Xan Fleet Composition (R13)

[Ultimate Newbie]

This discussion was for R13 - please see this thread for R14 discussion on Xandathrii fleet composition.

I received an inquiry from a galaxymate of mine, regarding fleet compositions for Xans. I thought it might be worth throwing up for anyone who is curious about it - either Xans looking to maximise their fleet, or people who like attacking xans .

Anyway, Thus:

i'll start with this insightful statement that i've been advocating for a few rounds now (heed) : "A balanced fleet has some capability in all areas, but is good in none." - ie by deliberately unbalancing your fleet you make it extremely hard to hit by some enemies at the cost of making it virtually free for others. I'll get back to this shortly.

This is my fleet (yeah, scan me you bastards ) :
Ships (19,350 total)
Vsharrak Fighter 10,000 Daeraith Pulsar 100
Lyvidian Sentinel 2,500 Kthal Fireblade 2,000
Culdassa Arrowhead 3,000 Andvordian Bomber 250
Dagger 1,500

As you can see, i have gone almost entirely for Fighters and Corvettes (the exception are the 250 Bombers which i built last minute against my Cathaar CR incoming this morning ). I use this fleet to roid Terrans (who have gone for Battleships and dont have too many Pegasi), Cathaar (particularly the CO caths out there (ie Tarantulas hurt - though they tend not to stop me), and of course the occasional Zikonian - as my fleet fires before him (though i try and avoid Cutlasses where possible - why give away your fleet? ).

Anyway, this fleet is also defensively strong - to an extent. By having alot of Fighters and Corvettes, it is difficult for a potential attacker to specifically target just one type. For example, a Cathaar CO attack (ie Beetles and Mosquitos) is interested in stunning my Vsharrack Fighters - but to stun them all he will also have to send ships to stun my Sentinels as well - which makes it harder as Sents have reletively higher armour. Or a better example - another Xan wants to roid me with his FI fleet - he will need to send ALOT of sentinels to kill all of my Vsh AND Sents to minimise his losses - which is alot harder than if i only had one type of fighter class.

The problem with a FI/CO fleet only is that you do not target Cathaar CR nor Terran BA attacks - they can roid you for free. The advantage of the inbalanced fleet means that i will never get attacked by Fighters, Corvettes or Frigates (and i prolly wont get hit by Destroyers though they are quite rare) - furthermore these small ships are also very fast and good for defence in my alliance. The holes in my targeting (CR/BA) are covered by friends/alliancemates building ships that target these classes well - particularly Cathaars with their Roaches and Scarabs, but also FR Xans (as opposed to FI/CO Xans like me) who tend to build more Bombers and Peacekeepers. Those people build fleets that are strong against the ships i cant target, and i am strong in the classes that they cant target, and we swap defence to cover each other. This way we both maximise our strengths by building ships that are extremely effective against their targets, and not wasting resources on ships which are bad or mediochre (Compatitive Advantage).

Now, in your case, i would strongly reccommend that you choose to build EITHER a FI/CO fleet like mine, OR a FR fleet (ie TBT, Bombers, Sabres, Peacekeepers with some of those FR structure killers that i cant remember the name of atm). The ships that you target will be different, and the ships that target YOU will be different - and thus you will be attacking different targets than i would. You would prolly go after Terrans who didnt build enough Frigates (i think Drakes target FR), you'd go after Cathaars who dont have enough Roaches (ie you are just larger than them so you can still cap free roids), or you could attack Ziks who are lacking in Clippers (iirc). You (still) dont want to attack Xans as most Xans tend to have Arrowheads (lots of Xans are FI/CO). MAKE SURE that you focus on ONE of these combos - either FI/CO or FR/CR - DO NOT MIX AND MATCH them - or you will have a fleet with some capability in all areas, and be good in none! (ie ANY attacker could overwhelm your fleet and that's bad).

I hope this helps a little bit .
Cheers,
Sovereign.

[Tietäjä]

Originally Posted by Ultimate Newbie

Now, in your case, i would strongly reccommend that you choose to build EITHER a FI/CO fleet like mine, OR a FR fleet (ie TBT, Bombers, Sabres, Peacekeepers with some of those FR structure killers that i cant remember the name of atm). The ships that you target will be different, and the ships that target YOU will be different - and thus you will be attacking different targets than i would. You would prolly go after Terrans who didnt build enough Frigates (i think Drakes target FR), you'd go after Cathaars who dont have enough Roaches (ie you are just larger than them so you can still cap free roids), or you could attack Ziks who are lacking in Clippers (iirc). You (still) dont want to attack Xans as most Xans tend to have Arrowheads (lots of Xans are FI/CO).

I would strongly recommend not to choose a FR fleet. That excludes you from targetting zikonians (thief, clipper), and many terrans (drake, syren+phoenix). Also, unlike it's zikonian counterpart, xandathrii FR fleet can't take a lot of arrowhead defences, because it will utterly fall apart once a thousand arrowheads give a mean look at you. Cathaars with lots of roaches easily stop you on your toes, and there's no shit you can do about arrowhead/fireblade combination either. Taken, the xandathrii frigate fleet looks quite inept to me.

And the structure killer is voracean predator, a fighter. I have a few of those.

What I'd suggest though, is sentinel/vsharrack heavy fighter based fleet with supplementary arrowhead/fireblade troupe to keep out frig xans *cough*, hedge out part of zik fr incs, and to keep pegasus away. With enough FI you'll easily overwhelm caths that haven't built much tarants, ziks should be easy food too, and terrans that aren't pegasus heavy can be hit with the left hand too.

[Ultimate Newbie]

Originally Posted by Tietäjä

I would strongly recommend not to choose a FR fleet. That excludes you from targetting zikonians (thief, clipper), and many terrans (drake, syren+phoenix). Also, unlike it's zikonian counterpart, xandathrii FR fleet can't take a lot of arrowhead defences, because it will utterly fall apart once a thousand arrowheads give a mean look at you. Cathaars with lots of roaches easily stop you on your toes, and there's no shit you can do about arrowhead/fireblade combination either. Taken, the xandathrii frigate fleet looks quite inept to me.

That would probably explain why there arent may FR Xans around. i was wondering about that - though i hadnt really thought of it too much as i was focused on FI/CO (obviously).

And the structure killer is voracean predator, a fighter. I have a few of those.

whoops - you can tell that i havent built any of them yet

What I'd suggest though, is sentinel/vsharrack heavy fighter based fleet with supplementary arrowhead/fireblade troupe to keep out frig xans *cough*, hedge out part of zik fr incs, and to keep pegasus away. With enough FI you'll easily overwhelm caths that haven't built much tarants, ziks should be easy food too, and terrans that aren't pegasus heavy can be hit with the left hand too.

Sounds like what i have been doing to a large extent. Must have been doing something right .

[MrPubes]

I found it pretty easy to roid with a Fi Fleet only this round. But then again, I heard roiding is easy with every fleet. :P
Most Xans flee when they see my Sents, Caths are overwhelmed easily (and i don't care about 1k or 2k losses from those Tarants yet) and Ziks are easy, too.
Seems like my race choice was finally right in a round! \o/

[at0mic.c0w]

With 10k Vsh FI even a Cutlass heavy Zik shouldn't be a problem. Stolen Sents, TBTs, Pegs and Tulas are the real threat. (hint hint: don't build any TBTs so those nasty Ziks can't steal them)

[Tietäjä]

Focusing on zikonians is a good pay-off, so vsh-heavy is the best option I see at the moment. Pulsars are a rear-end-wipe, bolters can be "useful" to scare out xan/zik fighter fleets (right, just make sure nobody touches them), bomber is just fine but it gets stunned quite easily.

Frankly, it's arrowhead/vsharrack/sentinel/XPK. Plus pods and structurekillers.

[pig]

To be honest my xan fi fleet is nice, but i rarely attack and cap with it anymore, anti fi is very common, so my mass of vsh/sents is now merly used for alliance defence or daytime raids.

What I will say is that im very pro frigate fleet. I said this from the start and here is why.

Xan fr fleet can attack cath with virtually 0 losses, just outflak there roach, very few caths build guardians, thus if you can outflak it ie hit them with bombers/sabres you are laughing to the bank. Not only this but caths are 50/50 on there fleet combos, you will once again find caths with little or no cruiser fleet so attack them there 1 billion beetles cant do a thing against you frigates and at this point in the game its rare people will be stockpiling to defend incoming.

Terran once again are weak, very few terran build drakes/syrens and those that do dont really do much damage to you compared to the roid gain and xp. They are always nice targets to hit as terrans are greedy and generally build masses of leviathans, rather than building defence ships.

I tend to stay away from zik and xan, but they are the group that I smash with my fi fleet.

[Ultimate Newbie]

Just for the record, i'd like to thank all those friendly Cathaars who sent their Cruiser fleets to attack me tonight.

If anyone else wants to launch, i'd suggest a JGP first so you can find an ETA without other attackers (be patient - you may have to wait a while) :\

[furball]

If people have done this, then it's absolutly ridiculous.

Almost enough to make me run VGN defence for you \o/

[Ultimate Newbie]

Originally Posted by Nonentity

If people have done this, then it's absolutly ridiculous.

Almost enough to make me run VGN defence for you \o/

Well, it didnt quite come to that - it was only two waves. everyone else in my got got three or four though and i was worried .

Still, any ziks who want some CR just send me a PA mail every night and i'll tell you what ETA to launch .

/me is thinking of writing up compo guides for other races. Need volunteers for fleets though .

[MrPubes]

Originally Posted by pig

"My Fi fleet is not good for attacking."

With the low eta of a Fi Fleet i didn't find defence very often this round.
Much harder to get. And many people are scared to defend against a Fi fleet with Fi or Co if you send enough Sents or Vs along. And then it's only the Gal that can do you harm, but if your alliance cover all of them, this shouldn't happen too often.
I don't like the Fr fleet for one reason mostly:
They don't shoot on the defenders against Fr. Except for the Roach and Syren, all Anti Fr is not targetted by Xan Fr. And Xan has the major advantage that it can kill defenders before they shoot on you, which you miss out with a Fr Fleet.

[Ultimate Newbie]

Originally Posted by MrPubes

With the low eta of a Fi Fleet i didn't find defence very often this round.

I've had to recall my FI fleet half the time due to def - though granted i have only recently got the lowest ETA research done (yikes it takes aaaages as a xan ). Anyway - i had to recall my FI attack just then because of def - it wasnt enough to cover it but it was (just) enough to make the roids a tad too expensive for my liking (~35k res per roid ). If it wasnt for my recent incomings i prolly would have landed it, but nevermind.

There's always this afternoon (i love low ETA attacks ).

[Makhil]

my Xan attack fleet is made of Tzen, Sabre and Lancers. With that i can pick big Xan planets and get a great score/roid ratio, i can also pretty easily take Cat of my size. I have Arrows and Fireblades for def. no anti CR (not much to do anyway vs Cat attacks) and not 1 Fi...
btw Lancers are terrific

[furball]

Originally Posted by Ultimate Newbie

/me is thinking of writing up compo guides for other races. Need volunteers for fleets though .

I'll pm you on IRC tonight (my time, not silly time) for Cath fleet compo. #strategy?

[Ultimate Newbie]

Originally Posted by Nonentity

I'll pm you on IRC tonight (my time, not silly time) for Cath fleet compo. #strategy?

rofl - mate i run on 'silly time' so you'll prolly get online when its the wee hours of the morning here .

i should be up by 5am my time - to minus 8 to get GMT. will you be awake still mate?

#strategy sounds good btw .

[furball]

Originally Posted by Ultimate Newbie

rofl - mate i run on 'silly time' so you'll prolly get online when its the wee hours of the morning here .

i should be up by 5am my time - to minus 8 to get GMT. will you be awake still mate?

#strategy sounds good btw .

That's 10pm here, and I've been invited to consume copious amount of alcoholic beverages tonight so no can do. Perhaps tomorrow morning GMT+1? I'll pm you in #vgn if I remember...

[Tietäjä]

Originally Posted by Makhil

my Xan attack fleet is made of Tzen, Sabre and Lancers. With that i can pick big Xan planets and get a great score/roid ratio, i can also pretty easily take Cat of my size. I have Arrows and Fireblades for def. no anti CR (not much to do anyway vs Cat attacks) and not 1 Fi...
btw Lancers are terrific

Aren't you awfully prone to a few thieves or fireblades? Though, yes, that's as good as a xandathrii fr composition goes. Props for it. I hate the zikonian cutter/thief, gryphon, and their ilk though. Troublemaking.

I see bringing in considerable amounts of off-pod class ships a minor risk always (unless you can, again, counter most threats on them, but even so), because some people might come up with the idea of hunting them down, and then you'll end up being annoyed for having to pull even with 0 podclass losses. You don't want heavy casualties anyways.

[MAdnRisKy]

you people.....

xan FR rocks, but you're all lacking the secret ingredient

[Makhil]

Originally Posted by Tietäjä

Aren't you awfully prone to a few thieves or fireblades? Though, yes, that's as good as a xandathrii fr composition goes.

thieves... probably, but i don't take ziks
fireblades... to a point yes, but the alternative for the defender is often : fight, lose 160 roids, 200K value of ships to kill 60K value of mine... or run and lose 200 roids (they can't run just a fraction, otherwise i kill all that's left). When you attack big players they're looking at their ranking more than their roid counts (easy to get back somewhere else), so they run.

[E-Choke]

Hmmm, I tend to have a mix of both.
10 K fighters, mostly Vsh and Puls and 1.5 K Frigs (mixed).
I can attack terrans/caths easily, coz if they have a lot of anti FI, they mostlikely haven't got anti FR.
For ziks, I just rush my fi's in, coz I hate those thiefs .
Only problem for me are Xan, they have good anti FI/FR, so very hard for me to attack.

The biggest problem for me are DE/CR/BS, but those are slower, so should be possible to get def for them.

[Gate]

Since I was quite enjoying my chat with newbie on the terran thread, I thought I'd share my fleet composition in a ratio format:

Vsharrak Fighter 85 Lyvidian Sentinel 67
Kthal Fireblade 30 Culdassa Arrowhead 3
Andvordian Bomber 7 Dagger 28
Xentrallis Peacekeeper 1
(numbers rounded to nearest whole, ratios based off the peacekeeper)


Unfortunately, it's been hard to keep up my number of certain defships this round, with various losses (750 bombers, 3.5k fireblades, 600 arrowheads, 2-3k FI getting stolen was one incident. And I've lost 200 peacekeepers and about 8-10k sentinels in def duty so far)

I was previously very FI oriented, but since I lost 18.4k vsharraks and 1.4k daggers (rounded to nearest hundred) this morning, I don't have that many right now

[noah02]

Is the pulsar extinct now? seeing as fireblades do the same job?
And actually survive against destroyers?
And if ppl still do buy them why?

[furball]

Originally Posted by noah02

Is the pulsar extinct now? seeing as fireblades do the same job?
And actually survive against destroyers?
And if ppl still do buy them why?

Most Xans went for Fireblades. But for FI-heavy Xans, they are still important. Sovereign is now building some for hitting Ziks, just to knock out some of their stolen Pegasus.

[pig]

Pulsars are key imo to any xan fi fleet. The best xan fi fleets I have seen, are not the ones with vs heavy fleets, rather ones with pulsar/sent fleets. That way you can attack a terran and introduce the chance of him running or him dying.

[Gate]

Originally Posted by pig

Pulsars are key imo to any xan fi fleet. The best xan fi fleets I have seen, are not the ones with vs heavy fleets, rather ones with pulsar/sent fleets. That way you can attack a terran and introduce the chance of him running or him dying.

I'm definitely considering buying a few for the stolen peg aspect of thing, but I've not really ran into too many stolen pegs yet.

However, I dislike the mutual destruction idea, so I've gone for fireblades; people have a tendency to suicide on my def and take a bunch out. And with XP being so much of a factor, people are more likely to land on heavier losses; I'd rather have a guaranteed way of taking out pegs and a guaranteed way of wiping out lancers before they shoot. If roiding terrans, I'll send vsharrak, sentinel, fireblade, dagger, and with enough I'll kill my way through for no losses anyway. The only problem then is vsh def persuading me to recall...

[Alki]

pulsar > fireblade in every sense ive not built 1 fireblade this round, never had to either, if u have enough pulsars a terran isnt going to argue and loose his de fleet, for 1 fact its usually out at night 2ndly u take a major chunk of there fleet which no terran wants to loose at this stage.

not to mention pulsar is better value for money

[pig]

Originally Posted by Alki

pulsar > fireblade in every sense ive not built 1 fireblade this round, never had to either, if u have enough pulsars a terran isnt going to argue and loose his de fleet, for 1 fact its usually out at night 2ndly u take a major chunk of there fleet which no terran wants to loose at this stage.

not to mention pulsar is better value for money

exactly the reason why i build pulsars, and not fbs, as well as that as a xan fi attacker, you cant really send along your fb, but you can send along your pulsars

[furball]

Originally Posted by Alki

pulsar > fireblade in every sense ive not built 1 fireblade this round, never had to either, if u have enough pulsars a terran isnt going to argue and loose his de fleet, for 1 fact its usually out at night 2ndly u take a major chunk of there fleet which no terran wants to loose at this stage.

not to mention pulsar is better value for money

All of that depends on how big a planet you have. If you're in the top 100, then sure you probably have enough Pulsars to deter most Terrans. But if *shock* you're not, then your next visit from a Terran could result in a lot of dead Pulsars.

[Gate]

Originally Posted by Nonentity

All of that depends on how big a planet you have. If you're in the top 100, then sure you probably have enough Pulsars to deter most Terrans. But if *shock* you're not, then your next visit from a Terran could result in a lot of dead Pulsars.

Agreed, my 10k sents aren't enough to deter xan attackers. I've had several xan FI incs this round infact... I hate it when it's like this, and I've had ****s land and lose half their fleet just to wipe out my own fleet (which is nearly always less value than they lose). I'm generally not very lucky at this game, and so I'd rather have a guarantee of my ships surviving.

Hell, I'm quite comfortably ranked, but I have no confidence in pulsars scaring off a determined terran attacker. Most will realise I'm active enough to want to save my fleet, and attack me anyway.

Hence, fireblade

[Ultimate Newbie]

Originally Posted by Gate

Agreed, my 10k sents aren't enough to deter xan attackers. I've had several xan FI incs this round infact... I hate it when it's like this, and I've had ****s land and lose half their fleet just to wipe out my own fleet (which is nearly always less value than they lose). I'm generally not very lucky at this game, and so I'd rather have a guarantee of my ships surviving.

i have 250 TBT partly for this reason. Partly because for about a day i considered building a small FR roiding fleet as i had alot of bombers i thought i could flak my pods with. The next night i tried to find a target that wouldnt maul me badly and the only ones i could attack had about 100k value . Whilst 250 TBT wont make a Xan attacker not launch, its a pain in the arse that he is just going to have to accept - which makes attacking me more expensive than most other xans and thus hopefully i wont get such incoming .

Hell, I'm quite comfortably ranked, but I have no confidence in pulsars scaring off a determined terran attacker. Most will realise I'm active enough to want to save my fleet, and attack me anyway.

Hence, fireblade

I've just started building my Pulsars up (got 2k in prod atm) as i have been experiencing the ill effects of Ziks with Pegasi. Obviously, 2500 Pulsar isnt going to scare anyone, but it makes me feel better when i take a bite out of his DE as well - as pegs are precious to ziks, so when he sends his Cutlasses away (or they die ), he has a choice of getting in a few licks that obviously wont stop me at the cost of some of his pegs, or not taking any losses at all other than roids. Edit: Obviously, the use of FB against a Zik is not an option. At least, not an intelligent one.

For the record, i find the difference in perspective ironic :\.

[Gate]

Originally Posted by Ultimate Newbie

i have 250 TBT partly for this reason. Partly because for about a day i considered building a small FR roiding fleet as i had alot of bombers i thought i could flak my pods with. The next night i tried to find a target that wouldnt maul me badly and the only ones i could attack had about 100k value . Whilst 250 TBT wont make a Xan attacker not launch, its a pain in the arse that he is just going to have to accept - which makes attacking me more expensive than most other xans and thus hopefully i wont get such incoming .

I'm definitely considering it, but it's still gonna take me another day to rebuild my attack fleet at this rate, so there'll be a while when I'm gonna have to cringe and take the losses of a fair few sentinels if I get hit \o/

I've just started building my Pulsars up (got 2k in prod atm) as i have been experiencing the ill effects of Ziks with Pegasi. Obviously, 2500 Pulsar isnt going to scare anyone, but it makes me feel better when i take a bite out of his DE as well - as pegs are precious to ziks, so when he sends his Cutlasses away (or they die ), he has a choice of getting in a few licks that obviously wont stop me at the cost of some of his pegs, or not taking any losses at all other than roids. Edit: Obviously, the use of FB against a Zik is not an option. At least, not an intelligent one.

For the record, i find the difference in perspective ironic :\.

How comes the irony? I don't get it

This has converted me slightly, I do plan to get a few pulsars some time, but only a few k, and only out of my altruism towards other xans who may want to hit the targ after me. Most of the time I always find myself wishing I have more vsh. Such as when I'm planning to go up against a zik with 10k+ cutlass, plus beetles, sentinels and TBTs :/

[MAdnRisKy]

ok my thoughts on xan.... I spout on enough about them so...

I've gone for an FR fleet, which I know is not exactly the norm. But combining tzen and lancers have always gotten me roids when i've sent them out, I do tend to gang bang slightly with a few mates, but when 500 lancers kill about 4k arrows, I find that most xan targets out there would rather not be home than stay there..... that and the 2k daggers in the other fleet which no-one can work out, on a tbt free target and he'll run the FI... (sents)

defensively, well i've figured it's pointless to even try tbh. I have about 2k CO and some bombers for when i find a drake empty terran, but I've stopped trying to avoid incs with my fleet, as it never works, i either get defence or i run, and cap the roids back, but by maintaining my attack fleet they never stay lost for very long..

were I to build defensively, I'fd be tempted to not bother with keepers, because most terrans will take the pitiful losses and land anyway, given that i;m not going to divert enough income to building a sufficient quantity to put them off. Bombers I do keep about because they're useful for attacking too as I mentioned. the CO are my primary defence fleet, i try to keep a fair few about, and other than that i'll use the fi to support or fake as an fr fleet.


Now some might call that selfish, i dunno, I am always defending every night, but this way i actually place less of a burden on my alliance by maintaining my roid levels (plus no xan comes near me and I can and have sent the fr in gal a few times to devistaing effect). oh and how effective are FR, well ask the #2 who got himself and a substantial portion of his mates fleet blown apart for barely any losses the other night

[Ultimate Newbie]

Originally Posted by Gate

How comes the irony? I don't get it

Well, the first part of the post i take the position of the defender - hoping that my small amount of TBT will make my attacker not launch because of the losses that i would incurr on him that he wouldnt notmally have.

The second half of my post, i take the guise of the attacker where i dont care about the losses to myself, but rather focusing on doing damage to the attacker so that the may potentially run - even if it is likely that he wont and i'll still take the same amount of damage anyway.

That, if what i find ironic .

[NotALegend]

As a terran, I have only this to say: "Please don't build pulsars and peacekeepers! Oh, and build TBTs instead of bombers!" kthxbye

[Makhil]

with a xan FR fleet you should consider building some Bombers, when you attack a cath they are a better flak than TBT and they kill CR. Other than FR and DE i think it is not worth building. I guess we all build some CO (fireblades) to keep our ally happy in case of def calls, but i find Arrows much too easy to steal for Ziks and Peacekeepers no match for the Terran Dragons.

[Ultimate Newbie]

I have also found that peacekeepers are wanting. In a 1:1 resource ratio, peacekeepers > dragons, but rarely does that ever happen. This is due to all Terrans spamming Battleships fleets (which tend to be heavy in Dragons), and Xans not being able to afford lots of Peacekeepers as they need to spam more vsh to attack with or arrows to defend with.

but just having 250 Peacekeepers at home has seemed to stopped the BA incoming to my planet for some reason. I dont know why - maybe they are just massing for a larger attack tomorrow night - but anyway, it seems to be a good deterrant (as other Xans may not have as many/none at all atm, so why attack me and take losses?).

[Gate]

Originally Posted by Makhil

with a xan FR fleet you should consider building some Bombers, when you attack a cath they are a better flak than TBT and they kill CR. Other than FR and DE i think it is not worth building. I guess we all build some CO (fireblades) to keep our ally happy in case of def calls, but i find Arrows much too easy to steal for Ziks and Peacekeepers no match for the Terran Dragons.

Umm, surely TBTs are better flak as you can build more of them, in the same way that Vsh are better flak than sentinels.

Though it depends on your definition I suppose, I'm merely talking about getting the most pods through un-stunned...

[NotALegend]

For anti-bs, speaking as a terran, I would rate the ships like this: pirate > peacekeeper > chimera > black widow. So, yes, stockpiling peacekeepers will make me think twice before attacking you instead of someone else. 250 peacekeepers are a tad too few though, but 500? Mm. I hate to lose any of my lovely battleships.

[Colt]

I also hate losing my BS but due to a few gambles/reluctant acceptances ive lost about 800 so far this rd, for the xp/score it gives, although sometimes i must admit it hasnt been worth it Peacekeepers arent bad if you have, like NotALegend said bout 500, but less than that id usually land and accept those losses, depending on value of target ofcourse...

[noah02]

Originally Posted by NotALegend

For anti-bs, speaking as a terran, I would rate the ships like this: pirate > peacekeeper > chimera > black widow. So, yes, stockpiling peacekeepers will make me think twice before attacking you instead of someone else. 250 peacekeepers are a tad too few though, but 500? Mm. I hate to lose any of my lovely battleships.

If defender has no fleet scan attacking a zik who has pirates is so much fun
I don't mind losing 9 or so levs

[Makhil]

Originally Posted by Gate

Though it depends on your definition I suppose, I'm merely talking about getting the most pods through un-stunned...

yes, Tzen have a slight advantage from a armour/cost point of view, but with Bombers you can inflict damage to cath CRs and they tend to run their fleet to avoid it resulting in less stunning of your FR.

also i found out that the best defense if you're heavy FR Xan vs Zik attacker is to counter (all his anti FR are out attacking you), one more reason not to build arrows and concentrate on Fireblades.

with such a Fireblade, Tzen, Bomber and Lancer fleet you keep Cath away, terran DE, Zik Co, Xan Fi.
you're prone to zik FR attacks but as mentioned above you can send effective counters.
That lets the terran BS as the real threat... but they're slow, you can get defense quite easily, everybody likes to kill BS and the Xan FR... (well a minority chose that option).

[MrPubes]

With being Xan FR a not too bad Roid-Fleet (i finally agree ) you though miss the big XP attacks on those big Ziks.
I still only boost my VS, they're the most vital ship of a Xan-Fi-Roid-Fleet imho.
It's not about defending properly against any incommings this round, it's just about hitting people much bigger than you to gain XP....

[Ultimate Newbie]

Just a quick update.

My fleet currently (well, of tick 1070 with stuff in production) is outlined below.

Ships (82,250 total)
Vsharrak Fighter 53,000 Daeraith Pulsar 5,000
Lyvidian Sentinel 7,500 Kthal Fireblade 2,500
Culdassa Arrowhead 10,000 Tzen Bolt Thrower 500
Andvordian Bomber 2,000 Hysperian Lancer 500
Xentrallis Peacekeeper 250 Dagger 2,500
Sabre 250 Voracean Predator 250

In the end, i decided to build some lancers as i got two massive combined Cath/Zik CO raids in two days and my vsh were out (they wouldnt have helped anyway), so i spammed 250 straight away and another 250 to make it scary. I've kind of accidentally and haphazardly for a small FR fleet, but its almost always out defending against furball's cath CR fleet (dont tell him btw ). Fighters are almost always out attacking and the CO are never home (defending against some unlucky zik. muahhaaha etc ).

But yes, i am naughtly by going against my own rules of not building everything . but i say in my defence that 1) there was need 2) the amount invested in those other ships is tiny in comparison and 3) i havent had any CR incoming for ages, no BA incoming for a long time, and indeed the last time i was attacked was with CO. which was along time ago now.

that means i'll get multi-waved tomorrow night, but bleh.

more retal points \o/

[Cannon_Fodder]

So what alliance are you in, and what times do you go offline?

[Ultimate Newbie]

Originally Posted by sniborp

So what alliance are you in, and what times do you go offline?

I'm australian. i'm awake all day (your night ).

Fjear.

[General Martok]

Building everything isn't that bad if your rankings are high enough Sucks if you're small though....

[Ultimate Newbie]

Originally Posted by General Martok

Building everything isn't that bad if your rankings are high enough Sucks if you're small though....

Tbh, i am of the opinion that it doesnt matter what your rank is - so long as your fleet isnt as efficient as it could be you are making yourself vulnerable.

[Cannon_Fodder]

Originally Posted by Ultimate Newbie

I'm australian. i'm awake all day (your night ).

Fjear.

Ah so I'll launch in the morning.

[furball]

Originally Posted by Ultimate Newbie

Tbh, i am of the opinion that it doesnt matter what your rank is - so long as your fleet isnt as efficient as it could be you are making yourself vulnerable.

Quality is better than quantity - but quantity has a quality all of it own.

[Makhil]

in late round Xan FR/DE fleets have problems finding targets.
Most Xan have by now built enough Fireblades to screw your lancers
Zyk are unattackable
Big Caths are scarce
Terrans are an option if you bring arrowheads with you