[Admiral_Stones]

AAHHHHH MY EYYYYYEEEEEEESSSS!!! MY EYEBALLS ARE BLOWING UP! All this PAIN!!! My very life consists of agony alone!

Ahem.

Ah oh yeah. Well, you DO know the Ursa, a FS1 era ship, has the 2nd-strongest hull in the game, only seconded by the mighty potato (...).
Maybe you'll want to build a entirely new class of ships, double the size of a ursa, completely remove weapon systems (except the mjolnir, o.c.) and take armour and shields instead.

[TrashMan]

Methinks the GTV should just mass-produce the mighty potato, Keysers, trebs and Harpoons.

Immagine a force of 5000 Ares fighters with that loadout flying at you

[Desert Tyrant]

Methinks the GTV should just mass-produce the mighty potato, Keysers, trebs and Harpoons.

Immagine a force of 5000 Ares fighters with that loadout flying at you

But where are they going to get all this?  It's a very potent force, but it costs money and costs a massive amount to even keep properly maintianed.  The Ares was mentioned to be prohibitely expensive, the Kayser IIRC was very expensive, and I see no reason why the Trebs aren't.

And if there's one thing the GTVA probably doesn't have, post-Capella, is a piss ton of money. 

[Bob-san]

AAHHHHH MY EYYYYYEEEEEEESSSS!!! MY EYEBALLS ARE BLOWING UP! All this PAIN!!! My very life consists of agony alone!

Ahem.

Ah oh yeah. Well, you DO know the Ursa, a FS1 era ship, has the 2nd-strongest hull in the game, only seconded by the mighty potato (...).
Maybe you'll want to build a entirely new class of ships, double the size of a ursa, completely remove weapon systems (except the mjolnir, o.c.) and take armour and shields instead.

I told you not to look.

Anyways--the GTVA would do its best by using its numbers against the Shivans. I think that the only way the GTVA could really beat the Shivans in a 1v1 fight would be to use the swarm tactics as well. Also remember the GTVA should be able to produce older ships quickly and inexpensively.

Imagine this... instead of having many huge Potatoes flying at you, there is something even scarier. Ok now...

A large carrier--about 3K long. On it about 5 fighter bays. Whats in those bays? In short... compact ships. Say you can fit 200 Ulysses in each fighter bay, plus enough primaries and secondaries to sortie all of them three times. So, even with 1k Ulysses flying at you, imagine the firepower even with cheap weapons and armor. Having them loaded up with Subach HL-7 and Rockeyes... I wouldn't want a swarm of highly maneuverable and quite fast fighters at me.

Anyways--it'd be easier to produce thousands of Ulysses and their respective weapons then produce even hundreds of Ares and their weapons. Besides--Ulysses should be capable of atmospheric flight. Launching from a moon-base or even planet-side hangers can make a very effective assault.

[TrashMan]

Are we even sure of the cost and build time of various ships? We're throwing around conjectures.

Wehave no clue how mucha potato costs, or how much a Ulysses costs. That said, mass producing ships with a lot of primaries is effective even if you outfit them with cheap weapons.

[Bob-san]

I would guess that a Ulysses is one of the easiest ships for the GTVA to manufacture. Plus the basic primary Subach HL-7 and secondary Rockeye should be quite cheap. The hardest part of it would be to hire the thousands of pilots and flight crews to make use of these ships in such a scale.

Overall, it should be less-expensive to put out Ulysses--even if crew costs a fortune.

[Admiral_Stones]

You could build AIs into the Ulysseses, and truly piloted Ares wings would be reserved to the Elite Wings.

[TrashMan]

You could build AIs into the Ulysseses, and truly piloted Ares wings would be reserved to the Elite Wings.

that's a good one. If nothing else they will serve to distract the enemy while the elites pound them into oblivion.

[Snail]

There has to be a reason AI has not been used other than in training.

[Bob-san]

I'd think that every AI fighter would simply die whenever hit with EMP or in an EMP-like shockwave. That, or a high rate of failure... the AI, despite programming, may not be opportunistic enough to fire when it would be natural to actually fire. Besides--its probably easy to dodge AI fighter--as there are set specifications at which they'll fire and how. If they only aim when 100% on--erratic maneuvers on the part of human pilots should be more than enough to set the shots off-course. Also, I'd guess poor engine/shield/weapon EMS.

[TrashMan]

Even if they are crappy shots, there would he 100's of them.

The proverbial - bury your enemy under the corpses of your own soldiers

[Snail]

Even if they are crappy shots, there would he 100's of them.

Maybe the AI was expensive or hard to produce...


AND SACRIFICING HUMANS WAS MORE EFFECTIVE!!!! MUAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!

[TrashMan]

"I was given this medal for my brilliant victory over the killbots! The tactics was simple - the killbots had a programmed kill limit, so I just threw wave after wave of my men at them, till they shut down!"

[Kie99]

Even if they are crappy shots, there would he 100's of them.

The proverbial - bury your enemy under the corpses of your own soldiers

You're proposing defeating the Shivans by swarming them?  You're going to run out of materials before you kill half the Shivans.

[Vidmaster]

"I was given this medal for my brilliant victory over the killbots! The tactics was simple - the killbots had a programmed kill limit, so I just threw wave after wave of my men at them, till they shut down!"

Furturama rocks 

[General Battuta]

I'd think that every AI fighter would simply die whenever hit with EMP or in an EMP-like shockwave.

That doesn't make sense, I think. If a human-piloted fighter was hit by an EMP there are two possible outcomes: controls shut down due to EMP burning out electronics, pilot and ship die OR controls are hardened and pilot continues.

If the controls can be hardened (in a Faraday cage) so can the AI, as they're made of the same components.

[castor]

There has to be a reason AI has not been used other than in training.

The AI needs to be remotely controllable, not necessarily safe

[krankes_hirn]

I agree with kietotheworld. I don't think swarming the Shivans would be a good choice, since Shivans are already a huge swarm. How about bottlenecking them? So that they bigger numbers can't be of some use to them.

[Hades]

"I was given this medal for my brilliant victory over the killbots! The tactics was simple - the killbots had a programmed kill limit, so I just threw wave after wave of my men at them, till they shut down!"

Furturama rocks 

That it does.

[Bob-san]

There has to be a reason AI has not been used other than in training.

The AI needs to be remotely controllable, not necessarily safe

If it was remotely controllable (depending on what you mean exactly), then it's not AI.