Damage and Shields
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Damage and Shields
Fleet battles in Per Regna resolve over a short series of combat rounds. Shields absorb before hull; planetary defense domes further reduce damage to turrets.
Combat rounds
- Battles run up to 6 rounds (about 10 seconds of report timing per round).
- Combat can end early when one side loses remaining combat power.
- Each round applies a small damage variance (about Γ0.95β1.05).
Fleet shields (side pool)
Each side maintains a shield pool from its ships. Incoming fire hits that pool before hull.
One pool per side
- Attacker β defender: all fire at the colony (ships + defenses as targets) shares the defender shield pool.
- Defender β attacker: colony ships and planetary turrets fire into the same attacker shield pool each round β one absorb pass after both volleys are merged. They do not each get a fresh copy of the full shield budget.
Priority before absorb
After ship + turret damage is merged toward the attacker, it is re-aimed with the same target priority tiers used for fleets (front screen before mid/rear), then the shared shield absorb runs. That matches the idea of dome-first ordering when defenses are the targets: one ordered distribution, then soak.
Degradation
- Shields degrade over the fight: a base per-round loss plus extra degradation as the pool takes hits (effectiveness can drop substantially across a long fight, capped in the combat model).
- Surviving ships regenerate shields between rounds, then degradation is applied again.
Strong shield fleets (and Shield Technology / related research) delay hull losses; once shields collapse, hull melts faster.
Defense domes
Colony defenses can field dome structures:
| Effect | Player feel |
|---|---|
| Planetary barrier field | Roughly 20% less damage to defenses (incoming Γ0.80) |
| Small / Large Shield Domes | Additional absorption layer (about Γ0.92 while domes are alive) β stacks with the barrier |
| Dome-first targeting | Soak domes tend to absorb before individual turrets take hull (see Targeting and Priority) |
After battle, 50% of destroyed defenses auto-repair, plus the Defensive Logistics restoration bonus. Exact structure names are on Defenses pages (Small Shield Dome, Large Shield Dome, Planetary Dome, etc.).
Support repairs
Support Vessels can repair friendly hull during the fight. Each surviving Support Vessel restores at most one combat ship per round. The hull budget is shared across all surviving vessels, so several of them can together restore one heavy hull. Repair efficiency rises across rounds and is strongest on the final round.
In battles with several players on one side (FCS attacks, stationed guardians), each player's own losses come first: up to 80% of their Support Vessels repair their own ships using the player's full repair capacity, and the other 20% repair allies with the capacity left. Nothing is wasted on the split: a player who brings only Support Vessels repairs the allies' fleets with everything, a player alone or with no allied losses repairs only their own ships, and capacity allies cannot use returns to the owner.
Practical tips
- Bring shield-capable combat lines when you expect long fights against heavy RF or defense yards.
- Domes matter on well-defended colonies β stripping soak domes opens the rest of the yard.
- Soft turret walls only matter if their shots reach hull after the attackerβs shared shield pool β RF on flak/rockets does not help if everything is eaten by shields twice.
- See Rapid Fire and Targeting and Priority for how shots are aimed and how RF adds extra shots (overkill is not splash).
References
- Fleet Combat Β· Rapid Fire Β· Targeting and Priority Β· Defenses Β· Battle Looting Β· Fleet Stun