Possible to beat Guardian with single super-dreadnought?

[Psillycyber]

In my current Darlok game that I'm winning, I've set myself a challenge to incentivize going to the end of the tech tree for once:

Beat the Guardian using only a single huge dreadnought ship (tricked out with all of the best gadgets, necessarily).

I'm thinking it could be done with a ship like this:

*Neutronium Armor (2400 hp)
*Max engines (warp 9)
*Max maneuver
*Class XV shields (nullifying Guardian's scatterpacks)
*Max battle computer
Specials:
*Inertial nullifier
*Advanced Damage Control
*Neutron stream projector
+ some good weapons.

Would it be possible?

It would have a missile and beam evade of 12 (9 from engines, -1 for huge hull, +4 for inertial nullifier). Going against the Guardian with an attack rating of 10, that would mean only 30% of the Guardian's attacks would get through.

For weapons, the Guardian on impossible has:
85 Scatterpack Xs (irrelevant with Class XV shields)
45 stellar converters - 10-35 damage each (---> 0-20 damage after shields). Let's say 10 on average. Plus, each stellar converter gets 4 attacks. So 40 damage on average.
18 plasma torpedoes - 150 damage each - 15 for each space traveled. Let's assume that they will be traveling 3 spaces on average. So, 105 damage. -15 = 90 damage each after shields.
1 death ray - 200-1000 damage (185-985 damage after shields). Let's say 590 on average.

45*40 = 1800 damage each round from stellar converters.
18*90 = 1620 damage every other round = 810 damage each round on average.
1*590 = 590 damage each round.

So we're looking at 3200 damage each round. Now we factor in evade...
3200*0.3 = 960 damage each round, on average. The rounds where the plasma torpedoes and the death ray hit will do more like 2000 damage, to be compensated (hopefully) by rounds where the torpedoes are not firing and where the death ray doesn't hit.

Unfortunately, our cruisers can't repel firepower of that magnitude with advanced damage control. (2400*0.3 = 720 recovered each round).

However, could we ditch the neutron stream project and equip both an automated repair AND advanced damage control? Would it heal the ship 45% each round? If so, then that would mean 1080 in healing each round, which would outpace the damage.

And if we happen to be the Alkari? Then we would have a beam and missile evade defense of 15, meaning that only 5% of the Guardian's weapons would hit.

3200*0.05 = 160 damage each round.

So, with a little bit of luck, it should definitely be possible to outlast the Guardian, even if we are not the Alkari (but especially if we are the Alkari).

Then it would also be a question of whether a single dreadnought could do enough damage ( >3000 / round) to kill the guardian.

I also wonder if plasma torpedoes would be the way to go. 60-ish plasma torpedoes fired at point-blank range every other round might be enough. (A missile could be equipped on the dreadnought, allowing it to fire at point-blank range and then scurry away so that the Guardian's own plasma torpedoes wouldn't wreck it so bad).

[RefSteel]

I doubt if that design would do it. For one thing, Stream Projectors don't appear to work on the Guardian (or space monsters) at all. It's not going to be easy for a single ship to deal enough damage to actually destroy the Guardian at all (to outrun its ADC) ... but I haven't played a game that went all the way to TL99 in years, so I don't know what's optimal.

[Psillycyber]

I doubt if that design would do it. For one thing, Stream Projectors don't appear to work on the Guardian (or space monsters) at all. It's not going to be easy for a single ship to deal enough damage to actually destroy the Guardian at all (to outrun its ADC) ... but I haven't played a game that went all the way to TL99 in years, so I don't know what's optimal.

Hmmm, that's a pity about the stream projectors. I wonder how many mauler devices or plasma torpedoes one could fit on a level 99 huge ship, then.....

[Psillycyber]

So, I discovered that it is indeed possible:





This was done with a tech level all around of 99. This was clearly overkill. Also, it was not the ideal setup, as I could not out-repair the damage that the Guardian was doing to me due to my low maneuverability (I was lacking better engines in my tech tree in this game). So I had to rely on offensive overkill.

The ideal setup would be a ship with hyper drives and the following specials:
*Inertial Nullifier
*Advanced Damage Control
*High Energy Focus

With those specials and the best engines, I am convinced that any race could outrun the damage done by the Guardian, especially with a little dodging of the plasma torpedoes, and especially if one had the Alkari evade bonus.

Then, to do more than 3000 hp of damage each round, you'd need about 120 mauler devices (except if Mrrshans, in which case fewer). I extrapolate this from the fact that my 227 mauler devices did about 7100 damage in the first round of combat.

As far as what tech level you'd need to fit all those goodies on a ship, I'm guessing somewhere in the mid-80s. I tried beating the Guardian with an inferior ship designed when my tech levels were in the low 70s, and that ship could "only" fit 58 mauler devices on it, and could not outpace the Guardian's auto-repair.

So, what was the point of all of this? Well, it's not just that the player can beat the Guardian, but that the player can, in fact, at a certain point design a better ship than the Guardian and out-class, one-on-one, anything that the Ancients put together. Kind of a cool thought, in my book.

[Ianus]

Very cool! I used to play up to level 99 and build stacks of 32000 smalls with Maulers on them, ideally with a teleporter too and then wreck everything. My personal best was six stacks of 32000 Mauler devices each. Talk about overkill!
So basically if you can deal more than 3000 damage a turn while not dying it is possible. I wonder what the bare minimum would be for this to be possible?

[RefSteel]

Hmmm. I'd replace the Inertial Nullifier and High Energy Foxus with Subspace Teleporter and Displacement Device. But then I'd also replace ADC and Neutronium 2 with basic Neutronium and a Battle Scanner and try to just slag the Guardian in two volleys, before its beams could fire more than once and before its missiles and torps could hit me. (The shields aren't for the scatters, which should never hit you anyway; the shields are to mitigate the Stellar Converters.)

[Psillycyber]

Very cool! I used to play up to level 99 and build stacks of 32000 smalls with Maulers on them, ideally with a teleporter too and then wreck everything. My personal best was six stacks of 32000 Mauler devices each. Talk about overkill!
So basically if you can deal more than 3000 damage a turn while not dying it is possible. I wonder what the bare minimum would be for this to be possible?

Exactly. And in order to outrace the Guardian's damage, you basically need neutronium II armor, advanced damage control (giving you 1080 hp of healing each round), and pretty much the best evade possible (hyper drives + inertial nullifier). But it IS possible.

(By the way, I noticed that the game will not allow you to stack auto-repair and advanced damage control. I bet it is the same way with inertial stabilizer and inertial nullfier, or ion stream projectors and neutron stream projectors, etc.)

And to do more than 3000 damage a turn, you need about 120 mauler devices (adjust downwards if you are the Mrrshans or if you replace the high energy focus with a battle scanner, as Ref suggested), or probably some number of plasma torpedoes would do it was well. Plasma torpedoes would probably work great with a ship with hyper drives and inertial nullifier. Do hit-and-run shots with the plasma torpedoes at close range every other turn, and end your turn on the other side of the screen (it should be possible to get a movement speed of 7, which should let you easily dodge the plasma torpedoes and still get your shots in on the Guardian at close range). With a battle scanner, 80% of your shots would hit. As the Mrrshans, all of your shots would hit.

150-15-9 = 126 damage from each torpedo.
You need to do about 7000 damage every two rounds.
That works out to only about 55 plasma torpedoes needed if you are the Mrrshans, or 70 if you are just using a battle scanner.

I'd reckon a tech level somewhere in the upper 60s would let you fit that many on a huge ship, along with all of the other gizmos.

By the way, one last thing: I experimented with using a technology nullifier on the Guardian, and apparently that doesn't work on it either. It seems the Guardian is hard-coded to be immune to pretty much all of those types of specials. A pity...that would have really opened up some clever strategies....

[Ianus]

The problem with a Teleporter is that it's all the movement you get so there is no fire move fire and thus you will spend every other inter turn alongside the Guardian (or wherever it moves to) and any movement other than 1 is a waste of space.

[RefSteel]

The problem with a Teleporter is that it's all the movement you get so there is no fire move fire and thus you will spend every other inter turn alongside the Guardian (or wherever it moves to) and any movement other than 1 is a waste of space.

Good points. The reason to use teleporter is to win initiative for a ship that will kill the Guardian ASAP. You still want to have some maneuver for the beam defense though, unless you can slag the thing in one volley. So, true, I think teleporter isn't terrific for an "unkillable" ship like Psillycyber was trying - and Inertial Nullifier is superior to Displacement Device if you have Beam Defense of at least 5 ... which you probably should anyway to prevent the over-100%-to-hit damage bonus. I do still prefer Battle Scanner over HEF: If your ship can't be killed, you just want to maximize damage per turn; it doesn't matter how long it takes you to close to firing range. Of course, DispDev stacks with beam defense for extra unkillability, but I think at that point, the battle scanner is more valuable since it gets you closer to outrunning the Guardian's ADC.

[Psillycyber]

Ooooh yes, I once had a game where Orion spawned in a nebula. I was definitely looking forward to killing the Guardian super early...but then I got dogpiled and put into final war by the AIs before I could have my fun.