The Three Weapon Trees

Weapon trees definitly differ greatly between races on the road to get to those weapons.

Placing the Alterians in a bubble and looking at those numbers.  Different weapons are better at different times of the game when you look at cost/size/dmg/RP.

It looks like when the weapon tree was designed, Missiles were supposed to be easier to get higher damage, but also easier to counter with defenses.  Don't know if that's reality or not, but I always research missile defense regardless of what the AI does  (unless I'm Korath--they don't get Aeron).

You're neglecting to consider weapon sizes (and sizemods), but yes, at this point in time, missiles are not only the best, but the cheapest.

I've complained about this a number of times, albeit not in a bug report, but it seems this is how the weapon tree is going to be now.  I liked DA's weapon tree much better, where beams were ~49k, guns ~67k, and missiles ~75k.

(It also doesn't make sense that the weapon techs that aren't even used anymore still show up in the default tree-which now that the minor races have their own tree, no one even uses.)

For what it's worth, Brad's change to weapons/defenses where they all have an increased cost was welcome, but not exactly what I had in mind.

Also, since I can't see that change in your above numbers, I'm going to guess you're playing fast or very fast tech, on a galaxy medium or smaller.

Thanks for the reply guys... I dunno, I'm struggling to not come to the same conclusion as Sole Soul, that missles are both the best and the cheapest in the game at the minute.The problem is, the AI definitely seems to be coming to the same conclusion and inevitable i'm fighting AI's with missles. very occasionally beams, but since 2.02 in 3/4 games i think i'm yet to see an AI using guns.

In fact, having played the previous two games with guns, I don't see any point where they were better in any respect than missles/beams. Loupdinour, do you have a suggestion as to which time in the game guns are superior for the Altarians?

I think it was 'fast' research in a medium galaxy, for the record. (and was isolating the RP required to research just the final step)

All of a sudden its such a decision which weapon choice i should make, in DA i just picked the least used in the galaxy and ran with it, that suddenly doesn't seem so viable!

I guess the question is: If most of the galaxy is going with missles should i go beams/guns to be different, so they (generally) won't develop defences for me?

Is there any pre-existing theory on the total RP cost, benefits (size/damage/credit cost), disadvantages of the three weapons trees (For each race?) anywhere?

In terms of the total RP cost and the end beenfit

Someone (or multiple someones) did quite a bit of it on the wiki, if you're interested.  Due to tech costs changing (as well as trees, to a large extent), it's only really valid for DL and DA, but the main thing that should stand out for you is that even under DL/DA where missiles were 75k research to beams at 49k, missiles were strictly better, and apart from psionic beams, there was no real reason to focus on the beam tree, either.

For what it's worth the primary issue that the gun tree has is that when you're using medium ships or larger, they have difficulty giving you the same weapon numbers-they're best suited to smaller hulls.  Unfortunately due to the very low space amounts one has in the early game, this does not provide as much of an early game advantage as it should, and more to the point, by the time one has black hole guns researched (for example-it doesn't have to be end tree to be noticeable), there is very little if any reason to use small/tiny hulls.

The other problem with TA's weapons in my mind is that unless you are the Drengin/Korath, who get psionic beam right after Laser V, psionic beam is now barely worthy as being your evil weapon of choice, as psionic missile is available much earlier, and while evil weapons are very good in combat, their primary purpose has evolved into intimidation-where timing counts more than anything.

The point being, in DL/DA it's worthwhile to pick up psionic beam and then max out the missile tree-in TA you may as well just grab psionic missile instead; since you're already going to max out the missile tree psionic beam isn't worth the extra 8k-13k it would take.

(These are base values only, taken from adding together requisite techs in Galactopedia-TA 2.0.something brings in an additional 50% modifier to all weapons/defense techs that I have not yet thoroughly tested.  But all of the above numbers are on the same scale, at least, as I have accounted for that change, galaxy size, and tech speed in none of them-they're just the raw numbers.)

Does anybody else do this?  The last few games, I'll just develop a basic weapon (usually beams), and then work on general stuff like miniaturization, logistics, engines and hull size.  It seems that I always steal a good weapons tech from the first or second planet that I take, then I just start upgrading everything.

Heck yeah.   The AI doesn't research Defense very much.  I'll research missile defense like mad and put out ships with crazy high D and maybe 1 or 2 attack.  Then I'll fleet up and maybe put up a military starbase to get that attack up.  Ships still die, but nothing I can't handle.  I can usually find a good victim without too much trouble, steal like Stinger IV from them.

Sometimes its also fun to see how long you can just not research any weapons/defense techs and just kiss the AI's virtual ass for a few years.  Then research like particle cannon 1 all the way through 12 additional techs in like 1 week.  Then rush-buy a few ships and sucker punch them.  Sure, you just did 2 decades of research and ship-building in the span of 1 galactic week and it totally blows any sense of realism you might have been striving for in your game.  It's sorta like Canada just invading and conquering Alaska with handheld ion particle accelerator cannons and hovertanks.  But it's kinda funny nonetheless. 

If Canada can terraform Alaska, I'll be impressed.

If they build Aphrodisiac, I'll move there.