Bomber SquadsIf you own a Starbase, you might be interested in how to manage the growth of squads… you may have noticed that the Pardus Manual is a little sparse on details.

Each Starbase can ultimately have 12 squads totalling 100 fighters or bombers – but there are certain conditions that need to be met to achieve this maximum.

When you have 1 ring on your Starbase you can grow up to 3 squads, each squad that “spawns” will be randomly a fighter or a bomber squad – and once spawned, the maximum the squad will grow to is 50. This growth occurs at 0313 GMT every 24 hours.

To increase the number of squads and the amount of fighters or bombers in each squad, you need to increase the number of rings on your Starbase.

Starbase Rings Required Population Max Number of Squads Max Size of Squads
1 500 ~ 5,000 3 50
2 5,000 ~ 15,000 6 65
3 15,000 ~ 30,000 9 80
4 > 30,000 12 100

Fighters or Bombers?

Once a squad has been spawned it will not change (from fighter to bomber or from bomber to fighter), so it’s a good idea to “prune” unwanted squads at an early stage.

You can’t control whether a fighter or bomber squad spawns (at 0313 GMT), but if a fighter spawns and you want a bomber squad instead – hire the fighter right away. The next time a squad spawns, it might be a bomber (if not, just hire the unwanted squad and try again until you get what you want). This is referred to “pruning” squads.

Growth Strategies

Even though you need to have a minimum number of rings to spawn squads, you do not need to maintain the rings to keep the squads once they have spawned.

One way to reach 12 squads of 100 fighters / bombers is to keep 4 rings until they are all grown to full size. This is definitely the easier route.

Another way is to grow the Starbase to 4 rings and get all 12 squads to spawn – and then let the population drop to support 3 rings until all the squads are at 80… before returning to 4 rings again until the squads all grow to 100. This is more Food/Water efficient but does require more attention to your population level.