Is combat supposed to be so... slow?

from Sins Forums
Just a quick question here. I'm new to the game - started and quit about 2-3 games now, just kind of getting used to how everything works.

One thing that I'm unsure about is combat. I'll send maybe 6 of those scout type ships and 1 of the slightly bigger ones (I don't know what they're all called right now) off to explore a planet, and when they get there, there's always some other ships always there.

So I end up having to destroy them - and it seems to take forever. I'll have the ships attack, and I'll go to my main planet and start building some things, and when I come back it seems like in 1-2 minutes maybe one unit has died.

I'll look at the ships and it seems barely any HP are coming off because the shields keep regenerating so fast, that the damage all goes into taking them down again... It just seems like it's taking way too long to me.

Is this just how the game is designed, or am I missing something here? Yeah, my first ships are weak - but compared to other real time games I've played, it just seems like it's taking ages just for one ship to be destroyed, even when all 7 ships are focusing fire on it.
16,366 views 8 replies
Reply #1 from Sins Forums Top
Scouts aren't very good at dealing damage.
Reply #2 from Sins Forums Top
There are almost always ships at every planet, how many determined by what it is, and if its colonised.

6 scouts have the combined firepower of a pea-shooter. :)

If the planet has 2 Heavy cruisers, then you can expect your scouts to be trashed. Even the combat frigate wont do so well, except in bigger numbers.

Everyone varies as to starting tactics, but I build 2 scouts first off and have them find the nearer planets with manual direction, always jump again before they can sustain too much damage, then build the free capital ship. I usually then build a second cap ship, and let them clean out the lightly defended planets. Thay may take damage, but they repair, so thats not an issue as long as you dont lose one. But before tackling a colonised world, I go for heavy cruisers to escort them. If the ai already has hangers, then you need some flaks as well. To get the heavy cruisers tho, you need at least 4 planets to have enough research for them.

Dont bite off more than you can chew. Have your scouts scout, not fight. Then you know the force you need to take each planet, and can build them before attempting them.
The Political Machine 2024
Reply #3 from Sins Forums Top
There are almost always ships at every planet, how many determined by what it is, and if its colonised.6 scouts have the combined firepower of a pea-shooter. If the planet has 2 Heavy cruisers, then you can expect your scouts to be trashed. Even the combat frigate wont do so well, except in bigger numbers.Everyone varies as to starting tactics, but I build 2 scouts first off and have them find the nearer planets with manual direction, always jump again before they can sustain too much damage, then build the free capital ship. I usually then build a second cap ship, and let them clean out the lightly defended planets. Thay may take damage, but they repair, so thats not an issue as long as you dont lose one. But before tackling a colonised world, I go for heavy cruisers to escort them. If the ai already has hangers, then you need some flaks as well. To get the heavy cruisers tho, you need at least 4 planets to have enough research for them. Dont bite off more than you can chew. Have your scouts scout, not fight. Then you know the force you need to take each planet, and can build them before attempting them.
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Sounds good. I guess I'm just using the units incorrectly. So far I haven't played a game long enough to have actually researched any ships past the original 3 you get (the scout, frigate thing, and the colony ship). Mostly due to just playing for a while to get used to how things work.

I'll try research some military techs and building some better ships, and let the scouts just scout planets out, as you suggested :)

This also explains why scouts don't have "auto attack" on by default. Because I kept setting them to auto attack, wondering why they came out with it off... They're not really meant to - huh? I had kind of figured they were footmen in Warcraft, or something, your first basic unit. I should probably look at this game more like Civilization or Gal Civ 2 than I should as a Warcraft type game.
Reply #4 from Sins Forums Top
Definitely follow the tip about getting your free capital ship. They're way more effective at clearing out those neutrals :) You'll have to build your capital ship factory first, and in fact most players build it before anything else.
Reply #5 from Sins Forums Top
Set the game speed to fast.
Reply #6 from Sins Forums Top
yup, free cap ship is vital at the start! But even still, combat seems a bit slow cos nothing moves around. Ships just sit there taking and returning fire. no movemet makes the game look a little lifeless in my opinion. Cap ships making strategic moves to get out of the line of fire and that would be really cool!!
Reply #7 from Sins Forums Top
To make the fighting more interesting, I zoom my camera in and rotate and move through the battle. I like finding all the different epic angles of the ships firing at each other. To tell you the truth though, most likely there won't be much movement in real space battles because of how hard it is to maneuver in space. Yes I do agree that it would be cool for the ships to move a little, but I think Ironclad did a good job of depicting what a space battle will probably look like.

Note: I have absolutely no idea what space battles in the future will look like, just making a guess based on the physics classes I've taken.
Reply #8 from Sins Forums Top
It would be too hard to micro if it were Homeworld 3 :)

I enjoy it, especially when I have three big battles going on at once and I start to freak out a bit.