I'm the Juggaernaught, B#@%H

[Vable]

So, speaking of Jugernaughts.

How have been early assessments?

I've found that they have some interesting tactical uses. Particularly, I've explored their use as a defensive weapon. I have not used them offensively yet, though I believe Garrett has.

The Jugg on 'D' vs. Computer

The Comp tend 'build up' or stage its forces just beyond immediate combat range until it has forces that it 'calculates' as sufficient to take on your fleet.
Once it has staged enough forces, the Comp initiates its attack run in formation. It is when the computer is executing this style of attack that I've found the Juggernaught to be of most interesting value.
Particullarly if you send it alone out towards their battle group as a suicide defense mechanism. I've effectively wiped out 40% of a very large force. At which point the computer retallied its total force value and beat a hasty retreat, which I then dog'd with my originally smaller force as they fled.
The most important (and obvious) factor is making absolutely sure, that you begin maneuvering your Jugg towards their stage point with enough time to keep your Mothership and exsising battle forces out of the Blast radius.
The Jugg is beastly slow, but extremely heavily armored. Luckily the computer tends to ignore the danger of the Jugg, and instead attempts to focus fire on it. Giving you time to drive it in under fire, position, and skuttle it. And if done right, successfully wiping out a massive portion of their force.

In the last scenario where I tested this, I played on the defensive until things were starting to look desperate. I pop'd the Jugg out, just as their main force was starting to take on 'overwhelming' portions. I just managed to pull the Jugg out of range of blasing my own Mothership and the small defensive force I had built up. I didn't get it 'perfect' but the detonation still wiped a clear 35-40% of the enemies armada.
The tide of the battle turned at that point.

I can't say that this tactic would work in PvP, but it makes for an interesting strategy. Perhaps Flying a sphere/perimiter of Juggs on the outskirts of your base setup, might make for a unpleasant suprise to 'would be' enemy forces hyperspacing in. Or at the very least, forcing inbound forces to maneuver to avoid the explosion.
Considering that most 'Mothership-killer' forces include a vareity of large and slow ships, having to take anything but a 'direct' line of attack after hyperspacing in, could buy your defensive force a large chunk of time in which to scramble countermeasures.

Enough rambling, anyone have any thoughts about either this strategy, offensive strategies, or exsisting experiences with the Jugg.

[Rabbit]

Well, the beast is definitely slow- too slow to slug it across the board. However, the jug tactic you summarized seems pretty solid against the comp (as you said). I use mine field in a similiar fashion. I'm guessing that the jug isn't really hyperspace friendly, and the fact that it worked for me was just a fluke. Honestly, I'm of the opinion that should be allowed to hyperspace, since players can use hyperspace inhibiters to thwart a direct hyperspace assault; and seeing how slow the jug moves, I would think that even if the jug hyperspaced, but could not hyperspace directly to a players base due to the inhibiter field, that a player could simply outrun the jug. I'm going to give your tactical use of the jug a try.

I think you mentioned earlier the option of using a suicide carrier with a cloak shield, accompanied by a pair of jugs. This might be the best way of reaching the enemy.

Here's a scenario I just thought of: Start the building process for two jugs- one on your mothership and the other on your shipyard. Just before the jugs are complete, pause the production. Then, hyperspace your mothership & shipyard directly to the enemy's mothership. Then continue the production of the two jugs. When the jugs are emerge, hyperspace the mothership & shipyard back to your base, then activate the self-destruct option on the jugs. I call this the 'egg-laying' strategy. I wonder if it would work. A deviant tactic might simply invovle building two suicide shipyards that would not hyperspace back. I think this would only be good if the enemy mothership has a battle cannon acompanied by lots of tango mines.

Also, Grant has had decent success with the minelayer as an aggressive ship. Basically, when an opponent attacks his mother ship he will begin laying down mines around the enemy ships. The mines will then 'gravitate' towards the enemy ships. Grant says it's not a game winning tactic, but that it definitely does significant damage to destroyers.

[Vable]

Very nice. I don't remember the minegun being in the old version, though there were 'standard' mine layers. I think the inclusion of the new vessel has to do with the old mine layer just not being worth the effort. The new duel purpose ship seems to be worth its cost by the accounts were receiving.

Actually, I was not the one who recommended the 2 jub/cloaked Carrier strat. Bravo to whomever, I assume Grant?

Gart... I thought you said you had been able to Hyperspace the Juggs before? I had assumed you meant by using them grouped with a Hyperspacing Carrier.

Also.. the MS can create Juggs? that is nice, I didn't realize that.

[Rabbit]

I've only been able to hyperspace jugs once, but it wasn't with a mothership. I hyperspaced them on their own, but since that one time, it has not worked again.

I guess it was Grant that thought about hyperspacing the carrior with two jugs.

Yep, Mommy has jug producing capabilities.

[Vable]

I don't know how you were able to hyperspace a Jugg. It dosen't have any module slots to build a hyperspace module. Had to have been a glitch, or you had it grouped and in range of another hyperspace capable ship.

Guess it dosen't matter. As long as they 'will' hyperspace when grouped with a Hyper-enabled Carrier. I would think that if you spent a little maneuvering time, you could more than 2 Juggs to jump with a Carrier.

Quite a scary prospect, getting hit with 2-4 Juggs at once.

[grant]

I did the same thing, I think it was a bug in 5.2 that they fixed in 5.3

[Vable]

That makes sense. Would definatly explain why they had a new patch out ..IMMEDIATELY after 5.2 releasee. hehe. I know I was suprised when I went to the site to download it, and saw that they had already patched it.

[Rabbit]

So, as of now there are three strategies with the jug:


1- footslog the beast alone.

2- footslog two jugs accompanied by a carrier with a cloaking shield.

3- hyperspace a production ship with a jug nearly complete, then let the jug emerge from the production ship, then hyperspace the production ship away, then activate the self-destruct mechinism on the jug.

What other possibilities are out there?

[Vable]

build a carrier with a hyperspace module, and group the juggs with it. when you select them to hyperspace as a group (the key) they will jump together, if the juggs are both in the radius of the carriers hyperspace bubble.

[grant]

The carrier can't build the jug

[Vable]

Yes. But...the way hyperspacing works..is all frigate and larger class ships inside the purple bubble that appears around your ship that does have a 'hyperspace' module built on it (IE a carrier can have a build a hyperspace module), that are also in the group you have selected when you click 'J' to bring up the jump command...will jump with it.

Test this:
Build a Carrier.
Build a hyperspace module on the carrier.
Park any frigate or larger ship close to the carrier.
Make sure you select those ships that are close to the carrier as well as the carrier itself.
Now hit 'J' to bring up the jump coordinates selection (looks just like issuing a move command, except the lines are purple)
Now when you execute the jump, all the ships that were close enough to the unit that is initiating the hyperspace, will jump with it to its destination.

*note
The more ships selected (and in range/eligibility) the higher the RU cost o jump. IE: The last big PVP game Garrett, Laken and I played..it cost me like 40k+ RU to jump the majority of my fleet. And that wasen't even everything.

Just target your carrier (with Hyperdrive) and click J...a tactical sphere in purple should now show up around your ship, to give you an idea of how close the other ships need to be.

And of course any fighters/corvettes that are docked will hyperspace with the Carrier. Use L to bring up the launch menu.

[Vable]

hehe.. I sense that a whole new range of strategies will open up to you, if you were unaware of this ability previously. You should beat up on Gart for not telling you .. hehe.

Additional Tactical usage:
Note that if your building a fleet of Battlecruisers..you can reliably build only one hyperspace module between 3 BC's and jump them all. However, sometimes you have to maneuver them manually to always make sure the middle BC is the one with the Hyperspace mod, or one may get left behind. (very frusterating)

[grant]

garrett said:

3- hyperspace a production ship with a jug nearly complete, then let the jug emerge from the production ship, then hyperspace the production ship away, then activate the self-destruct mechinism on the jug.

I was actualy refering to this because I thought it refered to carriers not just a generic production ship.

Anywho...yes the two best ways I can forsee using them are pigybacking them on a carrier or battlecruiser or using a cloaked carrier or battle cruiser to accompany them.

Though I have had trouble keeping ships in the cloaked field since it is so small. One other concept would be to just produce a bunch of sensory distortion probes and send them along the path of the juggie as he moves to the enemy. This is probably the cheepest and eaisist tactic.

[Rabbit]

I was thinking about the sensory probe tactic last night. In order for this to be effective, you would have to ensure that the probes were not within the path that you and your opponent are exchanging skirmishes, or else your opponent would see the juggs coming. Overall, this would be a very drawn out tactic, but might work very well, if you can move your jugs around to the side of your opponent's base.