.....continued from the previous page.
This last table (Table 6) only shows the price in MC
per mine unit laid/scooped. The next two steps will adjust these values to match numbers
used for the prefect torpedo conversion rate (Table 4)
and include the minerals gained through the conversion (Table
5).
The following table shows the number of megacredits gained through the conversion of torpedoes. This is calculated by simply extracting the number on megacredits actually spend on the laid torpedoes from the number of megacredits you would have spend to build the number of torpedoes you scooped. A positive value (green) means the torpedo conversion saves MegaCredits.
Interesting results... Unlike table 5 which seemed to suggest that only conversions of
high tech torpedoes to low tech torpedoes are profitable, the results in this table are
quite spreaded, and therefore promising for surprising results!
And now the final blow: combine table 5 and table 7 to show the total resources gained and lost through perfect torpedo conversion:
All positive values (green) indicate a combination of
torpedo types that actually make money for you! Some good combinations can be found:
25 position 6 (Mark 4 Photons) scooped up at position 10 (Mark 8 Photon) is very usable,
and it saves you a bit (Don't get excited: it's just 17 megacredits). 100 position 9 torps
(Mark 7 Photons) scooped up at position 10 (Mark 8 Photon) save you 603 MC! On the other
hand if you take the wrong combination and you convert Mark 5 Photons (position 7) into
Mark 7 Photon (position 9) torpedoes it can cost you thousands of MC worth of resources a
turn!
The position 6 torpedo (Mark 4 Photon) is in general the best idea to start laying mines
with and scooping them up again as other tech levels.
Take for example the Lady Royale Class Cruiser. When two of those are filled with 160
clans they generate 320 MC each turn. A more interesting option would be to use this
second combination as described above and fill one Lady Royale with 100 Mark 7 Photons and
60 clans, its mission set to Lay Mines. Fill the second Lady Royale with 79 clans and its
Mark 8 tubes set to sweep mines, FC 'msc'.
These two Ladies will generate 139 MC a turn, and save you another 603 MC worth of
resources whilst baking Mark 8 Photon torpedoes! (5) Total gain: 139
+ 603 = 742 MC (instead of the 320 MC...)
As the Mark 7 Photon gives the cheapest mine units (remember the 'Cheapest mine unit section above), it might be a good start for saving even more resources. Scoop them up as Mark 4 or Mark 8 Photons, which are generally believed to give you the most 'bang for the buck' (6).
Table 8 gives the total number of resources gained, but these are relative values based on the Perfect Torpedo Conversion listed in Table 4. To obtain absolute values for the total number of resources gained through torpedo conversion, you'll have to devide the totals (table 8) through the number of mine units that was laid (==swept) in the Perfect Torpedo Conversion.
Positive values (green) indicate a net gain in resources.
For example: when you lay position 8 torpedoes and scoop them up as position 2 torpedoes,
every mine unit will save you 2.062 MC worth of resources.
These values are independent of the number of torpedoes used and are therefore also
independent of the Perfect Torpedo Conversion Rate (table
4).
And last but not least I'd like to thank Sirius for his valuable comments. Let's play it again, Jan!
I hope this saves you all a couple of MC!
Timo Kreike
[email protected]
(1) Eden Tans site is no longer available, his Infolist can be downloaded here.
(2) To be complete: the values in this table are
calculated according to the regular minelaying formula as listed in the second paragraph
of this article.
A similar table can be found in the article 'Table Talk' by GammaMark in issue 2 of the Planeteer. The Planeteer Homepage can be found at: http://web.ukonline.co.uk/planeteer.resurrection/
(3) When considering the Robotic race advantage that
enables them to lay 4 times as much mines the values in the table above will change to:
This won't change the conclusion drawn above.
(4) The values in the Perfect Torpedo Conversion Rate have
been minimised to obtain the most usable (==smallest) values. For example when a
conversion suggests you should convert 100 position 5 torps to 25 position 10 torps, this
has been brought back to 4 postion 5 torps ans 1 position 10 torp.
(In this case both values have been divided by 25.)
100 -> 25 becomes 4 -> 1
36 -> 16 becomes 9 -> 4 etc.
(5) That is: if you have a use for Mark 8 torps. Otherwise you only have a book gain - that won't help you in any way.
(6) Proving this is out of the scope of this article. If you're interested in an excellent discussion about the weaponry used in VGAP, I suggest reading the 'Master at Arms' paper written by Jan Klingele (Sirius).
(7) The Planeteer Homepage can be found at: http://web.ukonline.co.uk/planeteer.resurrection/
Laatste wijziging op 5-6-1998 door Timo Kreike, e-mail [email protected]
Copyright Timo Kreike, published at Federal HQ with permission.