It's not aiming being the problem. It's your cannonball not travelling the path you aim.There's a lot of stuff in this thread, but you forgot a pair of things, there are tachyon sensors that are instantaneous and tachyon lances that are instantaneous because tachyons travel backwards in time, people keep thinking stellaris is eu4 or hoi4 in space but they forget all the advanced tech in stellaris:
Physics research - Stellaris Wiki
stellaris.paradoxwikis.com
Tachyon Sensors
Advanced sensors that rely on rotating tachyon beams to detect ship movements even at extreme distances.
Tachyon Lances
A more powerful version of the particle lance, this weapon fires a tachyon beam of immense power. Like its predecessor, its use is limited to battleships and titans.
A tachyon (/ˈtækiɒn/) or tachyonic particle is a hypothetical particle that always travels faster than light.Tachyon - Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org
They do, they travel backwards in time because they're faster than light:Unless Tachyons travel instantly, the problem persists.
It's not aiming being the problem. It's your cannonball not travelling the path you aim.
Even if you are shooting tachyon beams, it's still the same problem: Uneven machining, space-time fluctuations and small errors in measurements will give you a great distance off your mark.
The only possible solution is that your beam is used like a ridiculously long sword you slide it from one point to another so you can slash your target. Otherwise it is still going to have the same error source.
No, but there's no reason to think that 0.5 degrees (or any other particular number) is the limit to how accurate weapons can be made.This maths can simply never be avoided no matter how faster than light your fancy cannonball is flying.
Let's do the maths.
Let's say you're trying to hit a mark with perfect circular shape with 500m radius, which is analogous to a very large ship. Then let's say your reliability standard has it that you accept an error rate of 0.5°, accounting for all polishing, machining and mass fluctuations.
So 500m / Target distance = tan(0.5°)
It gives Target distance = 57294m
So with this error rate and such a large target size, you can only be able to shoot it with 100% accuracy at 57.3km. Anything more will have accuracy reduced with direct proportion to any extra distance. At 114.6km, you only have like 50% of chance that it hits.
This error margin is already very lenient as ships usually are not in perfect circular shapes and are not as large as 500m in radius (1km long).
This maths can simply never be avoided no matter how faster than light your fancy cannonball is flying.
Stellaris' habitable zone is 60-100 distant units. Earth's orbit around Sol is 90 distant units. Ringworlds are at 45 distance units.
So to redo the math it's a circumference of 471 million, half keeping the assumption it's a similar height to Earth it's got an area of 6 Trillion KM² but let's say each section has a similar height to Luna so at the smallest I'll use it's an area of 1.8T KM².
I realized I used circumference in my prior calculation so it was super wrong anyway. Blame it on doing math at 1AM.
Anyway a Stellaris Ringworld is 12,000 Earths worth of area at the largest 3600 Earths at the smallest.
So no less completely and utterly absurd. Thanks for informing me because it let me realize how bad my initial math was.
That's right, you have to take into account stellaris tech, scale and the weapons range.No, but there's no reason to think that 0.5 degrees (or any other particular number) is the limit to how accurate weapons can be made.
For what it's worth, the habitable zone is the same for all star classes, including red dwarfs and blue giants. So it's not consistently 1 AU.So since an AU is 150 million km and 90 range in stellaris
That's a solid argument for missiles, but I'm not sure about strike craft. Adding all the life support, propulsion for a return trip, defensive countermeasures (pilots are expensive, and you want to get them back if at all possible), it all adds up. I'm not sure the pilot offers enough of a benefit to be worth the downsides, especially when you consider how smart a missile computer these futuristic civs could build. (Hmm... sapient missile components? Sapient strike craft?) A missile may be slightly less "smart", but all else being equal it will be smaller, faster, more maneuverable, and have more payload.So strike craft absolutely make sense, in terms of your ability to predict enemy movement (and therefore hit shots) being a lot better from light seconds or actual seconds away from a target rather than light hours.
Usually strike craft are used in Scifi where big ships can't safely go (in unrealistically dense asteroid fields, or within range of a super-duper starbase that could knock them out) but neither of those are an issue in Stellaris. And ships are rarely costly, or take long, to replace, even if super-starbases existed.Where I would see strike craft being most useful, personally, would be at extreme short range, where the ability to project multiple points of attack is valuable. If your enemy is close enough to slip strike craft behind or inside their formation, that disruption could be extremely effective.
If you focus energy weapon attack speed, ion cannons might just barely be viable now, since they're finally affected by repeatables.Usually strike craft are used in Scifi where big ships can't safely go (in unrealistically dense asteroid fields, or within range of a super-duper starbase that could knock them out) but neither of those are an issue in Stellaris. And ships are rarely costly, or take long, to replace, even if super-starbases existed.
If we saw PDX adding anti-class guns (e.g. anti-corvette, anti-battleship) that can outrange most vessels of that class, it might make the case for missiles - or strike craft - much stronger, at least against certain hard targets. Ditto on longer build/repair times for large ships. In a way, ION cannons already act as a threat VS capital ships ... they are just so bad when you look at the number of targets / fire rate involved, that it is a non-factor.
That just sucks the fun out of fighting players in a maneuver war, though maybe it will stop the AI from going full hannibal and running amok in my backyard like assholes.Operational radius and limited ammunitions for fleet in order to make starbase essential.
The thing is even if you have really nice technology, you're tasked to build 1 Corvette within 60 days, and a year to build a Battleship.No, but there's no reason to think that 0.5 degrees (or any other particular number) is the limit to how accurate weapons can be made.
You are absolutely right here. Even if we up 1000 times the order of magnitude, it's still very unrealistic for Stellaris's distances.If you make it a million times more accurate so it's 100% accurate at 57,3 million kilometers, a third of astronomical unit, it would still be too inaccurate from stellaris:
Astronomical unit - Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org
The astronomical unit (symbol: au,[1][2][3] or au or AU) is a unit of length, roughly the distance from Earth to the Sun and equal to about 150 million kilometres (93 million miles) or ~8 light minutes.
149597870700 m.
The range of a large weapon is 120, XL 130 and titan cannons are 250 I think, andI saw in another thread talking about distance that earth was at 90 distance and a ring world at 45 from the sun:
What aspects of Stellaris hurt your suspension of disbelief?
For me, the following are hard to head-cannon away: Bureaucracy buildings can be better when not on your homeworld. This makes no sense to me, as you would expect that type of thing on a homeworld. The solution is to remove the bureaucratic...forum.paradoxplaza.com
What aspects of Stellaris hurt your suspension of disbelief?
For me, the following are hard to head-cannon away: Bureaucracy buildings can be better when not on your homeworld. This makes no sense to me, as you would expect that type of thing on a homeworld. The solution is to remove the bureaucratic...forum.paradoxplaza.com
What aspects of Stellaris hurt your suspension of disbelief?
For me, the following are hard to head-cannon away: Bureaucracy buildings can be better when not on your homeworld. This makes no sense to me, as you would expect that type of thing on a homeworld. The solution is to remove the bureaucratic...forum.paradoxplaza.com
So since an AU is 150 million km and 90 range in stellaris, a large weapon is 120 in range and 200 millions km, so to be accurate it's 4 millions more of what you said, so 0,000000125°
That's right, you have to take into account stellaris tech, scale and the weapons range.
If my argument on accuracy is taken with face value, then your normal ranges of engagement would not exceed 1000km. Even if we add some magic accuracy on top, then it'd still be around 10000km.That's a solid argument for missiles, but I'm not sure about strike craft. Adding all the life support, propulsion for a return trip, defensive countermeasures (pilots are expensive, and you want to get them back if at all possible), it all adds up. I'm not sure the pilot offers enough of a benefit to be worth the downsides, especially when you consider how smart a missile computer these futuristic civs could build. (Hmm... sapient missile components? Sapient strike craft?) A missile may be slightly less "smart", but all else being equal it will be smaller, faster, more maneuverable, and have more payload.
Where I would see strike craft being most useful, personally, would be at extreme short range, where the ability to project multiple points of attack is valuable. If your enemy is close enough to slip strike craft behind or inside their formation, that disruption could be extremely effective.
This cannot exist alone. Stellaris ranges are ridiculous. Flying from a few jumps takes a year or so. Returning home takes 4 years.Operational radius and limited ammunitions for fleet in order to make starbase essential.