Ship types and combat roles

Corvettes

Strengths:

High evasion, good against large weapon platforms



Effective against both small and larger targets



The perfect counter to battleship heavy fleets



Cheap and fast to produce as well as quick to reinforce



High sublight speed makes the corvettes an excellent response force

Weaknesses:

countered by bigger ships that can carry medium/small sized weapons like destroyers and cruisers



vulnerable to accurate weapons like lasers and auto cannons

Destroyers

Strengths:

Good evasion



Versatile loadout options



High sublight speed



Relativly cheap and fast to produce and reinforce

Weaknesses:

Weak to medium sized weapons



Weak against cruisers specalized in large weapons (more on that later)

Cruisers

Strengths:

Outstanding loadout versatility



Very durable against small and medium sized weapons



Can be equipped to deal with a variaty of combat scenarios



Relativly fast, although not as fast as a corvette



Able to "tank" damage for your fleet

Weaknesses:

Poor evasion



Weak to large weapons



Very vulnerable to XL type weapons



Expensive to produce



High upkeep limits the number of cruisers that can be fielded

Battleships

Strengths:

The best counter against cruiser-heavy fleet



Long range combat



Very durable

Weaknesses:

Weak to small ship types (corvettes and destroyers)



Poor mobilty



Very expensive to produce



Very high upkeep, greatly limiting their numbers

Titans

Strengths:

Extreme range combat



Very durable, can absorb a lot of punishment



Excells against cruiser/battleship heavy fleet

Weaknesses:

Very weak to small ship types



Can only field a limited number



Insane upkeep and production costs



Poor mobility

This section will detail the different ship types currently available in stellaris, their strengths, weaknesses and ther combat roles.Corvettes are your fleet's bread and butter.They are cheap and fast to produce in numbers and are highly evasive.Corvettes shine against larger ships that carry large/XL weapons with low accuracy and/or tracking.Due to their high evasion, the mentioned large weapons and XL weapons have large issues hitting them, making corvettes an excellent counter to fleets consisting of mostly battleships.In terms of firepower corvettes have their use small slot weapons and are capable of carrying torpedoes.The most notable weapon that can be equipped exclusivly on the small slot is the auto cannon.The auto cannon is a short range, highly accurate weapon ,capable of tearing through shields with ease and dealing good damage to the hull.The auto cannon allows the corvettes to engage other small ships with high evasion with high efficiency and serve as good shield strippers against larger targets like battleships.The main drawbacks of the auto cannon is its low range and its terrible damage against armor.the auto cannon allows the corvettes to stay relevant through all stages of the game.The second notable weapon that corvettes are able to carry are torpedoes.Torpedoes effectivly ignore shields and deal massive damage to the ships armor.Torpedoes have high accuracy but no tracking to start with, so they serve as battleship/cruiser killers.The torpedoes allow the corvettes to became a major threat to battleship/cruiser heavy fleets in the later stages of the game.Finally, the corvette is the fastest ship in the game, and therefore a fleet of corvettes can quickly respond to unexpected border intrusions or to chase down enemy fleets.Destroyers are corvettes that sacrificed some evasion for more firepower and better loadout options, as well as far better armor,shields and hull.Destroyers retains a good enough evasion value to stay relativily safe from large weaponsand at the same can be outfitted with larger guns.They are also far more tankier than corvettes, and combined with their high evasion state, destroyers have fairly good survivability against most weapon and ship types.Destroyers can be outfited with medium and small weapons to deal with fleets consisting mostly of corvettes and other destroyers, or they can be equipped with a Large slot weapon to deal with larger ships such as cruisers and battleships.They can also be outfitted to serve as Point defense/Flak support ships to counter torpedo/missile/fightercraft heavy fleet.Destroyers also have high sublight speed and, just like corvettes, are suited for "response" fleets.Cruisers are jack of all trades and masters of nearly everything.The cruiser's main strength is its incredible loadout versatility.It can be costumized to deal with almost any situation and with any enemy fleet composition in terms of weapon choices.Cruiser is the first ship type to have 2x Aux slots, allowing for more role specalization.In addition to this they get access to all 3 types of combat computers.While they have low evasion, they are very durable and can be outfitted to deal with smaller ships and overpower them fairly easily.Cruisers make for the best large weapon platforms in the game, this is due to them having access to the picket-type battle computer and 2x Aux slots which can be further used to bolster the accuracy of their weapons.This results in a sniper-type cruiser that can decimate smaller targets like destroyers and corvettes with large weapons, something a battleship cannot accomplish, and this is just one loadout option.Cruisers can be equipped with auto cannons if needed to deal with smaller targets as well.Another subtle feature of the cruiser is its tendancy to "Tank" incoming fire from enemy fleets, most notably medium sized weapons.This in turns greatly increases the survivability of the destroyers in the fleet.All in all cruisers are big step in fleet composition and are a great addition to any fleet.Battleships are late game ship type that serve a specific role.Battleships are platforms that excel at carrying a hefty amount of large sized weapons and an XL weapon.They lack the picket ship computer (which gives tracking bonus) and instead specalize on long range combat against other large targets such as other battleship or cruisers.Since their large weapons have fairly low tracking, battleships aren't suited to engage smaller fleets consisting of mostly destroyers and corvettes.Instead, battleships are great at engaging fleets with a large number of cruisers and some battleships.Battleships are very slow, making them poor choice for mobile fleets.Therefore a fleet that is composed of battleships should be carefully positioned on the galaxy map to deal with possible border intrusion during war or to invade enemy empires.When reinfocing battleships, its important to make sure that the shipyards producing said battleships are positoned near the front lines, as it takes a considerable amount of times for newly produced battleships to move across the galaxy due to their poor mobility.If battleships were specalized at killing cruisers, then titans are the solution at killing battleships.Titans are flagships, very durable and have a very specific purpose (except looking pretty cool).They can only equip Large slot weapons and they posses a titan-class XL weapon capable of firing across the entire system.As such they are very effective at killing battleships at extreme ranges and they are also capable of withstanding a great amount of punishment in return.They are also effective against cruisers as well.However titans, like battleships, fair poorly against small ship types.