Doctrine: Blue-Sky vs Black-Sky

[Max93b]

Thats some blue sky thinking there

 

[SanguineGus]

The only defining characteristic of black sky is that they need a contingent of ships devoted to taking out the spaceports- those ships would also be optimal for taking out your opponents big ships, so they would have a role in defense as well. Get a feel for how many are required to take out each systems local defenses, split your forces and hit as many different systems simultaneously, retreat where you have to, but you make progress and tie up your opponents fleet all the same.

Also, look at eve online, large hp buffer builds are standard for pvp for good reason, while regen builds are relegated to pve.

 

[cosmeIII]

You don't have to stick to only one doctrine. Divide et impera, as they say. Make specialized fleets, some black sky, some blue sky. And move them around as needed. Does a front need offensive capabilities? Send your Black Sky fleets. Does another front only need to hold the line? Prepare a Blue Sky strategy.

This is, I believe, a reason for Martin's hardships in the war. He wanted to make territorial gains both in the insect territory up north and the Q'ellnudar down south. He prepared a defensive line down south while he took care of the other front, but went on the offensive in both. If he had taken care of the bugs up north first, (that is, invasion and occupation of their capital) and then focused more of his fleet south, his victory would've been swifter. But still, he is streaming and needs to be entertaining which lowers his concentration, and also wanted to end the war as fast as possible in order to show off other things about the mechanics.

 

[swiftsvre]

Here's the initial draft. It'll grow larger in time, but I hope it'll prove useful and/or entertaining for some.

 

[Hull-Tanker]

wow nice writeup OP.

An actual good thread that is not cancer, good to see.

Regarding your post, I think a Black-Sky fleet based on carrier warfare and wormholes is an interesting concept since if the ships are strong and can sustain damage you can choose battles within enemy territory and also force decicive battles.

 

[TheBeautifulVoid2]

Both Blue Sky and Black Sky fleet doctrines are based on the concept of a decisive battle: that is, that the war is won or lost in a huge fleet-on-fleet engagement between the ships that each side has built up during peacetime, and that if you lose that battle then the enemy can easily destroy any new ships you build as and when you build them. A Blue Sky fleet and a Black Sky fleet will both seek to fight this sort of battle but will differ on where it gets fought.

After the battle, the fleet can start to destroy stations, bombard planets and escort invasion forces, and camp outside the enemy production facilities to prevent them rebuilding. Because of this, it's inaccurate to say that a Blue Sky fleet is a defensive fleet: its mission is to seek out and destroy the enemy's fleets, it just does it in a different place. Once that mission is complete it conquers planets at the same rate.

Some doctrines, like the Fleet In Being, Red Sky and No Sky doctrines mentioned here, are not decisive battle doctrines: they don't assume that the purpose of a fleet is to seek out and destroy the enemy in massed battle. These doctrines need to be considered separately.

 

[cletusallretus]

Great topic thanks TBV

I think your make-up of your naval forces will largely depend on your ethos/gov types and FTL choice. Expansionists going more black and Pacifists blue. I think I will prefer the mixed approach as other posters have suggested. I'd go with a more task force approach to my navy dividing it into three basic groups

- Battle ( Black , focusing on finding and destroying enemy fleets. More offensive in nature then a all- rounder fleet )
- System Defense ( Blue, focused on delaying and/or stopping enemy raiders and invasion fleets. A combination of stations and defense/health ships )
- Raiders ( Focused on disruption of enemy economic activity. Most likely smaller, fast , offensive )

I'm sure the game will undergo a lot more changes to the balance of combat as the release approaches , but I'm really looking forward to experimenting with naval composition.

 

[Synen]

Red Sky could also be used as scouts at the start of the war that you send into your enemies territory to find out what weapons they use and then have your Blue and/or Black Sky fleets upgrade to an appropriate counter.

 

[ikki]

Me, im much more into air-denial as a defence than active countermeasures.
That means fortresses. LOTS of them. I'm thinking 7 or more per bordering star, perhaps 2 or 3 stars deep.

Call it the Mannerheim line

I kinda expect to spend as much minerals and energy on the defences as on a fleet.
Besides passive is always better than active in real time.

Oh an i hope i can have 2 wormhole stations a star. Would kinda be a backup incase one is destroyed or otherwise busy.

 

[Lithran]

Interesting ideas. I'd be more Blue myself, as I tend to prefer holding the line and let my enemy wear themselves out.

 

[TheBeautifulVoid2]

- Battle ( Black , focusing on finding and destroying enemy fleets. More offensive in nature then a all- rounder fleet )
- System Defense ( Blue, focused on delaying and/or stopping enemy raiders and invasion fleets. A combination of stations and defense/health ships )
- Raiders ( Focused on disruption of enemy economic activity. Most likely smaller, fast , offensive )

Ironically, a Black Sky fleet is probably more defensive in nature than a Blue Sky fleet. Black Sky ships would need to be able to withstand large amounts of damage and not need repairs, so they're going to need to be fortresses. On the other hand, Blue Sky fleets can use ships which maximise firepower and maneuverability at the cost of defence because they know they can easily withdraw for repair.

I haven't had any thoughts on raider warfare, but it'll be an interesting thing to consider.

 

[sdeezie]

Ironically, a Black Sky fleet is probably more defensive in nature than a Blue Sky fleet. Black Sky ships would need to be able to withstand large amounts of damage and not need repairs, so they're going to need to be fortresses. On the other hand, Blue Sky fleets can use ships which maximise firepower and maneuverability at the cost of defence because they know they can easily withdraw for repair.

I haven't had any thoughts on raider warfare, but it'll be an interesting thing to consider.

Perhaps with future trade DLC it will make more sense to have "wolf packs" of raider ships...

 

[sdeezie]

Thinking about decisive battle and the difference being where that decisive battle occurs: It seems important to have the post-decisive-battle "mop up" go really quickly, as well - so that once the battle is won (and your intel leads you to believe that there are no fleets remaining), you can take out their ship production capacity as quickly as possible. This would be a tempting time to split up the decisive battle blob and spread it out among their planets to keep them from fielding any more ships, though it could be a serious mistake to split up the fleet before they are, well, decisively defeated.

Mop-up might also be slowed down by the necessity of building a wormhole station in range of their remaining planets, which might give them an opportunity to bounce back, or at least turtle somewhere.

 

[cletusallretus]

Ironically, a Black Sky fleet is probably more defensive in nature than a Blue Sky fleet. Black Sky ships would need to be able to withstand large amounts of damage and not need repairs, so they're going to need to be fortresses. On the other hand, Blue Sky fleets can use ships which maximise firepower and maneuverability at the cost of defence because they know they can easily withdraw for repair.

I haven't had any thoughts on raider warfare, but it'll be an interesting thing to consider.

I shouldn't have included black and blue in the description, thanks for pointing that out

 

[TheBeautifulVoid2]

An actual good thread that is not cancer, good to see.

One of the reasons that I started posting in this forum is that I wanted to help encourage the community to be a thoughtful, friendly place rather than just people complaining that "X is OP." I hope that with my example, we can be a welcoming and fun place.

Or, to state it with slightly more braggadocio: I am chemo.

Regarding your post, I think a Black-Sky fleet based on carrier warfare and wormholes is an interesting concept since if the ships are strong and can sustain damage you can choose battles within enemy territory and also force decicive battles.

That's an interesting idea, and plays well. A carrier fleet strong enough to annihilate the enemy at range will suffer almost no casualties in return, which really plays into the concept of force-preservation and self-defence which is central to a Black Sky doctrine. I want to try this out now.

Red Sky could also be used as scouts at the start of the war that you send into your enemies territory to find out what weapons they use and then have your Blue and/or Black Sky fleets upgrade to an appropriate counter.

Welcome to the community, Synen!

That's a great idea that I had not actually considered. I think it plays better with a Blue Sky doctrine, since they'll be close to their bases and so will be able to be refitted easily with the information you found. Black Sky ships need to be able to take on all comers, but even they can benefit from this sort of information-warfare.

That means fortresses. LOTS of them. I'm thinking 7 or more per bordering star, perhaps 2 or 3 stars deep.

Call it the Mannerheim line

I kinda expect to spend as much minerals and energy on the defences as on a fleet.

This is an important aspect of a Blue Sky fleet: it's expensive. Blue Sky doctrine requires lots of defensive stations, and while each of those is cheap individually, you have to put them in every system which will quickly add up. An impoverished empire might actually be better going with a Black Sky fleet.

I look forward to hearing about how the Mannerheim Line works in play.

Besides passive is always better than active in real time.

This is a crucially important point that I think a lot of people forget, and which is probably going to be vital when it comes to raider warfare.

 

[Red_warning]

My experience with video games tells me any fleet will want to have some battleships as tanks to soak up damage so that the more fragile ships may live a bit longer and deliver maximum damage.

If you could design a few of them to be aggressive and longevity focused that would be even better.

 

[Ifreann]

One of the reasons that I started posting in this forum is that I wanted to help encourage the community to be a thoughtful, friendly place rather than just people complaining that "X is OP." I hope that with my example, we can be a welcoming and fun place.

Or, to state it with slightly more braggadocio: I am chemo.

Beautiful Void is OP. Nerf being fun and welcoming.

 

[Murmeldjuret]

Beautiful Void is OP. Nerf being fun and welcoming.

It's almost like these forums are not a hive of scum and villainy.

 

[CassCD]

Dark Blue Sky. Declare war. Hold single navy of doom at a central system within your empire. Wait until their war fleet to identify and show themselves, preferably by them engaging one of your vulnerable systems. If your fleet is weaker, then build/upgrade up fast. Let them attrition their way through your defenses. When ready, send out your force and chase them back to their lair, if not able to outright engage and destroy. Efficiency of strategy dependent upon speed/type of travel of fleets. Wormholes speculated to be most efficient.

 

[Turin the Mad]

Raider warfare seems likely to double as primary reconnaissance, especially if you are able to develop stealth/cloaking technologies for your ships.

Legs, sensors, scout fighters and long range firepower with design emphasis on evasion, anti-capitol weapons and at least some degree of point defense.

Especially if you've developed stealth/cloaking you wait for the cooldown timer to expire on your FTL method before getting a rampage going in a given system, providing a better likelihood of escape via emergency FTL (or regular if you've done your deeds in that system).

I'm curious if there are such modules/components as longer-range or more accurate/enhanced sensor suites, passive sensor suites or if all of these are wrapped up in one of the sidebars where the FTL drive, combat computer and sublight drives are located. (Vaguely recall in one of the streams that there are 4 boxes on the side governing that design's choices of sublight, FTL, combat computer and sensor package.)

Perhaps you only use your fastest sublight drives on your raiding ships, relegating the cheaper and slower drives to your main designs until you can afford to upgrade them.