Ion cannons are they worth it?

    was just wondering if many othere people actually put time into these? I know there expensive and there firepower for there cost is pretty poor, but the idea of there shields helping to stretch out fights is very useful, ive also heard that they help with IPMs? not sure if that's true or not.
    currently sitting on a few thousand of these on my main planet, was just interested in peoples opinions on them and maybe some definite facts about them, also feel free to post your defence comps if you like :P

    Agrom.jpg

    They aren't worth it. If anybody wants to raid you, they usually send enough ships that you're outnumbered 20 or 30 to 1, and combat ends in the second round. Delaying combat for a round or two doesn't really do much of anything, even if you do manage to. The purpose of defense is to cause enough losses to an attacker that they don't bother attacking you, so your main goal is to maximize losses to attackers, making ions useless (terrible firepower, dying in 3 rounds instead of dying in 2 rounds doesn't make any difference, you still die).


    As defenses get more expensive, the firepower to cost goes down. The reason that you still build the more expensive defenses (despite lower firepower per cost) is due to the chance to explode mechanic. When a ship is hit below 70% health, it has a chance to explode, instantly dying. This means that the most efficient defense is the cheapest defense capable of dealing 30% of an attacking ships hull + shield integrity, so that you can blow it up. To deal with any capital ship, you need plasma turrets, as they are the only defense that can take capital ships that low in 1 hit. To deal with light fighters, you want heave lasers, as ll and rl don't deal enough damage. Finally, to deal with dessie fleets, you use rocket launchers to fodder block them, making it so that attackers need to send so many dessies to get through your defense the launch cost is too high.


    The optimal defense, therefore, is rocket launchers, heavy lasers, and plasma turrets. Anything else is a waste of resources.

    Defenses are worthless in later game stages... if someone wants to raid you or just see some destruction they will rip you without almost any losses with the exception being the tiny amount of fuel and just let them hit your defenses. Keep a low amount of defense... enough to guard your daily rez production from the noobies and put your rez into mines, cargoes, fleet, research and learn how to FS properly

    “War does not determine who is right — only who is left.”
    Clittle.jpg


    Ex- Gmod... don’t bother me anymore

    Ion cannons are generally worthwhile if implemented properly. The concept that ion cannons are defunct is not true, as the underwhelming shielding values can in fact render fodder/civil ships to commit shield bounce. If you're uber turtling, the ion cannon is supplementary for this sake and that of the shield domes.


    In later stages of the game, they do become a paradox, as the damage output of upper class ships rips through ion cannons like tissue paper. Essentially balanced gameplay will play in your favour long-term over building ion cannons.