Artillery

2dfx · January 20, 2002, 22:28

Does anybody use it?

k.k.fly · January 20, 2002, 23:00

not my cup of tea

I am looking very forward for some information though.

Vytae · January 21, 2002, 01:29

Basicly worthless,although it dominates worms,but thats all its really useful.

johndmuller · January 21, 2002, 01:41

Its not something I actually use a lot, but I definitely build them and they are good for a variety of different things.

I often prototype with an infantry artillery unit as it usually seems to be the cheapest (hence fastest) weapon-equipped unit you can buy. True, there are other units that cost the same thing, like a plain infantry unit, but you can't upgrade to something that you haven't prototyped, so I like to prototype something fast and I generally have other requirements, like armor or special abilities for the other types of units I want and those add a row or two to the cost (which is then increased by the prototyping surcharge). Of course, if you have a Skunkworks, you don't have to worry about that, but I believe that you still have to actually build the prototype, even if it doesn't cost more.

Arty can be very effective against native life.

(Land based) Arty gets a special bonus versus ship's artillery.

When used against bases and/or units stacked in the open and on transports, your artie gets one shot at each of the enemy units (unless they are stacked with an enemy artie, which will fight in their stead).

If someone attacks you with artie, you want to have some yourself, or else all your troops lose hit points. Troops also don't get repaired in a base as long as you keep up the attack.

If you are attacking a stronger force or an equal with higher morale or if you just want to improve your odds, you can soften them up with one or more turns of artie barrage until they get weak enough for you.

Ships can do all this stuff too, except for the disadvantage they have w/r land based arty.

I like rover based artie for taking on a land campaign because they can keep up with your rovers; they are, however, kind of expensive, especially when upgrading weapons levels.

Yxklyx · January 21, 2002, 07:58

Arty is awesome now with all the patches. I'm still trying to master it's use. They're the bane of armor-less speeders.

RedFred · January 21, 2002, 13:14

I use arty and missiles more when the battle odds are turned off.

MattyBoy · January 21, 2002, 20:33

I use it immediately before attacking a city that is defended by a large stack.

Maintaining at least one artillery in any attack force seems to pay dividends. At the beginning of the turn you look for the battle that will take the most out of your attacking force, then use your artillery against that enemy unit(s). This way you can win that battle at less cost to your non-artillery units. In tough battles, this allows you to sustain an attack for much longer.

Flubber · January 21, 2002, 20:40

I do not build bunches or arty but have found two uses

1. same as Mattyboy to make the odds a bit easier when attacking a tough base. When hitting a well defended base, a couple of arty might knock 20 or 30% off the defenders health

2. Anti worm--Mid to late game I will create a few SAM arty rovers. These things just decimate locusts and worms. 80-90% damage seems pretty typical and then they are easy pickings for anything else you have handy. Since I have adopted this strategy, I almost welcome the locust hordes for the cash influx

MattyBoy · January 21, 2002, 20:55

Hey this reminds me of how I discovered Yang and artillery in one of my first games of the old SMAC. Probably a familiar tale to many.

I was next to a powerful Yang. I began to despair when I discovered how many units (and bases) he could churn out, so I dedicated all of my efforts to war. Soon my weapon technology was marginally superior (perhaps enough to counter his extra defenses), so I churned out as many attackers as possible and went for one base at a time. I took the first base at great expense to management and kept building new units.

But then something changed (did he discover a new tech?) and I could no longer finish his units. I amassed hordes of attackers and kept all of his units near death, but they just would not die. I was truly desperate, as my faction was going down the toilet in every other respect and I had to win this war.

That was when I realised that it was my discovery of artillery that had made the difference. After that it took me a while to build another artillery unit.

Yxklyx · January 22, 2002, 00:22

Yeah, same experience here. Yang had (6)-1-1's everywhere - like 7 or more to a base. It was impossible getting my 6-1-2 Speeders in position. I think your only choices are to either close the "artillery gap" by building a bunch yourself or wait until choppers. Moving ships around was hard too though it looks like the AI never targets your foil transports with artillery.

mrdynamic · January 22, 2002, 13:15

Artillery works well for defense also. I usually try to keep at least 1 artillery in every front line base. There have been times when the enemy has weakened units inside of my base to 50% making in much harder to fend off an attack. If I keep artillery in the base, their artillery unit explodes trying to use it on my base 85% of the time.

Earwicker · January 22, 2002, 14:38

I have occasionally found artillery useful as a preemptive strike against amassed aircraft and missiles. The AI has a bad tendency to pile up its airforce in one base while it waits to use it. Artillery is particularly effective against these unarmored foes, and in my experience the AI won't use a damaged plane or missile to attack with. It can buy time to bring the troops in to wipe out the counterstrike capability.

That said, I usually only build artillery if my enemies come at me with artillery. It is common for me not to have built any until chaos weapons.

And a good "peacetime" use for artillery is to soften up fungal towers. But it won't do much damage until missiles or chaos.

Clear Skies · January 22, 2002, 15:03

I get irritated with artillery - it's normally not powerful enough, and too unpredictable in the amount of damage that it does...

Although occasionally it can be useful, especially with those bane-of-my-life Spore Launchers...

Fitz · January 22, 2002, 18:17

Quote:

Originally posted by SMAC Fanatic
Although occasionally it can be useful, especially with those bane-of-my-life Spore Launchers...

That's about my limit on artillery too. In the early game, a spore launcher on a Isle of the Deep is a real pain. Especially since you probably don't have a naval yard yet, so yer boats come out green. Empath hand weapon artillery can be a life saver.

If you stick trance on an artillery unit, does it get +50% on psi defense in an artillery duel with a spore launcher?

Yxklyx · January 22, 2002, 20:00

Though I rather not build artillery I find I'm forced to, either to prevent shore bombardment (there's nothing worse than losing a borehole to artillery) or to protect my lightly armored units. I think one arty per base for defense is a good idea.

MattyBoy · January 23, 2002, 01:00

Sorry Yxklyx, but it was actually me that discovered arty, not Yang. I just didn't notice and the design workshop snuck it onto my units, hence all of my units were arty and arty never completely destroys an enemy unit.

As for fungal towers, I patiently remove all of the fungus. Takes a long time, tho. I guess I will see what the artillery can do.

Sikander · January 23, 2002, 04:58

I find Arty useful in the early to midgame, especially when I'm concentrating on economic techs and am being harrassed by an aggressive AI who has a lead in military techs, especially airpower. I can drive away those annoying Pirate foils, and destroy those probe filled transports, blast runaway worms, or stacks of ecoworms, and even take the wind out of needlejets that attack my bases. It fills a void until I get choppers and the AI is doomed.

NorthSwordsman · January 23, 2002, 10:55

Quote:

Originally posted by Fitz

If you stick trance on an artillery unit, does it get +50% on psi defense in an artillery duel with a spore launcher?

IIRC, yes.

Lefty Scaevola · January 23, 2002, 11:11

Even low power artilery is very effective in crippling unarmored probe teams defending a base against probe action. Its reducing then to 10% making the easy kills in probe to probe combat.

Flubber · January 23, 2002, 13:21

I am experiencing the power of arty at the hands of the AI in a MP duel known as thunderdome (I replaced deimos in Thunderdome I). The map is such that there are a lot of 1 tile wide sea channels and strips of land. My rovers are under constant bombardment from arty which they cannot access by land as they go up the only land route to a certain destination

On one occasion my stack of 3 rovers and a probe team were bombarded 3 times, twice by one faction and once by another. They were weakened so much as to be ineffective and I retreated. THe only solutions I see are to get arty cover there or a transport so the rovers can get to their tormentors. It almost reminds me of the offshore spore launcher that never lands but plays havoc with your improvements.

NorthSwordsman · January 23, 2002, 16:33

Be interesting to see if the AI is effectively using those chokepoints as they are supposed to be used- chokepoints. This has been an interesting thread.

Flubber · January 23, 2002, 18:48

I doubt it was intentional but the AI was always hitting my units where the strip of land narrowed to 1 tile wide. How they could see me since it was a fungus tile and there are no sensors anywhere . . . well thats another issue.

NorthSwordsman · January 23, 2002, 20:13

Quote:

Originally posted by Flubber
I doubt it was intentional but the AI was always hitting my units where the strip of land narrowed to 1 tile wide. How they could see me since it was a fungus tile and there are no sensors anywhere . . . well thats another issue.

The Fungus hiding only applies to AI units and when you play against another human player. The AI ALWAYS sees your units. Unfair? You betcha. Can you do anything about it? Nope.

Will someone please rewrite the AI in this game?

Admiral · January 23, 2002, 20:28

Of course, the reason that the cheats were added in the first place was that since the AI cannot utilize all the various complex functions of the game, they need help.

Other than guarding my early game improvements, my only use for Arty is bombarding enemy aircraft. They are immensely volnerable when they are in base.

k.k.fly · January 24, 2002, 17:17

it is really annoying when A.I. crusiers start bombing my coastline, my trees, my forests. And I cannot do much damage to him with my artilleries.

johndmuller · January 24, 2002, 20:03

Quote:

Originally posted by k.k.fly
it is really annoying when A.I. crusiers start bombing my coastline, my trees, my forests. And I cannot do much damage to him with my artilleries.

If you can't hurt ships with your land based artillery (and its +50% bonus versus warships), you need to build better artillery units or maybe replace some of your doves with hawks.