[Qent]

If capship shields are developed, it seems pretty reasonable to assume that they would use the same damage factor as fighter shields, but that's not necessarily true. Besides, in BP capships do have shields inside the hull.

[Aesaar]

UEF bombers are a threat, yes, but they're certainly not unkillable.  The 12th Shuhudune heavy strike (Collateral Damage), composed of 2 Durgas and 8 Uriels, got torn to shreds by Serkr Team in less than a minute, did no significant damage, and Serkr had no fighter cover whatsoever.  And they don't kill a Diomedes that quickly.  In Aristeia, even after I call in the Durgas to take out the Medea, if I don't disable her beam cannons, she'll typically destroy one of the frigates before the 3 bombers can do their thing.

And even if the UEF have great bombers (the new Lapith is insane), how many do they have?  And how to deploy them when their capships get gutted left and right?  Deploying a bomber strike isn't as simple as giving them a target and sending them on their way.

You mention the Atreus in Darkest Hour would have been destroyed without its modified drives.  Probably true.  But would Steele have committed it if he wasn't sure it could disengage at a moment's notice?  Very doubtful.   

The Carthage fell into Calder's trap because it was just bait for Steele's even bigger trap.  If the Imperieuse hadn't been available for relief, then Steele wouldn't have allowed the UEF to get information to form a plan of attack.  The source that gave the UEF Lopez' psych profile and battlegroup engagement area had already been turned by that point.

Sure, shields would be nice to have, but why would the GTVA waste resources on developing something which is mostly useless against their primary enemy: the Shivans?  If Byrne's project and/or the Fedayeen can't turn the war around somehow, a total GTVA victory is a foregone conclusion.  There's no point whatsoever in creating something that will be pretty much obsolete once the current conflict is won.

The point I was making about the Shivans is that if they had such an easy time shielding their capitals, why is the Lucifer the only ship equipped with them?  I'm not saying they might not have other shielded ships, I'm just saying even they have limitations, and since they're still massively more advanced than the GTVA, I don't see the GTVA outfitting their Raynors and Titans with shields anytime soon.

[Mars]

The GTVA has lost a fair number of corvettes yes, but it's more akin to the UEF losing a Sanctus than a Karuna

[MatthTheGeek]

It is true that the GTVA in average gets much more heavily damaged warships than the UEF. It's just that the GTVA has magic Anemois to repair them in days, while the UEF only have drydocks to repair them in weeks. So at the end, the GTVA still has the advantage.

[Drogoth]

well, everytime i played the mission, the bombers wasted the medea in about 10-20 secs ... which speaks for a totally sick damage output. Btw it helps in that mission to call in an addtional wing of uhlans to distract the medeas guns a bit. Ofcourse the UEF has only a few of em, but they kick ass. About the rest: The war doesnt go THAT well for the GTVA. Even though the GTVA can afford the losses way more easily than the UEF, they still lost a bunch corvettes and cruisers so far and 2 Hecate class destroyers got nearly trashed. Ofcourse the GTVA still stands way better than the UEF, but its not a easy victory for em, if they win. All that just leads to one big questions (once again): What the hell is that "Project"?

Doesn't matter if the tevs lose more corvettes, as WiH itself states, post Blitz the UEF is only a few months from total logistical collapse. The noose is fit snugly around the UEF's neck at this point. All Steele has to do is wait for the drop.

[Fury]

GTVA has magic Anemois to repair them in days, while the UEF only have drydocks to repair them in weeks.

Anemois can repair ships yes, but as far as I know it has never been stated how quick or efficient it is COMPARED to a drydock.

Pure logic would dictate that a stationary, dedicated drydock still beats any Anemoi in efficiency. Anemoi's are missing a drydock in the first place. So if a repair requires you to park a corvette next to an Anemoi within a drydock, you'd have to set up that drydock first which takes up valuable time. Assuming an Anemoi can even set it up at all.

The only scenario where I see Anemoi being more efficient, is when it is only required to ship out and install spare parts for field repairs. anything that can be installed on the move with little to no downtime. But if a ship is badly damaged, engines are shot, hull has been breached, you need a drydock to fix those up. A drydock Anemoi does not have readily available at the very least.

Repairing small ships like fighters and bombers, now that's what an Anemoi can and probably does extremely well. If an Anemoi could house a cruiser within, it could repair them while on the move, anywhere anytime. Alas a cruiser cannot enter an Anemoi, requiring an external drydock for the most serious repairs.

[Fury]

And where would that statement be?

[Crybertrance]

In Aristeia, even after I call in the Durgas to take out the Medea, if I don't disable her beam cannons, she'll typically destroy one of the frigates before the 3 bombers can do their thing.

Umm.. I play on Hard and EVERY time I've played, I've only deployed the Heavy bombers and some Ulhans to take care of the Medea... While I just waited by the Indus to watch the fireworks  . They ALWAYS destroy the Medea in MAX 15 secs! Without losing any frigates (Mind you they are always below 15% health)

And even if the UEF have great bombers (the new Lapith is insane), how many do they have?  And how to deploy them when their capships get gutted left and right?  Deploying a bomber strike isn't as simple as giving them a target and sending them on their way.

The bombers could inflict heavy damage if they adopted the "run and gun" style of the GTVA. However that seems unlikely due to the logistical condition of the UEF.

well, everytime i played the mission, the bombers wasted the medea in about 10-20 secs ... which speaks for a totally sick damage output. Btw it helps in that mission to call in an addtional wing of uhlans to distract the medeas guns a bit. Ofcourse the UEF has only a few of em, but they kick ass. About the rest: The war doesnt go THAT well for the GTVA. Even though the GTVA can afford the losses way more easily than the UEF, they still lost a bunch corvettes and cruisers so far and 2 Hecate class destroyers got nearly trashed. Ofcourse the GTVA still stands way better than the UEF, but its not a easy victory for em, if they win. All that just leads to one big questions (once again): What the hell is that "Project"?

Exactly my point, even though a victory for the GTVA would be imminent, but its sure as hell not absolute... I mean in the game so far, the UEF have only lost a couple of cruisers and 4 frigates 3 frigates (the Indus survives), where as the GTVA have lost quite a lot of Corvettes and Cruisers (If you destroy them before the Warpout, like me), not to mention the amount of fighter and bombers (easily 6 or 7 squadrons during Delenda Est).

BTW: I think the project somehow involves the Karuna MK2... That frigate is SWEET... wastes a Narayana AND a Karuna with ease ( 1 on 1, that is).

GTVA has magic Anemois to repair them in days, while the UEF only have drydocks to repair them in weeks.

Anemois can repair ships yes, but as far as I know it has never been stated how quick or efficient it is COMPARED to a drydock.

Pure logic would dictate that a stationary, dedicated drydock still beats any Anemoi in efficiency. Anemoi's are missing a drydock in the first place. So if a repair requires you to park a corvette next to an Anemoi within a drydock, you'd have to set up that drydock first which takes up valuable time. Assuming an Anemoi can even set it up at all.

The only scenario where I see Anemoi being more efficient, is when it is only required to ship out and install spare parts for field repairs. anything that can be installed on the move with little to no downtime. But if a ship is badly damaged, engines are shot, hull has been breached, you need a drydock to fix those up. A drydock Anemoi does not have readily available at the very least.

Repairing small ships like fighters and bombers, now that's what an Anemoi can and probably does extremely well. If an Anemoi could house a cruiser within, it could repair them while on the move, anywhere anytime. Alas a cruiser cannot enter an Anemoi, requiring an external drydock for the most serious repairs.

it has been stated: they are as efficient as 3 docks

Its impossible, like Fury said, without an interior dock of some kind, it would be practically impossible to repair any major damage to Class Cruiser and up efficiently...

[MatthTheGeek]

I mean in the game so far, the UEF have only lost a couple of cruisers and 4 frigates 3 frigates (the Indus survives), where as the GTVA have lost quite a lot of Corvettes and Cruisers (If you destroy them before the Warpout, like me), not to mention the amount of fighter and bombers (easily 6 or 7 squadrons during Delenda Est).

Wait what.

The UEF has lost most of Third fleet, most of their subspace surveillance infrastructure, half their logistic infrastructure, including Artemis station and at least one major shipyard orbiting Earth, and multiple other fleet assets, especially cruisers and fighters, which aren't that easy to replace when you're under a critical logistic crisis.

What you see as a player in WiH is only a tiny part of what's going on in the Sol theater. There are at least 5 times during the events of WiH alone (aka not counting the 18 months prior) where major engagements throughout the system where happening while you're playing a mission : the Artemis Station blitz, the Meridian strikes on Luna, Darkest Hour, Aristeia and Delenda Est.

[-Norbert-]

GTVA has magic Anemois to repair them in days, while the UEF only have drydocks to repair them in weeks.

Anemois can repair ships yes, but as far as I know it has never been stated how quick or efficient it is COMPARED to a drydock.

Pure logic would dictate that a stationary, dedicated drydock still beats any Anemoi in efficiency. Anemoi's are missing a drydock in the first place. So if a repair requires you to park a corvette next to an Anemoi within a drydock, you'd have to set up that drydock first which takes up valuable time. Assuming an Anemoi can even set it up at all.

The only scenario where I see Anemoi being more efficient, is when it is only required to ship out and install spare parts for field repairs. anything that can be installed on the move with little to no downtime. But if a ship is badly damaged, engines are shot, hull has been breached, you need a drydock to fix those up. A drydock Anemoi does not have readily available at the very least.

Repairing small ships like fighters and bombers, now that's what an Anemoi can and probably does extremely well. If an Anemoi could house a cruiser within, it could repair them while on the move, anywhere anytime. Alas a cruiser cannot enter an Anemoi, requiring an external drydock for the most serious repairs.

it has been stated: they are as efficient as 3 docks

If the "magical Anemois" are so great, why does the GTVA still need to pull ships back into Delta Serpentis for extensive repairs, even though they have three of them (or two after the capture of the Agincourt) in Sol?

[Fury]

BTW: I think the project somehow involves the Karuna MK2... That frigate is SWEET... wastes a Narayana AND a Karuna with ease ( 1 on 1, that is).

What Sanctus MK2 and Karuna MK2 have been equipped with are placeholder armaments, particularly Karuna MK2. So don't base any assumptions based on their current weapon loadouts.

[BritishShivans]

On all the talk about capship shields above, an interesting thing I've noticed:

It should be noted that the Lucifer was completely to anything the GTA/PVE/GTVA had, except beam cannons could penetrate them in "normal space".

I theorize the Lucifer shields were so kind of Culture Effector Lite: They shunt the energy from weapons hitting the Lucifer into subspace, and that beam cannons use some unknown method that lets them penetrate the shield. Because they shunt the energy into subspace, by common sense this simply does not work in subspace because the Lucifer doesn't have a place to dump those raw gigatons of energy hitting it anywhere.

This is also why fighter-grade shields don't work in subspace as well: They seem to work the same way, but due to a fighter being, well, a fighter, they would lack the power output to work on the scale the Lucifer's did. In this way, it may be possible that a number of sufficiently powerful weapons could penetrate the Lucifer's shields and harm it.

It may be so that capital-scale beam cannons are simply the most ergonomic solution, and that the Shivans discontinued use of Lucifer-type shields simply because there was no longer a point. I think it likely a meson bomb could destroy the Lucifer in normal space.

[MatthTheGeek]

Hasn't that been discussed to death on dozens of topics all over the forum ?

[Crybertrance]

It may be so that capital-scale beam cannons are simply the most ergonomic solution, and that the Shivans discontinued use of Lucifer-type shields simply because there was no longer a point. I think it likely a meson bomb could destroy the Lucifer in normal space.

MESON BOMB FTW!!!

[Aesaar]

In Aristeia, even after I call in the Durgas to take out the Medea, if I don't disable her beam cannons, she'll typically destroy one of the frigates before the 3 bombers can do their thing.

Umm.. I play on Hard and EVERY time I've played, I've only deployed the Heavy bombers and some Ulhans to take care of the Medea... While I just waited by the Indus to watch the fireworks  . They ALWAYS destroy the Medea in MAX 15 secs! Without losing any frigates (Mind you they are always below 15% health)

And even if the UEF have great bombers (the new Lapith is insane), how many do they have?  And how to deploy them when their capships get gutted left and right?  Deploying a bomber strike isn't as simple as giving them a target and sending them on their way.

The bombers could inflict heavy damage if they adopted the "run and gun" style of the GTVA. However that seems unlikely due to the logistical condition of the UEF.

We saw how "give them a target and send them on their way" ended up in Collateral Damage.  Those 2 Durgas and 8 Uriels just got decimated by Serkr's point defenses.  No matter how good Durgas are, they're helpless without an escort.  If deploying them was so easy, why didn't TF Wargods have any Durgas attached?  How many does the UEF even have?  They're good, but like the Solarises, they're nowhere near invincible.
 
About Aristeia, I'm speaking of my own experiences on Hard.  You're luckier than I am, because every time I leave her beam cannons alone, I end up losing the Indus.

Exactly my point, even though a victory for the GTVA would be imminent, but its sure as hell not absolute... I mean in the game so far, the UEF have only lost a couple of cruisers and 4 frigates 3 frigates (the Indus survives), where as the GTVA have lost quite a lot of Corvettes and Cruisers (If you destroy them before the Warpout, like me), not to mention the amount of fighter and bombers (easily 6 or 7 squadrons during Delenda Est).

It's already been said, but I'll say it again.  The UEF lost a whole lot more than just TF Wargods.  Most of 3rd JRF is gone.  If we just remove the named ships it's lost from the order of battle posted in one of the stickied threads, they've got 3 Karunas (Minh, Ardent, Serenity), 3 Narayanas (Vikrant, Toreador, Rajput), an indeterminate amount of cruisers, and the Toutatis left.  At most.  They might have lost more.  1st and 2nd are in much better shape, but evidently not good enough to prevent the Blitz from doing the damage it did.

Speaking of the Blitz, they've also lost the Saab Shipyards, and enough orbital facilities that they're now only a few months away from complete logistical collapse, which means the end of the war.  To put this in perspective, it's so much that just Rheza station means the difference between surrender and fighting on.  Like I said, if Byrne's project can't turn things around, GTVA victory is absolutely certain.

I'm not saying the GTVA didn't take some pretty big losses, but they're much more capable of replacing them, so they're just not as important.

I'm really not sure how we're supposed to factor in "optional" losses.  I never take out the engines of the Carthage's escorts, I voluntarily lose My Brother, My Enemy (I love the BP team for giving us the option to do that), I save the Vatican, but not Torpedo Two. 

[Qent]

We saw how "give them a target and send them on their way" ended up in Collateral Damage.  Those 2 Durgas and 8 Uriels just got decimated by Serkr's point defenses.  No matter how good Durgas are, they're helpless without an escort.  If deploying them was so easy, why didn't TF Wargods have any Durgas attached?  How many does the UEF even have?  They're good, but like the Solarises, they're nowhere near invincible.

Hm. I thought Noemi's wing took escort. And what is an escort to do against point defenses, anyway? I don't even remember if Serkr had interceptor cover.

[Crybertrance]

We saw how "give them a target and send them on their way" ended up in Collateral Damage.  Those 2 Durgas and 8 Uriels just got decimated by Serkr's point defenses.  No matter how good Durgas are, they're helpless without an escort.  If deploying them was so easy, why didn't TF Wargods have any Durgas attached?  How many does the UEF even have?  They're good, but like the Solarises, they're nowhere near invincible.

Hm. I thought Noemi's wing took escort. And what is an escort to do against point defenses, anyway? I don't even remember if Serkr had interceptor cover.

No, there was a "Keep Safe Distance" directive. Also, Aesaar is right Serkr had no fighter cover whatsoever...

Which leads me to believe, Maybe the pilots of the Shuhudune Durgas were complete rookies, they flew straight into the point defences of Serkr corvettes. The pilots of the Durgas that lead the assault on the Medea on the other hand, completed their mission with little or no casualties.

[niffiwan]

Or perhaps the point defences of three elite corvettes are much more lethal than those of one normal corvette? 

[Fury]

Haha. You guys are really using Collateral Damage as an example here? These Serkr corvettes in this mission had armor that reduced damage taken by 60% and those gunships and bombers had armor that increased damage by 50% to both shields and hull.

In BP missions things play out however fredders feel like they should play out, regardless of tabled ship and weapon default stats.

[Crybertrance]

Haha. You guys are really using Collateral Damage as an example here? These Serkr corvettes in this mission had armor that reduced damage taken by 60% and those gunships and bombers had armor that increased damage by 50% to both shields and hull.

You mean plot armor?

In BP missions things play out however fredders feel like they should play out, regardless of tabled ship and weapon default stats.

Wut?