Late game because of my strategy I have a gigantic liquid treasury. I have enough military just to prevent computers from declaring war on me. After I max out all the techs however I mass the best types of ship I can, but they do have their limits so I bring along a few constructors with every fleet and create a military base near every major/intense battle to give me an extra boost.

they can be useful, but it depends on many factors. when they are useful is the question. i find them generally useful on smaller maps to defend small areas, or in a particular zone that's heavy with battle.

building several in a small area can also be useful for a specific effect. for example, sometimes i'll build a 'catapult.' i put 16 starbases on the intersection of 4 sectors, and add speed-boosting improvements to all of them. this is a great way to give a ship +32 speed for a turn, allowing you to send ships into far-off sectors very quickly.

are they worth it? that depends. are you having fun with them?

I like starbases for the bonus's they give. I wish the starbases had an auto-attack feature that when ememy ships come into range they would attack first.

I can only see it as a useful strategy for those people going for pure technology or pure influence victory. Military starbases play a more defensive game...so enemy ships coming into their territory have a big disadvantage.

It will be nice if Military starbase should automatically have the first weapons upgrade (1+ for all weapons) and shot anything in range...but cost 2.5x more than other starbases. A military starbase that can protect your ships, planets, and other starbases...that's awesome. But than players will start stacking military starbases as an exploit...perhaps limit stacking effect to two or just one. If these changes were made than this would be a very useful strategy defensive/offensive in any map size. Otherwise, a military bases are a waste of money.

Starbases shouldn't be able to move. But starbases that can manufactor ships...that whole different topic. It will also be nice to have the ability to merge any starbases with your ships into fleet as a defensive tatic.

There kind of a catch 22 thing really... if you need them, you cannot afford them, if you can afford them, you do not need them!

I almost never use them.

I play higher levels and never use them in any kind of map, but in small and medium maps it could happen i use attack/defense modules on mining starbases. Actually the cost of a well developed military starbase is so high that i prefer to build starships.

I think, talking about tactic, military starbases represent the general idea of giving a terrain advantage in a game that present a homogeneous territory and they should certainly be more powerful and more developed. The weakness of a tactical element in a game is easy to identify: if you can build somenthing when you don't need that something anymore it means its tactical impact is nullified.

My ideas:

1) I like constructors for starbases. It means you have to bring materials from a planet in order to build stuff on your bases. It's ok, it's a kind of realistic. But i also think the need for constructors for every single improvement on a starbase it's crazy. I would like to see a starbase-bar that allow you to put some of your money in the developement of all your bases (maybe with an "off" button in the detail screen if you don't want to upgrade a particular one). You should need constructors only for some milestone improvements and then let your money flow out and see your bases became jewels.

2) Military starbases should give you default advantages since the very beginning and:

- the two planetary defense improvements (that i never use so i never remember) should be instead starbase modules and planetary defense should be researchable immediatly after space weapons.
- military sb should give a tactical advantage to troops fighting on a planet in their influence area. A very good one, worth the high price of such a iron garbage in the middle of deep space.
- the range is too wide. I would like to see a narrower range but, if a battle happens in this range, starbases should be a part of it. It would mean, under certain circumstances, you can bring your enemy in your territory at your conditions. This will justify very much the construction of a military sb close to a planet.
- when you destroy one of your military sb (or any other sb) you should receive in exchange money or, better, some constructors. It makes sense: if you dismantle a sb you can use the old materials to build a new one. Maybe not everything but a lot (weapons for example, etc.).

All in all a tactical option in a game is worthless if it's not a balanced alternative to the other tactical options. And military starbases are clearly too expensive for the advantages they give you. Talking realistically, i think military starbases should be less expensive or more powerful in order to be a worth tactic. Until this doesn't change i won't use them because, as Lyvonia said before, fast fleets on your borders (with eye of the universe i would say) are the best defense system in the game.

richard

p.s. i think military starbases should be a priority in future patches because the question of "terrain effects" on battles is missed in GC and, whether is a core charachterization of the original game concept or not (i suspect it's not, due the fact someone actually introduced military sb), it would a great improvement to have, so to say, the option of battlefield tactics.

Heck yeah I use military starbases! And who says you have to use them defensively? Plonk them down on the OTHER guy's territory.

I tend to play Medium maps, on abundant/abundant. I like abundant settings, because that makes all 3 kinds of starbases able to envelope 4-6 planets at a time.

Exactly. In other words, right when it really matters.

Sorry for the typos, you're... not your...
Hate when I do that!