Author Topic: Strategic Advices?  (Read 6110 times)

Offline TheVampire100

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Strategic Advices?
« on: May 04, 2015, 01:30:45 pm »
I think I tunneled myself into a situation I cannot continue from here. Or maybe I'm just playing a little too dumb right now, I started this game months ago and picked it up again recently. So far everything worked good but currently I cannot hold the pressure on the AI any longer.

Some advices what I should or can do?


Offline Pumpkin

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Re: Strategic Advices?
« Reply #1 on: May 04, 2015, 02:10:50 pm »
Not being a proplayer, I'll just give you some general (and personal) advises.

Your turrets placement... Let just say I wouldn't have done it that way. Spreading sniper/spider turrets could be interesting, but having conventional turrets spread like that make many unable (or rarely able) of firing. Same thing for mines, I think they are too randomly disposed to be efficient. Also, you have spare energy and many MkII turrets unlocked, why not building more?

On the big scale, your empire is very "archipelago" style, but I can't see any logic. Try to make territories in little pack, try to avoid one planet alone (or let it neutral after you took what you wanted), they would be more easy to defend. Also, always go toward an AI home: I can see you destroyed all CSG, but one AI Home is 9 hops away your nearest planet and nothing is neutered on its path. You captured a planet adjacent to a core world without neutering it: this is bad.

You have more than 300 AIP and it's almost 15 hours. How?!? Maybe having the nebulae make you spend too much time focused on them. However auto AIP isn't Red.Qeen-high, so I don't understand. Have you been nuking around? Was a rebelling colony destroyed? And there is some CoProcessors and data centers, out there. I understand you didn't touched the superterminal, but you unlocked the raiders MkII. Remember that unlocking high mark raider and taking down CP/DC is the pending of letting AIP stash up and spend K in turrets.

Also, you have too much threat. However I don't see where, but your borders are not all neutered and under scout sight. On an archipelago game, it's bad. On an archipelago with that much AIP, it could be fatal.

You have the MkIV scout drone and planets unscouted within 6 hops or less of your homeworld. This is unacceptable.

EDIT:
On unscouted planets, I found 2 datacenters and one ARS. That means easy -40 AIP and one near A-prime ARS that could have spared you the need of taking one too away from your core territory.
Also, you can manually untangle your map during the game. This galaxy is not that complicated and there is many chokepoints you could have used. Your territory would have been better planned and would have been easier to defend by now.
One more word about neutering and AI homeworld proximity: you seems to be planning on taking Red first and going for Black after. Warpgates adjacent to core world is a good strategy on archipelago playstyle, but you need to avoid putting the core on alert for too long (you can use the Warp Jammer OCStation or just take the adjacent planet at the last time, when you're ready to take both home down). Also, you need to plan for a quick double strike, and Black's home is far far away and at the end of a thin branch of the galaxy, making you'll need to cross this long path with all its nastinesses (I see two eyes, one BHoleMachine and one planetary subcom). You need to be much more ready that that before committing yourself with putting a core planet on permanent alert.

But in your post you say your main concern is defense. I see four big points:
- better turret placing;
- better territory takingover;
- less AIP (kill all reducers, don't take unnecessary planets (joins better territory))
- deal with threat sooner (scout, put frontiers under scouts, neuter frontiers, go outside on threat cleaning rampage more ofter)

A general note: it looks like you've been very distracted. You don't have (barely) minor factions, but you have champion, but it's like you were going archipelago for a tons of minor factions (capturing golems or other shiny things that often distract us). As your save is labeled "campaign", I deduce you were trying to play the nebulae scenarii for your first time. Was you going archipelago to take nebulae more easily? If so, your champions are fast: neutering (and some remote territory) is more than enough.

I'll edit (further) this post if I find more advises.
« Last Edit: May 04, 2015, 02:32:59 pm by Pumpkin »
Please excuse my english: I'm not a native speaker. Don't hesitate to correct me.

Offline TheVampire100

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Re: Strategic Advices?
« Reply #2 on: May 04, 2015, 02:20:06 pm »
Okay, I should just scrap this. Personal note for me: Don't touch anything that's older than 2 weeks. You will regret it!

Offline Pumpkin

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Re: Strategic Advices?
« Reply #3 on: May 04, 2015, 03:13:37 pm »
Okay, I should just scrap this. Personal note for me: Don't touch anything that's older than 2 weeks. You will regret it!
Hey, sorry for being a bit pessimistic, I see what you shouldn't do first, but there is some margin. (Oh, and please, be more explicit; I'm I right when I suppose you were distracted by the nebulae?)

Maybe follow these steps and you'll have a better time.
Pause the game and...
- Take some times to untangle the galaxy. (You'll see that there is many planets you can take to make your life easier. I see you've gateraided some, but without neutering or even better taking the planet "in the way of your territory", you can't make efficient chokepoints. Look at Vaeras, Nephi, Rosesharp, Yimurdri or Ginyotooth.)
- Redesign some planet's turrets (not all, you'll take your eco down in no time): scrap them and rebuild them Kahuna-style (still while in pause).
Now give some orders and unpause (and try to make all the following at the same time):
- gather all your scouts, send the high mark (or the starships) on unscouted planets, and put one (and only one) on each frontier planet (each alerted planet).
- gather your army and go clean the threat you should now see.
- gather your raid starships, eventually unlock one more mark if you get some more K, and go raid every Data Center and CoProcessor (in that order).

Now that you should be a bit more easy (at least with AIP and threat), you can consider longer term strategy (I know, it's 15:00, but you're far from done) and do the following, in that order:
- Neuter Chaji (the core you put on alert); this is you absolute military priority. Let no GPost survive (but the Wormhole GP). After that, always make sure to regularly clean it from threat and reinforcement.
- Take planets in you way: Vaeras, Nephi, Rosesharp, Yimurdri or Ginyotooth. Take some time to hack (download/corrupt) if you're comfortable with the other frontiers. (I see you've made some, but you have plenty of HaP and... oh, you made a supertermi-hack without taking all DCenters/CoProc first? Strange, the termihack should be the most desperate AIP reducer, IMO). You'll have a much more "entire" territory (and some more K; you spent too much on turrets, IMO).
- Heavily defend Sekasi (adjacent to your home); it seems you have some trouble with it, but as it's adjacent to your home, its vital.
- You'll have more K: unlock some starships (it's a question of playstyle, but you definitely don't have enough; if you prefer playing with your fleet, unlock at least the MkII flagship and the Neinzul enclave), you should have some new downloaded designs.

Now you should have a good fleet and a territory easier to defend. It's time to go for the true endgame, with these two steps
- Go for a deepstrike neutering mission: go toward Black's home and let nothing stand in your way. Maybe take a stepstone, like Rinse (MAYBE Mirapeboat to save the BHoleMachine AIP, but beware the MkIV subcom on Leacuther), and brace yourself for epic fight, because you'll be deepstriking and fighting dirty AI territories away from your homeland.
- Plan your final assault, choose which one you'll strike first.
-> Take Red and capture its home (beware the second core world), rebuild, go for the distant Black's home and take it down in one strike.
-> Or kill Black first and send a followup on Red as soon as possible.
-> Or even bully Red, make it on its knees and let it down suffering without achieving it (to spare you some AIP at the cost of one exo each 30 min), stand the first exo and immediately go for Black; kill it and achieve Red.

This last is maybe the least recommended because you're far from AIP floor and you won't benefit that much of sparing Red's life while you kill its mate. My choice would be to take Black first: the hardest first, then I would have my rebuilt fleet fresh for the easy go to Red. (But maybe I won't resist the temptation of bullying Red first, and so much for the exo.)

I will keep this save and see if I can achieve this plan myself. Maybe I don't realize how deep you are and all these beautiful plans won't stand five minutes on the actual battlefield. We'll see. If you try to finish this game, let me know. I would be glad to know how I was wrong.
« Last Edit: May 04, 2015, 03:15:34 pm by Pumpkin »
Please excuse my english: I'm not a native speaker. Don't hesitate to correct me.

Offline TheVampire100

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Re: Strategic Advices?
« Reply #4 on: May 04, 2015, 03:26:28 pm »
Yeah, I was, this was my first game with Champion Ships. And some missions need your full attention like the Neinzul prisons (seriously, this mission was AWEFUL. The Neinzul mourners are just bad and you have to pay full attention and spam hadow shield so their base does not die).

Thank you for the tips, I will try to manage that.

Offline Red.Queen

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Re: Strategic Advices?
« Reply #5 on: May 04, 2015, 04:37:59 pm »
I'm away from my machine with AI War on it at the moment so I can't look at the save, but I'll offer a different perspective from what I can glean from the posts in case you change your mind and decide to try salvaging the game.

One word of warning -- I play with very high auto-AIP (1 per 5 minutes) so my advice is geared towards killing problems *fast* and betting you can beat the clock before the AIP you're racking up kills you.


AIP


~300AIP doesn't sound fatal to me, unless maybe you are playing on a very high difficulty?  If it's 8 or less, you can turn this around with enough aggression I bet, unless you have been dealt an incredibly unlucky hand with unlocks from ARS/fabs.  The low-AIP ship has sailed, but moderate-to-high is still taking passengers.

Definitely splat those remaining AIP reducers ASAP with your Raidstars since it sounds like you are feeling pinched, it sounds like that will bring you back down under 300 again and give you some breathing room.


Defense

Reposition turrets etc on your worlds to a maximum efficiency layout (i.e. Kahuna-style) -- if you have the K and haven't unlocked them yet, Area Mines are godlike, especially when placed in packed lines.  I've seen packed rows of 3x10 Area Mines instagib hundreds of ships.  Sounds like you have Spider turrets so if you don't have Widow Mines already, you may be better off putting spare K elsewhere since you have a source of engine damage.  If you don't have them, Grav turrets of at least Mk.II are also godly.  If the ships can't reach you, they can't kill you, and even if you have weak turrets they have more time to rip up the incoming trouble.

Speaking of turrets, if you don't have them already, grab the Core controllers for Missile, Laser, Needler, and Sniper if you can.  If you are over 300AIP, you should have plenty of HAP so you don't have to take and hold the planets if they don't get you closer to Black.

To give you an idea of how insanely effective Mk.V turrets are, Mk.V of those 4 mixed in with Mk.I Lightning, Mk.I Tractor, Mk.I HBC on certain planets, and Mk.I-II Grav, plus some mines, was enough to hold off virtually all waves without fleet assistance up until around AIP 500 in a recent difficulty 8/8 game.  Those were Assassin and Sledgehammer waves too, so bigger than normal.  Grav III + Needler II with some targeted warhead assistance (is that a Carrier on my planet or a flying bullseye?) held the line through AIP 700.  Planets with a Botnet on hand held until final victory at AIP 936.

TL;DR: Grav III, Area Mines, and Core turrets are amazing.  When in doubt, just apply Mk.I Lightning warheads to offending carriers until the problem goes away.

A somewhat risky strategy that can work under the right circumstances is, if something has pushed/will push through your lines, and it's not EMP immune, and you have enough Mk.V turrets to kill it before the EMP wears off and it finishes off your command station, is to EMP your own planet.  Mk.V turrets are EMP immune and will be able to fire freely.

Threat

Same deal for Threat -- when it finally picks a planet to stage an attack for, watch for it to ball up as it prepares to move in, but is still waiting for the last ships to join.  Once it does that, you have several options for rapidly destroying it, depending on your fleet strength, tolerance for more AIP, and how scary the planet is it's staging on.  If you have a Tachyon-free path, you can just sneak a Lightning warhead up to the ball and fry it.  The Missile frigates will be about the only thing that's left, and they won't be willing to attack on their own.  If that's not an option and it's too dangerous to just sic your fleet on it, EMP them first, then maul them while they're locked down.  Watch out for the Starships though.

If you have some flavor of reclamation available to you, hunting Threat can be a nice opportunity to boost your own fleet.

Core Worlds/Homeworlds

Otherwise, I'm not overly worried about that Core world by Red being on alert and unneutered, assuming you have Assault Transports or a lot of Cloaker starships.  I have yet to bother neutering a Core world even on alert, well unless you count nuking one that had become a staging ground for 80,000 strength of Special Forces. <cough> Just hit and run the Tach posts to clear a path, and shoot/Sabotage down the Warhead Interceptor if you are open to using warheads on the homeworld.  After that, it doesn't really matter what's on that planet, you're going to just sneak thought it and blow up the homeworld on the other side.

Black being so many jumps away is a pain, but can be dealt with.  At 9 hops, you only need to pick two planets to get you in range and avoid deepstrike, and you don't need to hold both permanently -- deepstrike only counts 4 *AI* controlled worlds in a row.  If no one controls it, it breaks the chain and it has to start counting from the neutral planet.

Just hop your way to a good staging planet and prep that one with defenses to deal with the Threat backlash/Exos, and kit it out with all the constructors or warp gates you need to get your reinforcements in place.  I would recommend getting a world adjacent to the Core world, but if you have to strike from farther, it can be done.  I've staged HW assaults from the max 4 out and won, but it's a pain in the arse to move cloaked warheads that far and your Transports will be in sorry shape by the time they reach the HW.  But it's not impossible.

As for the Homeworlds themselves,  I would scout both before choosing which one to attack first.  You already have one Core world on alert, so unless Red's HW is significantly more dangerous than Black's, I would probably kill Red first.  I prefer to kill the easier one first in case I need (want) to go crazy with the warheads on the last world, so I don't have to worry about living with the spike in AIP for long.

One last tip on the HWs, since I noticed some comments about them being off on the ends of strings of planets.  If you can cut a HW off from the rest of the map by blocking it with a fortified world of your own, you can likely prevent the Special Forces from rushing in to pile on while you attack, leaving you to only worry about the planet's own garrison and the Reserves.  Just be careful not to launch the blockade until you're sure the SF are safely away from the HW -- I found out the !!fun!! way last game that if you split the graph and trap the SF on a disconnected chunk of the map, it will convert to Threat after ~20 minutes and the AI will begin spawining a whole new SF somewhere else.  You will probably not enjoy the results if that happens.  ;)


Hope all/some of that helps if you decide to try to salvage this game after all!  And remember, when all else fails, the nuclear option is always an option...

EDIT:  I see Pumpkin updated while I was typing this, ignore anything in mine that's redundant/no longer applies.  :)
« Last Edit: May 04, 2015, 04:43:09 pm by Red.Queen »
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Offline Pumpkin

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Re: Strategic Advices?
« Reply #6 on: May 04, 2015, 05:58:12 pm »
As for the Homeworlds themselves,  I would scout both before choosing which one to attack first.  You already have one Core world on alert, so unless Red's HW is significantly more dangerous than Black's, I would probably kill Red first.  I prefer to kill the easier one first in case I need (want) to go crazy with the warheads on the last world, so I don't have to worry about living with the spike in AIP for long.
No Wrath Lance or Teuthida, I checked! ;)

EDIT:  I see Pumpkin updated while I was typing this, ignore anything in mine that's redundant/no longer applies.  :)
Yeah, the more the merrier. You're the high-AIP boy, I'm the low-AIP boy. Different opinions are always good!

However, the game is 6/6 with barely no MF, so 300 AIP / MkII is manageable for us, but maybe not for everyone.  I remember my first wins... My first games were on 7/7 ("if you're familiar with RTS? I am! Let's 7/7!") and ended badly, until I downgrade the diff to 6/6 and even 5/5. I was ashamed to feel like I was such a newb (no forum/wiki by this time, or so few) but little by little I climbed back the ladder, I had my first win on 5/5, I begun to understand the AIP and special PVE conquest style the game require, until I get comfortable on 7/7, and I recently tried 8/8 and was so happy to see how I improved.

Why am I telling you that? Well, maybe because I want to say that I think there is no shame in having hard time (but maybe fun time) on 6/6. I'm proud of climbing higher than my comfort zone, but there is so much to do, the 10/10 feels so far. And yes I'm proud of my 8/8 win while people on this forum are able to withstand 10/10 and manage to win. But the most important isn't the level at which someone is comfortable or how high he can climb, the most important is climbing. And when I see someone having trouble in 6/6, I'm glad I can help, and I know that anyone can have trouble at any level.
Please excuse my english: I'm not a native speaker. Don't hesitate to correct me.

Offline Red.Queen

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Re: Strategic Advices?
« Reply #7 on: May 04, 2015, 06:51:56 pm »
No Wrath Lance or Teuthida, I checked! ;)

Woot!  Vampire got a lucky break there!  My optimism for saving this match is further supported.  :D

Quote
Yeah, the more the merrier. You're the high-AIP boy, I'm the low-AIP boy. Different opinions are always good!

Yup!  That was why I wanted to jump in too, albeit with a disclaimer about my nonstandard settings.  Your advice I think fits a *lot* more people's preferences than mine, from what I've learned from reading the boards here. :) That and I like talking strategy and solving problems.  Also, words like "impossible" and "I'm gonna die" are bait I can't resist, so if anyone ever wants to summon me to a thread (for some peculiar reason, maybe they just want to see someone suggest ridiculous things like multiple nuclear strikes without meaning it as a joke), those are pretty reliable incantations...

Quote
<snip>

Why am I telling you that? Well, maybe because I want to say that I think there is no shame in having hard time (but maybe fun time) on 6/6. I'm proud of climbing higher than my comfort zone, but there is so much to do, the 10/10 feels so far. And yes I'm proud of my 8/8 win while people on this forum are able to withstand 10/10 and manage to win. But the most important isn't the level at which someone is comfortable or how high he can climb, the most important is climbing. And when I see someone having trouble in 6/6, I'm glad I can help, and I know that anyone can have trouble at any level.

Absolutely!  :)  And that is one of the reasons why this forum community rocks, it's incredibly supportive as we all get our arses kicked by the AI (or ourselves, when we go a bit berserk and nuke our own Transports  ::)) -- the exact footwear the AI has on when it delivers said kicking is merely incidental.

I definitely intended my comments as encouraging, sometimes it can be easy to read threads and think "oh no, I think I messed up, I'm doomed, I better quit and start a new game."  I like to be that little voice of Aggressive Stupidity(TM) that says "Even if you are, go for it anyway! >D"  Because hey, even if it turns out you really were doomed, pushing oneself to the limit to try to fix it means you will learn a LOT.
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Offline Tolc

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Re: Strategic Advices?
« Reply #8 on: May 04, 2015, 08:54:56 pm »
That sounds quite familiar :) I recently gave up on my old first game (6/6 beginner) as well, as I had done some of the same mistakes and the game was played with vanilla fleet command (I own the expansions, I just didn't have them installed), so no area minefields, cloaker starships or the likes.

My problem was that the retaliation exos from my first homeworld attack tore through my homeworld defenses like paper (bad turret placement on the non-homeworld planets). 2 Mark IV Heavy Bomber Starships, 2 Mark IV Zenith Starships and 1 Mark V Leech Starship were too much for my defenses. They were too fast and too focused on my command station, so yeah...

It might have been salvageable somehow, but after multiple previous tries I just couldn't be bothered anymore (besides I had human rebellions enabeled, never again...the sight of 60(!) Riot Starships patrolling on the colony's planet was enough to never make me enable that again.)

On my new game (with expansions) I'm following Kahuna's guide and so far it's working pretty well :)

Offline Kahuna

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Re: Strategic Advices?
« Reply #9 on: May 06, 2015, 11:16:45 pm »
rebuild them Kahuna-style
and Kahuna matata, it means no worries.
set /A diff=10
if %diff%==max (
   set /A me=:)
) else (
   set /A me=SadPanda
)
echo Check out my AI War strategy guide and find your inner Super Cat!
echo 2592 hours of AI War and counting!
echo Kahuna matata!

Offline TheVampire100

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Re: Strategic Advices?
« Reply #10 on: May 10, 2015, 05:27:09 am »
Okay, O'm doing a little better now, but it's tedious to rebuild the defenses. One planet at the time.
What shall I do about the rebel colony that appears ina about an hour? Losing it would cause 100 AIP, which would fling me back at cruel times. Capturing it means I have to take again another branch. Any ideas? Save game included.

Offline Toranth

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Re: Strategic Advices?
« Reply #11 on: May 10, 2015, 07:17:39 am »
Okay, O'm doing a little better now, but it's tedious to rebuild the defenses. One planet at the time.
What shall I do about the rebel colony that appears ina about an hour? Losing it would cause 100 AIP, which would fling me back at cruel times. Capturing it means I have to take again another branch. Any ideas? Save game included.
The colony's cloaking will reset if you capture the system, then lose your command station.  One possible method of handling this situation is to go rescue the colony, then deliberately scrap your Command Station, causing the rebel Colony to go back into cloak for another few hours...
But ignoring it is, as you've pointed out, a huge AIP hit.  On the other hand, rescuing the Rebel Colony gives you a nice bonus - so I suggest trying to rescue and defend it.  But if the situation becomes dangerous, you can buy some time by sending it back into cloak.

Offline Pumpkin

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Re: Strategic Advices?
« Reply #12 on: May 10, 2015, 09:52:46 am »
The colony's cloaking will reset if you capture the system, then lose your command station.
That sounds like a bug...

go rescue the colony, then deliberately scrap your Command Station, causing the rebel Colony to go back into cloak for another few hours...
... and that sounds like a bug abuse.
I'll mantis it one day if nobody did it since.

However, congrats for your re-try. I know how it can be painful, but it's with this way you'll learn the best. I'll give it a look when I'll have time (I'm a bit short on free time, those days).
Bonne chance !
Please excuse my english: I'm not a native speaker. Don't hesitate to correct me.

Offline Toranth

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Re: Strategic Advices?
« Reply #13 on: May 10, 2015, 10:02:21 am »
The colony's cloaking will reset if you capture the system, then lose your command station.
That sounds like a bug...
Nah, that's intended behavior.  You still need to recover the system before the new timer runs out, or the AI will kindly pop the colony for you.  It just gives you a chance to recover.

On the other hand,
go rescue the colony, then deliberately scrap your Command Station, causing the rebel Colony to go back into cloak for another few hours...
... and that sounds like a bug abuse.
It is abusive.  It's Grade-A Cheese for dealing with badly placed Rebel Colonies.  It used to be more common, but now that turrets are per-planet, you can actually defend isolated Rebel Colonies from most things.  I haven't needed to do it since that change was made.

Offline TheVampire100

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Re: Strategic Advices?
« Reply #14 on: May 10, 2015, 10:14:54 am »
Okay, I will try that, thank you. You learn always something new about AI War that you didn't knew before.
I still need to rebuild the planets the Ai waiped with its CPA. At least my Champion got ridden of the most ships from it (only the Starships could escape).
I also destroyed most DCs (only the two that are the furthest away are still alive). Next will be taking the planets that you suggested.

 

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