Realistic Military Tech

I designed this mod to create what I think would be a more ‘down to Earth’ representation of space. Full notes are below, but the mod basically creates smaller battles and more tactical wars. Military stations are now extremely viable until end game, and a few small annoyances I didn’t like have been removed.

DESIGNED FOR HYPERLANE ONLY MAPS.

I’d recommend tiny/small galaxies for a nice pacing.

Please comment on balance issues, especially regarding military stations.

#### FEATURES ####

## SHIPS ##

Massively increases energy upkeep for warships, essentially seeking to create an analogy of the naval forces in existence today (it takes a superpower to field hundreds of vessels and I’m going to assume that a single system couldn’t deploy more than a handful of ships). Civilian ships are unaffected by this change to avoid stagnating early expansion. Begin with only 1 corevette at spaceport.

25% buff to hitpoints, shields, and weapon damage for all ships to make up a little for reduced fleet sizes in dealing with space monsters etc.

Hyperdrive "Sizes" have to be researched before deploying on new ship classes (Hyperdrive 1 is for Corvettes and Destroyers, 2 is for Cruisers, 3 is for Battleships). All feature same wind-up time.

Hyperdrive wind-up outside borders no longer suffers a penalty. Should always be 14 days unless inhibited.

Hyperlane travel speed reduced by 50%.

Option to run ships with SUBLIGHT DRIVES, much reduced upkeep for home system defense fleets.

Slightly increased fleet upgrade speed (I hate waiting).

You can now customise Outposts and add a Mothball component (this is the default configuration), which creates a multi-layered aura that reduces the upkeep, mobility, and combat capabilities of friendly ships by staggered amounts as you approach the star).

All other forms of FTL have been changed to use hyperlanes (should only be available for spawned stuff like Fallen Empires – untested).

Ships move slightly slower while not in combat and system scale is slightly larger to simulate space being big (but not much).

## COMBAT ##

Missiles and Kinetics are king. The only laser available is the XL Arc Emitter with a reduced range because DAMN IT, MY BATTLESHIPS DESERVE GIANT LASERS. Why? Because I’d often find that lasers were THE weapon of choice late game, and with it being sci-fi that made sense, but I wanted more missile play. I toyed with the idea of rebalancing lasers into a short ranged tech or reducing damage etc, but at the end of the day, I figured that if humanity ever went to space, we’d pretty much just keep firing heavy chunks of metal at each other…

DOUBLED the time it takes to initiate emergency warp (60 days). E-FTL damage is set at 50% max HP, and 75% max when in a system with an enemy ‘snare’ station. Ships have a 50% chance of surviving with 1HP if they would be destroyed. Corevettes take full damage, destroyers have a 15% reduction, cruisers 30%, and battleships take 45% less.

Missile range slightly increased (130 for large rather than original 110 and the rest by same amounts).

Missiles maintain same fire rate but travel to their targets faster (to compensate for them fizzing out when launching vessel dies).

Point defence does have an increased fire rate however (to compensate for missiles being within their engagement range for less time – also helps dealing with strike craft as their wave sizes are unchanged).

Missiles are now almost guaranteed to acquire a new target if previous is destroyed.

Kinetic weapon MINIMUM damages have all been increased by around 50% while MAXIMUM remains unchanged (higher AVERAGE). They no longer do any extra damage to shields but have INCREASED armour penetration. This ends up INCREASING their overall effectiveness, although the range for mass drivers is slightly DECREASED. The AI will now treat them as "anti_armor".

Fleets more likely to prioritize orbit velocity and while it’s still very possible to charge to punching distance, ships will try to maintain a bit more range than before.

Spaceport power increased by around 30% (might go up more later).

## MILITARY STATIONS ##

Small Military Station can be retrofitted with a new component granting 250% sensor range at a high mineral and power draw cost.

Military stations can be placed closer together. Doing so adds a 25% fire rate reduction for all allied ships and stations within aura range.

Military stations suffer an empire wide 25% debuff to damage output (and fortress loses a chunk of hp as well).

Fortress can mount 2 XL weapons on the lefthand slot.

Technologies improving stations have reduced percentages. Further balancing required.

Military stations no longer have a snare magnet effect. This magnet is replaced by an infinite range aura – system wide sublight speed for hostile ships is reduced by 25%, wind-up should take around 9 months. These debuffs now give you the opportunity to chase down foreign fleets. Tactically positioning stations is more important and you will pretty much need to take out a systems defences before punching further behind enemy lines.

AI spending slightly rebalanced to allow them to build more military stations (about 3x the budget allowance).

Military stations also cost more in maintenance.

## SECTORS AND DIPLOMACY ##

Increased the base core systems to like 20 (abuse if you want but I just hate sector AI).

You are now able to drain sectors of 90% of their minerals/energy.

Reduced the total amount of border friction and per system malus (It made no sense to have trusted allies immediately hate you once you borders touch.

Federations don’t get a fleet capacity because the zero upkeep massively messes up the balance. Federation leadership should also NOT rotate through the members (untested).

## TECHNOLOGY AND TRADITIONS ##

‘Gene Tailoring’ tech no longer allows for spontaneous population changes (because half a planet would not suddenly decide to go augment themselves into a sub species with state of the art top secret government grade gene therapy).

‘Fleet Doctrine’ capacity techs have all been replaced by upkeep reduction ones (and each require the corresponding ship tech to unlock).

‘Spaceport 6’ is now MUCH more likely to appear if you are 100 years into the game.

Auto Survey possible from start.

‘Master Shipwright’ tradition now also gives a small reduction to upkeep rather than fleet cap. ‘Fleet Levies’ reduced to 25% cap, encouraging larger more dangerous vassals.

‘Galactic Force Projection’ accession perk has been replaced with a 10% upkeep reduction (rather than the 200 cap bonus).

## EVENTS ##

No more pirates (copied straight from Dazz Aephiex, who gives permission in his description – he’s also the creator of the planetary bombardment mod listed below, which really makes wars much better, so go get that).

## GRAPHICS ##

Flattened map to make hyperlane connections clearer…

More max missiles to make more missiles…

Fleets a bit more spaced out.

## CRISIS ##

Base 500% damage bonus against all. Ascension perk adds another 500% (just to test if you like them).

#### OTHER MODS ####

The mods I’ve used alongside this are as follows: (You’ll have to search them yourself).

Essential
Stellar Energy (Trust me, you need extra energy early on)
Powerful & Realistic Orbital Bombardments (Make war, not peace)

Suggested
No Clustered Starts (I just prefer space…)
Planetary Computer (A use for certain useless planets other than habitats)
Planetary Diversity (ooo, pretty)
Stellar Resources (more strategic resources to play with)

Convenient
Enhanced Gene Modding (VERY good after modifying a species)
Extended Traits