Siege ships vs. Capital Ships

Doing ONLY siege.

from Sins Forums
One of the balances that strikes me as peculiar, is the balance between Siege ships and Capital ships. The odd thing is when you strike out all the other abilities of a capital ship, and use them ONLY for siege. They hold up surprisingly well against a siege ship.

Siege ships chew up a whopping 15 fleet capacity, while capital ships require 50. This is not counting the capital ship slots, which a player will eventually pick up. For a siege ship to beat out a capital ship by fleet composition, it has to be able to out do the capital ship's use of fleet cap. This means roughly 3 siege ships match up against one capital ship, counting against ship cap.

The cost of siege ships isn't cheap. They take around 725 Credits, 95 metal, and 75-80 crystal depending on race. A Capital ship costs 3000$, 400M, and 250C across the board. This puts siege ships at roughly a quarter the cost of capital ships, using 1/3 of the crystal. So to be more cost effective, 4 siege ships have to win out over a capital ship.

Okay, so how do the numbers play out? First, is the raw siege damage. Siege ships do 20-23 damage every 10 seconds, vs. a capital ship doing around 50-60/10sec. Capital ships lose out here, matching up to only 2.5-3 siege ships worth of damage. That comes out to roughly 10-25% less up front siege damage per unit of supply. That's a pretty small margain to lose out by.

Second is the ship endurance. Capital ships win out using capital ship type armor, while siege ships use light armor. A capital ship takes less damage up front from every weapon type except for very heavy style weapons, and other capital ship basic weapons. For health, siege ships sit just around 675, for total shields+hull. Capital ships, on the other hand, start off with at least 4000 total! Through levels they can gain at least half more. This puts them at having 6 times the health of a siege ship, plus the armor type bonuses. One high level sieging capital ship can be 10 times as tough as its competitor.

For speed and maneuverability, siege ships are just slightly faster than capital ships at top speed. But this appears to be changing in 1.04, where capital ships seem to be getting a major speed buff. Never mind that.

But wait, there's more! Some capital ships have devastating anti planet powers, on top of their attack. The TEC siege ship has raze planet, which adds an additional 80 damage(+10 population) times 2/4/6 every 40-50 seconds. This adds up to being roughly the same as having an extra 2/4/6 siege ships in the mix! The Vasari colony cruiser has Drain Planet, which can deal the damage equal to 7 siege ships over time (and some of that cooldown is spent prowling the next target). Mass Hysteria can be both excellent on major worlds, or mediocre on simple asteroids. Regardless, these abilities once again put capital ships far ahead of the PRIMARY role of siege ships.

So, my question is:
Why ever use siege ships? Ever? Capital ships do the same thing better, in just about every way imaginable.
40,578 views 24 replies
Reply #1 from Sins Forums Top
But wait, there's more!
Capital ships can FIGHT. They fight far FAR better than siege ships can. They also have abilities that siege ships can't even dream of. So even when they aren't being used for siege, they can do something else equally useful for the space they take up in the fleet. Siege ships can only kill planets, and nothing more.
Reply #2 from Sins Forums Top
Methinks Siege Ships should get a massive damage bonus against all types of structures. Furthermore, since they're "siege" and not "hit-n-run" ships(as they are used right now), I think that al of them should require some type of a deployment mechanic, similar to the Vasari Charged Missiles. And then their damage and health should be increased, their speed decreased and cost decreased and their build time increased. They should still be pretty much useless against ships
WindowBlinds - Free yourself of the default settings, customize your desktop.
Reply #3 from Sins Forums Top
Methinks Siege Ships should get a massive damage bonus against all types of structures.
End of quote
I don't think this can be done without implementing a new weapon type. It would have to be a weapon that can not engage ships, but only structures.

Furthermore, since they're "siege" and not "hit-n-run" ships(as they are used right now), I think that al of them should require some type of a deployment mechanic, similar to the Vasari Charged Missiles.
End of quote
Since when does a ship have to transform? Siege ships already have a deployment mode. They stop putting energy into the engines, and start putting it into the weapons. Being spaceships, they can do this far faster and with much less vulnerability than a giant wooden trebuchet.

And then their damage and health should be increased, their speed decreased and cost decreased and their build time increased.
End of quote
I feel that making drastic changes to a siege ship's abilities against planets would be very detrimental to the balance of ship vs. planet warfare. In earlier versions, siege ships were annoying because a swarm could instagib a planet, move on to the next, and you were helpless even pitting all your forces against them. I don't want to return to that again.

They should still be pretty much useless against ships
End of quote
Should they be useless against any ships in particular, or just useless against all of them? There are plenty of ship types to weigh their planetary weapons against. Ever consider the possibility of of big expensive gun vs. capital ship?
Reply #4 from Sins Forums Top
I have a novel idea.

Keep the Siege ships as they are right now.. AND...

Implement planet shielding as a tech option. And only siege ships can penetrate the shield without any side effects. Instead of the siege ships standing there like capital ships to bombard from orbit, rather animate them by making bombing runs on the planet, therefore bypassing the planetary shield.

Reply #5 from Sins Forums Top
1. Not really. Vulkoras has the exact thing as a passive ability. Take that effect, empower it some and give it to siege ships.
2. Balance for one. And if you want a SciFi example, Star Trek: Nemesis'(however bad a movie it was) Scimitar had a planet killing weapon that required deployment. Let's just say that the weapon components can not be exposed to some kinds of space radiation for a long time bla bla bla...
3. Now this is borderline strawmanning. How does a slower ship that requires several seconds to deploy, fire and then change over to mobile form again equal instagibbing a planet and moving over to the next, and leaving you helpless to defend against it? The deployment mechanic would make it a pretty big decision to either move away, wait or commit your forces, knowing that it isn't a simple right-click-them-away maneuver to retreat.
4. Yes, they should be useless against all of them. Balance for one, ease of implementation for two. They're already deadly to buildings and planets, why enforce the spam-siege-craft mechanic by making them effective against caps? Plus, since they would now require to be deployed, and are themselves a pretty short-ranged and fragile unit, I don't think anyone would even want to use them in that role.
Reply #6 from Sins Forums Top
If you are confused to my replies, it's because you read my arguments upside down. I put quotes first, then the reply to that quote.

Not really. Marza DN has the exact thing as a passive ability. Take that effect, empower it some and give it to siege ships.
End of quote
The Marza's passive ability sets fire to everything but planets. It does not select one unit type over another. It's not even close. You're not even on the same topic.

There is an option for special abilities to distinguish between orbital modules, capital ships, and frigates. I do not know if it also applies to basic weapons.

2. Balance for one. And if you want a SciFi example, Star Trek: Nemesis'(however bad a movie it was) Scimitar had a planet killing weapon that required deployment. Let's just say that the weapon components can not be exposed to some kinds of space radiation for a long time bla bla bla...
End of quote
These aren't 1-shotting planet killers that destroy all life. These are prepackaged solutions for slowly taking out a planet's government and supporting infrastructure. You don't NEED them to engage a special deployment mode. They can shoot just fine as they are. "Just because every other game does it and it looks cool!" is not reason enough to fundamentally change the ship during siege. (BTW, that's the Bandwagon argument, as you seem to be interested in those.)

3. Now this is borderline strawmanning. How does a slower ship that requires several seconds to deploy, fire and then change over to mobile form again equal instagibbing a planet and moving over to the next, and leaving you helpless to defend against it? The deployment mechanic would make it a pretty big decision to either move away, wait or commit your forces, knowing that it isn't a simple right-click-them-away maneuver to retreat.
End of quote
Your suggestion is to make the ships slower, but more durable and deadly to compensate. It's the durability and damage that makes them deadly for steamrolling a sector. A few seconds of deployment is not going to be a crushing difference in a game where moving across sectors takes MINUTES.

My whole argument is that siege ships vs. planets shouldn't be changed. This is PRECISELY why I say that, because it's too slippery a slope! Killing planets is a VERY fickle role, with changes either way dramatically changing the course of the game. This is not the same with other theatres of combat such as fighters/frigates/orbital structure/cap ships.

They're already deadly to buildings and planets, why enforce the spam-siege-craft mechanic by making them effective against caps?
End of quote
You are now being deliberately misleading. Siege ships use their standard armament against buildings. They are in no way effective against them.

Anyway, what I'm trying to point out is that the siege ship is completely broken at its PRIMARY role, when pitted against a capital ship's SECONDARY role.

Implement planet shielding as a tech option. And only siege ships can penetrate the shield without any side effects. Instead of the siege ships standing there like capital ships to bombard from orbit, rather animate them by making bombing runs on the planet, therefore bypassing the planetary shield.
End of quote
Well, that's an interesting approach. I thought only TEC had planetary shields, though? Other races uses different approaches to protecting their planets.
Reply #7 from Sins Forums Top
Yeah, they're basically worthless as a general rule right now. In 1.02 they were already pretty crappy, but then 1.03 came and made them not worth building at all.
Reply #8 from Sins Forums Top
Wasn't confused.
The Marza's passive ability sets fire to everything but planets. It does not select one unit type over another. It's not even close. You're not even on the same topic.

There is an option for special abilities to distinguish between orbital modules, capital ships, and frigates. I do not know if it also applies to basic weapons.
End of quote

Vulkoras, I corrected myself while you were writing your post.
These aren't 1-shotting planet killers that destroy all life. These are prepackaged solutions for slowly taking out a planet's government and supporting infrastructure. You don't NEED them to engage a special deployment mode. They can shoot just fine as they are. "Just because every other game does it and it looks cool!" is not reason enough to fundamentally change the ship during siege. (BTW, that's the Bandwagon argument, as you seem to be interested in those.)
End of quote

It's not bandwagon mentality. It's not like I'm trying to turn siege ships into Arclite siege tanks. Bottom line, they can't shoot just fine as they are. They are not being used like that. They are either completely ignored in favor of caps, or they are organised into little fleets and sent to harry your opponents planets. But thanks for saying I like bandwagons, I appreciate that!
Your suggestion is to make the ships slower, but more durable and deadly to compensate. It's the durability and damage that makes them deadly for steamrolling a sector. A few seconds of deployment is not going to be a crushing difference in a game where moving across sectors takes MINUTES.
End of quote
Where did I say that a few seconds is enough for the ship to change modes? I actually implied it to be a while, with the whole "make it a pretty big decision to either move away, wait or commit your forces" part. To be precise, it should take at least the amount of time the Jarrasul needs to pull off a 360 turn.
You are now being deliberately misleading. Siege ships use their standard armament against buildings. They are in no way effective against them.
End of quote
Deliberately misleading!? I wasn't referring to their state right now, but their state with the changes I proposed. I did that because I believed you were also talking about their state with my proposed changes with this part.
Should they be useless against any ships in particular, or just useless against all of them? There are plenty of ship types to weigh their planetary weapons against. Ever consider the possibility of of big expensive gun vs. capital ship?
End of quote
Context is everything.
Reply #9 from Sins Forums Top
You place a very solid arguement, one in which ill gladly challenge and explain why siege ships are useful. In the early game your arguement wins hands down. There usefulness is moot to the existance of capital ships. Its in the late game that they become necessary and quite lethal. Even more so in multi- player. First off in this later game phase eco is everything. Youve got a strong credit income from planets, trade and max allegiance from media. But a fleet of 20-30 siege ships can wreck a credit eco very fast. All those scouted planets with themax pop buildings on em are prime targets to get whiped clean. Big fleet of siege ships warp in, whipe planet clean, lose 5-10 ships, move to next planet. The objective is simply to harass without the attentions of bringing and entire fleet to lvl a system. Thats one use that even against the ai is quite effective. Another use is the colony push. Your warp in your war fleet and as there crushing the opposition you have your siege ships killing planet asap. Moment its health hits zero u colonize and start building turrets. This speeds up the colony push significantly by having your capital ships and fleets attend to defense platforms mines etc. Once those buildings are done you can push to the next planet and leave your colonizer and siege ships there to finish tieing things up. This in general you cant say the same for with capital ships. Capital ships are much to valuable to sit around wasting a planets health down. Now im not saying that you need alot of em, like 3-5 per attack fleet gets the job done. Just make sure to warp em in when the opposing enemy fleet is close to dead.
Reply #10 from Sins Forums Top
Good idea regicide. What if they had siege mode? Siege ships when moving take the same damage they take now. But they move to planet, and divert power to mitigation. Thus, when siegeing, siege ships are much tougher. That would make them worth their cost, but still counter able by fighter runs as they approach a planet.
Reply #11 from Sins Forums Top
That's a good strategy Terlanis. But my question is whether the cost and supply of 20-30 siege ships is worth it? That's not cheap! Why not just put that money and supply into building a small minor fleet and then not only do you destroy the planet you can take out defenses too? Another advantage with a small fleet is you can always have them join up with your main one if you need a big push. Siege ships aren't useful for too much else except sieging...
Reply #12 from Sins Forums Top
One additional minor correction to the first post:
A Capital ship costs 3000$, 400M, and 250C across the board.
End of quote
...plus the necessary research to open up the trained crew slot, and that's not a trivial amount.

-- Retro
Reply #13 from Sins Forums Top
I think a major point in being missed here. First, one minor one is the amount to research capital ship crew points. It's not cheap and you don't get many of them. You're completely ignoring the cost of those upgrades.

More importantly, the fact that the caps are the backbone of your combat fleets is exactly WHY I don't want to use them in late game as my planet bombardment. They're far too valuable elsewhere to waste sitting in a conquered sector for 10 minutes killing off the planet. I need them to move on and engage the enemy forces. I can have a small siege ship fleet mop up the planet while my combat fleet moves on.

Bottom line, there simply are not enough cap ships slots available and they are far too valuable in other roles to be using them for planet bombardment. Me thinks you are playing an excessively slow play style, (which won't work at all in multiplayer) and that's why you don't see the need for them. You are content to take one planet out, sit there for 10 minutes with your fleet doing nothing while you bombard it, and colonize it before moving on. This works just fine against the AI, because it's terrible and will just let you do it. If it had any sense and was attacking you elsewhere while your huge fleet sits there waiting for 2 or 3 caps to take out that 6000 HP planet, you wouldn't be able to get away with this strategy, you'd be getting killed in the meantime.

You're comparison of DPS vs. Fleet slots is simply too narrow in the end. Fleet points are not the only resource that matters in the game. Time is very important and using cap ships for your primary bombardment is INSANELY slow.

Think of it this way...the important thing is how much DPS is your entire fleet doing, across the entire map?? If you are using your cap ships to bombard, you are GREATLY reducing your overall DPS galaxy-wide. Having a separate "bombardment" fleet to follow your combat fleets around enables you to keep your ships dealing damage against your enemy more often instead of sitting around doing nothing.
Reply #14 from Sins Forums Top
Think of it this way...the important thing is how much DPS is your entire fleet doing, across the entire map?? If you are using your cap ships to bombard, you are GREATLY reducing your overall DPS galaxy-wide.
End of quote


Trading away 300-500 supply points of combat ships for ships that can basically only siege wouldn't greatly reduce your dps galaxy wide, though? I would think that would be enough of a fighting handicap to lose a game.
Reply #15 from Sins Forums Top
Trading away 300-500 supply points of combat ships for ships that can basically only siege wouldn't greatly reduce your dps galaxy wide, though? I would think that would be enough of a fighting handicap to lose a game.
End of quote
This is the point. Sure, using capital ships on a siege takes away their effectiveness elsewhere. But using siege ships takes away the effectiveness of your entire fleet. At the very least, a capital ship can resume its duties as a fighting badass when the siege is done. A siege ship has no other options, takes up a very high amount of fleet space, but its primary role can't even match up to a capital ship's secondary role. This is not the case with other ship types, which can eventually overwhelm a capital ship's combat ability for cost.

Also, some capital ships have amazing abilities to take down a world. These abilities can end up being better than twice the capital ship's total cost, if it were placed into siege ships. That advantage can definitely pay off the cost of an extra cap ship slot.

I'll admit, there was one time I used siege ships. I sent 2 to take out an isolated asteroid on the side, because I wanted my cap ships on front. I forgot to scuttle them afterwards, but they died sometime in my main fleet.
Reply #16 from Sins Forums Top
Another problem, is that a capital ships can defend planets as well, and an siege ship is only good at destroying them.
Reply #17 from Sins Forums Top
I think 6 fighters can 1 pass a siege frigate right now. Giving the enemy 60 something exp. That right there means I NEVER BUILD ONE AGAINST A HUMAN.
Reply #18 from Sins Forums Top
I agree that for siege work, you're better off building the siege capitals than siege frigates. That said, I think maybe you're misreading the cost a little bit. In addition to the 3000/400/250 that a siege cap costs, you gotta figure in the cost of researching the ship slot. But even with that being counted, I still think siege caps are better. With special abilities, they can destroy a planet as quickly or even faster than an equivalent cost and supply in siege frigates. Plus, unlike siege frigates, siege caps are effective in ship to ship combat. In fact, my experience has been that siege capitals are the best for ship to ship combat with the exception of battleships. Certainly, I feel a Marza could destroy any carrier cap, colony cap, or support cap in one on one combat pretty easily.

At best, siege caps might be slightly more expensive than siege frigates when comparing cost vs how quickly you can take down a planet, but you get so much more with a siege cap that it more than offsets any cost differential.
Reply #19 from Sins Forums Top
Researching the capital cap
End of quote


Well, the thing with that is that you only have to research that once, if you lose the sieges, you have to pay their full price every single time. The capitals may be a little more expensive the first time for pure sieging purposes, but if they die, you don't have to research capital ship crew again to build them again.
Reply #20 from Sins Forums Top
No, only pay the three thousand again to rebuild them. And that's not cheap either.

Can really competitive players afford to have three thousand sitting around doing nothing in early- or mid-game, let alone several hundred crystal and metal?
I think 6 fighters can 1 pass a siege frigate right now.
End of quote
I don't think six fighters can one-pass a trade ship let alone a siege frigate. But the point is valid.

-- Retro
Reply #21 from Sins Forums Top
It is my view that siege frigates are largely crap. There may be an opportunity when you may find them useful, if you absolutely can't afford to use your battle fleet to flatten the planet, AND you can spare however many supply you need to do the job in equivalent time with an otherwise useless mass of siege frigates, but I somehow don't see it. The amount of supply you'd be wasting on siege frigates would get your battlefleet vaporized when your opponent spends it on LRMs. I suppose you could use maybe a HANDFUL of siege frigates to destroy a planet SLOWLY, seeing as it's not exactly going to fire back at you, while you overrun it and press forward, but eh.

One point to consider is that if the only thing left attacking the planet is a bunch of siege frigates, not much is stopping your opponent from simply sending his fleet and blowing your siege frigates to little bits, then recolonizing the planet if you managed to kill it. Having your capital fleet in orbit will force him to either fight you in force or give up and do something else entirely.
Reply #22 from Sins Forums Top
I'd also like to point out that capital ships suppress culture. If there's any planet with a broadcast tower around, you will not be able to take the planet without a capital ship presence to knock that culture down, anyway.

Siege ships do not suppress culture, giving yet another disadvantage against capital ships used for siege.
Reply #23 from Stardock Forums Top
Can really competitive players afford to have three thousand sitting around doing nothing in early- or mid-game, let alone several hundred crystal and metal?
End of quote


Siege ships are used when you're already pressing an advantage. If you have time to sit around waiting on the resources to put together any kind of decent siege fleet, I don't see how waiting on an equal sum for a cap ship would be any different.

Unless, of course, you're planning to go sieging with less than the cost-equivalent 4 frigates, in which case, you're just waiting an eternity for 3 or fewer easily-dispatched frigates to kill a planet rather than waiting on resources for a much more useful ship.
Reply #24 from Sins Forums Top
What they should do, is REMOVE seige ships. Replace them with Troopships. These would drop shuttles down on the planet, and work the exact same way as nukes do (every shuttle would drop a planets HP by an amount). The difference, would be at zero HP, the planet becomes yours, but with no damage to infrastructure.

This way, a troopship is a big investment, and not worth it when compared to other fleet vessels. However, a troopship will allow faster planet capture, since you wont need to rebuild every time. All techs could be reworded to make more sense(Improved Marine Power-Armor, instead of better nukes). Another advantage would be troops dont care about culture, so a cultured planet could still be invaded (If this stays balanced).

To implement this, they only need to change the animations, and the way a planet turns over(Dont reset everything). If possible, it would also be nice if troopships could capture other buildings as well.

*To prevent lameness, nuking a planet will now damage infrastructre, so if you nuke a planet to 1 HP, then troopship it, you wont really gain anything special*