(AP) What do I do with ten Hyperions, two Valhallas and an Aran?

[Sovereign01]

Title is as it says, my having boarded the above vessels. I trained enough 100% marines to board a Xenon I a while back and have kitted it out (still yet to fine tune its turret settings as it likes to sling Firestorms at everything ).

Boarded a Valhalla (actually two, only one is operational), need the Aran to haul it around since it can't jump anywhere on its own. I have plenty of credits partly due to the Nvidium exploit and two huge complexes cranking out capital ship weapons and shields.

I'm sure I can make a fleet out of this somehow, most of the Hyps are sat in various shipyards/equipment docks while I figure out the best use for them. In TC I took one as my personal ship, in AP my goals are different so I use a Springy, which seems to be well suited to shield suppression on the Hyps that I "acquire".

I know I have enough ships for one Valhalla or nearly two Kyotos. I get the feeling the Valhalla is just a huge floating target and is extremely impractical, which is a shame given its huge potential

[Simoom]

Aran: Put 30 bombers on it and load it up with tons of missiles - Destroyer of the Universe, in a can (quite literally).

Valhalla: Started hunting for jump beacons yet? No? Do that and you will be able to jump it around. I have a topic going about how to hunt for jump beacons (with JB spawning behavior) if you are interested. It's both a super-heavy destroyer and a super-heavy carrier, so up to you how you want to use it. Note that it can dock 10 "medium-sized ships" (so anything from TS, TP, TM, M6, M8 ), so how you utilize this is up to you. You could expand its fighter-carrying capabilities by docking 10 TM's, all loaded with fighters, for example, which will give you 30 additional fighters (for 80 total). That's a lot of fighters. Or you can do 40 M3's and 10 M8's for a balanced load.

Hyperions: Versatile ships - you can dock them on the Valhalla as escorts/firepower boosts (not that it really needs any...), or if you get that number up to 30, dock them all on the Aran. 30 Hyperions in a can is an impressive sight - not sure what you can do with it though. Likely to lose a few even taking on a single M2.

[Sovereign01]

Have you got a link to the thread in question? Yeah, I was afraid of losing a few Hyps in an engagement, it's not like they're easy to replace

Damn, I thought I had ten- looks like I only have nine. I must have miscounted, and I forgot I sent one to be REd Well, looks like I have one more to collect. What fighters would complement the setup? Since the Hyps can dock a couple fighters each it's going to be fun managing them

EDIT: forgot to add, I already have the infrastructure to produce both Tomahawks and Phantoms, so I can either use the Auster Hauler or the Claymore for that role. Auster has a bigger cargo bay and M6-Level shields, but the Phantom outranges the Tomahawk by 10KM.

[Simoom]

Yeah, it's only a few threads down: http://forum.egosoft.com/posting.php

In general I don't particularly like to deal with ship repairs/attrition, because X3 doesn't make the process very easy. So as a personal rule I don't use M1's/M3's/M6's for engaging enemy capitals - with the buff to capital ships in AP, as well as changes to OOS combat behavior, attrition rate for smaller ships against larger ships are much worse now than ever.

The only exception I make for carriers are ones who can dock bombers - and there are only a few ships that can dock them (Aran, Valhalla, and a the Boron/Paranid M7C's I think). Aran in particular would excel as a bomber carrier due to its massive storage space, so it can carry virtually an inexhaustible supply of missiles. Valhalla's bomber docking abilities are limited in comparison, and cargo space is much more limited as well, but if you use it in conjunction with a supply ship it shouldn't be a problem.

If you already have the PHQ you can reverse-engineer the Hyperion and build as many as you like - but they do take a LONG time to build. It may be faster to just keep capturing them from the Paranids if you don't mind the trouble of mending the reputation afterward (or just stay hostile with them, they are jerks anyway)

Phantoms are superior to Tomahawks not just due to range & damage but they are more space efficient (takes less space for more damage). This makes Terran bombers more potent since given the same amount of cargo space, they can carry more missiles.

[Sovereign01]

I already REd a Hyp, they take 20 hours to build so I'll be stealing some more. Still, the Paranid have gained quite a few stations as compensation

Phantoms are superior to Tomahawks not just due to range & damage but they are more space efficient (takes less space for more damage). This makes Terran bombers more potent since given the same amount of cargo space, they can carry more missiles.

Not anymore, in AP the Phantom no longer holds the space advantage over the Tomahawk it had in TC (1 vs 2), now both take up 6 units each, meaning a considerable drop in capacity.

[Tohron]

Valhalla's bomber docking abilities are limited in comparison, and cargo space is much more limited as well, but if you use it in conjunction with a supply ship it shouldn't be a problem.

Just noting - the Vahalla's 10 medium docks can also be used to have a supply TS - the Boron Sturgeon has the most space (16.5K) though fully upgrading cargo is expensive. Also, the Terran Kyoto can dock 6 bombers/supply TS's.

[bizbag]

Aran: Put 30 bombers on it and load it up with tons of missiles - Destroyer of the Universe, in a can (quite literally).

Valhalla: Started hunting for jump beacons yet? No? Do that and you will be able to jump it around. I have a topic going about how to hunt for jump beacons (with JB spawning behavior) if you are interested.

Since he already has an Aran, dock the Valhalla to the Aran and use the Aran as the "carrier" to deploy the Valhalla. The Aran doesn't have the jump restrictions the Valhalla does.