Stellaris

Battleship
Corvette
Destroyer
Cruiser

Cruiser CAN be fitted out to tank but if you're not building them for speed why bother building them at all.

And speed is hellaciously good right now.

Cruisers with two tier-2 afterburners are just as fast as a destroyer with one afterburner (speed 221). With a fast admiral nd 2+ system sighting it is almost impossible to catch a fleet of them with battleships... so you can destroy anchorages (fleet cap) or shipyards or pull their main fleets away from the front then run away.

The AI generally builds planetary fortresses for jump interdiction so you'd either need to preposition them before the war or crack a choke point early to get them past.

There is no point to Cruisers, sure you can run away from Battleships but the torpedo Corvettes will run you down and murder you.

Also, and apologies if you already know this, but battle computers in 2.0 need to be micromanaged extensively. The Battle computer dictates how your ships will operate/move in combat. This is especially important for Destroyers and Cruisers, since depending on what weapon size you use, you either want your ships to get into close range or stay back and play the artillery role.

Late game combat computers also provide a pretty substantial buff depending on which one you choose. For example, picking Swarm vs Picket on a Corvette can be the difference between significant evasion (iirc 15-20% on psi computers) to significant accuracy bonus (like 40% tracking i think?). Also, I like to prioritize those computers early because the base computer each hull gets is pretty bad.

And totally agree with Khorum's ranking on ships. Cruisers right now are pretty awful to use and only have 1 function - to move quickly with afterburners and Corvettes as a first responder fleet.

General Antony said:

There is no point to Cruisers, sure you can run away from Battleships but the torpedo Corvettes will run you down and murder you.

Click to expand...

Havent actually seen the AI field a all-torpedo corvette fleet, but yeah, they'd certainly fuck up speed-fitted cruisers. But then again, just about everything else will.

Furry said:

I had a nice choke point on the south border of my last game. Even was the gargantua system with the best result. Built a massive space fortress there and it was enough to hold off all three of the empires bordering me there from invading.

Click to expand...

Yeah once you’ve got them upgraded with three ion beam platforms and all the passives they can do a good job holding their own until a fleet can crawl there.

I get the logic of putting the bulk of the starbase upkeep costs on the platforms actually. Late game you’re gonna need dozens of citadels fitted purely with anchorages for fleet cap to counter the crises. The crises themselves could use tweaking too.... the contingency and unbidden fleets are ridiculously fast for their weight.

Oh yeah never use the auto-designs lol. The targetting computer slot should prolly be relabeled “ship role computer” or something, since it governs that design’s behavior in battle...you want to optimize the ship’s behavior with its loadout...standoff weapons should be artillery, high-evasion for fast ships etc.

LachiusTZ said:

Yeah ... Didn't know that either. Figured it was just more accuracy / evasion.

Since I started rigging up my own designs, the game got a lot easier. Lol

Click to expand...

Yeah you can design a fleet that can wipe out an opposing fleet 3x its size with the right load outs. If they have lots of corvettes, go for high rate of fire, high tracking weapons. Lots of point defense for missiles etc. PD and flak stacking can pretty much shut down a missile-based fleet for a fraction for the cost.

That's just some guy's buillshit about how things should work in theory. If you want practical advice you need to look at combat testing.

https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/foru...rge-fleet-collider-2-0-fleet-balance.1071646/

Well the beta 2.0.2 patch raises the max number of titans from 3 to 20.... so lategame fleets will be even slower and vulnerable to fast fleet shenanigans.

Just be a shitlord and use 100% torpedo/autocannon corvettes.