Dreadnougts

[Penguin]

My statement relates directly to WC.
WC1: The cap ships were hopelessly helpless. Without fighter cover the Kilrathi Ralaris & Fralthis were easy to whip.
WC2: As long as you have torps & are good at dodging AMG bursts again you shouldn't have too much of a problem.
WC3 & WC4: The laser turrets & those yellow burst firing turrets (tachyons/AMGs?) were less effective than the flak guns & easy to dodge. Also they could be destroyed & you didn't need torps. And let's not forget you could fly into the hulls.
WCP: Once again you need torps & maybe a heavy plasma for extra pleasure but turret placement on the bug cap ships was ineffectual.
Basically as long as it packs enough torpedoes, whatever strike force is deployed should be able to do the job no matter what it's composition, once the defending fighters have been disposed of.

 

[TC]

Yes, it would be very easy... Enemies never fight back... firing off capship missiles and launching bombers of their own... And Confed certainly doesn't have the same vulnerabilities as its opponents. Strategy and carrier groups never play any role in battles. A war can easily be won with just carriers and fighters...

TC

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CAG of the Blacklance HQ
"Canadian and proud of it"-TC
You are in no way entitled to any WC games, if you don't have them its your own damn fault.

 

[Quarto]

Penguin: Keep in mind that you had to fight against AI, which is inferior to RI (real intelligence). In WC2, for example, RI crews would lob so much flak at your incoming torpedoes that you'd have to launch about ten (at once) in order for one to get through. Also, in WC3 you wouldn't have the slightest chance of surviving a hangar run, if the damage had been modeled accurately.
BTW, I highly recommend that anyone who complains of the Ralari's weakness should download the WC1-WCP conversion pack and try taking down the Ralari using a WCP fighter. I found it something of a humiliating experience

.

LOAF: But is it classed as a heavy carrier because of those facilities, or is it a normal heavy carrier, whose fighter compliment is limited by the need for those facilities? Anyway, never mind. That's a question which could only be answered if we knew of another heavy carrier of that class. And unfortunately, we don't.

What I said about Armada armour isn't actually a complaint

. I was just pointing out that those fighters are far superior to anything we see in WC3. And they are - as you said, they have values between 100 and 500cm. To be precise, an Armada Arrow has 120cm armour. There's only one ship in WC3 which has better - the Longbow. Indeed, if we look at the Armada Banshee, we find that it's better armoured than the Devastator (!). At the same time however, we find that their shields are slightly inferior to WC3 ships (Arm. Arrow has 170/150cm, while WC3 arrow has 200/200cm), so it actually all makes sense. As I said, I'm not really complaining. In fact, I think it's rather neat, now that I have thought about it.

Well, anyway, looks like we're running out of things to discuss here. Thanks for all the info

.

 

[Penguin]

Quarto: True AI may not be as good as RI but AI can come close. I mean what if they programmed get the bombers no matter what. If the bugs really concentrated their firepower they could bring down any attacking Devastators & Shrikes before Confed even knew what was happening.
But what I'm trying to say is that cap ship armament generally isn't enough to stave off determined attacks despite the AI. I personally think that the cap ships in WC are under armed. E.G. the cat dreadnought from WC3 - 22km length & only 15 turrets (though I remember the manual saying 32)! Or the WCP cap ships - most had no turrets covering their rear sections.

 

[Quarto]

Well, I guess with that dreadnought it was a problem of game mechanics. And as for AI, yes, it could come close - but only if you had really great programmers, and two or three extra processors to handle it. I'm afraid we won't see proper AI for a while yet.
As for ships being underarmed - of course they are. Remember, this game is designed in such a way that the player can handle any capital ship all by himself. So, it's really the players' fault.

 

[Chernikov]

If any of you have played Xwing Alliance I heard rumors that they have eliminated the problems with ship size/armament and one fighter being able to take down the capship on it's own. Not that it was really easy in the earlier games but they really worked it so it took the better part of a Wing of Xwings to kill a Destroyer or something.

Also there's the Freespace series (FS2 in particular). Most of those ships are just plain mean (and a lot more intimidating than the Bugs), and the first time you try to take, say, a frigate (lightest capship if I remember correctly) on head-to-head and get nailed with the beam cannon... what can I say. Ouch.

As for the Bug ships. The only one I noticed with tailguns was the freighter, and that was a severe pain to take down, with or without fighter cover, if you were using torpedoes. To get the gun you had to fly head-on into it's fire, and try to hit a minute spot with your guns (one or two hitting at once - the Shrike is terrible like that) while the Bug nailed away at your massive bomber. If youre up against only a freighter or two its not too bad, but if you have three or four and a time limit, there are problems. Expand those problems to cruiser size, and you kow why the programmers didnt put in what we would consider a logical gun placement. Not that we cant change that...

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You deal death with your roars and your screams, your threats, your taunts, your overblown ego. I hand it out, one with the steel and the silence, the blackness around me, with a thought.

 

[Quarto]

I also used to have trouble with those Triton turrets. Could never quite hit them. Finally, I got tired of it and started ramming them instead. Works like a charm

. It's also safer, because you don't want to stick around too long behind a freighter, lest one of your wingmates fires off a torpedo.

 

[Penguin]

I've found a good way to get rid of the turrets on the Triton is to fly parallel with the ship. The turret can't really get you & just as you are passing it's front/aft pull a hard turn, cut the juice & empty your guns into the turret. It also helps to dispose of the defending fighter cover & put all shield power forward first.

Chernikov: I think I know what mission you're referring to. I found it difficult because the bugs run away at full AB & I can't catch up.
And yes it's very frustrating to watch that last Triton get away for want of a torpedo.

 

[Iceheart]

I've found that if you aim off center it's easier to take out the turrets on a Triton. Aiming slightly left or right of the ITTS reticle gives me a much higher rate of success.

 

[Nighthawk]

When I want to get rid of that pesky rear turret I usually attack it coming from the front of the 'sport. It seems to be shielded by the rim of the engine in some way.

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No one will hear your cry of death in the void of space

 

[Penguin]

Nighthawk: The rim of the engine shields the turret in that it is in between you and the turret

 

[Knight]

The easiest way to do it, is to roll over, so you're belly to belly with it, fly in from the front, at full Ab, so the front's don't get many hits in. the pop up over the rim as fast as you dare and start unleasing energy. I can usually get enough mass driver hits in to take out the turret before my energy goes dry. Of course, if it's giving you trouble, Quarto's tactic works good too

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Member of the LMG and hating it (Disgruntled Man)
Real heros wear SCBAs, not capes.--Me.

 

[Nighthawk]

Penguin: Hmmm....could be it. Never thought of that!

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No one will hear your cry of death in the void of space

 

[klaus]

That's one thing I specialized in WCP. Destroying the turrets in a Triton. And I also specialised in whacky ways to lob a torpedo at the engine. The funniest was one where I'd fly towards the bridge and detour towards the engine, so you see the cargo and the rim of the engine, and launch the torp, making it miss the engine rim by a hair. The thing would do a u-turn and hit the engine while that dope of a turret was busy shooting at me. But this depends on a lot of luck, so I'd call this a "Maniac" maneuver.

Regarding those ships with beam weapons in FS2. Ouch is the adequate word. Pick 2 or 3 of them firing at you and you got an instant funeral. Mainly in those nebula missions with those tag missiles. If you tagged a bogie while you were in the line of fire, you'd take quite a beating, which is quite easy, if that blasted nebula bothered you as much as it bothered me.

And the Star Destroyers from X-Wing Alliance. I takes a whole wing of fighters to take down because the AI isn't smart enough to take down the shield generators first. Take that down, disable it, and then destroy it.

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The WC Source Code Release Project needs you!

"This matter winds itself ever in new riddles.", Faramir - The Lord of The Rings

"...we follow the sun, we follow the sun, we follow the sun..."

[This message has been edited by klaus (edited August 04, 2000).]

 

[Quarto]

Yeah, I remember a mission in the original X-Wing, where we had to take out an STD. By the time the thing was dead, we had lost 18 Y-Wings in all, simply because they couldn't wait for me to take down the shield generators (and those Tie Interceptors on my tail made sure I took my time).

 

[Bandit LOAF]

Destroying a Star Destroyer in a Y-Wing in the original X-Wing was disgustingly easy... destroy the shield generators with your torpedoes and then shoot it like three times with your ion cannons.

 

[Mad Hatter]

I guess that`s why they made you fly an X-wing, not a Y-wing. took me almost a week just to get passed that mission.

Bastards!

 

[Shane]

If I recall it took 3 proton torpedoes per tower, so if you missed with one you were screwed. You also had to switch bewteen single and dual fire. The Y-Wing had a couple spares which made it easier. I recall that mission as well and it was a hassle.

However, other missions with Star Destroyers it became sort of fun to take the suckers out, even though it wasn't part of the mission. I recall one, where I took out the fighters near the SD and then worked my way to about 25 km Out. The thing would launch 4 TIES at a time at me, which I could handle easily and then have time to rechrage before the next wave came. Finally they launched Interceptors and eventually bombers and I think some Star-wings. Finally they had nothing left to throw at me. I had saved my torps, and without fighter cover taking down a Star Destroyer is very easy, even without an Ion cannon. I think I came back with around 100 kills from that mission.

 

[Quarto]

Yeah, exactly. It wasn't a Y-Wing that I was flying.

The worst part about that mission was that when you finally saw the ISD explode, it turned out that the LucasArts people didn't even bother making a bigger explosion for it. They just magnified the one used for fighters - and therefore made it look horrible.

Shane: You mean they can actually run out of fighters? I never bothered sticking around that long. But then of course, I'm such a hopeless shot in X-Wing (I'm useless with joysticks, while X-Wing is useless with keyboards and mice - thus, we don't work very well together

) that I never stick around after completing my mission. It's just a waste of my time.

 

[Shane]

That one did. I think it was one without a time limit, either that or I ignored it. It's been a few years since I flew it. I was curious to see if they would run out of fighters and they did. The cool thing was the mission, I think, called for there to be mostly just Ties, or maybe it was Tie Interceptors. Whichever, once you took all of those down, then they went to the other type. After those were gone, they they went to the next best ship they had. The only thing they didn't throw at me were the shuttles. The only thing that saved me was the AI of the game. If they would have launched more fighters instead of four at a time, I would have been screwed. Oh and it did take forever. I was encouraged though when the ship types changed. I think I didn't on a lazy, rainy Sunday when there was nothing better to do.

[This message has been edited by Shane (edited August 04, 2000).]