Survey -- Military starbases -- Do you use them?

No I do not use them.

I play on gigantic maps and I think they are a complete waste.

In fact I never put any defence or attack on any of my starbases.

I can see that they might be useful on a smaller map, but on a larger map they are a total waste.

I prefer to use ships that can move. I put my ships at the edges of my territory and as my territory expands my ships move to the new borders.

- Livonya

Late game because of my strategy I have a gigantic liquid treasury. I have enough military just to prevent computers from declaring war on me. After I max out all the techs however I mass the best types of ship I can, but they do have their limits so I bring along a few constructors with every fleet and create a military base near every major/intense battle to give me an extra boost.

Yeah I agree with this. I only play gigantic maps also and by the time I could get 5-10 constructors to a warzone the zone would have shifted somewhere else anyway.   

I use the other two kinds of starbases, though. Some will have defenses, some will not, and late-game no defenses at all.

they can be useful, but it depends on many factors. when they are useful is the question. i find them generally useful on smaller maps to defend small areas, or in a particular zone that's heavy with battle.

building several in a small area can also be useful for a specific effect. for example, sometimes i'll build a 'catapult.' i put 16 starbases on the intersection of 4 sectors, and add speed-boosting improvements to all of them. this is a great way to give a ship +32 speed for a turn, allowing you to send ships into far-off sectors very quickly.

are they worth it? that depends. are you having fun with them?

In general, I don't find them very useful on larger maps. You'd need to have some particular point in space that (a) sees a lot of combat and (b) is contested for a long time to make it worth piling on all those constructors. Generally, taking the fight to the enemy, and rolling forward as you take his planets, is a much stronger military strategy.

Use the credits you'd spend on constructors and modules to make more ships!

(I'm not saying I'd never use one, but I'd try mighty hard to avoid a defensive posture in the first place)

I like starbases for the bonus's they give. I wish the starbases had an auto-attack feature that when ememy ships come into range they would attack first.

Hmm... seems like alot of the questions about the usefulness of military starbases comes from playing larger maps where the proportion of space covered by the starbase is considerably smaller then on tinier maps.

Do any of you think that military starbases would be more uesful on a huge/gigantic map if their area of affect scaled similarly to how the range stat scales on a larger map? Is there a point where the aura would be large enough to be 'useful'? For example, military starbase aura covering a 2 sector radius on a huge map?

Just food for thought

I can only see it as a useful strategy for those people going for pure technology or pure influence victory. Military starbases play a more defensive game...so enemy ships coming into their territory have a big disadvantage.

It will be nice if Military starbase should automatically have the first weapons upgrade (1+ for all weapons) and shot anything in range...but cost 2.5x more than other starbases. A military starbase that can protect your ships, planets, and other starbases...that's awesome. But than players will start stacking military starbases as an exploit...perhaps limit stacking effect to two or just one. If these changes were made than this would be a very useful strategy defensive/offensive in any map size. Otherwise, a military bases are a waste of money.

Starbases shouldn't be able to move. But starbases that can manufactor ships...that whole different topic. It will also be nice to have the ability to merge any starbases with your ships into fleet as a defensive tatic.

I will use them (on medium maps) to protect vital areas, especially if I am fighting the Korath... but that is because I don't defend my worlds.

How I use them: Build 4 in a sector with key worlds. Upgrade each one only two to three times, the -2 enemy speed, +1 speed, and sometimes the second +1 speed. This gives a -8 speed to enemy ships moving towards your key worlds. This drastically stops enemy long range attacks, and enemy ships will move at you only one square per turn. At the same time, your ships are moving a minimum of 6 even without engines, often more like moves 12-15. I do not upgrade them with weapons (enemy ships should be destroyed before they make it through all of that slowdown to destroy the starbases) and I do not upgrade them with weapon/defense enhancing abilities. The cost of 8-12 constructors to put up this sort of "speed defense" around KEY worlds is worth it, IMO. This is about the only useful defensive tactic I have found in this game that works consistently.

Other than that one purpose (especially when fighting Korath), I never use them.

There kind of a catch 22 thing really... if you need them, you cannot afford them, if you can afford them, you do not need them!

I rarely use them, except in a region of space that enemies like to run through. That doesn't happen vary often, so I haven't used it in a few maps.

Every once in awhile I fight a two front war, so while I focus on one, I defend on the other. I augment the hot zones with military starbases.

But like I said at first, I don't use them very often.

I almost never use them.

I use them as a defence barrier and not to make some of my lesser ships completely obeleste. In fact if your lacking in military section, unite all your patroling fleets around one or two hevely upgraded starbases and no-one will want to hunt you anymore.

I play higher levels and never use them in any kind of map, but in small and medium maps it could happen i use attack/defense modules on mining starbases. Actually the cost of a well developed military starbase is so high that i prefer to build starships.

I think, talking about tactic, military starbases represent the general idea of giving a terrain advantage in a game that present a homogeneous territory and they should certainly be more powerful and more developed. The weakness of a tactical element in a game is easy to identify: if you can build somenthing when you don't need that something anymore it means its tactical impact is nullified.

My ideas:

1) I like constructors for starbases. It means you have to bring materials from a planet in order to build stuff on your bases. It's ok, it's a kind of realistic. But i also think the need for constructors for every single improvement on a starbase it's crazy. I would like to see a starbase-bar that allow you to put some of your money in the developement of all your bases (maybe with an "off" button in the detail screen if you don't want to upgrade a particular one). You should need constructors only for some milestone improvements and then let your money flow out and see your bases became jewels.

2) Military starbases should give you default advantages since the very beginning and:

- the two planetary defense improvements (that i never use so i never remember) should be instead starbase modules and planetary defense should be researchable immediatly after space weapons.
- military sb should give a tactical advantage to troops fighting on a planet in their influence area. A very good one, worth the high price of such a iron garbage in the middle of deep space.
- the range is too wide. I would like to see a narrower range but, if a battle happens in this range, starbases should be a part of it. It would mean, under certain circumstances, you can bring your enemy in your territory at your conditions. This will justify very much the construction of a military sb close to a planet.
- when you destroy one of your military sb (or any other sb) you should receive in exchange money or, better, some constructors. It makes sense: if you dismantle a sb you can use the old materials to build a new one. Maybe not everything but a lot (weapons for example, etc.).

All in all a tactical option in a game is worthless if it's not a balanced alternative to the other tactical options. And military starbases are clearly too expensive for the advantages they give you. Talking realistically, i think military starbases should be less expensive or more powerful in order to be a worth tactic. Until this doesn't change i won't use them because, as Lyvonia said before, fast fleets on your borders (with eye of the universe i would say) are the best defense system in the game.

richard

p.s. i think military starbases should be a priority in future patches because the question of "terrain effects" on battles is missed in GC and, whether is a core charachterization of the original game concept or not (i suspect it's not, due the fact someone actually introduced military sb), it would a great improvement to have, so to say, the option of battlefield tactics.

Hmmm... So there are some others who use military starbases, just not many.




I don't play gigantic maps often. I prefer the smaller maps where the game can be finished quickly. I'm however am playing a gigantic map right now. Its been a long time since I last did so, before I got good with military starbases. I can see why its difficult to use military starbases on larger maps, but I'm still finding them useful.



I do play defensively. I find it ammusing for my enemies to beat themselves to death against my defenses.

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Is there anyone else who would like to comment about this issue?

Heck yeah I use military starbases! And who says you have to use them defensively? Plonk them down on the OTHER guy's territory.

I tend to play Medium maps, on abundant/abundant. I like abundant settings, because that makes all 3 kinds of starbases able to envelope 4-6 planets at a time.

I do play on gigantic maps and I DO use them, especially around my home planet sector. Once upgraded they can be very useful to your ships, especially ones defending your homeworld. Plus, the bonuses they impart to your ships means that you don't necessarily have to have the baddest ships in the universe to stand a chance against invaders, thus allowing you to build cheaper defense ships, keep you maintenance budget low, and use the money elsewhere. Late game it doesn't really matter so much if your pretty much the dominant force, but when there are two or three civs at war with you and your still trying to complete some much needed research, the MB's can be a lifesaver.

Exactly. In other words, right when it really matters.

Dont use them very often, they take a lot of time to become useful.

Sorry for the typos, you're... not your...
Hate when I do that!

Hmm...

I guess the group of players that don't use, or like military starbases are merely very vocal...