DefStations

[python]

Defense stations sould be large enough that you could click on a sar then the planet and then find an icon that lets you upgrade up date defstations. You could also make a nifty little screen like the planet have that let you see the inside.

Thanks

[utilae]

I think there will be a likely hood of being able to design your space station as you would a ship.

[Sapphire Wyvern]

I think there will be a likely hood of being able to design your space station as you would a ship.

In a related matter, I think it would be useful to have an option to build a "System Defense Fleet" as a "building". A System Defense Fleet is essentially the same thing as MoO II's Fighter Garrison writ large... a fleet of battleworthy ships that just happen to lack FTL drives. They wouldn't appear on the galactic map, as they can't leave the system that they're built in. Unlike purely ground-based defenses, these ships would have in-system mobility.

I would propose allowing each player to have exactly one standard System Defense Ship design, which they can update at will as they invent new technologies; and all System Defense Fleets would be automatically upgraded to the new design. This keeps it simple.

[guiguibaah]

Somehwere lost in the threads there was discussion of expanding the system defence ship to a planetary wonder.

You make the wonder on system A, and it covers it and any neighboring systems by sending system defence ships to neighboring systems under attack. So you don't have to build the "system defence ship" building on each planet.

And you would only have to design one system defence ship design. This way you don't get stuck like in Moo3 building all these system defence ships that never get moved anywhere.

[Sapphire Wyvern]

Somehwere lost in the threads there was discussion of expanding the system defence ship to a planetary wonder.

You make the wonder on system A, and it covers it and any neighboring systems by sending system defence ships to neighboring systems under attack. So you don't have to build the "system defence ship" building on each planet.

And you would only have to design one system defence ship design. This way you don't get stuck like in Moo3 building all these system defence ships that never get moved anywhere.

Eh? But that doesn't make sense - the whole point was to have ships without FTL drives, which are therefore cheaper and less complex, so they're good for defense. If they're going to travel from star to star, that's what your regular fleets are for. Right? I know that "Realism is no excuse" in FO but at least things should be intuitive...

[utilae]

This way you don't get stuck like in Moo3 building all these system defence ships that never get moved anywhere.

I think it would be ok to build a system defense ship like any other ship, but if the ship cannot move to another system, then it should not show up on the map. It should just be factored into the tally for number of ships in system and selectable on a fleet screen, for selling & refitting, etc.

[Sandlapper]

The previous discussions centered on tech being researched that allowed either ftl carriers for system ships or ftl tugs that physically attached to an individual system ship (temporarily). This would allow system ships to move with the growth/decrease of the empire's outer boundaries. This would allow a sector wide defense wonder to move it's system defense ships as needed.

[guiguibaah]

[/quote]Eh? But that doesn't make sense - the whole point was to have ships without FTL drives, which are therefore cheaper and less complex, so they're good for defense. If they're going to travel from star to star, that's what your regular fleets are for. Right? I know that "Realism is no excuse" in FO but at least things should be intuitive...[/quote]

That's easy. The description could simply read "This device teleports system ships into a neighboring combat zone" or "... ships through a subspace rift" or "... fired through a magnetic accelerator" or "thanks to the pixie fairies it makes system ships ships magically appear and return to their destination and this cannot be argued because pixie fairies are awesome!"

Naturally, it would be a pretty expensive wonder, so you'd want to put it where a bunch of neighboring systems overlap. It would be worthless if it was way out in the middle of the boonies.

[Sapphire Wyvern]

That's easy. The description could simply read "This device teleports system ships into a neighboring combat zone" or "... ships through a subspace rift" or "... fired through a magnetic accelerator" or "thanks to the pixie fairies it makes system ships ships magically appear and return to their destination and this cannot be argued because pixie fairies are awesome!"

Naturally, it would be a pretty expensive wonder, so you'd want to put it where a bunch of neighboring systems overlap. It would be worthless if it was way out in the middle of the boonies.

Ah. Fluff. Now everything fits into my world-view, and all is right with the world. Fluff solves so many problems...

You've changed my mind about having a System Defense Fleet as a "building" though. Let me explain what I now think. Planets have a Defense Meter, don't they?

So what should happen instead of building SDB Fleets, is that each player designs a "System Defense Boat" via the standard ship design UI. There is exactly one SDB design per empire, although players can control exactly what their particular version's stats are, in accordance with their strategies and technologies.

As a planet's Defense Meter increases, it gets ground-based missile batteries, beam emplacements, and fighter garrisons. Higher meter = more missiles, beams, & fighters. Once the Meter gets above, say, 50%, you should also start getting free System Defense Boats that aren't on the galaxy map, don't appear in the Fleet Roster UI (if there is one), are always fully armed & repaired at the start of each battle (no lines of supply to worry about!), and always "fully upgraded" to the latest design. Basically these ships represent the in-system mobile component of the Defense Meter. You can't sell them or refit them to non-standard designs because they're part of a meter, not "actual" ships that you build yourself.

Obviously if you have several well-defended planets in the one system, and we have system-wide combat (my preferred option!) those SDBs will be pooled into a single, relatively powerful unit. So to a certain extent high-Defense worlds extend an umbrella over newer colonies in the same system, which is to my mind a feature, not a bug.

And if you build the "FTL Tug/Homeworld Defense Nexus/Subspace Rift/Pixie Fairies SDB Redeployment Matrix" wonder it just adds to Defense Meters for all nearby worlds, in the form of more SDBs. Or missile bases. Or whatever.

Best of both worlds, eh? All the benefits of cheap defense ships, with a simple UI, no need for direct intervention from players to build them in military-focussed worlds, and little added complexity.

Plus they would look cool in battles.