fighters too weak??

[Steppe]

i just wondered about there beeing so many anti fighter frigates. i just hope you cant specialise on cap ships in homeworld2 and leave the fighters no chance. perhaps the frigates have kinda a similar role like the corvettes had in homeworld1.

again i just hope you cant just specialise on caps and own every other tacitc away with it. cause i love swarming. these nothing more beautiful then hundrets of ships flying around a capship thats to slow and gets rocked away :D. guess i have to play a round homeworld1 now :D (this is not negative now. i love homeworld2)

[Jaymz]

I really cant see myself using fighters once the game goes into the Corvette / frigate stage. bombers might still be useful for sneak attack on the frigates at the back but the interceptors drop like flies.

But they might be more useful in bigger maps where you could use hit & run tactics on distant outposts. they are really fast and it would be impossible for the enemy to try and catch them with anything bigger.

[AncientGamer]

A dozen fighter squads with a carrier is an almost indestructable harrasment force. (as long as you don't send them against a half dozen or so flak frigates)

[PeanutR]

Originally posted by AncientGamer
A dozen fighter squads with a carrier is an almost indestructable harrasment force. (as long as you don't send them against a half dozen or so flak frigates) I agree, going straight for interceptors with the speed upgrade will allow u several hit and runs before an opponent has a decent frig production set up, and so if u target his collectors u can seriously slow him down...

The biggest problem for fighters in earlygame is the gun platforms... I havent actually engaged them with an all fighter force yet, but unless they're all ions I doubt it'll be pretty...

[GIMPbeowulf]

As long as you don't loose a complete group of fighters, all you've got to do is dock to replace the losses... it's even free isn't it?

Also, the speed upgrades help the fighters avoid the flak frigate fire a good bit and we only have one of those upgrades. With more of the fighter speed upgrades I imagine they'll become fairly good at avoiding the flak.

[motiv-8]

Remember that the Hiigarans' strength lies more in their capital ships. The Vaygr are the ones with the kickass fighters. ;)

[Enigma]

ya, i kinda found that the torp and ion frigs are the only ones i really used though. *shrug* meh, w/e.

[BoddoZerg]

I've found that sneak attacks with Bombers are actually one of the most effective late-game strats in the demo. While you and your opponent slug it out with vettes and frigs, you can sneak 8 upgraded bomber wings behind enemy lines and kill every module on his mothership within a few seconds. The easiest way to do this is to use a hyperspace equipped Carrier. =)

On the other hand, Interceptors seem thoroughly useless once you are past the first 5 minutes of the game. They just don't have enough firepower to make a difference. Inties can kill bombers or ion frigs, but it takes too long compared to how fast the bombers/ionfrigs can blow up your fleet.

[JamesX]

The intercepters arn't meant to take attack roles in late game. Their sole role is to hunt down Resourcers and Enemy Bombers. At least thats all I ever use them for in late game.

[Psycho-SoniC]

You should remember the option to retire fighters you don't need anymore. This gives you AFAIK nearly 80 percent of the spent resources back!

[Steppe]

Originally posted by motiv-8
Remember that the Hiigarans' strength lies more in their capital ships. The Vaygr are the ones with the kickass fighters. ;)

u are right i just forgot this :D. thanks

[Lucky]

Gun platforms slaughter fighter harassement force, unless it's very well micromanaged. Also the whole harassment tactic would require you to have a carrier tagging along - that's one resourse drop-off point less, and the carrier is very slow, so you might have to take long routes for reinforcing. Bombers, as boddozerg pointed out, are a killer force against modules after upgrade. I think it's quite possible to tech straight for upped bombers and keep enemy's resourse bays down, or constantly keep his building bays destroyed to avoid geting hit by reinforcements. Of course, that would need a lot of micro. As for interceptors, their key role is to stop bombers and hunt down scouts/probes. That's all they're good for anyway, as even resoursers take forever to be killed with those puny guns.

[Antra]

IIRC replacing ships lost in a fighter or corvette wing isn't free. Proportionally, it's the same as building a new wing (if 600 for corvettes then 200 apiece, etc)...I think. I'm not near a computer I can test this on :-/ :catpilot:

[mecha]

It's free

[SpinDizzy]

I hardly ever bother with intercepters, I find them pretty much useless, sure, 12 squads are kind of a strong force, but they'll get beaten by 6 squads of gunships.

You may be able to get intercepters out a bit faster at the start of the game, but their firepower is to weak in small numbers to do any sort of resource operation damage, and very soon after when the gunships come out, they get wasted.

I only build the fighter facility for the bombers, and very rarely, the scouts.

Intercepters = 500 ru
Gunships = 625 ru

go figure.

Seriously, Intercepters really are almost useless.
Only bother with them as a compliment to a strike force, just as
added number power, since bombers aren't going to fair well against other fast moving craft.

My two favourite units in the game are bombers and torpedo frigates. :)

[Henka]

I just attack and when i se ints/bombers go down to red (1 or so unit left) i go and dock them asap..

sometimes i get several kills when they go chasing after that sole bomber..

Thats the thing i like with the selection interface, you always se what squad is damaged or not..