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Updated: September 04 2021

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Fuel is your friend. Treasure it.

Ships of Netrek

Scouts, your fast fragile friends
Destroyers, the twink's favorite
Cruisers, a happy medium
Battleships, for those times when a Cruiser just isn't enough
Assault Ships, for making those unwelcome visits
Starbases, one ship to rule them all
Numerology, a table of info about all ship types

Each section below contains a summary of some basic information about each ship type, and links to some other guides written about that ship.
This guide covers the standard ships used in all Netrek variants; some Netrek flavors have additional ship types.
Note: Cruising speed is the fastest speed a ship can travel at without burning fuel faster than it is making fuel.

The Scout

Key to Press	Type	Max Speed	Cruise Speed	Max Armies	Shields	Hull	Fuel
S	Scout (SC)	12	8	2	75	75	5000

These are fast fragile little things. They are very good for harassing, and are most often used for bombing. Sometimes scouts drop armies too, but since they can only carry two, this is a limited role for them. They are difficult to use to fight, especially for the inexperienced and against the heavily armored opponents, although they can dodge faster than anything else.

Other docs available:

• playing_sc.txt
  
• sunscreamer_scout_lessons.txt
  
• Dean Yasuda's Scout notes
  

The Destroyer

Key to Press	Type	Max Speed	Cruise Speed	Max Armies	Shields	Hull	Fuel
D	Destroyer (DD)	10	7	5	85	85	7000

These are similar to scouts but they are a little more tough and they have slightly more powerful weapons. They are deceptively attractive; a bit quicker to turn and a bit faster than cruiser. The destroyer is sometimes erroneously referred to as halfway between the scout and the cruiser. If this were so, it would have more powerful phasers and be able to go an extra half warp faster. For the unskilled player, they live up to their nickname of "Ship of Lose". The destroyer is really a specialty ship, primarily used for taking planets by those who really know what they're doing.

Other docs available:

• playing_dd.txt
  
• playing_dd_alt.txt
  
• philosophical_guide_to_dd.txt
  

The Cruiser

Key to Press	Type	Max Speed	Cruise Speed	Max Armies	Shields	Hull	Fuel
C	Cruiser (CA)	9	6	10	100	100	10,000

An all-purpose ship, and the default if you don't select another. This is the best ship to use for learning, and is really the heart of the game. It's balanced; faster and more maneuverable than a battleship, but tougher than a destroyer and can carry more armies than anything except an AS or a base. Most people will be in CA's most of the time.

Other docs available:

• playing_ca.txt
  
• ca_exercises_part1.txt
  
• ca_exercises_part2.txt
  

The Battleship

Key to Press	Type	Max Speed	Cruise Speed	Max Armies	Shields	Hull	Fuel
B	Battleship (BB)	8	4	6	130	130	14,000

This ship is slow to accelerate and hard to maneuver. However, it has the most firepower of any normal ship. It is also very tough. Since it can take a fair amount of damage while still dishing out a lot, it is very effective for offensive players but watch your fuel, this ship uses a lot of it. The BB is not a bad ship for beginners, since it's harder to die in them. Dodging is tough for in a BB, so heavy use of tractoring, pressoring, and detting is important.

Other docs available:

• playing_bb.txt
  
• zex_bb_advise.txt
  

The Planetary Assault Ship

Key to Press	Type	Max Speed	Cruise Speed	Max Armies	Shields	Hull	Fuel
A	Assault Ship (AS)	8	8	20	80	200	6000

These ships are for bombing and capturing planets (something that beginners shouldn't try until after mastering a few basics). They are slow and clumsy, but have tough hulls and can carry more than anything else. They can carry 3 armies per kill as opposed to the usual two per kill, and can cloak without burning as much fuel as other ships. AS' also bomb well; the AS always bombs at least two, so if the planet is at 5 armies and you bomb it with an AS, it will always go to three armies or less! If the planet is at 6, however, you should first bomb it down to 5 with a normal ship and then have the AS bomb.

Other docs available:

• playing_as.txt
  

The Starbase

Key to Press	Type	Max Speed	Cruise Speed	Max Armies	Shields	Hull	Fuel
O (for Outpost)	Starbase (SB)	2	2	25	500	600	60,000

These are very powerful and hard to destroy. Each team is allowed only one at a time, and if destroyed, it will take about 20 minutes to build a new one. A team with less than four planets cannot build a new starbase. Other ships can dock at the base to refuel, and on most servers, ships can "transwarp" in to a base, flying there at very high speed. On most servers, a rank of Commander is required to fly a base, although there are "base practice" servers to learn on that have fewer restrictions. It generally takes several players working together to destroy a base. Newbies who see a hostile base are best off running away from it.

Other docs available:

• playing_sb.txt
  
• team_play_with_bases.txt
  
• working_with_starbases.txt
  

Ship Data for All Ship Types

Extensive data from a page by Bret Jordan.

SHIPS	SC	DD	CA	GA	BB	AS	SB
Fuel	5000	7000	10000	12000	14000	6000	60000
Hull Strength	75	85	100	120	130	200	600
Shield Strength	75	85	100	140	130	80	500
Shield Cost	2	3	3		3	3	6
Max Speed	12	10	9	9	8	8	2
Cruising Speed	8	7	6	6	4	8	2
Combat Speed	6	5	4	5	3	4	2
Armies per Kill	2	1.67	2	2	2	3	NA
Max Armies	2	5	10	5	6	20	25
Max Weapon Temp [1]	100	100	100	100	100	100	130
Max Engine Temp [1]	120	100	100	100	100	120	100
Torpedo Speed	16	14	12	16	12	16	14
Torpedo Damage	25	30	40	40	40	30	30
Average Torpedo Range	8480	11340	12120		12120	12960	11340
Torpedo Weapon Temp [1]	7	11	18		26	17	20
Phaser Damage	75	85	100	100	105	80	120
Max Phaser Range	4500	5100	6000		6300	4800	7200
30 point phaser range	2700	3300	4200		4500	3000	5400
Phaser Weapon Temp [1]	52	59	70		105	56	96
Plasma Speed		15	15	15	15		15
Plasma Weapon Temp [1]		142	292		307		292
Tractor Strength	2000	2500	3000	3800	3700	2500	8000
Tractor Range	.7	.9	1.0	1.0	1.2	.7	1.5

SHIPS	SC	DD	CA	GA	BB	AS	SB
Net fuel/sec at maxwarp, shields down, uncloaked	-80	-80	-120		-200	-40	500
Seconds cloaked at maxwarp before running out of fuel	20	24.1	26.3		28	28.6	240
Distance traveled doing that	48000	48276	47368		44800	45714	96000
Time to maximum safe engine temperature, at max warp	25	25	33.3		50	60	NA
Distance for this	60000	50000	60000		80000	96000	NA
Number of torps in fuel tank	28	33	35		38	22	200
Total damage from these torps	700	990	1400		1520	660	6000
Number of phasers in fuel tank	9	11	14		13	10	62
Total damage from these	675	935	1400		1365	800	7440
With empty fuel tank, damage delivered per second, warp 0, shields down. [2]	23	31	34		31	29	88
Same but with shields up	20	27	30		28	24	80
Repair/sec to shields (x2 if in repair mode)????	1.6	2.0	2.2		2.5	2.4	2.8
0-maxwarp acceleration time (in seconds)	6	5	6		10	8	2
Distance to do this	7200	5000	5400		8000	6400	400
Maxwarp-2 braking time (in seconds)	3.7	2.7	3.5		3.3	3.0	0
Distance to do this	5185	3200	3850		3333	3000	0
Time from earth orbit to canopus orbit (dist 20615)	12.8	13.4	15.3		18.6	17.4	50.3
Time from earth orbit to romulus orbit (dist 60000)	29.2	33.1 [Note 3]	37.2		43.2	42.1	148.8

Notes:

1. Weapon and engine temps are in tenths, relative to what you see on the client's display.

2. This is the average amount of damage you can do by recharging fuel and and hitting whenever you can. For assault ships and starbases the best average is with phasers (assuming point-blank range), and for battleships it's with torps. The figures above are with the best strategy for the ship.

3. There's some chance of overheating the engines doing this in a destroyer. Add a little extra time (I'm not sure how much, maybe a second) to avoid this. I've deducted 900 distance for orbit radius, and factored in the acceleration and deceleration times.

A "tick" is 1/10 of a second. Most of the cost constants above are per tick.

Every tick, your ship's speed is added to etemp, and you lose warpcost*speed in fuel. There's additional cost if you're a SB moving with docked ships.

When etemp goes over maxegntemp, there's a 1/40 chance (per tick) of getting an overheat lasting 100 + random()%150 ticks.
This is why I still have to wait a few seconds after my scout cools to 0 before I can move. Weapon temperature works the same way.
Detonating heats weapons by 20 (remember it looks like 2 to the client) regardless of whether there's anything to det.

Adding fuel (every tick):

• In orbit around friendly fuel planet, 8 * recharge.
• If docked on a starbase with at least SBFUELMIN, you take 12 * recharge from the SB.
• Otherwise, 2 * recharge.

Repairing (every tick):

• If in repair mode shields gain repair * 4, in thousandths.
• If in orbit around friendly repair planet another repair * 4.
• If docked at a starbase, repair * 6
• Otherwise, repair * 2.
• Hull damage works the same way, but repairs half as fast.

Damage from a torp you det is multiplied by (2000 - dist)/1650. Which means if you det it at 1600 (the best you can do), it will do 24.2% damage. This is independent of ship class.

Phaser range is proportional to phaserdamage. Phaser damage is multiplied by (1 - dist / phrange), i.e. drops off linearly

Ships blowing up: Starbase does 200, scouts 75, others 100. If the ship is farther than 350 away, this damage is multiplied (3000-dist)/2650. Ships that quit don't hurt.

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