[Scotty]

There are marines standing at attention and officers and ratings at control panels in all of the canon mainhalls, I'd say artificial gravity is fairly well supported even without Word of God explicitly stating it.

[Marcov]

This reminds me of how the GTVA assraped the NTF fleet with Mjolnir stationary beam cannons. They should put one of those in every node. 

[Dilmah G]

Would be a good idea, if not for two things.

1. If the GTVA usurps control of a node, those cannons can now be used against their invading fleet.

2. They look pretty expensive.

[Scotty]

3. They're very fragile.  Check out the King's Gambit.  On any difficulty Medium or higher, at LEAST one goes down to Ulys before you can get anywhere near them, even if you ignore the incoming capships.

[Marcov]

How about putting an elite Ursa bomber pilot in every node, complemented by perhaps, 3 fighters?

EDIT----

3. They're very fragile.

You won't see them going down easily as I said, only one for every node; if you put three, like 5 km away from each other that'd be quite a tough job to protect them for a single wing of fighters. How about a Mjolnir near every node, and a wing of fighters patrolling it? Having at least 2,500 hitpoints it should be able to hold those hostiles off and, if it gets worse, they can call in reinforcements.

[Niue]

Just attach some ULTRA AAA beams and flak turrets onto the already-crowded Mjolnir platform.  That way no one gets close without getting vaporized .  The only efficient way to take them out would be two salvos of dual Trebs. 

[Drogoth]

What about the FS1 mission where the shield prototypes are being transferred to Ribos? The installation there is clearly guarding the node, its the only point of interest in the area, but the installation is hung back, so as to prevent it from taking direct fire from incoming warships.

Ive always agreed that the nodes seem woefully undefended, but at the same time, look at the sheer amount of punishment warships can soak up. Look at the ships in the King's gambit for example. We were ripping the **** out of them, and on higher difficulties some still escape. This is after running what is it, 3? (i cant remember someone let me know) successive blockades, before reaching Alpha 1 and his god awesome skillz. Wouldn't it then make sense to have a fluid and rapid response from a fleet rather then static defenses? Every credit the GTVA spends on immobile stations is one less they spend on fleet units. Now, since fleet units do bring heavy firepower to bear, and enemy units still slip through, I think mobile units are a better choice, as they can pursue the enemy rather then sit their scratching their asses.

Mix that with the fact that mobile units can then be used as an attack force, and their value goes up exponentially.

Also, look at our canonical sources. The T-V war lasted 14 years, where the situation looked to remain highly fluidic (the terrans were on the doorstep of Vasuda, but unable to push it to victory), I expect any static defenses were wiped out early on or simply weren't funded in favor of mobile defenses and raiding forces, that could exact damage and pull out. Even leviathans, specifically designed for defensive roles, were mobile.

What happens when I build tons of defenses at the Ribos/Antares node, but then conquer Antares? If i used a fleet to defend the Ribos/Antares node then I can simply move the fleet up. If i used stations and heavy fixed defenses, then what are they doing now? Sitting there and chewing away my resources on maintenance. And in a 14 year war, resources are not plentiful. The same can be held true for FS2. Look at the GTVA. Despite the Vasudans miraculous economic recovery, they are still hurting bad, and rebuilding. The same but worse can be said for the Terrans. Mobile defenses canonically are more useful, and there never seem to be enough of them.

Or have we all forgotten how often ships have been 're-prioritized' for other engagements? It comes down to cost.. and well. What I deem to be effectiveness based on the amount of punishment we've seen destroyers soak up.

[ION3]

I think an orion is basically an installation with some thrusters. (and subspace drive) In space moving mass around is cheap. No point in having your defences not mobile.

[BengalTiger]

No point in having your defenses not mobile.

Unless you can't afford enough subspace drives or fuel. Then you could build sentry guns and space stations to watch over jump nodes and other places that need to be guarded, and if the situation changes you can hire a freighter to move stuff around.

BTW- anyone know of a small armed installation with a hangar bay, such as an Exos with turrets?

[ION3]

Unless you can't afford enough subspace drives or fuel.

Fuel only comes into play if you actually UES the thrusters. But a suspace drive of an orion certainly sound expensive.

[General Battuta]

No point in having your defenses not mobile.

Unless you can't afford enough subspace drives or fuel. Then you could build sentry guns and space stations to watch over jump nodes and other places that need to be guarded, and if the situation changes you can hire a freighter to move stuff around.

BTW- anyone know of a small armed installation with a hangar bay, such as an Exos with turrets?

Try Asteria

[BengalTiger]

Fuel only comes into play if you actually USE the thrusters.

Well, that is a point, but you need to build all the machinery, fuel tanks and a nice armor shield for them into your defensive position. And that costs a lot probably, given that there are lots of sentry guns floating around, and not a single canon combat drone protecting cargo containers and similar stuff.
You'll also need full time engine crews which could operate a freighter (which might just cost as much as adding a proper engine to an installation to make it a destroyer) instead during the long periods when your position is not changing, and generate some income.

But a suspace drive of an orion certainly sound expensive.

Agreed here.

Try Asteria

At 1 mile long it's too big. Found something better in the TBP folder- after chopping off the unnecessary rings and stuff I got a floating hangar that's 250 meters in it's largest dimension.

[Marcov]

Well, having a few Mjolnir cannons on every node is definitely cheaper than having a destroyer guard it. I mean, you are sacrificing a ship that commands an entire battlegroup, just to go on camping strategies? Why not use the cheaper alternative instead?

Destroyers, though having massive firepower, are more for use on serious and decisive battles than defense tactics. I believe that the situation in the King's Gambit was emergency and highly decisive, that's why they pulled in loads of firepower to guard the node.

If you put in, say, 3 Mjolnirs in a node the enemy always attacks at, then you can surprise them with 3 beams that are pointed directly at the ship that jumps out of it. If the enemy fields in an important ship, say a destroyer, then it is wrecked to pieces shockingly before it has the chance to jump out (remember, having fixed guns guarding a node, you can choose the concentration of firepower needed, unlike a destroyer, where guns are scattered around it).

[Drogoth]

The Destroyers aren't tasked to the node in 'camping strategies' but when you KNOW the enemy will assault a node, where else are the naval units going to be? Backed up by mjolnirs yes, but destroyers can follow leakers. RBC's cannot

[Unknown Target]

* Dilmah G recalls the intro to G-Police.

Whoaaa, blast from the past. That game was awesome.

[Dilmah G]

Yeah man, they don't make 'em like that anymore.