I got to the point in the Weave story in E2: Dark Horizons where I am offered the Weave Dreadnought and Support Carrier. And I cant decide between them! Both are good. So I decided to ask you, making yet another thread related to the Empire plugs. The Support Carrier is perfect in every way, except that it is the slowest ship the plug after Assault Carrier. It is so slow that it makes a Aurora Carrier look fast. It is not much faster than a Leviathan, the slowest ship in Nova with a accel of 70. The Dreadnought again, is armed with the wonderful Neutron Turrets as standard, has heavy shields and armor, and comes with Stringrays. And still remains faster than all fighters in the plug (with the exception of Weave ones), and comes very close to the Pirate Firedog. Ill post statistics to make it easier for you to decide.

Dreadnought
Shield: 850
Armor: 250
Accel: 525
Speed: 325
Turn: 90/ sec
Fuel: 11 jumps
Weapon space: 100 tons
Cargo: 60 tons
Shield regeneration: 100

Weapons:
3 Neutron Turrets
4 Stringrays
2 Torpedo Launcher+ 22 Torpedo
4 Manta (Ugh. Sour grin)

Guns: 4
Turrets: 6
Cost: 30 Million
Mass: 245
Crew: 212

Support Carrier
Shield: 1,900 (!)
Armor: 600
Accel: 75
Speed: 70
Turn: 60/ sec
Fuel: 14 jumps
Weapon space: 300 tons (!)
Cargo: 350 tons (!)

Weapons: 4 Neutron Turrets
4 Torpedo Launchers+ 200 Torpedos (!!)
12 Tactical Bombers
8 Stringrays
Guns: 8
Turrets: 10
Cost: 35 Million
Mass: 4000 (!)
Crew: 11975(!!!!!!)

I would love to have a ship which can hold everything I could ever want. But then again, when I get hit by LRMs (Long Range Missiles), or when things go wrong and I need to run to regenerate shields... LRMs do only 50 shield damage and 100 armor, but fire several at once, have 3x the range of a normal missile, and are sometimes hard to dodge even in a Beam Cruiser.

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I am eager to try to answer mission questions
"There is nothing certain but and taxes"- Benjamin Franklin

This was a hard choice for me as well. I ended up sticking with the Dreadnought for a while and switching to the Support Carrier later when...
(WARNING: POSSIBLE SPOILER AHEAD)

when i got faced with a more powerful foe than LR Missiles.

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Insanity has its advantages
"I- I Swear Officer.. The Dwarf was on fire when I got here!"

Quote

Originally posted by U.E. Admiral:
**This was a hard choice for me as well. I ended up sticking with the Dreadnought for a while and switching to the Support Carrier later when...
(WARNING: POSSIBLE SPOILER AHEAD)

when i got faced with a more powerful foe than LR Missiles.

**

Good that I am not the only one suffering from the difficulty of decision. Thanks for the suggestion, UE Admiral! Ill get the Dreadnought and kit it up. Now I can but wonder what the more powerful enemy was. Assault Carrier? Blockade Satellite? Aliens? When I get the Support Carrier... ph33r t3h power of a Rapier bay and whatever I manage to put on it.
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I am eager to try to answer mission questions
"There is nothing certain but and taxes"- Benjamin Franklin

(This message has been edited by General Cade Smart (edited 08-10-2004).)

Heh. I tend to drop any and all fighters to get my money back. I'm more of a Battleship or Dreadnought person than a Carrier type. Fighters cost too much to lose on a regular basis.

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Insanity has its advantages
"I- I Swear Officer.. The Dwarf was on fire when I got here!"

Quote

Originally posted by U.E. Admiral:
**< snip>

**

Why dont you say which this "more powerful foe than LR Missiles" is even if I asked? I need to know when to switch to a Support Carrier. Otherwise ill have to guess- Aliens? Assault Carrier? Tallos Station? And struggle with my Dreadnought, perhaps unnecessarily. I dont mind being spoiled. I think you mean Tallos Station in the EndGame mission, which I have now. It has 1500 shields. Atleast, its shields, armor and weapons are so heavy Ill switch anyway.

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I am eager to try to answer mission questions
"There is nothing certain but and taxes"- Benjamin Franklin

Unless i am remembering wrong, you will be faced with an Alien Planet that you must destroy. I switched to the support carrier for the extra fire power needed to counter the Alien regeneration speeds...

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Insanity has its advantages
"I- I Swear Officer.. The Dwarf was on fire when I got here!"

Thanks! I will try using the Dreadnought to assault Tallos Station. If it doesnt work, I have to change the shield regeneration rate of it. 80 is far too low for such a uber station, 1500 shields and all. Even Tim himself allowed me to change: Have you tried using the most recent updater for Empire 2.0? I do recall that one of my plugs had the battlestation sentinels set with a shield recharge rate that was far too low to operate. If you like use ResEdit to give the shield recharge a much higher value, for example 1000. So if it does be unbeatable, I abort and change it to 1000 (perhaps even more as it has 300 more shields than Pirate Battlestation which I previously fought).

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I am eager to try to answer mission questions
"There is nothing certain but and taxes"- Benjamin Franklin

I actually didn't have a problem beating any sentinals or superships in any of Tim's plugs... I guess the monty python isnt used by everyone against these stations with insane recharge. I find it works very well though.

Well, Good luck.

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Insanity has its advantages
"I- I Swear Officer.. The Dwarf was on fire when I got here!"