Keeping Planets

depends....ai or human opponent............

ai you can actually setup good defenses for in a rather stupid manner...human opponent......they will always find a way around your defenses

It's AI at the moment, and while I've been trying to set everything up, it usually doesn't matter since the enemy's planet killers come in 6 to 10ish at a time.

Are there any tactics to counter that?

well with the ai...you can just do a defense blob of turrets right inbetween the planet and the phaselane they would most likely come from....ive been attacked by a severe pirate raid numerous times and survived without losing a single turret once

2-3 repair stations and the rest turrets (bout 18 with max tactical) they get owned pretty well

ha, 18 turrets? I should hope that takes care of everything.

Thanks again for the help.

yea well..i got tired of spending money to outbid the ai and i got tired of leaving a fleet behind to deal with the raids....so i knew exactly where the pirates would go every time...so i just took care of the situation in the next most logical manner

I just bomb the crap out of the local pirate base. Problem solved.

sure...you can do that....but sometimes you want to have a way to still power-lvl your new caps off the line

Here's a wild idea:

Keep a group of Seeker Vessels stationed at the planet that is to be defended. They'll take up less cost and supply as the enemy's siege frigates, and when the enemy siege force shows up, open fire with your scouts and fighters. Wait until your planet is nearly dead, at which point you should have killed or weakened some of the aggressors. And then you pull suicide-ramming attacks on the remaining siege ships with your Seeker scouts and hope that the siege ships die. You'd expect a frigate-sized battering ram to do some serious damage at least to a target that isn't much larger than itself.

Each suicide attack would throw 200 cash down the drain, but it would be a deeper hole for your siege-spamming opponent to dig out of than for you, with each Siege ship costing them 520-530 Cash + 70-80 Metal + 60 Crystal.

For Vasari, all they need is Phase Stabilizers and they can be everywhere at once, even with less ships - mobility being a force multiplier.

And the TEC have their planetary Shield Generators to hold off non-escorted siege attackers, at least until hangar fighters and Gauss turrets take them down.

neat idea

still 2 much micro involved, i put my brain elsewhere then to kil invading planet bombers

put up 4/6 defence turrets as close as possible to the planet, do this in a circle
1 or 2 repair sstation wont be so bad
this wil 100% defend your planet vs a maximum of 8/10 siege friagtes
dont forget to micro the guns (all target 1 at the same timre)

Fighters are far more effective against seige craft than bombers, if I'm suspecting seige raids I do 2 fighters, 1 bomber per hanger bay (assuming Advent) or sometimes I'll even go all 3 fighters.

It's not uncommon for my planets to have 2 hangers, 5 fighters, 1 bomber or 7 fighters, 2 bombers for 3 hangers.

It's not too hard to build static defences that can take out small AI siege fleets without backup. Remember to upgrade the planet's defences (the HP buffs), and that fighters get a nice damage bonus against Light armour (the type used by Siege Frigates). You'll still lose some population during the attack, but that's all.

In general, though, static defences are designed to buy an attacked system enough time for a defending fleet to reach it, not to defeat a serious attack on their own.

Against an AI player I build 3 trade centres in a triangle as close as possible to the planet, Then a broadcast centre in front of that and to either side two hangers, two repair centres and two palnet shields. Then I circle these with as many turrets as I can build. Its very compact and usually means that almost every turrent can be brough to bear any ship that engages this tight cluster.

The reason for this is Pirates and AI normally for straight for the trade centres, so they pile up close to this massive density of weapons. The two repair centres can really keep my trade centres up while the turrets blast the enemy. The sheild generators keep my planet fairly safe too.

Now surprising I use a very similar strategy against Real people. Only I don't worry about placing the trade centres or the broadcast centre in the middle of all this. But I do sacrifice a few turrets for an extra sheild generator and an extra repair centre.

The reason being is that the shield generators will slow down their planet attack long enough for a defensive fleet to arrive.
Or they can attack my shield generators directly, but then they will be facing the same problem as the AI, i.e. lots of turrents.
Or they can stay at range and pick off one turret at a time. But again its slow and my defence fleet will arrive too soon.

So in answer, have a lot of defence, a lot of planet health upgrades and a decent size defence fleet. It does not have to be as large as the attacking fleet, because you will have at least 2 repair centres and a number of turrets backing you up.

yeah the OP plays advent not TEC, so no shield (cough spelling) generators. For me if its a front line world I expect to be hit I usually go with 3 hangars, 2 repair stations, 1 AM batt and the rest all in turrets along the enemy's line of approach. I also keep my defensive fleet within easy reach. planet upgrades +39 tac points on a planet = burning fleets. Current game that I'm in had a roid next to the pirate base and its there only way out of their system. 2 repair + all turrets. Reminds me of sunflowers...niven's sunflowers

I'm supprised this wasn't the first post. Fighters, Fighters, Fighters! They absolutely fustigate siege ships, which is usually your bigest problem. In the early game (first hour or so) I usually go with 1 hanger and either 3 fighters or 2 fighters one bomber and 3 turrets. The fighters are great for taking out ships as they jump into orbit because they are so fast, and can even cut them off if they try to leave. They can even take out scouts as a bonus. As advent you have the best fighters in the game so use them!

"ALT" key is your friend. It makes ALL things of a certain type do ONE thing.

Use turrets, and as previous poster said, put them between phase lanes and planet. When siege frigates come in, press and hold "ALT", select a turret, and then target one of the siege frigates. All turrets that can will then target the siege frigate and it will go down. Rinse & repeat with the rest of the frigates. (This works with any ship, not just frigates)

I've taken down 8 siege frigates w/out losing a single thing and planet health still very healthy.

Also - FWIW, another alternative I love to use is to have my new cap ships at the planet with a few support frigates and gain XP by taking down an entire fleet. If the cap gets damaged, I can withdraw & use the turrets to finish off the fleet. But by then my cap usually gains 1-2 xp points.