Yeah, I was very surprised to see they were cheaper than battleships.
It seems that there are a few very distinct 'eras' for combat.
Starfighter/corvette/defender era.
Frigate/Battelcruiser/Battleaxe/Battlehammer era.
Battleship/Dreadnaught era.
I guess there's likely a 4th era, but I haven't gotten far enough in tech to see it.
By the time the Dreadnaught era arises, the ships from previous eras aren't very useful. Yes, Corvettes and frigates make very good raiders... but unfortunately, it's a strictly human advantage as the AI doesn't look at it like that.. it'll gladly throw it's early era ships against my Dreads and the only result is to give my ships experience. It also means if you happen to be the first person to reach a new era and exploit the new designs, you get a significant advantage over your opponents. This problem is compounded by the bonus% over time. A fighter in the third era might have a 6/3 attack/defense (say a +200% bonus).. but a battleship gets the same tripling effect to IT'S base stats.
I think there's two possible solutions...
The first is likely the easiest - change or add designs to make progression more linear and to lessen the size of the 'power jumps' of ship designs. This would make it more likely that the suicide attacks made by the computer against my Dreads will have some sort of effect. Starfighters and corvettes might still do nothing, but a frigate might do a bit of damage before dying, perhaps 5 'light cruisers'(as an example of a new design) may even manage to kill one.
The second is a lot more labor intensive (for Frogboy that is, not for me
) - that's to recode the combat AI. Make the computer realize which attacks are futile.. make it start avoiding my Dreadnaughts with it's corvettes and frigates and using them on my transports and freighters. (it also needs to be coded to protect it's own transports).
The AI could also benefit from targetting priorities.. I had an enemy battleship chase one of my sensor drones for 5 turns until I got my own battleship in the area and killed the enemy. It was too slow to catch it, and not bright enough to realize it couldn't catch it.. and it's just a sensor drone. If the AI had targetting priorities, it should try and direct it's ships against targets it's own size or 1-2 classes smaller within say 3 turns movement (and sensor range of one of it's units). The add a secondary function where it will take an soft kill (like a sensor drone) if it can reach the target this turn, and no primary targets are in range.
Right now though, I'm glad the AI isn't that smart.. I've just finally figured out how to match the computer's early game expansion. I'm going to win a painful difficulty game for the first time because I matched it's expansion.. and because I managed to play my enemies against one another. A smart combat AI would have screwed me this game...
But it won't be long before I'll be looking for a stronger military challenge.
Stardock Forums
) - that's to recode the combat AI. Make the computer realize which attacks are futile.. make it start avoiding my Dreadnaughts with it's corvettes and frigates and using them on my transports and freighters. (it also needs to be coded to protect it's own transports).