The Purpose of Turrets: Chapter 1

posted on March 26th, 2010, 5:37 am

Depending on the map, the races and how the game is progressing, if I see a chance, and the map is small enough, I might even place a turret or two near an enemy ship yard, the entrance of it, or near their mines so slow them down and distrace them for a short while.

posted on March 27th, 2010, 4:03 am

I tend to play against the AI and I find that if I don't setup quite a few turrets it's game over since the AI - especially as of late - seems to be able to send massive numbers of ships at you in no time at all. Thus I tend to use turrets defensively rather than as a deterrent. However I don't build a wall of turrets. Rather I try to space the turrets so that I get maximum coverage with minimum expenditure as I would rather spend the resources on ships and research; usually this equates to two to four turrets, usually three, arranged in a diamond or triangle pattern. If the AI is feeling particularly aggressive that day or the map is very open, I might need two or three sets of three at various places. I almost always put at least two turrets at my expansions but I will also keep two or three ships there as well - usually the ships got there first and the turrets came later (Turrets, you're late! Get with the program damn it! ). If I'm against Romulans or Klingons I'll usually set up several sensor platforms, more so if I'm against Romulans.

Personally I have always seen turrets as small stationary defensive weapons which are intended to be deployed quickly and en-mass. They are not massive defense platforms; the only things which come close to that in FO are Klingon turrets. I don't really think the turrets need reworking with perhaps the exception of Romulan turrets which are quite weak. I have nothing against "turtling", frankly it's a perfectly valid strategy. The only downside is that it takes time, but more importantly, resources.

posted on March 30th, 2010, 2:26 pm

I like to use turrets to build deathtraps.  Especially Dominion turrets, which are fairly cheap.  Sure, one or two suck.  So you build a lot of them.  Bonus points do come from the fact that many players, and the AI both seem to think that large numbers of turrets = must attack area.  So they fly into 10+ Dominion Polaron turrets backed up by a Perimeter or a Cloning Center with a couple bugs nearby to deal with Serkas and Velaraquh.

Even cubes take serious damage from that.