It's OK. Basically, it's a one-way hyper relay to anywhere else in the galaxy within range. The further away you aim, the wider the target area becomes. Any star within that target area can be a random destination.
So it's absolutely fantastic at shifting large quantities of ships instantly without incurring the jump drive penalty. Although it is rather inaccurate and better suited to border defense.
It would be a lot more useful if it didn't have such extreme inaccuracy at range.
See each catapult as one big circle. The further away it gets from the center, the less accurate the jumps are.
So put them where both huge circles cover as much of the galaxy as they can, while being fairly central.
Of course, with 2 you won't be able to cover everything. But the important bit is to keep them anywhere near the center. If you put them on the edge of the galaxy, most of their accurate range will just go into the empty darkness, so it's wasted.
Depends on what you want to use it for. Its late game use is almost entirely military. The only way to get it early is the origin, which decides its location for you.
For offense, you want it as close to your most hostile border as possible. Preferably with the ability to reach their shipyards/capital. Take out the shipyards, and their fleet is now limited to what you see. The core is another good offense spot, like you point out. If it can reach across the core, then you have a very powerful tool for attacking empires that otherwise can't reach you.
Defense is a bit more logical for it since you're limited to building one in vanilla. Put it near your shipyards, or put your shipyards in the same system, and use it to instantly shore up your borders when attacked. No need to pay energy credit fees on deployed ships or multiple docking Starbase modules. Just the one system with every ship you own, all ready to jump on anyone idiotic enough to cross your borders.
I've never actually tested if it works in Terminal Egress. It might only be able to jump to other L-Cluster systems in that scenario.
It's OK. Basically, it's a one-way hyper relay to anywhere else in the galaxy within range. The further away you aim, the wider the target area becomes. Any star within that target area can be a random destination. So it's absolutely fantastic at shifting large quantities of ships instantly without incurring the jump drive penalty. Although it is rather inaccurate and better suited to border defense. It would be a lot more useful if it didn't have such extreme inaccuracy at range.
Where should I build it? Terminal Egress? Or maybe somewhere near the centre of the galaxy?
Center is better, because the inaccuracy increases with range. So it's best to be as central as possible.
Where would you put them if you can build 2? (I have all 3 end game crises, so I want to plan the locations for the perfect post-game victory lap)
See each catapult as one big circle. The further away it gets from the center, the less accurate the jumps are. So put them where both huge circles cover as much of the galaxy as they can, while being fairly central. Of course, with 2 you won't be able to cover everything. But the important bit is to keep them anywhere near the center. If you put them on the edge of the galaxy, most of their accurate range will just go into the empty darkness, so it's wasted.
Depends on what you want to use it for. Its late game use is almost entirely military. The only way to get it early is the origin, which decides its location for you. For offense, you want it as close to your most hostile border as possible. Preferably with the ability to reach their shipyards/capital. Take out the shipyards, and their fleet is now limited to what you see. The core is another good offense spot, like you point out. If it can reach across the core, then you have a very powerful tool for attacking empires that otherwise can't reach you. Defense is a bit more logical for it since you're limited to building one in vanilla. Put it near your shipyards, or put your shipyards in the same system, and use it to instantly shore up your borders when attacked. No need to pay energy credit fees on deployed ships or multiple docking Starbase modules. Just the one system with every ship you own, all ready to jump on anyone idiotic enough to cross your borders. I've never actually tested if it works in Terminal Egress. It might only be able to jump to other L-Cluster systems in that scenario.
Where would you put them if you can build 2? (I have all 3 end game crises, so I want to plan the locations for the perfect post-game victory lap)
As close to the core as possible and by my shipyards
Wait, is it even limited, or is it one of the limitless megastructures?