Hairless-Ape wrote: ↑Sat, 27. Jul 24, 04:36
If you're making an argument then I don't understand what it is.
I was replying to your previous post, specifically:
Hairless-Ape wrote: ↑Mon, 1. Jul 24, 23:24
I don't agree that all fleet forces should be in a blob. This was how all the previous developers approached it and something I was very intent on changing for Renegades. Naval fleets do not engage in a blob. They send out their fighters to hit the enemy weak spots well out of range of the capital ships. This is now the default of Renegades. This has many benefits in actual play and not something I'm going to change. I love it that way. The single downside to this is that if you are sending one large fleet after another large fleet and you launch 50 fighters at range, they may not be alive by the time your main fleet engages and so they would be wasted. This is where you come in and where you have to manage the engagement.
I mostly replied here
Negmek wrote: ↑Wed, 24. Jul 24, 12:30
Though it may have been convoluted. To recap: real naval fleets do indeed blob up, when they are using artillery, which is basically a "dps weapon". Except instead of a blob they do a
line, because two dimensions. And its not just sail ships, you can see it as late as 1942 in the battle of the savo island in the pacific. This is essentially what all battles in x3 look like, except again, its 3d, so you get blobs instead of a battle line.
The bit i quoted above talks about sending out fighters well out of range of the capital ships, and that applies only to things that can deal huge damage in a small burst, ie strike. And if such weapons exist, then its necessary to have screening ships that would destroy any strike craft before they get anywhere close to the big capital ships. This doesn't apply to m3s because they cant strike, they only deal DPS, so its best to meet them with your entire blob, which in turn means m3s shouldn't engage the enemy blob by themselves, else overmatch, etc.
There already are dedicated missile ships, which i like, its much better than when every ship has some mediocre missile capacity and everything sort of blends in. But these missile ships are also generally dps dealing, just via a different mechanic, and they are not m3s. So, perhaps actual strike craft is a niche in mayhem that is yet to be filled. Perhaps a fast m4 that can carry a high damage low range missile? Just one, having to reload at a carrier afterwards.
The worst thing with this idea would be having to implement Ai that would try to intercept these bombers before its too late. But, that would actually provide a reason for fleets to split up, either strike forces detaching for an attack, or screening ships intercepting the strike forces. But without that, its all blob blob blob, or at most m3s can flank. Which i haven't seen the AI do.
