I realize destroyers are cheaper and faster to build then a Carrier full of six fighters, but in most games Ive played the issue for the big clash of star fleets is your fleet capacity. When you go rolling in with your main fleets of Dreadnaughts wouldnt you rather have a full Carrier too take 7 hits than one destroyer?

Ive been toying with the idea to either make Destroyers only take up one fleet size per TWO destroyers or attach that ability to an existing tech.

Do you think this would unbalance things?

Wakrob

Destroyers are cheap and only hit on 9s, but they're great value for money. Assuming your opponent has some fighters, they effectively get 3 shots in the first round of combat - and given that some of those casualties don't get return fire, it actually makes them better than dreadnoughts in the first round (as both average 0.6 hits).

Add in Hylar V, and they're actually better than dreadnoughts in the first round of combat - buy 2 or 3, and they're still much cheaper, but they're superios in almost every way. And this is without adding ADT from the expansion.

So no, I don't think they are underpowered. Indeed, some players think they are over powered.

Sure, fleet supply is a problem, but you get great bang for your buck. In your example, your problem is building dreadnoughts - without modification, they are the weakest ship by far.

I probably dont play very well but I usually have more resources than I can spend so I tend to build Dreadnaughts early. Even once I have all three space docks out many times I dont have enough Command Pool to actuvate them all so I have a glut of resources to spend at one or two of them.

Wak

If that's the case, then you either

a.) Have misunderstood something about the rules (production, maybe galaxy setup)

b.) Need to play in lower-resource games.

In Twilight, you should never have more resources than you can spend - how many players in your games?

First Rule of Twilight: It is all about points.

Second Rule of Twilight: Build alot of destroyers and don't build DNs.

Bill ==> making rules on the fly

Actually Bill, I think the first two rules of Twilight are

1.) Nobody talks about Twilight

2.) NOBODY TALKS ABOUT TWILIGHT

But yours are a close 3rd and 4th.

possumman said:

Aha, so that's why it's been hard getting new players into TI3. Maybe if we scrapped those two rules, we could get more players

I've been lurking here for a month or so and I've seen this discussion come up alot. I admit that when I first wandered in I saw the Destroyer as the worst unit in the game. However after reading some very convincing arguments, I can see their appeal. In our group of players, fighters are typicall only built to use up a remaining resource point after building some bigger ships. Nobody ever went hardcore on the fighters so we've never really given the Destroyer a chance to shine. Our fleets were typically made up of Cruisers, Dreadnaughts, Carriers with groundforces and a sprinkling of fighters, and maybe a Warsun if a certain race was in play. (Which it almost always is for some reason.)

After what I've seen here though, next game I'm going to try to ignore Dreadnaughts altogether and opt for Carriers full of fighters instead. Maybe then our Destroyer pieces will stop gathering dust and finally see some action. And if not, well, from what I've read they'll have a hard time coping with this sudden change in strategy.

Wakob, your maps are definitely too rich if you're asking this.

I would like to advise a course of action: Balance

Essentially what I mean is that there is no win button of fleet direction that you can press if your galaxy is built right. If the galaxy is too spacious, slow ships suffer. If it is too rich, the affordable ships become trivial. But if balanced then roles will appear for ships that demonstrate that the right ship to build depends on the situation:

Specifically, the destroy is is hugely more affordable in terms of firepower vs cost. Even compared to the mighty war sun the destroyer is a better buy: for 12 resouces one can buy 3.6 hits a round (with hylar which you need for the war sun anyway), vs 2.4 hits a round from the war sun. The destroyer is also the cheapest non-figher casualty you can take, which I translate to mean the cheapest casualty I can rely on to suvive the anti-fighter barrage. For this reason alone they are a general must-have for any deployment.

The big advantage of the destroyer is that it can be lost so easily, and with so little cost. This allows a player to freely deploy light fleets of destoryers and cruisers deep into an enemy's space without concern for their survival and without exposing the player's own home system by sending out the armada.

Further, I want to dispel the myth of the allpowerful fighter fleet that every noob dreams of. Fighters are obstensibly 'cheap,' costing only half a resource. But they still use a full slot of production capacity each which means it costs and arm and a leg in space docks and command counters to field a carrier fleet. Replacing lost fighters is equally hard, and depends on superb organization which usually cannot survive into enemy space. All these cost concerns add up when one considers the terror that can be unleashed with the simple purchase of ADTs. Even without that purchase, hylar upgraded destroyer spam is more than a match for any player attempting fighter spam.

But fighters do matter! A few are always needed throughout the game to soak off hits from PDS's and later from Assault Cannons if anyone decided to bring those to bear. Other than that I avoid fighters, the Destroyer is too fundamentally good to be neglected by an enemy anyway.

The Fist of Ferrum said:

Fighters are still excellent units, they're just not the only unit to buy anymore. The destroyer is only fundamentally powerful when it goes up against fighters, that's where all the hit efficiency comes from. If your opponents don't buy fighters like you suggest, then destroyers are back to being terrible. If I had to give a newbie some basic advice, I'd still tell them to stock up on fighters rather than destroyers. One who goes fighter swarm is going to fare a hell of a lot better than one who tries to make destroyers the background of their fleet.

Zack said:

I disagree with this. Destroyers, alone, aren't that great, but when you build a lot of them, they can be just as effective meat shields (for not much more cost) than fighters, PLUS they can't be taken down by things that take down fighters.

For example:

• 1 Cruiser - without Hylar V, hits 40% of the time; with Hylar V hits 50% of the time.
• 2 Destroyers - without Hylar V, at least one hit 36% of the time; with Hylar V at least one hit 51% of the time.

2 Destroyers are comparible, combat-wise, than 1 Cruiser, but takes TWO HITS to destroy.

• 1 Dreadnought - Hits 60% of the time.
• 5 Destroyers - without Hylar V, at least one hit about 66% of the time; with Hylar V at least one hit 83% of the time.

5 Destroyers are far more potent in either case, and take more than TWICE as many hits to kill.

The only "downside" to this is the Fleet Supply issue, but that won't be a worry in the mid-/late-games.

Building fighters is nice, but you are restricted to moving them with your Carrier, and they don't really fight any better overall (a Cybernetic Fighter fights the same as a Hylar V Destroyer). You can spam Fighters more easily, but they aren't as versitile as Destroyers, especially when your opponent has Destroyers and/or some nasty Action Cards.

Zack said:

I think if you looked at the PBeM's played by some of the "better" players, you'll find that Destroyers are sought after more than Fighters. And in your example, if one who goes Fighter Swarm is up against one who makes Destroyers, the Destroyers will wipe up, especially if they have ADT (which they most likely will if you are building up fighters)

The biggest weakness of destroyers is their fleet supply efficiency. They are one of the best, if not the best buy when it comes to resources but if you are working with a limited fleet supply you can't really spam destroyers.

I'm playing a game right now where I've been stuck at three fleet supply for most of the game(various action cards and being stuck far away from speaker). if I had relied on destroyers I would have been eliminated a long while ago. Carriers filled with fighters have allowed me to maximize my usage of limited fleet supply. Yes I'm vulnerable to freindly fire and ADT but one fleet supply giving me 7 hits with a carrier and six fighters vs 1 hit with a destroyer is huge.

That is definitely true. Well, and the fact there are only 8 destroyers, where you have virtually unlimited fighters in theory.