Energy Storage & Electric Engines

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newageofpower
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Energy Storage & Electric Engines

Post by newageofpower »

Last night on Discord, I objected to many MP veterans stating "electric engines are useless" and hypothesized that (in addition to powering motor trucks on low-fuel worlds) you could make very fast laser light tanks for flanking and hunting down vehicles that aren't mounting MBT levels of armor.

It turns out with good rolls/field testing/iteration and triple electric you can get to +15% on light laser/50mm poly, which fulfills the fast criteria, but I run out of energy before I run out of AP! (Using 90ish Mobile Tactic OHQ commander)

Unlike fuel-burning vehicles, Electric Engines don't have an optimization, so there's nothing I can do in the current game to mitigate this.

Huge problem for laser light tanks if they can't actually fight after entering the opponent's rear areas!

Suggestion: Increase energy storage available to energy-using units with the "Energy Storage Optimization" linear technology, this way electric engines have a bigger niche.
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BlueTemplar
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RE: Energy Storage & Electric Engines

Post by BlueTemplar »

Oh crap ! XD

How *is* the (sub?)unit energy storage determined ?

But nothing forces you to use energy weapons on these tanks ?
Or are High Velocity Cannons so much heavier ?
(By the way, what weapon type are they : "Bullets", "Hollow", "Physical" ?)

EDIT : Or is this because the ammo (unlike energy) will actually gradually deplete the closest logistic points during the resupply phase, making logistics more of an issue (including for energy) ?
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newageofpower
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RE: Energy Storage & Electric Engines

Post by newageofpower »

Subunit energy storage is determined by engine type you select, IIRC.

No, guns have less firepower per cost/weight than lasers. Lasers are almost strictly superior to everything before them.

Lasers are obviously lasers; unless you meant High Velocity Guns. Those are "Bullet". Physical attacks are things you find on [s]Kaiju[/s] Xenofauna. Hollow means shaped charges, IIRC, which currently only come from RPG Infantry using non-Nuclear launchers.
zgrssd
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RE: Energy Storage & Electric Engines

Post by zgrssd »

This does sound like kind of a bug. For most units Fuel and Ammo are seperate entries. With both storages selected so high, you got 1-2 turns without supply before you run out.
Laser Tanks with Electroc Motors only got one entry it seems.

Either the addition is not working - meaning the storage is to low - wich should be reported as a bug.
Or the part where you are allowed to "burn ammo energy instead of fuel energy" allows you to run out with any level of supply disruption. Wich might be solved by still treating both as seperate resources, without dipping into the others pool.

I do have a suggestion of allowing Bicycle/Animal cavalry, wich would allow you to use Food as Fuel directly. This does indicated there might be some problems with that idea after all!
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BlueTemplar
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RE: Energy Storage & Electric Engines

Post by BlueTemplar »

We need pie throwers, that would use food as ammo ! [:D]
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BlueTemplar
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RE: Energy Storage & Electric Engines

Post by BlueTemplar »

ORIGINAL: newageofpower
No, guns have less firepower per cost/weight than lasers. Lasers are almost strictly superior to everything before them.
Hmm, what about flanking and hunting down motorized (mechanized?) infantry ?
Howitzers get pretty insane anti-soft firepower once you get cluster bombs, and it's not like you need a large calibre against soft targets (or even APCs)...

Now of course this still means ammo, which still puts a higher strain on logistics than energy, because it depletes logistic points, and makes deep attacks harder, but this might be compensated by electric engines being superior to diesels ?

Or does the relatively small calibre mean that you don't really need them... except maybe until you need to pack a larger howitzer calibre because you're facing battledresses with their 80/100mm of plating?
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newageofpower
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RE: Energy Storage & Electric Engines

Post by newageofpower »

Light tanks can't overmatch battledress (80mm) with howitzer (60mm max), so they're not a good candidate for anti-infantry work in the battledress age.
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BlueTemplar
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RE: Energy Storage & Electric Engines

Post by BlueTemplar »

Ah, good point !
What about medium tanks then ?

Also, for the basic battledress vs 60mm howitzer, 60/80=75%, so light tanks might be *still* worth it, considering all the other bonuses ?
(They'll probably want to have thicker plating too, if those battledresses have laser+ rifles, so electric engines might be still worth it ?)
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newageofpower
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RE: Energy Storage & Electric Engines

Post by newageofpower »

This whole thread is about the viability of electric engines; Medium Tanks get a significant innate speed penalty for their size even with double diesel (800 thrust) and as such triple electric wouldn't be a good candidate for electric engines.

Advanced battledress gets up to 100mm, at which point 60mm howitzers go from 'poor' to 'awful'.
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