by hoobajoo
SFRR wrote:
hoobajoo wrote:
fahbs2000 wrote:
Want some advice?
2 big mistakes most new players end up making: thinking dreadnauts and PDS units are worth it.
Dreadnauts are such a terrible value that the only circumstance I would ever get them is if I had unlimited resources, could only build one ship due to build limits, and didn't have warsuns.
You'd think PDS units would be the best for turtling in a system but they're not. You're paying 2 resources for a unit that basically amounts to a 50/50 chance of shooting down a single fighter before combat begins. If you want to defeat invading fleets, build ships. If you want to be immune to invasion, build more ground forces. You CAN develop technologies to make them more effective, but you'd be much better off with other technologies like Hylar, XRD, Enviro, Stasis capsules, and Warsuns.
2 big mistakes most new players end up making: thinking dreadnauts and PDS units are worth it.
Dreadnauts are such a terrible value that the only circumstance I would ever get them is if I had unlimited resources, could only build one ship due to build limits, and didn't have warsuns.
You'd think PDS units would be the best for turtling in a system but they're not. You're paying 2 resources for a unit that basically amounts to a 50/50 chance of shooting down a single fighter before combat begins. If you want to defeat invading fleets, build ships. If you want to be immune to invasion, build more ground forces. You CAN develop technologies to make them more effective, but you'd be much better off with other technologies like Hylar, XRD, Enviro, Stasis capsules, and Warsuns.
I think this is a bit of a simplistic analysis, since it's ignoring Fleet Supply (as an extension of CCs) as another resource to manage. Nothing matches the damage/cost efficiency of Destoyers, but they are the least efficient when it comes to Fleet Supply. And of course, while resources come back every turn (trade goods aside), CCs are the only resource that carries over from round to round.
I do think you're right that new players overvalue these units (esp. Dreadnoughts), but they both have their useful situations. You can't just look at their raw cost, you have to consider factors like CCs, build limits, the secondary on Production, and even the common political ramifications.
In my opinion, you are actually supporting Fahbs2000 position; DN's are only worth considering when fleet supply or production limitations demand it, more or less the same with PDS units. Fleets of CA's and CV's w/ftr support are much better than slower, less potent, less durable fleets formed around DN's, and the math on 4 GF's vs 1 PDS is fairly conclusive (though I will often put a PDS with 2-3+ GF's when I can to prevent DN bombardment on a strategically important planet).
If you look at my post, I in fact do say that Fahbs2000 is right in general; new players overvalue these units in general. All I was saying is that his reasons put forward were very shallow; a new player might well assume from reading his post that DN or PDS are never worth it, or are useless, which is not true. I'm not saying he's wrong in his overall conclusion, I'm saying it was over-generalized and too simplistic.