Is there any reason to build small ships?

[Winterhome]

yeah...swarm missiles do seem to very effective against my swarms. however I just put an AMS on each of them now, and well I think swarm fighters are the next swarm missiles.

everyone and his brother knows how to counter AMS, and AMS doesn't shoot down every missile.

Trust me, I've tried AMS/PD spam, and it didn't help much.

 

[timethatswasted]

Blocks or mass?
Because we've had a lot of success with ships in the 2k-5k mass range.

I did say "essentially decoration" course there are uses. But fighting with small stuff feels more like a slap fight then a dog fight to me.

Just my feelings. I can't quite seem to build anything under 15k that is viable for day to day use and worth risking in a fight.

If you have a 5k or less ship that won't get instantly torched by a pirate spawn or another player in a slightly larger ship i would love to check it out I obviously must just be doing something wrong.

 

[Master_Artificer]

I did say "essentially decoration" course there are uses. But fighting with small stuff feels more like a slap fight then a dog fight to me.

Just my feelings. I can't quite seem to build anything under 15k that is viable for day to day use and worth risking in a fight.

If you have a 5k or less ship that won't get instantly torched by a pirate spawn or another player in a slightly larger ship i would love to check it out I obviously must just be doing something wrong.

I have a 2k mass ship that doesnt make any fight feel like a useless slap fight.
Also try playing ares, a game mode where you capture bases to gain credits over time so you start off small and go big.

 

[timethatswasted]

I have a 2k mass ship that doesnt make any fight feel like a useless slap fight.
Also try playing ares, a game mode where you capture bases to gain credits over time so you start off small and go big.

I have played the Ares server, it's really quite fantastic I would like to see a persistant version of that doesn't reset. I made a control point set up that didn't involve a wrapper, just modifications to the config that uses the unused factories to produce important blocks essentially for free. Sadly not too many people showed interest.

Is your ships up for download on the dock? I would love to check it out.

 

[jayman38]

This conversation goes a long way towards helping understand how different space combat is from air combat. Without a forced gravity well, bigger is generally better. (Swarmer variation: heavier swarmer drones will generally defeat an equal number of lighter swarmer drones.)

With that said, I only have time to build small, but I think all my stuff generally gets up over 10k blocks (>1k mass) anyway. Exceptions: my Aluminum Mallard, which is a recreation of a tiny 1-man salvaged jalopy from the Space Quest adventure game series, and the Leopard CV, which is a recreation of one of the very lightest dropships from the Battletech boardgame and video game series.

 

[Pacific_Jim]

While that is true, if the 2 swarms were even approaching equivalent mass the lighter drones would have a huge advantage. Groups of smaller ships are generally more cost effective for their firepower. It's not really much of an issue now since you're limited to what you fly yourself, but if the game gets to the point where you need to control multiple sectors or systems of territory stationing groups of smaller ships for defense will likely do better than stationing a titan.

 

[Keptick]

Due to smaller profiles, better use of efficiency curves, and better options for re-positioning, a fight between fully player-piloted forces of equal mass will more often than not be in favor of those with smaller but more numerous craft.

#ThrynSquad
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A laptop breaking mixed swarm of 1000 will, WILL destroy anything. ANYTHING I TELL YOU!!!!!!

Unless the capital ship you're facing is a super carrier that can deploy more fighter than you :p. In that case the thing most likely to be destroyed is the server.

 

[Lecic]

For combat: lolno

Other reasons: Landing on planets, having a sexy yacht, not causing a server to lag to death, shuttles, RP, lack of $$$, etc...

Edit: Almost forgot drones.

For combat: lolyes, provided you have the faction member count

For example- FlyingDebris's Cherokee is a well built 600k mass ship. However, it could be taken down by something like 5 or 6 Thryn Apollyons (20k mass each) without losing a single one as long as they stay away from the main guns. Small ship fleets dominate large ships. Small ships do not need to be at a "drone" scale to massacre ships.

 

[Keptick]

For combat: lolyes, provided you have the faction member count

For example- FlyingDebris's Cherokee is a well built 600k mass ship. However, it could be taken down by something like 5 or 6 Thryn Apollyons (20k mass each) without losing a single one as long as they stay away from the main guns. Small ship fleets dominate large ships. Small ships do not need to be at a "drone" scale to massacre ships.

240k mass, not 600k. You would've been massacred had it been 600k :P

 

[Lecic]

240k mass, not 600k. You would've been massacred had it been 600k :p

We're both wrong. It's 316k mass. I was thinking of the Apollyon's shield DPS with the 600k.

 

[FlyingDebris]

This is why I'm reequipping the Cherokee's (already extensive) turrets to destroy 20k mass ships (which are already only debatably small) more efficiently. What's this thread about? Small ships? Heh, nope.

 

[Sgtwisky]

Hum... I'm just wondering. But what size do all of you consider small? I think of it being something less then maybe one or two thousand mass.

 

[Ragged Design]

I haven't built anything bigger than 5000 mass. I've also been playing mostly single player and building my ships out of the pirates I kill...

 

[Sgtwisky]

Wow. You build pretty small lol. Also, welcome to the forums Ragged Design.

 

[jontyfreack]

I build ships up to 200 mass.................so I think that would be counted as small

 

[Lecic]

I haven't built anything bigger than 5000 mass. I've also been playing mostly single player and building my ships out of the pirates I kill...

Maybe my perceptions are a bit tilted from faction warfare, but I'd say anything below 150k blocks is small, and anything up to around 400k blocks is medium sized.

 

[NeonSturm]

Soon, there might be a limit on how fast you can expand (miners can only be built/purchased for resources you obtain via missions or with play-time). You may have to protect this expansion with other blocks to not lose "miners gained with play-time".

But we don't know what really comes. Any resource-limit may fix this issue we are talking about.

Again, it depends on what people think 'small' is.
I'm not saying all smaller ships are garbage. When I talk small I refer to ships < 2-3k blocks with compact dimensions. In situations like that building bigger is a straight upgrade aside from turn speed.

Tiny : Everything smaller than a manned craft with RP-cockpit at least.
Small : A fighter/interceptor/shuttle for 1-4 players/NPCs with 2 small OR 1 a bit larger turret and minimal + uncomfortable interior space.
Medium : A ship that can at max take 1 small craft and has 3-8 crew members.
Large : A ship with multiple docking bays : 1 medium 2 small and 4 tiny, or twice as much. Crew = 3 + crew for dock-able entities.
Huge : Warships which only show up when 3-5 Large are already involved. Serial-Eaters of asteroids. Ships that drain the stock of a trading station. Warp-Gate deployers.
Extra : The biggest unclassified ships your faction possesses, space-whales and stations.

In my classification, a ship possesses all abilities of ships a class below them - even those of different categories. The mass difference is about 8x to 16x to lower class, so this shouldn't be much of a problem.

Light versions use only the minimal specification. Medium versions beat light ones, Heavy versions can beat a next-class ship if 2-3 work together.​

 

[jontyfreack]

in one on one, big will beat small, always. however if its mass to mass, small ships will always beat big ships.

also small ships are very effective at exploiting a hole in a big ships armour, because you can get very close and shoot the systems.

also I prefer to use a small ship if I am going to explore the universe (expecting to PVE, or PVP if multiplayer) because A. I like them and I use them like a house lol B. pew pew pew, instead of pew pew C. generally much faster than a capital ship D. can easily dodge missiles, even swarmers. E. I can land on planets and hide.
why fight when you can mess with their minds? be everywhere at once, yet nowhere. shoot off all their cameras and turrets without them noticing too much. the look on their face when they find out that their capital was nearly taken out by a 237 mass fighter, and they then realise that you have been tailing them for two hours and have taken out all of their turrets and have engraved your faction emblem onto the side of their ship. that is why I like small ships.

 

[NeonSturm]

What I forgot in my previous post:
Ships with turrets need to cover 2 half-spheres (except you use long-reload turrets on a rotating ring "©by NeonSturm").

Most turrets however are blocked by the ship's wings or tower and cover more or less 1/4 of all directions.
This means that any attack force with forward-facing weapons will meet only 1/4 the maximum firepower.
Maybe just 1/6, sometimes even 1/8 if they choose the right attack-angle or if the enemy ship has ill-balanced coverage to favour front-facing weaponry.

Defence-drones and missiles might turn the tide in favour of the big ship again (especially when it tanks alpha-strikes or dps with superior total shielding).

 

[Pacific_Jim]

From my experience you need quite a lot of drones to make a difference in giant ship battles. Enough to at least make the server not melting a concern.