnery algorithm that doesn't switch targets until the first is dead. Kinetic-kill countermissiles could do it, but again, not with the current guidance that causes all the missiles to go for the same target. I've also had a problem with cannon-launched gyrojets where all shots after the first seem to try to home on the first missile's engine heat, instead of the enemy missiles. High-yield nuclear countermissiles probably work, to take out the entire swarm with a single bomb, but I haven't tried them myself. Big nukes are really expensive. A 1.35 Mt warhead alone costs as much as 41 of the above missile. Heavy too, if you go much bigger than the 1.35 Mt optimum (it's bigger for U-235, but I haven't tried to find it). I think a good bet is probably medium-small (<1 t), high-acceleration laser drones, with lasers mounted on the sides in extruded turrets, so they can shoot backwards. Such a drone could be launched to intercept a swarm of missiles long before it reached the mothership, fly through the swarm, and then immediately lase their unprotected engine nozzles. I haven't tried this yet, though. I hate a short reply to a long post, but "running cold" by shutting down the main reactor is another major tactic I forgot to list. I love watching my laserstar button up and start spewing interceptors. |
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Post by jasonvance on Mar 14, 2017 13:54:33 GMT
Missiles can be made resistant enough to lasers that it is very difficult to shoot down a large swarm of them on a high-velocity approach. Also they can be light and cheap enough that it's not difficult to deploy a large swarm. Example: Flares work, but I think it's unrealistically easy to fool the missile guidance. If your own ship has a large heat signature, though, it's best to have a small backup reactor with low temperature radiators and just enough power to run life support and the flare launcher. I use 500 kW / 850 k. That actually ends up being enough power to run missile launchers too, so you could make a (relatively) stealthy missile boat. When combat starts, shut down your main reactor, wait as many seconds as you can afford to, then close the radiators. Projectile point-defense guns could probably do it, but not with the current gunnery algorithm that doesn't switch targets until the first is dead. Kinetic-kill countermissiles could do it, but again, not with the current guidance that causes all the missiles to go for the same target. I've also had a problem with cannon-launched gyrojets where all shots after the first seem to try to home on the first missile's engine heat, instead of the enemy missiles. High-yield nuclear countermissiles probably work, to take out the entire swarm with a single bomb, but I haven't tried them myself. Big nukes are really expensive. A 1.35 Mt warhead alone costs as much as 41 of the above missile. Heavy too, if you go much bigger than the 1.35 Mt optimum (it's bigger for U-235, but I haven't tried to find it). I think a good bet is probably medium-small (<1 t), high-acceleration laser drones, with lasers mounted on the sides in extruded turrets, so they can shoot backwards. Such a drone could be launched to intercept a swarm of missiles long before it reached the mothership, fly through the swarm, and then immediately lase their unprotected engine nozzles. I haven't tried this yet, though. Totally agree on flares not making any sense in this game.  The problem with trying to use a drone to fly by or just intercept missile in general is you usually loose the cost exchange when the missile slam into the drone as a drone with a reactor and a laser on it is orders of magnitude more expensive than an attacker missile. Firing a large nuke at them has the same problem as if they just have a few waves of cheap missiles accelerate ahead to intercept the single huge nuke has no defense of its own and will be intercepted so it is forced to attempt to dodge (burning a ton of delta-v) and eventually detonate itself early when it runs out. You can also go a whole lot cheaper in attacker missiles. There are tons of gameplay issues with missile swarms that prohibit us form using them in game like the tracking issues you mentioned, the targeting problems, and the massive amount of lag / eventual crashing of launching a bunch of cheap missiles causes. But assuming those get fixed at some point I don't really see anything beating missiles out. A few point defense lasers to reduce the number of interceptors required and to deal with drones or finish off disabled ships would be handy but overly investing could leave you vulnerable to being out missiled. |
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Post by Enderminion on Mar 14, 2017 14:11:11 GMT
I have nuclear interceptor missiles, NEFP of 70mm Os with 4 9.64Mt bombs from the standards thread, I also have rail/coil kinetic ciws which I also mount on drones to shoot down missiles away from the fleet, I also have lasers for lasing missiles when they get that close
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Post by lawson on Mar 14, 2017 15:18:01 GMT
Missiles can be made resistant enough to lasers that it is very difficult to shoot down a large swarm of them on a high-velocity approach. Also they can be light and cheap enough that it's not difficult to deploy a large swarm. Example: Flares work, but I think it's unrealistically easy to fool the missile guidance. If your own ship has a large heat signature, though, it's best to have a small backup reactor with low temperature radiators and just enough power to run life support and the flare launcher. I use 500 kW / 850 k. That actually ends up being enough power to run missile launchers too, so you could make a (relatively) stealthy missile boat. When combat starts, shut down your main reactor, wait as many seconds as you can afford to, then close the radiators. Projectile point-defense guns could probably do it, but not with the current gunnery algorithm that doesn't switch targets until the first is dead. Kinetic-kill countermissiles could do it, but again, not with the current guidance that causes all the missiles to go for the same target. I've also had a problem with cannon-launched gyrojets where all shots after the first seem to try to home on the first missile's engine heat, instead of the enemy missiles. High-yield nuclear countermissiles probably work, to take out the entire swarm with a single bomb, but I haven't tried them myself. Big nukes are really expensive. A 1.35 Mt warhead alone costs as much as 41 of the above missile. Heavy too, if you go much bigger than the 1.35 Mt optimum (it's bigger for U-235, but I haven't tried to find it). I think a good bet is probably medium-small (<1 t), high-acceleration laser drones, with lasers mounted on the sides in extruded turrets, so they can shoot backwards. Such a drone could be launched to intercept a swarm of missiles long before it reached the mothership, fly through the swarm, and then immediately lase their unprotected engine nozzles. I haven't tried this yet, though. Nuclear interceptor missiles in the 100-500Kt range have worked well for me. I size them so that one missile will usually wipe out a wave of 20 stock missiles. I test vs stock missiles because they are tougher vs nukes than my laser hardened missiles. On big ships, nuke cannons with >10kt shells work well. I like to get the shells over 10km/s but haven't found a good way to do it since some coil-gun bugs got fixed. Hm... I'm liking you fly-past laser drone idea. The drone would act as a large flare as well. (missile seekers track the brightest target, so proximity helps) I think it'd be best launched under manual control ~5 degrees off the incoming missile vector. Close enough to get the missile's attention, but not close enough to get hit. |
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Post by Enderminion on Mar 14, 2017 15:20:34 GMT
lawson I use 50k activation range, your not skipping that
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Post by ross128 on Mar 14, 2017 15:29:05 GMT
I will say that having a NEFP plate is pointless when intercepting missiles: they don't have enough armor to need it, and their profile is so small that the plate is unlikely to hit anything anyway. So you can save cost and mass by removing it and just killing them with the nuke flash.
NEFPs are for defeating armor on capital ships.
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Post by vegemeister on Mar 14, 2017 15:34:36 GMT
I have nuclear interceptor missiles, NEFP of 70mm Os with 4 9.64Mt bombs from the standards thread, I also have rail/coil kinetic ciws which I also mount on drones to shoot down missiles away from the fleet, I also have lasers for lasing missiles when they get that close The warhead alone costs as much as 1200 of my missiles. |
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Post by Enderminion on Mar 14, 2017 15:36:37 GMT
I have nuclear interceptor missiles, NEFP of 70mm Os with 4 9.64Mt bombs from the standards thread, I also have rail/coil kinetic ciws which I also mount on drones to shoot down missiles away from the fleet, I also have lasers for lasing missiles when they get that close The warhead alone costs as much as 1200 of my missiles. its less then a megacredit, I have 10.2Mt warheads from the steam forums that cost 3.66Mc |
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Post by newageofpower on Mar 14, 2017 17:08:43 GMT
IIRC, apophys and I have clogged up multiple threads with answering the same question. Tons of laser drones, and whenever the missile swarm gets too thick to lase down use a nuclear countermissile. Its not cost effective by itself, but as long as you kill the enemy capship before you get buried under incoming missiles you will win in cost efficiency. |
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Post by Enderminion on Mar 14, 2017 17:18:48 GMT
sake question?
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