In the case of most developers I agree. The point of "hiding" or more accurately not disclosing it is part of the marketing plan in recent years with after market tip, guide and insider books. With SD/IC this is simply not true however. It is likely that small stuff like this simply got over looked when one considers the scope and size of this project from such a small developer and publisher.

Simply put they dont have all the money necessary to flesh out all aspects of the game with regards to resource allocation. Believe it or not the manual we got cost a small fortune from what I understand. Beside they have to leave something for us modmen and community bean counters.

Well, Civ 4 has its share of semi-hidden data, too.

I had to turn to the internet to learn a lot about civ4, the civopedia basically says 'fighting causes war weariness' [They don't tell you that fighting on your own terrain doesn't contribute to it, that attackers get less if they win, but defenders get the same whether they win or lose]

The section on combat is sort of a vague glossing over of the mechanics, with no examples.

I discovered only recently that you research techs faster depending on how many other people already know the tech, I don't remember seeing any mention of that in game.

There is a minimum of detail on the espionage system, even simple things like explaining the global cost modifier. Some of the time, I can't do certain espionage missions and I have no clue why, as the game gives me no hints at all.

Don't get me wrong, I love civ4 and enjoy it, but it's not extremely forthcoming with data.

Alpha Centauri, on the other hand, had most of the exact formulas listed in its help thing, including one for commerce that was really really long. It was, now that I look, a ten step process that gave you the exact number.

If the devs posted all this information up front, what would I do all day?

/tonguecheek

Exactly. That is the right mind set. Some things are more meaningful if one discovers them.

[put on flame retardant suit]

nm

I spammed vasari's flak frigs last game, which use phase missiles. :3

They are quite effective.

100% damage to LRMS, but the thing is they have 1kish HP and heavy armor, so most things do only 25%-75% damage to them. And the vasari ones benefit from phase missile upgrades i assume(which is odd since fighters don't have shields).

Using them I could clear out LRMS and bombers with ease and allow caps to do the rest. They kept the space clear for me to use my own fighters to bring down lrms faster.

Also, interestingly, it seems fighters give insane ammounts of XP. I just sat outside and asteroid with 3 vasari caps and 50 or so flaks and the enemies 30 or so carriers and hanger defenses kept sending fighters and bombers at me, which did nothing but my caps rapidly leveled. My cap gained 4 levels when it was over(Granted, i was sitting outside for a long time, it's still the fastest I've ever leveled)


It really seems to me that gaurdians+tons of defenders+mothership+carrier+lrms combo would be extremely hard to beat. Currently you see a lot of people doing that but without the defenders, which is hard enough to beat. Add in the defenders and I don't really see how you'd stop it.. Not much has anti-heavy damage.

I'd be interested to know which races flak frig is best (with practical upgrades)

The basic Light Frigate.

Clutters the UI too much, but a table would've been nice along with other information say in a manual or listed on a website somewhere.

Which no one builds because of all the lrm spam that owns them

Is there any explaination as to why anti-med wpns are more effective against very hvy and cap armor (both 75%) compared to anti-hvy wpns against very hvy and cap armor (both 50%)? I would have thought that anti-hvys (being closer to the target types) should be better.

Probably balance -- rather than draw up an artificial table and then making the units conform to it, they just decided what they wanted the units to do then made the table conform to it

It's so that LRMs like the Javelis and Assailant do more damage to medium, v-heavy and cap armor than basic frigates like the Cobalt and Skirmisher. It simulates missile weaponry and makes up for their lighter armor.

In fact, I see no reason why anyone would build Ravastra Skirmishers anyway. They have just about nil advantage over tier-1 Kanrak Assailants. Their slightly better durability is pointless when compared to the Assailant's much longer striking range, far stronger weaponry, shield-negation ability, area-effect damage-dealing capability, slightly cheaper cost, lower supply requirement, etc.

Hi guys.

Sorry for the necro, but I'm new the Sins (bought Trinity a little while ago) and am the kind of person who *needs* to know all of this stuff.

How up to date is this information? I've found when searching myself that alot of the stated percentage damage dealt by different weapon types to different armour types is different now compared with everything I'm reading on the web.

Because of this, I'm trying to update the wiki page on "Ship Types" with the most current data that I find in the game files. 

I've found the "DAMAGEPERCENTBONUS" that each weapon type deals to each armour type (in Gameplay.constants), but can not find each ship types armour type, or even which weapon type each ship has.

Have all of the armour types and weapon types remained unchanged for each ship since this was posted? Is it only the numbers that have changed?

Regards.

 

**Edit **

I've found the armour types of all the ships (in the manual!!) apart from the Colony Frigates (it doesn't state a type) and the Strikecraft (it doesn't mention strikecraft at all).

The manual also lists each ships weapons, but doesn't mention what weapon type the ship is classes as, making knowledge of the armour type rather useless to be honest.

**Edit 2 **

The Trinity Manual states that the Carrier Cruisers have an armour type of "Medium", but all references on the web (the wiki and this thread, for example) are saying they have type "Heavy". Is this a typo in the manual or has it been changed from previous versions?

This is why I would like to know where to look in the game files for such information

The table there is no longer correct.  Please avoid necroing extremely old posts, as it can cause more confusion than it helps.  No one is going to fault you for creating a new thread if the most recent one is over a month old.

 

The actual damage and armor types of the current game (there's a table of modifiers elsewhere

Scouts = light armor, anti-light damage
Light Frigate = medium armor, anti-heavy damage
Long Range Frigate = light armor, anti-medium damage
Flak Frigate = medium armor, anti-very-light damage
Siege Frigate = light armor, anti-very-heavy damage
Colony Frigate = light armor, anti-light damage

Fighter = very-light armor, anti-light damage
Bomber = light armor, anti-very-heavy damage
Support Cruisers = heavy armor, anti-heavy damage
Heavy Cruiser = very heavy armor, composite (awesome vs everything) damage